Michele Moody-Adams


Michele Moody-Adams is an American philosopher and academic administrator. Between July 1, 2009, and September 2011, she served as Dean of Columbia College and Vice President for Undergraduate Education at Columbia University. She was the first woman and first African-American to hold the post. She has since resigned as dean, citing the decreasing autonomy of Columbia College. She remains a faculty member in the department of philosophy. In 2021, she was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Early life and education

Moody-Adams grew up in Chicago on the Southside. Moody-Adams' father was a schoolteacher. Moody-Adams was close with her father, and they would listen to opera and classical music together on the weekends. She attended Wellesley College and, having studied with Ruth Anna Putnam, she graduated from there in 1978 with a B.A. in philosophy. She attended Somerville College at Oxford University on a Marshall Scholarship, and received a B.A. in philosophy, politics, and economics, in 1980. She earned her Ph.D. in philosophy from Harvard University in 1986. Moody-Adams wrote her dissertation on "Moral Philosophy Naturalized: Morality and Mitigated Skepticism in Hume" under the supervision of John Rawls.

Career

Before joining the faculty at Cornell University in the fall of 2000, Moody-Adams worked at Indiana University, Bloomington, where she was a professor of philosophy, as well as associate dean for undergraduate education. At Cornell, she was vice provost for undergraduate education and Hutchinson Professor of Ethics and Public Life. In February 2009, Moody-Adams co-sponsored with university funds a controversial student display on the Cornell campus by the Islamic Alliance for Justice consisting of signs and 1300 flags representing dead Palestinians and Israelis. Moody-Adams responded to the September 11 attacks by asserting that "Vengeance is not the answer here," and that the result of an American military response could be the end of everything worth fighting for, "even the end of the species."
When she was appointed to her Columbia post, administrators at Cornell praised her; "Michele is an exceptional scholar and administrator," said Provost Kent Fuchs. "Her breadth of experience working on many issues of vital importance to the university and her deep academic insights have enriched Cornell in multiple ways. We will miss her leadership, insights and intellect." She was the first female and first Black dean at Columbia.
On August 20, 2011, Moody-Adams announced her resignation from the deanship, effective the following June 30, after only two years on the job, citing changes in Columbia University policy toward Columbia College that made it impossible for her to remain in her post. In addition, Moody-Adams stepped down because of concern that changes being made would greatly affect both the finances of the college and the academic quality. She also holds a tenured position at Columbia, Moody-Adams is currently a Joseph Straus Professor of Political Philosophy and Legal Theory in their philosophy department.

Personal life

She is married to James Eli Adams, a specialist in Victorian literature, who is a professor of English and comparative literature at Columbia University. Their daughter's name is Katherine; she was born in 1996.

Author

Moody-Adams has published more than two dozen reviews and articles, and two books. Her first book, Fieldwork in Familiar Places: Morality, Culture, and Philosophy, was written in 1997 and published by Harvard University Press. It challenges morality, culture, and objectivity. She explains that we can agree to moral disagreement while still upholding our beliefs of moral objectivity. Moody-Adams dissects evidence that anthropologists use for moral relativism. She details what "culture" is under moral relativism. Moody-Adams argues that ethics are interpretive. Her belief is that we must rely on ourselves as moral inquirers in our own complex communities. Her second book, Making Space for Justice: Social Movements, Collective Imagination, and Political Hope, published by Columbia University Press in 2022, raises philosophical questions about social justice movements and how justice can be met. Moody-Adams questions what can be learned from these movements and how we can create space for justice worldwide. She uses examples of movements, agents of change, and philosophical principles to raise questions. Political hope is upheld through social policy and motivation to pursue justice at all levels. Moody-Adams uses the book to close the gap between theory and practice.