This is a list of feminist philosophers, that is, people who theorize about gender issues and female perspectives in different areas of

philosophy Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...

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* Carol Adams * Jane Addams * Linda Martín Alcoff *

Alia Al-Saji Alia Al-Saji is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at McGill University. Her work focuses on bringing 20th century phenomenology and French philosophy into dialogue with critical race and feminist theories. Al-Saji believes that feminist phenome ...

Amy Allen Amy Allen (born October 24, 1976) is an American actress and film crew member who portrayed the Jedi Master Aayla Secura in ''Star Wars'' films released in 2002 and 2005. She worked behind the scenes on many different movies, including ''A.I. ...

* Elizabeth Anderson *

Pamela Sue Anderson Pamela Sue Anderson (April 16, 1955 – March 12, 2017) was an American philosopher who specialized in philosophy of religion, feminist philosophy and continental philosophy. In 2007 she was an Official Fellow, Tutor in Philosophy and Christian E ...

Gloria E. Anzaldúa Gloria Evangelina Anzaldúa (September 26, 1942 – May 15, 2004) was an American scholar of Chicana feminism, cultural theory, and queer theory. She loosely based her best-known book, ''Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza'', on her life ...

Hannah Arendt Hannah Arendt (, , ; 14 October 1906 – 4 December 1975) was a political philosopher, author, and Holocaust survivor. She is widely considered to be one of the most influential political theorists of the 20th century. Arendt was born ...

* Mary Astell

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Sandra Bartky Sandra Lee Bartky (née Schwartz; May 5, 1935 – October 17, 2016) was a professor of philosophy and gender studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Her main research areas were feminism and phenomenology. Her notable contributions to ...

Nancy Bauer Nancy Bauer, née Nancy Luke (born July 7, 1934) is a Canadian writer and editor who writes for a number of Canadian maritime magazines about people who write, produce crafts and create visual art. Born in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, the daughter ...

Simone de Beauvoir Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist, and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even th ...

* Seyla Benhabib *

Peg Birmingham Peg Birmingham is an American academic who serves as Professor of Philosophy at DePaul University. Much of Birmingham's work has focused on the work of Hannah Arendt, to whose thought she is considered to have made a profound contribution, althoug ...

Susan Bordo Susan is a feminine given name, from Persian "Susan" (lily flower), from Egyptian ''c:Lotus flower (hieroglyph), sšn'' and Coptic ''shoshen'' meaning "lotus flower", from Hebrew ''Shoshana'' meaning "lily" (in modern Hebrew this also means "ros ...

Chiara Bottici Chiara Bottici (born 24 January 1975) is an Italian philosopher and writer. Biography Bottici is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Director of Gender Studies at The New School for Social Research and Eugene Lang College, New York. Bottici ...

Rosi Braidotti Rosi Braidotti (; born 28 September 1954) is a contemporary philosopher and feminist theoretician. Biography Career Braidotti, who holds Italian and Australian citizenship, was born in Italy and moved to Australia when she was 16, where she ...

Samantha Brennan Samantha J. Brennan is a British-born philosopher and scholar of women's studies who is currently dean of the College of Arts and faculty member in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Guelph. She was previously a professor in the Dep ...

* Wendy Brown * Susan Brownmiller *

Judith Butler Judith Pamela Butler (born February 24, 1956) is an American philosopher and gender theorist whose work has influenced political philosophy, ethics, and the fields of third-wave feminism, queer theory, and literary theory. In 1993, Butler ...

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Joan Callahan Joan Callahan (March 29, 1946 – June 6, 2019) was a Professor Emerita of Philosophy at the University of Kentucky, an institution where she taught for more than twenty years and served in a variety of roles, including as director of the Gender a ...

Adriana Cavarero Adriana Cavarero (born 1947) is an Italian philosopher and feminist thinker. She holds the title of Professor of Political Philosophy at the Università degli studi di Verona. She has also held visiting appointments at the University of Californ ...

* Margaret Cavendish * Claudia Card *

Ruth Chang Ruth Chang is the Professor and Chair of Jurisprudence at the University of Oxford, a Professorial Fellow of University College, Oxford, and an American professor of philosophy. She is known for her research on the incommensurability of values a ...

* Nancy Chodorow * Hélène Cixous * Lorraine Code * Patricia Hill Collins *

Drucilla Cornell Drucilla Cornell (born 16 June 1950), is an American philosopher and feminist theorist, whose work has been influential in political and legal philosophy, ethics, deconstruction, critical theory, and feminism. Cornell is an emerita Professor of P ...

* Alice Crary *

Ann Cudd Ann E. Cudd is an American philosopher. She will be the President of Portland State University beginning in the 2023-2024 academic year. Until then, she is the Provost and Senior Vice Chancellor & Professor of Philosophy at the University of Pitts ...

* Chris Cuomo *

Jean Curthoys Jean Curthoys (born 1947) is an Australian feminist philosopher. She was born in Broken Hill, New South Wales, the daughter of Geoffrey and Barbara Curthoys, leading members of the Communist Party of Australia. Her sister Ann Curthoys is an aca ...

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Mary Daly Mary Daly (October 16, 1928–January 3, 2010) was an American radical feminist philosopher and theologian. Daly, who described herself as a "radical lesbian feminist", taught at the Jesuit-run Boston College for 33 years. Once a practicing Rom ...

* Angela Y. Davis *

Donna Dickenson Donna L. Dickenson (born 1946) is an American philosopher who specializes in medical ethics. She is Emeritus Professor of Medical Ethics and Humanities at the University of London, fellow of the Ethox and HeLEX Centres at the University of Oxfor ...

Penelope Deutscher Penelope Deutscher is a professor of philosophy at Northwestern University whose work focuses on French philosophy from the 20th and 21st centuries and gender theory. She has written four books dealing with subjects ranging from gender and fe ...

* Andrea Dworkin

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Bracha Ettinger Bracha Lichtenberg Ettinger (born March 23, 1948) is an Israeli people, Israeli artist, painter and writer, visual analyst, psychoanalyst and philosopher, living and working in Paris and Tel Aviv. She is regarded as a major French people, French ...

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Anne Fausto-Sterling Anne Fausto-Sterling ( Sterling; born July 30, 1944) is an American sexologist who has written extensively on the biology of gender, sexual identity, gender identity, gender roles, and intersexuality. She is the Nancy Duke Lewis Professor Emer ...

* Carla Fehr * Shulamith Firestone * Nancy Fraser * Miranda Fricker * Betty Friedan *

Marilyn Friedman Marilyn Ann Friedman (born April 7, 1945) is an American philosopher. She holds the W. Alton Jones Chair of Philosophy at Vanderbilt University. Education In 1967, she received an A.B. in political science from Washington University in St. Louis ...

Marilyn Frye Marilyn Frye (born 1941) is an American philosopher and radical feminist theorist. She is known for her theories on sexism, racism, oppression, and sexuality. Her writings offer discussions of feminist topics, such as: white supremacy, male pri ...

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Ann Garry Ann Garry is a professor of philosophy, emerita, at California State University, Los Angeles (CSULA). While at CSULA, Garry was the founding director of the Center for the Study of Genders and Sexualities, and also served several terms as the chai ...

Ivone Gebara Ivone Gebara (born December 9, 1944) is a Brazilian Catholic nun, philosopher, and feminist theologian.

Carol Gilligan Carol Gilligan (; born November 28, 1936) is an American feminist, ethicist, and psychologist, best known for her work on ethical community and ethical relationships. Gilligan is a professor of Humanities and Applied Psychology at New York Unive ...

* Kathryn Gines *

Emma Goldman Emma Goldman (June 27, 1869 – May 14, 1940) was a Russian-born anarchist political activist and writer. She played a pivotal role in the development of anarchist political philosophy in North America and Europe in the first half of the ...

Olympe de Gouges Olympe de Gouges (; born Marie Gouze; 7 May 17483 November 1793) was a French playwright and political activist whose writings on women's rights and abolitionism reached a large audience in various countries. She began her career as a playwright ...

* Germaine Greer *

Lisa Guenther Lisa Guenther is a Canadian philosopher and activist, known for her work on solitary confinement, prison torture, Reproductive rights, reproductive injustice, and the carceral state. Education and career Cross-appointed to the Department of Philos ...

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* Donna Haraway *

Sandra Harding Sandra G. Harding (born 1935) is an American philosopher of feminist and postcolonial theory, epistemology, research methodology, and philosophy of science. She directed the UCLA Center for the Study of Women from 1996 to 2000, and co-edited ...

* Nancy Hartsock *

Sally Haslanger Sally Haslanger () is an American philosopher and professor. She is the Ford Professor of Philosophy in the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She held the 2015 Spinoza Chair of Philosophy at ...

* Virginia Held *

Cressida Heyes Cressida J. Heyes (born 1970) is a British and naturalized Canadian philosopher, currently employed as the Henry Marshall Tory Chair at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, and formerly as the Canada Research Chair in Philosophy of Gender and Sexu ...

Nancy Holland Nancy Holland (born 3 February 1942) is a Canadian former alpine skier who competed in the 1960 Winter Olympics and in the 1964 Winter Olympics The 1964 Winter Olympics, officially known as the IX Olympic Winter Games (german: IX. Olympische ...

Bonnie Honig Bonnie Honig (born 1959), is a political, feminist, and legal theorist specializing in democratic theory. In 2013-14, she became Nancy Duke Lewis Professor-Elect of Modern Culture and Media and Political Science at Brown University, succeeding A ...

Gillian Howie Gillian Howie (4 October 1965 – 26 March 2013) was a Professor in Philosophy at the University of Liverpool and Director of the Institute for Feminist Theory and Research. She is author of ''Essential Reorientations: feminism and dialectical ma ...

bell hooks Gloria Jean Watkins (September 25, 1952December 15, 2021), better known by her pen name bell hooks, was an American author and social activist who was Distinguished Professor in Residence at Berea College. She is best known for her writings on ...

* Hypatia

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Luce Irigaray Luce Irigaray (born 3 May 1930) is a Belgian-born French feminist, philosopher, linguist, psycholinguist, psychoanalyst, and cultural theorist who examined the uses and misuses of language in relation to women. Irigaray's first and most well know ...

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* Alison Jaggar * Grace Jantzen

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Evelyn Fox Keller Evelyn Fox Keller (born March 20, 1936) is an American physicist, author and feminist. She is Professor Emerita of History and Philosophy of Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Keller's early work concentrated at the intersecti ...

* Eva Feder Kittay *

Sarah Kofman Sarah Kofman (; September 14, 1934 – October 15, 1994) was a French philosopher . Biography Kofman began her teaching career in Toulouse in 1960 at the Lycée Saint-Sernin, and worked with both Jean Hyppolite and Gilles Deleuze. Her abando ...

* Christine Koggel *

Julia Kristeva Julia Kristeva (; born Yuliya Stoyanova Krasteva, bg, Юлия Стоянова Кръстева; on 24 June 1941) is a Bulgarian-French philosopher, literary critic, semiotician, psychoanalyst, feminist, and, most recently, novelist, who has ...

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Rae Helen Langton Rae Helen Langton, FBA (born 14 February 1961) is an Australian-British professor of philosophy. She is currently the Knightbridge Professor of Philosophy at the University of Cambridge. She has published widely on Immanuel Kant's philosophy, m ...

* Hilde Lindemann * Michèle Le Dœuff * Genevieve Lloyd *

Helen Longino Helen Elizabeth Longino (born July 13, 1944) is an American philosopher of science who has argued for the significance of values and social interactions to scientific inquiry. She has written about the role of women in science and is a central ...

Judith Lorber Judith Lorber (born November 28, 1931) is Professor Emerita of Sociology and Women’s Studies at The CUNY Graduate Center and Brooklyn College of the City University of New York. She is a foundational theorist of social construction of gender ...

* Audre Lorde

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Catharine Macaulay Catharine Macaulay (née Sawbridge, later Graham; 23 March 1731 – 22 June 1791), was an English Whig republican historian. Early life Catharine Macaulay was a daughter of John Sawbridge (1699–1762) and his wife Elizabeth Wanley (died 1733 ...

* Catharine MacKinnon * Noëlle McAfee * Mary Kate McGowan * Peggy McIntosh *

Diana Tietjens Meyers Diana Meyers is a philosopher working in the philosophy of action and in the philosophy of feminism. Meyers is professor emerita of philosophy at the University of Connecticut. Biography Diana Meyers holds a bachelor's degree from the Universi ...

* Harriet Taylor Mill * Kate Millett *

Trinh T. Minh-ha Trinh T. Minh-ha (born 1952 in Hanoi; Vietnamese: Trịnh Thị Minh Hà) is a Vietnamese filmmaker, writer, literary theorist, composer, and professor. She has been making films for over thirty years and may be best known for her films Reassemb ...

* Cherríe Moraga *

Chantal Mouffe Chantal Mouffe (; born 17 June 1943) is a Belgian political theorist, formerly teaching at University of Westminster. She is best known for her contribution to the development—jointly with Ernesto Laclau, with whom she co-authored her most fre ...

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Uma Narayan Uma Narayan (born 16 April 1958) is an Indian feminist scholar and a current professor of philosophy at Vassar College on the Andrew W. Mellon Chair of Humanities. Narayan's work focuses on the epistemology of the inequities involving postcolo ...

* Kathryn Norlock *

Martha Nussbaum Martha Craven Nussbaum (; born May 6, 1947) is an American philosopher and the current Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics at the University of Chicago, where she is jointly appointed in the law school and the philosoph ...

Andrea Nye Andrea Nye (born 1939) is a feminist philosopher and writer. Nye is a Professor Emerita at the University of Wisconsin–Whitewater for the Philosophy and Religious Studies Department and an active member of the Women's Studies Department. I ...

* Noëlle McAfee

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Peg O'Connor Peg O'Connor, is a Professor of Philosophy and Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies as well as Chair of the Department of Philosophy at Gustavus Adolphus College. Her present research interests include two separate but intersecting strains: Wittg ...

Susan Moller Okin Susan Moller Okin (July 19, 1946 – March 3, 2004) was a liberal feminist political philosopher and author. Life Okin was born in 1946 in Auckland, New Zealand. She attended Remuera Primary School and Remuera Intermediate and Epsom Girls' G ...

* Kelly Oliver

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Carole Pateman Carole Pateman (born 11 December 1940) is a feminist and political theorist. She is known as a critic of liberal democracy and has been a member of the British Academy since 2007. Biography Pateman was born in Maresfield, Sussex, England. Ed ...

* L.A. Paul *

Nina Power Nina Power is an English writer and philosopher. She is a senior editor of and columnist for the online magazine ''Compact''. Power received her PhD in philosophy from Middlesex University on the topic of humanism and antihumanism in postwar ...

Paul B. Preciado Paul B. Preciado (born 11 September 1970 as Beatriz Preciado), is a writer, philosopher and curator whose work focuses on applied and theoretical topics relating to identity, gender, pornography, architecture and sexuality. Originally known as a ...

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* Adrienne Rich * Avital Ronell * Hilary Rose

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Jennifer Saul Jennifer Mather Saul (born 19 February 1968) is a philosopher working in philosophy of language and feminist philosophy, philosophy of feminism. Saul is a professor of philosophy at the University of Sheffield and the University of Waterloo. Bio ...

Naomi Scheman Naomi Scheman is a Professor of Philosophy and Gender, Women's and Sexuality Studies at the University of Minnesota. She is also a guest professor at the Umeå University, Umeå Center for Gender Studies in Sweden. Scheman was one of the first sc ...

Sally Scholz Sally J. Scholz (born 1968) is an American Professor of Philosophy at Villanova University and former editor of '' Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy''. Her research focuses on social philosophy, political philosophy, and feminist theory. H ...

Ofelia Schutte Ofelia Schutte (born 1945) is Professor Emerita of Philosophy at the University of South Florida, where she had served as Professor of Philosophy since 2004, and as Professor of Women's Studies (and chair of the department) from 1999 until 2004. S ...

* Vandana Shiva * Dorothy Smith * Holly Martin Smith * Nancy Snow *

Miriam Solomon Miriam Solomon is Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Philosophy Department as well as Affiliated Professor of Women's Studies at Temple University. Solomon's work focuses on the philosophy of science, social epistemology, medical epistemo ...

Elizabeth V. Spelman Elizabeth V. Spelman is a philosopher in the United States. She is currently a professor at Smith College. She is a Barbara Richmond 1940 Professor in the Humanities. Due to this position she currently resides in Northampton, Massachusetts. Studi ...

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (born 24 February 1942) is an Indian scholar, literary theorist, and feminist critic. She is a University Professor at Columbia University and a founding member of the establishment's Institute for Comparative Lite ...

Alison Stone Alison Stone (born 1972) is a British philosopher. She is a Professor of European Philosophy in the Department of Politics, Philosophy and Religion at Lancaster University, UK. Career Stone has a D.Phil. from the University of Sussex where her ...

Shannon Sullivan Shannon Sullivan is chair and Professor of Philosophy at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. She teaches and writes on feminist philosophy, critical philosophy of race, American pragmatism, and continental philosophy. Sullivan is the ...

Anita Superson Anita Superson is a professor of philosophy at the University of Kentucky. She was also the visiting Churchill Humphrey and Alex P. Humphrey Professor of Feminist Philosophy at the University of Waterloo during the winter term of 2013. Educatio ...

* Susanne Sreedhar

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Lisa Tessman Lisa Tessman is a professor of philosophy at Binghamton University. She is also a faculty member in the women, gender, and sexuality studies. She currently teaches graduate programs in social, political, ethical and legal philosophy or SPEL. S ...

Lynne Tirrell Lynne Tirrell is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Connecticut, where she is also affiliated with the Human Rights Institute. Much of the body of her work focuses on hate speech, especially the practical effects of linguistic practices ...

Sojourner Truth Sojourner Truth (; born Isabella Baumfree; November 26, 1883) was an American abolitionist of New York Dutch heritage and a women's rights activist. Truth was born into slavery in Swartekill, New York, but escaped with her infant daughter to f ...

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Margaret Urban Walker Margaret Urban Walker (born August 8, 1948), is the Donald J. Schuenke Chair Emerita in Philosophy at Marquette University. Before her appointment at Marquette, she was the Lincoln Professor of Ethics at Arizona State University, and before that ...

Georgia Warnke Georgia Warnke is a Distinguished Professor of Political Science (and formerly Distinguished Professor of Philosophy) and the Director of the Center for Ideas & Society at the University of California, Riverside. She chaired the Department from 2 ...

* Anna Wheeler *

Cynthia Willett Cynthia Willett is an American philosopher who is Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of Philosophy at Emory University, where she is also affiliated faculty with Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and with the Psychoanalytic Studies Program. She has ...

Charlotte Witt Charlotte Witt (born 27 September 1951) is a professor of philosophy and humanities at the University of New Hampshire. Education and career Witt double majored at Swarthmore College, graduating in 1975 with degrees both classics and philosophy. ...

* Mary Wollstonecraft * Alison Wylie *

Monique Wittig Monique Wittig (; July 13, 1935 – January 3, 2003) was a French author, philosopher and feminist theorist who wrote about abolition of the sex-class system and coined the phrase "heterosexual contract". Her seminal work is titled ''The Straigh ...

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* Young, Iris Marion * Yu, Cheng-hsieh

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Naomi Zack Naomi Zack is a professor of philosophy at Lehman College, City University of New York (CUNY), having formerly been a professor at the University of Albany and the University of Oregon. She has written thirteen books and three textbooks, and she ...

* Ewa Ziarek

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Feminist philosophers Philosophers Lists of philosophers