Heather Widdows

Heather Widdows (born 29 August 1972) is a British philosopher, specialising in applied ethics. She is currently the John Ferguson Professor of Global Ethics and Deputy Pro-Vice Chancellor for Research Impact at the University of Birmingham. Her research is in the areas of global ethics, feminist philosophy, and philosophy of health and bioethics. She has been based at the Centre for the Study of Global Ethics in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Birmingham since 2001. In 2005 she was awarded a visiting fellowship at Harvard University.

Her most recent book, Perfect Me: Beauty as an Ethical Ideal (Princeton University Press, 2018),explores how the nature of the beauty ideal is changing - becoming more dominant, demanding and global than ever before. Widdows argues that to address the harms caused by the beauty ideal, we must first understand its ethical nature. Vogue described the book as "groundbreaking", and writer and journalist Bri Lee included Perfect Me in her article Books That Changed Me.

Widdows studied at the University of Edinburgh. Following the completion of her PhD, Widdows spent a year as a post-doctoral research fellow at Imperial College London. She became part of the Department of Philosophy at the University of Birmingham as a research fellow in the Centre for the Study of Global Ethics in 2001. Widdows has continued to work there since, becoming a lecturer in 2003, senior lecturer in 2005, and professor of global ethics in 2009. She became the deputy pro-vice chancellor for research impact in 2017.

Widdows is currently the deputy chair of the REF2021 Philosophy sub-panel and a member of Nuffield Council on Bioethics. Previously she was a member of the UK Biobank Ethics and Governance Councilfrom 2005-2013, a member of the REF2014 Philosophy sub-panel, and a member of Nuffield Council on Bioethics Working Party on Cosmetic Procedures from 2015-2016.

She has published four sole-authored books: The Moral Vision of Iris Murdoch (Ashgate Publishing Ltd., 2006); Global Ethics: An Introduction (Acumen, 2011); The Connected Self: The Ethics and Governance of the Genetic Individual (Cambridge University Press, 2013) and most recently Perfect Me: Beauty as an Ethical Ideal (Princeton University Press, 2018).

Perfect Me

Perfect Me: Beauty as an Ethical Ideal (Princeton University Press) was published in 2018. Widdows was supported in writing this book by a Leverhulme Major Research Fellowship. In Perfect Me Widdows argues that beauty is functioning as ethical ideal, transforming our understandings of the world, our judgements of others and ourselves. The introduction is available here. Perfect Me was also voted one of the 19 best books of 2018 by The Atlantic, and one of the 100 best books to read in a lifetime by Edarabia.

Beauty Demands Network

Widdows is a co-founder of the Beauty Demands Network. The project began with an AHRC Network Grant on ‘The Changing Requirements of Beauty’ which finished in June 2016. Beauty Demands publishes a blog every two weeks (co-run by Widdows and Dr Fiona MacCallum, University of Warwick), and in 2016 published a Briefing Paper. The briefing paper contains key findings of the network in ethics, psychology and law, and makes policy recommendations based upon these. The briefing paper was launched at the Nuffield Council on Bioethics in June 2016.

#everydaylookism

Widdows launched a social media campaign to end body shaming at the Annual Global Ethics Conference at the University of Birmingham in June 2019. Widdows argues that lookism is a prejudice that is more prevalent and more damaging in a virtual culture where our bodies are ourselves. Body shaming is shaming people. Lookism has become so common that we have come to accept it, and even worse, expect it. The campaign asks people to share their lookism stories on social media using the hashtag or anonymously via the website.

Below is a selection of Heather's popular media articles and appearances.

Articles By Heather

• New Year, New You? Why We Think a Better Body Will be a Better Self - The Conversation (January, 2020)
• Join the #everydaylookism Campaign - Psychology Today (November, 2019)
• What's Wrong with Body Positivity? - Psychology Today (July, 2019)
• Plastic Perfection: Wanting the "Love Island" Body - Psychology Today (June, 2019)
• How Positive is Body Positivity? - Psychology Today (April, 2019)
• My Body, My Self? - Psychology Today (January, 2019)
• Dying for the Perfect Butt - why is There a Rising Demand for the Deadliest Cosmetic Procedure? - Psychology Today (October, 2018)
• Body Hair is Natural - Society Thinking Otherwise is Dangerous - Time (June 2018)
• I Feel Pretty's Intentions are Good, but it Fails to Deliver an Empowering Message - Huffington Post (May 2018)
• If You Want to Lose Weight, Ask Yourself: is This Really Self-Improvement? - The Conversation (January, 2018)
• How the Duty to be Beautiful is Making Young Girls Feel Like Failures - The Conversation (June, 2017)

Radio and Podcasts

• Out of the Vat #5 - Heather Widdows - Out of the Vat Podcast, LSE (February, 2020)
• Do the Clothes Maketh the Human? - The Forum for Philosophy (December, 2019)
• An Introduction to Intuitive Exercise, with Tally Rye - Body Cons Podcast (July, 2019)
• "You'd be Very Pretty if you Lost Weight": Birmingham Professor Launches Campaign Against 'Lookism' - Free Radio (June, 2019)
• What is #everydaylookism? - Adrian Goldberg's talk show (June, 2019)
• What is Beautiful? – Stance podcast (December, 2018)
• What Will we See in the Mirror of Erised? - Fantastic Research, University of Birmingham (November, 2018)
• Beauty - Ugliness - Thinking Allowed, BBC Radio 4 (July, 2018)
• Ethics, Beauty and the Handmaid's Tale - Appearance Matters podcast (July, 2018)
• The Body, Past and Present - Free Thinking, BBC Radio 3 (June, 2018)
• The Beauty Imperative - The Philosopher's Zone, ABC Radio, Australia (April, 2018)
• The Moral Philosophy of Beauty - 3CR, Australia (April, 2018)
• Are we Becoming too Preoccupied with Beauty? - Philosophy 24/7 (March, 2018)

TV

• What Makes Me, Me? - Royal Institution Christmas Lectures, BBC 4 (December 2018)
• Panel Discussion on Labiaplasty - Victoria Derbyshire, BBC 2 (July 2017)

In addition to her books, Widdows has published numerous articles in peer-reviewed journals and chapters in edited collections.

Books

• Perfect Me: Beauty as an Ethical Ideal (Princeton University Press, 2018)
• The Connected Self: The Ethics and Governance of the Genetic Individual (Cambridge University Press, 2013).
• Global Ethics: An Introduction (Acumen, 2011).
• The Moral Vision of Iris Murdoch (Ashgate Publishing Ltd., 2006).

Edited collections

• Handbook of Global Ethics, Edited with Darrel Moellendorf [de] (Routledge, 2014)
• Global Social Justice, Edited with Nicola Smith (Routledge, 2011).
• The Governance of Genetic Information: Who Decides?, Edited with Caroline Mullen (Cambridge University Press, 2008).
• Women's Reproductive Rights, Edited with Itziar Alkorta Idiakez and Aitziber Emaldi Cirión (Palgrave, 2006).

Peer reviewed journal articles

• ‘The Demands of Beauty: Editors’ Introduction’, with Fiona MacCallum, in Health Care Analysis (2018), 26:3, pp.207-219.
• ‘The Neglected Harms of Beauty: Beyond Engaging Individuals’, in Journal of Practical Ethics (2017), 5:2, pp.1-29.
• ‘Altered Images: Understanding the Influence of Unrealistic Images and Beauty Aspirations’, with Fiona MacCallum, in Health Care Analysis (2016), 26:3, pp.235-245.