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Listening to the Text: On the Uses of the Past
Book by Stock, Professor Brian
208 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1989
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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.
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January 12, 2016It is worth reading
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews