Here’s another example, which should even more clearly make my point: many teachers I remember from childhood used to give out graded papers in class. They would:
mention grades and observations out loud in front of the whole class
praise kids with high grades
scold kids with bad grades
give out papers in order, sorted from best grade to worst
sometimes read out loud from the most ridiculous passages in kids’ papers
If you wanted to design a system so as to maximize humiliation (ETA: within the bounds permitted in routine situations, see below), that is pretty much the way you’d go about it.
Now you would not necessarily consciously think to yourself “I’m doing things this way so as to humiliate most kids and encourage social shunning of the few getting top grades”. That isn’t the kind of things we allow to have running through our minds.
If you had any conscious thoughts about this at all, they might have to do with “holding up the bright kids as examples to the rest” and “giving each their due”.
But “the meaning of a message is the response it elicits”: even though a teacher’s conscious motivations may not include humiliation, if humiliation routinely occurs as a result of their actions we must entertain the hypothesis that it is a fully endorsed outcome of the system.
Now if you take a step back from just “grades”, one tiny component of the system, and look at the bigger picture? One thing that quickly becomes apparent is that the system has one adult in charge of twenty to forty kids, and it is in the nature of kids to be unruly. And this is supposed to last for hours on end. So we should not be surprised that the system includes provisions (more than one) whereby the teacher is encouraged to assert their authority over the kids, to somehow “keep them in line”.
Public nudity is one of our society’s taboos, making it both a potent tool for ingraining compliance and one that therefore cannot be used in routine situations. The fact that it has been used on a regular basis in hazing rituals is telling.
As for partial public nudity, in the form of spankings, it used to be a routine form of punishment; both in homes and in schools. Its demise (and relegation to pornographic fantasies, or so I hear) is relatively recent.
Both hazing and spanking involve full or partial nudity, contributing to their ickiness, and in my cultural experience at least, both have a moderately strong association with the school system.
I mentioned those because you seemed to point to the absence of nakedness, in the “teacher giving out graded papers” situation, as an objection to my argument that the school system appeared to have maximum humiliation as an outcome. Implicit in that argument was “maximum given the constraints of the situation” (and I’ve amended my comment to make that explicit). Hazing and correction are two situations where the context allows more humiliation, and that’s precisely what we see: so I see those two as counter-objections to your objections.
Does that help make sense of that comment?
(I could, of course, also be wrong or just plain confused. In this particular case I didn’t think I was.)
If you wanted to design a system so as to maximize humiliation (ETA: within the bounds permitted in routine situations, see below), that is pretty much the way you’d go about it.
Humiliation and praise can serve as motivation factors, not necessarily to train compliance.
Any evidence to back that up? If you wanted to design a system to result in maximum student motivation, and you had done even a modest amount of research on the topic of motivation, I’m pretty sure you would not do it that way.
Evidence to back up what? That threat of humiliation when failing exam can motivate people to learn more? I find it obvious. At least it works for me.
I don’t say it’s the optimal way to motivate. That doesn’t exclude the possibility (quite probable in my opinion) that most people in charge (from teachers to education ministry bureaucrats) who consciously endorse the practice think it is.
It even seems to me that motivation is essential part of your hypothesis. The praise and humiliation aren’t indiscriminate, they serve as reward and punishment. The questions are what is rewarded more, whether learning or compliance, and what certain people believe is the main purpose.
(I think that school rewards both learning and compliance, just don’t think that mere existence of humiliation and praise is evidence for either being more important.)
Here’s another example, which should even more clearly make my point: many teachers I remember from childhood used to give out graded papers in class. They would:
mention grades and observations out loud in front of the whole class
praise kids with high grades
scold kids with bad grades
give out papers in order, sorted from best grade to worst
sometimes read out loud from the most ridiculous passages in kids’ papers
If you wanted to design a system so as to maximize humiliation (ETA: within the bounds permitted in routine situations, see below), that is pretty much the way you’d go about it.
Now you would not necessarily consciously think to yourself “I’m doing things this way so as to humiliate most kids and encourage social shunning of the few getting top grades”. That isn’t the kind of things we allow to have running through our minds.
If you had any conscious thoughts about this at all, they might have to do with “holding up the bright kids as examples to the rest” and “giving each their due”.
But “the meaning of a message is the response it elicits”: even though a teacher’s conscious motivations may not include humiliation, if humiliation routinely occurs as a result of their actions we must entertain the hypothesis that it is a fully endorsed outcome of the system.
Now if you take a step back from just “grades”, one tiny component of the system, and look at the bigger picture? One thing that quickly becomes apparent is that the system has one adult in charge of twenty to forty kids, and it is in the nature of kids to be unruly. And this is supposed to last for hours on end. So we should not be surprised that the system includes provisions (more than one) whereby the teacher is encouraged to assert their authority over the kids, to somehow “keep them in line”.
I would include more nakedness if I was maximising humiliation.
Ever heard of hazing rituals? Ever heard of spanking?
Public nudity is one of our society’s taboos, making it both a potent tool for ingraining compliance and one that therefore cannot be used in routine situations. The fact that it has been used on a regular basis in hazing rituals is telling.
As for partial public nudity, in the form of spankings, it used to be a routine form of punishment; both in homes and in schools. Its demise (and relegation to pornographic fantasies, or so I hear) is relatively recent.
Yes. I’m not sure why you ask.
Those were rhetorical questions. (If LW had a Dark Arts penalty jar I’d be putting in a dime in it.)
That they were trying to be rhetorical was obvious. Yet the rhetorical meaning made no sense as a reply to their context.
Both hazing and spanking involve full or partial nudity, contributing to their ickiness, and in my cultural experience at least, both have a moderately strong association with the school system.
I mentioned those because you seemed to point to the absence of nakedness, in the “teacher giving out graded papers” situation, as an objection to my argument that the school system appeared to have maximum humiliation as an outcome. Implicit in that argument was “maximum given the constraints of the situation” (and I’ve amended my comment to make that explicit). Hazing and correction are two situations where the context allows more humiliation, and that’s precisely what we see: so I see those two as counter-objections to your objections.
Does that help make sense of that comment?
(I could, of course, also be wrong or just plain confused. In this particular case I didn’t think I was.)
Humiliation and praise can serve as motivation factors, not necessarily to train compliance.
Any evidence to back that up? If you wanted to design a system to result in maximum student motivation, and you had done even a modest amount of research on the topic of motivation, I’m pretty sure you would not do it that way.
Evidence to back up what? That threat of humiliation when failing exam can motivate people to learn more? I find it obvious. At least it works for me.
I don’t say it’s the optimal way to motivate. That doesn’t exclude the possibility (quite probable in my opinion) that most people in charge (from teachers to education ministry bureaucrats) who consciously endorse the practice think it is.
It even seems to me that motivation is essential part of your hypothesis. The praise and humiliation aren’t indiscriminate, they serve as reward and punishment. The questions are what is rewarded more, whether learning or compliance, and what certain people believe is the main purpose.
(I think that school rewards both learning and compliance, just don’t think that mere existence of humiliation and praise is evidence for either being more important.)