Simon Cabulea May
Assistant Professor of Philosophy
Ph.D. Stanford University, 2004
241 Major Williams Hall | Email | (540) 231-1142 | Personal Website
Moral and Political Philosophy, Philosophy of Law
Dr. May works mainly in political philosophy. His present research project concerns conflicts of moral conviction in democratic politics, particularly as they affect the legitimacy and authority of democratic law, norms of public deliberation, the justifiability of public policies, and the moral status of conscientious objection to the law. Other research interests include various issues in distributive justice, democratic theory, human rights theory, the history of political theory, analytic jurisprudence, and social epistemology.
In Fall 2009, Dr. May will teach a graduate class on religion in the public sphere and an undergraduate class on modern political theory from Hobbes to Marx. In Spring 2010, he will teach undergraduate classes on mass violence and human rights, and on jurisprudence.
Dr. May received his Ph.D. from Stanford University in 2004 and was Visiting Assistant Professor at UNC Chapel Hill in 2004-05. He was raised in South Africa and received his M.A. from Rhodes University in 1996, where he was also active in the anti-apartheid student movement.
Dr. May is the administrator of the political philosophy group blog, Public Reason, which has over three hundred academic political philosophers and theorists as members. Public Reason also has a facebook group. In his spare time, he reads history and follows test cricket.
Recent Articles
- "Religious Democracy and the Liberal Principle of Legitimacy," Philosophy & Public Affairs, 37 (2), Spring 2009.
- "Principled Compromise and the Abortion Controversy," Philosophy & Public Affairs, 33 (4), Fall 2005.
Book Reviews
- "Jiwei Ci, The Two Faces of Justice," Philosophical Review, 117 (3), July 2008.
- "David Braybrooke, Utilitarianism; Restorations, Repairs, Renovations," Philosophical Review, 116 (1), January 2007.