Fido the Yak

Johannes Fabian writes, "oralization, that is, recourse to audible speech, actual or imagined, is an essential part of our ability to read texts. Yet our 'ideology' of literacy seems to put a taboo on revealing what we actually do when we read, for fear that oralization might subvert the authority of the written text" ("Keep Listening: Ethnography and Reading," in The Ethnography of Reading, Jonathan Boyarin ed.,1993, p. 89). The issue is not simply that, to lift an idea, "the ear comes late to listening"; we come to listening, ears and all, by listening. Listening is the elaboration of an idea, its perplication and all that. What is prior about audibility is daring to listen, allowing the power to augment, authority, to be placed within transition—a phase in the metastabilization of the abyssmorphing of reciprocity, i.e., speaking— allowing the pause to resonate.

Labels: and so on, Boyarin, Fabian, listening, reading, reciprocity, speech, writing

posted by Fido the Yak at 7:13 PM.