Year: 2024
Type: article
Abstract: Recent work in the metaphysics of gender mostly focuses on trying to solve the exclusion problem - roughly, the problem of giving a metaphysical account of gender that doesn’t exclude anyone from their appropriate gender category. It is acknowledged that no completely satisfactory answer to the exclusion problem has yet been given in the literature; typically such theories fail to account for the diverse experiences and characteristics of trans people. One response is to adopt an anti-realism about gender properties, such as Heather Logue’s gender fictionalism. I rebut the move to an anti-realism, showing that it relies on assuming a representationalism about gender vocabulary that we need not hold. I put forward a non-representationalist theory of gender properties that analyses gender vocabulary in terms of its inferential profile, rather than its representational features. This theory constitutes a deflationary realism about gender properties; it solves the inclusion problem, and guarantees the first-person epistemic authority of an individual regarding their own gender identity.
Source: Synthese
Author: Evie Willems
Institution: University of York
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Gender equality
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid: $2,990
OpenAlex ID: W4405276154