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Good Night
Jan. 31st, 2019 12:11 am
Jan. 31st, 2019
Just Wondering
Jan. 31st, 2019 09:37 amWhat's the funniest movie you've ever seen?
What are three things you'd rather not have to live without?
Have you ever played hooky from work and got caught?
What are three things you'd rather not have to live without?
Have you ever played hooky from work and got caught?
Maryanne Wolf "Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain" (Icon Books)
What an incredible book. Supremely readable, it seems undignified to label this 'popular science', because the number of references shows clearly that this has been as thoroughly researched as any serious scientific book. The only thing, really, that puts it into the popular category is the lack of note markers in the text - which is nice, until you get to the notes and realise how hard it is to relate them back... a very minor gripe.
Maryanne Wolf's title alludes to the different aspects of reading exemplified by Proust's description of the book, in 'On Reading', as a place to take refuge and explore other realities and ideas, and the part the squid has played in the historical study of the brain. If you like, it's the felt experience of the reader complemented by the mechanics behind the scenes. The book is divided into three main parts: how the brain learned to read - a retrospective of the history of reading and brain science; how the brain learns to read over time - what we know or believe now about reading acquisition; and when the brain can't learn to read - a survey of current research and developments in dyslexia.
Wolf's style is delightful. Even when she is explaining the complexities of brain imaging and how that might relate to reading development, she is never less than fluid (though I suspect I fell into the trap that, she tells us, Socrates feared would arise through literacy: that of ceasing to question, and reading without truly understanding!). It's not the kind of book where you find yourself so bogged down in the technical descriptions you are unable to move forward. The science is leavened with anecdotes from her own research and family life and seasoned with numerous interesting literary and historical references (personal favourite: Eliot's analogies for Casaubon's mind from Middlemarch).
Wolf closes with a call to arms to urgently consider the implications for the current generation of schoolchildren of 'growing up digital', repeatedly worrying at the notion that the ease of access to information provided by the internet may produce a crop of children with little or no curiosity about exploring texts further than their surfaces.
I found this completely fascinating from just about every perspective: the history of reading, writing and alphabets, which I knew very little about; the process of language acquisition, which was particularly interesting as my youngest child is at the stage of beginning to reliably recognise letters; dyslexia, which I knew absolutely nothing about (nice too that Wolf uses The Lightning Thief for an epigraph in one of these chapters); and her personal mission statement in the final chapter. Everyone with an interest in reading should seek it out.
What an incredible book. Supremely readable, it seems undignified to label this 'popular science', because the number of references shows clearly that this has been as thoroughly researched as any serious scientific book. The only thing, really, that puts it into the popular category is the lack of note markers in the text - which is nice, until you get to the notes and realise how hard it is to relate them back... a very minor gripe.
Maryanne Wolf's title alludes to the different aspects of reading exemplified by Proust's description of the book, in 'On Reading', as a place to take refuge and explore other realities and ideas, and the part the squid has played in the historical study of the brain. If you like, it's the felt experience of the reader complemented by the mechanics behind the scenes. The book is divided into three main parts: how the brain learned to read - a retrospective of the history of reading and brain science; how the brain learns to read over time - what we know or believe now about reading acquisition; and when the brain can't learn to read - a survey of current research and developments in dyslexia.
Wolf's style is delightful. Even when she is explaining the complexities of brain imaging and how that might relate to reading development, she is never less than fluid (though I suspect I fell into the trap that, she tells us, Socrates feared would arise through literacy: that of ceasing to question, and reading without truly understanding!). It's not the kind of book where you find yourself so bogged down in the technical descriptions you are unable to move forward. The science is leavened with anecdotes from her own research and family life and seasoned with numerous interesting literary and historical references (personal favourite: Eliot's analogies for Casaubon's mind from Middlemarch).
Wolf closes with a call to arms to urgently consider the implications for the current generation of schoolchildren of 'growing up digital', repeatedly worrying at the notion that the ease of access to information provided by the internet may produce a crop of children with little or no curiosity about exploring texts further than their surfaces.
I found this completely fascinating from just about every perspective: the history of reading, writing and alphabets, which I knew very little about; the process of language acquisition, which was particularly interesting as my youngest child is at the stage of beginning to reliably recognise letters; dyslexia, which I knew absolutely nothing about (nice too that Wolf uses The Lightning Thief for an epigraph in one of these chapters); and her personal mission statement in the final chapter. Everyone with an interest in reading should seek it out.
Poems Of The Week
Jan. 31st, 2019 11:06 amA couple of poems I have liked this week --
Proud Songster
by Thomas Hardy
The thrushes sing as the sun is going,
And the finches whistle in ones and pairs,
And as it gets dark loud nightingales
In bushes
Pipe, as they can when April wears,
As if all Time were theirs.
These are brand new birds of twelve months' growing,
Which a year ago, or less than twain,
No finches were, nor nightingales,
Nor thrushes,
But only particles of grain,
And earth, and air, and rain.
Here It Is
by Leonard Cohen
Here is your crown
And your seal and rings
And here is your love
For all things.
Here is your cart,
And your cardboard and piss
And here is your love
For all of this.
May everyone live,
And may everyone die.
Hello, my love,
And my love, Goodbye.
Here is your wine,
And your drunken fall
And here is your love.
Your love for it all.
Here is your sickness.
Your bed and your pan
And here is your love
For the woman, the man.
May everyone live,
And may everyone die.
Hello, my love,
And, my love, Goodbye.
And here is the night,
The night has begun
And here is your death
In the heart of your son.
And here is the dawn,
(Until death do us part)
And here is your death,
In your daughter's heart.
May everyone live,
And may everyone die.
Hello, my love,
And, my love, Goodbye.
And here you are hurried,
And here you are gone
And here is the love,
That it's all built upon.
Here is your cross,
Your nails and your hill
And here is your love,
That lists where it will.
May everyone live,
And may everyone die.
Hello, my love,
And my love, Goodbye.
Proud Songster
by Thomas Hardy
The thrushes sing as the sun is going,
And the finches whistle in ones and pairs,
And as it gets dark loud nightingales
In bushes
Pipe, as they can when April wears,
As if all Time were theirs.
These are brand new birds of twelve months' growing,
Which a year ago, or less than twain,
No finches were, nor nightingales,
Nor thrushes,
But only particles of grain,
And earth, and air, and rain.
Here It Is
by Leonard Cohen
Here is your crown
And your seal and rings
And here is your love
For all things.
Here is your cart,
And your cardboard and piss
And here is your love
For all of this.
May everyone live,
And may everyone die.
Hello, my love,
And my love, Goodbye.
Here is your wine,
And your drunken fall
And here is your love.
Your love for it all.
Here is your sickness.
Your bed and your pan
And here is your love
For the woman, the man.
May everyone live,
And may everyone die.
Hello, my love,
And, my love, Goodbye.
And here is the night,
The night has begun
And here is your death
In the heart of your son.
And here is the dawn,
(Until death do us part)
And here is your death,
In your daughter's heart.
May everyone live,
And may everyone die.
Hello, my love,
And, my love, Goodbye.
And here you are hurried,
And here you are gone
And here is the love,
That it's all built upon.
Here is your cross,
Your nails and your hill
And here is your love,
That lists where it will.
May everyone live,
And may everyone die.
Hello, my love,
And my love, Goodbye.
Sunny Winter Day
Jan. 31st, 2019 11:29 amSo far in this part of Kent, we have had no snow and yet I know that around the Paddock Wood area where ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
poliphilo resides they have had a smattering of the white stuff.
As I look out of my windows it is dry and sunny, and as I not been out as yet, probably very cold. No plans to head into town until tomorrow when I shall do the last of my pub food visits and pop in to see my lady friend at Past Sentence.
Last night via a DVD borrowed from the common room I watched "Good Will Hunting". It is one of those films I never bothered to watch until now, and I did enjoy it. I might watch "Vanilla Sky" tonight.
poliphilo resides they have had a smattering of the white stuff. As I look out of my windows it is dry and sunny, and as I not been out as yet, probably very cold. No plans to head into town until tomorrow when I shall do the last of my pub food visits and pop in to see my lady friend at Past Sentence.
Last night via a DVD borrowed from the common room I watched "Good Will Hunting". It is one of those films I never bothered to watch until now, and I did enjoy it. I might watch "Vanilla Sky" tonight.
Cosmic Black Holes
Jan. 31st, 2019 12:36 pmOur universe resides in the centre of a black hole, this theory claims
https://bigthink.com/philip-perry/our-universe-resides-in-the-center-of-a-black-hole-this-theory-claims
https://bigthink.com/philip-perry/our-universe-resides-in-the-center-of-a-black-hole-this-theory-claims
Dark Matter and Dark Energy Explained!
Jan. 31st, 2019 12:42 pmI love these drops of documentary nuggets that pepper YT.
Dark Matter and Dark Energy Explained!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULoc-QUwH74
Dark Matter and Dark Energy Explained!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULoc-QUwH74
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