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Jacques Pluss: His comments on a forum

I post again to thank those scholars who have taken the time to comment on my work, whether in agreement or disagreement. One of my primary aims was to engender debate, and I've clearly done that, even though I did not anticipate the debate would begin until the publication of my research (probably in about a year). Yet I continue to be surprised by the reactions of those commentators who have not grasped that carrying on research in a post-modern, post-structural mode means bending the rules of research until they give in to pressure and break, giving rise to a completely new methodology. For example, in one of my graduate seminars at Fairleigh-Dickinson University, I had my students compare and contrast Mary Shelley's Frankenstein with Foucault's History of Madness and with Freud's Totem and Taboo, all along attempting to align their comparisons and contrasts with Poe's lines: "While, like a ghastly rapid river, Through the pale door, A hideous throng rush out for ever And laugh -- but smile no more." I expected a conclusion on their parts, but I did not anticipate any particular response. To do so would have been to violate the integrity of their method and thought processes, culled up from within them individually. Hence, I could not violate the integrity of the freedom of direction of my own method and thought when I researched the neo-Nazi's, who were, for me, a "hideous throng" from the very start. On another note, it's interesting to view the "official response" offered about me by the National Socialist Movement, which is packed with falsehoods and patronizing statements (www.nsm88.com). "I'm mad, I'm a fabricator, I'm a story teller (apparently, they don't grasp the notion of the directions "historical fiction" can take), I was really a true Nazi for a while, I was jealous of the advancement of others in the Movement, and other patronizing garbage. And, of all things, they hope I will be well." But, after all, what else could they come up with? Remember that a neo-Nazi doesn't lie when he/she scratches his/her forehead. He doesn't lie when he folds his arms. He doesn't lie when he wipes his hand across his cheek. He/she lies when he/she opens his or her mouth. Finally, for those of you who seem to believe that I spent my career in adjuncthood, it should be recalled that I hold a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago (medieval History, 1983), did two years as a postdoctoral Instructor there, and then rose to Associate Professor (tenured 1988) at the William Paterson University of New Jersey -- all before leaving academia in 2000 to co-own and operate a horse farm, the passion of my youth. My brief time at Fairleigh-Dickinson University (2002-2005) was completely "adjunctive" to other, more compelling pursuits.
Read entire article at Chronicle of Higher Education Forum: 'Becoming' a Nazi to study Nazis?