The Epistemology of Ignorance

The epistemology of ignorance in relation to the feminist movement is a study on the lack of knowledge surrounding women’s bodies and health. However, as Tuana and Ortega demonstrated there are many faces of ignorance. For example, Tuana listed willful ignorance, knowing that we do not know and we do not know that we do not know (amongst many others) as different forms of ignorance. If we expand on the case of willful ignorance then we will be able to see that this involves people not knowing and not wanting to know about women’s issues. Tuana links the works of several individuals who have linked willful ignorance with racial oppression. In summary, white privileged individuals often do not know of the experiences of black people and a lot of the time they do not want to know as the system of oppression is something that they are benefitting from.

 An example of willful ignorance can be seen through looking at the relationship between conflict minerals and the technology that we use everyday. A lot of people do not know where the parts that makes their phone work comes from, yet a lot of people do not want to know. They do not want to know that the phone they love so much is helping fund wars in places such as Congo. This is a similar case with conflict diamonds. However, some would argue that it is not their fault that they are ignorant about the origins of the items that they use, it is the distributors fault. In this case their argument would fall under “they do not want us to know”, which is a category of ignorance that Tuana also describes. This leads me to believe that more than one type of ignorance can occur at the same time.  

Ortega’s main approach to the epistemologies of ignorance is to explain the stance of being lovingly, knowingly ignorant, which interestingly enough actually opposes the notion of being loving in the first place. As she describes, a loving eye is one that listens, questions and checks. Whereas to be knowingly ignorant often involves inventing the reality of women of color, which is not loving at all. When you invent someone’s reality you do not bother to check with those that experience the reality that you speak of to see if your words are truthful, or not. The interesting thing about this form of ignorance is that many white feminists practice it. They believe that they are doing something out of the pureness of their hearts, which is why they may often refer to themselves as “allies”. However, what they are doing is harmful and disrespectful to women of color.