Faculty College 2001
 Innovative Approaches to Teaching in the Humanities
 How NOT to Teach While Giving Recompense to the Ages:
 A Workshop on Epistemology

Practicum:

What follows below are passages from two texts, written nearly a century and a half apart, used to demonstrate how to develop critical thinking practices.  The student is to read over the texts, and then underline what s/he believes are the pertinent theme(s).  Discussion follows, based on both this exercise and the brief essay, White Man’s Toilet Paper, which had been previously assigned.  This exercise was presented at the Faculty College Symposium.

What Modem Theme Is Spoken of in this Text?
 (Under1ine the passage for discussion)

The Kickapoo, are now under the care of a Methodist minister and a certain Kenekuk, a member of their tribe who calls himself 'The Prophet.' By force of sheer effrontery, and continued hard work, this man, really extraordinary for his time, has succeeded in assembling some three hundred souls in a temple built for him by the United States Government. He claims to be a special emissary from God. The complete, fantastic story of his birth and mission would be too long to recount in detail here. He descended from Heaven, he says, through a blue opening and, after having soared through space for a long time, he tumbled down upon our planet. This is but one example of his teaching, which may serve as an example of his imposture. The whites will not be saved because they made all Nature grieve. They cut the grain with their great scythes, thereby injuring the grass so that it wept. They chopped the trees with their great axes, thereby injuring them and making them weep. They ran their great steamboats on the rivers and thereby injured the rivers so that they, too, wept. Rivers, earth, trees and grass all wept. The white man, ingrate that he was, thus made all of Nature moan. Consequently, he would not be saved. For the Indians, the practical conclusion was that, since they inflicted none of these injuries on Nature, they could hope for eternal life, regardless of their stupidity, their sloth, their thievery, their adultery, their murderousness. And for the most part, they are given to these vices. As for Kenekuk, in his capacity as prophet, five wives are not too many for him. No one knows how many men his son has killed. Kenekuk's palace - for he is chief - is as filthy as a stable and his temple, which I actually saw, is just as bad. But the king-prophet has only to speak of his revelations and everyone listens to him with admiration. The authority for his divine mission is a piece of wood about two inches wide and eight inches long.
from Wilderness Kingdom: Indian Life in the Rocky Mountains 1840-1846.
The Journals and Paintings of Nicholas Point. 5.J.-- translated by Joseph P Donnelly, S.J.,
Loyola University Press, Chicago, 1967, Pg 23-4.
 Faculty College 2001


What Modem Theme Is Spoken of in this Text?
 (Under1ine the passage for discussion)
Environment and Ecology
The Kickapoo, are now under the care of a Methodist minister and a certain Kenekuk, a member of their tribe who calls himself 'The Prophet.' By force of sheer effrontery, and continued hard work, this man, really extraordinary for his time, has succeeded in assembling some three hundred souls in a temple built for him by the United States Government. He claims to be a special emissary from God. The complete, fantastic story of his birth and mission would be too long to recount in detail here. He descended from Heaven, he says, through a blue opening and, after having soared through space for a long time, he tumbled down upon our planet. This is but one example of his teaching, which may serve as an example of his imposture. The whites will not be saved because they made all Nature grieve. They cut the grain with their great scythes, thereby injuring the grass so that it wept. They chopped the trees with their great axes, thereby injuring them and making them weep. They ran their great steamboats on the rivers and thereby injured the rivers so that they, too, wept. Rivers, earth, trees and grass all wept. The white man, ingrate that he was, thus made all of Nature moan. Consequently, he would not be saved. For the Indians, the practical conclusion was that, since they inflicted none of these injuries on Nature, they could hope for eternal life, regardless of their stupidity, their sloth, their thievery, their adultery, their murderousness. And for the most part, they are given to these vices. As for Kenekuk, in his capacity as prophet, five wives are not too many for him. No one knows how many men his son has killed. Kenekuk's palace - for he is chief - is as filthy as a stable and his temple, which I actually saw, is just as bad. But the king-prophet has only to speak of his revelations and everyone listens to him with admiration. The authority for his divine mission is a piece of wood about two inches wide and eight inches long.
from Wilderness Kingdom: Indian Life in the Rocky Mountains 1840-1846.
The Journals and Paintings of Nicholas Point. 5.J.-- translated by Joseph P Donnelly, S.J.,
Loyola University Press, Chicago, 1967, Pg 23-4.
 
 
Faculty College 2001

 Innovative Approaches to Teaching in the Humanities
 How NOT to Teach While Giving Recompense to the Ages:
 A Workshop on Epistemology

What Modem Theme in Psychology is Spoken of in this Text?
 Underline for discussion)
 
It is true that drinking was never a tribal custom or a traditional transit of the Omaha Nation, and an early experience taught most of them its negative effects of its apparent usage. The real cause in terms of its acceptance and availability was in large measure due to an incomplete, almost empty lifeway which had evolved that brought on circumstances resulting from a way of life which had almost vanished overnight, and a new state of mixed affairs, and finally a hopelessness which inevitably replaced it. This was a perplexing situation many Omahas were born into.
Wayne Tyndall, et al, Omaha Tribal Action Plan
 (written for the Macy Counseling {Alcohol} Center, unpublished, circa late 1980's)

 
What Modem Theme in Psychology is Spoken of in this Text?
 Underline for discussion)

 Transgenerational, Unresolved Trauma
It is true that drinking was never a tribal custom or a traditional transit of the Omaha Nation, and an early experience taught most of them its negative effects of its apparent usage. The real cause in terms of its acceptance and availability was in large measure due to an incomplete, almost empty lifeway which had evolved that brought on circumstances resulting from a way of life which had almost vanished overnight, and a new state of mixed affairs, and finally a hopelessness which inevitably replaced it . This was a perplexing situation many Omahas were born into.
Wayne Tyndall, et al, Omaha Tribal Action Plan
 (written for the Macy Counseling {Alcohol} Center, unpublished, circa late 1980's)

 

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