#MAWAP2025
Date & Time: April 30th- May 1st, 2026
UIC Institute for the Humanities
1007 W Harrison Street, Chicago
University of Illinois, Chicago
Please register in order to have an estimate of how many attendants will come.
Registration is free.
About the Conference
The Midwest Annual Workshop on Ancient Philosophy (MAWAP) aims to foster the ancient philosophy community in the Midwest and to provide early-career scholars with a platform where to share their current research.
​
The Midwest has historically been a fertile soil for ancient philosophy. Back in the 19th century, the Midwest was home to the Illinois Platonists, led by Hiram Kinnaird Jones (1818-1903). He founded the Plato Club of Jacksonville, Illinois, 1866, which reached over 400 members across the world. Moreover, Thomas Moore Johnson (1851-1919), the ‘Missouri Platonist’, established two journals devoted to the study of Platonism, The Platonist (1881-1888) and the Bibliotheca Platonica (1889-1890). Funnily, Johnson—who also became a translator of Plotinus, Iamblichus, and Proclus—reports to have discovered ancient philosophy by accident in 1870 while roaming around the University of Notre Dame’s library. The first Midwest Annual Workshop in Ancient Philosophy was held at the University of Notre Dame in 2025. This year, the University of Illinois (Chicago) and Loyola University (Chicago) are delighted to continue to play a role in advancing the study of ancient philosophy.
Speakers
Schedule
Thursday
10:00-10:30 am - Breakfast
10:30-12:00 pm - “Teaching Ignorance with Lies: Wisdom and the Goodness of False
Speakers in Plato’s Lesser Hippias” by Daniel Kranzelbinder (University of Chicago)
Comments: Gonzalo Gamarra Jordán (University Notre Dame)
12:00-1:30 pm - Lunch
1:30-3:00 pm - “Plato’s Structural Conception of Pleonexia” by Christen Zimecki
Comments: Gabriel Lear (University of Chicago)
3:00-3:30 pm - Coffee
3:30-5:00 pm - Keynote: “Aristotle on How and Why the Eyes of Different Animals Differ” by Sophia Connell (University of Notre Dame) Comments: Josh Mendelsohn (Loyola University, Chicago)
6:00 pm - Dinner for participants
​
Friday
10:00-10:30 am - Breakfast
10:30-12:00 pm - “Aristotle on Perception as Criticism” by Josh Trubowitz (University of Notre Dame)
Comments: Arnold Brooks
12:00-1:30 pm - Lunch
1:30-3:00 pm - “Aristotle’s Psychology of Vice” by Sadie McCloud (Indiana University, Bloomington)
Comments: John Proios (University of Chicago)
3:00-3:30 pm - Coffee
3:30-5:00 pm - “Everyday Tranquility: Reassessing Ataraxia in Pyrrhonian Skepticism” by Chelsea Bowden (Denison University) Comments: Justin Vlasits (University of Illinois, Chicago)
6:00 pm - Dinner for participants
​
*Commentator at Large: Katy Meadows (Indiana University, Bloomington)
​​
Organizers
Joshua Mendelsohn, Loyola University, Chicago
Justin Vlasits, University of Illinois, Chicago
Rebecca Caithamer, University of Illinois, Chicago
