In The Middle of Precious Part II

Mapping the Definition of Cultural Sustainability

In The Middle of Precious Part II

In our Leadership and Self-Development class at Goucher, we acquired the process of examining assumptions.  It was enlightening to discover how unaware we are of the role assumptions play in our thoughts and actions. The exercises that Professor Ross-Veatch led had a binocular effect in viewing our groundwork projects. This fine tool was made pinpoint evident in that evening’s reading from our Cultural Sustainability session.

In the prior day’s session, we encountered a theoretical topic that broached emotional borders.  It began in a discussion about an occurence at our artistic social event.  The deliberation formed misunderstandings relevant to the issue of cultural authenticity v. authenticity of the moment. The discussion led to discomfort zones on racial tensions in America. The classroom setting became the vessel to explore actualities we might encounter in doing the work of cultural sustainability. The exercises on assumptions from our Leadership Class, and Parker Palmer’s excerpts from Courage To Teach, provided strong insight into managing situations of conflict. Palmer states, “At its best, the community of truth advances our knowledge through conflict, not competition….conflict is open and sometimes raucous but always communal, a public encounter in which it is possible for everyone to win by learning and growing. Conflict is the dynamic by which we test ideas in the open, in a communal effort to stretch each other and make better sense of the world. Further, Palmer relays, “it is our commitment to the conversation itself, our willingness to put forward our observations and interpretations for testing by the community and to return the favor to others [that keeps us in the truth.]” To be in the truth we must know how to observe and reflect and speak and listen, with passion and with discipline, in the circle gathered around a given subject.” The pinnacle lesson that tied these truths together was made crystal clear in the video of Chimamanda Adichie’s The Danger of One Story. Adichie's lecture is a profound, melodic and eloquent rendering that should be heard by every story researcher, writer, teller and listener.

The MACS Program Fall Class of 2010 has many stories to discover and tell. The totality of the residency, the intellectual study, the social gatherings, classroom and post classroom discussions, and the advisory sessions with Professor Turner have renewed brightness in my journey and forged new determinations.
The Residency did not just curtail analyzing theory while sitting at a desk. There was the manifestation of sustaining culture: A dinner with B’more crabs, conversation, and other cultural foods; a tour of Painted Screens; and, an evening of music, cowboy poetry, a drum circle, and storytelling. Collaborating with Jane Kamau from the first MACS contingency, tandem telling a story from her culture, The Kikuyu People Creation Myth was a humbling, yet invigorating experience.

From this juncture, this melding of culture consciousness, other emerging joint projects have seeded. Being in the middle of precious may footprint me to Guatemala helping children to tell their stories, and hoof me to New Mexico to joint teach educators in storytelling.  And thus, the journey continues.