Well, compliments on your diaries everyone and on your performance in Week 1, I got a mail from the facilitators saying you were all present and on time, and there weren't too many technical problems. The Department is going to buy some new USB headsets which Soliya say will improve the quality of the sound and some tech issues, so from a technical side things can only get better, and as regards all other aspects too I'm sure. Most of you have sent me your chat transcripts, and these too give me an indication of the success of your discussions!
For this second week you are supposed to do some readings before your discussions. I said I would be dealing with them in class, but unfortunately we won't manage it this week, but if you want to come to aula B3 at 16.00, after my class, we can have a short discussion about the readings, check understanding and deal with any other issues.
As for last week, send your diary entries as replies to this message, and email me your chat transcripts!
Enjoy!
Francesca
ps - the video footage is on the computers in the Department, you will find it under C: in the folder "video" and it is a zipped folder called Soliya spring 2010, you should save it on to a pen drive or a cd.
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Hello again,
RispondiEliminaWith the same joy and freshness, we met yesterday for our second Soliya session! Unfortunately,i had some problem with the connection and with my headphones so i got into the conversation a little bit late, and the others couldn't hear me clearly..it wasn't so problematic since i was able to hear everyone and to write every while my feedback in the chat box.
This time,we had to challenge new issues: finished with the presentation time, we went deeper in the conversation by dealing new argoments...our first mission was to make a list of seven elements that compose our identity,than drop off 4 of them and keep the most important three...that's how i began to understand more each one of us,seeing a little bit what really counted for each person,their values,and the difficulty of letting go some of these elements, like if you were taking off some part of yourself!
Then, talking always about the identity, each member of the group had to explain his reaction when it goes to defending our identity, the challenges that we face when others don't understand us...does we become defensive??
That's where one of my peer wanted to know how much religion counts in everyone's life and how do we see an unreligious person...so, for some,religion is one of the most essential aspect of life,for others no...and so on!
For me personnaly, i don't understand why religion should be a source of problems instead of being that element that makes us closer to each others?if we are all different,if we speak another language, live in another coutry, have other civilization,culture,ways of seeing the world..why do we pass our time fighting for our believes and judging each others for their religion? After all, we all pray for the same God...After all, we all believe in the same message of each religion:peace,love,forgiveness...why don't we see that as a common point instead of fighting for our differences?
Well,it seems easy to say..but not easy to do!
We talked also a little bit about nationalism and then time was up! We haven't had the opportunity to discuss our last readings..that will be our job for next time!
That was a little summary about my last meeting..
Bye bye for now...and see you next time!
Hello everybody!
RispondiEliminaThe second discussion session was extremely dense: two more people joined in (both from the US,thus giving the group a broader perspective on the topics dealt with - in the former session, nobody except for one facilitator was from the US..)and the conversation immediately focused on the problem of "identity". What makes identities either "Western" or "Eastern"? Well, some of us pointed out that religion does play a great role in the definition of identity. I did agree with a participant, for instance, in that Easern culture may be defined in a word as "religious", while the Western definitely appears as more "secular". Of course, that's a way to generalize, but it suggests something indeed on the way we see everyday life. Being more "religious" in an Eastern perspective may imply - as a girl from Jordan said - that religion runs everything in life, and affects politics too. But, going back to Rana's point of view, is religion necessarily seen in the same way by people of the same "geographic area"? I think, Rana, that you're a perfect example on how to be both "eastern" and more "secular" at the same time - sorry, I didn't want to take u as an example, but your words really struck me!
In a second step of the session we split up in different sub-groups and we were asked to find a word to define the relationship between the Western and Muslim world. I was in a group with a Maroccan girl living in Amsterdam, a very nice and friendly person who seems to be ina priviledged position to see things from two different angles..Well, the word we found was "blindness", because in our opinion neither side really makes the effort to "see" the other and to get to know it. The realut is that we consider things just from our perspective, and still remain blind and unaware of the other. This may be due from the fact that it's easier to behave like that, without making the real effort to understand the other. It's easier, in this way, to say what we are in terms of what we are not, since we want things to be in a perfect binary opposition. Is that just laziness, or is that due to some conscious will?
A further step of the discussion dealt exactly with this: the creation of contrasting identities. Many among us believe that the media play a huge role in the widespreading of stereotypes and conflict. I do agree with that, but I also think that, instead of just swallowing everything the media tell us we should be aware enough so as to get information form other sources - getting to know people from different countries may be one of these, for instance! If governments and media want us to think in acertain way, it's only through conscious efforts that we can escape from this ideology of power. The only thing is that, unfortunately, not everybody is willing to make such an effort - I know many people in my country who don't even care about it, and just take things as the media put them..
The session ended, at least for me, with a big headache! Too many ides, concepts, opinions and inputs..I must admit I was almost puzzled, and extremely tired after all that. Was that the normal reaction to multicultural exposure? Hmm..
That's all for now, see you next week!
Marta
@Emanuele: happy u solvd the problems with the video project!
Hello everybody,
RispondiEliminaThough we’ve known two new guys (Novel & Safaa) the second session was quite problematic: Brittany, Novel & Safaa had many technical problems with microphones & webcam, so they could only read & write in the chatbox; moreover in the USA was the “spring break week”, so they missed 3 american girls and there was only six of us (and the two facilitators).
Notwithstanding, it was a very interesting session because we’ve talked about the influence of one culture in another one: Mohammed explained us that he teach English in Egypt & this is one example of Western influence in Arabic world; moreover he has illustrated his own opinion about the influence and he disagree the influences that makes him bad. We’ve all agreed with him about the idea that an appropriate influence of another culture in our culture is important to keep our own identity.
After which facilitators asked us what we think about the terms “Western” & “Eastern” and I told that the terms for me are only “geographic”, because within the West & the East we can find many differences about religion, governments, languages, etc… Then the facilitators asked us what is for us the most important problem in the world (the choice was among “Israelian/Palestinian Conflicts”, “Economic issues”, “global warming”, etc… ) and I’ve chosen “other” because for me this several problems are close connected to one another & for me it was impossible to choose one instead one another. All the guys agreed with my opinion, although they’ve chosen another answer in the survey box.
In the second part of the session we’ve explained our opinion about the top causes of international tensions for us & I’ve chosen “the end of Cold War” that created an unipolar world with only one superpower and “the non functional & problematic development policy”, for example the IMF & World Bank politics that hasn’t resolved the economic issues of the third world. Moreover I told that “religion” is not a problem because it is manipulate to justify other politics & economic goals: for example I told that for me “terrorism” isn’t the result of a “religions war” but simply an unconventional & brutal response to the unequal military strength distribution, so for me the main problem that provoke terrorism is the lack of balance of power that “encourages” these unconventional responses.
In the end of the session we’ve chosen the topics who we will talk in the next session, & we’ve chosen “women’s rights”, “environmental policy” & “economic issues”; moreover facilitators ask us what was our impression about the second session and I told that was difficult because there was many technical problems for the other guys but notwithstanding it was a very interesting session because it is important to talk about this international problems with people from all the world and especially with eastern people. In the end Amanda asked us to talk about something funny so I declared that I wish a “geometric beard” like Muhammad! :)
See you next time,
Emanuele
Hello everybody!
RispondiEliminaMy Soliya second session started on 16th of March and it was very disappointing. Our session plan scheduled almost 30 or 40 minutes of discussion about “Global Challenges” but we talked about it only for 5 or 10 minutes!
A lot of people were missing during our session: we were only three guys (two new guys and me) and two facilitators. My group is composed of almost 10 guys and two facilitators: so we were very few people (some of missing people were on holiday). In my opinion, this show that a lot of people in my group are very little serious and maybe they are very little interesting in this project.
During our session there were anything interesting, so at last I felt a little bored!
We started our session with a lot of technical problems: the two new guys who participated weren’t able to hear and speak. These two new guys were: Wafa (from Tunisia) and Hawarii (from Indonesia). After having resolved their problems, we introduced (again) ourselves. Then we made a kind of play: we translated some expressions (like “ciao” or “buongiorno”) from english to our language.
During the discussion technical problems kept repeating: Hawarii wasn’t often able to speak as his mic was broken) and our co-facilitators kept often disconnecting. Then our facilitators explained (again) how to write down our final reflection paper and how to make our video project.
Only Wafa (she’s muslim) tried to provoke us by asking what we think about muslim people. She asked: “Do you think that every muslim is a terrorist?”. We spoke very little about this because only 15 minutes left. Obviously I answered that I don’t think that every muslim is a terrorist and I think that this prejudice has been created by our Western governments (that are influenced by economic interests) and by our media (above all newspapers and tv programs) that are influenced by governements. So I think that we don’t have to believe everything that media channels and our governements tell us: we must verify every news they give us (maybe looking for other channels of communications).
Unfortunately, our session just ended when it was becoming interesting. So I hope that next session will be more interesting!
Bye bye! See you next week!
Elvira.
2nd week of Soliya...step by step everything gets better!!!!!
RispondiEliminaIf I spent the first half-hour in a state of panic for technical problems finally, thanks to a great and steadfast technical support, my issues were just a nightmare and I had a voice too...
During this session the atmosphere was more familiar and free enough to communicate even without the intermediary role of the facilitators.
It was great having Anbreen from Pakistan and Jarred from the USA: these two "new entries" contributed to enrich the dialogue and remember me the shyness of my first session.
A lot of discussion and questions related to culture, family traditions and religion came up. With some of us explaining the role of Islam as a religion and a culture (way of life) and how that is slightly different in the West, such as the emphasis on individuality.
The "islamic side" of the group dominated this first part of the session.
By my side I tried to listen and understand them and their explanations of the contemporary events more than engaging me in the conversation. Paradoxically, despite living in Padova a lot of muslims, they are seen as dangerous immigrants to avoid, so it's hard to have a direct experience with the world of Islam. I want to use this experience first of all to hear people who I'm afraid to listen in my narrow reality.
In the second part of the session we spoke about the Huntington's and Khouri's articles. The readings for this week were really interesting but I felt the discussion a little bit superficial. Huntington's "Clash of civilizations" is a cultural revolution in the story of International Relations and it needs more than a quarter of hour of discussion.
Khouri's points on economic reasons and frustrations playing a big role in the tension between the West and predominantly Muslim world were a new point of view for me...usually I read western newspapers with a "western point of view".
Finally we talked about the role of media in inadequately presenting the other side and the importance of looking out for biases. So emerged another serious and unsolved problem in the use of the internet and the choise of the instruments of our knowledge of reality: Where can we find the truth? What's the better choise to understand an event? Could we speak about a demonic television and an angelic internet?
The session finished with a poll for next week regarding the topic we want to discuss next week. Israel/Palestine conflict won the majority of votes....I'm really excited and afraid of it...I'm sure the session will be great!
See u next week!
Silvia
Thursday arrived and it was the time of the second session of my group. This time I had a little problem with the microphone (I wasn’t at the department, I logged in from the office where I was working); but nothing compared with the problems of my group’s members. This time there was a new girl in the group, so we all did a new short presentation for her. After that the real discussion started with the necessary help of Jason and Aline, our group’s facilitators. As I was working my session finished at 13:30 but I had the time to express my opinion and to explain my point of view, but above all I had time to listen others opinions and to understand how social and cultural background could influence personal conviction. At first we gave an opinion on the text of Huntington “The coming clash of civilizations”. Everyone explained his point of view, and everyone gave importance to a specific kind of the main argument thanks to his cultural and religious background. From the beginning the discussion was very interesting and then it became more specific and deep, with some reasoning and examples. Someone said the real clash is not between different civilizations, but is in the name of economic and political interests. I explained my point of view: I think that there is a conflict and it is evident, the real reason of the conflict are politic and economic goals, medias try to give us the idea that the conflict is done for cultural reason, as defense of our culture and supremacy of our way of live. I mean, they try to convince the public opinion that others civilizations want to submit us so the right answer it only can be the war. Medias present us this conflict as cultural clash of civilizations because this aspect is very strong and can make society closer inside and stronger against enemies. Then others gave opinion too, but unfortunately the chatbox had a technical problem and we lost all the information.
RispondiEliminaI was so sad to leave the discussion, but I had to: so I don’t know how it went on. Now I’m waiting for next Thursday.
giacomo