Expressive Power, Hermeneutical Injustice, and Conceptual Access

Abstract This chapter discusses and defends a novel view of hermeneutical injustice (HI), i.e. the kind of injustice that renders epistemic agents incapable of interpreting their experiences due to conceptual lacks and deficiencies. To this effect, it starts by arguing that Miranda Fricker’s account is of HI too restrictive: HI is, alas, more ubiquitous than her account allows. That is because, pace Fricker, conceptual ignorance is not necessary for HI: hermeneutical injustice essentially involves a failure in concept application rather than in concept possession. The chapter shows that, if this view right, HI is a form of conceptual distributive injustice, and affords the corresponding traditional normative theorizing.