Micah Trautmann

Philosopher | Skidmore College

I’m a political philosopher specializing in normative questions about migration and displacement, which I approach from a background in phenomenology and 20th-century German philosophy.

In general, I am interested in the ways the places we inhabit inform our well-being — shaping our access to rights and privileges, the contours of our agency, even the ways we think and feel. My primary research engages that theme via an examination and critique of the contemporary landscape of forced displacement, focusing on the harms created by state responses to people on the move and the distinct costs of protracted displacement. I also maintain a more strictly historical research program centered on Arendt and Heidegger, and have an abiding secondary interest in moral psychology and the philosophy emotions, where I am working on a set of projects on hope and despair.

I'm currently a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Skidmore College. Previously, I was a Postdoctoral Associate at the Center on Forced Displacement at Boston University, where I also completed my PhD in 2024 in the Department of Philosophy. When I'm not thinking, I like to climb rocks, garden, take photographs (the ones on this site are mine), and design and build furniture.