Knowledge Humility and Epistemic Justice

Sor Juana's intellectual humility—her insistence on open inquiry rather than defending established dogma—modeled epistemic fairness in contexts demanding obedience. She asked questions rather than presuming answers, a radical stance against authorities claiming total knowledge. Fairness requires societies to recognize that excluded groups hold crucial knowledge about injustice, survival, and alternative possibilities. When universities, governments, and institutions dismiss entire categories of people as non-knowers, they lose access to essential truth. Epistemic justice means believing women about their experiences, listening to colonized peoples' understanding of colonialism, trusting poor communities' analysis of poverty. Sor Juana's tradition teaches that intellectual integrity demands skepticism toward those in power and openness toward those dismissed as ignorant. Periagoge explores how societies advance toward fairness by actively seeking knowledge from margins and treating intellectual humility—admitting uncertainty—as a virtue rather than weakness that strengthens collective understanding.