3,636 Years of Life or a Vacation Home?

Most people in the western world are very wealthy by most any measure.  That means we have extraordinary opportunities to change other people's lives.  If you've ever walked around a poorer country, where the average person is earning a couple of dollars a day, you've probably thought about this, how a fraction of your weekly income could send a child to a good school for a year, or enable an entrepreneur to start a business.  Most of us try not to think about this.  But an Oxford University ethics professor named Toby Ord has thought about it a great deal.

Ord founded an organization called Giving What We Can.  It includes a list of his favorite charities (he favors ones oriented toward health, relatively small investments that allow people to live much longer and more happily).  The site also includes a calculator that lets you know about how much good you can do.  He advocates that people earning generous salaries donate a large chunk of it--50% rather than just 10%  But I plugged in 10% of $80,000 or 25 years.  That amount of giving would produce an additional 3,636 years of healthy living, the equilalent of saving dozens of lives.  Or you could put that money into a time share or vacation home.  Which is what most of us will do.

Violence and Innocent Children

Every mass shooting leaves me sad--but also frustrated.  I recall when my first book appeared, a history of violence against wives, nearly twenty years ago, and I was trying with very little success to interest Portland radio stations in it.  KBOO did an hour-long interview, but the leading AM station said that they weren't interested until something newsworthy happened.  Finally the day came when a husband kidnapped a child rather than simply beating up his wife.  This was news.  But shortly before the interview was to commence a large passenger plane crashed and killed many people.  As an airline crash trumped a child kidnapping every day of the week, my ten minutes of fame was reduced to "can you sum up your book in a single sentence?"  I replied, with a touch of sarcasm, that the book argued that violence against wives should be understood as an ongoing process, not peculiar events.  I might have added that many more people are killed in automobile accidents than in airplane crashes, but I was out of time.

Of course twenty-seven people--most of them young children--being killed in a single event is tragic.  But I'm not convinced that it should become the prime driver of policy and legislation.  A few commentators have pointed out the neglected fact that homicides in the U.S. have been in steady decline in recent years.  So maybe the nation is not going to hell in a hand basket.  School shootings remain extremely rare.  Do we want to take money away from teachers so that every school has armed guards?  And in talking about the pros and cons of controlling guns or disseminating them more widely, shouldn't we be studying subjects such as the likelihood of accidental shootings, events that are so common as to be unremarkable and therefore not newsworthy?

I also wonder why we don't pay more attention to the deaths of innocent children that are relatively easy to prevent.  Few of us realize that our tax dollars are funding drone attacks that have killed scores of innocent children.  Thousands of children perish every day across the globe for lack of food and simple medicines.  Even right here in the U.S.A. millions of children's lives are endangered by problems such as poverty, malnutrition, obesity, and environmental health hazards that we lack the political will to address.

There is a lot that we can't do--or at least can't easily do.  But when it comes to saving innocent children, there is also a lot of "low-hanging fruit."

Christmas Versus X-Mas

It's that time of year again. . . .  No, I'm not talking about the bright lights, lilting carols, or barrage of adverstisements and unhealthy foods besieging us at every turn.  'Tis the season of "Happy Holidays" versus "Merry Christmas," that time of year that we celebrate the Winter Solstice and the Birth of Christ by yelling at each other about the true meaning of the holiday.

I find myself empathizing with both sides here, up to a point, with both those who feel like Evangelical Christians are trying to force Jesus down their throats and those who believe that, for them, Christ is at the center of Christmas--what ever other antecedents and associations the holiday might have.  If you believe that the central event in the history of humanity is God breaking into our world through becoming human, it's hard to take the often shallow forms of X-Mas that saturate our culture.

But I cannot muster much sympathy for Christians who respond to X-Mas by ranting at clerks who say "Happy Holidays" or bemoaning the fact that some public places don't allow creche scenes.  Many Christians seem unable to accept the fact that mainstream American culture does not reflect much of the New Testament.  They seem perpetually bemused and outraged that most Americans are worshipping other gods: wealth, fame, pleasure, to name a few.  It's perhaps useful to remind ourselves that Jesus didn't come into the world as mainstream sort of guy.  He was born to and among humble people.  He hung out with the poor and the maligned.  He was killed by authorities religious and secular.  So why are so many of his followers now trying to enshrine him at our shopping malls and town squares?

Why Ghanaian History Focuses on Big States and Big Men

I've been revising an article that I started working on a year ago that examines the history of surveys of Ghanaian history--or historiography.  Historiography sounds very, very boring, but it can be quite interesting, often reveals as much about the period in which the history was written as it does about the subject of the history.

Not surprisingly, early histories of Ghana written by Brits tended to focus on Ghana's relations with Great Britain.  Independence brought much more emphasis on Ghanaian history, especially the accomplishments of Asante, an Akan-based state that created an empire at least as large as modern Ghana, and the long independence movement.  But these histories still focused on elites, and more recent histories of Ghana--especially those created for students--have continued this trend.

There are several explanations for this.  Some historians argue that African historians internalized the methods and values of traditional colonial history and therefore emphasized the accomplishments of big states and big men--sort of like African American historians who focused on people like George Washington Carver rather than the lives of slaves.  But it's also the case that Ghanaian histories--oral and written--have long focused on the fate of states and rulers.  And some states outlawed any mention of the existence of states they had conquered.  As the saying goes, the winners get to write the histories.  One could argue that this focus on the history of powerful governments and people serves the interests of the current state by diverting attention from subjects that could lead to political or social disunity, such as poverty and inequality.

There are scores of interesting books and articles about the social and cultural life of Ghana, past and present.  But due to the factors noted above, it seems unlikely that authors of historical surveys will make use of them.

Ghanaian and Catholic Schools: Comfortable with Deference

I had the honor today of visiting several classrooms at St. Andrew Nativity School, where I started volunteering as a tutor nine weeks ago, to talk about Ghana.  And I was soon telling the students that of the many classrooms I have visited in the U.S., theirs most reminded me of Ghana.

There are, to be sure, a lot of differences: temperature control; furnishings; number of books and other teaching aids.

But there are also a lot of similarities.  The students at St. Andrew are much more respectful toward adults than are most students in the U.S.  This is not just a question of wearing uniforms and being quiet--though that helps.  It also seems to be internalized.  The students at St. Andrew seem to view their school as a splendid opportunity.  Indeed, the school is one of many Catholic efforts to provide an outstanding education to children from disadvantaged backgrounds.  But across the U.S. there are students from all sorts of backgrounds who seem to view school as some sort of punishment.  I recall students from my own childhood who seemed utterly devoted to driving teachers into early retirement.  The students at St. Andrew, like those I met and observed in Ghana, seem very pleased to be in school and to take pride in their accomplishments and ambitions.

In chatting with one of the staff members today, we remarked that the American love for equality and freedom has often translated into a distrust of any sort of hierarchy or deference.  But the students in Ghana and at St. Andrew seem pleased to show respect to their teachers in particular and to adults in general, people who are, one hopes, helping them to move from childhood to maturity, dependence to responsibility.

The website for St. Andrew Nativity School:  http://nativityportland.com/

Life's Sneaker Waves

We've been staying the past couple of days south of Lincoln City, very close to the spot where four years ago I nearly got swept into the ocean by a sneaker wave.  It was Wendy's 50th birthday celebration week-end, and I went for a walk with a friend.  We were talking, and I turned to see a huge wave coming at us, yelled to Mary to run, and made it to the rocks on the base of a short cliff, where I climbed up a couple of feet and then hung. on.  The wave washed completely over me, and as I held on for dear life I remember hoping with all my might that Mary would be there when the wave receded.  She was not.  I saw her in the ocean, being sucked out to sea.  So I figured I'd see if the next wave would bring her in, then decide whether or not to jump in to try to save her.  I'm a terrible swimmer.  It was a cold day; both of us had bulky clothes on.  But jumping in seemed like it would be the right thing to do.  But Mary found a way to find the current that was driving toward shore, and the next wave deposited her on the beach.  I kept yelling at her to get up.  I didn't want to go anywhere near the ocean.  She asked for help, so I trotted out and helped her up.  We went back to the house.  Life went on.

I was troubled by the event for a long time.  I felt so helpless and frightened on that rock.  And I wondered what I would have done--or should have done--if Mary had stayed out in the ocean.

I finally got specialized, rapid-eye-movement therapy to help me process and heal from the trauma of the event.  And the therapist helped me to realize that I dealt with the episode very successfully: I took care of myself,  then I took care of my friend.  Who knows what I would have done--or should have done--if she had been swept out to sea.

But I still  think of the episode from time to time.  Mostly I think about how ordinary the day seemed and how quickly the prospect of helplessness and death appeared.  My life almost always seems  ordinary, even routine, and I almost always feel in control.  But big events--danger, death, and other traumas--will come again, probably without warning.

The End of Christian America?

I seldom blog about explicitly religious subjects, as it seems like the one topic of conversation guaranteed to alienate at least some of my friends and students.  But the last election has me thinking about the relationship between Christianity and the mainstream political culture of the U.S.

Given the defeat of Republicans at the polls and, especially, the gains made by proponents of same-sex  marriage, some Evangelical Christians have concluded that the nation has decisively turned away from Christian values.

I have two (very different) objections to this way of thinking.  First, I think and believe that an open-minded reading (if such an endeavor is possible) of the New Testament suggests that Jesus and the early church were much more interested in people showing love and care for each other than in such subjects as abortion and same-sex relations--not to mention that the very definitions terms like "homosexual" are historically plastic and indeterminate.  And where is the chorus of outrage from conservative Christian commentators over drone attacks that kill innocent children or the deaths of several thousand children each day from lack of food and simple medicines?  Second, should we really expect the Christianity of the New Testament to become the basis of popular culture in any deep and meaningful way?  It seems to me that the crux of Christianity is God becoming human and offering himself as a sacrifice to humanity even as they--literally--crucify him.  Jesus washes the feet of his disciples even as he tells them that they will betray and abandon him on the cross. He urges people to confess their sins, their need for forgiveness, and to lay down their lives in humble service to God and humanity.  Does this sound like the Republican Party or mainstream America?  

Christians haven't lost America.  They never had it.

The End of the Republican Party?

Many pundits since elecrion day have pointed out that the Republicans foolishly hitched their wagon to a single demographic group: older white (and of course straight) males--preferably not with a lot of education in subject such as Sociology or Ethnic Studies.  As this group has been and, for the foreseeable future, shall remain a shrinking part of the electorate, it seems in hindsight unwise to have "fired up the base" by alienating Latinos and women.  Republicans since Richard Nixon have made a living by trying to paint the Democratic Party as the refuge of poor blacks and clueless intellectuals, thereby scooping up the white South and working class.  But they can ill afford to hand the Democrats large pluralities of the nation's young, women, and Latinos.

The problem facing Republicans, though, is that the party has become dominated by people who feel alienated by the same modern forces that are reworking the electorate.  Sensible Republicans who want to remain competitive in national elections and in states such Nevada and Florida recognize that they must now move significantly to the left on questions such as immigration and women's rights--and eventually on gay and lesbian rights.  But it is precisely these changes (a black man in the White House, women outnumbering men in a growing number of professions, Spanish speakers arriving in more and more local neighborhoods and schools, and gays and lesbians appearing in sit-coms and PTA meetings) that have motivated so many conservatives to become politically active, to "take back our country," as they often put it.

Those of us who embrace social and cultural diversity have a hard time not gloating at the fix the Republican Party finds itself in.  We should remind ourselves that most people find change unsettling, and that in the 1960s the Republican Party also seemed to be hopelessly out of step and headed for the scrap heap of history.

The Election We Deserve

'Tis the season for complaints about the endless barrage of political ads that treat us like we are a bunch of rubes easily influenced by lies, exagerrations, bombast, and personal attacks.

     Of course the problem is that these ads are so common because they usually work.

     Our inability or unwillingness to pay much attention to civics, to our obligations as citizens, means that we are influenced by relatively small amounts of information.  That is why televised debates and advertisements are so important.  Most of us don't get much information otherwise.

     Therefore candidates are often rewarded for appearing to be in command and assertive, even if they are spouting a bunch of nonsense.  They are banking on the fact that only a small sliver of viewers will read the fact-checkers' articles the next day.  Likewise, advertisements so often play to the more shallow side of human nature (fear and envy, for example), because in the absence of knowledge we tend to vote with "our gut."

     The power of this sort of advertising means that the candidate able to buy up the most advertising has a huge advantage.  This advantage would be greatly reduced--and the level of political discourse greatly elevated--if all of us spent half as much time educating ourselves about politics as we do watching sit-coms.

The Future of Higher Education?

     I've recently read a number of articles about inequality and, for lack of a better term, modernization--by which I mean globalization and the advance of technology.

     Part of this is due to simple self interest, as more and more academics are wondering if we'll eventually be replaced by a combination of online lecturers from the professorial elite and teaching assistants located in places like India.  Will students soon have the option to listen to the lectures of Stanford professors while getting detailed feedback from teaching assistantsliving in India?  The part of me that wants to keep teaching--and earning money--into my seventies hopes not.  But it is certainly conceivable that such courses would be both better and much cheaper than many if not most of the courses now offered at colleges and universities. 

     Economists seem to be divided on whether or not technological efficiency leads to a net job gain or loss.  But some are suggesting that most of the job losses of the Great Recession will not be recovered, that the combination of technological change and moving jobs offshore means that a smaller and smaller proportion of us will be able to make a decent living--even as our economy creates cell phones and, perhaps, college courses, that are both cheaper and better.


   

Books: A Precious Gift

One little incident that occurred during my recent trip to Ghana underscored for me how differently people there and in the U.S. view books.  I had finished skimming a scholarly journal that I had brought along, so I put it in the trash, as I had no further use of it and didn't want it to take up space in my luggage.  The person who cleaned my hotel room removed it from the trash and placed it back on the desk, no doubt assuming that I must have put it in the trash by mistake.  Not even an American would be so crazy as to throw a book away.

I enjoyed telling Ghanaian students that I knew students back in the U.S. who hoped to never have to read an entire book.  This they found very hard to believe.  They were incredulous that such opportunities are squandered.  Students in Ghana often share textbooks, or copy their contents from the blackboard.  They yearn for books that they can take home to study and for "story books" that they can read.  This is why the staff at Purity School decided that having a library was their highest priority.  And it is why when African students get to the western world, where we are awash in books that so many of our students don't want to read, that the students from Africa so often excel.

It doesn't cost those of us in the West very much to provide Ghanaian students with books of their own.  And that act might prompt us to take more seriously the opportunities for reading and learning that we so often spurn.

Question for Students at KNUST and PSU

When did you start learning about the history of slavery in school, and how do you think it has affected the development of West Africa and North America? As you post, be sure to remember that this is a sensitive subject for many people, so it's important to be respectful toward those with different opinions than your own.  Please contact me at delmard@pdx.edu if you have any concerns or problems.

Support for Awisa Schools

My last day in Ghana was a very full one, as my friend Dr. Kwasi Opoku-Amankwa and his driver picked me up in Kumaski at 4:00 a.m. and drove to Accra, where Dr. Amankwa had some appointments with education bureacrats.  We then drove to his home village of Awisa, where he introduced me to the staff and teachers of three fine schools that I hope to find partners for back home before they then drove me back to the airport in Accra.  They then headed northward, into the warm night, for another five hour drive before they reached home about twenty-one hours after starting their day.

I first ran across Dr. Amankwa's work while researching Ghanaian education, as he has written excellent articles on such topics as the impact of textbook shortages and a lack of instruction in indigenous, local language on Ghana's students.  He recently became a dean at KNUST (Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology).  Like many Ghanaian academics, in Ghana and abroad, Dr. Amankwa is interested in the practical application of his research.  So he spends much of his time not just teaching, researching, and admistering at the University, but also working to improve the quality of education in Ghana's schools, work that sometimes demands a 21-hour day.

In Awisa, once again I was deeply impressed by the dedication of Ghana's teachers and students.  I'm inspired by the example of academics such as Dr. Amankwa, and I know that the teachers and students back here, in the Pacific Northwest of the United States,  who get to know their counterparts in Ghana often feel the same way.  If you know a teacher who might be interested in working with these schools, please let me know.  We need each other.

Integrating African and American Worlds

Just about everyone who has gone to Africa from the United States comes home feeling disoriented.  My cousin was so put off by the supermarkets and glut of consumer goods that he found in America after two years in Northern Ghana that it took him about a month to get home.  My wife, Wendy, had a similar reaction after more than a year in Kenya.

My own trips to Africa have been much shorter, and I've stayed in very nice hotels, eaten expensive food, and traveled in relative comfort.  Even the schools that I have visited have been, on the whole, better than average.  But I, too, find myself struggling to reconcile the comforts of home with the reality of life for the teachers and students I met in Ghana.  Part of the difference is material.  I spend about as much on clean drinking water while in Ghana as the average Ghanaian spends on everything.  The difference in average income is somewhere between twenty-five and fifty fold, depending on how you calculate it.  Ghanaian students treasure books at school and home, a place to study, light to read by.  American students take these advantages for granted--and commonly squander them.  Observing Ghanaian students and teachers at all levels prompts me to realize how carelessly I have led my life.

These realizations prompt me to feel uncomfortable.  I don't like to acknowledge how privileged I am, how little I've accomplished with those privileges, or how skipping a dinner out or a magazine subscription can allow a student from a poor family to go to a fine school for a year or put several books at the disposal of hard-working students.  But it's a very necessary and, I hope, productive discomfort.  Imagine how different both Africa and the United States would look if those of us leading privileged lives shared our bounty with our less privileged brothers and sisters--and were inspired by their commitment to learning.

Test Post

This post is a test, to see if students in Ghana and the U.S. are able to respond to it.

Today was my last full day in Accra, and I had the pleasure of returning to L & A Academy.  This fine school has been sharing letters with an impressive school in the U.S.: North Marion Elementary and Middle Schools.  The students in Ghana were on holiday, but the proprietress, headmaster,  Kankam (who has spearheaded the project at L & A), and about fifteen students came in to spend time with me, which I am very grateful for.

Whenever I speak to Ghanaian students, I try to take the U.S. down at least a few inches from the pedestal on which it is placed.  Many of the students here are under the impression that everyone in the U.S. is wealthy and educated.  So I point out that we have hungry people and homeless people and a lot of people in prison and a LOT of students who wish that they were not in school.  For Ghanaian students, school is a break from work, and it's their best chance to have a better life than their parents were able to have.  They are, therefore, serious about their studies.  So I told them that they have already figured out the key to success in life (being devoted to your work and to your family and friends).  And I thanked them for inspiring me to expect more of myself and of my students.

Today I returned to Purity Preparatory School--with the essential assistance of Lucy of the Aya Centre--to interview the staff and to watch them and their students at work.  I got to observe pre-school; primary school, and junior secondary.  All three classrooms were relatively small and highly interactive.  Ghana's education curriculum is fixed; the state decides what should be covered, and their lengthy exams control access into the top high schools and universities and, therefore, professions.  So the teachers are under a great deal of pressure to prepare students for these fact-based examinations.  But the best teachers, in Ghana as elsewhere, do more than "chalk and talk."   The teachers at Purity School demand a great deal of their students.

They ask them to come to the board to demonstrate what they know.  The class is told to "clap for her" when a student answers a difficult question--and  any student may be called on at any time.  He must then stand and deliver--or  risk incurring his teacher's disapproval.  It's a much different system than in the U.S., where we are loathe to put students on the spot and encourage more independent and creative thinking.  Ghanaians are much more definite about what an educated person should know--and much more directive in getting him or her to that point.

I thought that this photo sums up Anani Memorial International School in many respects: they expect a lot from young children, from behavior to knowledge.  The children are taught both English and French by the time they are six or so, and their teachers expect great things of  them.

What the photo doesn't suggest is the tremendous sense of joy and love that the teachers also share with their students.  Music and clapping often breaks out in all of the classes, and the young scholars are made to feel important and precious.

Many of them are missing one or both parents and would be going to no school at all if  it weren't for this amazing school in the heart of the Nima slum.  Here's another photo, with happier faces.

Today was certainly one of the most unforgettable of my life.  The students and staff of Purity School, led by Proprietress Madame Constance Boakye Afriyie and Headmaster Mr. P.M. Offei, welcomed us before we even entered the school, as ceremonial dancers came out to greet us.

We then had a program of speeches and performances.  Many references were made to Elizabeth Fosler-Jones, who has led the efforts to raise money for the school, and to my son, Peter del Mar, visited the school with me in November and is one of about sixteen students working with Elizabeth.

I then interviewed seven of the school's leading students, who described with passion and eloquence how the school has helped them and how we might help them to make it even stronger.

The visit reminded me of why I have been trying to bring schools in Ghana and the U.S. together.  Certainly we have material resources that can help.  The Pals of Purity School already helped Purity School purchase its first computer.  But the Ghanaian students and their teachers also have a great deal to offer us, including a deep commitment to learning and graciousness that both inspires and humbles.

Leaving for Ghana Tomorrow!

My bags aren't quite packed yet, but I'm getting there!  Twenty-four hours from now I'll be heading toward Ghana for a 10-day trip.

I'm there for multiple purposes, mainly delivering a paper on the tension between how Ghanaian textbooks and intellectuals treat its history and going to a variety of schools to maintain or establish links between them and schools in the Pacific Northwest, where I live.  But I also go for more personal reasons.

Ghana, as one person wrote of Africa more generally, makes me believe in God.  Happiness and suffering alike seem much closer to the surface there, and human relationships seem to count for more.

Westerners are treated like celebrities in Ghana, especially if they are white.  When I speak to students there, I try to emphasize how much I respect how hard they work and how considerate they are with each other.  Maybe it's hard to remember that when you are reading letters from students in the U.S. talking about their games and their pets and their vacations.  But Ghanaians have a lot of very impressive virtues that are hard to put a price tag on

Going to Ghana also reminds me of how bizarre my life is--the material goods, the solitude, the comfort.  Only a small sliver of people in the history of the world have lived the way I do, the way that most people in the West now live.  Of course that doesn't make our lives bad or wrong.  But it's exhilerating to realize how little I know about the human experience and prospect--and sobering to realize what incredible resources I have at my disposal and the responsibilities that come with those unmerited privileges.

Hanna Rosin on Gender in the New Economy

Hanna Rosin, whose much-anticipated book on modern gender roles is about to appear, had another fine piece, this in The New York Times Magazine.

Here she looks at the changing roles of women and men in a small, conservative town in Alabama.  As in so many other places in the U.S., good-paying jobs for men have been disappearing, and their wives are earning a greater and greater share of the family income--this in a place where men are generally understood to be the head of the house.

Rosin does a fine job of pointing out that some of the wounds suffered by men are self-inflicted, as they are reluctant to train for and fill jobs that appear feminine.  But it precisely these jobs--some of which pay quite well, such as health administration or nursing--that are proliferating as high-paying manufacturing jobs dry up.

Traditional ideas about men's roles (and, I would argue, male privilege) are keeping men from being able to jump into the new economy.  As women's economic power grows, much of the rationale for male privilege should be crumbling.

U.S.A. !?!? U.S.A.!?!?

Every four summers we are treated to the Olympic spectacle of matchless athletes encased in a curious hodgepodge of patriotism, nationalism, and "human interest."

A columnist for the Oregonian drew a lot of flak for pointing out what the rest of the world has long known: everyone but the U.S. roots against the U.S. at the Olympics.  It hardly seems fair that the richest nation in the world, a country whose military budget is about as much as everyone else's put together, also gets to scoop up an obscene number of Olympic medals, wave the American flag around in front of the rest of the world every few minutes, and chant "U.S.A.!!  U.S.A.!!" nonstop for weeks while most of the world's nations win not a single medal.  All of this while American athletes and their families maneuver to present themselves as virtuous underdogs deserving of big sponsorship deals.

This is not to say that I didn't go crazy when Galen Rupp (who played soccer for a local coach I know well and went to my son's high school) kicked his way to a silver medal in the 5,000 meters.

But the Olympics more often reflect than transcend nationalism, a fact that the endless stories of young, virtuous Americans struggling for excellence helps to obscure.  The Olympics both project and disguise U.S. power.

Hanna Rosin on Young Women and Casual Sex

The most recent issue of The Atlantic has an interesting piece by Hanna Rosin who argues that handwringing over the "hook-up" culture of casual sex at modern colleges does not victimize young women.

Rosin points out that only a minority of college students have a large number of sexual partners and that the great majority hope to marry.

But most of her ink is devoted to puncturing the assumption that casual sex is bad for young women.  Rosin points out that the average woman at college is doing much better than her male counterpart, and that she's more likely than him to get a good job and make good money right after college.  Many such women conclude that it is unwise for them to take on children, husbands, or even serious boyfriends at a critical time in their lives--at or soon after college.  "Hooking up" enables them to enjoy sex without the burden of a relationship that will take up their valuable time--and might saddle them with a man who is apt to make less money and do less housework than they are.

Back in the 1950s, Hugh Hefner urged well-to-do young men to "rent" women rather than "buying" (marrying) them.  The dynamics that Rosin describes are a bit different, but the fact that many ambitious young women are avoiding commitments to young men is one more indication that the average young woman is apt to be more successful than her male counterpart.

"Wonders of the African World"

I recently watched--and read about--Henry Louise Gates's "Wonders of the African World," a six-part documentary created for public television in the late 1990s.  (Gates is arguably the most prominent African-American scholar in the world.)

The documentary elicited a great deal of criticism, especially from Africans, for Gates's flippant on-camera persona and his tendancy to lecture Africans on such topics as slavery and gender inequality.  The companion volume Gates wrote was much more detailed and nuanced, which suggests that Gates may not have had full control over the TV series.  Certainly complexity is often the enemy of popular historical documentaries.

But what comes through strongly in both the documentary and the book is Gates's focus on great African civilizations--and his often ambivalent reaction to their militaristic or hierarchical aspects. 

As one of his interviewees points out, however, what great civilization has not been ultimately concerned with the exercise of power?  If we are looking for impressive ancestors, how do we define "impressive"?  Should we necessarily conflate impressive with powerful?

The Color Purple and Moral Complexity

I watched "The Color Purple" today for the first time in many years and was reminded of the film's moral complexity.

The novel by Alice Walker and the film generated a fair bit of criticism for portraying the black men in Celie's life as brutal patriarchs.  This is also a common trend among scholars--often white ones--who hesitate to explore hierarchies and exploitations within exploited communities.  On the one hand, this tendency to depict oppressed people as uniformly noble reflects a noble impulse to reverse old, racist stereotypes.  But it can also reflect a subtle form of racism, namely an assumption that oppressed people are not capable of agency and complexity.  People without sin, after all, are not really human or interesting.  Part of what makes "The Color Purple" so compelling is that Celie wrestles with multiple forms of oppression (racial, gendered, sexual, economic), as well as her own timidity.  And the film, like the book, shows that all manner of people--oppressors and oppressed--are capable of great transformations and sacrifices, that we can all love fiercely.

A final piece of irony is that the author of this remarkable story of redemption and determined commitment to family and kin became estranged from her own daughter, who accused her of neglecting her as a child and then being unable to accept her success as an adult.

Hence the marvelous story and the life of its gifted creator remind us that suffering and redemption are bound to startle us.

Mining in the 1860s

We recently toured a mine in Virginia City, Nevada--a place I've wanted to visit since watching "Bonanza" episodes as a kid.  Every Sunday night my parents visited the Fletchers, who had a TV (we did not), and I got to watch "Candid Camera," "Disneyworld," and "Bonanza." 

But I digress.  The mining site reminded me of how incredibly difficult it was for most people to make a living even in relatively prosperous places in the nineteenth century.  The miners often worked far underground and in very hot and dangerous conditions.  Much of the work consisted of pounding away with a sledehammer at the end of a long drill for many hours a day.  Most people across the world still have to work very hard to make relatively little.

In this regard, as in so many others, middle-class Americans are truly exceptional.  We have much more comfortable lives and don't have to work all that hard (compared to people of other times and places) to get them.  But this arrangement strikes us as so natural, so ordinary, that we seldom reflect on how peculiar and lucky we are.

The Colorado Shootings

The tragedy in Colorado presents us with an unsettling pair of developments: the horrible shooting itself and the peculiar way that we try to make sense of it.

It will take awhile to to understand the precise motives and mindset of the shooter--and how the killings intersect with issues such as gun control and our nation's more general culture of violence (as represented, ironically, in blockbuster films of the "Batman" genre).  What is quite clear--though not much talked about--is that such killings are quite rare, that individual gun accidents and shootings and--if we widen our lens to include the rest of world--death from starvation and easily avoidable illnesses kill infinitely more people than mass shootings do and, I think, deserve a much higher fraction of the nation's chronically short attention span.

Emily Meehan on Helping Africans

Have you ever wondered if your charity was doing more harm than good?  If you were "being played"?  If so, you'll identify with a thoughtful series of articles written by Emily Meehan for Slate two years ago.

While working as an aid worker in the Democratic Republic of Congo Meehan met a remarkably intelligent boy who seemed determined to overcome the many disadvantages thrown his way--and determined that Meehan would help him.  Despite her misgivings, Meehan gradually relented, paying for his school fees, a bicycle, and other items.  Then, right before she left and after she had just given him a large sum, he reported that the money had been stolen.  She recalls: "I realized that I didn't know anything.  I didn't know whether Aime was tricking me.  I didn't know why he would trick me.  I didn't know if anything I have told you about his life was true, and I didn't know if foreign aid works."

Yet Meehan mainitains a blog (African Heroes: Stories of Brave Badasses) in which she urges her readers to donate money to various Africans in need--often for school fees.

Meehan shows us how difficult and yet necessary it is to try to help those less privileged than ourselves.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/dispatches/features/2010/the_humanitarians_dilemma/meet_aim.html

http://africanheroes.tumblr.com/

"Portland Timbers, We Adore You. . . ."

This past week-end Peter, his friend Zach, and I made the first of what we hope will be many "epic" roadtrips to watch the Portland Timbers play in Salt Lake City.  There was culture shock all the way around.  Unlike Portland's stadium, which is full of frenzied, chanting fans long before the game starts, Rio Tinto had a very sleepy, nonchalant feel to it.  None of the home-team fans save the public-address announcer--whose voice was magnified to levels I haven't heard since attending a Black Sabbath concert back in 1975--seemed all that excited as we neared the start.

But our brave little band of a few dozen Timbers fans surprised the locals by chanting and yelling fervently as soon as the torturous public-address system faded, including unflattering comments on Utah's weather, religious customs, and (most sacred of all to Portlanders) beer.  The profanities that the Timbers Army has (generally) removed from its chants while at home were back in full force.

Yet I have to say that something transcendent, even spiritual, happened after we fell behind 3-0 and thousands of the local fans were turned our way, taunting their tormenters.  None of us left, sat down, or shut up.  We sang loudly and proudly "Portland Timbers, We Adore You," with feeling.

The three of us were a bit concerned about retracing our steps to our parking slot, as I had managed to put our Portlandia Prius with its Oregon plates squarely in the middle of the centre of Salt Lake City's grizzled tailgaters who had been doing their best to get "liquored up" on 3.2 beer well before the game started.  But everyone was friendly and amiable.  "Thanks for coming," remarked one.  "You guys are amazing."  Of course he meant our fans, not the team, whose coach would be fired two days later.

There's something deeply satisfying about traveling three days to cheer with such devotion a team that doesn't even manage a shot on goal.

Men and Health

After limping around with a bruised knee for a week, with no relief in sight, I'm living out an aspect of masculinity that I've studied quite a bit, namely males' tendency to take risks.  We visit the doctor less often, are less apt to put sunscreen on, and get in far more accidents--on and off and road.  Scholars attribute this propensity to take risks (or, as my wife would put it, "be stupid") to the male urge to distinguish ourselves.  Raising half of the population to be willing to risk death in order to hunt and fight successfully made a lot of sense for  much of the history of humankind.  The men who survived could have more than one wife, and those who died (about one third of the group in many societies) served the interests of the group while alive by being daring hunters and warriors and could take a certain comfort, as their eyes closed for the last time, in knowing that people would be telling stories about them for generations to come.

Today, modern men of the western world seem to believe that taking risks sets us apart from women and gives us status among other males.  I also think that taking part in competitive sports that carry the risk of injury (I  hurt my knee playing soccer) makes us part of a brotherhood that is very strong and meaningful.  Scholars who study men in combat find that the main reason they risk their lives, when it comes right down to it, is to help their brothers.  I hear male professional athletes say the same thing when they retire, that what they'll most miss is that strong sense of belonging--and that they'd be willing to risk another concussion or two to keep playing another year or two. Still, a stationary bike and Zumba with my wife look pretty tempting right now. . . .

Spoiled Rotten?

Elizabeth Kolbert has a wonderful piece summarizing a spate of recent books on one of those developments that is both profound and largely overlooked: the fact that middle-class, American parents expect very little from our children.  Kolbert points out that parents in more traditional cultures rely on their children at a young age and that children seem to flourish with these sort of expectations.  I certainly noticed this in Ghanaian schools, where children deemed it a privilege to do whatever they could to make me comfortable and bragged about cleaning their school and helping their parents at home.

Kolbert has some hilarious stories about how children in American society, by way of contrast, demand that their parents wait on them--bring them silverware or tie their shoes, for example.  She suggests a couple of reasons for this dramatic shift.  First, middle-class parents want their children to focus on getting outstanding grades so that they can get into the best colleges.  Hence they shouldn't be distracted by petty chores such as weeding or doing the dishes.  Second, this embrace of the coddled, immature child reflects a larger embrace of immaturity and narcissism.  I'm sure there must be other, related causes.  But the fact that so many adults idealize childhood certainly helps to explain why we so many of us seem to believe that our own children should be free from any sort of inconvenience, let alone suffering.  But how will these children cope with the inevitable difficulties of life?

http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2012/07/02/120702crbo_books_kolbert

My Mother

Since I didn't post about my mother on Mother's Day, I thought I'd do so know.

My mother was a very interesting person, though she appeared to be very ordinary--certainly to me.  The earnest second child in a family of eccentric siblings, she skipped two grades in school, got her teaching degree from Oregon Normal School (now Western Oregon University), and returned home to teach in a one-room school east of Tillamook.  Then, early in the Depression, she met a dashing mill worker her father didn't approve of who swept her off her feet.  Within a few weeks she was married to a man who quickly became more demanding and less charming and who was not on speaking terms with her father.  Marrying Murl Peterson would stand as the single reckless act of a ruthlessly temperate woman.

Of course I didn't learn all of this until my mother was in her late eighties and my father was dead.  But it helped me to understand why she had always insisted that our family and her marriage were perfect and why I was not allowed to turn a heating pad past "medium."

Years later I tried to talk to both of my parents about how confusing my childhood had been, with a father who didn't seem to want me around and a mother who kept telling me how wonderful our family was. My father was surprisingly gentle and responsive.  He didn't understand what I was getting at, but he tried to engage me.  My mother, with whom I had always felt infinitely safer, would have nothing of it, kept changing the subject.

Bessie Priscilla Barber Peterson was an incredibly generous person and mother who managed to reserve a part of her soul from the domineering men whom she loved so deeply.

My Father

I don't ordinarily blog about highly personal matters, but here goes.

I had a great time with my father, Murl Peterson, until around the age of three.  I remember the exact moment that everything changed.  I told him he was the greatest dad in the world and, instead of telling me that I was the greatest kid in the world (which is of course what I was fishing for), he looked out the car window.  I figured there was something wrong with me.  Only much, much later, did I learn of the deep scars my father carried from his own childhood, of being tied up and beaten by his own father and constantly criticized for becoming a working man (mill worker, longshoreman, fisherman) instead of a minister.  My dad was the life of the party with lodge members, co-workers, and hunting buddies.  But family made him really nervous.  He carried around so much hurt and anger, and he knew that this anger could be very damaging.  So he tended to keep his distance from those he most loved--though he was great with babies and dogs.

I was too frightened of my father to challenge him directly, so I punished him in suble ways.  I became a vegetarian.  I steered away from carpentry or other practical matters that he excelled at--and wanted me to excel at--and focused on the arts and humanities.  One of my more diabolical digs at him was giving him a  very complex book on the history of black families in the U.S.  It was my way of saying "I am not you.  Deal with it."

But many years later, when helping my widowed mother to move, I found the book, saturated with tobacco smoke, the first half heavily creased.  My dad had tried to follow his youngest and most peculiar child for about 200 pages before giving up.  But he tried, even when I did not want him to.

Thank you, dad, and I'm sorry I didn't know you better.

Jeffrey Tayler, Facing the Congo

Of the many accounts of African travels I have been recently reading, the one I have most enjoyed is Jeffrey Tayler's Facing the Congo, as it is a wonderful example of how spending time in Africa can change one's reasons for being in Africa.

Tayler's began his trip--like so many people from the U.S. do--as a sort of self-actualization/adventure trek.  He was moving well into his thirties in the mid-1990s, had gotten out of the Peace Corps and found himself in Russia without a sense of direction.  Reading Naipaul's A Bend in the River convinced him that he, too, should explore the Congo River.  On the flight into Brazzaville, "my past fell away, as if into an abyss; ahead, for me, was only the Congo."

But it turns out that the Congo River Basin was a place where a lot of people lived, people with their own agendas who would make their own claims on Tayler.  This begins to occur to him as he is traveling up the river on a crowded boat packed with desperate people, people whom he befriends and occasionally helps, even as he keeps reminding himself that he must hoard his possessions--which represent more money than most Zaire residents will earn in a year--for the float down the river.  The best quote in the book, at least for me, is when a powerful friend of Tayler's tries to explain why the people on the boat believe that he must be up to something more profitable and nefarious than simply going on an expedition: "we Africans don't like adventure."

As the life of his guide and others continue to impinge on Tayler's life, the author eventually realizes that "I had exploited Zaire as a playground on which to solve my own rich-boy existential dilemmas."  He goes home transformed, but not in the way he had hoped for.

Anani School in Nima, a very diversse area of Accra, has a new website.  I had the pleasure of visiting Anani twice in November and came away extremely impressed by the dedication of Principal Kofi Anane (whose father started the school) and its teachers and students.  The students are from all over West Africa.  Many speak better French than English.  The school puts a great deal of emphasis on the arts, particularly music, and language.  Many of the students are from poor families and are able to attend the fine school--which sends the great majority of its graduates to junion high school and eventually on to high school--because of scholarships.  Here is a link to the website, which has more photographs of the school and information on how to support the fine school and its students.

http://www.ananischools.com/

Flattering Review from Choice

This is a nice review of my book on the American family from Choice, a publication that helps librarians select books for their libraries.



Historian del Mar (Portland State Univ.; Beaten Down: A History of Interpersonal Violence in the West, CH, Oct'03, 41-1131) is an innovative thinker and writer, and his book deserves to be read carefully by those who wonder how the US came to be the way it is today. Del Mar seems to know, charting vast changes experienced by various ethnic groups over time as family ties, kinship, and community have eroded and a contemporary "culture of self-actualization" has evolved. In the past, the preoccupation with freedom bore with it a sense of obligation to one's mate and family, but now freedom for many has taken a new direction, and through a variety of disruptive cultural alterations in values, there has been a "rise in familial and social fragmentation." People of color have suffered more and have been marginalized, particularly as del Mar heartbreakingly describes contemporary Native life on reservations and the plight of young black men. But the loss of values and interpersonal involvement cuts across all ethnic lines. An insightful book for those with interests in social, cultural, or family history. See also Laura L. Ellingson and Patricia J. Sotirin's Aunting: Cultural Practices That Sustain Family and Community Life (CH, Feb'11, 48-3350). Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries.

Peter Beard in Africa

I read another troubling book today, a biography of Peter Beard.  Beard is one of those people you've probably heard of, but maybe aren't sure why.  He's probably most famous for his marriage to Cheryl Tiegs and was born to money, but he's accomplished much in his own right as a photographer, conservationist, and artist.  Beard fell in love with "Africa" (as opposed to Kenya--Americans fall in love with the whole continent, seldom a particular place or country) at age sixteen, while reading Out of Africa and ended up being friends with its famous author, Karen Blixen.  He has lived much of his life at Blixen's old home in Kenya.  Beard has been much more concerned about Kenya's wildlife than its people, as he associates wild Africa with perfect freedom.  "What he likes most about Africa," noted an old friend, "is to do your own thing there, a way of life you create with no plan. . . . He can't--won't--accept the normal responsibilities of society."  Africa has long attracted Americans fleeing social responsibility and constraints.  This is a very common theme in film, literature, and memoirs.

Living with Enough

I've been reading about aid again and have been particularly impressed by William Powers's fine Blue Clay People: Seasons on Africa's Fragile Edge, which describes his stay in Liberia from 1999-2001.  Like another Catholic Relief Services administrator,  Michael Maren (author of the aptly entitled The Road to Hell: The Ravaging Effects of Foreign Aid and International Charity), Powers offers up a picture of large aid organizations that is not very flattering: highly paid administrators enjoying posh accomodations and multiple servants while overseeing poorly conceived projects.  Yet Powers is nevertheless transformed by West Africa.  He struggles and to a certain extent succeeds in making his agency's projects more useful, and he also learns to relax and learn from the remarkable Liberians he is surrounded by.  He becomes determined to live with "enough."  This entails fewer material goods and more dense and meaningful social relations.

Michael Williams of the Aya Centre

This week Dr. Michael Williams of the Aya Centre visited a group of high school students who are writing letters to Purity Preparatory School, in Ghana. 

Michael has become a good friend n the more than two years since I have met him.  His Center hosts college students from North America who come to Ghana to learn about its history and culture and to volunteer for local organizations.  He's also an accomplished academic who taught at many universities in the U.S. before moving to Ghana.  He's written extensively on Pan-Africanism.

Michael told us a great deal about education in Ghana, that it is very difficult for families without money to get their children into the schools that are the key to economic advancement.  He also stressed that Ghanaian students tend to be very hard working and that much of their future is decided by daunting exams that they take at the end of 9th and 12th grade.  If you are a college student interested in traveling to and learning about Ghana, the Aya Centre is a wonderful resource.  http://ayacentre.com/

Wind Farms and Scenic Places

The current controversy over whether or not to tolerate wind farms in the vicinity of Oregon's Steens Mountain is especially interesting to me, as a photograph of a wind farm graces the cover of the second edition of Environmentalism, my survey of nature loving in the western world which appeared last summer.  An editor at Pearson gave me a choice between a beautiful mountain or canyon and a wind farm.  I chose the wind farm because it meshes with the story I open the book with, a story which reveals the complexities and ironies of modern environmentalism.

That story is of a controversy over a wind farm in a much more celebrated and well-known scenic area than Steens Mountain: Nantucket Sound.  Residents and sympathizers raised some 3 million dollars to oppose the proposed wind farms.  "Our national treasures should be off limits to industrialisation," remarked Walter Cronkite, the famous retired news anchor--and a resident whose view of the sound would be marred by the electricity-producing turbines.

My problem with Cronkite's argument--that scenic areas should be off limits to industrialism--is that industrialism has everything to do with his enjoyment of Nantucket Sound.  Massive economic development made possible his career and wealth and allowed him and others to purchase expansive homes that consume a great deal of energy on the rim of this "national treasure."  Where is that energy going to come from?  Advocates of wild and scenic places often elide that inconvenient question.

The thesis of Environmentalism is that nature loving has more often than not distracted us from the hard work of establishing a sensible and sustainable relationship with the non-human world.

To see my op-ed on Oregonlive on this subject, published April 29, go to:
http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2012/04/steens_mountain_debate_is_bigg.html

The Growing Debate about College "Outcomes"

This morning's paper includes an interesting column by David Brooks of the New York Times.  Brooks is fairly conservative, but not extremely so.  He surveys a number of revealing studies which suggest that although students are spending more and more for college, they aren't learning much.  Reformers suggest that we should address this problem by more closely measuring what students are supposed to learn in a given course or course of study.  In fact I've been working on this very endeavor at Portland State over the past few months.  As a result, my courses have much more detailed rubrics or goals, as well as assignments tailored to strengthen student performance in particular areas.  The hope is that an outside evaluator could come along and assess student's capacity to, say, address both sides of a complex question.  This would be done at the outset and close of one of my courses to see if students are actually getting better at what I want them to learn.

Many academics dismiss such efforts as a waste of time and energy--in part, I think,  because many of us are inclined to dismiss out of hand any idea that comes from an administrator, especially if it has a lot of jargon from education professionals.  I think there is also something to be said for the idea that not all aspects of education can be measured; wisdom and insight are difficult to quantify.  In general, though, I think that colleges and professors should be much more accountable for what we do--and don't do--with our students.  But I think that this reform will face a great deal of resistance from academics.

Revolutionary Fiction

The final installment of Laurie Halse Anderson's trilogy on the American Revolution, Ashes, will be out late this year.  Anderson is a highly acclaimed and popular writer of historical fiction for youth.  The two earlier books in the trilogy, Chains and Ashes, have been extensively used in middle schools, especially, as they are engaging reads on one of the two big events in U.S. history.

The books are unusual in that their young protagonists are both black, and the author doesn't seem to feel much obligated to make white patriots seem progressive.  The fact that many more slaves won their freedom fighting for rather than against the British has long been a discomfiting fact for many Americans.  Historical fiction for children on the American Revolution has been much truer to the historical record than the highly popular film "Patriot" on issues of race and racism, but most of the novels have either pretty much ignored black people (Johnny Tremain is an obvious example) or suggested that the Revolution was ushering in--if fitfully--an era of freedom for all.

Anderson's books are much more realistic and depressing; she seldom lets the reader forget that the protagonists well realize that fighting for their own freedom and the young nation's freedom are two very different enterprises.  It will be interesting to see if she maintains this cheerless historical accuracy through this final book.  Balancing the requirements of patriotism and historical honesty is often a difficult proposition--though at least Anderson is making a good living at it.

What We Care About

Whenever I use Internet Explorer I start at MSN home page, which features photos of the top stories in the news.  As of right now, here they are: the recent jet crash in Virginia; a swimmer interrupted a boat race in the UK; the Master's Golf tournament; man survives nail gun (men and nail guns seem to give each other a lot of trouble--and it makes for great news stories and photographs); recent tornados in Texas; a Minnesota waitress gets to keep a $12,000 tip; Jackie Kennedy's Secret Service agent shares his experiences; Saturday Night Live has some "Hot & Hilarious" hosts; Martha Stewart's Easter desserts; keys to good health.

At the risk of seeming to be a point-headed intellectual, I'll just point out that none of these stories is going to make any of us much wiser.  Of course people use the internet for other reasons, too; researchers estimate that a third or more of the time we are using it to view pornography.  At least the "Hot & Hilarious" SNL women are shown with their clothes on.

I think what troubles me the most about  North Americans' addiction to trivial news is that most of us have extraordinary opportunities to affect the world.  We live, on average, more than twice as long as our ancestors, enjoy comforts that previous generations (and much of the world today) would find unimaginable, and have unprecedented access to education and information.   Yet most of us are woefully ignorant about politics or other forces reworking our world, forces that we have the freedom to shape as well as understand.  We are too busy amusing ourselves.

Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion

If you are like me, most of the friends you choose share your general religious and poltical beliefs.  That's what makes family gatherings so treacherous.  Every time my wife's family gets together I look forward to tormenting and being tormented by her libertarian Uncle John.  Have you ever tried to offer a Thanksgiving or Christmas Day prayer that would satisfy your born-again brother-in-law who has been holding forth on the evils of clerks who say "Happy Holidays" and your rationalistic brother-in-law who thinks religion is for wimps?  And I have to admit that most of my liberal friends are more close-minded and judgemental about their conservative counterparts than vice versa.  We'll tolerate just about anyone but a convicted, Evangelical Republican.

Now Jonathan Haidt has written a book (with the same title as this blog post) trying to convince liberals to extend their tolerance and understanding to conservatives.  Haidt argues that most of us base our beliefs and positions on moral intuition developed over thousands of generations, moral habits that he boils down to six norms: care, fairness, liberty, loyalty, authority, and sanctity.  Liberals focus heavily on care, conservatives--to varying degrees, of course--on all six.  Hence liberals lose a lot of elections even when their policies are more sensible and speak to the majority's self interest.

Haidt is not arguing that conservatives are more moral than liberals.  People have traditionally not cared much about people different from or distant from themselves, for example.  Caring for people different from ourselves--certainly a great virtue in our modern, shrinking world--does not come naturally.

Haidt is trying hard to break liberals of their reflexive belief that conservatives are cruel, stupid, or both--and to get both sides to listen more to each other.  Here is a site he's developed: civilpolitics.org.

Horse-Slaughter Plants and Nature Loving

OPB had a heated debate the other morning about the proposed horse-slaughter plant in Hermiston.  Though those for and against the plant disagree on some facts (whether or not the slaughter methods are humane and whether or not the meat is safe for human consumption, for example), much of the disagreement boiled down to the classic "head versus heart" division that characterizes so much of modern environmentalism.  Those in favor of the plant point out that thousands of unwanted horses are causing a number of economic and environmental problems and that the rational solution is to let a business make a profit from killing the excess.  Those who oppose the slaughterhouse argue that horses are an integral part of American history and have become loyal pets, so submitting them to mechanized slaughter and eating them are brutal and unAmerican.  The debate is somewhat reminiscent of the Cape Cod debate over wind power that I used to open my book on Environmentalism.  Some argued that wind farms constituted the industrialization of a beautiful area that should be a refuge from industrialization.  Supporters argued that wind farms are a relatively clean form of energy and we simply can't afford to declare every scenic area off limits to energy production--unless we are willing to decrease our consumption of energy dramatically by, say, not having vacation homes on Cape Cod.  Are enough people devoted enough to horses to ensure that each will be humanely cared for?  If not, what should be done wit the rest?  How we answer such questions depends a great deal upon whether or not we approach nature as a place to find love and inspiration or as a relationship to be maintained in a logical, sustainable manner.

Kony 2012 Update

The "Kony 2012" video is now up to 80 million hits, but criticism of it is also growing.  The story took a new, tragic twist Thursday when San Diego police detained the film's creator, Jason Russell, after claiming that he was obstructing traffic in his underwear.  Russell's wife attributes the irrational act to the stress and criticism that the co-founder of Invisible Children has been recently under.

As I noted last week, many Africans and other critics argue that the viral video, though very effective at conveying its message (warlord Joseph Kony must be brought to justice), oversimplifies a complex problem.  They are also troubled that the video may contribute to the "White Savior Industrial Complex," as writer Teju Cole puts it.  A showing of the film in Northern Uganda had to be halted when audience members threw rocks at the screen, as they felt that the movie was about white people rather than their suffering.  The purpose of the video is indeed to mobilize American opinion to care and do something about the suffering of Africans.  But it is troubling that Invisible Children's board is all white and that they apparently did not anticipate the criticisms that the video would provoke.

The Thorny Business of Doing Good in Africa

A recent story in The Guardian reveals, in dizzying detail, the many challenges of offering quick solutions from the West to African problems: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/reality-check-with-polly-curtis/2012/mar/08/kony-2012-what-s-the-story .  The story chronicles the story behind a youtube video created by an American nonprofit that has generated some 21 million hits.  The video is calculated to put pressure on politicians across the world to take action against warlord Joseph Kony's actions in Uganda, for Kony has routinely recruited child soldiers for many years.  The story points out several complicating factors, however: Kony has evidently not operated in Uganda for for some years; demonizing him may create retaliatory violence and make negotiation impossible; the film simplifies a complex situation and understates the degree to which Ugandans have improved their country; a very large share of donations to the organization are devoted to staff salaries and travel rather than directly improving the lives of Ugandans.  Many experts believe that the video is at the very least raising the awareness of many millions of people outside Africa about an important problem.  But, as usual, it is much easier to raise awareness if one neglects complexity.

Affirmative Action for Whom?

The recent announcement that the Supreme Court will likely overturn the remnants of affirmative action for students of color applying to universities has prompted me to do some research on the subject.  The last big court case in 2003 allowed public colleges to take race into account.  What is less known is that public and private colleges routinely take many other variables into account.  Scholars estimate that a gender-blind admissions system would produce a student body that would be roughly 80 percent female at elite institutions.  Such colleges routinely privilege male applicants to keep that from happening.  They also privilege legacy students, children of alumni.  Of these three groups (people of color, males, and legacy applicants), people of color are both the most disadvantaged (are more likely to have gone to poorer schools and to have parents who cannot afford to high private tutors who will boost their SAT scores and help them to write their entrance essays) and the most likely to perform well at an elite college (male college students, like their high school counterparts, spend more time playing and less time studying than do their female counterparts, and if legacy students from privileged backgrounds have not taken full advantage of their privileged background in high school, they are not likely to do so in college).  But despite occasional grumbling about the advantages offered to male and legacy applicants, public opinion and the Supreme Court focus on the modest and largely successful attempts to improve access to top colleges for black and Latino applicants where they constitute just 10 percent of the student body.  That percentage is likely to fall in the coming years, even as access to elite colleges becomes the gateway to the top jobs in law, medicine, and finance.

Men's Struggles: A View From Europe

I ran across this article in my friend Ken's daily blog--Ken is an amazing teacher at the University of Oregon who daily combs the web for interesting stories.  Written from Zurich, the story remarks that more and more young European women are concluding that they are better off without a man, as men are slow to grow up and are having trouble holding their own in the new economy.  The article notes several possible causes for males falling behind, including the fact that boys, especially, tend to associate doing well in school with being feminine.  I've started to do some reading, writing, and thinking about this for the U.S., where younger females, especially, are outperforming their male counterparts in school and the job market--and doing a better job, on average, as parents and friends and at staying healthy.  The modern economy is shifting to reward skilled communicators and collaborators.  These traits are more commonly associated with females than with males, and males who focus on those skills--like males who do well in school--risk being stigmatized as "girls."  Older men often seem to feel that being a man entails taking health risks--eschewing cancer screenings or sunscreen, for example.  But refuing to "act like a girl" is causing us to fall behind them.  Here's a link to the article: http://www.worldcrunch.com/men-struggle-keep-some-women-pose-question-who-needs-them/4736

Trends in U.S. Education

While in Ghana last fall I was repeatedly struck by the many differences between education there and here, in the U.S.  Ghanaian students tend to take education much more seriously than do their counterparts in North America, and in some respects much more is required of them.  Children as young as three are expected to sit quietly for long periods of time as they work at precisely shaping their letters.  A hush pervaded the crowded  University of Ghana library.  Of course I was visiting the better schools, not the ones hamstrung by class sizes of 100 or teacher-absentee rates of 33%, and Ghanaian education tends to emphasize rote learning rather than critical thinking.  But another difference that I noticed--and it's a characteristic that seems to pervade Ghanaian society in general--is that Ghanaian teachers at all levels feel permission to challenge their students morally and spiritually.  At Ashesi University, a very skilled lecturer sent her students off to work on their essays with these words: "You are eagles.  Now fly."  I would like to find more ways to challenge others and myself to take advantage of our marvelous opportunities to improve our selves and our world.  So often we seem to be just drifting, going through the motions.  But highly educated people in the U.S. have become uncomfortable with that sort of talk. 

Warm Memories

It's been about eleven weeks since Peter and I returned from Ghana, and the schools there and here have been making good progress at exchanging letters.  It's truly been a blessing to hear how excited the students in both places are to learn about each others' lives.  I sometimes read the letters, and they always make me happy and sad all at once.  Some of the students and their parents are making great sacrifices so that they can go to school, and some are frustrated by the lack of textbooks or opportunities to study.  But I'm also touched by the warmth and optimism that the letters reflect.  While in Ghana, many students and teachers told me that they hoped that they could some day travel to the U.S., and a few gently reminded me that my life was much more privileged than theirs--that I could, for example, travel to see them much more easily than they could trave to see me.  On this cold winter day, I look at the paintings that proud students at Anani Memorial International School showed me and wish that I was there to soak in the warmth of their smiles and the Ghana sun.  And I hope and pray that they enjoy opportunities worthy of their talents.

Cooperation in Hunter-Gathering Societies

A recent article in the LA Times (link) summarizes the findings of a group of researchers who just published an article in Nature entitled "Social Networks and Cooperation in Hunter-Gatherers."  It examines the social relations of the Hadza, a group of hunter-gatherers in Tanzania who have been relatively unaffected by modernity.

The researchers found that the Hadza who tend to be the most cooperative, the most group oriented, tend to associate with each other.  These groups tend to be more prosperous than the groups filled with more selfish people.  The researchers therefore suggest that, contrary to conventional wisdom, we are wired to care for others in part because it is in our material--not to mention spiritual or psychological--best interests to do so.  This is another indication that "survival of the fittest" has long been a social rather than an individual endeavor.

Peru Textbooks and History

Thank you to a very generous ex-student who is living in Peru, I've been researching how Peruvian high school (which in Peru runs from grades 7-11) textbooks address Peru's early history.  It's very interesting.  Peru has historically been one of the more conservative nations in Latin America, long dominated by the Spanish and their descendants, but its textbooks now celebrate its pre-Columbian past more than the its Spanish colonists or even creole patriots.  Scholars have advanced a couple of explanations for this.  First, since the tremendous bloodshed and disruption that plagued Peru in the 1980s and 1990s was rooted in part in racism and other aspects of inequality, the nation is using its education system to emphasize racial and social harmony.  Second, international organizations emphasizing neo-liberal development projects are also touting multi-culturalism and tolerance.  Both sets of interpreters note that embracing racial reconciliation and Peru's Inca heritage in the abstract do not preclude extreme economic/racial stratification or even denigrating Indians in the present.

More Films About Africa

I have been watching some more recent films about Africa.  I heard about one in a recent Atlantic article about Jack Abramoff, the powerful lobbyist sent to jail some four years ago.  Abramoff, with funding from the pre-Mandela South African government, helped to create the anti-Communist film Red Scorpion, which was a bomb at the box office and hardly approaches great art.  But the film--evidently intended to undermine support for the ANC--is very typical of its genre in showing how a wise and simple African man from the bush tutors a lost and alienated soul.  The redeemed soul in this instance is a nearly superhuman fighting machine who has been cast aside by the Russians and tortured by the Cubans.  (The film isn't long on subtlety.)  He gets his revenge--and serves black Africa--by kicking the living snot and a lot of other bodily fluids out of the Communists.  "A Far Off Place" is much less violent film that appeared four years later, in 1993 (and features a young Reese Witherspoon) that follows some of the same themes.  In this case it's a jaded teenager visiting from the U.S. who learns wisdom from a bushman.  These films show black Africans in much more favorable roles, on the whole, than their counterparts from the 1940s did, but the major black characters are always noble, never interesting or dynamic.

Ghana Historiography

I've lately been working on a piece that's a bit of a departure for me, an article assessing three recent surveys of Ghanaian history.  All three books have been published in Ghana since 2000.  Scholars have commonly made a pair of criticisms of post-independence African histories: 1) That they tend to be celebratory and non-critical of powerful African nations and leaders, before and after European contact; 2) That they tend to mimic traditional European histories in focusing on political history, narrowly defined.  The three books I've analyzed are guilty of the second charge but not the first.  All three books approach Ghana's history critically and address shortcomings of or resistance to Asante (the powerful empire) and Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana's most celebrated founding father).  But all three books define Ghana's history, particularly after European contact, in relatively narrow, political terms.  This neglect of social and cultural history can be attributed to habit, particularly since at least two of the books are intended for high school students who follow a prescribed syllabus, a history of Ghana in which the main subjects have already been established.