Jump to content

Helen Pluckrose

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by WikiCleanerBot (talk | contribs) at 21:37, 3 February 2021 (v2.04b - Bot T20 CW#61 - Fix errors for CW project (Reference before punctuation)). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Helen Pluckrose is a British author and cultural writer known for critiques of Critical social justice and promotion of Liberal ethics, most notably in the Grievance studies affair [1][2][3][4][5]

Education

Pluckrose completed a degree in English literature at the University of East London and a master's degree in early modern studies at Queen Mary University of London,[6] with a particular focus on "the ways in which medieval women negotiated the Christian narrative".[7]

Career

Pluckrose is currently editor-in-chief of Areo Magazine, an opinion and analysis digital magazine exploring "a variety of perspectives compatible with broadly liberal and humanist values".[8][9]

Pluckrose founded Counterweight, a "non-partisan, grassroots movement advocating for liberal concepts of social justice",[10] to "help individuals resist the imposition of Critical Social Justice (CSJ) on their day to day lives".[11] Counterweight launched an online advice service in January 2021.[12]

Grievance Studies Affair

Alongside James A. Lindsay and Peter Boghossian, Pluckrose was involved in the 2017–18 Grievance Studies Affair (also referred to as "Sokal Squared" in reference to the 1996 Sokal affair), a project which saw the group submitting a number of bogus academic papers to peer-reviewed journals in cultural, gender, queer and race studies, to see if they would get published. The authors stated their goal as highlighting poor scholarship and eroding criteria in some academic fields, particularly those influenced by postmodern philosophy and critical theory.[13] Despite criticism of the exposé as a "hoax" and "coordinated attack from the right", Pluckrose and her colleagues describe themselves as "left-leaning liberals".[14]

Cynical Theories

In 2020, Pluckrose released a non-fiction book, Cynical Theories, co-authored by Lindsay and published by Pitchstone Publishing. Shortly after its release the book became a Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and Publishers Weekly bestseller[15][16][17] and a #1 bestseller in Philosophy on Amazon.[15] Harvard University's Steven Pinker, psychologist and public intellectual, said of the book that it "exposes the surprisingly shallow intellectual roots of the movements that appear to be engulfing our culture".[18] However, Tim Smith-Laing in The Daily Telegraph says the authors "leap from history to hysteria" and that the book fails to fulfill the "values of rational, evidence-based argument" that it praises.[19] The accuracy of its scholarship was also questioned in an online article for Liberal Currents by Sam Hoadley-Brill.[20]

Cynical Theories was named one of the Best Books of the Year 2020 by the Financial Times [21] and in The Times' Best Political and Current Affairs Books of the Year 2020 [22]

References

  1. ^ "The controversy around hoax studies in critical theory, explained" by Zack Beauchamp, Vox, 15 October 2018
  2. ^ Murray, Douglas. "Cynical Theories by Helen Pluckrose & James Lindsay review – woke warriors are conquering academia". ISSN 0140-0460. Retrieved 2020-10-01.
  3. ^ "The destructive power of culture wars and how they put liberalism in retreat". Crikey. 2020-09-11. Retrieved 2020-10-01.
  4. ^ "Wokeness is being pushed on everyone". www.spiked-online.com. Retrieved 2020-10-01.
  5. ^ Paul Kelly (12 September 2020). "Tracing the dangerous rise and rise of woke warriors". The Australian. Retrieved 2020-10-01.(subscription required)
  6. ^ "Helen Pluckrose – Battle of Ideas 2017". Retrieved 2020-09-06.
  7. ^ Helen Pluckrose (18 March 2019). "The problem with grievance studies". The Australian.(subscription required)
  8. ^ "Scholar Who Pulled Off Publishing Hoax Defends It: 'Papers Are Either Sound or They Aren't' " by Alexander C. Kafka, The Chronicle of Higher Education, 5 October 2018
  9. ^ Rosemary Neill (10 September 2020). "'You can't cancel me'". The Australian. Retrieved 2020-10-01.(subscription required)
  10. ^ "Home". Counterweight. Retrieved 2021-01-31.
  11. ^ "Why Was Counterweight Formed". Counterweight. Retrieved 2021-01-31.
  12. ^ Ellery, Ben. "'Anti-woke helpline Counterweight flooded with calls'". ISSN 0140-0460. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  13. ^ Jennifer Schuessler (4 October 2018). "Hoaxers Slip Breastaurants and Dog-Park Sex Into Journals". The New York Times. Retrieved 27 October 2020.
  14. ^ "What an Audacious Hoax Reveals About Academia" by Yascha Mounk, The Atlantic, 5 October 2018
  15. ^ a b Pluckrose, Helen; Lindsay, James A. (2020). Cynical Theories: How Activist Scholarship Made Everything about Race, Gender, and Identity – And Why This Harms Everybody. ISBN 9781634312028.
  16. ^ "Bestselling Books Week Ended August 29". The Wall Street Journal. 2020-09-03. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved 2020-10-01.
  17. ^ "US-Best-Sellers-Books-USAToday". The Washington Post. Associated Press. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 2020-10-01.
  18. ^ Paul Kelly (12 September 2020). "Tracing the dangerous rise and rise of woke warriors". The Australian. Retrieved 2020-10-01.
  19. ^ Smith-Laing, Tim (September 19, 2020). "'Postmodernism gone mad': is academia to blame for cancel culture?". The Telegraph.
  20. ^ "The Cynical Theorists Behind Cynical Theories". Liberal Currents. August 19, 2020. Retrieved January 11, 2021.
  21. ^ "Best books of 2020: Politics". www.ft.com. Retrieved 2020-11-22.
  22. ^ Millen, Roland White. "Best political and current affairs books of the year 2020". ISSN 0140-0460. Retrieved 2020-12-01.

External links

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Helen_Pluckrose&oldid=1004687070"