Functional temporalism

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Functional temporalism is an anthropological theory drawing prominently from the functionalistic and postmodern schools of thought first discussed by Clifford Geertz. It is also heavily indebted to the symbolistic tradition in sociolinguistics.

The theory ostensibly deals with the functional aspects of more traditional temporalism. Functional temporalists maintain that such paradigms are consistently overlooked by mainstream academics and that this greatly affects the interpretation of cultural articulations in an exceedingly pejorative sense. With increased pragmatism in academic ethnographic work, however, the social other is able to attain a more post-idealistic status in the cultural hierarchy. This should empower her to achieve a kind of social solipsism not precedented even by late-twentieth century Marxist methods of inquiry.

[edit] Criticism

Some critics of this school of thought have argued that though there were flaws in pre-naturalistic sociological theories, these flaws are better compensated for in more recent theories which deal with interpretative analyses in a more deontological sense. Functional temporalism, on the other hand, is decidedly teleological in its disdain for feminist ideologies. Many advocates of the theory do admit the exceedingly teleological outlook of functional temporalism is a weakness.