small technology for big collaboration, creativity and learning stuff
As an anti-war activist, I am always on the lookout for organizations that not only promote peace, but are also actively involved in the converting warcraft into peace craft- from destruction to construction and growth. I just came across this organization that is doing amazing anti-mine work in Africa that can be used in many, many other countries around the globe.
www.herorat.org
Today in 1969 we fulfilled the stated vision of John F. Kennedy, and millions and millions others around the globe for as long as people could dream and tell stories- For All Mankind: www.hulu.com/watch/165094/for-all-mankind
Here is an excerpt of JFK’s September 12, 1962 Rice University speech (http://er.jsc.nasa.gov/seh/ricetalk.htm):
“And finally, the space effort itself, while still in its infancy, has already created a great number of new companies, and tens of thousands of new jobs. Space and related industries are generating new demands in investment and skilled personnel, and this city and this state, and this region, will share greatly in this growth. What was once the furthest outpost on the old frontier of the West will be the furthest outpost on the new frontier of science and space. Houston, your city of Houston, with its Manned Spacecraft Center, will become the heart of a large scientific and engineering community. During the next 5 years the National Aeronautics and Space Administration expects to double the number of scientists and engineers in this area, to increase its outlays for salaries and expenses to $60 million a year; to invest some $200 million in plant and laboratory facilities; and to direct or contract for new space efforts over $1 billion from this center in this city.
To be sure, all this costs us all a good deal of money. This year’s space budget is three times what it was in January 1961, and it is greater than the space budget of the previous eight years combined. That budget now stands at $5,400 million a year–a staggering sum, though somewhat less than we pay for cigarettes and cigars every year. Space expenditures will soon rise some more, from 40 cents per person per week to more than 50 cents a week for every man, woman and child in the United States, for we have given this program a high national priority–even though I realize that this is in some measure an act of faith and vision, for we do not now know what benefits await us. But if I were to say, my fellow citizens, that we shall send to the moon, 240,000 miles away from the control station in Houston, a giant rocket more than 300 feet tall, the length of this football field, made of new metal alloys, some of which have not yet been invented, capable of standing heat and stresses several times more than have ever been experienced, fitted together with a precision better than the finest watch, carrying all the equipment needed for propulsion, guidance, control, communications, food and survival, on an untried mission, to an unknown celestial body, and then return it safely to earth, re-entering the atmosphere at speeds of over 25,000 miles per hour, causing heat about half that of the temperature of the sun–almost as hot as it is here today–and do all this, and do it right, and do it first before this decade is out–then we must be bold.”
I recently accompanied a divers group of 20 university students from two L.A. schools on a trip to Poland. The classes were summer extension of a new class offered called “The Holocaust in Poland” and I participated as an educator and technologist. I have always been interested in my Jewish heritage, but my focus is usually on global Jewish communities and cultures. I am really interested in where Jewish communities exist and have existed and the mixture of the Jewish and non-Jewish cultures in things like music, diet, costume and other cultural identifiers. It is amazing for me to see how many similarities there are. For example, Jewish liturgical music in the communities of Iraq or Syria are very, very similar to the Moslem liturgical chants in the same areas. Food is similar- one community shares with the others. And I find this true with all communities and cultures who have migrated from their place of origin to someplace new. Lebanese food in Mexico (Lebanese immigrants), Indian food in England. For me, it is always quite wonderful to see these intersections.
One area that I have studied, but not focused on was the Holocaust. I am more interested in the living and the future than of the past and of the dead. This does not mean that I am unaware of insensitive to history of my heritage or my family. My grandparents came to the US in the early 1900’s, but everyone who stayed behind was completely obliterated, as were most of the European Jewish communities. I have been exposed to the horrors of the holocaust through multiple classes, friendship with survivors and refugees here and in Israel, memorials, museums, books, movies and even graphic novels. The planned, methodical and methodical destruction of the Jewish community truly demonstrated human-kind at it’s worst. Yet, I tend to look for the examples of people who retained their humanity and tried and even succeeded in assisting the multiple communities who were targeted. Raoul Wallenberg, Chiune Sugihara, Hiram Bingham IV and politicians and the multitude of civilians who put their own lives in danger to try to save Jews and stop the slaughter. These examples of courage illustrate the importance of speaking out when we see evil whenever and where ever it appears – Cambodia, Rwanda, Congo, Darfur, Bosnia. I wonder what would have happened if there was social networking, blogs, twitter, or facebook in 1939? Although there are still glaring examples of humans follies and inhumanity, we are still really new to being able to instantly connect with people around the globe for good or for bad. We have developed and made accessible these amazing communication tools that we are now learning how to use. I guess that it is up to us to decide what to do with them.
My week in Poland was intense and wonderful. I was challenged and inspired aesthetically, historically and emotionally. I really was not prepared for the depth of emotions and feelings that I experienced. It is a beautiful country, with a very complex history and legacy. It made me think of the movie “Shrek” where Shrek compared ogres to onions- that there are many, many layers. Following is one of the blogs that I posted on our class site: http://grou.ps/theculturebridge
One of the powerful moments of this trip happened last week at Lutotow- a small village in the Lodz area (about two hours by bus from Lodz). The countryside on the way was incredibly lush, green and beautiful. We traveled through forests and farmland, through small villages that could be described as quaint and farmhouses- many of which were pre-war brick or wooden structures and still are occupied. Cows and chickens and farmers walked and worked their yards.
We reached Lutotow- a town that one of our translators described as frozen in time. A word on our translators- Kaya and Kristoph- she a student and he a professor, both delightful, friendly and of the present and the future. We had dinner with them the night before at a Polish restaurant in Wodz. You may think, well, of course it is a Polish restaurant, it’s in Poland. But as Kaya said to me, the best Polish food is home cooked and Poles go out – they eat Pizza or things like that. But the Pirogi were tasty, the vodka (bison grass) was tasty and the company was warm and friendly.
We arrived in the town square at Lutotow- the sky was clear and rich blue, the sun was hot and there was no shade. But the mayor was there, the chief rabbi of Poland, dignitaries and representatives of the Polish and German governments as well as Polish representatives of cultural organizations promoting Jewish-Polish reconcilliations. The mayor gave a very heartfelt speech – he apologized for that happened. A friend who spoke Polish said that the language and tone was true. He said that the pre-war town was 80% Jewish. Now there are none. And it was this situation that made him think- What happened to all the Jews? The Rabbi spoke in Polish and English and said several psalms in Hebrew- perhaps the first time that Hebrew was spoken in the village since the war.
The ceremony was attended by a group of students who slowly pealed away- this history is very far from their reality. And some elderly who listened attentively and watched as the various dignitaries and LMU and CSUN students placed flowers on the large stone with the new bronze plaque commemorating the lost Jews.
After the ceremony, we all went to the local culture house for coffee and cake and for us to interview some of the elderly Polish residents. This was an amazing, amazing experience. There were about 6 old men, who seemed just waiting to speak with us. One gentleman really could not wait and it was hard to get him to pause so that we could gather a group and translator. The first question that we asked was : “what happened to you? what was you experience?” These old men were little children when the nazis came in to the town. They had Jewish friends and neighbors whom they were close with who suddenly vanished. There was nothing said about it. People there were trying to survive the war. But there was a tear in their community and society that was not healed. From the nazi era came the soviet era with all of the pain and suffering that the soviets brought. Post-soviet society did not bring the immediate healing of society. This does not minimize the terrible loss of the Jewish people of 1/2 of their community, but healing of the past and rebuilding the future cannot happen if we do not address all of the pain and suffering of everyone.
These old men have been carrying their pain for 60 and 70 years. They are not urban academics, but rural farms people whose community was also ripped. Asking them to tell about their experiences allowed them to open up their hearts and souls to find a bit of peace. Our feeling was that after speaking to us, they would go home and speak to their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren about things long held inside. Perhaps this is really what is needed to mend the past and build for the future.
Please check out this (and join too): www.grou.ps/theculturebridge
Here is an interesting article about leadership that I found in the April 2010 edition of Fast Company, a really cool magazine that I have been getting for years. It is like Forbes, except that it targets people concerned about the planet. It reports on and celebrates creativity, concern about the planet, the human condition. Every year there are issues about creative and successful women, social capitalism and more. It is informative and hopeful.
The article: Do Something: Let’s Hear It for the Little Guys
Fast Company home page.
Christian Boltanski is an artist who I have been following for a long time- his work is engaging, spiritual and requires you to think.
Click here to read the article in the New York Times
From this years TED conference.
We were discussing the STEM initiative today (Science, Technology, Education and Math) and I brought the idea that perhaps we should call it STEAM (Science, Technology, Education, ARTS, Math) with an emphasis on the ARTS. I feel that too often the arts are left out of any educational plan and that the arts are looked upon as a secondary or minor component of education). This bothers me because it is the arts that infuse meaning into a hard science. There is beauty in the sciences and math, but not everybody thinks in such terms and the arts infuse the hard sciences and math with beauty, with meaning and with the human elements. For example- look at space. We send up pilots and astronauts who can look out at the universe and describe it in hard scientific terms. But what about how they feel? What about the parts of being human that cannot be qualified or quantified. What would happen if an artist or poet was sent up on the next space mission. How would we explain and interpret what is seen and what is felt? Too often it is the arts that create meaning into an experience. Imagine what a poet would say when standing in the new cupola of the space station describing what they see as well as what they feel. The technical, linear and logical with the emotional, subjective and personal. Take this idea back to the classroom and have students of any age describe their experiments in terms of what they feel and what happened. Perhaps we can begin to address the human condition and shift it to a situation of thinking to a situation of feeling. Perhaps we can make it shift form hard analysis to the human feelings. This may also provide us with answers to what we actually feel…
