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Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!iuvax!purdue!haven!umbc3!drew
From: drew@umbc3.UMBC.EDU (Drew Eisenhauer)
Newsgroups: sci.lang,comp.cog-eng,sci.psychology
Subject: Re: Effects of poor writing? (Long)
Summary: Sex,drugs, 'n Rock 'n Roll vs. the Blackboard
Message-ID: <1998@umbc3.UMBC.EDU>
Date: 6 May 89 19:07:21 GMT
References: <39131@bbn.COM> <1982@trantor.harris-atd.com> <2947@tank.uchicago.edu> <17158@mimsy.UUCP> <2970@tank.uchicago.edu> <2880@crete.cs.glasgow.ac.uk>
Reply-To: drew@umbc3.umbc.edu.UMBC.EDU (Drew Eisenhauer)
Organization: University of Maryland, Baltimore County
Lines: 70

In article <2880@crete.cs.glasgow.ac.uk> gilbert@cs.glasgow.ac.uk (Gilbert Cockton) writes:


>I used to teach in an English Secondary School (11-18 year olds). I
>taught many bright children with poor reading and writing skills.
>These skills are very poor indicators of whole classes of performances
>in 'non-academic' tasks.  Hence the well-read, academically successful
>nerd and the illiterate, street-wise and ultra-sharp hussler.
>
>I agree with both posters.  There is no conflict.

There is if these two stereotypes are mutually exclusive which 
they are not-

>Wayne's "knowledge" is "school knowledge" - book knowledge presented in
>a bookish way for regurgitation in a bookish manner.

Taking into account the pejorative tendencies of a word like "bookish"
surely you are not suggesting that all, most, a large part, or even a resonable
amount of  "knowledge" learned from books is "bookish" in this sense.
First of all nothing
works quite so well as "regurgitation;" Once learned by Rote never forgotten-
is an old expression which I've totally butchered because I can't remember
exactly how it goes- but I can remember exactly how the Marseillaise goes 
although I learned it in the seventh grade and although I can't spell it
(an unfortunate fact which I will address below). Second, the notion that
there is a "school knowledge" seperate from a "street" or another type of
knowledge, implies an inate inferiority, a sense of uselessness in the "real
world" and what's much worse and what you're really driving at is that by
it's very definition "school knowledge" is just plain boring.

>Richards "knowledge" is "action knowledge" - common sense knowledge
>gleaned from active interaction in a rich social and physical
>environment.

Right, right, right...

>It is possible to have one without the other.  However, as reading and
>writing skills tend to go hand in hand, poor grammar and spelling can
>be taken as a sign of limited reading abilities, and thus limited
>contact with written culture.  

I went through school at a time when various experiments were
being tried "open-spaced education" and so forth which have basically proven
to be utter failures.  In my case I have no grip on spelling, punctuation,
or grammar (within certain rigid definitions of these)n, no doubt you can tell
from this posting if you look, but I am currently writing an MA thesis in
American Literature- I have in fact a great deal of contact with reading
and  pretty well developed "reading abilities."  Hemingway also could not
spell.

>Nerdhood is a similar indicator of zero
>contact with the social contexts of common sense knowledge :-)

No doubt, but often these "social contexts of common sense knowledge"
are utter rubbish- such as most of the garbage in the steet, American
television, or anything else...(but billiards:-})

>Moral: there is much more to knowledge than what is written down.

-He says in writing.




-- 
Is not conscience a pair of breeches; though a cover for lewdness 
as well as nastiness, is easily slipt down for the service of both?
-SWIFT
internet: drew@umbc3.umbc.edu bitnet: eisenhauer@umbc