scholarship. According to one panelist, reflexivity involves being
“self-conscious about the very nature of historical narratives, about
one’s own practice when one inserts oneself into the telling of his-
tory...Because these kinds of academic practices are cultural prac-
tices, you know, they’re not natural, they have their own culture...
What’s involved in being theoretically astute is that this is a form of
ongoing self-criticism.” To this, he opposes an unsophisticated pro-
posal that he defines as one devoid of theory, that is “just kind of
seat-of-the-pants descriptive scholarship...itisreallyunclear what
is the guiding principle organizing the study. It’s sort of popular chit-
chat...itstruckmeasscholarship lite.” Thus, for some evaluators,
the proper use of theory may play a crucial role in pushing a pro-
posal above the proverbial line of funded projects. What may be seen
by humanists as essential positioning and self-reflexivity will be
viewed as narcissistic self-indulgence by more positivist social scien-
tists. Unavoidable differences affect outcomes, but as we saw in
Chapter 4, the influence of individual tastes is counterbalanced by
cognitive contextualization and rules about consistency.
If theory is deemed essential by many, panelists, especially histori-
ans, also heavily criticize the abuse of theory. In fact, panelists appear
to be more aggravated by this failing than by most others. An English
scholar condemns this practice in strong moral terms:
Clarity trumps elegance, even in the English proposals, because
what are we all doing if we’re trying to build knowledge and [if ]
we can’t communicate...[?]IfIfeelsomeone’susing the jargon
just to throw it around and say “I read Gayatri Spivak,” forget it,
that dog’s not going to hunt with me...NowdoIwant to use a
word as strong as dishonesty? It’s a kind of trying to parade a sup-
posed sophistication...It’salso a kind of superficiality or lazi-
ness, not wanting to really think through either a theoretical
proposition or the application of it...I’mnotanti-theory at allRecognizing Various Kinds of Excellence / 185