ABSTRACT
Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Thorstein Veblen produced economic tracts that clearly situated thinking about economics in the context of cultural and social issues of the day. This chapter argues that Gilman and Veblen are not merely satirists or polemicists, but are indeed economists engaged in developing not only alternative theories of economics, but also alternative modes of theorizing about economics. Both Veblen and Gilman view economics as the study of livelihood and daily provisioning, which provides the understanding needed for social action, a position at odds with the dominant economic voices of their time. Gilman and Veblen reconceive not only the economic theorist as one who deliberates about action, but also the economic agent as one who deliberates and acts. Just as Gilman and Veblen ground economics in social action, so too do they ground the discourse of economics in the rhetoric of ordinary language, all the while developing ordinary language’s potential for reflection and critique.
