The Mismeasure of Woman: The Epistemic and Social Impacts of Gendered Citation Practices

Abstract

This dissertation will explore the philosophical problems that arise from the finding that women are cited less frequently than men in a number of sciences, what I’ll call gendered citation practices. Gendered citation practices have received little philosophical attention despite the importance of citations to the practice of science. Citations are used by scientists in every publication to connect their work to the community that they are a part of. Citations are public (to the extent that publications are public--minimally they are visible to members of the scientific community with institutional or other access to published articles), which makes them easier to track and quantify than many other types of barriers women face in science. Citations are also an increasingly important metric that are either currently used or raised as a potential metric for informing decisions about funding, hiring, and promotion. Disparities in citations have the potential for substantial impacts on the career trajectory of women in science, especially when compounded with other gender disparities. The three papers of this dissertation discuss some of the philosophical issues that arise from gendered citation practices. The first paper argues that GPCs are a form of epistemic injustice, where women are denied access to uptake, a term borrowed from Longino. The second paper provides a sympathetic extension of Longino’s views and argues that citations can be used to measure uptake and ensure that all members of the community are treated equitably. The third paper considers what would happen if citations were given even more weight in key decisions in scientists’ careers and shows that women may be subject to even more epistemic injustice when grants are given to the most highly cited researchers.