--- Betty Ragan ragan@sdc.org wrote: > Fiona Moore wrote:
Sally and Betty were mature enough to take me at
my
word, and provide me with intelligent and sensible answers, rather than making nasty
overgeneralisations
about social scientists.
In my case, this may have less to do with "maturity" than with the fact that I'm quite happy to have the metaphorical electrodes stuck in. (Heck, I'd probably volunteer for the *literal* electrodes if they'd let me in on the results.)
:)!
This is true with me too, flamewars aside. I do actually participate in colleagues' studies and surveys when asked, on the grounds that:
a) if you don't help other people with their projects, they won't help you with yours, and
b) I find, whatever other people may think aside, that having myself analysed in this way can give me new insights into what makes me tick (as my sister once said on the subject of volunteering for a project on stress in universities: "Hey, free therapy!")
the lines of "Here, sure, let me help you with those electrodes. Can I probe *your* brain next, please?"
Which is in my experience usually what happens. As I said, most social scientists are quite kindly and interested people who get genuinely shocked (pardon the pun) when accused of treating people like subjects. My department, in fact, once tried to commission an American anthropologist to come in and study *it* (on the grounds that an anthropology of anthropologists was long overdue), but couldn't get funding.
It comes as a bit of a surprise to
me, really, to see how defensive other people can get about being put "under scrutiny," although I can certainly understand it now that I think about it...
Me too, on both scores, which I suppose can be put down to sheer scientific naivete on my part. I suppose I've been rather lucky in that I haven't had to encounter that attitude very much in my professional life...
Anyway, thanks once again for your answer. It left me, as I said, with new insights into why some people like H/C, and also into where my own prejudices on the subject were coming from. Certainly, if I've ever dismissed a story in the past on the grounds that it was H/C, I'm more likely to take a good hard look at it now...
Fiona
The Posthumous Memoirs of Secretary Rontane Available for public perusal at http://nyder.r67.net
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