Stuart Hall’s intellectual habit was opening problems and moving on, not solving them

Evidence

But when he discovered that the terms of reference required the nominee to demonstrate that they had “definitively solved an identifiable problem in communications research,” he chuckled, declaring that he couldn’t possibly accept the nomination, insofar as solving preestablished problems had never been something that interested him, as opposed to deconstructing their changing nature and/or reformulating the questions we might ask about them. Indeed, he saw the terms of reference of this award as representing almost a direct antithesis to the pattern of his own working career—in which he always felt most comfortable opening up theoretical problems in one field and then moving on, leaving others to pursue, in their own ways, the issues he had raised. — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 49

Categorization

• DEFINE: Captures Hall’s self-definition of intellectual work as deconstructing and reformulating problems rather than solving preestablished ones.
• XREF: Connects to the Frankfurt School circle’s view of theory as perpetually reopened critique rather than completed system.