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Part 1 Epistemology and Marginality
Sumi Madhok
Mary Evans
For a âHandbook of Feminist Theoryâ, a section on epistemology is important for several reasons. Forms of epistemological enquiries, their resultant knowledges and the nature of sociality these uphold are central to feminist thinking not only because of their power to define who gets to be a âsubjectâ and a âknowerâ but also which know-ledges and phenomena are deemed valid âobjectsâ of study and consequently worthy of recognition, authority and legitimacy. Epistemological enquiries and processes uphold a particular view of the world, endorse certain forms of gender relations and assume a specific set of hierarchical social and political relations as standard. Therefore, in insisting upon uncovering the identity of the âknowerâ and the nature of âknowingâ, feminist theory is committed to knowledge as linked both to power and to a certain politics.
In conceiving this section, we focus in particular on the links between epistemology and marginality. In emphasizing the question of epistemic marginality we encouraged the contributors to conceive their pieces in light of the associations that feminist scholars have drawn between the production of knowledge and continuing social injustices including those resulting from the setting up of epistemic hierarchies and the production of marginal statuses, identities and knowledges and from the societal impact of deep epistemic divides â between those who are designated as âknowersâ and those deemed to be bereft of the capacity to âknowâ â on forms of epistemic violence and everyday modes of oppression. Feminist writing about epistemic marginality and exclusion is, of course, not new. In writing about marginality and knowledge-production feminist scholars have reflected on questions of who can be âKnowersâ, what is regarded as âKnowingâ and what can be âKnownâ (Hawkesworth, 1989), and drawn on their own institutional and epistemic marginality to note at least three things: the marginal status of feminist epistemology as a legitimate âfield of enquiryâ; the marginalization of feminist epistemologists as a group (not least in philosophy departments, where epistemology is a central field of enquiry and curriculum), and the marginal status of feminist and gender studies as knowledge-producing or a âdisciplineâ. To be sure, while the above can be seen as empirical âevidenceâ of the way in which epistemic processes and relations work in the âacademyâ, feminist scholars use this empirical fact to ask broader questions about marginality that are political, structural and ethical. But why does it matter that the connection between knowledge and marginality â the processes of knowledge-production and legitimation, who produces it, for whom and to what end â be opened up for critical and democratic scrutiny? It matters because feminist epistemology not only concerns itself with critique and producing new forms of knowledge; it is also deeply invested in the transformation of existing inequitable societal relations. And, therefore, it follows that, if theory is both a way of seeing the world and providing a blueprint for political action, then the world it illuminates, acknowledges and seeks to define cannot simply replicate the one that is the already normative, the always already privileged, the powerful and the authoritative. Furthermore, in order for theory to be transformative, including implicitly engaged in the transformation of unequal gender relations, then it must serve up a toolbox for challenging existing exploitative structural logics of the normative order in order to reorient it explicitly towards social justice and an ethical politics.
Overall, the intellectual oeuvre of feminist epistemology includes both modes as well as the processes of knowledge-production, but it is in its continual insistence on âknowingâ the âknowerâ, on making âsubjectivityâ count (Code, 1993 and in this volume) and on unmasking and assessing the epistemic impact of the âsex of the knowerâ (Code, 1993; this volume) on the nature of knowing that feminist epistemology has made important interventions, not least in uncovering the âpolitics of epistemic practiceâ (Fricker, 2007: 2). Consequently, feminist epistemologists have brought under their epistemic scanner processes of knowledge-production such as the âscientific methodâ and its accompanying values of objectivity, universality, scientificity and âvalue freenessâ, examined the politics of âepistemic relationsâ and âepistemic conductâ and insisted on discussing âthe political nature of epistemologyâ (Fricker, 2007; Alcoff, 1993) itself. The essays in this section reflect the concern with both the content and the processes of knowledge-production. The papers also reflect a multi-disciplinary interest in epistemological questions among scholars working in feminist and gender studies. However, they neither provide an exhaustive âcoverageâ of the field of feminist epistemology nor do they present reviews of all the important interventions; but they do build on the latter and put forward new directions for feminist epistemological work to consider. In this we do not attempt to replicate those important anthologies edited by Helen Crowley and Susan Himmelweit (1992) and Alcoff and Potter (1993) but, rather, suggest ways of taking forward and developing various debates.
Over the years, feminists have become accustomed to invoking epistemic harms and to reading and writing about âepistemic injusticeâ (Fricker, 2007), âepistemic violenceâ (Spivak, 1988) and âepistemic scandalâ (Chow, 2006). The intellectual potency of this language derives its poignancy and urgency from the structural injustices that order the organization of everyday life. As we write the introduction to this section, aspects of âepistemic and testimonial injusticeâ (Fricker, 2007), âpolitics of testimonyâ (Code, this volume), the withholding of âepistemic agencyâ and the reinforcing of epistemic marginality, are in operation across the globe in now all-too-familiar revealing and sinister ways, and not least in a courtroom in Sanford, Florida, where the trial of the murdered US black teenager Trayvon Martin has just concluded. We cannot afford to ignore formations of marginality and the epistemic questions they raise; these have, as feminist scholars have powerfully argued and reminded us, a strong and enduring material basis.
The emergence of the language of epistemic harm, of course, is itself an outcome of a long struggle not only against prevalent epistemological practices and dogmas but also against the reproduction of existing hierarchies and of coloniality within feminist theory itself. The critique of feminismâs and of feminist theoriesâ âinternal colonialismâ is now strongly registered (Mohanty, 1991; hooks, 2000; Collins, 2000; Lorde, 2001; Rich, 1986; Spivak, 1988; Crenshaw, 1989; Lugones, 2010; Bhavnani, 1993; Chow, 2006), and, as bell hooks notes (2000), the feminist movement is âthe most self-criticalâ among all movements of social justice, but despite this self-criticism and even self-reflexivity within epistemic practices, it is hardly short of a âpersisting epistemic scandalâ that much of feminist epistemology continues to be âself-referentialâ and to exhibit a âstrange complacency of its provincial contentsâ (Chow, 2006: 13), only âtelling feminist storiesâ (Hemmings, 2005) about particular epistemic histories, cultures and practices. In this respect we acknowledge the limitations of this section â nearly all the essays here focus upon ongoing epistemic debates within feminist epistemology from metropolitan locations and engage epistemic questions and scholarship that are rooted firmly within the âwestern canonicalâ tradition. While this shortcoming of feminist epistemological investigations cannot be understood in isolation from present geopolitical, historical and economic contexts â in fact, knowledge-production, pedagogical, research and institutional priorities and are conditioned by these â an acknowledgement of oneâs complicity in reproducing and keeping in place intellectual hierarchies, however, can be an important first step. Many essays in this section are deeply troubled by questions of coloniality and critical of âotheringâ practices in knowledge-production while also accepting their own structural implication within these. They are in the best tradition of feminist scholarship â not only reflexive but also concerned with questions of accountability and responsibility. But the difficulty remains nevertheless: how to resolve this âepistemic scandalâ? The reader will, we hope, understand if we refrain from providing simple and ready-to-use solutions here. For we doubt that these exist. One thing weâre certain of, though, is that simply resorting to what Sandra Harding referred to in another context as âadd and stirâ is not going to do. In other words, to provide spaces for âotherâ forms or modes of knowledge-production in a mechanical way, without attempting to show how these either effectively query or even displace the epistemic premises upon which questions of knowledge-production occur, hardly constitutes a âsolutionâ. In this section, contributors re-examine existing epistemic arguments and recalibrate epistemic questions and materials not by seeking to displace their own privilege (as if they could!) but through acknowledging their epistemic provincialism, their geopolitical and institutional location as also the raced and classed identities of their readings.
By acknowledging that epistemology is political (Alcoff, 1993) and that knowledge is not âvalue freeâ but is always a product of certain forms of political investments, these essays build on what is now a basic building block of feminist epistemological analysis â namely, that gender is not a unitary category of analysis but one that is mediated through the intersection of race, class, sexualities and other forms of marginality (Crenshaw, 1989; Collins, 2000). This epistemic insight, that gender intersects with other forms of marginality, has been heralded as the most âsignificantâ conceptual contribution of the last twenty years, since it not only uncovered (feminist) epistemologyâs âirrepressible connection with social powerâ (Fricker, 2007: 2) but also dealt a blow to the âtheoretical framework of individualism and compulsory rational idealizationâ predominantly favoured in epistemic arguments (see also Code in this section). Thinking seriously about marginality has challenged the methodological individualism as well as the assumptions of âhuman homogeneityâ that underpin epistemological enquiry and unmasked the processes through which subordinate groups are denied subjectivity and status as âknowersâ. Gayatri Spivak (1988) has written powerfully about the âepistemic violenceâ that accompanies the silencing of marginalized groups and Patricia Collins writes evocatively about the denial of subjectivity and the cognitive competence of Black women (Collins, 2000). bell hooks (2000) writes of the need âto develop feminist theory that emerges from âindividuals who have knowledge of both margin and centerâ (2000: xvii) and for âunderstanding marginalityâ as a âposition and place of resistanceâ that is âcrucial for oppressed, exploited, colonised peopleâ (1990: 150â51). Standpoint theorists such as Sandra Harding, for instance, write in favour of a methodology that involves âstarting thought from the lives of marginalised peoplesâ, arguing that this will reveal more of the unexamined assumptions influencing science and generate not only more critical questions but also a âstrong objectivityâ that would both recognize the social situatedness of knowledge and also critically evaluate it in order âto determine which social situations tend to generate the most objective claimsâ. For standpoint theorists, the key questions that are asked, investigated and indeed addressed by academic disciplines are those which affect the privileged and the powerful. And therefore, by implication, the intellectual investments are those which seek to entrench privilege in place and not displace it. As a corrective, standpoint theorists propose that if we are to challenge privileged views of the world then we will have to start producing knowledg...
