This blog entry is part of a project for a college course, Anthropology of Nature.
Some Class Reflections:
This week the class did Townsend presentations.
The ethnoecology
group was very interesting. I had no idea that there were so many known
language. I had heard about languages of indigenous people disappearing,
and I think realizing that there are so many of them makes it so much
more heartbreaking. I already think it's a crime that Latin isn't taught
in more schools (pfft, 'dead language', Science isn't dead and knowing
Latin would make deciphering science and so many romance languages so
much easier!). How many ancient texts will we find in the future, and be
unable to translate, because we force a peoples to speak English
(historically, so we can then hand them a Bible and count them tithers)?
I heard once that in childhood we destroy, burn, laugh, and in
adulthood we repair, save, and mourn. Apparently that's true of
ourselves as a species too.
I was amused with the Universal Dichotomy group. I'd seen many
parallels to their information through my Women in Religion course, and
even Abnormal Sexuality, but what really amused me was a big splat of
irony. One female spoke about gender norms and how women tend to engage
in self-restricting habits. While she was talking about women's equality
and having us listen to No Doubt's "I'm Just a Girl" I couldn't stop
staring at one of her images. A man, in business attire, playing at
tug-of-war with a women in women's business attire, complete with
open-toe-high-heels, the kind so high that you need an ankle strap. Talk
about not being on equal footing. I took this image's place in her talk
to be a sign of women successfully competing in today's world, and yet
she mentioned self-restricting habits and uses THAT image. I desperately
wanted to ask if she was aware of the irony.
The rest of the groups were pretty well done. I liked the Role of
Religion in Agriculture group. The Water Temples of Dewi Danu and the
rice system was fascinating. I enjoyed hearing about how the
introduction of the Green Revolution damaged a working system. Not in a
sadistic way, but in the "even when we try to save the world, we tamper
with long-standing working models and force them to collapse" kind of
way.
For our own presentation, I'm always terribly critical. It wasn't as
interesting as some of the others, but then again we DID have to outline
the steps of mining. I think I'll try for the more boring part of our
topic next time and see if I can Teach it Up to the students: see if I
can make it a little more engaging. I talked too much and too fast.
Observations of Environmental Anthropology in the Specimen "Me":
I realized that when I talk about environmentalism and what I think
it is, I'm really talking about what I wish it was. I sat the MGSA club
fest table today, for about an hour and a half, and heralded people in
to us. I'm pretty good at that. I realized that when I was explaining
what the group does I mentioned things that I had recommended we do (to
the other group members at the first meeting). We have no plans for a
Movie Night showing "Tapped" and then engaging in a talk/debate about
water bottles and the low-regulation of their contents, and yet I
mentioned it to at least two people. I hope I didn't misrepresent us too
much. I don't want people to be let down if I can't swing that event.
Does that make me an idealist, or simply an exaggerator? Boooo. :(
Ethnography of the South Floridian:
Sitting the table gave me a good opportunity to see what people
thought of environmentalism, while I people watched. How much more
Anthropology of Nature can one get? Answer? People don't want to put a
lot of work in, but want results. Attend an environmental leadership
conference for four days, paid by FAU? No thanks. Beach clean up? Maybe.
Save the world by just changing a 2-second habit? Yea, that had the
most people biting. Ah well. It's that sort of laziness that got us all
into this situation anyway. Convenience here, free stuff we don't need
there (says the girl who came home with a recycled paper notebook and a
MGSA polo shirt, but hey, those are for 'work', right?). Le sigh.
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