Viviane Fairbank

I am a journalist and philosopher currently based in Scotland. My journalism and philosophy overlap in some ways, but not others, and this website includes information about both.

Philosophy

I am a PhD student at the St Andrews and Stirling Graduate Programme in Philosophy (SASP), based in Scotland. My primary research is on normative pragmatism and the notion of objectivity in the philosophy of logic. I am also interested in feminist philosophy, epistemology, and the philosophy of science.

I received my MA in philosophy from Concordia University in Montreal in 2022. In autumn 2021 and autumn 2023, I was a visiting scholar at the University of Pittsburgh's Department of Philosophy. And in winter 2022, I was a visiting scholar at the Institute of History and Philosophy of Sciences and Techniques at Paris 1 University.

I am the editor of the Logic and Philosophy of Logic section of the Diversity Reading List in Philosophy.

Journalism

With Allison Baker, I am co-founder and project lead of the Truth in Journalism Project, an initiative focused on the nature and methodology of fact-based journalism. We educate students and professionals in editorial fact-checking, and we encourage public discussion about the notions of accuracy and objectivity in journalism, especially when it comes to reporting on trauma, marginalized communities, identity, and lived experience. We are the co-authors of the Truth in Journalism Fact-Checking Guide, which articulates new guidelines for editorial fact-checking that are rigorous, inclusive, and informed by interdisciplinary expertise. For this work, we were awarded the 2021 Michener-L. Richard O'Hagan Fellowship for Journalism Education.

Previously, I was an editor and head of research at The Walrus in Canada. I have written, edited, and fact-checked for The Walrus, the Globe & Mail, Harper's, NPR, the Literary Review of Canada, Reader's Digest, TVO, Toronto Life, BESIDE, the Review of Journalism, and Smithsonian—and I was nominated for Best New Writer at the 2017 National Magazine Awards. Currently, I'm interested in reading and writing about feminism, science, and cultural concepts.