No doubt many members of this list in the U.S. saw the article on the front
page of today's _NYTimes_ concerning the article published in _Social Text_
by Alan Sokal. (If there's interest, I could post the article to the
entire list. It is also available through the NYTimes' website.)
For those not familiar with this "event", Sokal is a physicist at NYU who
identifies with the Left but is critical of what he considers the obscurity
and "epistemic relativism" of poststructuralist theory and cultural
criticism. So, rather than debate the issue, Sokal wrote "Transgressing
the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity" -
a parody of "deconstructive criticism" - and submitted it to _Social Text_
for publication. It appeared in a special issue devoted to "Science Wars".
After Sokal's article was published in _Social Text_, he exposed the scam
in _Lingua Franca_.
Now there are a number of issues here. I mention only two of the most
obvious. How could such an article get through the "peer review process"
and the scrutiny of the editorial board at _Social Text_? To what extent
does this signal a legitimate problem in the production and reception of
contemporary criticism and theory?
tq
-----------------------------------
T. R. Quigley
School of the Visual Arts
25 E. 10th Street
Apartment 11B
New York, NY 10003
212 677 5767
squigle@xxxxxxxxx
----------------------------------
------------------
page of today's _NYTimes_ concerning the article published in _Social Text_
by Alan Sokal. (If there's interest, I could post the article to the
entire list. It is also available through the NYTimes' website.)
For those not familiar with this "event", Sokal is a physicist at NYU who
identifies with the Left but is critical of what he considers the obscurity
and "epistemic relativism" of poststructuralist theory and cultural
criticism. So, rather than debate the issue, Sokal wrote "Transgressing
the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity" -
a parody of "deconstructive criticism" - and submitted it to _Social Text_
for publication. It appeared in a special issue devoted to "Science Wars".
After Sokal's article was published in _Social Text_, he exposed the scam
in _Lingua Franca_.
Now there are a number of issues here. I mention only two of the most
obvious. How could such an article get through the "peer review process"
and the scrutiny of the editorial board at _Social Text_? To what extent
does this signal a legitimate problem in the production and reception of
contemporary criticism and theory?
tq
-----------------------------------
T. R. Quigley
School of the Visual Arts
25 E. 10th Street
Apartment 11B
New York, NY 10003
212 677 5767
squigle@xxxxxxxxx
----------------------------------
------------------