Materialitäten subjektiver Unsinn: A short reading of Wysocki

a text-collage by me, the dead author

 

 

Wysocki presents an interesting text. I cannot agree more with her general premises. In fact, as my last assignment attempted, I tried to engage these “materialities” in ways that would allow for both investigation and appreciation. I plan on using “new media” heavily in the classroom. I enjoyed the reinforcement of my pedagogical intuitions when she discusses actual ‘activities.’ I will not, however, require college students to purchase crayons for my class. I also doubt I will use the term “scavenger hunt” or ask two students to hold a pencil together and write. But it’s good to try new things. I sympathize.

What I am critical of is Wysocki’s supporting texts. I think these are drawn in from disparate sources and what I get from this is more sentiment than praxis.  For example, Bruce Horner’s “materiality of writing” may, as he says, refer to “global relations of power." Of course we can extend it to Nietzsche’s idea and say “the materialities of writing can refer to the ‘infinite sexual potency of the universe’” if we wanted to go that far. I’m not sure how broad the focus should be. There is a possibility of over-stating the claim in order to ‘scare’ young, politically impressionable compositionists into taking their task too seriously. Perhaps it is also a sense of trying to feel important—feel that we’re more than mere writing teachers but are scholar-warriors fighting against discourses of imperialism that have nested in the materials of what would otherwise be an ideal post-structural consciousness, imbued with all the virtues of communitarian identity and no trace of bourgeois boogeymen.  

Do YOU really accept this claim: “We can only see ourselves through the texts we make and give others” (18)?

She quotes Stuart Hall, writing that “your identity is also in part becoming through the writing” (20). Can this, though, be said of any activity one engages in? Is writing such a privileged activity? I think in textual cultures such as ours perhaps it does hold some privilege. But let’s not get over-excited. Also, it seems to me the assumption that identity is a posteriori is rather unfounded and debatable—another dogma of literary-scholar-culture. It is the assumption that you can be anything, anybody. The problem is: no matter who you are you are still yourself. Your experience implies an experiencer. If you have agency, as Wysocki insists, then there is a self that chooses its fashioning. But this self can not be a choice and must exist a priori regarding experience. I really don’t want to get into a tiresome dismantling of Wysocki’s implicit claims. I just think they're over-stated and tread on territory endless philosophers have plowed for centuries with greater yield than platitudes of post-structural 'discourse.'

 

 

talking in class and talking with faculty

Today, I observed Naomi Clark's English 1000 class. The class was divided into half this week since they had turned in their final copy of a paper. During today's class, each student read two pages of his/her work out loud and gave complimentary comments to the other students. I thought this was a great idea. bell hooks writes, "I have students write short paragraphs that they read aloud so that we all have a chance to hear unique perspectives and we are all given an opportunity to pause and listen to one another" (186). This activity does several things: it allows students to celebrate his/her work, it allows a student to celebrate other classmates' works, and it creates an opportunity to shift the authority and power to the students. And while the papers they were presenting weren't personal or unique, the students' presentations gave them all a chance to regard each other as scholars and authorities.

hooks also recognizes that a lot of these "uncomfortable" discussions need to happen with the faculty and staff first before a real change can happen in the classroom. This reminded me of when the former school I worked at had gone a few months into the school year without having that type of discussion with the staff.  Turns out, our goal of creating an specifically focused pedagogy wasn't being implemented since so many of the teachers had different understandings of race and class in the classroom. The discussion lasted several hours and many people had stormed out of the room during a few tense moments. And while things were not resolved at the end of the day, we had begun to come to a mutual understanding of our role in the classrooms. The discussion still persists (I assume), and because of this on-going conversation, I think the students in the classroom benefit.

Knowing Is Half the Battle

Perhaps one of the greatest hurdles to get over in terms of racism is admitting the presence of racism.  My feeling is that my generation of immediate peers who will become my future colleagues (certainly not everyone within my generation) has been imbued with enough cultural conscience and empathy through the 80’s, 90’s and early millennium to understand that racism has no place anywhere, the university level very much included.  But that’s just the problem.  That’s how I feel, but that’s not necessarily the case.  Forms of racism may indeed exist in my pedagogy without my knowledge.  When Hooks points out all the old guard professors at Oberlin who refuse to acknowledge racism in their classrooms--how they teach, what they teach--it’s easy for me to objectively chastise them for their ignorance; however, I went to a liberal arts school very similar to Oberlin, cast in the same small Midwestern mold, and as I look back, I honestly can’t fathom racism on my campus.  I can’t imagine any students feeling uncomfortable to contribute for any reason in any of my previous classes.  I can’t imagine any student staying quiet if they did feel uncomfortable.  But that doesn’t mean that it didn’t happen and that as people, and especially as educators, we shouldn’t be aware of it.

Hooks suggests building a community (focusing on the positive), rather than concentrating on building a safe space (focusing on the preventative or negative) (Hooks 40).  I agree.  I felt this should be the goal of any classroom, particularly one where peer review is administered, and I feel this is a great way to create understanding and avoid ignorance.  Hooks also mentions some “concrete strategies” that math and science faculty at Oberlin had to be more inclusive (38), but doesn’t list any of them.  I’d love to hear some of them.

I can’t say that I completely agree with Hooks personal assessment of class at the university level.  Though I don’t doubt hers, and surely others’, experiences with classism at schools like Stanford, I found that I had a different experience at my small liberal arts school and I can only speak from my experiences.  My family is low-middle class and it was only because of a sizable scholarship that I could attend school there.  While some students were like me, others were wealthier and attended without scholarships.  Some were wealthy and had scholarships.  Some were lower class than I and had better scholarships.  At my school, I would say it was admirable if you were working class but intelligent enough to receive the necessary scholarship to attend.  I can't say I ever felt any pressure to act out of my class or that any of my values, experiences, or ideas were judged.  I didn't feel that I was pressured to judge others.  Those who were of higher classes and had to in essence pay for their educations (or whose parents had to pay for it) were looked upon less favorably.  Maybe this was just substituting classism for intellectualism and it's no better.  Maybe that was only at my school, and maybe that was only my impression, but that’s all I have to go on in terms of my views of class on college campuses.  I'd like to look at this as not naiveté but optimism for the future.

Middle class knockoff

I spent my time as an undergraduate at a small, private, and very expensive college.  At $50,000 a year and rising, not many working-class families could afford attending PC without incurring massive amounts of debt.  That being said, when one of those "working-class kids" came to the campus on scholarship, they stood out like a sore thumb.  In a sea of NorthFace jackets, leggings, and Ugg boots, that one person not wearing the status quo apparel would be immediately noted and outcast.  How to combat this issue?  Assimilation.  By her second semester there, that working-class student would be wearing the full NorthFace/leggings/Uggs attire and no longer be living on the margins of campus life.  What is my point here, you ask?  Hooks notes that class issues are largely ignored in the classroom - well, they are largely ignored in everyday experiences, too.  And by ignored, here, I mean that hardly anyone notices them because those working-class subjects are forced to ignore the issues and become a middle-class facsimile, often in order to survive.

It  angers me that we spend so much time thinking about race matters and often, by doing so, completely neglect the issues of class, which are sometimes greater if not intricately connected to those of race.  I think this is evident in hooks' focus in her two chapters - while in the chapter on race she offers concrete ways for teachers to understand the issue and incorporate it into their classrooms, the same courtesy is not given to class.  This could be because the discussion has already taken place in the previous chapter, but I can't help but wonder nonetheless whether class is as actively discussed in those workshops.  The reason for this, most likely, is because it is much easier for those of a different class to pass of as middle class (I can imagine that it would be hard for an African-American to pass off as white, other than in mannerisms).  I think that this is all the more reason to reach out in an even greater way to those students "under" the middle class, so that they don't get lost and feel forced to be something that they are not.

I remember the first time that I actually admitted that I was not "middle-class" in the way that most of the other students at PC were.  I was in an Introduction to Sociology class, and all of the students had to write down their class on a piece of paper and hand it into the professor, who then turned the results into a tally on the board.  The purpose of the assignment was to show the astonishing majority of the students in the classroom who associated themselves with the middle class, and that we, as Americans, tend to view ourselves as that class whether we really are or not.  Surprisingly, though, I found myself itching not to be associated with them, and I boldly and confidently wrote down "working class" on the sheet of paper.  That was in the second semester of my junior year, and it was the first time I had stopped trying to be a part of the middle class.

I read an article once about working class law school students who passed themselves off as middle class (mostly by silencing themselves, as hooks describes) throughout their time there, and were so much more successful than those who did not attempt to pass themselves off in the same way.  Societal norms work against those of a lower class, and it is so easy for those same students to become lost in the classroom, trying to pass themselves off as something that they are not.  So, in response to hooks article, I ask that we do not ignore class issues in the classroom, even though they may be harder to notice.  Don't let those students get lost in the sea - let them speak, and let their experiences be heard.

Talking about Race

Ryan evoked the "racism of postmodernism" in his post. Admittedly, that is not terminology that I understand, so I will evoke an equally confusing term from sociology--abstract liberalism. Eduardo Bonilla-Silva uses abstract liberalism to talk about the way that many people that oppose affirmative action use the principals of the "equal opportunity" to oppose affirmative action, that is they take away all of the context so they can use the same argument that liberals use in favor of affirmative action to oppose it. Are you uncomfortable with the political tone of sociology, yet? Well, bell hooks other educators that approach teaching from conflict theories of sociology do not care, and I tend to agree with them even if it makes me feel uncomfortable. 

One of the key elements of abstract liberalism is the use of colorblindness, known less ambiguously as colorblind racism. Ryan makes some apt points about bell hooks rather typical orientalizing of the mind/body problem, I think that was a case of her being to abstract about that issue, being an abstract anti-Cartesian. I think in an effort to de-center mind/body dualism see got off her point about race. As teachers, especially in America, we cannot ignore the racial make up of our class and the racial history (and present) of this country. In other words, to simplify what bell hooks is try to seminar to her colleagues if you really care about having a classroom where everyone feels free to contribute TALK ABOUT RACE. 

Exactly, how to do that effectively is something that I have not yet learned. bell hooks talks about learning "codes," so if you ask her she might say something like it takes time and attention. How successful I could be a interpreting those "codes," I can't say for sure. One thing that I struggle with but was reinforced by the first chapter was to avoid temptation to address people as "native informants." Getting non-white students on issues of race is that much harder when every class is dominant by middle class white students with most of the more than willing to conciliate instead of confront the issue. Do you think that bell hooks strategy to get everyone to talk will necessarily result in real conversations about race and class? Is it our role as teachers to make sure these conversations happen and, if so, how do we do it?

no status quo

            If places like Tuskagee College and Lincoln University can be described as historically Black, the University of Missouri (and the overwhelming majority of educational institutions) can be just as accurately described as historically White, male and upper-class. Of course, no one calls MU or other universities that because white bourgeois norms are generally accepted as the neutral/positive status quo – not as dominant or hegemonic. If you ever hear me complain about the journalism school here (of which I am an alumna), my biggest critique is of this “status quo is neutral” mentality that the journalism professors and students overwhelming fail to discuss. It’s a real problem that results in lots of poorly written, dull, classist, heterosexist, et. al. news articles that lack diversity and any element of critical thinking.

To some extent, this mode of thinking and its accompanying classroom dynamics exist throughout the university setting. I’m really glad we’re attempting to critically engage ideas of diversity and classroom dynamics, but this forum of an online discussion board provides, at least for me, a limited space in which to discuss somewhat taboo topics that are hard to discuss openly. I’d much rather talk about the influence of race and class prejudice aloud with my colleagues than post them on a message board that’s open to the public, because I think people can be more honest and candid when their words aren’t searchable; I hope future class time allows for that discussion.

That said, I think hooks brings up some great points about the normalizing of bourgeois social and academic norms. Her realization that class is “more than just a question of money, that it shaped values, attitudes, social relations, and the biases that informed the way knowledge would be given and received,” echoes thoughts I’ve had over the past year, especially since beginning graduate school (hooks 178). The unspoken expectation of classroom dynamics is definitely one of reserved bourgeois norms of only speaking when asked or politely volunteering to speak. I acknowledge that this is learning on the white man’s terms, and that’s not fair, but how can an instructor maintain a dynamic where everyone’s voice is heard? Some people are understandably silenced by rigid bourgeois norms of communication because they feel their way of speaking will be met with hostility; others are silenced when fellow students overtalk or interrupt them, because interrupting can feel like a devaluing of that person’s thoughts. Damn – what can a balanced dynamic look like?

Concrete Strategies in hooks

When bell hooks talks about the conferences she held to help teach her fellow instructors how to be more multicultural in the classroom, she states that "Hearing individuals describe concrete strategies was an approach that helped dispel fears" (38).  The paradigm shift is tricky, yes, and often painful, but I was willing to go along for the ride. From the rest of the reading, however, I felt primarily that hooks was telling me what not to do in the classroom, giving me little by way of actual strategy.  However, the few concrete strategies it did promote were compelling and useful, many of them things I have often questioned in the course of my own higher education.

The most concrete and best articulated strategy hooks includes is particularly relevant for English instructors.  That is: question the canon.  Are we not including works by authors from disenfranchised groups because these works don’t exist?  Because they are not good or thought-provoking?  Or are we not including these because these weren’t included when we were taught?  After all, it is English departments who, to a large extent, create the canon.  (Nobody took Moby-Dick seriously until Carl Van Doren wrote on it and taught it at Columbia University in the 20s.)   If we continue to set aside minority groups as they were set aside for us, even in canons that we consider sealed or established, the consciousness can never properly shift.  I know that I will take this into consideration when constructing text lists for future classes.

I still would have liked more concrete strategies.  I feel like this is a common thread throughout the semester, really, reading theoretical approaches, deciding what I like and don’t like about them, and having no idea as to practical application.  Perhaps it’s a fault of my own, that I just can’t think critically enough to put these ideas into practice; after all, hooks’s text wasn’t even as lofty as most of the others we’ve read.  Even so, I can’t help but wish that each theorist could speak more openly, not only about which approaches to avoid in order to conform to their theories, but which ones to incorporate, as well.