Explain why the notion that cultures can be distinguished as either “oral culture” or “written culture” (19) is a mistaken understanding as to how culture works, according to Chamberlin and your reading of Courtney MacNeil’s article “Orality.
Yesterday morning, my Milton studies professor told us not to use audiobooks if we wanted to understand Paradise Lost. When someone reads Paradise Lost to you, they tend to put their own spin to it. My professor went further: every time he listened to a reading of the book, he would think, “That’s not how I would’ve read it.” A reading is simply that: a reading. An interpretation. The written epic is the truth. The important thing is: the written and oral forms do not exist on the same level as equals.
In a similar way, Chamberlain says, “It has become almost a truism that writing…marked an evolutionary advance…while oral cultures are imprisoned in the present” (19). The written form is often believed to be superior to the oral form, and MacNeil takes a critical tone when the ideas put forward by the Toronto School prevents “mutual independency between the two media” from being a “recognized possibility.”
MacNeil argues that we should be rethinking the literacy/orality model because these two worlds are blurring together with “the techonlogical advances of recent years.” Complicated social media conundrums aside, even my example of Paradise Lost presents difficulty in dividing literacy and orality. As many may know, Milton was blind, thus Paradise Lost was entirely dictated by speech. Paradise Lost had an oral form! In other words, there is a level of interdependency between the two media, which is what allows for different interpretations and no universal truth.
Let’s look at Shakespeare: how different is seeing and reading his plays? And how different is each production? Last year, I visited the Globe Theatre in London and I watched two plays: The Lightning Child, a really strange psychedelic version of The Bacchae, and MacBeth.
Left: Dionysus and his followers Right: Macbeth confronting the ghost of Banquo
From text to stage to text to stage, The Lightning Child was one of the weirdest experiences. I was caught between a cycle of amazement and disgust. Macbeth, though it was the second time I’ve seen this play, was exactly how I’d imagined it. It was probably exactly how they figured Shakespeare would’ve staged it. In a word, it was boring. I couldn’t take anything out of it that I haven’t seen or imagined already. Still, a play is the perfect example of harmony between literature and oraliture.
In Chamberlin’s more anthropological point of view, there is no such thing as “written cultures” and “oral cultures.” This categorization doesn’t take into account that “so-called oral cultures are rich in forms of writing, albeit non-syllabic and non-alphabetic ones” and “central institutions of our ‘written cultures’…are in fact arenas of strictly defined and highly formalized oral traditions” (19-20). The crucial part of this is that “our stories and our songs draw on both” (20).
People have always listened to the world around them to find answers (Chamberlin 125). Here’s an experiment:
Watch this video with words in mind:
Now try to imagine what this video would be like if you’ve lived your entire life without words. Would there be meaning? Do we need words to think that the girl is angry/annoyed that her hair dryer died?
Human communication alone is such a multi-sensory experience, yet how much of it is communicated through words? And how much of what we don’t communicate, verbally or in written form, permeates into our culture? The hard part is: each culture communicates a little differently, maybe even on a spectrum of worded language. There may be gestures, subtle things that onlookers can’t catch, that get a message across. There may be festivals to tell us our place in the world.
It’s easy to feel superior when it seems like our culture is sophisticated in its writing roots, but it’s also easy to dismiss a culture because we don’t understand it.
Just like the way we sometimes evaluate someone’s intelligence based on their knowledge of English.
When a complicated Iroquois oral tradition takes a lifetime to learn, and is so complicated that only less than 30 people understood, what right do we have to say that our culture is more sophisticated, more thoughtful, more anything (Chamberlain 22). The arrogance of the literacy/orality dichotomy diminishes cultures based on differences, rather than sameness. How is the chief of the Cayuga, who spent a lifetime learning the Great Law of the Haudenosaunee, different from the scholars of our institutions?
Cultures can shift and change, but can they be weighed and ranked?
Works Cited
Chamberlin, J. Edward. If This Is Your Land, Where Are Your Stories?: Reimagining Home and Sacred Space. Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim, 2004. Print.
Krulwich, Robert, and Jad Abumrad. “Http://www.radiolab.org/story/91725-words/.” Audio blog post.Radiolab. Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, 9 Aug. 2010. Web. 16 Jan. 2015. <http://www.radiolab.org/story/91725-words/>.
Macbeth. Digital image. Shakespeare’s Globe. The Shakespeare Globe Trust, 2013. Web. 16 Jan. 2015. <http://www.shakespearesglobe.com/education/discovery-space/previous- productions/macbeth-4>.
Courtney MacNeil, “Orality.” The Chicago School of Media Theory. Uchicagoedublogs. 2007. Web. 19 Feb. 2013.<http://lucian.uchicago.edu/blogs/mediatheory/keywords/orality/>
The Lightning Child. Digital image. Shakespeare’s Globe. The Shakespeare Globe Trust, 2013. Web. 16 Jan. 2015. <http://www.shakespearesglobe.com/education/discovery-space/previous productions/the-lightning-child>.
Words. Dir. Will Hoffman and Daniel Mercadante. YouTube. N.p., 9 Aug. 2010. Web. 16 Jan. 2015. <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0HfwkArpvU>.
Hi Florence!
My name is Laura Landsberg, nice to “meet” you! I really enjoyed your blog post, I thought it was really insightful and carried a lot of critical thought.
To answer your question, “cultures can shift and change, but can they be weighed and ranked?”, simply, I think no, they absolutely cannot be weighed and ranked. However, as you mentioned, historically, that is what we have done, That is exactly how Westerners colonized the new lands and people all around the globe.
In today’s times, I believe that the weighing and ranking of other cultures in comparison of your own is still used, especially in topics of war – quick relevant example, the critique of middle eastern cultures today to justify waging war against them.
I really enjoyed your thought on the Chief learning the Great Law of Haudenosaunee, such an interesting way at comparing knowledge! Western education is so often reviewed as being a “superior” education (in North America, education from across seas (unless from a Westernized country) is not equally valued, resulting in immigrants to be underemployed). I think with this example, we are ranking Western education (and culture) higher than others. This is something that I (and I think you as well), disagree with and realizes that it is actually quite a sad reality for those, like the Chief and many others, who spend their lives practicing and learning their traditions and then are shunned by mainstream society.
Quick question, I know your blog post was about ‘oral’ and ‘written’ traditions, do you think that literature is limited to only ‘written’ tradition? Or is it possible to have an oral story that is also considered literature? This is a question to 1: get your mind working but also, 2: I am just genuinely interested as well, there are so many other forms of media that also tell some sort of story or emit some form of knowledge, should literature only be limited to written forms?
Thanks so much for your insight!
Hi Laura!
Very nice to meet you! Your last question is just FANTASTIC! Thing is, I think yesterday I would’ve said they were two completely different things. When I did my storytelling assignment with my little sister yesterday, I simply couldn’t make it as dramatic and flowy as I wanted to. So I cheated and read the best bits off my phone. The result are two completely different things, right?
But when other people do it right, oral storytelling can definitely be considered literature.
I think nowadays, “literature” is all over the Internet, but the oral tradition is just as prominent too! For one thing, I thought of the podcast that I hyperlinked as literature. It was scripted and edited, then communicated through the voice. The Massey lecture of Dr. King is a great example too! If you listen to it, you’ll find that it’s different from the book. He’s so compelling and clear it was as if it was written.
Maybe another thing to consider is whether stand-up comedic routines can be considered literature too!
Hi Florence,
I really loved the .gif you used of Modern Family. That scene really rattled me, because it is so true that we make immediate assumptions of a person’s intelligence based on their proficiency of the language that we speak. I would like to point out that it is not simply their ability to speak the language, but a very specific dialect of it. If a person spoke with a thick accented drawl, used slang, or spoke in a tone that reminded us of “the valley girl accent” we would make an instant judgment on that person’s intelligence. These accents are used often in our media, such as TV or film, to represent a person who is supposed to be “naïve” or “unintelligent”. It’s not just a person’s grasp of English, but whether we believe them to be university educated based on their accent and use of language. This happens not only in English, but in various other languages as well. While abroad I have met a number of people who admit to switching their accent and dialect (in the various languages that they speak) depending on whether they are at university or speaking to their friends or parents from their home town.
On another note, I also really liked the video that you posted. Here is another video that I think you might find interesting. It shows how incredibly linked our auditory and visual cues are. It’s an experiment that explains the phenomenon of the McGurk Effect:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-lN8vWm3m0
– Charlotte
Hi Charlotte,
Excellent point about the dialects! I completely agree with you there. I admit I can be rather judgmental about people when I hear certain accents as well. I met with the same accent-switching phenomenon abroad as well! I’ve heard that accent coaches receive the most demand for the generic newscaster accents . It’s a shame really! I admit, when my friend from Glasgow showed me the way he really spoke I was pretty confused, but it would be nice if people can have the freedom to tell their stories!
Thank you for the video as well! Her last line is super intriguing! Sometimes our sight takes over, which enables us to “maintain a coherent view of the world.” I didn’t know what to make of that!
Hello Florence, thank you for this most thoughtful and well expressed answer to my question; you have stimulated some good dialogue here. And, your blog looks great! Thanks
Hi Florence! I had so much fun reading your post! I’m glad to have this opportunity to make a connection here!
There were a couple of things that I wanted to comment on and the first was about audiobooks. Personally, I love audiobooks in the way I love story-telling! I think in the way that one connects with the text on the page, one connects with the voice that reads the text. I think the thing that I like best is in the listening of the voice that reads to me.
In examining the consumption of audio-books, the essence is the story-telling. There is the text, the reader, the medium, and the listener. At each junction, the text is absorbed and transformed. While the reader influences the text, the text is also transformed by the reader. The medium – referring to how the audio is broadcasted could range from an actual person, the radio or the internet can also affect how the content will be received. Just like when choosing which books I should get at the bookstore, I look through the first few pages of the book to gauge my interest in it. Similarly, when I’m in the mood for an audiobook, I browse audiobooks by listening to the first few minutes of it. This is by no way reflective of how good the book actually is, but whether it grabs your attention. Hence the delivery is important. The first few minutes determines the audience’s receptiveness of the content. The voice used, the tone used, the rhythm and the pace, the pauses and silences – they all play a part in capturing the audience’s attention.
One of my favorite audiobooks is Steelheart by Brandon Steel and the reader definitely brought the text to life. There’s an audiobook that I borrowed from the library long ago, and though I do not remember the title of the book, I remember how I stayed up all night listening to the audiobook, how entranced I was, and how moved to tears I was at certain parts. Being part of the story-telling process (the receiver) has always given me the feeling of being more connected to the text than if I were to read it and that is a personal experience. I have always enjoyed being the story-teller and the listener. To me, being part of the story-telling journey is so special because it gives the opportunity for you to bring life to the text and to pass it on.
Story telling is a skill that needs to be learnt. Not only is it good for this class, it is good for conversations and more importantly for making connections, and building communities – passing on what is important to us.
I just had a thought. About cartoons. About the great Robin Williams. Robin Williams is such an amazing person, actor, and voice actor. I watched an interview once where Robin Williams was talking about his experience on the set of Aladdin and the link is here http://youtu.be/kRSdjZcXKow. In it, he talks about how he wanted to try something different, and by the end, the producers had so much content to work with. In another interview, the link here. http://youtu.be/akOo9XqAyxE?t=2m24s they talked about how the Genie in Aladdin was adapted to Robin WIlliams and the voices that he brought on set. I think this is a great example of how we cannot and must not classify cultures into oral and written cultures because of the way our senses work. The oral brings life to the written and so does the written bring life to the oral.
Hi Florence,
Your post really resonated with me and I feel like you captured the struggle between oral and written language very well.
In a previous comment that I posted I also mentioned Shakespeare and the difficulty that a play poses when trying to determine a distinction between oral and written stories. I suggested that not only can we not make this distinction, but we also cannot limit sharing to these two forms of communication. Visual communication is equally as important if not more. It seems that there is a constant power struggle between all forms of communication and it’s unnecessary because no one will ever be able to determine if one is in fact more important than another.
I believe that our senses all work together and they are all equally powerful. For example, I was in a really bad car accident in 2013 and although I was knocked unconscious I have equal visual and auditory memories. I didn’t realize this until a movie was playing in another room with a car accident, the sound alone was terrifying. Several weeks later I saw a clip of a similar accident to mine without any sound and my reaction was the same. I don’t know if my reaction would have been stronger had these two senses worked together but alone they were equal. This leads me to believe that no one form of communication is more powerful than another.
I also agree that it’s easy to dismiss a culture because you don’t understand it. I’m currently living in Montreal and I feel that with the friends that I make who speak only french, I am a totally different person. I do not feel that I can communicate my emotions and humour in a language in which I am not completely proficient. This is not to say that they are not my friends, simply that we have a different relationship because of the limitations on our communication. This leads me to believe that although, as you state, Cultures can shift and change that they will always be weighed and ranked. Not perhaps in a negative way but simply because all cultures place a different level of importance on how we communicate. Griggs states that we must transfer techniques in order to create powerful understandings that are identifiable. (Griggs 34)
Works cited
Griggs, T. (2001). Teaching as acting: Considering acting as epistemology and its use in teaching and teaching preparation. Teacher Education Quarterly, 28(2), 23–37.
🙂
Looking to mingle? 😉