On Opacity, the Unconscious, Uncertainty and the Feminine
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Rangel chose the epistemological route because she is convinced that HOW WE KNOW is not encompassed within established scientific theory. And because HOW WE FAIL TO KNOW also interests her.  Scientific spaces are formed by humans in relationships, with power, love, hate, sexual desires, open or hidden sexual orientations, drives for satisfaction that push people and yet which they are hardly aware of, especially if these drives or needs are categorized as "abnormal" or "evil," humans with wives, husbands, children, poverty, abundance, humans with family inheritances, ancestries.  With or without betrayals, with or without commitments, with spirituality, who had mothers and fathers, etc.

These ideas pushed Rangel toward bringing to light or making visible subjectivity's place in constructing scientific knowledge and ignorance, as well as her own experiences of subjectivity, feminism and complexity.  Additionally, as a psychoanalyst Constanza exchanges information and ideas with all types of people, based on what is expressed as desires, in conversation and language spaces.

For this reason, Constanza has specifically chosen psychoanalytic feminist epistemology as a basis for her dissertation because, in this epistemology, knowledge and ignorance result from multiple exchanges in a dynamic network that can not be reduced to a "subject/object" relationship precisely because diverse biologies/histories operate in its construction. Thus knowledge can only be understood as part of the network that gives it meaning.

Constanza arrived at the title of her thesis, "On opacity, the unconscious, uncertainty, and the feminine," in the following manner: "Opacity" refers to the way the contributions of women and the feminine are obscured. "The unconscious" refers to the associative processes that influence knowledge construction without one's awareness. "Uncertainty" refers to the privileged place we should give to doubt and suspicion of certainties, because truth is constructed on the warp and weft. And "the feminine" has to do with this description of anything to do with women that erases their status as historic, biological and desiring persons, always in relation.

The Newtonian or mechanist paradigm has promulgated the idea that "science is equal to masculinity and non-science is equal to femininity", which contributes to making invisible and devaluing women. This idea has been questioned within science itself by the biologist-mathematician Evelyn Fox Keller, among many others, demonstrating the "phallo/logo/centric" character of the Newtonian scientific regimen, from which the new paradigm has not totally escaped.

Psychoanalytic feminist epistemology reveals and notes what has been obscured, what is inconsistent, uncertain, devalued, that is, "the feminine." Drawing back the veils of what has been hidden and made invisible requires an understanding of how and on whom these veils are woven and placed. It requires understanding the conditions under which knowledge and ignorance are constructed, and how ideas and practices are built, which are not separate.   Also important are how socio-political dynamics that are woven in subjectivity are constructed. In the end, the personal is political. This has been one of the key epistemological categories of feminism.

Rangel suggests that in spite of the opacity and invisibility of "the feminine" in subjective constructions, the feminine "problem" is there, has always been there. It is evident in culturally constructed gender expressions obligatory for men and women, because subjectivity is one strand in the weave of life.

Therefore, it is necessary to look with caution, beyond what is apparent, tune into uncertainties to give us the opportunity to see new things, connect with the unconscious to draw back the veil, these veils that obscure our view and with which we obscure the "object" that we relate with. Finding connections, intersections, re-directions because there is no WITHIN or WITHOUT.

Group 13, "Beyond Gender, Body and Routine" has focused on:

Making visible what is indistinct by using methods shown by the holistic paradigm in order to address issues which until now have barely been explored: the power of cognition and emotions within subjectivity.

Creating bridges between complexity theory and feminist epistemology, which incorporate subjectivity and the power processes that limit it, applied to some subjects in the doctoral program.

Supporting strategies and actions for learning about movements and transformations of power and subjectivity, from what is not looked at, or what is not considered possible.

Within this context, Constanza's thesis notes how the prevalence of different expressions of the patriarchy in all social relationships has interfered in recognizing determined knowledge sets. This interference has resulted in conditions that limit visibility or promote devaluation of knowledge systems associated with the feminine by patriarchy.

Knowledge systems that have been made invisible and devalued include the following:

 - those relating to emotions
 - those relating to the unconscious
 - those relating to women
 - those relating to sexuality
 - those relating to sexual difference
 - those relating to power

Therefore, psychoanalysis, feminism, philosophy, anthropology and traditional knowledge systems do not have the ranking of hard sciences; and so are worth less, scientifically speaking.

The author says, "This is a puzzle for each person to solve, as I am doing. And it is an invitation to do it with me."