The well wrought urn : studies in the structure of poetry
About: This article is published in Modern Language Notes.The article was published on 1947-06-01. It has received 332 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Poetry.
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01 Jan 2000
TL;DR: In this article, Ricupero et al. introduce the notion of Second-order Cybernetics as Paradox, which is a doubling of reality in the sense of self-reference and other-reference.
Abstract: 1. Differentiation as a Doubling of Reality. 2. Self-reference and other-reference. 3. Coding. 4. System-specific Universalism. 5. News and In-Depth Reporting. 6. Ricupero. 7. Advertising. 8. Entertainment. 9. Unity and Structural Couplings. 10. Individuals. 11. The Construction of Reality. 12. The Reality of Construction. 13. The Function of the Mass Media. 14. The Public. 15. Schema Formation. 16. Second-order Cybernetics as Paradox. Notes. Index.
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01 Jan 2012
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present a taxonomy of the most common types of choices available to an improviser at the time of performing an improvised piece, including the most important ones from a phenomenological perspective.
Abstract: and general in order to be able to be performed on a wide variety of new inputs. The inputs may be an inventory of notes based upon key, style, et cetera. (Pressing’s cognitive model calls this the “referent.”) My taxonomy is a way of making those inputs clear. 184 Since improvisation (and composition) is fundamentally cognitive and motor selection, then this presupposes a set of things from which to select. One can only select if there are options, choices. Now, it seems that whether a person (agent) is aware (conscious or cognizant of the options (all or even some)), one may always post facto reconstruct the set of choices which were available or present to the agent at the time of selection. By this I mean the set of choices that were available to the agent from an objective point of view. This set has little to do with the actual, individual conscious states of the agent; however, it does involve many specific conditions of the agent and the agent’s environment. For example, a musician S may say that “it never occurred to me to play that B-flat after the A,” even though objectively that choice was available to S. Sometimes, however, we describe others, and even ourselves, as just doing something—no other options presented themselves to consciousness. So, “selection” may seem like an inappropriate term or concept for what is going on in improvisation. It may, however, seem more accurate in composition. When humans perform actions in quick succession, consciously it does not seem like a choice or decision is being made for each separate action. In fact, in some cases it may be difficult to individuate the rapid succession of actions into discrete units. It seems to be a unitary flow of movements. These are half-intentional actions. Beside the (SCI) case, examples of this kind of phenomenon are playing sports, talking, and just mundane actions like walking to the market. From a phenomenological perspective, in some moments the choice or decision aspect can be discerned, while other moments “feel” automatic. Consequently, it is in these seemingly automatic moments that selection may be an erroneous description. But there are several pieces of evidence that suggest that in both cases similar or the same processes are realized. First, it would be impossible to account for talent and skill if some sense of choice or selection or decision was not involved. Indeed, psychologists and others 185 indicate that some people are better than others (usually in some specific domain of behavior) in their speed of thinking, choosing, and moving in situations that require rapidity. In other words, if we cannot attribute responsibility to selection or choice, even in an attenuated sense, training and effort would be diminished or demolished. Why would one train if one could not control the automatic thinking or moving? What would be our understanding of talent and expertise? Second, there is reductio ad absurdam argument that can be given here, analogous to the one Thomas Nagel presents in the classic “Moral Luck” article. One could argue that artistic agents are never responsible for anything they do; they have no agency because all novel thoughts impinge. Humans do not cause their thoughts and selection. My only response is that creativity is still a mystery, and we are not yet epistemically entitled to run this argument to the point of absurdity. Furthermore, cognitive science has informed us that even in these moments sub-conscious motor and kinetic programs or mechanisms are running. Some of these were delineated for improvisation above. This is one reason why a phenomenology needs to be appended to cognitive models and the like. One should also be interested in what is present to the consciousness of the agent, and what is consciously occurring while playing (if anything), not only the underlying processes posited by a cognitive theory, nor what could be going on as argued for in a philosophical theory. David Sudnow is perhaps the best example of a phenomenological approach to improvising. By introspecting on his improvised piano playing and his learning how to play 62 For example, see Sian Beilock, Choke: What the Secrets of the Brain Reveal about Getting It Right When You Have To (New York: Free Press, 2010). 63 Thomas Nagel, “Moral Luck” in Mortal Questions, Canto Classics Series (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1979), 24-38. 64 David Sudnow, Ways of the Hand: The Organization of Improvised Conduct (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1978), and David Sudnow, Ways of the Hand: A Rewritten Account, foreword by Hubert L. Dreyfus (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001). 186 paino and improvise, Sudnow gives excellent descriptions of the process and actions. One of the most important insights he gives is that selection in jazz piano improvisation is in large part about fingering and the way one’s hands and fingers move across the keys. I can attest that the same is true for stringed instruments, like guitar. Often, when I improvise, my attention is on finger patterns that I know work (with embellishments) over certain “changes.” How strongly the phenomenology of playing an instrument comes to play in thinking about creativity and improvisation in particular comes to the fore in this extraordinary account of a conversation with the famous, brilliant pianist Bill Evans. ... I [Gene Lees] kidded him [Bill Evans] about his rocking a finger on a key on a long note at the end of a phrase. After all, the hammer has already left the string: one has no further physical contact with the sound. ‘Don’t you know the piano has no vibrato?’ I said. ‘Yes,’ Bill responded, ‘but trying for it affects what comes before it in the phrase.’ Evans reveals that there are motor selections that do not enter into the perceivable product (in this case sounds) but yet affect properties of that product. Not all selections will be perceivable in the final product (e.g., performance, recording). One should also be aware that selection may be coerced in both a literal and metaphorical sense. External factors such as authorities may constrain what artists do, thereby eliminating or reducing choices. I may only have the resources to learn one instrument. If I only know how to play saxophone, I am not going to pick up a trumpet. At any given time t, the agent (improviser, player, performer) has twelve pitches available in the range physically determined by the instrument. This range is vague because 65 Gene Lees, “The Poet Bill Evans,” in Reading Jazz: A Gathering of Autobiography, Reportage, and Criticism from 1919 to Now, ed. Robert, Gottlieb (New York: Pantheon, 1996), 424. 187 given certain techniques, which some musicians are able to do and others not, and physical enhancements to instruments, the range can be extended, both to the top and bottom of the frequency or pitch range. But it would wrong to suppose that this complete selection options set is fully available every time, in every context to an improviser. What decreases the possibilities of the selection options group are the constraints that are given and/or accepted by the player, the genre, context, et cetera. Now, the agent may at any point deviate from these constraints (intentionally or otherwise), but she may not deviate from the complete selection options group, unless she changes instrument or technique. The idealized selection options group is coextensive with the set of all physically realizable pitches and all possible durations. This set may be expressed in many ways. For instance, one could simply give the Hertz (Hz) cycles (frequency) of the pitch indexed to a timed duration, such as eight seconds or two seconds. Obviously, this is an infinite set, because the duration of a produced pitch could be infinitely long, and the sound waves, although severely limited by human audibility capacity (even non-human animal audibility) could be infinitely low or high, although there are frequencies which we cease to call sounds. Practically, in Western music theory, the accepted range of pitches is the human audition range (called audio or sonic), 66 I am assuming the agent is using the Western Equal Temperament (ET) tempered system. On the drawbacks of the exclusive use of the ET system that was more or less codified in the eighteenth century, see Ross W. Duffin, How Equal Temperament Ruined Harmony (and Why You Should Care) (New York: W. W. Norton, 2007). Scholars have identified at least 150 different temperament tuning systems in Western art music. Of course, ET does not apply to many non-Western music systems. The locus classicus is J. Murray Barbour, Tuning and Temperament: A Historical Survey, Dover Books on Music Series (n.d., n.p., 1951; reprint ed., New York: Dover, 2004). 188 which is approximately from 20 50 Hz (the lowest pipe organ sounds) to 20,000 30,000 Hz; while the accepted range of durations caps out at 128 notes. Selection is the process of choosing an output. The output may be physically realized or produced sound, or a notation for a realizable sound, or both. A single selection is actually an array of various factors as explicated in Pressing’s cognitive model. In using the term “choosing,” or “choice,” again I make no commitment to a theory of free will. This theory and taxonomy may remain neutral. If free will is false, then the selection process will be a product of some set of causal laws. Those causal laws will still have to operate within the taxonomy. Moreover, ideally a selection may be viewed as a choice of each discrete unit with relevant arrays, even though phenomenologically one may not be aware of all of the arrays. A musical phrase or lick may be played wherein the agent chose to play the lick as a whole. The entire phrase, then, which may consist of several pitches of different durations, dynamics, rhythms, and attacks, is the unit of selection—not each discrete pitch et cetera. Following are the selection options sets for musical sound generation (
273 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors describe what constituted literary understanding for one classroom interpretive community of first and second graders by analyzing their oral responses as picture storybooks were read aloud to them.
Abstract: In the context of the common, but potentially rich situation of classroom storybook readalouds, this study describes what constituted literary understanding for one classroom interpretive community of first and second graders by analyzing their oral responses as picture storybooks were read aloud to them. Over seven months, field notes and transcripted audiotapes of 83 read-alouds were collected; 45 representative readalouds were selected for intensive analysis. The findings indicated five types of literary understanding: (a) textual analysis, (b) intertextual connections, (c) personal connections, (d) becoming engaged in the story to such an extent that the world of the story and the children's world were transparent to each other, and (e) using the text as a platform or pretext for creative expression. A grounded theory of literary understanding was developed, differentiating and relating the five aspects of literary understanding by (a) the stances assumed by the children, (b) the actions performed by the children and (c) the various functions of the text. The five aspects were further conceptualized as the enactments of three basic literary impulses that interact synergistically. The hermeneutic impulse is the drive to understand the story and interpret it. The aesthetic impulse consists of either receptively responding to the story as a lived-through experience or using the story as the platform for one's own creative expression. The personalizing impulse is the impulse to link the story to the self and personal experience. The study suggests that the impressive literary critical abilities of children as young as first and second grade are appropriately understood through a wide variety of theoretical perspectives. The resulting grounded theory unifies and integrates these perspectives as well as focuses specifically on the literary understanding of young children. En el contexto de la comun, pero potencialmente rica situacion de lectura de cuentos en voz alta en el aula, este estudio describe lo que constituyo la comprension literaria para la comunidad de un aula de ninos de primero y segundo grado, analizando las respuestas orales a libros de cuentos ilustrados que les fueron leidos en voz alta. Durante siete meses, se recolectaron notas de campo y transcripciones de 83 lecturas en voz alta audiograbadas. Se seleccionaron 45 lecturas en voz alta representativas para ser analizadas en profundidad. Los hallazgos indicaron cinco tipos de comprension literaria: (a) analisis textual, (b) conexiones intertextuales, (c) conexiones personales, (d) involucrarse en la historia a tal punto que el mundo de la historia y el mundo del nino se volvieron transparentes y (e) usar el texto como plataforma o pretexto para la expresion creativa. Se desarrollo una teoria fundamentada de la comprension literaria, diferenciando y relacionando los cinco aspectos de la comprension literaria por medio de (a) las posiciones asumidas por los ninos, (b) las acciones llevadas a cabo por los ninos y (c) las varias funciones del texto. Los cinco aspectos se conceptualizaron como las realizaciones de tres impulsos literarios basicos que interactuan en sinergia. El impulso hermeneutico es la tendencia a comprender la historia e interpretarla. El impulso estetico consiste en responder receptivamente a la historia como una experiencia vivida o bien usar la historia como plataforma para la propia expresion creativa. El impulso personalizador es el impulso de vincular la historia con uno mismo y la experiencia personal. El estudio sugiere que las impresionantes habilidades criticas literarias de los ninos, aun desde primero y segundo grado, pueden comprenderse adecuadamente a traves de una amplia variedad de perspectivas teoricas. La teoria resultante unifica e integra estas perspectivas y se centra especificamente en la comprension literaria de los ninos pequenos. Im Zusammenhang der allgemein ublichen, jedoch potentiell reichhaltigen Situation von lautem Vorlesen im Klassenraum aus Buchern beschreibt diese Studie, was unter Lese- und Schreibverstandnis in der interpretativen Gemeinschaft eines Klassenraumes von Erst- und Zweitklaslern durch Analysieren ihrer mundlichen Wiedergaben sich konstituierte, wahrend ihnen aus Bilderbuchern laut vorgelesen wurde. Uber die Dauer von sieben Monaten wurden Notizen und ins Schriftliche ubertragene, besprochene Audio-Tonbander von 83 lauten Vorlesungen gesammelt; 45 reprasentative Vorlesungen wurden fur eine intensive Analyse ausgewahlt. Die Ergebnisse deuteten auf funf Arten des Lese- und Schreibverstehens: (a) textliche Analyse; (b) inter-textliche Verbindungen; (c) personliche Verbindungen; (d) Engagement und Anteilnahme an der Erzahlung bis zu einem Grade, das die Welt der Erzahlung und die Welt der Kinder zueinander transarent wurden; und (e) Benutzung des Textes als Grundlage oder Vorlage zum kreativen Ausdruck. Eine in sich begrundete Theorie des Lese- und Schreibverstandnisses wurde entwickelt, durch Unterscheiden voneinander und in Bezugsetzung dieser funf Aspekte des Lese- und Schreibverstandnisses zueinander, durch (a) die von den Kindern aufgenommenen Stanzen; (b) die von den Kindern ausgefuhrten Aktionen; und (c) die unterschiedlichen Funktionen des Textes. Die funf Aspekte wurden weiter als das Nachvollziehen von drei grundlegenden Lese- und Schreibimpulsen konzeptualisiert, die untereinander und gegenseitig synergetisch in Beziehung stehen. Der hermeneutische Impuls ist der Antrieb zum Verstehen der Geschichte und zur Interpretation. Der asthetische Impuls besteht entweder aus rezeptiver Erwiderung auf die Geschichte als eine durchlebte Erfahrung oder aus der Nutzung der Erzahlung als Plattform fur den eigenen kreativen Ausdruck. Der personifizierte Impuls ist der Impuls, die Erzahlung mit sich selbst und eigener personlicher Erfahrung zu verbinden. Die Studie schlagt vor, das die eindrucksvollen kritischen Lese- und Schreibfahigkeiten der Kinder bereits im fruhen Alter der ersten und zweiten Klasse durch eine breite Variation von theoretischen Perspektiven angemessen verstanden werden. Die im Ergebnis begrundete Theorie vereinigt und integriert diese Perspektiven und richtet ihren Blick ebenfalls besonders auf das Lese- und Schreibverstehen von jungen Kindern. Dans le contexte, banal mais riche, d'une situation de lecture a haute voix de livres d'histoire, cette recherche decrit comment s'est effectuee la comprehension de la litterarite dans une communaute scolaire interpretative d'enfants de premiere et seconde annee en analysant leurs reponses orales alors qu'on leur lisait des livres a haute voix. Pendant sept mois, on a pris des notes de terrain et transcrit les bandes audio de 83 lectures a haute voix qui avaient ete collectees; on a selectionne 45 lectures a haute voix en vue d'une analyse approfondie. Les resultats montrent cinq types de comprehension de la litterarite: a) analyse textuelle; b) connexions intertextuelles; c) connexions personnelles; d) engagement progressif dans l'histoire jusqu'a ce que le monde de l'histoire et le monde de l'enfant soient transparents l'un pour l'autre; e) utilisation du texte comme plate-forme ou pretexte pour une expression creative. On a developpe une theorie de terrain de la comprehension de la litterarite, en differenciant et mettant en relation les cinq aspects de la com prehension de la litterarite par a) les positions prises par les enfants; b) les actions effectuees par les enfants; et c) les differentes fonctions du texte. Les cinq aspects ont ete ensuite conceptualises comme manifestations de trois impulsions litteraires fondamentales qui interagissent en synergie. L'impulsion hermeneutique est la pulsion pour comprendre l'histoire et l'interpreter. L'impulsion esthetique consiste soit a repondre receptivement a l'histoire en tant qu'experience vecue, soit a utiliser l'histoire comme plate-forme pour sa propre expression creative. L'impulsion de personnalisation est l'impulsion consistant a lier l'histoire a soi et a son experience personnelle. La recherche suggere que les impressionnantes capacites litteraires critiques d'enfants aussi jeunes que des enfants de premiere et deuxieme annee peuvent etre apprehendees par toutes sortes de perspectives theoriques. La theorie de terrain produite unifie et integre ces perspectives tout autant qu'elle se centre specifiquement sur la comprehension litteraire des jeunes enfants.
265 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a broad overview of literary criticism is presented, along with a specific illustrative analysis, and suggestions for further research in consumer behavior analysis using advertising text, including content analysis, image analysis and history of consumption.
Abstract: This article proposes literary criticism as a source of insight into consumer behavior, presents a broad overview of literary criticism, provides a specific illustrative analysis, and offers suggestions for further research Literary analysis of advertising text reveals elements that provide additional information to consumer researchers, and contributions of literary criticism to consumer research are discussed Major postwar critical schools are reviewed, and relevant theoretical concepts summarized An ad for Ivory Flakes is analyzed using a variety of concepts drawn from literary schools, primarily sociocultural and reader-response ones Suggestions for additional research on content analysis, image analysis, and the history of consumption are made
236 citations