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Exploring Race, Representation, and History in Children's Literature
May 19, 2018
This session for early childhood teachers, hosted by Project Unlearn and Teaching for Change's D.C. Area Educators for Social Justice, provided time for early childhood teachers to explore how to address issues of race, representation, and history in developmentally appropriate ways.
Many teachers face either the pressures to avoid difficult topics or to plunge in with little consideration of what is best for children at each stage of their development. This session provided time for teachers to explore and discuss these issues surrounded by children's books in the beautiful Halcyon Lab.
I know myself hanging on the wind cold tree for nine icy nights.
Wounded by the spear, consecrated to Odin
I consecrated to myself.
I was hanging on the mighty tree which conceals man
Where man grew out of its roots.
They offered me neither bread nor wine
So I bent down in search.
I recognized the Runes; wailing I grasped them.
Until I sank down from the tree.
Now I began to increase, to be wise,
To grow and to feel well.
From the word, word grew after word
And deed shaped to deeds with deeds.
Now I know the songs like no wise one knows
And none of the children of men.
And should these songs, o' human child, be unlearnable to you for sheer endless time;
Grasp them as you get hold of them, use them as you hear of them. Hail you if you retain them.
How does belief in an "I" and the whole neurotic process begin? Roughly, according to the Madhyamikas, whenever a perception of form occurs, there is an immediate reaction of fascination and uncertainty on the part of an implied perceiver of the form. This reaction is almost instantaneous. It takes only a fraction of a fraction of a second. And as soon as we have established recognition of what the thing is, our next response is to give it a name. With the name of course comes concept. We tend to conceptualize the object, which means that at this point we are no longer able to perceive things as they actually are. We have created a kind of padding, a filter or veil between ourselves and the object. This is what prevents the maintenance of continual awareness both during and after meditation practice. This veil removes us from panoramic awareness and the presence of the meditative state, because again and again we are unable to see things as they are. We feel compelled to name , translate, to think discursively, and this activity takes us further away from direct and accurate perception. So shunyata is not merely awareness of what we are and how we are in relation to such and such an object, but rather it is clarity which transcends conceptual padding and unnecessary confusions. One is no longer fascinated by the object nor involved as a subject. It is a freedom from this and that. What remains is open space, the absence of this-and-that dichotomy. This is what is meant by the Middle Way or Madhyamika. --- The experience of shunyata cannot be developed without having worked through the narrow path of discipline and technique. Technique is necessary to start with, but it is also necessary at some stage for the technique to fall away. From the ultimate point of view the whole process of learning and practice is quite unnecessary. We could perceive the absence of ego at a single glance. But we would not accept such a simple truth. In other words, we have learn in order to unlearn. The whole process is that of undoing the ego. We start by learning to deal with neurotic thoughts and emotions. Then false concepts are removed through understanding of emptiness, of openness. This is the experience of shunyata. Shunyata in Sanskrit means literally "void" or "emptiness", that is to say, "space", the absence of all conceptualized attitudes. --- Chogyam Trungpa / Shambhala Publications
Exploring Race, Representation, and History in Children's Literature
May 19, 2018
This session for early childhood teachers, hosted by Project Unlearn and Teaching for Change's D.C. Area Educators for Social Justice, provided time for early childhood teachers to explore how to address issues of race, representation, and history in developmentally appropriate ways.
Many teachers face either the pressures to avoid difficult topics or to plunge in with little consideration of what is best for children at each stage of their development. This session provided time for teachers to explore and discuss these issues surrounded by children's books in the beautiful Halcyon Lab.
Marziyas teacher complains Marzya does not talk to the kids in her class and is very reserved..I know it Marziya is my teacher and teaches me to unlearn life..I walk her home through the Bazar and here the moment she saw the beggar she nudged me to give him something, I handed her a few coins and Marziya is giving it to him.
Perhaps I am discovering my own daughter through Marziya as both have similar hot headed impulsive temperaments , and Marziya will see a bike than ask me Phupa Kahan Gaye, her Uncle Assad is in Dubai..
When I cut my Haji Malang trip, and reached home the first question was Dada what did you bring for me..
Last evening we again walked the Bazar road..
2023
My "Once Removed" series (a sequel to my earlier series “Ain't I a Woman”) explores the stories of women who were only generations removed from the bonds of slavery, when millions of African-American former slaves fled the South in search of a better life for themselves and their descendants. With their first taste of freedom, they headed north and west in a “Great Migration” that changed the face of America forever. Those who critique attempts at teaching history's truth have suggested that white children might experience shame when confronted with lessons on systemic racism. But for me, shame comes from not knowing the truth and in having to unlearn a history that has taught less than the whole story. To teach a more complete history is to bring back the voices of those who have been intentionally silenced. The time is now to lift every voice.
Using 100 year old historical portraits which often feel strikingly modern, along with period documents, textures from my drawing and paintings, layered with pages from a 1919 antique book, "The Trees of Pennsylvania," I hope to create images that give voice to stories too long silent and restore dignity to women striving to escape their chains, both literal and figurative. I am creating select pieces from this series as mixed media collage works finished in cold wax to further explore the layering of time and memory as these women went on to create wide-growing family trees, putting down roots in fertile new lands.
today was a pretty day
no disappointments
no expectations on your whereabouts
and oh, did I let you go?
did it finally show that strange things will happen if you let
them?
today I didn't even try to hide
I'll stay here and never push things to the side
you can't reach me cause I'm way beyond you today
today was a pretty day
autumn comes with
these slight surprises where your life might twist and turn
hope to unlearn
strange things will happen
If you let them come around and stick around
today I didn't even try to hide
I'll stay here and never push things to the side
today I didn't even look to find
something to put me in that peace of mind
you can't touch me cause I'm way beyond you today .
With John & Anthony. Wonderful guys. Anthony had his book "A Life of Unlearning" go into yet another print recently.
It’s been said – spoken by the unlearned who spew a continuous narrative of white supremacy – that the African is docile, unintelligent, unable to fight. 25PIANKHI selects the African narrative below for education purposes. Aleksandr Pushkin, an African writer of political poems, novelist, dramatist, and short story is often considered the founder of modern Russian literature. Pushkin’s work places emphasis on civic responsibility, confidence in the triumph of reason over prejudice and of human charity over slavery and oppression. His poetry is remarkable for its classical balance, brilliant and frequently witty use of the Russian literary language, and philosophical content. Classical writers of the 19th century view Pushkin’s work as an inseparable part of the Russian literary world and aspects of Russian opera. Aleksandr Pushkin is but one of our many great authors. We are a great people. #AfricaWillRise #OneAfricanGiant (25PIANKHI © 2020 All Rights Reserved)