Reimagining the World

I imagine that whenever we have reimagined ourselves, our place in the world, and our vision of how the world can be, we have performed an act of political revolution – for revolution and change has to begin within the Self. One of the things I was most inspired by during my visit to South Africa was how often I heard or read the phrase "The New South Africa." It seems that South Africans are engaged in reimagining South Africa as a place that is inclusive and where social and economic justice prevail, and where all cultures are appreciated and respected. It is an enormous moment of change and far from the reign of oppression during apartheid. And while there are still many obstacles to building the new South Africa, I felt a tremendous spirit of hope within the people there that it can happen. I think their faith comes from knowing that they persevered under apartheid and the kind of oppression that American slaves endured but which lasted in South Africa until nearly the end of the twentieth century. To overcome that instills the hope that they can overcome the challenges of rebuilding.

Can we envision a "New America," one where educational access and success isn't so much a "noble" idea as it is truly a birthright for all, regardless of race, ethnicity, class, or gender? I like to imagine that through the Sharing Cultures Project, our students are not only being empowered to dialog with students halfway around the world about personal experience and cultural issues, but they are also gaining a sense of the global village and an understanding that despite being a world apart and coming from very different cultural backgrounds, as human beings, they have much more in common with each other than not. They are making connections that inspire them to think much more largely than they ever have about who they are in the world, and they are engaging issues of power and oppression and beginning to dream of being empowered in a world that, for them, is shrinking. A place like South Africa doesn't seem so far away or so foreign.