Lessons from the Past

Apartheid in South Africa: Ruling white minority domination over 'non-white' (black, mixed, indian) majority 1948-1994

This week I learned about another event I had never hear off. The articles were a bit overwhelming so I asked my mom to sum up for me the events that occurred during the end of apartheid in South Africa. It is a fascinating, a disturbing, detail in history that has contemporary effects on South Africa.

The "Anti-Apartheid Organizing on Campus... and Beyond" was full of ideas on how to protest and get attention. While some of the ideas may seem a bit outdated, I think some also can be seen in the environmental movement.

For one, media can never be underestimated. The television can be a useful tool for gaining attention and really sinking a message into people. This power is abused by commercial advertisements but can still be used to get messages across. "Political Organizations and movements working for social change must consider the role of media in their society, they ways it an promote social change and the ways it reproduces old ideas and structures" (On Campus, 47). With the role of internet and social media we can send an even more powerful message today.

The anti-apartheid movement has some strong central figures. One of these was Nelson Mandela. As soon as the National Party was elected in 1948 he began anti-apartheid campaigns. He was sentences to life imprisonment in 1961. He was known as the most significant black leader in South Africa and there were many protests for his arrest. His sentence was undone in 1990 under a new president and he was released. In 1994 he was inaugurated president after winning in South Africa's first multi-racial election. While central figures have been important to past social movements I think part of the uniqueness and strength of the sustainability movement is that we are all leaders and we can all take equal action.

"Reigniting the Struggle" stresses the important of international involvement in ending apartheid. "...the international anti-apartheid movement made a major contribution to ending white domination" (2). Similar to this, people around the world today need to set aside differences and fight towards environmental justice.

Here is a helpful timeline I found on BBC News to help me make sense of the length and dates of apartheid.

Universal Language ≠ Peace

"If languages are living things, inextricable intertwined with biological diversity, the loss of 'verbal botanies' is irreparable, and a monoglot globe is as unthinkable as a world with only one species of tree, flower, and bird." -Hawken, 96

The chapter in Blessed Unrest titled "Indigene" discusses loss of indigenous cultures and languages through extermination and the great 're-naming' (use of the Linnaean taxonomy). I grew up knowing everything has two names: common and scientific. I was a human but I was also a Home sapian. When I fill out paperwork, I fill the circle beside 'caucasian'. In truth, every object has more than two names; each language has its own way of describing things. Especially people, who Linnaeus broke up into multiple subspecies (or races).

What did this mean for the population of the world? They had their own language, and their own names for themselves and now Europeans were imposing a new system upon them with no consideration. This need to classify, while it may seem orderly and useful, cut out a huge chunk of rich world language. Hawken compares language to a living thing that grows, changes, and dies with the last person who could speak it.

Colonists assumed that native languages were inferior, simply because they could not understand them. Darwin himself said, "Their language does not deserve to be called articulate" (Hawken, 91). However, a study done on the Yámana language showed that they had around 33,000 words, and a way to describe nearly everything.

"Yámana is a language of finesse and subtlety. It has sixty-one words for kin, compared to twenty-five in English. There seems to be a precise word to describe every moment in their life." -Hawken, 92

There is a muted debate in America about a national official language. The debit sliders at most stores have an option for English or Spanish. Customers never realize that if they can read that it says 'select language' it is already in English so they punch at the button and say, "Gosh, wouldn't it be easier if everything was just in English? People who come here should speak our language." I never say anything, and I have grown so tired of hearing this I do not even give them my best service clerk smile. The ignorance that pours from a simple fly off the handle statement like this is sad. Would it be easier if world language were monoglot? Of course, we would understand each other all the time. But would that be that great a thing?

Languages are art. They represent the environment they are formed in. When translating between languages some terms simply just do not translate perfectly, because each language has its own was of describing something. My favorite example is the one Hannah gave in class that Italian's do not have a word for privacy. Simply knowing that says so much about their culture.

The wiping out of cultures and language done by conquistadors and colonialists in the 15th century up until now made extinct, or endangered, half the world's living cultural heritage (Hawken, 94).

"As cultures disappear at the rate of thirty a year, we find ourselves placing our species' cultural eggs in fewer and fewer baskets."

-Hawken, 94

Maybe we could all understand each other better if we just listened to what each person is trying to say, no matter how they say it.

Would Your Grandma Approve?

Saturday night I went to a lecture given by Michael Pollan as part of University of Portland's Food for Thought event. This is totally non relatable to this term, but since we read Omnivore's Dilemma in the fall I thought I'd share.

He started his lecture pulling food items out of two Fred Meyer's bags (he said he'd never been to a Fred Meyer!). They were all what he calls food like substances. Things like, Chocolate Cheerios, Ritz Munchables ("for this one, they put a cracker inside a pretzel, they really are running out of ideas"), Bagels with the cream cheese and jam already in the middle for you. He mentioned there are 17,000 new food products a YEAR. Crazy!

Something I had never thought of was a nutrient traveling into foods they didn't belong in. Some examples he had were Canada Dry Ginger ale with antioxidants. Calcium fortified bread. FiberPlus: Antioxidants. For that one he said, "look they didn't even need to put a 'with', it's a box full of antioxidants!"

He talked a bit about health care, and the high prices for Diabetes and Heart Disease. He said, "there are whole magazine dedicated to surviving with type 2 diabetes, before you know it there will be insulin buildings on every block!" The point he was getting across was that society has accepted that these are the ramifications of the Western diet, and instead of getting to the heart of the problem - our food industry - they have become a marketing niche. Sad.

In closing he gave shopping tips addressed in his book Food Rules:

1. 5 ingredients or less

2. Do you recognize every ingredient? Or do you need a nutritionist to dissect it for you?

3. The packaging; about one-third of the food industries expenses are spent on fancy packaging

4. Contradictory labels, i.e., Chocolate Cheerios: Help lower your cholesterol

5a. Shop the perimeters, perishable is usually the healthiest

5b. Except in the case of low-fat yogurt, which has more sugar that a soda pop

6. If you were shopping with your Grandma, what would she say about everything you put in your cart?

He was an amazing speaker, and there were 4,000 people. 4,000 people who care about eating healthy and sustainably. Just some food for thought ;)

Skewed Evolution

"It seemed obvious that some racial natural law was at work and that the extermination of non-Europeans was simply a stage in the natural development of the world." -Linqvist, 115

Social Darwinism is a concept advocated by Herbert Spencer that states individuals and groups are subject to the same laws of Natural Selection as plants and animals. This was a popular concept in the late 19th/early 20th century. This term could (can) be used to "justify" imperialism and racism and to discourage reform, among other things. In the context of Sven Linqvist's Exterminate all the Brutes, Social Darwinism is a rationale in the killing of indigenous peoples in the Americas. The author is not so much condoning the wiping out of these tribes but giving insight into how policy makers and conquistadors viewed the world.

"Five thousand soldiers were mobilized for a search party to drive all the natives onto a small headland... not a single native had been caught. There were, as it turned out later, only three hundred left." -Linqvist, 120

The above quote refers to the 1820's extermination of the Tasmanians. Colonists came onto the island of Tasmania (SE of Australia) and massacred natives within a year of colonizing. (It is interesting to note that Great Britain sent 24 convicts along with a few soldiers and volunteers for this mission.) After the initial massacre life for the natives was impoverished and they were starving. So, quite understandably, they attacked the settlers. This caused them to be seen as more savage and the need to move them increased. Linqvist writes that the lives of the Tasmanians were in the hands of fate, Natural Selection. The Europeans were simply aiding in the process of modifying and improving Tasmanian descendants. It was almost a compassionate act.

"According to the logic of the Darwinian patricide, we were forced to exterminate our parent species. That included all the 'savage races' of the world." -Lindqvist, 120

Natural Selection is often described or thought of as 'survival of the fittest'. In my biological anthropology class the professor has asked us to please not use that definition, ever. Natural Selection is not just about a massive competition for survival. It is about sex and reproductive success. Adaptations that are better able to acquire scarce resources and therefore mates in their specific environment will survive and reproduce more, leaving more descendants. When looked at from this way, 'Social Darwinism' is completely discredited. As far as patricide, the killing of ones father, I do not think Darwin intended for this to be used in justifying killing off natives and considering them the parent species who needed to die so the next group of people could flourish; obliterating them "to the long since dead world in which they belonged from the viewpoint of evolution" (Lidqvist, 120).

When we step outside of the frame, and toss aside our ideologies that mask our actions, it is only then that we can see history for what it was, and justice can be served. The fingerprints on the smoking gun of holocaust are our own (enotes.com summary).

Corporation and State: A Dangerous Marriage

"The environmental movement discovered that to protect the environment, it had to confront power, corruption, and mendacity in the world of commerce." -Hawken, 59

While reading "The Rights of Business" in Blessed Unrest, I was reminded of Annie Leonard's (the Story of Stuff lady) latest web video. In this chapter Paul Hawken discusses the power of businesses and the power they hold over government. When reading about these multinational corporations (such as Exxon and Shell) I was picturing a giant machine. We discuss corporations as if they are people, when really, they are a label with multiple real persons behind them. In order to fully launch environmental change - clean energy, emphasis on mass transit, less housing developments - the power has to be returned to citizens. It is nearly impossible to shift America's solo commuter mindset when oil giants like Chevron block the view. This video addresses corporate funding for presidential campaigns but the visual images are what I was picturing while reading.

*This is just a thought post and does not count towards my weekly assignment. See below for week 2 post.

'I am a citizen of the world'

"[Diogenes unseemly behavior was] to get people to question their prejudices by making them consider how difficult it is to give good reasons for many of our deeply held feelings." -Nussbaum, 57

In chapter 2 of Martha Nussbaum's book Cultivating Humanity, she writes about being citizens of the world; what this title entails, and how to achieve it. She begins by writing about Plato, Aristotle, and their unconventional contemporary Diogenes the Cynic. He provoked behavior in people by spitting in their faces, living in poverty, and eating in public (something only dogs did in their culture). The above quote describes his actions as a way of getting people to rethink what they thought was strange and why exactly they felt that way. When asked where he was from, Diogenes told them he was a 'citizen of the world'.

"When we see in how many different ways people can organize their lives we will recognize what is deep and sallow in our own ways... the only real community is one that embraces the entire world."

-Nussbaum, 58

As people age, we all develop a framework for how we view the world. What is right, what is wrong, what is normal or weird. Part of being a world citizen is learning about other cultural norms and broadening ones view of the world. It fosters respect and understanding. Being educated on ethnic differences can curb hate that breeds in ignorance. However, in learning about various peoples of the globe we can start to question ourselves and why we do things they way we do. This raises the question, is this really the best? Maybe that way of doing this is more efficient? World citizenship leads to ethical inquiry that "requires awareness that life contains other possibilities" (Nussbaum, 54). If we are all critical of our own mannerisms and customs, they can stretch and change as we see them more clearly. Nussbaum writes that Stoics held that thinking about humanity as a whole world is valuable for self-knowledge (59). Ancient Greeks examined customs of faraway countries to better understand their way of life and we, as modern and global citizens should do the same.

☮ What It's All About

"I would feel more optimistic about a bright future for man if he spent less time proving that he can outwit Nature and more time tasting her sweetness and respecting her seniority" - E. B. White

Hi. This blog will be home to a weekly reflective post based on the reading I've been doing for my Sustainability Freshman Inquiry class at Portland State University. Texts will include:

along with other online materials.