pdp1@EARTHLINK.NET on tue 24 aug 04
morning's mists...Vince's mentions...
Hi Vince,
----- Original Message -----
From: "Vince Pitelka"
> Phil wrote:
> > I can tell already I will be a little rambly, not too
> > much, but, happily, candidly, below...and amid...
>
> Hey, Phil, I read the WHOLE THING!
Cool...and too, I did not rambel on too much, either....just
some...!
Mel should be 'proud'...
> So apparently I don't have the
> attention-span problems that afflict so many people today.
No, you do not...
> Regarding the
> writing abilities of Civil War era teenagers, reading and
writing were all
> they had. No distractions in terms of high-pressure mass
media and popular
> culture. So, no wonder their English was so good!
It is more than that though...maybe much more...maybe much
much much more...than merely that, or, it is not their
English was so
good...it is more that their intelligence (or broadly, their
abilities to use or inhabit it,) was more nearly...intact.
To which, the details...were incidental...
> Nothing you say changes my convictions about children and
art.
Well, I was not trying to change your convictions about
Children and Art.
I might not personally find the term 'Art'
to be as popularly-connotatively free from downsides as I
would like
or wish it was, but lets say for the moment I will set that
aside...I still will question the wisdom of assigning to
Children such named ( or un-named) roles or titles as become
mediums for pretenses or
collusions of others giving to them, an identity, as,
especially
when, their identity otherwise recieves little or no
positive or energetic mirroring or wholesome interactions...
But, far from trying to change your convictions, I was
pointing out how you are home with your Son, and how
now-a-days, Fathers are almost never home with their
Children.
And, among other things, the Children never see
the Father 'do' anything, but maybe see him come home 'from'
work, sit on the couch, watch tee-vee, drink 'beer', belch,
eat, stare at mom's butt or somerthing if she still has a
butt 'worth' staring at in his view, or ...whatever.
The norm, is there are no actual or 'real' things to be with
the Father
about, the Father is never in any real way, 'with' them...he
is only with them in a superficial way. In effect, a
dismissive and deflective way...an absent way...or 'in'
false 'currencies'...
Almost everyone I ever knew as did reminesce about their own
Childhood, to one degree or another, makes that same
observation...it is the norm, it is the ubiquity...
"They were there...but they were never 'there'..."
Like that...
> In fact, it
> confirms that the wonderful potential for art-making in
every child gets
> screwed up most of the time.
I believe totally in the inate ability of Children to be
wholesome and intelligent and self posessed and to have and
evolve abilities and capacities and facilities of all
kinds...
What I have seen is that most adults will do all they can to
sabotauge and controll that, alomost allways under pretext
of doing something else, while, not letting on to to
hemselves that 'that' is 'what' they are doing. They,
adults, mystify what they do...in effect, they are in-a-way
hypnotised in how they do it. One can see that in their
eyes. One can see this happenning, all the time anywhere
adults and Children are interacting...I see it...I allways
saw it, whether I had some way to talk about it or not, even
when it was done to me, but I did not know often what to do
to preserve myself against it...
I am concerned with how Children DO get 'screwed up' to not
only be robbed of their Childhood's proper conditions for
their mental health and well being, but also as results in
their probable de-evolve and and diminution, and frustrated
continuation into
becomeing the kinds of 'adults' I remember being around when
I was a kid, and since - I am not in any way questioning the
presence of Children's innate or endemic propensities, or
their potential, for expression or accomplishment in any
field. I question how they are cumpulsively, unthingkingly,
un-feelingly 'managed', and, the effects of
that.
> Some young kids are lucky enough to develop
> their own natural inclinations, and I have seen that
happen enough (and read
> the research) to know that kids left to their own natural
inclinations will
> be artists, along with whatever else they become.
Yes...or, close enough for me...
I had learned to read and write on my own interest, before
being sent to school.
I had read Jack London's "The Call of the Wild" sent to me
by my Grandfather, oweing to how he heard about how I liked
'Animals' and so on...
Then, I was punished 'there' in the first grade, for my
printed letters having 'serifs', when they insisted on
'gothic' print, and, for my cursive to have existed at all.
Cursive was forbiden untill mid-second grade, when they,
intended to 'teach' it. When they did 'teach it', it was
insulting. There is more, but, that is one
portion, of one example...
'Art' in our casual use of the term, was 'worse'...
> I am not saying that they
> will be professional artists.
I detest all 'professions' anyway, even as I detest the
concept of them, so no loss there...
> I am saying that art-making will become a
> natural and permanent part of their lives, like writing
and speaking.
Except that for the most part, these things do not develop
well anymore...the 'writing' and 'speaking' of most people,
in their teens, twenties, thirties, and so on, is, at best,
quite poor...
These propensities have been more frustrated, than,
encouraged...more interfered with, than allowed to
develop...more punished, than cultivated benovently...and,
it shows..more with each decade...
Even 'letters home' from World War Two, retain far higher
literacy and references of symbol literacy and cognitive
skill, than say, most college essays do now...as well as
'better' Penmanship...
> That
> is the natural sequence in creative evolution.
Except nothing 'like-that' is happenning...nor are the
circumstances as could nurture it, happenning...excpet
rarely...
That the opposite is happening, is some of what concerns
me...
I have no ( 'zero') doubts, that what you mention would
happen, if allowed TO happen. That and more...
My concern, is that it is not 'allowed' to happen...except
very rarely, or, by default.
Some slip through the cracks...through...the 'net'...or play
'dead' untill the coast-is-clear...
> Best wishes -
Same here...
Phil
el ve
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