Mitch Clearfield

Mitch’s work focuses on issues related to harm and repair in general, and to criminal justice in particular. He is currently exploring the applicability and limitations of restorative justice, a framework which centers accountability and amends, especially as defined by the harmed person(s). He is also thinking a lot about the role that various forms of forgiveness – and lack of forgiveness – can play in healthy personal relationships and social arrangements.

Mitch is the creator and director of the Whitman at the Penitentiary Program, which encompasses a wide variety of classes and other academic opportunities that bring together students from campus and incarcerated students, working together as peers within the Washington State Penitentiary.  He is an active volunteer in other programs at the Penitentiary and a trained facilitator in Washington State’s Victim-Offender Dialogue program.

Mitch’s original background was in the philosophy of language and pragmatism. He particularly focused on the work of Ludwig Wittgenstein, Donald Davidson, Richard Rorty and Robert Brandom.

In his free time, Mitch enjoys playing guitar (poorly), and playing cards and games with his friends. He also loves cats, but thought for many years that he was allergic to them. Now that he's learned that he isn't, he's fighting the urge to adopt 100 cats at once.

M.A.
University of Notre Dame

B.A.
University of Pennsylvania

Here are some syllabi from Mitch's recent classes:

• GENS 176 – Incarceration
• PHIL 141 – Punishment & Responsibility
• PHIL 218 – Restorative Justice, taught at the Penitentiary
• PHIL 219 – Case Studies in Applied Ethics, taught at the Penitentiary
• PHIL 220 – Forgiveness & Repair, taught at the Penitentiary
• PHIL 270 – The Nature of Persons
• PHIL 329 – Wittgenstein
• PHIL 336 – Language & Meaning