That Obscure Object of Discipline (was lingua franca on "stars" in academia)

[d-m-c at worldnet.att.net]

>1. English has an obscure object of discipline. 'Hard' sciences and even
>social sciences seem (at least to outsiders) to possess relatively clearly
>defined objects of 'expert knowledge.' Moreover, what they do tends to have
>much more direct material and ideological relations to capitalist
>production, social reproduction, and legitimation than the study of English
>does. What are these things called literature, culture, art, or worse yet,
>'discourse'? Who can define them? And if you can't define them, why create
>a discipline that does not have a clearly defined object of study? (Is it
>some kind of con game?) 

yes, it's a con game.  this is true for both phys and social science and
thus for the humanities.  Nonetheless, I would like to know the dynamics of
an epistemology that does not also at least imply and thus require an
ontology.