The Unbearable Lightness of Being is a book that is many things to many people. To me, it is an exploration of how much our lives weigh. Do we, as Nietzsche suggested, come back again and again through eternity? Or, as Kundera asks in his novel, do we only live once and that's it? Both are compelling propositions, but the latter gives us a lot to think about--if we only live once, do our feelings, thoughts, works, and relationships have tremendous importance because we will only happen once, or do they have practically no importance at all, since in the grand scheme of things we won't be here for long?
Certainly, this gives me something to think about as a friend, husband, community member and father...but it also makes me think about who I am as a colleague, both to those I work with on a day-to-day basis and those with whom I collaborate and learn from throughout the world.
I wonder the same thing about the work we do in organizations. In my case this means the University of Missouri, where students and now faculty are trying to stand against hatred and intolerance by making our individual and collective commitments more visible. You can read a little more about One Mizzou here: http://www.themaneater.com/stories/2011/3/22/one-mizzou-set-begin-april-7/. The tag line for One Mizzou is "ONE MIZZOU. A culture of respect and responsibility. Many communities. One family. One Mizzou," and while such a statement in various forms has been in university documents for some time this is a more focused response to the racist crimes that have taken place here over the past two years.
I'm on board with this effort. I recently signed a statement avowing my commitment to these values that will be published in a few places and put up on the Internet (I believe). A few hundred of my fellow faculty members have done the same--several in my department and college, I'm proud to say. But... though it feels like it could be the beginning of an important social movement, I wonder...
What is the weight of my (and our) actions--are they light or are they heavy?
How do we make a cultural change in an organization that is, by it's very nature, transient? Students come and go, faculty come and go, administrators come and go, initiatives come and go--so by what means and to what end do we do the work shifting a culture?
I have two thoughts on that. First, I know there is value is visibly and consistently standing up for what I believe is right, when what I believe is right is in part a counter-culture. Mizzou, like many predominantly white-serving institutions, has come a long way but has not done enough to identify and interrogate institutional racism. Of course, there are other oppressed peoples and groups in such an institution, and the place has work to do in terms of sexual orientation, gender equity, ethnic discrimination, ageism, graduate student rights and many others. As a white man, as an ally, I feel it is important that I go beyond being "sensitive" to "their" issues and instead walk visibly in solidarity, supporting quietly and loudly when required (and I'm still learning what that means). Second, I believe that proximity and redundancy matter. By proximity, I mean that there may be only a few of us doing this kind of work in the College of Education, but like concentric circles rippling from a raindrop splash on a pond, we will influence our students, who will then influence others, and so on. By redundancy, I mean that maybe signing a One Mizzou petition feels in itself like a small thing, but when I saw over a hundred names it gave me heart--I was looking at a potential social network of people who want to, in the words of Ella Baker, "become the change they wish to see."
Mizzou One is a seed, it's up to the rest of us to care for that seed if it is to become a tree, and then a forest.
Back to the concept that I introduced at the beginning of this post, are my actions heavy or light? I think they are both--heaviest to those closest to me, and lighter to those further away. I'm not a tree, I'm not a forest...I'm a raindrop, splashing into the pond of the people in my life and into the organizations in which I work.
“Our schools are a vignette of how man, in the development of civilization and its core institutions, has managed to ignore or disregard some of the most compelling aspects of his own nature. But how long can we go on this way?” Edward T. Hall
Many communities. One family. One Mizzou," Holi quotes and while such a statement in various forms has been in university documents for some time this is a more focused response to the racist crimes that have taken place here over the holi messages past two years.
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