Cecelia Watson received her B.A. in Liberal Arts from St. John's College, her M.A., in Philosophy from the University of Chicago, and her Ph.D from the Committee on Conceptual and Historical Studies of Science at the University of Chicago.

Her research interests include the history and philosophy of science; scientific rhetoric and style; the connections between the arts and sciences; and the humanities and the history of ideas more generally. Her dissertation focused on the influence of visual art on the scientific and philosophical work of William James, using that historical episode as a means to raise questions about current institutional divisions between art and science.

She has taught in the Writing Program and in the Humanities and Social Sciences Collegiate Divisions of the University of Chicago, and in Bard College's Workshop in Language and Thinking. She has held fellowships from the Morris Fishbein Center for the History of Science and Medicine, the Franke Institute for the Humanities, and from the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science; and she was recently the recipient of the John C. Burnham Early Career Award in the history of the human sciences.

Publications: 

"Points of Contention: Rethinking the Past, Present, and Future of Punctuation," Critical Inquiry, Vol.38 No. 3 (Spring 2012). [forthcoming] 

"The Sartorial Self: William James's Philosophy of Dress," History of Psychology, Vol.7 No. 3 (August 2004).