Showing papers on "Critical theory published in 1994"

Hermeneutics and Consumer Research

Abstract: This article reviews the nature of hermeneutic philosophy and the assumptions and features of a textual interpretation consistent with this perspective. The relationship of hermeneutic philosophy to the interpretive and critical theory traditions in consumer research is also discussed.

Critical theory and methodology

Abstract: PART ONE: METATHEORY: GROUNDING METHOD Introduction What is Critical Theory? Foundations of Metatheory Between Subjectivism and Objectivism Postempiricist Critiques of Positivism and Empiricism PART TWO: CRITICAL THEORY AS A RESEARCH PROGRAM Early Critical Theory as a Research Program An Historical Introduction Postempiricist Metatheory and the Human Sciences Interim Developments The Metatheory of Critical Theory Beyond Objectivism and Relativism Contemporary Critical Theory as a Resarch Program Giddens and Habermas PART THREE: CRITICAL THEORY AND EMPIRICAL RESEARCH Deconstructing the Conventional Discourse of Methodology Quantitative versus Qualitative Methods Non-Empirical Methods Reflexive Procedures Empirical Procedures in Critical Research Contexts of Critical Empirical Research Critical Social Science and Society Theory and Practice

Habermas and the public sphere

Abstract: The relationship between civil society and public life is in the forefront of contemporary discussion. No single scholarly voice informs this discussion more than that of Jurgen Habermas. His contributions have shaped the nature of debates over critical theory, feminism, cultural studies, and democratic politics. In this book, scholars from a wide range of disciplines respond to Habermas's most directly relevant work, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere. From political theory to cultural criticism, from ethics to gender studies, from history to media studies, these essays challenge, refine, and extend our understanding of the social foundations and changing character of democracy and public discourse.

Communicative planning theory

Abstract: The critical theory of communicative action holds great potential for the renewal of planning theory. This work applies Habermas's theory to reformulate central themes of mainstream planning theory, characterize power relations and modes of conflict management and examine flexibility.

Postmodern Public Administration: Toward Discourse

Abstract: PART ONE: CRITIQUE A New Approach to Democratic Governance Orthodoxy and Its Alternatives The Growing Gap between Words and Deeds Postmodern Symbolic Politics PART TWO: DISCOURSE THEORY Theoretical Underpinnings of Discourse Theory Phenomenology, Constructivism, Structuration Theory and Energy Fields Warrants for Discourse Nascent Forms of Discourse

Contested Knowledge: Social Theory in the Postmodern Era

Abstract: Preface. Acknowledgements. Introduction. Part I: The Enlightenment and the Classical Tradition: The Dream of Reason: 1. Grand Visions: Auguste Comte and Karl Marx. 2. The Promise of Sociology: Emile Durkheim and Max Weber. Part II: Disciplining Theory: The Making of a Sociological Theory Canon: 3. From European Social Theory to American Sociological Theory: Talcott Parsons and the Autonomy of Theory. 4. The Triumph of Scientific Theory: Postwar American Sociological Theory and the Abandonment of Public Enlightenment. Part III: Dislodging the Canon: The Reassertion of a Moral Vision of the Human Sciences: 5. Between Science and Politics: The Critical Theory of C. W. Mills, Jurgen Habermas, and Stuart Mill. 6. Knowledge and Power: The French Poststructuralists. 7. The New Social Movements and the Making of New Social Knowledges. 8 Post-Enlightenment Paradigms of Disciplinary Knowledge: Refashioning Sociology for the Twenty-First Century. Epilogue. Bibliographic Essay. Index.

Resisting the canon: feminist cultural studies, sport, and technologies of the body.

Abstract: In this paper, I argue that contemporary critical theories as well as shifts in culture have produced a crisis in sport studies by displacing and challenging the "object of knowledge" as it has bee...

The political philosophy of poststructuralist anarchism

Abstract: The political writings of the French poststructuralists have eluded articulation in the broader framework of general political philosophy primarily because of the pervasive tendency to define politics along a single parameter: the balance between state power and individual rights in liberalism and the focus on economic justice as a goal in Marxism. What poststructuralists like Michel Foucault, Gilles Deleuze, and Jean-Francois Lyotard offer instead is a political philosophy that can be called tactical: it emphasizes that power emerges from many different sources and operates along many different registers. This approach has roots in traditional anarchist thought, which sees the social and political field as a network of intertwined practices with overlapping political effects. The poststructuralist approach, however, eschews two questionable assumptions of anarchism, that human beings have an (essentially benign) essence and that power is always repressive, never productive. After positioning poststructuralist political thought against the background of Marxism and the traditional anarchism of Bakunin, Kropotkin, and Proudhon, Todd May shows what a tactical political philosophy like anarchism looks like shorn of its humanist commitments-namely, a poststructuralist anarchism. The book concludes with a defense, contra Habermas and Critical Theory, of poststructuralist political thought as having a metaethical structure allowing for positive ethical commitments.

Contested Knowledge: Social Theory Today

Abstract: Preface. Acknowledgments. Introduction. Part I: The Rise of the Classical Tradition:. Introduction. 1. The Idea of a Science of Society: The Enlightenment and Auguste Comte. 2. The Revolutionary Theory of Karl Marx. 3. The Promise of Sociology: Emile Durkheim. 4. The Ironic Social Theory of Max Weber. Afterword. Part II: Rethinking the Classical Tradition: American Sociology: . Introduction. 5. The Grand Theory of Talcott Parsons and of Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann. 6. The Scientific Theory of Randall Collins and Peter Blau. 7. The Moral Sociology of C. Wright Mills and Robert Bellah. Afterword. Part III: Rethinking the Classical Tradition: European Theory:. Introduction. 8. The Critical Theory of Jurgen Habermas. 9. Stuart Hall and British Cultural Studies. 10. The Critical Sociology of Anthony Giddens and Pierre Bourdieu. Afterword. Part IV: Revisions and Revolts: The Postmodern Turn:. Introduction. 11. Post-Structural Theory: Jacques Derrida, Jean-Francois Lyotard, and Jean Baudrillard. 12. Michel Foucault's Disciplinary Society. 13. Zygmunt Bauman's Sociology of Postmodernity. Afterword. Part V: Revisions and Revolts: Identity Politics and Theory: . Introduction. 14. Feminist and Gender Theory. 15. Critical Race Theory. 16. Lesbian, Gay, and Queer Theory. 17. Colonial Discourse Studies. Afterword. Part VI: Revisions and Revolts: Theories of World Order: . Introduction. 18. From Nation to Global Order: David Held and Mary Kaldor. 19. Global Capitalism: Immanuel Wallerstein and Manuel Castells. 20. The Return of Empire? Hardt and Negri, Harvey, Mann. Epilogue: Social Theory Today. Index

The materiality of discourse as oxymoron: A challenge to critical rhetoric

Abstract: Recent rhetorical theory has adopted two versions—variously idealist and relativist—of the proposition that discourse is influential in or even constitutive of social and material “reality.”; This idea, which underpins much critical communication scholarship, I am calling the “materiality of discourse hypothesis.”; This essay documents and criticizes the idealism and relativism of the materiality of discourse idea in postmodernist and post‐Marxist rhetorical theories, illustrates the critique with an extended critical analysis of Persian Gulf War news coverage, and defends materialist ideology criticism as an alternative to a critical rhetoric that has become increasingly affirmative of the social order and detached from reality.

Poststructuralism and the ARTFL Database: Some Theoretical Considerations.

Abstract: In order to attract new scholars to computers in the humanities, some researchers suggest that poststructuralist theories should inform how one queries textual databases. This paper argues that if we adopt a poststructuralist methodology to analyze texts with computers, we must recognize the assumptions that motivate poststructuralist theories. Using such theories to find an ultimate meaning in literature would entail contradictions because these theories deny the possibility of an ultimate meaning in literature. Although computers can be used effectively in conjunction with current critical theory, they will never uncover the one true meaning of a text. The fact that present online text databases offer seemingly limitless opportunities to analyze literature in comprehensive ways has prompted much optimism about the future of computers in the humanities. Indeed, large corpora of texts immediately available in their entirety with a few strokes on the keyboard represent a remarkable achievement in applying computer technology to disciplines in the liberal arts. By rendering texts written in natural-language machine-readable, students of literature can let the computer do tasks that even with an authoritative concordance would be tiresome and time-consuming. Thematic studies that required long hours of reading and rereading in order to observe how certain words express a particular idea can now be executed in less than a minute. This radical reduction in the time necessary to work out a literary analysis enables one to pursue more ambitious studies that can treat many themes at once. In addition to thematic studies, the development of sophisticated morphological analyzers is opening the way to systematic linguistic and semantic investigations into the imperceptible shifts and transformationso f language that occur within a text or over time through many texts. Not only can we see how ideas are developed through language, but we can also observe how language itself operates to produce meaning. Given the exponential rate of advances in computer technology over just the past ten years and the promise of even more amazing things to come, it is no wonder that the possibilities for computerized literary studies appear endless. Unfortunately, most of the academic community does not share this enthusiasm. In a recent essay, Mark Olsen has addressed the lukewarm response of the academic community to computers in their midst, identifying two reasons that scholars seem reluctant to embrace the new technology.[1] First, previous literary studies employing computer methodologies have appealed only to researchers who have already adopted these methodologies in their own work. Instead of attracting new people to accept and use the technology, these individuals have ended up forming an isolated discipline complete with journals and conferences that nobody else reads or attends. The reason for this is that the wider academic community does not appreciate the conclusions drawn from the results of computerized literary analyses: as far as the majority is concerned, these analyses fo not really tell us anything we did not know without computers. Second, those who use computers to read literature have fallen out of touch with recent developments in literary criticism, namely poststructuralism. While the rest of academia was wrestling with semiotics, posychoanalysis, reader-response theory, and deconstruction, computer buffs continued to crunch words to uncover meanings without questioning what "meaning" meant. As a result, those who have been devoted to computers during the past ten to fifteen years find themselves removed from mainstream literary debates because their work has not contributed to current ciritical theory and has more or less ignored it. In order to demarginalize computer literary studies, Olsen proposes that those who use computers to study literature incorporate poststructuralist theories into their research models: The most surprising element of this problem is the relatively limited acceptance of critical models that stress intertextuality and sign theory among those interested in computer analysis of text. …

Children's Literature: Criticism and the Fictional Child

Abstract: 'Children's Literature: Criticism and the Fictional Child' draws on literary and critical theory to argue that children's literature criticism through its often contradictory versions of the `child' reveals the realm of `childhood' as one constructed by the adult reader. Crucially, however, this construction is not seen to be an incorrect or partial 'idealisation' of the child, as is commonly argued elsewhere in children's literature criticism and further discussions of childhood, but instead is understood to be about a textuality to which there is no 'outside' - all meanings and identities, including childhood, are here understood as produced in and as language. From this position, the book demonstrates that both children's literature criticism and the texts it studies are underpinned by the narratives of the liberal arts' educational ideals and their attendant socio-political and personal ideologies. In the book, literary discussion is placed in relation to wider debates about childhood in psychology and psychotherapy. The book argues for a significant re-thinking of `childhood' and approaches to children's literature.

Questions of evidence : proof, practice, and persuasion across the disciplines

Abstract: This anthology brings together thirteen major essays by leading scholars and researchers in multiple fields across the sciences and humanities. In addition, each essay is accompanied by a never-before-published critical response and a rejoinder by the author of the original essay.

Of critical theory and its theorists

Abstract: 1. Introduction: From the First Edition to the Second 2. Sketching the Lineage: The Critical Method and the Idealist Tradition 3. Karl Korsch: Western Marxism and the Origins of Critical Theory 4. Philosophical Anticipations: A Commentary on the "Reification" Essay of Georg Lukacs 5. Utopian Projections: In Honor of Ernst Bloch 6. Horkheimer's Road 7. Reclaiming the Fragments: On the Messianic Materialism of Walter Benjamin 8. Political Aesthetics: Reflections on the Expressionism Debate 9. Dialectics at a Standstill: A Methodological Inquiry into the Philosophy of Theodor W. Adorno 10. Fromm in America 11. The Anthropological Break: Aesthetics and Politics in the Work of Herbert Marcuse 12. Jurgen Habermas and the Language of Politics 13. Critical Theory and Civil Society 14. Points of Departure: Sketches for a Critical Theory with Public Aims

Engendering Modernity: Feminism, Social Theory and Social Change

Abstract: Introduction. 1. Gender and Modernity: Classical Issues, Contemporary Debates. 2. Rethinking the Gendered Division of Labour. 3. Social Reproduction and Socialist Feminist Theory. 4. Gendered Identities. 5. Gender Politics: Regulation and Resistance. 6. Feminist Theory as Critical Theory. Notes. References. Index.

Postmodernism and the Social Sciences: A Thematic Approach

Abstract: Introduction Toward an Understanding of Postmodernism Modernity, the Enlightenment, and the Social Sciences Modernity Modernism Reason, Methods, Values From Critical Theory to Poststructuralism Postmodernism, Identity, and the Self Postmodernism and Society The Challenge From Critical Theory Postmodernism An Overview How Postmodernism Is Changing the Social Sciences

Writing the Rural: Five Cultural Geographies

Abstract: Introduction - Paul Cloke and Nigel Thrift Refiguring the 'Rural' Doing the English Village, 1945-90 - David Matless An Essay in Imaginative Geography Habermas, Rural Studies and Critical Social Theory - Martin Phillips Something Resists - Marcus Doel Reading-Deconstruction as Ontological Infestation (Departures from the Texts of Jacques Derrida) (En)culturing Political Economy - Paul Cloke A Life in the Day of a 'Rural Geographer' Inhuman Geographies - Nigel Thrift Landscapes of Speed, Light and Power

"What is the case?" And "what lies behind it?" The two sociologies and the theory of society

Abstract: Ever since the inception of its academic career, sociology has approached its subjectmatter in two different ways; one positivist, the other critical. Important theories, such as those of Karl Marx or Emile Durkheim, have always emphasized either one of these perspectives, but could never completely ignore the other one. The result was that as an empirical science, sociology has been interested in latent structures, while as critical theory, it has pointed out that social reality is not what it seems to be. Therefore, all attempts at building a unified theory of society on the basis of the critical/positivist distinction had to lead into the paradox of treating appearance and reality, or latent and manifest structures, as one and the same thing. This situation is now changing in radical ways which sociology has yet to appreciate. I am referring to recent interdisciplinary discussions about theories of self-referential systems, autopoietic system closure, the second-order cybernetics of observing systems, and constructivist epistemology and information processing. We can draw upon these recent discussions in order to understand society as a self-observing system that defines its own identity while, at the same time, leaving an "unmarked space" for the possibility to describe society in quite different ways.

Revitalizing the Critical Imagination: Unleashing the Crouched Tiger

Abstract: The purpose of this article is to further the “critical imagination project” that we began in 1991. The goal of this project has always been to inspire researchers to engage in action-oriented programs of research aimed at improving society and the lives of consumers. On the basis of a dialogue with Hetrick and Lozada's thoughtful work, we suggest that the critical imagination project can still empower both consumers and consumer researchers. Toward this end, we respond to four important issues: First, what is a reasonable interpretation of critical theory? Second, does an accurate interpretation of critical theory necessarily involve a capitalist critique? Third, what are the core ideas of critical theory? And finally, what kinds of methods will justify a critical theory?

Ethos: New Essays in Rhetorical and Critical Theory

Abstract: Features 16 original essays by prominent rhetoricians, critical theorists, and composition specialists, many of which offer alternative histories as well as reinterpretations of classic texts, thus expanding the canon, and locating and analyzing competing cultural traditions of ethos and ethical arg

Construing the Critical Imagination: Comments and Necessary Diversions

Abstract: The following article offers a critique of the “critical imagination” thesis espoused by Murray and Ozanne in a recent article published in the Journal of Consumer Research . Also provided is a commentary on the proposed utilization of the Frankfurt Circle version of critical theory as a groundwork for consumer research. The possibility of emancipatory action stemming from critical consumer research is broadly discussed. Diversions on these themes are offered as potential areas for theory building and for the formulation of alternative conceptions of critical consumer research.

Constituting Critique: Kant's Writing as Critical Praxis

Abstract: Kant's philosophy is often treated as a closed system, without reference to how it was written or how Kant arrived at its familiar form, the critique. In fact, the style of the critique seems so artless that readers think of it as an unfortunate by-product-a style of stylelessness. In Constituting Critique, Willi Goetschel shows how this apparent gracelessness was deliberately achieved by Kant through a series of writing experiments. By providing an account of the process that culminated in his three Critiques, this book offers a new perspective on Kant's philosophical thought and practice. Constituting Critique traces the stages in Kant's development to reveal how he redefined philosophy as a critical task. Following the philosopher through the experiments of his early essays, Goetschel demonstrates how Kant tests, challenges, and transforms the philosophical essay in his pursuit of a new self-reflective literary genre. From these experiments, critique emerges as the philosophical form for the critical project of the Enlightenment. The imperatives of its transcendental style, Goetschel contends, not only constitute and inform the critical moment of Kant's philosophical praxis, but also have an enduring place in post-Kantian philosophy and literature. By situating the Critiques within the context of Kant's early essays, this work will redirect the attention of Kant scholars to the origins of their form. It will also encourage contemporary critical theorists to reconsider their own practice through an engagement with its source in Kant.

Modern critical theory & classical literature

Abstract: In recent decades the study of literature in Europe and the Americas has been profoundly influenced by modern critical theory in its various forms, whether Structuralism or Deconstructionism, Hermeneutics, Reader-Response Theory or Rezeptionsasthetik, Semiotics or Narratology, Marxist, feminist, neo-historical, psychoanalytical or other perspectives. Whilst the value and validity of such approaches to literature is still a matter of some dispute, not least among classical scholars, they have had a substantial impact on the study both of classical literatures and of the mentalite of Greece and Rome. In an attempt to clarify issues in the debate, the eleven contributors to this volume were asked to produce a representative collection of essays to illustrate the applicability of some of the new approaches to Greek and Latin authors or literary forms and problems. The scope of the volume was deliberately limited to literary investigation, broadly construed, of Greek and Roman authors. Broader areas of the history and culture of the ancient world impinge in the essays, but are not their central focus. The volume also contains a separate bibliography, offering for the first time a complete bibliography of classical studies which incorporate modern critical theory.

A postmodern critical theory of research use

Abstract: The knowledge use field is in a state of conceptual disarray that has contributed to problems in the dissemination and use of knowledge. Examining the nature of knowledge in a critical realist epistemology results in a reconceptualization of knowledge use from a postmodern critical theorist perspective. This theory takes as its focus the study of research, dissemination, and use as cultural structure, ritual, and ideology; and addresses concerns about knowledge use by articulating a conceptual frame-work that triangulates among issues related to knowledge construction, power and action, and ethics and ideology, as integral to any concept of knowledge and its use.

Enlightenment for Emancipation: A Critical Theory of Self-Formation

Abstract: Family life education is a profession that endeavors to support families in their everyday challenges. Implicit in this mission is the notion that there may be discrepancies between actual and ideal family life. Historically, family life educators have assumed that if information is disseminated and foundation skills are taught, changes in everyday life will emerge (Brown, 1980; Morgaine, 1992a). Although these instrumental/technical approaches may be somewhat helpful, they tend to be limited in that they (a) teach only skills and facts, (b) assume an asocial perspective or presume that discrepancies are evidence of a family defect (Prilleltensky, 1990), (c) accept a single view of everyday realities, and (d) rely on the "expert" model in which professionals (a knowledgeable elite) tell family members how to improve their situations. Due to family life educators' current emphasis on respecting diverse realities (Fine, 1993) and empowering families (Morgaine, 1992c), many social services professionals are beginning to question indiscriminate use of instrumental/technical approaches. Osmond (1987) and Prilleltensky (1991) urge all human services professionals to adopt a theoretical perspective that is macro-sociopolitical--one in which the influence of global and political forces on everyday actions is considered. Previously, I have claimed that when the appropriate knowledge paradigm is coordinated with actual needs, praxis, "the action emerging from informed, integrated, and rational understandings" (Morgaine, 1992a, p. 13) is more likely to emerge. Likewise, our professional preparation of family life educators must move away from an indiscriminate reliance on instrumental/technical paradigms. Banks (1993) argues that students should learn to understand all forms of knowledge. Miller (1992) claims that teachers need to "excavate, reflect on, and analyze underlying assumptions, expectations, and constructions" (p. 103) of everyday life in order to become insightful about the complexities involved. Walker (1993) provides suggestions as to how family life educators can value diverse realities when teaching about families. DuBois (1993) claims that feminist approaches can illuminate the ways in which dominant members of society have perpetuated hierarchical assumptions in all aspects of institutional norms. EMERGENCE OF A CRITICAL THEORY This article presents a critical theory of self-formation. It has emerged from my use of critical social science, or a critical/emancipatory paradigm (Morgaine, 1992b, 1994), when contributing to the professional preparation of early childhood and family life educators. After a brief narrative of the emergence of this theory, I will present an overview of the theory and implications for its use by family life educators. Critical social science assumes that contemporary societies are oppressive in that they systematically encourage the development of certain societal groups at the expense of others. Feminist in its philosophical assumptions (Fay, 1977; Lather, 1991), critical social science seeks to expose the ways in which social and cultural realities may be hindering the human potential of all people. This exposure is accomplished by encouraging oppressed group members to examine societal structures as well as their own values, beliefs, and assumptions about everyday life. Critical social science is based on the belief that individuals do not need an expert to tell them what to do; they are capable of becoming enlightened about hidden influences in their own personal and social situations. It is assumed that praxis, or emancipative action toward making change, will occur once people are enlightened. I turned to critical social science when I experienced a discrepancy between my lived reality and my desired ends. My goal was to facilitate the development of early childhood and family life educators who would be capable of contributing to the holistic development of children and families. …