From: Jerry Levy (Gerald_A_Levy@MSN.COM)
Date: Wed Nov 02 2005 - 13:39:36 EST
> The point Ian makes has a theoretical dimension: insofar as postmodernism > emphasizes the surface connections of things and rejects the idea of > causally potent deep structures, often unobservable, then this constitutes > a thread which can be characterized as dismissive of science. Hi Howard: It depends on what we're trying to comprehend, doesn't it? The closer one is to a subject on the 'surface', then the more variables there are which impact that subject. One can't, for instance, assume that all concrete surface phenomena are caused by "causally potent deep structures" since there are many contingent factors which shape these phenomena -- a point generally understood by historians, bourgeois and Marxist. While not an Althusserian, I think that there is something to be said for the concept of over-determination in this context. (NB: I don't think that the concept of over-determination is necessarily at odds with Hegelian-Marxist understandings -- once one is examining concrete and historically contingent phenomena in specific social formations.) Surely, you wouldn't claim that an analysis of (let's say) capitalism in the US today can be understood by reference _only_ to class? Race and gender (and other causally important factors, even where their concrete specification is tied to the historical circumstances of the development of that social formation) are clearly explanatory variables, aren't they? In solidarity, Jerry
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