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[to history grrrl]

See the appreciation of C. Wright Mills in Scott McLemee's column in insidehighered.com, Nov. 22.

[%sig%]

[to history grrrl]

> "learning." It included words like presentist, historicize,
> problematize, and neopositivist. I think there were about 25

Yes, that's what I would consider jargon, I think, words derived from theoretical discourse.  I'm not sure I would consider a major philosophical concept jargon, though, even if I didn't know anything about it (and really, I discovered Kant's categorical imperative in a detective novel, so what I know about it is pretty much....nothing!).

[Velvet Elvis]

Some concepts are well-defined and abused, and they become jaron through abuse.  Some are just jargon.  

Jargon: "narrativize"="narrate" with extra syllables.  

Concepts that become jargon through abuse: "Problematize"="make into a problem" but most people use it just to mean "criticize."  "theorize"="to make a theory" but most people mean it simply as "comment".  "Hegemonic" has a rich intellectual history but most people use it as a synonym for "dominant."  Etc.

Oh, and for the poster above.  "Postmodernism" has no common, accepted definition among either advocates or detractors.  Not all people who are routinely grouped under the label "postmodern" would agree with the tenets of standpoint theory.  "Standpoint theory," on the other hand, refers to a much more specific body of scholarship and does represent, well, a specific standpoint on the problem of epistemology, ie., how you know what you know.


VE.