SC - Re: Dangerous misinformation (bacterial selection)

[Alma Johnson]

Re:  Living the Dream or attending a graduate-level history class

As someone who has pushed for more historical knowledge among SCAdians, this
one's a toughie.  Especially since I love living the Dream, otherwise I
wouldn't have done it for this long.  

Personally, and IMHO, many of the problems stem from the limited scope of
research done by most of the people in the SCA.  Over the last 22 years, I
have watched more people get sidetracked by their particular interest, be it
cooking, or jewlerymaking, or what have you, into a little tunnel with walls
made of the things they're interested in.  Just the things.  No space on the
tunnel walls for the broader picture of where their "things" fit in.  No
knowledge of anything outside of their "thing".  No understanding of the
symbiotic relationship between land and peasant, peasant and noble, noble and
king.  No understanding of how their thing came to be, where the materials for
the thing came from, or how it was used after it was made.  And,
unfortunately, no desire to know, either.  Worse yet, when their lack of
historical knowledge is pointed out to them, they get all nasty and stiff-
necked about their expertise with the "thing".  I've actually been told, "How
dare you question our infalllibility on this matter?"  How dare I?  Even the
Pope gave up his fallacy of infallibility.  Isn't it time for the thing-makers
to give up theirs?  The mark of a true historical afficionado is the ability
to accept new research and findings, yet new sources of information are often
denigrated by the expert thing-makers of the SCA, because they don't know how
to interpret what's been newly-discovered and fit it into their own personal
view of "what was real".  Especially if the new information is counter to
their personal view.  Many excellent craftspeople have been left out of the
upper levels of our hierarchy simply because they make what are called leaps
of logic based on sound, historical scientific methods.  Makes me crazy, which
is the reason I do not do Art/Sci competitions.

Most SCAdians wouldn't pass a freshman-level general Medieval history exam,
let alone be able to slog through a graduate-level seminar.   And the few who
could, already have, and sit here wondering why there isn't more interest in
general mdeieval knowledge in a group which purports to be an educational
organization specializing in that period.  History cannot be sliced and diced
into a year here, and a year there.  It's a line, a continuum, and one thing
leads to another which leads to another, and if you don't know where you've
been, how the heck can you know where you're going?

Pet peeve mode off.

Walk in peace,
Wolfmother 
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