This framework has served as the foundation for a feminine epistemology that is focuses on knowledge embedded in specific relationships and setting. In what way(s) are processes and principles created that are specifically appropriate to a unique situation. As Mary Belenky and her colleagues have proposed, there is a “women’s ways of knowing” that is distinctive and critical to any appreciation of the diverse ways that people think and behave.
In essence, this constructivist perspective builds on the assumption that all knowledge is based in relationships and that each relationship can be a source of important wisdom that is specific to this relationship. Thus, all members of a community can contribute to the base of knowledge in the community, regardless of their status in the community. One looks for communalities rather than stratification from this perspective. An ethic of mutual care emerges as one finds communality with another person: “I care about you because I see me within you and because the two of us together can become wiser and more understanding of not only one another but also other members of our community.”
From this perspective, all relationships involve the construction of new knowledge—for knowledge exists in the specific relationship rather than in some abstract, external reality. Knowledge thus becomes a dynamic, ever evolving process. It is widely acknowledged in many cultures that knowledge is contained within the context. The story is told, heard and accepted within a specific community. Truth resides in the credibility of a specific leader or tribal council. There’s a self within the context of who I am with you at this moment that is more important than the enduring self. Apparently, contextual epistemology was not invented by Carol Gilligan. This widely held epistemological perspective is described by Julio Olalla, a noted philosophy and founder of the school of Ontological coaching. Julio offers the following observation during an interview I conducted with him quite a while ago (Olalla and Bergquist, 2008):
“I love that perspective from Carol Gilligan for a very simple reason: it challenges the ontology that you are you. Actually, you can never exist without me. We are a dance. Now, of course, we have a biology, but even from that perspective we’re not as independent as we think we are. The way I am being right now is not just defined by history. It is defined by your presence. What you allow me to be probably also means what you do not allow me to be. The dance constitutes the dancers as much as the dancers constitute the dance.”
Julio moves on to an even more profound observation regarding the implications of contextual epistemology:
“The moment that we hold the notion that we are interdependent, we begin to understand the phenomena of love and care in a very powerful territory. You allow me to unfold in ways that no one else does. The man that I am with you is just the man I can be with you. There’s a continuity, of course, but the unfolding that you allow me, the reflection I get from your questions, your presence, your physical attitude, etc., is all part of it. What Carol Gilligan is saying challenges the epistemology of the individual, and that is a very ontological, and interesting perspective.”
