Women and ReasonElizabeth D. Harvey, Kathleen Okruhlik University of Michigan Press, 1992 - 294 pages The idea of reason and its place in Western thought has long been a central topic for philosophers, histories, and cultural theorists. Some have claimed that since rationality is a male principle, the emphasis placed upon it has relegated women to secondary positions throughout the history of Western civilization. Women and Reason provides a revisionary assessment of the idea of reason and its relationship to femininity. The editors of this interdisciplinary collection have gathered essays that examine the concept of reason from a variety of perspectives and across a number of historical periods. Philosophers, philosophers of science, historians, literary critics, art historians, and theorists of culture address the idea of reason and how it has affected our notion of the feminine from the seventeenth century, the period many have seen as giving birth to our modern idea of rationality, to the present. Topics addressed include the place of women in seventeenth-century English culture, the relationship between women and religion in the writings of Francis Bacon and John Calvin, women and prophecy, and the relationship between gender and the origins of science. Examinations of nineteenth- and twentieth-century art and literature focus on the gendered linkage between madness and creativity and on abstract art's exclusion of the feminine. Other essays treat issues in feminist methodology such as whether reason and emotion are mutually exclusive, the role of experience in the construction of knowledge, and the place of language and consensus in the shaping of society. The result is a volume with far-reaching implications for the understanding of our cultural inheritance and for future feminist practice and theory. It will be of interest to scholars and students of philosophy, history, literary studies, art history, and the history and philosophy of science. |
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Page 45
... called back to her Memory the Sacred Watchwords which she received from him , and pronounce the good Speech . . . . For the Soul consists of Sacred Words .... " 29 However this material may be stretched , it comes too late to explain ...
... called back to her Memory the Sacred Watchwords which she received from him , and pronounce the good Speech . . . . For the Soul consists of Sacred Words .... " 29 However this material may be stretched , it comes too late to explain ...
Page 72
... called context of discovery or , alternatively , within those episodes called " bad science " in which the canons of rationality were clearly violated in favor of other interests ( the Lysenko Affair is a standard example here ) . In ...
... called context of discovery or , alternatively , within those episodes called " bad science " in which the canons of rationality were clearly violated in favor of other interests ( the Lysenko Affair is a standard example here ) . In ...
Page 206
... called Eliot " an Amazon thrown sprawling over the crupper of her spavined and spur - galled Pegasus " -a mock epic image deriding not only Eliot's body and her art but , more particularly , the relationship between the two.18 The impli ...
... called Eliot " an Amazon thrown sprawling over the crupper of her spavined and spur - galled Pegasus " -a mock epic image deriding not only Eliot's body and her art but , more particularly , the relationship between the two.18 The impli ...
Contents
Introduction | 1 |
Feminist Methodology in the Social | 15 |
Changing Conceptions of Authority and Reason | 39 |
Copyright | |
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Adam Adam's naming analysis animals argues argument Arnauld artist bodily body Bordo Calvin Camille Claudel Cartesian claims cognitive Commentarie communicative reason conception constructed context creativity critical critiques culture defined Descartes desire difference discourse discussion dominant English epistemic epistemology essay Evelyn Fox Keller example exclusion experience feel Female Malady feminine Feminism feminist research feminist theory Fontenelle Francis Bacon gender Genesis Genevieve Lloyd George Eliot Grimshaw Habermas Habermas's human hysteria ideological individual intellectual interests James Spedding John John Calvin knowing knowledge London madness male Malebranche marriage Mary Astell masculine metaphor mind Mondrian moral nature notion objectivity oracles outlaw emotions patriarchal patriarchy perspective physical Plato political purity question rational reality relationship role scientific sense seventeenth century sexual Showalter social society Stanley and Wise subjects Susan Bordo Suzanne Valadon Symbolist thought tradition trans understanding University Press values woman women York