Friday! I can’t believe I’ve only been here a week. Planning
so much for English lessons (and trying to make Georgian friends) has left me
with little time for actually studying Georgian. My goal for next week is to
make more time for formal study. That said, I’ve been practicing a lot and am
slowly improving. In fact, I understood two jokes from my students today. When
I asked Giorgi (a different one from my footballer friend) how the weather was
on this cold and rainy day, he replied that it was good and he likes rain. Then
he said there has to be rain for there to be any chance of a rainbow. In another
class, my co-teacher asked the 2nd graders what kinds of letters
we are studying. One of the girls answered, “Big and little ones.” [Georgian
script doesn’t have “capitol” and “lowercase” letters, so this is a new concept
for them.]
My co-teacher suggested a trip to her village on Sunday if
the weather is nice. Crossing my fingers and pressing my thumbs!Friday! I can’t believe I’ve only been here a week. Planning
so much for English lessons (and trying to make Georgian friends) has left me
with little time for actually studying Georgian. My goal for next week is to
make more time for formal study. That said, I’ve been practicing a lot and am
slowly improving. In fact, I understood two jokes from my students today. When
I asked Giorgi (a different one from my footballer friend) how the weather was
on this cold and rainy day, he replied that it was good and he likes rain. Then
he said something about a rainbow. In another
class, my co-teacher asked the 2nd graders what kinds of letters
we are studying. One of the girls answered, “Big and little ones.” [Georgian
script doesn’t have “capitol” and “lowercase” letters, so this is a new concept
for them.]
My co-teacher suggested a trip to her village on Sunday if
the weather is nice. Crossing my fingers and pressing my thumbs!
In the meantime, I'm sitting by the wood stove in my host family's kitchen. I'm marking up the textbooks that the older students are using. They have a lot of typos, misinformation, and social morality reading pieces. One short essay explained that the reasons ants have been able to survive millions of years are that they stick together, share work, and sacrifice for the good of the group. Another essay suggested keeping a journal as a tool for becoming great (as well as making a habit of helping people), but mentioned that mostly girls keep journals. There was an essay on Bill Gates being successful despite dropping out of Harvard. There were two essays presenting religious teachings as national history. There was an essay on the life of an American 7th grader (which sorely needs updating)...In fact, there are many American folk songs and even one essay about how to get a scholarship to study abroad in the US. And I squirmed a bit to find the n-word casually used in one of the end-of-chapter reviews. I re-wrote a few of the essays, and wrote a letter to my co-teacher about derogatory language.
I just wish I could read the text books used in the other classes! Soon enough, hopefully.
History is the story told by someone of something that has happened in the past. Telling stories takes what the teller imagines and translates it to be communicated to others. Such communication serves to create community as those in community hold a collection of stories in common. As "my" story becomes "our" story, "history" is made.
ReplyDeleteGiven that a community is always made up of individuals with unique imaginations, the "it" of history can NOT remain some collective constant that is consistently held in common by a community, despite any effort of community "leaders" to make it so. It is rather through continuous relationship with one another - part of which is a mutual telling of stories - that something called "history" is agreed upon.
Written history is merely an attempted snapshot of some community's supposed collective memory. Even then, like any photograph, the recorded result is very much subjective - some other perspective is always possible.
It is much easier for someone outside a community to question any history accepted by that community. Such questioning, however, should always be done in the context of relationship - mutual respect built upon trust developed over time through careful and considerate communication. This is possible when stories are shared and compared, revealing both commonalities and differences. As the newcomer, once a stranger, is accepted into the community, these stories come to be the basis for re-telling the common story that will become accepted as history for the community.