Cat Fischer
Postgraduate Researcher
Philosophy
About me:
I am a PhD researcher in Philosophy and based at the Wellcome Centre for Cultures and Environments of Health. My thesis investigates disability, especially disabled embodiment and disability technologies, through a phenomenology and crip/queer lens.
My research interests are primarily in the areas of phenomenology especially with regards to disability, illness, psychopathology, embodiment, emotions and feminist issues. I also work a lot at the intersections of philosophy, social theory and medical humanities.
I have a background in philosophy, social sciences and psychology - which has left me really interested in interdisciplinary research! Following my BA degree in Philosophy, Sociology and Psychology at the University of Exeter, I went to University College Dublin for my MA in Philosophy, specialising in Consciousness and Embodiment.
Research Unit:
Wellcome Centre for Cultures and Environments of Health
Research Project:
I'm interested in the relations of bodies to themselves, each other, and socio-material environments. My PhD project brings together phenomenological and crip, queer, feminist methods to investigate the lived embodied experience of disability. I have a particular focus on prostheses, and queer/crip uses of technology, appendages and environments.
I approach prostheses, and diability technologies, as a double-edged sword: on the one hand, they are rooted in medicalised udnerstandings of disability that disabled people have to be 'cured' or made to look 'normal'. On the other hand, prostheses highlight the artifice and permeability of the body, and they can be very useful. A nuanced understanding of disability and technology has to be mindful of all these dimensions.
Research Supervisory team:
My supervisors are Prof Luna Dolezal, Prof Joel Krueger and Dr Rebecca Lynch.
Research Wider Research Interests:
I am interested in interdisciplinary philosophical approaches which center the lived, bodily experiences of marginalised people and challenge normative assumptions. My research interests are primarily in the areas of phenomenology,especially with regards to disability, illness, psychopathology, embodiment, emotions and feminist issues. I also work in the intersections of philosophy, social theory and medical humanities.
Some of the things I am currently writing and thinking about include home and nostalgia, online spaces, eating disorders, depcitions of madness in pop culture, and heartbreak.
Education:
January 2021 January 9999
University of Exeter
Ph.D in Philosophy
January 2020 January 2021
University College Dublin
Master of Arts, Philosophy (Consciousness and Embodiment)
January 2017 January 2020
University of Exeter
Bachelor of Arts (with Honours), Philosophy and Sociology with Psychology
