Shadow Work

Ivan Illich

• Editore: Marion Boyars
• Anno: 1981
• ISBN:
  9780714521404
• Argomento: Ciencias sociales
• Categoria: Sociología

In five essays, followed by extensive notes and bibliographies, Ivan Illich embarks on a major historical and sociological analysis of modern man's economic existence. He traces and analyzes options which surpass the conventional political 'right-left' and the technological 'soft-hard' alternatives and presents the concept of the 'vernacular' domain: "...to name those acts of competence, lust or concern that we want to defend from measurement by Chicago Boys or Socialist Commissars...the preparation of food and the shaping of language, childbirth and recreation, without implying either a privatized activity akin to the housework of modern women, a hobby or an irrational and primitive procedure." Illich deals provocatively with the controlling uses of language and science and the valuation of women and work. Drawing on unfamiliar historical sources, he lays bare the roots of much of the social ordering which affects industrial man: his own creation, but one which, at the same time, connives at his own oppression.

NOTES AND BIBLIOGRAPHIES

NOTES ON ‘THE WAR AGAINST SUBSISTENCE’

IN connection with my comments on Nebrija, consult for further readings on the history of taught mother tongue:

HEISING, Karl, Muttersprache, ein romanistischer Beitrag zur Genesis eines deutschen Wortes und zur Erstehung der deutsch-franzoesischen Sprachgrenze, in: Mundartforschung, XXIII, 3, pp. 144–174.

DAUBE, Anna, Der Aufstieg der Muttersprache im deutschen Denken des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts, Deutsche Forschungen, Vol. 34, Verlag Diesterweg, 1940. A mediocre doctoral thesis, but a repository of quotations.

BOSSONG, Georg, Probleme der Uebersetzung wissenschaftlicher Werke aus dem Arabischen in das Altspanische zur Zeit Alfonsos des Weisen, Niemeyer Verlag, Tuebingen, 1979.

AUERBACH, Erich, Literatursprache und Publikum in der lateinischen Spaetantike und im Mittelalter, Francke Verlag, Berlin. Especially Chapter IV.

TANLA-KISHANI, Bongasu, African Cultural Identity through Western Philosophies and Languages, in: Présence Africanie 98, second trimester 1967, p. 127. “The ordinary man on the streets of Africa can at times be led to think that one is only bilingual when one can manipulate two European languages, since African languages are graded as dialects, vernacular, patois.”

JOSTEN, Dirk, Sprachvorbild und Sprachnorm im Urteil des 16, und 17. Jahrhunderts. Sprachlandschaftliche Prioritaeten, Sprachautoritaeten, Sprachimmanente Argumentation, in: Europaeische Hochschulschriften, R 1, 152, Bern/Frankfurt, Lang, 1976. Gives the contemporary opinions of German thinkers.

BAHNER, W., Beitraege zum Sprachbewusstsein in der spanischen Literatur des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts, Berlin, Ruettner Verlag, 1956.

GUIDE TO THE STUDY OF HUGH OF ST. VICTOR AND THE MECHANICAL SCIENCES

THIS essay is based on one of twelve lectures offered at Kassel, Germany, during the 1979–80 winter semester. The purpose of the lectures was to sharpen the students’ awareness of the limitations in contemporary thought and feeling which make a real understanding of subsistence-oriented cultures well-nigh impossible. The method used was to confront students with medieval texts selected principally from the second quarter of the twelfth century.

The essay was then written for a totally different purpose, to appear in a reader edited by Valentina Borremans. There it will be printed with essays by Karl Polanyi, Lewis Mumford, André Gorz, and others, all concerned with the radical criticism of tools. As an appendix to this volume, Borremans’ Guide to Convivial Tools will be reprinted. This work includes more than 450 modern reference tools dealing with science or technology by people.

The following guide to the study of Hugh of St. Victor and the mechanical arts in the Middle Ages is not provided to back up the statements of my essay. Rather, it is an invitation extended to some unknown reader, possessing a general knowledge of medieval history, who wishes to explore those of my remarks which strike him or her as worthwhile.

Biography:	J. TAYLOR, The Origin and Early Life of Hugh of St. Victor: an evaluation of the tradition. Notre Dame (Indiana) 1957. 70 pp. (Texts and Studies in the History of Medieval Education vol. 5).
Texts:	Opera Omnia. Vol. 1–3. Paris 1854–79 (Migne, Patrologia Latina vol. 175–77).
	Opera propaedeutic a. Practica geometriae. De grammatica, Epitome Dindimi in philosophiam. Ed. R. BARON. Notre Dame (Indiana) 1966. 247 pp. (University of Notre Dame Publications in Medieval Studies 20). Note: pp. 167–207 give the Latin critical text of the Dialogue with Dindimus, pp. 209–47 fifty explanatory notes by the editor.
	Didascalicon de studio legendi. A critical text. Ed. by C. H. BUTTIMER. Washington 1939. 160 pp. (The Catholic University Press, Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Latin vol. 10.) The English edition of this text brings the critical apparatus and the notes added in the introduction up to a later date: The Didascalicon of Hugh of St. Victor. A medieval guide to the arts. Translated from the Latin with an introduction and Notes by J. TAYLOR, New York, London (1961) (Records of civilization, sources and studies.)
His thought:	R. BARON, since his doctoral thesis in 1957 has written a dozen contributions through which Hugh of St. Victor can be understood in an entirely new way. His doctoral thesis deals with Science and Wisdom in Hugh: Science et sagesse chez H. de S.V. Paris, Lethielleu 1957 (complete bibliography pp. 231–63) is the best introduction. M. GRABMANN, Hugo von St. Victor und Peter Abelard. Ein Gedenkblatt zum 800 jaehr. Todestag zweier Denkergestalten des Mittelalters, in: Theologie und Glaube 34 (1942) pp. 241–9.
	E. LICCARO, L’Uomo e la natura nel pensiero di Ugo di S.V. in Atti del 3. Congresso internazionale di filosofia medievale, Milano 1966 pp. 305–13. B. Lacroix, H. de S.V. et les conditions du savoir au moyen age, in: An E. Gilson Tribute, Milwaukee 1959 (Marquette University Studies) pp. 118–34.
Dictionary art:	Both excellent for a first orientation: DICTIONNAIRE DE SPIRITUALITE, Beauchesne Paris 1969, art H. de St. V. by R. BARON and DICTIONNAIRE DE THEOLOGIE CATHOLIQUE, Lethouzey, 1930, art: H. de S.-V. by F. VERNET.

Originality of Hugh’s Concept of Remedy: L. M. DE RIJK, Some Notes on the Twelfth Century Topic of the Three (Four) Human Evils and of Science, Virtue and Techniques as their Remedies, in: VIVARIUM, Leiden, 5 (1967) pp. 8–15. Collates the known twelfth-century texts and compares them.

Originality of Hugh’s Division of the Sciences: Bernard BISCHOFF, Eine verschollene Einteilung der Wissenschaften in: Archives d’Histoire Doctrinale et Littéraire du Moyen Age 25 (1959) pp...