The following appeared in Volume 98, Number 2 (Spring, 1999) of the APA Newsletters

Though the papers I heard addressed past women philosophers, the very fact of learning of women philosophizing in the past transformed my vision of our present and future as women. Reckoning with the historical fact of the presence of published and well-known women philosophers in all periods of history—often repressed in general historical knowledge— forced a shift in my consciousness.

Unfortunately, before the conference I believed that famous women—philosophers or not—were a novelty of the twentieth century and a product of recent feminist gains. Of course I knew of a few exceptions like Marie Curie or the Brontė sisters, but in general my education did not teach me of the many women who shaped my culture. Before this revelation, I think I laid too heavy of a burden on myself to take advantage of recent feminist gains and contribute towards dramatically changing the future of women. Since, I believed, women only recently have began to publish, to be recognized for their talents, and allowed into formerly male dominated professions, then we ought to use this newly won power to undo everything that earlier kept us from being here. I suspected that many feminist philosophers were mavericks in the field of philosophy, inventing new arguments to challenge entrenched misogynist philosophical premises that women before us never challenged. Deprived of the knowledge that famous women, including philosophers, have always existed sometimes makes for a melancholy present. I felt alone—without historical role models.

However the historical work presented in these two panels lifted me from the heavy burden of changing our future. Attending these panels I found myself in an atmosphere of rejuvenation and joy as many of us at the conference learned about our impressive history as women. If women do not know their history and its riches, then their present understandings of themselves are mediated either by identifications with great men or they are not mediated at all. Without a history, it is easy to feel quite alienated and alone. But as feminists we are not in uncharted waters. Women have always challenged misogyny in philosophy and we are now in a position to learn from their arguments and continue their work. Perhaps with the continued work of historians of female philosophers, we will become even more empowered to act and challenge patriarchy. We will discover that women have always challenged the exclusionary practice of philosophy as well as significantly contributed to its body of knowledge. If women have always philosophized and even published their ideas, then we can no longer see ourselves as marginal to philosophy.

Furthermore, we can no longer assume that the major ideas of western philosophy were men’s. As Mary Ellen Waithe revealed in her paper, "Making History Fit the Myth: Posthumously Plagiarizing Oliva Sabuco," it is quite plausible that many men plagiarized women’s ideas because they were protected by reigning cultural beliefs about women’s inferiority. If most people believe that women are incapable of intelligent thought, then it’s pretty easy for a man to take a woman’s ideas for his own. Waithe presented the results of her impressive research into the controversy surrounding the authorship of Nuevo Filosofia de la Naturaleza del Hombre published in 1587. For four hundred years it was believed that Oliva Sabuco wrote and published this acclaimed book. However in 1987, upon publication of her father’s will in 1903 in which he claimed to be the author, the scholars of the Instituto de Estudios Albacentenses changed the authorship to her father, Miguel Sabuco. This is one of the insidious ways that women seem to drop out of the history of philosophy.

Waithe encouraged the audience to investigate similar cases they may come across—to follow up on any hunches that a man may have robbed a woman’s work. She offered some advice about how to begin an investigation to restore a woman to our history. She argued the importance for studying all legal documents—birth certificates, wills, licenses for publication, marriage certificates, mortgages on property, etc.—relevant to a controversy of authorship.

Her analysis of Miguel’s will, for example, provided interesting counter-evidence to his claim for authorship. For example, customarily wills end with a revocation of all former wills, notarization, and signatures of the witnesses. Miguel’s will ends with his claim to authorship, however, written a much tighter script and clearly using a smaller nib pen. Waithe proposed that Miguel later added the last paragraph after the will had already been signed. This claim challenged the scholars of the Instituto’s claim that the witnesses to the signing of the will would not lie. But Waithe suggests that maybe they never knew. Additionally, the scholars argued that a dying man would not lie in his final testimony. Of course on the face of it this claim is pretty dubious, but Waithe, granting its plausibility, then shows that Miguel lived at least another 14 years after writing it.

Waithe’s presentation stressed the importance of restoring women philosophers to the history of Western philosophy, and the panelists of "15th and 16th Century Discourses on Women" demonstrated the rich ideas of these forgotten women. In each paper in this panel, the panelists explored the arguments of various 15th and 16th Century female philosophers to either to suggest building on their arguments or to avoid some of the problems lying therein.

In her paper "The City of Virtue: Christine de Pisan’s The Book of the City of Ladies and the Ethical Importance of Place," Catherine Gardner worked through some of the problems with de Pisan’s moral philosophy. Gardner argues that de Pisan’s city of ladies not only protects them from the misogyny outside its walls, but also helps women to develop moral capacities. Women who are welcomed into the city due to their virtuous character are principally those who act virtuously toward their husbands. Hence, this suggests that the foremost virtue venerated in de Pisan’s city is prudence—a practical virtue. Prudence for women, according to Gardner’s interpretation, is the continuance of their marriage.

It is precisely this focus on ethical behavior that Gardner worries over. De Pisan wants women to take responsibility for their God-given role as guardians of the private sphere no matter how many hardships may present themselves—especially the hardship of a miserly husband—for this is the heart of their "feminine virtue." The City of Ladies provides positive standards of conduct that women learn to adopt and perform in order to become virtuous. In the city, women learn to perform their household tasks well no longer out of fear of their husbands, but for the love of virtue. Yet, Gardner wonders if this kind of ethical habituation of "feminine virtues"—the performance of household tasks with pride and devotion—which were developed under oppressive conditions, might ultimately reinforce their subordination. However, while we might criticize de Pisan’s moral philosophy, Gardner maintains that her work brings into relief the kind of virtues that women develop in oppressive environments, allowing us to be suspicious of moral theories that venerate these "feminine virtues."

Beth Savickey presented a very different reading of de Pisan’s City of Ladies in her paper, "Learning from Christine de Pisan: Past, Present, and Future." Savickey argues that the way in which de Pisan argues and writes challenges philosophers claim to authority through authorship. In the history of philosophy, philosophical arguments gain credibility often by who wrote them and also by conforming to a particular style. Savickey notes that philosophical tradition controls the form and terms of all debate; it defines what are acceptable questions and answers. The tradition also excludes women from a philosophical education and hence from participating in institutional and textual debates. Savickey highlights a particular scene in The City of Ladies where three female figures—Reason, Rectitude, and Justice—come to visit a very forlorn Christine, the protagonist of the book. Scholars’ misogynist views of women confuses Christine who finds their claims inconsistent with her knowledge of herself and the many women she keeps company with. One of the three female figures, however, calls Christine back to her senses and challenges her to recognize the contradictory claims these scholars make. This scene foregrounds de Pisan’s own philosophical method—to rely on the authority of first hand experience rather than esteemed authors.

Savickey further reveals de Pisan’s interesting philosophical and pedagogical suggestions that challenge the current practice of philosophy and make it a much more egalitarian practice. First, instead of presenting abstract arguments, de Pisan relies on concrete examples and counter-examples to build her argument, lending the strength of empirical evidence. De Pisan challenges the scholar’s of her time who make bold, unsupported claims. Her examples also work against essentialist definitions by providing complexity, detail and diversity. And, Savickey also highlights that de Pisan writes in French rather than Latin in order to reach a larger audience. Both of these practices have much to teach present and future women about how to do philosophy and how to challenge women’s exclusion.

Finally, Joan Gibson in "Women, Philosophy and Sex: Applied Logic in the Early Modern Period," introduced the audience to three early modern female philosophers who employ their contemporary logical and rhetorical forms to counter arguments that educated women are unchaste. The study of logic and rhetoric supposedly interfered with women’s virtues: silence, chastity, and obedience. And because women were morally weak—and therefore liable to lose sexual control—more rational creatures—men, must control their education and upbringing. Gibson, however, demonstrates that at least three women published treatises that reasoned that rational ethics would aid women in their chastity. She first presents Luisa Sigea who wrote The Dialogue of Two Young Maidens on Courtly Life and Retirement in 1552. The young maidens depicted in the dialogue, Flaminia and Blesilla move with ease between Hebrew, Latin and Greek and Sigea fills the dialogue with an excessive number of footnotes from a variety of traditions to fuel the interlocutors dialogues. Blesilla takes a more stoic approach, arguing for withdrawal from male seducers and self-determination through self-sufficiency, while Flaminia argues for courage and charges unscrupulous men as the major threat to women’s chastity rather than women’s instability. Pitted between Flaminia’s call for courage, and Blesilla’s caution the reader must ultimately decide how women will protect their chastity. And this feature emphasizes what Gibson calls a "social and non-coercive conception of reason."

Gibson next discusses Sor Juana who attacks philosophical method by thinking through many logical paradoxes confronting women in a masculinist society. Gibson recounts a story of how a male admirer of Sor Juana’s work suggested that she should have been a man; a woman is incapable of fine poetry. She also plays with the popular use of syllogistic verse that was used "to enshrine common misogynistic views." Gibson claims that during Sor Juana’s time a popular degree examination asked the student to prove, in syllogistic verse, women’s instability. Sor Juana turns the debate away from women’s chastity but rather to the logical paradoxes in male perceptions of women’s chastity.