ΕΡΓΑΣΙΑ ΦΕΜΙΝΙΣΤΙΚΗ ΦΙΛΟΣΟΦΙΑ ΤΗΣ ΕΠΙΣΤΗΜΗΣ

ΕΡΓΑΣΙΑ ΣΤΟ ΜΑΘΗΜΑ
ΦΕΜΙΝΙΣΤΙΚΗ ΦΙΛΟΣΟΦΙΑ ΤΗΣ ΕΠΙΣΤΗΜΗΣ
THE FEMINIST STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY

AND THE MAIN CRITIQUES ON IT
ΣΤΕΜΠΙΛΗΣ ΠΑΝΑΓΙΩΤΗΣ
Α.Μ.: 99860201500114
ΙΑΝΟΥΑΡΙΟΣ 2022
ΣΤΕΜΠΙΛΗΣ ΠΑΝ. ΦΕΜΙΝΙΣΤΙΚΗ ΦΙΛΟΣΟΦΙΑ ΤΗΣ ΕΠΙΣΤΗΜΗΣ
ΑΜ:99860201500114 FEMINIST STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. INTRODUCTION ............................................ 3
2. FEMINIST STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY ........................ 3
2 . 1 S T A N D P O I N T E P I S T E M O L O G Y T H E O R I E S .................... 3
2.2 S A N D R A H A R D I N G ..................................... 4
2.3 WHAT “STANDPOINT” STANDS FOR ........................ 5
2.4 FST AND M A S T E R / S L A V E R E L A T I O N .................... 5
2 . 5 E P I S T E M I C A D V A N T A G E ................................. 6
2.6 OBJECTIVES OF THE F E M I N I S T S T A N D P O I N T E P I S T E M O L O G Y .. 7
2.7 EPISTEMIC RESOURCES AND PERSPECTIVE OF F S T .......... 7
3. MAIN CRITIQUES ON FST ................................... 8
3.1 ETHNOCENTRISM AND F S T ............................... 9
3.2. TRADITIONAL OBJECTIVITY AND F S T ................. 10
3.3. ON THE EPISTEMIC ADVANTAGE OF F S T ................ 11
4 . C O N C L U S I O N S ......................................... 14
5 . B I B L I O G R A P H Y ........................................ 15
ΙΑΝΟΥΑΡΙΟΣ 2022 σελίδα 2 από 16

1. INTRODUCTION
Al o n g w i t h t h e f e m i n i s t m o v e m e n t i n t h e 1 9 7 0 s , t h e r e w a s a n e q u a l
concern with the conventional social sciences, which reflected the male
values, knowledge, and experience. The academia was criticized for their
scientific privileging of male biases that excluded and marginalized
women. It was largely questioned on the conventional forms of knowledge
production and the power imbalances such conventional methodological
practices would bring. Such practices had omitted women’s experiences,
downplayed their contribution, and over-generalized from men’s
practices.1
A feminist standpoint is a social orientation politicized through
feminism in which any person – not only women – may, but for which
women’s perspectives provide a nominal starting point. Moreover, as
gender intersects with other forms of social identity and feminists engage
other liberatory movements in fighting racism, classism, and homophobia,
alleviating women’s oppression can take many forms, and regularly the
lives of people who have been marginalized in those other ways provide
the starting place for thinking from a standpoint. Complex social
dynamics affect people’s knowledge as does their understanding of their
s i t u a t i o n w i t h i n t h os e d y n a m i c s , a c c o r d i n g t o t h e S i t u a t e d K n o w l e d g e
Thesis.2
2. FEMINIST STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY

2.1 STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY THEORIES
Standpoint epistemology theories claim to represent the world from
an epistemologically advantageous social position and perspective. A
Standpoint theory identifies:
 the social position of the advantageous perspective
 the scope- the issues it claims to analyze
 the cognitive advantage it creates
 the justification of the advantage of the position
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 the type of epistemological superiority (accuracy, generality,

etc.)3
Standpoint criticism of society draws in various ways on personal
experiences of subordination and people’s efforts to resist it. Self-
conscious feminist identity also can spur the self- reflection that provides
e p i s t e m i c a d v a n t a g e , b u t i t i s n o t n e c e s s a r y 4.
2.2 SANDRA HARDING

Sandra Harding’s (1986, 1991) taxonomy of early developments in
feminist philosophy of science groups together certain theories in the
social sciences and political theory as “feminist s t a n dp o i n t theory.”
Known sometimes as “feminist standpoint epistemology” or simply
“ s t a n d p o i n t t h e o r y ” (h e r e i n “ F S T ” ) , i t e m e r g e d w h i l e W e s t e r n f e m i n i s m
moved out of its second wave and has since evolved in various directions.
As a n e p i s t e m o l o g y o f s c i e n c e , F S T e x p l a i n s h o w b i a s e d s c i e n t i f i c c l a i m s ,
such as the view that human tool use was developed by early men (not
women), depend on sexism and patriarchal social structures. It does so by
scrutinizing the scientific norms and practices that determine what
questions people recognize as scientific and what resources scientists
consider.5
Harding (1986, 1991) contrasts FST with other trends in feminist

theorizing about scientific knowledge from the late 1970s and early 1980s:
“ f e m i n i s t e m p i ri c i sm ” a n d “ f e m i n i s t p o s t m o d e r n i s m .” U l t i m a t e l y ( 1 9 9 1 ) , s h e
makes standpoint theory her own with a socially situated feminist
postmodernist view of embodied rationality that rejects the abstract
rationality associated with modernism, which helps her to accommodate
the ways that gender intersects with sexuality and race. Harding’s
intersectional FST recognizes multiple feminist standpoints that attend to
s p e c i f i c w o m e n ’ s e x p e r i e n c e s o f o p p r e s s i o n .6
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2.3 WHAT “STANDPOINT” STANDS FOR
In the feminist standpoint theory, the term “standpoint” is meant to

designate a moral and political commitment and not merely a
p e r s p e c t i v e o n s o c i a l r e a l i t y (R o l i n , 2 0 0 9 ) . S o s t a n d p o i n t i s n o t j u s t a
perspective occupied as a matter of fact of being a woman. Perspective
may give a starting point of one’s socio-historical position, but standpoint
is earned through the experience of collective political struggle
demanding both politics and science (Kokushkin, 2014). Thus it has now
become a technical term that stresses the politics and science for
achieving group consciousness through distinctive understandings of
social relations in referring to dominant perspectives as well as to those of
oppressed groups.7
Standpoint refers to a "position" in society, a way of making sense
that is affected by and can in turn help shape structures of power, work,
and wealth.8
A standpoint can also benefit from a degree of separatism: safe
and nurturing spaces for marginalized people allow them to reimagine
their identities (Medina 2013) and to develop practical skills for resisting
oppressive forces.9
2.4 FST AND MASTER / SLAVE RELATION

Socialist feminists initially appropriated the notion of standpoint
from the insights of Marx, Engels, Lukacs, and others in order to formulate
a more coherent explanation of feminism's authority, who it speaks for,
a n d t h e f o r c e s o f o p p r e s s i o n a n d e x p l o i t a t i o n i t c o n t e s t s . 10
The intellectual history of feminist standpoint theory is

conventionally traced to Hegel's reflections on what can be known about
master/slave relationship from the standpoint of the slave's life versus that
of the master's life, and to the way Marx, Engels, and Lukacs subsequently
developed this insight into the "standpoint of the proletariat" from which
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have been produced marxist theories of how society operates. In the

1970s, several feminist thinkers independently began reflecting on how
the marxist analysis could be transformed explain how the structural
relationship between women and men consequences for the production
of knowledge. However, it should be noted that even though standpoint
arguments are most fully articulated as such in feminist writings, they
appear in the scientific projects all of the new social movements. A social
history of standpoint theory would focus on what happens when
marginalized peoples begin to gain public voice. In societies where
scientific rationality and objectivity claimed to be highly valued by
dominant groups, marginalized peoples and those who listen attentively
to them will point out that from perspective of marginal lives, the
dominant accounts are less maximally o b j e c t i v e . 11
2.5 EPISTEMIC ADVANTAGE

The thesis of epistemic advantage has been understood as claiming
that women always have an automatic epistemic privilege in virtue of
being oppressed. Standpoint theory argues that the knowledge and
theories of marginalized populations hold more epistemic authority than
t h e k n o w l e d g e a n d t h e o r i e s d e v e l o p e d b y d o m i n a n t g r o u p s . As t h e
oppressed groups have to endure many struggles and pain, they have
complete or diverse knowledge on the account of their lower status. It is
assumed within standpoint theory that dominant groups will be limited in
their epistemic perspectives to their own values and perspectives, unable
to gain a wider view of interests and experiences, but that marginalized
groups can attain a more global perspective that not only begins in their
own experiences but also includes consideration of the dominant
ideologies to which they are subjugated. Thus members of marginalized
groups have a kind of double vision that allows them to understand social
contexts broadly because they are not only experiencing their own
realities but also witness other realities through their engagement with
d o m i n a n t g r o u p s . T h i s p r o v i d e s t h e m w i t h a b et t e r f o u n d a t i o n f o r t h e i r
w o r l d v i e w s a n d t h e i r s t a n d p o i n t . 12
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2.6 OBJECTIVES OF THE FEMINIST STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY

The objectives of the feminist epistemology of position may be
synopsized as follows:
1. Representation of the world in relation to the interests of
women.
2. Encouraging the team to understand its problems.
3 . H e l p i n g t o o v e r c o m e t h e m . 13
Nevertheless, there is no single feminist standpoint because our

maps require too many dimensions for that metaphor to ground our
visions. But the feminist standpoint theorists' goal of an epistemology and
politics of engaged, accountable positioning remains eminently potent.
T h e g o a l i s b e t t e r a c c o u n t s o f t h e w o r l d t h a t i s , " s c i e n c e ” . 14
2.7 EPISTEMIC RESOURCES AND PERSPECTIVE OF FST

The epistemic resources of FST invigorate democratic ideals and
validate democratic practices (Harding 2015). In the context of
patriarchy, feminist attention to marginalized perspectives compensates
for various forms of exclusion. From the dominant perspective, a call for
input from marginalized groups may appear to be an inappropriately
political “special interest” but FST sees this as a counterbalance to an
unrepresentative homogeneity. Facilitating marginalized people’s
contributions to policies and practices that affect their own lives
encourages mutual accountability by providing avenues for feedback
a n d m a k e s c o n s e n s u s m e a n i n g f u l b y d i s t r i b u t i n g a u t h o r i t y .15
A feminist standpoint addresses the ideals or norms and attendant
practices involved in science and knowledge with a mind to lived
experiences of oppression, accounting for sexism but also racism,
heterosexism, ableism, and classism. That such matters of social context
and awareness of that context influence the ability of individual people
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to know their worlds constitutes the Situated Knowledge Thesis, which the
f i r s t s e c t i o n e x p l a i n s . 16
Feminist Standpoint theory challenges the notion of conventional

scientific practices that had excluded women from the inquiry and
marginalize them in every aspect of knowledge benefits and construction.
Am i d s t t h e p r e v a l e n t c o n t r o v e r s i e s , s t a n d p o i n t t h e o r i s t s h a v e p r o p o s e d
a l t e r n a t i v e k n o w l e d g e c o n s t r u c t i o n w i t h t h e t h e s e s o f ‘ s t r o n g o b j e c t i vi t y ’ ,
‘situated k n o wl e d g e ’ , ‘epistemic a d va n t a g e ’ , and ‘ p o we r relations’.
Feminist standpoint theory is claimed to be a successful methodology and
the author support this argument based on the four reasons; the logic of
discovery, insider-outsider position, study up, and methodological
i n n o v a t i o n . 17
3. MAIN CRITIQUES ON FST

Feminist standpoint theory has been the most controversial and
debated in more than thirty years of history of second-wave feminist
t h i n k i n g (H a r d i n g , 2 0 0 4 ) . I t i s h i g h l y a d v o c a t e d a s e q u a l t o i t s c r i t i c s e v e n
today and has invited ongoing debate and reflection. It has continued to
enflame discussion among feminist theorists. It looked into the inequalities
between men and women in knowledge production from the
e p i s t e m o l o g i c a l p e r s p e c t i v e . 18
Critics of standpoint writings have tended to refuse the invitation to
" h a v e i t b o t h wa y s " b y a c c e p t i n g t h e i d e a o f r e a l k n o w l e d g e t h a t i s
socially situated. Instead they have assimilated standpoint claims to
objectivism or some kind of conventional foundationalism, on the one
hand, or to ethnocentrism, relativism, or phenomenological approaches in
p h i l o s o p h y a n d t h e s o c i a l s c i e n c e s , o n t h e o t h e r h a n d . 19
The main critiques on FST may be synopsized in grounds of:
1. Ethnocentrism
2. Declinations from traditional objectivity
3. Objections on its epistemic advantage
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3.1 ETHNOCENTRISM AND FST

Universalists have traditionally been able to imagine only
ethnocentrism and relativism as possible alternatives to "the view from no
wh e r e " t h a t t h e y c l a i m g r o u n d s u n i v e r s a l c l a i m s ; s o t h e y t h i n k s t a n d p o i n t
epistemologies must support (or be doomed to) one or the other of these
p o s i t i o n s . H a r d i n g w o n d e r s “ I s t h e r e a n y r e a s o n a b l e s e n s e i n wh i c h t h e
ground for k n o wl e d g e claimed by feminist standpoint theory is
ethnocentric?” setting Ethnocentrism as “the b e l i ef in the inherent
s u p e r i o r i t y o f o n e ' s o wn e t h n i c g r o u p o r c u l t u r e ” , a s w e l l a s “ D o f e m i n i st
s t a n d p o i n t t h e o r i s t s a r g u e t h a t t h e l i v e s o f t h e i r o wn g r o u p o r c u l t u r e i s
s u p e r i o r a s a g r o u n d s f o r k n o wl e d g e ? ” A t f i r s t g l a n c e , o n e m i g h t t h i n k t h a t
this is the case if one notices that it is primarily women who have argued
for starting thought from women's lives. However, Harding provides some
reasons why it would be a mistake to conclude from this fact that feminist
s t a n d p o i n t t h e o r y i s e t h n o c e n t r i c : 20
1. Standpoint theorists themselves all explicitly argue that
marginal lives that are not their own provide better
grounds for certain kinds of knowledge. Thus the claim by
people who are women that women's lives provide a
better starting point for thought about gender systems is
not the same as the claim that their own lives are the such
starting points.
2. Thinkers with "center" identities have also argued that
marginalized lives are better places from which to start
asking causal and critical questions about the social order.
3. Women's lives are shaped by the rules of femininity or
w o m a n l i n e s s ; i n t h i s s e n s e t h e y " e x p r e s s f e m i n i n e c u l t u r e ."
Perhaps critic of standpoint theories thinks feminists are
d e f e n d i n g f e m i n i n i t y a n d t h u s " t h e i r o w n c u l t u r e ." B u t a l l
feminist analyses, including feminist standpoint writings,
are on principle ambivalent about the value femininity and
womanliness. Feminists criticize femininity on grounds that
it is fundamentally defined by and therefore part of the
conceptual project of exalting masculinity; it is the "other"
against which men define themselves as admirably and
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uniquely human. Feminist thought does not try to substitute

loyalty to femininity for loyalty to masculinity it criticizes in
conventional thought. Instead, it criticizes all gender
loyalties as capable of producing only partial and
distorted results of research.
4. Fourth, there are many feminisms, and these can be
understood to be starting off their analyses from the lives
of different historical groups of women. Liberal feminism
initially started off its analyses from the lives of women in
the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European and US
educated classes; marxist feminism from the lives of wage-
working women in the nineteenth- and early twentieth-
century industrializing "modernizing" societies; Third World
feminism from the lives of twentieth-century women of
Third World descent—and these different Third World lives
produce different feminisms. Standpoint theory argues that
each of these groups of women's lives is a good place to
start in order to explain certain aspects of the social order.
There is no one, ideal woman's life from which standpoint
theories recommend that thought start. Instead, one must
turn to all of the lives that marginalized in different ways
by the operative systems of social stratification. The
different feminisms inform each other; we can learn from
all of them and change our patterns
5. Only members of the powerful groups in societies stratified
by race, ethnicity, class, gender, and sexuality could
imagine that their standards for knowledge and the claims
resulting from adherence to such standards should found
preferable by all rational creatures, past, present and
f u t u r e . 21
3.2. TRADITIONAL OBJECTIVITY AND FST

The epistemic advantage of thinking from the outside- in applies
directly to understanding “the nature of society” and FST makes a clear
case that the independence from observers for which traditional
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objectivity strives provides an inadequate analysis, for instance, of

women’s underemployment or the absence of Latinas among managers.
However, critics claim that FST has little relevance to the physical
sciences. The worlds of particles or magnetic fields cannot be shared by
researchers in the same way as the worlds of women, cultures, or even
plants, and so Kristina Rolin (2006) argues that standpoint theorists must
be able to show that the context of patriarchy and forms of oppression
that intersect with it are relevant to the subject matter of a particular
type of inquiry, that situated knowledge provides epistemic advantage in
a specific domain.
N e v e r t h e l e s s , H a r d i n g (1 9 9 1 ) a r g u e s t h a t a f e m i n i s t s o c i a l a c c o u n t
provides valuable ways for questioning how consensus develops in the
physical sciences. Views in physics might possibly, for instance, be
affected by patterns in women’s unemployment or the causes of that
unemployment, regarding which Rolin argues feminists offer significant
insights. Different questions than usual might come out of a lab that
accommodates women workers or those who come from poor back-
g r o u n d s . 22
The problem with the conventional conception of objectivity is not
t h a t i t i s t o o r i g o r o u s o r t o o " o b j e c t i f y i n g ," a s s o m e h a v e a r g u e d , b u t t h a t
it is not rigorous or objectifying enough: it is too weak to accomplish even
the goals for which it has been designed, let alone the more difficult
p r o j e c t s c a l l e d f o r b y f e m i n i s m s a n d o t h e r n e w s o c i a l m o v e m e n t s . 23
3.3. ON THE EPISTEMIC ADVANTAGE OF FST

The thesis of epistemic advantage has been understood as claiming
that women always have an automatic epistemic privilege in virtue of
being oppressed. Standpoint theory argues that the knowledge and
theories of marginalized populations hold more epistemic authority than
t h e k n o w l e d g e a n d t h e o r i e s d e v e l o p e d b y d o m i n a n t g r o u p s . As t h e
oppressed groups have to endure many struggles and pain, they have
c o m p l e t e o r d i v e r s e k n o w l e d g e o n t h e a c c o u n t o f t h e i r l o w e r s t a t u s . 24
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The thesis of epistemic privilege has been criticized on two

grounds:
 One objection is that Harding’s feminist standpoint
epistemology does not provide any standards of epistemic
justification that enable one to judge some socially grounded
perspectives as better than others.
 An o t h e r o b j e c t i o n i s t h a t t h e r e i s n o e v i d e n c e i n s u p p o r t o f
the thesis of epistemic privilege.
T h e s e t w o o b j e c t i o n s a r e c o n n e c t e d . As l o n g a s i t i s n o t c l e a r w h a t
standards of epistemic justification allow one to judge some socially
grounded perspectives as better than others, it is not clear either what
kind of evidence we should expect in support of the thesis of epistemic
privilege. 25
The first objection is raised by Louise Antony (1993) and Helen

Longino (1999). They argue that the thesis of epistemic privilege is
undermined by another thesis in Harding’s feminist standpoint
epistemology, the thesis that all scientific knowledge is socially situated
(Rollins calls it “situated knowledge”). The thesis of epistemic privilege
relies on the assumption that there is a standard of impartiality that
enables one to judge some socially grounded perspectives as “less partial
and distorted” than others. The situated knowledge thesis seems to
undermine this assumption by suggesting that all knowledge claims are
partial in virtue of being grounded on a particular perspective on social
r e a l i t y . As H e l e n L o n g i n o e x p l a i n s , i n o r d e r t o a r g u e t h a t s o m e s o c i a l l y
grounded perspectives are better than others, a standpoint
epistemologist would have to be able to identify privileged perspectives
from a non-interested position, but according to standpoint epistemology,
t h e r e i s n o s u c h p o s i t i o n . L o u i s e An t o n y c a l l s t h e t e n s i o n b e t w e e n t h e
thesis of epistemic privilege and the situated knowledge thesis a “bias
paradox”. In claiming that all knowledge is partial, feminist standpoint
epistemology challenges the very notion of impartiality. But by
undermining the notion of impartiality, feminist standpoint epistemology is
i n d a n g e r o f l o s i n g i t s c r i t i c a l e d g e 26.
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I n W h o s e S c i e n c e ? W h o s e K n o wl e d g e ? ( 1 9 9 1 ) H a r d i n g i s a w a r e o f
the bias paradox. Instead of abandoning either the thesis of epistemic
privilege or the situated knowledge thesis, she tries to solve the bias
paradox by introducing a distinction between cultural and
e p i s t e m o l o g i c a l r e l a t i v i s m . S h e c l a i m s t h a t “ a s t r o n g n o t i o n o f o b j e c t i vi t y
r e q u i r e s a c o m m i t m e n t t o a c k n o wl e d g e t h e h i s t o r i c a l c h a r a c t e r o f e v e r y
belief or set of beliefs – a commitment to cultural, sociological, historical
r e l a t i vi s m ” . An d she adds that “it also requires that judgmental or
epistemological relativism be rejected”. However, Harding’s attempt to
solve the paradox is not successful because the distinction between
cultural and epistemological relativism begs the question of what
standards of epistemic justification enable her to reject epistemological
relativism. Instead of articulating such standards, Harding insists that
feminist standpoint epistemology should reject the assumption that there
is a “view from nowhere”. Moreover, Harding is reluctant to say that the
goal of scientific inquiry is truth or empirical success. Instead, she suggests
t h a t s c i e n t i f i c i n q u i r y s h o u l d p r o g r e s s “ a wa y f r o m f a l s i t y r a t h e r t h a n
t o wa r d t r u t h ” . 27
The second objection is raised by Cassandra Pinnick (1994 and
2005). Pinnick suggests that the thesis of epistemic privilege should be
understood as an empirical hypothesis and she claims that feminist
l i t e r a t u r e “ d e s c r i b e s n o e f f o r t t o a c c u m u l a t e t h e k i n d o f e m p i ri c a l d a t a
t h a t c o u l d e a s i l y r e s o l v e m a t t e r s i n f a v o r o f t h e f em i n i s t s ” . P i n n i c k (2 0 0 5 )
claims that the thesis of epistemic privilege still remains without evidence
to support it.
H a r d i n g ’ s W h o s e S c i e n c e ? W h o s e K n o wl e d g e ? p r e s e n t s s e v e n c l a i m s
in support of the thesis of epistemic privilege:
(1) Women’s lives have been devalued and neglected as
starting points for scientific research and as the generators of
evidence for or against knowledge claims.
(2) Women are “strangers” to the social order.
(3) Women’s oppression gives them fewer interests in ignorance
about the social order.
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(4) Women can come to understand hidden aspects of social

relations between the genders and the institutions that support
these relations by means of struggles to change them.
(5) Women’s perspective is from everyday life.
(6) Women’s perspective comes from mediating ideological
dualisms: nature versus culture.
( 7 ) W o m e n r e s e a r c h e r s a r e “ o u t s i d e r s wi t h i n ” .
However, Harding’s arguments fail to be convincing for two reasons.

One reason is that the universal extension of her claims about women
undermines their plausibility. The reason is that it is not clear how these
seven claims support the thesis of epistemic privilege, the claim that
women’s social positions, insofar as they are unprivileged, are likely to
generate better perspectives on social reality than other social positions.
More specifically, it is not clear what is meant by a perspective in feminist
standpoint epistemology. As l o n g as it is not clear what a socially
g r o u n d e d p e r s p e c t i v e i s a n d w h a t t h e re l e v a n t a l t e r n a t i v e s a r e , t h e t h e s i s
o f e p i s t e m i c p r i v i l e g e l a c k s e m p i r i c a l c o n t e n t . 28
4. CONCLUSIONS
Sandra Harding’s feminist standpoint epistemology is an ambitious
and controversial attempt to argue that diversity among inquirers is an
e p i s t e m i c a d v a n t a g e t o a c o m m u n i t y o f i n q u i r e r s . Ac c o r d i n g t o H a r d i n g ,
epistemic advantage accrues not to just any kind of diversity but to
diversity with respect to the social positions of inquirers and participants
in their studies. Harding’s feminist standpoint epistemology advances the
claim that those who are unprivileged with respect to their social positions
are likely to be privileged with respect to gaining knowledge of social
r e a l i t y . 29
Standpoint theory is a type of critical social theory aimed to
empower the oppressed to improve their situation which was largely
ignored in social-political theories and movements. It emerged from the
critical theoretical approaches within a range of social science
28
TBPFSE
29
TBPFSE
disciplines. Feminist standpoint theory has indeed made a major

contribution to feminist theory and has developed more useful ways of
thinking about the production of knowledge in local and global political
economies. 30
Moreover, standpoint theory itself is a historical emergent. There are

good reasons why it has not emerged at other times in history; and no
doubt it will be replaced by more useful epistemologies in future—the fate
o f a l l h u m a n p r o d u c t s . 31
5. BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. Catherine Hundleby, THINKING OUTSIDE-IN: FEMINIST STANDPOINT
THEORY AS EPISTEMOLOGY, METHODOLOGY, AND PHILOSOPHY OF
SCIENCE, The Routledge Handbook of Feminist Philosophy of Science
C h 7 {F S T A E M P S }
2. Donna Haraway, SITUATED KNOWLEDGES: THE SCIENCE QUESTION IN

FEMINISM AND THE PRIVILEGE OF PARTIAL PERSPECTIVE, Feminist Studies,
A u t u m n , 1 9 8 8 , V o l . 1 4 , N o . 3 ( A u t u m n , 1 9 8 8 ) , p p . 5 7 5 - 5 9 9 {T S Q F P P P }
3. Sandra Harding, RETHINKING STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY: WHAT IS

" S T R O N G O B J E C T I V I T Y ? , T h e C e n t e n n i a l R e v i e w , F AL L 1 9 9 2 , V o l . 3 6 , N o .
3 ( F AL L 1 9 9 2 ) , p p . 4 3 7 - 4 7 0 , M i c h i g a n S t a t e U n i v e r s i t y P r e s s { R S E W I S O }
4. Vanessa. Seifert, ΦΕΜΙΝΙΣΤΙΚΗ ΕΠΙΣΤΗΜΟΛΟΓΙΑ ΘΕΣΗΣ & Η ΘΕΩΡΙΑ

ΕΝΤΟΠΙΣΜΕΝΗΣ ΓΝΩΣΗΣ, Lecture 5, Σηµειώσεις Μαθήµατος. {ΦΕΘΘΕΓ}.
5. Lina Gurung, FEMINIST STANDPOINT THEORY: CONCEPTUALIZATION AND

UTILITY, D h a u l a g i r i J o u r n a l o f S o c i o l o g y a n d An t h r o p o l o g y , J a n u a r y
2 0 2 1 . {F S T C A U }
30
FSTCAU
31
RSEWISO
6. Rosemary Hennessy, WOMEN'S LIVES/FEMINIST KNOWLEDGE:

F E M I N I S T S T A N D P O I N T A S I D E O L O G Y C R I T I Q U E , w w w .f e m i n i s t e z i n e .c o m
1 9 9 5 . {F K F S I C }
7. Kristina Rolin, THE BIAS PARADOX IN FEMINIST STANDPOINT

E P I S T E M O L O G Y , Ar t i c l e i n E p i s t e m e , J u n e 2 0 0 6 . {T B P F S E }

ΕΡΓΑΣΙΑ ΦΕΜΙΝΙΣΤΙΚΗ ΦΙΛΟΣΟΦΙΑ ΤΗΣ ΕΠΙΣΤΗΜΗΣ

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ΕΡΓΑΣΙΑ ΦΕΜΙΝΙΣΤΙΚΗ ΦΙΛΟΣΟΦΙΑ ΤΗΣ ΕΠΙΣΤΗΜΗΣ

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ΕΡΓΑΣΙΑ ΣΤΟ ΜΑΘΗΜΑ

ΦΕΜΙΝΙΣΤΙΚΗ ΦΙΛΟΣΟΦΙΑ ΤΗΣ ΕΠΙΣΤΗΜΗΣ

THE FEMINIST STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY

2. FEMINIST STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY ........................ 3

2.3 WHAT “STANDPOINT” STANDS FOR ........................ 5

2.4 FST AND M A S T E R / S L A V E R E L A T I O N .................... 5

2.6 OBJECTIVES OF THE F E M I N I S T S T A N D P O I N T E P I S T E M O L O G Y .. 7

2.7 EPISTEMIC RESOURCES AND PERSPECTIVE OF F S T .......... 7

3. MAIN CRITIQUES ON FST ................................... 8

3.1 ETHNOCENTRISM AND F S T ............................... 9

3.2. TRADITIONAL OBJECTIVITY AND F S T ................. 10

3.3. ON THE EPISTEMIC ADVANTAGE OF F S T ................ 11

ΙΑΝΟΥΑΡΙΟΣ 2022 σελίδα 2 από 16

2. FEMINIST STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY

 the type of epistemological superiority (accuracy, generality,

2.2 SANDRA HARDING

Harding (1986, 1991) contrasts FST with other trends in feminist

2.3 WHAT “STANDPOINT” STANDS FOR

In the feminist standpoint theory, the term “standpoint” is meant to

2.4 FST AND MASTER / SLAVE RELATION

The intellectual history of feminist standpoint theory is

have been produced marxist theories of how society operates. In the

2.5 EPISTEMIC ADVANTAGE

2.6 OBJECTIVES OF THE FEMINIST STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY

Nevertheless, there is no single feminist standpoint because our

2.7 EPISTEMIC RESOURCES AND PERSPECTIVE OF FST

Feminist Standpoint theory challenges the notion of conventional

3. MAIN CRITIQUES ON FST

3.1 ETHNOCENTRISM AND FST

uniquely human. Feminist thought does not try to substitute

3.2. TRADITIONAL OBJECTIVITY AND FST

objectivity strives provides an inadequate analysis, for instance, of

3.3. ON THE EPISTEMIC ADVANTAGE OF FST

The thesis of epistemic privilege has been criticized on two

the thesis of epistemic privilege.

The first objection is raised by Louise Antony (1993) and Helen

(4) Women can come to understand hidden aspects of social

However, Harding’s arguments fail to be convincing for two reasons.

disciplines. Feminist standpoint theory has indeed made a major

Moreover, standpoint theory itself is a historical emergent. There are

2. Donna Haraway, SITUATED KNOWLEDGES: THE SCIENCE QUESTION IN

3. Sandra Harding, RETHINKING STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY: WHAT IS

4. Vanessa. Seifert, ΦΕΜΙΝΙΣΤΙΚΗ ΕΠΙΣΤΗΜΟΛΟΓΙΑ ΘΕΣΗΣ & Η ΘΕΩΡΙΑ

5. Lina Gurung, FEMINIST STANDPOINT THEORY: CONCEPTUALIZATION AND

6. Rosemary Hennessy, WOMEN'S LIVES/FEMINIST KNOWLEDGE:

7. Kristina Rolin, THE BIAS PARADOX IN FEMINIST STANDPOINT

ΙΑΝΟΥΑΡΙΟΣ 2022 σελίδα 16 από 16

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