Feminism and Historical Challenges of Anthropological Approaches

Feminist theory notes that structural limitations have excluded women from the process of knowledge production for a long time. Production of knowledge has been considered masculine realms in history. In this article, by using meta-analysis, we will demonstrate that anthropology has been prone to sexist presuppositions and viewpoints and its orientation has evolved according to the dominant paradigms. The feminist current has confronted anthropology with ontological, epistemological and methodological challenges in academic arena which helped develop new paradigms. Three main challenges of such nature that discipline of anthropology as faced are: the denial of biological; denial of major gender differences in brain's physical structure and functions; and denial of male sexual dominance in all primates. As a consequence, anthropology has distanced itself from naturalism and structuralism ideologies and approached towards integration of nature and nurture.