I'm on the run, but the essay on Plastics from the same volume is also very good.
Thankfully not all of the essays are equally insightful or it would just cause on to despair.
Oddly enough, I was talking to a friend about the wrestling essay last week ("It's brilliant," etc.). Of course we argued about which Barthes collection it was in. It's in Mythologies! I said. No, no, it's in -- well, I forget what he said.
Like the dorks we are, we hung up the phone and fled to our respective bookshelves and emailed within 5 minutes to report our findings on this important matter.
Wanting to pick a fight, I'm tempted to make fun of your distinction between expertise and "the proper eyes to see." Shouldn't you be suspicious of just this line?
I know, I know, I didn't try to unpack that because I didn't want the post to be about that, rather than the essay itself. I think it's a difficult distinction to maintain, but I do have an initial sense that what Barthes is analyzing is available to all of us in a way that, say, chemical interactions or even sickness and health aren't to a lay person.
Not only scientific expertise is expertise, ogged.
Available to us in the sense that he doesn't have bionic vision, yes-- that is, the observations he makes are of clearly visible phenomena. But unavailable to those without a certain kind of practical skill, one that might, in practice, be impossible to achieve without some theoretical knowledge. Sorry, I'm cranky because my spreadsheet isn't turning out right, so I thought I'd try to Dreyfuss you.
I'll be a crank, too. Both the powers of observation and the writing ability necessary to convey the observation are kinds of expertise, and both of them are relatively rare. That's why it's called a gift.
Cala's 10 gets me to my revised thought, that the distinction might be between teachable and non-teachable expertise, which is not quite the point I was making the post, but maybe the one I should have made.
Barthes is a genius.
Powers of observation are the opposite of expertise. Can you go to powers of observation school? Take powers of observation classes? Knowing how to do heart transplants or solve partial differential equations is expertise. This is something else.
analysis like this is so rare. which is what makes it so valuable. Before this I had no idea one wrestler was supposed to be the good guy and the other one bad. How subtle.
You can teach some of it. (e.g., investigative journalism classes.) But not all of it, and it's sort of depressing when you realize how little of it can be learned. It reminds me of a conversation I had a couple years ago about evaluating papers.
"What's the difference between an A and an A-?"
"An A just is an A. An A- doesn't make it."
"What do I tell the student when she wants to know how to get any A?"
"Oh hell, I don't know. Be smarter? Have different parents?"
I think observation is a form of expertise. People *are* trained to do it, and practice leads to improvement.
Can you go to powers of observation school? Take powers of observation classes?
Yes, and yes. Usually we call them journalism programs, but parts of them do include memory drills. Flash up a picture for ten seconds, then ask what time it was in the picture, that sort of thing, to see if the person noticed, in the corner of the frame, the time reflected backwards on the shop window from the clock across the street.
Ogged is right. It is a teachable skill (like every other kind of expertise). When did all you professional educators and professionally educated people become such aristocrats?
Somewhere around grading the 400th shitty paper.
We also teach it in art history programs, in medical school...
Labs, you teach medical art history? Esoteric.
Ogged is right. It is a teachable skill
Much as I'd like your endorsement, I was leaning toward "not a teachable skill." It's teachable to a degree, as Labs notes in 19, but I don't think what Barthes is doing is teachable--this is where Labs is just trying to devalue the non-analytic tradition. Anyway, I'm off to swim--with a little more practice, I think it might be the Olympics for me...
But not all of it, and it's sort of depressing when you realize how little of it can be learned.
Don't be ridiculous! Of course virtue can be taught.
Labs, you teach medical art history? Esoteric.
Labs is Lorraine Daston!
what Barthes is analyzing is available to all of us
It's a bit like saying that Wittgenstein's work on ordinary language is something (theoretically) available to us all, given that we all do engage in ordinary language use.
I've put that contentiously without meaning to.
If you bear with the comparison, though, which is not an analogy, drat it, I would nonetheless resist any characterization of ordinary language philosophy as a function of "expertise."
The term is problematic in this case, that's all, if it's also to include realms of what I might call esoteric knowledge of, say, chemical interactions.
And I see that Walt Someguy more or less said the same.
This is not to say that one can't attempt to teach the kind of analytic ability in question. But it's really a crapshoot.
Of course this sort of thing comes up in any area that calls for judgment. Perceptual expertise just is the proper formation of ethike arete, you know.
I think competence can be taught, excellence can be encouraged, but genius is largely uncoachable.
I wish that my comments weren't so obviously influenced by whatever I happen to be reading in a quarter.
that the distinction might be between teachable and non-teachable expertise
I think there's probably a third category: "teachable, but we don't know how, yet."
26: I've been reading Nietzsche and it's screwing around with my writing style.
Cool, I don't agree with Ogged after all.
"Genius" was invented by the Romantics.
The other part of what's cool about what Barthes is doing, by the way, is that he writes well enough that what he's saying seems accessible, even self-evident.
Of all the Kants which are Kanted in this Kanting world, ---- though the Kant of hypocrites may be the worst, -- the Kant of the critical period is the most tormenting!
I agree that it's impossible to teach what Barthes is able to do, and it's really a tragedy that English departments still try. They're trying to find a Barthes algorithm giving replicable results, and it can't be done. (Many other names can be substituted for "Barthes"). It's the art-science distinction, knowing how without knowign why.
The best of all is never to have Kanted; the second best - to Kant soon.
Amusing or annoying anecdote:
At a dinner with some guy who'd just given a talk in my department, I related that in the local bistro-cum-bookstore in the area, the philosophy section was dominated by Plato, Nietzsche and Wittgenstein. How odd, a little surprising.
The talking guy asked in a challenging manner: "Who's missing there?"
I answered (from the gut) without batting an eye: Kant.
The fab four!
This garnered me an invitation to breakfast with the talking guy the next morning before he flew out. We both cancelled. God, academics can be pathetic.
maybe i'm being needlessly kantrarian, but.
i didn't think it was very good. in fact, i thought parts of it were obvious and banal (cf biohazard in 13), and parts of it were bullshit.
"in wrestling, on the contrary, it is each moment which is intelligible, not the passage of time." nice line except for not actually meaning anything.
"judo contains a hidden symbolic aspect; even in the midst of efficiency, its gestures are measured, precise but restricted, drawn accurately but by a stroke without volume."
right. a stroke without volume. That makes all the difference.
I mean--c'mon, guys.
"mitigate its ignominy" is a beautiful combination of syllables. It has the property that Apostropher was attributing to "knuckles" the other day (if I was reading him correctly), that it draws the reader's eye back over it and demands to be intoned, repeated with variations in rhythm and emphasis. Mitigate its ignominy.
repeated with variations in rhythm and emphasis until it loses its semantic significance and becomes merely a pattern of sound, I mean.
A classic instance of croquemitainism.
Of course pro wrestling is teachable. Sometimes difficult students may require the application of the rod by an inscrutable Japanese guy, or alternatively, the use of psychoactive substances. And the costume and stage name are simply inexplicable.
Does this happen to anyone else? You look at a word so long it gives you a craving for an open-face ham, egg, and cheese sandwich?
I haven't had a croque monsieur in years.
41 was my feeling after watching Dazed and Confused back in college. I find there's a certain kind of movie that creates powerful desire, but it's never clear what the desire is going to look like. I had the same feeling after watching Rules of Attraction. After that one, I couldn't even want something as specific as a sandwich.
I haven't had a croque monsieur in years.
One does not address a sandwich-with-ova as Monsieur.
Well, I've never had a croque madame.
What I understand ogged to be saying is that this kind of understanding or perception is possible to have without formal training. (Whether training is possible is another question.) "Eyes to see" simply emphasizes that the formal training is not required. But as others have noted, it is a skill that needs development and practice. It's just that there's a certain personality whose holders habitually practice this observational skill in all sorts of situations, so without any directed effort, they eventually reach the limits of the skill given their knowledge and intelligence. Ogged is saying that Barthes has this personality. (Thus, "proper" eyes.)
nice line except for not actually meaning anything
Great, Carnap comments here. It means just what he says several times in the piece, that pro wrestling is a spectacle of intense moments, rather than something to which a narrative is essential, or something which derives its meaning from its goal or end. It's a brilliant essay because it brings together the raucous entertainment of the modern rabble and the themes of classical literature in a way that's clear and shows a deep understanding of both.
As for "stroke without volume," have you seen Olympic judo? That's a beautiful description of minimalist gracefulness and efficiency of the best moves.
And I'm surprised that a humorless liberal like you is also in the "that's pretty but meaningless" camp, bitzer. Now I have to revise my Venn diagrams of people whose asses I need to kick, and on a Saturday no less. You bastard.
I think that the distinction is between teachable skills and knacks (not really "genius"). Je-ne-sais-quois. For example, musical instruments are teachable, but some performers have something extra which they weren't taught and which they can't teach.
50:Laszlo Polgar pretty much refuted this
47: All you need is enough alienation so you're observing and not participating, and sufficient intelligence to make enough (semi-) sense of the observations to create a (semi-) coherent story out of them. (Ever take a good look at Rudolf the Differently-Nosed and his family's dynamics?)
Anyway, I'm going to work on my French accent. I've got the beard-stroking and tobacco-stained fingers down. Fame and fortune await.
50: I like to think that most people can be taught to do anything with enough discipline and practice, but there are some tasks, that, to some people, are blocked by self-limitation. I used to get this feeling back when I was studying piano, and a piece was going really super-well, that something was about to break. I'd panic, become too conscious of what I was doing, and fuck it up. I never figured out why that would happen.
I sometimes think that something like that happens with some of my poorer students. Being able to do a certain thing is not part of their self-identitfication, so attempting to do it (something like understanding the difference between metaphor, synechdoche, symbol, and emblem) is completely futile. You see them almost get a breakthrough, and then something snaps.
We all just snap in different places about different things. Eh?
Bob, if he'd had 20 daughters and taught them the same, I suspect that one would much better than the others for unexplainable reasons.
There's no doubt that you can teach piano. I'm talking about the difference between the wonderful and the competent, and between quick learners and slow learners. I don't think that it's physical superiority; some ultravirtuosos are well respected as musicians, and some great pianists are technically not especially outstanding.
vengeance is mine, sayeth the lur.
but what care I? you may be about to kick my ass, but I--
I made you redraw your venn diagrams!
that means I win on points--because my stroke had less volume.
The Grandmaster Experiment ...Psychology Today, 2006
Really good and fun article on the Polgars. Laszlo speaks two languages:Hungarian & Esperanto. The women speak seven, taught by their mother.
Zsuzsa...which I prefer to Susan...is really just wonderful, and is interviewed at length. I think Laszlo & Klara did offer a challenge and chastisement to the world as to what kids are capable of without torture or dysfunction.
Emerson, all three were champions very young. Zsuzsa & Zsofia...well the article explains. Grandmaster is not simply a violinist; all GM's are the equivalent of solo violinists. Menuhins or Haifetzes. The PT has researchers saying that most people can reach such levels.
It means just what he says several times in the piece, that pro wrestling is a spectacle of intense moments, rather than something to which a narrative is essential, or something which derives its meaning from its goal or end.
I think it's a coherent thought, but although I obviously like the essay (particularly the comparisons to Greek drama), I'm not sure this "intelligible moments" business is right. Matches are planned to have a narrative, both physically and in terms of plotlines. Earlier developments inform later ones; there's a very basic story to each match arranged around a few simple archetypes. It's true that these narratives are stupid enough that they almost certainly aren't what people tune in to watch, but they do exist and provide the framework for all of the clarity that Barthes talks about.
52: Well, you're disparaging the quality of the essay as well as responding to my point, which is a distraction. (I don't really know or care whether the essay is all that good.) But I do think there's something else to the skill. It's not just raw intelligence.
Besides, pretty much *everything* we do outside of hard science is exactly that story-weaving post-hoc rationalizing sort of argumentation and analysis. If that bothers you, break out the ruler and start measuring.
Bob, PT invented "pop psychology". Not an authority. All chess masters were prodigies. And chess wasn't on my list of knacks.
In support of your point, however, Mozart was a guinea pig kid too. As a professional musician, his father's specialized in music pedagogy.
59:Ad hominem! What matters is not PT, but its arguments and sources. And I have studied some games of Ognjen Amidzic, and know him to be a brilliant cognitive mycologist. (A subtle allusion to last week's bruhaha at Sawicky's in which Bruce Wilder refuted Chomsky's foreign policy work by reference to his linguistics. Evolution uber Generative Grammar, and Derrida sucks so there.)
Y'all just don't know how hard I struggle to disguise the word salad.
Go write yourself a nice editorial now.
Laszlo Polgar pretty much refuted this
Good lord. How is it not immediately obvious that some people have a knack that can't be taught? Everything is like this, whether it's athletics, mental tasks, dexterity, etc.
Wow. I cited that Barthes piece in grad school. It was part of a predictive theory of international conflict based entirely on wrestlers deciding to change from heels to heros and back. It was inspired when one of the big wrestlers who was part of the Soviet tag team announced that he was really a Lithuanian and just wanted freedom. And yes, we were totally having a laugh working this out. BUt it spoke to some disdain for a lot of "predictive" social science.
The new past tense of "cite" is "cote" (soft "c").
(Why yes, I'm a member.)
In grade school?
Oh. Grad school.
My self-medication is working too well.
It's a collection of strong verbs in all languages? That's pretty cool.
"clone clewn clown" is pretty great.
I'm reading through the substantivization project page and am curious as to how they came up with "ryquärz" for "rückwärts".
From an old language hat:
http://www.languagehat.com/archives/001171.php
"He dang his fender yesterday, but nobody core."
"He had corne for his aged mother for many years".
"I have never chorne a meeting before."
Hey thanks to the commenter here whose identity escapes me, who recommand "Das Leben der Anderen" in comments here a few weeks back. We two just saw it and were both blown away.
63:Sigh. Since no one is clicking thru 56:
Anders Ericsson is only vaguely familiar with the Polgars, but he has spent over 20 years building evidence in support of Laszlo's theory of genius. Ericsson, a professor of psychology at Florida State University, argues that "extended deliberate practice" is the true, if banal, key to success. "Nothing shows that innate factors are a necessary prerequisite for expert-level mastery in most fields," he says. (The only exception he's found is the correlation between height and athletic achievement in sports, most clearly for basketball and volleyball.) His interviews with 78 German pianists and violinists revealed that by age 20, the best had spent an estimated 10,000 hours practicing, on average 5,000 hours more than a less accomplished group. Unless you're dealing with a cosmic anomaly like Mozart, he argues, an enormous amount of hard work is what makes a prodigy's performance look so effortless." ...PT
58: Story weaving doesn't particularly bother me but I doubt the importance of most of it; it seems more like weaving a security blanket than anything else. Everyone does it, some do it more eloquently than others, and so what? Doing numbers makes things different, for better and sometimes worse.
I think Ericsson is on crack. Which is not to say there's not work involved, but talent is obviously a huge factor, and if he says otherwise, he's not living in the same universe as the rest of us.
When I was a kid I used to take classes in the summer at the Science and Industry museum in L.A. Some of them were those types for "gifted" kids, and the inherent differences in certain abilities were very apparent. I did well at problem solving exercises, but was maybe average at doing visual puzzles. But there were a couple kids in there that were eerily good at those visual puzzles. They would do them with this effortless speed that was clearly far beyond the rest of us.
I fairly easily learned hitting a baseball, but I can't draw to save my life. My hand can't reproduce on paper what my eyes see, but others, with little or no training, can pick up a pencil and draw an object that's damn near like a photograph.
Does this really have to be explained? Everyone who's done anything has seen this. Sports, academics, music, art, whatever. We've all encountered that person who with the same effort is head and shoulders above the rest of the group.
I did well at problem solving exercises, but was maybe average at doing visual puzzles
I fairly easily learned hitting a baseball, but I can't draw to save my life
Bejiminy, we really do share a brain.
Not being able to draw is kind of hellish in elementary school. "Now let's all show the class what we drew..." and I'm sitting there thinking to myself that even the fucking retarded kids could draw something better. My mom still laughs at the memories of some my attempts.
Laszlo wanted to adopt three poor kids from developing countries to prove his theories, but Klara put her foot down.
"The grandmaster title still retains some of its prestige because it represents a very high level of chess performance against other titled players. A chess master is typically in the top 2% of all tournament players. A grandmaster is typically in the top 0.02% at the time he or she earns the title.[4]" ...from Wiki
In the article, someone calls the Polgar women "an astonishing coincidence". Sure it is. If Peyton Manning or Bonds had two brothers of HoF quality I doubt much credit would be given to genetics.
74: Spoken like an idiot-savant. In fact, spoken like the bad half of an idiot-savant. Stories control the world.
If Peyton Manning or Bonds had two brothers of HoF quality I doubt much credit would be given to genetics.
I can't even tell if you're serious anymore.
That's true. That's what makes them scary.
I may have told this before, but somewhere in my parents' house is a schoolmade pottery bowl. Says my mother: "this is cute because it reminds me of you in second grade." Says I: "I made it in eighth." Mom winces.
I always thought talent came in bundles to a certain degree, but whatever traits there are for art skipped me entirely.
Ericsson's results depend pretty much on how you choose your pool. His pool was 78 people. Nuff said.
A highly-admired pianist famous for not practicing much was Gieseking. Google "Gieseking" + "practice" and one of the Amazon reviewers will say that. I would guess that one reason that less-good pianists practice less is that at some point they realize that they're second rank. Pianists usually know by the time they're 12 or 14. I don't know the names of any hard-working mediocre pianists, but I'm sure there are plenty of them, though they have to be slightly nuts to work that hard without encouragement.
It's too bad Mrs. Polgar didn't cooperate with the control experiment. I don't really think that this is a heredity / environment question though, it could be a path-dependent butterfly effect dependent on early experience.
"it could be a path-dependent butterfly effect dependent on early experience" ..."butterfly effect" implies less control than Laszlo showed.
Polgar was apparently a very good psychologist, waiting until asked to start teaching and possibly giving the toddler a tricky opening in order to create a confidence & enthusiasm building victory over an adult. His first book, before the project, was on child psychology. There was a plan, and a method.
It is one thing for a Josh Waitzkin to show talent and then be taught. Laszlo said he was going to create Chess Champions before the kids were born.
I guess if I said I will have three kids and they will all three be Nobel-winning Physicists and thirty years later they went to Stockholm this crowd would not be impressed.
As I said, chess-playing is not on my list of knacks which can't be taught. It's on my list of activities for which algorithms can be written, and which for that reason are more teachable.
It is also the AI favorite example. They argue "AI can do something as difficult as chess!" but chess is about as subject to writing algorithms for as any human activity. Chess is something that's easier for machines than for people.
In theory Chess is "teachable" and there is an entire industry built around ichess instruction. I am right now staring at my $3000 worth of books. The general pattern if for most students to go 200-300 rating points above their natural ability and then stop. The blocks are psychological and characterological, and thousands of unproductive hours can be spent in studying and practice. Ways of seeing and ways of thinking must be changed; and then changed again at the next level. The masters talk of "working on weaknesses" but the weaknesses are like impetuousness in the opening or impatience in the middlegame, i.e., personality traits.
I just saw Norman Mailer this morning say he doesn't read other novelists anymore. L Polgar said he discovered the emotional foundations of learning and creative productivity at the highest level, and I have no reason to doubt him.
The original question was why Roland Barthes "sees differently" than the rest of us. I do believe it is an answerable question, that cognitive psychologists are the ones likely to answer it, and that the answer may be counter-intuitive. But may also explain why one mathemetician achieves while another burns out.
Was I joking when I talked about a Zen master or psychedlics? Well Norman Mailer says he writes better novels by not reading others. What if the way to insight into Jane Austen was not into reading everything by and about Jane Austen, but in studying chess? Nabokov wrote a good piece on Mansfield Park.
I don't think Barthes does see differently; it's his style and format (brief, crisp essays on pop culture) that stand out as different.
He's the Ramones of theory: who hasn't heard either and thought something like, "cool! I can probably do that...."