In 2009, we celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of the publication of the pioneering study of women and political thought, Susan Moller Okin's Women in Western Political Theory (1979). This foundational text was soon followed by Jean Bethke Elshtain's Public Man, Private Woman: Women in Social and Political Thought (1981), which continued the analysis of woman as a figure in the writings of classical and modern theorists whose work comprises the canon of political philosophy. The intervening decades have seen efforts to further theorize the subject position of women in the canonical texts highlighted by the Pennsylvania University Press “Re-Reading the Canon” series, edited by Nancy Tuana, which has grown to include volumes focused on most of the major classical, medieval, and modern thinkers. Yet as Nancy Hirschmann and Kirsti McClure, the editors of the recent volume Feminist Interpretations of John Locke, provocatively ask, where are the women?

For centuries, it has seemed that the “woman question” in politics has been unequivocally answered with the assumption that women have been silent on political issues. The “private woman,” as she has been categorized, fulfills the ancient Periclean maxim that females should not speak on matters of public debate concerning governance. Such facile categorizations are invalidated by the emerging and ample evidence of women's active contribution to political discourse from antiquity to the late middle ages. Women writing on politics and society gained solid discursive ground from the early modern era through the Age of Enlightenment and became persistent critics of gender injustice to the present day. Yet to date, there has been little sustained scholarly discussion of how women political writers helped to define the categories and commitments of political theory, and how their ideas have contested and contributed to the divergent intellectual traditions associated with liberalism and communitarianism. Even the origins of feminist political theory have been relatively ignored in the attempts to highlight pioneering authors whose works, when studied, are typically situated among their male canonical counterparts but only rarely analyzed within the context of other women writers who came before them or were their contemporaries. Such conventional research obscures the bountiful and complex argumentation of women writing on authority, power, obligation, contract, virtue, rights, and duties. Our understanding of good government is impoverished by the absence of women's philosophical treatments of the relationship between monarchical absolutism and patriarchal authority in the household. A vibrant and inclusive understanding of democratic citizenship benefits from the carefully detailed accounts of women writers who make problematic the segregation of society by sex and race, contest rank and class divisions, and denounce the compartmentalization of human life into gendered and separate spheres.

In Canon Fodder: Historical Women Political Writers, Penny Weiss provides a theoretically sophisticated and rhetorically playful examination of the work of our philosophical foremothers that crosses centuries and cultural boundaries. If the origins of theory lie in the critical observation of the world around us, we gain fresh theoretical perspectives from the minute “brushwork” of Sei Shonogon's Pillow Book as she considers “laughter and anger” in the Imperial Court of Japan. Christine de Pizan's Book of the City of the Ladies requires us to look closely at ourselves as we wonder with Christine why learned women do not rely on their own judgment and experience regarding the capacity of females for virtue and wisdom rather than embrace the derogatory characterizations of their sex in the books of famous men. Mary Astell's Serious Proposal to the Ladies and Some Reflections on Marriage focus our attention on men's jealous guardianship of the tree of knowledge and the jeopardy of binding unequal partners in an indissoluble marriage that corrupts them both and places at risk the eternal salvation of the woman's soul. Mary Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Woman illuminates membership in an expanded political community when read alongside her earlier Original Stories Drawn from Real Life, providing a vivid representation of girlhood at odds with Jean-Jacques Rousseau's depiction of girls as dolls within Emile. Anna Julia Cooper's A Voice from the South challenges the blindness of white Americans to the hateful destruction of racism while demonstrating the dignity and value of contributions of African American women in developing a welcome notion of sisterhood with the power to regenerate society. Weiss highlights the revolutionary vision of Elizabeth Cady Stanton's Declaration of Sentiments at Seneca Falls, which goes far beyond Jefferson's Declaration of Independence in its calls for an equality that will liberate women from domestic servitude and inform a truly democratic citizenship. At the end of this philosophical journey, we emerge from the cave of our ignorance into the glaring light of Emma Goldman's challenge to patriarchal authority in writings on childhood prostitution and women wasted by economic disparity, social hierarchy, and political exclusion. Each woman's observations—whether on marriage, monarchy, republican politics, racial integration, or social and economic equality—help us theorize a more perfect union.

It could be argued that Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Woman is the only text Weiss discusses by a woman author that has generated enough scholarly attention to be a canonical contender. However, Wollstonecraft's argument that enlightened government requires gender justice looks quite different when examined in the light of the “sunshine” of the works created by these other good women (to adopt a felicitous phrase from Cooper). Weiss tells us that Canon Fodder is the book she has desired to write throughout her entire career. She, like many of the other women trained in the canon of political thought, has written extensively on the forefathers of the tradition. In the first half of her volume, “Rethinking the Canon,” she discusses the politics of our discipline where no women are included in the anthologies available for use in the introductory survey courses in the nation's universities. Weiss does not mention the anthology Princeton Readings in Political Thought, which I use in my own classroom and which includes short excerpts from Pizan, Olympes de Gouges, Wollstonecraft, Goldman, Hannah Arendt, and Simone de Beauvoir. Undoubtedly, the inclusion of these women worthies is reflective of the editorial choices of this book's editors, Mitchell Cohen and Nicole Fermon. The problem of inclusion is exacerbated by the fact that only a handful of the texts authored by these women appear in modern scholarly editions, further distancing them from the eager graduate students and innovative scholars who may begin the process of examination and explication. It has become commonplace to find in the prefaces of women researchers writing on these exceptional female authors a note lamenting how infrequently works by women were part of their own graduate training. Weiss asserts much is lost when we absent from the syllabi and the seminar the words of the prominent women interlocutors of famous men in the graduate education that shapes the thinking of the next generation of the profession. She identifies a vicious circle in which the critical texts by women are not incorporated into the canon and are thereby ignored in the formation of the theory curriculum. Thus, the canon of political philosophy can be said to replicate what she terms a “politics of ignorance.” The consequence of this ignorance is a political theory devoid of the life experiences, thought processes, ordinary insights, and paradigm-shifting revelations that reflect the historical contingency and cultural diversity of women's lives.

Weiss's scholarship focuses on the reclamation and critical evaluation of the political writings of women before and after Wollstonecraft, who considered herself to be “the first of a new genus of woman writers.” Her treatment is indebted to, and draws inspiration from, Dale Spender's Feminist Theorists: Three Centuries of Key Women Thinkers (1983); Nancy Tuana's Women and the History of Philosophy (1992); Kristin Waters's Women and Men Political Thinkers: Enlightened Conversations (2000); and most directly, Hilda Smith and Berenice Carroll's Women's Political and Social Thought (2000). Canon Fodder highlights the intellectual ancestry of a lengthy tradition of political discourse that importantly undermines Wollstonecraft's privileged claim to be the first woman writer on politics and society. Women, too, have a tradition of political inquiry, albeit one that is largely invisible to scholars and students of canonical political thought. Canon Fodder invites readers to begin their own discovery of the richness and complexity of women's writing. Weiss asks us, “What does political theory look like when women are among its central concerns?” (p. 142, emphasis in the original). The categories of political thought shift markedly when we theorize the political through the philosophical frameworks provided by these women writers. Perennial questions of human nature, consent and coercion, rights and duties, and the bonds between the individual and the community become complicated by the historical inequality of the sexes. An ethic of care pervades the analyses of these women writers as they raise uncomfortable concerns about the fragility of human life and the immediate needs of the very young, the weak, the impoverished, the old. Many of these women suffered themselves from economic vulnerability, political persecution, racial segregation, and sexual discriminations in all shapes and sizes … and still they wrote.

If there is a weakness in this courageous text, it is that the unique pairings and unusual points of analytical departure sometimes elide the political differences among the women under consideration. The political commitments and ideological divergence of an Astell and a Wollstonecraft are underexamined here. One, a staunch royalist, advocated the quietude of a female seminary to provide a contemplative garden for women who did not marry. The other, a revolutionary republican, sponsored outdoor exercise and an ambitious arts and sciences curriculum to be taught in England at coeducational day schools so intellectually compatible young men and women would form early and friendly marriages. Political connections that also could have been made are not fully developed but offer intriguing openings for future scholarship. Cooper's poignant and intricate explorations of racism in a post-Reconstruction America are a philosophical counterpoint to Goldman's fiery and brave reflections on the sexual exploitation of girls and the economic vulnerability of unskilled immigrants amid the shocking realities of poverty. Weiss deserves praise, and the flattery of imitation, for the creative discursive strategies employed throughout the volume to amplify the voices of previously silent women. She expertly uses dialogues and lists, close readings, and reflective argumentation to bring women into the conversation of political philosophy. There is much left to be said of each of the writers she discusses.

The prolific and varied writings of de Pizan, Astell, Wollstonecraft, Stanton, Cooper, and Goldman represent a vast and diverse philosophical legacy that has yet to be sufficiently documented and analyzed to frame the evolving discourse on women's political subjectivity and rights as citizens. Of particular importance is their understanding of human nature and sexual difference, women's internalization of negative social stereotypes rather than identification with the wise women of history, and the consequences of differentiating men's civic rights from women's domestic duties in the home. The careful and critical study of these multifaceted women who explored politics and culture in works ranging from classic treatises to political pamphlets, epistolary texts and didactic tracts, poetry, novels, and lists reveals that there is not a linear theoretical progression from one author to another. Indeed, their philosophical ideas are quite distinct, but Weiss has ably demonstrated that they have much more in common with their female predecessors or successors than their male contemporaries. Canon Fodder succeeds in making the often missed political point that when women's political writings are examined in their totality, there is a great deal of commonality of themes, attitudes, strategies, and philosophical principles. Future research is called for to detail the extent to which the groundbreaking ideas of a de Pizan or a Wollstonecraft, an Astell or a Goldmann, a Shonogon, a Stanton, or a Cooper influenced the ideas of their male counterparts whose originality and profundity secure their place in the canon of political thought.

Weiss has written a provocative and profound book. She challenges us as scholars to do a more diverse and inclusive form of political theorizing. “I urge all scholars who use the history of philosophy in their work to put a five-year moratorium on references to historical male thinkers. If we are to grant women epistemic authority—deemed essential by writers from Pizan to Frye—we must refuse to recreate patriarchy by repeatedly if unwittingly reinscribing men as single-parent fathers of every tradition, giving men pride of place in every philosophical narrative. Ultimately, it is by focusing on them that we can ask not only how women fit into malestream categories and schools of thought, but also how they reorganize, rewrite, repel, and reimagine them” (p. 54). Canon Fodder makes the case that women writing on politics are not exceptional or alone in their efforts but are part of a centuries-old tradition of political thought largely unexplored by political theorists, whether feminists or not. Indeed, special ire is reserved for feminist theorists who have written of patriarchy with little or no mention of the women authors who have engaged the questions before them. It is worthy work for all political scientists to explore the intellectual origins of ideas of equal citizenship and just governance among the men and women whose political writings shaped modern democratic institutions and cultures.

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Nancy Tuana, the editor of the “Re-Reading the Canon” series, offers a brief preface to the most recent volume, Feminist Interpretations of Alexis de Tocqueville, edited by Jill Locke and Eileen Hunt Botting. Her words echo and amplify the concerns of Weiss in Canon Fodder. “Take into your hands any history of philosophy text. You will find compiled therein the ‘classics’ of modern philosophy. Since these texts are often designed for undergraduate classes, the editor is likely to offer an introduction in which the reader is informed that these selections represent the perennial questions of philosophy. The student is to assume that he or she is about to explore the timeless wisdom of the greatest minds of Western philosophy. No one calls attention to the fact that the philosophers are all men” (p. vii). Here, she reflects on the purpose of the series and notes that few of the volumes have been devoted to women. Tuana's own editorial perspective and decision rules have cultivated an entire bookshelf of volumes documenting and developing a feminist interpretative framework for redefining the canon by openly questioning the gender ideologies of the philosophical masters and making room at the table for those who challenge the male hegemony of political theory. Editors Locke and Hunt Botting promise that the essays collected in the present volume will display the “cacophonous Tocqueville,” one who is not to be cast aside for his insulting commentary on women writers or pigeonholed for his gendered argument for separate spheres famously inscribed in Democracy in America (p. 8).

Certainly, this is not the Tocqueville of the undergraduate anthology in political thought, but the provocative questions raised in this collection suggest that it should be required reading in the graduate theory seminar. One of the strengths of this volume in the “Re-Reading the Canon” series is the evidence of how theorizing the experiences of women can alter our understanding of the canonized forefathers. Tocqueville's writings engage us in a new way as we contend with Cheryl Welch's discussion of his idealization of friendship in marriage. His epistolary reflections on the “marriage of souls” address many of the concerns of Astell in Some Thoughts Concerning Marriage and call to mind the egalitarian relationships envisioned by Wollstonecraft (p. 28). The often fraught power relationships between husband and wife are the subject of essays by Laura Janara and Hunt Botting as they use Tocqueville's familial model to delve into the psychological and political tensions created by the reality of the submissive wife and the democratic ideal of equality. Janara writes, “As part of his effort to grasp the psychic complexities of modern democracy, Tocqueville examines family relations. He insists that shaping these democratic family relations is the same psychology that animates democracy's broader social state” (p. 52). Hunt Botting borrows the notion of a “family resemblance” from Wittgenstein to explore the theoretical linkage between the writings of Wollstonecraft and Tocqueville (and responds to Janara's argument about girlhood) in her treatment of young women in America. As Hunt Botting ably demonstrates, these essays nicely complement Stanton's Declaration of Sentiments, written a little more than a decade after the publication of the first volume of Democracy in America.

Delba Winthrop's classic essay revisits Tocqueville's normative claim that American women secure in their household are the moral compass of the nation, and reads his account as a domestic counternarrative against the unsatisfying demands of the marketplace and democracy. “Tocqueville intends to show that neither business nor political life is truly fulfilling or liberating; neither has an end that is both meaningful and attainable. Therefore, women's lack of opportunities is no more a misfortune for her than for the men who she benefits in abjuring worldliness” (p. 192). Tocqueville, like Catherine Beecher, elevates the duties of women in the family while raising doubts about the personal sacrifices required for women to exercise political rights. Richard Boyd's contribution to the collection demonstrates the instability of gender categories and the mutability of the separate spheres as he asserts that “Tocqueville's critique of the breakdown of the public/private distinction in France is the key to understanding his justification of colonialism” (p. 234). This clever essay contrasts effeminacy and empire to deconstruct Tocqueville's gender system and offer useful insights into the national narcissism of colonialism.

There is plenty to garner the attention of those familiar with Tocqueville and the secondary literature on his philosophical corpus represented in Locke and Hunt Botting's fine volume. For feminist political theorists who share Weiss's vision of a more inclusive political tradition that recognizes and respects dissenting arguments, it is heartening to note the number of essays authored by younger scholars and a graduate student within the text. The centrality of gender to these critical pieces is perhaps no surprise in a series devoted to “feminist interpretations.” The remarkable variety of feminist methodologies, interpretive strategies, and theoretical richness of the text speaks to a conversation about the canon that is more than an immanent critique of political philosophy. It is proof positive that feminist political theory has accomplished much to destabilize the central categories of political thought, and retains the power to transcend the controversies of canonization and to transform the very discipline of political science.