Resisting Gender: Twenty-Five Years of Feminist Psychology

Abstract

This volume is a detailed participant–observer account of feminist psychology over the last quarter of the last century. Unger is well positioned in this body of research, having edited and authored numerous textbooks and research publications on women, gender, and psychology, as well as having been president of the Society for the Psychology of Women (APA Division 35). Unger presents an authoritative account of feminist psychology and its major practitioners, as well as her own contributions, including six reprints of earlier addresses or papers. The volume includes insights about the place of feminist psychology within psychology, methodologies and findings, and future directions. Because political activism preceded research on women in psychology, some of the early utility of feminist psychology was in empirically demonstrating discrimination and prejudice. The zeitgeist also focused on women’s ‘‘lesser’’ achievement, so much of the early research focused on this. Though much of her and her colleagues’ work could be described as feminist empiricism, Unger criticizes this approach, noting that it is removed from social applicability, and one of her key concerns as a feminist is that research be useful in a liberatory sense. Another of her concerns focuses on the generalization inherent to such research: Who is compared to whom? Unger also attends to the limited scope with which feminist psychology’s research agenda was carried out, and notes that sexual orientation, ethnicity, class, age, and disability issues were largely off the radar. Feminist empiricism was seen as somewhat naive by many in other feminist disciplines, who saw science as an outdated and patriarchal institution, unsuitable for the feminist enterprise. Unger notes, however, that findings resulting from feminist empiricism can be valuable, especially in supporting legal change, and I would argue that social change in the liberal feminist mold is well-served by feminist empiricism-the two are almost eerily well-matched. Unger makes the case that the practice of feminist empiricism should not be taken as, or concurrent with, a belief in the superiority or infallibility of the scientific method. It should be valued only in its utility as one tool in the box, suitable for some tasks. The tension between feminist empiricism and other feminist epistemologies, though not a main theme in this volume, is a continued subtle undercurrent and I would have liked to see more abouthowfeministpsychology as a whole has grappled with the issue. Unger alludes to this, in noting how little acceptance or welcome feminist psychologists, including her, have had in mainstream academic feminism and its structures. It may be because, as Unger notes, power (in contrast to powerlessness) has never been a ‘‘serious’’ subject in psychologyandhasemerged only slowly in feministpsychology, even while it is one of the defining topics of study for feminism. Of course, feminist psychology has been marginalized in mainstream psychology. In Reading 2 (1985), Unger notes that women are more likely to be targets of negative stereotypes when they step outside their normative roles. One might ask (tongue only partially in cheek) whether this explains the lack of acceptance of feminist psychologists in both psychology and feminism. Both areas have normative expectations, and feminist psychologists may not fit into these roles (e.g., psychology: subject matter and relevance; feminism: epistemologies and methods). One major point in the book is that professional legitimacy (respect, tenure, jobs, etc.) is largely a matter of power, and the psychology departments of elite American universities do not generally have feminist psychology classes (or even psychology of gender or women classes, though the landscape has changed somewhat since the volume was published) nor do they have S. M. van Anders (&) Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Indiana University, 1101 East 10th St, Bloomington, IN 47405, USA e-mail: smvanand@indiana.edu