Fear, Second Nature and Accumulation

"Accumulate, accumulate. That is Moses and the prophets! “Industry furnishes the material which saving accumulates.” Therefore, save, save, i.e, reconvert the greatest possible portion of surplus-value, or surplus-product into capital! Accumulation for accumulation’s sake, production for production’s sake".
- Karl Marx, Das Kapital.


Those who have a lot of capital have a lot more capital to lose and that is why they tend to be more conservative. And yet at the same time, because they have more, they have a greater fear that they could lose everything they have and this drives them to need to have more which then leads to a viscious cycle of fear and accumulation.

Even in the absence of competition, most especially in the context of multiple sources of vulnerability (economic, life cycle, social, political, etc.) fear drives those with capital to accumulate more.


There is a second, more potent dimension which explains accumulation by those who have a lot and this is their predisposition to accumulate. This is a more acceptable reason than to admit being afraid and yet these dispositions are at the same time not consciously transformed into action.

Maybe if they were to work out the numbers (especially if money can work for them), they would realize that they need not accumulate more and they even have sufficient hedge against catastrophic events. But they still accumulate because accumulation is “in their blood”.

Their entire environment is their conscience reminding them of the need to accumulate. Their family environment of course is a main influence. Either they grow up in a poor family that has become rich and thus they imbibe the need to avoid a return to poverty, to run away from it, as it were, as fast as they can, as far away (even geographically) as they can). Or they grow up in a rich environment and they fear the fact that they have to find ways to re-create that wealth on their own.

Then they encounter others situated in other families with similar environments directly through schools or indirectly through the media. All these influences, of course, affect us all and we find ourselves embedded in a culture of accumulation whose origins none of us can adequately trace. We then take for granted that the products of accumulation defines a good life, and that the process of accumulation defines a good way of living.

We, the rich more than others, would then consider ourselves less of a person (a loser, a failed man, a wasted life) and living less of a life if we did not accumulate.


Next post: Friday, August 31.

Slope

We identify ourselves consciously by our location at the present and also by our location in our past. But what others see in us (but which they often do not articulate, even to themselves) and what we more often than not do not consciously recognize in ourselves is the likely trajectory that our past and present social location and actions bodes for us in the future.

When others look at us, they get a sense of whether or not we will “go places”. They (think they) can tell our future by the way we carry ourselves (by our accent, by our “presence”, by our ability to interact with them, by our level of comfort with social situations, in the words that we say and the manner that we speak, by the things that we wear) and in doing so they decide (unconsciously) whether or not we are to be taken seriously.

To some extent, our past does not really matter in their assessment of our trajectories unless our deportment places us in locations where we would not be expected, either because we are too high for somebody with such a deportment (in which we would be a puzzle bordering on a mistake) or too low (which is rarely the case but if it were the case, then we would be considered a waste, sayang siya). The past matters only in assessing whether or not they can be comfortable with us.

To some extent, our disposition towards the future matters much more than the past, the question being how we intend to spend the capital we have accumulated in order to accumulate more capital. Those who have little capital are not expected to go very far and oftentimes they are blamed for having little capital to begin with. Those who have more capital are expected to have steeper trajectories and for them to choose not to maximize their capital would be considered foolish in the eyes of the world.

[I remember telling my father, who was at some point a small farmer, a jeepney driver and a gasoline boy that I was considering helping in the agrarian reform effort (inspired by my degree in Development Studies) and he said, Nagpakahirap akong pag-aralin kayo tapos babalik ka lang sa pinanggalingan ko. I eventually ended up teaching and he talked to my sister about me and told her that there's no money in teaching. It is only now that I understand where he was coming from. From his point of view, I was squandering accumulated labor. Parents know (unconsciously) that accumulation is the name of the game (To his credit, I knew I could count on him no matter what I decided to do. I did take Development Studies and I did teach and aside from those small pitiks, he did not really let me hear about it)]

Next Post: Friday, August 24

May ambisyon

Isa sa mga tinitignan ng mga magulang sa mga nanliligaw sa kanilang anak na babae ay kung may ambisyon ang lalaki na nanliligaw. Ang paghahanap ng lalaking may ambisyon ay paghahanap ng isang taong hindi kontento sa kanyang kinatatayuan kung hindi naghahangad ng mas mataas na lugar sa lipunan. (Kaakibat dito siyempre ang paghahangad na kumita ng mas malaki sa hinaharap)

Sa ganitong pamamalakad sa lipunan, hindi katanggap-tanggap ang isang lalaking kontento sa kanyang kinalulugaran lalo na kung ang kanyang kinalulugaran ay hindi naman itinuturing na mataas kung ikumpara sa ibang kinalulugaran. Hindi rin katanggap-tanggap ang lalaking mababa lamang ang hinahangad para sa sarili sapagkat ito'y isang palatandaan ng pagiging kontento. Hindi rin katanggap-tanggap ang isang lalaking mabagal kumilos sa pag-angat ng kanyang katayuan.

Nababatid natin sa ganitong pagpapahalaga sa lalaking may ambisyon ang kaayusan sa lipunan kung saan may kinalulugaran na tinuturing na mas mataas kaysa sa ibang kinalulugaran at nababatid rin natin dito ang pagturing na natural sa isang taong naising umangat ang kanyang katayuan.

Language, the biggest buy-in

Language appears to be the most natural thing in the world, and in that regard it is the biggest taken-for-granted. Anyone who has tried to learn a foreign language knows that there is nothing natural about language. We might be tempted to say "foreign" languages are not natural languages but we must remember that what is to us a natural language is to others a foreign language.

To speak a language is to participate in a particular collective game whose rules are socially constructed. To say that the rules are socially constructed is to say that there is nothing natural about these rules.

At its very base, there is nothing natural about alphabets. Letters (unlike some sounds we make or reproduce) do not faithfully reproduce anything in and of themselves except "A" and "I" but I does not in any way look like any person who utters the word.

Beyond letters, words and sentences are even more complex creatures. English, for instance, betrays this fact more than other languages (German, for instance). It is pointless to ask for example why it is that e comes before i but not before c or why ___'s is possessive unless the word is it's. There really is no rhyme or reason for these rules. People are just taught to accept them.

Game Ka Na Ba?

Rica Peralejo, a 26-year old actress, entered the Ateneo as a Freshman this month and the first issue of The Guidon for the school year (the campus newspaper) had a picture of her on the front page participating in group dynamics during the Freshman Orientation Seminar and looking like she was having fun. There was a part in an article by Boy Higad in The Katipunan which noted that Peralejo did not exhibit any “diva-ish” behavior during the Orientation Seminar.

To be 26-years old in a freshman batch whose average age is probably seventeen and to be a national celebrity in the midst of freshmen who on average are local heroes of their own school and to be “game” in participating at the Freshman Orientation Seminar speaks well for Ms. Peralejo.

Being “game” is very much part of Philippine culture. People are judged on whether or not they are “game”, especially in situations where a certain degree of informality or generosity of self is expected. To be “game” is to participate in the game in several ways, not just in terms of following the rules. After all, one can be part of the game and let everyone know that you do not like the experience. Then you wouldn't be “game”.

To be game, more importantly, is to want to play the game while playing the game and that takes a buying-in of the game itself. To be game is to (appear to) accept a collective game and in the process, accept a collective ritual. In the end, especially here in the Philippines, to be game is a symbol of one's acceptance of the collectivity itself.

Kinagisnan: Pagrorosario

Natanong ko sa isang nakatatanda kung kailan tinigil ang paggamit ng Latin sa misa (Gusto ko kasing malaman kung may kinalaman ito sa pagtigil ng pagtuturo ng Latin sa paaralan). Ang sabi ng nakatatanda sa 'kin, mga 1965/66 daw.

Maliban dito, nabanggit niya na dahil Latin ang misa at hindi rin naman maintindihan ng maraming tao ang pinagsasabi ng pari, kadalasa'y nag-rorosario na lang daw ang mga tao habang nagmimisa. Tinanong ko kung anong wika ang gamit sa pagdasal ng rosaryo, kung Latin ba at ang sagot niya'y hindi.

Nakakatuwang malaman ang konteksto ng pagrorosario ng mga matatanda habang may misa na paminsan-minsan nakikita pa natin hanggang ngayon (at kahit na pagsabihan na sila ng pari na hindi ito dapat gawin, patuloy pa rin itong ginagawa). Old habits die hard ika nila. Nakakatuwang isipin na ang pagrorosario ay isang pamamaraan kung saan naiintindihan ng karaniwang tao ang sinasabi niya sa Diyos.

Meron kaya itong kaugnayan sa pagkamalapitin ng Pilipino kay Birheng Maria? Kung sa pakikipag-usap kay Hesus kailangan mag-Latin, kay Maria, hindi ito kinakailangan at puwedeng kausapin ang mahal na ina sa salita ng karaniwang tao. Ito rin kaya ang dahilan kung bakit ang mga Atenista ay naging kilala na nagdadala ng rosario sa kanyang bulsa hanggang sa kamatayan?

Ngayon na ang wika sa misa ay naiintindihan ng karaniwang-tao, hindi na laganap ang pagrorosario habang nagmimisa. Sa panahon ngayon na ang Diyos ay minsan tinuturing na kaibigan, hindi na rin nakikitang kinakailangan ang formula prayers na kabahagi ng pagrorosario (Wala na akong kilalang Atenistang nagbibitbit ng rosario araw-araw). Ang bawat isang tao ay inaakalang puwedeng kausapin ng diresto ang Diyos na hindi nangangailangan ng pamamagitan ni Maria.

Kung meron pa kayong nakitang matandang nagrorosario habang sila'y nagmimisa, huwag na itong suwayin. Ang matandang ito ay nakikipag-usap sa Diyos sa wikang kanyang naiintindihan.

Reflexivity

I've been going over issues of The Guidon from 1956 to 1970 and doing so makes me understand a little bit what is meant by reflexivity. The Guidon of that period showed a world that was really different; debates making headlines, a strong American presence, Ateneans seemingly bolder than they are now.

While I read the articles, I notice things that are very different now or I notice things that began way back then or I locate individuals I know now in a different period in time and I understand them differently now.

If I step back from my thoughts, I begin to realize that while I am studying that particular period in time, I realize that I can only understand it from my point of view in the present. What I notice depends on that point of view. What I consider different depends on a definition of what is not-different. A person from that particular point in time might notice something different from what I did (or not notice what I noticed), much more a person from a completely different culture who is not an insider to the University even at the present.

So a reflection on the elements that I consider relevant to my understanding of the past tells me something about how I think at the present. I have a lens through which I see the past and yet, if I step back, I also become conscious of the lens itself through which I see, especially if I share with others what I see and they see something different.

In seeing something different, I begin to realize my way of being and my way of seeing that I have always taken for granted.

The Arrneow Accent

Ateneans of an earlier age were well-known for their so-called Arrneow accent. Reading through the issues of Guidon from 1956 onwards, I realized that the accent came from the preponderance of American Jesuits from the New York Jesuit Province who volunteered to come to the Philippines and teach at the Ateneo. Looking through the yearbooks from 1956 to 1967, one could see that an overwhelming majority of administrators were Americans and that a number of teachers were also Americans. I guess boys who lived 16-17 years of their lives with these Americans eventually picked up the accent, most probably without really intending to. Now that most of the Americans are no longer around, Ateneans have managed not to inherit the accent.

Accents are indicative of where we came from. One of my all-time favorite movies is My Fair Lady starring Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison where Harrison plays the part of a phoneticist who can tell where a person is from and has been based solely on their accent. Harrison asserts that, "Anyone can spot an lrishman or a Yorkshireman by his brogue... but I can place a man within six miles. I can place 'im within two miles in London.Sometimes within two streets". Having lived in Thailand for seven years, I can pretty much tell if people are Thai even if they are speaking in English.

In the Philippines, especially in Manila, one can tell if someone is a probinsyano based on their accent. One of the professors in our school who knows how to speak French tells the story of hearing Filipinos speaking French at an airport with Ilocano, Bicolano and other Filipino accents.
We can tell more about where a person from the way they speak a language and not just the language they speak.

Secret Handshakes

I remember the movies of old where spies would greet each other with innocuous phrases and expect a particular response which would indicate that the respondent was the person being sought. And then of course there are the secret handshakes which served the same purpose.

I think all cultures have these codes for greeting others and the person being greeted can be easily thrown off balance if the response isn't what is expected. The Japanese bow and the greeted person must bow at the same depth as the other person. The Thais do not shake hands but wai (A bow accompanied by a Catholic-type amen gesture of the hands). Traditional Filipinos greeted their elders with a mano. Some cultures even expect males to kiss each other like females do (the Russians and the Arabs, I think).

There are some rules regarding greetings that are familiar to people within cultures. Ang hindi pagmano or not kissing an adult relative is considered an insult in the Philippines. Shaking the hand of an adult relative is relatively strange. (I don't remember ever shaking my brothers' hands to greet them Merry Christmas for example. Usually we give each other a hug or a pat on the back).

I remember one famous incident where an American President and a Russian President kissed each other and the American President did the unthinkable by wiping his mouth with a hankie after the kiss.

The only difference between spies and all these cultural form of greetings is that spies keep their codes secret while cultures do not. The greeting forms of all cultures, however, are codes no less which are as loaded with meaning.

Of Skirting Rules and Jewelry

Most of the rules we live by are not codified. In fact, if a particular practice is officially made illegal through codification and requires enforcement, the rule is weak because the presecribed practice does not come naturally to the collective.

A rule requiring students to wear IDs on campus is weak because it goes against the natural tendency of students not to want to wear their IDs for whatever reason. Even with guards posted at strategic points on campus, students sometimes still walk around without IDs or with IDs borrowed from their friends. The long list of students violating the ID rule is an indication that the ID wearing rule is weak. (Moralists beware: I am not saying that the rule is wrong. I am just saying that the prescribed behavior is not natural)

A lot of rules that are not codified are strong. There was a time when I sat on a committee tasked to institute a dress code in the University and one member suggested that there should be a ban on garish jewelry. My reaction back then was that students never wear garish jewelry implying that it must already be an unwritten rule among students that they should not wear garish jewelry.

This afternoon, while waiting for something at the administration building, I saw two girls wearing skirts from some school with a uniform. I realized then that I almost never see female students wear skirts in the university where I work. It must be an unwritten rule that discourages them from wearing skirts. I remember girls being teased, "Wow, mukha kang babae ngayon" if they come to school in skirts.

Some rules need not be written and these have become very much part of our taken-for-granteds. These unwritten rules are more powerful than any security guard lurking behind a post waiting for unsuspecting students who fail to wear their IDs.

Originality

Because practices are homologous and tend to be reproduced, contemporary society places a high premium on originality. Watch popular singing contests like American Idol, for example, and you will hear judges criticize singers for singing like they were in a karaoke bar, or for not making the song their own, or for not letting their personality shine through, or in other words, for not being original.

I guess contemporary society has to wrestle with the boredom of reproduced practices and has become very much unlike other societies where reproduction of tradition maters, a time for example when guilds existed to make sure nobody deviated from trade or production processes.

The premium on originality, however, is not absolute. Originality has its limits and the art of practice is to innovate without offending society's unspoken standards. Not all practices that are different are considered original. Some are considered distasteful or inappropriate because they are different.

In other words, what we deem original is different but it is not too different and the trick is to have a sense of the difference between the two.

The (F)utility of military drills

Regular posts will be on Thursdays.

Military drills have lost the utility they once had in warfare. In many battles before the advent of automatic weapons, the success of an army depended largely on the ability to move as a unit. This was true during the Roman times when soldiers moved as a phalanx and up to the American Civil War when soldiers had to keep to their lines. In modern times, marching in lines is probably the worst military formation on the battlefield.

And yet modern military training still requires such drills even if they will never be used in the battlefield.

Several generations of Filipino men were required to do military drills 3 hours a week for three school years of their lives and the sentiment of these men was that these drills were absolutely useless.

Despite the seeming futility of these drills, they do serve certain social functions. First, the cadet learns to obey authority even to the point of absurdity. I turn left because my officer says so even if I had just turned left a few heartbeats ago and we really are not going anywhere. Logic does not matter here. only the fact that the cadet learns who is in charge and whose logic, or lack of it, is to be followed. In other words, cadets quickly learn their place.

Secondly, the drills are an exercise in appropriate deportment. Women, they say, love a man in uniform and the drills represent a test of whether or not a man can properly carry the uniform he desires to wear. The officer often inspects the deportment of a cadet, checking to see if his shoes are spotless (if a drop of water will fall like a tear over his shoe), if all the brass items are shiny and even if his hanky is properly folded. The officer also checks to see if the cadets movements are snappy and if he carries his body and his gun well. After a while the deportment becomes second nature to the cadet to the point that outside the military, the cadet will easily be recognized as someone who has undergone military training.

Thirdly, the cadet learns the importance of camaraderie, that he must learn to work with his unit. A mistake of one cadet is taken out on the whole unit so the cadet must learn to work with his team.

The practice of drills, like many other social practices, serves no practical purpose in themselves but are conducted nonetheless for reasons other than learning how to march.

The Politics of Place

Author's Note: The rate of posting will be reduced to once a week. Posts will come out on Mondays

Appropriate/ inappropriate practice varies according to the field onelives in and one's position in the field. This is evident in language:

- knowing your place
- "it is not my place to say..."
- "I put him in his place"
- nasa lugar/ wala sa lugar (which is probably less vertically orientedthan the first two)
- "i'm not yet in a position to do anything about it.
- positioning oneself for something
- "you've arrived"

Two examples.

I served as secretary for a conference in Cebu and arrived at a beach-sidedinner late so all the (round) tables were filled. I occupied the one empty chair I found and in a moment realized that it was not my place to sit there because it was filled with the people who occupied the top ofthe totem pole. Too late to get out.

Two months ago, I was in Makati for the signing of a MOA that I had worked for and involved my department. Before the start of the signing, two of my bosses and I were milling around with a few officers of the corporation chitchatting in a circle but my phone rang and I stepped out of the circle which closed quickly behind me. After I left, I noticed that the conversation started to flow more smoothly and I myself was more comfortable talking to the junior officers.

After the signing, the President of the corporation dropped by and there was a picture taking and my bosses were there but I was not invited even if the MOA involved my office. Don't get me wrong, hindi masama loob ko, it's just that I knew it wasn't my place to be there.

We all occupy a particular place which corresponds to a particular social space. Each particular social space in turn has a set of appropriate and inappropriate behaviors attendant to it. The trick then is "to know your place".

Indeterminate Identities

Author's Note: This essay was inspired by Bourdieu's Homo Academicus.

A person who faithfully observes the practices of a particular field or collective assumes the identities associated with that field. There are some fields or collectives however whose place in the bigger scheme of things (the social space, as it were) is yet to be established which makes the identity of the occupants of that field indeterminate.

This is apparent from my location in the academe in terms of the choice of courses of our students. Our students choose courses for which the identities which they will assume after graduation are well-defined within the context of a larger social space. They avoid courses which are loaded with indeterminacy.

The ability to assume a generally acknowledged label is of utmost important. Students must be able to say, "When I graduate I will be a computer scientist or a businessman or a lawyer or a doctor, etc".

At the very least, the field must have a clear place in the larger social space and this is why some disciplines fail to attract students. What is the place of a philosopher or a sociologist, for example, in the larger scheme of things?

Some fields, like mine (Development Studies) suffer from the most indeterminacy. The label is not generally recognized and the place of the field in the larger social space is not established. Our students don't even have a convenient handle to work with unlike students of Economics who can be economists or students of physics who can be physicists. What would you call a development studies graduate? (One student even suggested changing the name of the course to development science so that they could be called development scientists)

In choosing a course, students choose an identity and in doing so, they choose their place in society. Courses for which both identity and place in society are clear are more likely to attract students while those for which either element is missing will be hard-pressed to bring students in.

Identity

Author's Note: I've tried my best to create a flow between posts but I've run out of things to add to the current thread. So all the entries that follow will be independent essays. This essay on Identity probably should have come after Practice.

Every collective, and more particularly, every field has a sense of the appropriate and inappropriate practices including the appropriate and inappropriate behavior and deportment. Immersion in the field and constant (conscious and unconscious) repetition leads to the internalization of this sense of appropriate and inappropriate behavior and deportment and the manifestation of this in the immersee's practice.

This is evident in all fields whether the field be defined as the field of poetry, dancing, singing, being an Atenean or being a Filipino. Immersion in the arts, for example, leads to a certain poetic or musical or artistic sensibility (and temperement, artist kasi). For dancers, in particular, immersion in their art leads to a particular deportment. You can tell, for example, if someone is a ballet dancer even when the dancer is not dancing.

Immersion in a field also leads to the creation of identities, especially for established fields. A person who is immersed in the field of poetry is not merely a writer of poems, that person is a poet. The same is true for a dancer, a singer or an artist.

(The mystery is this: when does someone assume an identity, ex. when does someone become a poet and not merely a writer of poetry? A lot of it will probably have to do with when the legislators deem that person worthy to be called a poet. Otherwise the person will just be a feeling or trying hard poet)

Beyond the arts, people can tell by their practices who the Ateneans or Filipinos are. I was told recently by a mother of an Ateneo High School teenager that my deportment betrayed my being an Atenean (and someone who came from the Ateneo High School at that). And as for being Filipino, there are so many books on how one can tell that somebody is a Filipino.

Immersion in a field is reflected in the occupants' practices and the definition of the occupants' identity in terms of the occupied field.

Next Post: Thursday, November 9

Things Need Not Be The Way They Are

Every collective has a sense of appropriate and inappropriate practices but this definition of what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate practices can be a tremendous source of unfreedom.

Just ask the lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders. In almost all societies, they are regarded as engaging in inappropriate practices because they do not fall into the socially acceptable categories of male or female. Just ask the gays who were beaten up by their fathers and brothers and were told "magpakalalaki ka". Just ask the lesbians (like the contestant on Philippine Idol) or gays who are told by society that looking like a man or a woman is inappropriate (some collectives, for example, still insist that women should not wear pants).

Even "straight" men and women have to live with an unspoken code of what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate behavior. Men, in general, have to live by a standard of what it is "to be a man" which includes a certain deportment (avoidance of effeminate gestures, for example), corporealization (low voice, for example) and certian practices (not crying, for example).

Societies cannot live without a sense of appropriate and inappropriate practices but forgetting that things need not be the way they are can lead to grave injustices. Hitler and his Nazi party, for example, promoted the ideology that the Aryan race was a pure race and this was used to justify the extermination of many other races to prevent contamination. What Hitler did was extreme, yes, but the point is that we need to re-examine our sense of what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate behavior once in a while to prevent ourselves from perpetuating less visible injustices.

To a large extent, the women's movement best exemplifies this attempt to question practices and to expose the marginalization and subjugation of women through practices that have no logic beyond that the fact that practices that reinforce the subordinate position of women are a part of our collective culture and history. For sure there are other areas where practices (and representations) are a source of injustice and unfreedom.

Good Manners and Right Conduct

Teenagers have a tendency to rebel against accepted practice because they realize that the social sense of what is appropriate and inappropriate practice is socially constructed and that nothing is taboo in and of themselves but is only taboo because society says so. Furthermore, they feel that this definition of what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate practice is an exercise of social domination, social power or social control and this realization leads to their active resistance.

The problem is that these teenagers are correct on all counts. The sense of what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate practice is socially constructed and they do constitute exercises in social domination (at the very least, the domination of the society over an individual, not necessarily the domination of a particular group or individual over other individuals).

The problem is compounded by the fact that the reason why we engage in certain practices and not others does not usually flow from any logic and society would not perish if the practices were changed but we engage in these practices anyway because we "know" that this is how things are done.

Good manners, for example, are simply based on social convention or are derived from some ancient historical practice that has no contemporary relevance. The handshake (which used to be a medieval symbol that knights were unarmed; that's why we shake with our right hands) or the tipping of one's hat (or a salute for that matter which replicates a knight's raising of his visor to show his face to an approaching knight) has no contemporary logic aside from the fact that these are how things are done.

Everytime we have formal academic gatherings at the University, the faculty are hard pressed to remember if the tassle on the cap should be on the left or on the right until a colleague said that in medieval times, left was the side of royalty.

It is good when there are such explanations (which often lead teenagers to ask if practices should change now that circumstances are different) but most people do not know these explanations and most practices do not have explanations. That is why when teenagers ask why certain practices are considered inappropriate and they unmask the fact that these standards have no logical basis, an exasperated adult might just end up saying "because that's the way things are" or in Tagalog, "ah basta".

What teenagers need to know is that the practice of good manners and right conduct is not done in and for itself but is an affirmation of one's membership in a particular society by following that society's social conventions.


Next Post: Thursday, November 2.

Practice

Practice can take on a double meaning. The first meaning of the word pertains to the way things are done. One enters into a new situation or setting, for example, and wonder, "What is the practice here?" The second sense in which we use practice is that of training before an actual performance or event (ex. basketball practice vs. actual basketball game). In Tagalog we say, "Practice lang ito" to make it clear that the act is not yet the real thing.

When we enter into a new situation, we learn the practices through observation and eventually learn to embody them through constant repitition. Unlike theater or sports performances, however, most of the practices in life are indistinguishable from actual performance and the repitition is done unconsciously.

Almost all of the time (except during those times when we do role-playing during organizational development trainings), we do not train to live nor train before actual situations. We just act once the situation or the stimuli is presented to us and because of our sense of the appropriate practice given particular stimuli or situations, we "know" (we just know) what we need to do and we do it oftentimes without conscious deliberation.

A lot of our training happened when we were children but our parents were not fulltime coaches (nor were most of them aware that they were coaches. Sometimes we learn from them from their reactions to our action but more often than not, we learn from them by merely observing them and their practices. In that sense, they are unconscious teachers and we are unconscious learners.

And when we behave as they do, we do not practice behavior in the sense of training. We just behave. We may not engage in competent practice but we engage in practice in real time, as it were), nonetheless (as opposed to time for practice). Most of the time, there is no distinction between the backstage and the actual performance. If we are beginners, we may make mistakes but with constant repitition in real time, we become adept at the correct practice. Sometimes our behavior effects a favorable or an unfavorable response from others but most of the time, people do not react to what we are doing (because for them, what we are doing is the most natural thing in the world; it is part of their taken-for-granted).

And so we engage in particular sets of practices because our behavior is not noticed and therefore acceptable or because we have been told to engage in such practices and avoid their opposites. Over time, we repeat these practices and pretty soon, they become part of our taken-for-granteds and we pass these on to the next generation.

Next Post: Monday, October 30.

Confidence, Part II

Aside from confidence as mastery of skill, there is also confidence in relating with other people. When we say a person is growing in confidence, we usually mean that person is better able to relate with others. Sometimes we say that person is coming out of his shell.

The opposite of this type of confidence is shyness not skillessness.

I think that increasing social confidence is a by-product of (unconsciously) coming in tune with the social sense of what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate practices and a corporealized acceptance of that sense of appropriate and inappropriate practices (i.e. an acceptance that is manifested in deportment, practices and choice of strategies).

Again, Andy in the Devil Wears Prada is a perfect example of a person growing in confidence (in the fashion industry) after her decision to internalize (and externalize the internalization of) the practices and strategies of tha industry. In doing so, she became less confident of being able to relate with her old friends as she began to lose touch with their sense of what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate practices, strategies and values.

The internalization of a collective's sense of appropriate and inappropriate practices, strategies and values can be tough especially for an outsider coming in (i.e. entering a new culture). An extreme form is the physical hazing of fraternity or sorority plebes to demonstrate their loyalty and the intellectual hazing of a law student.

But the demands can be much more than endurance of physical pain during moments of initiation. In some collectives (fashion, entertainment), correct strategies dictate appropriate body types and complexions forcing those who want to be in to go through all sorts of regimens to help keep in shape and to look young and beautiful. (Papaya soaps, whitening lotions,) Diet and exercise help but the cosmetic surgery industry is also booming because of the need to manifest an appropriate body type and external manifestation. Some clients of cosmetic surgeons say that cosmetic surgery makes them feel better about themselves and though they may deny it, feeling good is a by-product of an appropriate bodily manifestation.

It requires a buying in to particular beliefs of what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate practices, strategies and values in order to gain confidence as a member of a particular collective.

Next post: Friday, October 27

Confidence, Part I

There are at least two types of confidence. One is confidence based on mastery of skills (discussed here in Part I) and the second, which is more important (the subject of Part II) is the confidence in relating with other people.

Confidence based on mastery of skills can only be attained through constant practice. Ask any musician, sports person, or any other occupant of any other field and the good ones will tell you that their skill was developed through intense immersion in their activity and constant practice.

I learned early on for example, that the secret to being good in math was constant practice. In studying for long tests, I would answer questions from textbooks which provide answers (to every other question) at the back so I could check whether or not I got the right answer even if answering those questions was not required.(I once got lucky and did drills on a higher level textbook and lo and behold, my teacher got all his questions from the textbook. Thus, two long tests with perfect scores).

Drills in math give a student a feel for the mathematical game, training that student in types of questions that are asked and the type of thinking required for a particular type of question. I hear that the trick to doing well in the GRE is the same. Practice.

The same is true for any other field. Pianists or other musicians for that matter become good or great by constantly playing the piano until such time that their fingers know what to do (they can play with their eyes closed). I am especially respectful of violinists because unlike pianists or guitarists, there are no real guides regarding where their fingers should go. They either know it or they don't.

An athlete must constantly train and practice before an actual game or event until participation in the event itself becomes second nature to him. When he is out on the field, he will know what to do. He is one wth the field or as basketball and golf coaches would say, "Be the Ball".

But an even more valuable form of practice is not the practice before the event but the practice inherent in the event itself. The experience of competition, most especially the experience when the stakes of the competition are high (ex. a championship) is also important because an athlete must also get used to the crowd as well as the pressure of the moment, factors which will be absent from the practice venue.

I remember a scene in Glory where white officers were training a newly formed company of black soldiers during the American Civil War. A particularly good black solider was showing off his marksmanship but the officer challenged him to display his talent while the officer fired rounds around the marksman to simulate battle conditions. While this is better training, nothing beats the training derived from constant exposure to actual warfare.

There is no better way to gain confidence except through constant practice and immersion in actual activity.