Crystal Huang on fb
3 hours ago
Had a farewell party for A (will be deployed) this morning in my Psychology of Human Relations class. Thanks to Ashley home-made delicious cupcakes, Bethany's fruit juice, Abby's crispy bars, Jake's chips, Amanda's gift and my safety talisman. Thanks to Audrey's flowers and movies. (4 photos)
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Crystal Huang Why teaching at a technical college is so unique, important, and surely challenging? One of the tons of diverse reasons is that the instructor gets to see students off to the battlefields once in a while...... It has happened to me several times... And I always joke with them - Please come back without losing any limbs or contracting PTSD which is no FUN, yes, with a whole piece to earn your deserved GI Bill for your education - even though I am unable to ask or explain: go to battlefield for whose real interests...in addition to "patriotism"??
Note- In my and my sister's case, not until 1995 when Taiwan instituted the National Health Insurance policy, could joining-military be the only way to support my parents to access hospitals and medicine -"free" of charge for parents' medical bills, because the Military Budgets (the most powerful, important, and richest Property of the Nationalist's Party) will take care of it, which were affordable only for a very privileged few (most of the China-Mainlanders, and a few elite Taiwanese) in my native country a while ago.
Interacting with students relating to these issues, there is a constant ambivalent, sometimes, oxymoronic, even, just starkly paradoxical situation, which is hard to express when you are teaching at a school where majority of students are from the working class, working poor, or some are underclass. A vivid example happening quite often is that some students know or heard off that I am a retired captain, severing military for 8 years. So, I guess that some taking my classes might be due to this connection through day-one self-introduction. For some of them would generously share the military experiences regarding the trips to Iraq, Afghanistan, or other domestic/oversea deployments with class and me. I could sense that they expected me to respect, support, or at least like Military affairs. In fact, I try hard to hold neutral views on this subject matter in the school setting. Once in a while I guess that they would like to hear from me to encourage young generation to be patriotic via joining military or address some conservative views praising the behavior being in uniform... and so on so forth.
Even more interesting things are that some instructors (my rough estimation, approximately, 50% of the whole, and could be increasing for the political climate has been changing, and keeping a job is always a priority...) who hold quite overt yet genuinely conservative views via daily conversation, such as against raising the minimal wage, enforcing the importance of free market- free trade-Capitalism, and surely anti-union and so on so forth. One of the faculty members always invites ROTC cadets or military recruiters to the classroom to do business, while his/her son is studying at an expensive college. Due to a group of faculty members sharing a office, one could easily hears even the lowest volume of conversation among faculty and students. One of the episode was that an instructor either argued or explained to a student that there was no racial issues in the US, but only ethnic conflicts. One openly proclaimed that teaching gender issues or sexual orientation was against his/her religious belief or bring in "baby-killing" visual elements to share with students...and so on so forth.
Now, returning to the military concerns- generally speaking, I try not to touch on "the specific type of patriotism", in particular, when some students asked me for advice regarding joining military... usually, I just briefly introduce German Socio-economist Max Weber's notion of LIFE CHANCES (another long story to tell...well, I had better stop here). But, I could give you an episode about how I made academic les faux pas.
A while ago during the end of War on Iraq, I taught an Intro to Psychology class. In chapter one, the textbook author used "Whether there was WMD in Iraq during Saddam Hussein's reign" to engage the psychological critical thinking processes. And the conclusion was that there was no WMD detected so far, according to the reasoning process of examining assumptions, discerning hidden values, evaluating evidence, and assessing conclusions.
Interestingly speaking, could it be my previous role as a military woman (as on the day one self-introduction-self-revelation) confounding some students' perception? I commented that if following this model of reasoning, the meaning and purpose of the war might need to be reexamined and reassessed...and so on so forth. "Seemingly, this instructor does not support the war/patriotism" - I could sense from the atmosphere- regardless the time spent on the critical thinking processes.
Then next day, I got a phone call from my supervisor that I was invited for a chat. In short, a student of that class, whose husband just returned his 2nd trip from Iraq, complained regarding her husband and her belief in their Patriotism to save Iraqi people's life and to implement democracy, and then felt in a Psychology class that the instructor should not talk about Politics and Sociology. My supervisor mainly said " You know where the students come from. Just tone down a little bit !" Tone-down was not difficult to do, but I surmised that it was another bigger layer of political operation going on in Wisconsin during that time as well. Briefly speaking, in this case, my academic faux pas was that seemingly I forgot "where the students came from..."?
In some situations, Technical Colleges' students' thinking capacity and behavioral patterns may have correlation to the "where students come from". But don't get me wrong. There are probably 10 to 15% students of each classroom, who are the outliers to this observation! Due to my day one student demographic and prior knowledge survey, I find a correlation between these outlier students and their family background, in particular their parents' educational and income level. As expected, yes, they are the minority of the school - the middle class students. In the nutshell, using the plain language, SOCIAL CLASS- is the biggest Elephant existing in the huge US room.
Here, let me add another tiny anecdote. It happens very often when touching on Social Class issues. Generally speaking, most students believed, as you know well- " We are 'middle class' (in a Technical College)" economically, while socially, holding strong conservative views, or implicitly deny that there is "Class" existing in American society. How deeply is Horatio Alger's syndrome or individualism implanted? How blessing could it be that " if one works hard, one can reach his/her dream - from rag to rich, and be anyone you want to be!" - still inspiring? How responsible does one have to be to bear all the liability of choices made in his/her life journey?...and so on so forth! Is it one of the most tough tasks for teaching sociology- being able to see Mills' "Imagination" to see the human society? In my sociology class, the most happy moment from the learning outcome is that some students without applying imagination could see social structures (not the social forces, yet), from small to big institutions. Seeing individuals contextually is the most delightful teaching-learning moment which is really a challenging task in a capitalistic individualists' society.
The phenomenon of the intertwining between economic and social issues intersect with class and gender (surely, welcome to add on the racial dimension), can be effortlessly explained by Dr. Michael Parenti (This is his website) in one of his recent posts (the last part of the writing, see below, though focusing on female gender). Here it goes:
"Someone (a woman) asked why any woman in her right mind would lend her support to the Republicans. Here is my conjecture:
GOP women who come from an affluent background are as interested in preserving and advancing their class prerogatives and privileges as their men are. They have money and servants and nannies and numerous other comforts and support systems. And they live so well, travel to luxurious places and choice vacation spots. They have their needs well met, with no trouble getting an abortion under the best conditions when they want one.
They send their kids to the best schools. They and their entire family enjoy the top medical services. One could go on. Struggling over feminist gender issues and wage equality is, well, just not to their taste. Don't take my word for it, ask Nancy Reagan or her affluent GOP sisters.
Of course, my remarks do not explain why poorer, working class women vote GOP. What they have is what we call "false consciousness" i.e., voting against your class interests because your political (mis)understanding has injected you with fears about gay marriage, or legal abortion, or immigrants, or environmentalists who might get the factory shut down, or people who are not super patriotic enough or not religious enough. So the upper crust GOP women can be as wedded to their privileged life as their men, and the poorer GOP women can be as misled and impassioned around deceptive issues as their men. Fox news does an effective job on both groups."
about an hour ago · Edited · Like · 1
Crystal Huang The 2-year Technical College is very close to the epitome of the human society. (It never occurred to me when I taught at the Wayne State College and UW-Stout, the very much traditional type of educational setting).
2 hours ago · Edited · Like · 1
Crystal Huang Today in my sociology class, students were interested in the concept of Meritocracy (relating to natural inequality, man-made inequality-including more justifiable inequality and unjustifiable inequality for life chances which feed the opportunities for many types of social mobilities). Here is a good example - some students have to go to battlefield in order to be able to attend college (more common is that students work several part-time or odd jobs); while, some others, mom and dad beg their babies to attend college with the FULL Scholarship from Parents and Grandparents, surly, that can be traced back to all the great-great-grand.. as well:)!
about an hour ago · Edited · Like · 1
