{"id":14322,"date":"2017-10-12T02:51:15","date_gmt":"2017-10-12T09:51:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=14322"},"modified":"2017-10-12T02:51:15","modified_gmt":"2017-10-12T09:51:15","slug":"unmasking-the-magician","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/unmasking-the-magician\/","title":{"rendered":"Unmasking the Magician"},"content":{"rendered":"

Have you ever seen those television programs that reveal the hidden secrets behind magic? It begins with a masked figure hiding in the shadows of the set. Around him are devices seen on magic stages around the world. The hidden secrets of magic, the intrigue and illusion, will be lost on those that watch this expos\u00e9<\/span>. There is a disclaimer that announces that once seen, once experienced, we will never be able to tak\"\"<\/a>e back what we know, the understanding of it will remain with us. The the culture around magic and our ability to speak about it will change in ways we don’t understand. While reading Bayard, How to <\/i>T<\/i>alk <\/i>A<\/i>bout <\/i>B<\/i>ooks <\/i>Y<\/i>ou <\/i>H<\/i>aven’t <\/i>R<\/i>ead<\/i>, I kept thinking that he was revealing secrets that I could never take back. He states that, \u201ca book stops being unknown as soon as it enters our perceptual field\u201d 1<\/sup><\/a> The magic is gone. The magician was unmasked as a regular guy; the books felt to have been devalued as regular references. What do we do now that the culture of reading and the mystic of an author that was able to get a book published has been revealed to be a tool for our own creative undertakings? Like the magician that gives away the secrets to all the non magic people, I felt as though Bayard gave us the keys to the closet of writers.<\/p>\n

Bayard says our minds are divided into libraries, \u201cBeing cultivated is a matter not of having read any book in particular, but of being able to find your bearings within books as a system.\u201d2<\/sup><\/a> He claims that we all desire to be cultured and civilized. What that truly means is that we are able to navigate the knowledge and texts of a communal agreed upon library. This Collective Library,3<\/sup><\/a> as Bayard calls it, shapes and defines the culture we navigate in. He sees books themselves as a, \u201csystem, …to be able to locate each element in relation to the others.\u201d4<\/sup><\/a> This cultural collective library is only important when we see it through the lens of how our society is able to engage in conversation about it. Can we be challenged by it, have it push us into conversations, produce new ideas that move us from our here and now to where we want to be?<\/p>\n

The last book we read gave practical ways to skim and get an overview of the book. As helpful as <\/span>I found Alder’s book5<\/sup><\/a> on practical ways to skim and read<\/span>, I appreciated Bayard<\/span>‘s<\/span> approach of giving us a cultural understanding of why we can \u201cnot read\u201d a lot of books and still be in discussion with others. My dissertation is about understanding these collective libraries from one culture and being able to translate <\/span>it <\/span>to <\/span>a <\/span>second culture, specifically regarding our understanding of developing leaders within a Christian context. How does one talk about what is important in one culture without having their culture, their own libraries, influence the development and learning of those we are leading? <\/span>This reminded<\/span> me that crossing cultural boundaries also means crossing cultural and societal interpretations of those boundaries. My challenge will be from my perspective how can I see ways to teach those of another perspective without allowing the cultural <\/span>influences<\/span> of my perspective to dominant and taint the outcome. We need to find a way to create a third culture that <\/span>represents<\/span> the intersectin<\/span>g<\/span> point between our cultures. <\/span>At this point, I am not sure how to do that.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The Inner Library, as Bayard calls it, or inner book is created by an individual\u2019s experience of the Collective Library.6<\/sup><\/a> There are some books I eat up and am passionate about and others that I put in my digital library or on my wish list because I want to be that kind of guy that reads those types of books. I loved the idea that it is an active engagement with the books rather than a simple non reading.7<\/sup><\/a> I want to be well read without actually reading everything I am suppose to read. Bayard says, \u201cRelations among ideas are far more important than the ideas themselves,\u201d8<\/sup><\/a> This idea of changing our relationship with books is radical and difficult for those that have been taught that the author is the teacher and we are the lowly student. We often have been reminded that we can never fully understand the master and are never to unmask the magician. \u201cWe must profoundly transform our relationship to books\u201d9<\/sup><\/a> , and \u201cPraise it without going into detail.\u201d10<\/sup><\/a> gives us an understanding of how Bayard views the books in our collective library. He shifts the master\/ servant model upside down, allowing the books to be ones we are to manipulate.<\/p>\n

Self- assurance is my Gallop Strength Finders number one strength.11<\/sup><\/a> I find myself speaking confidently assuming I am right. So Bayard liberates me to be creative and assertive in my conversations with others. I can freely and unashamedly talk about books that I haven’t read with creativity and confidence. \u201c…people know that talking about books you haven\u2019t read is an authentically creative activity\u201d12<\/sup><\/a> I look forward to, as Bayard has done in our reading, being creative and confidently talking around the proverbial water cooler.<\/p>\n

Some might think Bayard is too cavalier in his use of books, yet I see his use of creativity and its relationship with cultural conversations as a point that clarifies who I want to be. Not only having the freedom to discuss and engage others on topics beyond my expertise, but also the task of seeing culture as a limitation that sometimes needs to be overcome. Overcome in order to get at that heart of truth, rather than letting truth be filtered through our own cultural context. <\/span><\/p>\n

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1<\/a>Bayard, Pierre. How to Talk About a Book You Haven’t Read. <\/i>Kindle. New York: Bloomsbury, 2010. Kindle Locations <\/span>283<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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2<\/a>Ibid, 262<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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3<\/a>Ibid, 280<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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4<\/a>Ibid, 262<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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5<\/a>Adler Mortimer J, and Van Doren, Charles <\/span><\/span>How to Read a Book: The Classic guide to Intelligent Reading. <\/i><\/span><\/span>(Simon and Schuster, 2014). <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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6<\/a>Bayard, Pierre. How to Talk About a Book You Haven’t Read. <\/i>Kindle. New York: Bloomsbury, 2010. Kindle Locations<\/span> 988<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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7<\/a>Ibid, 289<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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8<\/a>Ibid, 225<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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9<\/a>Ibid, 2325<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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10<\/a>Ibid, 81<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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11<\/a>Self-Assurance is similar to self-confidence. In the deepest part of you, you have faith in your strengths. You know that you are able — able to take risks, able to meet new challenges, able to stake claims, and, most important, able to deliver.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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12<\/a>Bayard, Pierre. How to Talk About a Book You Haven’t Read. <\/i>Kindle. New York: Bloomsbury,2010. Kindle Locations <\/span>2340<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Have you ever seen those television programs that reveal the hidden secrets behind magic? It begins with a masked figure hiding in the shadows of the set. Around him are devices seen on magic stages around the world. The hidden secrets of magic, the intrigue and illusion, will be lost on those that watch this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":93,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[477],"class_list":["post-14322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-bayard","cohort-lgp8"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/93"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14322"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14322\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14326,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14322\/revisions\/14326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}