In reading Ronald Barthes I really found interesting his theories on toys.  I believe that as he is explaining and describing his theories on toys, he is really describing his view on children; he mentions that: “Frenchman sees the child as another self”(53). He talks about toy being only being “microcosm of the real word”, he mentions that French toys always mean something it is always depicting something of real life for example medicine and the army. It is a way to prepare the child for real life. It is preparing the child for role it should carry out. He mention “There exist, for instance a doll s which urinate…This is meant to prepare the little girl the casualty of house-keeping, to condition her future role as a mother”(53). This reminds me of what my professor in infant psychology class mentioned that “the job of a child is to play”; so even though we as adults see it as just recreation; a child is learning about real life and his role and social behaviour. Does this mean that all girls who played with dolls should become mother? No, I think that as a child we experiment with all kinds of different roles, and this does not limit what we are going to become. He also brings out a very important point which is that children are no longer creators of game but instead just owners or users, so in a way toys are limiting. But children do like to imitate and this is a way of learning. I remember seeing a picture in a psychology book where a 3 year old boy has put a ball under his shirt and have he mentions he wants to have babies when he grows up and you can see mother in the background and she is pregnant. So my question is how much can you blame toys for limiting children creativity and how much is their own predisposition not to create but imitate?

In the end I find it interesting that he compares bourgeois toys with wooden toys. He calls bourgeois toys the product of chemistry graceless material, compared to the wooden toys that have a natural touch and not a cold metal feel. I think the reason to include this is to highlight the way toys have changed and involved and how the newer toys are more impersonal. In conclusion I think the importance of talking about toys is that they influence our view of children and also t children themselves. And in way children toys can depict society’s view on children.

Art as a Technique by viktor Shklovsky

Shklovsky brings out that there comes a point were perceptions become habitual thus becoming unconsciously automatic. Here he refers to things we do in everyday life and that are repetitive. He gives the example of holding a pen where we no longer have to cognitively think on how to do it, we just unconsciously do, this act of holding a pen now is very different to the first time we try to hold a pen, which we do at a very early age so we might not remember but it does remind me of the first time I tried using a chop stick and once you get enough practice it becomes natural to you. He also brings out that that these types of acts are done unconscious. And if an act is doen uncouncsiously and we can’t remember doing it, then really there is not act and this extends to life he says: “If the whole complex lives of many people go unconsciously, then such lives are as if they have never been” (16). Shklovsky explains that the technique of art is, the process of making objects different and difficult; and there is a connection; the more different the more difficult and object is, the more time you will spend perceiving it. He gives the example of Tolstoy and the idea of flogging. The example I found most appealing was Kholstomer story telling from the perception of a horse. Shklovsky later mentions that “a work is created “artistically” so that its perception is impeded and the greatest possible effect is produced through the slowness of the perception (19) and that is why poetic language/ speech is a formed speech that is roughened and difficult. Here is where I really think that art is more than just causing a person to ponder in its perception, I think that the idea that art is something out of the ordinary unconscious life is true, there has to be a distinction between every day mundane things and art. But in everyday life we do spend more perceptive time in things that don’t involve art. I think that the definition of art has to be concise and selective if not almost everything could go under the term art.

When reading this essay I had a really hard time understanding it as a whole, but instead I think there are various ideas that are very important and thought-provoking. First there is an attempt to define language, I found it very interesting that he mentions: “We are talking language not as a system of abstract grammatical categories but rather language conceived as ideologically saturated, language as a world view, even as a concrete opinion”( 271). This definition is accurate because of the cultural weight you find in language. As time passes words and phrases obtain different meanings because they are connected to certain events and cultural phenomena’s. That is why I believe language is always changing and evolving, and why even though there are attempts to define language in terms of grammatical laws, this is impossible, since these are also affected by their environment.  In the essay Bakhtin brings out time and again the idea of heteroglossia which is defined as “The coexistence of district varieties with in a single language” That is having a variety of difference in one single language, Bakhtin mentions that in a moment in time “each generation at each social level has its own language, moreover every age group has a matter of fact its own language, its own vocabulary, its own particular accentual system”(290) So we can see how diverse a language can be.

Bakhtin later incorporates this heteroglossia into writing a novel and he talks about the “double voice” which he defines as two speakers at the same time and expresses simultaneously two different intentions”( 324). Here the double voice is that of the character in a novel and what the author is saying.

Bakhtin also compares and contrast scientific discourse with discourse in humanities he mentions that in science discourse is just a “operational necessity, and does not affect the subject matter itself of the science…Acquiring knowledge here is not connected with receiving and interpreting words”( 351). He compares this scientific discourse to humanities where you need to transmit and interpret words, there is work involved where you need to reach deeply to understand and interpret the real meaning of the word.

Reading this essay really makes me think about the importance of language outside of just communicating. Language helps us in almost every cognitive function; for instance  without language we have no memories and without memory we have no essence as a person.

hello my name is Esmeralda Robles and I am testing out my new blog 🙂