Bat-Ami Bar On was the Director of the Binghamton University’s Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities and Professor of Philosophy, Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, and Judaic Studies. She passed in 2020.
Our friendship began in 1993, when I participated in a meeting of socialist feminist philosophers in which nearly every participant was also a member of the Radical Philosophy Association (RPA). That group of socialist feminist philosophers continue to meet regularly. “Ami,” as we all called Bat-Ami Baron, was a dedicated participant whose commitment to mentoring young scholars continued through to her passing. I was struck by her humor, which was always marked by compassion and attention to others. This sparked an ongoing conversation on issues ranging from feminist philosophy to critical work on war to our commitments to bringing to the fore the reality of Jewish diversity.
A group of all of us who loved—and continue to love—her met last fall in her memory. The event was entitled: FEAST 2021 Conference on Violence and Politics: In honor of Bat-Ami Bar On. The sessions are available on the YouTube Channel of the Association for Feminist Ethics and Social Theory. I presented in Part V. At my conclusion, I read a poem, which I offer in this installment of Black Issues in Philosophy.
For Ami
Lewis R. Gordon
Daughter of the nation
A meeting of worlds
Land and sea
So she was
With strength
Of a transformed surname
Solid and fluid,
Fluid and solid,
Her strong arms opened wide
Her heart, open
Her curly hair
Danced with the wind
That paradoxical, visible invisibility
Known through voice:
Listen, we were asked, listen
Feast
For times to come
Feast
Love,
For times to come,
Love
Lewis Gordon
Lewis R. Gordon is Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor of Philosophy and Global Affairs and Head of the Philosophy Department at the University of Connecticut and Distinguished Scholar at The Most Honourable PJ Patterson Centre for Africa-Caribbean Advocacy at The University of the West Indies, Mona. His recent books include Freedom, Justice, and Decolonization (Routledge, 2021); Fear of Black Consciousness (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux and Penguin Books, 2022); Black Existentialism and Decolonizing Knowledge: Writings of Lewis R. Gordon (Bloomsbury, 2023); and “Not Bad for an N—, No?”/ «Pas mal pour un N—, n'est-ce pas? » (Daraja Press, 2023). Thirtieth Anniversary editions of his books Bad Faith and Antiblack Racism (Humanity Classics) and Fanon and the Crisis of European Man (Routledge) are forthcoming 2025.
