Abstract

Contemporary critiques within feminist epistemology and science studies problematize the traditional 'S knows that p' model of knowledge on grounds that it perpetuates a profile of the knower as implausibly interchangeable and autonomous. It also rests on what feminist philosophers have demonstrated to be a deeply flawed picture of objectivity. From these concerns, feminists have reworked knowledge frameworks to satisfy two general requirements. First, in line with traditional epistemology, a theory of knowledge must have a normative component by which our theoretical claims can be assessed. Second, the production of theories of knowledge must be understood to occupy complex intersections of competing influences, communities, power dynamics, and social particularities. To meet these requirements, some feminists use the naturalized epistemology of W. V. O. Quine's empiricism. Proto-Quinean feminist empiricist models of knowledge can demonstrate the relevance of location and community. But, I argue that they overlook the epistemic relevance of our physical embodiment. To illustrate this problem, I compare the feminist empiricist epistemologies of Louise Antony and Lynn Hankinson Nelson. I argue that Nelson's transformation of Quine's naturalized approach extends deeper than Antony's and more clearly develops the pertinent strengths of Quine's empiricism to bridge the insights of three feminist methodologies: standpoint, postmodern, and feminist empiricism. Nelson also diffuses the conundrum of bias and objectivity that Antony raises. But, while Nelson's Quinean model is preferable over Antony's, I argue that it still retains a limitation for feminist philosophers who wish to address embodiment as an important epistemic variable. To solve for this problem, I use John Dewey's theory of inquiry as a more inclusive naturalized epistemology that is compatible with embodiment and the major insights feminist philosophy. Based in cultural naturalism, Dewey's model features an epistemic subject who negotiates networks of symbolic meanings within the biological and cultural matrices of experience. Dewey's account of the biological and cultural matrices of inquiry lends itself to a rich and thoroughgoing naturalism. With attention to the example of birthing practices, I show how Dewey's theory of inquiry can be modified to create a feminist pragmatist epistemology that includes bodies as co-constituents of knowledge