Paragraph Polity

"habitus is in no sense a mechanical principle of action or, more exactly, of reaction (it is not a 'reflex'). It is conditioned and limited spontaneity." (Pierre Bourdieu, The Social Structures of the Economy)

“what children can do with the assistance of others might be in some sense even more indicative of their mental development than what they can do alone.” (Lev Vygotsky, Mind and Society)

This spring, I gave a talk at a conference on a subject maybe about a hundred people in the world care about. There was something interesting about my list of references. I had met four out of the seven authors personally, had been to several dinners with three of them and one of them was my former teacher who is now also a good friend. About two of them I know where they went to university, where they worked since then, and who their thesis supervisors had been. To people who are not linguists and even to many who are, the narrow topic is highly abstract and difficult to grasp. Not to me. Not because I have some higher faculties of abstract reasoning but because it is as familiar to me as the furniture surrounding me right now in my home. Home. I feel at home in my discipline. When I come to a conference and look at the list of talks with technical titles, it feels like coming home. Everything is familiar. The abstract terms, the obscure references, long lists of names of eminent people, the ways of talking and thinking - all of that feels concrete to me. But it didn’t when I took my first intro to linguistics class. I saw a glimpse of the future passion but it all seemed so out of reach. I took on what I would now call an apprenticeship and did everything I could to make the alien familiar. An equivalent of the apprentice sweeping the floors in the workshop and overhearing the masters’ words of wisdom, I volunteered to be an usher at conferences, went to extra talks, soaked in the disciplinary gossip, asked naive questions. And over time, it became my home. Home, the place where even the strangest things fit and make sense.