Dorothy Edith Smith is a Canadian Sociologist who is responsible for the development of an effective means of understanding the standpoint theory in relation to how it describes the sociology of women. Although the standpoint theory was coined by American feminist Sandra Harding, it was Smith who developed the notion of standpoint to shape the former’s theory (Cannon, 2016). Sociology in its theories and methods was built in male-dominated society that ignored the women’s world (Smith, 2005). In this case, sexual reproduction, children, and other women’s duties were considered natural rather than an addition to the community’s culture (Smith, 2005). It was through bifurcation of consciousness that Smith would further expand this theory as a measure of identifying the two modes being for women.
Bifurcation is recognized as a separation or dividing into two parts or branches. The divide causes women to experience two distinct experiences of the world (Smith, 2005). The first element is the individual view of the social world as the woman experiences it. In this context, smith describes here split experience in the university where she worked and at home. In the former, her thinking was abstract and generalized while in the latter her thinking was local and particular (Smith, 2005). The example shows that the problems that women experience in society are distinct only felt by them.
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The second element is the dominant view of the society to which women must adapt. As mentioned earlier, the norms and rules established in society are defined from a male point of view (Wylie, 2012). As a result, women have to fight against their expected roles as mothers and housewives, moving from the local home realm to the extra local realm of society (Smith, 2005). In this way, women will split their consciousness in two where they establish their lives as competent and knowledgeable beings within the oppressive society.
References
Cannon, J. A. H. (2016). Bifurcated Consciousness. The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Gender and Sexuality Studies , 1-6.
Smith, D. E. (2005) Institutional Ethnography. A Sociology for People. Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press.
Wylie, A. (2012). Feminist philosophy of science: Standpoint matters. In Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association, 86(2): 47-76. American Philosophical Association.
