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California State University, Dominguez Hills
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Created: June 23, 2003
Latest Update: August 3, 2003
jeannecurran@habermas.org
takata@uwp.edu

Soc. 395-04: Sociology of Knowingness
Class and Internet Discussions

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Week 2: Week of September 1, 2003
The Affect that Accompanies The Recognition of Ambiguity

Topic: We like to "know." We are curious creatures. And to varying degrees we are uncomfortable with ambiguity. In the course of creating the community of our lived experience, we come to accept the way things are as a "way we know," as the "way that's right," and we become oblivious to the judgments we have made as to "rightness" or mere "chance" throughout the whole aesthetic process of building our community.

Prepartory Readings:

• Idees dans l'Air or Dominant Discourse Sample Submissions

Lecture:

• Time Management for Study in a World Without Discretionary Time
• City Water Tunnel # 3: Performance Art
• White's Participatory Video, Introduction

  Concepts to be covered:

  • aesthetics of answerability: The Aesthetics of Answerability and Time Management for Study in a World Without Discretionary Time
  • climate of learning: the community of respect and good faith listening for each other's ideas that extends beyond the classroom onto the site. Needs the Pullias citation.
  • competency: Academic Assessment in Credited Course Learning
  • consistency: Academic Assessment in Credited Course Learning
  • creativity: Academic Assessment in Credited Course Learning
  • cooperation: Academic Assessment in Credited Course Learning
  • communication: Academic Assessment in Credited Course Learning
  • monologic nonanswerability: the utterance or act of one with authority who assumes the power to speak without having to take your answer into consideration. Monologic because the utterance or act is going from the authority to you, with no response from you allowed. Nonanserable because the authority is not held to account for whatever your answer might be. I made this term up because we needed it. jeanne
  • object and objectification: The object is acted upon, unlike the subject which acts. Objectification means treating someone or something as an object upon which one can act, without taking into account answerability.
  • the Other: The Other refers to humans other than ourselves. In postcolonial literature it refers to those of different nation-states or ethnic groups who have been colonized. But we tend to have trouble with the Other, period. Even when it's an Other in our own family, our own ethnic group, our own nation.
  • subject: The subject acts. However, in Bakhtin's theory, as interpreted by Greg Nielsen, when the subject acts, the utterance or act is answerable by the Other.

  Discussion Questions:

  1. What role does the aesthetics of answerability play in the grading policy for the Sociology of Knowledge?

     Consider that monologic non-answerability would leave you without an interdependent role in the measurement of your grade. That objectifies you. Objectification means that you are treated as an object without valid ideas and opinions, expected to absorb those given to you. Answerability means that we attempt not to objectify you, and promise to listen in good faith to your ideas and validity claims. You may think you don't care; you don't have any particular claims about knowingness. Not so. Silencing, which is typical of our educational system (See The Educational Octopus.) merely has taught you greater comfort with the passivity of not bothering to answer.

     In the Sociology of Knowledge, such nonanswerability plays havoc with the material we want you to learn. The knowledge that all knowledge is answerable is fundamental to what we teach. Because all knowledge is answerable we must retain open minds to consider new knowledge as it is discovered. Our round earth, round for thousands of years of our clearest thought, turns out now to maybe be on a two-dimensional plane. Answerability is what leaves us open to these considerations. But that leaves all knowledge ambiguous for we can know nothing "certainly and for all time;" we aren't even sure what "time" is, never mind "all time." For some of us that ambiguity is uncomfortable. I suspect, but have absolutely no proof, that the "tolerance of ambiguity," like IQ, just might be normatively distributed, meaning for a few it's very easy to accept, for most of us it's problematic, and for some, it's just not acceptable, regardless of evidence. We want to "know," for certain. And as my mother used to say, "Then, dear, want shall be your master."

  2. Do the five C's offer you an opportunity to count efforts towards your learning that have not been counted before? How do you feel about that?

     We rarely consider the consistency of your efforts. That's because neither you nor we have thought to record them. Your efforts must be measured by self-report data, what you tell us you do. Some don't trust such data, although much of criminal justice data come in this form. We do trust self-report, when it is appropriately considered with other measures. Besides, you'd be surprised how much it brains it takes to report specific details without showing marked inconsistency that expose untruths.

     We also rarely allow you to define "competency" in terms of where the material fits in your lived experience, and how you will use it. There's little sense in having those of you who are taking a course for general interest display the exact same competencies as those who expect to be come professionals in the field that uses the course as early training for that field. Again that means that we must know who you are and what your intentions for this learning are. Such knowledge should and does alter our perception of competence.

     Consider similar arguments with the other skills we try to measure.

  3. How do you feel about being told that you have to be creative to get an A? How different from that is any traditional grading system?

     Consider being told that you must be creative is scary, because we have long considered creativity a special gift. It's not. We're all creative. Witness the recent TV ads that tell you to think outside the box, or the pizza, or whatever. Creativity is as simple as making the learning fit you. Once again, see that I'm back to identity. Not the kind of identity that would violate your privacy. But the kind that says I'd rather talk to you in the hallways than in class. Or I'd rather write this. Or I'm terrified of writing, can we please just talk? We are asking to know your learning identity and your learning goals. That is because they are interdependent with your actual learning. Once you've defined who you are as a learner, creativity comes naturally with fitting what you've learned into who you are. And failure usually exits the scene along with that kind of creativity. How can you fail to be you? And to hear new things within that context of who you are as a learner?

     How different is this from traditional grading? Not so much, in the sense that teachers always say that an A represents the exceptional. Now what's the exceptional but the creative? Teachers may give you 14 criteria and tell you that if all those criteria are present you will have an A. But there's always room for judgment on each of those criteria. There is no perfect world in which we can regimentalize your learning and have you respond like robots and call that learning.

     What's the main difference between what we're asking and traditional grading? Answerability. That there be an Other, you, who thinks and feels and reacts to the concepts, readings, and discussions we have as part of our learning. And that that Other has the power to answer us, and in that aesthetic process of answering, affecs us, whether he/she will or no.

  4. Why is computer literacy essential for effective work in this course? How do you acquire that literacy?

     Consider that there is no way for me to respond to this much material, allow you to respond, and allow of all us to join in those response without the Internet. A book doesn't do it, because the book is basically unanswerable. So texts provide us with material. But we must provide the aesthetic of answerability to the ideas expressed in that text. For that we need this site. So you need to learn to find your way comfortably around the site. That's minimal literacy that will count on your job skills.

     How do you acquire the literacy? In our lab sessions, with other students who are caring enough to help, sometimes, if your lucky, with our computer lab techs. Budget has really hit tutoring help in many of our schools. But we encourage all of you to help those who need that help, in understanding a concept, in gaining comfort with the computer. If you're lost, be sure to let us know. We'll do our best to find you help. jeannecurran@habermas.org

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