(no subject)

[sophiaserpentia]

Nature vs. nurture? More like, nature plus nurture. Cooperation where previously antagonism was perceived.
http://www.livejournal.com/talkread.bml?journal=fumanchaw&itemid=171889

Meanwhile, lately I've been reading The Alphabet Versus the Goddess by surgeon Leonard Shlain. Not my usual fare, but I've been intrigued by the concept since I heard about the book. I disagree with the author's position, but at this point it's just a gut feeling; outside of my standard argument against the concept of "patriarchy" as a gloss-over, I haven't pieced together a counter-argument yet.

Interestingly it ties today's journal entries together. It is a complex argument, but the conclusion can be easily summarized. This summary is from the book jacket.

"Shlain argues that, with the advent of literacy, the very act of reading an alphabet reinforced the brain's left hemisphere -- linear, abstract, predominantly masculine -- at the expense of the right -- holistic, concrete, visual, feminine. This shift upset the balance between men and women, and initiated the disappearance of goddesses, the abhorrence of images, the decline of women's social and political status, and a long reign of patriarchy and misogyny."

Alright, darn it. I'm getting back to work.

Comments

[azaz-al.livejournal.com]

So in short, he's saying the ability to think is unfeminine.
Well, I've been hearing that in various subtle forms all my life.

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

So in short, he's saying the ability to think is unfeminine.

His argument is that abstract linear thought specifically was more likely developed to assist the hunters than the gatherers.

So basically, yeah, that's what he's saying.

That's one of my qualms with radical feminist arguments in general -- that they depend upon the very stereotypes that feminists hate most.

[herbalgrrl.livejournal.com]

bollocks.
Firstly the hemisphere split game is a crude & not very useful graph at best (besides being a gross oversimplification on the neurological level).
Second, I don't see linear, rational thought exactly hampers one's ability to paint, play music, arrange flowers or any other artform. It's always a marriage of science & art by which we create.

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

Firstly the hemisphere split game is a crude & not very useful graph at best (besides being a gross oversimplification on the neurological level).

I agree with you that "right brain vs. left brain" arguments tend to be over-polarized. However, linguistic abilities are localized in two specific parts of the brain which are within the left hemisphere -- Broca's area and Wernicke's area.


Second, I don't see linear, rational thought exactly hampers one's ability to paint, play music, arrange flowers or any other artform. It's always a marriage of science & art by which we create.

I'm not sure it whether this has any impact on Shlain's argument. His argument is that alphabetic writing -- as opposed to heiroglyphic or ideographic, which still depends on images to an extent -- enhances certain abilities biologically associated with hunting, essentially rewiring the brain to enhance these abilities. The link in my original post is to an article posted in someone else's LJ that suggests the evidence is growing that culture plays a large role in neural wiring. (We as readers of Leary and RAW knew that already, though, di'n't we?)

The anthropological argument is that childcare hindered women from participating in the hunt, making it a male purview.

It still seems way too "pat" for me, though, to accept the argument.

Re:

[herbalgrrl.livejournal.com]

It's analogous to Burrough's theory that the rewiring of the brain for written language cut off the conscious mind from magickal or psychic apprehension of the universe. That has to do w/ the temporal lobe though-- & I think it's more that we are enculturated not to accept input from that center, rather than a wiring issue.
I do agree that environmental factors do indeed have the ability to change the connectors.