ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the shared intellectual deportment or attitude characteristic of this moment of theory, and suggests certain ways in which it creates a particular identity for the persona of the theorist. It indicates how identity as a sociological object has been framed by the moment of theory, and presents some of the consequences of this framing. For the destiny of identity as a sociological object, and the moment of theory, are inextricably linked. The theoretical persona post-structuralist, deconstructive, whatever clearly appears attractive to those whose pedagogic bread and butter is often represented by themselves and by other critical intellectuals as less than spiritually uplifting. For Latour, as for Hunter, this critical theoretical persona clearly has some purchase, and not just in the social sciences and humanities. To get closer requires description, and through such proximity concern for the qualities of particular personae can be registered.
