> I am a staunch supporter of the institionalist model, but that is not my
> main reason of wanting to puke each time I hear the word "culture." The
> main reason is that "studying culture" is often an excuse for not doing a
> serious emprical science, but high brow journalism instead. It is one
> thing to, say, watch a movie and then to review and critique it in a Sunday
> edition of the local paper - which is a legitimate pursuit - and it is a
> quite different thing to do the same, then habermasize it by throwing a few
> obscure words and a lots of citations, and call it "research," "sociology,"
> or "critical theory." I often have an impression that overly ambitious
> people unwilling or unable to do a serious analytical and empirical
> research work substitute that inability or unwillingness with cultural
> commentaries which they call science but which are NOT science. That is
> why I often sympathize with hanns Johst (an otherwise despicable nazi
> playwright) who wrote "Wenn Ich Kultur hoere, entsichere ich meinen
> Browning." Ok, I do not have a Browning (or any equivalent), I just want
> to puke.
Is this - it's "an excuse for not doing a serious empirical science" made by "people unwilling or unable to do serious analytical and empirical research work" - an "institutionalist" explanation of "studying culture"? What is the institutionalist explanation of the activity of devising institutionalist explanations? I can see why you want to puke.
Ted