## 1. The Tradition Analytic Feminists Share with Other Analytic Philosophers



Contemporary analytic philosophers, feminist and nonfeminist, can be
characterized roughly as follows: they consider (some of)
 Frege,
 Russell,
 Moore,
 Wittgenstein, and the
 Logical Positivists
 to be their intellectual ancestors; they tend to prize explicit
argumentation and the literal, precise, and clear use of language;
they often value the roles of philosophy of language, epistemology,
and logic; and they typically view their stock of philosophical
concepts, methods, and assumptions to be a) consistent with their
Modern European heritage, and b) in contrast with methods originating
in continental Europe since 1900, from phenomenology and
existentialism through poststructuralism and new materialism.



Of course, each strand of mid-twentieth-century, "classic"
analytic philosophy has changed greatly. Many central dogmas have been
undermined, and nonfeminists and feminists alike have
"naturalized", "socialized", and otherwise
modulated the earlier, more abstract and highly normative enterprises
and doctrines. However, regardless of the extent of the evolution of
"analytic philosophy", the degree to which methodological
boundaries are blurred today, and the fruitfulness of intersections
among methods, a number of feminist and nonfeminist philosophers
continue to think of themselves in the historical trajectory of
analytic philosophy and find the tradition valuable. They claim the
term "analytic philosopher" for themselves, even if others
might prefer the term
 "post-analytic".[2]


## 2. What Analytic Feminists Share with Other Feminist Philosophers



One way to encapsulate the agreement in positions and values among
feminist philosophers, regardless of their methodological
inclinations, is to say that for feminist philosophers, both
philosophy and gender *matter*--both are important to the
lives of human beings. Feminists recognize that philosophy and
philosophers are part of the wider set of institutions of culture in
which human beings live, understand themselves, and, only sometimes,
flourish. Among the many functions of philosophy are the following: to
help us to understand ourselves and our relations to each other, to
our communities, and to the state; to appreciate the extent to which
we are counted as knowers and moral agents; to uncover the assumptions
and methods of various bodies of knowledge, and so on. These kinds of
philosophical insights--ones that concern our methods,
assumptions, theories, and concepts--can contribute to the
oppression of human beings as well as to their liberation (see, for
example, Langton 2000 and Vogler 1995). Given the current
imbalances of power and privilege with which people live, philosophy
has social effects when it "leaves everything as it is".
When feminist philosophers say that traditional philosophy is already
political, they are calling attention to these social effects.
Feminists seek "engaged" philosophy that is potentially
useful to empower human beings rather than contribute to the
perpetuation of a status quo in which people are subordinated by
gender, race/ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, and so on. Of
course, feminist philosophers disagree about the appropriate ways to
work this out, but they do agree that philosophy can influence lives
and should influence them for the better.



A second area of agreement among feminist philosophers is that gender
affects not only our lives, but also philosophy itself. Feminists
criticize the misogyny of philosophers and the overt and covert
sexism, androcentrism, and related forms of male bias in philosophy.
For example, philosophers have through the centuries made a variety of
false and demeaning claims about "the nature of woman";
they have defined central concepts such as reason in ways that
excluded women of their cultures; they have made allegedly universal
claims about human nature, desire, or motivation that were, in fact,
claims more likely to be true of men of their own social class; and
they have believed methods and positions to be
"value-neutral" and "objective" that were
instead promoting the interests of only the privileged groups. Once
again, while feminist philosophers agree on the existence of such
kinds of male bias, they differ over the best ways to criticize it,
the extent to which various philosophical approaches can be
reconstructed for feminist use, and so on. We turn to examples in
sections five through seven below.



Feminist philosophers argue that the kinds of male-biased views just
noted limit and distort philosophy on many levels--from
individual concepts such as reason or autonomy to entire fields such
as philosophy of mind. The remedy for these distortions and
limitations is not to substitute "female bias" for
"male bias", but to understand the variety of roles that
gender plays in the construction of philosophy. Feminists believe that
even as philosophers pursue their traditional goals, the likelihood of
progress toward them is increased by heeding feminists' more
inclusive and self-reflexive approach.



It is important to be clear that feminist philosophers realize that
traditional philosophy has been written largely by men who are
privileged in ways that go far beyond their gender. Feminists today
maintain that gender is only one facet of a complex nexus of mutually
influencing axes of oppression and privilege that structure society
and the social identities of human beings; other facets include
race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, class, and so on.
Feminist philosophers doing "intersectional analysis" try
to attend to this complexity. Although gender is only one facet, it is
nevertheless an important one with a wide variety of implications for
the way we should do philosophy. Most feminists share points in common
as they continue to critique other philosophers as well as try to
reconstruct philosophy that is neither male-biased nor oppressive in
any other respect. Let's briefly note a few of these points
before moving on to disagreements.


* Since many traditional philosophers believe that their own
theories or methods have universal applicability, feminists find it
appropriate to hold these philosophers' feet to the fire.
Feminists explain that part of what it means for a moral theory or an
epistemology to be universal is that it must be applicable to and
usable by a full range of human beings, not just to and by members of
a dominant social group. For example, a moral theory should allow for
moral agency for any person regardless of social status and specific
complex identity. An epistemological theory should be able to analyze
fairly a full range of cognitive situations of a wide variety of human
beings. A good philosophical theory or method would systematically
disadvantage no one: men, women--whether cis or
transgender--as well as nonbinary individuals from any social
group. For example, it would disparage no one's experiences, no
one's authority as a knower, and no one's goals as a moral
or political agent. Such an approach postulates neither the
"sameness" of everyone nor the existence of "group
differences". Instead, it asks that philosophers attend to the
full range of human beings, including their wide variety of
experiences, interests and situations, when purporting to construct
"universally applicable" theories.
* It is dangerous to stop paying attention to gender too soon. Even
if a feminist philosopher has a long-term goal of minimizing the
importance of gender, there is a risk of leaving too much unanalyzed
if one leaps immediately from male-biased philosophy to gender-neutral
philosophy. Attention to the influence of gender implies a recognition
that philosophy is embedded in social structures and practices, so
feminist philosophers tend to use "naturalized" or
"socialized" methods to explain the "located"
or "situated" character of the subject who does philosophy
as well as the objects of philosophical reflection. Of course, the
details here vary widely among feminists. A related notion,
"nonideal" philosophy (Mills 2005), is embraced by many
feminists who express the desire to produce philosophy that is
grounded in the material world full of human beings and institutions,
all of which are flawed in very complex ways.
* Philosophy must be normative at the same time it includes a
naturalized or socialized component. Feminist philosophers, like many
nonfeminist philosophers, struggle to maintain the level of
normativity that they require in order to serve their philosophical
and political goals. Again, details will vary concerning what level or
kind of normativity is necessary.



Although we return later to controversial aspects of these points,
feminist consensus is that although philosophy is a discipline that
purports to be about and for all humanity, it has not been.
Philosophers have not appreciated the extent to which their theories
and methods have underwritten and perpetuated cultures that have
prevented the flourishing of at least half of their populations.
Philosophy that reflects a feminist sensibility would take account of
the relevance of philosophy to the lives of all human beings and
promote the flourishing of every person. At the same time it would
help philosophy to more nearly approximate its own ideals.


## 3. Various Ways to Characterize Differences Among Feminist Philosophers



Although an essay on analytic feminism focuses our attention on
differences among philosophical methods that feminists favor, these
distinctions were not salient in the early days of contemporary
feminist philosophy in the 1970s. Even during the 1980s and 1990s when
methodological and other differences came under more scrutiny, the
question of whether a feminist philosopher finds more valuable
resources in analytic philosophy or in pragmatism, poststructuralism,
phenomenology, Marxism, critical theory, or hermeneutics was of more
concern to certain academic feminist philosophers than it was to the
wider feminist scholarly or political communities. In fact, academic
feminist philosophers in many parts of the world report taking less
note of feminists' methodological distinctions than do feminist
philosophers in North
 America.[3]



Today, although many feminist philosophers' mainstream
philosophical education still often focuses on one philosophical
method or tradition, one can find "analytic feminists"
discussing Beauvoir, Foucault, or Butler without hesitation. It is
fair to say that because of feminist philosophers' political
values and desire to communicate with other feminists, they are more
motivated to search for methodological cross-fertilization than are
many nonfeminist philosophers. (See the entries on
 intersections between pragmatist and Continental feminism
 and
 intersections between analytic and Continental feminism.)



The categories of feminist philosophies/theories most widely known
outside academic philosophy since the 1970s are those developed by
Alison Jaggar based on political values, goals, and assumptions.
Jaggar distinguishes liberal, radical, classical Marxist, and
socialist feminism. Each kind of feminism identifies the principal
sources of women's oppression and encompasses an epistemology
and a theory of human nature as well as political theory and
strategies for social change
 (1983)[4]
 It is very important to note that some women of color have long
objected to the widespread and hegemonic use of these categories (see
Sandoval 1991, 2000). In addition, because the categories are based in
political theories, it is not surprising that they function better in
social/political theorizing both in and outside of philosophy than for
philosophers doing metaphysics, philosophy of science, aesthetics, and
so on.



Sandra Harding developed a different widely used set of categories of
feminist philosophies in the context of philosophy of science and
epistemology (1986). Harding distinguishes feminist empiricists
(practicing natural and social scientists who tended to rely on
logical positivist theories), feminist standpoint theorists who drew
from Marxist epistemology, and feminist postmodernists. Although
Harding is distinguishing feminists by philosophical methodology, it
is important to emphasize that her category of "feminist
empiricist" captures a trend among pathbreaking women scientists
who aimed to hold scientific practice to alleged standards of
scientific objectivity and neutrality; however, the assumptions behind
this trend are not what philosophers today have in mind when speaking
of feminist empiricism. Contemporary analytic feminist empiricist
philosophers tend to be post-Wittgensteinian-Quinean-Davidsonian
empiricists, so not subject to the principal objections Harding raised
of the scientists. See, for example, Longino (1990, 2002), Nelson
(1990), Solomon (2001), E. Lloyd (2008), as well as essays collected
in Scheman and O'Connor (2002), Nelson and Nelson (2003), Clough
(2003), Superson and Brennan (2005), Grasswick (2011), Crasnow and
Superson (2012), and Garavaso (2018).



As we will see in more detail below, analytic feminists are among
those who argue that they are not captured by either Jaggar's or
Harding's sets of categories. The analytic feminists who
distinguish their philosophical method from their political values and
assumptions would reject, for example, a necessary connection between
being either an analytic philosopher or an empiricist and being a
 liberal.[5]


## 4. Characteristics of Analytic Feminism



Although there had been feminist philosophers using analytic methods
since the late 1960s, as feminist philosophy developed in the areas of
epistemology, philosophy of science, and metaphysics there were
clusters of controversies over the compatibility of feminist politics
with a preference for analytic philosophical methods. Panels at
American Philosophical Association meetings and discussions at the
Society for Women in Philosophy generated essays that explored these
matters. See, for example, issues of *The APA Newsletter on
Feminism and Philosophy* (Tuana 1992; Meyers & Antony
1993).



The term "analytic feminist" came into use in the early
1990s in North America. Virginia Klenk proposed a Society for
Analytical Feminism (see
 Other Internet Resources)
 in 1991 and was its first president (Cudd & Norlock 2018 recount
the story). Ann Cudd characterized analytic feminism on the
organization's website (see Cudd 1996 [2006) and in a special
issue of *Hypatia* on Analytic Feminism (Cudd & Klenk
1995). She notes that there is at best a family resemblance among
analytic feminists. Among the characteristics she cites are the
following:



> 
> 
> Analytic feminism holds that the best way for scholars to counter
> sexism and androcentrism is through forming a clear conception of and
> pursuing truth, logical consistency, objectivity, rationality,
> justice, and the good while recognizing that these notions have often
> been perverted by androcentrism throughout the history of philosophy
> .... Analytic feminism holds that many traditional philosophical
> notions are not only normatively compelling, but also in some ways
> empowering and liberating for women. While postmodern feminism rejects
> the universality of truth, justice and objectivity and the univocality
> of "women", analytic feminism defends these notions. (Cudd
> 1996 [2006: 158])
> 
> 
> 



As we flesh out the family resemblances among analytic feminists it is
important to remember that these resemblances include not only
substantive positions, but also styles of presentation and other
practices. Further, as we have already noted in the first two
sections, analytic feminists share resemblances with others in their
even larger "family" that includes both non-analytic
feminists and nonfeminist analytic philosophers. A large and diverse
family indeed!


### 4.1 Doctrines, Desires, and Tools



Although Cudd lists a few traditional concepts that analytic feminists
want to retain, she makes clear that this is no manifesto. Many who
consider themselves feminists in the analytic tradition hold that
there are no doctrines required of analytic feminists; indeed, there
is even a spirit of contrarianism about such matters, including over
"the univocality of 'women.'" Nevertheless,
analytic feminists share something that we might call a *core
desire* rather than a core doctrine, namely, the desire to retain
enough of the central normative concepts of the modern European
tradition to support the kind of normativity required by both feminist
politics and philosophy. For example, they believe that feminist
politics requires that claims about oppression or denial of rights be
true or false and able to be justified and that philosophy requires
much the same thing.



This "core desire" finds its expression, for example, in
the ways analytic feminists use some of what we might call the
"core concepts" that Cudd mentions above: truth, logical
consistency, objectivity, rationality and justice. Although, as noted
in the
 section 1
 above, analytic feminists agree with other feminist philosophers that
important facets of these concepts are male-biased, analytic feminists
*defend* the concepts in ways that other feminists do not. At
the same time analytic feminists disagree among themselves about a
number of matters, for example, what kinds of accounts of truth or
objectivity should prevail or whether scientific realism or
anti-realism is a better strategy. We will spell out some of these
details later as we discuss analytic feminists' defense of
analytic philosophy in the sixth section, on
 analytic feminists' responses to critiques.



Pieranna Garavaso's 2018 characterization of analytic feminism
recasts core concepts or desires in terms of toolkits and ways of
reading:



> 
> 
> Analytic feminists are philosophers who use methodological approaches
> often learned while training in analytic philosophy--that is, the
> ever-expanding toolkit that may include such instruments as conceptual
> and logical analysis, use of argumentation, thought experiments,
> counterexamples, and so forth--and who read classical and
> contemporary philosophical texts through a filter that highlights the
> existence and the effects of various systems of social inequality such
> as gender, race, class, physical and mental abilities, and sexual
> orientation. (Garavaso 2018: 8)
> 
> 
> 


### 4.2 Bridge Building



Analytic feminists' use of these toolkits and concepts and their
feminist reading of the work of traditional analytic philosophers
allow them to converse with and build bridges among different groups
of scholars, for example, traditional analytic philosophers, other
feminist philosophers, and, in some cases, scientists or scholars in
social studies of science. This is sometimes an explicit goal of their
work (see Fricker and Hornsby 2000, 4-5 and Superson 2011), but
is more often implied. Two analytic feminist philosophers of science
for whom this is an explicit goal are Lynn Hankinson Nelson and Helen
Longino. Nelson sees her work in feminist empiricism that builds upon
Quine as a way to engage philosophers of science, scientists and
feminists in constructive conversation (Nelson 1990 and subsequent
essays, e.g., 1996). Longino, in *The Fate of Knowledge* (2002)
takes bold steps to dissolve the rational-social dichotomy by
untangling the assumptions made by social and cultural studies of
science scholars, historians and philosophers of science, and
scientists. Interestingly, Longino's 2002 and 2013 books are not
cast in "feminist" terms, but build on her overtly
feminist work from the 1980s and 1990s and are informed by many
decades of feminist philosophy conversations.



Analytic feminists' styles of writing also have implications for
bridge building. Because analytic feminists value explicit
argumentation and clear, literal, and precise uses of language their
work "looks like philosophy" to nonfeminist analytic
philosophers; it makes nonfeminist philosophers feel more comfortable
engaging in feminist discussion. At the same time, feminist
philosophers from various philosophical traditions often engage with
each other's work outside their own "preferred
method" because of feminists' shared values and goals.
Thus non-analytic feminists who might find an analytic writing style
tediously overqualified or otherwise confining still
engage--along with nonfeminist analytic philosophers--in
fruitful bridge-building conversations. Editors of analytic feminist
anthologies and special issues of journals often have explicit
bridge-building intentions that rest both on authors' style and
 content.[6]
 Examples of anthologies and journal issues that tie well with
traditional analytic philosophy are Antony and Witt (1993 [2002]),
Cudd and Klenk (1995), Haslanger (1995a), Fricker and Hornsby (2000),
Superson and Brennan (2005), Crasnow and Superson (2012), and Garavaso
(2018); examples of books or symposia that intentionally build bridges
across feminist methods include Superson (2003), Witt (2011b), Garry,
Khader, and Stone (2017).


### 4.3 Style and Aggression



Although arguing explicitly is not to be equated with arguing
aggressively or in an adversarial manner, analytic feminists have
addressed the issue of stylistic aggressiveness. We must distinguish
two related issues on this subject: first, an aggressive manner of
arguing in general, and second, Janice Moulton's critique of the
"adversary method" as a paradigm in philosophy--and
specifically in analytic philosophy (1983). Moulton's point is
not simply that the socially constructed belief that aggression is an
unladylike/unfeminine characteristic puts women at a disadvantage
(indeed, in a double bind) in careers such as philosophy that equate
aggression with competence. She also focuses on the ways in which the
use of the adversary method as a paradigm of philosophy limits and
distorts the work of philosophers.



Moulton uses "the adversary method" to refer to the view
of philosophy in which the philosopher's task is to develop
general claims, produce counterexamples to each other's general
claims, and use only deductive reasoning (1983: 152-153). If
this is the paradigm of philosophy rather than simply one strategy
among many, then the discipline excludes many fruitful kinds of
exploration and development, distorts the history of philosophy, and
(because it works best in well-defined areas, even isolated arguments)
greatly narrows the scope of philosophical concerns. Moulton also sees
integrated into this paradigm several ideals of which she is critical,
for example, "value-free" reasoning and objectivity.
Interestingly, she does not draw illustrations from the obvious
examples in analytic philosophy such as Edmund Gettier's
analysis of "*S* knows that *p*" and the decades
of responses to it. Instead she uses an early feminist essay, Judith
Thomson's "A Defense of Abortion" (1971), to show
ways in which important facets of a substantive issue can be set aside
because of restrictions imposed by the adversary method.



I know of no feminist who has argued in print against Moulton's
specific argument opposing the adversary method, although some have
made further distinctions (for example, Govier 1999 and Rooney
2010). Nevertheless, some analytic feminists have pointed to the value
of arguing aggressively in general. For example, Louise Antony values
the gender transgression and feelings of empowerment and freedom that
can stem from a woman's using an aggressive analytic style of
writing and argument (Antony 2003, see also Baber 1993). More recent
treatments of aggressive or adversarial styles have arisen in
discussions of the persistently low number of women in philosophy,
compared with other humanistic disciplines (see, for example, Burrow
2010, Rooney 2010, Beebee 2014, and for a differing view that centers
Black women, see Henning 2018, 2020). This issue is not one that finds
analytic feminists (or any others) in unanimity. Underlying the
disagreement over style are important shared goals: to offer clear,
rational support for feminist positions and to remain respectful of
the other person while disagreeing. Feminist philosophers find the
latter to be especially important, but peculiarly elusive, when they
are disagreeing among themselves. The parameters of respectful
disagreement have engendered interesting
 debate.[7]


### 4.4 Reconstructing Philosophy



We noted in the
 second section
 that feminist philosophers with a variety of methodological and
political backgrounds would agree that *if* a philosopher
claims universal applicability for a theory or method, it must be
usable by people of any gender from a variety of complex social
locations. Many analytic feminists use a similar approach to the
*construction* of feminist philosophy. They tend to be wary of
creating specialized fields/types of philosophy that are relevant only
to (some or all) women or feminists, for example, ethics or
epistemology that is only for lesbians or is
"gynocentric". Analytic feminists tend to propose that
feminist ethics or feminist metaphysics would instead establish new
*criteria of adequacy* for ethics or metaphysics. The authors
in *The Cambridge Companion to Feminism in Philosophy* provide
excellent examples of this approach (Fricker & Hornsby 2000). This
approach can be spelled out in terms similar to some used in
 Section 2:
 An adequate philosophical theory, method or concept is one that
"works" for women as well as everyone else.
"Works" is very inclusive here: it cannot be enmeshed in a
philosophical system that has oppressive consequences large or small;
its theories and concepts must reflect and be applicable to the full
range of experiences, interests, and situations of all sorts of women,
men, and nonbinary people. Note that this view requires no commitment
to claims about feminist standpoints, nor does it treat women as a
uniform class of any kind. It is obvious that experiences vary
according to a number of different axes--not only along the
commonly cited axes of social class, sexual orientation,
race/ethnicity, physical or mental abilities, and gender--but
also in terms of individual variation as well as other general
factors. This approach leaves open many substantive questions about
the long-term interests of different individuals and groups. It also
permits one to point out the importance of having a variety of
perspectives without maintaining that there is something
"essential" about these perspectives.



As analytic feminism has become an increasingly developed field, its
practitioners have expanded the range of resources upon which they
draw as they reconstruct philosophy. Some analytic feminists alongside
others pursuing engaged scholarship, have argued that traditional
philosophy and feminist philosophy alike need to reflect the
complexities of intersectional analyses of gender, race/ethnicity,
sexuality, disability, class, and so on (Bailey 2010 and Garry 2012
took particular aim at analytic feminists in their arguments for
intersectionality). Philosophers need to draw on feminist critical
race theory, critical disability studies, and queer and trans theory
to enrich their understanding of the ways in which various axes of
oppression and privilege intermesh.



Reconstructing philosophy also requires understanding the roles that
privilege and oppression play in the widespread construction of
epistemic ignorance and in practices that result in epistemic
injustice and epistemic oppression. A rapidly growing body of
literature in the twenty-first century, for example, Miranda Fricker
(2007) and Kristie Dotson (2011, 2014) as well as multiple authors in
Nancy Tuana and Shannon Sullivan (2006),in Sullivan and Tuana (2007),
and in Ian Kidd, Jose Medina, and Gaile Pohlhaus (2017) call to
our attention both the depth with which privilege has been constructed
and the ways its tentacles reach into multiple facets of our epistemic
and moral
 lives.[8]See
 entry on
 feminist social epistemology
 for more detailed discussion.


## 5. Twentieth Century Feminist Criticism of Analytic Philosophy



Although every philosophical method is subject to feminist critique,
"classic" analytic philosophy might seem to be a paradigm
case of "male-biased philosophy"--a kind of
philosophy least hospitable to feminist values. Among the features
that feminists have criticized are that it is committed to pure
objectivity and value-neutrality, and uses an unlocated, disembodied,
disinterested, autonomous individual reasoner, knower, and agent.
Having stated it this boldly, let us look briefly at examples of late
twentieth-century arguments offered by feminists who themselves had
analytic training that became classic critiques of analytic
philosophy. In
 Section 6
 we will turn to the responses of other analytic feminists to
understand why they nevertheless find valuable resources in the
analytic tradition.



In some respects it is hard to disentangle feminist
philosophers' critiques of analytic philosophy from their
broader critiques of Western thought because sometimes their critique
of analytic philosophy is supported by their critiques of either its
antecedents in modern philosophy or its sister scientific disciplines.
For example, when Jaggar criticized abstract individualism and other
concepts of modern liberal political theory her critique was also
relevant to the disinterested, detached investigator prized by the
logical positivists. Jaggar faults liberalism for


1. its normative dualism that arises when the mental capacity for
rationality is "what is especially valuable about human
beings" (1983: 40),
2. abstract individualism--"the assumption that the
essential human characteristics are properties of individuals and are
given independently of any particular social context" (1983:
42), and
3. its assumption that rationality is instrumental, value-neutral,
and detached.



Jaggar did not claim that her critique applied to analytic philosophy
beyond positivism, but notes that neopositivist values are held in
normative theories even in the late twentieth century. She is
thinking, for example, of political or moral theorists'
characterization of objectivity as impartiality and lack of bias
(1983: 357).



Among Sandra Harding's analyses of the discourses upon which
feminists draw, the most relevant to analytic philosophy is her
account of empiricism as practiced by natural and social scientists.
Although Harding is speaking about scientists rather than
philosophers, her critique of the limitations of the empiricist
view--especially its assumed account of "value-free"
objectivity--is also applicable to philosophers who utilize this
concept of objectivity. Harding advocates that feminists retain a
notion of objectivity that incorporates appropriate values (her
"strong objectivity") and criticizes the
empiricists' alleged "value-free" objectivity by the
use of the arguments below.


1. It perpetuates the values of the researchers, and is, in differing
ways, both too narrow and too broad. It is too narrow because it can
detect only values that differ between researchers and
"competent" critics, and too broad because it purports to
eliminate all social values, when it may well be that some values
benefit science while others undermine it (Harding 1991:
143-4).
2. It is politically and morally regressive; for example, it
constructs science in a way that permits scientists to be "fast
guns for hire" rather than individuals who attend to the moral
and political values that support and are implied by their actions.
(Harding 1991: 158-9)
3. It is linked to other implausible views. Examples include, first,
that only false beliefs have social causes while true beliefs have
natural ones, and, second, that the ideal agent must create and
constantly police the borders of a gulf, a no-man's-land,
between himself as the subject and the object of his research,
knowledge, or action
  

in order to be "a self whose mind would perfectly reflect the
world" (1991: 158). Harding utilizes Nancy Hartsock's term
"abstract masculinity" for this last idea (Harding 1991:
158).



Nancy Holland utilizes the overlapping critiques of Harding and
Jaggar, particularly that of abstract individualism, and takes them to
be telling of Anglo-American philosophy in general (she considers
Locke and Hume as well as contemporary analytic philosophers to
exemplify Anglo-American philosophy). Holland focuses on the
metaphysical assumptions of empiricism that exclude women from
philosophy. She writes that contemporary analytic philosophy,



> 
> 
> by remaining within the Empiricist tradition, inherits not only the
> problems of that tradition, but also a self-definition that identifies
> it as necessarily men's philosophy.... [Men's]
> philosophy defines itself throughout its history in such a way as to
> exclude what our culture defines as women's experience from what
> is considered to be properly philosophical. (1990: 3)
> 
> 
> 



Although Jane Duran values the rigor of analytic philosophy and wants
to incorporate it into feminist epistemology, she sees analytic
epistemology ("pure epistemology") as a recent incarnation
of "a masculinist, androcentric tradition that yields a
hypernormative, idealized, and stylistically aggressive mode of
thought" (1991: 8). She appeals not only to Harding, but also to
Evelyn Fox Keller (1985) and Susan Bordo (1987) as well as to Janice
Moulton's (1983) critique of the adversary paradigm discussed
above in
 Section 4.
 Duran's examples of traits that have been seen as androcentric
include,



> 
> 
> analysis in terms of logically necessary and sufficient conditions,
> lack of allusion to descriptively adequate models, the importance of
> counterexampling, putative universalization of the conditions, and so
> forth. (1991: 44)
> 
> 
> 



Naomi Scheman refers to herself as an "analytic philosopher
semi-manque"--one who has left the analytic
neighborhood of her philosophical training. She has made several kinds
of arguments that bear on the adequacy of analytic philosophy: the
impact of individualism in philosophy of mind, the nature of the self,
and the nature of the normative philosophical subject (see her papers
collected in 1993 and 2011). For example, Scheman argues that it is
the ideology of liberal individualism rather than sound argument that
underlies the widespread belief that psychological objects such as
"emotions, beliefs, intentions, virtues, and vices" are
properties of individuals (1993: 37). In fact, part of Jaggar's
argument against abstract individualism relies on Scheman's
conceptual point that questions of identifying and interpreting
psychological states must be answered in a social context, not in
abstraction from it. Scheman acknowledges her debt to Wittgenstein in
making this point, but goes beyond his views by arguing that
women's experiences and psychosexual development do not bear out
this kind of individualistic assumption.



In other essays Scheman argues that the philosophical
"we"--the subject who has philosophical
problems--is a *normative* subject, one that bears the
markings of various kinds of privilege. Her examples of normative
subjects are the ideally rational scientist or the citizen of a
liberal state (1993: 7). In this way she shifts her argument away from
the experiences and developmental differences between actual men and
women (or between white people/people of color, or other actual
differences of privilege/marginality) in order to focus on the
connection between privilege and normativity. If one were to take a
Freudian-tinted view that philosophical problems are
"intellectual sublimations of the neuroses of privilege",
then their resolution would come, a la Wittgenstein, through
changes in our forms of life (1993:
 8).[9]



Lorraine Code is among those who have criticized analytic philosophy
for use of a moral-epistemic individual who is "abstract,
'generalized,' and disengaged" and a tradition that
is more concerned with what an ideal agent or knower would do than
with a real one (1995: xi). Code uses the example of an
"*S* knows that *p*" epistemology to focus one
of her most widely known critiques. The knowing subject *S*, in
what Code hyphenates as the "positivist-empiricist"
epistemology, is an individual--a detached, neutral,
interchangeable spectator whose knowledge is most reliable when his or
her sensory observations occur in ideal conditions, not real, everyday
ones. Code argues that "*S* knows that *p*"
models of knowledge work only in a prescribed area; indeed, they favor
a narrow kind of scientific knowledge. A more adequate
characterization of knowing must be applicable to a broad range of
examples in the lives of real people. In order to do so, it cannot use
the interchangeable subject, *S*, but must include subjective
features of *S* such as the person's identity, interests or
circumstances. For without these features we cannot explain complex,
relational knowing, for example, knowing a person. In addition, an
adequate account of knowledge should uncover ways in which political
interests are used to determine who is allowed to be a standard
knower, that is, an *S* (Code 1991, 1995, 1998). This is only one
of Code's early lines of argument against analytic philosophy.
In
 Section 7
 we will discuss her arguments that point to the limitations of
naturalized epistemology in the analytic style as well.



As we close our discussion of some of the important classic feminist
critiques of analytic philosophy, recall that another criticism was
discussed in
 Section 4:
 Janice Moulton's critique of the adversary method as a paradigm
of philosophy. Although use of the adversary method need not be
limited to analytic philosophers, Moulton's critique is clearly
applicable to widespread practices in twentieth century analytic
philosophy.


## 6. Analytic Feminists' Responses to Critiques



The most frequent kinds of responses by analytic feminists to feminist
critiques of analytic philosophy are variations of the following
arguments and claims:


1. Feminist critiques may have been legitimate for
some kinds of analytic philosophy, especially logical positivism, but
because analytic philosophy has changed, the objections do not hold
for most contemporary work. The analytic feminist then develops a
strand of analytic philosophy that is not subject to a particular kind
of objection, for example, that knowers are unlocated.
2. There were errors of interpretation in
feminists' critiques, for example, concerning the extent to
which analytic philosophy incorporated empiricism. After correction,
analytic philosophy will not be vulnerable to this particular kind of
criticism.
3. Critics have gone too far in undermining fields of
philosophy such as metaphysics and central concepts such as
rationality. Such fields and concepts are needed both on philosophical
and feminist grounds.



All three kinds of responses allow analytic feminists to engage in
activities on which they thrive--disentangling strands of
argument from each other, making distinctions among concepts,
searching for kernels of truth among points with which they disagree,
and so on.



Response (1).
 Regardless of the precise characterization of contemporary analytic
philosophy, it clearly cannot to be equated with logical positivism.
So to the degree that feminist critiques focus on logical positivism
rather than current analytic work, they will likely be off the mark.
As analytic feminists respond to other feminists' critiques,
they try to decipher which strands of analytic philosophy might be
most useful and the degree to which old assumptions and concepts that
are male-biased still linger. Although some feminists have defended
facets of the work of Neurath (Okrulik 2004) and Carnap (Yap 2010) as
useful for feminism, most analytic feminists find resources in
philosophers who themselves reject central dogmas and methods of
classical analytic philosophy, for example,
 Wittgenstein,
 J.L. Austin,
 Quine,
 Davidson, and others.



Let's take as examples of argument (1) feminists who believe
that useful strands of analytic philosophy will be
*naturalized* in some way. We need to cast a wide, permissive
net here for what counts as "naturalized" and to
acknowledge some controversies over its relation to analytic
philosophy and to feminism. As used here, "naturalized
philosophy" includes philosophy that is explicitly *informed
by*, rather than replaced by, empirical information about knowers,
agents, and social structures from psychology/cognitive science,
sociology, anthropology, and elsewhere. Although most analytic
feminists favor "naturalizing" philosophy (with a strong
preference for its subcategory of social epistemology), they are
critical of many nonfeminist ways of doing
 it.[10]



For example, the focus in traditional naturalized epistemology on
"individual" rather than "social" sciences
neglects the "situatedness" of our thinking. A final
caveat about terminology: since there is disagreement over the proper
scope of both "naturalized" and "analytic",
some will object that naturalized philosophy is not a strand of
analytic philosophy at all. For example, Quine, who might be
considered the father of naturalized epistemology, fits squarely into
our characterization of analytic philosophy; however, Lynn Hankinson
Nelson considers him post-analytic (Nelson and Nelson 2003). And, of
course, there is no necessary link between naturalized philosophy and
analytic philosophy in any case; one need only think of Foucault or
Dewey to sever that connection.



Keeping in mind all these caveats and controversies, let's turn
to the example of naturalized epistemology to consider what
"naturalizing" can do to help feminists overcome
difficulties with analytic philosophy. Feminists criticize analytic
philosophy for its concepts of a knower (and an agent), for example,
that it is an *individual* who is abstract, idealized,
interchangeable, unlocated, disconnected, disembodied, disinterested,
etc. The first thing that naturalized epistemology can do is to shift
the focus from the abstract or idealized knower to the concrete facets
of the person who has beliefs and knowledge. Although this move is not
in itself feminist, Jane Duran finds it a positive step toward
"gynocentric", i.e., woman-centered, epistemology. She
believes that naturalized epistemology--by its descriptive
character and its concern with the context and details of
knowing--is capable of including features valued by feminist
standpoint epistemology, for example, the relational aspects of
knowing and the grounding that knowledge has in the body and in
activities of daily life (1991: 112, 246). Duran is one of the first
feminists who explicitly combined feminist standpoint theory with
analytically oriented naturalized epistemology, and is an exception to
the widespread tendency of analytic feminists to stay clear of
gynocentrism. Of course, one need not agree with the specifics of
Duran's analysis to appreciate the importance of naturalized
epistemology's descriptive attention to context and concrete
details: this descriptive attention *allows gender into
epistemology* as facets of the knower and the context become
relevant. One can then debate what kinds of social structures,
individual variations, and their interactions are fruitful avenues of
exploration.



A second naturalized approach is Louise Antony's argument
concerning a different aspect of the knower--neutrality. Antony
maintains that naturalized epistemology resolves the "paradox of
bias" (how one can consistently critique male bias and at the
same time object to the notion of unbiased, neutral, objective, or
impartial knowledge). Naturalized epistemology rejects the ideal of
neutrality and instead gives us empirical norms by which to
differentiate good from bad biases, that is, biases that lead us
toward rather than away from truth (1993 [2002: 113-116,
 134-144]).[11]
 Antony also engages in many other facets of the debate between
analytic and non-analytic feminists to which we will return later.



A third strategy, still within the context of a naturalized
epistemology/philosophy of science, is to change the relationship
between empiricism and the individual. Lynn Hankinson Nelson and Helen
Longino are empiricists not in the style of Locke or Hume, but in
their positions that *evidence* comes from the senses, from
experience (Nelson 1990: 21; Longino 1990: 215). This is encapsulated
by saying that empiricism is a theory of evidence. Using different
lines of argument, they both shift the focus from the individual to
communities. Nelson argues that communities rather than individuals
"'acquire' and possess knowledge" (Nelson
1990: 14). She wants to use both Quinian and feminist
resources to forge an empiricism sufficiently rich and sophisticated
to overcome critiques of earlier feminist empiricism offered, for
example, by Harding as well as to avoid feminist objections
to individualism (whether to Jaggar's "abstract
individualism" or the other forms discussed above). Nelson
maintains that Quine--while remaining an empiricist--had
already undermined or abandoned many of the postpositivist
characteristics to which Jaggar and Harding object. Thus empiricism,
tempered by Nelson's focus on communities as knowers, can
adequately take into account the social identities of knowers and the
complex dependencies of individuals on epistemological
communities.



Helen Longino's approach in *Science as Social Knowledge*
(1990) is to argue that among the many ways in which science is social
is that epistemological *norms* apply to practices of
communities, not just to individuals. In *The Fate of
Knowledge* (2002), she further develops her contextual empiricist
argument along lines that break down the dichotomy between the
rational and the social (and many other dichotomies along the way).
Although her argument has a wide scope, we are now concerned only with
the ways in which her view breaks the connection between individualism
and empiricism. Longino distinguishes between individualism as a
philosophical position (that, among other things, tends to consider
knowers interchangeable) and whether individuals, in fact, have
knowledge (2002: 14-48). She does not deny that epistemic norms
apply to the practices of individuals or that Einstein had an
"extraordinary intellect, but what made [Einstein's] brilliant
ideas knowledge were the processes of critical reception" (2002:
122). Knowledge requires social interaction, not a dichotomy
between the rational and the social; it also integrates
values--some of them social--at both the constitutive and
contextual levels.



The responses of Longino, Nelson, Antony, and Duran to feminist
critiques of earlier stages of analytic philosophy all illustrate
variations on theme (1): they agree with certain facets of the
feminist critique, but draw on resources within particular strands of
analytic philosophy (in their cases naturalized
epistemology/philosophy of science) as well as other feminist
resources to produce epistemologies that overcome the objections to
analytic epistemology. Their strategies vary: Longino and Nelson
de-emphasize the individual in favor of communities; Antony and Duran
keep the focus on individuals, but make them more concrete; in
addition, Antony tries to resolve the paradox of bias.



Let us turn much more briefly to strategies
 (2)
 and
 (3).
 The claim in (2) is that there were errors of interpretation in the
feminist analyses of analytic philosophy and its antecedents that
weaken the feminist critiques. In (3) it is that critics have gone too
far in undermining fields of philosophy such as metaphysics or central
notions such as rationality that we need to retain. Examples of both
approaches (sometimes even in one paper) can be found in Louise Antony
and Charlotte Witt's *A Mind of One's Own*, a
collection of papers that focused on reason and objectivity in both
the history of Western philosophy and various fields of contemporary
philosophy (1993 [2002]). Those who propound claim (2) include
Margaret Atherton and Louise Antony. Atherton (1993 [2002]) criticizes
both Genevieve Lloyd (1984) and Susan Bordo (1987) for their
interpretations of Descartes. Although Atherton's piece is
purely historical, it is relevant to our discussion because feminists
of all persuasions who debate the merit of analytic philosophy
acknowledge historical analyses, especially Lloyd's extensive
work on "the man of reason". Louise Antony argues that
Jaggar (1983) and Jane Flax (1987) mischaracterize the rationalist or
empiricist traditions, and so miss the extent to which analytic
philosophers have already rejected aspects of them. This leads
feminists to misidentify analytic epistemology with empiricism and
overlook more rationalistic possibilities (Antony 1993 [2002]).



Finally,
 strategy (3).
 When analytic feminists defend a field or a concept from critiques of
other feminists who have "gone too far", they might be
fending off poststructuralist critics who do not want to do
traditional metaphysics at all or they might be arguing about which
aspects of the field are male-biased (for example, foundationalist
styles of metaphysics or the tendency to see selected categories as
natural). Both Charlotte Witt and Sally Haslanger argue that there is
no specifically feminist reason for rejecting metaphysics in general.
Witt considers the particular case of "what it is to be
human". She argues that feminists, in fact, need assumptions and
theories about what it is to be human even in order to criticize
traditional metaphysical theories (1993 [2002]). Haslanger discusses a
range of issues concerning social construction, realism, and natural
and social kinds. In the course of her discussion of feminists such as
Catharine MacKinnon and Judith Butler, Haslanger makes many
distinctions among kinds and functions of social constructions, sorts
out ways in which metaphysics and politics are related, and, in
general, provides an example of feminist metaphysical debate that
distinguishes male-biased facets of metaphysics from facets useful for
feminists (1995b, 1996, 2000, 2012). One way of characterizing this
approach is that it goes for the "kernels of truth" within
larger, more problematic (or at least more polemical) discussions, and
thereby performs a service for readers who might be sympathetic with
some aspects of the views of MacKinnon or Butler, but who are not
willing to accept the body of work that encompasses them.



A more controversial analytic feminist response that fits into
 (3)
 is Martha Nussbaum's defense of concepts and standards of
objectivity and reason. She argues forcefully that it is in
feminists' interests, both theoretically and practically, to
retain fairly traditional ideals of objectivity and rationality while
acknowledging their abusive use. This position, in itself, would not
have generated great controversy, even if not universally accepted.
However, because Nussbaum sees certain critics of the male-biased
aspects of objectivity and reason as part of a "feminist assault
on reason" (1994: 59), her essay and her interpretation of other
feminists' views generated wide and heated discussion among
feminist philosophers at the
 time.[12]



As we close the discussion of analytic feminists' responses to
critiques of analytic philosophy, it is important to restate the
obvious: not every analytic feminist would agree with the responses
articulated in the few examples chosen here. Indeed, in spite of the
desire that analytic feminist philosophy be sufficiently normative,
there is disagreement over issues such as the attitude to take toward
concepts that have typically embodied that normativity. Consider
traditional ideals of objectivity: views range from the claim that
although the ideals of rationality and objectivity are "both
unattainable and undesirable", we nevertheless ought to embrace
them as "regulative norms" or "heuristics"
(Antony 1995: 87) to a number of different understandings of
objectivity that would make them not so subject to distortion or
misuse (for example, E. Lloyd 1995a, 1995b; Haslanger 1993 [2002];
Scheman 2001a; Heldke 2001; Janack 2002).



Finally, we need to remember that what feminists expect of a
philosophical method--their own preferred method(s) or
others--will influence their critique of it. It is important to
be realistic in considering what any particular method might offer a
feminist. For example, an analytic method is likely to provide a
feminist with much more assistance in clarifying concepts, making
distinctions, and evaluating arguments than with creating her
"vision" or defining the goals of her work (see Garry
1995).


## 7. Analytic Feminism: Limitations and Challenges



Although traditional analytic philosophy seemed to many to be the
least hospitable philosophical method for feminism, analytic
feminists' work over the decades has greatly increased the
method's hospitality and showed its promise. Let's now
consider some limitations and challenges that remain for analytic
feminism.



The strengths and limitations of various kinds of feminist
philosophies can grow from the same sources--if feminists are
close to a mainstream tradition, they are subject to at least some of
its limitations although they stand a better chance of influencing it
and "building bridges" than do those who critique the
tradition more deeply. Audre Lorde, addressing the racism and
heterosexism of a feminist conference in 1979, pointed to one risk
quite powerfully by saying, "The master's tools will never
dismantle the master's house" (Lorde 1984: 112). Although
over the decades Lorde's claim sent chills down the spines of
feminists across the disciplines, the very existence of feminist
philosophy requires that neither the "tools" of the
philosophical trade nor the house(s) are the sole property of the
"master". Feminist philosophers, analytic or not, build on
the work not only of other feminists and other scholars doing engaged
work, but also of *some* traditional philosophers
*sometimes.* Because of the desire to utilize as well as modify
traditional philosophy, feminists must always be alert for deeper
levels of male or other kinds of bias that may become apparent in
their work--possible unwanted baggage of traditional analytic
philosophy.



Some potentially relevant "baggage" for analytic feminists
include the deeper limitations of their concepts and methods and the
level of abstraction at which they tend to work. For example, when any
of these contribute to an inability to notice and center diverse
experiences, analytic feminists do not attend to a full range of
complex human lives that they hope to encompass; the impact and
meaning of race/ethnicity, social class, religion, nationality, queer
and trans lives, lives of people with disabilities, and others will be
lost. Examples of such limitations as well as others are below.


1. Kristie Dotson, while praising Fricker's (2007) strong
contribution to understanding epistemic injustice, argues that
Fricker's lack of an "open conceptual structure"
about what constitutes epistemic injustice leads her work to
perpetuate epistemic injustice. This has happened, Dotson argues,
because Fricker contrasts epistemic injustice with epistemic bad luck
(Dotson 2012: 25). Dotson explores epistemic oppression in more
expansive ways that speak more directly to the different levels of
systemic oppression and that encompass various important forms of
epistemic exclusion and violence, including, for example, silencing
and smothering (2011, 2012, 2014).
2. Naomi Scheman and Linda Martin Alcoff point out ways in
which analytic feminists may not fully appreciate all the political,
metaphysical and epistemological baggage that has already been packed
into their theories and concepts. Scheman thinks that Nussbaum stops
listening too soon to attacks on rationality and fails to appreciate
that openness to reasonable argument (advocated by Nussbaum) implies
that we recognize when our own conception of reasonableness is being
questioned (Scheman 2001b). Alcoff, maintaining that we need
*some* concept of reason, makes a similar argument against
Nussbaum and points out the dogmatic character of claiming that some
*particular* concept of reason is *the* concept that
cannot be given up (Alcoff 1995).
3. A closely related objection is that it is not always easy or even
possible to detach one's method from one's politics.
Because some analytic feminist work is liberal, for example, Nussbaum
(2000a), Cudd (2006), and Bhandary (2020), other analytic feminists
take pains to separate their method from their politics. Antony argues
that her own socialist politics are compatible with an analytic method
(2003). Although one can appreciate Antony's point, if an
analytic feminist is articulating a socialist *feminism*,
rather than favoring some kind of socialism or other, then the facets
of her position derived ultimately from Marx, from Quine, and from
feminism need to be hammered out carefully in order to settle down
together well.



Others raise more general questions about the relation between
philosophical method and feminist and anti-racist politics. For
example, Alice Crary, taking on the general relation between
philosophical method and feminist politics, finds that Fricker's
neutral philosophical methods and concepts of reason (2007) are not
sufficiently radical to support feminist politics (2018). Tina
Fernandes Botts (2018) and Jana Cattien (2019) both criticize analytic
feminists' highly abstract level of analyzing race and gender as
well as their use of similar models for both. Instead, specific lived
experiences of marginalized people need to figure more centrally in
our thinking (Botts 2018). Cattien argues that what is at stake
politically is obscured by analytic feminist metaphysicians (including
their normative assumptions) and that they need "to be able to
take themselves as objects of a politically charged critique"
(2019: 733). For example, she finds Haslanger's (2012) analysis
that places all races on one conceptual plane can't do justice
to "*white* complicities in perpetuating racist power
relations" (2019: 720).
4. Clusters of separate objections focus around subjectivity and
standpoints. Traditional analytic philosophy has been rightly
criticized for its inability to handle subjectivity. In thinking about
whether this criticism applies to analytic feminists as well,
let's consider it in the context of knowledge. Elizabeth
Anderson calls the position that knowledge is "situated"
the fundamental point of feminist epistemology (see
 feminist epistemology and philosophy of science).
 Can "situated" knowledge as developed by analytic
feminists capture both the individual subjectivity of human beings and
the ways in which material conditions and complex social institutions
structure the standpoints of women and others in marginalized groups?
There are obviously two separate questions here--asked together
because they focus on whether analytic feminism has the resources to
capture what is very important to other feminist methodological
traditions: standpoint theory, psychoanalysis, and
poststructuralism.



Consider Longino as an example: she is dealing with situated knowledge
in the context of the sciences. Her contextual empiricism and her more
recent argument to dissolve completely the rational/social dichotomy
and the dichotomies that underlie it allow her to delve into the right
areas. Of course, science is not all of life or knowledge, so her
argument would need to be extended into areas of everyday life that
Code, among others, has discussed. Whatever the limitations of
contextual empiricism, it is better at analyzing the structural and
material features that construct subjectivity than it is at
illuminating individual subjectivity. It is in the latter area that
poststructuralist and psychoanalytic approaches flourish (see, for
example, Butler 1990; Butler & Salih 2003; Irigaray
1991; Whitford 1991; Kristeva & Oliver 2002). Their focus on
the opaque, fragmented, or unfinished character of human subjectivity
may be a bit untidy for many analytic feminists. But given the
importance of this topic for feminist philosophy, there is a need for
fruitful dialogue about it.
5. Feminist standpoint theory, drawing originally from Marxist theory,
raised a cluster of questions for analytic feminists: whether they can
explain the political/material construction of standpoints in the
production of knowledge, how they treat community-wide biases and
assumptions, what criteria they use to distinguish "good"
and "bad" biases, and so on. Harding advocates a
pluralistic form of standpoint theory that focuses on the importance
of starting research from the lives of marginalized people (1991).
Doing so has many advantages, including an increased likelihood that
we will be able to uncover community-wide biases and assumptions of
the privileged as we produce knowledge in a number of fields. Although
initially analytic feminist empiricists and standpoint theorists saw
each other as embodying rival traditions and were often critical of
each other, analytic feminist empiricists then developed significant
interest in looking at the resources offered by standpoint theory as
well as pursuing common themes or consensus in the two kinds of
approaches (see, for example, Wylie 2004; Potter 2006; Crasnow 2008;
Intemann 2010, 2016; Anderson 2020; and a 2009 *Hypatia*
symposium that includes Crasnow, Harding, Rouse, Kourany, Rolin, and
Solomon, all 2009). A range of possibilities include


	1. incorporating the insights of standpoint theory into empirical
	(and empiricist) work (Wylie 2004),
	2. maintaining that in a number of their forms they are compatible
	(Anderson 2020), or
	3. arguing that feminist empiricism and standpoint theory have
	significant overlaps but that their remaining differences show that
	they need each other (Intemann 2010).
Fuller discussion of these issues can be found in Intemann (2010,
2016), Anderson (2020), and entries on
 feminist social epistemology and
 feminist perspectives on science.
6. Related objections arise concerning naturalized epistemology. As
mentioned above, feminist social epistemology is the most typical form
of naturalized feminist epistemology today. Social epistemologists
have deep critiques of individually oriented and
"scientistic" analytic naturalized epistemology. In
addition to feminists already discussed above, Code and Phyllis Rooney
have both argued that there is tension between typical naturalized
epistemology and feminist epistemology; Rooney calls it an
"uneasy alliance" (Rooney 2003). Code offers an ecological
model that she maintains is preferable to analytically and
individualistically oriented naturalism (1996, 2006). Rooney appeals
to psychological studies of gender and cognition to provide evidence
for her critique of assumptions of empirical studies (and of the
epistemology that structures and then uses the empirical results). For
example, Rooney wants to critique the assumption of the stability of
the individual/social distinction, the stability of gender--or
even that gender is either stable or situational, for there might be
more choices (Rooney 2003). Although analytic feminist naturalized
epistemologists might well agree with much of Rooney's critique,
Code's 2006 ecological model would be a nearly impossible
stretch. In any case, analytic feminists must be very careful as they
choose their own models to reflect upon the kinds of assumptions to
which they acquiesce, whether those just mentioned or others that
might go under the label "scientism".
7. The final cluster of challenges concerns language, images, and
"rhetorical space". These challenges are meant to call
attention to other kinds of "baggage" of which analytic
feminists need to be aware. Although both feminist and nonfeminist
analytic philosophers are thought to favor literal uses of language,
they also rely on metaphors, analogies, images and the like in the
course of making their philosophical cases (think of the frequency of
Neurath's ship via Quine). Analytic feminists need to give
attention to the assumptions and implications of their literal uses of
language, their images and how they relate to what Lorraine Code calls
the "rhetorical spaces" in which they function (or, in
other cases, fail to function). In using "rhetorical
spaces" Code is thinking of the ways in which our discourses are
structured to limit what can count as meaningful, be taken seriously,
yield insight, expect uptake, and so on (1995: ix-x; with
continued discussion in Code 2006).



Marguerite La Caze, using methodology developed by Michele Le
Doeuff, argues that both feminist and nonfeminist analytic
philosophers use images that can unwittingly perpetuate images that
exclude women--think of mythical social contracts in political
philosophy and visual and spatial metaphors about knowledge (La Caze
2002, Le Doeuff 1980 [1989]; see also Gatens 1991). Analytic
feminists are being called upon to widen the rhetorical spaces in
analytic philosophy as well as to recognize and scrutinize the images
that they, in fact, use in the course of their allegedly literal
speech.



Most analytic feminists welcome challenges to their positions from
other feminists of any background. For, after all, there is no easier
way to be kept honest and to recognize one's own collusion with
male or other biases in philosophy than to have feminist colleagues
point it out. It is part of any reasonable feminism to want to remain
open to the ongoing possibility of collusion and self-deception.
Candid, fair-minded conversation benefits all forms of feminism.


## 8. Is it Important to Identify Feminists by Their Philosophical Methods?



Although methodology is the focus in this entry, it is nevertheless
important to ask to what extent there is value in identifying feminist
philosophy by method (see Garry 2018). The field of academic feminist
philosophy has developed, even flourished, across most all
philosophical fields and topics since the 1970s--in spite of
backlash and lingering resistance harbored in some quarters. Feminist
philosophers have taught and mentored multiple generations of students
who themselves generate new directions in feminist philosophy;
feminist dissertations, publications, and organizations have
increased; feminists drawing on many different philosophical methods
learn from and cite each other; practitioners of fields such as
feminism, critical race theory, trans and queer theory, critical
disability theory, decolonial theory, and others, understand the
importance of engaging across and integrating work in these fields.
Many feminist philosophers, especially from more recent generations,
simply go about their work without concerning themselves with labels
of philosophical method. In this context there are reasons to downplay
differences in method. In addition, it makes sense not to emphasize
philosophical method if it unnecessarily limits the appeal of
someone's work, especially in interdisciplinary or transnational
feminist contexts. Nor would one want a focus on method to be
accompanied by a lack of open-mindedness or a sense of
"superiority".



At the same time, methodological labels can be useful. They can help
us understand feminists' framing of issues, terminology,
probable toolboxes, and the feminist and traditional philosophers most
likely to have influenced their work. After all, feminist philosophers
often carry the methodological influence of their graduate philosophy
departments for many decades thereafter, albeit with varying strengths
of attachment. In addition, some feminists want to acknowledge
explicitly their connection to analytic philosophy; for example, Cudd
in *Analyzing Oppression*, makes a point to situate her work in
and defend both the analytic and liberal traditions (2006: ix).



In fact, some discussions are best understood in an analytic context
and are engaged in primarily by analytic feminists, for example,
twenty-first century debates in philosophy of language and metaphysics
concerning the categories of woman/man, sex, and gender. They have
encompassed disagreements over the nature of social categories and
social construction, the degree to which social categories have
grounding in the material world or should be analyzed as dispositions
to behave, the moral and political values assumed in metaphysical
discussions, the meaning of the categories for trans, queer, and
nonbinary people (including their legal implications), and so on (for
example, see Witt 2011a; Haslanger 2012; Saul 2012; Bettcher 2013,
2017; Diaz-Leon 2016; Jenkins 2016, 2018; Mikkola 2016; Asta
2018; Dembroff 2018, 2020; Barnes 2020; Antony 2020--among many
others. More detailed discussion can also be found in the entries on
 feminist philosophy of language,
 feminist metaphysics, and
 feminist perspectives on sex and gender.)



Another reason to wonder about the importance of methodological labels
is that methods can work in varied ways across philosophical
subfields. Consider whether fields such as moral, social, and
political philosophy frequently have separate analytic discussions or
methodological identifications. Although feminist philosophers in
these fields might prefer a particular writing or argumentative style
or prefer to engage with Rawls rather than Levinas or Habermas, the
fault lines or "sides" in major feminist controversies
rarely fall neatly into divisions among analytic and non-analytic
feminists. Instead, early typical feminist controversies in moral
philosophy, for example, concerned whether one should favor an ethics
of justice over an ethics of care or a virtue ethics, or whether one
should prefer Kant over Hume or Aristotle as a starting point for
moral thinking (see, for example, Held 1993, Herman 1993, Homiak 1993,
Larrabee 1993, Baier 1994). Interestingly, the degree to which
feminist moral philosophers--analytic or not--rely upon and
integrate historical figures into their work seems to be greater than
among analytic feminists doing epistemology and metaphysics.



Another persistently debated topic that does not divide neatly by
methodological orientation is the extent to which liberalism is
satisfactory for feminist politics and ethics. For example, Nussbaum
defends her well known liberal "capabilities" approach as
applicable across cultures against anti-liberal opponents (2000a,
2000b, entry on
 the capability approach).
 Asha Bhandary also supports liberalism and maintains that it can
adequately support dependency care provided that we make sure that
caregiving and caregivers do not remain invisible due to sexism and
racism (2020). However, Serene Khader, argues that although feminism
needs "universalist" opposition to sexism, it does not
require Western liberalism, which itself can even perpetuate sexist
oppression in some cultures (2019). Debates over liberalism are not
likely to end soon, especially given the number of philosophers
writing from decolonial perspectives.



As feminists explore a wide range of topics in moral, social, and
political philosophy the salience of their methodological background
often recedes, especially when their work draws on resources both
outside and inside philosophy--sometimes including the
authors' own social locations and experiences. Their work also
bears on urgent public issues. Let's note briefly a few
different kinds of examples. Serena Parekh combines multiple
philosophical and empirical methods in writing on refugees and the
ethics of forced displacement (2017). For many decades Anita Allen has
combined law and philosophy in her work on privacy (1988, 2019).
Myisha Cherry writes about rage and other emotions and attitudes in
public life (2019, forthcoming). Ayanna De'Vante Spencer is
among those writing about the missing narratives of Black women and
girls who have been victims of police brutality (2018). Eva Feder
Kittay has written for many years on the ethics of dependency and
care, cognitive disabilities, and their impact on moral philosophy
(for example, 1999, 2019). And, of course, there are entire fields of
feminist ethics that cross many kinds of methodological lines, for
example,
 feminist bioethics
 and
 feminist philosophy of disability,
 and the wider field of
 critical disability theory.



When philosophers' own intersectional identities are reflected
in their writing, their identities usually have more prominence than
their choice of philosophical toolbox or a preference for an
"analytic writing style". For example, Alcoff and Naomi
Zack have both written on race and mixed race for decades (Zack 1993,
Alcoff 2006); some of their more recent work on mixed race has been
collected along with other feminists and philosophers of race in Botts
(2016). For other philosophers, writing as lesbian feminists and more
recently as trans feminists is salient. For example, since the
beginning of academic feminist philosophy Marilyn Frye, Claudia Card,
and Sarah Hoagland have provided decades of lesbian feminist
philosophy (see, for example, Frye 1983, 1992, 2001; Card 1995, 1996,
2002; Hoagland, 1988). Cheshire Calhoun's *Feminism, The
Family, and the Politics of the Closet* explores the structure of
gay and lesbian subordination and its relation to feminism (2000).
Trans feminist philosophers work on topics in moral and political
philosophy as well as metaphysics and epistemology; they aim to make
trans lives visible, livable, valued, and understood (See, for
example, Bettcher 2019, forthcoming; Kapusta 2016; McKinnon 2014; Zurn
2019).



As we draw this section to a close, it is important not to overstate
the way differences in philosophical methods play out in generations
of feminists or in subfields of feminist philosophy: the differences
are matters of degree. It is even more important to remind ourselves
that feminist philosophy, whatever its method, retains both feminist
and philosophical roots. It is not to be subsumed solely under a
patrilineal philosophical identity. In the context of discussing the
importance of constructing a feminist genealogy of feminist thought by
claiming and engaging with other feminist thinkers, Frye notes
ironically how much "better placed in history" it seems to
be when one is seen



> 
> 
> in that august Oxbridge lineage [of Austin and Wittgenstein, rather]
> than in a lineage featuring dozens of mimeographed feminist pamphlets
> authored by collectives, ... Kate Millett, Mary Daly, Andrea
> Dworkin, ... [feminist philosophers such as] Claudia Card, Naomi
> Scheman, Maria Lugones, Sarah Hoagland, and troubadours like Alix
> Dobkin and Willie Tyson. (Frye 2001: 86-87)
> 
> 
> 



In order to resist the comfort/erasure of the patrilineal heritage,
analytic feminists, echoing Frye, can claim and engage other feminist
thinkers, critical race theorists, trans and queer theorists, and
more. Many already do so. This will not only help to sustain a
feminist tradition, it will also increase the richness of feminist
work and decrease the odds of feminists being held captive by
male-biased philosophical methods, theories, concepts and images.



Analytic feminists have left barely any philosophical topic untouched.
Readers who want to review the most recent work by analytic feminists
in specific areas of philosophy should consult the entries listed
here. A longer list that includes entries that broadly incorporate
several methods or are simply hard to categorize appears as
"Related Entries" after the
 Bibliography.[13]


* Feminist Metaphysics
* Feminist Philosophy of Language
* Feminist Perspectives on Sex and Gender
* Feminist Epistemology and Philosophy of Science
* Feminist Social Epistemology
* Feminist Perspectives on Science
* Feminist Philosophy of Biology
* Liberal Feminism
* Feminist Moral Psychology
* Feminist Philosophy of Law
* Feminist Perspectives on Autonomy
* Feminist Perspectives on Bioethics
* Feminist Perspectives on Objectification
* Feminist Perspectives on Reproduction and the Family