This article sorts out some of the theoretical dilemmas related to issues of identity, difference, and location that have arisen on the horizon of critical and cultural communication studies in the past few decades. Tracing the origins of the belief in the epistemological significance of social position to early criticaltheorists, it explores the further development of this concept in feminist scholarship. Using the feminist struggle with standpoint epistemology as an example, this work explores some of the dangers associated with the assumption that membership in a subordinated group affords one privileged knowledge about oppression, and critically examines the practical difficulties of applying a theoretically sophisticated understanding of the role of social position to politically grounded research.
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