Dear all,
After consulting with our colleagues at the other Philosophy departments in Aotearoa New Zealand, we've decided to postpone this year's on-the-ground NZAP conference at Massey University by twelve months. The main reasons are probably quite obvious:
- Currently, the likelihood that at least some region(s) in New Zealand will be at COVID alert levels above 1 at the start of December seems rather high.
- Many universities encourage their staff to both work remotely from home even at alert level 2 as well as refrain from national travel.
This makes planning and preparing for an event this year very difficult not just for the organisers but also for our guests. In addition, due to Delta's high transmissibility it's likely that on-the-ground events like our conference would require social distancing and the wearing of masks, neither of which is conducive to having the kind of philosophers' get-together that we all look forward to.
We're currently still exploring the option of having a small online event to avoid not philosophising together in December this year at all. Given that the annual NZAP members' meeting will have to be conducted online anyway, it might make sense to plan some virtual seminars around it (even if many of us are suffering from Zoom fatigue).
If you have any comments or questions, please do get in touch with us.
Ngā manaakitanga,
Massey Philosophy
