More on my work

Alright, so I've made some allusions to the work I'm doing w.r.t. education reform. This work springs from my doctoral dissertation, so I'll start there. I begin by looking at the National Governors' Association's version of standards-based reform as framed in the National Education Summits. That's Chapter 1.

From there, I go on to talk about my experiences in Marine Corps bootcamp. Here, you have a "strong standards" environment," but one that changes two key elements. First, people actually want to be there in the first place. Sure, some leave, but ultimately they have the choice to disengage from the process. Kids in school have less choice in that regard. The other difference is that you actually are trying to become something quite specific, a Marine, and everything you do has to do with making the change (yeah, yeah, "the change is forever" I saw the commercials, too.). That is, they understand that you must be motivated by something internal, in this case a kind of growing identification with an object of desire--yourself as the Marine. It's a far diffent thing to earn a diploma and to pursue vague dreams of your future, than it is to go through a process that highlights and makes possible as series of specific changes that make you a Marine.

The next two chapters, 3 and 4, are about my experiences training in kung fu (ving tsun, moy yat family, for those who need details). Here, you have a much more self-directed and self-paced version of training. There is no "right" or "wrong." You are shown some things, you work on them alone and with others, and you get better. Again, it is a choice, and many people choose not to follow this path either, for a variety of reasons. However, I think it illustrates the extent to which assessment can interfere with the process of learning. Also, it blurs the lines between teacher and learner, basic and advanced, and many other dichotomies posed in much of regular educational processes.

From here, the post-doctoral life, I hope to do more with this. I've reworked the first chapter, and hope to keep most of the bootcamp stuff. I will probably turn the kung fu chapters into something a bit more limited and focused, but that depends on how it develops. I would also begin to look at the relationships between self-identity, self-inscription (a new idea I'm looking at), and power. I'm sort of trying to get to the idea that people who have been really fucked up in life, whether they do it for themselves or have it done to them or some combo of the these, can use the act of creation to get themselves back. Some may use writing as a way, some may use art, some may use some sort of physical training, some may use mental training of various kinds, including meditation. Whatever the path they choose, my hypothesis is that they are, at least in part, creating both a new sense of themselves (their subjectivity) and projecting that power onto their world. This is key for me. We can take power over self and the world. I'm talking here, first about the limited world of the specific thing that makes you feel most real (art, writing, skateboarding, or whatever). If one can find a powerful self in that, there is a potential for building a more puissant sense of self in other contexts. The goal here is self-knowledge that makes us better somehow than we were.

I'm not sure whether that's coming out correctly or not, but it sure is a lot different than what school is about, mostly at least. I'm not saying that people don't benefit from going through some trauma. It's good to go through some shit. It can lead to wisdom, if you can take the next step after trauma, and not fall into self-pity or self-loathing. I'm saying that we mostly don't give people the tools for making something of it, for the acquistion of wisdom. Take me for example. I've been through a lot of things that have made me feel weak, stupid, inadequate, or whatever (moving around a lot, not knowing how to fight, not having a lot of constant friends). I've also seized upon other things that have helped me grasp power (satanism, racism, sexism, scholarship, kung fu). I'm not particularly proud of what I've done in the past, at least in some regards. However, I feel pretty good about what I am now. Part of it was my scholarship, part of it was a lot of self-reflection about what it means to be a good person, husband, teacher, student, etc. Part of it was my kung fu. It's amazing, for me, the extent to which my anger was a product of fear and self-doubt. Notice though, what I've been able to personalize, and turn into a tool for self-making, has been useful as a ground for learning, understanding and ethical strength.