The Feminist Standpoint Theory Reader

"Harding's work on standpoint theory has been groundbreaking." -- Alison Jagger, author of Living withContradictions: Controversies in Feminist Social Ethics "Standpoint theory has a very wide impact, from the humanities to the natural sciences.In bringing together a variety of standpoint literatures and demonstrating how important these lines of thought have become, this is a very strong collection." -- Nancy Harstock, Professor of Political Science, University of Washington "An essential resource for feminist theorists, researchers, women's studies students, and activists alike. This excellent anthology offers a rich interdisciplinary assessment of the impact of feminist standpoint theory in diverse fields and includes responses to postmodern and postcolonial challenges to standpoint epistemology." -- Nancy A. Naples, author of Feminism and Method "I can think of no other volume that covers this important area in feminist philosophy so well. It brings together the classics of the past with the best of the present. This is the place to go for standpoint theory." -- Linda Nicholson, author of The Play of Reason: From the Modernto the Postmodern "The Feminist Standpoint Theory Reader tracks, translates and augments several decades of classics and au courant contributions to what is perhaps the most significant theoretical discourse developed by interdisciplinary feminist theory." -- Judith Stacey is the author of BraveNew Families: Stories of Domestic Upheaval inLate-Twentieth-Century America "An invaluable book to read and reflect on-to teach in classrooms where education is seen as the practice of freedom." -- Chandra Talpade Mohanty, author of FeminismWithout Borders: Decolonizing Theory, PracticingSolidarity

Sandra Harding is Professor of Education and Women's Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, and is currently the co-editor of Signs. Her work has won the Jessie Bernard Award from the American Sociological Association, the Critics Choice Award from AERA, and the Choice Outstanding Book Award. A pioneer in the development of Standpoint Theory, she is the author of numerous books, including The Science Question inFeminism and The "Racial" Economy of Science.

Acknowledgments1. Introduction: Standpoint Theory as a Site of Political, Philosophic, and Scientific Debate, Sandra HardingI: The Logic of a StandpointIntroduction2. Women's Perspective as a Radical Critique of Sociology, Dorothy E. Smith3. The Feminist Standpoint: Developing the Ground for a Specifically Feminist Historical Materialism, Nancy C. M. Hartsock4. Feminist Politics and Epistemology: The Standpoint of Women, Alison M. Jaggar5. Hand, Brain, and Heart: A Feminist Epistemology for the Natural Sciences, Hilary Rose6. Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective, Donna Haraway7. Learning from the Outsider Within: The Sociological Significance of Black Feminist Thought, Patricia Hill Collins8. Rethinking Standpoint Epistemology: What is Strong Objectivity?, Sandra HardingII. Identifying StandpointsIntroduction9. History and Class Consciousness as an Unfinished Project, Fredric Jameson10. Choosing the Margin as a Space of Radical Openness, bell hooks11. Maternal Thinking as a Feminist Standpoint, Sara Ruddick12. Feminism, Marxism, Method, and the State: Toward Feminist Jurisprudence, Catharine A. MacKinnon13. Labor, Standpoints, and Feminist Subjects, Kathi Weeks14. U.S. Third World Feminism: The Theory and Method of Differential Oppositional Consciousness, Chela SandovalIII. Controversies, Limits, RevisioningsIntroduction15. The Project of Feminist Epistemology: Perspectives from a Nonwestern Feminist, Uma Narayan16. Truth and Method: Feminist Standpoint Theory Revisited, Susan Hekman17. Comment on Hekman's Truth and Method: Feminist Standpoint Theory Revisited: Truth or Justice?, Nancy C. M. Hartsock18. Comment on Hekman's Truth and Method: Feminist Standpoint Theory Revisited: Where's the Power?, Patricia Hill Collins19. Comment on Hekman's Truth and Method: Feminist Standpoint Theory Revisited: Whose Standpoint Needs the Regimes of Truth and Reality?, Sandra Harding20. Comment on Hekman's Truth and Method: Feminist Standpoint Theory Revisited, Dorothy E. Smith21. Reply to Hartsock, Collins, Harding, and Smith, Susan Hekman22. Strange Standpoints, or: How to Define the Situation for Situated Knowledge, Dick PelsIV. Modern or Postmodern? Natural or Only Social Sciences?Introduction23. Feminist Epistemologies for Critical Social Theory: From Standpoint Theory to Situated Knowledge, Fernando J. Garca Selgas24. Building Standpoints, Sarah Bracke and Maria Puig de la Bellacasa25. Feminist Standpoint as Postmodern Strategy, Nancy J. Hirschmann26. The Subsistence Perspective, Maria Mies and Vandana Shiva27. Why Standpoint Matters, Alison Wylie28. Feminism and the Social Construction of Scientific Knowledge, Joseph RouseIndex