I found the reading to be quite insightful and it resonated with my experiences. I often notice that when there is discussion of the power of freedom, I hear a focus on the acquisition of influence resulting from an individual’s education, public involvement and economic comfort. I think that these activities are often thought to be the environment where one can be free. Perhaps this common notion exemplifies the need to revive public thinking of ‘possibility’. Although education can be essential in the presentation and enticement to the dream of true emancipation, and public involvement gives demonstration of this power and solvency idealizes the result, I believe that the simple value of individual experiences and participation in the struggle is often overlooked. Therefore, my discussion of freedom involves an exploration of the individual, the value of diverse perspectives and the strength garnered by the struggle to be free.
While individual groups have different experiences and needs and desires, I believe that they still can enhance a public commonality. When they do so, it can entice youth to discover what it means to be truly free, building insights from individual living, informed by the collective experiences of the community and embodied in a public setting. As they strive, I believe that, individuals must make a place for themselves at the table and challenge the things that don’t build community or make for a caring people. I posit that freedom is rightly acquired when informed by diverse views of emancipation.
These multiple perspectives of freedom within our community can nurture different conceptions of possibility in a common world. I acknowledge that there are ‘others’ who want freedom that have painful experiences- like the Negro in America. My African-American ancestors were forced here, and their art gives universal expression to the struggle to regain freedom –a notion that was revised, created and recreated as effected by their experience. In a free culture, however, I feel that we may not truly understand another’s experience, but as we attend to these individuals, our perspectives on freedom and it’s possibility expands and becomes less general.
When I think less in the abstract and more in particular, I realize that one must not give in to the ‘wrong’ (that makes it much worse), rather, to simply endure and strive for freedom makes us stronger, so we must act in some manner. Simply perceiving myself as free or the act of an emancipated individual considering a subordinate peer as valued is a good start. Sometimes a gradual acquisition of liberty is warranted. Indeed, while there is a constant call for freedom, I may have to be prepared for freedom. In that vein, I think about striving for liberty in relation to the opening of spaces by the empowered to allow the underclass training to live freely. Thus, education is one way I can be skilled to thrive in freedom. The educational environment can also encourage the downtrodden to name and question authority. I wonder what kind of vision of the world does the struggle produce for me? How does that vision shape my actions, consciously or subconsciously? I know, however, that when the world can be questioned and named, then transformations can happen.
Therefore, I now feel that when I contemplate freedom, it is through the knowledge that liberty is entwined in conceptions of power, especially in regard to public relationships. I acknowledge that there is a relationship between participation in society and individual development. The conundrum is how society can educate for freedom and still create and maintain a sense of commonality within the diversity while dignifying individual experiences.
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