The notion of "feminist pragmatism" or "pragmatist feminism" has been around since Charlene Haddock Seigfried introduced it two decades ago. However, the bulk of the work in this field has been directed toward recovering the feminist strain of classical American philosophy, largely through renewed interest in the work of Jane Addams. This exploration of the origins of feminism and pragmatism has been fruitful in building a foundation for theoretical considerations. The editors of this volume believe the (...) next logical step is the contemporary application to both theory and experience. Contemporary Feminist Pragmatism is the first book to address the modern significance of the nexus of feminism and pragmatism. The issues explored here include the relationship between community and identity, particularly around the impact of gender and race; reframing political practice regarding feminist pragmatist commitments including education, sustainability movements, and local efforts like community gardens; and the association between ethics and inquiry including explorations of Buddhism, hospitality, and animal-human relationships. (shrink)

Feminist-Pragmatism is a philosophical tradition, which draws upon the insights of both feminist and pragmatist theory and practice. It is fundamentally concerned with enlarging philosophical thought through activism and lived experience, and assumes feminist and pragmatist ideas to be mutually beneficial for liberatory causes. Feminist-pragmatism emphasises the need to redress false distinctions, or dualisms, as these usually result in a denigration of one oppositional by another. Thus, feminist-pragmatists critique such bifurcations as thought/action, mind/body, (...) universal/particular, and they show how the skewed favouring of one over the other results in philosophical theories which are incapable of explaining our gendered existences, positions in society, understandings of knowledge, or learning experiences. Feminist-pragmatists contribute to current debates in epistemology, social and political philosophy, philosophy of education, ethics, and metaphysics. Their work reflects the theoretical advances made by feminist theorists especially over the course of the latter part of the twentieth century, while being rooted in the principles and criticisms of the classical pragmatists. (shrink)

By tracing a specific development through the approaches of Peirce, James, and Dewey I present a view of (classical) pragmatist epistemology that invites comparison with recent work in feminist epistemology. Important dimensions of pragmatism and feminism emerge from this critical dialectical relationship between them. Pragmatist reflections on the role of reason and philosophy in a changing world encourage us to see that philosophy's most creative and most responsible future must also be a feminist one.

Abstract:This paper is exploratory in a sense: I explore the possibility of feminist pragmatism as a pedagogical position compatible with online education. I argue in this paper that feminist pragmatism (FP) can be an important philosophic resource to continually challenge and change the online educational conversation. Contemporary feminist pragmatism is a conscious effort of women philosophers who took inspiration from the works of major women pragmatist thinkers, as well as others, especially John Dewey. Early (...) women pragmatists developed a fruitful collegial relationship with John Dewey and collaborated on studies and issues that shaped Dewey's pragmatism. FP's main tenets include an emphasis on context and experience, pluralism, diversity, and commitment to transformation. My aim in this paper is twofold: first, I seek to discuss online education and remote learning as experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic; and second, drawing from FP's philosophical tenets, I explore feminist-pragmatist perspectives on online education. Furthermore, I wish to contribute to the expansion and depth of Deweyan approaches through feminist consciousness and sensibilities. (shrink)

By tracing its own narrative from the feminist pragmatism of the 1980s-2000s back to the avant-la-lettre feminist pragmatism of the Progressive Era, this chapter explores the use of narrative within feminist pragmatism. It pays particular attention to uses of narrative in Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Anna Julia Cooper and Jane Addams to reveal the usefulness of narrative as a feminist pragmatist mode of inquiry and of elucidating meaning. The chapter concludes with a brief suggestion (...) of where feminist pragmatist narrative may take us next. (shrink)

In this essay, I reflect on the contradictions that arise from a personal experience of conflict with my father and the clash of traditional Filipino gender norms in the context of the practice of name changes within the institution of marriage and intersecting feminist critiques of patriarchy. My understanding of the Tagalog amor propio is self-love or self-pride within Filipino culture and signifies one's authority, place, and meaning in the community. As a concept of authority, amor propio encourages practices (...) of respect toward the authority figure. In the context of the home, amor propio is attributed to the father, and members of the family ought to respect his amor propio. This essay examines my own conflicted relationship with my father and my attempts to navigate the complex terrain of amor propio, as a Filipina, feminist/peminist, dutiful daughter. Filipino immigrant families face distinct challenges within family life owing to globalization, colonialism, and racism, so I find Jane Addams's social ethics of filial relations helpful in framing the tension between individual and social claims within the specific cultural values expected of Filipina women as dutiful daughters. Addams's feminist social sensibilities in her work at Hull House were attuned to the plight of daughters and the conflicting claims of the family emergent within the crowded immigrant neighborhoods in Chicago. She was able to articulate and sympathetically understand the generational divide within immigrant families at Hull House and sought to bridge these differences within the context of the family. I reflect on her work in my own experience as a dutiful Filipina daughter. (shrink)

While pragmatism as a philosophy and intellectual movement has been gaining inroads in international ethics and international political theory scholarship, feminist pragmatism is not yet as widely regarded. This paper explores the intellectual contributions of feminist pragmatism to international political thought, particularly Jane Addams’s social ethics which is largely overlooked in the literature on women’s contributions to international normative theory. Here I add to efforts to reconsider Addams as a thinker that was concerned with the (...) multiplicity and diversity, features of social life that make a foundational premise of international normative thought. In the paper, I explore how feminism and pragmatism challenge ideas about normatively constitutive communities. The nexus of the two philosophies come clearly in Addams’s progressive communitarianism and her ideas on the significance of settlement to social ethics. In addition to Addams’s pacifist thought and international humanism, I argue that her practice in Hull House draws attention to the site as a normatively significant category. The paper casts Hull House as an international social space that sustained social connections, instrumental to social ethics. Hull House serves as an exemplar that can inform further thinking about the international community and more democratised global governance structures. (shrink)

Pragmatist philosopher John Dewey famously stated that man is a creature of habit, and not of reason or instinct. In this paper, I will assess Dewey’s explication of the habituated self and the potential it holds for radical transformative processes. In particular, I will examine the process of coming to feminist consciousness, and will show that a feminist-pragmatist reading of change can accommodate a view of the self as responsible agent. Following the elucidation of the changing self, I (...) will appraise key pragmatist concepts of inquiry, such as doubt and self-reflexivity, with regard to their treatment of deep-seated internalisations of oppressive norms and the initiation of change. Ultimately, I will argue that a feminist-pragmatist understanding of transformation is conducive not only to the project of personal transformation, but also to social and political change more generally. (shrink)

In this article I pursue both a systematic and a historical interest. I develop the sentiment of unease as a feminist-pragmatist concept systematically. The main references are the terms habit and situation in John Dewey and the work of Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Perkins Gilman reflects experiences of unease as a writer and as a (social) theorist. The paper is therefore also a historical appreciation of the theoretical work of Charlotte Perkins Gilman. With Perkins Gilman, uneasiness appears to be an (...) expression of an androcentric world, more generally speaking, of a world in which gender relations are understood according to the pattern of normality and deviation. This can be generalized and unease can be understood as an expression of power asymmetries that damage the epistemic authority of some. Such a view is critical of a widespread tendency to individualize negative feelings and attribute them to individuals, who are then classified either as in need of individual coaching or as pathological, and who can therefore theoretically be passed over. (shrink)

The history of women in sociology is explored here through the correspondence written by Sophonisba P. Breckinridge to Marion Talbot in the summer of 1936. Their loving letters reveal the ideas and practices of feminist pragmatism and the female world of love and ritual located in Chicago in the twentieth century. This world of professional women flourished around the social settlement Hull House and the University of Chicago during the founding years of sociology. Their lives and social thought (...) challenge our understanding of the emergence of sociology at the University of Chicago, and their ideas remain a rich resource for analyzing society today. (shrink)

Unlike our counterparts in Europe who have rewritten their specific cultural philosophical heritage, American feminists have not yet critically reappropriated our own philosophical tradition of classical American pragmatism. The neglect is especially puzzling, given that both feminism and pragmatism explicitly acknowledge the material or cultural specificity of supposedly abstract theorizing. In this article I suggest some reasons for the neglect, call for the rediscovery of women pragmatists, reflect on a feminine side of pragmatism, and point out some (...) common features. The aim is to encourage the further development of a feminist revisioning of pragmatism and a pragmatist version of feminism. (shrink)

In Gendered Readings of Change, Clara Fischer develops a unique theory of change by drawing on American philosophy and contemporary feminist thought. Via a select history of ancient Greek and Pragmatist philosophies of change, she argues for a reconstruction of transformation that is inclusive of women's experiences and thought. With wide-ranging analysis, this book addresses ontological, moral, epistemological, and political questions, and includes an insightful exploration of the philosophies of Parmenides, Aristotle, John Dewey, Iris Young, and Jane Addams.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Approaching History through the Future: Some Thoughts from a Feminist PragmatistErin McKennai was recently asked to write on the philosophy of history from a pragmatist perspective. My initial response was that this is not my area of specialization and that I didn’t really have much to say. Then I realized that it was interesting to think about how I view and use notions of history in my work (...) as a feminist pragmatist. It turns out that in my own work, there is a theme of approaching/understanding history through the possibilities of the future. Rather than being confined by settled or fixed views of the present or the past, the present and past are better seen as possibilities for shaping new and different futures. This can be unsettling for many, as humans often like to justify practices and institutions with the idea that “it has to be this way” and/or “it has always been this way.” But unsettling this habit is important if we hope to approach conflict and disagreements in a productive manner that avoids dogmatism and division.Examining my own use of history in my varied philosophical work turned out to be interesting and instructive. It also revealed my reliance on theorists such as Jane Addams, Anna Julia Cooper, and John Dewey in my writing and my teaching. Usually, I work with implicit notions of history and its role in my philosophical writing. The one exception to that was in writing American Philosophy: From Wounded Knee to the Present, co-authored with Scott L. Pratt. In that work, we explicitly took up a pragmatist approach to history rooted in the work of John Dewey. There, we wrote:For Peirce, James, and Dewey, philosophy worth the name began in response to experienced problems—situations marked by confusion, doubt, indeterminacy—and then returned to these problems, aiming to transform and reconstruct them in ways that allowed the inquirer to go forward, to encounter still more experience. Philosophy, then should be understood as an activity that arises from experience. Since [End Page 71] experience is framed by language, culture and history, philosophy is not a transcendental practice engaged with the really real and truly true.(McKenna and Pratt 3)In “Philosophy and Civilization,” Dewey noted that philosophy is closely tied to the histories of cultures. These ties are mutually transformative, as the philosophy produced is rooted in, and shaped by, the place and time just as it then transforms the place, time, and traditions that give rise to it.Dewey’s own philosophy of history guided our work in American Philosophy: From Wounded Knee to the Present as we strove to offer a history of American philosophy that acknowledges its rootedness in particular times and places. In Logic: The Theory of Inquiry, Dewey noted that history is always in the making, when he wrote:The slightest reflection shows that the conceptual material employed in writing history is that of the period in which a history is written. There is no material available for leading principles and hypotheses save that of the historic present. As culture changes, the conceptions that are dominant in a culture change. Of necessity, new standpoints for viewing, appraising and ordering data arise. History is then rewritten. Material that had formerly been passed by, offers itself as data because the new conceptions propose new problems for solution requiring new factual material for statement and test.(LW 12:232–33)Dewey went on to argue that changes happening in the present put the past into a new perspective and bring to light new problems. This means that one’s understanding of the past is changed, and “we gain new instruments for estimating the force of present conditions as potentialities of the future” (LW 12:238). For this reason, in American Philosophy: From Wounded Knee to the Present, Pratt and I embedded the history of American philosophy in actual historical events that we thought could profitably provide context for the philosophy and could themselves be rethought from our present vantage point. We were guided by the standpoint that American philosophy is a tradition committed “to a dynamic, pluralistic world of experience in which knowledge is a... (shrink)

This paper offers an overview of Grace Lee Boggs's community-based and person-centered philosophy and pedagogy, highlighting how education can foster social responsibility and create democratic habits in students, better equipping them to create radical change within their communities. The essay demonstrates Boggs's commitment to philosophical-activist pedagogy and its alignment with a feminist-pragmatist approach, which emphasizes lived experience, pluralism, complexity, and equality, as well as praxis. The essay then considers how Boggs's philosophical activism can be enacted inside and outside the (...) traditional classroom, concluding by describing an educational and activist project called Narrative 4. (shrink)

The issue of surrogacy has received a great deal of attention in the West ever since the famous Baby M case in the latter part of the 1980s. Ethicists, psychologists, and legal experts have struggled with the meanings and implications of this practice, especially in its commercial form. In contemporary times, however, the phenomenon of surrogacy has assumed new dimensions as it travels across national borders in the context of globalization. As a transnational phenomenon, it is now marketed as an (...) attractive part of "Reproductive Tourism," for the most part, by various clinics and organizations located in the global south to some of the so-called "First World nations."Until now, most of the philosophical literature. (shrink)

The “right to belong” is a human right in two ways. First, there is the right to belong in a limited sense, i.e., to the extent necessary for individuals to secure all other human rights, such as those recognized by the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Second, there is a deeper aspect of the right to belong, that which is necessary to flourish as a human being. To establish, first, that the right to belong in a limited sense (...) should be a human right, I draw upon Hannah Arendt’s claim that stateless persons are without rights, as only communities can grant them. I argue that this limited level of belonging is a necessary but insufficient condition for human flourishing. Full human flourishing requires belonging on a deeper level. To articulate the nature of this deeper level of belonging I draw on Simone Weil’s definition of the “need for roots” and John Dewey and Jane Addams’ constructions of the self as social. I then show how “belonging” in a deeper sense necessarily connects with how a person is perceived and received by individuals and institutions in a community and argue that full perception by and participation in a community is necessary for humans to flourish. Thus, the right to belong imposes an ethical obligation on other members of the community to perceive undocumented immigrants as full human persons with the potential to lead flourishing lives. (shrink)

Though many pioneering feminists were deeply influenced by American pragmatism, their contemporary followers have generally ignored that tradition because of its marginalization by a philosophical mainstream intent on neutral analyses devoid of subjectivity. In this revealing work, Charlene Haddock Seigfried effectively reunites two major social and philosophical movements, arguing that pragmatism, because of its focus on the emancipatory potential of everyday experiences, offers feminism its most viable and powerful philosophical foundation. With careful attention to their interwoven histories and (...) contemporary concerns, _Pragmatism and Feminism_ effectively invigorates both traditions, opening them to new interpretations and appropriations and asserting their timely philosophical relevance. This foundational work in feminist theory simultaneously invites and guides future scholarship in an area of rapidly emerging significance. (shrink)

Birthing feminist pragmatist epistemologies -- Feminist epistemologies -- Embodiment -- Project overview -- Quine's naturalized epistemology -- A brief history of objectivity in western philosophy -- Quine's empiricism -- Holism -- Ontological and epistemological impact -- Antony's analytic feminist empiricism -- Objectivity and the bias paradox -- Quine's naturalized epistemology solves bias paradox -- Anti-quinean realism -- Nelson's holistic feminist empiricism -- Nelson's holism -- Communities as knowers -- Facts/values -- Dewey's theory of inquiry -- Epistemology (...) and inquiry -- Biological and cultural matrices -- Habits and embodiment -- Feminist pragmatist inquiry -- OB/GYN and midwifery models -- Time -- Technology -- Spatial presence -- Tacit knowledge as feminist. (shrink)

Feminist theorists have shown that knowledge is embodied in ways that make a difference in science. Intemann properly endorses feminist standpoint theory over Longino’s empiricism, insofar as the former better addresses embodiment. I argue that a pragmatist analysis further improves standpoint theory: Pragmatism avoids the radical subjectivity that otherwise leaves us unable to account for our ability to share scientific knowledge across bodies of different kinds; and it allows us to argue for the inclusion, not just of (...) the knowledge produced from marginalised bodies, but of the marginalised themselves. (shrink)

Idealism, Pragmatism, and Feminism provides an account of the life and writings of Ella Lyman Cabot (1866-1934), a woman who received formal training, but not formal recognition, in the field of classical American philosophy. It highlights the themes of idealism, pragmatism and feminism as they emerged in the course of career as an educational reformer and ethicist that spanned nearly four decades. Cabot's writings, developed in graduate seminars at Harvard and Radcliffe at the turn of the century complement, (...) and in many cases anticipate, the thinking of the "fathers" of the American philosophical cannon: Charles Sanders Peirce, Josiah Royce, William James, and John Dewey. Her formal philosophical writing focuses on the concepts of growth, creativity, and the moral imagination—a fact that is especially interesting given that these concepts are developed by a woman who faced serious obstacles in her personal and intellectual development. Indeed, these concepts are not merely philosophical ideals, but practical tools that Ella Lyman Cabot used to negotiate the gender roles and intellectual marginalization that she faces at the turn of the century. The discipline of philosophy was very slow to incorporate the insights of women into its self-definition. An analysis of the writings of Ella Lyman Cabot reveals this point, but also the pointed ways in which she sought to express her genuinely creative insights. (shrink)

Pragmatism, Feminism, and Democracy is James Livingston's virtuoso reflection on the period between 1890 and 1930, a primal scene of American history during which a wave of intellectual currents came together--and fell apart--to reorient society. Tying in critical insights on corporate capitalism, consumer culture, populism, and the American Left, Livingston analyzes the intersections and similarities of pragmatism and feminism to yield an original, provocative blend of historiography, feminist theory, and American intellectual history.

How Do We Reimagine?We reimagine by combining activism with philosophy.... We have to see every crisis as both a danger and an opportunity. It's a danger because it does so much damage to our lives, to our institutions, to all that we have expected. But it's also an opportunity for us to become creative; to become the new kind of people that are needed at such a huge period of transition.—Boggs, "How Do We Reimagine?"this essay seeks to add to the (...) emerging dialogue about the incredibly rich and complex nature of Grace Lee Boggs's philosophic activism by exploring the connections and tensions between her philosophic activism and pragmatist feminism. As an Asian American immigrant with a PhD in philosophy, her... (shrink)

This article explores pragmatism's associationwith relativism, not to rescue it fromrelativism but rather to highlight how aspectsof the classic pragmatists' positions supportqualified relativism. I do so in an effort tohelp restore ``relativism'' as a meaningfulconcept that is nuanced and complex, ratherthan naive and vulgar, as it is regularlyportrayed by more traditional philosophers. This nuanced relativism I call qualifiedrelativism. Qualified relativists insist thatall inquiry are affected by philosophicalassumptions which are culturally bound, andthat all inquirers are situated knowers who areculturally bound (...) as well. However, we cancompensate for our cultural embeddedness byopening our horizons and including others inour conversations. I connect the classicpragmatist points to current feministepistemological work and show that qualifiedrelativists (pragmatists, feminists, andpostmodernists) can claim roots to theirpositions in Peirce, James, and Dewey, some ofthe very scholars others turn to for theirpragmatic realism and their nonvulgar absolutism. (shrink)

Recent years have witnessed a focus on feeling as a topic of reinvigorated scholarly concern, described by theorists in a range of disciplines in terms of a “turn to affect.” Surprisingly little has been said about this most recent shift in critical theorizing by philosophers, including feminist philosophers, despite the fact that affect theorists situate their work within feminist and related, sometimes intersectional, political projects. In this article, I redress the seeming elision of the “turn to affect” in (...) feminist philosophy, and develop a critique of some of the claims made by affect theorists that builds upon concerns regarding the “newness” of affect and emotion in feminist theory, and the risks of erasure this may entail. To support these concerns, I present a brief genealogy of feminist philosophical work on affect and emotion. Identifying a reductive tendency within affect theory to equate affect with bodily immanence, and to preclude cognition, culture, and representation, I argue that contemporary feminist theorists would do well to follow the more holistic models espoused by the canon of feminist work on emotion. Furthermore, I propose that prominent affect theorist Brian Massumi is right to return to pragmatism as a means of redressing philosophical dualisms, such as emotion/cognition and mind/body, but suggest that such a project is better served by John Dewey's philosophy of emotion than by William James's. (shrink)

Although pragmatism and feminism share a number of key features, pragmatist philosophy has had little influence on feminist thought. This article explores the reasons for this failed rendezvous. Focusing particularly on Rorty’s neo-pragmatism, it is argued that neo-pragmatism’s lack of an adequate political theory, particularly regarding key issues in current feminist theory such as the conceptualization of the relations between the public and private spheres and the understanding of subjectivity, is a particularly important factor here. (...) Earlier versions of pragmatist thought, however, might make more useful contributions to current feminist debates, particularly on the issues of rationality and ethics of care. (shrink)

A contemporary appraisal of the breadth, significance, and legacy of the work of Charlene Haddock Seigfried, this book brings together writings focused on pragmatist feminism/feminist pragmatism, contemporary pragmatism, William James and the reconstruction of philosophy, education and American philosophy in the 21st century. Charlene Haddock Seigfried is a looming figure in American thought and feminist theory who coined the phrase 'pragmatist feminist' which has become an increasingly important concept in contemporary philosophy. Haddock Siegfried argues that (...) pragmatism and its rich history is a natural ally for feminism and that the creative combination of these two traditions can pave the way for a genuinely emancipatory feminist practice. Pragmatist Feminism and the Work of Charlene Haddock Seigfried explores and pushes this theory and brings it into conversation with some of the most vibrant strands of current philosophy. (shrink)

This article aims to contribute to the recognition of Jane Addams' aesthetic reflections. Her reflections extended pragmatism by anticipating some themes of Dewey’s aesthetics and some of its current aesthetic derivations. Addams broke down the barriers that separated art and life with the practices at Hull House in which immigrants of different ethnicities and women had an active and leading part. She thus expanded the social meaning of some of the avant-garde art movements that influenced her, such as the (...) Art and Crafts Movement, by trying to make aesthetic sensibility a part of the everyday life of Hull House’s neighbors. In this way, she anticipated current everyday aesthetics, but without diluting the artistic specificity. Art transfigures events through poetics, allowing us to transform our lives through the values that are the common heritage of humanity. In Addams, we find a social aesthetic that sheds light on some of the problems of contemporary theories, expands the considerations of the artistic movements of her time, and contributes to reflections on the vital importance of aesthetics. (shrink)

This is an intellectual biography in the most literal sense; at no point in the history of American philosophy has an individual embodied the ideals that they wrote about at length. Philosophical idealism, pragmatism and feminism served as guides for Ella Lyman Cabot as she entered the discipline of philosophy, a discipline that continues to marginalize the work of women to this very day.

In trying to connect a primarily literary account of sentimental history and theory to a primarily philosophical account of feminist pragmatism,1 certain dangers emerge. One is to unintentionally privilege the genre of philosophy over the genres of poetry or sentimental fiction. In H.S. Thayer’s insightful Meaning and Action: A Critical History of Pragmatism, as but one example, philosophical writing subordinates other genres, such as poetry or novels, leading to readings of Dewey and James that disproportionately weight the (...) influence of philosophical writing on their attitudes. Doing this not only limits the cultural complexity of James and Dewey’s thought, it tends to discount the writing of pragmatists like.. (shrink)

Neither philosophy in general, nor deconstruction in particular, should be thought of as a pioneering, path-breaking, tool for feminist politics. Recent philosophy, including Derrida's, helps us see practices and ideas (including patriarchal practices and ideas) as neither natural nor inevitable-but that is all it does. When philosophy has finished showing that everything is a social construct, it does not help us decide which social constructs to retain and which to replace.

Clough shows how inadequate empirical philosophy is in creating real change in the sciences. Instead, she supports a more pragmatic approach based on the work of Richard Rorty and Donald Davidson. This work encourages Clough's fellow feminists to refocus their critiques and discard their philosophical debates about epistemology.

I cite areas of pragmatism and feminism that have an intersection with or an appeal to the other, including the notions of the universal and/or normative, and foundationalist lines in general. I deal with three areas from each perspective and develop the notion of their intersection. Finally, the paper discusses the importance of a pragmatic view for women's lives and the importance of psychoanalytic theory for finding another area where pragmatism and feminism mesh.

Neither philosophy in general, nor deconstruction in particular, should be thought of as a pioneering, path-breaking, tool for feminist politics. Recent philosophy, including Derrida's, helps us see practices and ideas as neither natural nor inevitable—but that is all it does. When philosophy has finished showing that everything is a social construct, it does not help us decide which social constructs to retain and which to replace.

This essay introduces some of the many interests, methodologies, and goals that the philosophical tradition of classical American philosophy, usually referred to as pragmatism, shares with feminist theories. Because pragmatism developed along with the emergence of departments of philosophy in the United States, it also begins recovering the shared history of some of the first women to receive philosophy degrees. It claims that women in and out of the academy influenced pragmatism and shows how contemporary (...) class='Hi'>feminist philosophers continue to challenge and appropriate it. (shrink)

: In my response to the comments of Vincent Colapietro, Charlene Seigfried, and Gail Weiss on Living Across and Through Skins (Sullivan 2001), I explain pragmatist feminism as an ecological ontology that understands bodies and environments as dynamically co-constitutive. I then discuss the relationship of pragmatist feminism to phenomenology, psychoanalysis, Nietzschean genealogy, and Darwinian evolutionary theory. Some of the specific concepts I examine include the anonymous body, the bodying organism, truth as transactional flourishing, and the preservation of racial and ethnic (...) categories. (shrink)

In my response to the comments of Vincent Colapietro, Charlene Seigfried, and Gail Weiss on Living Across and Through Skins , I explain pragmatist feminism as an ecological ontology that understands bodies and environments as dynamically co-constitutive. I then discuss the relationship of pragmatist feminism to phenomenology, psychoanalysis, Nietzschean genealogy, and Darwinian evolutionary theory. Some of the specific concepts I examine include the anonymous body, the bodying organism, truth as transactional flourishing, and the preservation of racial and ethnic categories.

I. Introduction In 1966 two sociologists, Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann, published a small yet influential book, titled The Social Construction of Reality, in which they argue that reality is socially constructed and that it is the task of the sociology of knowledge to analyze the process in which this occurs (1966: 1). They acknowledge in their Introduction that “reality” and “knowledge” are two terms with a long philosophical history, and they are careful to claim they are not using (...) t... (shrink)