Where There's Smoke, There's IreAuthor(s): Gerd SchroeterSource: The Canadian Journal of Sociology / Cahiers canadiens de sociologie, Vol. 9, No. 2(Spring, 1984), pp. 193-194Published by: Canadian Journal of SociologyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3340215 .

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a non-objective and hostile criticism by those who might sympathize with any of the orientations I attack.

Brandon University Damic Mirkovic

Where there's smoke, there's ire

There is nothing that I wish to add to my review of Dialectic and Sociologi- cal Thought. I am glad that Professor Mirkovic has taken it seriously enough to respond, but I find some of his insinuations extreme, and I do not under- stand why he resorts to such violent language (e.g., "destroying," "assassinat- ing"). Surely we can argue without fighting! Launching into a diatribe about who is more antifascist or more procapitalist is hardly germane to evaluating the merits of his book. Whether I have done a greater disservice (whatever that implies) to the readers of this Journal, by writing the review the way I did, than he has done to sociology in Canada by allowing the manuscript to be published in such an embryonic form, could be a matter of debate, but is not particularly relevant, either.

I believe I made clear that - since this is the only indigenous book on the topic of dialectic - I approached it with enthusiasm and high hopes, only to have them dashed after the first few pages. To demonstrate that I did not read it superficially, however, I indicated a number of the inconsisten- cies, examples of misinformation, and sheer errors of interpretation, which an audience made up largely of sociologists might appreciate. This may verge on nit-picking, but it is far from hair-splitting, since the book is alleg- edly about dialectic and sociological thought, and the author himself chose to include those details.' A central difficulty throughout the book is sharply mirrored in Professor Mirkovic's reference to his "precise tentative defini- tion" [sic]; much of the discussion appears to be so tentative that the "real substance of the book" (the noumenal book, perhaps?) remains hidden. He lists several criticisms which he appears to accept as legitimate, but I actu- ally made these very points in my own way. Thus, he suggests: (1) too broad a conception of dialectics (I wrote: "adopts a 'cafeteria approach"'); (2) rely- ing on too many quotations ("relies heavily on secondary sources"); (3) con- taining generalizations too broad ("highly eclectic and lacks theoretical stringency"); and (4) sections that may in fact be unclear ("ambivalent, opaque and often confusing"). Doesn't this suggest that we both agree on some of the most obvious weaknesses?

It is true that I do not like the book, and that I would not assign it to stu- dents nor encourage anyone to buy it. I believe that Professor Mirkovic was

a non-objective and hostile criticism by those who might sympathize with any of the orientations I attack.

Brandon University Damic Mirkovic

Where there's smoke, there's ire

There is nothing that I wish to add to my review of Dialectic and Sociologi- cal Thought. I am glad that Professor Mirkovic has taken it seriously enough to respond, but I find some of his insinuations extreme, and I do not under- stand why he resorts to such violent language (e.g., "destroying," "assassinat- ing"). Surely we can argue without fighting! Launching into a diatribe about who is more antifascist or more procapitalist is hardly germane to evaluating the merits of his book. Whether I have done a greater disservice (whatever that implies) to the readers of this Journal, by writing the review the way I did, than he has done to sociology in Canada by allowing the manuscript to be published in such an embryonic form, could be a matter of debate, but is not particularly relevant, either.

I believe I made clear that - since this is the only indigenous book on the topic of dialectic - I approached it with enthusiasm and high hopes, only to have them dashed after the first few pages. To demonstrate that I did not read it superficially, however, I indicated a number of the inconsisten- cies, examples of misinformation, and sheer errors of interpretation, which an audience made up largely of sociologists might appreciate. This may verge on nit-picking, but it is far from hair-splitting, since the book is alleg- edly about dialectic and sociological thought, and the author himself chose to include those details.' A central difficulty throughout the book is sharply mirrored in Professor Mirkovic's reference to his "precise tentative defini- tion" [sic]; much of the discussion appears to be so tentative that the "real substance of the book" (the noumenal book, perhaps?) remains hidden. He lists several criticisms which he appears to accept as legitimate, but I actu- ally made these very points in my own way. Thus, he suggests: (1) too broad a conception of dialectics (I wrote: "adopts a 'cafeteria approach"'); (2) rely- ing on too many quotations ("relies heavily on secondary sources"); (3) con- taining generalizations too broad ("highly eclectic and lacks theoretical stringency"); and (4) sections that may in fact be unclear ("ambivalent, opaque and often confusing"). Doesn't this suggest that we both agree on some of the most obvious weaknesses?

It is true that I do not like the book, and that I would not assign it to stu- dents nor encourage anyone to buy it. I believe that Professor Mirkovic was

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ill-advised to submit it for publication in its present format, but also that he was badly served by his publisher. However, by being critical I do not want to discourage him. At a time when books are being published with such misleading titles as Toward a Dialectic of Heart Attacks, we certainly need

greater precision and clarity on this subject. After all, things have not im- proved since Socrates asked: "Aren't you aware how much mischief is associ- ated with dialectic?" (Incidentally, the statement to which Professor Mirkovic objects so strongly that he has used it for the title of his response, is not mine, but derives from Engels, who restated the Monsieur Jourdain prob- lem this way: "People thought dialectically long before they knew what dia- lectic was, just as they were already speaking in prose long before the term prose existed.") I look forward to a second, revised, and greatly improved edition, and will be happy to provide other examples of errors and oversights.

Lakehead University Gerd Schroeter

1. To focus on only one example. Unless the author now wants to draw a sharp distinction be- tween Marx and Marxism (which is certainly not found throughout his book), how can he pos- sibly reconcile his statement above that "nowhere do I claim that Park's thinking comes close to a Marxist perspective," with the claim found on page 123: "Of particular interest here is the structure of Park's thought, which we may say, without seriously stretching the imagination, comes close to Marx's dialectical model"? My point was that Park's thought approached nei- ther a Marxian nor a Marxist model (or perspective). Why is this haughtily dismissed as "an unpardonable impuration"?

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