Jesse-in-bolivia

Done!

jesseinbolivia — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 10:47:27 +0000

The thesis is done. It is now published on the IS Acadmie’s website. Check it out (near the bottom of this page): http://educationanddevelopment.wordpress.com/publications/

here’s the wordle version:

You know you’re not in Bolivia when…

jesseinbolivia — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 10:05:39 +0000

You know you’re in Amsterdam and not Bolivia when…

-You can walk long distances without stopping to breath (below sea level, as opposed to 3400 meters above)

-On your way from a talk on a Lefty take on the economic crisis…

–You are walking towards prostitutes and weed cafes to find a junkie to sell you a (probably stolen) bicycle

—You get interrupted on your way by fat Italian tourists looking for directions to a museum (which had been closed for HOURS), only to later be offered a “girl, all night, at my place” by those same fat Italians

—-You find good-as-new bedding, sparkly silver branches, an electric tea kettle, a deep fat fryer, and a fridge (all working) on the street

—–You end up with a free bicycle after wandering between strippers and stoners for hours

——That bicycle literally brakes in half after about a half mile

So, that’s been my experience so far in Amsterdam. Definitely a transition from Bolivia. I’m very sad to have left there, as I was especially feeling comfortable and at home in La Paz over my last weeks and especially days there.

In my last weekend, some wonderful people took me to Coroico, a tropical valley area about 3-4 hours outside of La Paz. It was incredible–beautiful, relaxing, fun, warm. The first night we ended up at a Preste (a 3-5 day, 24 hour party, where the ticket in is a case of gigantic beers), and danced with some locals and had a blast. The next day (my last day), we swam in the river… anyway, long story short it was great!

What’s a blog without pictures though, right?

I had been planning on changing the blog title so I could continue with it, but, on the bus ride back from Coroico to La Paz, my camera (with AMAZING pictures) disappeared… It was my dumb fault–falling asleep with it on my lap and not remembering until we had left the bus… On the bright side I have amazing memories, and it means I have to go back! Also, I put together a facebook photo album of my entire trip (some pictures are the same as the ones which have been here).

Anyway, I’m back in Amsterdam, my time in Bolivia is over for now (I would have extended it if my visa didn’t expire), although I am sure that I’ll be back there, and not in too long. For now, I have 206 pages of transcriptions of interviews which I need to somehow turn into a synthesized and concise 60-80 page document (that’s besides the few interviews I still have to translate). In the meantime, I’ll be volunteering at a vegan, organic, sliding scale, volunteer-run restaurant as well as at the IIRE (International Institute for Research and Education)–a ’4th International’-based international organizing center… But not speaking Spanish is definitely the largest culture shock for me. Luckily, I may be moving in with a Mexican teacher at my university, so I could keep it in practice… Oh, and I also may have received a fellowship to present my research at a conference in Barcelona in December! (cross your fingers for me!).

jesseinbolivia — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 15:26:17 +0000

It’s been a long time since the last blog, and a whole lot has happened. Moreover, I’ll be leaving Bolivia in less than a week (on the 28th), and I’m not ready to leave–just really started to get comfortable in the past few weeks…

But I’m also looking forward to all the upcoming things: getting back to Amsterdam, getting all my thoughts down in the thesis, seeing wonderful people, and eventually getting back to the states to do wonderful things. But I know that I’ll be back here one day, and it hopefully won’t be too long.

Also, today I’ll be moving from my apartment in Sopocachi (downtown neighborhood) to the Zona Sur (southside)–more specifically San Miguel tonight and Achumani tomorrow. Anyway, still trying to cram in as much work as I can before I leave, as there are so many people I wish I had talked to while being here. On the other hand, I have a ton of interviews done, over 150 pages of interviews transcribed, some articles read, and most importantly I can communicate in Spanish!

…Yesterday was my birthday, and it was definitely fun–and the festivities started on Saturday and won’t quite stop until I leave, I guess. I’m hoping that the plan to go to Coroico (a valley a few hours away from here, and valley=tropical!) this weekend, a folkloric concert on Friday, a big university party on Thursday, and who knows what else.

Anyway, it has been an incredible 3 months, and I CANNOT believe it’s already over. This won’t quite be my last blog from Bolivia, and I’m thinking that when I get back to Amsterdam I’ll change the name and continue with some kind of monthly update, but we’ll see how that goes.

Here are a few pictures from the last few weeks…

a street blockade I ran into, organized by 3 schools. The cops here are negotiating w/ the community leaders--a few minutes before the cops literally pushed a few hundred protests out of the streets (carrying giant tear gas guns and other intimidating funnery)

cute baby, bad picture... also at the random blockade/school protest

This guy had an incredibly manicured bed-head. I thought it was funny...

this is the La Paz-area urban teacher union, protesting the proposed education reform (which I am researching). They hold a strongly 'Trotskyist' political view, rejecting any non-socialist and dictatorial state. Very interesting to talk to them. I think their critiques of the law and the government are very on point.

The teachers' union as they were taking over the biggest street in La Paz. The cops ran in front and tried to get as many cars to pass as quick as possible... there were probably 600 teachers there.

Another education protest--this time it was by students in the Normales (teacher training institutes). After starting the march in El Alto (WAY up the hill), they finally arrived at the ministry of education to be greeted by many cops in riot gear. I find it disturbing that the ministry of education somehow felt the need to guard itself against the students it is "working for".

You can't tell from here, but the billboard in the background (also in front of the ministry of education) says '200 years of freedom'--commemmorating the bicentenial (La Paz freed itself from the Spanish in 1809). I found this ironic in the context of riot-geared cops blocking the ministry from students...

This is BEAUTIFUL La Paz, from the view from one side of the apartment window. It started raining/thundering/lightning all of a sudden for the first time since I've been here. It's an INCREDIBLE sight, because from an apartment on the 11th floor you can see lightning crashing around the mountains ALL around. La Paz is INCREDIBLY beautiful...

This is a view during the storm from the other side of the apartment (my bedroom window)

...and this is that same view from my bedroom window, about a half hour later

jesseinbolivia — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 15:48:55 +0000

Again, I got carried away in my academic mind, while not doing the things I was supposed to. And yes, again there are pictures of pretty things below to reward you for reading my random thought process (or again, skip to the pretty pictures).

Here goes:

Is social cohesion really what we want?

Over and over, in my education class in a masters program at a ‘top 50 university in the world’, I heard the term ‘social cohesion’, and we repeatedly explored varying strategies in education systems or programs being used to engage that idea. But every time I heard that term, something didn’t click for me. I wasn’t quite sure what the feeling was… it felt like I was being a little too ‘culturally relativist’ or something to have that thought, so I rarely, if at all, spoke up about it. I think a major problem that contributed to my uncomfortability was that we never got a clear definition of what we were talking about. What is ‘social cohesion’?

The way I understood the concept was a little bit too close to assimilation to make me comfortable. Then again, if social cohesion means people aren’t killing each other, that is generally something I can stand by. At the same time, however, it seemed that everyone (including myself) used the term as a synonym for social ‘integration’. Again, integration doesn’t quite fit in my vision of society. (And again, I’m not talking about physical violence on the one hand and psychological violence on the other—I feel it’s irresponsible to engage in a debate between those, as neither is acceptable in my view… But this is where I get uncomfortable, with the definitions of these concepts, especially how we define psychological violence (as it seemed that we had consensus on what physical violence is)).

But integration is an interesting issue, and it even feels uncomfortable to say that I am against an integrated society, but yet again, it is about how we understand integration.

In my understanding, ‘multi-culturalism’ has often focused its importance on a recognition of the cultural diversity present, but at the same time has tried to fuse those cultures to get a serious kind of integration, or assimilation, in which the multiple cultures present are there for the ‘fun’ stuff—foods, dances, music, etc. but the cultures do not have much of a deeper meaning. Through my entire undergraduate career, that was how I understood cultures: as having these different fun things that were easy to share and express to each other. At Evergreen (where I did my undergrad studies) I repeatedly heard intelligent critiques of this interpretation, but somehow they just didn’t click. I think this mistake was incredibly easy for me, as I feel that dominant US culture and the school system is fundamentally built with this understanding—a very directly assimilationist point of view. One example that quickly comes to mind is the vast opposition to immigration from non-(very)-Western countries. In California, where I’m from (and probably everywhere in the States, but I don’t know) this is characterized by a gross xenophobia against people from our own “backyard”—Latin America, and especially Mexico. At the same time, we can feel psychologically at peace while eating food picked by badly paid immigrant farm workers, going to our favorite Mexican restaurant, or buying pin(i)atas for our kids’ birthday parties.

I feel like this is what multi-culturalism is all about: taking the aspects that the dominant culture accepts and rejecting all other parts. What this translates into, for someone from a non-dominant background, is that to gain acceptance they can keep those ‘fun’ things that are easy for others to understand, and need to reject other parts of their cultural identity (most obviously this can translate into language). At the same time, I and others with dominant cultural identities (white, English-as-mother-tongue, male-centered, heterosexual, able-bodied, etc.) get to benefit from the shared aspects which are easy to understand and not bat an eye at other aspects, while these other aspects are a constant struggle for the Others (of non-dominant identities). To me, this interpretation of multi-culturalism is clearly supportive of social cohesion. It makes things run very smoothly—for those of us who benefit from the power structures we live with. (This is another conversation, about whether it is actually a benefit to have dominant identities, because in some ways we embody the non-unique culture of assimilation). This is how I interpret multi-culturalism. In this way, it is deeply disappointingly assimilationist, and I also see this process as psychologically violent, including the dominant discourses surrounding multi-culturalism. This is how I’ve experienced the idea of ‘social cohesion’ in my life—the way the systems in my society treat non-dominant cultures; and this is the reason this idea of ‘social cohesion’ is so uncomfortable to me.

Alternatively, there is a newer proposal for ‘inter-culturalism’ which has emerged in a number of countries. First, here’s a link to Handel Wright discussing his research comparing multi- and inter-cultural education processes around the world (although mostly focused in Western countries)-http://www.freireproject.org/content/handel-kashope-wright-talks-project. The way I understand it is a recognition of the actual interactions between multiple cultures in the same place. If this is an interpretation of ‘social cohesion’, I can get behind it more than of multi-culturalism. The way I understand the concept of ‘culture’ is that they are forever changing and adapting, because people exercise their cultural identities in a very personal way. In this sense, culture itself is a process, and the idea of ‘inter-culturalism’ recognizes and respects that each culture is individual and at the same time interacting, and maybe even that those interactions further shift expressions of culture.

Here in Bolivia, where I’m researching perceptions of a soon-to-be education reform, these ideas are in intense discussion. In 1994 the previous education reform was enacted. A central goal in it was ‘inter-culturalism’, as I’ve just discussed above. However, even with that recognition of cultural interaction, the makers of the new reform (along with many others I’ve spoken with) have rejected this idea of inter-culturalism, saying that it was a tool of the neo-liberal government to have a ‘softer’ assimilationist program (as before ’94 for example, ONLY Spanish was officially taught in schools, in order to achieve integration/social cohesion/assimilation to the urban areas). The idea that inter-culturalism in schools was a softer assimilationist policy has played out, for example, with the teaching of both Spanish and local/native languages, but the idea is that a much higher value was placed on Spanish and intense pressure was put on students and their families to integrate into the national culture—so that by recognizing the cultural interactions through inter-culturalism, the system recognized the country’s diversity but persisted with aim of integration. In this sense, in the way that I have understood it, inter-culturalism has played out somewhat similarly to multi-culturalism in my experience in the US (although a major difference is the US’s diversity is fundamentally made up of immigrants, whether recent or 500 years old, whereas Bolivia’s diversity is between the dominant culture which is ‘mestizo’ and primarily Spanish speaking and the indigenous population which makes up a majority).

The new education reform, however, brings in a new idea. In terms of this discussion, it proposes a system of ‘inter- and intra-culturalism’, maintaining that the two ideas cannot be separated. The inter-culturalism will stay the same, as discussed above, but the addition of intra-culturalism is central. If inter-culturalism is about a kind-of training people to respect each other while maintaining the idea of social cohesion/integration, intra-culturalism emphasizes the training of people to learn and respect their own culture. This much is clear. Just as I never got a solid definition of ‘social cohesion’, I haven’t yet gotten one of intra-culturalism. While the concept is strong in the new law, many people interpret it differently. But what is clear to me is that the idea of ‘inter- and intra-culturalism’ is not about social cohesion. Rather, it is about understanding oneself and respecting the identities of those around you, while recognizing culture as a process.

Two major difficulties arise here: first, that theoretically it seems very hard to engage in this type of relationship, especially through a school system, in the context of globalized capitalism—as students and their families will still live within this system, and will (do) want to participate in it by gaining economically. The second difficulty that I see is that it is easy to see this ‘inter- and intra-culturalism’ in a liberating light, as is described by the Ministry of Education. However, that rhetoric is similar to the rhetoric of inter-culturalism, or even multi-culturalism. Trying to evaluate now what the education reform will bring in terms of these concepts in the coming years almost seems irresponsible. Rather than evaluate them, I would like to recognize and support what they mean in theory, while keeping a watchful eye to see what the practice actually looks like.

I still don’t know exactly what ‘social cohesion’ is, but I definitely know that it doesn’t sit well with me.

Lastly, during that education course I had the opportunity to see an academic present her new book on ‘Educating Against Extremism’. For all the same reasons as above, this also didn’t sit well with me. Again, extremism to the point of either physical or psychological (or cultural) violence doesn’t sit well with me either; but at the same time, I have grown up in the US, under the farce of a ‘democratic’ government, which is in my opinion the essence of anti-extremism. While we may be the heart of supporting a vote, our options are limited to two parties which have few differences. Neither party takes extreme positions, and it is considered political suicide for a politician to do so. Due to this specific interpretation of democracy, the system of government in the US has seen very little change since its creation. Extreme opinions are what changes the world. Again in the context of the US, strong opinions and out-of-the-box thinking have been the only catalysts of what systemic changes we have seen—from the revolutionary war to the civil war to the mass mobilizations against racial discrimination which led to the more ‘equal’ legal reform of the Civil Rights Act. While I’m sure there are many more recent examples, none come to mind at the moment, and I see this due to the obsessive moderation of US politics. In other words, the political landscape in the US is all about integration, social cohesion and assimilation. Any rejection of that—perhaps taking the form of ‘extremism’—is political or social suicide.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

And here’s the fun part:

My supervisor took me to Lake Titicaca on Sunday with her family, just because I hadn’t been there. Its about 2 hours away on a beautiful drive, but the most beautiful thing was the lake itself. Seriously incredible, and enormous as well. I tried to capture the beauty in some of the pictures, but we didn’t have too much time there, besides a wonderful lunch and a short walk… (click on the photos to enlarge them)

jesseinbolivia — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 20:55:36 +0000

Somehow, in order to procrastinate from translating and transcribing hours and hours of interviews, I started writing a kind-of reflection of my research so far. I didn’t really stop for a while, so it probably seems like a rant, but there’s a few pictures at the bottom to reward you for reading my thought process (or skip the thought process and enjoy the pictures). Maybe it’s like a summary of what I’ve got so far for my thesis. Maybe.

Here goes:

In considering the plurality of identities in Bolivia today, the new political processes in play have stepped up to consider a kind of recognition opposed to that of previous periods in Bolivian politics (which have deeply shaped Bolivian social relations). As we know, following Columbus’ arrival in the Caribbean in 1492, the Spanish colonized much of what we know as Latin America. In this process, in most areas, not only were peoples’ lives and families physically destroyed (through everything from rape and slavery to all out genocide), but this physical destruction was accompanied by a social and cultural destruction that has penetrated Latin American cultures since. In most places, it has resulted in a complete change in population—many countries having very little of what I will call ‘indigenous’ peoples. In that way, Bolivia is unique. It has the highest per capita population of ‘indigenous’ identified peoples in all of the Americas. However, for centuries, the diversity here has been characterized by the identity politics of the ‘Mestizaje’—basically meaning ‘mixed identity’. While there is strong value to this recognition, as countless Bolivians have told me that there are no real or pure indigenous peoples here and at the same time there are no real or pure whites (except the immigrants from the North who benefit greatly from Bolivia’s cheap prices and deep economic inequalities), there is also a myriad of strong indigenous cultural identities here, from the Aymara to the Quechua to the Guarani, and many others. In fact, Bolivia’s new constitution, enacted in February 2009 recognizes thirty-six of these identities, and many of them have their own languages (the ones that only speak Spanish have lost their languages due to assimilationist political and educational strategies). Therefore, the politics of the Mestizaje in Bolivia is constantly being flipped around and upside down.

The new education reform, which is part of the new constitution (but has yet to be passed through one of the two congressional bodies), is seemingly an attempt to adapt the political and education system to the larger issue of the vast diversity of Bolivian identities. As multiple respondents have explained to me, the new constitution was built from this education reform. Therefore, just as is engaged by the education reform, titled ‘Avelino Sinani-Elizardo Perez’ after two indigenist educators from the 1930’s, the new constitution brings up this plurality of identities. Most directly, this is through a re-naming of the state from the ‘Republic of Bolivia’ to the new ‘Plurinational State of Bolivia’. The new name (and the text itself) recognizes the thirty-six cultures I mentioned above as nations, giving itself a centralized state power while recognizing the diversity of ‘national’ identities.

Curricular Organization-->Administration and Management-->Community-based Popular Participation-->Technical Support, Resources and Services-->(circle)"" width="460" height="425" />

"Structure of the Plurinational Education System: -->Curricular Organization-->Administration and Management-->Community-based Popular Participation-->Technical Support, Resources and Services-->(circle)"

By engaging this idea of ‘plurinationalism’ through numerous political/social projects including the new education reform, the country is rejecting the idea of the ‘mestizaje’. Alternatively, and my focus is in education, although these ideas are engaged around the political map, Bolivia is working towards the decolonization of these colonial ideas. As the ‘mestizo’ is a colonial construction through a homogenization of the diverse aspects of both the personal and larger cultural identity, the Plurinational recognition of the plurality of the people of Bolivia seems deeply important. As an effort to respect the diversity, ‘Avelino Sinani-Elizardo Perez’ (the new education reform) engages four fundamental ideas (as defined by the legal text and articulated into these sections by someone from the Ministry of Education who I saw speak on Thursday night): ‘decolonization’, ‘inter- and intra-culturality, and plurilingualism’, ‘community-based education’, and ‘productive education’. However, through my research and interviews it has seemed like the idea of ‘decolonization’ is more of a theoretical umbrella term for the rest (although this is debatable).

"What does a decolonial education mean? ... Deconstruct the categorial Euro-centric framework: -For example, the Spanish "discovered" the new world... Equal distribution of cultural capital... Terrorism is the massacre that the US is commiting in Iraq; Bush is the first/worst terrorist in the world... Coca (the leaf, which is produced in Bolivia) is not cocaine; erradicate drug addiction... This decolonial process has three matrixes which need to be deconstructed: 1. the myth of race (mestizo included); 2. Eurocentrism: our elites have always looked otuward; 3. Capitalist development"

In terms of the politics of the ‘mestizaje’, the ‘inter- and intra-culturalism and plurilingualism’ seems most important. While there is no standard definition of these terms (or any of the ones mentioned above, which could prove to be a major problem with implementation), it is pretty solidly agreed that ‘inter-culturalism’ cannot be separated from ‘intra-culturalism’—intra-culturalism being the development of a cultural identity while inter-culturalism respects and honors the interaction between those cultural identities. As the concrete aspect of these, ‘plurilingualism’ will force schools to teach the local mother-tongue (if in rural areas), Spanish, and a foreign language. In urban areas it will be Spanish, the most popular indigenous language of the general area (Aymara for La Paz, Quechua for Cochabamba, etc.) along with a foreign language. As numerous folks have explained to me, if people, especially a young person, cannot identify personally with a culture, the interaction between them and others of a culture with more historical power will result in an assimilationist practice: the person from a lower-historically-powered culture feeling the need to participate in the stronger culture in order to gain respect by the stronger culture and generally to become more economically successful. For this reason, some parents have rejected the idea of teaching native languages in schools, as they want their children to be able to integrate and “make it” in either the cities (which are all primarily Spanish-speaking) or global society.

"Objectives of Inter-cultural, Plurilingual Education: Develop, value and recuperate languages, wisdoms, knowledges, values; strengthen the identity and diversity of the peoples and interrelating them with universal wisdoms and knowledges for an equilibrium in the development of knowledges..."

The trouble here is that it seems that this capitalist ideology has engaged an idea of preference (in some communities) for the idea of the ‘mestizaje’. This, at least for me, is critical to think about. Is it responsible to create new systems of power and reorganize the government with the goal of decolonizing society from colonial systems of homogenization as well as capitalism and imperialism (as the law is anti- both of those) in the context of a population who wants to integrate into capitalist culture and focus their priorities on their own family’s success? This is a complicated, but major question for me. Undoubtedly, the goals of the Plurinational constitution and the education law, ‘Avelino Sinani-Elizardo Perez’, are central in my own analysis of systemic and cultural change, but for it to occur in a top-down, government-sponsored way does not seem 100% responsible. To me, it fundamentally means that the government considers its own ideas as superior to those of the people it represents.

Now, this gets even more shifty, as everyone I’ve spoken to from the government and Ministry of Education has insisted that the constitution and education law are guided by an incredible amount of popular participation.

A seminar by a rep from the Ministry of Education justifies the widespread participation of education related organizations from all over the country

Further justification of participatory nature of the law. Translation: "An Education Law From Bolivians For Bolivians: -end participation of consultants; -stop expenses in the creation of the new education law; -active participation by nationally-based organizations and institutions; -participation of historically marginalized sectors...; -a new Education Law coming from the masses"

This definitely makes me feel better about the whole process, or at least it did before coming here. While a few teachers have told me that they have participated in local or national meetings for the development of these proposals, the majority that I have spoken with have told me that they haven’t been aware of these ‘participatory’ goings-on. One teacher who teaches math in a teacher-training institute in Cochabamba went to a national curriculum meeting in Sucre, a number of hours away from his home, and had prepared for weeks by reading and coming up with ideas. On his arrival, there were a few seminars/lectures by various education-related organizations, and finally a proposed curriculum was passed around by the Ministry for the participants to sign—with no real participation and barely any discussion.
Moreover, there have been a number of teacher protests and strikes against the new education reform, but the folks I have spoken with who’ve participated in these have done so simply because they don’t know what is going on with the reform—they had not been invited to participate in the planning process, and there had been apparently little-to-no communication about the progress of the change of plans for the education system from any of the appropriate organizations (Ministry of Education, SEDUCA…, teacher unions, etc.), and rather their information came from a small but strong group of ‘Trotskyist’ teachers, who seemingly (according to all the teachers I’ve spoken with, who are not part of this group) resist any type of change at all which recognizes the existing system of government, and advocates for a complete political and social reorganization based on a pure class analysis.

But anyway, whether we (anyone) likes it or not, the new constitution was passed by an overwhelming majority, and the education reform is part of it (the part that still needs congressional approval is not whether there will be a reform, but rather some of the specific terms of it). With everyone I’ve spoken with, this is non-debatable. The rejection of the colonial idea of the ‘mestizaje’ is strong in Bolivia, especially with those involved in the government. The recognition of the country’s diversity is essential to the country’s plans for development, and these plans are seemingly based out of educating the younger generations in a culturally respectful and non-assilimilationist way. The terms of the decolonization process are definitely not clear, but with better communication and common definitions, it could be. In fact, these two aspects would probably be able to bring the resistance to the changes into a productive debate, rather than a kind-of “I’m right!” “No! I’m right” argument.

But who really knows? Maybe it’s not even productive of me to be doing this research at this stage of the reform. Things will definitely change, but a plan for cultural decolonization is in the works, and in a few years it will surely prove to look at the Bolivian example and see what processes have been successful and supported, and what has remained unclear and maintained colonial hierarchies, or in even more academic language: the coloniality of power and knowledge.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Okay, I promised some pics that are a little more fun. These were from the “costume party” at a friend’s apartment last weekend. Somehow I was Harry Potter… with a mustache??? whatever…

jesseinbolivia — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 16:56:28 +0000

So I’ve been lazy with these updates. I realized its been almost a month since my last update… sorry… I’ve been super busy with research and tons of things, but these are the highlights…

At the very beginning of the month I went to a town called Warisata for the day. Warisata is a town where the first indigenous alternative school was built in the 1930s. At that time in Bolivia, there was no formal education at all in rural areas, and rural/indigenous communities were basically ignored in terms of education. This school was conceived and organized by two men: Elizardo Perez and Avelino Sin(i)ani. The education reform that I am researching now is loosely based on their model (and its title is ‘Avelino Sin(i)ani-Elizardo Perez’). I went to Warisata because I had heard that the 74th anniversary celebration of the school there would take place. I had been hoping to talk to teachers and folks there, but it turned out it was a real celebration (there are holidays here ALL the time), so the adults were all either busy supervising tons and tons of school kids who had been brought or were busy getting drunk, so it really wasn’t great for research, but really fun and great to see a different type of area. Warisata was the first rural place in Bolivia I’d been to, and it was beautiful. The bus ride there was a little over 2 hours, and I started to really understand why they call the area the ‘altiplano’ (high plains) because it’s the only place I’ve seen here which isn’t really in the mountains, or very very close to them. The altiplano is also SUPER hot during the day and really cold at night because the altitude is really high.

These are some pictures from the bus ride there (over 2 hour ride for barely over US$1)…

View of the Altiplano from the bus

[caption id="attachment_139" align="aligncenter" width="460" caption="View of the Altiplano from the bus 2"][/caption]

View of the Altiplano from the bus 3

On the way to Warisata there was a march blocking the street/highway. All the cars just drove off the road to get around it... but the march was quite long and impressive

So I finally got there, and realized how small the town really was. There was a town square, buildings surrounding it, which extended for a few blocks in one direction, and then there was nothing again. The town is basically completely based around the Normal (teacher training institute), so the celebration happened on the grounds of the Normal. It was also the first (and only, so far) time that I’ve been in a community that’s basically 100% indigenous (everybody here has indigenous blood, but in Warisata, as far as I understand, everyone identifies as indigenous). Moreover, I stuck out like a sore thumb. Here in La Paz I blend in pretty easily, but I was literally the only light skinned person I saw the whole day there. The students reactions were interesting–many times when I would walk by I would see out of the corner of my eye a group of little ones pointing at me or just staring… I think light skinned folks really stay in urban areas and especially not in the Altiplano…

easily over 1000 people in the crowd

This is a (not-so-good) picture of the stage, which was backed by photos of Avelino Sin(i)ani and Elizardo Perez as well as the Wiphala (the flag w/ 49 colors which represents Aymara communities in the Altiplano, but has been appropriated controversially by Evo Morales as another national flag to represent indigenous communities, but it really only represents indigenous peoples in the Altiplano)

The march was great, and the kids were all trying to march in formation (...but didn't do a great job... very cute)

I'm not sure why, but there were a number of boys dressed in military garb, heading up different school groups (there were hundreds of students from all over the Altiplano). Also interesting to note is that military service is mandatory for men for 1 year, although it sounds like many who can afford it buy their way out of service...

The 'ponchos rojos' are a kind of non-police police force in Aymara communities (I don't totally understand their role), but they were repping themselves intensely in Warisata

This is the group of people studying to be teachers in the Normal (teacher training institute) in Warisata. Notice Che Guevara, who has also been represented a lot at all the rural teacher union offices that I've been to...

A mural honoring the namesakes of the new education reform...

So that’s all for Warisata. It was a lot of fun…

I came back to La Paz after that and really cracked down on work, so not really fun stories or photos at that point, but I had fun too… anyway, about two weeks ago I went to Cochabamba (which you may or may not know from the Cochabamba water war of 2002, when the Bolivian gov’t sold the state-run water company to a private company, which made it illegal to collect rain water without paying. The community came together and basically shut down the city and the surrounding areas until the government revoked the contract–also the water war has been seen as pretty inspiring for the global anti-globalization movement). Anyway, Cochabamba is amazing. At this time of year, the climate is beautiful–not too hot during the day, and not too cold at night, the people are very relaxed, there are parks EVERYWHERE (I kind of understood this part as a Paris that is not stuck up, with better weather), and another thing I noticed is that there is basically no police presence there (in La Paz there are cops all over the place…).

One of the first things I ran into in Cochabamba was this march against domestic and sexual violence

This is a flyer they passed out at the march...

In Cocha, I stayed with a friend, Andrea, who I had met at the youth encounter here in La Paz at the beginning of July (check blog 1 or 2 or something…). Her family was wonderful, and especially her mom made me feel really at home there. Additionally, both her mom and dad are teachers (at a middle school and teacher-training school, respectively), so they had tons of connections. But definitely my favorite place I went to do research while in Cocha was the Ciudad de Nin(i)os, an orphanage by night and school during the day, which was where Djive (Andrea’s mom) worked as a math teacher. In the middle school there, 25 of the students lived there at the orphanage and the rest (probably 100+) came from nearby in the community.

This is Djive helping a student work on a math problem... It's been a while since I've done math... ugh... but she is an AMAZING teacher!

Students working...

I tried to explain to this guy that he was repping California in some way... but he was too excited to play with my camera to really care...

That’s really all the research-ish pics I got in Cocha, but my research was great there–I did tons of interviews, with everyone from directors of schools to directors of both the urban and rural unions as well as SEDUCA (which is the gov’t institution which does outreach for the ministry of education)… In fact, I have 14 interviews that I haven’t even started translating/transcribing… ugh.
Anyway…

I really liked this mural... it was in downtown Cocha. Here's the translation: 'Brother indian, you have taught us to resist with dignity... Blood of liberation runs in our veins. Our ancestors protect us and guard resistance against coups and strikes of fascists who can't silence our shouts of rebellion, equality and liberty.' --I don't know what Jallalla means (it's in Aymara I think), but it's about honoring Pachamama (mother earth). Also notice everything growing out of a woman in the tree

Also, 3 of the days I was in Cocha was the celebration of Urkupin(i)a, which is a religious celebration in Quillacollo (key-a-koy-o) which is a town about 20 minutes from Cocha. I was able to go to one of the parades, which was incredibly full of people… Bolivians really like to celebrate… But on my way in, in a packed crowd, some guy threw soil on the back of my neck, and while I was wiping it off and realizing what happened he slickly pulled my camera out of my front pocket… Incredible actually… haha, anyway, Andrea realized what happened really quick and figured out who had my camera and got it back!!!–so I can still take these pictures…

This is a dance troup from the Cochabamba University of San Simon...

I don't remember what the shoes symbolize, but they are important (maybe representing some kind of social struggle (?))

again, I don't remember the significance of the shoes ;(

Interesting to note that 80% of Bolivia's economy is on the black market... this way it makes it easy for beer and toys and food and whatever to come to you while you're cebrating. Beer came by about every 7 seconds...

…and this is a view from the mountain behind Quillacollo

Quillacollo view

and I came back to La Paz this past Thursday morning… I’ll give updates more often, and I’ll make ‘em shorter… promise!… but I should really get to translating/transcribing those Cocha interviews…

jesseinbolivia — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 18:47:25 +0000

So it’s Monday afternoon and I’m not working. Well, I should be, but I’m good at distracting myself. This past week has been a LOT of work as well as a lot of fun. This post is a lil different though, with some of my reflections from my research–and I’d love any ideas y’all have about them…

Last week I was able to interview a number of folks as well as go to a few schools to talk to teachers. Most awesome was a primary school I went to where the teachers were incredibly welcoming. I went back 3 times during last week, and actually got a lot of interesting input. I’ll get back to this later, but what’s been most interesting for me is that people’s responses are NOT what I had expected. I came here looking to research how a decolonial education law is being put into practice. Alternatively, the teachers themselves dont see anything changing–it sounds like they mainly just see the names of different aspects changing and a lot of intellectual masturbation by the government and ministry of education. Anyway, that school I went to was awesome, and I snapped a few pics of ridiculously cute kids:

Students at Escuela Cuba

Besides that school, I spoke with reps at both the urban and rural teacher union as well as the director of the office of ‘intra-culturalism and plurilingualism’ at the Ministry of Education. Finally for the research part, yesterday I had lunch with a roommate’s boss’ family, where the father had worked in the Ministry, and now does some other edu related things in Cochabamba (where I’ll visit in a few weeks)–very interesting conversation and amazing Peruvian food (apparently Bolivia isn’t known for its food, at least in comparison with Peru). Also, a friend took me on a grand tour of La Paz, coming from the cemetary (which is WAY up the hills, on the way to El Alto), through the GIGANTIC black market (where you can by ANYTHING, from knock-off adidas to food to a tattoo right there on the street), across the main drag to the Plaza Murillo (the presidential plaza), up a cute awesome street that I forget the name of, across town in a mini-bus to the National Park, down to Zona Sur (the richer-ish area), and finally to an awesome park that overlooks the city–and at night it’s amazing cause you can see the little dotted lights of houses all around on the mountain tops. Sorry, no pictures here, but lots of fun. I’ll definitely be back to these places and I’ll try to bring the camera. Thank you Ara!!!

Finally, on Saturday there was a big parade (there’s festivals here ALL the time… next weekend I’m going to one in a more rural area to celebrate the anniversary of the indigenous schools that the new education reform is based on, and the week after that on Aug 6 is the independence day (from the Spanish, 1825)). The parade last Saturday was a students parade, showing off dances from all different parts of Bolivia. The dances were very fun and the costumes were incredible. Also, people had come early and set up chairs and tarps behind them so that the only way you could see the parade would be to rent a chair. It was a good time, and definitely worth the $3. Here are a bunch of pictures from the parade:

"Angels"

"devils"

hate to be ridiculously stereotypical, but the essential Japanese tourist...

Coca Cola hired tons of kids to sell their product. gross...

and there were clowns... but they all seemed to be bored or depressed or something. They reminded me of FatLip (see video below)

Oh, and I forgot, but there was a kind of going away thing for the Swedes. The dinner choice was pizza, but it was GIGANTIC. I mean, about a meter in diameter (that’s a little over 3 feet for y’all Amerrrrcans). Maybe more…

Okay, and last but not least here’s my lil’ research reflection from last night… where is this research going?

I think the motivation for being a teacher here (as in anywhere I’ve been) is very problematic. While the work is clearly underpaid, I’ve been told again and again that many teachers get into the profession for the purpose of security—that they will be able to have the job for the rest of their lives. Somehow, in order for schooling to be a liberating process, I think that teacher motivation has to be pedagogical. This is difficult given class and capitalist reality, as people have no choice but to live within the system in order to survive, so teaching becomes a secure option. The issue is that teaching essentially stems from pedagogy. If a teacher is not pedagogically driven, then what is their role in the classroom? Will they regurgitate what they are taught? Will they do what they are told? Will they change the curriculum to make it simpler for their own comfort/happiness of daily life? This brings me to my second point: the education reform is built by pedagogues—people who’ve studied education and the learning process. What is the significance of a pedagogically-driven education reform for a personal-security driven teacher? For many who I’ve spoken with, the law appears to be a form of intellectual masturbation, in which there’s all these people who are ‘highly educated’ who talk about this utopic version of education, but it is very heady and they see the only changes in names and top-down stuff. Can pedagogically-driven ideas be pushed in a top-down manner? In this case, it looks like the answer doesn’t look too positive. Can pedagogically-driven ideas be pushed from the bottom-up? It would be decentralized and require motivation by all involved. Then we come to the following question: Can a pedagogically-driven education reform gain legitimacy through work/security? This is interesting, as the 2 teacher unions both support the reform, while they first and foremost represent the teachers in terms of work/security/labor rights. However, it seems that teachers are not following their respective unions pedagogically. Can a union be a uniting force between the areas of security and pedagogy? What shape would that take?

Anyway, I guess that’s the rut I’m stuck in at this point. Lemme know if you have any thoughts!

Keep in touch!

jesseinbolivia — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 00:11:18 +0000

Today was a big day. A lot got done, and after a seemingly empty few weeks for my research, it all got packed in… I woke up wondering how in the world I would find the rural and urban teacher union headquarters to set up interviews (I had asked many-a-folk. The best I got was ‘It’s on El Prado’, which doesn’t help, given that El Prado is the biggest street in La Paz). Anyway, after a few short hours of confusion, I geniously checked the phone book, and vuala (no idea how to spell that)–I got 5 different addresses. I left the house to head towards the rural union addresses (they were seemingly all on the same block), and ended up in the middle of a protest against COAS (I asked 3 people what was up and I didn’t quite get it from any of them. I’ve also tried to look it up in the news, and …zilch…). I only realized it was serious when everyone crowded up and took over the street. I wasn’t quite sure how to judge what was going on, so I walked up to the corner, where I saw a number of cops in what I imagine Bolivian riot gear to look like, loading enormous guns. I imagine they were loading tear gas canisters (cause the things looked like canisters), but the guns looked pretty scary. I stayed for a bit to take some photos, but I stayed outside the action cause I wasn’t sure how to judge it. Then again, there were about 3 or 4 street vendors pushing carts through the crowd and selling a ton of stuff, and I imagined that they would know when to get out of there before they lost their products in a stampede of folks…

cops with giant guns

Before I knew it, more cops were coming…

more cops arriving on motorcycles

So I stayed there for about 45 minutes. It seemed like nothing was changing, and that the cops weren’t going to do anything besides stand patiently, but who knows. Also weird to me: cops with tear gas guns had no gas masks, just kind of thick looking beanies covering their nose and mouth under the helmets.
Anyway, all of a sudden everyone in the actual street kind of dispersed to let traffic through, so the protest got much smaller, and a lot of the cops left (although there were still probably 20ish).

And this last one I guess was a changing of the guard... A whole new crew came in two of these trucks and a bunch of the others left.

On a more… enlightening note, I saw this graffiti around the corner from the cops. Same handwriting as the one from my second post (‘if I don’t die fighting I want to die loving’), and both were about a block away from the Mujeres Creando building (also post 2).

‘You cannot decolonize without dismantling patriarchy – Mujeres Creando/Women Creating’

This was also especially interesting to me, as the new education reform (that I am researching) has as a top priority ‘decolonization’, and decolonization is central to the new Bolivian constitution. It seems that I’m really lacking a feminist p.o.v. in my research, so I’m going to go to Mujeres Creando when my already-set meetings are done and see if I can get some input on a radical feminist take on the new education reform, or at least the new constitution.
Anyway, it seemed that Bolivians were out in full force today–or maybe its just a Monday thing (and this is the first ‘real’ Monday I’ve been here, cause the swine flu fear had shut down many institutions until today, including all schools. As I kept on walking towards the rural teacher union headquarters, about three blocks from the other madness I ran into the main street, being shut down:

Bolivia's flag in the forground. another in the background that I've seen a lot here...

At first it seemed like a nice parade (besides all the honking traffic surrounding it. Then I realized it was another protest. This time for rights for disabled peoples.

'Federation of People with Disabilities' over a Bolivian flag

'We want bonuses (rights?) for disabled peoples. Brother Evo (Morales), remember us...'

I left and found the rural teacher union headquarters a few blocks away, but it was closed for lunch. Oh, and it turned out only one of the 3 addresses actually existed. Plus, it shared a building with a Karaoke disco bar

So I kept on going, heading over toward the urban teacher’s union, which also happened to be closed for lunch. What better do than eat lunch? Another Silpancho and soup (post # 2) and I was ready to go. Back to the rural union, where they had re-opened, and I made a date for later in the week with the executive secretary for an interview. Also, he gave me his card which has a big picture of Che…
So, I headed back to the urban teacher union headquarters, and scored a half hour interview, with responses that I honestly wasn’t expecting. They also gave me a 65 page book exploring the union’s position on the new education reform.
Then I headed out towards the market to buy some food, shampoo, and slippers. On my way though, I saw these two statues (on the same really long block). Very funny…

Left=Simon Bolivar, the liberator of much of South America. Right=our good friend Christopher Columbus

Again, a few blocks away, the traffic got terrible

This is the chaotic traffic-all trying to turn around to be able to go about their days. I only saw 1 small accident here...

It turned out that a little over two hours after I had seen the start of the march for the rights of disabled peoples, they began to really stop traffic. At one point four folks in wheel chairs parked their chairs about a foot from stopped cars at a crosswalk. The cars kept inching forward to threaten them, but the folks in the road didn’t budge…

right outside of the office of the vice president, and across the street the national bank headquarters...

Group of women in the protest...

Hmm… What else… I bought shampoo finally, so I don’t need to keep trying to squeeze those two little shampoo traveler tester bottles. I got ripped off for it, but then again, I spent the same amount of money on slippers (about $3.50 each). and I bought some ‘farmer’s cheese’ which is awesome–basically just cheap white salty cheese…

Oh, and this is how I get around when I’m not walking. They’re called ‘mini-buses’. They cost Bs1.50 (about 20 cents).

...and you have to check what the signs say about what areas they go by...

I was sure there was more, but I can’t seem to think of it now… Well, I better go make dinner and then translate/transcribe/analyze a bunch. WHOO!!!

jesseinbolivia — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 00:18:54 +0000

So, not so much has happened in the past few days, except I’ve been trying to translate and transcribe as much of my 2 interviews as possible… which is WAY more tedious than I had expected. ugh. Anyway, great interviews with 2 interesting academics. Also, I met up with my supervisor and the director of ‘Emancipation’ at the Dutch embassy (she bassically works with indigenous and women’s groups, and organizes events and stuff… I think…), and next week is gonna be SUPER busy. I figure I may as well try to relax as much as possible before it gets real busy (cause the translate/transcribe process is gonna be crazy once I have more stuff going on). In the meantime, I watched Men In Black and a bunch of Family Guy, and am planning to put on Space Jam–cause the memories are …

Also, I’m a tiny bit sick. Mostly in my throat though–and Ii think it feels worse than it is because the climate is super dry. Lucky enough, globalization has provided Halls cough drops and Twining’s tea…

Oh, and today I took a nice long walk through the Church of San Francisco, the Sagarnaga (tourist spot for artisan and other stuff, but kind of lame, cause more people spoke english than spanish, and all the restaurant/cafe signs were in english), and finally through an enormous street market–probably about 8-10 blocks long covering the entire street with everything from fish to veggies to hair products to anything you could imagine (besides clothes, i guess…).

Besides that, some things I’ve discovered about Bolivia:
-most liquid things come in bags, i.e. milk, juice, dulce de leche, etc.
-Shampoo is surprisingly expensive (I mean, compared to other products here)
-Dry black beans are also surprisingly expensive (compared to other grain things–rice, etc.)
-New movies at the cinema cost about Bs25, which is about USD$3.25, which is considered expensive here

that’s all for now. Here’s some pictures with descriptions below… (I didn’t take pictures of the market today and on my walk because I don’t want to be one of THOSE tourists. Also, it feels slightly sketchy, even though crime here is rare).

This is across a bridge from Sopocachi (downtown) to Miraflores (another area)

From the same bridge, this is the scenery (it's 360 here...), and the mountain in the background on the left in called Ilimani--super famous and I really want to get over there some day...

And this is Sopocachi (downtown-ish) from the bridge

'Evo (the Prez) and Alvaro (VP) rep Bolivia with dignity'

...classic Bolivia...

These are the Sweidsh folk that came for the youth encounter last weekend...

Week 2

jesseinbolivia — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 21:39:42 +0000

It’s been about half a week since I posted here, but I’ve done a ton. I’ll try to fit in the main things…

I got some requests for house pictures… here’s a few:

Okay… going back to Thursday:

My research process kind of officially started that day. I met my local supervisor, who works at one of the universities in La Paz. She’s incredibly knowledgeable and super nice–she’s also my Dutch supervisor’s local supervisor (that probably doesn’t make any sense). Anyway, as soon as we met, she rushed us off to a conference on engaging plurinationalism (which is the basis of the new constitution), with, among others, Enrique Dussel, who I read a bunch of before coming here. There had been things related going on for the previous 3 days, but I hadn’t known about it. Anyway, I also went to the night event (which was held at the national bank headquarters), and it was a pretty amazing event… Besides the over-done security and the lab-coated doctors asking EVERYONE questions about whether they felt any fever symptoms (cause they’re SUPER paranoid about swine flu… and yes, they dont use H1N1, just ‘swine flu’), the event was wonderful. Sponsored by a number of ministries of the government (including the ‘ministry of decolonization’, ‘ministry of culture’, and ‘ministry of education’), as well as by the overarching ‘plurinational state of bolivia’, the panel started out with an Aymara blessing to Pachamama (mother earth).

...and that is the minister of culture holding the staff

Earlier in the day, I had also met up with a friend from ISS’s wife, who is an architect here–and she told me that whenever they build a new building, in order to ‘get most of the construction workers to work’, they need to bring a witch to come and bless the earth below, by, among other things, burying a lamb fetus. Blessings to pachamama are really important in Aymara culture, and they occur all the time… Anyway, here’s some more pics of the panel:

This is the whole panel, Dussel giving his talk...

Choque (minister of decolonization), Dussel, and Zemelman

After the panel, I had heard about a jazz/funk/samba show at a tiny club called ‘Thelonious’, so I convinced a roommate (who would be moving out the next day–for me to get his room) to come with.

…but somehow the roomie and his partner ‘hated’ the show (I thought it was pretty amazing). We ended up going to this strange underground reggae club called ‘detecos’, which is made to look like something in between an old bunker and a chilled out dance club…

The drum band at Detecos

…and somehow I got convinced to stay there with the roomies until 4am, getting home closer to 5, and having spanish class at 9:30 the next morning…

Anyway, the rest’ll be much shorter, promise!

For friday, sat, and sunday, my roommate Gerie heads a local youth NGO, and had a giant youth ‘encounter’ for young people from all across the country. The focus was on cultural interaction and supporting diversity. It was really cool to see such a big group of young people really engaging with each other–from debates around gay marriage in the church to covering each other with paint, the weekend was a lot of fun (but also really stressful for my roomie and her friends, who are awesome…). Anyway, I was a ‘photographer’ for the event–really just an excuse to go hang out with a bunch of young people (I think they were 17-23 or something), and practice my Spanish a lot…

Group Picture

A group of participants wrote lyrics to the tune of 'La Bamba', but with Bolivian pride

Because of the swine flue scare, some of the facilitators did a skit about prevention... that was after they had a doctor check EVERY single participant for it... oh, and the guy in blue is Luis, one of the roomies

These folks did a short skit to honor pachamama (mother earth)

Each participant painted a square of cloth to represent what bolivia meant to them. this one was by a guy from El Alto, which is right next to La Paz (I took the pic midway through)

'We are free'

...some of them got a little carried away. Most of us ended up with paint somewhere...

...and it was decided that this guy in the middle is my twin... but I don't have a better picture of him

Here’s some random other things:

These are AMAZING. It's wafer cookie things with coconut inside...

Silvio... only decent close up pic of any of the roomies

Without Fear with Evo (Morales)

'The elections distract from the revolution'

So that’s it for this time.

I did my first official interview today with a pretty amazing academic. Between that and the conferences and the youth encounter, I have over 4.5 hours of talking to translate and transcribe, so I’d better go. Hope all is well wherever you are. Keep me updated!

Abrazos