>Date: Mon, 18 Apr 2005 13:59:18 -0700 (PDT)
>From: Juergen Hahn <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Was Cervantes a feminist?
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Comment: DomainKeys? See http://antispam.yahoo.com/domainkeys
>Original-recipient: rfc822;[log in to unmask]
>
>I would agree that Cervantes shows among his female
>characters some which todays's feminists can find
>appealing.
>
>But, does that make him a "feminist"? Here I see an
>insurmountable problem. Like Sr. Rodriguez, I become
>uncomfortable with the application of deliberately
>anachronistic terms. How valid can any analysis be
>whose first principle is essentially flawed? There is
>a profound intellectual dishonesty in this approach.
>What right do we have to judge authors by terms they
>never heard of? Previous generations of critics at
>least had the decency to use the term "avant la
>lettre" in such discussions, and I compliment Sra.
>Rodilla for her courtesy. But since the 1970's a whole
>generation of scholars has staked its reputation on,
>and made an entire industry out of stuffing all the
>modern "isms" like Feminism, Marxism, Freudianism,
>imperialism, gay activism, etc., down the throats of
>unsuspecting authors like Cervantes and Shakespeare,
>and then passing judgment. And to make this dishonest
>practice seem at least superficially plausible they
>invented the equally anachronistic period term "Early
>Modern". Ah, if only Cervantes and Shakespeare had
>been enlightened enough, like us superior Moderns,
>surely they would have agreed to our dogmatic social
>improvement program?
>
>This dishonst practice is so widespread now,
>especially in the most elite universities like
>Stanford (where I experienced it personally) and the
>MLA, that any disagreement is plainly regarded as
>"Quixotic." Lenin, I believe, stated sinisterly that
>he who controls the discourse, controls society. And
>if you don't like it, off with you to the intellectual
>Gulag. Clearly, tilting at windmills has to be
>reinvented, but who will take up the charge? Don
>Quijote, where are you when we need you?
>
>Juergen Hahn
>City College of San Francisco