Martha Craven Nussbaum is an American 20th century philosopher who has a particular interest in Ancient Greek and Roman Philosophy, political philosophy, feminisms and ethics. She studied theatre and classics at the New York University, where she received a BA in 1969, and eased her way into philosophy while attending Harvard, where she received an MA in 1972 and PhD is 1975.
In 1972 she became the first female to hold the Junior Fellowship. This allowed certain graduate students to be relieved from teaching and get on with their research. She focuses a lot of her work on the freedoms and opportunities of women and emotions. Nussbaum draws a lot of inspiration from the liberal tradition, and sides a lot with philosophers who want to extend philosophy’s reach. She holds associate appointments in classics, divinity and political science, and is also a member of the Committee on Southern Asian Studies, and a board member of the Human Rights Program.
Nussbaum taught philosophy and classics at Harvard in the 1970s and early 1980s, where she was denied tenure by the Classics Department in 1982. Nussbaum then moved to Brown University, where she taught until the mid-1990. She is currently at the University of Chicago where she is the Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics
Nussbaum has made herself a very well-known figure with her many well written books and articles. Some of her publications include The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy (1986), For Love of Country (1996) Cultivating Humanity: A Classical Defense of Reform in Liberal Education, and From Disgust to Humanity: Sexual Orientation and Constitutional Law (2010). They one that really interested me was From Disgust to Humanity: Sexual Orientation and Constitutional Law (2010).
In this book Nussbaum argues that disgust has been the central motivator