Philosophy and Classics participants donate to the Centre for Life Ethics at the University of Bonn

Introduction

The summer school was organised by the Center for Life Ethics, University of Bonn in collaboration with the Department of Philosophy and Classics, University of Ghana as part of the existing collaboration between these two institutions. 

The Summer School focused on three conceptual questions: First, how can we deal with ethical plurality? Second, how to address the decolonising of future-making? Third, how can these reflections (re)shape the ideas of socio-ecological futures and which role does sustainability play in ethical thinking about it? 

Date and Venue

The event was held from July 16-22, 2023, and was mainly held at the Centre for Life Ethics at the University of Bonn. 

Conference Programme

The summer school was co-led by Prof. Caesar Atuire of the Department of Philosophy and Classics at the University of Ghana and Prof. Christiane Woopen at the University of Bonn. 

As part of the summer school, 10 graduate students from varying disciplines at the University of Ghana were sent to the University of Bonn to meet with graduate students from the University of Bonn. The Ghana team was led by Dr Nancy Myles and Dr Stephen Nkansah Morgan both from the Department of Philosophy and Classics, UG. 

The students and faculty engaged in different activities throughout the week including seminars, workshops, problem-based learning, academic field trips and leisure tours. Keynote addresses were delivered by Christoph Horn (Bonn) on ‘Ethical Plurality’; by Paul Basu (Bonn) on ‘Decolonization, Pluriversality and the challenges of cultural relativism: thinking through the case of N.W. Thomas and the EzeNri’; by Nancy Oppongwaa Myles (UG) on ‘Ethical pluralism and environmental sustainability: An Akan religious ontology’; by Sascha Mikoweit on ‘Art Practice and Decolonial Methods: Mineralogy and Extractivism Transpositional Geologies’; by Lisa Biber-Freudenberger(Bonn) on ‘Embracing Complexity: Visions of Nature and Land Use in the Context of a socio-ecological Transformation’; and by Stephen Nkansah Morgan (UG) on ‘Towards a Plurality of Environmental Values: A Relook at the Anthropocentrism and Non-anthropocentrism Debate for an Environmentally Sustainable Future’.

The participants included graduate students and faculty from both the University of Ghana and the University of Bonn with a range of interdisciplinary backgrounds. They also got the opportunity to share their research work and received valuable feedback.