[Xmca-l] Re: "cultivating Minds

[valerie A. Wilkinson]

David,
Thank you for the glimpse of the Moebius strip of XMCA history.
I’m one of the participant readers who randomly drops in with a comment. 
XMCA continues to be vitally interesting to a list of great variety. 
Paradox is reiterative and fractal,
Embedded in the extreme unique present 
Anywhere and everywhere.
On paradox, then and now:
*Zhuangzi* (3rd c. BC)
Once upon a time, I, Chuang Chou, dreamt I was a butterfly, fluttering hither and thither, a veritable butterfly, enjoying itself to the full of its bent, and not knowing it was Chuang Chou. Suddenly I awoke, and came to myself, the veritable Chuang Chou. Now I do not know whether it was then I dreamt I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly dreaming I am a man. Between me and the butterfly there must be a difference. This is an instance of transformation.

In the 2010 film *Inception*:
The labyrinth of many layers took me many viewings, putting up with loud action sequences and incendiary CG scenes, to excavate the core:
Cobb: You're waiting for a train. A train that'll take you far away. You know where you hope this train will take you. But you can't know for sure. Yet it doesn't matter. Now, tell me why? 
I would not have gotten "the message" had I not watched the film repeatedly. 

Consciousness, reality and virtual reality, represents itself in paradoxical images.
Recall also, the play by Calderon *Life is a Dream* (1635)
Vandy

-----Original Message-----
From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu] On Behalf Of David Kellogg
Sent: Wednesday, March 04, 2015 6:59
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: "cultivating Minds

Sometimes xmca reiterates.

This isn't always a good thing; it's often because someone (usually me) wants to say the same thing a second time and just can't come up with a better way of saying it. But sometimes it's a good thing, either becuase the list as a whole has forgotten something it once knew or (better) there are new people who weren't here for the first part of the conversation, or (best of all) a thread has really turned into a kind of Moebius strip and is doubling back on itself, but in a way that brings something that was only implicit out and makes it explicit.

All of which is an excuse for me to recycle the following posting, which I wrote many years ago when my friend the performance artist Shu Yang was last in Seoul.

http://lchc.ucsd.edu/MCA/Mail/xmcamail.2010_11.dir/msg00242.html

I think the point I'm trying to make here--but it is implicit and I will try to make it a little more explicit--is that we should have predicted all the sensationalist and EXHIBITIONISTIC excesses of today's performance art, simply from the fact that performance art is ART, and art in a bourgeois society will inevitably centre on the all-conquering, all-absorbing, all-obscuring individual. So today performance art sees the body as its main asset, but by doing this it has turned the body into its main obstacle. Seeing performance art as a projection of performance, the body denies performance art as an injection of art.

If performance art wants to be art and not just performance, then it has to grasp the basic Vygotskyan principle that art is not the socialization of bodily feelings, but on the contrary, the individuation of a social feeling. That's what made Shu Yang's performance art, and the other performances mere performance.

Reiterate xmca...sometimes.

David Kellogg
Hankuk University of Foreign Studies

On 4 March 2015 at 02:51, HENRY SHONERD <hshonerd@gmail.com> wrote:

> Larry,
> I am mashing up serveral themes lately in the chat braid:
> Style and authenticity: Are they compatible? I am thinking about the 
> discussion of performance art. Annalisa posted a radio podcast about 
> professional wrestling. Is it fake, and if so, so what? it’s just 
> entertainment. And makes lots of money. Your three definitions of 
> FREEDOM come to mind (boiled way down, leaving just the salt): 1) 
> autonomy, 2) expression of AUTHENTIC self, 3) collaborative/creaiive 
> hoping. So, I see PLAY saving the day in that third, hopeful space, 
> that sweet spot. Where people play at being both stylish and 
> authentic. That would never go out of style. That would be vital. And wouldn’t be dreadfully boring.
>
> I look back at the previous paragraph and thought I might try to 
> unpack it, but that would be even more arrogant than having written it 
> in the first place. So, let’s just leave it there. Play with it. Come 
> on, peeps, come out and play!! Snow has melted here in the Break Bad 
> City, all mud puddle luscious. We’re high desert, so this is a real 
> treat. Sorry can’t send some of our mud to Mike in San Diego.
> Henry
>
>
>
> > On Mar 3, 2015, at 7:45 AM, Larry Purss <lpscholar2@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Henry,
> > Let's follow further the opening comment of the song [this is an
> "approach
> > that has gone out of favour in the scientific world]  Poetry as
> "metaphor"
> > but not "mere" metaphor as the handmaiden of the "realistic" and the 
> > "conceptual"  Rather "metaphor AS realistic" and also the reciprocal 
> > "the realistic AS metaphorical"  Chemicals as personifications 
> > [anthro-morphisms] "attract" each other.
> >
> > I am "implicating" metaphor and valences AND rational conceptions as
> equal
> > "partners" in "approaching" the notion of life as "vitality" 
> > [another notion that has gone out of fashion  I am suggesting that 
> > this "theme" of "life" as vital/dead seems to "play" out and also 
> > "play" within  internal/external "dramas".
> > Daniel Stern most recent book is on the notion of "vitality"  Also 
> > Heidegger's notion of "care and concern".
> >
> > Just saying -
> >
> > Larry
> >
> > On Mon, Mar 2, 2015 at 9:43 PM, HENRY SHONERD <hshonerd@gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> >> Larry and Mike,
> >> I think you guys are on to something. Thank goodness for valence, 
> >> the
> salt
> >> of the earth according to the McGarrigles:
> >>
> >> KATE & ANNA MCGARRIGLE
> >> "NaCl"
> >> Just a little atom of Chlorine, valence minus one Swimming through 
> >> the sea, digging the scene, just having fun She's not worried about 
> >> the shape or size of her outside shell It's fun to ionize Just a 
> >> little atom of Cl with an unfilled shell But somewhere in that sea 
> >> lurks handsome Sodium With enough electrons on his outside shell 
> >> plus that extra one Somewhere in this deep blue sea there's a 
> >> negative For my extra energy Yes, somewhere in this foam my 
> >> positive will find a home Then unsuspecting Chlorine felt a 
> >> magnetic pull She looked down and her outside shell was full Sodium 
> >> cried, "What a gas, be my bride And I'll change your name from 
> >> Chlorine to chloride!"
> >> Now the sea evaporates to make the clouds for the rain and snow 
> >> Leaving her chemical compounds in the absence of H2O But the 
> >> crystals that wash upon the shore are happy ones So, if you never 
> >> thought before Think of the love that you eat when you salt you 
> >> meat!
> >>
> >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpTzawl3OmI < 
> >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpTzawl3OmI>
> >>
> >> Henry
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>> On Mar 2, 2015, at 8:47 PM, Larry Purss <lpscholar2@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> Mike,
> >>> I will follow further in Simmels and Urs Furher's footsteps as 
> >>> this theme also brings in Ernst Boesch's theory of "symbolic 
> >>> action" which
> was
> >>> developed as a notion that all phenomena [including action] have 
> >>> both objective and symbolic "aspects". Boesch wrote:
> >>>
> >>> "This 'pervasiveness' of symbolism may be easy to grasp for a
> >> psychologist
> >>> with psychoanalytic experience or with strong artistic tastes; in 
> >>> my
> >> case,
> >>> however, although I believe myself to have a bit of both, this 
> >>> insight
> >> had
> >>> much more 'rational' roots. ... I trace its inception back to the 
> >>> 1963 article 'Raum und Zeit als Valenzsysteme', in which I 
> >>> formulated, for
> the
> >>> first time, the close *interrelatedness of 'valence' *[LP- 
> >>> worth/value
> ]
> >>> and 'structure': the conceptual structuring of space depends, I 
> >>> said,
> >> upon
> >>> the location of valences [worth/values] - it was the *'wish to return'
> >> *which
> >>> led to the specification and stability of *places.*"  [cited in
> "reasons
> >>> For a Symbolic Concept of Action" in Culture and Psychology 1997 
> >>> Volume 3(3): pages 423-431]
> >>>
> >>> I am suggesting that Simmel, Urs Furher, and Ernst Boesch were all 
> >>> following in the footsteps of the concept of "polyvalence" 
> >>> [multiple
> >> worths
> >>> and  values] as symbolic actions.
> >>>
> >>> Larry
> >>>
> >>> On Mon, Mar 2, 2015 at 3:23 PM, mike cole <mcole@ucsd.edu> wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> Amazing "coincidence" Larry--- I just wrote to Urs who I have not 
> >>>> corresponded with for years as a result of going through his book 
> >>>> on cultivating minds. It has a chapter on behavior settings as 
> >>>> media for promoting children's development that has me 
> >>>> re-thinking a number of issues. Among other things, there is a 
> >>>> very interesting discussion of Roger Barker's research program. 
> >>>> Very worth
> >> while
> >>>>
> >>>> I could not open that file you sent, but I found the link to the
> journal
> >>>> article. Its here:
> >>>>
> >>>> http://lchc.ucsd.edu/Histarch/ja93v15n1.PDF
> >>>>
> >>>> There are a number of other interesting/relevant articles there. 
> >>>> "The
> >> sound
> >>>> of the violin" is a favorite.
> >>>>
> >>>> Thanks for reminding us of Simmel.
> >>>> Today, March 1, was his birthday!
> >>>> Coincidence?
> >>>> mike
> >>>>
> >>>> On Mon, Mar 2, 2015 at 3:01 PM, Larry Purss 
> >>>> <lpscholar2@gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>> Mike,
> >>>>> I continued to explore Urs Furher's book that you mentioned on 
> >>>>> Simmel
> >>>> that
> >>>>> would be potentially beneficial to follow. In my explorations I 
> >>>>> came
> >>>> across
> >>>>> this article on the metaphor of "traces" or "footprints" in the 
> >>>>> XMCA archives. It was written in 1993 and is an interesting 
> >>>>> perspective on
> >> the
> >>>>> metaphor of cultivation AS FOOTPRINTS.  It is the third article 
> >>>>> in
> the
> >>>>> newsletter.
> >>>>> Urs is pointing to the reciprocal processes of "internalizing" 
> >>>>> and "externalizing" the inner "affective sense" of "place" 
> >>>>> through
> >> attachment
> >>>>> to "home" and "vehicle" as concrete ways to form one's identity
> through
> >>>>> attachment/security needs and  autonomy needs.
> >>>>> Larry
> >>>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> --
> >>>> It is the dilemma of psychology to deal as a natural science with 
> >>>> an
> >> object
> >>>> that creates history. Ernst Boesch.
> >>>>
> >>
> >>
>
>
>