Epistemology in patenting perpetuates a subordinate status for women

It is also worth noting that evidence of the first kind of gendering, the explicit or de facto exclusion of women from the patent system, could be taken as evidence of the latter kind of gendering, the masculinization of patent doctrine and patentable subject matter. However, a lack of evidence of the former kind of gendering does not necessarily preclude the latter kind of gendering; women might be participating in the patent system, but under social or epistemological constraints that perpetuate subordinate status.

Feminist scholars have expressed a parallel concern that either the culture or epistemology of science and engineering are hostile to women,25 resulting in relatively few women entering these fields of endeavor, and even fewer succeeding in reaching a point where they can generate then kinds of technological developments that would qualify for a patent. There is certainly considerable evidence that fewer women than men select careers in physical science and engineering,26 and some evidence that those who do select such careers encounter gender-based discomfort in their chosen fields.27 If women generate fewer patents than men, this could simply be a sort of spillover from the paucity of women in science and engineering; if fewer women professionally engage technological innovation, fewer will obtain patents on technological innovations.