Editor’s note on Feminist Epistemology (original) (raw)
Related papers
Feminist Encounters (Vol 1, Issue 1) : 'On Feminist Epistemic Habits and Critique'
This special issue opens with an article by Ellen Mortensen assessing Rita Felski’s (2015) account of critique and her alternative postcritical position. Mortensen focuses on the question of mood and does this from the viewpoint of affirmative affective thinking, paying attention especially to the notion of mood within Deleuzian affect theory. The next two articles give historical interpretations on the formation of feminist epistemologies. With a personal and autobiographical account, Nina Lykke’s article concentrates on dis/identification, ‘cruel optimism’ and everyday utopianism as instances of feminist epistemic habits, but also as structuring themes for feminist thought. Elina Vuola also on her part engages in a re-reading of academic feminism, but from a very different point of view compared to Lykke: Vuola discusses the epistemic habit of exclusion within academic feminism focusing on religious feminisms. In Vuola’s text the critique becomes ‘cure’, ‘correcting’ or reconstructing versions of a particular theoretical development. Three articles deal with feminist epistemic habits of de/constructing dualisms. In order to problematise the binary between poststructuralist and new materialist feminist work, Sari Irni examines as her case study the history of steroid hormones, rethinking the relations between natural sciences and politics. She pays special attention to Helga Satzinger’s (2012) ‘politics of gender concepts’ and suggests that in particular in relation to steroids a feminist critique is required which does not reproduce, but bridge the binary mentioned. Monika Rogowska-Stangret and Malou Juelskjær investigate temporalities and possibilities of thinking through new materialist theorising and concepts in order to examine conditions of the im/possibility of living live-able (learn-able, teach-able, and response-able) academic lives in current political climates. Addressing the temporal ontologies that drive and haunt university life, they deal with the notion of ‘slowing down’ as a response to the ‘fast neoliberal university’. They make visible epistemic habits from the context of our everyday lives and practices and show the challenge in engaging in critique, proposing an ethics of a pace of our own. The third text in the cluster of articles all engaging with the question of dualisms, is written by Liu Xin and deals with another set of binaries, namely both specificity and universality, and unity and plurality discussing especially the question of origin. Based on the (Irigarayan) idea of the impossibility of counting zero, Liu Xin suggests a form of feminist critique similar to what Trinh T. Minh-ha (2016) has named ‘lovecidal’. The last group of articles close in quite different ways around the question of feminist politics and knowledge production. Katariina Kyrölä investigates the knowledge of Black feminist thought in the music videos of Nicki Minaj and Beyoncé through the notion of disidentification, Kyrölä takes feminist criticism as her object in asking what kind of racialised, sexualised and gendered power relations and affects are articulated in the habit of asking: ‘whether the videos and artists are – or are not – feminist or empowering’? In their article about Valerie Solanas’ controversial SCUM Manifesto, Salla Peltonen Mio Lindman and Sara Nyman and read the politics of philosophy as the grammar of patriarchy, claiming that the SCUM Manifesto text has critical, philosophical and political significance they also point to certain difficulties of judgement that characterise feminist and queer critique. Like Kyrölä also the authors of this article highlight the importance of asking ‘non-habitual’ questions, refusing to apply a ‘hermeneutics of suspicion’ in reading Solanas, but considering the Manifesto as a highly relevant, queer philosophical text. In addition to the articles the special issue contains two separate interviews with Robyn Wiegman and Heather Love on current debates about critique and postcritique, addressing especially the question of epistemic habits. Assessing the state and status of critique in feminist, gender and queer studies Wiegman and Love both historicise and contextualise the ongoing debates. They address the impact of neoliberalism, and the changing academic practices, linking it to personal investments. Furthermore, they also reflect on the psychoanalytical and affective aspects of critique. Considering habitual gestures and habits of feminist academic knowledge production, and the questions, reflections, viewpoints and thoughts expressed and discussed in the published texts, that we think are particularly important within current feminist analysis, we hope that this special issue contribute to the surely intensifying debate about contemporary critique/postcritique.
Feminist Theologies: Looking Back to Look Ahead
Mandrágora, 2021
As teologias feministas nos Estados Unidos são a razão pela qual a categoria gênero tem transformado as religiões. Os estudos feministas da religião e o ativismo social têm caminhado lado a lado. Esses focos gêmeos formam um pano de fundo útil para a compreensão da espiritualidade feminista contemporânea, que é um acoplamento concreto da dinâmica religiosa e da ação feminista. Essa espiritualidade é produto do trabalho feminista na religião, e tem impacto na sociedade. Breves descrições de uma pequena amostra dos grupos que continuam a aprofundar esse trabalho apontam para um futuro brilhante para as metodologias feministas, apesar das resistências e obstáculos.
Third wave feminism acknowledges the importance of socio-historical contexts with the development of women’s movements. Such an understanding must also be extended to the history of Western feminist thought as well. Using the case study of 17th Century theorist Francois Poullain de la Barre, what seems as counter-intuitive today as an argumentation for women’s liberation, Cartesian methodology aided the birth of feminist ideals in Europe, and they have lingered. Problematize, investigate, and reach a method beyond it. De Beauvoir of the Second Wave feminist movement picked up his argument structure, and reformulated it to her contemporary understandings. The questions haven’t changed, but the methodology has altered. Putting these two in conversation with one another will help us realize the underlying history in Western feminism, and reveal new answers to continuing questions that can help frame action and theory in our contemporary society. By tracing through the genealogy of these core problems, we as a discursive community can reveal a deeper philosophical understanding to our approach to gender, embodiment, and education. Understanding the shifts in argument structure and the grounds for acceptable argumentation can reveal much about how to continue open feminist discourse amongst varying worldviews, as well as a deeper, more profound understanding of the importance of historical contextualization for argumentation within any discourse.
A contribuição do olhar feminista
2008
Este texto recupera, de forma historica e conceitual, a discussao entre Estudos Culturais e feminismo, especialmente a partir da consolidacao dessas perspectivas de analise na Inglaterra. Busca mostrar que a origem dos estudos feministas dentro ou fora dos Estudos Culturais nem sempre e pacifica. Mostra, igualmente, que conceitos como receptores, espectadores ou audiencia tornam-se importantes nessas discussoes, ja que as filiacoes a determinados modelos de analise indicam um vies que privilegia ora o individuo na formacao da subjetividade, ora o cultural e o historico.
The Revista Alicantina de Estudios Ingleses is published yearly by the Department of English at the University of Alicante in volumes of approximately 250 pages. The journal aims to provide a forum for debate and an outlet for research involving all aspects of English Studies.