ABSTRACT
As a feminist scholar who for fifteen years has studied women's use of substances, I have found addiction professionals, whether they are researchers or clinicians, male or female, to be deeply resistant to the need for a feminist perspective in this area of study. Given this deep level of resistance, two very basic ideas need to be injected into this field if a feminist perspective is to develop. First, we need to be relatively familiar with the social scientific way of viewing the world and in particular, with how the notion of gender has had an impact on recent developments in the sociology of health and illness. Second, we need to be open, both theoretically and methodologically, to an approach which is sensitive to the needs of women as a social group.
