Gender in Science: Theoretical Perspectives and Their Application in Research Cover Image

Rod vo vede: teoretické perspektívy a ich uplatnenie vo výskume
Gender in Science: Theoretical Perspectives and Their Application in Research

Author(s): Mariana Szapuová
Subject(s): Social Sciences
Published by: AV ČR - Akademie věd České republiky - Sociologický ústav
Keywords: feminist epistemologies; gendered science; epistemic communities; trust; equal opportunities; Slovakia

Summary/Abstract: The objective of this article is to show how issues concerning women in science and the problem of gendered science, often treated separately, are interconnected. To examine how research on women in science and research on gender and science relate to each other, some feminist epistemological perspectives, mainly feminist contextual empiricism, are used in order to show how the feminist philosophical conceptual framework may be useful for understanding the problems currently faced by women in science. After reflecting and elaborating on the very thesis of gendered science, the author analyses in more detail the concept of epistemic communities and the concept of trust as an epistemic factor. Through these concepts the author argues that philosophical/epistemological considerations are fruitful for studying the experience of individual women in science. Both of these interrelated concepts are considered highly relevant in the search for an epistemological framework facilitating the thematic study of women in science on a theoretical level and research on the current situation of women in the academic world in Slovakia.

  • Issue Year: 45/2009
  • Issue No: 04
  • Page Range: 649-670
  • Page Count: 22
  • Language: Slovak