Life is a Drama

Dramatism pertains to the important role that the public plays in persuasion. Dramatists believe that unless the audience identifies with the speaker, persuasion is not possible. The public refers to listeners, consumers, and audiences—playing a role in deciding the extent to which others will affect us.

Dramatism, as its name implies, conceptualizes life as a drama, placing a critical focus on the acts performed by various players. Just as in a play, the acts in life are central to revealing human motives. Dramatism provides us with a method that is well suited to address the act of communication between the text.

Kenneth Burke’s "Theory of Dramatism" allows us to analyze rhetorical choices in a situation (how the situation is framed, say by a politician or other public speaker) and responses to these choices. Drama is a useful metaphor for three reasons:

1) Drama indicates a grand sweep, and Burke does not make limited claims; his goal is to theorize about the whole range of human experience. The dramatic metaphor is particularly useful in describing human relationships because it is grounded in interaction or dialogue. In its dialogue, drama both models relationships and illuminates relationships;

2) Drama tends to follow recognizable types or genres: comedy, musical, melodrama, and so forth. Burke feels that the very way we structure and use language may be related to the way these human dramas are played out; and

3) Drama is always addressed to an audience.

In this sense, drama is rhetorical. Burke views literature as “equipment for living,” which means that literature or texts speak to people’s lived experiences and problems and provide people with responses for dealing with these experiences. In this way, Dramatism studies the ways in which language and its usage relate to audiences.

Burke’s theory compares life to a play and states that, as in a theatrical piece, life requires an actor, a scene, an action, some means for the action to take place, and a purpose. The theory allows a rhetorical critic to analyze a speaker’s motives by identifying and examining these elements. Furthermore, Burke believes, guilt is the ultimate motive for speakers, and Dramatism suggests that rhetors are most successful when they provide their audiences with a means for purging their guilt.

Assumptions of Dramatism

Ontological issues concern how much choice and free will humans possess. The assumptions we make about human nature are articles of faith about basic reality. Burke’s thinking is so complex that it is difficult to reduce it to one set of assumptions or to a specific ontology.

I) Humans are animals who use symbols.

The first assumption speaks to Burke’s realization that some of what we do is motivated by our animal nature and some of what we do is motivated by symbols. For example, when I drink my morning coffee, I am satisfying my thirst, an animal need. When I read the morning news and think about ideas, I am being influenced by symbols.

II) Language and symbols form a critically important system for humans.

In the second assumption about the critical importance of language, it is difficult to think about concepts or objects without words for them. Thus, people are restricted (to an extent) in what they can conceive by the limits of their language. People use their language but they are used by it as well. Furthermore, when a culture’s language does not have symbols for a given motive, then speakers of that language are unlikely to have that motive. Thus, because English does not have many symbols that express much nuance of opinion about certain behaviors and motivations, our discussions are often polarized.

Think back to other controversies you have talked about (such as the moral implications of cloning, stem cell research, dealing with North Korea, invading Iraq, immigration issues, same-sex marriage, the 2012 presidential election, the recent terrorist activity in Libya, and so forth). Unfortunately, discussions as either/or propositions—positions were cast as either right or wrong. Burke’s response is that symbols shape our either/or approach to these complex issues. Words, thoughts, and actions have extremely close connections with one another.

Burke’s expression for this is that words act as “terministic screens” leading to “trained incapacities,” meaning that people cannot see beyond what their words lead them to believe (Burke, 1965). For example, despite educational efforts, U.S. public health officials still have difficulty persuading people to think of the misuse of alcohol and tranquilizers when they hear the words “drug abuse.” Most people in the United States respond to “drug abuse” as the misuse of illegal drugs, such as heroin and cocaine (Brummett, 1993). The words “drug abuse” are “terministic screens,” screening out some meanings and including others. For Burke, language has a life of its own, and “anything we can see or feel is already in language, given to us by language, and even produced as us by language” (Nelson, 1989).

This explanation is somewhat at odds with the final assumption of Dramatism, humans are choice makers.

III) Humans are choice makers.

Burke persistently suggests that behaviorism has to be rejected because it conflicts with human choice -- conceptualization of agency, or the ability of a social actor (you or me) to act out of choice. There is a difficult task of negotiating a space between complete free will and complete determinism. Burke’s thinking continued to evolve on this point, but he always kept agency in the forefront of his theorizing. To understand Burke’s scope in this theory, we need to discuss how he framed his thinking relative to Aristotelian rhetoric.

Dramatism as New Rhetoric

Burke maintains that the definition of rhetoric is, in essence, persuasion, and his writings explore the ways in which persuasion takes place. In so doing, Burke proposes a new rhetoric (Nichols, 1952) that focuses on several key issues, chief among them being the notion of identification. In 1952, Marie Nichols said the following about the difference between Burke’s approach and Aristotle’s: “The difference between the ‘old’ rhetoric and the ‘new’ rhetoric may be summed up in this manner: whereas the key term for the ‘old’ rhetoric was persuasion and its stress was upon deliberate design, the key term for the ‘new’ rhetoric is identification and this may include partially ‘unconscious’ factors in its appeal.” Yet Burke’s purpose was not to displace Aristotle’s conceptualizations but rather to supplement the traditional approach.

Identification and Substance

Burke argues that when there is overlap between two people in terms of their substance, they have identification. The more overlap that exists -- the greater the identification. The opposite is also true, so the less overlap between individuals -- the greater the division that exists between them. However, it is also the case that two people can never completely overlap with each other. Burke recognizes this and notes that the “ambiguities of substance” dictate that identification always rests on both unity and division. Individuals will unite on certain matters of substance but at the same time remain unique, being “both joined and separated” (Burke, 1950). Furthermore, Burke indicates that rhetoric is needed to bridge divisions and establish unity.

The Process of Guilt and Redemption

Consubstantiality, or issues of identification and substance, are related to the guilt/redemption cycle because guilt can be assuaged as a result of identification and divisions. Patricia Sullivan and Lynn Turner (1993) argued that Zoe Baird, President Clinton’s first, unsuccessful, nominee for U.S. attorney general, acted as a sacrificial vessel for the country to expiate our feelings of guilt about inadequate child care. Using Burke, Sullivan and Turner argue that Baird was consubstantial with many Americans because the problems of adequate child care are widespread. Yet her uncommon wealth separated her from most, allowing people to blame her without condemning themselves.

For Burke, the process of guilt and redemption undergirds the entire concept of symbolizing. Guilt is the central motive for all symbolic activities, and Burke defines guilt broadly to include any type of tension, embarrassment, shame, disgust, or other unpleasant feeling. Central to Burke’s theory is the notion that guilt is intrinsic to the human condition. Because we are continuously feeling guilt, we are also continuously engaging in attempts to purge ourselves of guilt’s discomfort. This process of feeling guilt and attempting to reduce it finds its expression in Burke’s cycle, which follows a predictable pattern: order (or hierarchy), the negative, victimage (scapegoat or mortification), and redemption.

Saying no to the existing social order is both a function of our language abilities and evidence of humans as choice makers. When Burke penned his often-quoted definition of Man, he emphasized the negative: Man is the symbol-using inventor of the negative
separated from his natural condition by instruments of his own making goaded by the spirit of hierarchy and rotten with perfection. (1966.) When Burke coined the phrase “rotten with perfection,” he meant that because our symbols allow us to imagine perfection, we always feel guilty about the difference between the real state of affairs and the perfection that we can imagine.

Victimage

Victimage is the way in which we attempt to purge the guilt that we feel as part of the human condition. There are two basic types of victimage, or two methods to purge our guilt. Burke calls the type of victimage that we turn in on ourselves mortification. When we apologize for wrongdoing and blame ourselves, we engage in mortification. In 1998, Republican leaders said they would have felt more sympathetic about President Clinton’s sex scandal if he had admitted he was wrong and had not perjured himself. Clinton refused to engage in mortification. Instead he turned to another purging technique called scapegoating.

Scapegoating

In scapegoating, blame is placed on some sacrificial vessel. By sacrificing the scapegoat, the actor is purged of sin. Clinton attempted to scapegoat the Republicans as deserving the real blame for the country’s problems after confessing to an inappropriate relationship with Monica Lewinsky. When the news of the sex scandal first broke in 1998, before Clinton admitted his relationship with Lewinsky, Hillary Rodham Clinton appeared on television suggesting that the rumors about her husband were the result of a complex “rightwing conspiracy” that was out to get her and her husband. This type of rhetoric illustrates Burke’s concept of scapegoating. In the aftermath of the 9/11 tragedy, President Bush also engaged in scapegoating. When Bush spoke of the “Axis of Evil” and used stark contrasts between good and evil, he operated within Burke’s concept of scapegoating. People who objected to this rhetoric pointed out that the United States itself had some responsibility for the fact that people from developing countries harbored resentments against the United States.

Redemption

The final step in the process is redemption, which involves a rejection of the unclean and a return to a new order after guilt has been temporarily purged. Inherent in the term redemption is the notion of a Redeemer. The Redeemer in the Judeo-Christian tradition is the Savior (Christ) or God. When politicians blame problems on the media or on the opposing party, they offer themselves as potential Redeemers—those who can lead the people out of their troubles. A key in the redemption phase is the fact that guilt is only temporarily relieved, through the Redeemer or any other method. As any order or hierarchy becomes reestablished, guilt returns to plague the human condition.

The Pentad

In addition to devising the theory of Dramatism, Burke (1945) created a method for applying his theory toward an understanding of symbolic activities. He called his method the pentad because it consists of five points for analyzing a symbolic text like a speech or a series of articles about Martha Stewart, for instance. The pentad may help determine why a speaker selects a particular rhetorical strategy for identifying with an audience.

The five points that make up the pentad include the act, the scene, the agent, agency, and purpose. Almost twenty years after creating this research tool, Burke (1968) added a sixth point, “attitude,” to the pentad, making it a hexad, although most people still refer to it as the pentad.

1. The act is what is done by a person.
2. The scene provides the context surrounding the act.
3. The agent is the person or persons performing the act.
4. The agency refers to the means used by the agent to accomplish the act.
5. The purpose refers to the goal that the agent had in mind for the act—that is, why the act was done.
6. Attitude refers to the manner in which an actor positions himself or herself relative to others.

How might we as members of the human race, or as citizens of this United States, talk about the 2012 presidential campaign in a less polarized fashion?

Can you use the pentad to analyze Obama or Romney and their discourse surrounding the attack in Libya involving these two political figures?

Do you agree that guilt is the primary human motive? If not, what do you think is the primary human motive?

Thoughts?

Have You Befriended Your Dark Side?

"Star Wars” is a series, which exemplifies in a clear-cut manner many of the archetypes of Jungian psychology. These films are modern retellings of ancient myths. Carl Jung has described myths as "fundamental expressions of human nature" (Hull, 1991). In the films, fairy tale motifs such as typical clothing, animals, knights, princesses, and emperors, along with primeval settings, are projected into the future with star ships, death stars and light sabers as swords. Although the films take the viewer far into the future, connections to an unconscious past are never forgotten. The popularity of these films could be attributed not only to the actors, special effects, and adventure, but more than that, to the connections with the collective and personal unconscious the trilogy continually evokes.

In the first episode of the “PBS Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth” series (1988), “The Hero's Adventure” and the fifth chapter of the book, "The Hero's Adventure," Bill Moyers and Joseph Campbell discuss George Lucas' report that Campbell's work directly influenced the creation of the “Star Wars” films. Moyers and Lucas filmed an interview in 1999, modeled after “The Power of Myth.” It was called the “Mythology of Star Wars with George Lucas and Bill Moyers” and further discussed the impact of Campbell's work on the Lucas' films.

According to Baxter and Babbie (2003), virtually anything can function as a social text, so long as it has symbols and meaning – including films. A qualitative approach to analyzing a film or a series of films as social text, involves understanding the meaning of that social text. In this case, I analyze the meaning behind the “Star Wars” film series by filmmaker George Lucas (with a little help from our friend, Carl Jung). My endeavor is an interpretive one, not a numerical one (as with a quantitative analyses). For this assignment, the social text, the “Star Wars” series, functions as the primary data being analyzed. There are many messages communicated within the work, known as “Star Wars.” My approach to analyzing this particular social text is “Communication Criticism.” Baxter and Babbie (2003) believe that there is little difference between the qualitative approaches to communication and the more humanistic approaches found in communication criticism. Communication criticism focuses on four stages: textualization, analysis, interpretation and judgment (Baxter & Babbie, 2003).

Sometimes documents (whether electronic, visual, or written) are helpful as resources for participants, including the researcher, as they conduct their everyday lives. Also, they are helpful in providing information that is not easily found through observation or interview. Studying the history, religiosity, and psychology embedded within the “Star Wars” series, can be fascinating. One can see that the films are conceptually very rich and robust, and quite self-revealing, if you look closely.

Although I had seen the film series time and again, I chose to watch critically to gain a better and deeper understanding of the meaning of the social text, “Star Wars.”

Many people judge simply on entertainment value. To know the difference between being truly joy-ful or being simply entertained is a life’s lesson many never comprehend. Any one of the films in the “Star Wars” series is never simply a good or a bad film. Each installment in the series is much more than a film in front of which we sit and munch popcorn. If aware, a viewer understands that each film is an invitation to look inside our selves. Each film offers us a reminder, an opportunity to visit that “shadow” or “dark side” which resides within each of us. It is the collection of negative or undesirable traits we keep hidden. Most of us never analyze our own dark side…and we don’t recognize it even when it’s larger than life on a 50-foot movie screen. Our own dark side is the collection of negative or undesirable traits we keep hidden – the things we don’t like about ourselves, and certainly don’t want others to recognize in us. These are things we are afraid to admit: egotism, non-politically-correct proclivities, extreme material desires, a gross need for power, and forbidden sexual desires, for examples.

However, as evidenced by the character, “Anakin,” a very likeable character who later becomes “Darth Vader,” a very unlikeable character, we know deep inside that we too have the capacity to go to the dark side. We have an equal (or greater, if you’re lucky) capacity for positive (yet often untapped) potential. This potential includes qualities that we admire in others but may disavow in ourselves. Befriending our dark side enables us to live a more authentic life. Had Anakin heeded the wise words of his mentor, the series may have turned out quite differently (Anakin’s loss is our gain). He was weak and naïve, became distrusting and greedy. We too fall prey to the negative behaviors fear and anxiety can perpetuate.

I find great value in analyzing “Star Wars” from a Jungian perspective. Jung was interested in the collective subconscious (Hull, 1991). If a film is consciously Jungian then the subconscious content that was clearly being portrayed was made for psychological self-realization – and to earn money, of course. Do you believe that Jung’s subconscious archetypes really exist? If you take the time to analyze “Star Wars” you will see, as George Lucas did, “A great classic hero saga, dealing with the classical questions about religion and history based on a psychological theme, played out in the futuristic setting of space” (Moyers & Lucas, 2010).

I believe that the “Star Wars” series falls within the social tradition of communication criticism because it highlights what we all share in common, a capacity for good and evil. The series does a good job of constructing shared meaning between people. Even for those who are not seeking the meaning in the messages within the film series, one cannot help but walk out of the theater with a need to reflect on “The Force,” God, the Self, or god-within, as some people refer to the universal force that is greater than we our selves are.

To understand, and truly appreciate the “Star Wars” film series you have to understand the main theme, a classical saga. In the series, the saga is the religion – a conviction; a system of values or beliefs -- and religion is something with which we can all identify, whether a religious person or not. The series presents the viewer with a story where an ordinary person, faced with many of the same challenges we experience, is faced with life-changing opportunities or challenges (again good versus bad). He, as with most of us, must go on a life quest where a number of life-challenges and struggles between good and evil, present themselves. These struggles are evident throughout history. Many pit fear against love, ego against spirit, the devil against God. But we all have “the Force,” as considered by many, intuition within us.

What is the Force? I believe it is an energy that resides within each of us at a cellular level. It can guide you and show you your life’s path. One is still left with the concept of free will to choose the “right” path or the “wrong” path. Many interpret the Force as God or as a positive, at the very least, and the dark side as the devil, or a negative at the very least. However, what many viewers fail to recognize is that there is no good guy or bad guy…there is only both within each of us. Our intuition may guide us but we still have free will to choose to do the right thing or not.

In Carl Jung’s collective unconscious, that which can be likened to the Force, intuition shows us what to retreat from and what to embrace; it is a gift of knowing, inherited from those who have gone before us…it heavily influences our free will, it guides us. The idea that we create our own reality correlates with this. In other words, if one lives in fear and negativity, bad things happen. If one lives with hope and positivity, good things happen.

The dark side of the Force attracts people/characters to power in a Machiavellian sense. Influence is seen as being afforded to those with power. Those with power can use their power for good or evil. The problem arises when leaders become dictators and influence is no longer enough, such that power and greed take over a person’s character. We see this all the time with politicians running for office who want to solve the problem and later, as elected political leaders, become the problem. Pure greed, without any struggle with conscience, gives the illusion of great power. Just because someone avoids struggling with his conscience does not mean his issues go away. The shadow or dark side will lie dormant until one day without warning will rear its ugly head and all will be lost. Again, we see this often with those same political leaders. Anakin suffered from never having embraced his dark side and all the while the fear and insecurity worked its black magic inside him until fear and greed were all he knew. When one is distrusting, it is often a sign that he cannot be trusted. Anakin relinquished his power to the dark side – the collection of his undesirable traits that had remained hidden from others, and himself. As presented in mythology, the Bible, psychology, and even in “Star Wars,” denying or worse, ignoring the dark side will only result in fear and anxiety –the presence of the ego, the devil, whatever negative name we wish to give “it,” returning to make demands of us.

Filmmaker George Lucas says that “Star Wars” is a classical saga, but in a futuristic environment (Moyers, B. & Lucas, G., 2010). But what is a classical saga? Adolf Bastian (1826-1905) first proposed the idea that myths from all over the world seem to be built from the same "elementary ideas.” Bastian was a 19th century ethnologist best remembered for his contributions to the development of ethnography and the development of anthropology as a discipline. Modern psychology owes him a great debt, because of his theory of the “Elementargedanke” (Britannica, 1999). This led to Carl Jung's development of the theory of archetypes, which he believed to be the building blocks not only of the unconscious mind, but also of a collective unconscious (Hull, 1991).

The Jedi Knight represents a basic psychological theme that fits well with the hero archetype. To the naïve, young Jedi, Luke Skywalker, the wise, old Jedi, Yoda states, "A Jedi's strength flows from the Force. But beware of the dark side. Anger...fear...aggression. The dark side of the Force are they. Easily they flow, quick to join you in a fight. If once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you it will, as it did Obi-Wan's apprentice." Luke then says, "Vader. Is the dark side stronger?" to which Yoda replies "No...no...no. Quicker, easier, more seductive." And Luke again asks "But how am I to know the good side from the bad?" and Yoda replies, "You will know. When you are calm, at peace. Passive. A Jedi uses the Force for knowledge and defense, never for attack” (Yoda, a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away).

We all have the Force within us; we all have free will to choose to use the Force for good or evil. As Jung stated, the shadow is a very common archetype that reflects deeper elements of our psyche, where “latent dispositions” which are within us all, arise (Hull, 1991).

It is, by its name, dark, shadowy, unknown and potentially troubling. It embodies chaos and wildness and tends not to obey rules. As such, it may plunge us into a world of chaos as it did to Anakin in the film series. It has a sense of the exotic and can be disturbingly fascinating and mythical, like mysterious fighters and dark enemies. We may see the shadow in others and, if we are truly healthy, know it in ourselves. Mostly, however, people deny it and project it onto others. Our shadow or dark side may appear in dreams and hallucinations as it did with Anakin, often as something or someone who is bad, fearsome or despicable in some way. It may seduce through false friendship (think Sith Lord). Encounters with it, as an aspect of the subconscious, may reveal deeper darker thoughts and fears. 

Do you acknowledge your dark side and if so, how do you manage it?

In what setting does your dark side rear its ugly head most?

When people disagree with your beliefs do you shut them down or open your mind to alternative beliefs?

Do you have a far right conservative friend whose opinions differ from yours? How do you handle?

Do you have a far left liberal friend show opinions differ from yours? How do you handle?

Thoughts?

What's Life Look Like From Where You Stand?

"People are situated in specific social locations; they occupy different places in the social hierarchy based on their membership in social groups (poor, wealthy, men, women, European American, African American, Latino, uneducated, well educated, and so forth). Because of these social locations, individuals view the social situation from particular vantage points. Those vantage points formed in opposition to those in power, resisting the social definition given to them by those in power, become standpoints. No standpoint allows a person to view the entire social situation completely—all standpoints are partial—but people on the lower rungs of the social hierarchy do see more than their own position."

-- Richard West

We all belong to a community. Some of us are members of a culture with a long history in the United States. Others of us belong to cultures that have recently found prominence in this country. The term culture has many different meanings. There are various interpretations and issues pertaining to culture and human behavior. 

When it comes to communication, a person’s standpoint often determines how he or she composes, analyzes and relays messages. A woman who speaks bluntly, for instance, is often viewed negatively in certain environments by members of both sexes. Though her message may be clear and direct, social hierarchies and norms that expect women to exercise tact and restraint can prevent her straightforward disclosure from achieving the desired outcome. Knowing this, many women hedge their speech with adverbs, conditionals and passive phrases in order to appear warmer, more inclusive and less threatening. Women also have different criteria than men for evaluating expert knowledge.

Certain theories represent a cross-section of what it means to be a member of a cultural community. Each of these theories takes into consideration what happens when we communicate with people who come from different cultural backgrounds with different cultural expectations. For example, Standpoint Theory states that people view the world according to their positions in life. So the theory considers socioeconomic class
and its application to a variety of marginalized populations, including women, the poor, gay men and lesbians, and many racial and ethnic communities.

Feminist Standpoint Theory rests first on a few general beliefs that characterize the theory: 1) Sex or gender is a central focus for the theory; 2) sex or gender relations are viewed as problematic, and the theory seeks to understand how sex or gender is related to inequities and contradictions; 3) sex or gender relations are viewed as changeable; and 4) feminist theory can be used to challenge the status quo when the status quo debases or devalues women.

Standpoint Theory rests on five specific assumptions about the nature of social life:

1. Material life (or class position) structures and limits one’s understandings of social relations.
2. When material life is structured in two opposing ways for two different groups, the understanding of each will be an inversion of the other. When there is a dominant and a subordinate group, the understanding of the dominant group will be both partial and harmful.
3. The vision of the ruling group structures the material relations in which all groups are forced to participate.
4. The vision available to an oppressed group represents struggle and an achievement.
5. The potential understanding of the oppressed (the standpoint) makes visible the inhumanity of the existing relations among groups and moves us toward a better and more just world. 

Individuals’ location in the class structure shapes and limits their understandings of social relations. Feminist Standpoint Theory assumes that all standpoints are partial, but those of the ruling class can actually harm those of the subordinate group. This point leads naturally to an assertion that the ruling group structures life in such a way as to remove some choices from the subordinate group. In the United States people have very little choice about participating in a market economy, which is the preferred mode for the ruling class. As Hartsock (1997) comments, “The vision of the rulers structures social life, and forces all parties to participate in this structure. Truth is, to a large extent, what the dominant groups can make true; history is always written by the winners.” Furthermore, the ruling class promotes propaganda that describes the market as beneficial and virtuous.

The subordinate group has to struggle for their vision of social life. This struggle results in a clearer, more accurate vision for the subordinate group than that possessed by the ruling class. With this clear vision, the subordinate group can see the inherent inhumanity in the social order and can thus attempt to change the world for the better. At the end of the day, although all standpoints are partial, the standpoint of an oppressed group is formed through careful attention to the dominant group. This isn’t true in reverse. Thus, members of oppressed groups have a more complete standpoint than do members of dominant groups.

Standpoint Theory embodies a set of beliefs about knowledge and knowledge gathering:

• All knowledge is a product of social activity, and thus no knowledge can be truly objective.
• Cultural conditions “typically surrounding women’s lives produce experiences and understandings that routinely differ from those produced by the conditions framing men’s lives.” These different understandings often produce distinct communication patterns.
• It is a worthwhile endeavor to understand the distinctive features of women’s experience.
• We can only know women’s experience by attending to women’s interpretations of this experience. 

Knowledge is not an objective concept but rather is shaped subjectively by knowers. This suggests an approach to knowing that is much different from that suggested by a belief in objective truth. Also, different social locations that men and women inhabit in the United States exists even when they work and live in what seem to be similar situations.

Standpoint Theory rests on several key concepts: standpoint, “situated knowledges,” and sexual division of labor. The central concept of the theory, standpoint, is a location, shared by a group experiencing outsider status, within the social structure, that lends a particular kind of sense making to a person’s lived experience.

A standpoint is not simply an interested position (interpreted as bias) but is interested in the sense of being engaged. The concept of engagement is amplified by researchers who distinguish between a standpoint and a perspective...it is easy to confuse the two, but there is a critical difference. A perspective is shaped by experiences that are structured by a person’s place in the social hierarchy. A perspective may lead to the achievement of a standpoint but only through effort. Standpoints are only achieved after thought, interaction, and struggle. Standpoints must be actively sought and are not possessed by all who have experienced oppression. Standpoints are achieved through experiences of
oppression added to active engagement, reflection, and recognition of the political implications of these experiences. Furthermore, standpoints are not free of their social and political contexts.

Standpoints are “socially mediated.” Because standpoints are defined by specific social locations, they are by necessity partial, or incomplete. The location allows only a portion of social life to be viewed by any particular group. In addition, the political aspect of standpoints stresses that individuals go through a developmental process in acquiring them. Developing a standpoint requires “active, political resistance to work against the material embodiment of the perspective and experience of the dominant group. Standpoints are political because they are achieved in collaboration and dialogue with others rather than in isolation.

“Situated knowledges,” meaning that any person’s knowledge is grounded in context and circumstances. The notion of “situated knowledges” reminds us that what we know and do is not innate but rather is the result of learning from our experiences.

“Feminist Standpoint Theory” rests on the notion that men and women engage in different occupations based on their sex, which results in a sexual division of labor. Not only does this division simply assign people to different tasks based on sex, but it also exploits women by demanding work without providing wages while making “women responsible for the unwaged maintenance and reproduction of the current and future labor force.” Furthermore, the inequities women suffer in the workplace when involved in labor for wages are linked to their responsibility for unwaged domestic work. A feminist standpoint “enables women to identify the activities they perform in the home as ‘work’ and ‘labor,’ productive of ‘value,’ rather than simply the necessary and essential byproducts of ‘nature’ or the function of biology which women experience.” Standpoint Theory highlights the exploitation and distortion that result when labor is divided by sex.


Standpoint Theory presents us with another way of viewing the relative positions, experiences, and communication of various social groups. It has
a clear political, critical bent, and it locates the place of power in social life.
It has generated much controversy as people find it either offensive to or compatible with their views of social life.

How might Standpoint Theory be identified with a political ideology?

If there is no objective truth, how do we reach agreement among people with different standpoints?

Thoughts?