Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-6bf8c574d5-xtvcr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-17T04:34:54.512Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Chapter 2 - Thriving within Ourselves: Epistemic Injustice and Individual Wellness

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 November 2024

By
Laura Smith ,
Lisa A. Goodman ,
Tyner Gordon  and
Helen P. Hailes
Edited by
Isaac Prilleltensky ,
Salvatore Di Martino ,
Michael Scarpa  and
Ottar Ness
Isaac Prilleltensky
Affiliation:
University of Miami
Salvatore Di Martino
Affiliation:
University of Bradford
Michael Scarpa
Affiliation:
University of Miami
Ottar Ness
Affiliation:
Norwegian University of Science and Technology
Get access

Summary

In this chapter, we discuss the relationship of individual personal thriving to fairness and worthiness by exploring the concept of epistemic injustice. Epistemic injustice refers to the rejection of people’s capacity as knowers, such that these individuals are treated as being less knowledgeable and less believable than other people, frequently on the basis of their social identities. In the first half of the chapter, we will explain how epistemic injustices take place and how they interrupt human thriving. In the second half of the chapter, we will profile the ways that psychologists and others can work to prevent epistemic injustice.

Keywords

epistemic injusticeepistemologyparticipationexclusioninclusion#MeTooracismmarginalization
Type
Chapter
Information
How People Thrive
Promoting the Synergy of Wellness, Fairness, and Worthiness
 , pp. 37 - 64
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abramson, K. (2014). Turning up the lights on gaslighting. Philosophical Perspectives, 28, 1–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anderson, K. O., Green, C. R., & Payne, R. (2009). Racial and ethnic disparities in pain: Causes and consequences of unequal care. The Journal of Pain, 10(12), 1187–1204.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Andreasen, M. B. (2021). “Rapeable” and “unrapeable” women: The portrayal of sexual violence in Internet memes about #MeToo. Journal of Gender Studies, 30(1), 102–113.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bailey, A. (2014). The unlevel knowing field: An engagement with Dotson’s third-order epistemic oppression. Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective, 3(10), 62–68.Google Scholar
Bjorklund, P. Jr. (2018). Undocumented students in higher education: A review of the literature, 2001 to 2016. Review of Education Research, 88(5), 631–670.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blease, C., Carel, H., & Geraghty, K. (2017). Epistemic injustice in healthcare encounters: Evidence from chronic fatigue syndrome. Journal of Medical Ethics, 43(8), 549–557.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Borda, O. F. (1979). Investigating reality in order to transform it: The Colombian experience. Dialectical Anthropology, 3, 33–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Breeze, J. A., & Repper, J. (1998). Struggling for control: The care experiences of “difficult” patients in mental health services. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 28(6), 1301–1311.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cooper, A. J. (1892). A voice from the South. Aldine Printing House.Google Scholar
Cosgrove, L., & Herrawi, F. (2021). Beware of equating increased access to mental health services with health equity: The need for clinical and epistemic humility in psychology. The Humanistic Psychologist, 49(2), 338–341. https://doi.org/10.1037/hum0000227.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cuevas, A. G., O’Brien, K., & Saha, S. (2016). African American experiences in healthcare: “I always feel like I’m getting skipped over.” Health Psychology, 35(9), 987–995.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davidson, L. J., Sherman, B., & Goguen, S. (2019). When testimony isn’t enough: Implicit bias research as epistemic exclusion. In Sherman, B. J. and Goguen, S. (Eds.), Overcoming epistemic injustice: Social and psychological perspectives, (pp. 269–284). Rowman & Littlefield International.Google Scholar
Davis, A. M., & Ernst, R. (2019). Racial gaslighting. Politics, Groups, and Identities, 7(4), 761–774.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dotson, K. (2011). Tracking epistemic violence, tracking practices of silencing. Hypatia, 26(2). 236–257.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dotson, K. (2012). A cautionary tale: On limiting epistemic oppression. Frontiers: A Journal of Women’s Studies, 33, 24–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dotson, K. (2014). Conceptualizing epistemic oppression. Social Epistemology, 28, 115–138CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Drescher, J. (2015). Queer diagnoses revisited: The past and future of homosexuality and gender diagnoses in DSM and ICD. International Review of Psychiatry, 27(5), 386–395. https://doi.org/10.3109/09540261.2015.1053847CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Duncan, R. (1988). That’s an excellent idea, Miss Triggs. Punch Magazine, January. https://doi.org/10.3109/09540261.2015.1053847.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Epstein, D., & Goodman, L. A. (2019). Discounting women: Doubting domestic violence survivors’ credibility and dismissing their experiences. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 167(2), 399–461.Google Scholar
Fals-Borda, O. (1991). Remaking knowledge. In Fals-Borda, O., & Rahman, M. A. (Eds.), Action and knowledge: Breaking the monopoly with participatory action research (pp. 146–166). Apex.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Faro, M., Sàez-Francás, N., Castro-Marrero, J., et al. (2016). Gender differences in chronic fatigue syndrome. Reumatología Clínica, 12(2), 72–77.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Zed Books.Google Scholar
Fricker, M. (1998). Rational authority and social power: Towards a truly social epistemology. In Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society (pp. 159–177). Aristotelian Society.Google Scholar
Fricker, M. (2007). Epistemic injustice: Power and the ethics of knowing. Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fricker, M. (2015). Epistemic contribution as a central human capability. In Hull, G. (Ed.), The equal society: Essays on equality in theory and practice (pp. 73–90). Lexington.Google Scholar
Fricker, M., & Jenkins, K. (2017). Epistemic injustice, ignorance, and the trans experience. In Garry, A., Khader, S. J., & Stone, A. (Eds.), The Routledge companion to feminist philosophy (pp. 268–279). Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gaspar, M., Skakoon-Sparling, S., Adam, B. D., et al. (2021). “You’re gay, it’s just what happens”: Sexual minority men recounting experiences of unwanted sex in the era of MeToo. The Journal of Sex Research, 58(9), 1205–1214.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Given, L. M. (2008). Evolution of qualitative research. In The SAGE encyclopedia of qualitative research methods (Vol. 1, pp. 312–318). Thousand Oaks: SAGE.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goodman, L. A., Epstein, D., & Sullivan, C. M. (2018). Beyond the RCT: Integrating rigor and relevance to evaluate the outcomes of domestic violence programs. American Journal of Evaluation, 39(1), 58–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goodman, A., Fleming, K., Markwick, N. et al. (2017). “They treated me like crap and I know it was because I was Native”: The healthcare experiences of Aboriginal peoples living in Vancouver’s inner city. Social Science & Medicine, 178, 87–94.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Goodman, L. A., Fels, K., & Glenn, C. (2006). No safe place: Sexual assault in the lives of homeless women. VAWnet. https://vawnet.org/sites/default/files/materials/files/2016-09/AR_SAHomelessness.pdf.Google Scholar
Goodman, L. A., Smyth, K. F., & Banyard, V. (2010). Beyond the 50-minute hour: Increasing control, choice, and connections in the lives of low-income women. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 80(1), 3–11.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Green, J. (A). Becoming a visible man. Vanderbilt University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gutowski, E., & Goodman, L. A. (2019). “Like I’m invisible”: IPV survivor-mothers’ perceptions of seeking child custody through the family court system. Journal of Family Violence, 35(5), 441–457.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haas, B. M. (2017). Citizens-in-waiting, deportees-in-waiting: Power, temporarily, and suffering in the U.S. asylum system. ETHOS, 45(1), 75–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hayes, S., & Jeffries, S. (2016). Romantic terrorism? An auto-ethnography of gendered psychological and emotional tactics in domestic violence. Journal of Research in Gender Studies, 6(2), 38–61. https://doi.org/10.22381/JRGS6220162Google Scholar
Hoffman, K. M., Trawalter, S., Axt, J. R., & Oliver, M. N (2016). Racial bias in pain assessment and treatment recommendations, and false beliefs about biological differences between Blacks and Whites. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 113(16), 4296–4301.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hooks, B. (1994). Teaching to transgress: Education as the practice of freedom. Routledge.Google Scholar
Jacklin, K. M., Henderson, R. I., Green, M. E., et al. (2017). Health care experiences of Indigenous people living with type 2 diabetes in Canada. Canadian Medical Association Journal, 189(3), E106–E112.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jacques, J. (2015). Trans: A memoir. Verso.Google Scholar
Jenkins, K. (2016). Rape myths and domestic abuse myths as hermeneutic injustices. Journal of Applied Philosophy, 34(2), 191–205.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jordan, J. V. (2017). Relational-cultural theory: The power of connection to transform our lives. The Journal of Humanistic Counseling, 56(3), 228–243.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kidd, I. J., & Cavel, H. (2017). Epistemic injustice and illness. Journal of Applied Philosophy, 34(2), 172–190.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lorde, A. (1984). Sister outsider. Random House.Google Scholar
Maguire, P. (1987). Doing participatory research: A feminist approach. University of Massachusetts.Google Scholar
Markin, R. D., & Coleman, M. N. (2021). Intersections of gendered racial trauma and childbirth trauma: Clinical interventions for Black women. Psychotherapy, 27–38.Google Scholar
Martín-Baró, I. (1994). Writings for a liberation psychology. Harvard Press.Google Scholar
Mbilishaka, A. M. (2021). PsychoHairapy through beauticians and barbershops: The healing relational triad of Black hair care professionals, mothers, and daughters. In Lewis, Marva & Weatherston, Deborah (Eds.), Therapeutic cultural routines to build family relationships (pp. 173–181). Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Medina, J. (2013). The epistemology of resistance: Gender and racial oppression, epistemic injustice, and resistant imaginations. Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mehl-Madrona, L., & Mainguy, B. (2014). Introducing healing circles and talking circles into primary care. The Permanente Journal, Spring;18(2), 4–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Meier, J. S. (2020). U.S. child custody outcomes in cases involving parental alienation and abuse allegations: What do the data show? Journal of Social Welfare and Family Law, 42(1), 92–105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Milaney, K., Lockerbie, S. L., Fang, X. Y., & Ramage, K. (2019). The role of structural violence in family homelessness. Canadian Journal of Public Health, 110, 554–562.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Miller, J. B., & Stiver, I. P. (1997). The healing connection: How women form relationships in therapy and in life. Beacon Press.Google Scholar
Narayan, D. (2000). Poverty is powerlessness and voicelessness. Finance & Development, 37(4), 18–21.Google Scholar
Nembhard, S., & Robin, L. (2021). Racial and ethnic disparities throughout the criminal legal system. www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/104687/racial-and-ethnic-disparities-throughout-the-criminal-legal-system.pdf.Google Scholar
O’Neil, A., Sojo, V., Fileborn, B., Scovelle, A. J., & Milner, A. (2018). The #MeToo movement: An opportunity in public health. The Lancet, 391(10140), 2587–2589.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pagán, C. N. (2018, May 3). When doctors downplay women’s health concerns. The New York Times. www.nytimes.com/2018/05/03/well/live/when-doctors-downplay-womens-health-concerns.html.Google Scholar
Payne, Y. (2006). Participatory action research and social justice. In Battle, J., & Bennett, M., & Lemelle, A. (Eds.), Free at Last (pp. 265–280). Routledge.Google Scholar
Payne, Y. A., & Brown, T. M. (2016). “I’m still waiting on that golden ticket”: Attitudes toward and experiences with opportunity in The Streets of Black America: Golden Ticket. Journal of Social Issues, 72(4), 789–811. https://doi.org/10.1111/josi.12194.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pohlhaus, G Jr. (2020). Epistemic agency under oppression. Philosophical Papers, 49(2), 233–251.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Portnow, K. E. (1996). Dialogues of doubt: The psychology of self-doubt and emotional gaslighting in adult women and men. Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Prilleltensky, I. (2020). Mattering at the intersection of psychology, philosophy, and politics. American Journal of Community Psychology, 65(1–2), 16–34.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Reich, R. (2018). The common good. Knopf.Google Scholar
Robinson-Wood, T., Muse, C., Hewett, R., et al. (2021). Regular White people things: The presence of White fragility in interracial families. Family Relations, 70(4), 973–992. https://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12549.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roman, L. A., Raffo, J. E., Dertz, K., et al. (2017). Understanding perspectives of African American Medicaid-insured women on the process of perinatal care: An opportunity for systems improvement. Maternal and Child Health Journal, 21, S81–S92.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sarat, A. (1990). The law is all over: Power, resistance, and the legal consciousness of the welfare poor. Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities, 2(2), 343–380.Google Scholar
Scrutton, A. P. (2017). Epistemic injustice and mental illness. In Kidd, Ian James, Medina, José, Pohlhaus, Gaile Jr. (Eds.), The Routledge handbook of epistemic injustice (pp. 347–355). Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sheridan, N. F., Kenealy, T. W., Kidd, J. D., et al. (2012). Patients’ engagement in primary care: Powerlessness and compounding jeopardy. A qualitative study. Health Expectations, 18, 32–43.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Shotwell, A. (2017). Forms of knowing and epistemic resources. In Kidd, I. J., Medina, J., & Pohlhaus, G. Jr. (Eds.), The Routledge handbook of epistemic injustice (pp. 79–88). Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, L. T. (1999). Decolonizing methodologies: Research and indigenous peoples. Zed.Google Scholar
Smith, L., & Romero, L. (2010). Psychological interventions in the context of poverty: Participatory action research as practice. American journal of Orthopsychiatry, 80(1), 12–25.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Smith, P. H., Tessaro, I., & Earp, J. A. L. (1995). Women’s experience with battering: A conceptualization from qualitative research. Women’s Health Issues, 5, 173–182. https://doi.org/10.1016/1049-3867(95)00615-X.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Smith, L., Chambers, D. A., & Bratini, L. (2009). When oppression is the pathogen: The participatory development of socially just mental health practice. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 79(2), 159–168.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Spivak, G. C. (1988). Can the subaltern speak? In Nelson, C. & Grossberg, L. (Eds.), Marxism and the interpretation of culture (pp. 66–111). Macmillan.Google Scholar
Stevenson, J. (1999). The circle of healing. Native Social Work Journal, 2, 8–21.Google Scholar
Stewart, H. (2019). ” Why didn’t she say something sooner?”: Doubt, denial, silencing, and the epistemic harms of the #MeToo movement. South Central Review, 36(2), 68–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stewart, M., Brown, J. B., Donner, A., et al. (2000). The impact of patient-centered care on outcomes. The Journal of Family Practice, 49(9), 796–804.Google ScholarPubMed
Sue, D. W., Capodilupo, C. M., Torino, G. C., et al. (2007). Racial microaggressions in everyday life: Implications for clinical practice. American Psychologist, 62(4), 271–286.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Teo, T. (2008). From speculation to epistemological violence in psychology: A critical-hermeneutic reconstruction. Theory & Psychology, 18(1), 47–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Teo, T. (2009). Philosophical concerns in critical psychology. In Fox, D., Prilleltensky, I., & Austin, S. (Eds.), Critical psychology: An introduction (pp. 36–54). Sage.Google Scholar
Thomas, S. A., & González-Prendez, A. A. (2009). Powerlessness, anger, and stress in African American women: Implications for physical and emotional health. Health Care for Women International, 30, 93–113.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tolman, R. M. (1992). Psychological abuse of women. In Ammerman, R. T. & Hersen, M. (Eds.), Wiley series on personality processes. Assessment of family violence: A clinical and legal sourcebook (pp. 291–310). John Wiley.Google Scholar
Walker, M. (2019). Why epistemic justice matters in and for education. Asia Pacific Education Review, 20, 161–170.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wang, E., Glazer, K. B., Sofaer, S., Balbierz, A., & Howell, E. A. (2021). Racial and ethnic disparities in severe maternal morbidity: A qualitative study of women’s experiences of peripartum care. Women’s Health Issues, 31(1), 75–81.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wardrope, A. (2015). Medicalization and epistemic injustice. Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy, 18, 341–352.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Whiting, J. B., Oka, M., & Fife, S. T. (2012). Appraisal distortions and intimate partner violence: Gender, power, and interaction. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 38(s1), 133–149. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1752-0606.2011.00285.x.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wyder, M., Bland, R. Blythe, A., Matarasso, B., & Crompton, D. (2015). Therapeutic relationships and involuntary treatment orders: Service users’ interactions with health-care professionals on the ward. International Journal of Mental Health Nursing, 24,181–189.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×