Social Text is a peer-reviewed[1] academic journal published by Duke University Press.

Each issue covers subjects in the debates around feminism, Marxism, neoliberalism, postcolonialism, postmodernism, queer theory, and popular culture.

The editorial board, according to Editor Andrew Ross, published the article as a good faith attempt by Sokal, a well-known physicist, to develop a social theory of his field.

[3] Ross claims that the editorial board asked Sokal to revise and resubmit his article, but Sokal refused, and so the editors decided to publish the paper as a prominent physicist’s best attempt to develop theory.

[4] The editors of the journal were awarded the 1996 Ig Nobel Prize for literature by "eagerly publishing research that they could not understand, that the author said was meaningless, and which claimed that reality does not exist".