What you are referring to are, I believe, Max Weber's "Idealtypen" (as elaborated upon in the methodological chapters in Band 1 of "Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft", if memory serves).

Best translated as "one-sided exxagerations," or "einseitige Uebertreibungen," in Weber's parlance.

sk

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What is the meaning you assign to the words "ontological", "ethical", "fetishistic" and "voyeuristic" ?

About the 3 or four types of viewers, I'm curious to know how you came to determine their "theoretical" existence. And, as the terms you use to define them (Speelie, RonK, MLyons, and Adlion) have no meaning whatever for me, I would like you to define them by more precise terms.

>Furthermore, there are many different kinds of textual and contextual parameters, which point to different concrete ways in which either of the 4 basic building blocks of the systematic porn pragmatics are constructed in actual movies.

Does this mean, in other words, that the "four basic building blocks" have no practical use as they tend to intermingle?

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Ethical porn is porn that expresses a view, that has a voice. With Max you are asked plenty of questions such as 'is it acceptable to portray these girls in such a young manner' and the answer to this question is likely to decide whether you are turned on by his stuff and why/why not.

I may be wrong but I would give the following analogy.
Esthetic porn is like a typical pop record, it succeeds or fails on the catchiness of the tune; ethical porn is like a Bob Dylan record where the record aims to be more than a catchy tune but to make a statement or challenge your views as well.

Thes are my guesses anyway.
SNP.

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fetishistic - the focus is specifically on the acts rather than the method of portrayal.
voyeuristic - the scenario, the ambience and the method of portraying the act is more significant than the specifics of the act itself.

SNP.

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ethical voyeuristic - a rape scene in a porn movie is controversial and to make it a rape scene(un/ethical) requires the way the scene is to be set to be the prime concern(voyeuristic)

ethical fetishistic - an anal fisting(fetishistic, usually) causing some obvious discomfort (un/ethical)

esthetic voyeuristic - 90% of Private films nowadays. I would have thought that privates 'pirate' fetish line would come under this label as would many 'safe' rubber/leather fetish films which is a little confusing.

esthetic fetishistic - Gaping anal or clear butt plug insertions.

Guessing complete.

SNP.

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Personally my mental diagram of what I think Walter is showing does not look like his diagram but more of an open space divided into four quadrants with the same axes (but not inexplicably described at both sides).
Here we can describe all eventualities from wholly ethical to wholly aesthetic and from wholly voyeuristic to wholly fetishistic and all positions inbetween. Clearly universal/complete porn would simply be the point directly in the middle.

SNP.

PS, I would be interested for Walter to tell us whether he sees the goals of this study as purely theoretical or actually a real methodology for ascribing a commonly understood and universal value or descriptor to porn reviews as an aid to specifying a genre.

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Ron

Edited by - ronk on 4/13/2003 9:10:59 PM

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I think that ultimately, it's very unlikely that Walter will attain his goal of establishing this definitive framework with which we can discuss porn in a universal way. I think there are a number of reasons why this won't happen, but one of them has to do with the porn audience's unwillingness to dig that deep into it, or to think about words and definitions enough to effectively communicate within this framework. Perhaps unlike Walter, I don't believe that there is necessarily anything wrong with not wanting to analyze it to such a degree. On the other hand, I applaud Walter's drive to define (at least for himself) these "universal porn pragmatics", and he's welcome to use any of my thoughts or contributions for that purpose.

That said, however, I believe what Walter is attempting to take on is a monumental task, that requires a fair amount of cross-sectional knowledge of a wide range of psychological and media related fields. I have stated before that I feel vastly underqualified to take on such a challenge myself. This is why I insist on evaluating porn from MY PERSPECTIVE ONLY--and I insist on being careful not to pretend that others will feel universally the same way I do about whatever particular aspect I happen to be discussing. My goal is to understand MYSELF, as I believe that to be difficult enough a task without trying to garner universal truths about large groups of people. I hope that by making such contributions about how _I_ feel, that maybe I can contribute a very SMALL universal piece of the pie in a .... well... in an inductive way. This is, I feel, the absolute limit of what I can contribute in this area.

Walter is attempting to do something much more difficult, and as seems to have been shown, much more frustrating. I'll reiterate that I'm not sure that going down this road will bear much fruit, but I find the exploration itself fascinating, even if I sometimes feel that ultimately, it might serve to disillusion, or demystify our perceptions of porn in a negative way.

Mike L.

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Keeping with the food metaphor, some of what Walter has done reminds me a little of Elizabeth Rozin's book "The Flavor Principle". In that book, a simple chicken soup recipe, is adapted in vary specific ways, using regional spices/spice combinations, and so on to become, for example:
Won ton soup
African peanut soup
Greek Avgolemono
Thai chicken curry,
and so on.

OK, now I'm hungry.....

Scott Kinney
Diversified Video Associates
www.xxx-imports.com

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The other stuff is way too complex and I had a long day at work and with committee work too. Just give me lots of new drop dead gorgeous babes doing double everything every week and I will be very happy .

But seriously, the terms can be defined better and without the unnecessary and extraneous verbage that obfuscates the entire conversation. You can tell I am not a philosopher.

Ron

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I also think the table is complicated by having the axes effectively described top and bottom, right and left. Maybe I'm missing something here, but can't we just have the four descriptors (idealtypes, archetypes or whatever) two top and two left like any normal chart. Further details can soon be placed as notes below?

SNP.

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Now, this is a project I can truly appreciate -- describing porn in 3 dimensional space. The 3 dimensional space concept makes this a truly dissecting narrow boundary pursuit.

Ron

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Blissful Rupture is highly spontaneous and daring, much like highly improvisational jazz fusion music.

Porn Spectacle is highly stylized and perfected, much like highly perfected progressive rock.

Neither of these is like pop music. That is trash, pure and simple.

Private would fall in the spectacle category, especially Adamo, since it is all about form. Perfect lighting, wardrobe, makeup... presentation.

Max would fall in the rupture category, since the formula is, take a girl and throw her to the wolves and see what the hell happens... improvisation.

Now, I'm contemplating the other axis. Going back to the music analogy, I'm gonna try this on for size.

Voyeuristic is along the lines of a well balanced quartet. Each player lends to the overall harmony and melody. Each aspect has a roughly equal role in the final result.

Fetishistic is along the lines of a great soloist. Perhaps one listens to Zappa to hear him take the guitar to levels that the average listener would never have dreamed of. Hence, a guitar fetish .

Walter, am I even close here? If so, I think you nailed me by putting me in the Spectacle column, but not in limiting me on the modalities.

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If I find some more free time the following days, I will try to formulate some more concrete answers to specific questions in this thread. I would like to conclude now by stating that I don't understand what some of you are saying about the structure of the 'chart'. Maybe this confusion has its origin in the word 'chart'. I am not sure if that is the correct translation of the Dutch term "tabel".
To make at least 1 thing clear (??): it is a 2x2 "tabel" describing 4 basic "ideaaltypes" by crossing 2 viewer modalities with 2 textual subsystems. These 4 "ideaaltypes" (indeed a concept borrowed from Weber) describe 4 basic/theoretical/abstract viewer-text relationships, that can be combined in many systematic ways to explain a plethora of 'real' viewer-text relationships. I have indicated 5 of those in the bottom line and the right column of the "tabel". And I suspect that even those 5 systematic combinations, with the exception of the complete/universal porn category, are not be found in their 'pure' form in the 'real world'.

Interpretation is a very strange and sometimes highly personal operation. Look at what I describe as a "quickie". I will come back at this. Maybe I will be able to explain some things or two. Maybe I will fail.




Walter Burns says:
"Meaning is relative and selective, 'knowledge' is not. 'Meaning' lends itself to debate and is limitless in scope. 'Knowledge' has to be researched and is limited in scope."

Edited by - Walter Burns on 4/16/2003 7:24:16 AM

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Should we develop a guilty conscience about it?

>I understand why many have complained about the terms and concepts not being clear or well defined, but that is because I haven't defined them at all at this point.

Have you at least defined them to yourself?

> Expressing the thought that the terms are not very useful without having a clear idea what they mean, seems not very insightful to me.

Are you sober? Can you read what you just wrote?

>Furthermore, I am surprised that some concepts haven't been questioned at all.

Will you ever forgive us for not being up to your expectations?

>I have called the 'chart' "Towards a systematic universal porn pragmatics". Everybody here is familiar with the concept "pragmatics"?

Not me. But see my comment on your title. Of course I can start commenting on the title of your table only after I have understood its content.

> Hell, is there even any kind of agreement to be found on the concept "porn"?

I presume there isn't, if we want to start a discussion about it. Otherwise, there wouldn't be any discussion.

Furthermore,if we start questioning the meaning of the words of more common usage, we will never end. Shall we have to import into the discussion the concept of "idiolect" from de Saussurre; or quote Borges' "Paul Menard"? If you do not want the discussion not to even start, then you can begin questioning the meaning of each and every word: but to what end?

>if you want to indicate that my terms are not precise enough...

I can't say they are not precise as long as I don't understand what you mean by them.

>And I suspect that even those 5 systematic combinations, with the exception of the complete/universal porn category, are not be found in their 'pure' form in the 'real world'.

Which questions the validity of the table itself.

Anyway, I'm still waiting for an answer to my questions.

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As a recent discover of ADT, I have only read a few of your posts. However, as MLyons has said, this system that you've been working on is deserving of praise for its ambitiousness, if not yet for its clarity.

Without exploring the specific meanings of your designated viewer modalities and textual subsystems, and given your statement that your “table” is indeed intended to covey a 2x2 analysis yielding the 4 “ideaaltypes&#8221forth in the central quadrants, I think Sir Noel’s observations about how to re-do your table in order to eliminate confusion bear noting.

Because the quadrants are defined only by the "western" axes of voyeuristic/fetishistic viewer modalities and the "southern" axes of ethical/esthetic textual subsystems, your table would be much clearer if the creative representatives of the voyeuristic/fetishistic axes (i.e., Joey Silvera/RLD-Anabolic) were removed from the "eastern" portion of the table (which itself should disappear) and were added into their respective "western"-axes description boxes (as is the case with the creative representatives of the ethical/esthetic axes of textual subsystems, who share the "southern"-axes description boxes with their corresponding categories).

Further, your designated components of the porn text --"porn subject" and "porn-style" -- should not be part of the table itself at all, but rather should appear only below in the definitions section. As the table is currently drawn, it appears as if you are attempting to use a two-dimensional table to effect a three-dimensional analysis, which you rightly disclaim as your intention.

In addition, as Sir Noel suggested, if the category of universal/complete porn means to describe porn that fully integrates the two viewer modalities and the two textual subsystems -– i.e., it describes porn that is voyeuristic, fetishistic, ethical, and esthetic all at once –- then that category would seemingly be a fifth ideaaltype, which should properly occupy a place in the centermost part of the table (the connection-point of all the quadrants), and its creative representatives, Stagliano and DeRenzy, would then best appear in that place as well.

Edited by - Bob on 4/18/2003 3:21:29 AM

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I will try to give more clearcut answers to all the serious questions in this thread, but first, maybe it is a good idea to explain what the hell I mean by a "systematic universal porn pragmatics". I am afraid that this post alone is illustrating all too well what I meant when I said I wasn't sure that this forum (or any forum for that matter) is the best place to explain this kind of thing. I am afraid I may be breaking some records here and I would like to make an honest request: if you don't like longwinded posts, full of boring and dry as the dessert textbooklike 'explanations', STOP reading here. I am not in the mood to once again defend my kind of work because of some unfounded anti-intellectual stance. If you criticize my work, do it because of substantial criteria. If you have to dismiss "my game", know what it is about first. If you adopt an anti-intellectual stance (which can be perfectly valid), know and explain why you adopt it.

1) Pragmatics : Pragmatics is the third and most recent research field within semiotics. There are two sign/text related research fields within semiotics: semantics (relation sign - meaning) and syntaxis (relation sign - sign). Both of these fields are concerned with the construction of a text: semantics is primarily concerned with paradigmatic relations, syntaxis with syntagmatic relations. Pragmatics has been slowly developing since the beginning of the 60s and has been getting more and more attention and recognition as researchers began to develop the idea that meaning isn't simply a matter of textual analysis but is also related to different kinds of reading by different types of readers. To make it clear, pragmatics researches the relationship between sign/text and context. Another explanation of pragmatics within the field of semantics, was given by me in this thread.
Having said this, I hope it is clear that although my project is certainly ambitious, it is not a "grand theory" designed to explain everything related to porn. This project is in fact rather specialized and limited in methodology and purpose. It is geared towards a better understanding of the relationship between different kinds of porn texts and different kinds of porn viewing, by cross referencing two basic viewer modalities and two textual subsystems. It does not aim to explain different kinds of porn or different kinds of porn viewing in and by themselves. RonK, for instance, was used as an example of the "ideaaltype" of "fetishistic sexual rupture", because of his fetishistic relation to a specfic sexual act (you all know which one). But my chart treats that piece of information as a given. My chart does not aim to explain why RonK is so fascinated by DAP.
This specialized, limited character of this project makes it hard for me to relate to what MLyons wrote here: "

@ Sir Noel : I don't entirely get what you mean here:

2) Universal : To continue the critism on "grand theory", I still have to admit that the project I am proposing, is pretty ambitious. The fact that I am claiming to try to develop a universal pragmatics, is the first reason why this project does sound overly ambitious. However, again, the interpretation of the term universal that I am giving, reflects more the limits than the ambitions of the project. I am trying to develop a universal pragmatics in 2 senses.
a) I hope to develop an abstract (therefor the use of "ideaaltypes") framework, which can be used by any type of (re)viewer to judge any type of porn. The outcome will be different every time, since every (re)viewer brings his own personal belief and taste system to the table. In this thread I have briefly touched upon this when I mentioned the work of Bourdieu. And that is also exactly what my framework is trying to understand: how come that different types of porn elicit different types of (re)viewer responses.
b) I am not looking for a universally applicable standard of judgement and I am also not really looking for a universally applicable explanation of what makes good porn. I have not developed, nor am I interested in developing, a normative model. Instead, I am trying to develop a universally applicable model for analysis, of both reviews/reviewers and texts, with the explicite aim of trying to establish some systematic relationships between the two. Since that covers an absurd amount of ground, the model refrains from getting too concrete, although it certainly allows for rigorous, methodological concrete analysis of texts and (re)viewer responses.
@ Sir Noel : I may very well be interpreting your comments about this model being "purely theoretical" completely wrong, but I want to stress that I am trying to develope this universally applicable analytical model through fact-driven research and NOT through theory-driven research. Although the model is supposed to be universally applicable, its usefulness is limited in scope and is only directed at a porn pragmatics. It is in fact what Noel Carroll has called a "piecemeal theory", highly specialized to only reflect on a very specific, empirically defined 'problem'. As such, it is my aim to definitely give it some practical uses. If someone else would actually like to make use of this practical use, is another matter entirely.

3) Systematic : This may seem the most straight forward concept, but in fact it is the most difficult to both explain and integrate in the model. In fact, in some ways, it IS the model. A lot of confusion has already been evident about this in this thread: the use of specific and specialized terminology; the meaning of the form of the chart and the placement of different concrete names of both porn viewers and porn makers; the specific use of "ideaaltypes", which refer indeed to Weber's idea of "idealtypen" , but in a slightly modified way; and, most importantly for a systematic approach, the relations between the different types of porn (viewing), the chart hints at.
In the first post, I have referred to the 4 different types as building blocks. That is still valid, but maybe an even better term would be subsystems, as this term makes it more clear that they are made up by many different concrete elements. The 4 subsystems, which have been described by "ideaaltypes", entertain systematic relationships which each other and with the systematic elements within their own structure. This systematic nature is especially important for a proper understanding of the research and analytical possibilities of the model. It means that different systematic elements can be located on different levels of abstraction within different (sub)systems AND that these elements can be isolated for analytical purposes IF one keeps firmly in mind that these elements entertain relations to other elements in the system.

I guess the only way to make this clear, will be to define the terms used in and explain the form of the "tabel". As already explained, it is a 2x2 "tabel", wherein two basic viewer modalities are crossed with 2 textual subsystems, leading to 4 basic viewer-text relationships, which take the form of 4 basic "ideaaltypes". These "ideaaltypes" describe viewer-text relations in their 'purest' form, while in 'reality' those pure form do not exist. Actual viewers don't respond to just 1 "ideaaltype", but can be defined by the way they respond to or 'score in' the 4 "ideaaltypes". Let me explain this by using the examples of the "tabel":
@ Mark Shanon & RonK : I used the names of 4 ADT members for the characterisation of the 4 "ideaaltypes", because I thought they would provide a more concrete point of departure for discussion in the forum. As explained before, I have placed their names between brackets because they are in fact 'real persons' and not "ideaaltypes" (which can not really be compared with archetypes). I have chosen RonK as the "ideaaltype" for "fetishistic sexual rupture", because of his dominant fetishistic relation to DAP and DPP, specific sexual act(s)or facets of performance(s). I have chosen Adlion as the "ideaaltype" for "fetishistic porn spectacle", because of his strong fetishistic relation to girls with big natural tits, a relationship with a specific (part of the) porn actor/actress or performer. (I could also have picked Darth-Morpheus because of his fetishistic relation to Jessica Darlin, or Tommi Rose Fan, for ...). I have chosen Speelie as the "ideaaltype" for "voyeuristic sexual rupture", because of his insistence on 'chemistry between performers'. And I have chosen MLyons as the "ideaaltype" for "voyeuristic porn spectacle", because of his attention to stylistic details, such as lighting. I very well realize that all 4 of them are not in fact perfectly congruent with the "ideaaltype" they 'represent'. I know enough about Speelie and MLyons to know that they are looking for much more than either 'pure' "voyeuristic sexual rupture" or "voyeuristic porn spectacle". Hell, if we look at the bulk of recent postings made by MLyons and his recent editorial on his website, I am more and more convinced that MLyons is as much interested in the ethical side of porn than the aesthetic side. Looking at the discussion between Adlion and 2Big in this thread, it is clear that simply big natural titted girls are also not enough for Adlion; he needs to see them in some specific forms of "fetishistic sexual rupture" as well, which differ from the ones 2Big wants to see. And when RonK wrote this:

@ Sir Noel and Bob . The above explanation, especially the systematic relation between "fetishistic sexual rupture" and "voyeuristic porn spectacle" evidenced in the view of RonK, may be the beginning of an explanation why I don't understand this comment of Sir Noel:

I realize that this explanation still leaves open many, many questions. Hell it has probably caused even more confusion. I still haven't explained the meaning of the terms voyeuristic-fetishistic and sexual rupture and porn spectacle and subsequently haven't really described the 4 "ideaaltypes" at all. Therefore, I also can't begin to explain why the systematic combinations lead to the 5 "systematic ideaaltypes" ("voyeuristic + fetishistic sexual rupture" leads to "ethical porn", "voyeuristic + fetishistic porn spectacle" leads to "aesthetic porn", "voyeuristic sexual rupture" + "voyeuristic porn spectacle" leads to "voyeuristic porn" and "fetishistic sexual rupture" + "fetishistic porn spectacle" leads to "fetishistic porn"; all 4 basic "ideaaltypes" combined lead to "universal/complete porn".)
I certainly have defined all the terms for myself. Hell, how could I have put them in a systematic model without having defined them. The problem is, how to explain them in the context of a forum post. Maybe some of you could let me know how I can do this. I mean, the explanation of a single term and all its systematic elements and its possible systematic relationships, will take up more space than 99% of the regular posts here. If I were to say that "voyeuristic" is used to describe a viewer modality centered on 'looking through' the image and is related to the ethical question of the nature of the 'fantasy of reality', which in turn is connected to the (problematic) concept of suspencion of disbelief, while "fetishistic" is used to describe a viewer modality centered on 'looking at' the image and is related to the ethical question of the nature of the 'reality of fantasy', which in turn is connected to the notion of audio-visual 'proof', as in 'seeing is believing', I still have a lot of explaining to do, have I not?

So, once again, let me do this ass backwards, since that is the way I have started this thread anyway. Let me give you a concrete example of how the model can be used to 'explain' or 'categorize' an actual viewer response. Maybe the oversimplification of the following example may help to clear some confusion, without having to explain the terms and concepts in depth.
Let's apply the model to me and my tastes/viewer responses. There are not many specific sexual acts I really want to see and there aren't many acts I don't like to see, so I score rather low on the "fetishistic sexual rupture" scale. However, there are some acts I really like to see. The tease sequence is one of them (probably because it is the most basic kind of "sexual rupture" available in porn). The effectiveness of the tease sequence can be greatly enhanced or diminished when the tease is performed by an actress I personally am attracted to or not. So, I guess that I score a little bit higher on the "fetishistic porn spectacle" scale, but only in a general, non-specific way. If you have been following my Babes of the Week posts, you can see that I am attracted to lots of different looking girls and to lots of different body parts. IOW, looks matter to me, but I like variety more than specific standards. Now, the way the teasing of an attractive girl is presented to me in the filmic representation of that tease, is even more important to me. So, I guess I really score high on the "voyeuristic porn spectacle" scale. If a tease sequence is not shot and edited the way I like it to be shot and edited, I don't care about it much. And finally, if the director/shooter has not only been succesful in shooting the tease sequence the way I like it, but has also been able to convince me that the tease was 'authentic' and done out of horniness — iow, when it has a high degree of vraisemblance of a really 'passionate and spontaneous tease', instead of a formulaic, mechanical 'stripper tease' — that, for me, is the ultimate in porn satisfaction. So, I guess I also score high on the "voyeuristic sexual rupture" scale.
Of course, in actuality it isn't nearly as simple and straight forward as explained above. Why not, you say? Well, because there are systematic relationships between the different subsystems/scales. For instance, there is a strong relationship between the kind of "voyeuristic porn spectacle" I like and the possibility to capture some real good "voyeuristic sexual rupture" I like, you know the one I am talking about ("blissful rupture"). Since I believe that porn is all about performance (hence, I begin with "fetishistic sexual rupture"), I also prefer a concrete construction of the "voyeuristic porn spectacle", which is best suited for an exploration of the performance within the filmic representation. Therefore I strongly prefer shooting styles geared towards a carefully constructed choreography between camera-actors-acts, without messing too much with spatial and temporal relationships. This kind of style, wherein reel time reflects real time pretty well, is also very adapt at capturing moments of "voyeuristic sexual rupture", would it not be that the choreography may be too strict for the performers to really allow them to express their own sexuality. Therefor, I place as much importance to the chemistry between the performers and the shooter/crew as to the chemistry between the performers. That is why I believe that John Stagliano is the most complete/universal porn director ever: he has managed to create a porn vision that scores high on all the different subsystems, while other directors have been contented to focus on 1 or 2 subsystems. Of course, this judgement is in part informed by a personal qualitative interpretative operation of some concrete parameters in the model and therefor reflect only my own 'opinion'. That is why I placed the names of porn directors/companies in italics in the chart.

I am still willing to explain all the concepts and their systematic relationships in depth, but honest to God, I have no idea how this can be done in an efficient way here. The fact that I am thinking about this in Dutch is no great help. My command of the English language isn't subtle enough to allow me to express all the important nuances of the model in 'plain English', so I resort to the scientific jargon I am familiar with. I realize that this is an easy solution for me, while it is probably a pain in the ass for most of you.

(Endorphin: Have I broken any records here?°)





Walter Burns says:
"When discussing visual representation, try to understand the possible relations between image-referent-meaning."

Edited by - Walter Burns on 4/18/2003 9:26:33 AM

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I just want to clear up a couple of questions you have thrown back.

'universal value or descriptor' by this I don't mean a specific value or even a numerical value but rather a scale of sorts that is universal in that all reviewers could apply it: rather like the Beaufort scale or Glasgow coma scale in a way.
I am minded of a procedure we have at work for identifying workplace risk. Using a system of charts and guidelines values are created for the likelihood of an accident occuring and the likely seriousness of such an accident were it to take place. These values can be used to grade how significant a risk is posed. The relevance of this to your chart/table is that the very aim of the procedure is to create consistency in risk evaluation throughout the organisation thereby gaining a true picture of which risks most urgently need addressing even when comparing evaluations carried out by different individuals. This is the kind of universality I am thinking of.

Secondly, you are looking too deeply into my use of the word genre and I wasn't really thinking along the lines of gonzo and couples friendly anyway. Rather than 'specifying a genre' on a different day I may well have said 'describing the film' or 'categorising the film' although you would then have told me to stop calling them films

SNP.

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You see I originally thought that this chart may be a useful way of describing a film outside of the normal classifications and perhaps in a way that better bands together real-life viewers preferences than the usual terms and categories that are used (and abused). I can see that my comments on universal values are totally at odds with what you are trying to achieve and that your system is actually wholly dependant on the individual as opposed to an attempt to factor personal differences out of the equation.

I don't mean any of this as criticism and it doesn't make your work here any less worthy; I just feel that actual practical applications for this system are likely to be fewer than I previously thought (more likely to fall under what I earlier termed 'purely theoretical' inasmuch as it is a theoretical exercise rather than a general reviewing tool)

Still, for purely interests sake I will elaborate on what I meant by a chart but do bear in mind I was under this assumption that we were dealing with immutable (if tough to measure or agree upon) properties of a specific film to be categorised rather than the interplay between a film and a viewer. With this in mind I would like you to have a look at the following example which is the kind of thing I had in mind:

H-R Diagram

Now the subject matters may be poles apart but that doesn't really matter. My viewpoint was that although your categories were not numerical, the lack of mutual exclusivity between them meant that one could have assigned proportional values for both vertical and horizontal axes.
Notice how the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram is much more than a simple scatter chart and by seeing the location of a star on the diagram we can learn much about what stage of its lifecycle it is at; you can't see on this static diagram but different sizes of star describe different paths across the diagram as they age (sorry for stating the obvious if you are already familiar with this diagram). The important point is that we end up being able to make useful generalisations and observations for different points on the diagram - the ringed areas on the bottom diagram remind me of your 'idealtypes' and, as can be seen on the upper diagram, this does not discount stars from existing between these broad categories, just as your idealtypes are not exclusive properties.

Anyway, I see now that this is all irrelevant to what you are doing. I do hope though, that this gives you an idea of what I was envisaging and why potentially it could have been useful.

SNP.

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btw, this still doesn't mean that a pragmatics model, which tries "to factor personal differences" into the equation, doesn't have any pratical uses. If my model can only illustrate WHY 'opinions' may differ, it has proven its value to me. I believe at this moment that the model can do much more.





Walter Burns says:
"The dichotomy form-content is not very useful."

Edited by - Walter Burns on 4/18/2003 2:23:26 PM

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