How do parents of children with disabilities create meaningful lives? In what ways do past experiences shape fathers' caregiving in the present? And how is men's care for their disabled children influenced by social norms of masculinity?

These are some of the questions we explore in this episode, with Aaron Jackson. Aaron is an anthropologist whose research focuses primarily on best practices for supporting people with intellectual disabilities, with an emphasis on active support and supported decision-making. He was recently appointed as Course Coordinator and Head Lecturer of the Masters in Disability Practice at La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia. Aaron’s academic interests include social worlds of disability and disability care, world-building, identity and memory, gender and masculinities, philosophy of self and other, disability politics of inclusion, emotional experience, and the phenomenology of bereavement.

Aaron’s doctoral research, which explored the practical and emotional realities of intensive caregiving for fathers of children with profound physical and intellectual disabilities, formed the basis of his book Worlds of Care: The Emotional Lives of Fathers Caring for Children with Disabilities, which was published in 2021.

We explore the following topics in this episode:

Aaron's personal and academic journey to researching fatherhood, care and disability (02:34)

Aaron's ethnographic research with fathers of children with disabilities in the United States (06:52)

The combination of narrative, creative and academic styles of writing in 'Worlds of Care' (09:55)

Aaron's inclusion of his personal experience of caregiving in his research and writing (13:26)

The influence of key theorists on Aaron's thinking (18:04)

How parenting a child with a disability disrupts personal life narratives (20:55)

The focus on emotions in Aaron's research (24:25)

The role of memory and past experiences on caregiving in the present (28:33)

Fathers reframing their identities as a result of parenting a child with a disability (32:10)

Men, masculinities and care (35:33)

The influences on men's caregiving (38:15)

Embodied caregiving as a form of moral education (41:46)

Parents' mutual support as 'moral cosmopolitan communities' (44:20)

Aaron's experience of serious illness and becoming a receiver of care (47:53)

Paternalistic relationships in medical practice (50:10)

Improving care for people with disabilities and support for their families (53:19)

Aaron's plans for future research (56:45)

Some of Aaron's other publications

'The social framing of diagnoses and empathetic listening'

'When Doctor's Don't Listen'

'Embodied Spaces, Cosmopolitanism and Corporeal Diversity'

'Attuned Fathering and the Moral Dimensions of Caregiving'

'Between us: Facilitated decision-making in the relational experience of profound intellectual disability'

What does it mean to describe care as 'beautiful'? Is caring an art, and if so, what would 'artful' care (and careful art) look like? And how might an aesthetics of care transform how we think, not only about interpersonal care, but also about broader social relationships?

These are some of the questions we explore in this episode of the podcast, with James Thompson. James is a theatre practitioner, academic and researcher, and is currently Professor of Applied and Social Theatre at the University of Manchester. James’ professional practice has included ten years developing arts programmes in prisons and over fifteen years documenting and supporting arts projects in sites of armed conflict and humanitarian disaster. He helped to set up the TiPP Centre, which develops participatory arts projects in prison contexts, and also In Place of War, a global organisation that uses artistic creativity in places impacted by conflict.

James’ books include Performance Affects: Applied Theatre and the End of Effect and Performance in Place of War, both published in 2009, and Humanitarian Performance: from Disaster Tragedies to Spectacles of War, from 2014. He also co-edited the collection Performing Care: New Perspectives on Socially Engaged Performance, which was published in 2020. James’ most recent book is Care Aesthetics: For Artful Care and Careful Art, which came out in 2023. He currently leads a cross-disciplinary team of theatre and nursing academics and practitioners working on the Care Aesthetics Research Exploration project, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, which explores what happens when we consider care a craft of artful practice.

We explore the following topics in this episode:

James' work in prisons and the activities of the TiPP Centre (03:00)

James' experience in conflict zones and the work of 'In Place of War' (05:38)

The personal roots of James' interest in care aesthetics (08: 04)

The genesis of 'Care Aesthetics' during the COVID-19 pandemic (11:00)

'Clapping for carers' as an aesthetic experience (12:33)

Towards an alternative aesthetics (14:38)

Relational aesthetics (18:23)

'In between' aesthetics (21:00)

Self care and care for the other (22:52)

The influence of feminist care ethics (25:00)

Connecting intimate care with care for the wider community (27:52)

Care as performance (31:14)

Art, play and care (34:43)

An aesthetic critique of care (37:13)

Towards a dramaturgy of care (40:42)

Everyday care aesthetics (43:51)

Slow art and slow care (45:50)

A care aesthetics manifesto (47:30)

The Care Aesthetics Research Exploration Project (49:35)

The Care Lab and the future of care aesthetics (52:47)

Some...

Is care a virtue? And what is the relationship between care ethics and virtue ethics? Is there a need to 'queer' care ethics? And what does an ethic of care have to say about the needs of marginalised groups like migrants and those with invisible disabilities?

These are some of the questions we explore in this episode, with Steven Steyl. Steven studied law, philosophy and politics at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, where he also completed an M.A. in politics and international relations. He then studied for a PhD, at the University of Notre Dame Australia, where his thesis was entitled ‘Towards an Aristotelian Theory of Care: A Comparison of Neo-Aristotelian Virtue Ethics with Feminist Ethics of Care, and the Fundaments of a Virtue Ethical Theory of Care.’ Steven has been a visiting researcher at Oxford, at the University of Minnesota and at Arizona State University, and he currently teaches at UNDA’s Sydney campus where he will shortly be taking up a new post coordinating the national bioethics curriculum. Steven is also in the process of completing postgraduate legal training with the New Zealand Law Society and from July he'll have a licence to practice law. He has published a number of journal articles in the field of care ethics, exploring the nature of caring actions, the relationship between care ethics and virtue ethics, and queer care ethics. With Daniel Engster, Steven is co-editing a forthcoming collection on care and moral theory.

We discuss the following topics in this episode:

The origins of Steven's interest in care theory (02:55)

Care and the virtues (05:43)

Care ethics and analytic philosophy (19:46)

Caring actions (23:14)

Queering care ethics (30:18)

Conversion therapy and the ethics of care (37:42)

Care theory and invisible disabilities (41:27)

Care ethics and migration (45:57)

Steven's plans for the future - philosophy or the law? (48:17)

Links to some of Steven's publications

'The Virtue of Care' (2019)

'Caring Actions' (2019)

'A Care Ethical Theory of Right Action' (2020)

'Theologically Motivated Conversion Therapy and Care Epistemology' in Care Ethics, Religion and Spiritual Traditions

Other publications discussed in the episode

Clare Mac Cumhaill and Rachael Wiseman, Metaphysical Animals: How Four Women Brought Philosophy Back to Life

Carol Gilligan, In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women's Development

Lynne Huffer, Are the Lips a Grave? A Queer Feminist on the Ethics of Sex

Some of the writers and thinkers mentioned in the episode

Aristotle