Beyond ``identity'' ROGERS BRUBAKER and FREDERICKCOOPER
نویسنده
چکیده
`̀ The worst thing one can do with words,'' wrote George Orwell a half a century ago, ``is to surrender to them.'' If language is to be `̀ an instrument for expressing and not for concealing or preventing thought,'' he continued, one must `̀ let the meaning choose the word, and not the other way about.'' The argument of this article is that the social sciences and humanities have surrendered to the word `̀ identity''; that this has both intellectual and political costs; and that we can do better. `̀ Identity,'' we argue, tends to mean too much (when understood in a strong sense), too little (when understood in a weak sense), or nothing at all (because of its sheer ambiguity).We take stock of the conceptual and theoretical work `̀ identity'' is supposed to do and suggest that this work might be done better by other terms, less ambiguous, and unencumbered by the reifying connotations of `̀ identity.''
منابع مشابه
Beyond ``identity'' ROGERS BRUBAKER and FREDERICKCOOPER
`̀ The worst thing one can do with words,'' wrote George Orwell a half a century ago, ``is to surrender to them.'' If language is to be `̀ an instrument for expressing and not for concealing or preventing thought,'' he continued, one must `̀ let the meaning choose the word, and not the other way about.'' The argument of this article is that the social sciences and humanities have surrendered to th...
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