Full Circle
Full Circle
Students in Australia respond to Still Life and explore the arts around them
Friends,
A few weeks ago an old college friend and long-time Still Life reader let me know he assigned a Still Life letter to his students as they traveled through Australia (!!). We chatted back and forth in emails, and Jeremy shared their reflections with me. I asked if I could share them with you here, and not only did he agree, he also wrote a lovely reflection on exploring our shared life through the arts. It’s a full circle moment. So many of my interests started while studying in Florence through the same college program almost twenty years ago.
Also, it’s worth pointing this out: he assigned a letter I wrote after intentionally focusing on the diverse local culture around me in the Twin Cities. I love how that commitment to specificity and place circles around the globe. I’m glad to share their reflections, and I hope you enjoy reading from Jeremy and his students as much as I have. “What a gift to see travel transform the questions we carry,” he writes. And what a gift to travel together.
Jeremy Daggett directs Harding University Latin America and works in community development in Arequipa, Peru. He writes at Post Modern.
Take care,
Michael
One of the gifts of study abroad as a professor is to try to connect local experiences with in-class assignments. I’m working this fall as visiting faculty for Harding University Australasia. HUA is a 3-month study abroad program focused on learning through travel in Australia, New Zealand, Thailand and Japan. I’m sharing all this with you because I assigned a recent Still Life letter to my Humanities students while we traveled.
In September we spent a couple of weeks in Sydney. It’s an amazing international, multicultural city—with its own challenges given a long history of colonialism and abuses toward some of the oldest living human cultures in the world. As US Americans, we immediately noticed a difference in the way this complex history is treated. The first thing the flight attendants announced when the plane landed was an acknowledgment of the First Peoples, the traditional custodians of the land and their elders—past, present, and emerging.
In Sydney, some students took the opportunity to visit galleries showcasing aboriginal art, such as the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Museum of Contemporary Art, Cooee Art Leven, and the Australian Museum. Just outside Sydney, we visited an aboriginal cultural center where members of a few of those people groups shared their story with our group, their traditions, food, art, music, and dance, as well as the current challenges they face in education, social services and politics.
Finally, we got to see a concert at the Sydney Opera House. It was beautiful and haunting. “Eumeralla, A War Requiem for Peace” by Deborah Cheetham Fraillon tells the tragic story of the Gunditjmara through a combined performance of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, art, and adult and children’s choirs singing in the Gunditjmara language. The creators designed it to be sung together by non-indigenous and indigenous Australians “to ease the troubled spirits” of the land.
After the performance, I assigned an episode of the Lexicon Valley podcast about reviving dead languages as well as the recent Still Life letter “Memory Threads.” I invited students to reflect on the significance of Eumeralla being sung in Gunditjmara instead of English and to consider Michael’s own invitation to discover multicultural life around us. We closed the class session by exploring Native Land and formulating our own land acknowledgements based on where we’re from and the land on which the university sits. What a gift to see travel transform the questions we carry.
I shared with Michael some of the students’ takeaways from this convergence of art, music, culture on the other side of the world, and he wanted to share their reflections with all Still Life readers. You can read the students’ reflections below. I’m deeply grateful for Michael’s work all these years in bringing poetry into my life, and was excited to use his letter as our teacher from afar.
Art gives us a vast view of others’ worldviews. And art is more than just painting; it is poems, songs, sculptures, basket weaving, dancing, singing, etc. Reading and seeing the artworks created in the past gives us a direct view of how those people felt about the world and the situations that they were in. You can take so much artwork into your perspective, but it’s so interesting when you try to see it through the artist’s lens. I go to artwork when I feel disconnected from something I am trying to learn because it gives me that first-person perspective. - Anne P.
Art is an important aspect of cultural revival. The podcast mentioned the importance of Bangla art in the revival of Bangla culture. In the letter, art is mentioned as an “open access point” to living cultures. It’s a way to know living cultures through “visual” language rather than spoken language. - Em S.
We should dig into art and culture all around us, even if we have been living there for a long time. We have to get over our pride and shock that we didn’t know what we uncover, and just be willing to search. - Nataleigh L.
Art is a way to express culture. It is able to link together the past, present, and future. People today can understand the ideas and views that these ancient people believed in. It is important to educate ourselves on these cultures as it is vital for expanding the mind and learning all that we can. - Lauren M.
Art always feels like the best entry point to a culture to me, followed closely by religion as they are often used together. Walking through art exhibits in Sydney helped me see what of Australia's culture was shaped by the aboriginals and what was shaped by the English. - Julia M.
In the Still Life article, the quote by Anita Fields really resonated with me. “The objects on display tell the story of our relationship to nature and the cosmos.” It goes on to refer to this as symbolic to how we see ourselves within the earthly/spiritual realm of existence. I think this really opened my eyes to view life and what’s in front of me as a reflection of what God has provided in this world as a human trying to grasp and understand his handiwork better. We are constantly trying to reset our perspectives to understand ourselves better and how we can better appreciate the life God has set before us. - Abby B.
You don't just look at the art and learn something either. Art has a transformative ability to it. You don't just learn about the art, but it should transform your perspective about the world around you. - Rylan P.
I often find myself thinking that in order to truly learn and explore, I have to go somewhere new and amusing. Michael’s letter helps me remember that there is joy and value in learning the history of those around me in my hometown. I hope that by taking the skills and knowledge through this course that I will continue to be a curious and lifelong learner wherever I go. - Carrie Anne P.
The way that we talk about native cultures and native peoples is important because there are hundreds of cultures and peoples and you can learn a lot from all of the different ones. - Katie S.
There is excitement in the unknown of our culture's history. Rather than leaving the parts of the past behind us, we should explore into the lives and works of those who carry on these lifestyles and traditions. - McKenney S.
The letter highlights the importance of recognizing indigenous cultures as living and evolving and keeping them in the present tense. It urges us to be specific about their cultural differences. He honestly explores art as a gateway to understanding identity, history, and community. - Ashleigh S.
It is easier and more accurate to look into other cultures for what they are doing today in the present tense. In the article he talked about this with the native people. I feel like we did something similar at the Aboriginal center. Seeing their culture today and their modern practices helped give us a deeper understanding of what they are about today and in the past. - Grant T.
I really liked the piece of an interview that Michael included in his article that talks about not speaking about Native Americans as “has been,” but speaking about the present living culture. I think this is important for every culture that we encounter, as having the attitude that it is still able to be learned and can still be practiced in today’s world. - Alexis T.
Aboriginal philosophy written in poems
Deborah Cheetham on Eumeralla, a war requiem for peace
Ancestral Modern: Australian Aboriginal Art
Indigenous Futurism—a fashion show at the Getty Museum
p.s. “Long-time readers of Still Life will also appreciate the Sydney callback to 42 Wallaby Way—Michael’s original “address” for Still Life!” —Jeremy