Gee (Whiz) Thoughts

Sorry for taking so long to post. I've had some password problems (namely, forgetting my password and not receiving it via E-mail). I have created another profile, so there are two Davids under the "Contributors" heading, but they are both me. I am responding to the Gee reading, since the LeFevre and LaTour readings felt too general to respond to at this point, and I still have to read the Gaokar. Here goes.

I found the Gee reading interesting, because although this piece was—like the LaTour reading for this week, and the LeFevre—introductory, I appreciated how Gee focused on politics, particularly how developments in theory, often seen in academia as being inherently progressive, can be swallowed by the any social group for its own ends. Thus, I found Gee’s discussion of “new capitalism” interesting. After all, since we are talking about the social, why not examine the ways in which theory is applied “out there”?

The Gee piece also reminded me of some other stuff I’ve been reading recently. In bell hooks’ book Class Matters, hooks also writes about how contemporary corporate culture has shifted its strategies, embracing diversity because diversity means—to borrow from Gee—a “value added.” Under the “old capitalism” (again, using Gee’s terms), makers of goods cared little about reaching marginalized groups because doing did not positively affect the profit line, but businesses today sell the idea of a classless, raceless, democratic world. The African American kid, the Latino kid, the rural white kid can feel included, instead of excluded, because said kid can spend his/her money on a pair of shoes, an automobile, an MP3 player—just like anyone else. Anyway, that’s what the Gee reading reminded me of, and I liked how Gee tackled the question over whether the “social turn” automatically equals progressive thinking, progressive politics. Gee’s focus on the business world serves as a fine example on how meaning is indeed socially constructed. On paper, social constructivism seems radical and subversive. In practice, however, it too can be subverted depending on the people involved and the context at hand.

Finally, I appreciated Gee’s clear examples and nifty comparisons, such as when Gee’s language borrows from the language of science, particularly physics—for instance, Gee talks about the intellectual and creative energy required to produce a specific configuration (enactive work) and then keep that configuration alive and available for interpretation by others (recognition work). Gee’s notion of enactive work and recognition work struck me as both useful and lucid. How did others feel?