Formal, Informal & Technical Knowledge

Rule-governed Human Activity

Informal Formal Technical

So what? What exactly does this even mean? Let me give you an example of the differences of the Informal, Formal and Technical modes.

“Some years ago in the town of Grand Lake, Colorado, on the snowy western slope of the Rockies, there was a tradition that everyone had to use skis to get around in this wintertime. New schoolteachers transferred into the area had to learn to ski, and even the school principal and the school band were on skis. Small children learned to ski soon after they could walk. When one watched these people move about, it was as though the skis were an actual extension of the foot, a highly adapted organ for locomotion. Each person had developed his own highly individualistic style, just as everyone has his own way of walking. When skiing competitions took place some villagers were better than others, while many did not compete at all. The main thing was that everyone skied. No one questioned the fact that this was desirable. Skiing was taken for granted as a part of the daily life of the town. This is a formal tradition.

At the same time, there were a few hardy souls in Denver and other nearby towns who used to take to skis for pleasure, as a part-time activity. There was no pressure on these persons to ski, they simply liked to get out into the open. Some of them had very real talent, others weren’t so skilled…They were not highly conscious of how they skied, what technique they used or how the skill would be taught. They would say, ‘Watch me,’ or ‘Do it like this,’ and that was about as far as they could go…Their conception of skiing was informal, a view which is no better expressed than in the phrase, ‘You’ll get the hang of it.’

At the same time that the townspeople on the western slope were teaching their children to ski and the informal skiers from Denver were making their weekly pilgrimage to the mountains, thousands of feet of film were being taken in the Alps of wonderfully skilled skiers rushing down the slopes, turning, climbing, and coming to a stop. These films were analyzed, and the whole process broken down into its components. In addition to the components, broader patterns were also analyzed. After a while it was decided that skiing was not an art which had to be restricted to the gifted. Anyone with patience and a modicum of control could be taught to ski, since the components had been so well identified that they could be talked about and described technically.”

The Silent Language
E.T. Hall