great visual from class

This picture speaks a thousand words! Thank you to the group who created it for us.

Nietzsche's swamp:

Ghandi video

Debt and Goodness

This is a picture of the "courtyard" at Kilmainham Gaol, Dublin Ireland. My family visited this landmark about 3 years ago. Most people talk about this place because the famous martyrs of the Easter 1916 Rebellion were killed there. But I am haunted by other "residents" we learned about on our tour. The prison, like so many others of the time, served as a debtor's prison. But don't picture old men there; many of them were women and children. I remember the guide walking us out into a courtyard with slate flooring and explaining that the children would be sent out there for a walk once a day. But also, when someone would die in the prison, they would bury them in the courtyard by lifting up some stones, digging a little, putting the body down, covering it with quicklime, and then replacing the stones. So children would walk over the bodies of people they knew on the daily walk.


When I was looking over our readings this weekend, I was caught by N.'s discussion of the word "debt" and its link with the word "guilt." (p.63). Maybe more importantly, "innocent" is linked to being debt-free. We don't often think of it, but people who can't pay their debts can still be put in prison. More often though, because of our bankruptcy laws, people are given second chances. It is easy to think that is "not fair" that they are getting out of their debts. But I always remember what those laws prevent when I think of the children in the Kilmainham Gaol. The statistics on the people who are in our prisons now, however, show that the poor are WAY overrepresented in jails, and we have an enormous jail population. Have we really solved our problems?

Bad vs. Evil

Ever since Abby said in class on Friday "I'm not sure I get the difference between bad and evil" I have been bothered. I thought I understood that, but then it slipped away from me again. I hate to be defeated, so back I went to those parts of the text to try to work it our again.
I think I have a tenuous grasp again. It is all about perspective: who's making the statement? whose eyes are we seeing through? Since nobles define "nobility" and "good-ness" as themselves, all things not noble are "bad." I believe we can relate that to similar experiences of the 'haves" and "have nots" in our culture today. In America, the "goodness" and "nobleness" of someone is closely tied to their financial status (rather than their bloodline). I didn't realize how much I had these biases myself until I had one of those lightbulb moments. When my husband and I bought our first house, we were really proud. It had an unfinished upstairs and it needed a little work but we were assuming that that was "good," that we would earn the added value our house would get by putting in our own "sweat equity." We had used every penny we had to buy the house, and bought an "affordable" house--the bank easily approved our loan. But when we went to start putting in our "sweat" we realized we had a problem: sweat alone didn't cover the wood siding; one needs a good paint to do that, and paint costs money, as does brushes and buckets, etc. To our shock, we realized we couldn't do much at that time to improve on the house. It would have to wait until we had a little more money. When I walked out of the house after that, I didn't feel proud--I felt embarrassed at how it didn't look as nice as I thought it should and I worried about what people would think when they saw our "shabby" house. Not long after that, I was driving through a poor and not safe neighborhood downtown, and then noticing what it was that made me think that about this particular block. I realized it was the "shabby" houses, and I thought of my own house. And I thought, for the first time in my privileged life: "oh--maybe it isn't that these people are "bad" or "lazy" or "dangerous". Maybe they don't have enough money to buy paint, just like me!" I have not looked at life the same since that day.

But what about "evil"? Nietzsche only uses that term to describe what the aescetic priests say about the nobles. The priests are trying to guide (or some might say "whip up") the mob." Only when one is the "victim, like the lamb, can one see the "bird of prey" acting on its own instincts, as "evil." The interesting tie here is to the warrior/noble mentality vs. the aescetic priests who deny their own nature, and in not letting it out, they stuff it down, turning the violence in on themselves.

whew!

how to read Nietzsche

As we read "The Genealogy of Morals" it seems that we are struggling almost as much with HOW to read it as we are with the controversial ideas themselves! You can see that Chris has come up with a strategy

and Peyton notes a Nietzsche's own advice for us: ruminate. I think that Chris is giving us a concrete "how-to" which is really helpful.

A new word for learning: Ako

A guy who does what I do (faculty development) wrote this on a listserve I read today:
Our indigenous people in NZ (the Maori) have a particular word 'ako' that incorporates the concept of teaching and learning as one idea.
It is regarded as poor treatment of the student to ask a question that the 'elder' knows the answer to.
The T&L process is deeply embedded in dialogue, story telling and narrative.
The written word is not as highly regarded.
There is further a set of attitudes and values around the concept of authority, age and leadership that I don't feel qualified to comment on...There are huge issues in NZ with some international students who see teaching and learning as a "teacher tells, student listens and learns, student regurgitates content".

This reminded me of our talks about Socrates. So many of you mentioned that you didn't like him because of his asking leading questions, of having hidden, pre-decided answers. The Maori would not think of this as Ako.
Do you think our culture is more like the culture of the Maoris or more like the "foreigners"? What would you think of a teacher asking you a question that the teacher did not know the answer to?