Winter
2005 / Volume 10, Number 2
Translating
Ideas into Action: Lucia Morales Cariani ’08
|
Lucia
Morales Cariani ’08
(photo by Fred LeBlanc) |
Last spring, Lucia
Morales Cariani ’08, a native of Venezuela,
found herself going door-to-door at housing projects in Holyoke.
Working with Neighbor to Neighbor, a grassroots effort to bring
low-income residents
into the political process and develop local coalitions, Morales
served as a translator for conversations with Hispanic immigrants
about health
care, child care, and political awareness. What brought her into
their lives was Justice: Ideals and Practices in History, a first-year
seminar
featuring a semester of community-based learning.
The course,
taught by history professor Harold Garrett-Goodyear, uses
historical case studies to examine what justice has meant
in Western cultures since the late European Middle Ages. During the
second
semester, students participate in social action projects to
see how practice illuminates their arguments about ideologies
and institutions. Morales, a history major, admits that no
one in the class could imagine initially how their fieldwork
would relate to what they were studying.
“I chose to
work with Neighbor to Neighbor because I knew they needed someone who
spoke Spanish,” said Morales. “They involved
me in every aspect of the organization. I participated in
meetings with local representatives and helped organize an event that
brought together residents, coalition leaders, and elected
officials. ”
The experience of
going door-to-door turned out to be quite different from what
Morales had envisioned. “I thought
we’d go with
an agenda, such as vote liberal because we think it’s better
for you. Instead, we talked to residents about who their
representatives were
and how those representatives were voting. We’d ask ‘Do
you have MassHealth? Can you use it with your providers?
Do you get money
for eyeglasses?’ We talked about issues that directly affected
their lives.”
Along the way, connections
between theory and practice emerged. “One
case study in class had been on the language used by
twentieth-century labor unions. At a Neighbor to Neighbor meeting involving
unions I was amazed when I listened to what was being
said. I realized
that much of
the language used by political organizations to attract
people—the
tools used to make people identify with an organization’s
ideals—remains
the same.”
Morales has only the
highest praise for community-based learning. “The
way you think about what you learn is so different,” she
said. “By
putting it into practice, it comes to life and changes you. ”
On the MHC
Web:
Weissman
Center for Leadership
Vista
- Winter 2005 Index
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