Information Access: A Trope of the Library

Many of the core values of librarianship are geared to support human rights. As the ALA Core Values of Librarianship note, Intellectual freedom, diversity, democracy and social responsibility are perhaps most obviously supportive of human rights.

Diversity, at the very least, is a value that helps us to recognize the variety of sources and kinds of experience, people, and expression or thought that we may encounter, and reminds us not to withhold service, but to tailor our service to the community and its needs. Democracy, or the right to be heard by our governments, and have our opinions represented in public decision making, is an explicit value of both human rights and the ALA’s core values list. One finds a good deal of overlap, if one compares the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the ALA’s core values list.

But perhaps the most relevant human rights value, given what libraries have been in recent history, is Intellectual freedom, which cannot exist without freedom of expression and freedom of thought. There are certainly practical limits to a library’s contribution to such issues, but many basic functions of a library are geared to just these kinds of issues, particularly freedom of thought or intellectual freedom.

Intellectual freedom is preserved by open access to information, and the banning or burning of books has been the bane of most libraries historically. There are many examples, historically, but perhaps literary tropes are the window which show us how deeply this notion is buried in the public psyche.

A library’s support of intellectual freedom seems to be often at odds (historically) with socially conservative values, or so the long-running narrative tradition shows us, like in the case of Bertram Cates teaching evolution and finding not only community resistance but an actual full trial in Inherit the Wind (based on the real-life example of the Scopes-Monkey trial), or the more recent story of the illicit extension of library services to a Jew in Nazi Germany in the novel The Book Thief (perhaps based on the real history of ghetto book libraries; such libraries are discussed in some measure by Matthew Battles in our recent readings). 

If there are inverted versions of this trope, in which it is not social conservatives as we often think of them today that oppose information access, they may be more obviously found in works written during the cold war, like Orwell’s 1984, in the which the perversion and destruction of intellectual freedom seems to be the primary method by which the state dominates all of society. Another, example, Fahrenheit 451, published only 4 years later, in 1953, being the origin of inspiration for many dystopian science fiction works. In it, fireman is a title for men that find books and burn them, because they are contraband.

Other examples of this trope might include the scene in Field of Dreams where Annie Kinsella defends the work of the fictional author Terrence Mann,¹ or if we branch out to other kinds of media, the early Assassin’s Creed video games, which tell a narrative that is deeply concerned with the rewriting of history.

But we need not look to fiction alone to tell us these truths. A school board in Biloxi, Mississippi has banned to Kill a Mockingbird just 2 years ago (or, rather, elected not to use the book for it’s 8th grade reading), and this, with the reasoning that it “makes people uncomfortable.” A few centuries back, for several decades, Europe’s religious and state leaders killed would-be translators of the Bible itself.

As librarians, there seems to be a needle to thread– one in which we must convince public and patrons, and sources of funding, to not meddle in what libraries lend out. According to studies by the ALA, parents are the largest group of people that wish to challenge books or ban them, mostly based on the notion of protecting children.²

There may be limits to what librarians can do about other human rights, or human rights which seem orthogonal to the ones libraries hold dearest. But freedom of thought is not one of these– it must be a primary focus for libraries.

1. Field of Dreams. Directed by Phil Alden. Hollywood California: Universal Studios, 1989 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ur7pHRRKhV4

2. Banned Books Q & A. American Library Association. Accessed 24 Sept 2019. http://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/banned-books-qa

 

On Ideology and infrastructure

Infrastructure is expensive. That’s the way of things.

Major infrastructure shifts are even more expensive. And the U.S. in general has lagged behind on major infrastructure developments for about 40 years now. Ever since the Reagan era, no one wants to commit public resources to providing better infrastructure here at home— we hear the cry of “socialism,” and “big government.” This isn’t to say that we shouldn’t be very wary of socialism, or that big government isn’t a problem. But perhaps that shouldn’t push us away from being concerned about our infrastructure. We have spent more and more on wars and entitlements of various kinds, but with better infrastructure and better education, we wouldn’t need quite so many entitlements, and often, these wars are unnecessary, and products not of national defense, but flat-out imperialism.

Too many fight this perspective, it seems — and such is partially a problem tied to the intense U.S. cultural focus on localism and individual liberty.

Our public education systems are a messy patchwork, our national highway systems are incredibly expensive to maintain, and the need for road expansion just to have the parking for individual cars often exceeds our capacity, especially in the crowded Wasatch Front area of Utah where I live.

Limited government, and fiscal responsibility are important components to a nation that wishes to remain free. The road to serfdom is not only paved with entitlement, an ignorant public, a shrinking middle class, and corporate welfare, but also with inflexible ideology.

My experience and my instincts both tell me that ideology makes for bad policy — not because there aren’t effective and true ideologies out there. No — ideology itself, in its axiomatic inflexibility (not to mention the frequently inflammatory rhetoric so often intertwined in its presentation) is too simple to explain and account for the varieties of our reality.

Libertarianism, in all its anti-big-government glory, and its admiral wish to protect civil liberties above all else, can be blind to systemic societal problems. And the voluntaryism espoused by its adherents never can, by itself, make major dents in improving our quality of life. (And regardless of its effectiveness, voluntary is difficult to define– the definitions of “voluntary” and “coercion” are fuzzier than many Voluntaryists would like to admit.) The intense focus on individual liberties, and the disregard, disdain, or outright disapproval for any group action that encourages or enforces cultural norms — these negative reactions will destroy community, eventually.

Libertarianism, at its core, makes assumptions about human nature that treat individuals not simply as independent actors, but ones only minimally affected by the conditions of mortality, by psychology, by social conditioning. The zeal of Libertarians is infectious, and powerful, but too often, this zeal leads to blaming the poor for their circumstance — which may be fair at times — instead of finding systemic ways to lift them out of their condition — which doesn’t have to be fair or unfair to be wrong.

On the other end of the spectrum, Communism, and all of it’s Socialist cousins — are just as guilty, if not more so. Socialism, in it’s zealous desire to build a community that allows the individual to flourish without exploitation by the state or the corporation, does the inverse: it makes community meaningless — or simply annihilates it, because of assumptions about human nature that ignore or subvert any notion of a fundamental human nature, human roles or relationships. Socialism says: we can build new societies any way we want, and so of course we should. But this is dangerous when we perceive human beings to be more flexible than they really are — and here’s where it gets weird. Human beings aren’t a Tabula Rasa, or a blank slate — but this is the fundamental belief that socialist ideologies almost always purport — but individualists, including Libertarians, make this assumption too. This is why I’m drawn to conservatism as much as Libertarianism (although I will frequently agree with the latter group about civil liberty policies). I like conservatives because they believe in a fundamental order to the universe. But like a good anthropologist, I hesitate to believe in absolutes, and instead am more willing to accept that there are, generalities that will never fundamentally alter (I do not claim to be an anthropologist of any variety, but I do admire them at times). And like a good historian (which I do claim to be), I believe that context never vanishes, and that it always has significance.

Ideologies often focus on what human beings deserve, and I have big objections and problems with the very concept of desert (not a dry biome characterized by a lack of rainfall, but a social and moral concept revolving around notions about what ought or ought not to be given to certain people — or simply ought to be, period).

We have spent centuries studying both empirically and religiously, what people’s needs are. What we have never been able to do, is get any sort of real consensus on what people deserve. What people deserve can’t be studied empirically, because such study must rely on answering the is-ought question that philosophers have debated, politicians have assumed the answer to, religious leaders have conflicting messages over, and that business, and the general public, have too often ignored.

I don’t trust ideology. I don’t believe in Utopia (not of man’s making). And I hesitate to make drastic changes to society — such changes require intense study by experts and generalists, and should be made carefully and with precision and sensitivity.

But I do believe in progress. And from where I’m standing, it has been too long since American Republicans have believed in the same — too long since they’ve recognized what it means to truly be conservative.

Gun Problems

We have gun problems in the U.S. We’re not alone– many nations have gun problems. Ours are interesting in part because of our profoundly exuberant and resilient ‘gun culture’, as well as our constitutional protection of gun rights.

The right to bear arms has been argued to be both a private, individual protection of individuals against crime, of individuals and citizens against big government, and of course there’s the argument that it’s not about individuals so much as it’s a protection of the citizenry in general’s ability to form militias.

I don’t know which of these were meant to be protected by the U.S. constitution. Perhaps all of them are. I do believe that which of them is most valuable should also be weighed against the cost of fundamentally altering the original document by new amendments, or by radical reinterpretation (especially narrow interpretation) of the meaning of the 2nd amendment. Whatever the exact meaning of the 2nd amendment, it is embedded deeply in American culture, for good or for ill. Which means that discussions of gun safety, gun rights, and gun control are especially heated.

I have few ideas about ways in which discussion of guns in the U.S. can change for the better. There are 2 ways I know of to attempt to reconcile positions that are enormously different. The first is compromise. The second is innovation. They are not mutually exclusive. Gun rights advocates and gun control advocates need to stop ‘talking past each other.’

A stereotypical conversation about gun rights and problems might go like this:

Liberal: “We should really do something about these crazy shooters! Wouldn’t less guns and more difficult access to guns make it harder for them to be as violent?”
Conservative: “The 2nd amendment guarantees my rights to bear arms and defend myself from these shooters.”

These two haven’t really talked about the same thing– not yet. And usually the argument doesn’t get past this problem, although the particulars will vary and it may go on a long time. Liberals object to all the solutions conservatives propose, and vice versa. Part of this stems from the fact that gun violence is hard to study, and to some degree has been made more difficult by the attempts of the NRA to make gun studies harder to do, or to prevent funding for such studies. On the other hand, liberals are just as guilty as conservatives; they are notorious for ignoring or dodging the argument that says that CCWs, armed guards, and better police presence can reduce violence by making criminals think twice about what might happen if they attempt a crime. Conservatives and liberals both appeal to studies and statistics from various places in the world, but usually neither group accounts very well for the cultural differences or the contexts for many of these things. Conservatives will cite Switzerland as an example of a highly armed society where crime is minimal– but ignore the fact that the requirement for military service in Switzerland is very different than our military structure in the U.S., or they make the argument broader by claiming that Switzerland’s model of required military service would be beneficial. But that’s a different kind of claim. Simple small changes are easier to talk about than enormous shifts in military requirements, and the cultural differences between Switzerland’s historically (fairly) homogeneous people and the diversity of groups in the U.S. (and the ensuing cross-cultural internal struggles or lack thereof) are difficult to incorporate into a solid pro-gun argument.

Liberals on the other hand will cite countries in which firearms are effectively banned, like Japan or Britain. There are problems with these categorizations, too, the most obvious of which is Britain’s high violent crime rate– there is more to these pictures than liberals usually choose to portray. In addition, these arguments are not likely to even appeal to an audience that regards firearms as something fundamentally different from what liberals categorize them as.

Liberals see guns as a tool with a single function– and little nuance to that function. According to them, the gun is a device to kill with, and a handgun in particular is designed for killing people, not animals. And of course there are also liberal groups that don’t even recognize hunting as a valuable or legitimate activity, but that’s another argument entirely. But this is exactly where I think the divide becomes important– how we regard a tool, and the level of nuance which we give it.

Conservatives too, are guilty of ignoring nuance, as they portray firearms as simply protective devices for law-abiding citizens, and ignore virtually the entirety of the community and individual instances of the abuse of firearms in the name of justice, so-called ‘Manifest Destiny’, or again, ‘protection,’ that dominate the historical U.S. landscape, especially the mid-west, the west, and the south of the U.S. Here I refer to the attitudes that generate police militarization, a problematic development that in recent years has both libertarians and liberals outraged quite often. Some will want to dismiss this as unrelated to the issue of individual firearm ownership, but there is likely a deep connection between the issues, when one focuses on the psychology of guns.

Both conservatives and liberals ought to be more willing to attempt to grasp the values the other group has before they even begin to engage in an argument. Essentially, both groups approach the gun issue with a typically closed mindset about what they will or will not agree to as solutions for the problems we face.

Guns are a tool. Understanding what kind of tool they are, and the psychological implications they have for differing groups– these matter to the discussion, but they are seldom discussed (in my experience).

Previously I mentioned compromise and innovation as solutions to our bi-cultural impasse. Compromise is valuable, and I think with a better understanding of what each group values, all of us will be better able to come to compromises that we can settle for. But the superior component in this is innovation. Innovation tends to ask if there is another way entirely– some way that would allow both groups to have their way, or would redefine circumstances such that the problem disappears, or says both sides are wrong or insufficient– and sends them back to the drawing board. Innovation will help us. We must be imaginative if we want to come up with ways in which gun-rights and gun-control can be adequately addressed. I have ideas of my own, but I’d like to let them cook before I bring them to the table. In time, I’ll make a post on my own suggestions.

Parental Rights and the Public Education Classroom

Recently a Utah legislator proposed a parental ‘bill of rights‘ regarding the education of their children. The idea seems to be that parents will agree to be more involved with their children’s education, and will then get more of a say in how they are educated.

This is very poorly thought out (read: not at all). I’m convinced that this legislator has no idea what it’s like in a Utah classroom already.

From a theoretical perspective, rights cannot be had without the exercise of responsible behavior. As it stands, parents have little say in how the state educates their child, officially. I don’t approve of this legislator’s position, but it seems to be a response to the parental demand for more say in how their children are educated. In some sense, it would have to be contractual. In general, I think this would be disastrous, because we don’t have a society that gives parents pay enough to spend extra time with their kids’ teachers and schoolwork anyway.

We effectively outsource the education of our children to professionals because it’s effective. (This is not to suggest that innovation and adaptation won’t occur, but that there are at least some good reasons for what we do right now. I honestly wonder how effective it will remain.)

Teachers spend years learning how to manage a classroom full of children and get them to grab a hold of the information and skills they’ll need. They are trained on how to do this. Some of them are better than others. The only advantage a parent typically has is that they will know their children better (ideally), and therefore know how to adapt materials to their childrens’ needs. But I do believe that the great variety of experience and training of a teacher will weigh in heavier most of the time.

This is not to say that homeschooling or private tutoring can’t be extremely effective, but they usually ‘cost more’ in some sense. They require more investment for a parent anyway– in their own education, or in their willingness to learn alongside of their children as they move through subjects. A parent must also seek the materials for their children to work with, and find activities to engage their children. This is literally a full-time job. To be fair, I also wonder if

This is not to say that I discourage homeschooling. I encourage it, and am proud to be from a state that endorses and has a great support system for ‘dual enrollment’– where a student to can attend part of public school, but also obtain homeschool credits. (My current understanding is that this is limited to Junior High and High School, but I’m still learning about it.  Here’s a link with the legal mumbo-jumbo.)

This dual enrollment program is far more effective a resource than some parental bill of rights would be. And it is already in place. With that said, I’ll be watching this development carefully. If this becomes some method by which to prosecute ‘irresponsible’ parents, or it becomes clear that this is a ‘classist’ kind of a program that essentially widens the gap between children who recieve time and attention from their parents, and those who do not then I’ll have to condemn it even more strongly.

Black Friday as a Wholesome Tradition and Destructive Force

Yesterday I did the unforgivable. I shopped on Black Friday. To be fair– I was not up at 5 am, or 7 am, or even 8 am. I didn’t leave the house until 11:10. And furthermore, I had already decided what I was going to buy– and it was only one, relatively inexpensive item. I had been shopping for dress shoes for about 2 weeks, and had decided on one pair in particular. It should be noted here that my taste in dress shoes is a bit eclectic, and while I’m generally picky, I’m even more picky about my shoes. I drove to the mall, went to the shoe section of the department store, and asked about the shoes I had already tried on. I picked up a pair in my size (at a 65% discount), and went on my merry way.

Perhaps I can explain further. For about 10 years now, I have essentially espoused the position that Black Friday is a day on which one should hang out at home all day long. Which I have done, faithfully during that time period. And I still espouse the position that Black Friday is generally terrible and that it is not an event worth participating in, as a general rule. But I had a thought today.

Having studied some anthropology in school, I began to wonder how a cultural anthropologist would explain Black Friday as a… familial phenomenon. The stampedes of Black Friday, the wanton materialism are atrocious. The products purchased largely originate in places where working conditions, governments, and life in general are all pretty terrible for those involved of the production of our phones, shoes, t-shirts, toys, etc.

But some of this is a product of circumstances and infrastructure over which most of us have little direct control. And some of it is such clearly awful behavior on the part of the shoppers, that no one in their right mind would condone it, myself included. However, I began to wonder where Black Friday has come from. I’m sure there are many contributors, but among them are one that I’ve seen among my female relatives. My wife doesn’t shop for fun the way some do, but she really enjoys shopping with her mother and sisters. Women bond over shopping– I don’t know how that works, to my knowledge I’ve never experienced anything like it.

Women bond over cooking, too. And sometimes they bond over other things, like running/aerobics/yoga, or even particle physics, right? But, they like to do things together, and in some sense, Thanksgiving AND Black Friday share this thing– a common activity and purpose. In some sense, shopping on Friday is an extension of the family gathering that began the day before. This can be low-key and fun, or high-intensity and stressful, or half a dozen other things. My point is that it doesn’t have to be this awful, terrible thing. And it doesn’t have to be all about the deals and doorbusters. A friend of mine and anthropology student says that we should “Consider Black Friday to be not just a ritualized tradition, but a liturgical tradition.” It marks the passage of time, and the coming of the Christmas season– and shopping, for whatever reason, is something long associated with the Christmas tradition (even before the advent of our current version of Consumer Capitalism).

Here’s what I think anthropology might say: Traditions have a measure of stability that lend them both authority and a ritualization that grants them similar respectability. Cooking your turkey a specific way, or having certain games, or having Thanksgiving in a particular location– all these can have similar weight, emotionally speaking. But Black Friday has a couple of complications it adds to the Thanksgiving weekend.

First, it is changing and expanding rapidly. In this sense, I think I can say that it’s clear that Thanksgiving and Black Friday have yet to come to a position of balance. Because of this, some people are working on Thanksgiving that didn’t used to– retailers, mostly. (Combined with the recent economic crunch, and the rapid winnowing of the economic mobility of the poor, lower, and middle class in the U.S., this is particularly irksome, understandably, and I think that retailers and larger corporations would be wise to listen to their employees on these matters– I don’t really have a solution to that problem, but I think there are  systemic solutions out there, mostly because I believe in creativity and innovation.)

Second, enter the context of American Consumer Capitalism, which, in a general sense, pervades our modes of life in the U.S. This is not to say that there are many that resist this force, but they have not been successful in creating many pockets where it does not reach. So, the social activities of Black Friday are intensely driven by modes of the thinking that pit us against one another– in ways that could be theoretically (physically) harmless, but that are in practice the cause of many injuries, and it appears, even deaths, in the mad race for the newest, shiniest thing at the supermarket. Black Friday is not unique in that it is shaped by consumer capitalism, but it is still unique somehow as a liturgical moment in the American cultural landscape. This may be partially because unlike many other holidays, Black Friday is a modern invention not tied to the state (unlike say, Memorial day), and it’s connection to Christmas is tenuous at best, and virtually non-existent in some cases. It is a day whose sole purpose seems to be surrounded by, driven by, and immersed in the need to buy– to consume, to acquire– yet this doesn’t quite encapsulate it either. As my friend noted to me, “It’s not just a big sale.  We have those all the time.”

He sums it up well. “Black Friday is camping out in the cold so you can save 50% off on a game system — with other people. Black Friday is about pushing past bodies of other people in order to get what you want. Black Friday is about swearing at other people who can’t drive or drive recklessly. It’s about the insane, frenetic interaction with other people that makes it Black Friday.”

Somehow, Black Friday is both communal and competitive. It is a communal experience in that it has, with some pushing and shoving, made its way into the American liturgy, and therefore affects virtually all Americans (except perhaps expats). If one could hope for something truly positive to come out of Black Friday, I don’t see that it will be an economic benefit– at least not one across the board. Nor does it bode well for our cultural development. Americans are made up of such diverse groups, that this shopping frenzy is notably appealing across cultural divides. And yet it does nothing to truly unite us.

Truth in Storytelling

There is a power in storytelling. Our stories have the power to tell us the truth about the world, and reaffirm that truth in ways that change our behavior for the better. They can teach us things that are untrue, be they ugly fantasies, self-deception, false ideals– in this way they can be our undoing.

I’ve found myself watching a number of popular animated films lately. Wreck it Ralph, The Sword in the Stone, Cars, Pinocchio, Brave, Howls Moving Castle, and my all-time favorite animated film, How to Train Your Dragon.

I’ve noticed some patterns in the more modern stories. Perhaps they reflect the culture and values of today. This would be unsurprising. I intend to suggest something more radical, perhaps? My suggestion is that not only does that which is popular appeal to the masses, but that there are truths that can only be discovered through storytelling. While I do not believe in an axiomatic world, in which a single, or even a few axioms, can describe and work out all the problems of our world, I certainly do believe that there are fundamental components to human nature. Anthropologists, theologians, philosophers, and scientists may (and do) disagree on this point.

I am certain that the best of stories speak to us something true about ourselves– not you and me as individuals, nor society at large (which one, eh?)– but rather both at once. And these best stories will rise to the top. They will consistently be the stories that become timeless.

Of my favorite animated film I will say that the appeal it has is one of an individualistic culture. Hiccup, the main character, finds a way to be his best self– and in doing so, he also serves his community. He is a naturalist, an animal lover, and an engineer. His talents are in his ability to build and create, and his inquisitive nature and problem-solving ability. These, in the end, transform his way of life first, and then transform those around him.

Kennewick Man, Media Bias, and NAGPRA

Kennewick Man, Media Bias, and NAGPRA (note: I wrote this in the Fall of 2008, and got around to editing and posting it in Fall of 2012)

The Kennewick Man controversy has possibly altered the landscape of American archaeology and anthropology like nothing has before. It has exacerbated the already turbulent relationship between the archaeological community and Native Americans. In the realm of archaeological finds, it has impacted the American public more quickly and more profoundly than almost anything previous. It seems to be a sort of archetype of current American archaeology. Yet it is but one example of the U.S. Government’s and the American archaeological community’s interactions with the Native Americans. The history of American archaeology has been plagued with ‘racial science’ and disregard for the Native Americans, their desires, and their needs as peoples. The Umatilla Indians have struggled with the Kennewick Man controversy directly, including the detrimental effects of media distortion on the issue. On the other hand, there are increasing examples of American-Indian groups that could be said to be abusing powers granted them by the government where archaeology is concerned.¹ Media spin, unclear language in NAGPRA law, and inflammatory language and actions from both the Umatilla indian Tribe, and James Chatters, the initial forensic anthropologist to study the skeleton ‘Kennewick Man’, have served to make the Kennewick Man issue far more complicated than it had to be.

Before the introduction of NAGPRA (the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act), the various attempts of the government (and others) at protecting the Native Americans were largely ignored, thwarted, forgotten, or just plain ineffective—with the exception of the Indian Reorganization Act, which effectively dismantled the previous Dawes Act, and attempted to give the Indians some tribal autonomy and land base.² And although NAGPRA hasn’t ended all the difficulties—it has given the Indians some powerful federal backing. NAGPRA in a nutshell states that Native Americans have a right to a proper burial—mandating that all Native American remains and burial artifacts in government museums must be cataloged and available for repatriation to appropriate tribal organizations. Also, any remains or burial artifacts found on federal land that may be connected to a tribe must first be offered to said tribe. This is where Kennewick Man comes in.

Kennewick Man was discovered the 28^th of July of 1996 on the banks of the Columbia River during the annual hydroplane races. The discovery of a human skull on the bank of the river was brought to the attention of the local police, and eventually to James Chatters, a forensic anthropologist³. Chatters searched the area and found a very nearly complete skeleton. His first impression was that Kennewick Man was a settler from the 1800’s, based on the remains of an early homestead among the bones.⁴ However, as he examined the bones, Chatters found a spear point in the man’s hip. Such is unusual—especially for an 1800’s settler—so he sent some samples of bone to a facility to have radiocarbon dating done. The results showed that the bones were ancient—about 9,000 years old. This gave Chatters mixed feelings; this was an amazing find and there was a great story to tell that could be had from studying the remains, but it may not be told at all, considering that local Indian tribes might want to bury the remains, and could be granted that right by NAGPRA.⁵ Chatters was right; The Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation made a claim for the remains—as did several other groups, including the Nez Perce tribe.⁶ The legal logistics became complicated very quickly, and the lack of clarity in NAGPRA became apparent.

Many voices were speaking about the ancient skeleton, and not many were very clear. Of course, the news media listened to all of them—as generally it should, but often enough, put it’s own spin on things to attract attention. They drew some conclusions that, upon a closer examination, were ridiculous. A great example of this was the oft-quoted statement from James Chatters, “I’ve got a white guy with a stone point in him.”⁷ Chatters was often frustrated by the twists the media gave to the story, and repeatedly attempted to correct the notion of the remains being called ‘European’ or ‘Caucasian;’ he insisted that it wasn’t the case.

The Umatilla Indian tribe has ended up dealing with quite a hassle, and perhaps they were a bit of a hassle themselves. There are only two repatriations they’ve been involved in, and one has taken thirteen years, and has finalized in the repatriation of some human remains, and a number of funerary artifacts from the former Maxey Museum, now known as the Northwest Museum. ⁸ The other is Kennewick Man—which, as of 2012 is still in the Burke Museum in Seattle. They have the problem of skepticism toward their religion and their oral history and its validity. This is compounded by different voices, including scientists, politicians, white supremacists, and bad media confusing the issue. Even the Asatru, a Norse pagan group, claimed that Kennewick Man was their ancestor. The issue was blown so out of proportion and distorted by the media so quickly, that clear, relatively unbiased sources have been scarce.

A prime example of these distorted sources is found in National Review in July of 1997. There was an article published entitled “Devolution,” which stated, “Scientists believe that Kennewick Man may represent a people who migrated from Europe over a North-Atlantic land bridge, only to be later subsumed by Indian latecomers. (Might the Indian-style spearhead lodged in Kennewick Man’s side be a clue?) The Umatilla Indians would rather we not know.” This doesn’t present the Indians request in a fair way—instead of telling us why the Indians disagree with the scientists desire to study the bones. Instead they present the Indians solely as opposers of scientific inquiry. It may be granted that the National Review is not peer reviewed—but little that reaches mainstream audiences is, and such is part of the problem. We live in a world that is shaped and presented by the media—often very poorly. The aforementioned article continues, saying, “Although Kennewick Man is clearly unrelated to any American Indians, the Umatillas nonetheless may have a case under a post-modernist provision of NAGPRA.” It can claim such based mostly on ‘caucasoid’ traits forensically determined by the aforementioned anthropologist Chatters. But there are problems with forensics and morphology (study of bone structure) relating to the age of bones.

Scientists have also told us that skull shape and bone structure vary greatly from generation to generation.⁹ The idea that morphology can help determine a person’s origins or relatives has long been associated with racial typology—a touchy subject for this case.¹⁰ And although such does not have to be the case, and morphology can be useful, the terms used can lead back into racial typology again. In addition, morphology tends to apply best within the last couple hundred years, and by a thousand years, it can be pretty uncertain.¹¹ So the idea that such information tells us that Kennewick Man is unrelated to modern day Native Americans is fairly inconclusive—although it may point us in some interesting directions. Instead, it is more likely that Kennewick Man is related to a great many modern day tribes.¹²

According to the popular opinion, the inconclusive scientific evidence weighs in more heavily than oral tradition. It would appear that we have inconclusive evidence on both sides—until we look at the wording of NAGPRA.

(e) Evidence. Evidence of a kin or cultural affiliation between a present-day individual, Indian tribe, or Native Hawaiian organization and human remains, funerary objects, sacred objects, or objects of cultural patrimony must be established by using the following types of evidence: Geographical, kinship, biological, archeological, anthropological, linguistic, folklore, oral tradition, historical, or other relevant information or expert opinion.

(f) Standard of proof. Lineal descent of a present-day individual from an earlier individual and cultural affiliation of a present-day Indian tribe or Native Hawaiian organization to human remains, funerary objects, sacred objects, or objects of cultural patrimony must be established by a preponderance of the evidence. Claimants do not have to establish cultural affiliation with scientific certainty.¹³

Noticing the specific statements “geographical … folklore, oral tradition,” “preponderance of evidence” and “do not have to establish cultural affiliation with scientific certainty,” it can be concluded that such evidence is likely to be taken lightly in court, and dismissed—as it has been for the last 200 years—hence the specific inclusion herein. There are scientists today, who examine with great curiosity the folk tales and oral traditions of many tribes, finding clues to the past there, although this approach isn’t typical.

Religious claims are generally not considered as seriously as other, more analytical or science based claims are, for the simple reason that they often aren’t provable by in court, or in the lab. But when the Umatilla Indians ceded their lands to the U.S. Government, nowhere in such treaties did they cede their rights to their dead, or their rights to a proper burial for them—or their ancestors.¹⁴

It’s possible that Kennewick Man came from somewhere else—and thus is not ‘native,’ and so wouldn’t be subject to NAGPRA, but Chatters himself in an early interview said that he was probably born within 200 miles of where he died, and that he is very probably an ancestor of modern American Indians (assuming he had children).¹⁵

The Umatilla Indians claim their legal rights to the skeleton. Found on their website is some of the history of their legal struggle. One of their religious leaders, Armand Minthorn, says “…(NAGPRA)… as well as other federal and state laws, are in place to prevent the destruction of, and to protect, human burials and cultural resources.” He also claims the support of four other tribes in the northwest area, all of which have similar religious beliefs. The Umatilla Indians worry about destructive tests in particular and seem to feel that scientific testing in general is a ‘desecration’ of the remains.¹⁶ Many other tribes have made similar claims across America, but it is unusual for such an instance to provoke such heated debate among those in mainstream America—it is usually left to the scientists and scholars to sort things out with the tribes.

However, there are those in the scientific community that claim that many Indians are overzealous, vengeful, and/or unreasonable with their claims and requests.

So there are other parts of the story. The Haida tribe, of British Columbia wasn’t satisfied with the usual. From a publication in ‘Politics and Life Sciences’:

…museum workers and officials were required to participate in Native American rituals on the museum grounds for the spirits of the skeletons, as well as to attend a “Feast to Show Respect.” Another request of the Haida was for the destruction of casts made of some of the bones. No scientist will ever be able to study this large collection again.¹⁷

These sorts of seemingly vengeful acts may be what some scientists fear– the idea that their profession will come under increasing attack by Native Americans and supporters until the life is choked out of it entirely. Perhaps such is an extreme example– but their have been such clamps on science before in the United States—the Milgram and Stanford experiments in the 1970s. Both of these were also judged based on human rights. Such a position is supported by David Walker, ethnographer.¹⁸
The magazine Preservation, claims that “Chatters nearly lost his forensic consulting business because of tribal pressures.”¹⁹ If the Umatilla Indians felt that Chatters was threatening their way of life—they apparently weren’t entirely above threatening his. In fact, the first contact Chatters had with the Umatilla Indians after the discovery was a phone call from the cultural resources office of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation. It was an irate Jeff Vanpelt, who had been presumably informed by the Army Corps of Engineers.²⁰ Jeff seemed ready to tear Chatters to pieces when he had hardly had enough time to know what he was working with. Jeff continued to exacerbate the situation in other ways by being generally uncompromising and disagreeable, as well as by attempting to discredit Chatters and destroy his reputation with the Coleville tribe of eastern Washington, at which he was somewhat successful (Chatters had worked with the Coleville tribe cooperatively for years).

And interestingly enough, when it was granted that the Asatru could perform their rituals—it was demanded that they in no way alter the state of the bones, yet the Umatilla Indians had been allowed access to the bones, “Scientists complained that the bones were being tampered with in the federal storage facility; and, indeed, various ritual items had been placed among the bones and some bones were missing.”²¹ The concern here was that the cedar boughs in with the bones would ‘damage’ them, or change moisture content and make studies of the bones more difficult. The Indians also worried about destructive studies—and in putting cedar boughs in with the bones, it’s possible that they could ‘damage’ the bones—skewing information future studies—so it seems ‘damaging’ the bones is defined differently by each side.

It is interesting to note the lack of comparison from the media with regard to other ancient skeletons, or which there have been discovered 3 dozen or more in North America. References to comparable archaeological finds seem not to make it out of the peer-reviewed journals. One of these was discovered after Kennewick Man and is virtually unknown. The site was known to a few as “On your knees Cave,” and is in Alaska, on Prince Edward Island. When compared to the Kennewick Man discovery, the remains found in Alaska have been treated far differently. David Thomas uses the discovery in Alaska to provide a model for a hopeful future in relations between tribes and others in his book, Skull Wars.²² In stark contrast to the discovery in Washington, the scientists who discovered the remains in Alaska chose immediately to notify and work directly with the local Indians, even having natives as interns to help them with the study process. After DNA studies as well as other analysis, the skeleton was turned over completely to the tribes involved. Recently, Timothy Heaton, professor and department chair of Earth Sciences at The University of South Dakota, was invited to a reburial ceremony in Alaska.²³ >Such isn’t a far cry from what James Chatters had done for some time when dealing with the Coleville tribe.

There are many things that went wrong to make the Kennewick Man case such a problem. Many hope that the Kennewick Man case will be the last of it’s kind, but that isn’t necessarily likely. There are problems with NAGPRA’s vague wording, and lack of specific instructions in some areas. There are those Native Americans who now have political power, and will not seek to use it for useful and just ends—but may instead use it for retribution on those they consider usurpers to their lands, and desecrators of their ancestors. There are scientists that are becoming more aware of the Native American groups, and their needs, and desires, but struggle with how to compromise with them. And then there’s the media, who aren’t concerned with the resolution of the issue, nor an accurate record of what went on, but instead are trying to be as catchy as possible—even if it puts the wrong spin on things.

Yet there is hope for a more cooperative future, as demonstrated by the Maxey repatriation, and the dig at ‘On Your Knees Cave.’ There must be a compromise, and there must be forgiveness. James Chatters was mercilessly attacked from almost the very start, and it only served to inflame the situation. There were poor choices of words—one Chatters’ part, and more especially on the part of the media—in describing Kennewick Man, who later has been stated to be morphologically similar to any groups living today,²⁴ and finally there was confusion between the Army Corps of Engineers and those more directly involved in the NAGPRA legislature.

1 Elizabeth Weiss, 2001, “Kennewick Man’s Funeral: The Burying of Scientific Evidence.” Politics & the Life Sciences 20, no. 1: 13-18. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed November 29, 2008).

2 David Hurst Thomas, Skull Wars: Kennewick Man, Archaeology, and The Battle For Native American Identity (New York: Basic Books, 2000), 64, 182, 191.

3 Virginia Morell, “Kennewick Man: More bones to pick,” Science 279, no. 5347 (Jan. 2, 1998): 25; “A Conversation with James Chatters.” Friends of the Past. Available from http://www.friendsofpast.org/forum/chatters-conversation.html. (accessed Nov 22, 2008).

4 “A Conversation with James Chatters,” http://www.friendsofpast.org/forum/chatters-conversation.html.

5 Ibid.

6 Thomas, xxii.

7 Ibid., xx.

8 Becquer Medak-Seguin, “Umatilla tribe to reclaim Maxey artifacts,” http://www.culturalheritagelaw.org/news-issues/news-issues-in-cultural-heritage/umatilla-tribe-to-reclaim-maxey-artifacts/ (accessed Dec 1, 2008).

9 Thomas,105.

10 Ibid., 37, 113

11 Ibid.,232; Jeffrey Kluger, “Who Should Own the Bones? – TIME,” Time Magazine, March 5, 2006, http://aolsvc.timeforkids.kol.aol.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1169901,00.html.

12 James C. Chatters, Ancient Encounters, (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2001), 65.

13 “NAGPRA: Determining Cultural Affiliation within NAGPRA,” http://www.nps.gov/history/nagpra/TRAINING/Cultural_Affiliation.pdf: (Accessed Nov 28, 2008)

14 Thomas,235-236

15 James C. Chatters, Ancient Encounters, 65

16 Armand Minthorn, “Human Remains Should Be Reburied,” Ancient One/Kennewick Man, September 1996, http://www.umatilla.nsn.us/kman1.html. (accessed Sept 2, 2008)

17 Weiss, Elizabeth. “Kennewick Man’s Funeral: The Burying of Scientific Evidence.”

18 Thomas,236.

19 Jack Meinhardt, “A Bare-Bones Controversy ,” Preservation Online: Magazine Archives – July/August 2001, http://www2.preservationnation.org/Magazine/archives/arc_mag/ja01books.htm (accessed Nov 29, 2008); James C. Chatters, Ancient Encounters, 92, 93, 108

20 James C. Chatters, Ancient Encounters, 57-58

21 Meinhardt, “A Bare-Bones Controversy.”

22 Thomas, 270-273.

23 Phillip Carter, “USD professor to accept award at re-burial ceremony,” September 22, 2008, https://www.usd.edu/press/news/news.cfm?nid=1415 (accessed Nov 30, 2008).

24 Joseph F Powell, The First Americans: Race, Evolution, and the Origin of Native Americans, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 11. 

Publicly Funded Election Cycles — A Suggestion and Analysis from Ben

Today’s post is a guest post, and a method of ‘kick-starting’ a friend’s new blog; I am posting his first entry here. I hope his careful insight and analysis of issues is helpful and interesting. Ben is a long time friend of mine. He has Master’s degree in Public Policy from BYU, where he focused on microeconomic theory. He has worked as a financial analyst. His hobbies include math, Russian, Chess, hiking, and Ultimate Frisbee.

He entitles this post:

“How to Stop Money and Partisanship from Ruining Our Political Process.”

 

The Problems

Political parties

The politics surrounding the recently passed health care bill has brought public attention even more to a problem that has been steadily growing. Political parties have been growing stronger and generally less willing to compromise since the mid-nineties. This leads to politicians voting and acting in ways that appeal to various political parties rather than the general public. In addition, appealing to a party does not necessarily imply appealing to party moderates. Those seeking political office need to appeal to those who will vote in their party’s primary election, which is not representative of the whole party (not to mention the general public). We see the influence of political parties reflected in the party line votes that so often come out of Congress. When one party doesn’t hold a filibuster-proof majority in Congress (or if a party has a few defectors) we often end up with gridlock and no bill gets passed at all. This unfortunately means that our political system is more like a football game with a red team and a blue team, invoking all the hysterical behavior that football fans can muster.

Money in politics

Another problem we face is the influence of money on political campaigns. Those running for office spend large amounts of money on their campaigns, and those with less money seem to have less of a chance of winning office. Recently, the Supreme Court ruled that corporations can contribute to political campaigns,ⁱ leading President Obama to comment that this gives “the special interests and their lobbyists even more power in Washington.”ⁱⁱ

How much money is spent on political campaigns? According to a story by Politico.com, “the 2008 campaign was the costliest in history, with a record-shattering $5.3 billion in spending by candidates, political parties and interest groups on the congressional and presidential races.”ⁱⁱⁱ At the time of the writing of this article, Barack Obama had already raised over $86 million and Republican candidates had raised a total of more than $80 million for the 2012 presidential election cycle.^iv

The Solution: Publicly Funded Debates

We can weaken the influence of political parties and fix the problem of money in political campaigns at the same time. I propose we move to a system of government funded debates. Following is an example of how this would work for an election of the president of the United States. At the beginning of the debate cycle, people will meet at town meetings throughout the nation. At this meeting, anybody who wants may come to the front and explain why he or she would make a good president. People at the meeting can ask them questions and they can debate with other potential candidates as well. At the end of the meeting, everybody present votes for someone at the town meeting. The top two winners will go on to the district level.

A subsequent, larger, meeting will be held at the district level and those who won the town meetings will participate in a debate. After the debate, the people at the meeting vote again to select a candidate to go to the state level. By the time the debates are at the state level they will be broadcast on T.V. and voting will occur at polling stations. From the state debates, winners will go to regional debates, and finally about four or five candidates will appear in series of televised national debates. These debates will be followed by a (ballot) vote and the winner of the vote will become the next president.

Along the way, candidates will also have the opportunity to give 30 minute presentations of their ideas without facing interruptions or immediate questions from other candidates. (They will be facing plenty of that during the debates.) These presentations will have rules: the candidates will have equal time for their presentations, and equal resources available for preparing them. They will not be allowed to play music. They will not be allowed to merely slander their opponents.

Notice that this process says nothing about party affiliation of those who enter the debates.

Anybody with any point of view may enter the debates at the lowest level. Those who do enter the debates are required to follow certain rules. They will not be allowed to direct an organized campaign. If other people want to put signs in their yards saying vote for so-and-so, they may, but the candidates themselves communicate with the public only through the official debate process. This would be a temporary restriction of the candidates’ free speech which they would knowingly and willingly agree to so long as they choose to remain in the debate cycle. They are allowed to say whatever they want in the debates of course, but they won’t be able to call corporations or other politicians and promise political support in exchange for campaign support.

These rules governing candidates in the debate cycle will be enforced by an election committee. The purpose of this committee will not be to make subjective decisions about what people can say during a debate, but rather to set up and organize debates according to predetermined rules. As for questions put to the candidates, they could come from the general public, but the system by which questions are selected, among so many being entered, will have to be designed and planned, and so that may be left to an election committee as well. This choosing of questions should follow an orderly and transparent process.

Recent debates between Republican presidential candidates are a step down from traditional debate formats and could be described as “antagonistic press conferences.” The debates proposed here should be better designed. Candidates should be given adequate time to explain their positions, including complex positions. They should be given time for rebuttals and cross-examinations.

Analysis

Not every problem solved

The campaign system proposed here leaves many problems unsolved. In the first place, democracy has always had the problem that a candidate can make many fair promises to the electorate in order to gain votes only to do something different. Candidates would try to win votes based on good looks, good speaking skills, and emotional appeals. The public will have difficulty understanding the technical details which must necessarily be considered in order to make good policy decisions. Without technical details, political debates are often more about persuasively appealing to people’s ideologies, rather than a careful cost/benefit analysis of all available options. We already have these problems in American politics, and they are probably too hard to solve right now. The publicly funded debate system described here does solve some problems however, and it may be worth switching.

No more money in campaigns

The problem of money in campaigns would be almost completely solved. Whether or not you had a lot of money to contribute to a campaign would matter little. An average American could potentially become the next president of the United States. (This would be unlikely however, because other candidates would probably point out your complete lack of political experience.)

Weakened influence of political parties

The Constitution says nothing about political parties. They came into existence on their own. They are held in place by candidates’ need for campaign support. If campaigns were publicly funded, and anyone were allowed to enter the political debates and potentially show up on the ballot, regardless of party identification, political parties would be greatly weakened. Candidates could still say their political philosophy matches that of Republicans or Democrats (or Libertarians, or Socialists, etc.) but because candidates’ points of view would not be held in place by the need to appeal to a party base, these distinctions would become blurred. Without the need to identify with a party in order to appear on the ballot, the mechanism for keeping party ideologies uniform would disappear. Political parties would fade away. Few things could be better for our government than this.

“Third party” representation

There would be no “third party” candidates because parties would disappear. Nevertheless, those who hold a point of view that would, under the current system, be considered a “third party” point of view would have a much better chance of being elected. Right now we say that a candidate is “far-right” or “center-left,” etc., but under the public funded debate system, a candidate can have views from both the left and the right, and from things that don’t fall well into that dichotomy.

Taxes

In order to fund debates, some tax money will need to be used. Overall, the total amount spent on political campaigns would be far less, but it would come out of taxes rather than from individuals choosing to donate. Spread out over so many people, the tax burden per taxpayer would be very small, probably less than five dollars per year. It is worth this cost if it will solve the problems with our current system.

Need to appeal to everyone at once

Right now a candidate running for president can go to Iowa and tell the Iowans that he or she considers nothing in this nation more sacred than the right to receive corn subsidies. Then he or she can go to Utah and explain why nothing stands out more prominently in the Constitution than the right to personally own an AK-47. In the publicly funded debate system, the whole nation would be watching nationally televised debates. What the candidates say to one they say to all. While it is true that voters can find videos of what candidates are saying throughout the nation, most Americans do not have the time to follow all the candidates so closely. Nationally televised debates provide a good setting for Americans to listen to candidates’ positions explained in full in one sitting.

Change in media coverage

Should we implement this system of federally funded debates, the nature of media coverage of the candidates and their platforms would change. We would not see a series of sound bites from the candidates on the news every day. Candidates often play an image game where they try to make their opponent look bad by making fun of something dumb their opponent said, or digging up some third grade essay that their opponent wrote. The media loves to cover these entertaining antics, but what is good for T.V. ratings is not always good for understanding candidates’ views on the issues.

Sometimes people complain that the media picks a winner in elections. Indeed, more media coverage can lead to better name recognition and a better shot at winning. A publicly funded debate is a controlled setting wherein candidates get roughly equal time. Based on the way televised debates occur now, it seems more like a forum where arguments are actually made. By making candidates respond to questions they will have to address issues rather than merely play the image game. Furthermore, as explained earlier, debates could be better structured than the style already shown on T.V., to improve the quality of arguments made.

No more campaign slogans

Candidates will have to package themselves differently. Politics now is full of slogans possibly because it works as something simple that candidates can use to flood the media. Under the debate cycle campaign rules, candidates won’t be allowed to organize some massive distribution of a slogan. They have to look good in debates. Slogans would have to be mixed up with complicated arguments, rendering them less effective.

Higher turnover

This process will likely result in much more turnover, which could be a good thing. Incumbents would face a tough battle every election against the newbies. In other words, the value of political experience to winning an election would be weakened. Some might see this as an advantage because they don’t like the idea of having career politicians. Others might see this as a bad thing. Right now, members of the House of Representatives, who face an election cycle every two years, are incentivized to prefer policies with short term gains even when they are bad in the long term because they are worried about the upcoming election cycle. If we consider it a bad thing to threaten incumbents so greatly, because that threat will lead to shortsighted behavior in office, we can give them an advantage by not requiring incumbents to enter at the lowest level, but giving them an automatic bid to the debate at their level. They would still face a significant challenge at this level. This is an issue that could be further explored later.

Fewer people paying attention to politics

Because debates are more boring than sound bites, fewer people will pay attention to what candidates are saying. Right now, there are so many signs in people’s yards, sound bites on news programs, T.V. commercials, etc. that it is almost impossible to be unaware that campaign season has come. In the publicly funded campaign system, candidates will be restricted to the controlled debate cycle, resulting in less media coverage. Nothing will necessarily prevent political commentators from talking about the candidates all they want. Nevertheless, because the whole thing will be less festive, political commentators would not be able to find an as large an audience as they would during a traditional campaign season.

Fewer people voting

Because campaigns would not be as well advertised, fewer people would vote. We might expect those who are public spirited to vote however. These voters would be better informed about the candidates, because the debate system makes forces candidates to answer questions rather than play the image game (compared to what we have now). We would be trading a larger number of voters for better informed voters.

No pre-filtering

One might make the argument that candidates would be more technically competent under our current system. Part of gaining a party’s nomination is appealing to party elites, and these elites may have better political savvy than the general public. These elites want their party to win in the short-term and long-term. If party elites are partially responsible for selecting candidates, they will filter out those who appeal to the general public but lack true political skill, because they realize that a poor politician from their party will threaten the party’s standing in future elections. Individual non-party system candidates don’t face this kind of peer assessment.

Implementing the Publicly Funded Debate System

Implementing the publicly funded debate system will not be easy. Unfortunately, creating such a system would almost surely require an act of Congress, and no group would feel more threatened by such a system than Congress. In order to implement the debate system, the idea needs to gain widespread public support. Then the public would need to pressure Congress to make it happen. Since this still hasn’t been tried, it might be a good idea to try it in elections for local government offices first and work out the kinks. Once the system is working well, the public will be able to point to positive results as an argument for implementing the system nationwide. Right now, there is more dissatisfaction with the political process than ever before. This gives us an opportunity to change the system for the better. We should use this widespread dissatisfaction to improve the process for future generations.

Details need to be worked out

The above describes the basic idea of how a publicly funded debate system would work. At the same time, some details still need to be filled in. For example, what should be the rules for people entering the debates at the lowest levels? At a low level, an influential businessman could organize many friends to come to the debate and vote for him. This might make the low level debates into a competition to see who can get the most friends to show up. Also, possibly so many people would want to be part of the debate that none of them would have sufficient talking time. It might be a good idea to impose some kind of rule that ensures that only those really serious about contending for office would be part of the lowest level debates. Readers of this paper are thus invited to contribute their ideas for improving the system described here.

This paper contains a survey of areas that any campaign reform proposal might have on society, including what issues need to be thought about when implementing such a system, and how the change could benefit (or possibly harm) government decision making. One proposal for diminishing the influence of money on politics through publicly financed campaigns has been discussed, but many of the observations made here would also apply to other ways of publicly financing campaigns. Plenty of room is still open for discussion.

-Ben Warner

i This was the ruling of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.

ii http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/01/21/campaign.finance.ruling/index.html

iii http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1108/15283.html. The record breaking amount was as of the time the story was written in November 2008.

iv http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2011/11/2012-presidential-campaign-fundraising-update/

Educational Policy Discussion Without Pedagogical Context?

Paul Manna has aptly named his book, “Collision Course: Federal Education Policy Meets State and Local Realities”– the very title reflects the haphazard propulsion of educational endeavors in the US educational system. He details a number of frustrations with the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), including it’s tendency to lower expectations of students, rather than maintain them, or to distort the approaches of teachers, focusing on material and testing, rather than focusing on our long-valued, well rounded liberal arts education, or teaching students as individuals. The only notable lack in his analysis is that there is no explanation of pedagogy to contextualize pedagogical strains created by NCLB. His analysis claims three major positive influences of NCLB including a push for administrators, state officials, and teachers to narrow the achievement gaps between disadvantaged student groups and the rest of the students, the forcing of “educational bureaucracies to improve their technical abilities,” and in places where NCLB was adopted fully, necessary but difficult policy and administrative changes were pushed through because of NCLB’s requirements and Federal backing. His points are very well contextualized, although they may take a careful reading by readers unfamiliar with educational policy and issues in the US. His greatest strength is the balance of sources used to illustrate his points, and show the difficulties of NCLB. He utilizes statistical data, but complements it with simple explanations, and clear anecdotes, providing not only his careful analysis of what is actually going on, but including the public’s reaction to NCLB. While the book could easily be many times larger than it is, it covers the material well, and provides readers with a far better understanding of the complex issues, as well as the benefits and drawbacks, attending the No Child Left Behind Act.

The author takes some time in getting there, but he reconstructs the frustration over the restriction of available time and resources for primary and secondary teachers alike – and he does so with remarkable concision, encompassing the issues and providing analysis based on statistics. However, he does so only after reminding the readers of the various criticisms of the act. He quotes historian David McCollough, who asserts that history as a core subject has fallen by the way side because of the heavy focus on English and math. Others referenced by the auther claim that civic education is also markedly lacking, and even President Obama was quoted, saying that the liberal arts education his generation enjoyed is rapidly becoming non-existent for our youth today.¹

These reflect the common statements heard in newspapers, classrooms, and staff room discussions all over the US today, but Manna continues, explaining that these conclusions, although anecdotal, are actually well supported by most of the quantitative data available. Most school districts showed decreases in art classes as well as science and social studies, commonly dropping an entire hour or more per week in those subjects. He also details the exceptions to the general support of that quantitative data. He details the achievements of the Osmond A. Church Elementary and Middle School, showing the reader that it is possible to focus on a new, NCLB driven curriculum that is both geared toward improving English and math skills, while maintaining gains in all areas, and serving a typically disadvantaged student population.

Manna’s observations aside, the ramifications for teachers are enormous – lesson planning by itself was already a difficult task. Pedagogy as a context is never addressed within his work, but such is important to fully grasp the nature of the struggle not only in the bureaucratic circles, but in the classroom. Teachers struggle to include all students, and remember to ‘teach students and not lessons’ is complicated by these new restrictions and pressures. From a pedagogical perspective, one can note that the solution lies in complex approaches to lesson planning and presentation, as well as grading programs and individual attention to students. This raises the bar, not only for students, but for teachers. Teachers who have traditionally had the freedom to design their own lesson plans must be clever to maintain what freedom in that realm they can. If one knows anything about pedagogy at all, it is hard to avoid these conclusions, despite Manna never addressing pedagogy directly.

Manna also points out that despite many conflicts and “tensions” generated by the legislation, NCLB has also driven some positive changes, assisting the reader in understanding complex political and educational interconnections. The positive benefits from NCLB include a focus on what has been called in educational circles ‘the achievement gap’. It has been tackled again and again, but students from lower socioeconomic positions have consistently scored poorly on tests, done poorly in school, and often fail to continue their education after high school. Central to NCLB’s attempt to narrow this gap in performance is the requirement for states to divide their reports on testing results into student categories, including minority groups, students with disability, students from low-income homes, and ESL students.² This allows various government agencies, as well as local administration and educators, to monitor this achievement gap closely. Various looming consequences for failing to improve all (or the vast majority) of these groups from year to year (the term used here is Adequate Yearly Progress, or AYP) ensures quite a focus on the achievement gap, although that focus may or may not be effectively utilized toward improving student performance. His writing indicates that the legislation and the accountability measures in particular are flawed, but that the overall effect is a tension is generated within the educational system that is slowly changing our attitudes about how to go about education, testing, pedagogy, and administration.

Manna explains some of the nature of educational bureaucracies. These state and local administrative components to our educational system are varied across the nation, and examining the impact of NCLB requires that one look at each state individually. The act’s requirement for AYP meant that each state had to have a new accountability system, either in addition to, or as a replacement or adaptation of, their original system. Each state chose their own plan, and most, in seeking a way to measure this progress, actually contracted out that process. This complicated matters, because the testing agencies, while paid to do this, are certainly not perfect, indeed, they may not even be considered experts. This caused many school districts and states concern when inaccuracies in testing materials or grading processes resulted in problems with NCLB, namely inaccurate sanctions or poor ratings. Despite all of this, or rather because of these problems originating within state bureaucracies and their adjuvant contracts, the states have taken closer looks at how they measure performance, and who is doing the measuring. Most states concluded that their own systems were disconnected, disparate pieces, with little effective capacity for “tracking and integrating sometimes even basic information about their students and teachers.” Manna says that 39 states reported better data tracking systems because of NCLB’s influence. Some of these changes came with difficulty, as administrative and policy changes often do. This point, with connections throughout the book, is perhaps the best illustrated point, and the most necessary of discussions, if NCLB is continue in any effective direction.

Policy changes and administrative changes were also goals, for schools whose educational ‘culture’ was ‘broken’. On pages 85 and 86, Manna relates the common ‘restructuring’ moves made by many schools: replacing a principle, and occasionally other administrative staff, along with various teachers and other employees. He notes that the attempts made at restructuring were varied, some schools attempted very little, but others were able to use Federal backing to push through big changes. The explanation follows about a school shutdown and restart in Michigan. Manna draws a heavy contrast between schools’ typical actions (or lack thereof), and what NCLB actually seemed to call for – which few school districts utilized. Bureaucracies and state employees are notoriously difficult to change, or fire, yet NCLB attempts to change that. Manna is effective in explaining how NCLB makes that possible, primarily through the use of these anecdotes.

Smooth transitions and clear connections, here and throughout the work, exemplify Manna’s ability for tying examples and stories to the theoretical framework and interactions at the policy level itself. To create his framework, assumptions about human nature are made, but are never clearly articulated in a broad, philosophical sense; rather, they are exemplified through the various anecdotes utilized. The stories are wide and varied, and range over a variety of human behavior, pointing to a view that says humans are flexible and varied. Such is integral to his analysis, as discussion of human nature never enters the conversation. Instead, his analysis tells us that the way we structure accountability systems, conflict and confrontation, education and the classroom, not to mention testing for proficiency, all can have marked impacts not only on the students in the education system, but on the adults administrating it and teaching within in it.

1 Paul Manna, Collision Course: Federal Education Policy Meets State and Local Realities (Washington D.C.: CQ Press, 2011), 116.

2 Ibid, 23.

Bicycle: A literal and figurative vehicle for change.

Since April of 2010, I have been riding my bicycle almost everywhere I go. Occasionally I have borrowed the car, or hopped on the bus instead, simply because it was that cold, wet, or snowy, but I have largely been going to school via bicycle, even in the dead of winter.

Part of the decision process was that I wanted my wife to have transportation while I was in school during the day. I began biking to school for summer block last year, in what was usually an 8 or 9-mile round trip. I often wouldn’t come straight home, but instead would visit one of the local bicycle shops, Racer’s Cycle Service. There I met Racer (that’s actually his legal name, as I understand). Racer organized a group ride on Tuesday nights, going up to Squaw Peak Landing, along a road that varies between a 9 and 14% grade. This is very steep, and none of the riders waited for anyone– it was a bit of a race. I was dead last, every time. My poor legs didn’t have the stamina to keep up the sort of monumental effort it took to move upward so quickly (these guys were fast). The trail has an elevation gain of roughly 1600 feet, over about 4.2 miles, not including the ride to the trail, which is a very gradual slope that is almost imperceptible, at least most of the way.

It took me 40 minutes the first time I went up that trail, and it took me 35-36 minutes on my best time– but it was great cross training for the Logan Marathon that I did in the fall. Coming back down that road, we would fly, traveling at speeds I’ve never reached on my bicycle anywhere else– probably close to 50 mph (roughly 80 kph). Racer and the others always beat me by at least 4 minutes. I think that Racer was impressed that I stuck with it– week after week, dead last, with the hill practically wiping me out by the time I got to the top. Here I was riding a commuter/cyclocross/touring bike, while everyone else had some high-end, sleek bike that was at least partially carbon fiber.

Toward the end of Summer, in late July, I was hit by a car. I also had an accident coming down Squaw Peak road. Both of these made me rethink cycling. I decided that despite an auto collision that could have been much worse, and a solo accident that left me with internal bleeding which formed a hard lump in my side that stuck around for about 10 weeks, that I wanted to keep biking. The solo accident that bruised my side really badly was only 6 or 8 weeks before the Logan Marathon, and I wondered if I could keep training. But I was out the next evening, running a fiver with Ben. He thought the bruise was ghastly, but I felt much better after having run– especially the following day.

Later that year, after the evening group rides were over, it got cold, and icy, and snow, and wet. I decided in the fall that I wanted to ride through the winter, and I began looking for ways to prepare my bike for the arduous activity. I needed knobby tires for my commuter– which, although a little unusual, has become far more common with the advent of Cyclocross. Racer actually just gave me an old, halfway worn out tire that he wasn’t going to use, nor likely sell, which I put on the front wheel, for better steering traction. I put my fenders on, and cleaned the bike thoroughly  (I didn’t anticipate being able to clean it until the end of winter– too busy with school/ cold outside). My first ride in the snow was intense; I went 12 miles or so, down to Provo, and back up to Orem– most of the time I had clear roads, or would avoid riding in snow on days that it was really wet.

Riding in the cold was awful. I intend that next winter I have little windshields for my hands– even gloves couldn’t keep the wind chill out. Most of the time, my 180 ear muffs and my leather jacket would do the trick– on the coldest days I had to wear a hoodie under the leather jacket. Let me tell you, leather jackets are the best for keeping out wind chill.

After Christmas break, I was working in the writing lab, and a student came in. His name was Zac, and he was studying blue collar and white collar work, Marxism, and politics in general. We looked over his proposal for a conference paper, and I found myself very interested in his views. I ran into him later in the hall, and started talking to him– I found out that he was way into bicycles and interested in education, too. Education is a big deal to me, and we talked just about anytime I ran into him for a couple of months. We’ve become good buddies at this point, and I’ve joined the Provo Bicycle Committee, which Zac organized for the purpose of promoting tolerance and awareness of cyclists of all-kinds, as well as a love of bike culture. I love the bike committee, and I really like talking to Zac and learning about what’s going on in bicycle circles, both here in Provo, and elsewhere.

Fun times. Let’s talk about the changes that happened

Change 1: Even here in Utah, I went through the winter without using the car much. Between the bus system and my bike, I got everywhere I needed to go. I now believe that year-round cycling is possible in more places than I would have before. I decided that wherever I live, I want to be within 35 minutes of work via bike.

Change 2: I spent more time exercising this winter. I run three times a week, and usually after thanksgiving and before Valentine’s Day, I have a hard time keeping it up– especially because none of my running buddies (I’ve tried running with 4 different people) want to in the winter either– so I’m less motivated. This drop-off makes it harder to get going in the spring. This spring I took even longer to start up again, because I was so busy with school and work, but that’s beside the point.

Change 3: In the winter, it’s dark a lot– I had to get lights for riding at night in Autumn, and riding in the dark with lights is an interesting experience– it makes me think about traffic and cycling in new ways, although I haven’t thought all that through. I did read an article about a guy without lights who was hit and killed in the winter, which made me even more wary.

Change 4: After my auto-collision (low-speed, probably him at 4-6 miles an hour and me at 10 or 12), I decided that it was important that I learn carefully the traffic laws, and figure out how to be safer. I think the accident was a 50/50 fault, and the guy was pretty accommodating (he volunteered to help pay for a new rim, so long as I didn’t sue him– which I really didn’t want to do anyway). I became interested in bike safety and bike culture.

Change 5: I became converted, to a full-time cyclist, after meeting Zac and learning what it was he was doing for the community, as well as what communities in various places do for bicycles and how they benefit from bicycles (Amsterdam, Portland, Boulder Colorado). As Zac says, the bicycle is a literal and figurative vehicle for change– and I’m sure he stole that from someone else, but I now know that it’s true.