Re: Cultural rituals and activity theory

Charles Bazerman (bazerman who-is-at humanitas.ucsb.edu)
Mon, 11 Dec 1995 13:39:48 -0800 (PST)

Judy and Michael,
The interaction of class, tools, experience, and reflective
understanding are not simple and determinative, as Michael was
suggesting, but nonetheless certain class positions provide socialization
into tools and dispositions that provide access and successful
participation in a variety of experiences that may give one much
comparative material and some social distance that enable reflection.
This may be as true of the children of carnival families as children of the
Bateson class, raised to administrate and govern a complex class-divided
society. On the other hand tools to get by during a brief stay are quite
different tools
that allow one to take a central place, to bide one's time while one
observes the situation, and to assert authority. Moreover there arise in
the two cases different levels of confidence of participation as well as
different experiences and perceptions of one's role.

Another aspect of the interaction is how others perceive and
react to the tools you bring. Tools and habitus of particfular groups
are welcome or at least tolerated more widely and in a different range of
circumstance than the tools and habituses of others. Children that carry
the marks of privelege and power may be widely accepted if not alweays
loved, as do children who bear the mark of romance or adventure or
celebrity.
Again this is not simple, and highly differentiated among groups and
circumstances. But perceptions of others certainly influence the range
of circumstance you can participate in at what depth, and with what
success, again influencing confidence and the incorporation of a broader
repertoire of tools.

That these influences are not simply linked is made evident by
the example, I think cited by Bourdieu, of the deposed royalty that are
totally unfit for any form of participation outside of a court (i.e.,
having a very limited and specific set of social tools) but who are
treated with great respect and tolerance in their place of exile, still
treated as royalty, essentially allowing them to gfet by on their limited
set of tools and dispositions even when totally inappropriate to their
current condition. Such people may never have to face the radical
reflection their change of circumstances might seem to call for.

Chuck

On Mon, 11 Dec 1995 HDCS6 who-is-at jetson.uh.edu wrote:

>
> Judy, the idea of "leeway" you propose is an interesting one. I'd
> like to take a stab at it from a line of thinking I have been persuing
> lately. You equate the ability to recognize "leeway" as being related
> to social class. In reading Vygotsky and Leontiev I have become convinced
> that they, at least, were thinking of a similar idea in terms of "mastery",
> and that "mastery" is the result of conscious educational practices. Now
> it is true that social class and level of education is often correspondent
> in a number of societies (including, I assume, Bateson's). But I question
> the relationship between material comfort and the ability to think
> about your own purpose in terms of the activity.
>
> Let me suggest that we learn our cultural rituals as every day concepts.
> Meaning they are part of our every day activity. This becomes our knowledge
> base, the frame of our future activity. This is not done consciously, but
> is the result of individuals in society being presented with certain
> instruments (conceived in its broadest sense) in certain situations,
> causing the individuals to understand the world in terms of the use of
> those instruments. It is not important in this type of "cultural"
> education for the individual to understand the relationship of the
> instrument use to the larger social motivation. When the individual
> reaches a certain level of experience (Vygotsky seemed to use adolescence
> as a marker), he or she is ready to learn that there is an abstract
> relationship between motivations, goals, and what it is you actually do.
> This abstract relationship can be taught using any material, any instruments.
> What is important, I think, is the recognition of the abstract relationships.
> This recognition allows the individual to then return to his or her
> every day knowledge base and examine the abstract relationships that lie
> behind both the action and the larger activity of the cultural rituals.
> So it is the realization of abstract relationships between activity and
> action that I would think allows for this leeway and passing that you
> talk about. This all hooks in to a discussion on every day and scientific
> concepts that I believe we had last year on this network.
>
> Michael Glassman
> University of Houston
>
>