Definitions can be held provisionally and polemically without belief in essence

Evidence

My own definition of a woman is very simple: it rests on the word “man” as used in the texts that provide the foundation for the corner of the literary criticism establishment that I inhabit. … Here I must repeat some deconstructive lessons learned over the past decade that I often repeat. One, no rigorous definition of anything is ultimately possible, so that if one wants to, one could go on deconstructing the opposition between man and woman, and finally show that it is a binary opposition that displaces itself. Therefore, “as a deconstructivist,” I cannot recommend that kind of dichotomy at all, yet, I feel that definitions are necessary in order to keep us going, to allow us to take a stand. The only way that I can see myself making definitions is in a provisional and polemical one: I construct my definition as a woman not in terms of a woman’s putative essence but in terms of words currently in use. — Donna Landry and Gerald MacLean, The Spivak Reader, 453

Categorization

• XREF: Central to the reader’s strategic-essentialism genealogy: this is Spivak’s own early articulation of ‘constructing definition not in terms of essence’ — the antecedent of the term she coins in ‘Subaltern Studies: Deconstructing Historiography.’, — connects to: Essentialist-sounding definitions can be adopted provisionally without belief in essence — Donna Landry and Gerald MacLean, The Spivak Reader: Selected Works of…, 453; Polemical labels gain no theoretical validity by being deployed earnestly — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures, 374; Lochner is merely one example in which a false assertion of inexorability is decried as formalistic. Much contemporary criticism of Blackstone, Langdell, and others of their persuasion attacks their jurisprudence on similar grounds. They stand accused of presenting contestable applications of general terms as definitionally incorporated within the meaning of the general term. It is important, however, to understand the relationship between the linguistic and the ontological questions for those of Blackstone’s vision. Blackstone’s view that certain abstract terms definitionally incorporate a wide range of specific results is tied intimately to his perception of a hard and suprahuman reality behind these general terms. If the word ‘property,’ for example, actually describes some underlying and noncontingent reality, then it follows easily that certain specific embodiments are necessarily part of that reality, just as pelicans are part of the underlying reality that is the universe of birds. These instantiations might still follow even if the general term is not a natural kind whose existence and demarcation is beyond the control of human actors. There is nothing natural or noncontingent about the term ‘basketball,’ but it is nevertheless an error in this culture at this time to apply that word to a group of people hitting small hard balls with one of a collection of fourteen different sticks. Still, linguistic clarity and rigidity are both facilitated insofar as the words track the natural kinds of the world. To the extent that Blackstone and others believed that categories like liberty, property, and contract were natural kinds rather than human artifacts, they were less likely to perceive the choices we would now not think to deny. When one believes that a general term reflects a deep reality beyond the power of human actors, the view that certain particulars are necessarily part of that reality follows with special ease.
• DEFINE: Shows the provisional/polemical definitional stance that underlies strategic essentialism before that term was coined.

Broader Connections

• Essentialist-sounding definitions can be adopted provisionally without belief in essence #corroborates (1.00) — Donna Landry and Gerald MacLean, The Spivak Reader, 453
• Lochner is merely one example in which a false assertion of inexorability is decried as formalistic. Much contemporary criticism of Blackstone, Langdell, and others of their persuasion attacks… #expands (0.80)
• Polemical labels gain no theoretical validity by being deployed earnestly #qualifies (0.75) — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 374