Welcome to my website! I’m a professor of philosophy at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia. I’m originally from Chicago and completed my Ph.D. in Philosophy at the University of Wisconsin—Madison. My primary areas of research and teaching include normative and applied ethics, social and political philosophy, and feminist philosophy. Within these areas my philosophical interests are fairly broad and include topics such as meaningful work, universal basic income, awareness of suffering, the ethics of belief, and autonomy in the context of social oppression.
I’m honored to be the recipient of the 2025 Madison Scholar Award from the College of Arts and Letters at James Madison University. The Madison Scholar Award is given annually to one faculty member in the College in recognition of an outstanding record of scholarship, creative work and publication. Faculty who receive the Madison Scholar Award are nominated by their colleagues and selected by a college-wide committee of faculty.
I’m currently working on a book on the ethics of belief, described here under Current Work. Earlier this year, I completed a monograph on awareness of suffering, which is forthcoming from Bloomsbury and described here under Books. I’m also a philosopher of work. I published Meaningful Work with Oxford University Press in 2016, and I continue to be interested in questions concerning the role of work in a flourishing life. You can listen to podcast interviews about my views on meaningful work here or here. Please feel welcome to contact me at veltmaal@jmu.edu.
Andrea Veltman 