The Butler did it (Signifying Nothing: how does saying nothing at all become so loud?)

Thursday, 3 June 2004

The Butler did it

Both Dan Drezner and Amanda Butler (Dan’s research assistant) respond to some grade-A dipshittery from commenters with ideological axes to grind who are pissed off that the empirical results of Dan’s survey don’t comport with their normative views of how the universe ought to be.

First to the point that Amanda’s work amounts to nothing more than “secretarial” labor. Every political scientist, social scientist, or scientist period worth his or her salt has worked as a research assistant—collecting data, photocopying articles, and compiling bibliographies. I’ve done it, Dan did it, and everyone else with a Ph.D. next to their name has done it. To an extent, this is a menial task, but it’s also valuable training—since 95% of social scientists don’t get the research support they need to publish, they need a sound background in doing this. And to finish your dissertation, you need to know the skills learned as a research assistant. In fact, I’d argue the role of a RA is a much less menial task than that of a teaching assistant, whose job is usually confined to grading papers, passing out materials, and proctoring exams.

Second, for Dan to entrust an undergraduate with the role of a research assistant is a compliment to that undergraduate’s abilities. To my knowledge, the University of Chicago (unlike, say, 95% of departments) is not hurting for graduate students who are already being paid to do this work.

Last, I think this entire exchange solidifies my long-standing impression that those who promulgate the fraudulent philosophy known as post-modernism—to a person—reject the ideals of absolute truth and empirical research simply because those methods of inquiry clearly show reality to be at odds with their normative beliefs about what that reality is.

5 comments:

Any views expressed in these comments are solely those of their authors; they do not reflect the views of the authors of Signifying Nothing, unless attributed to one of us.

1. Spencer wrote @ Thu, 3 Jun 2004, 4:58 pm CDT:

I agree whole-heartedly with 75% of your post, but…

I can’t quite figure out how that last point rises out of your previous ones, or what postmodernism has to do with the strict binarism of Feministe.

I mean, if post-structuralism = postmodernism, wouldn’t it work against the very rigid distinctions that Wilson makes? You could argue they’re operating out of some kind of institution/marginalization power-structure paradigm, I guess…but it seems a stretch—& anyway, that’s old-school Foucault & more structuralist than not. More likely, to this innocent bystander, is the possibility that you assign to postmodernism all the many arguments you find lacking. That, of course, becomes a way of ensuring you never find any value….

2. Chris Lawrence wrote @ Fri, 4 Jun 2004, 1:23 am CDT:

After reading your more lengthy remarks at your blog, I think I understand where you’re coming from. Hopefully I can clear things up.

I don’t have an encyclopedic knowledge of postmodernism, and it could very well be that the self-proclaimed “pomos” in political science and the study of government, as represented by the left wing of the “Perestroika” movement (who are the more accurate target of my ire; the right wing generally consists of normative political theorists who study conservative thought) do not represent post-modernist thought in general, or may just be very poor scholars to begin with (witness the confusion of many members of this community in even identifying the basic strands of thought in modern political science).

3. Spencer wrote @ Fri, 4 Jun 2004, 7:58 am CDT:

Chris…

Thanks for the clarification…I’m completely with you on the way in which po-mo theory can be used to hide a lack of rigor (& believe me, it’s not just in political theory)...I think I was more worried by the “to a person” part of the comment…

I’m not quite sure why anyone would want to use, say, post-structuralism to analyze government. Any suggestions on who I might look to for answers? Any names you might give me to get a better idea of what you’re talking about?

Thanks.
Enjoying your blog.

4. Spencer wrote @ Fri, 4 Jun 2004, 5:36 pm CDT:

I followed your links…which helped immensely in limning what exactly (or inexactly) has been labeled po-mo with regard to PoliSci/Theory/Etc. Fascinating. Thanks a bunch. And sorry for my insolence (........if it read as such.)

5. Chris Lawrence wrote @ Fri, 4 Jun 2004, 8:48 pm CDT:

Insolence? Hardly ☺.

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