Appropriation is a much more appropriate term for what I was trying to get at. Thank you.
I think I have explained my terms no less than BvBPL has explained hers/his and have established a basis for discussion which has lasted FIVE pages. So I don't understand BvBPL's accusation that I have not done those things?
My comment to Kaiserguard was intended to illustrate the general problems in discussing these issues rather being specific response to your statements. In the past I've mentioned the difficulties of discussing feminism on this board without a definition as to what feminism people are talking about given that the multiple waves and segments of feminist can have very different ideas. Discussing feminism without limning the discussion to specific aspects or calling out what facet of feminism is worth discussing is less than useful because "feminism," by itself, is too broad a term to facilitate meaningful discussion.
No doubt I will have cause to mention this particular bugbear of mine in the future as well.
I'm not sure what the "definition" of multiculturalism or feminism would be.
As the initiator of the discussion, particularly when you are putting forth a positive thesis as opposed to a request for information or the like, you are responsible for providing some basis of discussion which includes defining ambiguous terms.
Once a definition is proposed, people can debate the definition or debate the thesis as it applies to the definition, or both, but without the definition, without some sort of basis for the discussion, people are left to use their own internal definitions as they presently understand them. This is problematic because people responding to the thesis do not necessarily call out their definitions when responding. That is to say that the person declaring a thesis think a core concept of the thesis means "thus and such," but a reader things the core concept means "this and that" then the thesis writer should declare that the thesis means "thus and such" so that his reader knows that the definition of the concept is at issue. Without this, the reader may assume that the thesis author believes the concept to be "this and that."
This is particularly true of abstract concepts that are difficult to define. Authors do not receive a pass on defining a core concept of their theses simply because that concept is abstract or difficult to define. Indeed, the difficulty in defining these terms underscores the clear need to define those concepts.
For example, if I present a thesis that "video games are not art," then I am obliged to define what constitutes art. Obviously there are a myriad of possible definitions for that term, but it is incumbent upon the speaker to provide some sort of workable definition of the term to provide a basis of discussion.
Indeed, the definition of what is art was the key point
Roger Ebert made in counterpoint to Kellee Santiago's statement that video games are art.
Ebert later had to modify his premise to note that he meant video games cannot be great art but can be art because he believes that art and great art can be distinguished as two separate concepts.
To use a more on-point example, we could talk about equality for women. However, this necessitates defining what equality means. Say it means equal pay. What happens when a woman reenters the workplace after five years of childrearing; should she receive pay equal to a man of equal skill who has five more years work experience or should she receive less because she has less experience in the workplace? Either way achieves equality but they are different types of equality. If we give the woman equal pay then we have an end effect equality, but if she does not receive equal pay because she has less work experience, rather than because of her sex, then we have a separate equality in the form of non-discrimination. When someone starts talking about equality he or she will need to define what form of equality is being spoken about else the discussion will be impaired by the potential by a fundamental misunderstanding about what sort of equality is being discussed.
