ABSTRACT
In previous chapters I have discussed subject creativity both in terms of teachers’ and students’ activities in the classroom. There are, however, occasions when subject creativity seems to resist in spite of our various attempts to use mysteries, exercises and other similar techniques. Often this resistance goes hand in hand with ego resistance and the whole creative process stalls. What emerges in its place is the insistence of old well-cherished pieces of ‘truth’ which the student or teacher for various reasons cannot relinquish. In fact, sometimes this insistence becomes repetitive in a way the student or teacher is not aware of. When discussing repetition, Lacan described a colleague who stood up at every meeting and exclaimed exactly the same thing (as if it was for the first time). Most of us have had to sit through similar ‘speeches’. Students recognise when a teacher becomes stuck in an old argument which s/he fondly airs whenever the opportunity arises. Meaningful looks are exchanged (‘here we go again. . . .’). The teacher on the other hand seems blissfully unaware of the reiteration. Repetition comes in many shapes and guises, such as repetitive dreams, neurotic symptoms, rituals and repetitive thought patterns. Even music (jingles for example) can repeat in our minds over and over again. Repetition can be pleasurable (football slogans and chanting during a match). It can also be irritating as, for instance, when mulling over an embarrassing event. Repetition can even be destructive, such as when individuals repeat the same patterns in relationships, choosing violent partners again and again (brilliant students can repeatedly
sabotage their results by failing to hand in assignments on time; similarly brilliant teachers can produce the same destructive classroom dramas every year). Repeating old given truths would seem to indicate that the subject cannot forget or release this information. Forgetting is as essential to learning as remembering! Luria (1968), for instance, described the case of a man who could not forget. S earned his living performing memory feats on the stage. He stored memories as pictures, and while accurate, he claimed that pictures would ‘jam’ his mind. He was troubled by his recurring memories and spent a great deal of time attempting to create strategies helping him to forget. We must be able to forget certain information so as to allow for the integration of new information – memory is not limitless. Trauma survivors with PTSD also suffer from the inability to forget. In this chapter I intend to investigate why creativity stalls, what causes repetition (the ego, the subject or both) and if there are any means to inoculating ourselves and our students against this rigidity. I hope during the course of this investigation that new information about the mechanisms of subject creativity will emerge, albeit through an inverted analysis. Research in the previous chapter indicated that metaphor is involved in creativity. Is there any evidence pointing to the lack of metaphor being involved in memory repetition or rigidity of discourse? Further, in what way does metaphor facilitate creativity and can a lack of signifiers affect the creative process negatively, as suggested by Antonio Damasio?
