How Do I Love Thee? CEP 818 Embodied Thinking My topic is spatial description. Although it calls mainly for visual input, with careful consideration, one way find the other sensory inputs equally, if not more important, than sight alone. While sight will allow for an accurate description of the room, it won’t be enough to induce in the reader the sensations that come along with each piece of furniture. It would be like describing what a certain food looks like, when what equally matters is what it tastes like. One could describe a delicious plate of shrimps on a bed of lettuce and exquisite dressing, but what guarantee does one have that the shrimps taste good? In other words, a description of the plate of shrimps would be incomplete if one can’t ‘taste’’ it in his mind. That’s what menus try to do. Every time I read the menu in a restaurant, I carefully go through the list of ingredients; if they don’t make me drool, I forget about it. The same sensation has to be created in the reader so they can remember the room as much as possible, just like I would remember what this plate of shrimps tastes like even years after eating it. I would reminisce about the sensation I got from reading the carefully worded list of ingredients.
Grilled combo shrimps marinated in a mixture of lemon juice, green onions, garlic, and herbs and laid on a bed of fresh baby lettuce from Scarborough.
Doesn’t the description of the dish add to its visual exquisiteness? With that said, students have to think about how to describe the room other than through their eyes. An important sensory input would be kinesthetic. What better than describe what the furniture feels like when sitting on it? Or what atmosphere the wind blowing through the window and light shining through the room create? Rather than only describe what the furniture looks like or where it is, students will spice up their description by adding what the furniture feels like when sitting on it. Instead of simply describing where the window is, they may imagine the pleasant sensation that the light coming through the window gives the room.
Created by: Jean-Claude Aura
Date: October 2010
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How Do I Love Thee? CEP 818 If the window is open, they might want to describe how the wind adds to this pleasant atmosphere.
The pictures above represent the room to describe.
Students can feel the texture of the furniture.
After feeling the texture of the furniture, students can imagine what it feels like to lie down or sit on it. The whole idea here is to have students involve more than their eyes when describing the room. Thus, the description will be filled with visual as well as kinesthetic sensations. Together, they can help the reader feel the description with his body. That’s what embodied thinking is meant to do.
Describing what a sofa looks like is not enough to convey its comfort. Saying that one may fall asleep on it within seconds gives the description a whole new dimension.
Created by: Jean-Claude Aura
Date: October 2010
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