Identity and Ong’s psychodynamics of orality
The first word I wrote when reading chapter three of Orality and Literacy by Walter Ong was Identity. To understand who we are as individuals, it is necessary to have at least one means of communication so as to interact with others and therefore learn about oneself; much like a mirror reflects an image back to us. Who we are is based a lot on our past and present cultural influences. We begin life with the communication of interaction with our mother, parent, and family.
As I continued reading the ideas on the special relationship between sound with time and the development of aides-mémoire with the use of mnemonic patterns I was reminded of scenes from a mini-TV series, Roots (based on the book written by Alex Haley, 1976)
“Then they told me something of which I’d never have dreamed: of very old men, called
griots, still to be found in the older back-country villages, men who were in effect living,
walking archives of oral history. A senior griot would be a man usually in his late sixties
or early seventies; below him would be progressively younger griots– and apprenticing
boys, so a boy would be exposed to those griots’ particular line of narrative for forty or
fifty years before he could qualify as a senior griot, who told on special occasions the
centuries-old histories of villages, of clans, of families, of great heroes. Throughout the
whole of black Africa such oral chronicles had been handed down since the time of
the ancient forefathers, I was informed, and there were certain legendary griots who
could narrate facets of African history literally for as long as three days without ever
repeating themselves”(Haley, 1976).
While it may not be considered an academic/scientific resource, Haley’s search for his past, his identity, illustrates to me what Ong calls a ‘primary oral culture’. “…reminded me that every living person ancestrally goes back to some time and some place where no writing existed; and then human memories and mouths and ears were the only ways those human beings could store and relay information. They said that we who live in the Western culture are so conditioned to the “crutch of print” that few among us comprehend what a trained memory is capable of” (Haley, 1976).
We as modern human beings have the mental power to name everything around us. As children we learn the different Canadian provinces and capitals in ways that could relate back to the time of Homer. If you ever watch the TV program Jeopardy, the American contestants seem to know in a flash the name of the fifth undersecretary to the minister on a particular subcommittee working in the department of such and such under a president’s second term of office. I have no idea what they are talking about! American school children do learn this data. Is it a form of environmental conditioning?
I am having a mental block when it comes to understanding what Ong states on the bottom of page 43 “ Writing fosters abstractions that disengage knowledge from the arenas where human beings struggle with one another. It separates the knower from the known” and again on page 45 “writing separates the knower from the known and thus sets up conditions for ’objectivity’, in a sense of personal disengagement or distancing”. To me writing in its various forms of mark making should be considered a unifying, sharing or a tool of reaching out between individuals or groups much like sound (drums, music or voice). I’m not clear on the definition that Ong was using at the time of his research. My thinking processes may be tainted by a news item I watched recently about the Canadian anthropologist, Genevieve von Petzinger and her research in caves of Europe:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/did-early-humans-communicate-with-cave-signs-1.3040723
“Anthropologists are now taking a closer look at the significance of strange abstract signs – including spirals, ovals, handprints and intersecting lines – found alongside prehistoric rock art depicting animals”. Von Petzinger says these signs suggest “the first glimmers of graphic communication” among human beings before the written word” which I understand historians currently agree this to have taken place in approximately 3,000 B.C in Mesopotamia by the Sumerians. I’m guessing that there is a difference in the graphic communications used by the cave dwellers and what constitutes as writing systems of ‘modern man’. Even though Ong’s focus was on orality, I wonder what his response would be today to von Petzinger’s findings. There was ‘an incredibly pivotal moment in human history when we went from spoken language to making these durable marks, which could then be communicated to people who were outside of the physical realm of speech distance,’ says von Petzinger” (CBC, 2015).
This brings me back to aides-mémoire. “Oral folk have no sense of a name as a tag, for they have no idea of a name as something that can be seen. Written or printed representations of words can be labels, real, spoken words cannot be” (Ong, 2002). Are there not sound utterances associated with feelings/emotional reactions that could be considered as ‘tags’? Can they not be seen in human expression /body positions? Are we learning anything of oral communications from the studies of our cousins the apes/monkeys? “Aides-memoire such as notched sticks or a series of carefully arranged objects will not of themselves retrieve a complicated series of assertions”. So how complicated was life for oral culture peoples. The sun came up, the sun set. They didn’t need calendars/daytimers. Mastering fire was possibly the most important ‘technology’ in their day. Knowledge would have been shared by the family unit/community support structures. This would also hold true in how we came to learn how to use new technology when it first arrived on the scene. Some of the same aides memoire could be used in breaking down what we today think of as a ‘complicated series’ of tasks to work/play with new-to-us technology when expected to obtain specific outcomes.
In exploring the British Museums’ online collections I came across the Italian Bucchero ware drinking-cup (kantharos); Etruscan, about 600 BC:
http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/gr/b/bucchero_ware_drinking-cup.aspx
The description explains how it is thought that someone inscribed their name on the side of the container, much like current trends of showing ownership/identity (this cup belongs to…) or graffiti tags (I exist. I was here.).
Walter Ong provides us fodder for many a discussion. I would have liked to have heard his ideas on whether savants and autism were more prevalent in the past or are the result of modern conditions.
References:
British Museum: http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/gr/b/bucchero_ware_drinking-cup.aspx
CBC( 2015) Genevieve von Petzinger
http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/did-early-humans-communicate-with-cave-signs-1.3040723
Haley, A. (1976). http://crasseux.com/books/Alex_Haley-Roots.pdf
Ong, W. J. (2002). Orality and Literacy, New York, NY: Routledge.
Doing this module’s reading really shone some light on practices of the past for me. When Ong described the characteristics of the oral tradition with its repetitive phrases, mnemonics, bigger than life stock characters, I saw books like the Iliad and the Bible in a whole new light – their format made sense now and the fact that no two gospels in the Bible said exactly the same thing.
I agree with you about ‘tagging’ in oral traditions. Certainly there was no written word associated with a particular object, but as you stated there was likely feelings/emotions and body postures or expressions associated with certain concepts. These still exist today in the verbal exchanges we have with each other and are quite common when trying to communicate with someone in a language you don’t understand.
One article noted that we don’t talk the same way that we write. I think this is because it takes more effort to write than it does to speak and writing is usually more complex than that which is spoken. This is because with writing we are able to go back and review the text again and again in order to understand it. Orality needs to be more simple as it is transient.
Unfortunately, sometimes however we are so immersed in the literate world that we can relate to the oral world. In nursing there is a lot of patient teaching. Not all patients are literate English speaking which sometimes causes anxiety for the nurses. “How am I going to teach this person about concept X if they don’t read?” Our if they are literate, sometimes the information relayed to the patient is riddled with jargon and sounds like it came out of a textbook, which makes it even more difficult to understand. I think having an understanding of the differences between oral and literate communication styles can only assist one to communicate effectively.
“And when they have been once written down they are tumbled about anywhere among those who may or may not understand them, and know not to whom they should reply, to whom not: and, if they are maltreated or abused, they have no parent to protect them; and they cannot protect or defend themselves.”
Phaedrus-Plato
I was struck by what you wrote around your perception that writing, rather than the insulating experience Ong (2002) describes, is instead a means of connecting. I agree with what you are saying in terms of writing’s global reach and certainly its staying power. No one can deny that it is through writing that we as modern day people are able to get glimpses into the past through preserved writing, be it on caves or codexes. Nor can we deny that it is through writing that we are able to foster correspondence with people from outside our spatial vicinity.
I was better able to understand what Ong (2002) was speaking of when he stated that “writing and print isolate”, through reading Phaedrus. In the quote at the start of this reponse Plato states how words, once written, are no longer connected to the writer. Instead they are open to the interpretation of the person reading them. They connect the reader to the writing, not necessarily to the writer. This stands in contrast to oral cultures where the speaker is directly in contact with the listener. I would be interested to see what effect text messages are having on the Ong’s thesis. Is text becoming less isolating as people are now using text messaging to instantly connect between parties in a way not available to people in the past?
Thanks for the great post. It really made me think and reflect,
Ben King
Works cited:
Ong, Walter J.. (2003). Orality and Literacy. Routledge. Retrieved 26 may 2015, from http://www.myilibrary.com.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca?ID=1960
Plato (2013) Phaedrus. (B. Jowett, Trans.) Retrieved from http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1636/1636-h/1636-h.htm
Thank you Benjamin;
This makes much more sense. I can relate to this now. This is much like the philosophy associated with Painting. As artist mast send forth their artistic creation knowing that the project’s real completion comes with the interpretation of the audience. It is the viewer’s personal connection to an art piece that completes it, gives it full value.
as for your question Is text becoming less isolating as people are now using text messaging to instantly connect between parties in a way not available to people in the past?” I would say that texting does not actually ‘isolate’ individuals so much as it connects them with getting too close, in their physical space or their ‘comfort zone’ which can happen in F2F situations. I’m thinking more of today’s young people. Texting provides the option of time and space.
Terry
Thank you, Susan for your response.
“…no two gospels in the Bible said exactly the same thing.” we must also remind ourselves of how many translations have taken place over the centuries since the ‘first Bible’ was written down. Human beings have a history of unknowingly/knowingly including their own interpretation for personal advantage.
As for” the verbal exchanges we have with each other and are quite common when trying to communicate with someone in a language you don’t understand” we don’t share the same ‘cultural/ethnic? language but communication can still be made possible by universal gestures (show hands sleep, eat/drink, hello/goodbye) that are ‘tagged’ with universal meaning.
“it takes more effort to write than it does to speak and writing is usually more complex than that which is spoken.” The mind to mouth connection compared to that of the mind to hand seems to perform differently maybe because our eyes have a say, too, in the aesthetics of our writing. You may have been taught the same saying as I and be somewhat cautious of having something said in haste come back to bite you: “If you wouldn’t write it and sign it, don’t say it.” Earl Wilson? Or as stated by a pair of great thinkers:
Calvin: Sometimes when I’m talking, my words can’t keep up with my thoughts. I wonder why we think faster than we speak.
Hobbes: Probably so we can think twice.
~Bill Watterson, Calvin & Hobbes (comic strip)
And this was before the Internet!
“riddled with jargon” jargon or local regional phraseology works in both directions Growing up in New Brunswick, we called the hospital emergency area – the Out Door. So if you were very ill you were taking to the Out Door. I think it may have originated from the term ‘outpatients’. The locals understood. Sometimes it may be advantageous to have the patient relay back to the teacher (Nurse) what was just discussed. Then fill in the gaps.
Terry
Module 2 Week 2: What a difference a week makes.
The readings for Module 2 were centred on Walter Ong’s Orality and Literacy. From the very first page, I was in awe of the amount of knowledge presented by the author. I found myself wanting to question this or that element of a few of his fast flowing stream of ideas. At the same time, I was convincing myself much like he states on page 84 (Ong 2002) that I as “the unwary reader, demand[ed] a guru-like figure to mediate between reader and text [content]”. Ong could only be one of the leading researchers in this field. Why should I question his knowledge? My mind couldn’t formulate what questions I wanted to ask so they could be asked; so much so that I made a mental note to purchase a copy for future rereading and referencing.
I was so intrigued by Ong’s presentation and writing style that he drew me into what seemed to be almost total acceptance of his theories, his logic on orality and writing made sense to this novice. It was in reading the critiques by Chandler and Biakolo that I was brought back to reality. Walter Ong is a philosopher, a man of incredible ideas that may or may not be authenticated within scientific research. “We are often left with the impression that these scholars are working backwards to answers assumed from the start” (Biakolo 1999, p55) which is quite possible when the subject of their writings is back many centuries in time. Ong’s writing is in itself an example of the power of writing/reading, the effect of the written word. “…it takes only a moderate degree of literacy to make a tremendous difference in thought processes” (Ong 2002, p33).
“A text stating what …is false will state falsehood forever, so long as the text exists. Texts are inherently contumacious” (Ong 2002, p78) which is partly due to the lack of the communication tool of face to face discussions; the timely two way interaction between presenter and audience. The written content of a book has the ability to impact on the reader’s intellect over and over again while the reader has no immediate reciprocal influence that can make changes to the information contained in the book. Ong presents us with the view of Plato’s Socrates on writing being a destroyer of human memory due to a weakening of the mind because we utilize this external device. We have witnessed in our school systems that that is not so. The mind can be strengthened by being focused on the immediate coordination of hand and eye (multiple senses), whereby using the computer does not have the same close relationship with its point click actions. Writing is not so much ‘passive’ as it is a transition as we add distance with the addition of technology. Finger painting could be considered an extension of writing whereby computer processing requires the additional steps of data entry before performing a ‘writing’ task. This places it further from the human brain.
On page 84(Ong, 2002) Ong tells us “writing … was and is the most momentous of all human technological inventions. It is not a mere appendage to speech because it moves speech from oral-aural to a new sensory world, that of vision, it transforms speech and thought as well.” This we can see clearly in our distance education courses.
As Chandler mentions “the sharp division of historical continuity into periods ‘before’ and ‘after’ a technological innovation such as writing assumes the determinist notion of the primacy of ‘revolutions’ in communication technology. And differences tend to be exaggerated.” (Chandler, 1994). There may not be exact diving lines as societies morphed with one to another change over time. Not all areas of the world receive the same impacts at the same time in an all-or-nothing fashion. We must not become gullible in accepting all we read but be open to exploring different viewpoints remembering the power of the word is present.
References:
Biakolo, E. A. (1999). On the theoretical foundations of orality and literacy.
Research in African Literatures, 30(2), 42-65.
Chandler, D. (1994). Biases of the Ear and Eye: “Great Divide” Theories,
Phonocentrism, Graphocentrism & Logocentrism [Online]. Retrieved, 8
August, 2009 from: http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/litoral/litoral.html
Chandler, D. (1995). Technological or Media Determinism [Online]. Retrieved, 8
August, 2009 from http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/tecdet/tecdet.html
Ong, Walter. (2002). Orality and literacy: The technologizing of the word.
London: Routledge.