My first reaction is I enjoy how Belenky et al. present research in the form of personal stories from women in their study. It gives the piece a human touch I think necessary for a conversation on the relationship between silence and epistemology. Also, after reading this I feel privileged to have grown up in a supportive house and community where I was allowed to play and communicate with others since, according to the authors, it is a foundation for learning. At first I was skeptical of the notion that self isolation is connected with disconnection from the social world, that "individuals remain isolated from others; and without tools for representing their experiences people also remain isolated from the self." (26).
After more consideration it makes complete sense. I thought of a concept I learned in Lit Theory & Criticism called the mirror stage (from the psychoanalytic theory of Jacques Lacan) and how essentially babies (people) first understand their own self image through negation of the other, whether their mother or a crib-device holding them up. Either way, they get a sense of their own image through what they are not, the idea is they understand for the first time, Oh, that thing I see in the mirror is my mother, and she is holding something. I am not my mother, therefore that 'something' she is holding is me. Thinking about our identity as a construct created through socialization and the negation of the other is jarring because it threatens the sense of individuality (and ego) we hold onto in American culture.
I went off on a tangent but it relates to the text because Belenky et al. argue "exterior dialogues are a necessary precursor to inner speech and an awareness of one's own thought process." (33). What I understand is since play provides children with their first metaphors it prepares them to enter the "consensually validated symbol system" that is language (33). It hurts me to think about women like Ann and Cindy who had no such experience, who grew up in physical and emotional isolation and completely unprepared for school from the very beginning because they were not allowed the important first step of meaning-making.
It is interesting how absolute Truth is so central to the silent women making them dualists, seeing things in polarities-- black and white, right and wrong, etc. They view authorities as having the Truth without awareness knowledge could be a construction. Honestly, I did not think of reality as competing subjective truths as I do now, I thought there was one Truth too. In a way, I entered college as a "received knower," my freshmen experience is similar to those mentioned by women on page 38, I relished in having so much in common with my friends and I could not distinguish my own thought and opinions from theirs (this is embarrassing to admit but it's true). I wonder if many people feel like this when they enter college? My peers who are reading this, what do you think? I feel like my college experience has been a journey of dissociating myself with others and finding my own truth, my own distinctive voice. I recognize I am more privileged than the women in the text, but it still made me think about my own experience with silence and knowing.
Hi Addie,
ReplyDeleteI love the digression on Lacan, and the theory of "not me," which I agree seems absolutely consistent with the development of a sense of self. I really hope, too, that others in the class weigh in on your question about whether anyone remembers those early days in college as a period of believing in received knowledge. I asked a similar question in my comment on Casey's post. You write at the end that your journey has been one of "dissociating myself from others and finding my own truth, my own distinctive voice." That is wonderful. Wouldn't it be great if you could tell that story, identifying and naming those moments that lead to your self-awareness?
In later chapters, Belenky et. al. suggest that for some women who embrace what they call "constructed knowledge," (women like you), they find a self that is not necessarily "separate" from others but differently connected. What they seek--and come to understand--is how knowledge connects to their own experiences. These "passionate knowers...learn to use the self as an instrument of understanding." They learn to "care" about what they know, and "establish a communion with what they are trying to understand." I think one of the reasons my professional career has focused on the writing and teaching of the personal essay is that this is exactly the kind of know that the genre privileges. How does my experience and what I'm discovering intersect? Why does it matter?
Oh, that’s an interesting concept about babies...! I didn’t think back as far as that when it came to the concept of self-knowing, haha. I also think it’s interesting how you described entering college as a freshman and immediately blending into your friends, cause I was the exact opposite! I was probably too set in my ways and enjoyed disagreeing with my roomates a little too much, but I think this gave us all the chance to evaluate what we truly believed in and why.
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