William Day, Ph.D.
- Professor Philosophy
William Day writes primarily on Wittgenstein, Cavell, and topics in aesthetics (improvisation, music, film). He is contributing co-editor (with Victor J. Krebs) of a volume on Wittgenstein’s aspect-seeing remarks, Seeing Wittgenstein Anew (Cambridge UP). Other publications include articles and book chapters on Emerson, the Neo-Confucian thinker Wang Yangming, and moral perfectionism. He teaches courses in the philosophy of art, American philosophy, theory of knowledge, the philosophy of language, and the experience of time.
Education
B.A., St. John’s College
M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D., Columbia University
Publications
- “The Time of Their Lives: Before Midnight and the Conversation of Marriage.” In Happiness and Tears, After Cavell: New Readings in Hollywood’s Comedy of Remarriage and Melodrama of the Unknown Woman. Edited by Paul Deb. SUNY Press, 2025, 149-74.
- “Shakespeare vs Wittgenstein: The Fight for Meaning.” The Institute of Art and Ideas, IAI News, 03 February 2025.
- “Impressions of Meaning in Cavell’s Life out of Music.” In Music with Stanley Cavell in Mind. Edited by David LaRocca. Bloomsbury, 2024, 53-81.
- “Hearing Between the Lines: Impressions of Meaning and Jazz’s Democratic Esotericism.” Conversations: The Journal of Cavellian Studies 11.1 (December 2023): 75-88.
