[Xmca-l] Re: Having an experience
mike cole
mcole@ucsd.edu
Fri Jul 17 10:40:22 PDT 2015
Alfredo--
a "method of organization" seems close to a synonym for design.
mike
On Fri, Jul 17, 2015 at 9:42 AM, Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>
wrote:
> I like very much how Greg brings in a methodological issue here with his
> mention about ethnography and his reading of "fidelity"; that the latter is
> not about representing exactly, but about describing events in terms of
> consequences for the participants, which they display for each other in
> their actual practice.
>
> This methodological aspect makes me think that the the notion of ANALYSIS
> BY UNITS, which has been discussed in xmca before, is useful here. Unit
> analysis reminds us that, as units, experiences, as concrete and real
> phenomena, have some form of organization that extends in time. That is
> why, if I understood the discussion below correctly, Beth is warned not to
> think of the unit of experience as a unit "in itself".
>
> Dewey and Bentley 1949 made the differentiation between self-action and
> transaction. In self action, things are explained by their own powers. This
> is, I believe, what Vygotsky would have referred to as analysis by
> elements. In transaction, they say, “deal[s] with aspects and phases of
> action, without final attribution to ‘elements’ or other presumptively
> detachable ‘entities,’ ‘essences,’ or ‘realities,’ and without isolation of
> presumptively detachable ‘relations’ from such detachable ‘elements’”. An
> experience can be studied precisely because it is not a thing in itself: it
> is always a moving, gesture, a "method of organization" as Dewey & Bentley
> write.
>
> I thought this my add something to your fascinating discussion,
> Alfredo
>
>
> ________________________________________
> From: xmca-l-bounces+a.g.jornet=iped.uio.no@mailman.ucsd.edu
> <xmca-l-bounces+a.g.jornet=iped.uio.no@mailman.ucsd.edu> on behalf of
> mike cole <mcole@ucsd.edu>
> Sent: 17 July 2015 18:23
> To: Andy Blunden; eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Having an experience
>
> Marx: It is only in a social context that subjectivism and objectivism,
> spiritualism and materialism, activity and passivity, cease to be
> antinomies and thus cease to exist as such antinomies. The resolution of
> the theoretical contradictions is possible only through practical means,
> only through the practical energy of man. Their resolution is not by any
> means, therefore, only a problem of knowledge, but is a real problem of
> life which philosophy was unable to solve precisely because it saw there a
> purely theoretical problem."
>
> On Thu, Jul 16, 2015 at 10:45 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:
>
> > No, no, Beth. As Dewey says:
> >
> > "This unity is neither emotional, practical, nor
> > intellectual, for these terms name distinctions that
> > reflection can make within it. In discourse//about//an
> > experience, we must make use of these adjectives of
> > interpretation. In going over an experience in
> > mind//after/ /its occurrence, we may find that one
> > property rather than another was sufficiently dominant
> > so that it characterizes the experience as a whole."
> >
> > Isn't this beautiful scientific prose! We make these distinction when we
> > *reflect* on an experience. And perhaps we include the experience in our
> > autobiography, act it out on the stage, analyse it scientifically, all of
> > which presupposes analysis and synthesis. But it is important to
> recognise
> > that the unity is prior. It is not only a unity of emotion and cognition
> > (for example) but also of attention and will - and any other categories
> you
> > abstract from an experience.
> >
> > Andy
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > *Andy Blunden*
> > http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
> > On 17/07/2015 3:00 PM, Beth Ferholt wrote:
> >
> >> Or reproducing the part that represents the whole? Like a fractal? I
> >> think it is the similarity across scales that makes an experience
> >> proleptic, or gives that 'bliss conferred at the beginning of the road
> to
> >> redemption" that Vasilyuk refers to. You have an experience on several
> >> timescales and so a sense of deja-vu is central to having an experience.
> >> This is what I am thinking about after reading both the paper of Dewey's
> >> and your recent piece on perezhivanie, Andy, although I am picking up
> on a
> >> small piece of the last email in this chain -- : If something is only
> >> itself in its whole then you can't study it, is what is bothering me.
> Beth
> >>
> >> On Thu, Jul 16, 2015 at 11:22 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net
> >> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>> wrote:
> >>
> >> Not "getting at something", Michael. Just pursuing
> >> this question you raised about Dewey's saying that the
> >> aesthetic quality of medieval buildings arises from
> >> their not being "planned" like buildings are nowadays.
> >> He goes on to say "Every work of art follows the plan
> >> of, and pattern of, a complete experience." The puzzle
> >> he is raising here is the completeness of an
> >> experience which gives it its aesthetic quality, and
> >> this cannot be created by assembling together parts in
> >> the way a modern building is planned. An experience -
> >> the kind of thing which sticks in your mind - is an
> >> original or prior unity, not a combination, and this
> >> is what gives a work of art that ineffable quality,
> >> something which can only be transmitted by reproducing
> >> that whole of an experience.
> >>
> >> Andy
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >> *Andy Blunden*
> >> http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
> >> <http://home.pacific.net.au/%7Eandy/>
> >> On 17/07/2015 2:32 AM, Glassman, Michael wrote:
> >>
> >> Andy,
> >>
> >> I'm still not sure about your question. Did I set
> >> out to have that experience, that morning...no, I
> >> don't think so (it was a long time ago, but I'm
> >> pretty sure no). Could I have just treated it as
> >> an indiscriminate activity, probably, I had done
> >> so before.
> >>
> >> But I am guessing you're getting a something here
> >> Andy?
> >>
> >> Michael
> >>
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From:
> >> xmca-l-bounces+glassman.13=osu.edu@mailman.ucsd.edu <mailto:
> >> osu.edu@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> >> [mailto:xmca-l-bounces+glassman.13
> >> <mailto:xmca-l-bounces%2Bglassman.13>=osu.edu@mailman.ucsd.edu
> >> <mailto:osu.edu@mailman.ucsd.edu>] On Behalf Of
> >> Andy Blunden
> >> Sent: Thursday, July 16, 2015 12:21 PM
> >> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> >> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Having an experience
> >>
> >> YOu said: "... But that time I had the experience
> >> with the paintings..."
> >>
> >> I mean that was an experience. Did you set out
> >> that morning to have that experience?
> >> RE, your question: "what does he mean when he says
> >> you can't do things indiscriminately and have
> >> vital experience, but you also can't plan things?"
> >> Andy
> >>
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >> *Andy Blunden*
> >> http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
> >> <http://home.pacific.net.au/%7Eandy/>
> >> On 17/07/2015 2:09 AM, Glassman, Michael wrote:
> >>
> >> Well I'm not sure I understand your question
> >> Andy, but perhaps it has
> >> something to do with my grandfather's favorite
> >> saying (translated from
> >> Yiddish),
> >>
> >> Man plans, God laughs.
> >>
> >> Michael
> >>
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From:
> >> xmca-l-bounces+mglassman=
> ehe.ohio-state.edu@mailman.ucsd.edu
> >> <mailto:ehe.ohio-state.edu@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> >> [mailto:xmca-l-bounces+mglassman
> >> <mailto:xmca-l-bounces%2Bmglassman>=
> >> ehe.ohio-state.edu@mailman.ucsd.edu
> >> <mailto:ehe.ohio-state.edu@mailman.ucsd.edu>]
> >> On Behalf Of Andy Blunden
> >> Sent: Thursday, July 16, 2015 12:04 PM
> >> To: xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu
> >> <mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> >> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Having an experience
> >>
> >> So Michael, there was just that one occasion,
> >> in all your museum-going, when you had an
> >> experience. Was that planned?
> >> (I don't mean to say you haven't had a number
> >> of such experiences,
> >> Michael ... just some number actually)
> >>
> >> Andy
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >> *Andy Blunden*
> >> http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
> >> <http://home.pacific.net.au/%7Eandy/>
> >>
> >> On 17/07/2015 1:19 AM, Glassman, Michael wrote:
> >>
> >> Hi Larry and all,
> >>
> >> I think this is one of the most complex
> >> aspects of experience, what does he mean
> >> when he says you can't do things
> >> indiscriminately and have vital
> >> experience, but you also can't plan
> >> things? I have discussed (argued) about
> >> this a lot with my students. I have
> >> especially seen him raise this point in at
> >> least two of his great works, Democracy
> >> and Education and Experience and Nature -
> >> and again of course in Art as Experience
> >> (notice he is not saying how Art enters
> >> into experience but how art is experience
> >> - I have come to notice these little
> >> things more and more in his writing).
> >>
> >> The difficulty we have, at least in the
> >> United States because of the dominance of
> >> the idea of meta-cognition, is that we too
> >> often translate what individuals are
> >> bringing in to experience to organize it
> >> as a form of meta-cognition. It is kind
> >> of possible to make that interpretation
> >> from Democracy and Education, although
> >> what I think he is doing more is arguing
> >> against misinterpretations of his work as
> >> random, child centered activities. I
> >> think he is clearer in Experience and
> >> Nature that we bring in who we are at the
> >> moment into the activity, and use who we
> >> are (I don't want to say identity) as an
> >> organizing principle for what we do. It
> >> is perhaps one of the places where Dewey
> >> and Vygotsky are close. Perhaps I can use
> >> the same Jackson Pollock example. The
> >> first few times I saw his paintings I was
> >> trying to "apprecitate" them because I was
> >> told that was the best way to experience
> >> them. Dewey says no vital experience
> >> there because my activities become stilted
> >> and artificia
> >> l. Sometimes I went through the
> >> museum and just looked at pictures, one to
> >> the other. No vital experience there,
> >> just random threads. But that time I had
> >> the experience with the paintings I was
> >> allowing who I was, what had been built up
> >> in the trajectory of my life to enter into
> >> my experience with the painting, making it
> >> a vital experience. I think Dewey makes
> >> the argument in Experience and Nature that
> >> it is not just the experience the moment
> >> before, but the experiences leading to
> >> that experience, the context of my life,
> >> of my parent's life, of a long line of
> >> historical experiences.
> >>
> >> Anyway, my take.
> >>
> >> Michael
> >>
> >> -
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> Beth Ferholt
> >> Assistant Professor
> >> Department of Early Childhood and Art Education
> >> Brooklyn College, City University of New York
> >> 2900 Bedford Avenue
> >> Brooklyn, NY 11210-2889
> >>
> >> Email: bferholt@brooklyn.cuny.edu <mailto:bferholt@brooklyn.cuny.edu>
> >> Phone: (718) 951-5205 <tel:%28718%29%20951-5205>
> >> Fax: (718) 951-4816 <tel:%28718%29%20951-4816>
> >>
> >
> >
>
>
> --
>
> Both environment and species change in the course of time, and thus
> ecological niches are not stable and given forever (Polotova & Storch,
> Ecological Niche, 2008)
>
>
--
Both environment and species change in the course of time, and thus
ecological niches are not stable and given forever (Polotova & Storch,
Ecological Niche, 2008)
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