Prof. Dr. Nadja El Kassar
Professor of Philosophy, with a focus on Theoretical Philosophy;
Head of Department
T +41 41 229 55 30
nadja.elkassar@unilu.ch
Frohburgstrasse 3, Room 3.A42
Consultation hour during the semester:
Wednesdays, 16:00 – 17.00 (only after pre-registration by e-mail)
CV
Nadja El Kassar is Professor of Philosophy with a focus on Theoretical Philosophy at the University of Lucerne since April 2023. Her current work focuses on philosophies of ignorance, epistemic injustice, epistemology of online spaces, and intellectual self-confidence.
From 2003 to 2007 Nadja El Kassar studied English and Philosophy (Lehramt an Gymnasien und Gesamtschulen) in Dortmund and Leeds. In August 2013, she defended her PhD thesis entitled A Theory of Epistemically Significant Perception (summa cum laude) at the University of Potsdam. The PhD was supported by a three-year doctoral fellowship from the German National Academic Foundation.
From August 2013 to July 2019, she was a postdoctoral fellow at the Chair of Philosophy with special emphasis on practical philosophy at ETH Zurich. In 2019-2020, she was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Zurich at the Assistant Professorship of Theoretical Philosophy. In August 2020, she received the Venia Legendi in Philosophy from ETH Zurich based on the habilitation thesis What Is Ignorance and How Should We Rationally Deal with It? (book version under contract with Routledge). From October 2020 to March 2023 she was a visiting professor at FU Berlin.
Since August 2023, Nadja El Kassar has been Head of the Board of the "Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Lucerne (GSL)", a doctoral study programme for highly qualified students.
Publications
- How Should We Rationally Deal with Ignorance? A Philosophical Study. 1. Auflage. London: Routledge, 2024. https://www.routledge.com/How-Should-We-Rationally-Deal-with-Ignorance-A-Philosophical-Study/ElKassar/p/book/9781032451213?srsltid=AfmBOopY8oKZuhhWU3Aew9xfpZn6PRSc1jKN9axFkoKRtZoTljFruxnC.
- El Kassar, Nadja. Towards a Theory of Epistemically Significant Perception: How We Relate to the World. Ideen & Argumente. Berlin; Boston: De Gruyter, 2015. https://www.degruyter.com/view/product/462709.
- Habgood-Coote, Joshua, Natalie Alana Ashton, and Nadja El Kassar. ‘Receptive Publics’. Ergo an Open Access Journal of Philosophy 5 (2024). doi:10.3998/ergo.5710.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘Epistemische Ungerechtigkeit in bildungswissenschaftlichen Kontexten: Einführende Überlegungen’. PraxisForschungLehrer*innenBildung. Zeitschrift für Schul- und Professionsentwicklung. 2 (2023): 7–12. doi:10.11576/pflb-6084.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘First Steps in an Epistemology of Collective Intellectual Self-Trust’. Ergo 9, no. 6 (2022). doi:https://doi.org/10.3998/ergo.2262.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘Epistemische Ungerechtigkeiten in und durch Algorithmen – ein Überblick’. Zeitschrift für Praktische Philosophie 1 (2022): 279–304. doi:10.22613/zfpp/9.1.11.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘Valuable and pernicious collective intellectual self-trust’. Philosophical Issues 1 (2022): 286–303. doi:10.1111/phis.12228.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘A Dialogue on Intellectual Self-Trust: Replies to Congdon and Koskinen’. Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective 6 (2021): 70–73. https://wp.me/p1Bfg0-5Yc.
- Altanian, Melanie, and Nadja El Kassar. ‘Epistemic Injustice and Collective Wrongdoing: Introduction to Special Issue’. Social Epistemology 2 (2021): 99–108. doi:10.1080/02691728.2020.1843199.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘The Affective Component of Intellectual Self-Trust: A Reply to Jones, Nadja El Kassar’. Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective 6 (2021): 74–76. https://wp.me/p1Bfg0-5Yw.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘The Powers of Individual and Collective Intellectual Self-Trust in Dealing with Epistemic Injustice’. Social Epistemology 2 (2021): 197–209. doi:10.1080/02691728.2020.1839592.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘Was ist Wissen? Einige philosophische Überlegungen’. Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, 2021, 4–8.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘The Place of Intellectual Self-Trust in Theories of Epistemic Advantages’. Journal of Social Philosophy 1 (2020): 7–26. doi:10.1111/josp.12300.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘A Critical Catalogue of Ignorance. A Reply to Patrick Bondy’. Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective 2 (2019): 49–51. https://social-epistemology.com/2019/02/26/a-critical-catalogue-of-ignorance-nadja-el-kassar/.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘The Irreducibility of Ignorance. A Reply to Peels’. Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective 2 (2019): 31–38. https://social-epistemology.com/2019/02/19/the-irreducibility-of-ignorance-nadja-el-kassar/.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘What Ignorance Really Is. Examining the Foundations of Epistemology of Ignorance’. Social Epistemology 5 (2018): 300–310. doi:10.1080/02691728.2018.1518498.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘Review of E. Schmidt. Modest Nonconceptualism (Springer 2015)’. Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung 3 (2016): 453–56. doi:https://doi.org/10.3196/004433016819567445.
- Congdon, Matthew, and Khurana, Thomas, eds. ‘Recognition and Intellectual Self-Trust’. In The Philosophy of Recognition. London: Routledge, 2025.
- Peels, Rik, Ranalli, Christopher, and Kloosterboer, Naomi, eds. ‘The role of self-trust in evaluating extreme beliefs’. In Understanding Responsibility for Extreme Belief and Behavior. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2025.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘Ignorance’. In The Blackwell Companion to Epistemology, Third Edition, edited by Sylvan, Kurt, Steup, Matthias, Sosa, Ernest, and Dancy Jonathan. Hoboken, USA: Wiley-Blackwell, im Druck.
- Hänel, Hilkje C., and Müller, Johanna, eds. ‘Non-Ideal Theory and Ignorance’. In Routledge Handbook of Non-Ideal Theory, 259–72. London: Routledge, 2024.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘Self-Trust’. In The Blackwell Companion to Epistemology, Third Edition, edited by Sylvan, Kurt, Steup, Matthias, Sosa, Ernest, and Dancy Jonathan. Hoboken, USA: Wiley-Blackwell, im Druck.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘McDowell’s Conceptualism and the Rapprochement between Hermeneutics and Cognitive Sciences’. In McDowell and the Hermeneutic Tradition, edited by Spiegel, Thomas Jussuf and Feige, Daniel Martin. London: Routledge, 2023.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘Wissen, Unwissenheit und Ignoranz: Corona als Chance und Herausforderung für den epistemologischen Diskurs’. In Wissensproduktion und Wissenstransfer in Zeiten der Pandemie, edited by Schmechtig, Pedro and Hauswald, Rico. Baden-Baden: Karl Alber, 2022.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘Authenticity and the Significance of Self-Knowledge and Self-Ignorance’. In Authenticity. Interdisciplinary Perspectives from Philosophy, Psychology, and Psychiatry, edited by Brüntrup, Godehard, Gierstl, Liselotte, and Reder, Michael, 29–49. Wiesbaden: Springer Fachmedien, 2020.
- El Kassar, Nadja. ‘Wie gehen Sie mit Unwissenheit um?’ Das philosophische Radio, WDR 5, 9 January 2023. https://www1.wdr.de/mediathek/audio/wdr5/wdr5-das-philosophische-radio/audio-wie-gehen-sie-mit-unwissenheit-um-100.html.
- El Kassar, Nadja, and Ralph Hertwig. ‘Die Vorzüge der Ignoranz: Gewolltes Nichtwissen’. Sein und Streit, Deutschlandfunk Kultur, 28 November 2021. https://www.deutschlandfunkkultur.de/die-vorzuege-der-ignoranz-100.html.
Achievements
- Algorithmen und Epistemische Ungerechtigkeit. Lecture, fem.wis – Standpunkte aus der feministischen Erkenntnis- und Wissenschaftstheorie, TU Dortmund, Dortmund, 2023
- Trust and Self-Trust in Expertise. Lecture, Epistemic Injustices, Marginalized Knowledges, and Trust Conflicts, Goethe University Frankfurt, Frankfurt, 2023
- Irren ist menschlich, Unwissenheit auch. Philosophische Überlegungen. Antrittsvorlesung, Luzern, 2023
- Approaches to Ignorance. Applied Philosophy of Science and Epistemology Lecture Series, Wien, 2023
- Was soll ich wissen? Was darf ich nicht wissen? Deontologische Zugänge zu Unwissenheit. Institutskolloquium, Göttingen, 2023
