[Xmca-l] Re: language and music

Fri Nov 23 09:27:53 PST 2018

Yes, Greg, thank you for sharing. From a look at the abstracts and conclusions of the two articles, they resonate amazingly with this subject (language and music) and the subject line it came out of (Corballis), as if to instantiate what you say in the articles. 
Henry

> On Nov 22, 2018, at 12:31 PM, James Ma <jamesma320@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Greg, your articles sound exciting. I'm going to read. Thank you for sharing. James
> 
> Greg Thompson <greg.a.thompson@gmail.com <mailto:greg.a.thompson@gmail.com>> 于 2018年11月22日周四 17:55写道：
> James and Helena (and others),
> 
> Martin checked me offline for putting forward a notion of intersubjectivity that presumes that subjects are prior to intersubjectivity.
> I entirely agree with Martin's concern that a properly dialectical notion of the subject would recognize that intersubjectivity and subjectivity are mutually constitutive (and perhaps we should just speak of "intersubjects"?). 
> 
> In fact, I happen to have two papers (attached) that seek to forward such a notion of mutual constitution of subjectivity and intersubjectivity (and beyond). One is in the idiom of self and frame (Goffman 1973) and the other in the idiom of subjectivity and stance (Du Bois 2007 - more on that in a sec). In the stance paper, I draw on the notion of contract as it pertains to right (I even briefly cite Fichte and Hegel) as a way of trying to capture some of the ways that subjectivity is real-ized (Bakhtin speaks of subjects being "consummated") in the interstitial space between self and other (not just other subjects, but also bodies and things that can serve to take stances toward subjects), and as captured by Du Bois' undertheorized notion of "stance ownership" - which I seek to theorize in this paper. 
> 
> With regard to Bakhtin, I'd love to hear more. I'd note that John Du Bois' notion of dialogic syntax might be particularly relevant here. He draws on Bakhtin to make the case that syntax is fundamentally dialogical. I wonder if others are familiar and/or have any thoughts on this approach and how it might fit with Vygotsky's work?
> 
> Helena, I didn't mean to hijack your intentions in bringing up Bakhtin - I wholeheartedly second a conversation (bad conversational participant that I am!) about Bakhtin!
> 
> (and perhaps I should have added this to a different thread - I still find the asynchrony of listserves make it difficult to maintain "a conversation" in any traditional sense - chaining is normal in face-to-face conversations, but whereas in f2f conversations everyone more or less goes along with a single chain of topics (and the negotiation thereof is a big part of making conversations - and making subjects!) in listserve conversations, the chaining can spin off into many directions at once and the coherence of the conversation can quickly be lost (and the subjects with it!).) 
> 
> (And one last parenthetical note, in typing "listserve" I just realized how old fashioned we are! Are there other more contemporary mediated spaces out there where Vygotsky is being discussed? Might such conversational spaces allow for more involvement from and animation of a next generation of CHAT thinkers? Just wondering...). 
> 
> -greg
> 
> 
> On Wed, Nov 21, 2018 at 12:42 PM Helena Worthen <helenaworthen@gmail.com <mailto:helenaworthen@gmail.com>> wrote:
> Outlines?  This sent me to my dog-eared (but lying on the shelf for 20 years) copy of The Dialogic Imagination, Michael Holquist’s collectiion of four essays by Bakhtin. 
> 
> So, on the topic of edges, outlines and constraints on the one hand, and coherence and wholeness on the other, I’d like to offer the concept of “utterance,” a speech act performed in order to generate, sooner or later, a counterstatement. (I’m cribbing from Holquist’s glossary on pg 434.) An utterance can be brief or long; the defining feature of it is that gets a response — it’s part of a dialog. A dialog can be you and me talking, or it can be an entire discourse; a discourse itself can be an utterance. Individual novels are utterances in the genre of novels, which Holquist says is “a horizon of expectations brought to bear on a certain class of text types…” 
> 
> Anyone else want to talk about Bahktin? Then we could talk about the way a song coheres and musical improvisation operates under a horizon of expectations, but come to think of it, does not generate a response. 
> 
> Something else: I’m still trying to learn Vietnamese. The CD I am listening to now, produced by the University of Social Sciences andHUmanities in HoChiMinh City, lists each track as a “song.” Thus, Track 1, “Excuse me, what is your name?” appears on the CD menu as “Song 1.”
> 
> H
> 
> Helena Worthen
> helenaworthen@gmail.com <mailto:helenaworthen@gmail.com>
> Berkeley, CA 94707 510-828-2745
> Blog US/ Viet Nam: 
> helenaworthen.wordpress.com <http://helenaworthen.wordpress.com/>
> skype: helena.worthen1
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>> On Nov 21, 2018, at 12:07 AM, Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@ils.uio.no <mailto:a.j.gil@ils.uio.no>> wrote:
>> 
>> Henry's remarks about no directors and symphonic potential of conversation reminded me of G. Bateson's metalogue "why do things have outlines" (attached). Implicitly, it raises the question of units and elements, of how a song, a dance, a poem, a conversation, to make sense, they must have a recognizable outline, even in improvisation; they must be wholes, or suggest wholes. That makes them "predictable". And yet, when you are immersed in a conversation, the fact that you can never exactly predict what comes next is the whole point that keep us talking, dancing, drawing, etc!
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Alfredo
>> 
>> 
>> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>> on behalf of HENRY SHONERD <hshonerd@gmail.com <mailto:hshonerd@gmail.com>>
>> Sent: 21 November 2018 06:22
>> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
>> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: language and music
>>  
>> I’d like to add to the call and response conversation that discourse, this conversation itself, is staged. There are performers and and an audience made up partly of performers themselves. How many are lurkers, as I am usually? This conversation has no director, but there are leaders. There is symphonic potential. And even gestural potential, making the chat a dance. All on line.:) 
>> Henry
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>> On Nov 20, 2018, at 9:05 PM, mike cole <mcole@ucsd.edu <mailto:mcole@ucsd.edu>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> For many years I used the work of Ellen Dissenyake to teach comm classes about language/music/development. She is quite unusual in ways that might find interest here.
>>> 
>>> https://ellendissanayake.com/ <https://ellendissanayake.com/>
>>> 
>>> mike
>>> 
>>> On Sat, Nov 17, 2018 at 2:16 PM James Ma <jamesma320@gmail.com <mailto:jamesma320@gmail.com>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Hello Simangele,
>>> 
>>> In semiotic terms, whatever each of the participants has constructed internally is the signified, i.e. his or her understanding and interpretation. When it is vocalised (spoken out), it becomes the signifier to the listener. What's more, when the participants work together to compose a story impromptu, each of their signifiers turns into a new signified – a shared, newly-established understanding, woven into the fabric of meaning making. 
>>> 
>>> By the way, in Chinese language, words for singing and dancing have long been used inseparably. As I see it, they are semiotically indexed to, or adjusted to allow for, the feelings, emotions, actions and interactions of a consciousness who is experiencing the singing and dancing. Here are some idioms:
>>> 
>>> 酣歌醉舞 - singing and dancing rapturously
>>> 
>>> 村歌社舞 <> - dancing village and singing club
>>> 
>>> 燕歌赵舞 <> - citizens of ancient Yan and Zhao good at singing and dancing, hence referring to wonderful songs and dances
>>> 
>>> 舞榭歌楼 - a church or building set up for singing and dancing
>>>  
>>> 
>>> James
>>> 
>>> ________________________________________________
>>> James Ma  Independent Scholar https://oxford.academia.edu/JamesMa <https://oxford.academia.edu/JamesMa>   
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Sat, 17 Nov 2018 at 19:08, Simangele Mayisela <simangele.mayisela@wits.ac.za <mailto:simangele.mayisela@wits.ac.za>> wrote:
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Colleagues,
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> This conversation is getting even more interesting, not that I have an informed answer for you Rob, I can only think of the National Anthems where people stand still when singing, even then this is observed only in international events.
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Other occasions when people are likely not to move when singing when there is death and the mood is sombre. Otherwise singing and rhythmic body movement, called dance are a norm.
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> This then makes me  wonder what this means in terms of cognitive functioning, in the light of Vygotsky’s developmental stages – of language and thought. Would the body movement constitute the externalisation of the thoughts contained in the music?
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Helena – the video you are relating about reminds of the language teaching or group therapy technique- where a group of learners (or participants in OD settings) are instructed to tell a single coherent and logical story as a group. They all take turns to say a sentence, a sentence of not more than 6 words (depending on the instructor ), each time linking your sentence to the sentence of previous articulator, with the next person also doing the same, until the story sounds complete with conclusion. More important is that they compose this story impromptu, It with such stories that group dynamics are analysed, and in group therapy cases, collective experiences of trauma are shared.  I suppose this is an example of cooperative activity, although previously I would have thought of it as just an “activity”
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Simangele
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> [mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>] On Behalf Of robsub@ariadne.org.uk <mailto:robsub@ariadne.org.uk>
>>> Sent: Friday, 16 November 2018 21:01
>>> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu <mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>>; Helena Worthen <helenaworthen@gmail.com <mailto:helenaworthen@gmail.com>>
>>> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Michael C. Corballis
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> I remember being told once that many languages do not have separate words for singing and dancing, because if you sing you want to move - until western civilisation beats it out of you.
>>> 
>>> Does anybody know if this is actually true, or is it complete cod?
>>> 
>>> If it is true, does it have something to say about the relationship between the physical body and the development of speech?
>>> 
>>> Rob
>>> 
>>> On 16/11/2018 17:29, Helena Worthen wrote:
>>> 
>>> I am very interested in where this conversation is going. I remember being in a Theories of Literacy class in which Glynda Hull, the instructor, showed a video of a singing circle somewhere in the Amazon, where an incredibly complicated pattern of musical phrases wove in and out among the singers underlaid by drumming that included turn-taking, call and response, you name it. Maybe 20 people were involved, all pushing full steam ahead to create something together that they all seemed to know about but wouldn’t happen until they did it. 
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Certainly someone has studied the relationship of musical communication (improvised or otherwise), speech and gesture? I have asked musicians about this and get blank looks. Yet clearly you can tell when you listen to different kinds of music, not just Amazon drum and chant circles, that there is some kind of speech - like potential embedded there. The Sonata form is clearly involves exposition (they even use that word). 
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> For example: the soundtrack to the Coen Brothers’ film Fargo opens with a musical theme that says, as clearly as if we were reading aloud from some children’s book, “I am now going to tell you a very strange story that sounds impossible but I promise you every word of it is true…da-de-da-de-da.’ Only it doesn’t take that many words.
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> (18) Fargo (1996) - 'Fargo, North Dakota' (Opening) scene [1080] - YouTube
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Helena Worthen
>>> 
>>> helenaworthen@gmail.com <mailto:helenaworthen@gmail.com>
>>> Berkeley, CA 94707 510-828-2745
>>> 
>>> Blog US/ Viet Nam: 
>>> 
>>> helenaworthen.wordpress.com <http://helenaworthen.wordpress.com/>
>>> skype: helena.worthen1
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> On Nov 16, 2018, at 8:56 AM, HENRY SHONERD <hshonerd@gmail.com <mailto:hshonerd@gmail.com>> wrote:
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Andy and Peter,
>>> 
>>> I like the turn taking principle a lot. It links language and music very nicely: call and response. By voice and ear. While gesture is linked to visual art. In face-to-face conversation there is this rhythmically entrained interaction. It’s not just cooperative, it’s verbal/gestural art. Any human work is potentially a work of art. Vera John-Steiner and Holbrook Mahn have talked about how conversation can be a co-construction “at the speed of thought”.  Heady stuff taking part, or just listening to, this call and response between smart people.  And disheartening and destructive when we give up on dialog. 
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> As I write this, I realize that the prosodic aspects of spoken language (intonation) are gestural as well. It’s simplistic to restrict gesture to visual signals. But I would say gesture is prototypically visual, an accompaniment to the voice. In surfing the web, one can find some interesting things on paralanguage which complicate the distinction between language and gesture. I think it speaks to the embodiment of language in the senses. 
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Henry
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Nov 16, 2018, at 7:00 AM, Peter Feigenbaum [Staff] <pfeigenbaum@fordham.edu <mailto:pfeigenbaum@fordham.edu>> wrote:
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Andy,
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> I couldn't agree more. And thanks for introducing me to the notion of delayed gratification as a precondition for sharing and turn-taking. 
>>> 
>>> That's a feature I hadn't considered before in connection with speech communication. It makes sense that each participant would need
>>> 
>>> to exercise patience in order to wait out someone else's turn. 
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Much obliged.
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Peter
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> On Fri, Nov 16, 2018 at 8:50 AM Andy Blunden <andyb@marxists.org <mailto:andyb@marxists.org>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Interesting, Peter.
>>> 
>>> Corballis, oddly in my view, places a lot of weight in so-called mirror neurons to explain perception of the intentionality of others. It seems blindingly obvious to me that cooperative activity, specifically participating in projects in which individuals share a common not-present object, is a form of behaviour which begets the necessary perceptive abilities. I have also long been of the view that delayed gratification, as a precondition for sharing and turn-taking, as a matter of fact, is an important aspect of sociality fostering the development of speech, and the upright gait which frees the hands for carrying food back to camp where it can be shared is important. None of which presupposes tools, only cooperation.
>>> 
>>> Andy
>>> 
>>> Andy Blunden
>>> http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.ethicalpolitics.org_ablunden_index.htm&d=DwMFaQ&c=aqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM&r=mXj3yhpYNklTxyN3KioIJ0ECmPHilpf4N2p9PBMATWs&m=itd0qPWlE7uAuyEX0ii8ohEoZegfdMAOOLf-YoaEqqs&s=-uwTjZDhHtJM2EFdBS-rXLTptADQdSGAcibaav-mhJw&e=>
>>> On 17/11/2018 12:36 am, Peter Feigenbaum [Staff] wrote:
>>> 
>>> If I might chime in to this discussion:
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> I submit that the key cooperative activity underlying speech communication is *turn-taking*. I don't know how that activity or rule came into being,
>>> 
>>> but once it did, the activity of *exchanging* utterances became possible. And with exchange came the complementarity of speaking and
>>> 
>>> listening roles, and the activity of alternating conversational roles and mental perspectives. Turn-taking is a key process in human development.
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Peter
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> On Thu, Nov 15, 2018 at 9:21 PM Andy Blunden <andyb@marxists.org <mailto:andyb@marxists.org>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Oddly, Amazon delivered the book to me yesterday and I am currently on p.5. Fortunately, Corballis provides a synopsis of his book at the end, which I sneak-previewed last night.
>>> 
>>> The interesting thing to me is his claim, similar to that of Merlin Donald, which goes like this.
>>> 
>>> It would be absurd to suggest that proto-humans discovered that they had this unique and wonderful vocal apparatus and decided to use it for speech. Clearly there was rudimentary language before speech was humanly possible. In development, a behaviour is always present before the physiological adaptations which facilitate it come into being. I.e, proto-humans found themselves in circumstances where it made sense to develop interpersonal, voluntary communication, and to begin with they used what they had - the ability to mime and gesture, make facial expressions and vocalisations (all of which BTW can reference non-present entities and situations) This is an activity which further produces the conditions for its own development. Eventually, over millions of years, the vocal apparatus evolved under strong selection pressure due to the practice of non-speech communication as an integral part of their evolutionary niche. In other words, rudimentary wordless speech gradually became modern speech, along with all the accompanying facial expressions and hand movements.
>>> 
>>> It just seems to me that, as you suggest, collective activity must have been a part of those conditions fostering communication (something found in our nearest evolutionary cousins who also have the elements of rudimentary speech)  - as was increasing tool-using, tool-making, tool-giving and tool-instructing.
>>> 
>>> Andy
>>> 
>>> Andy Blunden
>>> http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.ethicalpolitics.org_ablunden_index.htm&d=DwMFaQ&c=aqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM&r=mXj3yhpYNklTxyN3KioIJ0ECmPHilpf4N2p9PBMATWs&m=VlOXr8x02-mghKHGod2LwGx8_X-LHNRmDI_elI-7rKI&s=A3k5oeQ13zGCPUbWibdOb2KNZT4q__fLyCwugyULUDw&e=>
>>> On 16/11/2018 12:58 pm, Arturo Escandon wrote:
>>> 
>>> Dear Andy,
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Michael Tomasello has made similar claims, grounding the surge of articulated language on innate co-operativism and collective activity. 
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/cambridge-handbook-of-child-language/90B84B8F3BB2D32E9FA9E2DFAF4D2BEB <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.cambridge.org_core_books_cambridge-2Dhandbook-2Dof-2Dchild-2Dlanguage_90B84B8F3BB2D32E9FA9E2DFAF4D2BEB&d=DwMFaQ&c=aqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM&r=mXj3yhpYNklTxyN3KioIJ0ECmPHilpf4N2p9PBMATWs&m=VlOXr8x02-mghKHGod2LwGx8_X-LHNRmDI_elI-7rKI&s=vxJZooXRDYwTRrM4dzWBbLfUhF9HhmUvU3ouq6sbwPI&e=>
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Best
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Arturo
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> --
>>> 
>>> Sent from Gmail Mobile
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> --
>>> 
>>> Peter Feigenbaum, Ph.D.
>>> 
>>> Director, 
>>> 
>>> Office of Institutional Research <https://www.fordham.edu/info/24303/institutional_research>
>>> Fordham University
>>> 
>>> Thebaud Hall-202
>>> 
>>> Bronx, NY 10458
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Phone: (718) 817-2243
>>> 
>>> Fax: (718) 817-3817
>>> 
>>> email: pfeigenbaum@fordham.edu <mailto:pfeigenbaum@fordham.edu>
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> --
>>> 
>>> Peter Feigenbaum, Ph.D.
>>> 
>>> Director, 
>>> 
>>> Office of Institutional Research <https://www.fordham.edu/info/24303/institutional_research>
>>> Fordham University
>>> 
>>> Thebaud Hall-202
>>> 
>>> Bronx, NY 10458
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Phone: (718) 817-2243
>>> 
>>> Fax: (718) 817-3817
>>> 
>>> email: pfeigenbaum@fordham.edu <mailto:pfeigenbaum@fordham.edu>
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> This communication is intended for the addressee only. It is confidential. If you have received this communication in error, please notify us immediately and destroy the original message. You may not copy or disseminate this communication without the permission of the University. Only authorised signatories are competent to enter into agreements on behalf of the University and recipients are thus advised that the content of this message may not be legally binding on the University and may contain the personal views and opinions of the author, which are not necessarily the views and opinions of The University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. All agreements between the University and outsiders are subject to South African Law unless the University agrees in writing to the contrary.
>> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
> Assistant Professor
> Department of Anthropology
> 880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
> Brigham Young University
> Provo, UT 84602
> WEBSITE: greg.a.thompson.byu.edu <http://greg.a.thompson.byu.edu/> 
> http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson <http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.ucsd.edu/pipermail/xmca-l/attachments/20181123/490fe24d/attachment.html 