Max Weber’s View of Objectivity in Social Science: This essay seeks to shed light on Weber’s view of the applicability of objectivity by answering a question that dogs Weberian scholarship: Was Weber an advocate of value-free social science? Download PDF
The Myth of Psychoanalysis: Wittgenstein Contra Freud: In this essay, my central thesis is that if, as Wittgenstein says, Freudian psychoanalysis is based in myth, its application to actual psychological problems does not, indeed cannot, resolve them. Instead, all it can do is clarify them or present them in a different light. Implicit in my argument is that this is how Wittgenstein thought of the results of psychoanalysis, much like he thought of the application of his philosophical technique to philosophical problems, especially those of metaphysics, ethics, and aesthetics. As such, Wittgenstein is also subverting a larger myth: that the insights gained in psychoanalysis lead to the scientific resolution of psychological problems. Download PDF
A Wittgensteinian Approach to Discourse Analysis: This essay takes Wittgenstein’s influence on discourse analysis a step further by using his writings as the theoretical foundation for an approach to analyzing discourse that is distinct from speech act theory, which stems from the analytic tradition in philosophy. The essay suggests that a Wittgenstein-inspired approach is closer in spirit and content to that of an unlikely candidate whose views, in contrast to the analytic school, harbor a distinctly Continental flavor and influence critical theory: Mikhail Bakhtin. Download PDF
Saussure’s Sign: The sign, the signifier, and the signified are concepts of the school of thought known as structuralism, founded by Ferdinand de Saussure, a Swiss linguist, during lectures he gave between 1907 and 1911 at the University of Geneva. His views revolutionized the study of language, inaugurated modern linguistics, and influenced critical theory. The central tenet of structuralism is that the phenomena of human life are unintelligible except through their network of relationships, making the sign and the system (or structure) in which the sign is embedded primary concepts. As such, a sign–for instance, a word–gets its meaning only in relation to or in contrast with other signs in a system of signs. Download PDF
An Analysis of Kellner’s Theory of Media Culture In an era when the media have grown to be one of the most dominant forms of culture in North American — so dominant, in fact, that the they can now be seen as the pinnacle of commercial culture — an explanatory theory of the media becomes paramount. Yet considering the intimate relationship between culture and media and that, for many, the media have become their culture, a theory that views the media outside the context of culture will be afflicted with myopia. Thus, for completeness, a theory of the media requires a firm connection to culture in its every step. Douglas Kellner, in his book Media Culture: Cultural Studies, Identity and Politics Between the Modern and the Postmodern, sets out to make these connections. Download PDF
Book Review of Read All About It: The Corporate Takeover of America’s Newspapers: Read All About It: The Corporate Takeover of America’s Newspapers is an institutional acknowledgement of what many wary readers have known for years: Corporate control is ruining our daily newspapers. Download PDF
Topical Structure Analysis of Accomplished English Prose This study analyzes the topical structure of accomplished essays and compares the results with the topical structure tacitly preferred by assessors in their judgments of student essays. The paper examines whether the same patterns of topical structure that are rewarded by assessors in student writing, as reported by previous studies, are in fact used by professionals writing within a similar genre. The results of the comparison help determine the extent to which essays written for such tests as Educational Testing Service’s TOEFL Test of Written English are evaluated in accordance with the unstated norms of topical structure in comparable accomplished English prose. Download PDF
Interpretation and Indeterminacy in Discourse Analysis: This essay argues a hard line: the exact meaning of a speaker’s utterance in a contextualized exchange is often indeterminate. Interactional linguistics, however, reduces the indeterminacy and yields a more principled interpretation than other approaches to discourse analysis. Download PDF
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— Essays by Steve Hoenisch.