Anarchic Bodies: Foucault and the Feminist Question of Experience

The article shows that Michel Foucault's account of the sexual body is not a naive return to a prediscursive body, nor does it amount to discourse reductionism and to the exclusion of experience, as some feminists have argued. Instead, Foucault's idea of bodies and pleasures as a possibility of the counterattack against normalizing power presupposes an experiential understanding of the body. The experiential body can become a locus of resistance because it is the possibility of an unpredictable event.     

Sex,Race, and Biopower: A Foucauldian Genealogy

For many years feminists have asserted an “intersection” between sex and race. This paper, drawing heavily on the work of Michel Foucault, offers a genealogical account of the two concepts showing how they developed together and in relation to similar political forces in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Thus it attempts to give a concrete meaning to the claim that sex and race are intersecting phenomena.     

Towards a Feminist Reassessment of Intellectual Virtue

This paper presents an argument for reconceptualizing (human) intelligence as intellectual virtue, and makes same proposals as to how we would understand intellectual virtue if feminist values were taken into account. Several abilities are identified which are closely connected to one aim that is common to most feminists: the building of communities in which well-being is possible.     

Anarchic Thinking

This paper explores a possibility of atheoretical feminist thinking. Anarchic thinking is a way of thinking which is neither based on nor yields one account of truth or reality. Its particular value to feminists is its affirmation of multiple voices, ways of being and possibilities for action.     

Power,Empowerment, and Equality: Evidence for the Motives of Feminists,Nonfeminists, and Antifeminists

Both feminists and antifeminists claim they do not seek to dominate others, and accuse their ideological opponents of an insidious desire for power. The purpose of this study was to examine the motives of feminists, nonfeminists, and antifeminists by assessing their values in a context in which they would not feel that their motives regarding feminism were being scrutinized. Participants were 126 mostly European-American students. Antifeminist men placed more emphasis on their own power than did other men; but antifeminist, nonfeminist, and feminist women did not differ in emphasis placed on power. Among both men and women, antifeminists placed little importance on equality. Feminist women placed more importance on equality than did nonfeminist women, who in turn placed more importance on equality than did antifeminist women.     

Tools for a Cross‐Cultural Feminist Ethics: Exploring Ethical Contexts and Contents in the Makah Whale Hunt

Antiracist white feminists and ecofeminists have the tools but lack the strategies for responding to issues of social and environmental justice cross‐culturally, particularly in matters as complex as the Makah whale hunt. Distinguishing between ethical contexts and contents, I draw on feminist critiques of cultural essentialism, ecofeminist critiques of hunting and food consumption, and socialist feminist analyses of colonialism to develop antiracist feminist and ecofeminist strategies for cross‐cultural communication and cross‐cultural feminist ethics.     

Is Neo‐Republicanism Bad for Women?

The republican revival in political philosophy, political theory, and legal theory has produced an impressive range of novel interpretations of the historical figures of the republican tradition. It has also given rise to a variety of contemporary neo‐republican theories that build on its historical themes. Although there have been some feminist discussions of its historical representatives, neo‐republicanism has not generated a great deal of enthusiasm among feminists. The present paper examines Phillip Pettit's theory of freedom as nondomination in order to assess its potential usefulness for those with feminist goals. It defends Pettit's account of interpersonal domination from certain feminist objections, but argues that his account of state domination needs to be amended if it is fully to protect the interests of women and other groups.     

The meanings of silence: Wittgensteinian contextualism and polyphony

Radical feminists have argued that there are normative exclusions that have silenced certain voices and have rendered certain meanings unintelligible. Some Wittgensteinians (including some Wittgensteinian feminists) have argued that these radical feminists fall into a philosophical illusion by appealing to the notions of 'intelligible nonsense' and 'inexpressible meanings', an illusion that calls for philosophical therapy. In this paper I diagnose and criticize the therapeutic dilemmathat results from this interpretation of Wittgenstein's contextualism. According to this dilemma, if something is meaningful, it must be expressible from the perspective of the participantin language-games; and if it is not so expressible, it is not meaningful at all. I argue that this is a false dilemma that rests on the untenable internalist notion of a unified 'participant's perspective'. I propose an alternative contextualist view that underscores the polyphonyof language-games, that is, the irreducible multiplicity of perspectives always present in discursive practices (if only implicitly and in embryo). Through a discussion of the different meanings of silence, my polyphonic contextualism tries to show that our linguistic practices always exhibit an irreducible diversity and heterogeneity of points of view that cannot be subsumed under a unified perspective.     

Power and the origins of unhappiness: Working with individuals

Evidence that the ‘ultimate repressed’ in our understanding of emotional distress is power can be gleaned even from Freud's writing. This is a form of repression which community psychology is well placed to lift. Impossible though it is to stand outside the ‘apparatus of power’ (and, therefore to give a complete analysis of it), we cannot achieve an accurate account of the causes of human unhappiness without taking its operations into account as fully as possible. The psychological therapies do have an implicit notion of will power, but this serves only to distract our attention from the external, material nature of power. We have to be careful, moreover, not to ‘psychologize’ power by trying to turn it into an internal attribute to be ‘switched on’ by an essentially mysterious process of ‘empowerment’. We need to specify empirically the types of power that contribute to ‘clinical’ distress and give an account of ‘therapy’ in terms of the powers to which it has access (recognizing also that these are limited).     

Putting on Virtue Without Putting Off Feminists

Mary Wollstonecraft's account of virtue discourse and formation, which deploys ancient and medieval ethical resources for modern purposes, challenges a prevalent narrative in Christian ethics today. Several prominent Christian virtue ethicists have left the false impression that serious reflection on the virtues depends on pre‐modern traditions and the eschewal of modern resources. Troubled by skeptical quandaries and the difficulty of adjudicating conflicting claims about virtue, they are concerned with securing a pre‐modern court of appeals. Many feminists worry that these appeals unduly constrain because they naturalize what is contingent and fix what should be open to debate. Wollstonecraft does not share the skeptical concerns and so has no need for metaethical appeals. Adapting Edmund Burke's moral philosophy, her use of virtue discourse deploys his metaphor of “the wardrobe of the moral imagination” to more religious, radical, and democratic ends. This way of proceeding signals the possibility of a rapprochement between feminists of various stripes and those interested in deploying the discourse of the virtues for contemporary Christian ethics.     

Individuals‐in‐Communities: The Search for a Feminist Model of Epistemic Subjects

Feminist epistemologists have found the atomistic view of knowers provided by classical epistemology woefully inadequate. An obvious alternative for feminists is Lynn Hankinson Nelsons suggestion that it is communities that know. However, I argue that Nelsons view is problematic for feminists, and 1 offer instead a conception of knowers as “individuals‐in‐communities.” This conception is preferable, given the premises and goals of feminist epistemologists, because it emphasizes the relations between knowers and their communities and the relevance of these relations for epistemic assessments. Furthermore, it provides a sense of epistemic agents as active reflective inquirers, capable of transforming and improving knowledge‐seeking practices.     

Threats to Feminist Identity and Reactions to Gender Discrimination

The aim of this research was to examine conditions that modify feminists’ support for women as targets of gender discrimination. In an experimental study we tested a hypothesis that threatened feminist identity will lead to greater differentiation between feminists and conservative women as victims of discrimination and, in turn, a decrease in support for non-feminist victims. The study was conducted among 96 young Polish female professionals and graduate students from Gender Studies programs in Warsaw who self-identified as feminists (M _age ?=?22.23). Participants were presented with a case of workplace gender discrimination. Threat to feminist identity and worldview of the discrimination victim (feminist vs. conservative) were varied between research conditions. Results indicate that identity threat caused feminists to show conditional reactions to discrimination. Under identity threat, feminists perceived the situation as less discriminatory when the target held conservative views on gender relations than when the target was presented as feminist. This effect was not observed under conditions of no threat. Moreover, feminists showed an increase in compassion for the victim when she was portrayed as a feminist compared to when she was portrayed as conservative. Implications for the feminist movement are discussed.     

Faith,Family, and Feminism: Irreconcilable Differences?

The purpose of this article is to characterize and evaluate the phases through which feminist positions on the family have evolved in recent history and to suggest feminists in Christian and Jewish theology and religious studies as among the most important participants in current discussions about the family.     

Questioning Feminine Connection

This paper examines Nancy Chodorow's theory of feminine connection and masculine separation in The Reproduction of Mothering. First it demonstrates that, contrary to many feminists’ interpretations, Chodorow's theory does not portray masculine separation as a social problem to which feminine connection is the solution. Then it shows that Chodorow's apparently intended theory is incoherent. Finally, it argues that Chodorow's claims imply another theory that is coherent and that deserves feminists’ attention.     

A SHORT HISTORY OF THE FUTURE

Since the 19th century, feminists have criticized the mental health establishment and its treatment of women. Issues include the sexist use of psychoanalytic concepts and psychiatric diagnoses, the misuse of medication, and sexual misconduct in therapy. Feminists have also called attention to psychological problems arising from gender inequality in everyday life. Physical and sexual abuse of women is of special concern. Feminist innovations in therapy include consciousness-raising, sex-role resocialization, and new approaches to psychoanalysis and family therapy. We urge feminists to develop a fuller understanding of gender and power, and to use this knowledge to challenge the established theory and practice of clinical psychology.     

The Discrepancy Between How Women See Themselves and Feminists Predicts Identification with Feminism

Many women who accept the basic tenets of feminist ideology are reluctant to call themselves feminists, which is problematic because feminist self-identification is related to a variety of positive outcomes. The present research tests the idea that discrepancies between women’s self-view and feminist-view on the dimensions of competence and warmth are related to identification with feminism. This supposition is guided by the idea that a full understanding of why women have difficulty embracing feminism must take into account not only their view of feminists, but also whether women see themselves as different from feminists. Three online survey studies, which included 387, 288, and 116 adult U.S. women, demonstrate that perception of warmth identification with feminism was lower if women regard feminists as less warm than they see themselves. For perceptions of competence, the direction of this discrepancy was irrelevant: The more women see feminists as differently competent (i.e., higher or lower), the less they identify with feminists. Moreover, perceived discrepancy predicted identification with feminism even after controlling for women’s agreement with feminist values. Both endorsement of feminist values and perceived discrepancy are important in predicting identification with feminism and therefore practical interventions to maximize identification should target both of these components. For perceived discrepancy, interventions to reduce feminist-self discrepancies will likely be most effective if they target stereotypes of feminists as being cold.     

Positive Contact with Feminist Women as a Predictor of Feminist Solidarity,Gender Privilege Awareness,and Public and Domestic Support for Gender Equality in Straight Men

Men can play an important role in supporting gender equality. In the present research, we draw on Intergroup Contact Theory to examine positive intergroup contact with feminist women as one factor that can encourage men to support gender equality. In one cross-sectional study (N?=?170) and one half-longitudinal panel study (N?=?240), we found that straight men who reported more positive contact with feminist women also reported greater feminist solidarity. Cross-sectional results indicated that straight men’s solidarity with feminists, in turn, predicted more support for gender equality in public and domestic spheres and greater awareness of their gender privilege. The longitudinal results also supported the association between solidarity with feminists and gender privilege awareness, but not public and domestic support for gender equality. Decades of research has shown that positive intergroup contact can change attitudes. Our research suggests that, when it comes to gender equality, positive contact with feminist women may also encourage men to identify with feminists and raise their gender consciousness.

     

Feminism and Attachment Parenting: Attitudes, Stereotypes, and Misperceptions

This paper investigated attitudes and stereotypes about what feminist women, primarily from the United States, believed about a number of practices associated with attachment parenting which is theorized to be both feminist and non-feminist. The goals of this study were to determine whether feminists endorsed attachment parenting and whether stereotypes of feminists’ beliefs corresponded to actual feminists’ attitudes. Women were recruited online, primarily through blogs, to complete an online survey about feminism and mothering. Four hundred and thirty one women comprised the sample for the current investigation and included heterosexual-identified feminist mothers (n?=?147), feminist non-mothers (n?=?75), non-feminist mothers (n?=?143), and non-feminist non-mothers (n?=?66). Participants were asked to rate their own attitudes towards specific practices associated with attachment parenting and to indicate their perceptions of the beliefs of the typical feminist. Results indicated that feminists were more supportive of attachment parenting practices than were non-feminists. Non-feminists, particularly mothers, held misperceptions about the typical feminist, seeing them as largely uninterested in the time-intensive and hands-on practices associated with attachment parenting. Feminist mothers also held stereotypes about feminists and saw themselves as somewhat atypical feminists who were more interested in attachment parenting than they thought was typical of feminists. Our data indicated that feminists did endorse attachment parenting and that stereotypes of feminists related to attachment parenting are untrue. Furthermore, the role of feminism in the identity of feminist mothers and whether attachment parenting is truly a feminist way to parent are discussed.     

Rethinking Sadomasochism: Feminism,Interpretation, and Simulation

In reexamining the “sex war” debates between radical feminists and lesbian feminist sadomasochists, I find that the actual practice of sadomasochism provides the basis for a philosophically more complex position than has been articulated. In response to the anti-SM radical perspective, I develop a distinction between simulation and replication of patriarchal dominant/submissive activities. In light of this important epistemological and ethical distinction, I claim that the radical feminist opposition to SM needs reassessment.     

Relational Knowing and Epistemic Injustice: Toward a Theory of Willful Hermeneutical Ignorance

I distinguish between two senses in which feminists have argued that the knower is social: 1. situated or socially positioned and 2. interdependent. I argue that these two aspects of the knower work in cooperation with each other in a way that can produce willful hermeneutical ignorance, a type of epistemic injustice absent from Miranda Fricker's Epistemic Injustice. Analyzing the limitations of Fricker's analysis of the trial of Tom Robinson in Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird with attention to the way in which situatedness and interdependence work in tandem, I develop an understanding of willful hermeneutical ignorance, which occurs when dominantly situated knowers refuse to acknowledge epistemic tools developed from the experienced world of those situated marginally. Such refusals allow dominantly situated knowers to misunderstand, misinterpret, and/or ignore whole parts of the world.