Considering Your Own Influence (Storytelling Series Part 3)
Recently, I had the privilege of spending some time in the Amazon rainforest, guided by a man named Carlos. Carlos grew up in the Amazon, 2 days walk from any other villages, and was generous enough to share some of his knowledge of how to live there with us. We were accompanied by a number of people from the US.
When Carlos taught us to make clothing out of palm and philodendron leaves, there was a sudden chorus of "What a great Halloween costume!" "Oh! It's like we're at a costume party!" "You look just like my Haitian maid!" (Yes, that last one is a real quote.)
Someone shared intimate and endangered practices from their life, their family traditions, their culture and history, and the responses immediately invalidated them as equal to a last minute decision on a holiday that has long since lost its roots.
Unfortunately, sometimes the reality is that no matter how meaningful, sentimental, responsible or practical the stories are that we tell, people will get out of them only what they have been conditioned to.
We have a critical and systemic need to increase people's ways of thinking. I use the word increase there quite intentionally. If people do not have the capacity, or skills, or support systems necessary to process relationships and experiences and stories in ways that recognize how they are affected by them, they will be naturally excluded from the conversations that could initiate change.
Active listening, consideration and research is unfortunately an undertaught skill. Our education system utilizes the same textbooks year after year. Most core subjects do not require empathy, relation or an understanding of equity vs. equality to do well - They are based on black-and-white concepts, not ethics, intersectionality or progression. Math, writing composition and even social studies, such as geography and history (generally focused on dates and place, rather than social factors and outcomes: https://www.ualberta.ca/en/folio/2024/01/is-history-teaching-stuck-in-the-past.html) are good examples of this. Furthermore, our work in school does not affect other people. What we contribute does not extend beyond ourselves. We are taught that the most valuable knowledge is that which is handed to us by people we know, that we can utilize it without concern, and that it does not need to be changed.
Then we throw people into University and adulthood and expect them to be motivated, critically-thinking members of society. What resources do they have to fulfill those expectations? How can we teach them to consider us, when they were never taught to consider their own influence to start with?
Knowledge is not equal to skills, and skills often have no bearing on one's resources. We are so focused on giving people a start, that we have forgotten we need to get them to the end.
Note: Teachers are badass. The funding and resources provided to them, however, are not.
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