This omniscient perspective represents the universal privileging of the Western rational subject. Against this position de Certeau positions a rhetoric of walking, of being a flaneur and moving through – and therefore learning – the city. These acts serve as metaphors for ways of knowing and speaking. For de Certeau, a knowledge of the city produced through direct contact with the world and others and an unprivileged, situated perspective on one’s surroundings are tactical responses to the problematic nature of Western scientific thinking.