ABSTRACT
The role of gender in the expansion of knowledge for social work practice is complex. Many of the challenges to traditional epistemology and research methods within the social sciences and helping professions emerged from each field's biases and distortions in the study of women. The objectivity of science and other issues concerning a value-free science have been discussed for many years within the philosophy of science. The plurality of thought regarding what values are feminist makes it difficult to formulate an alternative research method based on feminist values. Many feminist researchers are postpositivists and advocate for a "socially constructed" or postmodernist view of science that acknowledges the sociopolitical nature of science and seeks to dethrone science as a kingpin in providing knowledge about everyday life. Feminist theorists and researchers have worked to assure that gender is included in the theories and methods produced by social science researchers.
