The essay "Throwing Like a Girl" explored how social conditioning impacts the physical motility and spatiality of women, grounding feminine experience in an embodied phenomenological perspective. This 1980 publication remains a foundational text in gender studies, reflecting the broader academic career of a thinker who bridged political science, feminist social theory, and the normative analysis of public policy.
Academic Trajectory
Born in New York City in 1949, Iris Marion Young completed her undergraduate studies at Queens College. She proceeded to Pennsylvania State University, where she earned a Master's degree and a PhD in philosophy by 1974. Her teaching career included positions at Worcester Polytechnic Institute and Miami University before she spent nine years instructing in political theory at the University of Pittsburgh. She eventually joined the University of Chicago as a professor of political science, maintaining affiliations with the school's Center for Gender Studies and the Human Rights program.
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Young argued that traditional theories of justice, often focused on individual desert, failed to address systemic inequalities. In her 1990 work, "Justice and the Politics of Difference," she proposed that social groups must be recognized as essential constituents of justice. She diverged from liberal thinkers such as John Rawls and Ronald Dworkin, suggesting that procedural equality often masked group-based oppression. To categorize these issues, she identified five faces of oppression: exploitation, marginalization, powerlessness, cultural domination, and violence.
Social Connection and Responsibility
In her posthumously published collection, "Responsibility for Justice," Young articulated the social connection model of responsibility. She distinguished this from a liability model, which seeks to assign individual blame for specific harms. Instead, her model posits that individuals hold a political responsibility to remedy structural injustice, as social processes are reproduced by collective actions. She applied these concepts to global issues, including the labor conditions found in sweatshops, emphasizing the role of consumers in high-income nations.
Fast facts
- Born: 1949, New York City
- Died: 2006, Chicago
- Education: Queens College, Pennsylvania State University
- Awards: Victoria Schuck Award, 1991
- Key Publication: Justice and the Politics of Difference (1990)
- Key Essay: Throwing Like a Girl (1980)
- Fields of Work: Political Science, Gender Studies, Philosophy
Questions readers ask
What is the social connection model?
It is a framework suggesting that because structural injustice is produced by collective social processes, all those who contribute to those processes have a political responsibility to help remedy the resulting harm.
What are the five faces of oppression defined by Young?
They are exploitation, marginalization, powerlessness, cultural domination, and violence.
Achievements
- Held posts at University of Chicago, University of Pittsburgh and Miami University
- Fields: gender studies
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