[Air-L] history of Plato's Phaedrus as example of moral / media panic?
Simon Joyce
simonjoyce at blueyonder.co.uk
Sun Apr 28 09:13:46 PDT 2019
Re. “strong tradition among many historians of western civilization, particularly the English, to truncate world history before the Greeks as being irrelevant” — this exhibition currently on at British Library in London...
https://londonist.com/london/art-and-photography/writing-at-british-library
> On 28 Apr 2019, at 15:35, Thomas Ball <xtc283 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Charles-
> Thanks for your followup question. My view is that there exists a strong
> tradition among many historians of western civilization, particularly the
> English, to truncate world history before the Greeks as being irrelevant.
> Thus, in delineating the 'classic' period it is commonly posited as
> beginning around 700 BCE with the pre-Socratics. In part, this is driven by
> an academic's need to limit the boundaries of their research and
> discussion. What complicates things is the extent to which we take
> philosophy or history or science as transhistorical categories, and how
> much we see those as ways of knowing constituted by discrete textual
> traditions/reception traditions where there is a constant, relentless
> return to Greek texts as the fountainhead.
> FWIW,
> Best regards,
> Thomas
>
>
> On Sun, Apr 28, 2019 at 10:04 AM Charles M. Ess <c.m.ess at media.uio.no>
> wrote:
>
>> Again, many thanks on all fronts.
>>
>> Can you provide an example of historians who place the origins of
>> writing to 700 BCE in Greece? This would likewise greatly puzzle me - I
>> thought it was common knowledge that the Epic of Gilgamesh is likely
>> from 2700 BCE, generally regarded as in-scribing oral traditions that go
>> back earlier; hieroglyphics are likewise well before 700 BCE, etc.
>>
>> I'd have to go back to check - but my recollection is that these
>> historical episodes / examples of writing are properly included in the
>> theorists / historians familiar to me. But again, my great worry is
>> that I've missed something (many things) more familiar and taken for
>> granted among colleagues with more formal academic training in media and
>> communication studies.
>>
>> If I ever turn any of this into a presentable paper, I'll let you and
>> all the other contributors to this thread know - and certainly
>> gratefully acknowledge all the insights and help.
>>
>> Again, many thanks and all best.
>> - charles
>>
>>> On 26/04/2019 16:32, Thomas Ball wrote:
>>> Charles-
>>> Based on the empirical information from Google Ngrams, it would
>>> appear that modern notions of moral and media panic were initiated by
>>> McLuhan in his 1964 book, /Understanding Media./ It's around or shortly
>>> after that date that these keywords explode into exponential or even
>>> superexponential growth. While Havelock's book was first published in
>>> 1963, it's doubtful that it could have had such widespread dissemination
>>> as to catalyze the observed growth rate in these keywords. Moreover,
>>> Ong's book and theory was a much later contribution to an already extant
>>> literature.
>>> Regardless, it's useful to suggest that Plato's ambivalence about
>>> writing in the /Phaedrus/ was a similarly late contribution. Those
>>> historians who place the origins of writing to around 700 BC in Greece
>>> are entirely missing the fact that there was an earlier, more than 3,000
>>> year old cuneiform civilization in Sumeria. This places into question
>>> any theories linking temporal shifts in orality, chirometry, cognition,
>>> memory, brain function, etc., to pre-Socratic Greece. In other words,
>>> why wouldn't there be a similar shift occurring millennia before the
>>> Greeks? See Marc Van De Mieroop's book, /Philosophy Before the Greeks:
>>> The Pursuit of Truth in Ancient Babylonia/, for confirmation of these
>> facts.
>>> Best regards,
>>> Thomas
>>>
>>> On Thu, Apr 25, 2019 at 7:24 AM Ricardo Rohm <ricardorohm at gmail.com
>>> <mailto:ricardorohm at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Dear Charles and Air-lists,
>>>
>>> Congrats for this insightful discussion! Really.
>>> This made me also think about one of the questions which concerns,
>>> ultimately, "who opened the box first".
>>> I do not know if this one might be the case, but in my life I have
>>> sometimes faced some so-called scientific discourses which seemed to
>> be
>>> entitled with logical meaning, a valid argument or even deductively
>>> achieved by a plettora of "practical examples or personal
>> experiences".
>>> Whatever.
>>> I have also come accross conclusions from reflexions, surveys and
>>> essays,
>>> which have been used strategically for important purposes, decision
>>> makings
>>> by governments and corporatios. Many of which have lead humanity to
>>> misery,
>>> war, suffering, and oppression: yes oppression!
>>>
>>> Citing and refering to famous classical authors in the past ( and
>>> still
>>> nowadays) is an interesting habit which goes far beyond than a
>> simpler
>>> meaning of well- established methodological procedures or even
>> research
>>> designs. Beyond also a rhetoric concern or vanity. Indeed, and I
>>> repeat, -
>>> I do not know if the present case in the Air-l here discussed might
>> be
>>> considered in my refkexion! - I cannot avoid but keep wondering:
>>>
>>> To whom would it be useful and empowering to cast away important
>>> critics on
>>> new technologies, as well as, who "should" be spared of the
>>> so-called "weak
>>> and worthless critics", once someone or some organization (and if
>>> science,.in general is considered, an Institution) decides that these
>>> critics might be nothing but some kind of moral or psychological
>>> disorder
>>> or malfunction ?
>>>
>>> On the other hand - (and I might share mine with many 😉 ) - what
>> might
>>> motivate the curiosity towards "opening this box of Plato/Socrates"
>>> in the
>>> present moment?
>>> Yes, because this is the time when privacy ans other "boxes and
>>> caves seem
>>> to be vanishing" , intentionally produced disinformation is
>> compromising
>>> democracy in many countries, and.so on and forth.
>>>
>>> In fact, I decided to share my own concerns here with you because,
>>> maybe,
>>> someone becomes intetested in producing some research or personal
>>> discussions at some future phisical venue, strengthening memory and
>>> bonds,
>>> instead of "writing or computing".
>>>
>>> Best regards,
>>>
>>> Ricardo Rohm
>>> Federal University of Rio de Janeiro
>>> (at) FAU - Erlangen- Nürnberg
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, 24 Apr 2019, 18:37 Charles M. Ess, <c.m.ess at media.uio.no
>>> <mailto:c.m.ess at media.uio.no>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Dear AoIRists,
>>>>
>>>> Please be kind and patient with me, recalling that my formal
>> academic
>>>> training was in history of philosophy, German literature, and
>> ancient
>>>> Greek. I am comparatively still a little wet around the ears with
>>>> regard to media and communication studies - or so it seems in this
>>>> instance.
>>>>
>>>> I keep encountering discussions of moral / media panics that
>>>> consistently invoke Plato's _myth_ of the invention of writing.
>>>>
>>>> This seemingly standard invocation puzzles me greatly for a long
>>> list of
>>>> reasons. I include a short list below for anyone with time and
>>> interest
>>>> in looking them over.
>>>>
>>>> The upshot is that I'm left wondering: who - and when -
>>> introduced what
>>>> has apparently become received tradition in these domains that the
>>>> mythos (see "2" below) of the invention of writing in the
>>> Phaedrus is a
>>>> prime or supportive example moral or media panic?
>>>>
>>>> This is, as they say in administration-speak, an appreciative
>>> inquiry.
>>>> I'm genuinely curious for the sake of better understanding how
>> this
>>>> trope first appeared, etc - as well as genuine worried that I may
>>> have
>>>> somehow missed something that is considered elementary and
>>> obvious for
>>>> those of you with academic training more directly within media and
>>>> communication studies.
>>>>
>>>> Many thanks in advance for any enlightenment and eludation!
>>>> best,
>>>> - charles ess
>>>>
>>>> PS: The short list includes:
>>>> 1) the account is taken (bloody and screaming) out of the context
>>> of the
>>>> larger dialogue in the Phaedrus. When read within the larger
>>> context -
>>>> beginning with (the young) Phaedrus' effort to impress (perhaps
>>> seduce)
>>>> Socrates by memorizing a speech he has copied down on a scroll and
>>>> initially tries to hide from Socrates - the mythos works much more
>>>> immediately as a lightly veiled (and hence, pedagogically
>> speaking,
>>>> likely more successful) chastisement of Phaedrus' efforts at
>>>> dissimulation. By no means a wholesale critique of writing per
>> se.
>>>> 2) The account is explicitly delivered as a _mythos_ - too easily
>>>> translated as a "myth." But: a _mythos_ in Plato is a technical /
>>>> philosophical form, going well beyond and in some ways directly
>>>> contradicting more everyday notions of "myth" as a false story; a
>>> mythos
>>>> is specifically an _oral_ story, with its own set of distinctive
>>>> strengths and limitations. It is often used in Plato when
>>> interlocutors,
>>>> attempting to pursue a reasoned argument (logos), come to an
>> impass.
>>>> The relation between mythos and logos is hence often
>>> complementary, not
>>>> contradictory.
>>>> 3) It would seem very odd for an author of multiple dialogues, of
>>>> sometimes staggering sophistication and literary nuance, to
>> sincerely
>>>> believe that writing is somehow an entirely suspect technology.
>>>> Different from orality, certainly, as is suggested by the
>> consistent
>>>> presentation of Socrates as an oral teacher, the careful use of
>>> mythos
>>>> vs. logos, etc. - but hardly an example of media / moral panic.
>>>> And so on.
>>>> Again: what am I missing?
>>>>
>>>> Again, many thanks,
>>>> - c.
>>>> --
>>>> Professor in Media Studies
>>>> Department of Media and Communication
>>>> University of Oslo
>>>> <http://www.hf.uio.no/imk/english/people/aca/charlees/index.html>
>>>>
>>>> Postboks 1093
>>>> Blindern 0317
>>>> Oslo, Norway
>>>> c.m.ess at media.uio.no <mailto:c.m.ess at media.uio.no>
>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>
>> --
>> Professor in Media Studies
>> Department of Media and Communication
>> University of Oslo
>> <http://www.hf.uio.no/imk/english/people/aca/charlees/index.html>
>>
>> Postboks 1093
>> Blindern 0317
>> Oslo, Norway
>> c.m.ess at media.uio.no
>>
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