When I read your story I could "see" the moment of the ZPD -- What I see in
the T'ai Chi moment, which ever so rarely happens in the classroom, or
talking with a student, or reading one of those books that changes you
forever, is extremely hard to describe in words. To me it's somewhat
shimmery, something like heat waves, but a definite zone, a space. It's
perched, high-tension, perhaps right on the edge between visible and
invisible. I'm not trying to be mystical here --I'm just curious about if
people do have a concrete visual sense associated with processes of change,
learning, and that "betweenness."
L*
>
>>Perhaps it would help to frame our questions comparatively -- to me what
>>is powerful about the concept of
>>zoped it that it is one of those rare concepts that captures the
>>"between-ness" at the core of social
>>science. (The people, Diane! without essentialism.) We can't SEE change,
>>or work, or thought, and we're
>>stuck with indicators (like measurement of progress, gestures, words) that
>>point back to that limnal zone.
>>A couple of questions: how do people visualize the zone? Are there other
>>"between" concepts that we
>>could compare to zoped?
>
>I have a story. :-)
>
>I was working with a seven-yr old boy who had been diagnosed with ADDH
>(attetnion deficit disorder and hyperactivity/hypertension),
>and
>he was having a lot of trouble participating in his gr.1 class.
>
>Three times a week, he and I would
>spend about four hours in an empty classroom, working through some of
>the basics of the gr.1 curriculum.
>
>Very early on I realized there were several factors at play, not the last
>of which is the problem with the gr.1 curriculum (can u say WORKSHEETS?)
>-ah, learning. Ah, education.
>
>anyhow, his mother was dosing out his ritalin erratically, like, if they
>were taking a long car drive, she would dose the kid up for the ride...
>
>we talked a lot about the ritalin, this boy and I, and I asked him if he
>liked it, liked the medication.
>He said, "You know, sometimes I can feel my eyes just jiggling in my head,
>they're just jiggling in my head, and the ritalin helps stop that..."
>
>so I said something about feeling nervous, and he nodded enthusiastically,
>nervous, very nervous...
>
>So I shucked the worksheets to the side (woo-hoo!) and taught him a few
>Tai Chi
>exercises.
>One is called
>"Drawing the bow" - but of course the key is breathing, relaxation, and
>slow movements,
>so we practiced that, breathing deeply until your stomach is full and you can
>feel your lower back fill up with air, and then letting it go, slow slow,
>like a balloon with a tiny hole...etc...
>and then I showed him the movements for Drawing the Bow, which are,
>basically, like drawing the the arrow back on a bow and aiming it into the
>air, slowly,
>
>well.
>He copied my movements and we stood in front of each other, and I realized
>he wasn't looking at my body, he was looking into my eyes. I looked into his
>eyes, and I could SEE something shift, or change, but what? I could never say.
>
>But he stood there, ADDH and all, jiggly eyes and nervousness, and he
>slowly slowly drew the arrow back in his bow, leaning on his stance, slowly
>tilting and holding the pose,
>
>and he looked at me again, as he stood there in the pose, stillness - I
>remember the
>stillness and the poise, and then, as though he"knew" what he had just
>done, he grinned and his eyes opened wide and he just beamed at me. Then he
>said, "What's another one? What's another one?" and we learned a few
>more...
>
>the point of the story is that sometimes to "SEE" the change, you have to
>be tuned
>in to the person in a way which exceeds gesture or measurement,
>
>but, spatially, we were there, in that zone, and it was an instant of
>something
>quite intimate, in the eyes... and it didn't alter his condition,
>or make him better at filling out worksheets,
> of course, but rather gave him a tool for his own sanity.
>
>I also taught him isometric exercises, but that's a whole other story. :-)
>
>diane
>
>"Every tool is a weapon if you hold it right"
> (Ani Difranco)
***************************************
Susan Leigh Star
address until January 15, 1998:
539 Summit Drive
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Phone: (408) 454-9218 (h) (408) 454-0965 (w)
FAX: (217) 244-3302 email: s-star1 who-is-at uiuc.edu
---------
In speaking of lies, we come inevitably to the subject of the truth. There
is nothing simple or easy about this idea. There is no 'the truth,' 'a
truth' -- truth is not one thing, or even a system. It is an increasing
complexity. The pattern of the carpet is a surface. When we look closely,
or when we become weavers, we learn of the tiny multiple threads unseen in
the overall pattern, the knots on the underside of the carpet.
That is why the effort to speak honestly is so important."
--Adrienne Rich. (1979). "Women and honor: Some notes on lying, In her
On Lies, Secrets and Silence: Selected Prose, 1966-1978 (pp. 185-194).
New York: Norton.