Keynote Speakers
Sandrine Bergès
Bilkent University |
Sandrine Bergès is associate professor in philosophy at Bilkent University in Ankara. Her publications include: Sophie de Grouchy's Letters on Sympathy (with Eric Schliesser), The Wollstonecraftian Mind (with Eileen Hunt Botting and Alan Coffee), Women and Autonomy (with Alberto Siani) The Social and Political Philosophy of Mary Wollstonecraft (with Alan Coffee) A Feminist Perspective on Virtue Ethics and The Routledge Companion to Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman.
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From Margaret Cavendish to Laura Ingalls Wilder: The descent of women to the power of domesticity
Is the virtue of domesticity a way for women to access civic power or is it a slippery slope to dependence and female subservience? Here I look at a number of early modern women responses to this question and trace a path to the 19th century Cult of Domesticity.
When the question of women’s vote and political participation was raised most vehemently in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, some women refused to participate on the grounds that women’s power was better used in the home, keeping everybody safe, alive, and virtuous.
This attitude seems to us very conservative, preventing women from accessing the political power and influence that is their right, as much as it is men’s. In this paper I want to argue that this attitude has its roots in the republican thought of the eighteenth century in America, and in France. I will show how the status of women before the two revolutions did not allow even for power exercised in the home, and how the advent of republican ideals in France and America offered women non-negligible power despite their not having a right to vote.
Is the virtue of domesticity a way for women to access civic power or is it a slippery slope to dependence and female subservience? Here I look at a number of early modern women responses to this question and trace a path to the 19th century Cult of Domesticity.
When the question of women’s vote and political participation was raised most vehemently in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, some women refused to participate on the grounds that women’s power was better used in the home, keeping everybody safe, alive, and virtuous.
This attitude seems to us very conservative, preventing women from accessing the political power and influence that is their right, as much as it is men’s. In this paper I want to argue that this attitude has its roots in the republican thought of the eighteenth century in America, and in France. I will show how the status of women before the two revolutions did not allow even for power exercised in the home, and how the advent of republican ideals in France and America offered women non-negligible power despite their not having a right to vote.
Ruth Hagengruber
University of Paderborn |
.Ruth Hagengruber is Professor of Philosophy, specialized on philosophy of Economics and Information Science. She is Head of Philosophy at the University Paderborn and Director of the Center for the History of Women Philosophers and Scientists https://historyofwomenphilosophers.org.
In 2006 she founded the teaching and research areas: Philosophy and Computing and History of Women Philosophers and Scientists. She received the award for Teaching Philosophy in the Media (2014) and Online Teaching Philosophy goes MOOC (2016) and became Lifetime member of the International Association of Computing and Philosophy (I-ACAP) in 2011. She became member of the Advisory Board of Munich Center for Technology in Society from the Technical University, Munich in 2011. In 2015 she was awarded the Wiener Schmidt Prize of the Society for Cybernetics and Systems Theory, with publications in the field, such as: The Computational Turn, Past, Presents, Future, coedited with Charles Ess (2011), Philosophy, Computing and Information Science, with Uwe Riss (2014). Publication in the history of women philosophers began in German language, among those German translations from Anne Conway, Emilie Du Châtelet, Marie de Gournay, Olympe de Gouges, Mary Wollstonecraft, Margret Cavendish in: Klassische philosohische Texte von Frauen (1998). Émilie Du Châtelet between Leibniz and Newton (2011) History of Women's Ideas, coedited with Karen Green (The Monist, 2015); With Sebastian Luft: Women in Early Phenomenology on Social Ontology. On Edith Stein, Gerda Walter and Hedwig Conrad Martius (2018 Springer Series HWPS). Emilie Du Châtelet und die deutsche Aufklärung, with Hartmut Hecht (2019), Guest editor with Sarah Hutton British Journal of the History of Philosophy on 'Women Philosophers in Early Modern Philosophy' BJHP (2019, vol. 27, no.4). With Sigridur Thorgeirsdottir: Methodological Reflections on Women’s Contribution and Influence in the History of Philosophy (2019 autumn Springer Series HWPS) |
It is as if we had calculated the planetary system of our sun without taking every second planet into account.
Women who are deprived of their histories can be compared to people who have lost their memories. They are unable to build a personal identity. This analogy may be the leading paradigm for my talk, which is, in the first place, a talk dedicated to epistemological questions.
Throughout the last 40 years, many scholars have dedicated their endeavours to conserving the writings of women philosophers. Now we have access to valuable sources which show that the history of women philosophers stretches back as far as the history of philosophy itself.
Using the history of women philosophers as a methodical approach to philosophy is a unique and indispensable means to widen and to change philosophical insights. Re-reading the history of philosophy and including the ideas of women philosophers, however, does not add some more narratives, it challenges the methodology of philosophy.
The history of philosophy we are traditionally educated in in the western world is simply not true to the facts. Thus, I demand a rewriting of the history of philosophy that takes into account these ideas that are incorporated in these writings of women philosophers and that have been denied by the narratives and fabric of sexualized and patriarchally influenced thought.
Women who are deprived of their histories can be compared to people who have lost their memories. They are unable to build a personal identity. This analogy may be the leading paradigm for my talk, which is, in the first place, a talk dedicated to epistemological questions.
Throughout the last 40 years, many scholars have dedicated their endeavours to conserving the writings of women philosophers. Now we have access to valuable sources which show that the history of women philosophers stretches back as far as the history of philosophy itself.
Using the history of women philosophers as a methodical approach to philosophy is a unique and indispensable means to widen and to change philosophical insights. Re-reading the history of philosophy and including the ideas of women philosophers, however, does not add some more narratives, it challenges the methodology of philosophy.
The history of philosophy we are traditionally educated in in the western world is simply not true to the facts. Thus, I demand a rewriting of the history of philosophy that takes into account these ideas that are incorporated in these writings of women philosophers and that have been denied by the narratives and fabric of sexualized and patriarchally influenced thought.