Philosophy, Eugenics, and Disability in Alberta and Places North
University of Alberta
October 25, 2008
This was a special invited, public symposium at the Western Canadian Philosophy Association’s annual meeting, held at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta, in October 2008. It features talks by What Sorts Network members Dick Sobsey and Rob Wilson, as well as by Simo Vehmas, a specialist in disability visiting from Finland, and Martin Tweedale, an emeritus professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Alberta. All of these talks have been closed captioned in English; written transcripts of the talks are also available.
The titles of the talks--Varieties of Eugenics Experience in the 21st Century; Preventing Disability: Nordic Perspectives; Ethical Dilemmas in Eliminating the MacEachran Prizes in Philosophy; and Building Inclusive Communities Through Practices of Collective Memory: The Case of Eugenic Sterilization in Alberta—give some idea of the particular topics discussed, but there are a few other things to note about the topic of the symposium by way of context-setting.
The Sexual Sterilization Act of Alberta was law from 1929 until 1972. During this period, the rate of eugenic sterilization in Alberta was one of the highest in any jurisdiction, especially after 1945. Most of what is known here came to light through the 1996 legal case of Muir v The Queen, including the decision handed down by Madam Justice Veit finding for the plaintiff for wrongful sterilization and institutionalization. In the 1990s, the Scandinavian countries engaged in a sustained, public exploration of their own history of eugenic and other sterilization practices, resulting in the book Eugenics and the Welfare State: Sterilization Policy in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Finland (ed. by Gunnar Broberg and Nils Roll-Hansen, 1996, reissued 2005), which caused some public controversy when it was published that focuses on revelations about the extent of sterilization practices in Scandinavia.
Two aspects of Alberta’s history of eugenic sterilization especially relevant for this symposium are that (a) the head of the Eugenics Board for nearly 40 years was the founding chair of the Department of Philosophy and Psychology at the University of Alberta, John MacEachran, who also served as Provost of the university; and (b) that, in the wake of the Muir trial, the Department of Philosophy, on the recommendations in the "MacEachran report" of a departmental subcommittee (of which Martin Tweedale was a member), acknowledged the role of philosophy--disciplinarily and institutionally--in the history of eugenic sterilization, and in contemporary reflections on that history. In this symposium, past meets present, with local twists to general issues.
Download the flyer for the conference
Transcripts (Coming Soon)