Towards the 'Overthrow of Platonism': Processist Critical Social Ontology and Ameliorative Discourse

Giladi, Paul ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8934-3602 (2023) Towards the 'Overthrow of Platonism': Processist Critical Social Ontology and Ameliorative Discourse. European Journal of Philosophy, 31 (3). pp. 622-638. ISSN 0966-8373

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Abstract

In this article, I argue that, for the purpose of developing an effective critical social ontology about gender groups, it is not simply sufficient to carve gender groups at their joints: one must have in view whether the metaphysical categories we use to make sense of gender groups are prone to ideological distortion and vitiation. The norms underpinning a gender group's constitution as a type of social class and the norms involved in gender identity attributions, I propose, provide compelling reason to think critical social ontological discourse is more processist-orientated, rather than substantival-orientated. The advantages of a processist critical social ontology of gender groups are that, unlike substance-discourse, process-discourse recognizes how gender group talk and gender identity talk are often messy and therefore require a conceptual scheme that can transform vocabulary for the emancipatory purpose of ending oppression, domination, and marginalization.