ABSTRACT
Feminism is one of the most powerful concepts in higher education and student affairs today. It has the potential to serve as a tremendous basis of empowerment and inclusion; yet, it also has the means to alienate and infuriate. This chapter makes a deliberate call for women, men, and transgender scholars and educators to work toward centering feminist perspectives (and other marginalized perspectives) in research and practice as the complexities of college and university life continue to evolve. Some feminist researchers, such as Catharine MacKinnon, believe that “consciousness raising is feminist method”. In On Methodand Hope, Tierney mentioned that research should be a “struggle to investigate how individuals and groups might be better able to change their situations”. Standpoint research (one type of feminist approach) is built on notions that women have been marginalized from research and, consequently, places women’s knowledge, emerging from their situated experiences, at the forefront.
