Rafael R Vizcaino '13
Rafael Vizcaíno graduated with a major in Philosophy and minors in Critical Theory and Latin American History. A Posner Fellow (2010) and a Leopold Fellow (2010-2011), Rafael was encouraged to apply to the MMUF program by Geraldo Cadava. As a Mellon Mays Fellow, Rafael studied the work of Karl Marx and Michel Foucault under the mentorship of Charles W. Mills and Penelope Deutscher. He also co-founded the Critical Theory Research Workshop and wrote an honors thesis (supervised by Mark Alznauer) on Jürgen Habermas's theory of deliberative democracy. In 2014, Rafael started his PhD in Comparative Literature at Rutgers University. Under the supervision of Nelson Maldonado-Torres, Rafael studied Latin American and Caribbean philosophy, especially decolonial thought, writing a dissertation on the colonial construction of the modern secular/religious divide. During his time at Rutgers, Rafael presented and published research in several venues, organized conferences and spaces for collaboration, earned a certificate in Women’s & Gender Studies, and won the Erna Neuse Prize for Best Graduate Essay in German Studies. His last year at Rutgers he was a Ford Foundation Dissertation Fellow in philosophy (2019-2020). As of September 2020, Rafael is back in Chicago, as Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy at DePaul University. He is excited to continue pursuing the transformation of the academy in this new stage, and to reconnect with the NU Mellon program.