Martha Nussbaum

Martha Nussbaum is the Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics at the University of Chicago, appointed in Law, Philosophy, and Divinity. Her many books include Hiding from Humanity: Disgust, Shame, and the Law; Cultivating Humanity: A Classical Defense of Reform in Liberal Education; Frontiers of Justice: Disability, Nationality, Species Membership; and Liberty of Conscience: In Defense of America's Tradition of Religious Equality.

Deborah Solomon interviewed Nussbaum about her new book, From Disgust to Humanity: Sexual Orientation and Constitutional Law. A sample of the Q & A:

Your inquiries have lately revolved around the politics of physical revulsion, which you see as the subtext for opposition to same-sex marriage.

What is it that makes people think that a same-sex couple living next door would defile or taint their own marriage when they don’t think that, let’s say, some flaky heterosexual living next door would taint their marriage? At some level, disgust is still operating.

In your book “From Disgust to Humanity: Sexual Orientation and Constitutional Law,” which will be out in February, you draw a distinction between primary disgust and projective disgust.

What becomes really bad is the projective kind, meaning projecting smelliness, sliminess and stickiness ontoa group of people who are then stigmatized and regarded as inferior.

Read the complete Q & A.

--Marshal Zeringue