misinterpret

Or laughable and painful, to be more precise: a stinging joke with real-world consequences, like the joke of "scientific" racial classification itself, a perverse fiction made fact in the 19th century by misinterpreters of Darwin, "proved" through phrenology and other invented sciences, written as history, and then denounced in the early part of the century by African-American intellectuals.

Is it the author whose pragmatic competence is not equal to the task, or perhaps his/her misinterpreters (if this is the case) who fail to use their interpretative skills appropriately or have not acquired them adequately, or finally, perha ps the inherent features of discourses (texts) both written and oral should be held responsible for this predicament?

Where then are the misinterpreters? Ericson focuses heavy artillery on Olga Carlisle, George Feifer, and Michael Scammell, all of whom, according to him, were settling personal scores in their studies.