Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: Re: Persona
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1992 08:27:08

 Fra Tadhg Liath unto "Edward V Wright" (however construed) and all others
 unto whom these presents shall have come giveth greeting:

 EV> > Fra Tadhg Liath unto "Edward V. Wright" (Nicholas, is that you?)

 EV> Well, now, that would put this discussion into the more philosophical,
 EV> "what is a persona?" category, wouldn't it? :-)

 Well, I'd hate to punch out the wrong persona at dance practice.... 8-)

 EV> > EV> There seems to be an underlying assumption here that a good teacher
 EV> > EV> ought never to withhold information from a student.
 EV>  
 EV> > No, merely that this is an inappropriate pretext for doing so.

 EV> What makes it inappropriate?

 The fact that it is more likely to induce irritation in the student than
 creative thought. See my other posts on the subject.

 EV> > Well, it was certainly effective in reinforcing my conviction that such
 EV> > persona games are absurd.  My difficulty is not with the subtlety but with
 EV> > the offensiveness; were I a student in that class...

 EV> If it's your conviction that persona games are absurd, I don't see why
 EV> you would choose to attend a class that was advertised as being taught
 EV> in persona.

 The point is that one can be "in persona" without such "persona games".
 When I teach (which is more often than I really have time for), it is
 always "in persona". As I've said before, there are many completely
 legitimate ways to avoid answering such a question, and most of them (such
 as your suggestion) are completely inoffensive; this, however, IMHO doesn't
 happen to be one of them.

 EV> >I would find thoroughly offensive a statement
 EV> >that *implies* (whether it states it or not) that the teacher knows and is
 EV> >deliberately not going to say.

 EV> The statement was something along the lines of, "There's another form of
 EV> poetry, but I don't know anything about that because it was only discussed
 EV> after women had left the room."  I don't see how "I don't know anything
 EV> about that" can possibly be construed to imply "I do know about that."

 That's not the way it was presented in the original post, unless my
 recollection is seriouly faulty. And, in any event, that's not been the
 basis for the discussion so far; why seek to intrude it now?

 EV> > Is this so unnatural a reaction? Am I being oversensitive? Would NO ONE
 EV> > ELSE in this situation be as angered as I would be? If so, then I guess
 EV> > it's just me being peculiar (again); if not, I'd appreciate hearing some
 EV> > other viewpoints.

 EV> If something about a teacher's style angers you, then the obvious solution
 EV> is not to attend any of her classes again.  If enough people are angered,
 EV> she will soon get the message.  However, if this is all it takes for a teacher
 EV> to offend you, then you must have led a very charmed life or spent most of
 EV> your academic carreer being offended.  

 The thing is that I don't participate in the SCA for the same reasons that
 I spent time in my academic career. (The SCA, for example, is not a
 requirement for a job in my chosen field, whereas an "academic career" is.)
 The SCA (in theory, at least) is supposed to be superior to the mundane
 world in that sort of thing. Granted that it doesn't always turn out that
 way, nevertheless I see no reason to excuse offensiveness just because it
 *will* happen.


 * Origin: Herald's Point * Steppes/Ansteorra * 214-699-0057 (1:124/4229)