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The Feminist Methodology
The feminist methodology in research is explained by discussing the various strands of feminism and bringing out the distinction between method and methodology.
The author is grateful for the reviewer’s comments and has incorporated some of them.
The basic argument of this article is that research is based on the theory of a particular aspect of society one wishes to investigate. “Feminist research” is keyed on to theories of feminism. Methodology chosen would therefore depend on our theory. A method, on the contrary, refers to the techniques of data gathering. These techniques are: a survey with random sampling; case studies of selected events; in-depth interviews, and so on. These are subject to errors. Often, the response of the interviewee would depend on their own interpretation of the question. In social sciences unlike the physical sciences, experiments are not possible. An experiment would alter the individual’s or social behaviour, which we wish to record prior to intervention.1
There are many questions that arise in articulating a “feminist methodology” for research. First of all, what are we doing research for? What does the adjective “feminist” denote? Can only a woman be a feminist? Is feminist research different from “ordinary” research? Obviously, we have to first uncover the adjective “feminist,” derived from feminism. Do we have baseline definition of feminism/feminist? A working definition would be
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