In whatever ways humans have developed throughout the years our ability to create tools and learn to use them has needed to be tempered with the understanding that our sophistication can create along with it a lot of danger. Those dangers are often cleverly disguised.
When our technical advances are moving forward at a faster rate than we are getting rid of our negative attitudes, those technical advances will be tainted with those negative attitudes.
Words are tools and the more words we know along with knowing the history behind them the better we CAN become at communicating with others by using those words and the better we can learn to be more accepting of different cultures. However, this sophistication of becoming educated can bring with it the subtle acceptance of the school of thought that once one is seen as archiving this status they are then entitled to belittle, ignore, and isolate a less formally educated group that isn't seen worthy of their acceptance.
When this happens, formal education becomes a tool created by the elite to make the elite feel and appear to others as more sophisticated rather than it being any real type of advancement for the human race to be better able to be more accepting of different cultures.
One of the issues I've heard discussed in recent years is whether Ebonics should be taught in the U.S. public schools. My initial thoughts on the matter and how I still think about that is, "Of course Ebonics should be taught in school!!!!" I can't understand why anyone other than the culture who speaks this way could feel that they have the right to even vote on such matters except to decide if how the language may be more widely used and accepted in more diverse public environments.
All significantly sized subcultures with a public presence need to have the opportunity to express how they speak as well as have that be taught with in their own public schools so that the students there may have a better way of communicating with fellow students and other members of their community. This also teaches them more about their history and gives them a sense of belonging to a subculture that is validated within their larger culture.
Having one rigid definition of education and the use of the dominate language in the United States doesn't seem practical as even an aide to any kind of integration as it was once thought. The people I've known in this country who actually want to obtain citizenship often have the most difficult time with learning the English language.
My wife knows many different languages and worked for the US military as a linguist. She says that English is the most difficult and least logically based language there is to learn as a second language.
My sister speaks French and lived in a small village in a west African country for several years. She says that most villages within walking distance of where she lived spoke the French language in a different dialect yet each had little difficulty with understanding their neighbors who spoke differently. It would seem to me that part of their acceptance of difference (while at the same time maintaining their personal identity) came from growing up in a culture where that was demanded of them.
The American language (which was originally the English language) was created in the U.S. with a great deal of bigotry woven in to many of our words and expressions and there are continually words added that suggest even worse.
There are many different cultures within the U.S. that have fought for dominance against another culture with a similar status. However, the more isolated and visible dominant culture continues to have an oppressive influence on the educational process, and they continue to reserve this process for those whose families have already attained their status. The educational process is then used to oppress rather than empower.
When people are new to language with so many bigoted influences against so many cultures, there are many ways that one can speak in words and ideas and not even realize that those words and ideas have connotations toward minorities that we ourselves belong to.
Most of the population of people within the United States at this point in time won't have the option of learning a lot of the subtly and nuances woven into the American language within our educational system but to call that more widely used way of learning as being ignorant is a completely irresponsible judgment.
Few people are provided the right to a mainstream education in the United States. To call something that people are not given the right to as being the result of their own ignorance is in itself a very ignorant thinking .
What is described as the autistic (including we who are more visible as well as able to learn from others who have this advantage) may know the least (in comparison to other minority cultures) about all the different ways that others who are autistic and how the many autistic subcultures have adapted to their environment throughout the years.
Just as every oppressed or marginalized group of individuals or group cultures throughout time has been in danger of falling into the trap of neglecting and oppressing our own, the autistic culture is vulnerable to that as well.
The most visible people in the United States have little understanding of what the nation looks like, who is in it, or what we have and don't have. The ignorant views aren't on the bottom of the influential ladder. They are at the top because they neglect, abuse, and avoid looking at a larger percentage of their resources.
The world outside of the United States may also know what the most visible people in the United States look like but the most visible are in no way representative of the majority. The reasons the majority does not have a widely visible culture that reflects how they see things is due in part to the way they see things being thought of as not being worthy of visibility by those who can control their exposure.
To claim that the teaching within our mainstream educational system provides us with an understanding of more cultures may be true in part. However, it is often not done in a way that truly teaches how we can be accepting of more cultures that we live next to. This intellectual knowledge is too often used as a way for the more visible and more socially acceptable learners to distance themselves from having to understand the differences in people better that are often right in front of them.
The current use of formal mainstream education in the United States is very new. Certainly some of the so-called advances that have been made to our educational system during this short time have actually moved us backwards in terms of being more equipped to do those more practical things that the educational system was originally designed to teach.
The questions that I don't feel have adequate answers to how well the educational system is serving us are:
Why is the US workforce continuing to shrink in proportion to it's number of citizens? When people are prepared by our educational systems to enter the workplace, why are the jobs they are qualified for considered entry-level jobs when they aren't entry level jobs at all?
If they *were* entry-level jobs, why are the majority of people who enter them never moving beyond them to better jobs that these jobs claim to help them to be more qualified for.
The societal problems of a more centralized government that don't affect the most influential and visible people are too often thought of as not needing to be understood. So many advances in so many areas are being made today that I don't think enough time is spent looking at some of our mistakes.
Exclusionary methods described as inclusion are a very cleverly disguised. Too often this prevents people with truly ignorant views that too often truly lack compassion from attaining the best things in life and obtaining access to their most valuable resources.
I think that blogging can go a long way toward getting more visibility for alternative points of view. Because there are so many people from different cultures involved in blogging, our prejudices are more likely to be challenged.
Posted by: abfh | August 24, 2008 at 11:20 AM
I agree ABFH. I also believe that less formally educated people and (non educated people like myself) can and often are less likely to be accepting of alternative points of view. Oppression can feed on itself just like ignorance and one can create the other.
When in places where expressing your point in the most educated way is seen as the best view, many without a formal education either won't comment or will not feel comfortable doing so and sabotage their successful communication . This is true in schools as it it is on the internet.
It would help a lot if more less educated people would understood that they had access (through libraries and such)to more information and were taught the importance of learning it. Although many people don't have access to that either.
The thing is though that when uneducated people see that the information they are privy to doesn't include the reality they know to be true (which is actually makes it completely untrue because it doesn't include the majority view) they often don't have a lot of faith in the accuracy of any more official appearing report.
It's just like while voter's make a difference, until most people vote, the difference will most likely favor the voters who are described as being the most of everyone even if they aren't.
It can become superfluous to debate which view is best when the the evaluation process is only accepting of what is best due to an unfair and therefore inaccurate method of judgement.
People who aren't accustomed to having what they say be seen as valid aren't as likely to voice their view. When they do they may be socially awkward and even break a lot of the rules considered to be common courtesy and they will be more likely to be expected to break this cycle although they are in the most difficult position to do that.
Remember that when autistics are lacking in this regard it may be an even more difficult to break the cycle because society has influenced many people (too often even the autistic themselves and even other autistics which really makes it difficult) that autistics are lacking empathy to other peoples views just due to them being autistic. Narrowness of views can be very productive in less social situations and it isn't necessarily a product of an over inflated ego.
My question is how do we (including we as bloggers)promote a larger and more truly educated culture.
Ranting on about my own narrow view is certainly not conducive to promoting the kind of discussion that will bring attention to the subject I feel is important....So, what's the answer?
Posted by: Ed | August 24, 2008 at 01:31 PM
To bring more people into the discussion, I'd say. Blogging also helps with that because people don't have to be educated or have a high social status to write blogs, and they don't have to follow any particular rules when they do. That makes the Internet much more democratic than other parts of society. Of course, there are still many people worldwide who do not have Internet access, but it is becoming more widely available.
As you say, there are some people who have been taught to believe that their opinions have no value, so they do not even try to express themselves. I agree that this is a failure of our educational system.
Posted by: abfh | August 26, 2008 at 11:08 AM