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Saluting
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Message 1.聽
Posted by Elkstone (U3836042) on Friday, 14th January 2011
Does anyone know if the Romans had a salute? Were they the first to start using it as a form of greeting, those of higher rank? Did the Ancient Greeks and Egyptians salute?
Now was the Facist or Nazi salute copied from the Romans or something they invented to look diferrent to the customary hand to forehead? -
Message 2
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Friday, 14th January 2011
Elkstone
The Fascist Salute seems to be generally treated as the old Roman one.. I think that I heard this said quite specifically in a documetary on "Yesterday" on the Norwegian collaborator Quizling... "Goose-stepping" too.
Cass -
Message 3
Posted by Herewordless (U14549396) on Saturday, 15th January 2011
Cass, I once read somewhere that Goose-stepping was also originated (or adopted) by the British army during the mid-19thC as a drill yard practice?
I agree that the nazi salute was based upon the Roman one, similar in style. -
Message 4
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Saturday, 15th January 2011
Man Alive
I can well believe it.. British Imperialism looked very much back to the Roman model, the only really accessible historical model for the successful running of this kind of empire which built upon a earlier English/Greek period.. England like Greece being a land of small places/spaces with each their own character and successful ways of doing things, and most with ready access to the seas, that the expertise of gifted people turned into a real asset.
The British public schools worked to some extent on the thesis that, if all the Greeks had developed Spartan virtues, then the glory of Greece might have endured longer..So I can well believe that goose-stepping, which is apparently really demanding physically, could have been used, just like the cold baths etc in the "top schools".
On a general point I think that it is important to recognize the point made by Matthew Arnold- that there was much common ground between Great Britain and the new Germany that emerged during the nineteenth Century, but ( as he admired) the Germans had an extra capability of pushing things through to their logical conclusion.
I think that this is particularly important in any rational and logical historical study of Nazi Germany, because the post-45 modern world has been constructed on an acceptance that the Nazis actually got a lot of things right- notably in grasping the potential of the new emerging branches of learning science, mathematics and technology.
Cass -
Message 5
Posted by Anglo-Norman (U1965016) on Saturday, 15th January 2011
There is some sculptural evidence that Roman infantry used a salute not wholly dissimilar to modern salutes - right hand raised to the forehead, palm outwards. Some argue that the soldiers in question are merely pushing their helmets back, but that would be uncharacteristically informal in sculpture, and certainly they appear to be being hailed by a mounted superior (who is issuing the 'fascist' salute). It has been theorised that the hand to the forehead was for use on foot, and the hand raised was for horseback.
Either way, to the best of my knowledge there is no evidence for the chest-thumping so beloved of TV and movies! -
Message 6
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Sunday, 16th January 2011
I think that this is particularly important in any rational and logical historical study of Nazi Germany, because the post-45 modern world has been constructed on an acceptance that the Nazis actually got a lot of things right- notably in grasping the potential of the new emerging branches of learning science, mathematics and technology. 聽
A somewhat bizarre notion, Cass. The post-45 world was largely constructed on the observation that the Americans got things right by their embracing of science, technology, industrialization and attention to planning: It was their model that prevailed, with its ability to complete enormous projects in remarkably short time. Our perspective of the Nazi regime has been warped, I believe, by a syllogism that may be logically correct but starts from incorrect assumptions: All Germans are well-organized and rational, the Nazis were German, therefore the Nazis were well-organized and rational. In fact the Nazi regime was noteworthy for its irrationality and its wasteful management of scarce resources. This, ironically, is why Germany produced, by 1945, impressive new technologies which lacked military value.
And except post-revolutionary France, probably no state has adopted Roman models with more enthusiasm than the USA, if not in substance then at least in style and pomp. The models of European royal courts were obviously inappropriate. -
Message 7
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Sunday, 16th January 2011
Mutatis
I wrote you a substantive reply earlier but it seems that I did not push the post button.
In brief my "bizarre notions" are largely based upon Dr Julian Huxley's volume of collected pieces published in 1944 under the title "On Living in a Revolution". He pointed out in terms of Darwinist evolution that three totalitarian states had seized the advantages that science and technology had offered in the developing World Chaos- notably of 1932-4. They had thus taken a short cut that produced an initial advantage in an age of Blitzkrieg and Pre-emptive strikes.
He had made two visits to the Tennessee Valley Authority Scheme which showed that a democratic state could harness science and technology: and this meant that Britain was fighting "two revolutions in one". It was fighting the revolution for the Future of a Christian based Civilization, and the interior revolution to change to a much more state-controlled society.
As President Obama has discovered, the USA never made that change. But the 2WW taught the American people that only a condition of world war, or global conflict would bring full "Pareto efficiency"- full emplyment to its vast resources of Land, Labour and Capital. Hence for almost fifty years after the end of the war the USA embraced both the struggle for global economic expansion- that could use US Capital and Products- and the global Cold War.
This involved learning many lessons from Germany and the USSR, not necesarily just Nazi Germany. As early as 1944 Butler's Education Act finally grasped the challenge -avoided since Matthew Arnold's reports on the Prussian and French national systems of education. That act created the same kind of three tier secondary schooling system that had underpinned the German revolutions of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries- with separate schools for the intellectual elite, the technicians and the "lumpen-proletariat". Hence leaving Germanised legacy to post-war Britain of state grammar schools, technical schools and Secondary Moderns.
Cass -
Message 8
Posted by an ex-nordmann - it has ceased to exist (U3472955) on Sunday, 16th January 2011
The Fascist Salute seems to be generally treated as the old Roman one.. I think that I heard this said quite specifically in a documetary on "Yesterday" on the Norwegian collaborator Quizling... "Goose-stepping" too聽
If by the fascist salute you mean the one with with arm oustretched then the documentary in question should not have been as emphatic as you describe. It acquired popularity because of a perception that it was indeed based on Roman precedence, but this perception was misplaced and largely due to Jacques-Louis David's famous painting "The Oath of the Horatii", an approved icon within early Italian fascism but itself a work of David's imagination, not historical knowledge, and in any case a depiction of oath-taking, not salutation.
It is not a misperception unique to fascists either however. Earlier cinematic representations of Roman life in worldwide blockbusters such as "Ben Hur" (1907) and "Spartaco" (1914) also employed David's subjects' stance as a military salute, and in fact the popularity of such films may well have influenced later fascists to a far greater degree than did any learned appreciation on their part of classical Roman culture and practices. It is known that Mussolini rated the film "Cabiria" (1914) as one of his favourites, and it too shows Roman soldiers of the Second Punic War era employing the salute.
It has been argued that the Nazi salute can be traced directly back to the USA, where a similar gesture was adopted by American socialists as the correct one when pledging allegiance to the flag. This may or may not be true, but the question still remains of how much these socialists had also been duped by David's popular representation if they did so. In any case, an earlier pedigree than David's painting is not to be found in the historical record, at least with regard to Roman tradition. -
Message 9
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Sunday, 16th January 2011
Nordmann
That is most helpful.. But are you sure that David had no authentic input at all?
T.B. Macaulay, I think in his essay on history for the Edinburgh review c1828, commented on the fact that the French fascination with Ancient Rome drew its strength and weakness from the great familiarity with Ancient Texts that had been built up during the Age of Reason and Enlightenment, texts which Macaulay claimed had little or no respect for historical veracity, a very dangerous situation because France did not have England's tradition of successfully managing constitutional change, and went about destroying the existing constitition and inventing a new one from first principles, and imagined Roman precedent.
Mutatis,
Just not to disappoint Temperance, or to seek to prove her wrong,:
There is that interesting comment in Harold Nicholson's war diaries that, after the French Armistice in 1940, the British War Cabinet was very concerned that Hitler would offer Europe a new Europe that would be like the Zollverein that had provided the basis for the Nineteenth Century German miracle. This New Order would offer a stable managed future with Germany acting like Ancient Rome as the central and commanding hub that would prevent Europe falling into a Dark Age proper.
Perhaps if Hitler had gone through the kind of education of most of those in the UK cabinet, or was prepared to listen to their German peers, he might well have done so. What the Cabinet feared was that France and other countries would sign up for this, leaving Britain not only alone, but with the British people wondering why Britain too would not make peace and seeing no good reason for "blood, sweat, toil and tears".
According to the contents page of his book, Dr. Huxley's article, in which he postulated many of the features of what became the fundamental concept of the European Recovery Programme under the Marshall Plan, was first published in 1941.
He showed how Nazi expansionism reflected the way that existing economic development in Europe was not really based upon clearly nationalistic lines, but on various transnational zones. In a post-war world, he argued, Germany should be allowed to participate in the reconstruction of Europe in the interests of all Europeans, with Huxley coming back frequently to the British Commonwealth model of friendly cooperation within that tradition that had made it possible at the Ottawa Conference for Britain to abandon the "Holy Cow" of Free Trade in favour of trade-management to mutual advantage within a managed world trading system.
It is surely very obvious that the Common Market owed much to the historical precedent of the Zollverein.
Cass -
Message 10
Posted by bandick (U14360315) on Sunday, 16th January 2011
To return to the OP鈥
Anglo-Norman鈥 *either way, to the best of my knowledge there is no evidence for the chest-thumping so beloved of TV and movies!*鈥
I鈥檓 sure that鈥檚 a widely held assumption of people taking that chest thumping salute to be factual. I bet if you watched a group of youngsters playing鈥 not so much cops and robbers, or cowboys and Indians鈥 maybe Romans and Goths, Vandals, Christians or the rest of the world, the kids playing the Romans would thump their chest and raise their arm in the Nazi style salute and wouldn鈥檛 have a clue why. Sometime, somewhere it鈥檚 been adopted into the movie theme.
So where did it come from鈥?
According to Wiki:
The Roman salute is a gesture in which the arm is held out forward straight, with palm down and fingers extended straight and touching. Sometimes the arm is raised upward at an angle, sometimes it is held out parallel to the ground. A well known symbol of Fascism, it is commonly perceived to be based on a classical Roman custom. But no known Roman work of art displays this salute, nor does any known Roman text describe it.
Beginning with Jacques-Louis David's painting The Oath of the Horatii (1784), an association of the gesture with Roman republican and imperial culture emerged through 18th century French art. The association with ancient Roman traditions was further developed in popular culture through late nineteenth and early twentieth century plays and films. These including the epic Cabiria (1914), whose screenplay was attributed to Italian nationalist Gabriele d'Annunzio. In a case of life imitating art, d'Annunzio appropriated the salute as a neo-imperial ritual when he led the occupation of Fiume in 1919. It was soon adopted by the Italian Fascist party and from them the Nazi party. The Bellamy salute was a similar gesture and was the civilian salute of the United States from 1892 to 1942.
In Germany showing the Roman salute is prohibited. Even rendering similar salutes, for example raising the left instead of the right hand, or raising only three fingers, are put under prosecution. The punishment derives from 搂 86a of the German Criminal Code and can be up to three years of prison or a fine (in minor cases).
The modern Western military salute evolved from the practice of men raising their hats as a gesture of respect. Taking off or tipping one's hat on meeting a social superior or a lady, or when greeting an acquaintance, was a normal polite civilian gesture from the 17th Century until the 1960s. Repeated hat-raising was impractical if heavy helmets or hats with chinstraps (such as shakos and bearskins) were worn, so from about 1745 the gesture was stylised to a mere hand movement. It was also common for individuals who did not wear hats to "tug their forelock" in imitation of the gesture of tipping the hat. This origin accounts for the common rule of not saluting when not wearing a cover. This principle was applied to the military as early as Roman Republican times, when a foot soldier would remove his helmet as a show of respect to the commander or general. This was eventually adapted to the visor, the right hand lifts the visor up to the forehead, where the hand would remain in order to keep the visor from dropping, hence the position of the hand in the modern-day salute.
I鈥檝e often wondered why different branches of the armed forces salute in a variety of ways鈥 especially the navy, I was therefore interested to read this:
The naval salute, with the palm downwards may have originated because the palms of naval ratings, particularly deckhands, were often dirty through working with lines: it would be insulting to present a dirty palm to an officer, so the palm was turned downwards. More likely it is simply the more natural position of the hand when seizing the peak of a cap. During the Napoleonic Wars, British crews saluted officers by touching a clenched fist to the brow as though grasping a hat-brim between fingers and thumb.
So they got it right in the Hornblower series and the film Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World.
And I love the way the military has an answer for all eventualities, i.e. riding a motorcycle.
The British Army's salute is given with the right hand palm facing forwards with the fingers almost touching the eye. The salute is with the left hand when riding a motorcycle, as the right hand is needed to hold its throttle open. The salute is given to acknowledge the Queen's commission. A salute may not be given unless a soldier is wearing his regimental headdress, for example a Beret, Caubeen, Tam o' Shanter, Glengarry, field service cap or peaked cap. If a soldier or officer is not wearing headdress then he or she must come to attention instead to give/return the salute.
I have a comical vision of Norman Wisdom, an army motorcycle escort proudly riding at the head of a huge column of army vehicles, troops, tanks, trucks, everything鈥 Norman sees a high ranking officer and salutes鈥 with his right hand, and the throttle closes. The bike stops. The trucks stop. The army stops鈥 maybe the war stops too. Good old Norman and his mate Mr Grimsdale. -
Message 11
Posted by bandick (U14360315) on Sunday, 16th January 2011
Oops sorry鈥 thought I鈥檇 posted ages ago鈥 must have missed the button and went for dinner.
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Message 12
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Sunday, 16th January 2011
An interesting and useful post bandick
Picking up the David thing again, I note that he went to Italy for his art training in 1775, and studied naturalistic Roman relief sculpture- and no doubt the Roman people..Can we know exactly what "input" he found there? Apart from anything else this was a time when rich people on Grand Tour- not least from the UK- were often buying up Ancient Roman bits and pieces and, though people were prepared to pay good money, as we know from archeological digs in the early nineteenth century, treasure hunting often got in the way of conservation.
I wondered whether Diderot's Encyclopedia might have something about salluting.. The country of Martinet surely might have found miitary codes interesting.
Cass -
Message 13
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Sunday, 16th January 2011
<quote>He pointed out in terms of Darwinist evolution that three totalitarian states had seized the advantages that science and technology had offered in the developing World Chaos- notably of 1932-4. They had thus taken a short cut that produced an initial advantage in an age of Blitzkrieg and Pre-emptive strikes.</quote>
It still sounds like a somewhat bizarre theory to me, especially if generalized to all three Axis states in this way, as each had a very specific approach to the mobilisation of its resources to prepare for war, and they achieved very different results. If they had anything in common at all it probably was the need to catch up on their rivals: All entered the 1930s still lagging behind in technology, if not necessarily in science, and tried to compensate by making massive short-term investments. This indeed produced an initial advantage, but it wore off quickly as a generation of technical tools became obsolete. The real hotbed of technological development in the 1930s remained the USA, and the Nazi regime unwittingly gave its lead a further boost be expelling Jewish scientists and even briefly turning its back on science itself, at least science as an independent intellectual activity.
In many ways, what made the totalitarian states unique was not their early embracing of science and technology, but their thoroughly ambivalent attitude to it, which in some ways managed to be post-modern before the moderns. While they acknowledged the value of the products of (military) industry and science, their core beliefs appealed far more to emotion than to reason. Huge shows such as the Nuremberg party days were not about technology, but about directing and releasing the willpower of the masses. While the hardware was welcome, scientific ideas that somehow conflicted with the "gut feeling" of of the masses were recognized as a threat, just as modern art was.
</quote>He had made two visits to the Tennessee Valley Authority Scheme which showed that a democratic state could harness science and technology: and this meant that Britain was fighting "two revolutions in one". It was fighting the revolution for the Future of a Christian based Civilization, and the interior revolution to change to a much more state-controlled society.</quote>
I think this meshes two things into one. I think a good case can be made that to effectively harness science and technology, some investment by the state was crucial and at least very much accelerated the process. For example, the aeronautical research done by NACA in the 1920s and 1930s directly contributed to the American leadership in aviations and its post-war dominance of the aviation industry. But the "killer product" of this revolution, the DC-3, was the product of industry applying the lessons learnt by government-sponsored research. Interestingly, none of the Axis state managed to produce something that could rival it (the Japanese produced their own version) despite much greater state involvement.
State control, as opposed to state investment, contributed less to science and technology. Applying the resources of the state in this way mainly helped to scale projects to a larger size, it did not necessarily lead to innovation. -
Message 14
Posted by bandick (U14360315) on Monday, 17th January 2011
Cass
*Picking up the David thing again, I note that he went to Italy for his art training in 1775, and studied naturalistic Roman relief sculpture- and no doubt the Roman people..Can we know exactly what "input" he found there?*
Well Cass you got me there鈥 I guess we don鈥檛 know exactly what 鈥渋nput鈥 he found there鈥 but it somewhat depends exactly what 鈥渋nput鈥 you鈥檙e looking for, and after 236 years exactly how we interoperate it. I should imagine we could all come up with a different interpretation鈥 that鈥檚 what art is.
But insofar as Diderot's Encyclopaedia comprised 35 volumes, with 71,818 articles and 3,129 illustrations go鈥 I would imagine you鈥檙e quite right; it might have something about saluting鈥
But it鈥檚 so damned annoying one of my volumes鈥 the one covering P-T is missing鈥 or I鈥檇 have a look see.
But where is The Country of Martinet鈥? I鈥檝e looked everywhere on Google Earth鈥 maybe they鈥檝e flogged it鈥 or is it that isthmus on the lee side of Bum Island, way down in The South China Sea, where it鈥檚 always the monsoon season. Can you give me its position鈥 I鈥檓 intrigued.
Kind regards bandick -
Message 15
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Monday, 17th January 2011
Bandick
Thanks for that.. Martinet was an important figure in the French Army of Louis XIV- a great drillmaster.. Along with Vauban the great genius of fortifications probably the most famous French military man of that era.. He was and is particularly associated with a very strict code of discipline, and gave his name to a small leather whip that was used to chastise the troops..(Thinking of another thread this could have something to do with the strap used in Scottish schools. Have they banned it yet?)
If you go to your English dictionary you will find that it is not only the French who have adopted his name to mean someone who runs things in a strict and authoritarian manner.
Every so often I am reminded that the name "franks" is allegedly derived from the Greek for "the fierce ones".
Cass -
Message 16
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Monday, 17th January 2011
Mutatis
I am preparing a proper answer- but will try not to Cass-trate this thread.
Your post reflects the fact that the modern age that has largely lost faith with science too..in that sense of a whole Scientific Civilization that Julian Huxley and many of his generation believed in--
But of course not his brother Aldous- who, like many others in the Thirties, found himself moving back towards old religious beliefs..
One has to wonder whether the current prevalent belief in personal self-interest within the "Western world" equips us collectively for the kind of struggle that Julian Huxley could see in that age of revolution.
But Aldous Huxley- as he explained in "Doors of Perception.. Heaven and Hell" - believed that science could help us to make trips back to the realities known to more "natural" and "primitive" ages.. That is largely what people value it for these days- either through drugs, or techo-virtual realities, or trips that transport people physically to a "mock paradise".
Cass -
Message 17
Posted by bandick (U14360315) on Monday, 17th January 2011
Yes Cass I am well aware what a martinet is鈥 (I鈥檝e had a few) hence my reference to it being flogged.
But your last sentence *The country of Martinet surely might have found miitary codes interesting.* aren鈥檛 you being just a little bit 鈥榥aughty naughty鈥, one might take it that your suggesting I came down with the last shower of rain. (monsoon), when we all know it鈥檚 a member of :
King regards bandick. -
Message 18
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Monday, 17th January 2011
bandick
You have totally lost me on that one.. I realised that your flogging references applied to the English word martinet.. But I was not sure that that the derivation was generally known.
Cass -
Message 19
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Monday, 17th January 2011
Your post reflects the fact that the modern age that has largely lost faith with science too..in that sense of a whole Scientific Civilization that Julian Huxley and many of his generation believed in-- 聽
I am a card-carrying scientist myself, both by education and as a profession. I have hardly lost "faith in science", if such a slightly self-contradictory concept indeed exists. But I am increasingly skeptic about the notion, inherent in some forms of belief in progress, that science can be made to produce what we want or need, on command... even if we throw massive amounts of money at it. Science is a process of discovery, it has the pesky habit of delivering things one didn't want or expect, and refusing to give what one was looking for. I now work in the pharmaceutical industry: What makes this business so expensive is that we fail in our projects 95% of the time.
There is a popular belief that times of crisis, such as war, stimulate technological and scientific progress. I think that belief needs to be strongly mitigated, if not abandoned altogether. Crises stimulate short-term thinking, certainly inducing people to make rapid progress in practical realizations, but at the cost of longer term projects. This may create the impression of rapid progress on the short term, but it is achieved by emptying the reservoir, which needs to be replenished afterwards -- over a longer period of time, the rate of progress may well be slowed down. -
Message 20
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Monday, 17th January 2011
Mutatis
Julian Huxley's ideas perhaps go right back to his grandfather Thomas Huxley's public debates with Matthew Arnold (two families linked by marriage) over the respective value of reading, with a heavy bias on classis ancient and modern, and the experiential knowledge acquired through the scientific method in the lab.
But by then Von Ranke in Germany had been working on History as Science for more than half a century, and contempories were developing "Natural History" approaches to Human Affairs, notably in an age of the discovery of extinct dinosaurs and vanished Civilizations- the whole idea that Human sub-groups too had a Natural History, and would not only evolve upwards but also become gradually too specialised, and too suited to favourable circumstances to either remain fit to survive or able to adapt to changing circumstances.
This Scientifci View of History seemed to be reflected in the tragedy of the Western Front, and the Wasteland that emerged soon afterwards. Hence the very influential "Decline of the West" and the idea, expressed for example in the Labour Party manifesto of 1918 that the times called for a New Civilization. c1927 H.G.Wells and Julian Huxley collaborated on a work entitled "The Science of Life" from which I could quote a passage developing what I have summarised about the function of revolutionary times in forcing evolutionary development.
The idea that Humankind was "going down" into a Dark Age of Malthusian "Natural Checks" of war, famine and disease was encouraged by the events of 1914-24; while the American Prohibition Era showed a determination not to let the "New World" at least go the way of the old, as happened too with the WASP immigration policies, and the revival of Ku Kluc Klan activities.
Such avowedly scientiic ideas as the inevitability of history and racial difference, and eugenics were important in various degrees to the Nazi and Soviet regimes. Totalitarianism tended to mean the triumph of Collective Will and consciousness, another favoured scientific idea of the late nineteenth century.
Science and mathematics thus leapt to the aid of the State: as for example in the naive idea of Keynes that in real life and in mathematics there is a true symmetry between the world of "plus" and that of "minus", or that the dymanics of the economy could work like the dynamics of electro-magneticism.
Thus the standard Macro-Economic Model of Keynesian Scientific Macro-economics is really just a diagram of Faraday's Induction Ring. If movement turns the ring electricity is generated. But if the ring is left immobile and electricity is fed into the ring, it will turn and become the basis of an electric motor. So in his great "Theory of Money" he replaced the electricity with money.
When an economy is turning round it generates wealth that can be turned into money. But if an economy is stagnant or turning only slowly, if you inject money you will make it turn faster and more strongly. It is like saying that because your can pull something with a piece of string, you should be able to push with the string as well.
One of the favourite themes of crime stories is the poor gullible fool who handed the money over on a mere promise of delivery. As post war scientific macro-economic management showed, especially in the new "professionally and scientifically run" Nationalised Industries, you could throw endless amounts of money at industries without making them run faster or better.
We have long-since given up any real belief that we can effectively control the future through Economics as a Science.. Like the experts in "Silent Witness"- currently on 麻豆约拍 I- what this kind of scientific approach can do is provide a "post-mortem" analysis. Or like our daughter, a Master of Physics at Oxford, and a very successful Actuary, all science can do is to assume that- en masse- humanity is not endowed with intelligence and free-will, and so what has happened in the Past can usefully be projected into the Future.
But a Future that is merely a continuation of the Present is not really a Future. Just a present in different clothes.
In addition to Economics and History, the intrusion of Science into the mainstream of Human life and decision making, also came into the fields of individual and group Psychology, and theories of the subconscious related to those knew branches of Knowledge. With Psychiatry they leant themselves to interventions like the castration of young men who were prone to masturbation- a popular option for wealthy Americans, when Prohibition was found not to be working in the 1920's- and the other great 'life-saving' operation, the lobbotomies of the US in the Fifties. By the time of "One Few Over the Cuckoo's Nest" they could just do this with drugs.
And within the world of work there were those "Time and Motion Studies" examining the human species in the kind of generic way beloved of the propenents of that other Social Science, Sociology.
One of my favourite stories was the experiment that tried to show whether there was a connection between light and work. So the management were persuaded to iinvest in better lighting. Productivity went up. Pluses and minus thinking then argued that the lighting should be dimmed. Production stayed up. So what was the link between light and work?. They conducted interviews with the workers.
Yes. They had noticed the improved lighting; but they had not noted that the intensity had been reduced. When there was new lighting, they felt cared for and appreciated. And the glow had not warn off by the time that the lights were dimmed. I am not sure whether they conducted any assessment about how the workers reacted once they found out that they had been treated as guinnea pigs.
I think that some of us Welfare State guinnea pigs in the post-war world reacted angrily to not having been treated as human beings in the scientifically managed Fifties and early Sixties. "We never had it so good"- as a species. And Eric Hobsbaw described that as a Golden Age.. But it fell short because of its lak of Humanity.
Cass -
Message 21
Posted by AlexanderLiberty (U14397753) on Wednesday, 19th January 2011
Hi everyone,
the Facist or Nazi salute copied from the Romans adlocutio, it wasn't a salute but it was the custom to make a formal speech to the troops or in the Senate, It is often portrayed in sculpture by a general or a senator with his arm outstretched.
bye -
Message 22
Posted by arty macclench (U14332487) on Wednesday, 19th January 2011
"This was eventually adapted to the visor, the right hand lifts the visor up to the forehead, where the hand would remain in order to keep the visor from dropping, hence the position of the hand in the modern-day salute."
I have never bought this theory. Isn't this a piece of folklore?
Visored helmets were, roughly speaking, in general use by W European armoured cavalry from about the C14th until the mid-C16th, (although they may not have become entirely obsolete until the early C17th).
The notion of hierarchies of military rank was only just beginning to develop as the visored helmet was giving way to the open helmet. In any case, men who previously used visors were, broadly speaking, equals and they would all have had to raise their visors to communicate (ventilate, drink, etc) so it was a necessity rather than a courtesy to rank.
In any case, by 1745 the majority of western soldiers had been wearing a felt hat since the mid-C17th when the dragoon helmet and pikeman's pot became obsolete. So why didn't the 'salute without helmet' become formalised much earlier? Even the C18th cocked hat could be grasped by a corner to make a very elegant courtesy - as allegedly happened at Fontenoy in 1745 when English and French officers vied for who would have the privilege of receiving the other side's fire first (Crazy times, crazy guys).
Soldiers and officers _presumably_ had been 'presenting arms' either with sword, pike or musket as a courtesy to senior officers for some time; a gesture of readiness and subordination. Is there not likely to be some connection with the empty hand?
A substitute for raising the hat does seem quite plausible. The shako with chinstrap was only adopted generally ca 1800-1810, however, although there were various forms of brimless grenadier/fusilier cap awkward to replace, for some before that as well as light, pseudo-Classical helmets and bearskins from about 1760. If the military hand salute we are familiar with came in earlier it must have been for a different reason. Maybe it was to save time on campaign and also save the parade ground soldier from disrupting his carefully coiffed curls and queue. Also wigs which became popular from 1660 onwards were easily dislodged.
Perhaps we should look more carefully at the middle of the C17th.
I have heard another explanation for the raised, open-palm salute which has to do with showing an empty hand as a gesture of trust when men went armed. I am not really any more convinced by that. -
Message 23
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Wednesday, 19th January 2011
Did Amerindians in early contact with English speakers really hold up an open right had and say "How".. short for How do you do?
Cass -
Message 24
Posted by arty macclench (U14332487) on Wednesday, 19th January 2011
yes and no. From what I know this has a certain ring of truth:
"THE STRAIGHT DOPE
Did Indians really say "how" as a greeting?
February 7, 1986
Dear Cecil:
Did Indians ever really say "how" in formal greeting?
鈥 Keath G., Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Dear Keath:
Not exactly, but you've hit on one of those rare bits of frontier rubbish that actually has some basis in fact. There is no such thing as a universal Indian greeting--the original inhabitants of North America spoke some 500 different languages--but we do find variants of "how" in the native speech of many Plains Indians tribes, who spoke versions of a major language called Siouan. The Tetons said "howo" and "ho," the Dakota had "hao" and "ho," and the Omaha had "hau" (and maybe "ho" too, but I didn't find it in my Omaha dictionary.)
The precise meaning of these words varies with the ethnographer who recorded them, but from my reading of various ancient Native American tales (rendered in the original, of course) I deduce that they served as a sort of all-purpose introductory adverb or interjection along the lines of "well," "hey," "so," or "now," as in, "Now see here, white-eyes..." You can imagine how ignorant pioneers who heard this at the beginning of every Indian soliloquy might come to regard it as a greeting, just as there are Anglo employers in the barrio who think the Spanish words for "yes, boss" are "tu madre." At any rate, the word eventually found its way into the public consciousness. Plains tribes also provided the basis for other popular beliefs about Indians, such as the idea that all chiefs wear elaborate feathered headdresses.
鈥 Cecil Adams -
Message 25
Posted by arty macclench (U14332487) on Thursday, 20th January 2011
The RAF website offers this:
"During the 17th Century, military records detail that the 'formal act of saluting was to be by removal of headdress' For some time after, hat raising became an accepted form of the military salute, but in the 18th Century the Coldstream Guards amended this procedure. They were instructed to 'clap their hands to their hats and bow as they pass by'. This was quickly adopted by other Regiments as wear and tear on the hats by constant removal and replacing was a matter of great concern. By the early 19th Century, the salute had evolved further with the open hand, palm to the front, and this has remained the case since then." -
Message 26
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Thursday, 20th January 2011
artyMacleath
Thanks for that.. I now remember reading that kind of thing about 40 years ago.. I wondered then however whether the "how" had come from the increasingly widespread encounters with the English speakers..something that widely scattered Amerindian communities now had in common. It is often more diplomatic to use a shared foreign language. Much as English is still probably the number one world language.
Cass -
Message 27
Posted by arty macclench (U14332487) on Thursday, 20th January 2011
Sadly, what we gave them in common was steel weapons, glass beads and small pox. I guess the iron cook pot was a genuine boon.
And returning to the subject, we took from them the beaver felt hat !
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