Nicole Yokum (she/they) joined the Philosophy Department at St. Olaf as Visiting Assistant Professor in the fall of 2023. Nicole holds bachelor's and master's degrees from Dartmouth College, and a dual-title PhD in Philosophy and Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies from Penn State. From 2021-2023, she was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Toronto.

Nicole specializes in feminist philosophy, philosophy of race, and critical theory, with supporting interests in psychoanalysis, ethics, queer theory, and Black Feminisms. Her research focuses on the politics and ethics of affect (especially indifference, anger, and bitterness), the relationship between theory and praxis, and coalition politics. Her publications include essays in Hypatia, Philosophy and Social Criticism and the Journal of Speculative Philosophy, as well as a chapter in the book Feminism and the Early Frankfurt School. Some of Nicole's forthcoming publications will be in the Oxford Handbook of Adorno, Adorno and Identity, and The Dialectics of Freedom: The Critical Theory of Angela Davis.

Nicole loves teaching at a small liberal arts college, and at St. Olaf, has participated in CURI, the ACE program, and the Honest Storytelling project. Beyond her philosophical interests, Nicole is a longtime competitive trail runner/ultrarunner and a poet, and loves going on adventures with loved ones and friends. Check out her website here!