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A review by rromanereads
How to Think Like a Woman: Four Women Philosophers Who Taught Me How to Love the Life of the Mind by Regan Penaluna
5.0
a feminist book to reconcile you with philosophy.
At the crossroads between a philosophical lesson and a memoir, this book tells the story of four women philosophers: Damaris Cudworth Masham, Mary Astell, Catharine Cockburn and Mary Wollstonecraft as well as the story of Regan herself. Immersed in academic and then professorial life, she ponders the "big questions" of life. She reflects on the position of women in philosophy, and experiences herself the omnipresent misogyny in this milieu and the devaluation of the work of women philosophers. She highlights how these women of letters are ignored in philosophy curricula. It's simple, without having much knowledge in this field or having done dedicated studies, how many women philosophers can you name? It's indicative of the place we give to their work. Another area where white men dominate. This ubiquitous observation in every field makes me mad, thank you to women like Regan Penaluna for writing this kind of work to enrich and educate us, long live the sisterhood.
This was my first audiobook ever and as it’s not fiction you can’t just distractedly listen with one ear, I will read the physical book as well just to be able to actually remember things from what I read. This is completely personal but if like me you have a more visual than auditory memory and attention span then I would recommend going for the physical copy! Either way, this book is an incredible work piece and very interesting. It makes philosophy accessible to everyone.
At the crossroads between a philosophical lesson and a memoir, this book tells the story of four women philosophers: Damaris Cudworth Masham, Mary Astell, Catharine Cockburn and Mary Wollstonecraft as well as the story of Regan herself. Immersed in academic and then professorial life, she ponders the "big questions" of life. She reflects on the position of women in philosophy, and experiences herself the omnipresent misogyny in this milieu and the devaluation of the work of women philosophers. She highlights how these women of letters are ignored in philosophy curricula. It's simple, without having much knowledge in this field or having done dedicated studies, how many women philosophers can you name? It's indicative of the place we give to their work. Another area where white men dominate. This ubiquitous observation in every field makes me mad, thank you to women like Regan Penaluna for writing this kind of work to enrich and educate us, long live the sisterhood.
This was my first audiobook ever and as it’s not fiction you can’t just distractedly listen with one ear, I will read the physical book as well just to be able to actually remember things from what I read. This is completely personal but if like me you have a more visual than auditory memory and attention span then I would recommend going for the physical copy! Either way, this book is an incredible work piece and very interesting. It makes philosophy accessible to everyone.