aka Ken Smith: Story as pushing back against naming

Tuesday June 18, 2024; 9:00 AM EDT

Story as pushing back against naming#

At the end of a long article about his family having hidden away, living in a chicken coop during World War II, in an effort to escape the Nazi persecution that killed millions, Max Heppner reflects on trying to escape the naming others place on victims:#
“It’s been a lifelong challenge not to see myself as a victim. The Dutch word for victim is ‘slachtoffer’ — which is the word for the animals taken to the temple to be slaughtered as an offering to God. I don’t want to see myself as that, as a victim. I’d prefer to see myself as a storyteller.”#
The word feels static, imposed, thoughtless, fatalistic, implying powerlessness. Heppner is right to push back. If he experiences storytelling as one countermeasure to the naming society places on him or on his people, that makes sense. A good story can make something visible, bring something up for reflection, that might otherwise go unnoticed amidst the din of rote language and thoughtless "common sense" of tradition. Even individual words do some of that damaging work.#
Stories, too, can do little more than to reinforce those thoughtless meanings being passed down in a society, like the word victim in Dutch, as he describes it here, implying appeasement to God, a grim vision. But stories can disrupt the senseless common sense of a society too. How do they do that? -- a great question. #
You hear about native American groups in the West who associate places in their home landscape with events that took place there--historical events and even events before the firm remembering of historical time, perhaps mythological events, perhaps versions of old events that have been smoothed into poetry and vision through retelling. You could see these old stories tied to place as lessons to be memorized, as ways to pin oneself to unchanging knowledge and tradition, I suppose, but maybe they have equal power as points of example and deliberation. Reflect on these touchstones of story, a lively humane cultural tradition might say to its young people. These stories offer you something, if you open yourself to their richness. Not meant for memorizing, I'd guess, but meditating. #

Tuesday June 18, 2024; 9:00 AM EDT

Story as pushing back against naming#

At the end of a long article about his family having hidden away, living in a chicken coop during World War II, in an effort to escape the Nazi persecution that killed millions, Max Heppner reflects on trying to escape the naming others place on victims:#
“It’s been a lifelong challenge not to see myself as a victim. The Dutch word for victim is ‘slachtoffer’ — which is the word for the animals taken to the temple to be slaughtered as an offering to God. I don’t want to see myself as that, as a victim. I’d prefer to see myself as a storyteller.”#
The word feels static, imposed, thoughtless, fatalistic, implying powerlessness. Heppner is right to push back. If he experiences storytelling as one countermeasure to the naming society places on him or on his people, that makes sense. A good story can make something visible, bring something up for reflection, that might otherwise go unnoticed amidst the din of rote language and thoughtless "common sense" of tradition. Even individual words do some of that damaging work.#
Stories, too, can do little more than to reinforce those thoughtless meanings being passed down in a society, like the word victim in Dutch, as he describes it here, implying appeasement to God, a grim vision. But stories can disrupt the senseless common sense of a society too. How do they do that? -- a great question. #
You hear about native American groups in the West who associate places in their home landscape with events that took place there--historical events and even events before the firm remembering of historical time, perhaps mythological events, perhaps versions of old events that have been smoothed into poetry and vision through retelling. You could see these old stories tied to place as lessons to be memorized, as ways to pin oneself to unchanging knowledge and tradition, I suppose, but maybe they have equal power as points of example and deliberation. Reflect on these touchstones of story, a lively humane cultural tradition might say to its young people. These stories offer you something, if you open yourself to their richness. Not meant for memorizing, I'd guess, but meditating. #

Last update: Tuesday June 18, 2024; 4:36 PM EDT.