No disagreement here. I simply wished to state clearly what sort of theory we (the broadly defined feminist left) need.
At 9:56 AM -0800 3/30/03, andie nachgeborenen wrote:
>>The "psycho-sexual" as explanans, in my view, cannot explain
>>historical changes and synchronic cultural differences.
>
>I never said it could, all by itself. i said it was an important
>explantory factor.
As an independent variable in statistical analysis, for instance?
At 9:56 AM -0800 3/30/03, andie nachgeborenen wrote:
>>Luker examines the "psycho-sexual" as explananda, but she doesn't
>>use it as explanans. I've already described her descriptions and
>>explanations and offered what political insights we may gain from
>>them:
>
>I think you misread Luker by overintellectualizing her subjects. As
>I read her, the antis are people who, having made a choice for
>motherhood and having given up a lot in terms of potential
>self-realization for it, come to naturalize their choice by seeing
>itr as inevitable and God-commanded, and so view the very idea that
>there is a choice as a threat
Suppose, for the sake of argument, that your interpretation of Luker's work is better than mine. What political implications follow from her work? How would you go about the work of defending and expanding reproductive rights and freedoms, having learned from her work? My interpretation of her work suggests a certain course of action we may take (which I've stated in my previous posts), so as not to make the idea of "choice" a threat to working-class women. Does yours?
At 9:56 AM -0800 3/30/03, andie nachgeborenen wrote:
>Part of your fundamental confusion is that your identify
>explanations with causes, and then compound the error by treating
>reductive explanations as causal.
With regard to social theory (which I've thought of as the question at stake here), I am interested in causal explanations of the reductive sort capable of accounting for historical changes and cross-cultural differences, as such tend to suggest what can be politically done about explananda. There's nothing wrong with using a pragmatic standard in social theory choice, is there? -- Yoshie
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