Re: imitation vs. emulation

Ana M. Shane (pshane who-is-at andromeda.rutgers.edu)
Sat, 16 Aug 1997 01:41:03

Hi, to all!
Reading through the latest discussion on imitation/emulation reminded me of
a story written by Jorge Louis Borges: 'Pierre Menard, Author of the
Quixote'. Of course, already the title seems a bit absurd but it isn't in
the light of the present discussion. For those who are not familiar, I'll
give a brief plot of the story, so that I can make my point better. In
short, in the story, the narrator (in a persona of a literary critic) tells
of a writer, Pierre Menard, who attempted to produce "a few pages which
would coincide - word for word and line for line - with those of Miguel de
Cervantes." (but not by merely transcribing Cervantes, but by
psychologically becoming Cervantes to the extent which will enable him to
in fact write Quixote!)

The narrator describes the way Menard carried out his attempt and then he
compares the two texts in the following way:

"It is a revelation to compare Menard's Don Quixote with Cervantes's. The
latter, for example wrote (part one, chapter nine):
...truth, whose mother is history, rival of time, depository of deeds,
witness of the past, exemplar and adviser to the present, and the future's
counsellor.

Written in the seventeenth century, written by the 'lay genius' Cervantes,
this enumeration is a mere rhetorical praise of history. Menard, on the
other hand writes:
...truth, whose mother is history, rival of time, depository of deeds,
witness of the past, exemplar and adviser to the present, and the future's
counsellor.

History, the *mother* of truth: the idea is astounding. Menard, a
contemporary of William James, does not define history as an inquiry into
reality but as its origin. Historical truth, for him, is not what has
happened; it is what we judge to have happened. The final phrases -
*exemplar and adviser to the present, and the future's counsellor* -are
brazenly pragmatic.
The contrast in style is also vivid. The archaic style of Menard - quite
foreign, after all - suffers from a certain affectation. Not so that of his
forerunner, who handles with ease the current Spanish of his time." (here
we leave off the story).

In his characteristic ridicule of intellectuals, Borges, however, presents
one of the most important points about *MIMESIS*, imitation, and the like
activities or processes. (The quoted story is not the only one in which he
plays with this notion). But what comes as a revelation, to me at least, is
that, imitation, or emulation not only almost never produces the "same"
result and that it is almost never achieved by exactly the "same"
processes, but that as an ACT it has a completely different meaning in the
social sense, from that which is imitated/emulated. Pierre Menard's writing
of Quixote is not simply an act of emulation, and act of complete imitation
of Cervantes, but it has a completely different meaning, and a completely
different purpose (!) from Cervantes's writing of Quixote.

And that is the point which is absent in almost all discussions of
imitation/emulation processes and especially if imitation/emulation is
regarded as a learning tool. Sometimes this point becomes almost visible,
like in Jay's last comment:

>Of course we then need to reinterpret just what kinds of mimetic activity
>are pretty species universal for humans, and one way to do that would be to
>consider that mimicry can function for humans (and for chimps?) as play,
>and so as having a salient, motivating result-object which is NOT the same
>for the child as for the person being mimicked.

Who doesn't remember the game of "imitation"? Repeat everything that your
friend (brother, sister, mother, father) does and says - like a mirror. But
not like a mirror, because it contains a social commentary, because it is a
social act of doing something to the other (not always with the same
purpose!!)

Just to say that learning is achieved by imitation or even emulation, makes
the whole process as mysterious as assuming that "the eye sees the picture
of the reality" (period).

If we take the social aspect of imitation into account, then, of course,
the further discussion on disconnecting activities from their original
context and re-connecting them in another context becomes even more
complicated (or maybe simpler in a way?)

What do you think?

Ana

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Dr. Ana Marjanovic-Shane

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