Gee and Cuddy are talking about faking a role in society but Gee doesn’t believe someone can enter a Discourse if you’re not in it or being trained for it. These passages relate because Gee says mushfaking is a way to gain access to a Discourse and Cuddy says power poses can help people with no resources significantly change their lives. I agree with Cuddy on the idea of faking it until you make it. I believe this view from personal experience. It is possible to enter a Discourse with no formal training. I also have used power poses before giving speeches or presentations so I know they actually work.
Questions for Gee and Cuddy 1
Theorem 1 in Gee states that a person cannot engage in a Discourse unless they are fluent in it. He also says that failing to show all the aspects of the Discourse is equivalent to announcing you don’t have that Discourse. Theorem 2 states that a primary Discourse are limiting because a person needs more than one Discourse in their life. They are controversial because he is saying that it is not possible to fake a Discourse if you haven’t been in it but he also says that you have to have more than one Discourse because your primary Discourse is limiting. So he is saying that if you aren’t in a Discourse you can’t fake it but you also have to have more than one Discourse.
A mushfake is when someone does something when the real thing is not there. So it is to make due with what you have. People can have a mushfake Discourse by knowing some things about a Discourse and using strategies to pretend they are fluent in the Discourse. Meta-knowledge and resistance are together because they both go into a Discourse.
Cuddy says “…when you pretend to be powerful, you are more likely to actually feel powerful.” This relates to Gee because he says “the lack of fluency may very well mark you as a pretender to the social role instantiated in the Discourse.” These two quotes relate because they both agree that a person can pretend to be in a Discourse or feel powerful. Cuddy suggests power poses to help confidence which helps with Gee’s idea of a mushfake so they can feel confident in the Discourse you are faking.
Why are their points of view so different from each other?
