HWS News
20 January 2026 When Images Tell Stories
Feminist Philosopher Mariana Ortega examines memory, displacement and photography in the Ann Palmeri Lecture.
Hobart and William Smith will host the annual Ann Palmeri Lecture in Feminist Philosophy on Friday, Feb. 13, at 3 p.m. in the Sanford Room of the Warren Hunting Smith Library. This year’s lecture will be delivered by Mariana Ortega, Professor of Philosophy and Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies at The Pennsylvania State University. The event is free and open to the public.
Ortega’s talk, titled “Photographic Fabulation,” explores the relationship between home, memory and the photograph. The lecture introduces the concept of photographic fabulation as a creative practice through which individuals construct stories with images to engage with personal and collective histories—particularly those shaped by displacement and colonial erasure.
The lecture is co-sponsored by the Department of Philosophy and the Gender, Sexuality and Intersectional Justice (GSIJ) Program.
The Ann Palmeri Lecture is presented annually in memory of Ann Palmeri, a beloved feminist philosopher and longtime member of the HWS faculty whose teaching and scholarship continue to inspire students and colleagues.
Ortega is the author of Carnalities: The Art of Living in Latinidad (Duke University Press, 2025) and In-Between: Latina Feminist Phenomenology, Multiplicity, and the Self (SUNY Press, 2016). She has co-edited several influential volumes, including Theories of the Flesh: Latinx and Latin American Feminisms, Transformation and Resistance (Oxford University Press, 2020), and is the founder and director of the Latina/x Feminisms Roundtable. Her work focuses on Women of Color Feminisms, in particular Latina/x Feminisms, Critical Phenomenology, Philosophy of Race and Aesthetics.
