Date of Award

2015

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelors

Department

Humanities

Second Department

Social Sciences

First Advisor

Edidin, Aron

Keywords

Gender, Philosophy, Gender Disparity, Epistemic injustice, Testimonial Injustice, Inquisitory Injustice, Hermeneutical Injustice

Area of Concentration

Philosophy

Abstract

There is a significant gender divide in philosophy such that the vast majority of published authors and those holding professional positions are male. This project looks at the aforementioned gender disparity by first discussing three forms of Epistemic Injustice. Testimonial Injustice occurs when an individual’s statements and knowledge claims are rejected due to the speaker’s social categories rather than merit or expertise. Hermeneutical Injustice happens when people in marginalized groups are denied the tools necessary to understand experiences that they are having. Inquisitory Injustice occurs when an individual is denied participatory power in a discourse or process of inquiry, thereby stripping her of epistemic agency. The classroom setting and online blog posts are used as lenses through which to discuss these injustices as well as the psychological phenomena that fuel such injustices. The phenomena of schemas, schematic-mismatch, stereotype threat, and implicit biases were first viewed in the context of philosophy and then through previous empirical research. With a connection between rationality and philosophy established, the researcher sought to uncover implicit biases between gender, reason and emotion. An Implicit Association Test (IAT) was developed and distributed to undergraduate students throughout the state of Florida who were currently in at least one philosophy course. The test showed a moderate to strong association between femaleness and emotion, and maleness and reason across the board. This suggests that one way to improve the position of women in philosophy is to change the associations people have either between philosophy and rationality, or femaleness and rationality. Future research of this variety will continue the conversation regarding philosophy’s gender disparity, leading to further avenues through which to improve the position of all marginalized individuals in philosophy.

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