Standpoint Theory, Slides of Social Theory

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Standpoint Theory

“One of the best ways to discover how the world works is to start from the standpoint of the margins.” Sandra Harding & Julia T. Wood

z Key Ideas  Understand that this theory is about examining how the power of the powerful is taken for granted; this theory offers a way to question the status quo  This theory helps explain the significance of “standpoint” and its revelation of power structures  This theory challenges concepts of “knowledge” and “truth” (Knowledge from nowhere vs. Local knowledge)  It explains why marginalized people offer a less distorted view of the world

Influences  Feminist Standpoint Rooted in:

 Philosophy and Literature

 What people “know” depends on which group they are

in; the powerful control “received” knowledge

 Marx & Engels

 The poor can be society’s “ideal knowers.”

 Symbolic Interactionism

 Suggests that gender is socially constructed

 Postmodernism

 Suggests a critique of male-centered epistemologies

Standpoint Theory’s Central Tenet  All scholarly inquiry should start from the lives of the marginalized.

Women as a Marginalized Group  Women are underadvantaged; men are overadvantaged.  “Women” are not a monolithic group.

Why is Standpoint Theory Important?  The social group that gets the chance to define the important problematics, concepts, assumptions, and hypotheses in a field will end up leaving its social fingerprints on the picture of the world.

Local Knowledge  Knowledge situated in time, place, experience, and relative power, as opposed to knowledge from nowhere that’s supposedly value-free.  Calls claims of “truth” into question.

All Knowledge is Partial  However, “perspectives of subordinate groups are more complete and thus better than those of privileged groups in a society.”

Reasons Marginalized Perspectives Offer Less Distorted Perspective  Marginalized people have more motivation to understand the perspective of the powerful than vice versa.  Marginalized people have little reason to defend the status quo.

Standpoint of Black Feminist Thought  “Intersecting Oppressions” put black women in a different marginalized place in society than either white women or black men.