Staff profile

About

My office hours in Michaelmas 2026 are Monday 9.30am-12.30am (please email me if you'd like to meet online).

I have broad interests in philosophy, but spatial themes are a running thread in most of what I've thought about or tried to approach. More recently, this has involved refection on the nature of human action and form in art. Even more recently, I have been thinking about imagination, community and connection. I hope to develop work in this area in the next few years.

My approach tends to be fairly historical and I enjoy collaboration. Since 2015 I have been working closely with Rachael Wiseman on the Women In Parenthesis project, one of the fruits of which is our co-authored book Metaphysical Animals. We've also run a number of spin-off activities, the latest of which was Philosophy in the Wild. You can join the Mapping the Quartet network (for researchers working on one or all of Iris Murdoch, Elizabeth Anscombe, Philippa Foot or Mary Midgley) here. I am also part of the research collaboration Sense Perception in the North (SPIN) with fellow philosophers of perception from Leeds, York and Liverpool.

This year I am working on a number of areas/papers: perception and the is/ought dichotomy; how the space of action is normatively shaped (and how an Anscombean treatment of action might be adapted to take due account of exercises of practical agency in conditions of oppression and domination); (with Rachael Wiseman) the idea of 'practical nonsense' as it shows up in Anscombe and Midgley; and (also with Rachael) how historians of philososophy might think about the concept of the past. We also have a larger, systematic project thinking about orientation with respect to value across multiple spatio-temporal scales - and maybe some day this will be a book.

I am originally from Dublin and my name Mac Cumhaill is pronounced Mac 'Cool' (a gaelified version of the anglicized Mc Cool, which is the name of this mythical person).

 

Administrative Role

Co-Director of Research, including Impact (with Dr Jeremy Dunham)

 

• History of Philosophy (esp. mid-century British moral philosophy)
• Philosophy of Perception
• Aesthetics

Authored book

• Metaphysical Animals: How Four Women Brought Philosophy Back to Life
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C., & Wiseman, C. (2022). Metaphysical Animals: How Four Women Brought Philosophy Back to Life. Chatto and Windus (UK), Doubleday (US).

Chapter in book

• Sensation in Intention
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2022). Sensation in Intention. In A. Haddock & R. Wiseman (Eds.), The Anscombean Mind. Routledge.
• The Importance of Murdoch's Early Encounters with Anscombe and Marcel
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C., & Wiseman, R. (2022). The Importance of Murdoch’s Early Encounters with Anscombe and Marcel. In M. Hopwood & S. Panizza (Eds.), The Murdochian Mind. Routledge.
• Sensation and the Grammar of Life: Anscombe’s Procedure and Her Purpose
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C., & Wiseman, R. (2021). Sensation and the Grammar of Life: Anscombe’s Procedure and Her Purpose. In H. Logue & L. Richardson (Eds.), Purpose and Procedure in Philosophy of Perception (pp. 276-294). Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198853534.003.0014
• 'Raum' and 'room': Comments on Anton Marty on Space Perception
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2019). ’Raum’ and ’room’: Comments on Anton Marty on Space Perception. In H. Leblanc & G. Bacligalupo (Eds.), Anton Marty and Contemporary Philosophy. Palgrave McMillan.
• Nonsense and Visual Evanescence
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2018). Nonsense and Visual Evanescence. In T. Crowther & C. Mac Cumhaill (Eds.), Perceptual Ephemera. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198722304.003.0014
• Night Fight
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2017). Night Fight. In H. Naar & F. Teroni (Eds.), The ontology of emotion. (pp. 187-208). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316275221.011

Edited book

• Perceptual Ephemera
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C., & Crowther, T. (Eds.). (2018). Perceptual Ephemera. Oxford University Press.

Journal Article

• ‘Are there no foxes in the human soul?’ The Mixed Community and Midgleyean Metaphysics
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2026). ‘Are there no foxes in the human soul?’ The Mixed Community and Midgleyean Metaphysics. Philosophy. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0031819126101600
• Anscombe and the 'Reach' of the Mind
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2026). Anscombe and the ’Reach’ of the Mind. Mind. Advance online publication, Article fzag041. https://doi.org/10.1093/mind/fzag041
• Bivs, Space and 'in'
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2022). Bivs, Space and ’in’. Erkenntnis, 87(1), 369-392. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-019-00198-z
• Interrupting the conversation: Donald MacKinnon, wartime tutor of Anscombe, Midgley, Murdoch and Foot
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C., & Wiseman, R. (2022). Interrupting the conversation: Donald MacKinnon, wartime tutor of Anscombe, Midgley, Murdoch and Foot. Journal of the Philosophy of Education, 56(6), 838-850. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9752.12689
• Depicting Human Form
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2020). Depicting Human Form. Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement, 87, 151-167. https://doi.org/10.1017/s1358246119000274
• Still Life, A Mirror: Phasic Memory and Re-encounters with Artworks
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2020). Still Life, A Mirror: Phasic Memory and Re-encounters with Artworks. Review of Philosophy and Psychology, 11(2), 423-446. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13164-020-00472-y
• Getting the measure of Murdoch's Good
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2020). Getting the measure of Murdoch’s Good. European Journal of Philosophy, 28(1), 235-247. https://doi.org/10.1111/ejop.12540
• Co-seeing and seeing through: reimagining Kant’s subtraction argument with Stumpf and Husserl
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2020). Co-seeing and seeing through: reimagining Kant’s subtraction argument with Stumpf and Husserl. British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 28(6), 1217-1239. https://doi.org/10.1080/09608788.2019.1695579
• Absential Locations and the Figureless Ground
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2018). Absential Locations and the Figureless Ground. Sartre Studies International: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Existentialism and Contemporary Culture, 24(1), 34-47. https://doi.org/10.3167/ssi.2018.240104
• The Tactual Ground, Immersion and "the space between"
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2017). The Tactual Ground, Immersion and "the space between". The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 55(1), 5-31. https://doi.org/10.1111/sjp.12212
• Perceiving Immaterial Paths.
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2015). Perceiving Immaterial Paths. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 90(3), 687-715. https://doi.org/10.1111/phpr.12037
• Specular Space
  
  Mac Cumhaill, C. (2011). Specular Space. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 111(3pt3), 487-495. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9264.2011.00320.x