Mentorship in Method: Philosophy and Experienced Agency

Against the background of the exclusion of many feminist methodologies from mainstream philosophy, and in light of the methodological challenges of providing accounts of experience responsive to the lives of agents, in this paper I return to early feminist philosophers of emotion to highlight how they anticipate and respond to methodological criticisms. Sue Campbell (1956–2011) was one philosopher who used methodological quandaries to strengthen her account of the formation and expression of feelings (Campbell 1997 ). By rereading selected texts together intentionally for their structural and methodological strategies, I emphasize the power of formal characteristics to make insightful claims about experience possible. I consider how feminist philosophers of “experienced agency” can put these strategies to use in facing ongoing methodological criticisms, taking as a case study an account of how it can feel to act responsibly against injustice.