What do you think?
Rate this book
Listening for the Text: On the Uses of the Past (The Middle Ages Series) by Brian Stock
"Ours is largely an ahistorical world. And yet we take history very seriously. The more remote the past becomes, the more we seem to concern ourselves with understanding it. We are no longer linked to our ancestors through common material conditions. If earlier ages still have a hold on us, it is through our thoughts about them."The essays in this volume are about a segment of the past that runs roughly from the end of antiquity to the thirteenth century. More generally, they are about recollecting the past by putting words into writings. They are equally about the past that is written about and the writing that brings it to life. In other words, they deal with the creation of the past as text."--from the Introduction
Paperback
First published January 1, 1989
2 people are currently reading
37 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
March 10, 2024
I think I like this book.
It’s a very tough read—especially the middle chapters, which focus more on theory—but the main theme is how events acquire meaning through becoming texts.
Stock is a medievalist, and in this book largely builds off of his work in The Implications of Literacy (1989) In that work, he had studied how reformist and heretical groups of the 11th century operated as “textual communities” during a period of increasing literacy. This is his term for “microsocieties organized around a common understanding of a script” (LftT, 23). This work builds on this to discover how “texts” broadly defined impose on reality a particular arrangement of subject, object, and meaning (88). This allows history (perceived change) to have meaning and be interpreted (108 cr. 86). This meaning then results in further events and the “subjectively meaningful rightness of conduct” (Weber’s term) which takes place in the context of the group following the script (109, 100, 152).
The book concludes with a re-examination of Weber’s formulation of tradition and modernity. This is necessary, he alleges, because 1) Weber interacted very little with the MA and 2) tradition and modernity are both hard to define.
In order to define these terms, Stock distinguishes between the traditional—which is inherited and a habitus— and the traditionalist—which is self-conscious and selected. This gives rise to his next definition: “Modernity, in this sense, [ratiocination applied to the traditional] occurs when the distance between the traditional and the traditionalistic is so great that the models can no longer be reconciled within individuals’ minds.” (166)
Stock is careful to state that we must avoid ideologies of progress or of traditionalism in making these definitions, and he seems to appreciate Weber’s assessment of modernity as a mixed bag. In this, it would seem that a larger payoff of the work lies in the parallel between the act of ratiocinating upon the traditional—effectively a creation of history (textualized and perceived change) and the discipline of history itself. History is fundamentally interpretative and seeks to yield meaning from change which then influences how we interpret our own past. How texts “bring [history] to life” and how we allow earlier ages to “still have a hold on us” (1).
At least, I think that’s what it all means.
It’s a very tough read—especially the middle chapters, which focus more on theory—but the main theme is how events acquire meaning through becoming texts.
Stock is a medievalist, and in this book largely builds off of his work in The Implications of Literacy (1989) In that work, he had studied how reformist and heretical groups of the 11th century operated as “textual communities” during a period of increasing literacy. This is his term for “microsocieties organized around a common understanding of a script” (LftT, 23). This work builds on this to discover how “texts” broadly defined impose on reality a particular arrangement of subject, object, and meaning (88). This allows history (perceived change) to have meaning and be interpreted (108 cr. 86). This meaning then results in further events and the “subjectively meaningful rightness of conduct” (Weber’s term) which takes place in the context of the group following the script (109, 100, 152).
The book concludes with a re-examination of Weber’s formulation of tradition and modernity. This is necessary, he alleges, because 1) Weber interacted very little with the MA and 2) tradition and modernity are both hard to define.
In order to define these terms, Stock distinguishes between the traditional—which is inherited and a habitus— and the traditionalist—which is self-conscious and selected. This gives rise to his next definition: “Modernity, in this sense, [ratiocination applied to the traditional] occurs when the distance between the traditional and the traditionalistic is so great that the models can no longer be reconciled within individuals’ minds.” (166)
Stock is careful to state that we must avoid ideologies of progress or of traditionalism in making these definitions, and he seems to appreciate Weber’s assessment of modernity as a mixed bag. In this, it would seem that a larger payoff of the work lies in the parallel between the act of ratiocinating upon the traditional—effectively a creation of history (textualized and perceived change) and the discipline of history itself. History is fundamentally interpretative and seeks to yield meaning from change which then influences how we interpret our own past. How texts “bring [history] to life” and how we allow earlier ages to “still have a hold on us” (1).
At least, I think that’s what it all means.
Read
January 12, 2016It is worth reading
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews