Mid Century Girl

Mid Century Girl

Last year, I orchestrated a one woman art show called, “Mid Century Girl”. My work dealt with baby boomer themes and how they influenced the world. It was a lot of fun to research. I organized the work like a quiz, I asked the viewing audience to try and guess the objects or people I depicted. I tried to interpret the iconic images of the mid-20^th century using the mediums of painting and printmaking techniques. I took a class of elementary students to the show, and they kept asking me who made all of the art. For some reason, they had a hard time accepting it was me! I wanted them to understand the roots of my social justice agenda that informs my lessons. I was inspired by the Beatles and there were some Abbey Road http://www.abbeyroad.com/  references as well as John Lennon in New York. In this blog I will look at how boomers influenced my classroom and the types of projects I work on with my students.

The origin of this social justice agenda probably came from my childhood. My father was a World War ll veteran and my mother was a “stay at home mom.” Dad was a typical veteran of his vintage; they rarely talked about the war. I would get snippets of information but not very much. On the other hand, the Great Depression and World War ll had a profound effect on my mother. She told me a lot of stories about wartime Cape Breton. She never forgot the fear, food rationing, air raid drills, and the anxiety of not knowing if she would ever see my father again. I got the sense from their generation that war should be a last resort; no one actually wins a war. I felt their generations sowed the seeds of feminism and the anti-war “Hippie” movement. The Hippies and their “counter culture” philosophy were the children and grandchildren of the survivors of the war. http://deoxy.org/leary.htm

I remember distinctly the day my brother brought home a Beatles album. I had never heard anything like it, it had a magical quality. They became the sound track of my life. Last year, I saw a Paul McCartney concert in Montreal. People of all ages were on their feet the entire concert, singing every word with him. We stayed in the Queen Elizabeth hotel in the room next to John and Yoko’s suite where they staged their, “Bed in for Peace” and Lennon wrote Give Peace a Chance in that room. It was like a religious pilgrimage. http://honeymoons.about.com/cs/canadiangetaways/a/johnyoko.htm

Other painting were about the Catholic of abstaining from meat on Friday, John Kennedy junior saluting his father’s casket, John Lennon portrait made from the word of the song Imagine, cat eye glasses, 45 speed records and cars with wings. People had a great time at the opening trying to guess a lot of the objects and eating the candy from their childhoods. I became very nostalgic during the process of making this show. I had not realized that the music, food and clothing had made such an impression on my imagination. That is probably why I have been collecting vintage clothing from the mid-20^th century for many years. Women had real bodies; they didn’t starve themselves to be underweight. Tom Wolfe called the ideal of the emaciated woman a “social x-ray”. http://www.smh.com.au/news/people/death-of-the-social-xray/2005/07/06/1120329491888.html

As my “Mid-Century Girl” show was evolving I was amercing myself in the past, the music, food, hair styles, clothing, and current events of the time. As far as I could tell, it was the first time people drew on their faces and their clothing. I responded by painting peace signs on clay face masks and decorating a t-shirt and jean with “counter culture’ slogans and icons. The 60’s was a time of conflict and peace. The war in Vietnam versus the Give Peace a Chance crowd. The charisma of the Kennedy`s, Martin Luther King and the promise of new and exciting times. The possibility of reaching the moon both literally and figureatively.All under the shadow of the Holocaust, reminding the world what can happen when we are indifferent to human suffering.

The opposite of love is not hate, it`s indifference.

Eli Wiesel

When I compare my teaching practice to some of the younger teachers on my staff, I see a different agenda. For me, everything I engage in comes from a social justice perspective. A lot of my issues are not even on their radar. They do not remember Pierre Trudeau`s `Just Society`

http://archives.cbc.ca/politics/prime_ministers/topics/2192-13269/ 

I was a teenage volunteer working on a campaign for Trudeau. He was magical and had a charisma that even a young girl could see. Richard Gwyn called him the “Northern Magus”. http://www.amazon.ca/Northern-Magus-Richard-J-Gwyn/dp/0771037325 I believe it was that sense of hope for the future and pride in our country that ignited my political passion. President Obama has that same type of energy, you can`t learn that in a Christopher`s Leadership course. http://www.clcnational.com/

            Currently, there are artists from the mid-century practicing art and still relevant. One that influenced my work is Yoko Ono. Outside of the conceptual art world her work may not be appreciated. Her influence during the mid-20^th Century was profound. She has recently enjoyed a renewed popularity. Since Lennon’s murder she has dedicated her art to creating a legacy for him. Most people have heard of Strawberry Fields in New York City, her Central Park tribute. She constructed an amazing light sculpture that was conceived during her years with John Lennon but installed after his death. The city of Reykjavik, Iceland is the home for her Imagine Peace Tower. It is lit on the anniversary of Lennon’s birthday October 9^th and is extinguished on December 8^th the anniversary of his murder. http://imaginepeace.com/

            Another piece of Ono’s that I have adapted it my classroom is the Peace Tree. This concept was influenced by the peace trees she saw in Japan and has gained popularity post atomic bomb. She has installed them in many places and encourages people to leave messages on the tree on the white tags she provides. To some people it may seem like schmaltzy hippy stuff but for me they are words to live by. http://imaginepeace.com/archives/16428

            I suppose it is a normal progression of events that each generation has a clash in values. I don’t feel that same sense of hope for the future that the post war world enjoyed. Everyone was putting the past behind them, starting families and buying as many plastic mass-produced products as they could.  By the time I became old enough to be a hippy, the movement was over. It was replaced by the disco era, the “Me” generation , http://www.generationme.org/aboutbook.html generation x  http://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=generation%20x&source=web&cd=6&ved=0CFEQFjAF&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.theglobeandmail.com%2Flife%2Fthe-hot-button%2Ffor-generation-x-its-all-work-and-no-kids-study-finds%2Farticle2174324%2F&ei=HXtzT5bhGsWu0AGTvoCBAw&usg=AFQjCNE8qfCLkGmQy6Y6vwC-g17wV6xoNg&cad=rja   & y http://legalcareers.about.com/od/practicetips/a/GenerationY.htm  and it became cool to be corporate. Make money at all costs and spend what you don’t have.

            I believe trends are cyclical and we may be at a point in civilization, post Iraq War when we can again work for peace. I dream of that day, as idealistic as it sounds. In my opinion it is the only way. The only thing wrong with peace it that is hasn’t been tried before, Groovy!

           

           

Question

Question

Mark Bracher’s book, Radical Pedagogy Identity,Generativity, and Social Transformation dedicates a section in Part Three called Self Analysis for Teachers.(Bracher, 2006) I am willing to lay on Dr. Freud’s coach and answer a series of revealing question about my motives for teaching. In fact, I highly recommend teachers put themselves under the microscope on a regular basis.

I decided to become a teacher because my father thought it would be a good career choice. He worked for the Department of Education as the business manager for an adult trade’s school. I was a fine art student at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design studying painting, I planned to become an artist and live in poverty. My father believed I could never support myself painting pictures. He felt a teacher’s license would allow me to earn a good living and pass on my art skills to children. I would not have taken that path and at that time, I could not understand why a stable job was important but I trusted him. I was 18 and didn’t understand myself, I was drifting. I am so grateful to him for giving me that advice, he knew me better than I knew myself.

I enrolled in the Bachelor of Art in Art Education at NSCAD. This program no longer exists, at the time; it gave me an art specialist’s license. I enjoyed the program, for the most part, but only four of us graduated from the program. In retrospect, they were very hard on us. Decades later, when I had my own B.Ed. Fine Art students at Cape Breton University I decided I would never treat them the way I was treated at NSCAD. It is the same promise I made when I got my teacher’s license, I vowed to never make a chid scared of me. I have kept both promises.

Initially, I stayed in the art education program because I was fulfilling my father’s wish but I began to see why he had recommended this profession. I was painfully shy. Most of my teachers, from grade primary to twelve would not have recognized the sound of my voice. I didn’t look people in the eye and was socially awkward. My teacher training helped me to overcome this affliction. I had a lot to say but was not able to communicate in social settings. As I gained more confidence as a student teacher, I started to forget about my fear of public speaking. Feminists call it finding your “voice”. http://www.daringtobeourselves.com/ Anyone who knows me today would find it hard to believe I was quiet and shy. The truth is, the shyness is still there, I have better coping skills. Johnny Carson used to tell a joke about his shyness. He said he was the guest at a party who was standing behind the drapes with a drink in his hand when the host opened them.

My identity needs are met by becoming a teacher. I see myself as an educator, no matter the particular job I am engaged in. In the earlier half of my career, I was the justice educator for the John Howard Society. The job straddled the education and criminal justice systems. I developed a series of lectures that I presented to school children and community groups that were designed to demystify the justice system. I had the freedom to develop the program from the response forms of the students. Students would evaluate my class and give me suggestion for future lectures. I wrote new material based on their suggestion so it would always be current. I developed my writing and teaching style working for this non-profit organization. Whenever a new school year starts, I always think about the fact that every September since I was five years old I was in school. Thirteen years of public school, four years of university, two years of graduate school, twenty one years at the John Howard Society and now an art teacher for the Cape Breton Victoria Regional School Board. I cannot see myself ever in a position that does not involve education.

I also have an identity as an artist. It is a struggle to maintain that identity because I do not produce as much work as I would like. I think being an artist is more than producing paintings; it is a start of mind. It is the way I approach the world. It is the way I learn and express myself. I think visually and make associations that make sense to me but often leave others in the dark.

I believe the artist‘s role in society is to be a free thinker, to go against the status quo. People look to our out spoken nature to get a fresh perspective. We can hide behind our eccentricities to not receive the wrath of our opponents. We capture a moment in time with paint, metal, charcoal or clay.

I want my impact on my students to be part of the catalyst that helped them to find out who they are, to be productive members of society, and fully realized human being. I want them to celebrate their uniqueness and be brave. Bravery to me is being scared but doing it anyway. Jumping in with both feet and having faith in yourself that you will figure things out. I want them to care about this world and contribute to its greatness. I want them to be comfortable in their own skin. They should develop a love of learning and stay curious about life. It all sounds very cliché but I really mean it and I hope I model these ideals.

Being a teacher is a very noble profession. I am constantly reminding myself of the responsibilities I have shaping young minds. I am often amazed at the ideas they take away from my class. It is sometimes hard to tell if you are making any impact or if they are going through the motions. Every once and a while, a parent will tell me something their child told them about my class. It is very gratifying to know that I touched someone’s life. Students leave handmade cards on my desk. The elementary students have such pure hearts, I live for those cards.

            I see the role of the teacher evolving to a combination of teacher/counsellor. The social problems and mental illnesses that are present in our students will make our job descriptions morph into a different combination of skills. Presently, I don’t feel, teachers are equipped to deal with the types of emotional problems in our classrooms. Our teacher training did not prepare us for the inclusive classroom, lack of resources, and the types of learning issues that are a regular part of our day. I believe each school will need an expert to deal with the students with autism spectrum disorder. This disorder is more prevalent in the classroom and research indicates it is on the rise. http://autismcanada.org/

There is no question the role of the teacher has changed since I took my teacher training. It is natural for professions to evolve. Although I feel it is more challenging to be a teacher, my love of the educational process has not wavered.

                                                    Reference

Bracher, M. ((2006).Radical Pedagogy Identity, Generativity, and Social Transformation. New York: Palgrave MacMillan

           

           

I Do Not Live in the Past

I do not Live in the Past,

the Past Lives in Me

                                                                                      Ellie Wiesel

          Chapter 9 in the Bracher book Radical Pedagogy Identity, Generativity, and Social Transformation gave me lots of food for thought about how I teach the Holocaust. I am going to back track and explain why I teach my students about the Holocaust before I put “how” I teach under the microscope.

When my mother died, I discovered that she had a secret. I was going through her belongings and I found a plastic bread bag of press clipping and some typed manuscripts. The manuscripts were typed on her old manual typewriter and the text matched the clippings. After some investigation, I discovered that during the 1950’s my mother wrote under a number of pen names for a magazine called the Cape Breton Mirror. I was able to find out the name of the publication during my research for an article and a CBC Information Morning phone in show called “Remembering the Cape Breton Mirror”. The CBC was interested because I had written a magazine article about my mother, Isabel Lewis. Before the magazine was released the publisher told me I had to find out more information about the Cape Breton Mirror. I was able to track down the publisher 50 years later. He was a Holocaust survivor, Norman Lipschutz.The Lipschutz family were Polish Jews who fled Hitler and eventually settled in Glace Bay. Norman’s dream was to have a literary magazine, my mother wanted to be a writer. Their worlds collided in the 1950’s for a few years and then that was basically the end of both of their dreams. My mother became buried alive as a post World War ll homemaker and Norman never achieved the same level of success. After the CBC phone in, I was offered the opportunity to write and narrate a documentary for a CBC Radio Program-Maritime Magazine-Reflections from the Cape Breton Mirror. I was taught how to use the editing equipment and learned as I went along how to make a documentary. The documentary led me to Yad Vashem in Israel, the March of the Living for Teachers in Poland and Germany, The Paper Clips Museum in Whitwell Tennessee and gave me the impetus to successfully lobby the Nova Scotia government to proclaim the first provincial Holocaust Education Week. That is why I teach the Holocaust.

            Traveling to Israel had a profound influence on my teaching and my life. I studied at Yad Vashem an internationally recognized Centre to learn about the Holocaust. It is a Museum, archive, Art Gallery and meeting place for scholars. I am trying to specialize in Visual Art and the Holocaust. It is a massive subject and I feel everyone needs to carve out their area of specialization. The workshops I attended talked about Holocaust Education disappearing from schools all over the world. One professor from Germany L discussed research that suggested Holocaust education presented improperly could create anti-Semitism. He said that teenage boys do not relate to victims but ally themselves with the power of the armed forces and often admire the German military. This made my heart stop. I thought of the responsibility I had to teach this material in away that did not victimize people. I wondered if I was approaching this topic correctly.

  Yad Vashem is an incredible structure built by Moshe Safdie. The design is like an arrow piercing the side of a mountain. The arrow is a metaphor for the Holocaust, piercing the heart of the Jewish people but not destroying them. They did survive in spite of the Nazi’s and their collaborators. When you start to go through the Museum you might become overwhelmed but there are no exits, you would have to retrace your steps to exit the exhibit. This is intentional. The lack of exits makes the visitor confront the Holocaust. The last exhibit you visit has pictures of people killed in the war displayed in a circular fashion in the ceiling. These pictures cast their reflection on the floor which resembles a dark pool. The idea is that when we die we go into the ground, but Jewish people believe their body is transformed and goes to heaven. Over to the side of that room is a lookout over the Jerusalem, the holy city of David. It is quite an experience.    

Speaker after speaker recommended that Educators focus on human rights. They believed that a society that values human rights would not allow a Holocaust to take place. They also felt that Jewish history should be taught in its entirety, focusing on their accomplishments.  For thousands of years, the Jewish people have survived many persecutions, but they have been triumphant.

            When I got home I met with Dr.Katherine Covell from the Cape Breton University Children’s Rights Centre. After that meeting, I accepted the challenge of writing a curriculum that would show teachers how to use art to teach the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.  I wrote the lessons and worked out the strategies with my Grade 10, Visual Art classes at Memorial Composite high school. This curriculum called, “Using Art to Teach Children’s Rights”, is now currently being used by UNICEF. http://globalclassroom.unicef.ca/en/resources/featured_lessons.htm

            This brings me back to Bracher, Page 109, paragraph 1, “…many teachers and scholars who want their work to promote social justice view historicism as an essential weapon in their battle against injustice and oppression...” I have definitely used history to teach about social justice, I believe it is important to know the roots of issues. I don’t think I have to throw the baby out with the bath water; it is a question of how much emphasis to place on the parts of the lesson that is historical.

Also, Page 111, paragraph 1, quotes Nietzsche with a different opinion, he felt that”…while the lessons of history are indispensable, they can be learned from a relatively small piece of history….historical sense makes its servants passive and retrospective.” I see these comments as looking at the weighting of issues and the techniques of getting enough information on a topic to move forward and put everything in context.

Further, Page 113, paragraph 2, reminds us that “…Dead White European Male literary histories promote suppression and oppression of, and repression in, those (women, racial and ethnic minorities, and others) whose attributes are not recognized in these histories.” The balances of voices, genders, social status, and ethnicity should always be considering when choosing research. Allowing the dissenters to have a voice is crucial.

Page 114, page 2 warns that “…overinvestment in a single identity (racial, gender, sexual, national, etc) produces two negative consequences.” It makes ones identity vulnerable and cultivates an identity as a victim.

           

            It seems in an attempt to disclose the injustices of the past and right past wrongs, we are in danger of victimizing groups of people thus damaging their self worth to the point when they stay victims. We get the opposite of what we are trying to achieve. When teaching students about racism, anti-Semitism, sexism and other injustices there is a huge burden of responsibility on the purveyor of information to do justice to the material and those who are suffering.

            The information in Chapter 9 appears to support what I learned in Israel about Holocaust education. When students learn about and value human rights they can analyze situations and determine if people are being treated fairly. That is the most effective way I have found to help children understand that, “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”(George Santayana.)

References:

Bracher, Mark. (2006) Radical Pedagogy Identity, Generativity, and Social Transformation. New York: Palgrave MacMillan

With God On Our Side

With God On Our Side

Comments on the Mark Bracher book: Radical Pedagogy

By Diane Lewis

Reading the book, Radical Pedagogy Identity, Generativity and Social Transformation by Mark Bracher has made me ask myself some important questions. http://www.amazon.ca/Radical-Pedagogy-Identity-Generativity-Transformation/dp/0230621112/ref=sr_1_10?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1330287767&sr=1-10. I have been an educator all of my professional career, it is my identity. I have also been a student for a longer time. The Buddhist Proverb, “When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.” has been a consistent theme for me, in both roles.

I love teaching because I love to learn. I like to switch roles from educator to student on a regular basis. It keeps me humble, put me in the place of the student, vulnerable. I teach elementary school and at that age there is a joy of learning, especially art. The reality is they don’t have a choice and children have a sense of adventure. They throw themselves into new situations without a lot of inhibitions. Their carefree attitude has transformed by painting. I feel free to use bold colours; they often give me advice on projects. I like to show them the process of creating art, how I overcome creative blocks and correct mistakes. I ask them to save their draft copies of their work so I can see the development of their ideas and they can see their progress.

 Bracher states “…education should support and develop students’ identities…” (Bracher, 2006, p.X1), he considers this the central purpose of education. I agree and would add that it should help them find their place in the world. I was intrigued by his statement that education can reduce such behaviors as violent crime, group hatred, racism and sexism.(Bracher,2006,p.X111,para 3). As an educator with roots in social justice I wanted to learn more.

The lesson I use to help develop my students’ voice is my children’s rights project. Elementary aged students really do have the capacity to decipher the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. I let the children chose an article from the convention and develop a project around those concepts. Child labor is always a popular topic, as is the right to play and the right to have a name. They have raised money for groups who immunize child in the midst of war, the organization Peace One Day. http://peaceoneday.org/ The convention made them realize that war is a children’s right issue.

           

Chapter 1, Bracher discusses his reasons for believing that one’s identity is at the root of human behavior.  He discusses political action and social problems. He returns to identity and the connection to social problems though out the book. (Bracher, 2006, p.3)

________________________________________________________________________

“I DON'T WANT TO BELONG TO ANY CLUB THAT WILL ACCEPT PEOPLE LIKE ME AS A MEMBER".

Groucho Marx

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Groucho_Marx

I agree with Bracher that identity is an important motivating force. It has been my experience that if students feel the class is busy work or if they cannot relate to the topic, they do not engage. This is particularly an issue in high school where students are constantly asking why they have to learn certain subjects. They have troubling understanding that the high school curriculum is relevant to their lives. They want the movies shown in class to be current; if they had an outdated hairstyle or clothing they  reject the message. They wanted a curriculum that was based more on pop culture than the outcomes identified by the Department of Education. In elementary grades they embrace the lessons with less complaining and questioning. The differences may be attributed to different times in their lives or hormones. If they didn’t like the package they didn’t want to know what was inside.

            The section on vulnerability deals with war and terrorism. As a Holocaust Educator I can relate to the material about identity. In early 20th Century Germany, the seeds for anti Semitism had been sown. Hitler was able to bring to the for front the German peoples’ shattered identity from their World War l humiliation. He was able to galvanize his country by finding “identity-protecting scapegoats”, (Bracher, 2006, p.6) those who were not Ayrans, the pure master race.

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/GERhitler.htm

It is hard to believe such hateful ideology could bring the world to its knees. I would submit the world is still recovering from this madman. When you travel throughout Europe there are many visible scars of a past conflict. It may be less obvious the emotion toll on the people who in some cases lost their entire family. Hitler certainly knew how to create an identity for a nation that excluded people he saw as inferior. Polish people, homosexuals, Jehovah Witnesses, mentally and physically handicapped people, artists-the list is unending. Most of us would be on his list at some point.

Many Neo- Nazi or white supremacists groups try to disguise themselves these days as patriots. They have such names as Heritage Front or Nationalist Party of Canada. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo-Nazism_in_Canada

They sound harmless, perhaps even patriotic. Hate groups are smart enough to understand how they are perceived and know how to sanitize their message. The new Anti-Semitism is Holocaust denying. http://www.adl.org/holocaust/introduction.asp They try to turn hatred into an academic debate. The courts have had to sort out cases and determine when the right to free speech becomes hate literature.

When people with these belief systems become educators we can have situations as explained in the chapter, Collusion in the Transference, “… students to seek recognition from authority by adopting certain alien identity contents they believe the authority approves of…”  ^{(Bracher, 2006, pp.80-81, para.3)}

The New Brunswick former teacher Malcolm Ross came into the public foray when a Jewish student complained about his Anti-Semitic teachings. It was written in a 1996 Supreme Court of Canada ruling  that his writings and teachings were harmful and that society needs to , “ …protect the right and freedom of Jewish children to have a school system free from bias, prejudice and intolerance'.^{[2]” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_Ross_%28school_teacher%29}  

            The Arab/Israeli conflict would certainly be an example of identity spurring on hatred and terrorism. Bracher states, “…when their own group engages in violence, people see the action as justified by some form of provocation by the other party, but when their group is the victim of violence, people perceive themselves to be innocent of all provocation and attribute all the blame to the other party, which is seen as the aggressor.” I believe that is why the average person seems to have a hard time sorting out this conflict and assigning blame or guilt. (Bracher, 2006, p.9, para.2)

            As I was reading this book I kept hearing Bob Dylan’s song, “With God On Our Side.” Many times in my travels though life I have remembered the lyrics, it goes like this:

Oh my name it is nothin'
My age it means less
The country I come from
Is called the Midwest
I's taught and brought up there
The laws to abide
And that land that I live in
Has God on its side.

Oh the history books tell it
They tell it so well
The cavalries charged
The Indians fell
The cavalries charged
The Indians died
Oh the country was young
With God on its side.

Oh the Spanish-American
War had its day
And the Civil War too
Was soon laid away
And the names of the heroes
I's made to memorize
With guns in their hands
And God on their side.

Oh the First World War, boys
It closed out its fate
The reason for fighting
I never got straight
But I learned to accept it
Accept it with pride
For you don't count the dead
When God's on your side.

When the Second World War
Came to an end
We forgave the Germans
And we were friends
Though they murdered six million
In the ovens they fried
The Germans now too
Have God on their side.

I've learned to hate Russians
All through my whole life
If another war starts
It's them we must fight
To hate them and fear them
To run and to hide
And accept it all bravely
With God on my side.

But now we got weapons
Of the chemical dust
If fire them we're forced to
Then fire them we must
One push of the button
And a shot the world wide
And you never ask questions
When God's on your side.

In a many dark hour
I've been thinkin' about this
That Jesus Christ
Was betrayed by a kiss
But I can't think for you
You'll have to decide
Whether Judas Iscariot
Had God on his side.

So now as I'm leavin'
I'm weary as Hell
The confusion I'm feelin'
Ain't no tongue can tell
The words fill my head
And fall to the floor
If God's on our side
He'll stop the next war.

http://www.stlyrics.com/lyrics/fahrenheit911/withgodonourside.htm

Reference

Bracher,M. (2006).Radical Pedagogy Identity, Generativity, and Social Transformation. New York: Palgrave MacMillan.

           

Martin Luther King, Jane Elliot and Hitler

Martin Luther King,

Jane Elliot and Hitler

Outwitted

He drew a circle that shut me out-

Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout

But love and I had the wit to win:

We drew a circle and took him In!

Edwin Markham

1852-1940

I saw the movie Crash in 2004 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0375679/fullcredits

 when it was released and immediately knew it would be a thought provoking film. The movie made me confront the fact that we all have prejudices, biases and preconceived notions about people.Ageism, sexism, or homophobia, we all like to think we are broad minded but are we really? I think it is important to identify these prejudiced and not pretend we don’t have them.

            For me, this movie raised issues of racial profiling. Although I was born in Sydney, Nova Scotia I don’t feel very connected to Cape Breton. I don’t have a Celtic background and I don’t relate to fiddle music, don’t speak Gaelic and don’t have coal miners or steel workers in my background, none of the stereotypes. I guess I am struggling to find my identity in a community that is so full of stereotypes.

It was interesting watching Crash after our class discussion on the text, “Situated learning Legitimate peripheral participation” by Lave and Wenger. http://www.amazon.ca/Situated-Learning-Legitimate-Peripheral-Participation/dp/0521423740/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1329434135&sr=1-1    Professor Plumb asked us to take note of the communities of practice. With this filter, I felt like I was watching a different movie.  As I began to takes notes, I noticed patterns as if people were moving in a series of concentric and sometimes overlapping circles. Each group was using their biases and prejudices to shield themselves from the other group.  People organized themselves into groups according to culture, social status or old world hatred. It seemed to be fueled by fear. No one saw a person from the other group as a human being with hopes, dreams and struggles of their own. As a visual artist I began to form pictures in my mind of how I could depict this on a canvas and what colours I would use.

I remembered a trip a took to Boston in the 1980’s.I stayed in the notorious Dorchester district. I did not know it was notorious at the time. It was a hot summer day and I took the children to the corner store for ice cream. When their mother returned home at the end of the day she went ballistic. She said there were youth gangs that robbed and raped people in that neighborhood. If I needed something at the store, I should drive with the windows up and the doors locked, without the children. I was a long way from Cape Breton Island both literally and figuratively!

            I have been mistaken for a Mi’kmaq woman and have been asked for my tax card in a store. When I lived in Montreal an Arab friend of my partner chided me for not being able to read the Arabic newspapers.  “How come you can’t read in your own language?”, he asked indignantly.  I had a similar experience when I was in Israel studying the Holocaust. Some Jewish American women on a bus asked me to read the Israeli newspaper and translate for them. I often get asked by people I don’t know, if I am Italian, Greek or Lebanese and then exasperated they will exclaim, “What are you then?”  I don’t understand why it is an issue and would never ask someone about their ethnicity. It is too personal bordering on racist and it makes me uncomfortable. I guess in some ways, without meaning to, I have been walking in the shoes of many cultures, none of whom I belong to.

Imagine no possessions,

I wonder if you can.

Nothing to kill or die for,

A brotherhood of man.

                                   John Lennon

                                Imagine

www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLgYAHHkPFs

            Yoko Ono, a conceptual artist, has just produced a fabulous film I have been using in my Grade 4 Art classes called, “My Hometown.” It attempts to unite people rather than emphasize cultural or geographic differences.http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0375679/fullcredits In this movie, she asked children to consider the world as a series of hometowns. Everyone in the world belongs somewhere. She promotes the technique of exploring how powerful our minds are when used to create a peaceful world. To think of every member of the human community belonging to a hometown somewhere on earth discourages alienation and war. It is a beautiful sentiment.

            The movie Crash makes me think about identity. At what point are people considering to be part of a community? Why do we care about someone’s skin, hair or eye colour? What should pigmentation define us?

            Jane Elliot an elementary school teacher in the United States tackled this notion with her students after the assassination of Martin Luther King. He had talked about his dream of the day when skin colour wouldn’t matter anymore than eye colour. Her students could not understand why someone would be murdered because of their race.http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkihaveadream.htm

She devised a controversial experiment that was documented in the movie, Eye of the Storm. http://janeelliott.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=J&Product_Code=JE-26 In this film, she divides her class by eye colour. She gives children privileges on alternating days according to brown or blue eye colours. She notices the test scores go down on the day the children feel they are not the top group due to eye colors.

http://www.janeelliott.com/

            King and Elliot had very similar philosophies about eye colour; they thought it should not matter. Hitler thought it did matter.

http://www.newfoundations.com/GALLERY/Hitler.html

The notion that a person is superior due to eye and hair colour may seem preposterous these days but it was a guiding principle during the Nazi era. Hitler anti-Semitism was based on the idea of a Jewish race which was propagated by him. There is only one race the human race but he found ways to divide and conquer.

            In my view there are enough divisions in society but people always seem to break down into groups. When I worked in the justice system, I noticed that even in prison inmates formed groups such as bikers, African Nova Scotian, Mi’kmaq, Newfoundlanders, Cape Bretoner etc...Everyone was united in their hatred of sex offenders, even the murderers felt superior to them.

            In a school cafeteria, students sit in groups of popular girls, jocks, etc...I guess it is human nature but when does it become harmful? I think we would be more productive if we embraced our differences and learned to accept other cultures customs and beliefs. I embrace Dr. King’s dream as well as the former Beatle John Lennon words “Imagine all the people living life in peace.”

           

Barn Raising

Blog 2

Barn Raising

Diane Lewis

This blog is in response to the book, “Situated learning Legitimate peripheral participation” by Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger. http://www.amazon.ca/Situated-Learning-Legitimate-Peripheral-Participation/dp/0521423740/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1328042167&sr=1-1

  I found this book presented interesting research on learning but was very heavy going because it used too much jargon. I can appreciate the authors are presenting their research finding but for the general public, I think this book would be intimating and confusing. The concepts that were presented seemed overly complicated; I had to slow down and reread many passages to glean their content. I spend a lot of my professional life simplifying and demystify concepts for elementary aged students. I don’t tend to read this type of book. Having said that, it was a good brain workout.

            Lave and Wenger made me think about the idea of a barn raising. In rural communities, people depended on each other for survival. A natural disaster, family tragedy, sickness or death could leave a family in jeopardy of starving to death. In a barn raising, the community helped a family construct a barn, shed or house. Each neighbor pitched in to help the other. Habitat for Humanity http://www.habitat.ca/   has a similar idea requiring the person receiving the home to put in some sweat equity and help to build other people homes. The theme of learning communities in this book seems to marry with these ideas. The interdependence and sometimes vulnerability of the learner is a community experience. The interdependence is what makes the community stronger, like the barn raising. You have a group of people to count on; you are not in this alone.

            The book also raised questions for me about how we educate people and the curriculum we use to educate students. Teachers live and die by their curriculum. I always say you can use it as a jumping off point to do some exciting lessons or you can hide behind it. “I am too busy.” or “I don’t have time” can be code for; “I am not interested.”

            CHAPTER 3, Page 79-84, talked about Alcoholics Anonymous. I found their research on this organization fascinating. I have never thought of A.A. as an apprentice relationship before I read this book. I have a great deal of respect for A.A, many seemingly hopeless alcoholics are able to attain and sustain sobriety due to the support systems created by this organization. On page 80, the authors include a study by Cain that talks about how people are transformed through the A.A. process. The personal stories, told many times to more experienced story tellers who act as mentors to apprentices helps to put the alcoholic‘s life in a format that suits the organization. It seems the new person learns from the examples of more seasoned story tellers the rhythm of the addicted person’s life. “…through the process of constructing personal life stories, and with them, the meaning of the teller’s past and future action in the world.” On page 84 it states. “Stories do not just describe a life in a learned genre, but are tools for reinterpreting the past, and understanding the self in terms of the A.A. identity.” It seems they are implying that the apprentice teaches by giving examples of the types of stories that will help a person accept their addiction, join a community who understands them and puts in place safety nets to prevent a relapse.

The book talked about learning outside of a school setting. As a Teacher I am aware of the fact that a lot of learning takes place outside of the classroom. It has been my experience that unless a child connects to the lesson they don’t have meaningful learning, perhaps just some memorization or data stored in short term memory.

            I was intrigued by the types of apprentices the book talked about mainly pages 61-87.Before reading this book, I had a much narrower understanding of the master-apprentice relationship. The notion of a young man learning to carve furniture from a master carpenter was the primary image in my understanding of apprentices. Spending years practicing leg turning, joinery and wood finishes would complete the wood worker’s training. In fact, Teachers do an apprenticeship when they do their practicum. My BEd program at NSCAD lasted 2 years. We observed, studied teaching techniques, taught Saturday morning art classes at NSCAD and did a number of practicum placements with master teachers. By the time we graduated, we had a real sense of what teaching was all about, only 4 of us graduated from my NSCAD Art Education class. It was a brutal process.

            Probably the worst rendition of the apprentice relationship to the master is Donald Trump’s television show, Celebrity Apprentice. http://www.nbc.com/the-apprentice/   Purely for entertainment value, the meaner they are to each other the better. There is not as lot of team work, the winner must develop a strategy to eliminate everyone else. It is great for rating, but very nasty business. Last man or woman standing is the winner, perhaps that is the real world, but it is not my world. The mean spiritedness from this type of “entertainment” is permeating our society, in my opinion making us more selfish less concerned about others.

            In a recent issue of The Canadian Artist Magazine

http://www.canadianart.ca/online/  They included a supplement from the Rolex Mentor & Protégé Arts Initiative. http://www.rolexmentorprotege.com/en/index.jsp.

 On page 4 of the magazine, the author Charlotte Rey explains that the Rolex Company created a Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative matching master artists from varied arts backgrounds with up and coming artists.  29 of the world’s leading artists, such as Martin Scorsese work with the protégé’s for one year. The article describes on Page 4, “… the nature of the transmission between mentor and protégé and how Rolex Arts Initiative is promoting an artistic community transcending borders, generations and disciplines.”

The mentor gets as much inspiration as the protégé.”

Martine Scorsese

Mentor Protégé, Issue 3/November 2011.

The visual arts have used apprentices for hundreds of years. The apprentice stretched canvas, mixed paint, cleaned the workshop and made copies of the master works for many years before they set off on their own individual creative endeavors.

           

On page 5 of the same article artist Rebecca Irvin says the definition of the French word protégé means to protect. “…so a mentor is somebody who oversees, supports, guides and nurtures a less experienced person. She feels the mentor is a trusted advisor but the relationship goes beyond that. A mentor demonstrates how an artist lives. This seems to support Lave and Wenger research on what is being transmitted to the apprentice, not just book knowledge but a way a person behaves in this position

As an Educator I feel there is a lot of good material in this book on learning communities and apprenticing that could be adapted to the public school system.

References

Lave, Jean & Wenger, Etienne. (1991).Situated learning Legitimate peripheral participation. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Rey, Charlotte. (2011).Mentoring in the 21^st Century. Mentor Protégé, 4-9.