> Carrol Cox wrote:
>
>> If "socially constructed" means the same as "historically created,"
>> why do we need both terms? Answer, "social construction" is a weasel
>> term designed to dissolve history.
>
could it not be held that "social construction" has the same general meaning as "historically created" but additionally points out that the historical creation has been carried out by society i.e., through the conscious (to use another confusing term) choice of peoples, not by the deterministic progression of the universe (of course the people are part of the universe but it would be a difficult and perhaps impossible act to perform the necessary reductions). i am probably being clueless here and can be accused of
not differentiating between natural history and cultural history.
--ravi