Abstract

Despite social epistemologists’ condemnation of epistemic bubbles (Nguyen, 2018; Miller & Record, 2013; Pariser 2011; Simpson, 2012; Sunstein 2017), we defend that they may be epistemically beneficial for marginalized communities, especially when they help insiders to make sense of their lived experiences, that is, acquiring hermeneutical resources. Building on the previous work of Anderson (2021), Sunstein (2017) and Frost-Arnold (2021), who have already highlighted the epistemic benefits of certain bubbles, we focus on the case of Cystic Fibrosis (CF), a chronic illness with severe symptoms, whose patients face difficulties to understand their own experience (for example, what being ‘young’ means with a reduced life expectancy). We then explain how they engage in what we assess as, following Medina & Whitt (2021), “epistemic activism” in a Facebook group meant for patients to share and interact with their favourite CF-related memes. The case illustrates how conditions of isolation and technological affordances contribute to a hermeneutical gain in the marginalized community (augmenting the community’s agency, amplificating their voices, and allowing them to develop and exercise their epistemic capacities). Lastly, we present the ethical guidelines (inspired in Frost-Arnold 2023) we have followed to engage in this sort of online research.