The Virtue of Feminist Rationality

by Heikes, Deborah K.

• ISBN13: 9781441186577
• ISBN10: 1441186573
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2012-06-21
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic

Summary

Feminist philosophers have been some of the most vocal critics of reason and rationality. While most feminists realize that rationality is a concept that cannot be entirely abandoned, few have considered how to construct a positive account of rationality. This book represents a sustained argument for a feminist theory of rationality. It opens by asking the question: is reason inherently masculine? Deborah K. Heikes goes on to answer this question negatively and to examine what feminists actually want from a theory of rationality, specifying what a virtue theory of rationality is and how it works. She identifies those features that feminists believe are central to reason, identifying four dichotomies that are central to feminist thinking (mind/body, reason/emotion, identity/difference, objectivity/subjectivity), and argues that they can be captured by conceiving of rationality as a virtue concept. She further demonstrates how a specifically feminist theory of rationality can provide objective grounds for feminists' moral, political and epistemic agendas.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments\ 1. Why Reason? \ 2. The Fossil of Reason\ 3. The Virtue of Reason \ 4. The Virtue of Embodiment \ 5. The Virtue ofEmotion \ 6. The Virtue of Difference \ 7. The Virtue of Subjectivity \ 8. TheFuture of Reason \ Notes \ References \ Index