172 SECTIONAL ADDRESSES. 



even in counterpoint. All these spatial and temporal characteristics of 

 pattern could be recorded. But equally important would be the delicate 

 variations in force, corresponding to accent. 



This integration of the part-actions into wholes usually expresses the 

 individuality of the performer. It is unlikely, for example, that the 

 separate steps of a dance are ever fused into a whole without being changed. 



Skill and Awareness. 



Unless and until a highly skilled action has become really automatic, 

 the performer is aware of its integral character. This awareness, unclear 

 though it may be, determines the character of the part-actions. Examples 

 are stress, accent and intonation in speech. As the sentence is initiated 

 the whole, of which the speaker is aware, determines the parts. To speak 

 a foreign language well, one must raise and lower the voice at points quite 

 different from those which would receive the stress in one's own tongue. 

 To acquire such skill the learner must attend not so much to the single 

 words as to the whole sentence. 



This patterning, which dominates corresponding bodily and mental 

 events, acts upon reflex, instinctive and habitual mechanisms. When 

 it employs habits it usually transmutes them into actions less fixed and 

 more adapted to the situation. 



' Knack.' 



A most interesting example of patterning in skill is ' knack.' It would 

 be unprofitable to quarrel about the exact meaning to be attached to a 

 popular word, but the definition of Mr. Vivian Caulfeild in his book ' How 

 to Ski '^ promises to be as useful in theory as it is in practice. 



He defines knack as ' the ability to perform easily a rapid and accurate 

 co-ordinated movement of a number of muscles,' and continues : 



If this movement is an unaccustomed one the ability to perform 

 it properly is only attainable by long practice. 



The action of throwing, for instance, requires knack. It is this 

 which makes it so difficult to learn to throw with the left hand, even 

 though one already has the ability to move the left arm with quite 

 sufficient strength and speed, and knows not only how the movement 

 should be made, but even how it feels, to make it with the other hand. 

 Writing is another excellent example of knack. 



In ski-running nothing which can strictly be called knack comes 

 into play. In this sport the voluntary muscular movements (as 

 distinguished from the involuntary ones used in keeping the balance) 

 are neither complicated nor unusual, and, except in jumping, they 

 need seldom be rapid. Any difficulty in learning them is due partly 

 to the disturbing effect on one's clear-headedness^of^the speed at 

 which one is travelling, and partly to the fact that some of the move- 

 ments, though simple in themselves, are almost the reverse of those 

 one's natural instinct would prompt one to make in the circumstances. 

 This difficulty, of course, diminishes with practice, but an effort of 

 will goes just as far as, or even farther than, practice towards over- 



» London, 1924, pp. 10-12. 



