Harding argues that standpoint theory imposes a rigorous logic of discovery involving a strong demand for ongoing reflection and self-critique from within a standpoint, enabling the justification of socially-situated knowledge claims. This critical approach, Harding asserts, results in a stronger notion of objectivity than that achieved by traditional approaches to enquiry. The traditional starting point for knowledge is the position of the dominant and, despite assumptions to the contrary, that position is ideologically permeated. This results in partial and distorted accounts of reality, which thereby fail to live up to modernistic standards of impartiality, neutrality and universality associated with a commitment to epistemic objectivity.

all speech is socially situ-ated, there will always be some "of course" limits.

When we speak, we stand somewhere, and our standing place makes both known and silent claims upon us