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Wabi-Sabi as an Effective A(n)esthetic in the
Teaching & Learning Process
Mike CourtneyIndiana University
EMBRACING IMPERFECTION AND
THE CRAFT OF “THINKING WRONG”
To enjoy good taste we only have to decide for ourselves what good sense is.
-- Jean de la Bruyere as paraphrased by Donald Richie
Don’t “cut any new channels of consciousness but simply dig deeper into old ones that have become silted in with the debris of thoughts grown stale and platitudes too often repeated.”
-- R. Pirsig
The struggle: Do you teach students what they need to know with the foresight that [it] will blossom into a romantic awareness? Or do you teach the romantic viewpoint and hope that a love of the idea of the subject evolves into a fascination with the parts that make it operate?
-- S. Johnson
You’re in the scene, not just watching it anymore, and the sense of presence is overwhelming.
The best [pathways] always connect nowhere with nowhere and have an alternate that gets you there quicker… the main skill is to keep from getting lost.
-- R. Pirsig
Searching is often nonlinear and iterative
Learners:
• exhibit mental flexibility and creativity• are persistent • suspend judgment on value until the larger context
is better understood• are adaptable, flexible, and recognize ambiguity is
beneficial • synthesize ideas
Instruction is imperfect…
Students are imperfect…
Assignments are imperfect…
Writing Haiku
EXERCISE ONE
Japanese aesthetics is…
a net of associations composed of listings or jottings, connected intuitively, that fills in a background and renders the subject visible.
-- D. Richie
We should not strive for logical conclusions. Rather, we ought to define those perceptions and variances…through a style that conveys something of the very uncertainty of their description.
-- D. Richie
Follow the brush, allow it to lead.
It is the dismissal of linear structure, the neglect of logical method that allows this progression.
-- D. Richie
Be more concerned with process than with product…
with the actual construction of a self than with self-expression.
-- D. Richie
Things as they are, or Nature itself.
Nature should be our model, we are to regard it, to learn from it.
-- D. Richie
If man were never to fade away… but lingered on forever in the world, how things would lose their power to move us. The most precious thing in life is its uncertainty.
– Yoshida Kenko (1283-1340)
Wabi Sabifinds beauty and harmony in what is simple, imperfect, natural, modest, and mysterious.
It can be a little dark, but it is also warm and comfortable. It may best be understood as a feeling, rather than as an idea. – M. Reibstein
Four Basic Tenets of Wabi Sabi
• Everything is in flux• To embody and suggest
impermanence• Peaceful contemplation of
transience• Appreciation brings holistic
perspective
– A. Juniper
Sabi is an aesthetic term rooted in a given concern – it is concerned with chronology with time and its effects, with product.
Wabi is a more philosophical concept, a quality not attached merely to a given object. It is concerned with manner, with process, with direction.
– D. Richie
Video:Wabi-sabi: The Beauty of Imperfection(Rachel Nabors)
https://youtu.be/zd9fVvVQUVs
An acceptance of the natural order of things.
Learners understand: “yeah, it’s not perfect, but it’s useful and this beautiful in and of itself.”
Visualizing Haiku
EXERCISE TWO
The Great Cover-Up
EXERCISE THREE
