The price of education

As a grad-student I often complain about the price of an education these days but, aside from my social life, my schooling has cost me only money. However, for many people education costs much more.   Social reformers seem to have latched onto education as the latest trend but in many cases I have to wonder if ‘education’ provides a less problematic framework for ‘development’.

A recent CCTV the headline reads, ‘Tibet people’s living standard improves over the years’.  The report tells us that

“Chinese anthropologists have spoken out saying that Tibetan people are better off under Chinese rule because children have greater access to education than before.

The riots in Lhasa two weeks ago claimed 18 innocent lives and injured 382 people. Hundreds of stores were destroyed, and seven schools and five hospitals were burnt down. According to one anthropology expert, these numbers indicate the riots are a violation of Tibetan people’s human rights.

Hao Shiyuan, Principal of Institute of Ethnology & Anthropology, said, “It’s a typical example of the violation of human rights, by destroying the atmosphere when a society is experiencing a peaceful and harmonious development.”
…
According to statistics, before 1960, the enrolment rate for children of school age was only 2 percent. That number has now risen to 99 percent.”

See whole article at - http://www.cctv.com/english/20080329/101757_1.shtml

The argument seems to be that the Tibetan people should be happy about being given an education and if they lose some of their ‘culture’ well that is the price of joining modernity.  While many people empathise with the Tibetan plight, here in Australia, similar arguments about education are being made. The Federal Government is using these arguments to justify the building of bordering schools in regional centres, away from family and community, to improve the education standards of Aboriginal Australians.  One article says,

Boarding schools not the answer, Indigenous group says

“The Federal Government is building hostels in the Northern Territory and Queensland for Indigenous children to live in while they attend schools in larger population centres.

Federal Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin says encouraging Indigenous children to attend boarding schools away from their families is a world of difference from the treatment of the Stolen Generations.

The Alliance’s Central Australian representative Jackie Baxter says often students who go to boarding schools cannot adjust back to community life when they finish.”

See whole article at -
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/03/31/2203082.htm

The introduction of boarding schools for Aboriginal children is based on research like-

Indigenous test scores narrowest in early years: study

“”The fact that we observe a much smaller gap in the early years suggests that improving school quality for indigenous Australians may help to close the racial test score gap.”

But the researchers also found that about one-third to two-thirds of the score gap could be explained by family demographic factors.

Researcher Dr Xiaodong Gong said policies to improve incomes and parental education might help to close the gap, but were unlikely to entirely solve the problem.”

See the whole article at -
http://ibnnews.org/localnews/indigenous_test_scores_narrowest_in_early_years
_says_study_31308_9087523323223_0000.html

This research claims that low test scores can be explained by ‘demographic factors’ but that improvements to things like ‘parental income’ will not solve the entire problem. It seems that they are saying that Aboriginal communities cannot produce children who perform like ‘other’ children on standardized tests therefore aboriginal children should be taken away from the community so that they can learn to be more like ‘other’ children.  Macklin may argue that boarding schools represent a ‘world of difference’ from the treatment of the stolen generations but when governments take away choice under the guise of empowerment I have to wonder; how can education provide people with a choice if they are not given a choice about how they want their children to be educated?

‘Architecture of Density’

Urban anthropologist might find Michael Wolf’s photos interesting. He has amazing photographs of massive apartment buildings in Hong Kong, a very densely populated place. The photographs called ‘Architecture of Density’, give an idea about a-very- dense urban- lifestyle in Hong Kong. Wolf was born in Germany, grew up in the USA, and has lived in Hong Kong since 1994, and in these photographs he explores ‘the theme of the organic metropolis’. Here’s a quote from his website, a review by Rebecca Walker:

Hong Kong is one of the most densely populated metropolitan areas in the world and Wolf’s photographs seek out the human spirit in the urban jungle. The images in the book[he published the photos as a book] depict the highrises that shape the spatial experience of Hong Kong’s citizens. Since Wolf himself is one of those citizens (he has been a Hong Kong resident since 1994), his photographs have a distinctively personal essence.  

You can check out the photographs on  

http://www.photomichaelwolf.com/hongkongarchitecture/

Good News For Bloggers!

There is good news for bloggers. According to an article on the Age (‘Bloggers feel more connected’, 4 March 2008), “blogging may help people feel happier and more satisfied with their friends”. Psychologist James Baker and Professor Susan Moore from  Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne conducted a research based on two surveys, and the results were published in the latest edition of the journal CyberPsychology & Behaviour. The first survey asked 134 new users of MySpace ‘whether or not they intended to blog’. The researchers found out that ‘people who intended to blog were more psychologically distressed than those who didn’t intend to blog.’. These people were more depressed, anxious and stressed. Two months later, a second survey compared ‘those who had blogged to those who hadn’t’. The results showed that ‘the bloggers were happier about the number of friends they had, both online and face-to-face, and were more likely to reach out to these friends for help’. Psychologist James Baker said ‘They [the bloggers] felt more socially integrated,” and “They felt that their friends were a better fit and they connected better.”

www.theage.com.au/articles/2008/03/04/1204402430340.html 

NYTimes debate on female genital surgery

Generally, I avoid commenting too much on the debate on female genital ‘mutilation’/’surgery.’ It’s sort of like the ‘pro-choice’/'pro-life’ debate in the United States; even the terms that one might use are so loaded that it’s almost impossible to make any point other than with one’s own choir.  But John Tierney has a fascinating discussion of the debate at The New York Times.  You can link to the discussion, which sprawls over several different pages, through his recent commentary, ’Cultural Imperialism at the W.H.O.?‘ I’ve been sitting on some thoughts about this one, not sure entirely that I’m of one mind on this, but I feel like I need to just do the deal already, and hit the ‘publish’ button. As someone who teaches about ‘Culture and Human Rights’ (it’ll be offered in the first half of 2009, if you’re interested), and as a human rights activist (though not so much on women’s rights), it’s an issue that I feel I need to discuss even if I’m not terribly confident doing so.

The original provocation of the exchanges (multiple different directions) on Tierneylab seems to be a study published in Lancet in 2006 (download a pre-print .pdf version of the study) and a debate at the 2007 meeting of the American Anthropological Association (see Tierney’s account here). The panel abstract included an explanation of how the presentations differed from what one might expect:

The panel includes for the first time, the critical “third wave” or multicultural feminist perspectives of circumcised African women scholars Wairimu Njambi, a Kenyan, and Fuambai Ahmadu, a Sierra Leonean. Both women hail from cultures where female and male initiation rituals are the norm and have written about their largely positive and contextualized experiences, creating an emergent discursive space for a hitherto “muted group” in global debates about FGC [female genital cutting]. (Note: excerpt of abstract from Tierney’s website)

I didn’t attend the panel; I’m sure I was somewhere else at the Anthropalooza, ordering skulls for MU, trying to viral market my book, or standing in line for someone’s autograph. As anyone knows who has been to the AAAs, it’s usually such a mass of hive-like activity that one quickly becomes overwhelmed by the sheer anthro-excitement of it all (or gets a splitting headache from being at the wrong panel; e.g., ‘…my original paper is 83 pages long, so I’ll try to condense as I go. How much time do I have?…’).

Patriarchal Australia

     Unfortunately we still live in a patriarchal world. All societies are patriarchal; in some societies male dominance is more visible; in others you have to keep your eyes wide open to ‘see’ the patriarchal system. A couple of articles I read on the internet made me think Australia is a very patriarchal society. The first article “Rudd rapped for ‘white-anglo blokes’ club” (Sydney Morning Herald, 26 February 200 is about the members of Australia 2020 Summit. According to official website of the summit (http://www.australia2020.gov.au/about/index.cfm)” The Prime Minister of Australia Kevin Rudd will convene Australia 2020 Summit at Parliament House to help shape a long term strategy for the nation’s future. The Summit will bring together some of the best and brightest brains from across the country to tackle the long term challenges confronting Australia’s future –challenges which require long-term responses from the nation beyond the usual three year electoral cycle.” SMS reported that the government appointed nine men and only one woman, actress Cate Blanchett, to the committee that will lead the Federal Government’s Australia 2020 Summit. Women’s Electoral Lobby spokeswoman Eva Cox told “she felt ‘sick’ at the committee’s make-up of nine men and only one woman.” Ruth Medd, executive chair of women’s advocacy group Women on Boards, said “It seems entirely unreasonable there’s not a better representation of women,” and “with the best will in the world, men can’t convey the views of a woman. Women … have got the right to be represented properly, we’ve got a new Government, a new broom, and … it’s a missed opportunity.”. Although SMH contacted both Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard for a comment, they did not respond. The link for this article http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2008/02/26/1203788313398.html           The second article ‘Reporter accuses Nine news boss of sexism’ (25 February 2008, SMH ) is about sexual discrimination at workplace. According to the article, Australian TV channel  Channel Nine’s head of news John Westacott has been accused of making offensive and sexist remarks to female journalists, and he is alleged to have told a group of female journalist at a book launch last year “To make it in this industry, you gotta have f—ability. To make it in this game, women have to be f—able,”. Nine Los Angeles correspondent Christine Spiteri made these claims in ‘an unfair dismissal and sexual discrimination claim’. Westacott is also alleged to have said “women reporters should do the ‘soft news’ stories”: “Sheilas do health and consumer stories, the second-break stuff (after the second advertisement break on commercial television). You want your blokes, your main guns, doing the real news stories,”. Christine Spiteri also claims “Nine has damaged her reputation by claiming she is not ‘good enough’ to host a news program, such as Nightline, having given the position to reporter Michael Usher, and that she is “unable to engage in serious journalism”. The link to the article :http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/reporter-accuses-nine-news-boss-of-sexism/2008/02/25/1203788223090.html also see http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/articles/2008/02/25/1203788288316.html           The last article ‘Bosses treating maternity rights as optional: study’ (SMH, 2 February 200 is about maternity rights in Australia. A research conducted by  Melbourne academics shows that there are “widespread ignorance or contempt for the unpaid parental leave standard, under which working women have had the right to 12 months’ unpaid maternity leave and a return to their job since 1979”. Employers undermine the work guarantee and they  “sack women or make them redundant while they are pregnant or on leave, or sabotage their return to work by abolishing their job or offering them an inferior role.” Sara Charlesworth, a senior research fellow at RMIT University, pointed out that “employers considered the legal entitlement an ‘optional extra’ and questioned how the latest push for paid maternity leave could be successful when the unpaid leave guarantee was so widely violated.” And here is the link to this article  http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2008/02/01/1201801034866.html    

Proudly 100% Australian

Like many newcomers to Australia (I am one even after three years), I find this kind of text in advertising and on packaging amusing and occasionally irritating. Why not “Proudly 100% Bangladeshi”? On the whole, though, this kind of product nationalism is less menacing than the varieties I know from my home country – at least it doesn’t look at blood –and it can pass for left-wing, environmentally conscious ”buy local” discourse rather than outright right-wing racism.

 But, as we know well from the history of the labour movement, the two have often been close. Yesterday, on ABC’s popular Lateline, there was a report of a union protest against Woolworth for including products made by Asia Pulp & Paper in its “ecologically and socially responsible” product line. APP is a Singapore-based company, owned by Sinar Mas, the conglomerate founded by one of the most famous Chinese-Indonesian tycoons of the Soeharto era, Eka Tjipta Widjaja. Most of APP’s plants are in Indonesia, others in China and elsewhere.

Although APP’s website says that most of its products have been “have been ISO 14001 and ISO 9002 certified for diligent adherence to both environmental and quality management” and has a special page devoted to “Sustainability and CSR [Corporate Social Responsibility] News,” it is widely condemned by environmentalists for destroying the Indonesian rainforest. Indeed, Staples, an office-supplies chain, dumped APP earlier this month for that reason. This is just what the union spokesman pointed out, adding that APP had also been condemned for its labour conditions — a claim not readily corroborated by an Internet search. The reporter declared that the bag of paper towels he bought at Woolworth did not say it was made by APP, “but,” he added vindictively, ”it does say Made in China.” The camera then went back to the union chap, who said, with an air of indignation, that it was not “fair competition” that paper products were made in countries where the environment and local workers were exploited.

So here we are the heart of the debate about the imposition of Western environmental or labour standards, the usefulness or not of the green/local/ethical consumer movement and certification, and whether these have the power of improving the lives of more people around the world than those whose jobs are threatened by the boycotts. I cautiously believe that they do, if they operate in an informed way. If APP, despite its certifications, continues to damage the rainforest or mistreat workers, then this should be exposed.

What worries me about this story and its reporting is that it equates Asia with labour exploitation, as if anything made in China or Indonesia were automatically tainted. Of course, blanket attacks against “made in China” seem rather too late, considering that probably over 80% of consumer goods in Australian supermarkets are made in China. But, though no doubt reflecting the fears of Australian workers, they also discredit the ethical consumer movement, whose idea is after all to encourage decent labour and environmental standards everywhere, not just where they already exist. And they smack of a new type of media-propelled eco-rights-xenophobia, in which China appears not just as super-polluter and a violator of political rights but also as the hotbed of industrial espionage, traffic in women and children, fake medicine, poisonous food, and sweated labour. No doubt, all of these claims have some truth in them, and each individual instance of possible abuse should be exposed and debated. But today, they are woven together into a giant conspiracy that appears to have a single teleology — viz., to conquer the world — and are beginning to taint everything and everyone coming from China. This is dangerous.

Betterplace.org

Some readers might be interested in Joana’s new project — about which she has been keeping modestly silent — the Internet charity platform betterplace.org, which matches needs (of any nature and size) with donors willing to help. THe platform has recently been featured in Die Zeit: http://www.zeit.de/online/2008/08/betterplace. If you know a project or person that or who deserves help, consider putting them up on the platform. (It doesn’t have to be an African latrine — it can also be a talented but poor student who needs money for a PhD scholarship.)

While I am at promoting Joana, I might as well mention that our new book Maxikulti is coming out on 3 March with Campus-Verlag. The book is a critical examination of “culturalism” in various public arenas, intended for a broad readership. 

Self archiving poster from Savage Minds

Is there anybody out there who reads Culture Matters but doesn’t read Savage Minds? No? Oh, just you Speculum folks? Right — hi! So look, just in case any of you haven’t seen this already, because I am such a fan of the open access movement, I thought it was important to direct people over to this poster. You can print it and hang up around your department to educate people about self archiving.

L.L. Wynn

Speculum (because it’s almost Friday [in Australia])

At Macquarie University, where the popular perception amongst the older generation is that student activism is at an all-time low, there was a bit of excitement when we heard that a student publication would be launched. We all fancied it would be the start of a new era of student extracurricular activity.

Well, today I saw the first issue. Jovan showed me his copy. It’s a glossy magazine. “It’s called Speculum,” Jovan told me. My jaw dropped. Jovan said, “Isn’t that…?”

Midwife and maternity crisis

Seeing as I have become mildly obsessed with what is going on with ‘culture matters’, I thought I might as well jump in and contribute. I am an MAA student and am mainly interested in issues related to maternity & motherhood. I am also interested in debates and issues relating to ethics, corporate anthropology and ethnographic methodology in market research… 

  There has been a steady trickle of media coverage over the last couple of months regarding under funded and understaffed hospitals, and the impact this is having and has had on women being placed in dangerous and traumatic situations during pregnancy (specifically during labour and miscarriage). With the recent media coverage of Jana Horska more and more women are coming forward with their experiences of being maltreated by hospital staff. And now, a growing body of midwives and other medical professionals are also coming forward and uncovering the severity of the issue. 

SENIOR staff at the state’s busiest hospital have threatened to close its doors to women in labour because there are not enough midwives or beds to cope with the baby boom and they fear lives are in danger.Angry midwives at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Camperdown wrote to the Herald to complain women were left to labour in chairs because the beds were full, and that they were asked daily to work double shifts to cope with demand.They said the maternity unit was down 29 midwives, and some staff were working three shifts in a 34-hour period.“Our maternity services are stretched beyond a safe working capacity. We are constantly … asked to care for more mothers and babies than is humanly possible,” one midwife, who sought to remain anonymous, said.“Patient safety is continually compromised … bed block is occurring every day. Delivery suite is constantly overcrowded with 14 women in an 11-bed unit and unsafe staffing levels.”She said staff had requested that the maternity unit be closed to new patients when full or overcrowded to ensure its safe operation, and that women be transferred to other maternity units in the area.            The rest of the article is here

This raises a number of issues along the lines of objectification of the body, compassion fatigue, perhaps even misogyny. The victims according to these articles are both pregnant women in crisis, and midwives (generally women). I would suggest that this also points out the current government’s inability to create strong infrastructure to support the results of policies, in this case of the predictable effects of the baby bonus and campaigns to ‘have one for the country’…  

M.Stockey-Bridge