Cynical theories : how activist scholarship made everything about race, gender, and identity - and why this harms everybody
Postmodernism Philosophy, Modern Authoritarianism Deconstruction Sociolinguistics e-böcker
Pitchstone publishing
2020
EISBN 9781800750050
Introduction.
Postmodernism: a revolution in knowledge and power.
Postmodernism's applied turn: making oppression real.
Postcolonial theory: deconstructing the West to save the other.
Queer theory: freedom from the normal.
Critical race theory and intersectionality: ending racism by seeing it everywhere.
Feminisms and gender studies: simplification as sophistication.
Disability and fat studies: support-group identity theory.
Social justice scholarship and thought: the truth according to social justice.
Social justice in action: theory always looks good on paper.
An alternative to the ideology of social justice: liberalism without identity politics.
BOOK OF THE YEAR in The Times, the Sunday Times and the Financial Times Have you heard that language is violence and that science is sexist? Or been told that being obese is healthy, that there is no such thing as biological sex, or that only white people can be racist? Are you confused by these ideas, and do you wonder how they have managed so quickly to challenge the very logic of Western society? Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay document the evolution of the dogma behind these ideas, from its origins in French postmodernism to its refinement within activist academic fields. Today this dogma is recognisable as much by its effects, such as cancel culture and social-media pile-ons, as by its assertions, which are all too often taken as read: knowledge is a social construct; science and reason are tools of oppression; all human interactions are sites of oppressive power play; and language is dangerous. As they warn, the unchecked proliferation of these beliefs present a threat to liberal democracy. While acknowledging the need to challenge the complacency of those who think a just society has been fully achieved, Pluckrose and Lindsay break down how often-radical activist scholarship does far more harm than good, not least to those marginalised communities it claims to champion--
Postmodernism: a revolution in knowledge and power.
Postmodernism's applied turn: making oppression real.
Postcolonial theory: deconstructing the West to save the other.
Queer theory: freedom from the normal.
Critical race theory and intersectionality: ending racism by seeing it everywhere.
Feminisms and gender studies: simplification as sophistication.
Disability and fat studies: support-group identity theory.
Social justice scholarship and thought: the truth according to social justice.
Social justice in action: theory always looks good on paper.
An alternative to the ideology of social justice: liberalism without identity politics.
BOOK OF THE YEAR in The Times, the Sunday Times and the Financial Times Have you heard that language is violence and that science is sexist? Or been told that being obese is healthy, that there is no such thing as biological sex, or that only white people can be racist? Are you confused by these ideas, and do you wonder how they have managed so quickly to challenge the very logic of Western society? Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay document the evolution of the dogma behind these ideas, from its origins in French postmodernism to its refinement within activist academic fields. Today this dogma is recognisable as much by its effects, such as cancel culture and social-media pile-ons, as by its assertions, which are all too often taken as read: knowledge is a social construct; science and reason are tools of oppression; all human interactions are sites of oppressive power play; and language is dangerous. As they warn, the unchecked proliferation of these beliefs present a threat to liberal democracy. While acknowledging the need to challenge the complacency of those who think a just society has been fully achieved, Pluckrose and Lindsay break down how often-radical activist scholarship does far more harm than good, not least to those marginalised communities it claims to champion--
