Women and Logic

What Can Women’s Studies Contribute to the History of Formal Logic?

Abstract

Beiküfner’s report reflects on woman’s place in the history of logic. These reflections date back to a larger research project entitled Case Studies Towards the Establishment of a Social History of Logic (1985–1989). The project was initiated under the direction of Professor Christian Thiel, University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, and funded by the German Research Foundation DFG. The main focus of the Erlangen research project was laid in the historical analysis of the emergence of modern logic in Great Britain and Germany during the 19th and early 20th century. This research prompted the discovery of a series of important female authors in the Anglophone and German speaking area. This led, firstly, to the question of what might be gained from the research results for the project’s objectives and, secondly, to a closer examination of the methodological demands and problems of a feminist historiography of science.