Hmm, I'm not sure I buy this. At the very least, I think it's a very strange way to phrase it if that's the case. Wouldn't you think it was odd if a woman spoke to you about the "unfortunate fact of your femininity"? Or the "unfortunate fact of your sex"?
As I said, I'll usually ignore a clumsily phrased sentence, but it's hard for me to see this phrasing as not suggesting something deeper than a discomfort with division. Especially as she's insisting that these superficial things divide us.
Yeah, as I mentioned to somebody else, I have the advantage of having had a few other conversations with Mrs. C. So I have a little more insight into her thinking. But even without that, it's hard for me to see how the "unfortunate" in "unfortunate skin" doesn't modify "skin".
See my comment above. Your interpretation would make sense if "unfortunate skin" wasn't followed by "and caste divisions'.
Having some charge from other interactions may not help in an unbiased understanding of her sentence. We have to admit that we have some of the same human flaws as we so easily perceive in others. (Myself very much included).
One common flaw in those following neo-progressive ideology is the inability to take a peek at things through any lens but the first and most emotionally driven one that triggers them, and then seek to defend that first take. It's a human thing, but they generally don't care to try to compensate for that bias.
"Having some charge from other interactions may not help in an unbiased understanding of her sentence"
It's not charge, I've spoken to her. I know my interpretation of the sentence is correct not because I'm triggered, but because I've spoken to her about it in other conversations. That's why I said I have an advantage. With no other context, I can see how the sentence could be interpreted as you interpret it. I have that context.
You're totally right. A common flaw in all thinking is the inability to look at things through any lens but the first or the most emotionally driven. I'm fully aware that I'm susceptible to that flaw too. But isn't it also what you're doing here?
I read it the same way, and even upon multiple re-readings still do. Here's the phrasing, in multiple interpretive parses:
1: "the fact of our (unfortunate ((skin and caste) divisions)) is not one of them."
>> the fact of our unfortunate skin divisions is not one of them
>> the fact of our unfortunate caste divisions is not one of them
2: "the fact of our (unfortunate skin) and (caste divisions) is not one of them."
>> the fact of our unfortunate skin is not one of them
>> the fact of our caste divisions is not one of them
3: "the fact of our (unfortunate ((skin) and (caste divisions))) is not one of them."
>> the fact of our unfortunate skin is not one of them
>> the fact of our unfortunate caste divisions is not one of them
(Other forced parses I can come up with get even weirder, but you are welcome to suggest another)
The first parsing makes a lot more sense to me in context. The others require a real stretch to justify, and sound ridiculous. For me hers was not even a 'strange' way to phrase it - collapsing the two parallel phrases of the first interpretation into her "combined with and" phrasing is common, proper and usually understood.
The only critique I can find with her sentence would be: that she let the words "unfortunate" occur next to "skin", such that if those successive words got extracted together but out of context, one might think that it was skin that she found unfortunate rather than divisions.
I would hate to have to scan every sentence I write to be sure nobody could misread anything to that degree, and I suspect you would not want your writing to be that subject to such selective interpretation - ie: must contain no two word sequences which might be interpreted outside badly if removed from their syntactic and semantic context.
Imagine an video where just speaking those two words was shown, outside of the full sentence structure. That's essentially what is happening here, as best I can understand. (In the _interpretation_; not saying you didn't provide the fuller text context to us!).
I find you an very thoughtful and wise voice in general, Steve. But in this particular case, I fear that you may have over-reacted to an accidental mis-parse. At the minimum, one could admit that the second parse is not the only feasible interpretation, and checked to see what she meant. You still have the opportunity to rethink and revise your response to come from your best self.
(Oh, and the examples you used in your response to Erica do not follow the syntax or semantics of the original. The ambiguity is about which word 'unfortunate' modifies ('skin' or 'divisions') and which fragments the 'and' connects ('skin' and 'caste' or 'unfortunate skin' and 'caste divisions'). Besides transposing the word 'fact', your examples omit that ambiguity so as to admit only one interpretation).
"I suspect you would not want your writing to be that subject to such selective interpretation"
ЁЯШЕ You're absolutely correct. But sadly that's not how writing works. Writing, and all communication, is always subject to selective interpretation. The skill and struggle of good writing is communicating in such a way that it's hard to misinterpret. As I said in the post itself, I usually overlook a clumsily worded sentence. This went beyond that for me.
I freely admit that my interpretation isn't the only reasonable parse. No argument whatsoever. I don't think I've written anything that suggests otherwise. My confidence in my interpretation doesn't come simply from the words in the sentence, but from the fact that I've spoken to her before and since. I understand her thinking in ways that you don't yet. Mrs. C had the right of reply, and if she *had* replied, I'd have included that too. Note that she didn't.
Lastly, I'm fascinated by the accusation of an over-reaction. I interpreted a sentence in a particular way, and made a comment based on that interpretation. Let's pretend that I haven't had any other conversations with her (which I have), how would that be an over-reaction? Do you think my response was particularly harsh or emotional? If so, why? What makes you so certain that my response didn't come from my "best self"?
First off, I hope this examination is welcome; I've come to greatly appreciate most of what you say and I don't want this particular small issue to cause you to think of me as an enemy. If it's alienating you, I'm glad to drop it.
That said, I can answer better if you could explain how you parse the whole sentence, including the words "and caste divisions". Please briefly paraphrase the meaning(s) you take from the whole sentence.
I ask because I cannot see a sensible way to parse the whole sentence which binds "unfortunate" to "skin" rather than to "divisions". Parelleling "skin" and "caste" as types of unfortunate divisions is extremely logical, while parelleling "unfortunate skin" and "caste divisions' doesn't make sense to me, semantically or syntactically.
However, if we stopped reading after the word "skin" I would agree with you.
So maybe I don't understand correctly how you interpret the (whole) sentence, and that needs to be cleared up before I build any argument upon a false understanding.
"First off, I hope this examination is welcome; I've come to greatly appreciate most of what you say and I don't want this particular small issue to cause you to think of me as an enemy"
No, no worries there. I rely on you guys to keep me honest. If I thought of everybody who occasionally disagreed with me as an enemy I'd have very few friendsЁЯШБ
I'm simply reading "the fact of our unfortunate skin" and "caste divisions" separately. Caste divisions aren't even a meaningful way to describe divisions in the west.
But the issue here is that you're working off less information than I am. It's as if you had a conversation with a friend of yours, you recounted it to me, and then I wanted to debate what they meant by a particular phrase. It's not that I don't see that there's more than one way to interpret the sentence, it's about context.
I interpreted Mrs C to be saying not that skin color is "unfortunate" but that divisions and hierarchies based on skin color are unfortunate.
Hmm, I'm not sure I buy this. At the very least, I think it's a very strange way to phrase it if that's the case. Wouldn't you think it was odd if a woman spoke to you about the "unfortunate fact of your femininity"? Or the "unfortunate fact of your sex"?
As I said, I'll usually ignore a clumsily phrased sentence, but it's hard for me to see this phrasing as not suggesting something deeper than a discomfort with division. Especially as she's insisting that these superficial things divide us.
I guess it all hinges on whether "unfortunate" is modifying "skin color" or "skin color divisions and hierarchies." Maybe you could ask her.
Yeah, as I mentioned to somebody else, I have the advantage of having had a few other conversations with Mrs. C. So I have a little more insight into her thinking. But even without that, it's hard for me to see how the "unfortunate" in "unfortunate skin" doesn't modify "skin".
See my comment above. Your interpretation would make sense if "unfortunate skin" wasn't followed by "and caste divisions'.
Having some charge from other interactions may not help in an unbiased understanding of her sentence. We have to admit that we have some of the same human flaws as we so easily perceive in others. (Myself very much included).
One common flaw in those following neo-progressive ideology is the inability to take a peek at things through any lens but the first and most emotionally driven one that triggers them, and then seek to defend that first take. It's a human thing, but they generally don't care to try to compensate for that bias.
"Having some charge from other interactions may not help in an unbiased understanding of her sentence"
It's not charge, I've spoken to her. I know my interpretation of the sentence is correct not because I'm triggered, but because I've spoken to her about it in other conversations. That's why I said I have an advantage. With no other context, I can see how the sentence could be interpreted as you interpret it. I have that context.
You're totally right. A common flaw in all thinking is the inability to look at things through any lens but the first or the most emotionally driven. I'm fully aware that I'm susceptible to that flaw too. But isn't it also what you're doing here?
I read it the same way, and even upon multiple re-readings still do. Here's the phrasing, in multiple interpretive parses:
1: "the fact of our (unfortunate ((skin and caste) divisions)) is not one of them."
>> the fact of our unfortunate skin divisions is not one of them
>> the fact of our unfortunate caste divisions is not one of them
2: "the fact of our (unfortunate skin) and (caste divisions) is not one of them."
>> the fact of our unfortunate skin is not one of them
>> the fact of our caste divisions is not one of them
3: "the fact of our (unfortunate ((skin) and (caste divisions))) is not one of them."
>> the fact of our unfortunate skin is not one of them
>> the fact of our unfortunate caste divisions is not one of them
(Other forced parses I can come up with get even weirder, but you are welcome to suggest another)
The first parsing makes a lot more sense to me in context. The others require a real stretch to justify, and sound ridiculous. For me hers was not even a 'strange' way to phrase it - collapsing the two parallel phrases of the first interpretation into her "combined with and" phrasing is common, proper and usually understood.
The only critique I can find with her sentence would be: that she let the words "unfortunate" occur next to "skin", such that if those successive words got extracted together but out of context, one might think that it was skin that she found unfortunate rather than divisions.
I would hate to have to scan every sentence I write to be sure nobody could misread anything to that degree, and I suspect you would not want your writing to be that subject to such selective interpretation - ie: must contain no two word sequences which might be interpreted outside badly if removed from their syntactic and semantic context.
Imagine an video where just speaking those two words was shown, outside of the full sentence structure. That's essentially what is happening here, as best I can understand. (In the _interpretation_; not saying you didn't provide the fuller text context to us!).
I find you an very thoughtful and wise voice in general, Steve. But in this particular case, I fear that you may have over-reacted to an accidental mis-parse. At the minimum, one could admit that the second parse is not the only feasible interpretation, and checked to see what she meant. You still have the opportunity to rethink and revise your response to come from your best self.
(Oh, and the examples you used in your response to Erica do not follow the syntax or semantics of the original. The ambiguity is about which word 'unfortunate' modifies ('skin' or 'divisions') and which fragments the 'and' connects ('skin' and 'caste' or 'unfortunate skin' and 'caste divisions'). Besides transposing the word 'fact', your examples omit that ambiguity so as to admit only one interpretation).
"I suspect you would not want your writing to be that subject to such selective interpretation"
ЁЯШЕ You're absolutely correct. But sadly that's not how writing works. Writing, and all communication, is always subject to selective interpretation. The skill and struggle of good writing is communicating in such a way that it's hard to misinterpret. As I said in the post itself, I usually overlook a clumsily worded sentence. This went beyond that for me.
I freely admit that my interpretation isn't the only reasonable parse. No argument whatsoever. I don't think I've written anything that suggests otherwise. My confidence in my interpretation doesn't come simply from the words in the sentence, but from the fact that I've spoken to her before and since. I understand her thinking in ways that you don't yet. Mrs. C had the right of reply, and if she *had* replied, I'd have included that too. Note that she didn't.
Lastly, I'm fascinated by the accusation of an over-reaction. I interpreted a sentence in a particular way, and made a comment based on that interpretation. Let's pretend that I haven't had any other conversations with her (which I have), how would that be an over-reaction? Do you think my response was particularly harsh or emotional? If so, why? What makes you so certain that my response didn't come from my "best self"?
First off, I hope this examination is welcome; I've come to greatly appreciate most of what you say and I don't want this particular small issue to cause you to think of me as an enemy. If it's alienating you, I'm glad to drop it.
That said, I can answer better if you could explain how you parse the whole sentence, including the words "and caste divisions". Please briefly paraphrase the meaning(s) you take from the whole sentence.
I ask because I cannot see a sensible way to parse the whole sentence which binds "unfortunate" to "skin" rather than to "divisions". Parelleling "skin" and "caste" as types of unfortunate divisions is extremely logical, while parelleling "unfortunate skin" and "caste divisions' doesn't make sense to me, semantically or syntactically.
However, if we stopped reading after the word "skin" I would agree with you.
So maybe I don't understand correctly how you interpret the (whole) sentence, and that needs to be cleared up before I build any argument upon a false understanding.
"First off, I hope this examination is welcome; I've come to greatly appreciate most of what you say and I don't want this particular small issue to cause you to think of me as an enemy"
No, no worries there. I rely on you guys to keep me honest. If I thought of everybody who occasionally disagreed with me as an enemy I'd have very few friendsЁЯШБ
I'm simply reading "the fact of our unfortunate skin" and "caste divisions" separately. Caste divisions aren't even a meaningful way to describe divisions in the west.
But the issue here is that you're working off less information than I am. It's as if you had a conversation with a friend of yours, you recounted it to me, and then I wanted to debate what they meant by a particular phrase. It's not that I don't see that there's more than one way to interpret the sentence, it's about context.
this was also my interpretation of the phrase