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Curriculum Vitae

Narrative Summary

I am currently an ABD doctoral candidate in the Philosophy and Education Program at Teachers College, Columbia University in the City of New York. I am also a scholar at the Western New England Institute for Psychoanalysis in New Haven, CT.

 

I am a first-generation college graduate from a working-class family in the Appalachians of rural Western Pennsylvania. This positionality deeply informs my entire way of life.

 

I have taught at a number of institutions, including most significantly the Philosophy Department at Fordham University. In a recent observation report, a tenured faculty member there declared that I am "among the very best college teachers [they] have seen in action, anywhere," adding that my teaching style is "radically student-centered but uncommon in its execution" and concluding that, if they could, they would "immediately hire [me] into a permanent position."

My published works have appeared in Teachers College Record (2020), the Elgar Encyclopedia of Environmental Sociology (Edward Elgar, 2024), and The Marcusean Mind (Routledge, 2024). The last of these, titled "Extinction Rebellion: A Great Refusal for the Anthropocene," was honored with awards from both the American Educational Research Association and the Center for Sustainable Futures, and it has also been nominated for the Iris Marion Young Award from the Radical Philosophy Association.

I am the recent recipient of an American Psychoanalytic Association Fellowship and the past recipient of a National Merit Scholarship.

My interdisciplinary research focuses broadly on the question of existential education in the Anthropocene. In addressing this topic, I draw primarily on the fields of aesthetic education, critical theory and critical pedagogy, environmental sociology, philosophical fiction, and psychoanalysis. Thus, with my dissertation I am articulating a concept I call "mortal foresight," or the human capacity for death vaticination, which I take to be a necessary learning outcome for any education system that aims at cultivating a "radical hope" for the survival of our species amidst the devastating existential crises we face in the Anthropocene.

 

To that same end, I am also a co-founder of Extinction Rebellion NYC, part of the global nonviolent revolutionary movement for climate and ecological justice. (Scroll to the bottom of this page to learn more about my involvement with XR.)

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Education

2025 (expected)

Ph.D., Philosophy and Education

Teachers College, Columbia University

My subfield concentration is social and political philosophy. My dissertation is titled "Mortal Foresight: Learning to Live through Extinction," and I expect to successfully defend in Spring 2025.

2014

M.A., Political Science

School of Politics and Global Studies

Arizona State University

I graduated summa cum laude with a major field in political theory and a minor field in International Relations. My thesis was titled "Reforming Deformity: John Stuart Mill as Harbinger of Nietzsche’s ‘Last Man.’”

2011

B.A., History

Barrett, the Honors College at Arizona State University

I graduated cum laude with a major concentration in United States history and a minor in political science. My honors thesis was titled "Second Nature: A Practical Application of Nietzsche's Philosophy of History for Life."

2025 (expected)

Certificate,

Scholars Program

Western New England Institute for Psychoanalysis

I am completing a two-year program of study that includes coursework on psychoanalytic theory and clinical technique. (This program does not lead to licensure.)

Awards & Interests

Accolades

SELECTED AWARDS

Iris Marion Young Award for Best Graduate Student Paper, Radical Philosophy Association (2024; nominated)

American Psychoanalytic Association Fellowship (2024-2025)
The Matilda Levy Paper Award on Environmental Sustainability,

Center for Sustainable Futures, Teachers College (2024)

Outstanding Graduate Student Paper Award,

Environmental Education special interest group,

American Educational Research Association (2024)

Provost's Dissertation Research Award,

Teachers College (2023-2024)

Full Tuition Waiver, Western New England Institute for Psychoanalysis Scholarship Committee (2023-2024)
National Merit Scholarship (2006-2010)

Research

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

​​Varrato, Rory. 2024 (in press). "Extinction Rebellion: A Great Refusal for the Anthropocene." In The Marcusean Mind (Routledge).

https://bit.ly/TheMarcuseanMind.

Varrato, Rory and Michael Dowd. 2024. "Overshoot." In Elgar Enyclopedia of Environmental Sociology (Edward Elgar).

https://doi.org/10.4337/9781803921044.ch78.

Hansen, David T., Megan J. Laverty, and Rory Varrato. 2020. “Reimagining Research and Practice at the Crossroads of Philosophy, Teaching, and Teacher Education.” Teachers College Record. https://doi.org/10.1177/016146812012200401.

Awards & Interests

Activism

EXTINCTION REBELLION NYC

I am a co-founder of Extinction Rebellion NYC, the New York City chapter of the decentralized global movement for climate and ecological justice. Extinction Rebellion (XR) utilizes mass nonviolent civil disobedience with the goal of prompting a revolutionary transfer of power into anti-capitalist democratic assemblies which would, in turn, immediately enact emergency political measures commensurate with current planetary crises. During my time with XR NYC, I have acted as the group's spokesperson, I have served as president of the board of directors for our nonprofit fundraising corporation, and I have been arrested for participating in nonviolent protest of corporate complicity with ecocide.

SELECTED MEDIA APPEARANCES

Rory Varrato Ben Kallos Extinction Rebellion statement
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