3 thoughts on “Stanley Fish: “How to Recognize a Poem When You See One.””
OK. Let’s see if I got this right: “if the understandings of the people in question are informed by the same notions of what counts as a fact, of what is central, peripheral, and worthy of being noticed–in short, by the same interpretive principles–then agreement between them will be assured”
So if their understandings are NOT informed by the same notions, then you have one person with “assignment-seeing eyes” guffawing at the gullibility of the one with “poetry-seeing eyes.” Or worse. When people are blind to the interpretative community out of which they are seeing, for example, the systems of white, wealthy male privilege and power, they will not be able to understand why people of color are upset by the Trayvon Martin case. Yes?
Chris Cocca 
OK. Let’s see if I got this right: “if the understandings of the people in question are informed by the same notions of what counts as a fact, of what is central, peripheral, and worthy of being noticed–in short, by the same interpretive principles–then agreement between them will be assured”
So if their understandings are NOT informed by the same notions, then you have one person with “assignment-seeing eyes” guffawing at the gullibility of the one with “poetry-seeing eyes.” Or worse. When people are blind to the interpretative community out of which they are seeing, for example, the systems of white, wealthy male privilege and power, they will not be able to understand why people of color are upset by the Trayvon Martin case. Yes?
Yes!