Page 37 - Šolsko polje, XXXI, 2020, 5-6: Teaching Feminism, ed. Valerija Vendramin
P. 37
b. kašić ■ feminism as epistemic disobedience ...
and, in short, calls into question everything that is taught at universities
(Bahovec, 2002, p. 23).
Almost two decades ago, the Slovenian theorist Eva Bahovec made
the above statement about feminism, which in my view is more than rel-
evant here. This concerns the radical deconstruction of the entire tradi-
tion of thinking “inside”, or what is considered to be “official” (male, het-
eronormative, universal) knowledge, along with creating the foundations
for a new tradition at the threshold of the epistemologisation of the con-
cepts of “absence” and (female) Other, and the (feminist) theory that it
has incited.
When thinking about feminist knowledge within the educational
institutional frame, the whole issue takes on a new problematic dimen-
sion. While agreeing with Mary Evans’s statement that in the meantime
“feminism has achieved at least partial academic recognition” (Evans,
2003, p. 15), it is still unclear to what extent this recognition assumes fem-
inism’s subversive and counter-canon potential. Namely, just the fact that,
as Bahovec rightly considered, the potentially subversive knowledge that
is that distinct feature the epistemic status of feminism makes specific at
the same time provides for a continuous tension between feminism and
its academic verification. On one hand, feminism means permanent ques-
tioning and challenging the foundations and canons of official knowl-
edge across various disciplines, while on the other it constructs a space
for its more viable basis and acknowledgement. This means both adding
new contents into existing scientific disciplines and embedding a gender
perspective across the curriculum as well as introducing different episte-
mological and analytical tools as its feminist standpoint theory, for exam-
ple (Smith, 1987; Harding, 2004; Hill Collins, 2009). Starting from the
premise that knowledge is always socially situated and that women’s lived
experiences are crucial for any scientific enquiry, this approach over the
last few decades has introduced critiques of the relationship between ma-
terial experience, power and epistemology that in various ways have influ-
enced the production of knowledge.
Since neoliberal trends in conjunction with scientific backlash
have in many respects shifted the university’s role in the direction of a
managerial and almost tedious institution (Butler & Athanasiou, 2013;
Alvanoudi, 2009), along with changing the existing disciplines, impos-
ing new curricula, and diminishing their critical stimulus, feminist schol-
ars are confronting new-old obstacles and hostility to feminism. The main
question today is not whether the academic community is willing to ful-
ly allow a counter-hegemonic scientific narrative such as feminism into
35
and, in short, calls into question everything that is taught at universities
(Bahovec, 2002, p. 23).
Almost two decades ago, the Slovenian theorist Eva Bahovec made
the above statement about feminism, which in my view is more than rel-
evant here. This concerns the radical deconstruction of the entire tradi-
tion of thinking “inside”, or what is considered to be “official” (male, het-
eronormative, universal) knowledge, along with creating the foundations
for a new tradition at the threshold of the epistemologisation of the con-
cepts of “absence” and (female) Other, and the (feminist) theory that it
has incited.
When thinking about feminist knowledge within the educational
institutional frame, the whole issue takes on a new problematic dimen-
sion. While agreeing with Mary Evans’s statement that in the meantime
“feminism has achieved at least partial academic recognition” (Evans,
2003, p. 15), it is still unclear to what extent this recognition assumes fem-
inism’s subversive and counter-canon potential. Namely, just the fact that,
as Bahovec rightly considered, the potentially subversive knowledge that
is that distinct feature the epistemic status of feminism makes specific at
the same time provides for a continuous tension between feminism and
its academic verification. On one hand, feminism means permanent ques-
tioning and challenging the foundations and canons of official knowl-
edge across various disciplines, while on the other it constructs a space
for its more viable basis and acknowledgement. This means both adding
new contents into existing scientific disciplines and embedding a gender
perspective across the curriculum as well as introducing different episte-
mological and analytical tools as its feminist standpoint theory, for exam-
ple (Smith, 1987; Harding, 2004; Hill Collins, 2009). Starting from the
premise that knowledge is always socially situated and that women’s lived
experiences are crucial for any scientific enquiry, this approach over the
last few decades has introduced critiques of the relationship between ma-
terial experience, power and epistemology that in various ways have influ-
enced the production of knowledge.
Since neoliberal trends in conjunction with scientific backlash
have in many respects shifted the university’s role in the direction of a
managerial and almost tedious institution (Butler & Athanasiou, 2013;
Alvanoudi, 2009), along with changing the existing disciplines, impos-
ing new curricula, and diminishing their critical stimulus, feminist schol-
ars are confronting new-old obstacles and hostility to feminism. The main
question today is not whether the academic community is willing to ful-
ly allow a counter-hegemonic scientific narrative such as feminism into
35
