[Sca-cooks] Overdocumentation
Laura C. Minnick
lcm at jeffnet.org
Fri Nov 19 21:31:29 PST 2004
At 02:49 PM 11/19/2004, you wrote:
>>The proper way to handle out of period conversation IMO, is not to
>>panomine, but to say, The seers tell me or I had a dream that in the 21st
>>century they will have this, do this or whatever. Making a bit of joke
>>of the thing... Not to be deliberately dense or hard to deal with. I
>>rarely serve obviously out of period or really Americana foods for SCA
>>stuff, even just to family at war. When I do there are always comments
>>of: "I just found this wonderful root from the new worlde. It is called
>>a potato." Every one giggles, and gets the joke...
>
>Now let me disagree from the other side. Making a joke out of persona, in
>any of the versions you describe, simply makes it harder to make persona
>work when you do want it to.
In similar vein, I have found it much more disrupting to draw attention to
the OOP thing/conversation by giving it a silly 'periodish' name, or making
up some 'explanation' for it. Calling a camera a 'soul-stealer', or
remarking to someone dressed in a earlier period as yourself that they
might be your ancestor- it's jarring. Or suggesting that something is 'from
the future'- if someone on the street showed you something that you were
not familiar with, do you think it is from another time? Another place,
maybe, but not another time.
>The best solution to the problem, in my view, is to explicitly drop out of
>persona in order to have the conversation. If possible, I prefer to take
>advantage of some symbolic dividing line--move to the edge of the feast
>hall, or move outside the boundary of our encampment. If I am teaching a
>class on in persona story telling and want to start in persona as a
>sample, I can put my glasses on, or take my turban off, to mark the switch
>from being Cariadoc to being David.
I agree. Might be as simple as being discreet, dropping your voice, ducking
behind a curtain. Being quite and matter-of-fact draws less attention to
the non-periodness of whatever the article or activity is.
I taught at an Ithra session (An Tir university) last Saturday, the 4-hour
gargantuan Survey of the Middle Ages class (1000 years of history in 4
hours? Nope- I didn't get all the way through). Because Elaine is a French
noblewoman in 1404, she would not have been in a University class, much
less taught one, I brought out the handy stand-by- Father Abelard. One of
the students, at the end of the class, asked "What is your persona?" Not
something I could actually answer in persona, could I? So I basically had
to drop out and explain why Abelard teaches classes and not Elaine. This is
a way of dealing with that issue that I am comfortable with. It might be a
little extreme to some- most people don't bother rationalizing their
persona for the purpose of teaching.
Funny note though- the first time Father Abelard taught an Ithra class, I
gave a 15 minute break (it was another 4 hour class- we needed it), and
went off to use the facilities. Found myself stopped in front of two doors,
momentarily flummoxed- I might 'be' Abelard for the day but the persona
only goes so far, you know? So I used the womens'. On my way out I passed a
local fellow who also has a clerical persona, as he was on his way into the
gents'. He raised his eyebrows at me, and said "Father! I'm shocked!" to
which I had to reply "Aquinas says that it is no sin to act with reason and
use things in the manner to which they are best suited. I assure you, I did
not misuse that room, so how could it be sinful?" He laughed, and said "Ah,
never try to argue with a Dominican!" and we both went our way.
Sometimes a little education can be a good thing. :-)
'Lainie
___________________________________________________________________________
The penalty good men pay for not being interested in politics is to be
governed by men worse than themselves. -- Plato
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