Just to clarify that in my thesis I criticised in details the youtube  
method to which LET was transformed from autoethnography.

Re- This is what watching real human beings, being with one another, (in
real time or on film),

Real human beings cannot be reduced to films.  For a start because  
filming misses on smell (very important), taste and touch.  It merely  
covers seeing and hearing.  Hardly sufficient.  Also, there is the  
question of
human behaviour in front of camera.  Not asking permission is  
unethical and I think illegal.  People like to be portrayed favourable  
in front of a camera and this hinders natural behaviour.
I offered an alternative of dialectically enquiring-within-b/logging  
into the question, how do I lead a more fulfilling, meaningful and  
secure existence and relationships in, with and towards the world for  
myself?  I argue this method to be more profound and analytic in the  
phenomenological analysis and processing of ontolological experiences  
and values. I discuss this AR method in details and try to develop it  
into postdoc project that will popularise it and legitimate it further.

The thesis was a very practical suggestion of a dialectical AR method  
that I think is superior to LET in the studying of human existence and  
human subject.

In 2009 was told by an Internal Reader who was reading a previous and  
very different draft why I criticise LET for doing something that it  
did not intend to.  But then in the LET homepage, it is described as  
an approach to human existence.  My thesis tries to transform it into  
a superior 'AR approach to human existence'.  One that better delves  
into, identifies and processes ontological experiences of human being  
in the world.
Alon

Quoting "Salyers, Sara M" <[log in to unmask]>:

> Dear Alon and All...
>
> Alon wrote:
> "My main disagreement with LET is with the point that verbal   
> language cannot express ontology that therefore requires   
> audio-visual youtube clips.  Then,
> the problem of course is that audio-visual clips only cover seeing   
> and hearing.  What about smell, taste and touch?  I think efforts   
> need to be made to express oneself verbally.
> ...I keep seeing the most amazing examples of creative writing and   
> the most amazing creative writing tutors."
>
>
> Boy, this conversation is forcing me to to reflect and clarify more   
> and more deeply! It is very hard work and I thank you for making me   
> do it!  I think, as one who is profoundly in love with the beauty   
> and power of language, I can empathize with what you say.  Actually,  
>  in terms of precise definition, I agree with you - but in terms of   
> what you *mean* by what you say, I take a different view.  If   
> Ontology is "A science or study of being: specifically, a branch of   
> metaphysics relating to the nature and relations of being; a   
> particular system according to which problems of the nature of being  
>  are investigated; first philosophy", then, ontology is absolutely   
> expressed in words. In fact, there is no such thing as inquiry   
> *without* language.
>
> If, however, we are appropriating the word ontology to mean, not the  
>  inquiry into 'being-ness' but being-ness itself, then the case is   
> somewhat different. (You notice that I do not use the word   
> existence. This is because 'existence' does not convey the qualities  
>  of presence and awareness, for example, that we assign to   
> ontological inquiry. Which is why, of course, ontology is so often   
> 'reassigned' to describe being-ness.) Being-ness is a clumsy,   
> cobbled together word, and quite ugly; but substituting the word   
> 'ontology' is a misappropriation of existing language to meet a new   
> purpose, something that makes the process of distinction,   
> articulation and reflection extremely difficult. We do need a new   
> word but until we have one, I shall use being-ness.  As we know,   
> words describe experience and assign meaning to that experience;   
> i.e. they are descriptive and interpretive. Words 'name' and thereby  
>  describe experience, (never entirely adequately), but they cannot   
> *be* the experience. Being, just like sunshine, roses or starlight   
> has no meaning that we do not assign through language; (we see, we   
> feel, we name and we interpret). Being and naming are two different   
> things. We do these two things, describe experience and assign   
> meaning, congruently, fluently and seamlessly, which is why we   
> confuse the two more often than not; that is, we mistake assigned   
> meaning, or interpretation, for experience to such a degree that it   
> is almost part of the human condition. Here's an illustration:
>
> Suppose you are stopped in traffic when look to your right and see   
> the driver of the car next to you - staring at you with a look of   
> absolute venom. You say to your friend who is driving, 'That man in   
> the car beside us looked at me with pure hatred'. What happened,   
> though you did not know it, was that you looked at a man in the car   
> beside you at the same moment when he turned his head toward you. He  
>  seemed to be staring - but he did not really see you at all because  
>  he was thinking about how to tell his wife that he had just been   
> fired. You *could* have described the experience by saying, 'That   
> man just looked in my direction with a terrible expression on his   
> face.' But you instantly, and unconsciously, 'named' and assigned a   
> meaning to his expression, one that was personal and hostile. It was  
>  to that meaning that you reacted. (Notice that the meaning you   
> assign to the experience exists in and arises only out of the   
> language you use for your interpretation.) You did not notice the   
> process by which you have now come to own and internalize an   
> experience of being stared at with hatred by a frightening stranger.  
>  Your brain will react to the meaning as to an actual experience and  
>  will produce the appropriate chemicals, so that you will feel  
> shaken  and perhaps upset for some time afterwards, thus confirming  
> a 'real'  encounter. But what happened actually occurred, not in  
> experience,  but only in the naming of what you saw and the meaning  
> you derived  from that naming.
>
> Thus what happens when we (daily), mistake meaning for experience,   
> is that our interpretations create our descriptions of the world   
> which, in turn, generate new ideas which create further description…  
>  or to put that more simply, our 'stories' become self-referenced,   
> grounded in and sustained by their own internal consistency rather   
> than by living experience. Since human beings live in stories, this   
> substitution of interpretation for experience can, and sometimes   
> does, have deadly results. Please forgive me, I mean no disrespect   
> or criticism by it, if I take another example from one of your posts  
>  where you describe the psychological anatomy of a racist. (This one  
>  doesn't have any 'deadly' results but I think it shows the   
> possibility of a common progression.) Your postulation of the racist  
>  character is entirely consistent with your description of racism;   
> this in turn is supported by a good deal of evidence from other   
> sources. (Not all the evidence, however, and not all sources.) In   
> other words, your analysis is entirely self-consistent - but it also  
>  puts meaning in place of experience and then self-references. A   
> racist is not an idea but a person. You have described 'the racist'   
> and then presented that story as if it were an existential reality,   
> i.e. in place of a human being who thinks feels and acts in ways   
> that we would interpret as racist. You have analyzed that story and   
> drawn sound, compelling conclusions from the evidence contained   
> therein. But as this is self-referenced, it's fundamentally flawed.   
> Here is an amazing thing about it, for me. *I* found your story both  
>  satisfying compelling. It put the racist firmly in the camp of the   
> 'other', flawed by design, less healthy than 'us', and definitely   
> less human. And I have to say that at visceral level I really liked   
> that! But then, that is precisely what racism does - dehumanizes the  
>  'other' while vindicating 'us'. So now I can see that the story   
> cannot be true because enjoyment of 'othering' - even those who   
> offend my own humanity because they 'other' and then oppress on the   
> basis of class, race, sex, belief etc. - demonstrates that the   
> operant factor is as present in me as it is in 'racists' and, in   
> fact you and everyone else!
>
> What has that to do with what can and cannot live in words, with AR   
> and Living Theory? Just this. The only way to avoid the kind of   
> inauthenticity that lives in the substitution of meaning for   
> experience, is to understand, absolutely clearly, that words are   
> *not* and never can be the experiences they describe; that you must   
> live, and live in, the experience that you describe; that you must   
> return to the experience again and again to test your own   
> description. Thus, my own experience of enjoying the 'portrait of a   
> racist' and then reflecting on that enjoyment was all that pulled   
> *me* up short; there were no flaws in the internal consistency of   
> your story and analysis. This is why we have to ring-fence   
> unfiltered experience in ways that constantly bring us back to it,   
> that remind us that description is not the 'thing-in-itself', so   
> that we can stop describing and self referencing our own stories and  
>  begin to give the being-ness that precedes description and meaning   
> its true place.
>
> This is what watching real human beings, being with one another, (in  
>  real time or on film), does for us. We can allow ourselves to see   
> and feel, just the way we might turn our faces up to the sun or the   
> rain. Then we can look at one another with love or wonder and say,   
> 'What *was* that?' And begin to talk. And we will know that the love  
>  and wonder that we write and talk about are what-they-are, and are   
> beyond our words. And we will also know that it is wonderful to   
> reflect, to talk and to write about them so that we can share and   
> grow from the experience. We will also know that the words and the   
> experience are not the same thing. The being-ness lives in the   
> experience; the reflection (an image of the real thing only), lives   
> in the words. This is one of the things that makes subjective, LT,   
> and our sharing of the experience in its being-ness (on film if   
> that's all we have available) so powerful.
>
> love
> Sara
>
>