feminist research essay

Understanding Feminist Research Methodology in Social Sciences

15 Pages Posted: 15 Jun 2019

Ramandeep Kaur

Punjabi University, Department of Economics

Sangeeta Nagaich

Punjabi University-Department of Economics

Date Written: March 15, 2019

For the purpose of analysis and assessment of the great literary and non-literary argumentations, the research methodology has always been a vital concern in today’s scenario. Women’s perspective has been always taken into account in feminist research as the base of the research. The commencement of feminist research is emerging from the viewpoint that values women’s experience, needs, and perception of the social world. Feminist research also aims at bringing transformation and phasing out the gender asymmetry in the world. The deliberate discrimination of women at household level which results in a higher level of unhappiness and morbidity among women can be easily understood and unpacked from the perspective feminist lens. This research is prerequisite and essential for achieving the goal of equitable social and economic development. The present piece of work tried to give the backdrop on understanding the meaning of feminist research and the origin of feminist research methodology for conducting the research from the gender perspective. This paper also envelopes the pivotal standpoints on how feminist research is differentiated from social science research. Since, the social science research generally omits and overlooks the manifold aspects of gender relations resulting in incomplete and biased research, which in turn leads to the construction of incomplete development policies and programs. So, this work will also try to scrutinize the approaches that feminist methodologies have been used in the development of gender-sensitive indicators and measurements of change. The focus has also been given to highlight the use of feminism in the indigenous Indian context for addressing Indian issues. It suggests that before the onset of feminist studies, social scientists had not engaged critically with patriarchal and androcentric structures which oppress and dominate women. Lastly, an attempt has been made to discuss various methods used for feminist research and the main focus has been given on the understanding of feminist action research and its emergence.

Keywords: Feminism, Feminist Research, Feminist Research Methodology, Indian Primitive Feminism, Feminist Action Research, Social Transformation, Gender Inequality

JEL Classification: B00, B5, B54

Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation

Ramandeep Kaur (Contact Author)

Punjabi university, department of economics ( email ).

Patiala India

Punjabi University-Department of Economics ( email )

Patiala India Patiala, IN Punjab 147002 India

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Feminist Research Ethics

From Theory to Practice

• Living reference work entry
• First Online: 25 February 2019
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• Anna Karin Kingston 2  

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Feminists endeavor to conduct research through a gender conscious prism while challenging patriarchal structures in society. The topic “feminist ethics” is well documented in the literature; however, “feminist research ethics” is less so. The empirical practice of applying a feminist ethics in research has hitherto not received large attention from feminist scholars as the debate instead tends to focus on underpinning philosophical theories. Some feminists argue that it is unethical not to apply a gender perspective in all research regardless of discipline. This standpoint may suggest that all feminist researchers, by virtue of claiming to be feminists, consider themselves adhering to a feminist research ethics while conducting their research. There is, however, a myriad of feminisms and subsequent research methods which challenges the notion of a uniform feminist research ethics. This chapter attempts to address some key aspects on the topic, by firstly introducing the reader to some of the feminist theories which underpin a feminist ethical approach to social scientific research. I will then continue to discuss examples of practices of feminist ethics in research internationally. There is growing concern among contemporary feminists about how research is conducted, who is involved, and most importantly who benefits from research results. To illustrate these ethical dilemmas, I will also discuss my own PhD research, a feminist ethnography documenting the experiences of 18 mothers of children with special needs in the Republic of Ireland. Finally, drawing from these documented practical experiences, I will summarize suggested recommendations for researchers who aim to pursue research that adheres to feminist research ethics.

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Kingston, A.K. (2019). Feminist Research Ethics. In: Iphofen, R. (eds) Handbook of Research Ethics and Scientific Integrity. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76040-7_64-1

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DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76040-7_64-1

Received : 10 December 2018

Accepted : 16 December 2018

Published : 25 February 2019

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Online ISBN : 978-3-319-76040-7

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Feminist theory.

• Pelagia Goulimari Pelagia Goulimari Department of English, University of Oxford
• https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190201098.013.976
• Published online: 19 November 2020

Feminist theory in the 21st century is an enormously diverse field. Mapping its genealogy of multiple intersecting traditions offers a toolkit for 21st-century feminist literary criticism, indeed for literary criticism tout court. Feminist phenomenologists (Simone de Beauvoir, Iris Marion Young, Toril Moi, Miranda Fricker, Pamela Sue Anderson, Sara Ahmed, Alia Al-Saji) have contributed concepts and analyses of situation, lived experience, embodiment, and orientation. African American feminists (Toni Morrison, Audre Lorde, Alice Walker, Hortense J. Spillers, Saidiya V. Hartman) have theorized race, intersectionality, and heterogeneity, particularly differences among women and among black women. Postcolonial feminists (Assia Djebar, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Chandra Talpade Mohanty, Florence Stratton, Saba Mahmood, Jasbir K. Puar) have focused on the subaltern, specificity, and agency. Queer and transgender feminists (Judith Butler, Jack Halberstam, Susan Stryker) have theorized performativity, resignification, continuous transition, and self-identification. Questions of representation have been central to all traditions of feminist theory.

• continuous transition
• heterogeneity
• intersectionality
• lived experience
• performativity
• resignification
• self-identification
• the subaltern

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Critical Writing Program: Questions of Normalcy: Researching the White Paper

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Research the White Paper

Researching the white paper:.

The process of researching and composing a white paper shares some similarities with the kind of research and writing one does for a high school or college research paper. What’s important for writers of white papers to grasp, however, is how much this genre differs from a research paper.  First, the author of a white paper already recognizes that there is a problem to be solved, a decision to be made, and the job of the author is to provide readers with substantive information to help them make some kind of decision--which may include a decision to do more research because major gaps remain. 

Thus, a white paper author would not “brainstorm” a topic. Instead, the white paper author would get busy figuring out how the problem is defined by those who are experiencing it as a problem. Typically that research begins in popular culture--social media, surveys, interviews, newspapers. Once the author has a handle on how the problem is being defined and experienced, its history and its impact, what people in the trenches believe might be the best or worst ways of addressing it, the author then will turn to academic scholarship as well as “grey” literature (more about that later).  Unlike a school research paper, the author does not set out to argue for or against a particular position, and then devote the majority of effort to finding sources to support the selected position.  Instead, the author sets out in good faith to do as much fact-finding as possible, and thus research is likely to present multiple, conflicting, and overlapping perspectives. When people research out of a genuine desire to understand and solve a problem, they listen to every source that may offer helpful information. They will thus have to do much more analysis, synthesis, and sorting of that information, which will often not fall neatly into a “pro” or “con” camp:  Solution A may, for example, solve one part of the problem but exacerbate another part of the problem. Solution C may sound like what everyone wants, but what if it’s built on a set of data that have been criticized by another reliable source?  And so it goes. 

For example, if you are trying to write a white paper on the opioid crisis, you may focus on the value of  providing free, sterilized needles--which do indeed reduce disease, and also provide an opportunity for the health care provider distributing them to offer addiction treatment to the user. However, the free needles are sometimes discarded on the ground, posing a danger to others; or they may be shared; or they may encourage more drug usage. All of those things can be true at once; a reader will want to know about all of these considerations in order to make an informed decision. That is the challenging job of the white paper author.     
 The research you do for your white paper will require that you identify a specific problem, seek popular culture sources to help define the problem, its history, its significance and impact for people affected by it.  You will then delve into academic and grey literature to learn about the way scholars and others with professional expertise answer these same questions. In this way, you will create creating a layered, complex portrait that provides readers with a substantive exploration useful for deliberating and decision-making. You will also likely need to find or create images, including tables, figures, illustrations or photographs, and you will document all of your sources. 

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