CONVERSATIONS IN MAINE 2004

I hope these very fragmentary notes will give a sense of this summer’s conversations with two very different groups – the first twice as large as the second.
1 One of the main goals of our conversations was to help clarify priorities for the Boggs Center in the light of what time it is on the clock of the world, our history and what we have been doing in the last few years.
2 Articles and excerpts from Gar Alperovitz on America Beyond Capitalism, Maria Mies and Vandana Shiva on EcoFeminism and Subsistence Perspective, and by Jimmy Boggs on Blacks in the Cities and the Next Development in Education were circulated in advance. (See attached)
 3 The Conversations took place on the eve of the presidential election, the Michigan vote on gay marriage, and the Detroit vote on who will run the public schools.
4 More Detroit Summer youth and more Boggs Center Board members participated this year than in any previous conversations in Maine.

FIRST ROUND: 8/18-20/04
1. The Local and the Global.
David (BOSTON NOAR): Tough to educate kids these days. Emphasis on testing. Dangers of fundamentalism.

Shea: At 3rd World Social Forum in Mumbai, I was impressed by confidence of the people who are acting locally.

Rick: Local action doesn’t affect power.

Emma: It has to be 1-1.

Steve: Need to be thinking about building Movement for empowerment.

Shea: Need to think about Power from a different base, e.g. Starhawk. Recognize MNC’s assault on people and resources, e.g. taking water from everywhere and inability of national governments to withstand. Growing resistance from Brazil, India et al.

Rick: no longer state-to-state , e.g. Chiapas.

Shea: Sit-ins started locally at Greensboro N.C. Feb. 1, 1960; then sprang up all over South.

Grace: Importance of small actions that are rooted in reality and therefore spread organically. Quantum approach, as contrasted with Newtonian (incremental).
Mission of Center: Clarify this relationship of Local to Global, new concepts of power, of development and role of state.

II: At the community level
Shea: 2nd WSF in Brazil in 2003 was attended by Embry, Angela, Will, Yamini, Kevin. 3rd WSF in Mumbai in 2004 by me, Lee,Christina, Jane, Yamini and mother. 120,000 people inc. 11,000 from global North.
(a) I had assumed national govts were focus of initiatives & had no idea how grassroots had given up on corrupt national govts, were no longer thinking in terms of nation-state. Massive organizing going on among Untouchables. Met Sri Lanka accountant who gave up his corporate job to work with wife’s little coconut bowl business.
(b) Widespread recognition of U.S. destructiveness, arrogance, unilateralism, not only Iraq war but refusal to honor Kyoto Treaty, World Court.

Janice: Is best use of my energies going door-door in Huntington Woods?
Rachel: Like idea of focusing on community level. So many ways we can organize locally. Even if Kerry wins, we’ll need to help ourselves rather than expect everything will be done for us.
 

Rick: Since 1983 MNCs have taken over govts. What forms of activity & organizing create a basis for ongoing community building?
 

Shea: Need to build international consciousness at local level. We have not done enough to help young people think about international connections , how what we’re doing in Detroit is part of new global movement. In workshop with Americorps volunteers at Access, (almost all of M.E. descent) I encouraged them to tell stories of their families of origin to get sense of community strengths rather than deficits only.
 

Rick: SOSAD and Kucinich.
 

Janice: Importance of story-telling.
 

Shea: Sanctuary movement during Central American Solidarity struggles.
 

Rachel: When you’re so deep into hopelessness, it’s hard to think outside it.
Impt to share stories of successful community struggles, e.g. Michelle Lin’s
little book.
 

Kibibi:The hopeless are the ones who most need these stories.
Grace: Civil rights movement grew out of people testifying, i.e.telling stories of their experiences; So did women’s movement.

III. Gay marriage: a wedge issue
 

Michelle Brown: Co-Chair, Coalition for a Fair Michigan. Petition for amendment to ban gay marriage will be on ballot in November. More than gay marriage is at stake. This is a defining time. How are we going to live together? In beloved, inclusive, diverse communities? Or by demonizing “the other’? What kind of country are we building? A new America where everyone belongs? The rightwing is exploiting worsening conditions, fears and insecurities to spread fundamentalism/nationalism and to create antagonism. Religion/church is becoming new drug of choice.
 

Rachel: People are not aware of what we have to put up with, the rights denied us. Americans hate conflict, are afraid to talk about this issue or take a stand. But if we give people an opportunity to talk about it, it is amazing how many people have family members who are gay and who want fairness for everyone.

Shea: The rightwing is desperate. They’ve lost every battle for 40years: Civil rights, Vietnam, Women, Iraq.
 

Rick: Opposite of fear is dialogue, conversations to create community.

Vote for Fairness! Speak up for Fairness! Dialogue to Create Community.
 

Michelle: It’s not just November 2. Win or lose, we create a process.

(Emma: I liked this conversation best).

IV. Detroit Summer with Shea, Grace, Mariana, Rachel, Kibibi, Niles.
Shea/Grace: Summary of why/how Detroit Summer was founded.
Rachel: This year there were too many 14 year olds, some paid. Lack of clarity about purpose. None had to apply.

Shea/Grace :In early years everyone had to apply. We were afraid college kids would overwhelm high school kids, but then we got folks like Julia,

Becca. Our explicit goal was creating a Movement. In Orientation we discussed difference between Program and Movement. Importance of not being paid. E.g. Tracy in Commitment Newsletter.
Smaller group, more adults involved, less complicated projects. Kids helped to define projects. Projects are now defined in advance. E.g. This year we had worked out Courtyard project, didn’t engage kids’ creativity.

Mariana: Where did these kids come from? What are kids in Detroit looking for?

Rachel: Some were there because their parents wanted babysitters.
 

Niles: To be part of social change, must want social change.. There are so many kids out these whose talents are going to waste. Need to say to kids: “You just can’t sit there and do nothing while your community is falling apart. Begin building a network of friends.”

Grace: Maybe we need to see Detroit Summer more in connection with the ongoing/deepening school crisis, the catastrophic dropout/incarceration rate, and urgent need for paradigm shift as described in Jimmy’s speeches on Education.

Rachel: Need to start with kids, their real life stories, their passions. If you’re not happy about school, about your community, come and talk with us. We want to hear your ideas.

Mariana: Dialogues were too much like school. Gave answers rather than encouraged questioning.

 
On the Side
Mariana: RETC was important to me because it was forward looking but also provided a sense of the past. My heart was asking questions and it provided exactly the information I was looking for.

Shea: Kevin Early and I did diversity training with a group of teachers, 90% African American, 80% women. When we asked them about problems, they reported “None” because they were framing problems in terms of Race and saw themselves as “all alike.” But when we asked them about “tensions,” they described problematic relationships between older and younger teachers, between Christians and non-Christians, between those living in Detroit and those living outside of Detroit, in the neighborhood and not in the neighborhood, English speakers and Arabic/Asian speakers. There were huge gender issues, violence against women, women fighting one another.

 SECOND ROUND: 8/23-8/27/04
1. Another Detroit Summer discussion (inc. Marianna & Niles before they left by bus)
Marianne: What are kids in Detroit looking for? What would they like to change? Maybe we should begin by asking them to write answers to these questions. Discussions this year were not connected to these questions.
Shea: How connect Detroit Summer with crisis in schools? Last year Yamini wrote EPA project, got CFA students involved in soil-teating project.

Scott/Emily: got funding for Asian Day Project. UofM already had connection with
Hmong community, Young people were bored, hungry to do things together outside of home and not just in parents’ businesses. Wanted to meet other youth. Parents saw it as community-related. We also offered a scholarship.

Scott: Who were the kids in Detroit Summer? How did we end up with them?

Soh: Parents wanted them in Detroit Summer, but didn’t see D.S. as alternative.

Shea: Media center is critical.

Mariana/Soh: Youth leaders didn’t do better with D.S. youth than “leaders” usually do.
Shea: In past each group elected its own leaders (2 facilitators one with experience,one without)

Emily: Maybe we are replicating the hierarchy of schools.

Niles: Kids at 15 are at age when they need to be doing for self.

Shea: Youth don’t see schools in crisis, not looking for an alternative, just want to get out of a bad situation, vote with their feet against school.

Mariana: But there are some kids who are looking.

Scott: City youth come in very different forms: In past D.S. has been most successful with “good”, potentially middle class students like Julia. What about neighborhood youth who feel completely dissed by system? How do we develop the Desmonds? 

This year we have opportunity to re-evaluate. I would like to see smaller groups, fewer projects, more bonding with staff, more structured program for leadership development. Need to reconstitute a Board, talk to Alumni like Julia, Becca
2. Where we are in our personal lives, jobs, choices, life styles, health issues.

Shea: With my mother’s illness and going back and forth to Ohio every weekend I’m at the point where I have to rethink time commitments. What about D.S? Boggs Center? My writing?

Emily: Teaching has given me resources, e.g for dental work. Need to think through questions about teaching, writing, community work, myself.

Soh: Feeling uncertain about direction of my life. Concerned about whether I need a job that provides health care.

Michelle: After graduation wanted to be in Detroit, was fortunate to get a job with non-profit, community-based, but not really my community. Trying to work out balance between working for pay and community work. Still trying to make choices, Should I go to graduate school? . How much time should I spend in Detroit? 

Scott: Trying to figure out how to connect my teaching with community work, e.g. bring resources to Community work..

3. Subsistence Perspective/ Ecofeminism/America beyond capitalism

Scott: A different way of thinking about Revolution and Work e.g. Isleford Potter/Artist charges $5 each if she sells one pot, but $20 each if she sells 100 because that means she has to spend so much of her time non-creatively. Poverty has been seen as cause for radical change, whereas the situation is much more complex.

Michelle: Didn’t realize these ideas actually had a name: EcoFeminism..

Emily: In my class we spent a week talking about Filipino culture. Everybody in barangay (or boat) has community responsibility. How do we form a learning community – instead of competing. Students can grasp this model. 

Shea/Grace: Most people under 30 have no idea of what a community looks like. Before WWII a lot of food came from home gardens, bread was baked at home; a lot of health care depended upon neighbors and elders in the community and eating home-cooked (rather than processed) food. As urbanization/suburbanization and professionalization increased, after WWII and GI Bill of Rights,have become dependent upon experts. Today 48% of household expenditures for meals goes to restaurants. New immigrant communities still retain features of pre-WWII America.

Scott: U.S.Communities are now mostly intentional (mostly white middle-class). The northeast side Hmong community where we have done work in Asian Day Project is a real community of working poor. Tensions between Hmong youth and African American youth. Community garden/coop could play important role.

Grace: In Power of Ideas we discussed the little book, Seedfolks by Paul Fleishman. I wrote a column about it, entitled Growing Vegetables and Spirituality.

4. November Elections
Scott: I Remember voting for first time in 1988. Young folks think of elections as “politics” that don’t make much of a difference in their lives. But there are intense feelings about this election.

Michelle: Going to NY for Rep.Convn. Trying to think how to be active in Detroit, how to get Det. Summer youth involved. 3-tiered approach: Inform voters (Voters Guide) and Voters Bloc. 2 main events: End of Sept. and after election (show that you voted). Young folks don’t see election making difference.

Grace: The challenge is to recognize validity of their rejection of electoral politics and at the same time mobilize them to get involved. It means that we have to ask them to do more than vote.

Shea: 2000 election showed need to call for international monitoring of election.

Grace: Organizing young folks to demand monitoring and to watchdog elections
themselves is the kind of strategy that creates a form of “dual power.” Does it help to recall the struggle in Germany between Communists and Social Democrats over whether to form United Front to oppose Hitler? Communists took (ultraleft) position “After Hitler comes us.”
 
Shea: Bush & Co. are manipulating Fear and Guilt. In “The Rhetoric of Hitler’s Mein Kampf” Kenneth Burke (in accordance with his dramatistic interpretation of history) said Hitler had tapped into deep guilt of Western culture. Polluted environment requires redemption by assigning responsibility.

Grace: Built into U.S. patriotism is chauvinism, insecurities. Need to project healing values like fairness that Americans also identify with.

5. Another discussion on Detroit Summer
Late Thursday night, after Shea had gone to bed, we had another discussion on Detroit Summer. Based upon that and previous discussions I talked to Shea the next morning, suggesting that we recognize that Gerald’s death, the contradictions from EZ grant and this year’s discussion point to need to recognize Det Summer’s accomplishments and move to new stage:
1. begin making more direct connection between Detroit Summer and deepening school crisis. Try to get Gardening program into individual schools as Gerald was doing. (Howe, Holbrook).  Aretha Marshall, retired DPS official, was visionary behind Catherine Ferguson Academy. AC3T is way of getting mural program into schools.
2. Work with Hmong community (an organic community)
3. Develop youth leadership through involving them in organizing to create community in Cass Corridor/Core City neighborhood where Becca and Jamal and Rachel and Kibibi will be living and where a lot of housing is being rehabbed and new housing is being built but where nothing has been done or is being done to create community, e.g. bike and pedestrian traffic/ skills exchange, involvement in local schools.