Women in philosophy

Women are involved in philosophy throughout the field’s history. While there were women philosophers since ancient times, they were accepted as philosophers during the ancient , medieval , modern and contemporary eras, particularly during the 20th and 21st century, almost no woman philosophers have entered the philosophical Western canon . [1] [2]

In ancient philosophy in the West, while academic philosophy Was Typically the domain of male philosophers Such As Plato and Aristotle , philosophers female Such As Hipparchia of Maroneia(active ca. 325 BC), Arete of Cyrene (active 5th-4th century BC) and Aspasia of Miletus (470-400 BC) were active during this period. A notable medieval philosophers include Hypatia (5th century), St. Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179) and St. Catherine of Sienna (1347-1380). Notable modern philosophers included Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-1797) andSarah Margaret Fuller (1810-1850). Influential contemporary philosophers include Susanne Langer (1895-1985), Hannah Arendt (1906-1975), Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986), Mary Midgley (born 1919), Mary Warnock(born 1924), Julia Kristeva (born 1941), Patricia Churchland (born 1943) and Susan Haack (born 1945).

In the early 1800s, some colleges and universities in the UK and US began admitting women , giving rise to new generations of female academics. Nevertheless, US Department of Education overs from the 1990s indicate indication That philosophy is one of the least proportionate fields in the humanities with respect to gender. [3] Women make up as little as 17% of philosophy faculty in some studies. [4] In 2014, Inside Higher Education describes the philosophy “… discipline of own long history of misogyny and sexual harassment ” of women students and professors. [5] Jennifer Saul, a professor of philosophy at the University of Sheffield , stated in 2015 that “… leaving philosophy after being harassed, assaulted, or retaliated against.” [6]

In the early 1990s, the Canadian Philosophical Association has argued that gender imbalance and gender bias in the academic field of philosophy. [7] In June 2013, a US sociology professor reported that “out of all recent citations in four years, including female authors, just 3.6 percent of the total.” The editors of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy have raised concerns about the underrepresentation of women philosophers, and they require editors and writers to ensure they represent the contributions of women philosophers. [7]According to Eugene Sun Park, “[p] hilosophy is predominantly white and predominantly male.This homogeneity exists in almost all aspects and at all levels of the discipline.” [2] Susan Price argues that the philosophical “… canon remains dominated by white males-the discipline that … still hews to the myth that genius is tied to gender.” [8] According to Saul, “[p] hilosophy, the oldest of the humanities , is also the malest (and the whitest). mathematics. ” [9]

Representation and working climate

In the early 1990s, the Canadian Philosophical Association claimed that “… there is compelling evidence” of “… philosophy’s gender imbalance” and “bias and partiality in many of its theoretical products.” In 1992, the association recommended that “fifty percent of [philosophy] … positions should be filled by women.” [7] In a 2008 article “Changing the Ideology and Culture of Philosophy: Not by Reason (Alone),” MIT philosophy professor Sally Haslanger Stated que le top twenty graduate programs in philosophy in the US-have from 4 percent to 36 percent women faculty. [7]In June 2013, Duke University professor of sociology Kieran Healy stated that “out of all recent citations in the field of female history journals, female authors included just 3.6 percent of the total.” The editors of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy have raised concerns about the underrepresentation of women philosophers; as such, the encyclopedia “encourages [their] authors, subject editors, and referees to help ensure that they do not overlook the work of women or indeed members of the public”. [7]

In 2014, professors Neven Sesardic and Rafael De Clercq published an article entitled “Women in Philosophy: Problems with the Discrimination Hypothesis.” The article states that “… a number of philosophers attribute the underrepresentation of women in philosophy to bias against women or some kind of wrongful discrimination “. Evidence cited includes “gender disparities that increase along the path to full-time faculty member”; “anecdotal accounts of discrimination in philosophy”; “research on gender bias in the evaluation of manuscripts, grants, and curricula vitae in other academic disciplines”; “psychological research on implicit bias”; “” [7] Sesardic and De Clercq argue that” proponents of discriminating hypothesis, who include distinguished philosophers … have tended to present evidence selectively. ” [7]

American philosopher Sally Haslanger stated in 2008 that “… it is very hard to find a place in philosophy that is not actively hostile towards women and minorities, or at least assumes that a successful philosopher should look and act like a (traditional, white) man. ” [11] Haslanger states that she experienced” when a woman’s status in school was questioned because she was married, or had a child ‘mature’ student), or was in a long-distance relationship. American philosopher Martha Nussbaum , who completed a PhD in philosophy at Harvard Universityin 1975, alleges that she encountered a huge amount of discrimination during her studies at Harvard, including sexual harassment and problems of getting childcare for her daughter. [10]

In July 2015, British philosopher Mary Warnock addressed the issue of the representation of women in British university philosophy departments, where 25% of faculty are women. Warnock stated she is “… against intervention, by quotas or otherwise, to increase women’s chances of employment” in philosophy. [11] She also argues that “… there is nothing intrinsically harmful about this imbalance” and she states that she does not “… believe it shows a conscious bias against women.” [11] Philosopher Julian Bagginistates that he believes that there is “… little or no conscious discrimination against women in philosophy”. At the same time, Baggini states that there may be a “… great deal of unconscious bias” against women in philosophy, because it does not address issues of gender or ethnicity. [11]

Allegations of sexual harassment

In 2014, Inside Higher Education describes the philosophy “… discipline’s own long history of misogyny and sexual harassment.” [5] On March 28, 2011, The New APPS published a review of the allegations of persistent sexual harassment by women professors in philosophy, due largely to “serial harassers” continuing to work in the field of widespread knowledge of their actions. The post proposed that, had been ineffective at removing or punishing harassers. [12] The story was subsequently featured at Inside Higher Ed [13] and several blogs, includingGawker [14] and Jezebel . [15] In 2013, a series of posts on the blog “What is it like to be a woman in philosophy?” instigated a spate of mainstream media articles on the continued dominance of men in philosophy. [16] [17] [18] [19] Eric Schliesser, a professor of philosophy at Ghent University , Said he Believes que la “… systematic pattern of exclusion of women in philosophy is, in part, due to the fact That my profession has allowed a culture of harassment , sexual predating, and bullying to be reproduced from one generation to the next. ” [5]According to Heidi Lockwood, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Southern Connecticut State University , there is a “… power” asymmetry “between professors and students – even graduate students”; As well, she noted that “… even when colleges and universities have blanket prohibitions against professor-student sexual relationships, as does Yale, … institution-specific policies [5]

According to an August 2013 article in Salon , a tenured male University of Miami philosopher resigned after allegedly “… sending emails to a [female] student in which he suggests that they have sex three times.” [9] Jennifer Saul , a professor of philosophy at the University of Sheffield , set up a blog for women’s philosophers in 2010. She received numerous allegations of sexual harassmentby alexandra bodyman, a job candidate who said she was sexually assaulted at the APA annual meeting where job interviews take place “, an” undergraduate whose professor joked public about dripping hot wax on her nipples “and a” … lesbian who found herself suddenly invited, after she came out, to join in the sexualizing of her female colleagues. ” Saul states that the departments failed to deal with the allegations. [9] In 2013, the American Philosophical Association formed a committee to study the allegations of sexual harassment of women and faculty by faculty. [5]Saul states that one of the allegations was regarding a “… distinguished visiting speaker whose first words are:” Show me a grad student I can fuck “.” [6] Saul states that women are “… leaving philosophy after being harassed, assaulted, or retaliated against.” [6] In 2014, Inside Higher Education reported allegations that Yale University had sexually harassed a woman; “Yale, victim with the real result”. [5] In an interview with Inside Higher Ed , the alleged victim stated that she “… suffers from post-traumatic stress disorderthat impedes everyday life, not only from the alleged attack, but also from the “browbeating” it has been attempted to report the professor, again and again, to Yale officials. ” [5]

In 1993, the American Philosophical Association’s sexual harassment committee set out guidelines for this issue in the government. The APA guidelines, which were revised in 2013, stated that: [20]

“Sexual advancements, requests for sexual favors, or sexually directed statements, where sexual behavior is a condition of employment or employment decisions, or when such conduct persists against its rejection.”

“Sexual harassment is a serious violation of professional ethics, and should be regarded as such by members of the profession. or allow that environment to exist, colleges and universities should supply clear, fair institutional procedures under which charges of sexual harassment on campus can be brought, assessed, and acted on. “

“Complaints of sexual harassment at APA-sponsored activities should be brought to the chair of the committee for the protection of sexual health. against APA staff members should be brought to the chair of the board. “

Black women

There are few black women philosophers, who include women of African and Caribbean ancestry, African-Americans and other individuals from the African diaspora . According to philosopher Sally Haslanger , the “numbers of philosophers of color, especially women of color, is even more appalling”; in a 2003 study, there “… were insufficient data for any racial group of women. [21] In the United States, the “… representation of scholars of color is plausibly worse than in any other field in the academy, not only physics, but also engineering.” [21] According to Professor LK McPherson, there is a “gross underrepresentation of blacks in philosophy.”McPherson states that it is a “… willful, not necessarily a conscious, preference among many members of the profession professionalism to maintain the status quo; the areas and questions properly or deeply philosophical. None of this is good for black folk. ” [22]

The first black woman in the US to do a PhD in philosophy was Joyce Mitchell Cook, who obtained her degree in 1965 from Yale University . LaVerne Shelton was also one of the earliest black women to receive a PhD in philosophy. Other notable women include Angela Davis , a political activist who specializes in writing about feminism , critical theory , Marxism , popular music , social consciousness , and the philosophy of punishment and prisons; Kathryn Gines , the founding director of the Collegium of Black Woman Philosophers, who specializes in continental philosophy , Africana philosophy, philosophy of race and Black feminist philosophy ; Anita L. Allen , the first African-American woman to complete both a JD and a PhD in philosophy, who focuses on political and legal philosophy, and who is in the US President Obama to sit on the Presidential Commission for the Bioethical Study issues; and Adrian Piper , an analytical philosopher who received a PhD in philosophy from Harvard; Jaqueline Scott, who received a PhD in Philosophy from Stanford University , and who specializes in Nietzsche , nineteenth-century philosophy, race theory and African-American philosophy .

Reports from the US

US Department of Education deferrals indicate indication That philosophy is one of the least proportionate fields in the humanities with respect to gender. [3] Although it is a question of a professional field, it is disproportionately male, no clear, unequivocal data exists on the number of women currently in philosophy, or indeed, on the number of men in philosophy, and it is debatable how to define what it means to be ‘in philosophy.’ Ph.D. Holders of a Ph.D. Holder of Ph.D. Holders of Ph.D. Holders of Philosophy, Ph.D. and Ph.D. one data setexists which measures these), or the current number of living women with publications in philosophy. The lack of clear data makes it difficult to establish gender proportions, but the consensus of the 17 percent of academically employed philosophers. [4]

The National Center for Education Statistics 2000, “Salary, Promotion, and Tenure Status of Minority and Women Faculty in US Colleges and Universities,” estimates in Table 23 that the total number of “History and Philosophy” US citizens and full-time faculty who were taught in 1992 were 19,000, of which 79% were men (ie 15,010 men in history and philosophy), 21% were women (3,990). They add, “In fact, men were at least twice as likely as women to teach history and philosophy.” [23]

In their 1997 report, ” Characteristics and Attitudes of Instructional Faculty and Staff in the Humanities ,” NCES notes, that about “one-half of full-time instructional faculty and staff in 4-year institutions in English and literature (47 percent) (50 percent) were female in the fall of 1992, compared with 24 percent and philosophy and religion (13 percent) (table 4). ” In this report they measure Philosophy and Religion in the same data set, and estimate the total number of full-time instructional Philosophy and Religion faculty and staff in 4-yr institutions to be 7,646. Of these, 87.3% are male (6675 men), 12.7 are female (971 women). [24]The 1997 report measures History Full-time instructional faculty and staff in 4-yr institutions to be 11,383; male: 76.3 (8,686 men); female: 23.7 (2,697 women). The numbers of women in the world are not easily comparable, but one can not be compared to the number of women in the history of the world. postponement. These women are employed as instructors of philosophy.

The 1997 report indicates that a large portion of all humanities are part-time instructors. [25] Part-time employees are disproportionately female but not female. [26] Therefore, considerations of full-time employees only partially require part-time to remain active in their field. In 2004, the percentage of Ph.Ds in philosophy, within the US, reached a record high percentage: 33.3%, or 121 of 363 doctorates awarded. [27]

Organizations and campaigns

APA committee on the status of women in philosophy

The Committee on the Status of Women is a committee of the American Philosophical Association dedicated to the assessment and reporting of the status of women in philosophy. [28] It is currently chaired by Hilde Lindemann . [29] In April 2007, the Committee on the Status of Women co-sponsored a session on the central question “Why Are Women Only 21% of Philosophy”. [30] At this session, Sharon Crasnow suggests that the low numbers of women may be due to:

Differential treatment: male and female university students may be treated differently in the classroom.

Vicious circle: female students do not feel inclined to study philosophy because of lack of contact with female professors.

Misleading statistics: university administrators focus on gender representation in the humanities overall, which obscures the disparity in philosophy. [30]

Society for Women in Philosophy

The Society for Women in Philosophy is a group created in 1972 that seeks to support and promote women in philosophy. It has a number of branches around the world, including New York, the American Pacific, the United Kingdom and Canada. [31] Each year, the society names one philosopher of the distinguished woman philosopher of the year. [32]

Honorees include:

2016: Maria Lugones ( Binghamton University )

2014: Peggy DesAutels

2013: Alison Wylie ( University of Washington , Seattle)

2012: Diana Tietjens Meyers

2011: Jennifer Saul

2010: Sally Haslanger ( MIT )

2009: Lorraine Code

2008: Nancy Tuana

2007: Joan Callahan

2006: Ruth Millikan

2005: Linda Martín Alcoff

2004: Susan Sherwin

2003: Eva Feder Kittay

2002: Sara Ruddick

2001: Amelie Rorty

Gendered conference campaign

The blog Feminist Philosophers hosts the Gendered Conference Campaign, which works towards increasing the representation of women at conferences and volumes. The blog states that “all-male events and volumes help to perpetuate the stereotyping of philosophy.” [33]

History

While there were women philosophers since the earliest times, and some of them were accepted as philosophers during their lives, the philosophers have entered the philosophical western canon . [1] Historians of philosophy are faced with two main problems. The first being the exclusion of women philosophers from history and philosophy, which leads to a lack of knowledge about women philosophers among philosophy students. The second problem deals with what the canonical philosophers had to say about philosophy and women’s place in it. In the past twenty-five years ago, an exponential increase in feminism, the philosophical canon. [34]According to Eugene Sun Park, “[p] hilosophy is predominantly white and predominantly male.This homogeneity exists in almost all aspects and at all levels of the discipline.” [2] According to Jennifer Saul , a professor of philosophy at the University of Sheffield, “[p] hilosophy, the oldest of the humanities, is also the malest (and the whitest). gender parity, philosophy is actually more overwhelmingly male than even mathematics. ” [9]

In the May 13, 2015 issue of The Atlantic , Susan Price notes that even though Kant’s first work in 1747 quotes Émilie Du Châtelet , a philosopher who was a “… scholar of Newton, religion, science, and mathematics”, “her will be found in the 1,000-plus pages of the new edition of The Norton Introduction to Philosophy. ” [8] The Norton Introduction does not name a female philosopher until the book begins to cover the mid-20th century. Scholars argue that women philosophers are also absent from the “… other leading anthologies used in university classrooms.” [8] Price states That university philosophy anthologies do not usually mention 17th century women philosophers Such As Margaret Cavendish ,Anne Conway , and Lady Damaris Masham . [8]Price argues that the philosophical “… canon remains dominated by white males-the discipline that some say still hews to the myth that genius is tied to gender.” [8] Amy Ferrer, executive director of the American Philosophical Association, states that “… women have been systematically left out of the cannon, and that women have come into the field. ” [8]The Encyclopedia of Philosophy , which as published in 1967, had” … articles on over 900 philosophers, [but it] did not include an entry for Wollstonecraft , Arendt or de Beauvoir. “[T] hese women philosophers were scarcely even marginal” to the canon set out at the time. [35]

Explaining the very small number of women philosophers, American academic and social critic Camille Paglia (born 1947) Argues That “… women in general are less comfortable than men in inhabiting a highly austere, cold, analytical space, Such As the one qui They are more likely to have a talent for or a better understanding of mathematics, but they are more likely to a frigid space from which the natural and the human have been eliminated. ” [36]Paglia claims that “[t] oday’s lack of major female philosophers is not in the world of talent because of the collapse of philosophy”, because, in her view, philosophy “… as traditionally practiced may be a dead genre” that ” belongs to the age of much slower and rhetorically formal inquiry. ” [36]

Ancient philosophy

Some of the Earliest Were women philosophers, Such As Hipparchia of Maroneia (active ca. 325 BC), Arete of Cyrene (active 5th-4th century BC) and Aspasia of Miletus (470-400 BC). Aspasia appears in the philosophical writings of Plato , Xenophon , Aeschines Socraticus and Antisthenes . Some scholars argue that Plato was impressed by her intelligence and wit. Diotima in the Symposium on her. [37] [38] Socrates attributes to the (possibly fictional) Diotima of Mantinea his lessons in the art of Eros (or philosophical searching).Plato’s final views on women are highly contested, but the Republic suggests that they are equally capable of education, intellectual vision, and rule of the city. [39] [40]

Other notable philosophers include:

Theano of Croton (6th century BC)

Aristoclea of ​​Delphi (6th century BC)

Sosipatra of Ephesus (4th century BC)

Nicarete of Megara (flourished around 300 BC)

Catherine of Alexandria (282-305)

Ptolemais of Cyrene (3rd century BC)

Aesara of Lucania (3rd century BC)

Diotima of Mantinea (appears in Plato’s Symposium )

Ban Zhao (c.35-100) D2

Xie Daoyun (before 340 – after 399)

Gargi Vachaknavi (7th century BC)

Medieval philosophy

Medieval philosophy dates from the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD to the Renaissance in the 16th century. Hypatia (AD 350 – 370 to 415) was a Greek mathematician, astronomer, and philosopher in Egypt , then part of the Eastern Roman Empire . [41] She was head of the Neoplatonic school at Alexandria , where she taught philosophy and astronomy . [42] [43] [44] [45]

Other notable woman philosophers include:

Aedesia of Alexandria (5th century AD)

Catherine of Siena (1347-1380)

Tullia of Aragona (c.1510-1556)

Moderata Font (1555-1592), critic of religion, feminist

Modern philosophy

The 17th century marks the beginning of modern philosophy , which ended in the early 20th century. During the 17th century, various women philosophers argued for the importance of education for women and two women Influenced philosophers René Descartes and DURING THE early portion of the 18th century, two women philosophers commented on John Locke ‘s philosophy. Laura Bassi (1711-1778) was the first woman to earn a university chair in a scientific field. Olympe de Gouges (1748-1793) Asked that French women be given the same rights as men, a position also taken by Judith Sargent Murray (1751-1820) in her essay ” On the Equality of the Sexes ” andMary Wollstonecraft in her essay A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792). During the 19th century, Harriet Martineau (1802-1876) criticized the state of women’s education and Harriet Taylor Mill (1807-1858), Sarah Margaret Fuller (1810-1850) and Antoinette Brown Blackwell (1825-1921) called for women’s rights . Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) argued that women were oppressed by an androcentric culture. Near the start of the 20th century, Mary Whiton Calkins (1863-1930) Was the first woman to Become President of the American Philosophical Association. Women thinkers such as Emma Goldman (1869-1940), an anarchist , and Rosa Luxemburg(1871-1919), a Marxist theorist , are known for their political views.

17th century

Marie de Gournay (1565-1645) was a critic of religion, proto-feminist, translator, and novelist who insisted that women should be educated.

Anna Maria van Schurman (1607-1678) was a multilinguist known for her defense of female education .

Elisabeth of Bohemia (1618-1680) influenced many key figures and philosophers, most notably René Descartes , who she corresponded with. She questioned Descartes’ idea of dualism , or the mind being separate from the body, and his theories regarding communication between mind and body.

Anne Conway (1631-1679) was an English philosopher whose work, in the tradition of the Cambridge Platonists , was an influence on Leibniz . Conway’s thought is original, it is rationalist , with hallmarks of gynocentric concerns and patterns, and in that sense it was unique among seventeenth-century systems. [46]

Damaris Cudworth Masham (1659-1708) was an English philosopher, proto-feminist , and advocate for women’s education.

Mary Astell (1666-1731) was an English feminist writer and rhetorician known for advocacy of equal educational opportunities for women , which earned her the title of “first English feminist.” [47] Her very well-known books outline her plan to establish a new type of educational institution for women.

18th century

Catharine Trotter Cockburn (1679-1749) published a first major philosophical work, A Defense of Mr. Lock [e] ‘s An Essay Concerning Human Understanding in 1702, at the age of 23. Much of the scholarly interest in her writing centers on gender studies .

Émilie du Châtelet (1706-1749) was a French mathematician, physicist , and author during the Age of Enlightenment . She translated and commented on Isaac Newton’s work Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica . She criticized John Locke’s philosophy and emphasis on the need for verification of knowledge through experience. She also theorized about free will and metaphysics . [48]

Laura Bassi (1711-1778) was an Italian philosopher and physicist who was the first woman in the world to earn a university degree in a scientific field of studies. She received a doctoral degree from the University of Bologna in May 1732, [49] the third academic qualification ever bestowed on a woman by a university, [50] and the first woman to earn a professorship in physics at a university in Europe. [51] She was the first woman to be offered an official teaching position at a university in Europe. [50]

Catharine Macaulay (1731-1791) was an English historian and writer. She attacked This is Edmund Burke ‘s Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents , calling it “a poison …”. [52] In her 1790 Letters on Education , Mary Wollstonecraft would say in 1792, that the apparent weakness of women was due to their mis-education. [53]

Olympe de Gouges (1748-1793) was a French playwright and political activist whose feminist and abolitionist writings reached a large audience. She was an early feminist who asked that French men be given the same rights as French men. In her Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen (1791), she challenged the practice of male authority and the notion of male-female inequality.

Judith Sargent Murray (1751-1820) was an early American advocate for women’s rights, an essayist, playwright , poet , and letter writer. She was one of the first proponents of the idea of ​​equality of the sexes-that women, like men, had the capability of intellectual achievement and should be able to achieve economic independence. Among Many other influential parts, her landmark essay ” On the Equality of the Sexes ” paved the way for new thoughts and ideas Proposed by other feminist writers of the century. The essay predated Mary Wollstonecraft ‘s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman qui Was published in 1792. [54]

Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-1797) was an English writer, philosopher, and advocate of women’s rights . She is regarded as one of the founding feminist philosophers . In A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), her most famous and influential work, [55] she argues that women are not naturally inferior to men, but appear to be only because they lack education. She suggests that both men and women should be treated as rational and social .

19th century

Harriet Martineau (1802-1876) was an English social theorist and political writer, often cited as the first female sociologist . [56] She wrote books and essays from a sociological, holistic, religious, domestic, and feminine perspective. In Society in America , she criticized the state of women’s education, stating that the “intellect of women is confined by an unjustifiable restriction” of access to education; she urged women to become well-educated and free.

Harriet Taylor Mill (1807-1858) was a philosopher and women’s rights advocate. In John Stuart Mill ‘s autobiography, he claimed to be the author of most of the books and articles published under his name. He stated that “when two persons have their thoughts and speculations completely in common, it is of little consequence, in respect of the question of originality, which of them holds the pen.” Together, they wrote “Early Essays on Marriage and Divorce,” published in 1832. [57] The debate about the nature and extent of collaboration is ongoing. [58]

Sarah Margaret Fuller (1810-1850) was an American journalist, critic, philosopher and women’s rights advocate. Her book Woman in the Nineteenth Century is considered the first major feminist work in the United States. She was an advocate of women’s rights and, in particular, women’s education and the right to employment. Many other advocates for women’s rights and feminism, including Susan B. Anthony, cite Fuller as a source of inspiration.

Antoinette Brown Blackwell (1825-1921) was the first woman to be a Protestant minister in the United States . She was a well-versed public speaker on controversial issues such as abolition of slavery and she sought to expand women’s rights . In 1873 Blackwell founded the Association for the Advancement of Women.

Victoria, Lady Welby (1837-1912) was a self-educated English philosopher of language . She was published in the leading English language academic journals of the day, Mind and The Monist . She published her first philosophical book, What Is Meaning? Studies in the Development of Significance in 1903, following the lines of the Language and the Language of the United States. word significs for her approach. Welby’s theories is meaning Anticipated contemporary semantics ,semiotics , and semiology .

Helene von Druskowitz (1856-1918) was an Austrian philosopher, writer and music critic. She was the second woman to obtain a Doctorate in Philosophy, which she obtained in Zurich . She usually published under a male alias because of the predominant sexism of the era.

Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) was an American feminist , sociologist , novelist, writer and social reformer . Her short story ” The Yellow Wallpaper ” has become a bestseller. The story is about a woman who suffers from mental illness after being married. She argued that the domestic environment is oppressed by the patriarchal beliefs upheld by society. [61] Gilman argued that women’s contributions to civilization, throughout history, have been halted because of an androcentric culture. She argued that women were the underdeveloped half of humanity. [62] She believed economic independence would bring freedom and equality for women.

Early 20th century

Mary Whiton Calkins (1863-1930) was an American philosopher and psychologist . She was also the first woman president of the American Psychological Association and the American Philosophical Association . Calkins studied psychology under William James and studied at Harvard University , which allowed her to attend school. She published her doctoral dissertation in 1896, and Harvard’s Department of Philosophy and Psychology recommended that she be granted her PhD, but Harvard’s President and Board refused, as she was a woman. The President believed women should not study with men. [63][64] James was astonished at the university’s decision, as he described his performance as “the most brilliant examination for the Ph.D. that we had at Harvard.” [65] She published four books and over one hundred papers in her career in psychology and philosophy. [66]She Was aussi year avid supporter of women’s rights [67] and an advocate of women’s right to vote .

Emma Goldman (1869-1940) was an anarchist known for her political activism, writing and speeches. She played a pivotal role in the development of anarchist political philosophy in the first half of the 20th century. She was viewed as a free-thinking “rebel woman” by admirers, and denounced by critics as an advocate of violent revolution. [68] Her writing and readings are varied, including atheism , freedom of speech , militarism , capitalism , marriage, free love , and homosexuality. Although she distanced herself from first-wave feminismand its efforts towards women’s suffrage , she developed ways of incorporating gender politics into anarchism.

Contemporary philosophy

Contemporary philosophy is the present period in the history of Western philosophy beginning at the end of the 19th century with the professionalization of the discipline and the rise of analytic and continental philosophy . Some influential women philosophers from this period include:

Susanne Langer (1895-1985) was an American philosopher of mind and art , who was influenced by Ernst Cassirer and Alfred North Whitehead . She was one of the first women to achieve an academic career in philosophy and the first woman to be popularly and professionally recognized as an American philosopher. Langer is best known for her 1942 book entitled Philosophy in a New Key . It argues that there is a basic and pervasive human need to symbolize, to invent meanings, and to invest meanings in one’s world. [69]

Hannah Arendt (1906-1975) was a German- born American assimilated Jewish political theorist . Though often described as a philosopher, it is a question of a political commentator on the subject of “man in the singular” and earth and inhabit the world. ” [70] Her works deal with the nature of power , and the subjects of politics, direct democracy , authority , and totalitarianism . The Hannah Arendt Prize is named in her honor.

Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986) was a French writer, intellectual, existentialist philosopher , political activist, feminist and social theorist . Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, she had a significant influence on both feminist existentialism and feminist theory . [71] De Beauvoir wrote novels, essays, biographies, autobiography and monographs on philosophy, politics and social issues. She is known for her 1949 treatise The Second Sex , a detailed analysis of women’s oppression and foundational tract of contemporary feminism .

Elizabeth Anscombe (1919-2001), usually cited as GEM Anscombe, was a British analytic philosopher . Anscombe’s 1958 article ” Modern Moral Philosophy ” introduced the term ” consequentialism ” into the language of analytic philosophy, and had a seminal influence on contemporary virtue ethics . Her monograph Intention is generally recognizable as her most influential work, and the continuing philosophical interest in the concepts of intention , action, and practical reasoning can be taken from her main impetus from this work. Mary Warnockdescribed as “the undoubted giant among women philosophers” while John Haldane said she “certainly has a good claim to be the greatest woman philosopher of whom we know”. [72]

Mary Midgley (born 1919) is an English moral philosopher . A senior lecturer in philosophy at Newcastle University , she is known for her work on science, ethics and animal rights . Midgley strongly opposes reductionism and scientism , and any attempts to make science a substitute for the humanities-a role for which it is, she argues, wholly inadequate. She has written extensively about what philosophers can learn from nature, especially from animals. The Guardian has described its fiercely combative philosopher and the UK’s “foremost scourge of” scientific pretension. ” [73]

Mary Warnock (born 1924) is a British philosopher of morality , education and mind , and writer on existentialism . From 1984 to 1991, she was Mistress of Girton College, Cambridge . Warnock studied at Lady Margaret Hall , Oxford , and was made an Honorary Fellow in 1984. She delivered the Gifford Lectures , entitled “Imagination and Understanding,” at the University of Glasgow in 1992. She has written extensively on ethics , existentialism and philosophy of mind. [74]

Philippa Foot (1920-2010) was a British philosopher , most notable for her works in ethics . She was one of the founders of contemporary virtue ethics , inspired by the ethics of Aristotle . Her later career marked a significant change in her work in the 1950s and ’60s, and may be seen as an attempt to modernize Aristotelian ethical theory, to show that it is adaptable to a contemporary world, and thus, that it could with such popular theories as modern deontological and utilitarian ethics. Some of her work was crucial in the re-emergence of normative ethics withinanalytic philosophy , especially her criticism of consequentialism and of non-cognitivism . A familiar example is the continuing discussion of an example of the subject referred to the trolley problem . Foot’s approach is influenced by the work of Wittgenstein .

Patricia Churchland (born 1943) is a Canadian-American philosopher noted for her contributions to neurophilosophy and the philosophy of mind . She is UC President’s professor of philosophy emerita at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), Where She has taught since 1984. Educated at the University of British Columbia , the University of Pittsburgh , and the University of Oxford , she taught philosophy at the University of Manitoba from 1969 to 1984.

Susan Haack (born 1945) is distinguished professor of the humanities, professor of philosophy, and professor of law at the University of Miami. She earned her PhD at Cambridge University . She has written on logic , the philosophy of language , epistemology , and metaphysics . Her pragmatism follows that of Charles Sanders Peirce . Haag’s major contribution to philosophy is her epistemological theory called foundherentism , [75] [76] [77] which is her attempt to avoid the logical problems of both pure foundationalism(which is susceptible to infinite regress) and pure coherentism (which is susceptible to circularity). Haack has been a fierce critic of Richard Rorty . [78] [79]She is critical of the view that is a specific female perspective on logic and scientific truth and is critical of feminist epistemology . She holds that many feminist critics of science and philosophy are overly concerned with ‘ political correctness ‘. [80] [81]