Interdisciplinary fields are always a bit wooly anyway. There’s no reason why a smart, motivated person couldn’t do sociology with an emphasis on gender, or philosophy with an emphasis on gender, or so on. And if you don’t have an established field for your line of inquiry, you’re not going to have rigorous standards for what constitutes good work. So gender studies ends up with standards hovering somewhere between sociology and postmodernist critical theory.
I completely agree. A UCSC professor named Donna Haraway, who wrote A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Social-Feminism in the late-Twentieth Century is an excellent example of a professor who is capable of putting a gender emphasis upon the issues of sexual roles in society, sociology, and history.
It was she to whom I went to discuss the issue after discovering she was at UC Santa Cruz (I had already read the book a few years prior to the Class with the crazy teacher).
I had taken a women’s studies class because my ex-wife died from being sexually exploited while strung out on crack cocaine (typical crack whore story), and I figured that I might have something to learn from it. Dr. Haraway informed me that I was expecting too much, as most women’s studies teachers are incredibly biased and emotionally driven and don’t take to facts too well.
I don’t agree with much of Dr. Haraway’s politics, but at least she has sound arguments for her position, rather than appeals to emotion or ignorance. Now, some of the premises of her arguments I would question, but that is the whole point isn’t it. That we argue the premises and from those we attempt to form a sound argument, rather than throwing together an argument that consists of “It would be horrible if it were any other way!”
Interdisciplinary fields are always a bit wooly anyway. There’s no reason why a smart, motivated person couldn’t do sociology with an emphasis on gender, or philosophy with an emphasis on gender, or so on. And if you don’t have an established field for your line of inquiry, you’re not going to have rigorous standards for what constitutes good work. So gender studies ends up with standards hovering somewhere between sociology and postmodernist critical theory.
I completely agree. A UCSC professor named Donna Haraway, who wrote A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Social-Feminism in the late-Twentieth Century is an excellent example of a professor who is capable of putting a gender emphasis upon the issues of sexual roles in society, sociology, and history.
It was she to whom I went to discuss the issue after discovering she was at UC Santa Cruz (I had already read the book a few years prior to the Class with the crazy teacher).
I had taken a women’s studies class because my ex-wife died from being sexually exploited while strung out on crack cocaine (typical crack whore story), and I figured that I might have something to learn from it. Dr. Haraway informed me that I was expecting too much, as most women’s studies teachers are incredibly biased and emotionally driven and don’t take to facts too well.
I don’t agree with much of Dr. Haraway’s politics, but at least she has sound arguments for her position, rather than appeals to emotion or ignorance. Now, some of the premises of her arguments I would question, but that is the whole point isn’t it. That we argue the premises and from those we attempt to form a sound argument, rather than throwing together an argument that consists of “It would be horrible if it were any other way!”
You write these brief comments that are incredibly intriguing. Please post more about your life.
Maybe some day after I have made more in-person acquaintance of more people on the list.