Art
has a natural relationship with the environment, and man in turn has the
ability to demonstrate this relationship as an aesthetics equation. This ability
comes from its resources of communication, sensitivity and exercising thought
in the environment at where man lives and where man shares dreams with
others through narrative interpersonal communication and reflection on the relationship
amongst environment and man's art, whether in the desert or on the banks of the
river, while seeking into his deep cultural identity roots, both ancestral and
current. The interests of social power systems, religions, dogmas and
technological media can distort the sense of communication and reflection. Get in touch with us in order to talk and reflect together!!!
Dr. Julio Enrique Correa
A Canadian-Argentine framework for narrative Construction
Dr. Julio Enrique Correa is a
high qualified research professional that is running the “Cultural Space” of
the INSTITUTE OF ENVIRONMENTAL
SCIENCES AND HEALTH (Buenos
Aires , Argentina Canada
SCHEDULE DEVELOPED
AT THE CANADIAN JOURNEY OCT 7/NOV 4 2011
October 7-15 Kingston Neil Hobbs [Queens University: Tuesday Oct 11 Introductory conference at the
Family Medicine Grand Rounds Dr. Julio E. Correa and Dr. R. Neil Hobbs; October 12th 9:15 Wed
Oct 12 Academic Half-Day Seminar at the Palliative Care Unit of Queens
University Dr.
Julio E. Correa and Dr. R. Neil Hobbs Workshop: The narrative of
bereavement, Thursday 13th,
2011 19hs, Palliative Care
Service, Queen’s University, Dr. Julio E. Correa; Friday Oct 14 Palliative Medicine Rounds: "Telling Stories to
Heal: the art of narrative reconstruction in the care of the bereaved"; Dr
Julio Correa, Educational Objectives: [1] to understand the role of narrative
process in the healing of the bereaved, [2] to understand the possible roles of
the physician in the grief process, [3] to participate in an brief example of
narrative reconstruction, [4] to reflect on how narrative reconstruction may
play a part in palliative care [with particular attention to the role of family
physicians], [5] to discuss how knowledge domains, other than those customarily
deployed in
medical science, contribute to the understanding of bereavement process].
October 17-21 Montréal
Franco Carnevale [Mc Gill University: Julio Correa, MD:
Wednesday, October 19th, 2011, 10h30-12h Seminar discussion on: “Telling Stories to Heal: the art of
narrative reconstruction in the care of the bereaved”. This presentation
examined (a) the role of narrative processes in the healing of the bereaved,
(b) the possible roles of therapists in the grief process, (c) how narrative
reconstruction may play a part in palliative care, and (d) how knowledge
domains, other than those customarily deployed in the health sciences,
contribute to the understanding of bereavement. Location: Oral Health and
Society Seminar Room, 3550
University Avenue McGill University
October 19th Session, Oral Health and Society Seminar
Room, 3550 University Avenue, McGill
University
October 21st “Narrative training on
Family Medicine Nurse Counseling”, Prof. Franco Carnevale
introduced Dr. Correa to of a
francophone Spanish Nurse working at Montreal Children's Hospital on Marital and
Family counselling to whom a narrative training workshop on bereavement was given
as applied to a clinic case [Anne-Marie Martinez, MUHC Marital
and Family Therapist and Nurse at Montreal Children's Hospital].
October 21/ 28 Montréal [Mc Gill University:
Preparation of reports]
October
31-November 4 Toronto-Niagara Falls [Ontario art association: Art Therapy Here and Now, November 3-6, 2011, Niagara Falls , ONTARIO
1.
Following the FRP project design exploring
the role that narrative skills and cultural variables have on the aesthetic
story construction, the Kingston bereavement workshop was replicated at Buenos
Aires with a same design schedule and number of attendants, which permitted
further comparison of the Canadian and Argentine stories (Correa,
2012).
2.
In attempting to further advance in considering the
narrative skills and trans-cultural factors that melt together into diverse
meaning levels at the construction of intercultural
stories of bereavement, Dr. Julio Correa aimed to describe on what was built
simultaneously to the development of the Canadian FRP Fellowship project, as a parallel project that was entitled:
“A multicultural medical view
considering native land populations and environment: Preliminary Notes” This
study considers the narrative construction connected to native populations and
environmental change (See below).
3.
All this connects to a third earlier
project entitled “A Study on aesthetics judgment as related to aesthetics
perceptual determinants, artistic skills and socio-cultural environmental
variables”. This
proposal follows narrative
inspiration from Phillipson Test pictures providing a narrative high quality art design
which enables to appraise the structuring
capacity of perceptive stimuli in shaping both psychological and aesthetic
skills narrative construction (de Artiagoitia &
Correa, 2005).
A
multicultural medical view considering native land populations and environment:
Preliminary notes.
Dene
culture
Since Neil’s trip this July to Canada’s Northern Territory (involving Fort Simpson and Trout Lake in the South, and Norman Wells and Fort Good Hope further north, almost on the Arctic Circle), he started re-writing a multicultural story under the impact of such story-making context with a significant personal-medical ethnographic contact with native cultures, in this case with the DENE (because he had been several other times to wild Canada, as i.e. Goose Bay together to destinies at his early arrival to Canada: “working in Northern Newfoundland, and had gone on to work in Labrador and the James Bay area of Hudson Bay”), Such an experience assisting patients of the DENE culture should necessarily had challenged meaning on the many aspects of ethnic contribution by such a singular native Canadian culture to his previous medical and educational experiences. Therefore we might infer that such a story-writing context turns his story not only a voyager diary but a multicultural story expanding meaning on the many aspects of ethnic contribution to medical approaches to the caring of the terminally ill and relatives’ grief. By sharing experiences with individuals of such different cultures at the challenging palliative assistance in Northern Canada -as an amount of cultural/transport/housing issues that are unique (i.e.: South Slavey native language needs a translator when those patients are to be assisted), a novel multicultural story might got started:
“I'm
on my way - waiting in Kingston
Comparison of Dene and Mapuche cultures
On my side the Canadian FRP scholarship
guidelines I received, underscored the need to develop the study within a
"cultural frame" (as purely health/ medical approaches were not
considered for it), although in the case exerting an impact on health would
have to be considered it would only from a multicultural/ diversity outlook,
displaying Canadian contents of interest as it were to be directed to a
Canadian interlocutor, as in fact Neil is. Further, simultaneous to the time
Neil prepared his Northern Territory trip I got in touch with artists that worked on
Argentine-Canadian projects [related to a Canadian awareness-creating series program of
educational activities in connection with environmental concerns including Canadian projects on ice
[In Antarctic Peninsula where environmental change has caused a loss
of ice of 4000 km3 over the last 31 years, Visual artist Andrea Juan
has developed several projects dealing with the climatic change impact on ice
as i.e. Methane, that hints the apparition of methane gas particles on the ice
surface; Sparkles (pollutant alterations), The Invisible Forest (the ocean invisible marine
phytoplankton forest playing a critical role in regulating Earth's climate that
human activities can alter and is disclosed by the impact on the carbon cycle
which is crucial for predicting long-term ecological effects); Geo-Radar (due to climatic
variations, soil-permafrost-frozen is suffering unusual structural changes as
i.e. in its water content and ice wedges that can be detected by geo-radar that
reaches up to approx. 15 m depth)] and Canadian-Argentine inter-hemispheric migratory birds at risk of
extinction [Boreal forest project seeking for the preservation
of the Red Knot Calidris canutus rufa
which has been aided by Edith Matzen Hirsh leading an educational
program to paint the bird by low graders and send it as mail cards to Canada,
as a message mimicking the bird, is sponsored by the Argentine-Canadian Studies
Association (ASAEC) and the Canadian delegation of the Global Conservation
Congress composed by government, entrepreneurs, researchers, advocacy
officers as potential on-site mentors, that would even integrate Margaret
Atwood, a novelist with whom I am particularly interested to get in touch with
because of a study where I focus on the effects of bereavement on foreigners
[“The Stranger”, Albert Camus] settled into discriminative cultures. Therefore a multicultural/
diversity outlook fits the aim of a multicultural story making format following
a conversational style as the one Neil devised we have already held along our
large correspondence. The case that since June this year Chile’s southern volcano
Puyehue started eruption loading enormous layers of ash
over lakes and landscapes of Argentine’s southern desert region inhabited by
natives from the Mapuche culture, opened Neil’s interest
in order to compare Mapuches’ cultural stories with Canadian Dene’ on their “many
similar struggles with climate and land, language, culture, land
rights and struggles with colonial expansionism, respectively in South America
and in North America [Wikipedia entry http:\\en.wikipedia.org/wiki/*Mapuche*]”.
By following Neil’s proposal, it would be possible to tell Canadians
an Argentine imaginary journey story in parallel to Neil’s present journey
through Canada’s northern territories.
As we have described in a former paper (Correa & Hobbs, 2007),
cultural stories overlap with personal and family stories in the bereavement
narratives shared by group members that were gathered with that aim, the
present scope of this study entitled “Multicultural communication and diversity
of meaning in the inter-professional narrative construction: An
Argentine-Canadian story”, might pose new challenges to the “multiculturalism
and interculturalism” question not only “to be understood as policy
orientations, more or less formalized” but to be “continuously
redefined”(Duchastel, 2010). One significant source of redefinition may come
from bereavement shared experiences by individuals of different cultures as
those challenging palliative care in Northern Canada. On the other side it is
to be considered if the multicultural/ intercultural issue can be compared
between Canada and Argentina concerning the relationships with the original
land people. On such matter Neil asked: “I wonder how often you need a
translator for native people in Argentina...” As it is not clearly established
a policy ruling such issue -if not by all means natives are submitted, with
exceptions, to the official culture-, as does emergence practice to disaster
(María Cristina Diaz, Bs As, XIth Psycho-trauma Congress, 2010), it might be
certain to state that native people find themselves without adequate government
support in Argentina –like shows the plea from fundacion@cruzadapatagonica.org asking for 180 native
families isolated in the ash waiting to receive help to feed and water their
sheep in peril of starvation and thirst-. The Argentine Association
of Canadian Studies (ASAEC) is interested in aiding native populations in
Argentina: Beatriz Ventura, the Canadian Embassy Public Affairs Officer who
assesses on the Cultural and Academic matters, told me about a Southern
Argentine bursar [Valentina Farías] that under a Canadian project has already
inaugurated a Centre on Ethnic Health that considers the subject of mental
health on a native context.
Mapuche narrative culture
Mapuche people have had worship for the
narrative skills becoming a trait necessary to become “chief” (Fernández,
1995). In order to find if it existed some connection of such a communication
skill development and transmission of knowledge related to volcano perils at
the same region they lived, it were studied all Mapuche stories collecting such
an issue from an anthropological survey (Fernández, 1995): eleven stories were
found to appertain to such a theme category showing not only behaviours to be
followed by learning on risks as well the beneficial outcomes that are needed
to take notice about, as praise on mountain stones transmitting a kind of mountain language [study not shown here].
Otherwise, as last year an Argentine narrative group that I
coordinate since a long time ago produced stories on the alchemy of stones,
animals and birds turning into new life after devastation brought in the
collective fantasy by Iceland’s volcano ash clouds that disturbed European
voyagers, I asked them if they felt moved to write stories on our local land
havoc. Then a group member that writes poetry and stories on her recollections
when living in the “Mapuche” land, to whose legends and beliefs she is
particularly acquainted and has written stories about their worries and
hardships with the land, wrote stories on this subject that underscored respect
for earth violent lessons and a kind resemblance amongst human (woman)
sensitivity and birds:
No place to hide Marta Bailaque, July 21st, 2011
The sky is also stepmother.
If I not delude, it is pure
truth. And fell, wicked, over all innocent life.
One morning it was. One
morning . One morning when the sun itself was in retreat. The volcano had
erupted, and instead of lava, he delivered ashes. Dark remained the day, fears
and shadows the ancient step-brothers.
Ashes first rose up to the
clouds themselves, up high there to untie all their strength and expand then
into the vast ethereal immensity to free as they had never lived as squeezed
down in the bottom of earth.
The infinite space was of
them until the inevitable occurred: the fall. Coming from the height or highest
height, according to the load of each tiny grain of silica, the gray flecks
returned this world.
Then men begged for their
flocks, women prayed for brooms, oaks and grasses. The roses prayed for their
roses.
And yet, the crystal waters
were concealed. The birds rested hoarse until got dumb. Sheep, with damaged
eyes, bleated asking for a big snowstorm, because that would certainly have
been less cruel than such havoc. But deaf, ashes that had suffocated the grass,
now would do on their guts..
No greenness of the forest could retain its liveliness, no rose offered more its smell.
No greenness of the forest could retain its liveliness, no rose offered more its smell.
The mountain range, abducted paradise, was moan. The plateau, without even some memory of beauty, was one tear.
Yet a new morning had the winds to rest and ash ended. Nobody knew what would happen in the immediate, in the time after tomorrow, but all of them delivered entirely to hope. The rain that fell, lamblike, would wash. Would then remain unmasked each life that had been taken away. Empty-looking eyes would become indictment, secure and direct dart to human folly.
Disturbed, another eyes, when feeling each fleece, each log, each saved petal would bow down all pride and pay respects.
With the breath as a load Marta Bailaque July 26th, 2011
It is said by many lands of earth that when God annoys is when storms occur, even calamities. And God had got angry. Somehow the men had caused this rage, this atrocious deploy of restricted fury and until previous hours, not visible.
But on that fateful day, burst fire from within and it showed the world as
deadly rest, ash. From the
volcano¡ from beautiful Puyehue, the crater regurgitated silica, dense and
imposing silica column.
All soil and plants and
trees and flowers and grasses, and the flight of birds and the fleece of the
lamb, and the waters of the lake so clear, everything was exhausted, barren,
flattened.
The mountain range,
abducted paradise, was moan. The plateau, without even some memory of beauty,
was one tear.
However, there was a woman
that even with the shock getting to the bone, got further beyond fear and pain.
Simple woman of the common people, she sought the warm fabric, as many pine
nuts* she could put in her pocket, and went to the lake. On her own, only.
Already in the bank,
kneeling on the rocky beach, she held herself with the left arm to increase her
strength together to move the right like an oar, over and over. By this way she
generated a small wave that, in its widest and distant replicas started to
slightly move, to get rid long after, the gray blanket. Meanwhile, the woman
murmured from time to time: “Om, Om” ** as she was saying a psalm.
To believe that she would
clean the lake if she was to persist in such gigantic effort, was perhaps as
outrageous or miraculous as when Siegfried drank the blood of the dragon and so
learned the language of birds. However, she might have remembered it without
knowing it, because the heroes whether not knowing each other, share the same
essence.
There was no clock to
measure the span of time during which the one and only shook her arm both
gently and rhythmically. What is certain is that with dauntless persistence she
recovered a thin layer of clear water. Clean. Only then she rested. She stopped
and ate a pinion. And she started asking with the heart of a girl that looks
after embrace instead of any reprimand. That wants to be reminded: “Again! It’s by
here." She begged for mercy.
Nor even the air moved.
With the peace of
deliverance, she wrapped better herself with the blanket and ate another
pinion. Then she bowed down her head up to touch the water and drank. She drank
and gave thanks.
Immediately, a bird flew.
By telling other experiences Dr Neil Hobbs had at other countries where
he travelled for giving educational training on Palliative Care as New Zealand,
he told about a friend and her ophthalmologist husband at Christchurch that had
resisted bad earthquakes. In this case would be worthwhile to know how the
Maori culture population had been aided both at the housing and survival, as
well at the medical assistance and palliative care, This conversation on Maoris
led to further comparisons with Mapuche culture as we could find as we talked,
similar ethnographical traits in both cultures in respect to praise for
narrative skills, posing an hypothesis of cultural transmission by sea in
between Chilean/ Patagonian Mapuche and Southern Polynesia cultures. In fact
they were brought to my mind remembrances from a book by William Willis that I
had read in my youth.
[WILLIAM WILLIS (September 8,
1893 – July ?, 1968) was an American sailor and writer who his fame was due to
his solo rafting expeditions across oceans. Willis became a sailor at 15,
leaving his home in Hamburg to sail around CAPEHORN. During his first solo
expedition in 1954 from South America to American Samoa, he sailed 6,700 miles
— 2,200 miles farther than did Thor Heyerdahl on Kon-Tiki. His raft was named
"Seven Little Sisters" and was crewed by himself, his parrot, and
cat. Willis was age 61 at the time of this voyage]
As Willis’ story about the voyage he planned in order to reach Easter Island in the South Pacific, leaving from Peru’s seashore with the aim of following the native culture ocean path that might have transported stone sculpturing knowledge to an island lost in the ocean neighborhood. Anyway he had arrived Samoa [6,700 miles: away from Peruvian seashore from where he departed], finally arriving a much farther destination that the one he had formerly planned to arrive, this new story frame would enrich the intercultural medical/ Health agents Palliative care story-making by giving testimony about the impact of environmental injury done by volcanic ashes on ground, water surfaces, sheep cattle, and population health, specially focusing on native culture populations as the Mapuche.
Moreover social and cultural loss in
oppressed minorities as those concerning American continent native populations
exposed, as Neil Hobbs has addressed Mapuche and Dene Cultures respectively in South
America and in North America, to “many similar struggles with climate and land,
language, culture, land rights and struggles with colonial expansionism” that
finally reflect “the abuse of power and ‘political amnesia ’that comes from
abusive situations; inequitable distribution of health care; geographic and
anthropological influences on health care”; would provide a wider social and
cultural grief and loss frame for these groups’ environmental injuries, “as
well as the possibility of recovery from these central human experiences”.
As was stated a principal
aim at the FRP research project (Correa, 2011), the use of storytelling and
literature merits stand for the expansion of the intercultural communication
aspects that interest bilateral Canadian-Argentine relationships, as those
encompassing contemporary situations affecting both countries.
These notes outline similar situations that
are connected to native populations and environmental change issues needing to
deepen the understanding of diverse levels of cultural meaning present at the
intercultural and multicultural narratives (Correa, 2013). On such realm our
narrative conception states that rather than technical media, the narrative
skills are the substantial cultural bricks for building intercultural and
diversity competence (Mighty, pdf), as they open to the understanding of both
own and alien culture. Such a key for achieving multicultural communication
handles diverse levels of meaning and stands at the threshold of the
inter-professional communication, as the one assayed in the Argentine-Canadian
story leading the FRP project (Correa, 2011). From our point of view narrative
may evolve into significant conversation and comprehension of different levels
of meaning if it delves into all members in a group and expands through
sufficient human interaction with persons and groups from outside the group. It
is not a sum or superposition of a diversity of narratives, nor a repetition of
master narratives or dogma, neither DIY narrative patchworks as recovered
materials taken from different cultures (Cuche, 2002) whatsoever how much
functionally inserted in the narrative set can be, as could eventually happen
in order to help patching holes due to "associative/ affective"
disturbances in the narrative contact and communication with other people,
rendering individuals alienated by the values promulgated by economic
globalization & "postmodern collage culture" (Mary , 1994 )
helplessness that is so well pictured these days as played by Kate Blanchet in
Woody Allen's film “Blue Jazmin”. Regrettably many professional encounters
these days, whether at the working places, congresses, symposia, on line or on
electronic quick interactions, might follow a similar trend of isolation,
disregard for others` reports and insufficient narrative exchange and
co-construction.
Therefore we understand that as much as
narratives interact amongst the members of a group and the outsiders bringing
knowledge or new narratives to the former, hard real live narratives made of
integrated personal contributions of each participant will result.
Example: One of the Buenos
Aires Narrative Workshop participants [see below: A.L.], who selected as
initial image for her narrative a Phillipson picture that was also selected by
a Kingston N.W. [V.F.], was asked after she made the reflection on her own story,
to read and make a reflection on the Canadian participant story and finally
summarize reflection on both. This participant along other three B.A.
participants selected the same plate in a former WS to the one in which V.F.`s
story was introduced to the group in order to reflect on both, but only A.L.’s
story corresponded on the same matter about concern on a relative’s health
problem, claiming that “a truly loving relationship allows saying with courage” what has to be
told, whatever “terror, fear and hopelessness” feelings were to become. Exactly
one year after this participant was confronted with the same situation that was
drawn by the Canadian WS story, as her daughter was diagnosed with very
malignant oncotype of breast cancer. Override by elevated anxiety she could
return to his senses finding courage on her “own loving resources”, as
following the witty advice she had made herself.
Study of narrative significant meaning
connectedness
Inter-personal/ intercultural constructive/ reflective exercises
Argentine group reflective
work on the Argentine and Canadian stories
Extracted from Correa, 2012
Stories based on two figures: AL [A2*2(2)]
Comments made over stories based on two figures: AL [A2*2(2)]
”Concern” (AL)
A man and a woman, they have a mean age of 55-60 years old.
Relationship: a loving friendship. Context: Walking through a park at late
evening. What's going on?: They're keeping deep talk about the issues that each
of them have and share. What happened before?: Long time has passed since last
time they’ve met, so they need to say, consult, communicate, because of the
deep love relationship amongst them. Both of them know that the other one could
understand what’s going on in each of them. Anyway the woman claims that if she
doesn’t call him, he doesn’t communicate. And she fears for his health as he
can barely walk. The light of the path outlines an after that might be a little brighter. But increasingly, she thinks
she will have to look after him in order to know about what’s going on with him.
Actually she thinks he is in danger of death.
Canadian Story “Speaking
Truth” by volunteer caregiver VF [Plate A2 *2 (2)]
At a hospital ward a MD
gives medical diagnoses to a woman that listens terrified what she would not be
able to tell her daughter, although she knows she ought to. When she goes to
her room, she sits by her but feels she cannot touch her. So she bends her head
to become closer to her and then she looks at the eyes of the young girl to
talk about what she strives to say at the same time she needs to protect her
child from suffering. Many questions arise on what, how and when to speak to
her. She then recalls the stories she had told her when a little girl and
trusts the words filling the imaginative space grown amongst them will come to
tell with no harm but with love and understanding.
AL’s reflection on the own
and FV stories from plate A2*2 (2)
AL story: Love is pleasant, bright, but also raises concern if really
the other one is significant for oneself. In such sense, even without fighting,
the other’s feeling is receipted by oneself. And in the same way that it brings
joy to know/ feel that the other one is fine, also sadness and concern for the
other's pain. I believe this is true in every kind of true love, whether with partners,
children or friends. I think that in such is founded a true love relationship.
VF story: I think this story will end as it deserves. Mother and
daughter are lovingly close. Why then doubt about a possible deep
communication, although the expected truth turns to be terrifying?! Love will
emerge, once more, this time in the form of courage.
AL’s reflection on the two
stories together from plate A2 *2 (2)
Conclusion: Whatever the situation
experienced, in the infinite gradations of love, terror, fear and hopelessness,
a truly loving relationship always allows saying with courage what
intrinsically is felt, and this is possible as based on the reciprocity of the
same feelings
We decided then to run such
a narrative intermingle process in order to produce inter-personal narratives
with the participants
attending regular narrative workshops and with the professionals giving Art
Seminars at the Environmental Sciences and Health Institute (ICAS) of Buenos
Aires. This strategy looked on to provide at the Conferences and Seminars a
high individual learning level in the workshops together to a high social
learning level [Nakahashi, 2010]. Such latter
schedule followed a two year conference period since the FRP Canadian
project was performed: the first conference [2011] was held one month before
the journey to Canada and aimed to integrate Argentine narratives with
narratives of indigenous people (Mapuche), who were exposed to environmental
injury caused by ash from the Puyehue volcano during the first half of 2011,
the second one [2012] focused on the integration of Canadian narratives with
Argentine-Native people narratives, both with a similar number of workshop
attendants as the Kingston experience (Correa, 2012) and by inviting to
participate Fellows from the Argentine-Canadian Association. The third Meeting
centered on a guided visit to places integrating Natural environment and Art
[2013], that in turn corresponded to the themes deployed in each Seminar, which
were designed to develop thematic interdisciplinary and intercultural aspects
of female narratives particularly focusing on the integration of reflection and
sensitivity, which were understood to exert an stimulating effect on the
aesthetic developments that lead to the arts as well as protect or enhance
health. All the Workshop attendants gathered at meetings held once a month
during two years [November 2011- October 2013] whereas the monthly Seminars
were given during April-September 2013. The three conferences were made to
coincide as possible the Canadian journey and each of the opening and ending
conferences’ dates, therefore as a symbolic “celebration” schedule recalling
from beginning to end the Canadian initial and ending events. Such idea
supports the notion that significant narrative events are build upon
remembrances of inaugurating meeting events, endowing an original meaning that
is to be renewed and recreated since then in the upcoming meetings. Anyway the
last forthcoming third conference [Sat. November 2nd, 2013] celebrates rather
than the OATA encounter -which was extremely brief and made hardly impossible
to establish good communication amongst the noise and dark emplacement around a
large table with people shouting while asking beverage and sort of mollusks-,
the magnificent encounter with the strength and mysticism of the Canadian
horseshoe waterfalls on Wed. November 2nd., that itself corresponded the next night to Art Therapist Wanda Sawicki’s
tale she told me about, while we met in the Hard Rock café noisy and dark
environment: “a boat sailing on rippling
water one dark night, suddenly jumping through lightning into the Spirit world
until it slid back to earth again”.
Becoming part of nature as if it was to feel
capable to flow with it, is a most daring experience to share with others: thus,
while staring together how the Milky Way stars move as water currents up to
fall into the black abyss wholeness of the night sky, perhaps would have made
the Templar knights to feel God to ask: “Who is the Lord of the Grail?”. Becoming
part of the Arts also challenges a similar experience to share with others as
being pulled on by forces striving to melt in together, as a people river made
of women and men marching together through excitement to get into the Orchestre
Symphonique de Montréal conducted by Kent Nagano at the Place des Arts Hall on
October 26th, 2011, to listen Gabriel Fauré’s Ballade or Georges Bizet
Symphonie in C major; or else as a sole stream of wonder, to become amazed by
the very tall Far East statues sheltering the rooms at the Philosopher’s Walk
Wing at Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum while you make your way to find the
Library and search in the files to know about martyrdom in Egypt; if not
perhaps the next afternoon meet the awesome Chagall and the Russian Avant-Garde
masterpieces from the Centre Pompidou of Paris, as exhibited on November 1st.
2011 at Toronto`s Art Gallery of Ontario.
SCHEDULE DEVELOPED
AT BOTH CANADIAN AND ARGENTINE EVENTS
September 15, 2011 First Conference on Art and Environment, ICAS, Buenos Aires , Argentina Kingston , Ontario ,
Dr. Neil Hobbs [Queens
University
Tuesday October 11,
2011[Introductory conference at the Family Medicine Grand Rounds Queens]
Thursday October 11, 2012 2nd
Conference on Art and Environment, ICAS, Buenos
Aires , Argentina
November 3, 2011, Niagara Falls, Ontario
[Ontario art association: Art Therapy Here and Now] November 2, 2013 3nd
Conference on Art and Environment, ICAS, Buenos
Aires , Argentina
In
turn, for the Argentina Third Conference on ART and the ENVIRONMENT
which was held on November 2nd 2013, I asked one of the Seminar
lecturers to choose a title for her guidance walk around a fountain monument
representing the bravery of ocean waters –without making any comments on such a
symbolic meaning nor the relation I had made with the Falls--. After she worked
on the matter, she mailed me a title that matched the feeling I experienced in
the falls: “The strength of nature”. The goal of this Meeting was to generate
possible integration of views upon art and the environment in the narrative
group, through visiting sites in contact with art and nature located next to
one other: narrative activities were planned since starting a walk along the lagoon of Coipos recently recovered
in the ecological reserve, where its easy to sight watch Argentina’s endemic families of ducks (Anas
flavirostris), the Monument of the Nereids of Lola
Mora (1903) and the Museum of traced
sculptures and compared Sculpture "Ernesto
de la Cárcova" (exhibiting sculpture reproductions from
various different cultures that were made in Paris and brought to Argentina in
the early 20s).
It
was asked six participants with narrative construction experiences to outline narrative parallels
between such sites. The
observations of the four members group attending monthly narrative workshops
highlighted the beauty that exalts nature and "life experiences that
represent" artworks, made by man with "sublime inspiration according
to nature" or the stimulus exerted on each subjectivity: making to "imagine
strong roots under the trees"/ to feel “a bath of ancient cultures inducing
togetherness that make wings to grow". The other two non-attendant
workshops participants, emphasized in turn the dialogue between sensations and
reflections that are to be triggered by nature and art, described at the current
experience as 'nature displayed in its best with the beauty of gardens as
source and creation", which should be encouraged to persist through appropriate
"observation - as it is provided by the artistic language-, along care and
protection of the world around us, preserving the systems within the universe"
as those generated by water, first element that has created the world we live
in and that is expressed in the sculptural creation of the Fountain of the
Nereids with exalted manifestation of the soul and wonderful creativity".
This
constructive narrative scope stresses on a constant practice of narrative
performances amongst all members in a multicultural group, maintaining
faithfulness to all members narratives in spite the difficulties that could
appear due to time, space, opposite views or social, cultural and institutional
appurtenances that may become disrespectful for the different cultural
narratives. On the other hand, the dominant accepted narratives certainly
conceal aligned ideological axes of cultural or political domain instead of
triggering interest in understanding the role that every narrative has on the
dynamics of intercultural communication. Moreover, a permanent constructive
narrative attempt endeavors to integrate diverse narrative styles and formats,
opening to multiple participation and dialogic interaction, such as those
generated in the multicultural and intercultural systems and disciplines.
Intercultural and Interdisciplinary Narratives testify about practices in
different scientific and artistic domains, building new connections within the
sciences, the arts as well between the arts and the sciences, encouraging
dialogue or encounter between diverse knowledge dimensions and discipline expressions,
instead of encouraging individual master narratives
that scavenge with other authors and views opposite to the commercial and
political trends of the social power systems. Therefore it seems necessary to design strategies to enhance the use of
analogical communication codes in the narratives’ construction by developing
products, methods, activities and guides for the construction of permanent
group narratives that operate as bridges amongst cultures.
The consideration of the concept of art as a reflection
of Nature comes from ancient Greece that connected art to nature, interpreting
it according to idealized or realistic forms. Such ways of listening to nature
or interpret it, changes according to the various cultures and societies over
time, which in turn gather the diverse optics and personal experiences of each
observer, the latter becoming an artist itself by exposing its aesthetic taste
and appreciation of nature, while also a defender of those aspects of the
environment that feels should be considered and preserved to protect it.
Dr. Julio Enrique Correa jecorrea@retina.ar Buenos Aires, 8/11/2013
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Humans strongly depend on individual and social learning, both of which
are highly effective and accurate. This study considers the effects of
environmental change on the evolution of the effectiveness and accuracy of
individual and social learning (individual and social learning levels) and the
number of pieces of information learned individually and socially (individual
and social learning capacities) by analyzing a mathematical model. I show that
individual learning capacity decreases and social learning capacity increases
when the environment becomes more stable; both decrease when the environment
becomes milder. I also show that individual learning capacity increases when
individual learning level increases or social learning level decreases, while
social learning capacity increases when individual or social learning level
increases. The evolution of high learning levels can be triggered when the
environment becomes severe, but a high social learning level can evolve only
when a high individual learning level can simultaneously evolve with it.