3 ms·

Metatextual Literacy

56 points by dado3212 6mo ago

bananaflag 6mo ago
> So Greg might still be a twat, but the one thing that you actually can't accuse him of is obliviousness towards his own behaviour. I don't think so. The author of the blog projects their own view onto the situation. As they say, when they were a kid they took it at face value. So Greg could also draw the situation without inferring that he is being a twat.
- unignorant 6mo ago
  I agree, the more likely psychology of the Greg character is that he doesn't understand the way he presents himself in the pictures damns his surface level framing. You can really go quite far with more sophisticated versions of this technique in fiction -- Ishiguro's Remains of the Day is my favorite example!
  - QuercusMax 6mo ago
    Like half the posters on AmIAnAsshole-type forums, Greg doesn't realize he's an ass. But he's also a kid. Adults should know better.
- WhrRTheBaboons 6mo ago
  I agree. For me, it's much funnier when read as Greg not being aware of the issue. It's the same idea as Dennis in It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia being oblivious that he's acting like a psychopath. Doesn't stop a lot of people from pushing a fan-theory that he is indeed a psycho and tries to hide it - which to me ruins the joke completely.
deleted 6mo ago
[deleted]
throwanem 6mo ago
The proper term for those whom the author describes is subliterate. The author can't really help herself either, sad to say. Losing the Tiktok habit would be a good start. But I get that that is like asking my parents' generation not to smoke cigarettes, or mine not to moralize intolerably. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/subliterate https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/subliterate
- dado3212 6mo ago
  She’s describing something much more specific than subliteracy.
  - throwanem 6mo ago
    She is describing one of the ways in which that condition manifests.
- lo_zamoyski 6mo ago
  > The proper term for those whom the author describes is subliterate. Indeed, literacy is is the ability to read, and reading is interpretation. Interpretation requires context - of the domain, the culture, and the text - and resolving possible competing interpretations using a combination of charity and probability. Even the concept of "literal meaning" is problematic, because words don't mean anything by themselves; they requires disambiguation and contextual resolution of meaning. So really all you can have are more or less competent readings. Pedantry is, therefore, arguably subliterate.
  - throwanem 6mo ago
    You have wholeheartedly defended literacy in this one specific example, on the basis that literacy in general is actually impossible. Now I really have seen everything.
    - lo_zamoyski 5mo ago
      How on earth did you come to that conclusion?!
perching_aix 6mo ago
> Taking the text at face value, Greg Heffley has an irony-tinged self awareness of his own shittiness. I'm not familiar with this book, but just the excerpts shown really mismatch the NYT quote in terms of their self-commentary. The blogpost supposes that Greg is aware he's being a twat, and so somewhat mocks himself for it through the drawings and diary entries. I can accept (and even find it obvious) this applying to the NYT guy, but not to Greg. Greg just comes off even worse for this, not like he'd be ashamed about it at all. More like proud in case he is aware, or indeed oblivious, if he is not aware. This is because despite the blogpost author's assertions otherwise, I really don't find it a slamdunk conclusion he'd be self-aware about being a "twat", or that he'd understand why he'd be a "twat". On the contrary, the diary entries come across as quite the on the nose lesson in not being obnoxious (i.e. bad writing), completely upending such an interpretation. I notice the word "literacy" thrown around a lot lately, in part by myself, but there's an inherent dishonesty to this. Language does not have absolute meaning, and you cannot read another person's mind. Just because you interpret literal works of art differently, I don't believe that necessarily qualifies you as illiterate. These are not the same qualities. Just the other day I was discussing shows with a colleague, and I was convinced that by willfully skipping on large swaths of the medium, he lacked the genre literacy to "correctly" interpret various motifs. In the end, it turned out he actually experiences shows very differently to me. For him, self insertion is simply never a thing. It was a complete whiplash to figure that out, and everything made a lot more sense in retrospect afterwards. I still maintain he misunderstands the medium significantly, but I no longer see it to be a matter of a gap in literacy. It's a genuine difference in how the medium can address him. It becomes a difference in knowing what someone meant, and actually taking it that way. He can only do (and can be expected to do) so much to bridge such a gap.
- throwanem 6mo ago
  [flagged]
  - perching_aix 6mo ago
    [dead]
- 6mo ago

56 points by dado3212 6mo ago

> So Greg might still be a twat, but the one thing that you actually can't accuse him of is obliviousness towards his own behaviour. I don't think so. The author of the blog projects their own view onto the situation. As they say, when they were a kid they took it at face value. So Greg could also draw the situation without inferring that he is being a twat.

unignorant 6mo ago
I agree, the more likely psychology of the Greg character is that he doesn't understand the way he presents himself in the pictures damns his surface level framing. You can really go quite far with more sophisticated versions of this technique in fiction -- Ishiguro's Remains of the Day is my favorite example!
- QuercusMax 6mo ago
  Like half the posters on AmIAnAsshole-type forums, Greg doesn't realize he's an ass. But he's also a kid. Adults should know better.
WhrRTheBaboons 6mo ago
I agree. For me, it's much funnier when read as Greg not being aware of the issue. It's the same idea as Dennis in It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia being oblivious that he's acting like a psychopath. Doesn't stop a lot of people from pushing a fan-theory that he is indeed a psycho and tries to hide it - which to me ruins the joke completely.

deleted 6mo ago

[deleted]

throwanem 6mo ago

The proper term for those whom the author describes is subliterate. The author can't really help herself either, sad to say. Losing the Tiktok habit would be a good start. But I get that that is like asking my parents' generation not to smoke cigarettes, or mine not to moralize intolerably. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/subliterate https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/subliterate

dado3212 6mo ago
She’s describing something much more specific than subliteracy.
- throwanem 6mo ago
  She is describing one of the ways in which that condition manifests.
lo_zamoyski 6mo ago
> The proper term for those whom the author describes is subliterate. Indeed, literacy is is the ability to read, and reading is interpretation. Interpretation requires context - of the domain, the culture, and the text - and resolving possible competing interpretations using a combination of charity and probability. Even the concept of "literal meaning" is problematic, because words don't mean anything by themselves; they requires disambiguation and contextual resolution of meaning. So really all you can have are more or less competent readings. Pedantry is, therefore, arguably subliterate.
- throwanem 6mo ago
  You have wholeheartedly defended literacy in this one specific example, on the basis that literacy in general is actually impossible. Now I really have seen everything.
  - lo_zamoyski 5mo ago
    How on earth did you come to that conclusion?!

perching_aix 6mo ago

> Taking the text at face value, Greg Heffley has an irony-tinged self awareness of his own shittiness. I'm not familiar with this book, but just the excerpts shown really mismatch the NYT quote in terms of their self-commentary. The blogpost supposes that Greg is aware he's being a twat, and so somewhat mocks himself for it through the drawings and diary entries. I can accept (and even find it obvious) this applying to the NYT guy, but not to Greg. Greg just comes off even worse for this, not like he'd be ashamed about it at all. More like proud in case he is aware, or indeed oblivious, if he is not aware. This is because despite the blogpost author's assertions otherwise, I really don't find it a slamdunk conclusion he'd be self-aware about being a "twat", or that he'd understand why he'd be a "twat". On the contrary, the diary entries come across as quite the on the nose lesson in not being obnoxious (i.e. bad writing), completely upending such an interpretation. I notice the word "literacy" thrown around a lot lately, in part by myself, but there's an inherent dishonesty to this. Language does not have absolute meaning, and you cannot read another person's mind. Just because you interpret literal works of art differently, I don't believe that necessarily qualifies you as illiterate. These are not the same qualities. Just the other day I was discussing shows with a colleague, and I was convinced that by willfully skipping on large swaths of the medium, he lacked the genre literacy to "correctly" interpret various motifs. In the end, it turned out he actually experiences shows very differently to me. For him, self insertion is simply never a thing. It was a complete whiplash to figure that out, and everything made a lot more sense in retrospect afterwards. I still maintain he misunderstands the medium significantly, but I no longer see it to be a matter of a gap in literacy. It's a genuine difference in how the medium can address him. It becomes a difference in knowing what someone meant, and actually taking it that way. He can only do (and can be expected to do) so much to bridge such a gap.

throwanem 6mo ago
[flagged]
- perching_aix 6mo ago
  [dead]
6mo ago