Natural Science Building
East Lansing, MI 48823
USA
Professor Ishani Maitra, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
New Words for Old Wrongs
This paper begins with the idea, defended by Miranda Fricker and others, that the absence of terms like ‘sexual harassment’ can constitute a significant lacuna in our interpretive resources;; this lacuna is sometimes an injustice, and filling it in a major cognitive achievement. I start by diagnosing the nature of this achievement. I argue that it consists in seeing the phenomenon at issue as a novel instance of another normatively familiar one. I then argue that this assimilation brings with it cognitive costs. Using terms like ‘statutory rape’, I show that these costs include distorting our understanding of the phenomenon in question. I argue that these results have consequences for how the underlying injustices should be understood, and what it takes to overcome them.
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