Have you heard of TED talks yet…?
Being that this is one about education, creativity, and what is considered to be intelligent &/or valuable, you know it’s pretty much one of my favorites.
On this subject I have to share that while I went through the “traditional” academic experience, earning my B.A. and going on to law school (though I did not continue on with law), my husband is my polar brain opposite. While I began my academic career at community college and thought, “This is awesome!,” my husband started community college and thought, “This is dumb. I don’t care about any of this… Why am I here?”
He went on to attend the Motorcycle Mechanics Institute where he flourished, with perfect attendance, and perfect grades, at the top of his class.
His brain can understand, compute, and work with numbers, math, technology, and mechanics in ways that mine just can’t. Not to mention, he is the one that (in the midst of my college career, no less- in 2008) explained the economic meltdown to me, in terms that I could actually understand. Moreover, if I’m being perfectly honest, I had to learn critical thinking (to a certain extent) in college. As presented in the following video, my educational upbringing did not foster creativity, nor was I encouraged to think critically. I was raised, like many of us (especially being that my first 7 years of schooling were in Catholic school), to accept the information that was being given to me, at face value, and to not really think critically or analyze anything, but rather, to just memorize. I mean, really, isn’t that a lot of what education in this country is these days? It’s not critical thinking and analysis— it’s the banking concept of education.
I questioned things, to be sure, and my stepfather is really the only person throughout my upbringing that fostered this. [He was born in a small Louisiana town in 1930, a huge fan of the Romantics (think: Walt Whitman, Ralph Waldo Emerson), preferring spirituality to religion, and always willing to talk to me about art, religion, music, books, and movies, any time of day. He had me reading Voltaire at age 8. I’ll never forget him pulling a book from the shelf and saying, “You know I think you’ll really like this one. It’s called “Candide.” Read it, enjoy!”]
But save for that, like I said, my educational upbringing was lackluster at best. I later went on to skip class constantly while in high school just to be in the music room, where I would sit and write songs, play my guitar, and hang/jam with other musicians like myself.
Contrastingly, my husband was inculcated in the world of critical thought by his parents and and all the other parents that taught at his co-op school throughout his childhood. His ability to just naturally think outside of the box never ceases to amaze me. For example, recently we were watching TV when this cereal commercial comes on, the voiceover stating, “People who choose _____ tend to be healthier than those who choose other cereals!” (or some such nonsense) and my man just remarked, “Yeah, and I’m sure that’s because those people are probably making a whole lot of other healthy decisions regarding lifestyle and diet, too.”
So there ya go. In spite of my learned intellect, I’m not always above seeing past everything the way he is. He is, without a doubt, the smartest person I know. And higher learning had nothing to do with it. With all of that said….
Please watch, and enjoy.
My Feminist Briefs 