New Look, New Website, and New Episode!!

Dear followers:

I’m very grateful for the following that I have managed to cultivate over the years on this humble wordpress site. However, this site will cease to exist soon, so I want to make sure that everyone gets re-directed to the new home of the Sacred and Profane Love podcast. You can now find us here:

Main home
Please make sure to bookmark the new site and subscribe for updates–and I hope you love the new look and format as much as I do.

Please don’t forget to consider supporting our work on Patreon. You can become a monthly patron for just 2 bucks a month!

https://www.patreon.com/eudaimoniapod

You can also follow us on Twitter, where our handle is @eudaimoniapod

To check out our latest episode, please go to the new website!!

Episode 47: Justin E.H. Smith on Suttree

In this episode, I speak with the philosopher, podcaster, and substacker extraordinaire, Justin E.H. Smith about Cormac McCarthy’s fourth novel, Suttree.  We were both struck by how different this novel is from McCarthy’s later, more famous works—both in its style and in its literary ambitions. We resist the common temptation to read McCarthy as a nihilist; we puzzle over the beginning and the end of the novel, and how they relate to one another; and quite generally we just had a great time trying to figure out what McCarthy was up to in this beautiful and somewhat mystifying novel about one man’s journey into the depths of the seedy underbelly of Knoxville, Tennessee.

I hope you enjoy our conversation!

Justin E.H. Smith is professor of philosophy in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Paris. In 2019-20, I was the John and Constance Birkelund Fellow at the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers of the New York Public Library. He has written many books, including Irrationality: The Dark Side of Reason and Divine Machines: Leibniz and the Sciences of Life. He also authors a substack, which you can subscribe to here. You can follow Justin on Twitter @jehsmith

Jennifer Frey is an associate Professor of Philosophy and Peter and Bonnie McCausland Faculty Fellow at the University of South Carolina. She is also a fellow of the Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America and the Word on Fire Institute. Prior to joining the philosophy faculty at USC, she was a Collegiate Assistant Professor of Humanities at the University of Chicago, where she was a member of the Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts and an affiliated faculty in the philosophy department.  She earned her Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh, and her B.A. in Philosophy and Medieval Studies (with a Classics minor) at Indiana University, in Bloomington, Indiana. She has published widely on action, virtue, practical reason, and meta-ethics, and has recently co-edited an interdisciplinary volume, Self-Transcendence and Virtue: Perspectives from Philosophy, Theology, and PsychologyHer writing has also been featured in Breaking Ground, First ThingsFare ForwardImageLaw and LibertyThe Point, and USA Today. She lives in Columbia, SC, with her husband, six children, and chickens. You can follow her on Twitter @jennfrey.

Click here to find the podcast on your preferred streaming platform, my social media profiles, and recent episodes!

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Sacred and Profane Love is a podcast in which philosophers, theologians, and literary critics discuss some of their favorite works of literature, and how these works have shaped their own ideas about love, happiness, and meaning in human life. Host Jennifer A. Frey is associate professor of philosophy at the University of South Carolina. The podcast is generously supported by The Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America and produced by Catholics for Hire.

Audio Edited & Music Produced by Anthony Monson

Episode 46: Katy Carl

In this episode, I speak with Katy Carl, who is the editor in chief of Dappled Things and also the author of As Earth Without Water, to discuss Henry James’s novella, Washington Square and R.R. Reno’s essay, Duty, the Soul of Beauty. After a great deal of back and forth, we come to the conclusion that what the novella shows is that mere duty, in absence of well ordered loves and the habits of attention that come with it, can be a destructive force in family and social life.

As always, I hope you enjoy our conversation.

Katy Carl is the editor-in-chief of Dappled Things and the author of the novel, As Earth Without Water. You can follow her on Twitter @MrsKatyCarl

Jennifer Frey is an associate Professor of Philosophy and a Peter and Bonnie McCausland Fellow at the University of South Carolina, as well as a fellow of the Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America and the Word on Fire Institute. Prior to joining the philosophy faculty at USC, she was a Collegiate Assistant Professor of Humanities at the University of Chicago, where she was a member of the Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts and an affiliated faculty in the philosophy department.  She earned her Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh, and her B.A. in Philosophy and Medieval Studies (with a Classics minor) at Indiana University, in Bloomington, Indiana. She has published widely on action, virtue, practical reason, and meta-ethics, and has recently co-edited an interdisciplinary volume, Self-Transcendence and Virtue: Perspectives from Philosophy, Theology, and PsychologyHer writing has also been featured in Breaking Ground, First ThingsFare ForwardImageLaw and LibertyThe Point, and USA Today. She lives in Columbia, SC, with her husband, six children, and six chickens. You can follow her on Twitter @jennfrey.

Click here to find the podcast on your preferred streaming platform, my social media profiles, and recent episodes!

Subscribe

Become a Patron!

Preview on iTunes

Sacred and Profane Love is a podcast in which philosophers, theologians, and literary critics discuss some of their favorite works of literature, and how these works have shaped their own ideas about love, happiness, and meaning in human life. Host Jennifer A. Frey is associate professor of philosophy at the University of South Carolina. The podcast is generously supported by The Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America and produced by Catholics for Hire.

Audio Edited & Music Produced by Anthony Monson

Episode 45: Roosevelt Montas on Great Books and Intellectual Transformation

In this episode, I am joined by Professor Roosevelt Montas to discuss his new book, Rescuing Socrates: How the Great Books Changed my Life and Why They Matter for a New Generation. Montas, a Dominican born American academic, makes the compelling case that study of the Great Books is potentially transformative, especially for students from working class communities or who are members of historically marginalized communities. Montas further argues that the future of the Humanities in this country does not lay primarily in specialized research but in undergraduate education–particularly in general undergrad education. We talk about arguments that Great Books courses are racist, sexist, or otherwise somehow oppressive, and why we think they are dead wrong.

This episode is especially close to my heart and I hope you enjoy our conversation.

Click here to stream on Spotify

Click here to stream on Soundcloud

Roosevelt Montás is Senior Lecturer in American Studies and English at Columbia University.  He holds an A.B. (1995), an M.A. (1996), and a Ph.D. (2004) in English and Comparative Literature from Columbia University.  He was Director of the Center for the Core Curriculum at Columbia College from 2008 to 2018.  Roosevelt specializes in Antebellum American literature and culture, with a particular interest in American citizenship.  His dissertation, Rethinking America: Abolitionism and the Antebellum Transformation of the Discourse of National Identity, won Columbia University’s 2004 Bancroft Award.  In 2000, he received the Presidential Award for Outstanding Teaching by a Graduate Student.  Roosevelt teaches “Introduction to Contemporary Civilization in the West,” a year-long course on primary texts in moral and political thought, as well as seminars in American Studies including “Freedom and Citizenship in the United States.” He is Director of the Center for American Studies’ Freedom and Citizenship Program in collaboration with the Double Discovery Center.  He speaks and writes on the history, meaning, and future of liberal education and is author of Rescuing Socrates: How the Great Books Changed My Life and Why They Matter for a New Generation (Princeton University Press, 2021). You can follow him on Twitter @rooseveltmontas  

Jennifer Frey is an associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of South Carolina and fellow of the Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America. Prior to joining the philosophy faculty at USC, she was a Collegiate Assistant Professor of Humanities at the University of Chicago, where she was a member of the Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts and an affiliated faculty in the philosophy department.  She earned her Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh, and her B.A. in Philosophy and Medieval Studies (with a Classics minor) at Indiana University, in Bloomington, Indiana. She has published widely on action, virtue, practical reason, and meta-ethics, and has recently co-edited an interdisciplinary volume, Self-Transcendence and Virtue: Perspectives from Philosophy, Theology, and PsychologyHer writing has also been featured in Breaking Ground, First ThingsFare ForwardImageLaw and LibertyThe Point, and USA Today. She lives in Columbia, SC, with her husband, six children, and six chickens. You can follow her on Twitter @jennfrey.

Twitter @jennfrey.

Click here to find the podcast on your preferred streaming platform, my social media profiles, and recent episodes!

Subscribe

Become a Patron!

Preview on iTunes

Sacred and Profane Love is a podcast in which philosophers, theologians, and literary critics discuss some of their favorite works of literature, and how these works have shaped their own ideas about love, happiness, and meaning in human life. Host Jennifer A. Frey is associate professor of philosophy at the University of South Carolina. The podcast is generously supported by The Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America and produced by Catholics for Hire.

Audio Edited & Music Produced by Anthony Monson

Episode 44: The Tragic Abyss with Dr. Kevin Kambo

In this episode, I speak with Dr. Kevin Kambo about Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, in light of an essay by Louise Cowan titled “The Tragic Abyss.” Cowan argues that tragedy is “a liturgical confrontation of a deep seated dread which, when brought to light, can be borne only through the medium of poetic language.” We discuss the nature of the tragic, which always involves a moment of “unmasking” and a peering into the dark abyss; we discuss what tragic wisdom is and how you could possibly gain it; and we try to grapple with the question of how our grasp of the tragic changes when we shift our perspective from Athens to Jerusalem.

As always, I hope you enjoy our conversation.

Click here to stream on Soundcloud or Spotify!

Click here to view The Tragic Abyss: Introduction by Louise Cowan

Kevin Kambo is an assistant professor of philosophy at Hope College in Michigan. He is an expert in the history of philosophy, with particular interest in moral psychology in the classical and patristic eras. His recent work focuses on Plato and Augustine of Hippo, as well as with bringing ancient sources to bear in contemporary debates on the natures and roles of technology and liberal education in human life. He is presently working on a project on Plato’s Phaedo on the various meanings of death and how the practice of philosophy is a preparation for facing one’s demise. You can follow him on Twitter @mythwright.

Jennifer Frey is an associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of South Carolina and fellow of the Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America. Prior to joining the philosophy faculty at USC, she was a Collegiate Assistant Professor of Humanities at the University of Chicago, where she was a member of the Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts and an affiliated faculty in the philosophy department.  She earned her Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh, and her B.A. in Philosophy and Medieval Studies (with a Classics minor) at Indiana University, in Bloomington, Indiana. She has published widely on action, virtue, practical reason, and meta-ethics, and has recently co-edited an interdisciplinary volume, Self-Transcendence and Virtue: Perspectives from Philosophy, Theology, and PsychologyHer writing has also been featured in Breaking Ground, First ThingsFare ForwardImageLaw and LibertyThe Point, and USA Today. She lives in Columbia, SC, with her husband, six children, and six chickens. You can follow her on Twitter @jennfrey.

Click here to find the podcast on your preferred streaming platform, my social media profiles, and recent episodes!

Subscribe

Become a Patron!

Preview on iTunes

Sacred and Profane Love is a podcast in which philosophers, theologians, and literary critics discuss some of their favorite works of literature, and how these works have shaped their own ideas about love, happiness, and meaning in human life. Host Jennifer A. Frey is associate professor of philosophy at the University of South Carolina. The podcast is generously supported by The Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America and produced by Catholics for Hire.

Audio Edited & Music Produced by Anthony Monson

Episode 43: The Closing of the American Mind with Brad Carson

In this episode, I speak with the president of the University of Tulsa, Brad Carson, about Allen Bloom’s infamous book, The Closing of the American Mind. Brad and I ultimately decide that while we like some of Bloom’s key ideas about what a university is for, we do not love the book itself, which has some serious flaws (though we may differ slightly about what we think those flaws are).

As always, I hope you enjoy our conversation.

Brad Carson is The University of Tulsa’s 21st president. Having built a distinguished career in public service, law and education, before becoming president of TU, Carson was a professor at the University of Virginia, teaching courses related to national security and public sector innovation. In 2015, President Barack Obama appointed Carson acting under secretary of defense for personnel and readiness at the U.S. Department of Defense. Prior to that, Carson served as the under secretary of the U.S. Army, where he managed the daily operations of the largest military service, and as general counsel of the U.S. Army, where he oversaw the service’s worldwide legal operations. Carson is widely published and is a noted authority on national security, energy policy and American politics. From 2001 to 2005, Carson served two terms as a U.S. congressman, representing Oklahoma’s 2nd District. Later, he was appointed to the faculty of TU’s Collins College of Business and College of Law, where he taught courses on energy policy, property law, negotiation and game theory, globalization and law and literature. In 2008, Carson deployed during Operation Iraqi Freedom as an intelligence officer and was awarded the Bronze Star for his service. Raised in Oklahoma, Carson received his BA from Baylor University and was a Rhodes Scholar at the University of Oxford. He then went on to earn a JD at the University of Oklahoma.

Jennifer Frey is an associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of South Carolina and fellow of the Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America. Prior to joining the philosophy faculty at USC, she was a Collegiate Assistant Professor of Humanities at the University of Chicago, where she was a member of the Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts and an affiliated faculty in the philosophy department.  She earned her Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh, and her B.A. in Philosophy and Medieval Studies (with a Classics minor) at Indiana University, in Bloomington, Indiana. She has published widely on action, virtue, practical reason, and meta-ethics, and has recently co-edited an interdisciplinary volume, Self-Transcendence and Virtue: Perspectives from Philosophy, Theology, and PsychologyHer writing has also been featured in Breaking Ground, First ThingsFare ForwardImageLaw and LibertyThe Point, and USA Today. She lives in Columbia, SC, with her husband, six children, and six chickens. You can follow her on Twitter @jennfrey.

Click here to find the podcast on your preferred streaming platform, my social media profiles, and recent episodes!

Subscribe

Become a Patron!

Preview on iTunes

Sacred and Profane Love is a podcast in which philosophers, theologians, and literary critics discuss some of their favorite works of literature, and how these works have shaped their own ideas about love, happiness, and meaning in human life. Host Jennifer A. Frey is associate professor of philosophy at the University of South Carolina. The podcast is generously supported by The Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America and produced by Catholics for Hire.

Audio Edited & Music Produced by Anthony Monson

The Permanent Crisis with Chad Wellmon

In this patrons only episode I speak with Chad Wellmon about his new book, Permanent Crisis: The Humanities in a Disenchanted Age.  I hope you enjoy our conversation and many thanks for your continued support for the podcast!  We are currently working on a major redesign of our website and our patreon site…so stay tuned to this space in the New Year for some exciting new things!

Patrons can stream the full episode with the link below!

https://www.patreon.com/posts/59058188