[AAACE-NLA]servers, hosts, functions

Mon May 19 11:09:43 EDT 2003

I'm wondering if someone could volunteer to draft a summary of what has taken place with the NIFL lists and contact the ACLU with this information.  What is happening with NIFL is a tiny piece of what is happening on many fronts  in every space for public dialogue.  There are lawyers and activists working on these issues and connecting with them is one strategy (although I'm not one who believes in relying on legal strategies...).
Elsa Auerbach

> ----------
> From: 	Catherine B. King
> Reply To: 	aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org
> Sent: 	Monday, May 19, 2003 11:07 AM
> To: 	aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org
> Subject: 	Re: [AAACE-NLA]servers, hosts, functions
> 
> George, Eileen, Colleagues:
> 
> I'd like to raise a question on one recent issue, and comment
> on another:
> 
> First, I heard some years back when I lived in Northern Virginia
> that government workers could not advocate for party concerns
> from their positions in the government--that there was a law
> about such activities because of the position of power and
> potential uneven influence of government workers; and that
> there was of course always a "fine line" between one's
> position as a government worker and one's position as a citizen.
> 
> I am not a lawyer, and I do not remember the name of the law;
> however, at the time I thought its premise was reasonable, but
> that it was difficult in many specific situations to distinguish
> when a person is acting as a government employee and when
> as an informed and mandated citizen.
> 
> My question is based on the fact that it seems to me that on
> a website, the filterers are themselves government employees
> advocating for or against a particular policy every time they
> censor a discussion on a government website--aren't they?
> 
> I am wondering what law or policy legitimates the filtering and
> censoring of the discussions on government sponsored list
> serves; I am wondering if there is some planned confusion
> between
> 
> (1) government employees advocating and
> (2) website discussions on government sponsored websites
> where advocacy--either for or against current administration
> policies--is generated not from government employees but
> rather from citizens who are not only NOT government
> employees but are assumed to be
> 
> (a) free and largely self-governing and responsible;
> (b) actually mandated in a democracy to become as
>          politically astute as possible;
> (c) as teachers in a democracy, are even more so.
> 
> Is the law for government employees being applied too broadly
> to include government sponsored websites where freedom of
> speech is the rule and where the authority for such discussions
> is transferred to self-restraint and responsibility of the citizen-
> writer; or is there indeed such a law specifically ordered
> around government sponsored websites?
> 
> Perhaps as someone mentioned earlier there are lawyers
> working on such things; however, is there someone on this list
> who knows the technical details of this issue?  As Eileen says,
> this whole thing has flown in the face of long-held and almost
> sacred assumptions about our freedoms.  Anyone who has
> studied any history at all and the connection between censorship
> (filtering, or whatever you want to call it) and totalitarian and
> fascist orders (secular or religious) gets a deep-down chill at
> even the hint of such action--it is no small thing that we are
> talking about here.
> 
> Also, a comment:  Freedom of speech is a general notion
> and a governing principle that rests on the assumption of a
> civilized and self-governing social-community order committed
> to working out problems and exploring the specifics of meaning,
> truth and good in an open and ongoing dialogue.
> 
> Freedom of speech is so important to us because it constitutes
> the necessary condition for ANY exploration or argument to
> develop fully.  Without it, meaningful insights and expressions> 
> aimed at getting at the truth of things and the best way to
> develop ourselves are stopped at the gate, as it were.
> Allowing a curtailment of this freedom, especially where
> teachers are concerned, strikes at the heart of a an open
> civilization by destroying the very dynamism of ideas that
> keeps it alive and vibrant.
> 
> Furthermore, the First Amendment has not been amended out
> of the Constitution.  And if websites are government-sponsored
> rather than party-sponsored, and if the websites belong to the
> same government that has freedom of speech as its founding
> pillar (and it still does), then the government employees who
> "monitor" government sites should be guarding against
> censorship of advocacy, or anything else, rather than against
> advocacy as such.
> 
> Freedom of speech is something I thought I'd never have to
> defend.  I really did think that everyone in our land at least
> took this freedom to be the basic foundation for anyone to
> disagree with anything regardless of your political stance.
> The only political stance that puts this freedom in danger is
> the one that speaks against freedom of speech itself, but
> ironically from the position of already having it.  So we can
> even speak against freedom of speech and for censorship.
> 
> And so rather than passing laws curtailing speech against
> freedom of speech, we have to continually defend it in our
> arguments and hope for understanding.  It depends entirely
> on the deeper and fuller understanding of people in power,
> like Mr. Sweet and our lawmakers, to distinguish between
> specific polemics and arguments, and the common
> ground on which all those arguments stand or fall.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Catherine King
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Eileen Eckert <eileeneckert at hotmail.com>
> To: <aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org>
> Sent: Sunday, May 18, 2003 7:44 AM
> Subject: Re: [AAACE-NLA]servers, hosts, functions
> 
> 
> > Janet said she's struggling with the reflection/action tension. This
> > triggered my own reflection, so I'd like to...not respond exactly, but
> pick
> > up on the idea.
> >
> > Paulo Freire said that reflection without action is verbalism, "an
> alienated
> > and alienating 'blah'", while action without reflection is activism,
> action
> > for action's sake, which "negates the true praxis and makes dialogue
> > impossible" (pp. 68-69). I think discussions on this list and others can
> > help us achieve "praxis"--reflective action. However, I don't think we
> can,
> > or should, expect to reach consensus on one collective course of action as
> > an "NLA community" or "NIFL community" or "adult literacy education
> > community." We are many voices and minds, and if there are groups among us
> > who can agree and act together without sacrificing integrity, I think
> that's
> > great. We should strive to find common ground through dialogue, but we
> > shouldn't demand it of ourselves or each other. I think that if we place
> too
> > high a value on coming to agreement, or on expressing ourselves
> > appropriately, we sacrifice opportunities to learn.
> >
> > The current situation at NIFL, and indeed throughout the federal
> government
> > and its relations with individuals and groups, presents us with an
> > opportunity for transformational learning. Jack Mezirow's theory of
> > transformational learning posits that there are three main kinds of
> > reflection: content and process reflection (reflection on "what" and
> "how"),
> > and premise reflection (reflection on "why" or the mental model underlying
> > practices). But our mental models are largely tacit, acquired through
> > experience and not easily accessible for reflection and transformation.
> > Patricia Cranton, in an essay on "teaching for transformation" talks about
> > "activating events"--events that expose a discrepancy between what has
> been
> > assumed to be true and what has just been experienced, heard, or read.> 
> > Barbara Daley's research on professional development highlights the role
> of
> > emotional encounters that challenge tacit assumptions and beliefs. The
> work
> > of Antonio Demasio can give us some understanding of the reasons that our
> > emotions need to be engaged in order for us to become aware of and maybe
> > transform our mental models.
> >
> > Right now, many of us are reeling from the news that our discussions (on
> the
> > NIFL lists, not this one) are not only being monitored but filtered and
> > censored, and certain views and their expression are simply not allowed.
> > This goes against many of our deeply held and taken for granted beliefs
> > about freedom of expression and about power and control, but I wonder if
> > there are people whose identity is somehow outside the mainstream who are
> > saying "Well, duh. It's always been like this for me. Now you get a taste
> of
> > what it's like." This moment of disorientation, in which some become aware
> > of the discrepancy between assumptions and experience, can be an
> "activating
> > event" that triggers premise reflection and transformational learning.
> What
> > can we learn from this, and what are some of the things we can do about
> it?
> >
> > Eileen
> >
> > From: Janet Isserlis <Janet_Isserlis at Brown.edu>
> > Reply-To: aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org
> > To: aaace-nla at lists.literacytent.org
> > Subject: [AAACE-NLA]servers, hosts, functions
> > Date: Fri, 16 May 2003 17:28:42 -0400
> >
> > Colleagues,
> >
> > I was writing to a couple of people off list , thinking of Audrey Lourde's
> > work (The Master's Tools Will Never
> >    Dismantle the Master's House) and am increasingly wondering about
> > a) my hesitancy to jeopardize NIFL
> > and
> > b) thoughts that NIFL is changing regardless of what we do or don't do
> > and
> > c) wondering how/if other lists might want to migrate to different
> servers.
> >
> > While NIFL has provided valuable resources to the field for many years,
> many
> > of us now believe that this focus is shifting away from the needs and
> > concerns of adult literacy and towards the vortex of research driven
> > practice of a very limited kind.  Rather than argue those points again and
> > again, I wonder if those NIFL moderators who also might subscribe to this
> > list have considered what, if anything , they and those on their lists
> might
> > do in order to maintain open conversations.
> >
> > Of course, there are far larger questions than this (where to go to talk)
> > that go begging.  I wonder, though, if and how we have the collective will
> > and ability to create places through which to continue to converse, or do
> we
> > accept that *this* list is OK, but wonder how others might be supported in
> > critical dialogue?
> >
> > And what do we consider doing to support colleagues at NIFL who continue
> to
> > believe that adult literacy and education are critically important?  How
> do
> > we support the work itself?  How/do we tolerate the suppression of ideas?
> > Do we assume, well, the ESL list will just talk about methods, the
> > pov-race-lit list will use coded messages?  I understand the
> > advocacy/information distinction; I'm struggling now with the
> > reflection/action tension.
> >
> > Janet Isserlis
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > AAACE-NLA mailing list: AAACE-NLA at lists.literacytent.org
> > http://lists.literacytent.org/mailman/listinfo/aaace-nla
> > LiteracyTent: web hosting, news, community and goodies for literacy
> > http://literacytent.org
> >
> > _________________________________________________________________
> > Protect your PC - get McAfee.com VirusScan Online
> > http://clinic.mcafee.com/clinic/ibuy/campaign.asp?cid=3963
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > AAACE-NLA mailing list: AAACE-NLA at lists.literacytent.org
> > http://lists.literacytent.org/mailman/listinfo/aaace-nla> 
> > LiteracyTent: web hosting, news, community and goodies for literacy
> > http://literacytent.org
> 
> _______________________________________________
> AAACE-NLA mailing list: AAACE-NLA at lists.literacytent.org
> http://lists.literacytent.org/mailman/listinfo/aaace-nla
> LiteracyTent: web hosting, news, community and goodies for literacy
> http://literacytent.org
> 
> 