Writing on Stones: Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind

Sitting in her forest green long velvet dress storyteller and word magician Orunamamu perused the small book of poetry looking for the poem our host had read just before her arrival at the neighbourhood friendship potluck gathering. I had told her about it because I knew she would like it. Something about the combination of courage, gaiety and the quiet mind.

On my hands and knees in my ridiculous but practical hort outfit I spend hours tending to dozens, maybe even, hundreds of plants, perennials, heritage, gifts, volunteers, seeds, flowering, vegetables, herbs, invasives (too enthusiastic at the wrong place and time).

The garden is one place where some of us find courage as we see the tiny new growth on a plant that has looked forlorn for months, barely alive in the fall many of them transplanted perhaps too late in the season surviving somehow the trauma of roots being wrenched apart, moved far from the others in a cold place that will only get colder. Death would have been a logical conclusion but somehow they survived protected by layers of mulch and snow and God’s grace.

I never use the old word gaiety but it does describe the “sweet moment” of gardening when you see a clump of early blue violets flourishing in an urban garden in Calgary, a reminder of my older sister’s uncanny ability to speedily find and make a wild blue violet bouquet; single shooting star plant chosen for the garden because of the Garry Woods fields on Vancouver Island; a single brilliant orange poppy opening in May; and too many to describe because the garden and the robins are waiting.

A quiet mind in an anxious world where even one’s own home and garden is temporary and insecure.

Two years ago the 1950s bungalow across the street with its very old heritage garden was demolished, the fertile ancient river bed soil was scraped away and a duplex quickly filled the entire lot. The front landscaping is as polite as that in any new development.

Last year a neighbour sold and moved back east. The new owner tore out the old garden that had been tended for 15 years replacing it with more practical grass which requires less work in their busy schedule.

On the corner one of our oldest neighbours has finally agreed to his family’s desire to sell. The house was built in 1945 and moved in the 1950’s and is surrounded by a horticultural heritage garden, sun rooms, inviting comfortable sitting areas in every corner, sheds overflowing with tools . . . It too will be sold, demolished, the garden uprooted, the topsoil scoured and replaced by other built forms like the one next door, and the one next to that and the next one: walls of sensible stucco with ubiquitous earth colours coordinating with other homes, designs and forms. Perhaps its what postmodernism has become in the booming housing market, picking up on details from Tudor, Victorian, Queen Ann, etc from here and there and tacking them on superficially. Their height is maximized to the zoning limits and the walls extend to the edge of the property. The intelligent pragmatic architecture and materials of these buildings will be easily recognized in the future as D1 of the 21st century many surviving only as photos since the actual buildings are not made to the same standards as pre-1980s. Fortunately the set back gives room for some old trees and tasteful, smart urban landscapes spaces.

This is not “my” garden. I for a short period of time am simply the worker for the robins, plants and the worms. It is a gift to the street. I work outside the fence. I have to be realistic.

As I dig up ancient river stones I write on them, words that I then reread when I am taking out the braids in the rhizome of roots.

But for today I will compost, mulch, feed, plant, transplant, water, tidy, admire, get tired, feel courage, gaiety and enjoy fleeting moments of a quiet mind.

Locating the Concept of  Success

"We thank Thee for this place in which we dwell;
for the love that unites us;
for the peace accorded us this day;
for the hope with which we expect the morrow;
for the health, the work, the food, and the bright skies,
that make our lives delightful;
for our friends in all parts of the earth,
and our friendly helpers in this foreign isle.
Let peace abound in our small company.
Purge out of every heart the lurking grudge.
Give us grace and strength to forbear and to persevere.
Offenders, give us the grace to accept and to forgive offenders.
Forgetful ourselves, help us to bear cheerfully the forgetfulness of others.
Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind.
Spare to us our friends, soften to us our enemies.
Bless us, if it may be, in all our innocent endeavours.
If it may not, give us the strength to encounter that which is to come,
that we be brave in peril, constant in tribulation,
temperate in wrath, and in all changes of fortune,
and, down to the gates of death,
loyal and loving one to another.
As the clay to the potter,
as the windmill to the wind,
as children of their sire,
we beseech of Thee."
Robert Louis Stevenson

Stevenson wrote the Valima Letters after he and his wife Fanny settled In the village of Valima on Upolu island, Samoa. He also became an much-appreciated activist highly critical of European colonial administrators worked very hard on land he had purchased in Vailima. He published A Footnote to History. He died in 1894.

http://wp.me/p1TTs-qH

Death of paradox

James Arthur Baldwin (August 2, 1924 – December 1, 1987) was an American novelist, writer, playwright, poet, essayist and civil rights activist. Baldwin described the ambiguous situation of black Americans in the 1950s as Kafkaesque. He predicted that American nation will be put to death by paradox, itself a paradox since Americans seemed intent on putting paradox to death. He then situates American author Richard Wright fictional character Bigger Thomas in Native Son (1940) as a character controlled, defined by hatred and fear as a descendant of Uncle Tom. Bigger Tom’s hatred and fear later drive him to murder and rape. Baldwin saw Richard Wright as the 1940s Negro novelist locked with the 19th century New England author in a deadly timeless battle. He decries the fact that Bigger Tom’s tragedy is that he has accepted a theology that situates him as subhuman eternally constrained to fight for his humanity. Baldwin then summarizes, “But our humanity is our burden, our life, we need not battle for it; we need only do what is infinitely more difficult, that is accept it. The failure of the protest novel lies in its rejection of life, the human being, the denial of beauty, dread, power, in its insistence that it is his categorization alone which is real and which cannot be transcended (Baldwin “Everybody’s Protest Novel” in Zero 1955: 58).”

1852 American author Harriet Beecher Stowe published her anti-slavery novel entitled Uncle Tom’s Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly. Although some argued that the novel “helped lay the groundwork for the Civil War” (Will Kaufman) James Baldwin claimed that is reeked of self-righteousness and virtuous sentimentality. Baldwin argued that sentimentality is the mark of dishonesty which betray the sentamentalist’s aversion of experience, fear of life and an arid heart. Baldwin states that sentimentalism is a signal of secret and violent inhumanity, a mask for cruelty. Uncle Tom’s Cabin is a “catalogue of violence”. He described Harriet Beecher Stowe as an impassioned pampheteer not a novelist who wrote solely to reveal the immorality of slavery (Baldwin “Everybody’s Protest Novel” Zero 1955: 57).

1924 James Baldwin was born

1938 Shoghi Effendi (1938:36) Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith, wrote that racial prejudice was the most vital and challenging issue confronting the Americas.

“Freedom from racial prejudice, in any of its forms, should, at such a time as this when an increasingly large section of the human race is falling a victim to its devastating ferocity, be adopted as the watchword of the entire body of the…believers, in whichever state they reside, in whatever circles they move, whatever their age, traditions, tastes, and habits (1938:36).”

“The ceaseless exertions which this issue of paramount importance calls for, the sacrifices it must impose, the care and vigilance it demands, the moral courage and fortitude it requires, the tact and sympathy it necessitates, invest this problem…with an urgency and importance that cannot be overestimated (1938:34).”

” [Freedom from racial prejudice] should be deliberately cultivated through the various and everyday opportunities, no matter how insignificant, that present themselves, whether in their homes, their business offices, their schools and colleges, their social parties and recreation grounds, their Bahá’í meetings, conferences, conventions, summer schools and Assemblies (1938:36).”

1940 American author Richard Wright published Native Son. James Baldwin in his essay entitled “Everybody’s Protest Novel” (c. 1950s?: 54-59) published in Zero situated American author Richard Wright fictional character Bigger Thomas in Native Son (1940) as a character controlled, defined by hatred and fear as a descendant of Uncle Tom. Bigger Tom’s hatred and fear later drive him to murder and rape. Baldwin saw Richard Wright as the 1940s Negro novelist locked with the 19th century New England author in a deadly timeless battle. He decries the fact that Bigger Tom’s tragedy is that he has accepted a theology that situates him as subhuman eternally constrained to fight for his humanity. Native Son is number 71 on the American Library Association’s list of the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 1990-2000. The Modern Library placed it number 20 on its list of the 100 best novels of the 20th Century. Time Magazine also included the novel in its TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005.

1941 Seventeen-year-old James Baldwin studied at The New School, Greenwich Village, New York City.

1948 James Baldwin lived in Paris, France and became involved in the cultural radicalism of the Left Bank. His work started to be published in literary anthologies, notably Zero.

1949-1956 Albert Benveniste and Themistocles and Hoetis were editors of Zero, Gotham Book Mart Selection. James Baldwin’s essay entitled “Everybody’s Protest Novel” (pp 54-59) was published in Zero. http://books.google.com/books?id=9wdVDKAZZFoC&pg=PP5&lpg=PP5&dq=New+York+Times+’Zero’+Themistocles+Hoetis&q=New+York+Times+’Zero’+Themistocles+Hoetis&hl=en#v=snippet&q=New%20York%20Times%20’Zero’%20Themistocles%20Hoetis&f=false

“It is the peculiar triumph of society – and its loss – that it is able to convince those people to whom it has given inferior status of the reality of this decree; it has the force and the weapons to translate its dictum into fact, so that the allegedly inferior are actually made so, insofar as the societal realities are concerned. This is a hidden phenomenon now than it was in the days of serfdom, but it is no less implacable. Now, as then, we find ourselves bound, first without, then within, by the nature of categorization. And escape is not effected through a bitter railing against this trap upon us. We take our shape, it is true, within and against that cage of reality bequeathed us at our birth; and yet it is precisely betrayed. Society is held together by our need; we bind it together with legend, myth, coercion, fearing that without it we will be hurled into that void, within which, like the earth before the Word was spoken, the foundations of society are hidden. From this void – ourselves – it is the function of society to protect us; but it is only this void, our unknown selves, demanding forever, a new act of creation, which can save us – “from the evil that is in the world.” With the same motion, at the same time, it is this toward which we endlessly struggle and from which, endlessly, we struggle to escape(Baldwin “Everybody’s Protest Novel” Zero 1955: 57).”

“It must be remembered that the oppressed and oppressor are bound within the same society; they accept the same criteria, they share the same beliefs, they both alike depend on the same reality. Within this cage it is (Baldwin “Everybody’s Protest Novel” Zero 1955: 57) romantic, more, meaningless, to speak of a “new” society as the desire of the oppressed, for that shivering independence on the props of reality wyhich he shares with the herrenvolk makes a truly “new” society impossible to conceive. What vengeance will be exacted; either there will be no oppressed at all or the oppressed and the oppressor will change places (Baldwin “Everybody’s Protest Novel” Zero 1955: 58).”

1955 James Baldwin published Notes of a Native Son. The title refers to Richard Wright’s 1940 protest novel entitled Native Son.

1963 James Baldwin’s book entitled The Fire Next Time was considered to be one of the most influential books about race relations. In it Baldwin predicted, “The Negroes of this country may never be able to rise to power, but they are very well placed indeed to precipitate chaos and ring down the curtain on the American dream.” Could he have imagined President Obama?

“James Baldwin’s collection of essays, The Fire Next Time, is considered one of the most influential books on race relations published during the 1960s. Divided into two sections, the book urges the politicization of both African Americans and European Americans on the issue of racism. Baldwin explains that the radicalism and militancy of many prominent African Americans is a reaction to feelings of alienation inspired by traditional American society. Originally published as two separate works – “Letter from a Region in My Mind” in The New Yorker and “A Letter to My Nephew” in the Progressive – the essays were retitled “Down at the Cross” and “My Dungeon Shook: Letter to My Nephew on the One Hundredth Anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation” for their appearance in book form. Using rhetorical devices learned in his youth as a Pentecostal preacher and examples from his own life, Baldwin argues for an end to racism (Gale Free Resources).”

“In order to survive as a human, moving, moral weight in the world, America and all the Western nations will be forced to reexamine themselves and release themselves from many things that are now taken to be sacred, and to discard nearly all the assumptions that have been used to justify their lives and their anguish and their crimes so long (Baldwin).”

1979-1981 Atlanta Child Murders were a series of murders committed in Atlanta, Georgia, United States in which a minimum of twenty-eight African-American children, adolescents and adults were killed creating an atmosphere of panic and paranoia. James Baldwin documented these murders in his nonfiction book entitled The Evidence of Things Not Seen. Although Atlanta African American Wayne Williams was convicted of two murders and suspected to be guilty of more Baldwin criticized the “untidy” criminal investigation process and felt it was incomplete.

1987 James Baldwin died.

Who’s Who

James Arthur Baldwin (August 2, 1924 – December 1, 1987) was an American novelist, writer, playwright, poet, essayist and civil rights activist.

Webliography and Bibliography

Baldwin, James. 1962-11-17. “Letter From a Region of My Mind.” The New Yorker. “Letter from a Region in My Mind.” p. 59.

Baldwin, James. 1963. “Down At the Cross; Letter From a Region of My Mind.” The Fire Next Time. Dial Press. USA.
Baldwin, James. 1963. The Fire Next Time. Dial Press. USA.
Baldwin, James. 1964. The Fire Next Time. Penguin Books. UK.

Rifkin: Schopenhauer’s empathic instinct versus Kantian categorical imperative)

1785 German philosopher Immanuel Kant () in his publication entitled “Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals” translated by Thomas Kingsmill Abbott

1839 According to Rifkin (EC 2009:346) it was the German philosopher, Arthur Schopenhauer , (1788 – 1860) who was the first to clearly define the empathic process. In his paper entitled On the Basis of Morality (Über die Grundlage der Moral) submitted to the Royal Danish Society of Scientific Studies, Schopenhauer argued against Kant’s purely rational-based, prescriptive ethics and offered an opposing description of the source and foundation of morals. Schopenhauer made the controversial claim that compassion animated by feelings and emotions formed the basis of morality.

links

http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/11945/pg11945.html

http://www.archive.org/stream/basisofmorality00schoiala/basisofmorality00schoiala_djvu.txt

Authenticity: the Authentic Self

The Romantics argued that at the core of being there is an authentic self that is pure in nature, although corruptible by society. What made the Romantic era unique within the context of the evolutionary history of empathic consciousness is the great stress placed on what Rousseau, and later Wordsworth and Whitman, called the “Sentiment of Being.”

1755 In “Discourse on the Origins and Foundations of Inequality among Men” Rousseau argued that the noble savage man, alienated from others was more authentic than the hypocritical, servile social man who tells people what they want to hear. Kant developed the concept of the “enlarged mentality” – the ability to exercise empathy, to “stand up in the mind of others”.

“the savage lives within himself; the social man lives always outside himself; he knows how to live only in the opinion of others, it is, so to speak from their judgment along that he derives the sense of his own existence.”

The social man is someone who cares only about appearances. Rousseau abandoned Paris (and the modern age) for rural isolation claiming that even the politeness of the city promoted corruption. He concluded that,

“We have only a deceptive and frivolous outward appearance, honour without virtue, reason without wisdom, and pleasure without happiness. It suffices for me to to have proved that this is not the original state of man, and that it is only the spirit of society and the inequality it engenders which thus transform and corrupt all our natural inclinations.”

Rousseau sees human history as beginning with the struggle for mutual recognition that Hegel analyzed as the master-slave dialectic. Rousseau’s Sentiment of Being.”

1762 Rousseau’s self-help book on proper parenting entitled Emile was published.

1790s Rousseau’s self-help book on proper parenting entitled Emile rose in popularity at the dawn of the Romantic period. Romantics were attracted to Rousseau’s emphasis on nurturing the child’s natural instincts in direct opposition to John Locke’s assertion that children are born a tabula rasa, a blank slate. Rousseau argued that children who are naturally inclined towards the good and that childhood is a time for parents to honour and nurture their children so their naturally good instincts will develop (See Rifkin EC:354).

1790s Jane Austin introduced the two sisters Elinor and Marianne in her satire of dominant currents of the later 18th century entitled Sense and Sensibility (published in 1811). The reliable, predictable Elinor, who is the voice of reason, has a deep sense of responsibility, keeps her emotions in check, fulfills her social responsibilities but ultimately finds happiness when she discovers her inner sensibility and finally marries her true love. The overly emotional, romantic, Marianne is spontaneous to the point of being irresponsible represents the bleeding heart liberal governed entirely by passions and desires. She finds happiness when she balances her exercises more sense and reason in her decision-making and actions. keywords: ideological thinking. See Rifkin (EC:320).

1805 In The Prelude begun in his twenties by Romantic poet William Wordsworth (1770-1850)’s semi-autobiographical poem of his lifelong spiritual journey. early years spiritual autobiography, he associated the experience of beauty as transcending rational thought: Wordsworth’s “Sentiment of Being.” See Trilling 1972 Sincerity and Authenticity.

The song would speak
          Of that interminable building reared
          By observation of affinities
          In objects where no brotherhood exists
          To passive minds. My seventeenth year was come
          And, whether from this habit rooted now
          So deeply in my mind, or from excess
          In the great social principle of life
          Coercing all things into sympathy,                         390
          To unorganic natures were transferred
          My own enjoyments; or the power of truth
          Coming in revelation, did converse
          With things that really are; I, at this time,
          Saw blessings spread around me like a sea.
          Thus while the days flew by, and years passed on,
          From Nature and her overflowing soul,
          I had received so much, that all my thoughts
          Were steeped in feeling; I was only then
          Contented, when with bliss ineffable                       400
          I felt the sentiment of Being spread
          O'er all that moves and all that seemeth still;
          O'er all that, lost beyond the reach of thought
          And human knowledge, to the human eye
          Invisible, yet liveth to the heart;
          O'er all that leaps and runs, and shouts and sings,
          Or beats the gladsome air; o'er all that glides
          Beneath the wave, yea, in the wave itself,
          And mighty depth of waters. Wonder not
          If high the transport, great the joy I felt,               410
          Communing in this sort through earth and heaven
          With every form of creature, as it looked
          Towards the Uncreated with a countenance
          Of adoration, with an eye of love.
          One song they sang, and it was audible,
          Most audible, then, when the fleshly ear,
          O'ercome by humblest prelude of that strain
          Forgot her functions, and slept undisturbed.

Whitman “Sentiment of Being.”

1807 G.W.F. Hegel major philosophical work entitled  Phänomenologie des Geistes [Phenomenology of Mind, Phenomenology of Spirit] was published. Hegel traced the evolution of consciousness distinguishing between lower and higher levels of consciousness. In the section entitled “Self Consciousness > A: Independence and Dependence of Self-Consciousness > Lordship and Bondage” Hegel developed the Master-slave dialectic.

1870 In “St. Paul and Protestantism” Matthew Arnold (1822-1888) wrote,

Below the surface stream, shallow and light,
Of what we say and feel — below the stream,
As light, of what we think we feel, there flows
With noiseless current, strong, obscure and deep,
The central stream of what we feel indeed.

Trilling cited this in Sincerity and Authenticity (1972).

1968 Student uprisings at Columbia University, Trilling’s academic intellectuals community. The adversary culture, the cruder form of liberalism, asserted itself. Complex arena of mental struggles were forced into the arena of simple political struggles. Moral, psychological, social selves that we imagined ourselves possessing were split and fragmented and a “dissociation of sensibility” took over. Wordsworth and Rousseau are crucial to Trlling in Sincerity and Authenticity.

1972 Trilling, Lionel. 1969-70. Sincerity and Authenticity. Charles Eliot Norton Lectures at Harvard published in 1972. “It comprises a history of the elaborate development of mind and self since Shakespeare, a brief consideration of certain literary texts he sees as central, a polemical refutation of some prophets of our time, and an authorial credo that conceals hope about literature while it counsels stoic resignation about life. And as his last argument with the forceful reality of death, it is also Trilling’s attempt to discover a means by which estrangement of self from self might at last be resolved. Trilling’s authentic authenticity is perhaps best embodied in Conrad of Heart of Darkness. Lesser authenticities Chace, William M. Lionel Trilling, criticism and politics. Lionel Trilling makes the point that authenticity is not to be confused with sincerity, which is being true to one’s social self. Authenticity runs deeper-it is, in the words of Trilling, a “primitive” strength that is continually compromised by society. Maintaining one’s core authenticity, for Rousseau and the Romantics, required a life of personal suffering and constant attention and sympathy to the plight of others. Only the alientated could enter into this world (Rifkin EC:350).

Sartre, the French existential philosopher of the mid-twentieth century, defined the sentiment of being as the place where

“each of us finds himself as well as the others. The common place belongs to me; in me, it

 

 

1990 Kenneth D. Bailey defined social entropy  as “a measure of social system structure, having both theoretical and statistical interpretations, i.e. society (macrosocietal variables) measured in terms of how the individual functions in society (microsocietal variables); also related to social equilibrium” in his publication entitled Social Entropy Theory. (State University of New York Press).

1999 In their publication entitled A Primer of Jungian Psychology  , (New York: Meridian), Calvin S. Hall and J. Vernon described “psychological entropy as the distribution of energy in the psyche, which tends to seek equilibrium or balance among all the structures of the psyche.”

Robinson, Jeffrey Cane. The current of romantic passion.

Emphatic Relationship between Knower and Known

1939 Heinz Kohut (1913-1981) was forced to emigrate from Vienna to Chicago when the Nazis took power. He was trained as a medical doctor in Austria but became known as Mr. Psychoanalysis in America where he played a central role in the twentieth-century psychoanalytic movement (Strozier 2001).

1966 Academics challenged the scientific establishment’s faith in objective science creating a schism among academics. Abraham H. Maslow contributed to the debate in his influential book entitled The Psychology of Science: a Renaissance (1966). In it he argued that by integrating experience (practice) and abstraction (theory), he wished to enlarge not destroy science.  However, Maslow rejected the concept of a neutral observer removed from reality and experience. Rifkin described how Maslow following Goethe and Kohut argued for more sensitive observers capable of incorporating more of the world into the self. These emphatic observers identify with “wider and more inclusive circles of living and nonliving things (Maslow 1966).” Maslow used AA as an argument for the legitimacy of knowledge claims from experience versus theory. Rifkin (2009:610) referred to Maslow’s “receptive strategy” of knowing in section entitled “Teaching Emphatic Science” in the chapter entitled “Biosphere Consciousness in a Climax Economy” in The Emphatic Civilization (2009). He cited Maslow:

“Can all the sciences, all knowledge be conceptualized as a resultant of loving and caring interrelationship between knower and known? What would be the advantages to us of setting this epistemology alongside the one that now reigns in “objective science”? Can we simultaneosly use both?” (Maslow 1966).

1970s The Chicago Institute had a lively intellectual atmosphere was polarized into two factions those who supported Freudian traditional psychoanalysis with its emphasis on drives (instinctual motivations of sex and aggression), internal conflicts, and fantasies and individual guilt and those who accepted Kohut’s empathic approach which embraced the post WWII zeitgeist with is emphasis on how issues of identity, meaning, ideals, and self-expression impact on emotional needs and concerns (Strozier 2001).

1978 The first self psychology conference was held in Chicago. Kohut replaced Freud’s structural theory of the id, ego, and superego with his own concept of the tripartite self (Flanagan 1996), self psychology with its emphasis on relationships. One’s “self states,” including one’s sense of worth and well-being, are met in relationships with others.

1980 A major conference on history and psychoanalysis was organized by Arnold Goldberg and Heinz Kohut.

Webliography and Bibliography

Rifkin, Jeremy. 2009. The Empathic Civilization: The Race to Global Consciousness in a World of Crisis. New York: Jeremy T. Tarcher.

Strozier, Charles B. 2001 “Heinz Kohut: The Making of a Psychoanalyst.” New York:Farrar, Straus & Giroux.  See also this critical review of Strozier’s biography.

Flanagan, L.M. 1996. “The theory of self psychology”. In (Eds.) Berzoff, J., Flanagan, L.M., & Hertz, P. Inside out and outside in, New Jersey:Jason Aronson Inc.)

Maslow, Abraham H. 1966. The Psychology of Science: a Renaissance. South Bend: Gateway Editions, Ltd.  McIsaac, David S. 1997. “Empathy Reconsidered: New Directions in Psychotherapy. Washington: American Psychological Association. (McIsaac 1997:248 cited in Rifkin EC 2009) ftn 19

Kohut, Heinz. 1978. The Psychoanalyst in the Community of Scholars.” In Paul H. Ornstein Ed. The Search for the Self: Selected Writings of Heinz Kohut: 1950-1978. Vol. a. New York: International University Press. (Kohut 1978:702 cited in Rifkin EC 2009) ftn 20

Ornstein, Paul H.  Ed. The Search for the Self: Selected Writings of Heinz Kohut: 1950-1978. Vol. a. New York: International University Press. (Kohut 1978:82 cited in Rifkin EC 2009) ftn 21

Paul H. Ornstein Ed. The Search for the Self: Selected Writings of Heinz Kohut: 1950-1978. Vol. a. New York: International University Press. (Kohut 1978:714 cited in Rifkin EC 2009) ftn 22

Ornstein, Paul H.  Ed. The Search for the Self: Selected Writings of Heinz Kohut: 1950-1978. Vol. 1. New York: International University Press. (Kohut 1978:529 cited in Rifkin EC 2009) ftn 23

Ornstein, Paul H.  Ed. The Search for the Self: Selected Writings of Heinz Kohut: 1950-1978. Vol. 1. New York: International University Press. (Kohut 1978:707 cited in Rifkin EC 2009) ftn 24

Deus Absconditus: Teaching from the Rostrum, Language and the Teaching Situation

“The ideal lecture theatre is vast, truly vast. It is very sombre, very old amphitheatre, and very uncomfortable. The professor is lodged in his chair, which is raised high enough for everyone to see him; there is no question that he might get down and pester you. You can hear him quite well, because he doesn’t move. Only his mouth moves. Preferably he has white hair, a stiff neck and a Protestant air about him. There are a great many students, and each one is perfectly anonymous. To reach the amphitheatre, you have to climb some stairs, and then, with the leather-lined doors closed behind, the silence is absolute, every sound stifled; the walls rise very high, daubed with rough paintings in half tones in which silhouettes of monsters can be detected. Everything adds to the impression of being in another world. So one works religiously. (History student, female, aged 25 – cited by Bourdieu and Passeron 1994:1)”

Bourdieu used this student’s description of the ideal lecture theatre to illustrate his theme of the French professor in his rostrum as deus absconditus [1] (Bourdieu and Passeron 1994a:11)

This Adobe Photoshop layered image or digitage reflects Bourdieu’s student’s ideal lecture theatre but was also informed by my teaching, learning and research with urban Inuit, First Nations and African Canadians. The intimidating architecture and décor of the ideal lecture room and gallery served to inspire awe and an almost sacred respect. Starting from the student’s description of the ideal lecture theatre I created this layered digitage in Adobe Photoshop using borrowed images of tourists in the Pantheon in Rome (including an Inuit student wearing her amautik), the Quesnay Theatre (1788), Raphael’s School of Athens with Aristotle and Plato in the centre; a generic business meeting, McGill University’s MacDonald-Stewart Physics building with pillars on which the words Power and Knowledge were engraved; a white-haired immobile male professor at his rostrum, a Roman Marble Rostrum. A relief of Triton illustrates the mythical monster-like creatures depicted on the walls of the theatre. The amphitheatre with leather-backed chairs was designed to silence students whose focus was entirely centred on the soft-spoken professor at his rostrum.

Bourdieu (1994) used his concept of Deus Absconditus in his critical examination of the role of academics in the French tradition based on a 1960s study in French universities which he claimed was still relevant in the 1990s, who claim knowledge and power from the safe distance of the rostrum (Bourdieu and Passeron 1994:11).

“It is in all its peculiarities in which the academic institution locates the teacher–the rostrum, the chair from which a French professor holds forth, his position at the point where all attention converges–that he finds the material conditions to keep his students at a distance, to require and enforce respect, even when, left to himself, we would decline it. Physically elevated and enclosed within the magistral chair which consecrates him, he is separated from his audience by a few empty rows. These physically mark off the distance which the profane crowd, silent before the mana of the word, timorously respects and abandons to the most well-trained zealots, pious lesser priests of the professorial word. Deus absconditus, remote and untouchable, protected by obscure and alarming spiritual ‘authorities’ (so many mythologies to him), the professor is in fact condemned by an objective situation more coercive than the most imperious regulation to dramatic monologue and virtuoso exhibition (Bourdieu, 1994, p. 10).”

He explored how academics use language and linguistic misunderstanding in the educational process. Academics maintain an ontological, epistemological, pedagogical and embodied distance through the use of text which serves as a tool of distantiation filtering out all but those who are best suited to become their progeniture.

Notes

1. Deus Absconditus according to Plotinus (204-270 CE) refers to a transcendent God who is also the Primal Will with its inherent concepts of creation as emanation and the eternity of the world, and the great chain of being, which has influenced Judaism, Christianity, Islam and the Baha’i Faith (Mautner 1997). Plotinus (204-270 CE) organized Platonic philosophy (427-347 BC) into a system referred to as neo-Platonism (a term coined by Thomas Taylor 1800s) which had a profound influence on late classical, medieval Christian, Islamic and Renaissance thought. Plotinus (250) argued that all modes of being emanate from the Platonic concepts of the “One (Plato’s Parmenides)” and “the Good (Plato’s Republic)  which, according to Plotinus, is the entity deus absconditus which has influenced Judaism, Christianity and Islam since the time of Plotinus and is referred to a transcendental Godhead, the Great Chain of Being and the Primal Will. There has been a revival in interest in the writings of Plotinus (Mautner 1997).

Derrida leaves room for the possibility of the existence of the Primal Will without granting human capacity to transcendence.

Pierre Bourdieu used the term deus absconditus to critically examine the role of academics who claim knowledge and power from the safe distance of a rostrum (Bourdieu and Passeron 1994:11).  Donna Haraway also referred indirectly to the way in which scientists claim a superior perspective through a god’s-eye-view.

Selected Bibliography

Bourdieu, Pierre; Passeron, Jean-Claude. 1994a. “Introduction: Language and Relationship to Language in the Teaching Situation.” in Bourdieu, Pierre; Passeron, Jean-Claude; de Saint Martin, Monique. 1994. Academic Discourse: Linguistic Misunderstanding and Professorial Power. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press. Pp. 1-34.

Bourdieu, Pierre. Trans. Richard Nice. (1984). Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste. Cambridge, MA: Harvard.

Bourdieu, Pierre. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Trans. Richard Nice. (1989). Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press.

Bourdieu, Pierre. Trans. Richard Nice. (1990) The Logic of Practice. Stanford: Stanford U. Press.

Bourdieu, Pierre; Passeron, Jean-Claude; de Saint Martin, Monique. Trans. Richard Teese. (1994). Academic Discourse: Linguistic Misunderstanding and Professorial Power. Stanford: Stanford U. Press.

Bourdieu, Pierre, Jean-Claude Passeron, de Saint Martin, Monique. 1994b. Academic Discourse: Linguistic Misunderstanding and Professorial Power. Translated by R. Teese. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press.

See also
Timeline of hermeneutics

Some Thoughts on Inuit Art 2002

Geographic situation of inquiry into the Inuit art knowledge community

The geographic space encompassed by this stage in my research project stretches north and south to include northern hinterlands and southern heartlands. The producers of Inuit art reside mainly in hamlets that sparsely dot the landscapes of Labrador, Nunavik, Nunavut and the Western Arctic. There are some organizations, institutions and activities in the North that produce and disseminate narratives that contribute to the Inuit art knowledge community. In the North, oral presentations, museum exhibitions, Nunavut Arctic College, commercial dealers produce information, documentation that informs that Inuit art knowledge community. Some researchers communicate with Inuit artists by telephone, email and through other distance communications. Others travel to northern hamlets to gather ‘data’ for theses, dissertations, reports and programs. However, most published material is produced, disseminated and consumed by and for outsiders in the south.

Dismantling the exotic myth of the North: The north as a relevant concept. Iqaluit is not really as isolated, as cold, as small as one might expect!

Iqaluit is only a three hour flight from Ottawa on a comfortable, First Air jet, with excellent service! As we travel north the aerial view reveals a rumpled snow blanket that covered everything. It was no longer white, but soft pinks and blues with touches of yellow where the late afternoon sun caught the snow drifts and snow‑covered hills. Hudson Strait was a flat, frozen white mass. Cliffs along the shore cast long, blue shadows like fingers stretching towards Baffin Island. Farther out over the straight I could see patches of openings in the ice where clear water was visible. As we approached Iqaluit, the landscape changed. Coastal winds from the eastern shore seemed to scrape the soft surface snow away revealing hard icy or rocky surfaces below. Nearer the town, antennas and satellite dishes, these contemporary inukshualuk, dotted the hills surrounding the airfield. As we landed I couldn’t tell where the warehouses, hangars and airport buildings ended and Iqaluit itself began. The architecture of many of the buildings was functional, not aesthetic,  more like army barracks that it used to host, than a capital city.

The descent into Iqaluit reveals a tiny capital spread out along four miles of Koosejee Inlet.  In spite of its relatively small population of seven thousand, the boom in population growth propelled by its status as Canada’s newest capital city, has provoked a housing crisis unparalleled in Canada. Today curved lines of houses, supported  on stilt‑like piles buried in the permafrost, trace irregular paths up the hills that surround the Inlet. Many homes and apartments, designed as single family dwellings, have been informally transformed to accommodate family members, friends and paying boarders. Even professionals open extra rooms to boarders who share scant housing.

The homes perched at the top of these hills enjoy a panoramic view of the islands in the Inlet and the Peninsula across the water.  These sections of town called Tundra Valley and the Road to Nowhere provide the best views of the surrounding area and are not surprisingly the area Iqaluitmiut identify as upper class.  Except in these newer areas, exclusive use of private property seems to be an ambiguous concept. In the areas inhabited by the lower classes, such as the Beaches, informal trails tightly encircle almost every home, providing bikes, snowmobiles and walkers with limitless shortcuts and making landscape and fence‑building a delicate negotiation.

Frobisher Bay: a colonialist not‑so‑distant past

Frobisher Bay was a highly segregated community. Apex to the east of town was the Inuit residential area. Only three decades ago young Inuit children walked the three miles to school from their homes in Apex to the elementary school in Iqaluit even in temperatures of ‑40 degrees! A contemporary northern myth affirms that the colonialism in the north was relatively benign. In reality Inuit have been cast into the minority status in Nunavut. In every social institution, Inuit values have been replaced by the dominant western value‑system.  This does not mean that the majority of Inuit have adopted these values. However, the modus operandi of northern institutions reflect the dominant values of the southern market economy. Education in the North does not respond to the real needs of the Inuit in the North. This leads to a cognitive and learning gap with widespread consequences. There is an assumption that there is only one way of perceiving progress and growth. It is more reflection of a corporate vision than an Inuit vision.

Iqaluit, Nunavut:

It is a desert region surrounded by water. Strong sunlight has become a concern. It is narrated as an exotic, isolated, pristine, northern frontier. The Road to Nowhere is officially marked on maps of Iqaluit and included on taxi tours of this northern capital. The self-mocking de-locational indicator  ‘nowhere’ is turned on its head becoming the Road to Everywhere, when viewed from the standpoint of a circumpolar map.  In reality Iqaluit is a hub of northern activities with a nonstop flow of expert outsiders, government workers, consultants, travelers, tourists and people on transit to other northern communities.

Many hamlets are still ninety percent Inuit. However, both Iqaluit and Cambridge Bay, are composed of 30% non‑Inuit. Iqaluit, Nunavut,  is a complex community governed by three layers of government. Indigenous peoples worldwide are watching Nunavut and the unfolding of this experiment in indigenous governance and sovereignty.  At the same time, deeply entrenched government bureaucracies challenge more equitable social change with paralyzing, counter productive responses.

There is an epidermic respect paid to the role of IQ in the Nunavut government. But the unwritten whispers in the hallways and over coffee call for a return of the ‘corporate dinosaurs,’ with quick, decisive action and a ‘firmer grip on reality.’ They question if there is a specific way of knowing that is IQ. They confide in each other the belief that the knowledge of the Inuit elders is outdated. The work of Culture, Language, Elders and Youth, in educating and integrating IQ into everyday government operations, is a challenging, uphill struggle.  Their job is not only to convince the outside world of the validity of IQ in the contemporary northern landscape. They must also quell the murmurs that abound within the walls of Nunavut government offices. These myths that IQ is outdated, are reinforced by an overwhelming group think that maintains the status quo.

Grounding through sound: A Polyglot Community

In Iqaluit everyday life unfolds in a sound‑scape of three accent‑textured languages, Inuktitut, English and French.  Social classes span language and cultural lines. There are distinct social classes evident within the Inuit community.

Hearing diversity

Accents in three languages reveal newcomers geographic origins. Among Inuit, the varying levels of mastery of Inuktitut and English, flavoured with distinct accents in Inuktitut from smaller hamlets, separate a small community into even smaller nodes. English is lightened by the Inuit, Newfoundland, Maritime, Irish and Finnish accents. French is heard everywhere, in coffee shops, restaurants and stores, and frequently, in taxis, as most cab drivers are recruited in Quebec. It is ironic that Environment Canada’s weather channel which provides blizzard warnings was recently made available in French as well as English. It is not yet available in Inuktitut.

On alienation and belonging in a complex society

Iqaluit is not a homogenous community. Inuit now residing in Iqaluit come from communities across the north. These ‘outsiders’ may feel a sense of alienation and ‘otherness’ that plays out in schoolyard bullying, adult shunning, gossip and feelings of homesickness. Acquiring the status of ‘belonging’ in Iqaluit can be a lengthy process. One can remain there as a ‘tourist’ and outsider for several years before being recognized as a community member, insider or northerner.

The politics of naming

There are few street names. Every building is identified by a number that is not necessarily in numerical order. Taxi drivers learn them all. For some Iqaluit residents the concept of street names is a southern importation that is just another irritating example of the politics of naming.

The Inuit art market: producers, Co‑ops, dealers, consumers

The origin of northern co‑ops is linked to the Inuit art boom of the 1960’s. In a number of northern communities, co‑op’s continue to purchase carvings and drawings from local artists.

The changing of the guard

Terry Ryan remained as Co‑op manager in Cape Dorset for over three decades. His continuous presence and his quiet passion for Inuit art, provided a partnership with Inuit artists that helped the West Baffin Print Shop and Co‑op to flourish.

Arctic Co‑operatives: Groceries, snow machines, fuel, furniture

Contemporary Co‑Op managers are more likely to be interested in the more lucrative and less sensitive and demanding markets in commodities such as fuel, groceries, furnishings, etc. and less committed to Inuit art as an integral part of the Co‑op organization. Inuit artists, like any other artist, craftsmen or small businessmen, may not always be easy to work with!

Art‑while‑you‑wait, tourists and cruise ships

In some cases dealers, local customers and tourist‑collectors, request very specific subjects. Tourists off the cruise ships who arrive for very brief visits in small hamlets, have very specific ideas of what they want to purchase. They will make specific requests, for example for Sedna carvings or polar bears. In the case of dealers they may also request specific forms and poses for example in the shape of the wings of a bird or the angle of the neck of a bird.

Art dealers, commercial galleries and stables of artists

Art dealers and commercial galleries operate by maintaining close working relationships with specific artists. In the best arrangements, both dealers and artists benefit. The price of a work of art is split with about 60% going to the dealer and 40% to the artist. The high cost of maintaining expensive commercial gallery spaces, art show openings, invitations, on‑going press coverage, advertisements, etc. and the risk that the artist’s work might not sell, is compensated in the high commission the dealer receives.  In some cases, commercial galleries produce exhibition catalogues and information about the artist’s life, career and individual works of art. The prestige of the artist, and therefore the value of her/his work, is increased by this association with reliable, recognized professional art dealers. It provides the artist with a sense of security and a focus for production. Galleries demand a certain number of works from the artists in their stables.

Shopping centre‑style commercial art galleries

Galleries and dealers vary. There are the shopping centre‑style commercial galleries whose focus is purely commercial. These galleries insist on quantity and a certain predictable uniformity in the artist’s production. Mechanically produced reproductions are sold at prices similar to limited edition prints.

Fine Art galleries

Fine Art galleries attempt to varying degrees to diffuse works of art that contribute to some extent to the fresh and original. They are more comfortable with a continuity in style that evolves and changes rather than abruptly taking on completely new paths. The focus is still on sales. In some of these galleries, the framing is arranged by the gallery but the artists pay for the frames of unsold works. Frames for a medium‑sized art work can be as much as $500.

Art dealers and stables of Inuit artists

Some art dealers live and work from a northern base. Much like southern galleries, they maintain a stable of artists whose work they regularly purchase. They provide stone and tools. The size and hardness of the stone impacts on the size and nature of the carving.

The artists who are part of a stable, may feel that the price they are receiving is unacceptably low. In one case L. E. reported selling a piece for $200 that was sold almost immediately to a European collector for $700. They prefer to sell directly.

Inuit art on the menu and on the run

To the frustration of the professional art dealers and the delight of Inuit artists, the parallel market of direct sales is quite lucrative. Inuit artists are among the only Canadian artists who can produce and sell work on the same day. Artists sell their work from table to table in hotel restaurants, in lobbies of public buildings, at workplaces and/or door‑to‑door in Iqaluit, often through the intermediary of relatives and friends. These purchases which routinely sell for hundreds of dollars, are still a fraction of the cost of one of these works in a southern gallery.

Triage: Fine Art, gift or souvenir?

In the co‑op’s there is a system of subjective but informed triage. Certain works are sent to the more prestigious galleries, such as Dorset Fine Arts and southern auctions organized by Arctic Producers. There public and commercial galleries as well as individual collectors purchase the most expensive and the most valued works by the most highly recognized artists. Seasoned collectors also chose reliable galleries such as the Marion Scott in Vancouver, when making their purchases of Inuit art.  Even before carvings leave the North, certain works have been chosen for the larger market aimed at the tourist‑collector and often destined for gifts and souvenir shops. Prices for the carvings vary from $50 to $200. Artists, whose sustained production, has captured the attention of collectors, produce work that is sold in gallery settings for over $1000. Wall‑hangings average $800 for a large‑sized tapestry. Inuit prints routinely sell for $250 ‑ $500.

Myths and delusions: Inuit artists and their dealers

On the part of both management and artist, there seems to be little understanding of the larger workings of the world of art in which a sculpture or print can become an investment with the potential of increased value through time.

Art collectors: Motivations and standards for acquisition: the passionate collector, art as sound investment, the museum piece, the ideal gift for your Japanese business partner

Inuit art collectors: Inuit art is appreciated at home, in Nunavut.

Original Inuit art works now enhance the living spaces of private homes and public places in Iqaluit. Private collectors hold pieces that would be the envy of curators of public collections. The Nunavut Legislative Building takes pride in the tasteful exhibition and rotation of fine examples of contemporary Inuit art. Hotels and restaurants highlight prints, wall‑hangings and sculptures. The streets of Iqaluit are filled with walking art. Outer clothing, custom‑made by skilled textile artists in Iqaluit, reflects a heightened sense of design, innovation and creativity. Finely crafted silver, ivory, baleen and antler miniature works of art in the form of jewelry are sold in stores, on the streets, worn and admired.

Inuit art easier to purchase on the street than in a gallery in Iqaluit

Unfortunately, in Iqaluit there is no one accessible place where quality Inuit art can be purchased. There are two commercial galleries where the lack of interest of the staff perfectly mirrors the lack‑lustre collection of works for sale. There is one dealer who will show works by appointment. Nunavut Arctic College Arts and Crafts have begun a monthly sale which seems to be quite successful. Artists bring their own work to sell.

The consumers of Inuit art objects are part of a large international community with galleries in France, Germany, Belgium, the United States and Canada. There are a number of small but respected centres of teaching, learning and research with a focus on Inuit art.

The passionate collector

The passionate art collector who purchases works of art based on a resonance between the work and himself/herself is a gift to the art community. Public collections have been enhanced by inheritance of these collections intact.

The collector as investor

Collectors interested in purchasing a work that is not only pleasing to them, but potentially a sound art investment, depend on information about the market, the artist, the artist’s oeuvres gleaned from art dealers, exhibitions, art books and travel.

The dream of a lucrative investment

The highest purchase price for an Inuit print was over $50, 000.  The 1967 print Enchanted Owl by Kenojuak, heralded an era described by some as the golden age of Inuit art. Kenojuak’s prolific and unbroken career as a gifted artist spans three decades and has been well‑documented in film as well as in prized art books. Collectors yearn for the collectible that may one day soar in value. An artist’s death may be greeted with pleasure by dealers  and collectors whose collections increase in value as the rarity of the objects increased.

Inuit artists are aware of the discrepancy between the price received at the time of the initial sale and the price of certain works of art through appreciation.

Artists are dismayed that the work sold in the early years for a pittance is worth more than they would make in a year. There is a sense of mistrust between artist and dealer. The dealer may feel artists are not sufficiently appreciative of the art market and the value of ongoing promotion in which they are constantly involved. The artist feels he/she is being underpaid for their work. The subject matter of Inuit art work reflects an intense symbiotic relationship to the northern ecosystem. Artists take pleasure in discussing the tools with which they work, the choice of stones, the organization of their studios (if they are fortunate enough to have them), details of the geographic location and seasonal attributes, which inspired a particular work. But the actual working conditions under which the Inuit artist works, reflects a market mentality. They are also willing to discuss these conditions which embitter some artists and lead to mistrust of the Inuit art system.

Acquisition policies for public collections

Public museums and galleries, such as the National Gallery of Canada, have stringent policies for acquisitions. Collections are built around themes such as Early Canadian art, First Nations art, Modern Canadian art and Inuit art. Within each of these categories curators attempt to acquire works that reveal pivotal aspects of the theme around which the collection has been built. Similarly to academic work, the question is asked, “What has this artist accomplished and/or does this work represent that is new, original, to the field, that is new knowledge?” Within these categories specific artists are selected for a more in‑depth representation.

Canada’s professional visual artists: managing the contemporary career

Artists, whose works are finally collected by the National Gallery, have become part of the larger conversation about art, by actively producing and exhibiting in provincial, national and international venues. Their work is inserted into contemporary discourse in academia, in art reviews, in art journals. They have exhibited in juried exhibitions.

The role of documentation in the career of the contemporary visual artist

Usually contemporary artists substantiate their claim to professional artist status through a thorough documentation of their work. Applications for grants and submissions for exhibitions and competitions require text‑based and visual documentation. Slides of works are produced and stored. Press books are maintained. The artist’s curriculum vitae is kept up to date. Individual curators research the artist’s biography, including exhibition career, publications. The concern is not with the marketability of the work of art as much as the contribution to the ‘knowledge’ community in which the artist is working. Is the artist contributing to the production of new knowledge about art by providing a fresh idea or object that stimulates a fresh, innovative, original way of thinking, a new way of seeing, perceiving, reading and/or relating to his/her environment?

The profile of professional contemporary visual artists

Numerous artists graduate from art schools without a motivation to enter the commercial art market. The goal is to produce original works of art that contribute to a larger, more enduring conversation about art, a discourse that is tied intricately to theory, literature, philosophy… In reputable art schools, students study theory as much as techniques. Aspiring artists are challenged to think as artists not merely to produce works that look like art. These artists subsist by teaching art, working at a job that is not‑related to the arts, maintaining a studio production, applying for exhibition and project grants, and working as part of artists’ co‑operatives and/or alternative galleries. Visual artists are among the lowest wage earners in the country.

Why produce art?

It is astounding to witness the results of the Arctic Youth Arts Initiative, an ambitious project to bring painting into the lives of Inuit. Beth McKenty has been going into local schools and community centres in Iqaluit and Clyde River with good quality paints and paper in minute quantities. Using postcard size papers she encourages children, adults and elders to paint what they feel. Invariably the results are a visual feast. These artists can describe, using kitchen‑table poetry, complex feelings and imaginary worlds they inhabit or that inhabit them. They are no different from any art activity undertaken by any group where barriers to creativity have not yet been erected. The painting becomes addictive with groups requesting again and again for a repeat of the activity.

Art in schools in Iqaluit

Yet in Iqaluit, except for this volunteer initiative,  art is not actively encouraged in grade schools or high school. Drum dancing is being taught in one fortunate school where a well‑respected Inuit, knowledgeable in traditional ways, actively seeks to incorporate Inuit culture into the curriculum.

The profile of contemporary Inuit artists

While there are exceptions, many Inuit artists seem to be uni‑lingual Inuktitut speakers. This makes it more challenging for researchers who wish to interview the artists. The activity of carving is not considered as a career but as a way of making money. There is virtually no difference between the production of skilled craftswomen who design and sew sealskin kamiks, mittens, hats and jackets. The cost of living in Iqaluit is artificially high.  One of the local artists who was brought up by two very well‑known Cape Dorset artists, lived at the homeless shelter next door to where I was living. Everyday he worked outside in temperatures that ranged from ‑30 to 0 degrees. He sat on a piece of plywood and worked non‑stop for hours using stone provided by his art dealer, David. I could hear the buzz of power tools, and see him carving, sanding and polishing. I bought a couple of pieces that I later realized were not that good. I had the impression that his skill far outweighed the effort he made in these pieces. I looked up his name on the Internet. He was there with photos of his art work and a description of an exhibition in France!

The boom, government salaries and inflated prices

Federal and Nunavut public servants earn salaries two and three times what they could anticipate in southern urban centres. These employees also enjoy extended vacations in the south with in some cases, several round trips tickets a year. They are able to purchase the more expensive items while in the south and further cut the cost of living in the north. Federal and Nunavut governments provide housing for their employees and pay inflated prices for rents. For those who do not qualify for housing, the cost of rental is about twice the cost of a major urban centre. A house rents for $2500 a month, a room in a house for $500‑$1,000. The high costs are reflected in every purchase from clothing to food. Yet a single person on Social Assistance in the north collects less than $400 a month.

L’art, pourquoi faire?

Creating works of art for personal fulfillment, as a means of authentic expression, to enhance understanding of contemporary theories, to

Narrating Inuit art: Who is the intended audience?