{"id":4939,"date":"2013-11-08T11:49:58","date_gmt":"2013-11-08T16:49:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/?p=4939"},"modified":"2018-08-29T19:51:02","modified_gmt":"2018-08-29T23:51:02","slug":"shakespeare-follow-up-nature-vs-nurture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/archives\/4939","title":{"rendered":"Shakespeare Follow-Up: Nature vs. Nurture"},"content":{"rendered":"

The term “nature vs. nurture” is a poetic turn of phrase that refers to an ongoing reexamination of the roles that heredity and environment play in determining who we are as individuals. The expression was popularized in the 19th century by Francis Galton<\/a>, though the debate and the phrase had been around much longer than his day. In fact, Shakespeare himself juxtaposed the two words in The Tempest<\/em><\/a>, as Prospero describes Caliban thusly:<\/p>\n

A devil, a born devil, on whose nature
\nNurture can never stick;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Shakespeare was not the first<\/a> to contrast these two words, but Galton is known to have been a Shakespeare fan<\/a>, and it seems reasonable to imagine this was his source.<\/p>\n

Shakespeare’s plays are filled with models of the intricate workings of human nature, depictions of how individuals are influenced by external factors, and the complicated interplay between the two. As we will soon see, Shakespeare was also an early voice in this conversation, and an often-quoted source by later thinkers as well. Therefore, our Shakespeare Follow-Up<\/a> will focus on the development of the nature vs. nurture debate from Shakespeare’s time to ours today. <\/p>\n

But please note that this is a very large topic, and I’m going to sweep through it rather quickly, so feel free to do your own follow up on any topic here that interests you.<\/p>\n

Political philosophers such as Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau are often grouped together as “social contract theorists,” because they presented ideas about how and why humans form societies. But when considering their impact on the nature\/nurture question, it’s more illustrative to focus on their differences. <\/p>\n

In Leviathan<\/em> (1651), Thomas Hobbes argued that human beings, existing in a state of nature, are savage and brutal. Therefore, we willingly surrender our autonomy to a sovereign unconditionally in order to gain security from our murderous brethren. John Locke, in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding<\/em> (1689), lays out the idea that we refer to today as tabula rasa<\/em>, or “the blank slate.” Rather than seeing human beings as being innately evil, as Hobbes does, he sees us as being neither good nor evil naturally, but rather open to influence from our environments. Jean-Jacques Rousseau presents a different view of the natural state of the human in his book \u00c9mile<\/em> (1762). For Rousseau, humans are born innately good, and it is society that corrupts.<\/p>\n

Naturally, the choice of which of these three views to adopt will have a profound effect on how a culture views education and child rearing. We can’t control the nature, but we can structure the nurture to make the best use of our understanding of it. If we believe that human beings are born evil, we’ll want to make discipline the backbone of our educational system. If we believe that children are blank slates, we’ll seek to fill those slates with our best models for citizenship and morality. If we believe that our students are innately good, then maybe the best thing we could do would be to just get out of the way and let them explore the world they find themselves in. You can hear echoes of these debates in today’s conversations about education. <\/p>\n

In the post-Darwinian era, psychologists began to codify the progression of human development into various stages. The progression was determined by nature, but profoundly impacted by environment. Sigmund Freud described five psycho-sexual stages<\/a> of development in childhood. The eight psycho-social stages<\/a> outlined by Erik Erikson were strongly influenced by Freud, but extended to adulthood.<\/p>\n

But wait! A lifetime of human progression divided into stages? Why does that sound familiar? Oh right…<\/p>\n

All the world\u2019s a stage,
\nAnd all the men and women merely players:
\nThey have their exits and their entrances;
\nAnd one man in his time plays many parts,
\nHis acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
\nMewling and puking in the nurse\u2019s arms.
\nAnd then the whining school-boy, with his satchel,
\nAnd shining morning face, creeping like snail
\nUnwillingly to school. And then the lover,
\nSighing like furnace, with a woful ballad
\nMade to his mistress\u2019 eyebrow. Then a soldier,
\nFull of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
\nJealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
\nSeeking the bubble reputation
\nEven in the cannon\u2019s mouth. And then the justice,
\nIn fair round belly with good capon lin\u2019d,
\nWith eyes severe, and beard of formal cut,
\nFull of wise saws and modern instances;
\nAnd so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
\nInto the lean and slipper\u2019d pantaloon,
\nWith spectacles on nose and pouch on side,
\nHis youthful hose well sav\u2019d, a world too wide
\nFor his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
\nTurning again toward childish treble, pipes
\nAnd whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
\nThat ends this strange eventful history,
\nIs second childishness and mere oblivion,
\nSans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It seems that Jacques in As You Like It<\/em><\/a> was on the right track, centuries ahead of his time. Freud famously wrote about Hamlet<\/em>, and Erikson even cites Shakespeare’s “ages of man” in his 1962 article “Youth: Fidelity and Diversity,” which also provides an in-depth discussion of Hamlet<\/em>. <\/p>\n

Jean Piaget (1896-1980) developed a set of four stages of cognitive development<\/a> that have been profoundly influential in our understanding of human nature. Piaget believed that these stages developed naturally, and that new levels of learning become possible at each stage. Score one point for nature! Lev Vygotsky (1896 – 1934) built on these ideas, but demonstrated that learning could actually encourage cognitive development. There is a zone<\/a> between what students are capable of doing on their own and what they can do in an environment that includes guidance and collaboration. Stretching into this zone can assist children in progressing developmentally. There’s one point for nurture, and it’s a tie game.<\/p>\n

In fact, it will always be a tie game. Everyone agrees that both nature and nurture are significant, and we can argue about various degrees. Noam Chomsky (1928 – ) revolutionized<\/a> the field of linguistics by describing, in Syntactic Structures<\/em><\/a> (1957), the innate ability of the human brain to acquire language. This was a challenge to the behaviorist<\/a> philosophy that was dominant at the time. In Frames of Mind<\/em> (1983), Howard Gardner describes a system of multiple intelligences that different people seem to possess in different measures. The rise of theories such as Chomsky’s and Gardner’s would seem to move the needle towards nature, but the fact that they continue to influence our educational practices demonstrate the importance of nurture in the equation all the more powerfully.<\/p>\n

Shakespeare, of course, didn’t know any of this. Nevertheless, his understanding of the complex interplay between nature and nurture was nuanced enough for him to create models that still have us debating the actions and motivations of fictional characters as though they were real people. Why, for example, does Macbeth kill Duncan? Is it because he’s ambitious? Or does he succumb to pressure from his wife? If it’s the former, would he have done so without prompting from the witches? And if it’s the latter, what elements of his nature make him susceptible to his wife’s influence? <\/p>\n

I give up. What do you think, Lady Macbeth<\/a>?<\/p>\n

Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be
\nWhat thou art promis\u2019d. Yet do I fear thy nature;
\nIt is too full o\u2019 the milk of human kindness
\nTo catch the nearest way; thou wouldst be great,
\nArt not without ambition, but without
\nThe illness should attend it; what thou wouldst highly,
\nThat thou wouldst holily; wouldst not play false,
\nAnd yet wouldst wrongly win; thou\u2019dst have, great Glamis,
\nThat which cries, \u2018Thus thou must do, if thou have it;\u2019
\nAnd that which rather thou dost fear to do
\nThan wishest should be undone. Hie thee hither,
\nThat I may pour my spirits in thine ear,
\nAnd chastise with the valour of my tongue
\nAll that impedes thee from the golden round,
\nWhich fate and metaphysical aid doth seem
\nTo have thee crown\u2019d withal.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A lot of these Follow-Ups are about how much Shakespeare didn’t know. This one is about how much he still has to teach us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The term “nature vs. nurture” is a poetic turn of phrase that refers to an ongoing reexamination of the roles that heredity and environment play in determining who we are as individuals. The expression was popularized in the 19th century by Francis Galton, though the debate and the phrase had been around much longer than […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57,89,16,104,91,4,41,6,52,85,23,3,7,126,31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-as-you-like-it","category-ed-policy","category-education","category-follow-up","category-hamlet","category-history","category-information-literacy","category-international","category-macbeth","category-popular","category-science","category-shakespeare","category-studies","category-tempest","category-the-brain"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4939"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4939\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6504,"href":"https:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4939\/revisions\/6504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shakespeareteacher.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}