Professor
University Hall 5007
(205) 934-0991
Pronouns: she/her
Research and Teaching Interests: Applied Ethics, Social/Political Philosophy
Office Hours: Tuesdays, 11:15 a.m. - 12:15 p.m., or by appointment
Education:
- BA, Davidson College, Philosophy
- MA, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Philosophy
- PhD, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Philosophy
I was raised in northeast Tennessee and attended Davidson College in North Carolina before pursuing graduate studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I earned my MA there in 2008 — the same year my beloved Davidson Wildcats handily defeated the UW Badgers in the Sweet 16 round of the NCAA tournament — and my PhD in 2012. While there, I was awarded a College of Letters & Sciences Teaching Fellowship, recognizing outstanding undergraduate teachers.
In 2012 I moved to Abingdon, Virginia, to teach at Emory & Henry College, where I taught a wide range of classes, including courses focusing on the family, synthetic biology, contemporary problems of justice, health care ethics, and the role of social media in social justice movements around the world. I served on the Women's and Gender Studies Collective, chaired a task force to improve diversity and inclusion within the Honors program, and served as advisor to Sigma Upsilon Nu, a local social sorority. In 2016 I received the Outstanding Faculty Award, given to the faculty member students select as exhibiting outstanding teaching and mentorship, both in and out of the classroom.
In 2016, I joined the faculty at UAB. In 2018, I served as an Honors Faculty Fellow, and in 2021, I received the Dean's Award for Excellence in Teaching in the College of Arts and Sciences. My current research focuses in general on the intersection of the family with other social institutions. (You can watch my TEDx talk on YouTube.)
For more information, check out my personal website.
Scholars @ UAB Profile
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Select Publications
- Brynn Welch, "Syllabus Showcase: Family and Philosophy," https://blog.apaonline.org/2021/10/13/syllabus-showcase-family-and-philosophy-brynn-welch/ (2020)
- Brynn Welch, "Promoting a Culture of Biosafety and Responsibility," ABSA International, Biosafety Month - https://absa.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/2018-Biosafety-Month-Focusing-on-Ethics-BWelch.pdf (2018)
- Brynn Welch, "Glowing Plants on Kickstarter: The Ethics of Synthetic Biology," (with Christine Fleet) National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science (2016)
- Brynn Welch, "The Pervasive Whiteness of Children's Literature: Collective Harms and Consumer Obligations," Social Theory and Practice (2016)
- Brynn Welch, "Shifting the Concept of Nudge," Journal of Medical Ethics 39 (No. 8, 2013):497-98.
- Brynn Welch, "A Theory of Filial Obligations," Social Theory and Practice 38 (No. 4, 2012):717-37.
- Brynn Welch and Daniel M. Hausman, “To Nudge or Not to Nudge,” Journal of Political Philosophy 18 (No. 1, 2010):123-36.
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Academic Distinctions and Professional Societies
- Dean’s Award for Excellence in Teaching, 2021
- Phi Beta Kappa