At the turn of the 20th century in Chicago, a community of feminist women conducted the first sociological field studies. Jane Addams and her colleagues pioneered a method that was both scholarly and political: conducting research from the margins, sharing authority with those being studied, and refusing to separate the production of knowledge from social engagement.

After World War I, in the name of a neutral conception of objectivity, Robert Park and Ernest Burgess institutionalized sociology by expelling women from the university: this was the founding act of the first Chicago School. Analyzing this “great erasure” traces the genealogy of another form of objectivity—what philosopher Sandra Harding calls “strong objectivity,” which calls for incorporating minority perspectives into the search for truth.