Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Forerunner of a Feminist Social Science

Bibliographic Data

ID20076259
AuthorsAnn Palmeri (Hobart and William Smith Colleges, corresponding author)
Year2005
Pages97-119
Publication date2005-12-29
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeCHAPTER
VenueDiscovering reality (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherKluwer Academic Publishers (PUBLISHER • NL)
DOI10.1007/0-306-48017-4_6
OpenAlexW1715917408
ISBN9789027714961
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited5

Charlotte Perkins Gilman considered herself a social scientist and a feminist theorist. In Gilman’s eyes, doing social science and doing feminist theory were not two separate enterprises, they were one. But modern historians have dismissed her claim to being a social scientist and have resurrected her solely as an important feminist from the past. There are at least two reasons for this dismissal. First, the social evolutionary theory on which Gilman based her claims for social reform was discarded long ago by social scientists because of its neo-Lamarckian reasoning. Secondly, since her feminism was an essential part of Gilman’s scientific argument, her social theory seems to be discounted on this basis alone. In other words, feminism, since it is a form of moral reasoning, has no place in social scientific research. Although historians of science are now engaged in assessing theories in the context of their time, no real consideration has been given to the role of moral reasoning in social scientific research. This is particularly important for those engaged in trying to reconstruct what a feminist social science might be

Dismissal · Epistemology · Feminism · Feminist philosophy · Political science · Psychoanalysis · Social science · Social theory · Sociology · Chemistry · Contemporary Sociological Theory and Practice · Gender Studies · History · Law · Philosophy · Psychology

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