I am Reader in Philosophy at Manchester Metropolitan University since 2021, and have been Postgraduate Reserach Coordinator and AHRC North West Doctotal Pathway Consortium Lead for Philosophy since 2020. I was elected to a Visiting Fellowship at St Catherine's College University of Oxford for Michaelmas Term 2021. My service to the profession outwidth the University includes acting as Secretary of the World Psychiatric Association (WPA) Section for Philosophy & Humanities in Psychiatry (October 2020 – present), Executive Committee Member of the Royal College of Psychiatry (RCPsych) SIG in Philosophy (February 2020 - present) and External Examiner, University of Liverpool (November 2019 – present, four-year tenure). I am also Director of the Values-based Theory Network at St Catherine’s Collaborating Centre for Values-based Practice at the University of Oxford, and Member of its Whiteness and Race Equality Network.
My approach to philosophy bridges the disciplines of moral philosophy, moral psychology and philosphy of psychiatry to improve lives through my reputable expertise in moral perception and co-production as a mechanism for change.
Areas of Specialisation: Moral Perception, Metaethics and Aesthetics, Philosophy of Medicine and Psychiatry, and selected issues in Philosophy of Language and Perception.
Areas of Competence: Social Epistemology, Applied Phenomenology, Philosophical Psychopathology, Philosophy of Scince and Mind
I am currently Co-Investigator for a major 4-year project, funded by the NIHR Policy Research Programme, to support the government’s announced reform of the Mental Health Act. The topicality of my research on lived experience and patient values in psychiatry has also led to my current project working with the Mental Health Foundation, including a collaborative PhD studentship award, funded by an AHRC Collaborative Award, to develop a new public mental health approach to severe and enduring mental illness (SMI).
I am married to the wonderful Dr Philip Mallaband. We have a Siamese cat called Paddy. We like travelling, contemporary opera and post-rock bands, hiking and cycling - and fresh water swimming.
For me, one central aspect of teaching philosophy lies in its capacity to free peoples’ minds: the continuous work that it takes in deciding for yourself what is valuable and living your life in accordance with that decision. In practice, one of the central challenges as a teacher is to give students the opportunity to take ownership of the ideas they are offered.
“Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you've got a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies - 'God damn it, you've got to be kind.'” Kurt Vonnegut
My lectures are structured so as to provide the student an engaging learning-experience. I produce substantive handouts that students can use as a starting place for their own further research for each lecture so they do not need to concentrate on copying down the material from the PowerPoint slides, but rather focus on the lecture itself. My seminars are run so as to give students more of an opportunity to express their own ideas, demonstrate their own understanding of the issue at hand, and to explore other related issues. As a supervisor I encourage, inspire and ‘point in the right direction’ in a way that enables the students to develop their own mark on the arguments and philosophical thoughts under discussion.
Keywords: rigour, passion, integrated learning
Academic qualifications:
Professional qualifications:
Temporary F/T Postdoctoral Positons:
Temporary P/T Graduate Positions:
Philosophy teaches you not only how to think, but also how to think critically: it enables you to assess which belief that have inevitably been passed down to you are worth holding onto, and on what grounds. This is a key principle that informs all my work, both teaching and reserach.
My approach to teaching is to give students opportunity to take ownership of the ideas by engaging actively in learning, by thinking about the ways in which abstract philosophical ideas can bear on everyday life, to engage with different perspectives, and to feel confident in independently reach conclusions and articulate ideas in discussing complex issues with your peers.
Outwidth MMU I have also thaught modules in:
Outwidth MMU I have also thaught postgraduate modules in:
PhD Completions
Current Supervision
Master by Research
I am interested in the significance of the first-person perspective in any domain where normativity, the sense that we all have of things going better or worse in a given context, is at issue. One way of describing this inquiry is to say that my research interests surround Particularism, a thesis that is often thought to be restricted to moral philosophy, but in fact its conception of rationality, which I term ‘situated evaluative thought’, is of a more general importance. I have published on aesthetic particularism, thick evaluative concepts, semantic contextualism, and objectivity in criticism. My current work concentrates on the methodological implications of particularism for debates about perspectivalism and objectivity in aesthetics and metaethics, as well as wider debates about the role of context and professional judgement in medicine and bioethics. I am also involved in work at the intersection between ethics and philosophy of perception, where I deploy the idea of situated evaluative thought to illuminate the notion of affordances and the idea of action-oriented perception.
For Grant Awards, see separate section below.
A. Bergqvist (2023). Lived Experience and Co-production in Philosophy of Psychiatry, Clinical Practice and Mental Health Research. Cambridge University Press.
A. Bergqvist, R. Cowan (2018). Introduction. Oxford University Press.
A. Bergqvist, R. Cowan (2018). Evaluative Perception. A. Bergqvist, R. Cowan. Oxford University Press.
VS. Harrison, G. Kemp, A. Bergqvist (2017). Philosophy and Museums Essays on the Philosophy of Museums. Cambridge University Press.
A. Bergqvist, D. Crepaz-Keay, A. Wilde (2023). Introduction: What is the role of lived experience in research?. Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplements. 94, pp.1-14.
A. Bergqvist (2023). Shared decision-making and relational moral agency: on seeing the person behind the ‘expert by experience’ in mental health research. Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplements. 94, pp.173-200.
C. King, S. Clarke, B. Fulford, A. Handa, A. Bergqvist (2023). Whiteness and the Race Equality Network: co-production in action. Lancet Psychiatry. 10(10), pp.739-741.
A. Bergqvist (2016). Framing Effects in Museum Narratives: Objectivity in Interpretation Revisited. Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement. 79, pp.295-318.
A. Bergqvist (2010). Why Sibley is Not a Generalist After All. The British Journal of Aesthetics. 50(1), pp.1-14.
A. Bergqvist Thick Concepts and Context Dependence. Southwest Philosophy Review. 29(1), pp.221-232.
A. Bergqvist (2009). Semantic particularism and linguistic competence. Logique et Analyse. 52(208), pp.343-361.
ADR. Bergqvist, R. Cowan (2018). Introduction. In: Evaluative Perception. Oxford University Press, pp.1-15.
Invited keynote speaker and other invited conference presentations
· Ethics and Aesthetics Conference. Lingnan University, Hong Kong, 28-29 May 2015. Title ‘Thick Aesthetic Concepts and Reasons’.
· Royal Institute of Philosophy Workshop on Moral Perception. Cardiff University, 30 October 2014. Title: ‘Situated Evaluative Thought: Revisiting Iris Murdoch on Moral Perception’.
· British Society of Aesthetics Connection Conference on Realism and Anti-Realism in Metaethics and Aesthetics. University of Cambridge, 8-9 August 2014. Title: ‘Value, Perspective and Objectivity’. Harvard Conference on the Cognitive Penetrability of Perception: Ethics and Psychology, Harvard University, 19-20 April 2014. Comments on Paul Kastafanas, ‘Moral Perception’.
· Ethics, Museums and Archaeology Workshop, the Ashmolean Museum University of Oxford, 2-4April 2014. Title: ‘Value and Perspective in the New Museum’.
· Imperatival Aspects of Perception Conference, Centre for the Study of Mind in Nature (CSMN), University of Oslo, 28-29h August 2013. Comments on Susanna Siegel, ‘Affordances and the Contents of Perception’.
· Philosophy in the North West Symposium, University of Manchester, 8July 2013. Title: ‘Moral Perception’.
· Moral Uncertainty Workshop, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, 6 April 2011. Title: ‘Uncertainty and Rational Regret’.
· Particularism in Context Conference, Sorbonne, France, May 2008. Title: ‘Particularism and Semantic Normativity’.
Regular colloquia invitations
· Centre for Aesthetics and Centre for Ethics and Metaethics Joint Research Seminar. University of Leeds, 19 November 2014. Title: ‘Value, Perspective and Objectivity’
· KCL Concepts of Health Seminar, King’s College London, 6 May 2014. Title: ‘Methodological Particularism and Evidence Based Medicine’.
· Humanities in Public Women in Philosophy Lecture Series, MMU, 10 February 2014. Title: ‘Moral Particularism: a Contribution to Feminist Theory’.
· Manchester Philosophy Research Seminar, University of Manchester, 13November 2013. Title: ‘Thick Concepts, Meaning and Evaluation’.
· Royal Institute of Philosophy Seminars, Department of Philosophy, University of Nottingham, 30th October 2013. Title: ‘Thick Concepts, Meaning and Evaluation’.
· Human Sciences Research Seminar, Manchester Metropolitan University, 24 October 2013. Title: ‘Affordances and Situated Representation’.
· Visiting Speaker Programme, University of Stirling, 18 April 2013. Title: ‘Situated Evaluative Thought’.
Selected peer-refereed presentations
· ‘Moral Perfection and Situated Evaluative Thought’. Prospects for an Ethics of Self-Cultivation Conference, University of Warwick, 25-27 September 2014; Revising the “Divide” Conference, University of Sussex, 20-21 September 2014.
· ‘Particularism and Person Centered Medicine’, WMU Fourth Annual Conference in Medical Humanities, Western Michigan University at Kalamazoo, USA, 18-19 September 2014;
· ‘Thick Concepts, Meaning and Evaluation’, Inaugural Normativity Conference, University of Kent, 22 March 2014.
· ‘Particularism and Linguistic Competence’. VAF III: Recent Trends in the Philosophy of Language Conference, Tilburg University, the Netherlands, (January 2009); 45th WCPA Western Canadian Philosophical Association Annual Meeting, University of Alberta at Edmonton, Canada, October 2008; Joint Session of the Aristotelian Society and the Mind Association, University of Aberdeen, July 2008.
· ‘Sibley and Defeasibility: Holism about Reasons in Aesthetic Evaluations’. American Philosophical Association Annual Pacific Division Meeting, San Francisco, USA, April 2007; American Society of Aesthetics Annual Pacific Division Meeting, Asilomar, USA March 2007; 7th SIFA Conference, Milan, Italy, September 2006; British Society of Aesthetics Annual Conference, Oxford, September 2006.
· ‘Brandom and Dancy on the Normativity of Prima Facie Reasons’. ENFA-3 Conference, University of Lisbon (Faculty de Letras), Portugal, June 2006; III Meeting on Pragmatism: Inference, Agency and the Origins of Analytic Philosophy Conference, University of Granada, Spain, April 2006; Reading-Lund Conference, Lund University, Sweden, May 2006.
· Invited Panel Speaker, Manchester Debating Society, ‘Has science got the monopoly on truth?’, University of Manchester, 19 November 2015.
· Invited Speaker, Students for Sensible Drug Policy UK, ‘The ethics of drug use’, MMU, October 2015.
· Invited Battle of Ideas Panel Speaker, ‘Playing God? The ethics of biomedicine’. Manchester Science Festival. Venue: Cross Street Chapel Manchester, 27 October 2014.
· Discussant, IHSSR Humanities in Public Festival Feminism in the 21st Century: Privilege, Bias and Feminist Practice (together with Dr Ginette Garpenter, Caroline Bayliss-Green and Helen Malarky). Venue: Friends Meeting House Manchester, 5 March 2014.
· Humanities in Public Lecture on Women in Philosophy, 21 February 2014.
· Public lecturing for TRAUMA film group to run a film season on the cinematography of Terrence Malick. Three film screening sessions during January and February 2014. Venue: MMU Business School.
· Public Lecture, University of Glasgow. Title: ‘Moral Discernment’. Venue: University of Glasgow Debating Chamber, 18 January 2012.
· Outreach Philosophy Programme Developer and Course Designer. School of Continuing Education, University of Reading, 2008-2009; 2009-2010.
· Organiser, Workshop on Virtue Ethics and Health Economics, Manchester Metropolitan University, 11 January 2016.
· Organiser, Advance Studies Inaugural Workshop to launch the Values-based Practice Theory Network of St Catherine’s Collaborating Centre for Values-Based Practice. St Catherine’s College, University of Oxford, 12 October 2015.
· Organiser, Particularism and Professional Ethics workshop, Diakonhjemmet University College Oslo, 14 September 2015.
· Organiser. Particularism and Bioethics workshop, Tilburg University, 6 June 2015.
· Organiser, Particularism and Personalised Medicine workshop. MMU, 6-7 January 2015.
· Organiser, Particularism in Bioethics and Professional Ethics Conference. MMU, 19 June 2014.
· Co-Organiser, Feminism in the 21st Century: Privilege, Bias and Feminist Practice workshop (together with Helen Malarky, Dr Ginette Carpenter and Caroline Bayliss-Green. Humanities in Public Festival, Friend’s Meeting House Manchester, 5 March 2014.
· Organiser, IHSSR Humanities in Public Lecture Series. Theme: Women in Philosophy. MMU, Spring Term 2014.
· Co-organiser, Centre for the Study of Perceptual Experience conference on Evaluative Perception (with Dr Robert Cowan). Department of Philosophy, University of Glasgow, September 2013.
· Co-organiser, 2013 Royal Institute of Philosophy Conference on Philosophy and Museums (with Dr Victoria Harrison and Dr Gary Kemp). Philosophy, School of Humanities, University of Glasgow, July 2013.
· Co-organiser, Think About Health conference workshop on Compassion and the NHS (with Dr Anne Raustol), Birmingham, 26-28 June 2013.
· Organiser, Practical Conflicts and Degrees of Moral Rightness conference. Stockholm University in association with the Swedish Research Council, 9 November 2011.
· Co-Organiser, Moral Uncertainty workshop. Karolinska Insitututed in association with Stockholm University in association with the Swedish Research Council, 6 April 2011.
a) Member of the AHRC Peer Review College, 1 October 2015-31 December 2018.
b) Journal Scholarly Article Referee:
- The British Journal of Aesthetics
- Journal of Applied Philosophy
- Journal of Moral Philosophy
- Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice
- Philosophy, Psychiatry & Psychology
- Logique et Analyse
-Philosophical Quarterly
c) Conference Scholarly Article Referee
- American Philosophical Association
- American Society for Aesthetics
- Western Canadian Philosophical Society
- Philosophy and Museums Conference
- Evaluative Perception Conference
External Research Grant Awards
• Co-Investigator, Major External Grant Capture from the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR). Project Title: Improving the Experiences of African Caribbean Men detained under the Mental Health Act: A Co-Produced Intervention Using the Silences Framework. PI: Prof. Joy Duxbury. Project duration: 1 Jan 2021 - 31 Dec 2024. Value: £803,862.44.
• Co-Investigator. Project title: Enhancing community training for student mental health nurses: preliminary development work to improving community mentorship to meet Uganda’s identified health challenges. Value: £45,000. Project duration: 26 August 2021-28 February 2022.
• Principal Investigator, AHRC North West Consortium Doctoral Training Partnership (NWCDTP) Collaborative Doctoral Award with the Mental Health Foundation. Project Title: Experience and Personal Values in the Philosophy of Psychiatry: Reframing Evidence in Developing a New Public Mental Health Approach to Serious Mental Illness. Project duration: October 2021-October 2024.
• Co-Investigator, QR Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) 2020/21 – UCRKE Investment Request. Project Title: Meeting mental health nursing curriculum needs for the advancement of the future Ugandan health workforce; ensuring ecological fit with content, values literacy processes and cultural application. PI: Dr Lucy Webb. Project duration: 4 Jan 2021 - 31 July 2024. Value: £28,500.
• Co-Investigator, QR Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) 2018/18 – UCRKE Investment Request. Project Title: Adapting substance use services in delivering values-base interventions: identification of specific research aims and objectives in the development in substance misuse services in Sao Paulo. Project duration: January 2019-31 July 2019. Value: £3,710.
• Principal Investigator, Wellcome Trust Ethics & Society Small Grant Award. Project: Particularism in Bioethics, Professional Ethics and Medicine. Project duration: November 2014-November 2015.
• Swedish Research Council Postdoctoral Research Fellowship. Project: Partial Norms (joint investigator with main investigator Professor Martin Peterson, Eindhoven University of Technology). Value: 1,350,000 SEK. (01/10/2010 – 31/12/2011).
• AHRC Doctoral Fees and Maintenance Award. Project: Understanding Moral Situations: An Essay in Particularist Epistemology. (01/10/2005 – 30/09/2009).
Pedagogical Awards
• Winner, Annual American Association of Philosophy Teachers 2016 Innovations in Teaching Award. Project title: From Photovoice to Photo-Philosophy. Joint PI with international partner Professor Sheryl Tuttle Ross of University of Wisconsin La Crosse conduct collaborative pedagogy research focussing on narrative strategies and values-based education for internationalisation in the curriculum via the online “photovoice” Learning and Teaching innovation. Value: $2000.
• Principal Investigator, Global Challenges and Internationalisation in the Curriculum, MMU Learning and Teaching Innovation Fund Award. Value: £4500
• ERASMUS Staff Mobility Grant to conduct a series of knowledge exchange activities in professional ethics for nursing educators at VID Specialized University Oslo, 10-14 March 2014.
Curatorial exhibition catalogue text:
Outreach Philosophy Programme for the Worker’s Educational Association (South Division, Reading Branch):
Newspaper article:
AHRC Peer Review College, academic (early career).
Member of the Consortium for Applied Research and Professional Education (CARPE) Future of Health Care theme. March 2014 – present.
Elected Member of European Society for Person-Centred Healthcare (ESPCH) special interest group ‘Health Philosophy’, October 2013 – present.