Help Crowdfund a Book on Women Philosophers by Women Philosophers


The Philosopher Queens is book in progress that features over 20 chapters on women philosophers written by women philosophers.

The book’s intended audience includes “newcomers to philosophy, as well as all those professors who know that they could still learn a thing or two.”

Edited by Rebecca Buxton (Oxford) and Lisa Whiting (Durham), the book sets out to respond to “those many people who have told us that there are no great women philosophers,” as they explain in the following video:

Production of the book is being crowdfunded at Unbound.  Check out this page to see the ways you can support the project, along with the various benefits you can get for doing so, as well the list of contributors and subjects.

Lisa Whiting and Rebecca Buxton

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Philgrad
Philgrad
5 years ago

I wish these sorts of posts connected this with the research that many philosophers, especially women philosophers, have been doing for years and which has recently been given more formal organizational structures and platforms in projects like, project vox, the centre at paderborn university, or the sshrc-funded partnership that is new narratives in the history of philosophy, to name a few (forgive me if I’m forgetting important projects), not too mention the books on this very subject, by and large, by women philosophers. Maybe this is my misinterpretation and over-reading, but I find the implication of this post to be that it is novel to point out the existence of good women philosophers, which clearly it isn’t. Let’s not reinvent the wheel, but recognize and build on the work on women philosophers that has already been done and is ongoing!

Margaret Atherton
Margaret Atherton
5 years ago

Justin, you seem to have taken Philgrad’s comment personally, but it seems to me to have a point that is quite independent of whether or not you have mentioned work being done about women in philosophy. I do get a kind of re-inventing the wheel feel about what these two women say about their project, inasmuch as there has been quite a lot of work done by a whole lot of people, since, for example, the publication of May Ellen Waithe’s books quite some time ago now and which include many of the women in their table of contents. I’m not saying this to discourage their project, this is really let one thousand flowers bloom territory, just their way of packaging it.

Lisa Shapiro
Lisa Shapiro
5 years ago

I just want to second Margaret’s sentiment. There is a real tendency in the discipline to assert novelty as a way of promoting one’s project, and I understand that impulse and even the need for that. But I also think it is important, especially in the case of rehabilitating the work of women philosophers, to acknowledge the work that has been and is being done. It legitimizes the effort and situates in a kind of causal nexus that allows it to gain traction. What is original in this particular effort is to create something accessible to the general public — think readers on the subway/metro/underground or students in HS. It’s a great idea. And for those who are interested in more scholarly articles, let me draw attention to _Women and Liberty 1600-1800_ edited by Jacqui Broad and Karen Detlefsen.

Larry Rosenthal
Larry Rosenthal
5 years ago

Steady now, colleagues – it’s a student project of innocent, early-careerist mien, enthusiastic, idealistic, crowdfunded for the sake of learning and illumination, quite deserving of Justin’s kindly, encouraging post.
“Feigned novelty!” the academy charges. “Stand and deliver!”
Yet might the barbarians be not poised at the gate but, rather, detained in the garden, tending to the begonias?

hypatia
hypatia
Reply to  Larry Rosenthal
5 years ago

I’ll try out that early-careerist excuse next time I gaffe…