Vision

As we are approaching the end of semester, we stand at the cross rod to really think back and evaluate what we have done this semester.

Last Thursday, when were discuss a text about participatory action research by Lois Weis and Michelle Fine in Working Method, we touched based upon many critical questions about the effects and purpose of our art workshop in prison.  I want to expand more on that topic as well as our last workshop.

Firstly, one valued was emphasized was to be able to challenge the traditional power relationship. Such a statement was very easy to say but hard to execute. In our case, two groups of women were brought together and doing the same art project corporately. Various background and social status were mixed in the room and conflicts were expected. I don’t know which group benefits more from such a gathering. However, we can’t that each one us were able to see a different side of the concept were talking about form others, For me, even their positions in this society were inmates. I was able to, for the first time, to have “real-life” interpretation of what dies justice system do to individuals’ lives.

I am really trying to make up the two posts I missed for Barb’s class

I think want to reflect more on the last last Friday’s discussion about looking-glass identity transformation inside the prison. The reading was very comprehensive and easy to read however the indications behind all text are very provoking and indeed caused many disagreement and tensions.  

Two important things were mentioned throughout the text which I think are really relevant to our conversation: labeling and rehabilitation.

This memo, I was trying to emplore the similarities and differneces between our Canery visits and Visiona dn Alliance in Offending women. I found when comparing either two of these three, many interesting anf similarities appear. However, the length of the porgrma made the final differnece. I am not sure whihc road( the porgram) will take womne furhter.

In the first week's memo, I talked about viewing the issues of disadvantagous class with differnet lences. Through the socialeconomic lence or historical lences, we will be able to see the differnece elements that might not be as obvious as it should be in other lences. Also, it's important ot consider question from various perspectives.

I totally forgot to post my image and caption with my second Memo so here it is now:

I had been thinking a lot about the disconnect between how our incarcerated classmates see themselves as responsible for their positions vs. what we know about the injustices of the Prison Industrial System. In my memo I went back to the Graphic Novel (or whatever you call it), "Prisoners of a Hard Life" and in particular Ramona's story. She feels like she is to blame, like everything is her fault when in reality she is a victim of the system. I want the women we know to understand that, and at the same time I don't want to take away their agency. This is what I was grappling with in my memo.

Yesterday morning I woke up prepared to do work...sike. I ended up wacthing a few shows and then I stumbled upon a documentary entitled The Falling Man. For my vision post, I wanted to share a journal entry I wrote right after watching it.

Dear 360 Vision Journal,

After two hours spent aimlessly searching the web for something to watch, luck would have it that I would come across a documentary on Hulu.com entitled, The Falling Man. In the context of the horrific events that happened on September 11, 2001, the documentary explores the mixed public responses and the story of a man who is headed 100 stories to his death from the World Trade Tower. As I tearfully watched the falling man’s picture, heard his stories and digested the public’s disgust and seemingly justified ignoring of the cohort  200-something individuals who plummeted to their deaths, I couldn’t help but think about my experience with the 360/women of the Cannery.

...from yesterday that I don't want to forget:
"Just because they have life doesn't mean their life stops."
"What do I get by telling others that they are stuck?"
"Nobody's homework is done."

Paul Doherty, Water Waves Seen by Diffraction

The reading “How Offenders Transform Their Lives” kept reminding me of our discussion in Voice class today about GirlTime. Someone in class brought up how self-congratulatory many of the people in charge seemed about the program, and how that was a negative aspect because it seems to eliminate possibilities for the program to effectively critique itself and become better for the girls it was attempting to change. In addition, it was brought up that the program was supposed to be for those girls, not necessarily for the volunteers involved. However, I also thought that the reverse would have been equally negative, if not worse. If the women (teacher-artists) had maintained the position that they were the authority and the program had no effect on them, they would have reinforced a sense of hierarchy, a separation between the girls and their more “enlightened” positions. Positioning themselves as authority figures, they would have continued to perpetuate the sense that there was a fundamental difference between themselves and these girls. Doing this places even more importance in their authority, the necessity of having someone “in charge” who by the nature of their position, knows more than those they are intending to change. It sets up a dynamic of us/them, perpetuates the “normal” vs. “other” attitude that can be so damaging to how people chose to live their lives.