Provocation (PO)

Provocation

As a provocation, PO indicates that the arrangement of information has no justification except the possibility that it might set off new lines of thought. Such an arrangement of information may be as fantastic or unreasonable as anyone can make it. The arrangement is not examined in itself but only in terms of what it sets off.

5. Juxtaposition

This is the simplest provocative arrangement of information. Two words are put together with PO inserted between them to indicate why they are put together. The pairs of words are then offered to the class one at a time. The session may be conducted in an open class with students volunteering suggestions which are listed by the teacher on a blackboard or else by some student who is asked to take notes. Alternatively the students can list their own ideas and these are collected and compared at the end.

Possible pairs of words might include:

• Ice cream po electric light.
• Horse po caterpillar.
• Book po policeman.
• Rain po Wednesday.
• Stars po football.
• Stars po decision.
• Shoe po food.

The students are not specifically asked to relate the words, or to find some connection between the two or to show what the two words have in common. Any sort of ideas at all that arise are accepted. There is no question of directing the sort of ideas that the students ought to be having. If on reading through the results one cannot see the connection then one asks how it came about, one asks for the missing links. One does not care what the idea is but one does want to know how it came about.

6. Random word

It consists of introducing into the consideration of a subject a word which has no connection with the subject at all. The idea is to see what the random word triggers off. In this case PO would be used to introduce the random word. An alternative way of doing it would be to take some word which appeared to be vital in the discussion and couple it in juxtaposition with a random word by means of PO.

Possible subjects for discussion might include:

• Advantages of saving against spending.
• Advantages of attack rather than defence in sport.
• Knowing where to find information.
• Why do fights start?
• Should people do exactly what they want to?
• The design of shoes.

Possible random words might include:

• Fishing line.
• Bus ticket.
• Motor car horn.
• Eggcup.

7. Concept reuniting

PO can be used to put together again things that have been divided up into separate concepts. PO can be used to remove labels and extract information from pigeonholes. In order to put across this function of PO one takes concepts which have been created by a division (or which have created each other by implication) and puts them together by means of PO. Such paired concepts are presented to the class in the same way as juxtapositions were presented and the ideas arising from this presentation are examined and compared. In this instance it is better if the students individually list their ideas so that when these are read out at the end they can appreciate the usefulness of the procedure.

Possible examples might include:

• Soldiers po civilians.
• Flexible po rigid.
• Attacker po defender.
• Order po chaos.
• Liquid po solid.
• Teacher po student.
• Up po down.
• Day po night.
• North po south.
• Right po wrong.
• Male po female.

8. Generating provocations

In addition to reacting to the juxtapositions and paired concepts provided for them the students can be asked to generate their own juxtapositions and paired concepts. Suggestions for these are collected on slips of paper and then a selection of these is fed back to the students for their reaction. The simple exercise of generating such juxtapositions and paired concepts is itself very useful in making clear this particular use of PO.