[Xmca-l] Re: The emergence of Boundary Ojbects

[Alfredo Jornet Gil]

Thanks a lot for your engagement in the conversation. I find your example of the Japanese greeting, which includes not just a movement but a set of several connected movements, really interesting. I think that it goes into the core of what we were after in our article: a bodily performance, unlike an abstract propositio, message, meaning, or intention, has TEMPORAL EXTENSION. That is, in my view, the performative dimension in boundary objects that you may miss if you focus only on the object(s). And that is why we bring, building on Bowker and Star, the notion of experience and experiencing forward in the article. Performances have consequences. And, as Bowker and Star remind us, "the materiality of anything ... is drawn from the consequences of its situation". In our paper, we point out that bodily action has import not just because things are shown or referred to, but also because they allow to go through, to experience in the deep sense, so that possibilities that could not be directly intended because they did not yet exist (the museum space is being designed), came into being through being experienced. And, at the same time, because going through together does not require of a prior substantial understanding (but, as we argue, a shared affectivity and orientation towards further experiences), performances are core to the organizational and collaborative aspects of boundary objects. 

Best
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 Lplarry <lpscholar2@gmail.com>
Sent: 15 July 2015 18:41
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: The emergence of Boundary Ojbects

Well I am now hooked on this topic
I am pro-foundly curious about "living the question" and your question is calling me to the "depths" of my shared question.

"How is the doing, which is primary AND the coming along a trajectory conceptual development related to each other.

In other words, how are place/place-making and "meaning" related?

I will now move to focus attention on the relation of "making" and "design".  The design team must first design/engage in a place-making activity FOR (in order to) their collaborative setting. In other words attend to taking "care" and focusing this design moment prior to attending to future imaginal design moments.

I want to share a word in Japanese that I find relevant to this topic/narrative of place/meaning.  It is the word "ma" which can be translated as "interval"
An example: In greeting another you bow down and then arise. However there is an interval/pause between the bowing down and arising. The design performance INCLUDES this interval BETWEEN movements.  This pause is PRIMARY in expressing the doing of place-making.

I share this focus on "ma" as a way of expanding the movements of "repair" to include the "tarrying in place" (the place of rest and stillness) in our notions of "care" and "repair".

I am exploring this notion of "making/construction" as focused on the active doing.  place-abiding (as meaning) may also consider the place of rest (the interval as a form of "care".

I am now translating (and entering your question).
It may overlap with per-forming and de-sign as another aspect of meaning/place.

The "/" can be read as an interval, a moment of stillness and coming to rest in our "making" and "doing"  The place of "ma" as the interval in time.

I am deeply moved by your profound way of "living the question" which opens a space for focusing our awareness on performance and coming into existence what has been previously imagined.

I will pause at this place and listen with care to others reflections.

Thank you for this opportunity to think out loud

Larry



-----Original Message-----
From: "Alfredo Jornetgil" <alfredoj@uvic.ca>
Sent: ‎2015-‎07-‎15 8:18 AM
To: "xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: The emergence of Boundary Ojbects

Thanks, Larry, for your very interesting reading of the topics in our article. I like very much your metaphor of the table, which points out the organizational aspect that we aimed to describe with regard to boundary objects. Rolf has done an excellent case about this in his previous e-mail.

I'd like also to pick up on your comments about subject matter. Indeed, the title of the paper, "The Matter of Space" was intended precisely as a play on words that was to mark the issue of space both as matter, and as subject matter. As to the connections with Mead, I have only recently begun to read him, and actually motivated by some of the last e-mails in this list about Mead. But I definitely think that one of the points was what I heard Jean Lave say in a lecture that Andy uploaded here( https://vimeo.com/28855105 ):  "We always learn what we are already doing". So, one question we set up for ourselves in this paper was: how is the doing, which is primary, and the coming along a trajectory of conceptual development related to each other?

Thanks,
Alfredo


((Sorry I write outside of the thread of e-mails, but I am having some troubles to publish in xmca from my e-mail address and I must do some tests. The e-mail below aimed to address Larry's last e-mail on the article's discussion thread. This e-mail may end up appearing several times. Apologies...))