Analysis by anecdote

What is reality? A lot of it is relational. I think we can gain a good understanding of everyday interactions through thinking about relationships.

This is through thinking through our interactions with others, and gaining insight through interpreting what this means about society, relationships and our place within these.

I am very interested in embodied knowledge: in the knowledge that people can gain through a thoughtful approach to everyday life, that prompts questions and deeper intellectual inquiry.

This knowledge becomes manifest through people skills: in being able to listen to and engage with other people in their difference and incompletion.

There is so much that is revealed by body language!! i just wish i knew how to enter into dialogue better with people about their beliefs, anxieties and values, based on their body language.

The closest intellectual discipline i have encountered that values this approach is phenomenology, a discipline within philosophy, that sees 'reality' as something dynamic, constituted through intersubjective interaction.

(this was prompted by speaking to Phil McShane, an Irish philosophy professor (who writes books about economics), who teaches by anecdote. Mum convinced us to go to his talks at which we were among the only people in the audience... he had some pretty hilarious anecdotes, made funny through his sharp observation skills. He spoke about the example of a man who invited a woman on a date, but conveys his disinterest through having three beers by the time she meets him. Thus, he is not sensitive to how she is : he does not listen to her: all he wants is to come across as relaxed and not to betray his anxieties- which is really a very self-centred approach, that cannot result in a deeper connection- rather it builds barriers!!)

and another thing...

Reflecting on his wonderful, very human (what a funny adjective) way of educating, It is a constant puzzle for me to understand why such large sections of the Left have such authoritarian educational methodologies, when for many decades a major project of liberatory people has been to create liberatory methodologies, such as this man. I guess some people think that commitment and discipline precludes the possibility of non-authoritarian educational practices.