I'll throw my 2 cents in here.
1st I think Al Bergesen's article in Protosoziologie is quite good on
this topic: the < 25 version: po-mo, deconstruct etc, is a SYMPTOM of
hegemonic decline and lack of hegemon in the core.
If Immanual W is online, may he can point us to his address from fall '96
ASA paper. One of his memorable lines, in paraphrase was:
I appreciate some of their critiques. They are important. But they have
not said anything we did not say earlier and better.
That, too, is my take on all this. It is ironic, and tragic as Nikolai
just said, that lit-crit types discovered anthro & cultural relativism a
few years back and have turned it into a fad, that is now infecting
social sciences.
However, contral Nikolai, I think it is a "project" that has peaked, for
precisely the reasons Nikolai pointed out: it has gotten nowhere fast.
tom hall
Thomas D. [tom] Hall
thall@depauw.edu
Department of Sociology
DePauw University
Greencastle, IN 46135
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http://www.depauw.edu/~thall/hp1.htm