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Hypatia 19.2 (2004) 134-149



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CanonFodder:

New Works by and About Women Philosophers

Truth demands an exposure of the evils of opinions and practices.
—Catharine E. Beecher, Letters on the Difficulties of Religion

An evil opinion harbored until recently is that philosophy is a man's enterprise. That opinion created an evil practice: the omission of works by women authors from the canon of philosophy. The works reviewed here are nothing less than canon fodder. The latest volleys are: Prudence Allen's The Concept of Woman, Volume 2: The Early Humanist Reformation, 1250-1500 (2001); John Conley's A Suspicion of Virtue: Women Philosophers in Neoclassical France (2002); Eileen O'Neill's critical edition of Margaret Cavendish: Observations Upon Experimental Philosophy (2001); Jennifer McRoberts's two-volume Philosophical Works of Lady Mary Shepherd (2000); and Therese Dykeman and Dorothy Rogers's six-volume The Social, Political and Philosophical Works of Catharine Beecher (2002).

I. The Concept of Woman, Volume 2: The Early Humanist Reformation, 1250-1500. By Sister Prudence Allen, RSM. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2001.

Early modern philosophical writing by women is best understood by a langorous read of The Concept of Woman, Volume 2. Allen's focus is on a narrow question: What theories about the nature of woman can be identified in the works of philosophers of the period 1250 to 1500? Allen's answer digests what is probably three-fourths of the canon of philosophical writings of the period. (By digests I intend both senses of the term.) Allen processes for us only those writings most relevant to her question. She distills each view for her readers in a way that fits into her well-explained sex-polarity/sex-complimentarity model and helps further flesh out that model. She then uses what she has learned to expound an original theory. [End Page 134]

The Concept of Woman, Volume 2is far more than a mere extension centuries forward of the views expounded in Allen's first blockbuster volume. Honest, rigorous examination confronts the question of whether particular philosophers fit the model so persuasively argued for in her first volume's review of the ancient and medieval philosophers. The answer to the question is, Yes, the earlier model fits the later philosophers' views. This work stands on its own as a history of philosophy of the period. One could teach Renaissance philosophy using only this text. Students would benefit tremendously from the ability to examine the works of so many philosophers, both male and female (find that in a history of philosophy text), to see what their views were on the nature of woman.

Allen takes us beyond the male-centric canon to review works by recently considered women philosophers such as Beatrice of Nazareth, Hadewijch, Mechtild of Madgeburg, Mechtild of Hackeborn, Bridget of Sweden, Catherine of Siena, the ever-popular Christine de Pizan, and others. She gives the writings and reported teachings of each a new critical eye. An entire chapter exceeding one hundred pages is devoted to an analysis of the corpus of philosophical writings (including poems) by Christine de Pizan. In it, Allen identifies Pizan's counterarguments to the epistemological and moral principles inherent in the misogynist literature of her time. Allen notes that "her method consisted in selecting direct quotations from [Aristotelians'] works, and then introducing a series of philosophical arguments to prove them fallacious or unsound. . . . Christine used philosophical arguments such as reductio ad absurdum and modus tollens, appeal to experience (especially women's experience) and authoritative historical texts for counterexamples, and arguments by clarification of terms—by division, by classification, by relating the whole to parts, and cause to effect" (Allen 2001, 655).

What shocked me was the substantial amount of material by and about Joan of Arc. When I came upon mention of her in the Chronological Table I steeled myself to maintain an open mind. With excruciating attention to detail, Allen reproduces a comprehensive account of Joan's arguments from a variety of sources, including trial transcripts of Joan's testimonies. The Maid of Orleans deftly...

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