āI like everything about standpoint ā except the āstandingā and the āpointingāā
In this episode, we speak with Linda MartĆn Alcoff, professor of philosophy at Hunter College, City University of New York (CUNY). As a PhD student working in epistemology, right at the time when Sandra Harding and Nancy Hartsock published their first articles on standpoint theory, Linda was immediately drawn to these emerging feminist and socialist theories.
Standpoint theorizing for Linda has always been deeply connected to her political work: she explains how her 1970s civil rights and anti-war activism has influenced her work and why, for her, identity politics has never been formulaic, or opposed to her Marxist views. In this context, she tells us about her close friendship with Charles Mills and how their political genealogiesārooted in Panama and Jamaicaāshaped their philosophical thinking.
We also discuss why āstandpointsā are a better conceptual tool than āwomenās ways of knowingā and what remains troublesome about the individualist notion of āstanding and pointingā; and why itās vitally important to look beyond our disciplinary silos and to rebuild the threads of connection to earlier generations of standpoint theorists and political movements.
Works discussed TBD.
Edited by Karoline Paier, Alex Bryant
Mixed by Lilith Charlet
Illustrations by Rachel Cripps
Music by The Years from the ā ā Free Music Archiveā ā licensed under anĀ ā ā Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States Licenseā ā .