STRUGGLING FOR 'WOMAN': A RECONCILIATION WITH THE ORDINARY

Abstract

This article aims to show that Ludwig Wittgenstein’s ordinary language philosophy provides an adequate framework to approach the feminist debate over the meaning of ‘woman’. I begin by clarifying the philosophical problems that are at the basis of the debate. I then expound Wittgenstein’s later conception of meaning and briefly survey some of the most relevant Wittgensteinian feminist descriptive analyses of ‘woman’. I argue that such analyses must be at the basis of an ameliorative approach to the debate, while the latter should be understood as a practice of conceptual delimiting in view of a special purpose.