Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, Sean Sayers, who taught at Kent from 1969 until 2009, has published a highly readable and thought-provoking memoir of his family and his time at Kent: The Making of a Marxist Philosopher: A Memoir.
Sean was born in New York of left-wing parents. His father was an Irish writer who was given his first job by T. S. Eliot, shared a flat with George Orwell, and was blacklisted under McCarthyism. Sean’s mother was the American daughter of a world famous Italian American anarchist. She became a communist and lived and worked in China. Sean grew up in London. He studied philosophy in Cambridge and Oxford in the 1960s and has become an internationally known Marxist philosopher.
When Sean first came to Kent in the late sixties, it had been established for only three years and was still small and growing. In some ways it was deeply traditional and yet there had been an influx of young teachers who were committed to educational innovation and to interdisciplinary teaching. The staff had enormous freedom to try out new ways of working and teaching.
In the book, he explores the work and struggles that led to the creation at the University of the journal Radical Philosophy, for which the Philosophy department at Kent was best known in the 1970s and 80s. Having been at the centre of the development of philosophy at Kent during the past 50 years, Sean is able to reflect on the changes he has seen in an engaging and thoughtful way.
The Making of a Marxist Philosopher is filled with revealing personal photographs which Sean uses to craft an original and compelling work.
Sean will discuss the book at Waterstones in Canterbury on Wednesday 25 September. Book your tickets here.