What Makes Work Meaningful (A Feminist Intervention)
Why does care work feel fulfilling on some days, and infuriating on others? What could success look like if we divorce it from individualism and achievement? In this episode, listen in to a conversation with Paul Blaschko '19 Ph.D., Director of the Sheedy Family Program and assistant teaching professor in philosophy at Notre Dame, about how feminist thinkers are reworking western definitions of meaning and success. We’ll consider Ursula Le Guin’s 1982 New Yorker short story "Sur” to illustrate.
Experience the Episode
Thursday, April 24, 2025 12:00 pm
Why does care work feel fulfilling on some days, and infuriating on others? What could success look like if we divorce it from individualism and achievement? In this episode, listen in to a conversation with Paul Blaschko ’19 Ph.D., Director of the Sheedy Family Program and assistant teaching professor in philosophy at Notre Dame, about how feminist thinkers are reworking western definitions of meaning and success. We’ll consider Ursula Le Guin’s 1982 New Yorker short story “Sur” to illustrate.
Women’s Work is sponsored on ThinkND by the Sheedy Family Program in Economy, Enterprise & Society at the University of Notre Dame and Notre Dame Women Connect.
Meet the Faculty: Paul Blaschko '19 Ph.D.
Paul Blaschko ’19 Ph.D. is an assistant teaching professor at the University of Notre Dame. He teaches God and the Good Life, a course dedicated to asking the big questions about meaning, morality, and faith. He also serves as the founding Director of the Sheedy Family Program in Economy, Enterprise, and Society, a program devoted to exploring how the humanities can help us find meaning in work. With Meghan Sullivan, he co-authored The Good Life Method (Penguin Press, 2022), a book about how philosophy can help us live better lives, which was also the basis for The Good Life Method series here on ThinkND. He is currently working on a book about the philosophy of work (under contract with Princeton University Press), and is the co-founder of a Notre Dame based tech start-up that aims to solve problems with dialogue on the internet. In his spare time, he does a good bit of philosophy on TikTok, and he used to do professional improv comedy in the Twin Cities.