Epistemic Justice in Climate Science

Epistemic justice addresses how certain voices are systematically discredited while others are privileged. Sor Juana's struggle for intellectual credibility as a woman of mixed heritage illuminates how climate science has historically dismissed indigenous land management practices, local ecological knowledge, and Global South perspectives as unscientific or primitive. Climate justice requires radically expanding whose knowledge counts: indigenous fire stewardship that prevents catastrophic wildfires, peasant farmers' adaptive agriculture, coastal communities' understanding of ocean systems. Sor Juana's insistence on rigorous thought across multiple domains—theology, science, poetry, philosophy—demonstrates that wisdom takes many forms and languages. Applied to climate crisis, epistemic justice means validating diverse knowledge systems, centering affected communities in research and policy, and recognizing that Western scientific approaches alone are insufficient. This prevents the historical pattern where solutions are imposed by distant experts, ignoring centuries of sustainable practices developed by those living closest to ecosystems.