Talk:Anthony Giddens

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Contents 1 Questions 2 Failed GA 3 Failed GA nom and adding POV tag 4 Article Cleanup Co-Ordination Point 4.1 Discussion 5 Cleanup

[edit] Questions

I am expanding this stub, but there are few things in his writings I don't understand. Namely:

1. If there are "no universal stages, or periodization, of social development" than how can he differentiate between pre-modern/modern/late modern societies at all?
2. His concept of importance of 'time-space' in the structurization theory still eludes me.

--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 00:55, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Failed GA

Here's my reasoning:

• There is only one picture of him, and it is fair use, not GFDL.
• Possibly too long, consider condensing.
• Could use a thorough copyedit by a third person familiar with this topic (I'm not), as much of this article has been written by one person.
• Select Bibliography may be too long, and needs ISBNs.
• Too many redlinks.

It certainly has a lot of information, though. It's well on its way. Just needs a bit more time and TLC. —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 16:18, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Tnx. Picture is a though one: I cannot find any copyleft ones with him on it. I'll try to address the others before PR.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 17:27, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Update: can't find another image, can't get copyleft license for it. Can't find anybody else to work on it. ISBNs are optional. I did what I could during the PR/FAC rounds, including dealing with redlinks: do you think it passes the GA criteria now?--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 03:27, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Failed GA nom and adding POV tag

I feel this article fails the first criteria that the prose should be well-written, compelling and accessible for the non-specialist reader. An admirable effort has been made in synthesising summaries of Giddens' work from academic books, but the text is still dauntingly dense for the non-specialist reader. The text also needs a thorough going over for wording, misspellings and syntax e.g. "The problem is, however, that conflicting viewpoints in social science result in a desintrest of the people. For example, when scientist don't agree about the greenhouse-effect, people will withdraw from that arena, and negate that there is a problem. Therefore, the more the sciences expand, the more incertitude there is in the modern society. In this regard, the juggernaut even gets more steerless." (sentence also doesn't distinguish clearly between social science/scientists and natural science/scientists). Also there is a lack of NPOV issue as this article is comprehensive in its positive portrayal of Giddens' theories and concepts but it neglects to convey that while he is a very influential contemporary theorist, he is also a much-criticized (as all influential social theorists are) and even academically controversial one (controversial even at Cambridge SPS). Bwithh 04:50, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I think the POV tag is a little extreme and needlessly off-putting to potential readers. The article appears a fair representation of the man and his theories regardless of whether they are agreed with or not. As mentioned above, most influential theorists are criticised, that is the point of critical study and analysis. Therefore have removed the tag.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 82.153.139.126 (talk • contribs).

[edit] Article Cleanup Co-Ordination Point

[edit] Cleanup

As a start, I've tried to clean up part of the Modernity section, but are having problems with some of the content. Aside from my reservations that this kind of jargon-orientated account is suitable for a general encyclopedia, I'm not sure what the original writer is trying to say, as some of the content seem contradictory and odd. Giddens may have written about these things (I don't recall enough of his work to be definite), I don't think most of these problems stem from his actual writings.

It is stated (this version includes some minor word tweaking by myself, but the original sense remains intact) for instance: Humanity tries to steer [the juggernaut of modernity], but as long as the modern institutions, with all their uncertainty, endure, we will never be able to influence its course. The uncertainty can however be managed, by 'reembedding' the expert-systems into the structures which we are accustomed to.. This statement has a number of problems - how are modern institutions separable from modernity? Have modern institutions really had little or no influence over managing the course of modern social transformations? The solution of rembedding the expert systems into familiar structures... does this mean that modern structures are unfamiliar to us? i.e. we find modern offices, hospitals, banks, supermarkets, factories, police stations alienating?

Then there's the apparent reference to the US TV chat show celebrity, Oprah Winfrey (I assume that's what the original "Oprah" was referring to - if not, what does it refer to?) uses expert (computer?... this is what "expert system" usually refers to) systems to guide people while being perceived as an ordinary woman. But Oprah isn't perceived as an ordinary woman (she's a major celebrity and the wealthiest African-American woman, I believe) and how does she use expert (computer?) systems to help people as if she was a doctor? I'm not sure how this explains how uncertainty is managed... as apparently the expert systems of modern institutions are still relied on?

Then there's the line about how the enhanced reflexivity of modern institutions needs explanation, and explains it by saying that language has become increasing abstract and institutionalized into universities - so the reflexivity of modern institutions is due to the institutionalized abstraction of language into universities (themselves being modernized institutions too)? Then the section launches into a discussion of double hermeneutica which describes a concept which is attributed to Giddens, but doesn't sound particularly original. I'm not sure where this explanation is going.

As for the block of text immediately following this, I already discussed this above in an earlier comment. I'll try to look at the rest of the article more later. Bwithh 20:35, 12 December 2006 (UTC)