Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-x4r87 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-25T14:49:25.547Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Revisiting Rorty: Contributions to a Pragmatist Feminism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 March 2020

Abstract

In this paper, I contribute to the ongoing investigation of the similarities and dissimilarities between feminism and pragmatism—a project explored more than fifteen years ago in the Hypatia special issue on Feminism and Pragmatism (1993)—by looking at the value of Richard Rorty's work for feminist theorists and activists. In this paper, I defend Rorty against three central feminist criticisms: 1) that Rorty's defense of liberal irony relies upon a problematic delineation between public and private, 2) that Rorty's endorsement of reform over revolution is too conservative to be of use for feminism, and 3) that the role of the ironist in social progress is not useful for, nor does it accurately reflect the history of, the feminist movement. I argue that these criticisms can be mitigated by being located within the broader context of Rorty's philosophical and political commitments, which we are now in a better position to understand and thus revisit. More specifically, I contend that bringing together Rorty's private discourse of redescription with his public discourse of justification provides for feminists new methods for animating social progress. I conclude by offering examples of how adopting a Rortyan perspective would be well-suited to achieving further feminist aims.

Type
Contributed Papers
Copyright
Copyright © 2010 by Hypatia, Inc.

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bickford, Susan. 1993. Why we listen to lunatics: Antifoundational theories and feminist politics. Hypatia 8 (2): 104–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duran, Jane. 1993. The intersection of pragmatism and feminism. Hypatia 8 (2): 159–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fraser, Nancy. 1991. From irony to prophecy to politics: A response to Richard Rorty. Michigan Quarterly Review 30 (2): 259–66.Google Scholar
Fricker, Miranda. 2007. Epistemic injustice: Power and the ethics of knowing. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuhn, Thomas S. 1996. The structure of scientific revolutions. 3rd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leland, Dorothy. 1988. Rorty on the moral concern of philosophy: A critique from a feminist point of view. Praxis International 8 (3): 273–83.Google Scholar
Lloyd, Genevieve. 1993. The man of reason: “Male” and “female” in Western philosophy. 2nd edition. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Lorde, Audre. 1984. Sister outsider. Berkeley: The Crossing Press.Google Scholar
Rooney, Phyllis. 1993. Feminist‐pragmatist revisionings of reason, knowledge, and philosophy. Hypatia 8 (2): 1523.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rorty, Richard. 1979. Philosophy and the mirror of nature. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Rorty, Richard. 1989. Contingency, irony, and solidarity. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rorty, Richard. 1991a. Objectivity, relativism, and truth. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Rorty, Richard. 1991b. Essays on Heidegger and others. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rorty, Richard. 1993. Feminism, ideology, and deconstruction: A pragmatist view. Hypatia 8 (2): 96103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rorty, Richard. 1996. Debating the state of philosophy: Habermas, Rorty, and Kołakowski, ed. Niżnik, Józef and Sanders, John T.Westport, Conn.: the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences.Google Scholar
Rorty, Richard. 1998. Truth and progress. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rorty, Richard. 2002. Against bosses, against oligarchies: A conversation with Richard Rorty. Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press.Google Scholar
Rorty, Richard. 2006. Take care of freedom and truth will take care of itself: Interviews with Richard Rorty. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Seigfried, Charlene Haddock. 1993. Shared communities of interest: Feminism and pragmatism. Hypatia 8 (2): 114.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Status of Women Canada. Governor General's awards in commemoration of the Persons Case: The Famous Five and the Persons Case. http://www.swc‐cfc.gc.ca/dates/gg/case‐affaire‐eng.html (accessed March 8, 2010).Google Scholar
Young, Iris Marion. 2000. Inclusion and democracy. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar