2018 Annette Baier Prize Winner
Jennifer Windt Monash University
Synthese 195.6 (2018): 2577-2625.
This paper is exceptionally clear and systematic. Building on an impressive body of prior work, Windt does a great job of walking the inexperienced reader through the steps of both established scholarly debates in analytic philosophy of mind, and a wealth of empirical data on dreaming. The manifold and subtle ways in which the paper manages to explore the testability of various well-known philosophical positions as empirical hypotheses greatly impressed the judges. The paper is also notable for arguing powerfully against a view of the relationship between mind, brain and body that is currently widely held by philosophers (‘cranial envatment’), and advancing an interesting positive thesis of its own: that the way we imagine our body to be shapes our phenomenal states, and thus while we’re dreaming our actual bodily sensations might give rise to dream images that unfold through their own logic and then inform further dream ‘perceptions’ in a rich feedback loop. One judge also noted potentially rich connections between this discussion and work by Lacan and Merleau-Ponty.
2018 Annette Baier Prize Commendations
Talia Morag Deakin University
"The Tracking Dogma in the Philosophy of Emotion"
Argumenta 2, 2 (2017) 343-363
Helen Ngo Deakin University
"Simulating the Lived Experience of Racism and Islamophobia: On ‘Embodied Empathy’ and Political Tourism"
Australian Feminist Law Journal (2017) 43:1, 107-123, DOI: 10.1080/13200968.2017.1321090
Annette Baier Prize
Annette Claire Baier was a New Zealand philosopher and Hume scholar, focused in particular on Hume's moral psychology.
The Australasian Association of Philosophy offers an annual monetary prize for an outstanding philosophical paper or book chapter published by an Australasian woman during the previous calendar year.
The prize is awarded during the Presidential Address at annual conference each July.
Sponsored by Taylor and Francis,
publisher of Australasian Journal of Philosophy & Australasian Philosophical Review.
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2017 Annette Baier Prize Winner
Miriam Bankovsky La Trobe University
'Excusing Economic Envy: On Injustice and Impotence'
Journal of Applied Philosophy - March 2016
Bankovsky’s paper provides a highly original analysis of an idea that has been with us since the Ancient Greeks – that envy is irrational, and as such, does not provide justification for economic redistribution. Bankovsky challenges this orthodoxy by recovering the overlooked concept from John Rawls of ‘excusable envy’, which she argues shows that envy can be rational, and does provide grounds for economic redistribution. Bankovsky’s analysis is both detailed and ambitious; it has the potential to re-orient philosophical analysis of economic envy, from the language of individual shame to that of collective social justice. In this, she links conceptual argumentation with contemporary political concerns, in an article that the committee judged to be of a high standard of scholarship, clarity and overall merit. Her article is a commendable achievement.
2017 Short List
Tracy Llanera Macquarie University
'Rethinking nihilism: Rorty vs Taylor, Dreyfus and Kelly', Philosophy and Social Criticism, 42.9 (2016), 937-950.
Talia Morag Deakin University
'Emotions as judgments or as modes of “seeing-as”: The explanatory challenges toward a causal account for emotional episodes', Emotion, Imagination, and the Limits of Reason, London: Routledge, 2016, pp. 21-57
Miriam Bankovsky La Trobe University
'Excusing Economic Envy: On Injustice and Impotence', Journal of Applied Philosophy, (March 2016), DOI: 10.1111/japp.12194
Dalia Nassar University of Sydney
'Analogical reflection as a source for the science of life: Kant and the possibility of the biological sciences', Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 58 (2016), 57-66.
Anik Waldow University of Sydney
'Natural history and the formation of the human being: Kant on active forces', Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 56 (2016), 67-76.
Monima Chadha Monash University
“Time-Series of Ephemeral Impressions: The Abhidharma-Buddhist View of Conscious Experience,” Phenomenology and Cognitive Sciences: 14 (3), pp. 543–560.
This paper defends the Buddhist Abhidharma theory of experience from phenomenological and metaphysical challenges due to the doctrine of momentariness, the view that ‘seemingly rich conscious experiences are made fully available in a moment’. (544) It is a very thorough paper, responding to recent criticisms by Dan Zahavi and others, and elegantly weaving together history of philosophy in the Buddhist tradition, contemporary analytic philosophy, empirical neuroscience and the phenomenology of Husserl to craft an intricate united view. The piece is incredibly rich, and correspondingly complex, due to the worlds of knowledge navigated. It carefully treads the line between textual fidelity to particular traditions and conceptual engagement across traditions. The committee judged the paper to be of a high standard of scholarship, clarity, and overall merit, and found that one could keep reading this piece and finding more insights in it. 
2016 Short List
Joanne Faulkner University of New South Wales
‘Our own Hurricane Katrina: Aboriginal disadvantage and Australian national identity’, National Identities, 2015, 17(2),117-135.
Bronwyn Finnigan Australian National University
‘Phronesis in Aristotle: Reconciling Deliberation with Spontaneity’, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 2015, Vol. XCI No. 3, 674-697.
Dalia Nassar University of Sydney
‘Analogy, Natural History and the Philosophy of Nature', Journal of the Philosophy of History, 2015, 9, 240-257.
Monima Chadha Monash University
‘Time-Series of Ephemeral Impressions: The Abhidharma-Buddhist View of Conscious Experience’, Phenomenology and Cognitive Sciences, 2015, 14 (3), 543-560
Anik Waldow University of Sydney
‘Activating the Mind: Descartes’ Dreams and the Awakening of the Human Animal Machine’, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 2015, doi: 10.1111/phpr.12252
Eligibility
The prize is open to female professional philosophers who are actively engaged in an Australasian higher education and/or research institution. ‘Professional philosopher’ includes Research Higher Degree students. Entries must appear in print (or in final form if the publication is online only) in 2017 to be eligible. The prize is open to published papers or book chapters (i.e. chapters in edited anthologies, (not monographs)) in any area of philosophy.
In addition;
- Only single-authored entries are eligible
- If the author has Australasian and non-Australasian affiliations, the paper needs to be published under at least one Australasian affiliation (Australia, New Zealand, Singapore)