matching tracksuits

I did some reading yesterday afternoon/last night — Talcott Parsons. It’s something of a critique of Durkheim’s theories. The problem is that I really don’t know enough about Durkheim’s thoughts to be able to see the points he’s making. I understand to some degree, but at the same time I have a little trouble figuring out what’s Parsons’ thoughts (i.e., critique of Durkheim) and what’s simply restating D’s ideas (i.e., explication). And of course there’s the whole issue of the academic voice that makes it incredibly boring reading: “In spite of these legitimate ethical objections the immense sociological importance of Durkheim’s work must not be lost sight of.” This simply makes me want to scream. Why not simply say, “We shouldn’t lose sight of . . .” or even “Social scientists should not lose sight of . . .” There’s just something about the whole tone of the article/chapter that makes it dizzingly tiring. One has to struggle with almost every sentence with all the subordinate clauses and generally poor writing.

Why is it that academia compels itself to write in such an obfuscating fashion that, unless one is not well versed in the tools and lexical developments of the particular field in question and has read said field’s entire canon (and this is not to say that those not inducted into the field in any way is somehow lacking cognitive abilities, a conclusion that, regrettably, many scholars seem drawn toward), it is completely illegible? Even when I try, as in that example, to write so pompously, I fail miserably. That’s a good sign . . .

I think of writers like Peter Berger who share incredibly profound thoughts in their writing without sounding so ridiculous — it makes me wonder why the hell everyone can’t write like that. I guess they get so involved in their research that they never bother taking courses on or reading books about good writing. Of course once you read enough of it, you tend to start writing like that yourself. It’s a sort of stylistic blackhole.

And to what end? It doesn’t seem to do much for me other than torture me — force me to struggle through something on a Saturday afternoon that I could probably read in a few moments if it were written in a little clearer fashion. I can’t understand this need, though. Granted there’s a lot of shorthand that needs to be in academic writing, but that doesn’t mean the whole thing has to be so muddy.

Last night during class Dr. Seligman asked a question that has remained unasked all semester: “Did you read this?” He didn’t of course ask me in particular, but the whole class. And when did he ask this? The one class for which I hadn’t read every single word assigned. In fact, I only read one article — a bit from Durkheim’s Sociology and Philosophy. It was a little embarrassing. “This won’t do,” he said when he saw how few hands went up for the Parson’s reading. “No, it won’t,” I though, and I immediately felt like an idiot for not having gotten my packet or readings earlier.

One of the things he talked about during class that wasn’t in the reading was Durkheim on suicide. Durkheim found within the notion and statistics of suicide a “proof” that society exists. There are those — Margaret Thatcher among them — even today who feel that we’re just a collection of individuals, that “society doesn’t exist.” (I won’t really comment on how shockingly medieval such a notion seems to me.) Durkheim points out that suicide is the most personal of acts imaginable. There is nothing more intimate and individual than the taking of one’s life. If there is no such thing as society, then the distribution within suicide rates should be completely random. There shouldn’t be different levels of suicide within different cultures — or between different groups of the same culture. However, there are. More Protestants tend to kill themselves than Catholics, for example. This shows that even in the most intimate of acts, there are social forces at work.

“Well, this is just illustrative of differences in theology,” one might argue. But it’s more than that, I think. Both Catholics and Protestants (by and large) believe that suicides go to hell — not much difference in theology there. But look at the differences in social stigma: a Catholic suicide won’t get a church funeral in some places; a Catholic suicide isn’t buried in the main, “blessed” portion of the cemetery but in a corner designated for the “sin” of suicide; Catholicism (though now a stereotype) plays more heavily on guilt than Protestantism. And so on. This shows that there is something at work other than the individual’s thoughts and desperation. It’s really quite ingenious.

Dr. Seligman said something else — more in passing than anything else — which stuck in my mind. He was discussing the fact that sociology and other social sciences deal with “facts” in a way that the humanities don’t. Facts, data, statistics — whatever. At any rate, he said, “If John [Clayton] were here, I would add, ‘Not like those in the humanities, who just tell stories.’”' This leads me back to my thoughts concerning philosophy of religion versus sociology of religion. I really need to talk to someone about this to see if in the latter I could still deal with the issues of the former which interest me: knowledge, language, &c. I was going to talk to Dr. Seligman about this, but I still haven’t emailed him to set up some kind of appointment. I should do that today — this week at the very latest.