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Social Constructionism: Knowledge is a Creation Based on Social Interests

Social Constructionism: Knowledge is a Creation Based on Social Interests. Science is not the objective accumulation of facts, because “facts” are answers to questions framed in incommensurable theoretical frameworks ( paradigms )

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Social Constructionism: Knowledge is a Creation Based on Social Interests

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  1. Social Constructionism: Knowledge is a Creation Based on Social Interests Science is not the objective accumulation of facts, because “facts” are answers to questions framed in incommensurable theoretical frameworks (paradigms) Epistemological Relativism: knowledge varies in conceptual schemes with different criteria for justification, truth, & rationality • Communal interests determine how to evaluate different paradigms Thomas Kuhn

  2. The Gendered Character of Knowledge • Feminine characterizations of knowledge aim at explanation and understanding instead of an adversarial determination of “facts” removed from their contexts • This does not imply that women are “naturally” different from men (e.g., more sensitive or less objective); such essentialism ignores how even gender is a social construct • What is knowable is determined by relations of power in a discipline Lorraine Code Michel Foucault

  3. Constructivist Confusions: Alan Sokal • To say that “physical reality is a social and linguistic construct” is to confuse: • objects in the world with what we say about them • how we get knowledge with its reliability • knowledge about the world with social, political, or ethical uses of such knowledge • Reply: objective/subjective distinctions are naïve, unjustified, and even dangerous

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