Page 93 - Composing Processes and Artistic Agency

82 Orchestrating different forms of knowledge

levels of competence. Varying levels of dexterity and mastery are also revealed
when using material and immaterial tools.
Philosophers frequently refer to the concept of knowledge, psychologists to
the concept of intelligence and social scientists to the concept of competence
as though they had found, in these concepts, the cause of successful actions
(see Taylor 1987/1995). We do not pursue any fundamental approach and
therefore use the concept of knowledge primarily as an explanatory tool
without ontological claim. And even though we posit that actions are guided
by knowledge and rules, mastery in fact exceeds every set of rules and every
set of explicit knowledge aspects that academics are able to identify (see
Zembylas 2004: 291–294; 2014: 112–116). Whilst our fundamental thesis is
that people act knowingly – where the suffix “-ing” expresses precisely that
idea of knowing-as-doing (Dewey 1916: 331) – this does not mean that there
is causal determination. According to our conception, the relationship
between knowledge and action is reciprocal. Specific concepts of knowledge
1
such as “tacit knowledge” or “artistic practical knowing” offer conceptual
help with interpreting practices as intelligible or as the results of learning
processes. It is obvious that such concepts of knowledge have inherent limits.
First and foremost, they suggest that the acting subject as carrier of knowl-
edge or possessor of mastery has sovereign control over himself or herself and
over the situation in which he or she acts. This perspective masks two factors:
first, the latent and at the same time ineliminable fragility and ambiguity of
actions, and, second, the presence and effectiveness of a community of practice,
which shapes the criteria for success and thus also the recognition of mastery
through regimes of competence. We therefore use the concept of knowledge
with a degree of epistemic caution concerning its actual explanatory force.
Since we do not wish to fix our concept of knowledge in advance, we will,
in the following sections, give precedence to our empirical material. After all,
composers did not first acquire knowledge or learn competences or techni-
ques, and only thereafter compose. Agency in composing is not the cause of
actions – it develops during composing activities. Rogers Albritton’s (1959/
1970: 233) remark on verbal language is thus also true for the practice of
composing: “For remember that in general we don’t use language according
to strict rules – it hasn’t been taught us by means of strict rules, either.” We
can only meaningfully refer back to the concept of knowledge and explain
its epistemic usefulness from within the description and interpretation of
composing practices.

3.1 The various manifestations of artistic practical knowing

3.1.1 Experiential knowledge as knowledge of the work process
Both our sample of composers for the case studies and individual interviews
mostly consisted of people with professional experience who have been regularly
composing for at least fifteen years. One result of the knowledge of the work