From steven@sizcol1.u-shizuoka-ken.ac.jp Sun Feb 13 00:03:07 2000 Received: from mxu1.u.washington.edu (mxu1.u.washington.edu [140.142.32.8]) by lists.u.washington.edu (8.9.3+UW99.09/8.9.3+UW99.09) with ESMTP id AAA53880 for ; Sun, 13 Feb 2000 00:03:06 -0800 Received: from ham.t.u-shizuoka-ken.ac.jp (sizcol.u-shizuoka-ken.ac.jp [133.33.105.11]) by mxu1.u.washington.edu (8.9.3+UW99.09/8.9.3+UW99.09) with ESMTP id AAA00838 for ; Sun, 13 Feb 2000 00:03:04 -0800 Received: from steven ([133.33.106.107]) by ham.t.u-shizuoka-ken.ac.jp (8.9.3/3.7W-98122215) with ESMTP id RAA12171 for ; Sun, 13 Feb 2000 17:03:03 +0900 (JST) Message-Id: <200002130803.RAA12171@ham.t.u-shizuoka-ken.ac.jp> From: "Steven J. Willett" To: classics@u.washington.edu Date: Sun, 13 Feb 2000 17:12:55 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: Re: Those darling dildoes Reply-to: steven@sizcol1.u-shizuoka-ken.ac.jp In-reply-to: X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Win32 (v3.12b) On 12 Feb 00, at 12:26, Julilla1@aol.com wrote: > Here again, the pagan chick uninvolved in any University studies and > therefore not in the "System" must ask: Is this really called for? I've > noticed something quite troubling on this list. It seems that any time > Judith Hallett responds to anything, someone jumps right in and tries to tear > her up. Personally, I thank the gods for Judy and her intellectual > compatriots. It is time that someone looked at what women have to do with > ancient history besides being slaves, concubines and wicked empresses. As a > woman, I deeply appreciate being able to read a woman's interpretation. > Don't get me wrong, I love you men in the field, but this olisbos subject is > a perfect example of how men might see one thing and women another. Might be, but isn't in this case. JH, who can take care of herself, violated the basic principles of evidence. I addressed that narrowly. If she thinks otherwise, she will certainly respond. You wrote nothing to the point. The Classics list is mostly populated by exceptionally well-educated academics with a wide range of reading, languages, experience and humor. Anyone who gasses or behaves like a plonker will face the consequences. If you feel obliged to support her, try framing a specific argument based on the texts. > Prof. Willet, surely you see that such an emotional response would actually > feed into the fires of many of the Feminists you so obviously despise. Your > response smacks of "I will not accept anything those Feminists say, nor even > consider it." And the Feminist response would likely be "What can you expect > from a man?" Not emotional in the slightest, just hard cold fact. You're obviously ignorant of threads on this subject over the past six years, and probably ignorant of the Classical scholarship produced by certain feminists, so let me lower you gently to some hard earth, hoping no plonk resounds. I haven't the slightest problem with feminist Classical scholars--I have no interest in generic feminists--who use the tools of the trade properly. But there is a rather large group who look at our Classical heritage as little more than a source of evidence to use against men, logic, patriarchy and any other currently fashionable hanger for despite. The Phallogocentric Temperance Union. Their goal is to dry out penetrationists-- and embargo logic as a danger to sound morals. Among this group, it is quite literally not considered proper to enjoy a large range of literature thought demeaning to women. High on the hate list is Latin poetry, but then the list is really longer than Leporello's. Enjoyment would be a violation of their gender identity politics. Some of these like to decouple truth from objectivity, deny the validity of fact, extract a mountain of certitude from a midge of text, practice the new art of confessional scholarship and generally play fast and loose with reasoning. Those of us who dislike this pseudoscholarship have no problem with uncomfortable findings that rest on careful research. Adesso, voi che sapete... ========================================== Steven J. Willett University of Shizuoka, Hamamatsu Campus 2-3 Nunohashi 3-chome Hamamatsu City, Japan 432-8012 Voice: (53) 457-4514; Fax: (53) 457-4514 Japan email: steven@sizcol1.u-shizuoka-ken.ac.jp US email: sjwillett@earthlink.net .