'Schooling for all' is beginning to seem a not-so-innocent upper class macination.
To serve that as the panacea absolves the upper class of facing the utterly unfair distribution of resources in a skewed world. of which inequity they are the sole beneficiaries. It also eases their concscience, as if 'the poor are not rising despite schools' it must be their inherent laziness or genetic backwardness.
How they cannot see that the very yardstick of reading-writing is skewed, when a child whose inherited wisdom is cropping and grazing and livestock maintainance has to match a child whose ancestors have only read and written and whose very genes have started looking like pens. Of course the child also lives in a single roomed house, his mother does not have money to address her TB, the father is a drunk
... Also the fact is that the world can survive without pens, but not without crops. But we have manipulated our inherited skill to seem the sole and all important skill. Mind boggles at how we managed all this.
Met someone saying in his introduction that he and his brothers are from IIT. Maybe he indicated that they were all very intelligent. I kept quiet.
Life is not about fast fourier transforms. Or writing nice prose, for that matter. High IQ is no big deal.
Life is about humility, balance, sensitivity, compassion, forbearance, courage. Average intelligence and loads of common sense is what is needed.
Parenting is about living and nurturing these foundations.
Where does IIT, or any other college, come into the reckoning. Or marks or awards.
Rajeev R. SinghIf one has the qualities of humility, being sensitive etc, can one be proud of these ?
Aparna KrishnanNot possible. if there is sensitivity, one will at each point know that one is doing too little. And if one had courage one will look into the mirror at one's own compromises. There will be little to be proud of.
"Schooling for All" is a process of universal deskilling. Every traditional sustainable skill that can save the planet is lost. Weaving, pottery.
These skills need years of apprenticeship through growing years. Which is labelled 'child labour' today.
Unable to restore these skills to their rightful place of prestige and honour, we allow them to die, and speed their exit by putting their children into non functional village schools. Where the children also learn to despise them, as skills of the 'illiterate'.
The shepherd. Playing a lilting melody on his flute to the grass and clouds. Happy in his small mud house. With the sheep housed outside.
And then we step in. Tell him he is illiterate. Poor. That his children are uneducated.
Because we cannot let well like alone ? Or is it something less simple ...
Modern education confers arrogance. Dismissing vaster knowleges that exist outside its purview.
And yet education is that which confers humility.
विद्या ददाति विनयम्
Modern schooling is just a polite term for Deskilling.
Loss of all traditional sustainable skills. Weaving, pottery, farming, animal care.
And some reading, writing, memorising is all the next generation has in lieu
Schooling is structured to celebrate reading wrinting as the sole skills, and everything else is devalued. A child who passes through schooling, mainstream or so called alternative, espises the occupations of his forefathers,
In school one tops the class, or wins a debate, only if the others do worse than oneself. This way of living for 12 formative years does deep moral and psycological damage. I think i am still undoing that damage.
I wish parents would realize the costs to the child's wholeness, before they applaud and exhibit their children's 'successes'. What a child needs to learn is only to take joy in others doing excellently, and to learn to put in one's heart and soul in one's own work. And to learn a larger responsibility thro' life.
The Ayurveda texts were created by the Rishis who left no watermark.
Ishwara arpanam of each act. Surrender of each act. Non ownership.
To aspire to that state, over one or many lifetimes.
To not lose sight of that goal even as we deal in the material world with materialistic contexts.
The goal of surrendering of Ahamkara and Mamakara, I and Mine.
The very act of being credited, admired, complimented takes us away from that goal.
Unless we are fully aware. That we are merely a dot. In a larger panorama.
There are posts celebrating schooling in villages. My heart
aches. Schooling every potter and weaver and farmers away from their vast
traditions is a defeat and no victory. It is the indicator of the destruction
of diverse learnings and strengths and existances. And the establishment of the
monopoly of the Schooled.
When a farmer, an adivasi deeply learned in the lore of the
forests, desires his children to learn reading, writing and go to colleges and
start anew in the other world, losing every vast inherited wisdom and starting
anew as a first generation learner - then I see the utter defeat of my dreams,
and the end of my imaginings.
Challenging schooling.
Allowing a million skills to flower in their own ways.
May be the most radical way of challenging the iron grip of Privilege.
Children of incredible talents.
Now all of them making their own kites, helping one another. Through vacation days.
With single focussed attention, making the perfect kite that soars above the clouds.
And these children are judged by society in schools. By the completely limited and blinkered yardsticks. That suit us, the Privilegd. Yardsticks of reading and writing. And memorising irrelevant facts.
Because in any real yardstick, they will soar way above our children. Like the kites they have crafted
Schools and schooling have to go.
...
Aparna Krishnan I understand all that. Yes, it if far far better
that than the excuses for schools that there are. But the fact is that
schooling as a structure is deeply and unremediably flawed. We would do well to
face that. Many many skills can neither be taught nor validated in a school. A
'double period' of pottery cannot make a potter - chooseing the clay,
harnessing the bullocks, seaching the right sand, fashioning the wheel - these
belong to a different framework of learning. To even think of working towards a
sane and fair society we are forced to see foundational flaws. And envision a
different society, which will have very different learning frameworks. Modern
schooling - the good, the bad and the ugly - is all one. Destructive.
Aparna Krishnan To school the world is to establish ourselves as
the leaders as finally it validates our reading writing skills over all others.
We have deep stakes in the continuing of the schooling myth, as we do in many
other myths.
Aparna Krishnan Outlawing schools would level the field in ways
no revolution can. Schools and English.
...
Aparna Krishnan I would think that the potter's son makes pots
with the father, and the thatcher's son thatches. These are skills learnt by
working thro' growing years. Required literacy skills can be supplied in the
evenings. And before someone jumps in to tell me that I am 'depriving the poor
of schooling' I extend an invitation to all to come to my village and see where
the poor are left postschooling. In a nether world. Unfit to farm, and unfit
for the dream white collar jobs. Simply making a beeline to the arrack shop.
Like · Reply · 1 · August 12, 2015 at 4:19pm
Aparna Krishnan But parallely we need to structure a world where
every sustainable skill has respect and remuneration equal to that of 'computer
skills'. Faling which, lets lump it. And watch communities get negated and
destroyed.
Like · Reply · August 12, 2015 at 4:20pm
Aparna Krishnan Anyway we are unable to rebuild the world of our
dreams. And so we play along as well.
...
And there is the the retarding effect of school which is more
visible with every passing generation (at the least the personalities are
disjointed, with some scholastic ability but little perspective or empathy,
just like the subjects they learn which are as artificially disjointed).
But more worrying is the hegemonising effect of schools where
wise and learned village communities become 'iiliterate', second division holders,
and suddenly and cruelly inferior to the literate community. The complete
negation that schooling does to the potter and the thatcher and the vaidya in
our village is a crime vaster than any.
But unable to beat this system, we also school our children, and
goad them to do 'well in board exams'.
...
Children are given prizes. Parents hyperventilate.
The child learns to celebrate being better thatn others. A sad learning.
They tell me that this is competition, and that brings out the best.
It teaches the worst. To rejoice in others doing less well than oneself.
What is rooted in a negative emotion, can never be a positive growth.
8Archana Prasad, Ritesh Singh and 6 others
Comments
However competing with oneself to get get better than before is desirable
Doing ones best is different. I would prefer not using the word competing. That pressure itself is somehow not needed. A farmer just does his best.
A school can attack the very foundations of a community's sense
of self worth and self identity. A 'superior way' is imposed from above and
that can be fatal.
Every schooled youngster in my village is convinced that local
systems of healing are 'superstitious', they take their wives only for an
allopathic delivery and do not trust the local dai, they certianly do not want
to do agriculture or pottery and prefer shopfloor jobs to these even when they
are lower paying.
I agree this is the malighned mainstream schooling at work, and
some alternative schools would be more sensitive. But I suspect more and more
it is part of the framework of the school itself - otherwise why would one set
up schools in the world of other communities. The potter does not come and set
up pottery schools in our spaces ro raise us out of our abyss. These are deep
seated games of power and dominence.
Why do we promote schooling and literacy with such fervour ? Why
do we permit it to be vastly over compensated compared to every other skill and
learning ?
Is education for ushering in a fairer, better society ? Are the
'alternative schools' addressing that, or are they simply for individual gain
of privileged kids ? Local language is the touchstone of whether we mean them
to impact all children, or just the privileged children.
(via Komakkambedu Himakiran Anugula - in reponse to a post
listing alternative schools, largely Krishnamurthy schools and Steiner schools)
Alternative Schools of India. Would love to hear personal
experiences of the same. There is a strong need to look at education in India
as it is not serving the purpose and creating a distinct segregation in
society;
One group of people who think in English and control the economy
with their privileged backgrounds and another group that is called
"unemployable", having lost their own skills as well as barely
knowing the skills of the globalised economy.
1) How many of these schools teach using local language/mother
tongue to teach?
When we set up schools, when we set out to 'teach the village
children', we in deep ways destroy the validity of their own knowleges and
learning systems. It is invidious. However 'alternative' the school may be. As
I teach the children of my village, I deeply rue the need to.
"If you wanted to change an ancient culture in a
generation, how would you do it? You would change the way it educates its
children.
The U.S. Government knew this in the 19th century when it forced
Native American children into government boarding schools. Today, volunteers
build schools in traditional societies around the world, convinced that school
is the only way to a 'better' life for indigenous children. But is this true? What
really happens when we replace a traditional culture's way of learning and
understanding the world with our own? SCHOOLING THE WORLD takes a challenging,
sometimes funny, ultimately deeply disturbing look at the effects of modern
education on the world's last sustainable indigenous cultures.... "
Many 'alternative' schools have students whom they try to make
'sensitive' and 'socially concerned'. The first step to being socially
concerned is to belong to the society. To talk the local language, to wear the
local clothing, to engage in local customs.
But many of these alternative schools are expensive, and have
students who can only converse in English, and who are usually in shorts or
three quarters as their most preferred attire. Most would not be seen dead with
jasmine in plaited hair, or even a standard bindi.
'Social concern' comes after belonging to the society one claims
as one's own.
We define the parameters of what we call learning. And we award
ourselves.
And disenfranchise the inherited leanings of vast communitities.
Is 'Down with Schooling' too politically incorrect. I suppose
one will be outcasted by the progressive, the modernists, the traditionalists
and the very children for whom one is questioning schooling.
I have no idea on what to do for my degreed village children.
Deeply convinced that they should only do desk jobs, and neither farming or
other on-ground work. Schooled so imperfectly that they are honestly not fit
for any reading-writing job.
A friend trying to help me place Munendra echoed the same
observations. She has worked with many such children from villages, and they
have a clear concept of what works are inferior for them. And they are not fit
for the jobs they deem are fit for them ! And their parents have gone deep into
debt for degreeing them. The 10th pass children have better adaptability and
possibilities.
But schooling is modern day religion - and to question these
blasphemy.
That is the only truth behind Schooling.
Modern parents and educators are eager that their children
'discover themselves'. And send them to many workshops, and classes. They
themselves try to 'discover themselves'.
Many of them forget that one discovers oneself in service to
others. Forgetting oneself, is the way to discovering oneself. This learning
starts early in life.
(via Rohit Bansal)
... and let me add, very humbly, the process, which makes us
good scientists, economists, doctors and engineers, is at odds with what makes
us good human beings;
we need to choose, and choose wisely ... iMHO, today, we
exercise this choice, without even realizing (forget thinking), when we send
our toddler to a school ...
Marks, ranks are unimportant, and to celebrate marks, ranks,
prizes, adulation is unwise. It makes for a neurotic adult for whom public
validation is what validates. It makes for insecurity. Which covers itself as
pride.
I would seek for all children,
Perspective, an honest understanding about society.
The heart and the head and the spine to take on the wrongs here.
The inner calm to sustain this through.
Marks, ranks are unimportant details, and to celebrate marks,
ranks, prizes, adulation is unwise.
It makes for a neurotic adult for whom public validation is what
validates. It makes for insecurity. Which covers itself as pride.
Thats modern schooling for us. And modern parenting.
...All formal degrees are equally irrelevent when it comes to
making choices and moves in life that matter. There only essential integrity
and courage count. IIT and IISc only teach how to do sums faster.
Posts from parents on how their children have sung on stage, or
published a book, or won an award. Or on smart things the children say.
.
The importance of that simple childhood which does not need or
seek the stage or public acclaim. Which has retained the habit of simple
happiness in simple work well done. Is all but forgotten. The childhood which
alone can nurture the adult who can work steadily and silently away from name
and fame. For a larger good.
Deluded parents crafting deluded children in deluded times.
Literates learn the WORD; illiterates learn the WORLD!
Modernity can be defined as the 'beingness' that got formed due to mediated learning rather than direct knowing, by using the mind rather than the whole being, by engaging with the description rather than the described.
This means the WORLD is replaced with the WORD, Experience is replaced with reading and thinking and the senses are replaced with the mind causing a fundamental rewiring of the cognitive tools, cognitive process and the cognitive source.
WHERE AS
Traditional 'illiterate' artisan’s learning is experientially rooted, learner driven. It has the quality of re-creating, re-inventing and re-living knowledge.
The cognitive space ensures the first handedness in these learnings and helps the learner to situate oneself in the cultural conditions of one's life.
- Jinan
http://www.wampumchronicles.com/benfranklin.html
...
This is a sad thing to admit, but I need to table it. In the light of discussions on reservations. The issue is deeper and sadder.
When I was studying in college, one of our classmates was seen as a quota student, and we all subtly, and unconcsiously even, looked down on him. The fact that he spoke English haltingly put him on a different social strata. We were snobs in that fluent English marked a camaraderie.
We were a gentler crowd, and mostly girls, and were always polite, but stayed away from being really friendly. What such subtle demeaning can do to honest, hard working youth who have suffered all odds to reach where they do, god alone knows. What sense of bitterness, or what sense of worthlessness it can create.
All I can say in my defence is that I did not know better the when I was in my late teens, and I was a product of a social reality of middle/ upper middle class schooling. Now when I think of reserved students in IITs I wonder what they would face - and whether it is worth their existing in a space where the other ihabitants consider themselves the creme de la creme.
The SCs carry many many burdens.
20Komakkambedu Himakiran, Vigneshwaran RK and 18 others
Comments
In IIT the identities are not disclosed as such . and the discrimination is not as much as it is hyped about , recently our foundation has funded two students at IIT roorkee and I found them quite confident , even when I was at IIT Delhi as a post grad student the hostel environment was good , we never went into caste matters and there were several intercaste marriages and we came to know about only then . all of them eventually got married too
Good if so. But my village children have faced different realities in college.
When young and going to school and college did not know the word Dalit or Obc etc we knew only Christian,Muslim and Jews and Hindus They were my best friends While teaching for 10years I did not know whose who . Now reading newspapers TV and your account of village have started knowing I agree with Himansu raiji
In TamilNadu alone, we had an entire community of houses burnt , we had a young engineering student whose killing is still a mystery with perpetrators not convicted, we had a honest senior police officer who committed suicide whilst investigating the case! To say the least there is no simple solution. In my view they should be aware of all the facilities that they have access to and the people on top of the pyramid from within them should also take steps to give a helping hand too! They also need to be aware that they don't allow themselves to become someone else's pawn and focus more on what their end goals are. Otherwise I sincerely believe that every good citizen shuns such discrimination and is more than willing to contribute to their upliftment.
I remember my son n his friends making fun thier classmate for his poor English. I was very disappointed at my son and gave him a mouthful.
But is doing away with English an answer? In a country which doesnt have one national language, isnt it better to opt for English than Hindi?
We need to move to local languages. Only then will ordinary people come into their own strengths. English out ! Hindi out !
When the world is moving towards an idea of global village, how can we hold on to our own language alone?
For the sake of those who will get more disadvantaged if their languages get more marginalized. Towards that we need to fight. Yes, most battles seem losing battles - but we need to fight. Who knows.
To say 'teach them english' is a non starter ma. They will forever stay our clerks !!
Local language or mother tongue builds on creative instincts. English or any alien language destroys the same. Any language can be learnt provided medium of education is in local language or mother tongue.
What the Germans or Japanese have achieved, we never will be able to, as our system deracinates and unskills.
And anyway if we need to empower local people, we need to stop demanding they prove themselves in an alien language at the least. If we want to be a country we need build up a federation of different languages. It is possible if the will is there. Its not rocket science.
I dont know why i feel that the students of malayalam medium of my generation know better English than English medium students if today. Many of my colleagues (i studied in vernacular medium) speak or write in English very well. May be it has to do with not having too many subjects in schools ( computer studies n the like) and the reading culture we had then. Now i see very few children reading outside their textbooks..
Zakeena Seethi
: What you mention is true....When primary education is in mother tongue, the ability to pick up a second language increases.
If it is true, then why fight against English? They too can be taught...rt?
Btw, im an adult educator. I teach them spoken English.... Through hindi.
English and any other language has to kept at bay till the kid learns in mother tongue. When we have schools that punish if kids speak in their mother tongue, we have to take the fight to English to achieve middle ground.
This is how the corporate cartels of modern India treat native languages!
Will they dare to say this in Germany or France?
Germany has a national language..
Kannada is the national language of Karnataka...Nationalism itself is a concept that came from language groups aligning together.
In India making one language primary will work against other communities. If Hindi or English is made primary, the children of my village whose primary anchor is Telugu will suffer a handicap - and god knows they have enough handicaps already. Same for children in Oriya or Bengali villages. In a situation like this a federation with all languages gives equal weight is what will work.
But it is so weird there. Minorities can open schools only in their own language. Muslims can have only urdu medium schools n christians in English. Karnataka has the devious distinction of having too many lingos. In Mangalore christians speak konkani, shettys n Rais speak tulu, brahmins -shenoys- speak a different konkani, muslims speak urdu, other hindus have kannada.
This language difference could be one reason for such non-unity among people. Mangalore is a melting pot of religious-casteist tension.
nothing devious about that! Isn't that the diversity that we all boast about?
That is india - the diversity. How will my village children have a level playing field if they need to express in a non telugu space. Given the reality of infinite handicaps and poverty that is India. An NRI may suggest that all village childen be taught in English medium. Apart from my other objections to that - the sheer impracticality is evident. In AP all govt schools have an English-medium-section ! Come and see it !! Anchor local languages, give place in employment etc. for local languages. And over and above that teach other languages also.
I dont know... I feel language n culture are closely related. When different communities in one place have different lingo, culture etc, instead of appreciating it, i feel there is a fear of the other, fear of the unknown. I could feel it in karnataka... Not in kerala or TN
The fear I think is that the local people may lose space. Assure the local people space in local employment, local existance. Thats fair enough. This is a poor country ma, with people struggling to survive. That causes fear.
In this land of infinite disparities, the best gift we an give our children is breaking the bubbles.
Bubbles of gated apartments.
Bubbles of elite schools.
Bubbles of exotic vacations, hotels, shopping spaces.
And to move to share common spaces with the peoples of the land.
There is no other way to raise a responsible child, a responsible adult.
Aware of one priviliges, and ones duties.
Today i saw a 14 year old child gather accolades for his performance, gather trophies, a proud mother beaming at him, and a smart speech given by him.
I simply felt very sad for the child. Trapped into the whole game of name, fame, limelight and public adulation. So young. And will he finally even learn that none of all this counts at all.
To lose one's sense of identity, to drop the sense of being the 'doer' is all that counts. And then alone will any and every meaningful action happen thro' us. And only in that space of negateng oneself, will he find even true happiness in the work he loves.
There was another 14 year old, son of our friends - sitting in the shade, comfortable being himself, comfortable with his friends and his interests. And i know that he will grow into an adult who will be at peace and give peace to those around him. And I suspect he knows as much as the first child did - but whether he does or does not also is so irrelevent.
Today i saw a 14 year old child gather accolades for his performance, gather trophies, a proud mother beaming at him, and a smart speech given by him.
I simply felt very sad for the child. Trapped into the whole game of name, fame, limelight and public adulation. So young. And will he finally even learn that none of all this counts at all.
To lose one's sense of identity, to drop the sense of being the 'doer' is all that counts. And then alone will any and every meaningful action happen thro' us. And only in that space of negateng oneself, will he find even true happiness in the work he loves.
There was another 14 year old, son of our friends - sitting in the shade, comfortable being himself, comfortable with his friends and his interests. And i know that he will grow into an adult who will be at peace and give peace to those around him. And I suspect he knows as much as the first child did - but whether he does or does not also is so irrelevent.
My village children are so far singularly untouched by this business of feeling validated by prizes and medals, or of feeling invalidated by the absense of the same. Because the village adults similarly live a life rooted in reality - and there is no name, fame addiction that a city promotes. The adults work hard, and in the evenings dance their gabbeyala dances simply for the joy it gives.
Gyan Mitra
pointed out that the TV was precisely for this puspose, to insiduously hook the children into these baser values of envy, greed and desire.
It seems like the eternal battle of good against evil. The village is rooted in a value frame of dharmam, which gives them a way to think, a way to position themselves in the universe ('we do what we do because of the god who gives us that thought' - thereby negateing ego and judgementalisim), and a way to live with sympathy and generosity (dharmam is to give to whoever asks, of whatever we have - and they give in drought times to every begger.)
Will TV values win, or will the eternal dharma ? I do not even wish to guess - but somewhere there is that deep sense that satya has to win over asatya. Because the very meaning of asatya is itself unreality.
When we expect our children to come in the top few in class.
We implicitly tell them to rejoice when they do better than their classmates.
And thereby when their classmates do worse than them.
And then they grow up, become adults. And that training stays ...
17Archana Prasad, Mamatha Balasubramanian and 15 others
Comments
Uma KiranamInteresting perspective. I guess it also means telling them happiness cannot be found within oneself.
Precisely. Thats the other game of prizes. To tell them that their self esteem depends on public approval.
We create psycho cases. A very few escape with humanity intact.
Uma KiranamI love your candidness! Good to meet you.
I am a casuality. i was in the 'top three'. and looking back, i know how it distorts. takes forever to correct, and probably full correction is impossible.
...
Avoiding competition to “learn new skills” is a luxury of the rich, who know that they will have the security of their future whether they work or not, excel or not.
Not for those whose lives are made or broken by that one admission, one job, one competition. The difference between one lower/middle class kid who makes it and the other lower/middle class kid who doesn’t is those few grades, those few marks.
I have seen the so called 'middle' or 'mediocre' kids grow into far better human beings. Not hell bent to others doing wose than oneself, also worded as 'doing better than others'.
And the toppers of my class are in places I dont envy.
Aparna Krishnan
As I said, perception is 90% of the reality. For many toppers, not topping is not an option. Maybe it was for you and I am glad it was. It wasn’t for me. I simply couldn’t afford to take the risk.
Aparna Krishnan
And “better” human beings is also subjective. This is obviously not to say that kids who get “average” can’t rise or can’t grow up to be spectacular. But its easier to judge others, than it is to introspect one’s own privilege. That’s all.
The ones who were middle of the class, have done as well in life as the ones who were 'trying to top'. Not everyone can be 'top three'.
I am talking of everyone in the same 'privilege zone' here. Its not a class comment.
“better” human beings - kinder, more able to share. more able to rejoice in anothers doing well.
Aparna Krishnan
Privilege is what is perceived. Judging a book by its cover, class is an incomplete indicator of privilege, often. A businessman’s son and a service class employee’s son may overtly appear to be in the same “class”, yet one has the security of knowing they can take over their father’s business, the other will probably go homeless once their father retires.
Aparna Krishnan
And its again overly judgemental to think that those who “top” won’t be willing to share. In my school, the toppers notebook was almost communal property. It was shared and photocopied and circulated. Just because a child is working hard to excel does not necessarily mean they also hate others or don’t want others to rise. Not all competition is done through crab mentality.
My point is different. Please see the above post. Its about the killer instinct to top having as its other side erosion of empathy.
Aparna Krishnan
The instinct to be on the top is not always “killer”, is my limited point. Sometimes its the only option, because you simply can’t take the risk of missing.
Most of us miss it. In a class of 30, 27 miss it. Being in top 3.
Anyway never mind. Lets drop it.
Aparna Krishnan
Yes, most of us miss it. Perhaps because you can afford to. Perhaps because you have other priorities. Perhaps because you dont have to start wondering at age 12, how you will take care of your old parents when they retire, if you don’t find a job that pays enough. Perhaps because you dont have to look at your parents rationing out money for one frock in holi and one frock in diwali against buying a new quilt for your grandmother. A lot goes on in the house of the kid for 16 hours away from school that is masked away from their schoolmates that meet him for 8hours.
In a class of 30, only 3 can top. And please, for god's sake, it's not because the rest are lazy. Or rich.
In Awadhi there is a saying - thor padho to har se jao, dher padho to Ghar se jao..... Which means study a little and the plough is useless for you, study more and your village and your home will become useless for you!
Who invented the school ?
Where a child spends its entire childhood and youth there learning to 'pass exams'.
... or else in more expensive alternative schools learning some 'pottery' also. Living in a bubble.
... and we urban deluded souls then also go around trying to open schools in far more sensible spaces
... in villages where children learn as they work in a community that nurtures and guides.
... and we also celebrate 'Schooling for All'.
September 16, 2015 at 12:40pm •
Why is it the 'uneducated' people are far more cultured and civilised and humble.
Even just by by the fact that the 'uneducated' never look down on the educated for not knowing agriculture, or weaving. While the educated look down on them for not knowing reading, and label them 'illiterate'.
The 'educated' are full of arrogance, superciliousness and hot air. While they trade their skills in modernity which is what is laying waste this earth with pollution and depletion.
(Pallaguttapalle - Dalitwada)
There are expensive alternate schools that Progressives send their children to. There the small children 'learn to sweep with a broom', and also 'make salads'. The Progressive mother probably has a servent at home to sweep the rooms, and a cook to cook dinner.
The children of my village sweep at home, carry water, and do the cooking. My daughter also. Happily. That is real learning ...
To teach a child to to satisfied with simple joys, and never to need name or fame may be to create the foundations of freedom for life. And also allow for a simple and focussed work, undistracted by non-essentials.
Schooling and the ranks and prizes therein works against that.
To bring up a child in a simple setting of least affluence, is to enable it to learn the richess of the common people of this land. It is to enable it to stayed rooted in this land. It is to enable it to engage meaningflly with the issues of this land.
There is no greater learning we can offer our children.
There is no shorter path to that learning.
To encourage our children to leave this land for 'higher studies' or 'higher earnings' is to teach them dishonesty and ingratitude. And to teach them to compromise with their own concsience.
Our first duty is to that land which fed us. To the farmers whose sweat was there in each grain we ate. To whom we are answerable. And that is the first lesson we owe our children.
20Shyamala Sanyal, Sreenivasan Ravichandran and 18 others
Comments
To learn skills which otherwise wouldn't be available here and come back and apply them?
No. The skills to address the disadvantaged are available here.They are rarely high technology skills !
The manpower which cares is lacking.
Exposure to outside world is good. Gandhi, Nehru, Bose, Patel...I believe their foreign time shaped their outlook.
Actually all the skills that you need to learn to become a great human being are available right here.
If every single child is sent overseas to get perspective, what will happen to the nation?
Exposure to the villages of this country is needed !
Enough kids are sent abroad, and the narattive that follows is evident !!
Paranthaman SriramuluI am seeing enough non sense from west. You don't even have to go there. All the *ism are from them. First they badly screw everything and find another bad way to reduce that screwing. They claim it as development. Most of them were not needed in first place.
West need to learn from India. There are very simple ways.
Very well said, screwup something and went on unscrewing
But what about the lack of opportunities here? How do we justify that
Opportunity to serve is there on every front. And a simple earning also.
... does the child, on the cusp of college, seek ranks / adulation/ famous colleges ?
... or meaningful work to address the concerns of the land that nurtured it ?
Only that learning which includes the truth of simplicity and non acquisitiveness is valid learning.
It will not run riot. And it will work to serve.
Higher the formal education common sense and social sense reduces. (Via
Keerthi S
)
When I see my children struggle to learn better English. After a Telugu medium learning, in a poor quality government school. Against all odds.
Understanding that only English will get them better jobs. In this land.
I see more and more clearly.
Is not to somehow make them learn English. A language completly alien to them.
But to break down, demolish, destroy this artificial value we have given English.
In our land of a million languages.
Education back to States list.
English-educated Indians are a GM variety of Indians. And equally problematic.
Krishna Kanth Telikepalli But as i understand, your intention to standby poor is good..did learning english had stopped those intentions in any which way?
Aparna Krishnan it weakens one's ability to understand the country and its soul. one gets westernized in one's outlook in some fundamental ways. it took a long time to recognize it, and then a long time to start growing out of it.
Krishna Kanth Telikepalli my point is, people irrespective of what they have learnt for their living, should be made more responsible towards society..this is not just by way of charity but by giving their time and be part of the society and contribute..i usually don't rate charity high ..it's just another way of showing their superiority
Aparna Krishnan true. one's language and roots matter to understand the society.
To bring up a child with discrimination of right and wrong (vivekam) and with the spine to stand ones ground.
Only that matters.
It is not about 'bringing up children'. It is about living ethically, honestly, compassionately.
Children learn by seeing.
"... the major determinant of your career chances in India is not your caste or religion, but whether you are fluent in English."
Some schools seem to be giving credits, marks, for 'social work'. Colleges seem to be looking for these credits.
Another madness unleashed..
The surest way to destroy genuineness and potential good in a child is this.
Service is that which is done in silence, in humility, in gratitude.
It is not a token of exchange. That is business.
23Lavanya Lakshmanan, Sunanda Surya and 21 others
Comments
Baah. What's the point then.
I think its fine. The ultimate goal is to teach and ensure that the under-privileged are giving a helping hand.
I have had a convent education and the first time I volunteered was when my teachers told me what we would do, why its important and how it would help them. From organizing regular evening classes for the kids from brick kiln, to visiting an old age home and leprosy medical home, these helped me learn and develop empathy. We had no marks for it but I did learn about life in those years.
Now when most kids are busy with smartphones, encouraging them for marks is all fine
Cannot agree more with Samrat on this. I also had a strong convent education and I recall volunteering from the age of 4 - it just became part of our everyday schedules. Most human being seek validation and/ or for others to hear them ( thats why we post on social media, in the first place) . If giving a child appreciation for being a better human being will result in social good, what can the harm be ?
if you give credit d make it mandatory.is it appreciation?
i would have agreed with you Aparna but years ago I remember as part of my own work I had to supervise school kids who were made to volunteer at a nearby basti. I recall students asking questions and talking about all that they had not realised. So at least for some becoming more sensitive or at least aware of the problems of others is a good thing.
Means alone is the end. Sometimes.
credit volunteer is more a headache for ngo. We have to spend more time, more energy with those who don't want to. Many a time we end up catering to their need than the other way. Or like many things they just ask for certificate and done with it.
I have seen how a village inculcates giving. In humility. Thro lived examples of elders.
To give marks for giving. To give name and fame for giving. Is to make it a business.
Sorry, the way things are done is as important as what is done.
The right steps rooted in humility. AmAnitvam, Adhambatvam. Ch 13, BG. Essential.
Thst is where religion plays a role. These details have been thought out of in all the spiritual wisdom of the world.
When will we teach our children that the only purpose of life is the greater good of all.
After we take them thro' a childhood and youth of chasing medals and of trying to do better and get more marks than others ?
Absolutely true..First we will have to understand the real objective of life. Then we can change the direction of their learning.
If only English could be 'banned'. At one stroke, a large levelling would happen. My only claim to fame over my village people is a grasp of the language of the coloniser (and a matching weakness in my own vernacular - a sad confession, but a fact).
Otherwise in terms of wisdom, rootedness, generosity, sagacity, skills, knowlege of trees and herbs, and agriculture, and mechanical skills - the village people score over me, hands down.
Those who rave and rant about the caste system - i wish they would see that the deepest caste system is that divide between the english-fluent, and the vernaculr- fluent.
But that caste divide suits us and our children - why would we even see it !
12Vigneshwaran RK, Mark Johnston and 10 others
Comments
Within India, absolutely true, but with that we will lose out globally.
First things first. More than 6 decades have passed trying to prioritize 'both'.
Anyway its not going to happen. Just a thought thrown out for those who wish to, to chew on.
Schooling taught me to seek to be first in class !
Schooling taught me to rejoice in doing better than others !
Still undoing the damages that were wrought in those formative years ...
To bring up a child who rejoices in her success
Or
To bring up a child who rejoices easily in the successes of others
If you had to choose, which would you choose.
If, as in the real world, one usually sees one trait or the other.
9Vijay Chacko, Pavan Manikanta Kumar and 7 others
Comments
I prefer to bring up the children who appreciate the efforts of every one. , Others.
That has been the emphasis to my son while growing up and. Even now.
Success does not matter and is relative.. cannot be defined
To rejoice in the well being of all is the greatest of successes. And in that attitude, the best of efforts happen. Work, devoid of desire for external appreciation. Focussed and undistracted.
24 February 2016 at 06:58 ·
Children are trained in school to want to run faster than their best fried, get a mark more than their best friend. Insiduously over a few years at school it translates to wanting their best friend to run slower than them, and to get a mark less than them. I was one of the toppers at school, and that is the most corrupted lot. Been there, done that. One day I woke up - and I know that undoing that damage takes time.
Parents who post their children's marks, or medals would do well to remember the damage that is done by adulating success thus. Success that happens naturally, happens at a pace that does not measure it against another's doing better or worse. And that is the real success.
Took half a lifetime to undo the ravages of schooling.
That wishing to come 'first in class', which implies, even though one does not face it, that others should do less well than oneself.
Luckily I never got medals and awards, or that would have taken the damage to greater heights.
Medals, awards, ranks defeat him who gets it, and he who doesnt.
In modern times there is one ladder. Of literacy and schooling. A unidimensional merit reckoning.
In older times, with multiple professions, merit had a different implication.
A weaver seeked to be a great weaver. A surgeon (the barber community made the best surgeons) seeked to be the best surgeon. A stapathi seeked to be the best stapathi.
It is essential to revisit the past in detail. Dharampal did it, and his conclusions from archival studies are pathbreaking. And many easy assumptions stay challenged.
But the attention that these demand has not been given. In a modern India, that has scant faith in itslf and it's traditions. And sees westernization as the only path for itself.
We need to create a new future that is anchored in our past. Understanding it. The past had its strengths and its weaknesses. So also the jati system.
7Ritesh Singh, Sureshkumar Chellaperumal and 5 others
Comments
within Jati(s) the meritorious accommodated the less merit.
Why has 'intelligence' been celebrated thus ? Or talent ?
Common sense, a sense of perspective, an sense of values, and the integrity to try to live by them is what I would wish for a child.
Paradoxically those seeking and revelling most in the limelight, are the most insecure.
The humble have no image to maintain, and are able to focus on things that really matter.
Facing the truth that we are a speck of dust, and yet that our actions are infinitely important. As the tornado is itself made only by specks of dust.
Is success getting name and fame ?
Or is success not needing name and fame ?
Our children somewhere down the line, become our deepest lived beliefs.
Not what we say, or think we believe in, but what we believe in enough to bring into our own living.
What we most sincerely admire in our child is what we nourish and water. It could be
- Marks and medals in competitions or fame or success,
- Simple sensitivity and concern and thinking.
It may have to be one or the other. And then the parent's deepest convictions are tested.
Why have we created a situation where children from villages and towns feel that the Centres of Excellence are in distant Hyderabads and Delhis. Where they need to battle the snobbery and vacuosness of those places.
The emptiness of the places have to be exposed. JNUs count for nothing except for Lutyens Delhi. Villages have to become vibrant. States need to own up their own inherent excellence.
Decentralize, Localize. There is no other way.
To give a prize, an award, is to co-opt into the paradigm. To get the protogonist to buy into the narrative that public adulation, name, fame matter. And to from now on begin to dance to that tune.
To accept an award is to risk being co-opted.
Each time I see a youngster get an Award for music or games or a speech I feel sad. Its likely the end of Innocence. As for adults, it's their choice. Most of them have already lost their way into the delusion of name and fame.
This school overload seemed a waste of entire childhood and youth. And we stepped away from it somewhat for our own daughter into a looser, wider framework.
But nowadays it seems less innocent than just a 'waste of time'. It is a subtle indoctrination. Through years when a child is made to direct its entire energies into the pursuit of pointless learning 'for future successful career', what is learnt is mindlessness as much as comples mathematics.
It shows in the unquestioning way in which most 'successes' move from 100% in Maths, into IITs, into greencards and into pursuit of name and fame. Waste of a childhood and youth, translates into a waste of a lifetime.
But parents themselves are clueless these days
They are themselves indoctrinated, yes.
Know a case where some lady wanted to home tutor her child but it was best that the child goes to school because mother was clueless and filled with vague ideas. Eventually, she gave in and was enrolled. Enrolling him was a better choice.
Yes, yes. Seen that in many cases !
This so called 'home schooling' has also become an elite club.
We learnt to simply say our daughter was taking her exams privately.
Many people want to do something about this, but honestly, it's not possible. Nature is to blame, for endowing humans with a larger than necessary brain, which in any case baffles evolutionary logic. See all other animals - every generation lives just like its previous generation and does not make any effort to modify the world it inherits. Humans, unfortunately, can accumulate and expand on knowledge from generation to generation. So, even if you don't want to change the world around you, someone else will and you either adapt to that new reality, or perish. A good example is the Tibetans. They were happy with their Tantric and close-to-nature life and sought to keep away modernity. But the Chinese weren't interested and crushed them ruthlessly. So yes, we need to do certain things just so that we can survive. Status quo may be good, but we cannot control others' actions and sooner or later they will come invading. We are all hurtling towards a precarious future, but dropping out is same as perishing instantly. That is the inevitability, at the individual level, at the community level and at the nation level.
Yes, it seems an inevitable suicidal path. The Kaliyuga was not ndicated in the cycle of Yugas.
There is an inner confidence in the village children that comes out of the security and love a small village community gives. Not the confidence that tries to impress by performances or by getting prizes. But that confidence which does not need to impress at all.
When in school i told one child nagamani she has done well, she pulled from behind her her classmate janardhana and said, 'madam ask him some sums - see how fast he is !' It was on that day, long ago, that I realised what a village was !! and what village children were.
a urban space that gives medals and accolades to children and adults kills that inner sense of real goodness and real wellbeing.
Aparna Krishnan
7 April 2016 at 21:10 ·
Schooling ...
I was schooled into a sense of arrogance and diffidence. I was 3rd or 4th in class thro' middle and high school. The value given to marks implied that one's worth was measured, and compared. And when i did not get into IIT after my 12th, my world crashed.
It took me many years to slowly undo the damage of schooling. Slowly I learnt that life and worth are very different from whether one did better than someone, or worse than someone. That what matters is courage, integrity, sensitivity, perspective, humility, gratitude. None of which can be or need be compared.
A village taught me that. otherwise I might have been the useless schooled creature forever. Schooled into arrogance and diffidence.
Sanjay Maharishi Yes. Super silver lining it has been.
Aparna Krishnan what has ??
Sanjay Maharishi Failure to get in IIT.
Vishwanath GR I did get into IIT, and *then* my world crashed. Wonderful post
Vishwanath GR similar reasons: worth measured by grade [later scholarships, job, career]. Also: failure to persevere. Too much book reading [Graham Greene] => wrong heuristics for life
Aparna Krishnan never too late to start to unlearn all that. a village helped me find true perspectives. satsangh matters.
" If parents promote the idea that success is primarily determined by variables within our child’s control, even such noble things as skill and effort, we are ignoring the overriding influence of chance, to the detriment of our children. When they fail at something (as inevitably we all will) children who don’t recognize the significant role of random chance in determining life’s outcomes may blame themselves or stop trying.
Conversely, those who do achieve prominent success may overestimate their role in it, and see those who have more average resumes as inferior or less deserving. ... "
Sailesh Bhupalam sounds fatalistic. It will become a self fulfilling prophecy and children will probably attribute everything to chance rather than take responsibility when they become adults. Sure there is chance, but we can overcome most of it's effects by sheer grit and perseverance.
Sethuraman Pasupathy The idea is not fatalistic but to inculcate a sense of balance in the children as well as adults. It says one should never over estimate ones role in any outcome. The outcome is a combined result of opportunity,ability and chance.
Vishwanath GR Disagree. Effort needs to be encouraged. The world is complicated and there are other factors etc, but this message is fatalistic in its effects
Aparna Krishnan not at all. karmanyavaadhikarasthe ...
Aparna Krishnan Our duty to do our best. The credit of the results is not ours. The successes and failures are due to many many factors.
Vishwanath GR So the above 2 quotes actually encourage effort. Especially the part that you did not quote "nor you be attached to inaction" etc.
Aparna Krishnan Effort is to be encouraged. Not a feeling of 'doership', and associated ego.
Mark Johnston How often do the awards and medals go to those who, in spite of suffering many barriers, have put in the most effort? In my experience they tend to go to those who due to privilege and opportunity succeed with little personal effort.
Aparna Krishnan Medals are the greatest perversion. It defeats him who gets it and him who does not. The work has to be done is a deeper spirit of service and surrender and joy. All awards subtly kill that inner nature, which is actually natural to each of us from birth.
Why do schools rank and award ? Why do adults seek accolades and citations ?
The best things in life are those which are collective, and then there is no space for a separate mention. Collective concern, collective work towards justice, collective effort to save the earth, collective celebration. Only when one subsumes into the larger process does one reach the state of unfettered action.
Then why do people seek or post pictures of their children or themselves collecting medals ? It is an aberration.
12Ritesh Singh, Monica Ramadhenu and 10 others
6 Comments
what about value of the individual?
our deepest meaning and individual strength is called forth when we work sans the need for name and fame.
Schools have become Corporate entities, and children are more of competitors than students who come to learn, they come to compete, this is the bane of modern education.
The 'rank' system is gone in most of the urban schools, I think (based on Bangalore, CBSE schools experience), there is only 'grade'.. this is something better than the earlier system, but can be done away with when people & system mature. But, awards and medals for a specific achievement (like sporting, music, a project well done etc.) are ok, if they awarded with some diligence by the school. Even at home/family, rewards certainly encourage children and give them a sense of "earning something by their hard work and merit".
The motivation needs to be love of a work, the desire to do something well, and the wish to serve. That is how are children begin. The energy a child puts into learning to walk and then to play it hardly ever attains later. We corrupt that child with rewards, grades, ranks. And it corrupts the soul by odious comparisons. Childrenm or adults, were never meant to be compared.
Just about 10-15% of post-graduate education in universities is meaningful. The rest should be shut down.
The money saved should be diverted to school and college education.
Every college student must spend 6 months in rural development programme in tandem with MGNAREGA and other schemes.
Also substantial money should be diverted to establishing good sustainable livlihoods for the youth.
We call a community illiterate. We set out to school them.
The million ways we establish and protect our privileges!
6 Comments
Do you want to keep them uneducated and protect your privilege.
I refuse to answer that insinuation. Please draw your conclusions.
Village. Sustainable skills. A sense of community. Simple religions, rooted ethics. The ability to sustain the earth with their labour.
And the urban with the sole learning of reading and writing and typing sets out to school them.
To defend and protect his privileges - that is schooling will accomplish for him. Whereby he can claim many times what a farmer earns, claiming his knowlege to be the prime knowlege.
And then we talk of casteism and feudalsim and other isms, ignoring our complicity is this present day deeply entrenched exploitation. By colonizing minds. Into accepting their inferiority, and our superiority.
No village child seeks a prize or a rank. Happiness is in the being and the doing.
No village man or woman seeks a prize for growing a bumper crop. The happiness is in the doing. And in the happiness of timely rains and weather.
An urban child is trained to seek to come first in class. To seek happiness in comparison and in external applause. And the perversion continues into adulthood, seeking and revelling in awards and name and fame.
When the perversion is normalized, the defeat of the community is total.
... and let me add, very humbly, the process, which makes us good scientists, economists, doctors and engineers, is at odds with what makes us good human beings;
we need to choose, and choose wisely ... iMHO, today, we exercise this choice, without even realizing (forget thinking), when we send our child to a school ...
Question - Is employ-ability the sole focus of education?
Response - The rest of wisdom - of co-operation, goodness, rigour - is amply given by a hard working, decent community, as in my village. Education happens through living, house chores, field chores, helping a coolie mother ... Even employability in a sustainable lifestyle will smoothly happen in such a community.
I am not very sure of the role of schooling as I see it. In a distorted world where 'literacy' is seen as the prime skill - I suppose it gives degrees that will employ non-literate communities at the lower rungs.
The purpose of education is vast - and schooling has little to do with it.
Empowerment is not having the strength to take. It is having the strength to give.
Success is not making it ahead of others. It is being able to step aside when one is ahead, and help others falling behind also make it.
If only we understood this.
If only we taught our children this.
When children are persuaded, applauded to make it to the top, in academics and competitions, many a time a certian simple humanity is stifled in them.
The simplicity to wait and help those falling behind, stepping aside from the race. That spark to joyfully seek others doing well. To not seek name and fame and live in a space beyond that.
If we understand this, what would we wish for our child ? For all children ? What kind of success ?
More than 100 years ago, while enumerating “India and her problems”, Swami Vivekananda said prophetically: “The child is taken to school, and the first thing he learns is that his father is a fool, the second thing that his grandfather is a lunatic, the third thing that all his teachers are hypocrites, the fourth, that all the sacred books are lies
Why is il-literate a negative word. What is so special about literacy ? As opposed to say farming, or weaing.
Why is 'gavaar', used for a villager, as a negative term in Hindi.
Unless we understand these biases, we will never be able to save ourselves, or the earth from us.
However many climate conferences or beach cleanups are organized, or however many of us cycle
Why is success taught as name and fame ?
And not as not needing name or fame. Of choosing to work in silence, away from all floodlights.
Why is success taught as topping the list ?
And not as stepping aside from the track to help others lagging behind ?
It only feeds the killer instinct. To 'top the class' means to want to do 'better than others'.
Not a quality I would wish to nurture in my child. Or in any child. Life is vaster than that. And to do ones best is very different from wanting to do 'better than another'.
To bring up a child who actually does not seek adulation or name or awards, and can work just for the work itself, may require being out of the schooling game.
Schooling, in any version, is about comparisons, about doing better than ones peers, about loving awards, and about working for the love of the result. It reduces the soul.
Life is far vaster, and far more beautiful than that.
A 5th standard urban child once informed me he was a 'champion' and 'prize winner'. I felt very very sorry for him.
I was used to village children, happy, complete, hard working and co-operative. They never describe or think in these sad terms.
15Arun Kombai, Vigneshwaran RK and 13 others
2 Comments
Sanjay MaharishiSad really, for left to themselves children don't think like that.
Aparna KrishnanWhen I see parents proudly describing the ranks or awards their child gets, I see one more child taught to devalue itself, and value itself based on ephemeral name and fame. Destroyed adults destroying children. Tragic.
Seeing too many articles on 'meritocracy' these days. By privileged sections
How do they plan to assess merit ? When the situation is so heavily loaded against some. Against most.
Poverty. Malnourishment. Single teacher for a school of 5 classes. Family under stress of debt and illness.Welcome to my village.
Bit it seems well nigh impossible to get this picture into the heads of the privileged.
"And I start to look at subjects in the university, every faculty, most of them is destructive knowledge. There’s no productive knowledge in university for me. When I look at something like if you learn to be an architect or engineer, that means you ruin more. The more these people work, the mountain will be destroyed more. And a good land in Chao Praya Basin will be covered with concrete more and more. We destroy more."
A friend Ananth, then teaching in KFI, maybe 15 years ago, was then saying how marks and ranking destroys children. How the 'winner' and the 'loser' both stand defeated.
In life, many times friends have come and put into clear words my own thoughts. This was probably one such because the conversation stays fresh in my mind like it was yesterday. In ranking one child is destroyed by a false 'sense of superiority', and another by a false 'sense of inferiority'. And this is not just an academic identity, but a deep self identity. Which flows into all aspects of life later for most,
And it is so sadly evident all around us. To simply put one's heart and soul into any activity one likes or loves or finds purpose in ...i see that in village childre as they sweep and cook and take the cowdung basket and play, and then i see that attitude flow into studies also. One cannot address that by 'structuring schooling' alone. Its the way society and we operate ...
The greatest inheritence we can give our child is the thought to serve, the heart to serve, the space to serve, the ability to serve.
The understanding of ones answerabilities, and the courage to answer them.
In a country that has rampant poverty, and where our privilege has placed on us an immense debt.
And instead we distact them into chasing IITs and Oxfords.
(via Kannan Thandapani)
In my opinion, IIT Chennai and IIT Guwahati should have
different purposes and should produce different impacts, given the vastly
different communities in which they are situated. But I feel, their current
structure is to serve a mythical global-community. Service to the nation or the
world cannot happen without service to the local community.
Vinoba Bhave had this to say to those of us who crave for
uniformity and standardization, be it in having a national curriculum or
national exams:
“You can’t teach in exactly the same way in Sevagram as in
Paunar. And why not? Because Paunar has a river and Sevagram does not.” Paunar
and Sevagram are about 6kms apart.
Learners are not commodities. A child in a village has to learn
differently than a child in a city. A child in a village in Tamilnadu has to
learn different things than a child in a village in Assam.
Why does our education system fail in instilling the sense of duty.
To the community that sustained us. To the country that nurtured us
To that last man who toiled on the fields to grow that which nourished us.
Sans that understanding of duty, and the strength to live that, a student stays essentially a selfish, self centred clod of mud. Which ever elite college he or she may get admission into.
13Komakkambedu Himakiran, Lakshmi Nandakishore and 11 others
7 Comments
Ravish MalhotraMoral values aren't now taught on TV otherwise there was a lot back in 80s and 90s..
Aparna KrishnanYes, the serials then had more social purpose. There was one about a young man who had moved to a village to work.
And yet very few of my college classmates from those years are doing anything socially relevant either !
The total is deeper and of longer antiquity.
Sivapriya KrishnanYou talk of duty. Duty starts from the smallest unit ...our home and neighbourhood. We dont do anything even here.. how will we for a larger cause. Even for their own house the youngsters are not duty bound. Parents themselves sometimes are not. They dont teach . Duty needs commitment and these are unfashionable words with moneyed kids. They ask back ..why shoukd we always live in austerity and struggle? Like you guys in the olden days?
Lalitha RangachariWhen I was in school we had a subject civics this taught us role of the government role of the citizens and their duty. Now they do mot have such a subject.
Suresh RangarajanThat is because it is not "OUR" education system. Just one more area where we ape the western world.
Aparna KrishnanAnd because it has roots in religion. And the urbane urban cannot bear the religion of the 'masses'. He has to stay far from the 'masses' and their ways.
Illiterate means unskilled in reading. It indicates backwardness. Schools are set up to develop these uneducated people who cannot read.
What is the word for unskilled in farming ? What does it indicate ? And what is done for those uneducated people who cannot farm ?
And thus is the most vicious caste system in the history of mankind established. The super-literate, the literate, the barely literate, the illiterate. Chaturvarna.
The kingpin is the English-fluent-super-literate.
' xlink:href='%23b'/%3e%3cuse fill='black' filter='url(%23c)' xlink:href='%23b'/%3e%3cpath fill='white' d='M12.162 7.338c.176.123.338.245.338.674 0 .43-.229.604-.474.725a.73.73 0 01.089.546c-.077.344-.392.611-.672.69.121.194.159.385.015.62-.185.295-.346.407-1.058.407H7.5c-.988 0-1.5-.546-1.5-1V7.665c0-1.23 1.467-2.275 1.467-3.13L7.361 3.47c-.005-.065.008-.224.058-.27.08-.079.301-.2.635-.2.218 0 .363.041.534.123.581.277.732.978.732 1.542 0 .271-.414 1.083-.47 1.364 0 0 .867-.192 1.879-.199 1.061-.006 1.749.19 1.749.842 0 .261-.219.523-.316.666zM3.6 7h.8a.6.6 0 01.6.6v3.8a.6.6 0 01-.6.6h-.8a.6.6 0 01-.6-.6V7.6a.6.6 0 01.6-.6z'/%3e%3c/g%3e%3c/svg%3e){kind=small}
' xlink:href='%23b'/%3e%3cuse fill='black' filter='url(%23c)' xlink:href='%23b'/%3e%3cpath fill='white' d='M10.473 4C8.275 4 8 5.824 8 5.824S7.726 4 5.528 4c-2.114 0-2.73 2.222-2.472 3.41C3.736 10.55 8 12.75 8 12.75s4.265-2.2 4.945-5.34c.257-1.188-.36-3.41-2.472-3.41'/%3e%3c/g%3e%3c/svg%3e){kind=small}
' xlink:href='%23b'/%3e%3cuse fill='black' filter='url(%23c)' xlink:href='%23b'/%3e%3cpath fill='url(%23d)' d='M5.333 12.765c0 .137.094.235.25.235.351 0 .836-.625 2.417-.625s2.067.625 2.417.625c.156 0 .25-.098.25-.235C10.667 12.368 9.828 11 8 11c-1.828 0-2.667 1.368-2.667 1.765'/%3e%3cuse fill='url(%23e)' xlink:href='%23f'/%3e%3cuse fill='black' filter='url(%23g)' xlink:href='%23f'/%3e%3cpath fill='%234E506A' d='M4.616 7.986c.128.125.136.372.017.551-.12.178-.32.222-.448.096-.128-.125-.135-.372-.017-.55.12-.179.32-.222.448-.097zm6.489 0c.128.125.136.372.018.551-.12.178-.32.222-.45.096-.127-.125-.134-.372-.015-.55.119-.179.319-.222.447-.097z'/%3e%3cpath fill='url(%23h)' d='M4.157 5.153c.332-.153.596-.219.801-.219.277 0 .451.119.55.306.175.329.096.401-.198.459-1.106.224-2.217.942-2.699 1.39-.301.28-.589-.03-.436-.274.154-.244.774-1.105 1.982-1.662zm6.335.087c.099-.187.273-.306.55-.306.206 0 .469.066.801.219 1.208.557 1.828 1.418 1.981 1.662.153.244-.134.554-.435.274-.483-.448-1.593-1.166-2.7-1.39-.294-.058-.371-.13-.197-.459z'/%3e%3cpath fill='url(%23i)' d='M13.5 16c-.828 0-1.5-.748-1.5-1.671 0-.922.356-1.545.643-2.147.598-1.258.716-1.432.857-1.432.141 0 .259.174.857 1.432.287.602.643 1.225.643 2.147 0 .923-.672 1.671-1.5 1.671'/%3e%3cpath fill='url(%23j)' d='M13.5 13.606c-.328 0-.594-.296-.594-.66 0-.366.141-.613.255-.852.236-.498.283-.566.339-.566.056 0 .103.068.339.566.114.24.255.486.255.851s-.266.661-.594.661'/%3e%3c/g%3e%3c/svg%3e){kind=small}
' xlink:href='%23b'/%3e%3cuse fill='black' filter='url(%23c)' xlink:href='%23b'/%3e%3cpath fill='url(%23d)' d='M3 8.008C3 10.023 4.006 14 8 14c3.993 0 5-3.977 5-5.992C13 7.849 11.39 7 8 7c-3.39 0-5 .849-5 1.008'/%3e%3cpath fill='url(%23e)' d='M4.541 12.5c.804.995 1.907 1.5 3.469 1.5 1.563 0 2.655-.505 3.459-1.5-.551-.588-1.599-1.5-3.459-1.5s-2.917.912-3.469 1.5'/%3e%3cpath fill='%232A3755' d='M6.213 4.144c.263.188.502.455.41.788-.071.254-.194.369-.422.371-.78.011-1.708.255-2.506.612-.065.029-.197.088-.332.085-.124-.003-.251-.058-.327-.237-.067-.157-.073-.388.276-.598.545-.33 1.257-.48 1.909-.604a7.077 7.077 0 00-1.315-.768c-.427-.194-.38-.457-.323-.6.127-.317.609-.196 1.078.026a9 9 0 011.552.925zm3.577 0a8.953 8.953 0 011.55-.925c.47-.222.95-.343 1.078-.026.057.143.104.406-.323.6a7.029 7.029 0 00-1.313.768c.65.123 1.363.274 1.907.604.349.21.342.44.276.598-.077.18-.203.234-.327.237-.135.003-.267-.056-.332-.085-.797-.357-1.725-.6-2.504-.612-.228-.002-.351-.117-.422-.37-.091-.333.147-.6.41-.788z'/%3e%3c/g%3e%3c/svg%3e){kind=small}
No comments:
Post a Comment