[MR] Peerage questions

[Nicole Spaun]

Sir Salamandra,

> It is obvious that we are looking at the same set of facts and coming to different conclusions. Perhaps with this friendly dialog, we will come to a closer agreement.
>

Wow, I agree! ;)  Seriously though, I’ve learned much through this.  And though we may not agree in the end, at least we can understand where the differences come from. 


> I don't view the peer/associate relationship as a clique, and you apparently do. I view it as a mentor/student relationship with a strong personal bond of two-way loyalty.
>

No, I don’t view that relationship as a clique.  I view the various households as cliques.  And the orders too, to an extent.  Please don’t be insulted since the word only means ‘an exclusive group of people who identify with each other and are a subset of a larger group’, which is precisely what they are, really.  It’s absolutely period, too.              


> Or, do you mean that the peers are being unchivalrous because someone chooses not to take advantage of the opportunities the peers provide? If so, why? The peers make the offer to teach one on one to their associates, if the offer is refused, why blame the peers?
>
 
What I view as unfair is the notion that it is acceptable for it to take unassociated individuals longer to become a peer.  I clearly understand your points about peers needing to know who you are to vote on you or not- well said.  But _accepting_ the idea that people must work harder just because they’re not associated as 'the way things should be' seems imbalanced.  Maybe they never found a compatible peer who didn’t already have many associates.  Or maybe they were so busy doing an art or science or service they didn't stop to pick one peer.  So it reads to me like you’re saying that if you don’t pick one peer, you’ve got to work harder and that’s as it should be.  Which is where I disagree a bit.  I firmly believe that you learn best from many teachers rather than just one. 


> Do you think we don't go looking for people to teach? I assure you that
there are few things as exciting as finding that special someone who would
make a good associate. 
>

With all due respect, perhaps you missed the next few lines where I stated that many many peers actively seek out students/talent and that’s what keeps me in the SCA, knowing there are such generous folks about.  Sorry for the correction, but I want to clear that up right away.


Elsewhere I said…
>>I'm not saying merit doesn't enter into it but you said yourself that you have to do many things to get noticed to get the attention of the peerages. Those things to get one noticed are considered "campaigning" by many. That's the notion in a nutshell. 
>>

And then You said:
> Well, the notion is wrong. If many people have it, then many people are wrong about it.    
>

Respectfully, I still disagree. True story… one person teaches classes at nearly every event they can attend.  They have the confidence and guts to put themselves out there and teach time and time again.  They allow for people to find their class in the class schedule and the classes are generally well attended.  Another person also has the confidence to teach but he doesn’t teach as frequently, and yet every time he does he posts to the baronial, canton, kingdom, etc e-lists saying, “You're invited to my class at the event”… even though all 20 or so other teachers haven’t sent out such announcements.  Compare the two and focus on the latter and the contrast.  It could be due to him being mildly naive and not realizing that everyone else isn’t advertising their classes the same way.  It could be due to insecurity and a fear that no one will attend his class.  It could be his topic is fairly exotic (like most of what we study is normal?) that he wants it broadly advertised since few teach on that subject.  OR it could be effectively an “oh oh Mr. Kotter, Mr. Kotter” look-at-me statement by someone vying for a title.  Especially when compared to the first individual.  While we would all like to lock onto the more favorable light provided by some of those explanations, you can not flatly rule out the possibility that the person is campaigning and just aiming for the award, rather than vying to be deserving of the award.  It is not wrong to believe that people can, and do, seek awards for the wrong reasons sometimes because they are out there and we've all seen one or two of them.  There will always be a few rotten apples around and we can only hope they lose their worms and freshen up with time or with discouragement from others.  I come from a barony where it took, on average, 4 years for a person to get their AoA! That really discouraged the award seekers.  But I wouldn’t recommend doing that in general since it affects the worthy too.         

There is a fine line between confidence and cockiness.  Our love of history means we know about hubris and have most likely seen it in action.  Based on my experience, I’d say that, within the peerages, confidence belongs and cockiness is discouraged.  One l conversation with most peers and you've no doubt about their confident humility.  Yet on the way up to achieving that balance, many people may very well, intentionally or not, cross that line between confidence and cockiness.  And when that happens, it may appear as if they are working with the wrong intentions or goals.  That they're policking, as you called it.           


> You may take offense at my comments that some people would not be a good fit for me. I will try to explain. I am the person I am. I teach the way I teach. I have interests and expertise in some areas, and not in others. I can adapt to another person's needs to a certain degree, but some people just would not learn from me. Others find my way of teaching to be perfect for them. That is what I mean by "a good fit".
> 

I am not offended and I completely agree (though I’m respectfully curious why you thought I would be offended).  As a bit of background, I have a PhD so I know what finding a good match with a good advisor is like.  I was at a school where it was not a good match, so I transferred.  It wasn’t easy, but I knew the match wasn’t working.  The new advisor and I had a good fit so things went well enough that I’m now a doc.  Want to talk about understanding the meaning of a good mentor relationship?  I can think of only a few other examples in the non-SCA world (military, law enforcement, and tradesmen spring to mind) where such mentorship matters so much.

It is precisely because I understand how strong that relationship is that I haven’t entered into something similar in the SCA.  All of the students my advisor taught all learned to think alike.  We all learned to do everything his way.  He gave us the freedom to observe how other professors do things but, since we represented him, we had to do things his way while we were his students.  I’ve seen the same thing with squires and apprentices.  Once we were cut loose (ie, graduated), we were then free to mash styles together and go with what worked best for us considering our own strengths and abilities.  This was true for most of the professors.  There were a few profs who let the students try things based on learning from other profs, but I must say that those lenient ones were the same profs who were also rarely there for their students, off doing research for months, on sabbatical, etc.  Knowing what I know about that kind of mentor relationship, therefore, in the SCA I would rather be able to observe how _many_ people do things and implement what I learn from all of those sources.  I’m not trying to come up with a new way of doing something, nor do I believe I could do something better though I'll try, but I can, and must, come up with the best way to do something using my skills and abilities.  To ensure I do it the best way that _I_ can, versus how it works best for someone else.  Benefiting from the knowledge from many people instead of becoming a mini-me of a specific one.        

There’s definitely a disconnect going on where you may believe that I’m against the idea of peers and associates bonded together.  I’m not against that; quite the opposite is that I’m in favour of people forming tight bonds with multiple peers.  Hence the “footloose and politic free” comment.  The one thing I am against is people condoning how much longer it takes the unassociated to be recognized.  That seems backwards to me.  And I’m not whining because I haven’t been so recognized-- I’ve been in 4 kingdoms in 16 years so I know I’m off the radar screen and that’s fine with me.  Because I truly believe I’ve been blessed by moving kingdoms so often… of having the perspective of, say, how events are run in the West vs the East.  How feasts in the Mid were usually chaos at seating time versus how Atlantians use self-filled seating charts so it goes oh so smoothly!  And let’s not even get into learning about the differences in fighting styles or arts presentations across the kingdoms!  Looking back, I wouldn’t trade those experiences for any award or recognition.  But I do know people who have stayed put, been working hard, are fun to be around, and still haven’t received the recognition that people who associated have received by now… and that is what has inspired many of my questions and statements.

And yes, I remember mimeograph machines ;P
Cheers,
~Bianca    


~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~:~
 Lady Bianca di Bari,  'Per bend wavy sable and azure, a comet bendwise inverted and a comet bendwise argent'