Interview with Lorna Wanosts’a7 Williams and Reuven Feuerstein in Shoresh
Add to collection
You do not have access to any existing collections. You may create a new collection.
Playlist
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN ... know that you were here five years ago, Lorna.
LORNA Ya, in 1988.
REUVEN When did you first hear about me before coming. I
can’t imagine that you just came in without to know
something about ...
LORNA No, I first heard about you Reuven in 1979 when I was
still living in Mount Currie. We had, um, um, taken over,
taken over control of our school, ah, in 1973 and, um, for,
from 1973 onward we were looking for some answers that would
help us to understand why our children were not performing,
um, academically well in school and, um, and I had read the
research in North America which we’re not, um, which had
many discrepancies and so in 1979, I realize now that it
must have been, um, because you were in Vancouver in ‘79, I
didn’t know that ... that I received some articles that, ah,
that you had written and, um, and it talked about, um,
motivation and language, um, cultural depravation and
cultural difference and I think that that probably was what
attracted me most, was that no where else in anything that I
had read had anyone, um, made it, made a distinguishment
between, between those two and also your definition of
cultural deprivation, um, which stated ...
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN Which made me a lot of, a lot of difficulties.
LORNA Right. And I realize why and why it was right for us,
uh, because during the seventies it was said that, that we
did not do well in schools, uh, in Canadian schools and in
American schools because we were culturally deprived of
Canadian culture and, um, American culture. No one had
talked about the importance of one’s own culture in the
development of, um, um, the ability to, to adapt to live and
uh, and so it, it was for those reasons that, um, that I, I,
um, was attracted to it, but on the other hand I rejected it
because of the, because of the term cognitive deficiencies.
And, um, because everything that had been said about was
that we were deficient in some way and I was not ready to
accept any more that, um, that, uh, that we were deficient.
And oft-, because often the deficiencies that people talked
about were that we were genetically deficient and um, so it
took me another few years before I came back to your work
and it resu-, and it resulted only because, um, I had been
looking in so many places in what people were writing about,
ya, so ...
REUVEN I must tell you something. You were among the first to,
um, understand the concept of cultural deprivation as a
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
status, as a state which is not related to be, to the
culture, the culture deprives you but you being deprived of
your own culture. Because usually one des-, describes the
native and First Nation culture or the minority culture as
depriving its people. And I’ve attempted to make it very
clear, it’s not the culture which deprives, it is the fact
that individuals become deprived of their own culture which
makes them acting in a deficient way.
Now, I have had great difficulties also with the concept of
deficiencies. People tell me, why do you have to use a
negative term. Why can’t you say it, put it in a positive
way. Put it that you need clear perception, put it that you
need logical evidence, put it that ... why do you have to
call it deficient in its perceptual processes, in its
capacity, its tendency to use more sources of information,
etc. and the answer, my answer is, if I want to remedy, if I
want to improve, if I want to change, I have to call the
child by its name. I have to create myself a target for
attack, a target for remediation, a target for development,
a target for re-orientation and I have made of this
provoca-, a provocative approach which people will ask the
question and by virtue of just asking the question, I was
able to explain. I have did, I have used my technique, what
I refer to as provoking mediation.
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
LORNA I recognized that very early. (LAUGHS)
REUVEN And I must tell you, I had long talks especially with
our friends, the black, Afro-, Afro-American group in, at
Yale when they came to study with me, ____(?) and ____(?)
and then also Larry Anderson came to Yale in 1980 and took
me some time to explain it.
LORNA Ya, so it took me away, but then I realized that, um,
that it was important that we have a clear image of where
it is we need to go with, um, you know in searching for some
strategies.
REUVEN You know that at this time, I was called by Mr. Barry,
Barry, can’t remember now his name, who belonged to the
lobby at the Congress(?) today, minority lobby in the
Congress(?) ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
... black but also Indian.
LORNA Oh?
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN And the major question was, how do you relate to the
possibility of having schools, Indian schools using the
Indian language, Navaho, Cherokee or whatever it is, rather
than using English as the first language. And, of course,
consonant(?) is my approach which is the revival of a, of
native cultures as a way to ensure mediational processes,
both in the nuclear family and in the society as at large, I
have been very much in favour of reviving native culture and
this was then used and brought up. It was the time when the
question of to whether to allow, this was the time when you,
you won(?) in ‘72, approximately, the right to have your own
school. By the same time, a little bit later eventually,
the Aleutians came to me too. Through this group, lobby
group in the Congress and I was then very much involved in
thinking, how do I convince of the necessity to create
conditions under which an Indian will be a better American,
a better Canadian by being a good Indian.
LORNA I guess, um, that’s another issue. I um, the only way
that we can be better Canadians through being a good Indian,
for me to be able to be a good Canadian by being a good
St’at’yemc can only exist when, um, the Canadians too, can
say, I can be a better Canadian because I can accept, um,
the way of the world view of the St’at’yemc or the Navaho.
You see it can’t only be ...
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN Absolutely.
LORNA ... in one direction.
REUVEN I will tell you, this is one of the things in which I,
which I have already ... the, there are two forces in the
process of belonging. There are two forces. There are
centrifugal forces and centripetal forces. The centrifugal
forces tend to have the individual thrown out of the center
of its existence. And the centripetal is the one which
makes the individual go in, become ins-, in the, in his
group and belonging to his group and this depends as well as
... it, uh, determines that, some of the conditions.
First of course, you have to have an ideology. You have to
have a belief system, you have to have a, a desire to
belong. But, this is not enough. If belonging to a
particular group is necessarily also belonging to a lower
socioeconomic disadvantaged group, then the centrifugal
forces will be ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
... those which will take over and the people will disband
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
and will run away and they are running away ...
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
BEEP BEEP
THIS IS THE 21ST OF JULY AND THE NEXT SLATE WILL BE NO.
99.
BEEP BEEP
REUVEN The readiness to belong is first, eh, dependent on a,
a, on the existence of an ideology, and of a, but it also
depends on the amount of status an individual is getting out
of belonging. If he has to give up on his status, then the
centrifugal forces will take over and, and people will be
disbanded and will run away and I must say, one of the
tragic results of running away are very pervasive. Very few
people who run away and don’t want to know any more of their
group because they belong to another social class, uh, and
they succeed are very minimal compared to those who go down
the drain and certain, because of a feeling of uprootedness.
They are uprooted. This is what happens with the
Aboriginals in Australia. This is what has happened also
with some of the groups in other, eh, urban gathering were
really, because this feeling of belonging is a basic need of
human beings.
LORNA Uh huh.
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN But it has its price. And therefore, what has to be
looked for, what has to be demand, uh, fought for is to
ensure together with the recognition of a pluralistic
approach, also, the rights to exceed to higher levels of
functioning and in terms, not just in terms of, uh, of, uh,
financial, this is, but of the culture.
LORNA I guess that’s what I mean Reuven when I say that it,
that, um, that it’s, that in order for me to be a better
Canadian as a St’at’yemc, Canadians have to be able to
accept us without making a judgment as to our class in
society because when a society devalues another group, then
it establishes a relationship and this is something that I
see in, um, instrumental enrichment classes. Not just with
First Nations children, but with, um, other children who are
considered to be lower than others, is that, um, and it has,
so if in instrumental enrichment, our goal is to become
independent thinkers, to become autonomous, then that
implies freedom and, um, but in order to be independent, I
have to, uh, look at my position in the bigger world and,
um, and sometimes, um, there is a fight to maintain the
status quo. The way things are. Both by the teacher, by
the child, by the student and by the parent. Because
they’re saying, like you can’t go outside of your class.
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
You cannot grow outside of your group and, um, and this is,
I think, um, an area that, um, that we need to, to explore
in, you know, in your work because what you are doing is you
have opened ...
BEEP (SLATE NO:____)
... the gates so to speak. So that we are able to look at
that very concretely within the class and so once you open,
open that out, you’re, you’re upsetting like, everything.
The way the applecart to the way, way that apples are piled
on top of one another and, um, and I know that there are
other teachers and other groups who are struggling with this
because, you know, because then, in a way, in a sense what
we are also doing is, um, is breaking that, that
communication between, you know, between the families and
the student.
REUVEN Well this is something which I have been very concerned
already at a very early stage. When, uh, children were
given a language in the classroom, in the kindergarten and
was, was no more understood by the parents. And, some
parents reacted very badly against it and the gap, school,
parents, school, society has increased in a very meaningful
way. And one of the ways to deal with it was to ...
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
...approach it in more system oriented way. To try to
change the total environment in which a child found himself.
GARY WE’RE JUST GOING TO CHANGE CASSETTES HERE.
BEEP BEEP
REUVEN 195-, 1988. Did you, was it the time when Larry was
here too?
LORNA No, but Larry wrote to you about me.
REUVEN This I remember.
LORNA Ya.
REUVEN But you were not here together during the conference on
mediated learning experience?
LORNA No.
REUVEN Aha. Who else came with you from Vancouver at this
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
time?
LORNA Patrick Maxie.
REUVEN Ah Maxie. Maxie, Patrick. And this is all? Hildy.
You knew already Dan Hildy?
LORNA No I didn’t know Hildy yet.
REUVEN But Maxie you were?
LORNA I knew Max, I new Patrick. I had met him, ah, and
Charlene Goldstein who was also from Vancouver. Okay, so I
knew her and Hildy I knew about but I hadn’t met her at that
point.
REUVEN Because Hildy was the first to come and I think this
was in 19-, what is, what was it? 1973. ‘72. Hildy was
here with a group of people ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
...from Canada and from New York. The first workshop which
we have organized for people from abroad and this was still
done in 1972 I think, in ____(?) Street. It was ____(?)
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
from Toronto who has organized this workshop and Hildy was
among the first to come and she was among the first to bring
back the word and I then followed very closely, I came to
Vancouver and gave a workshop at UBC.
LORNA Uh huh.
REUVEN So, eh, you came in after, quite a little while, but it
was then that Maxie has already done some work with ...
LORNA In Salmon Arm.
REUVEN In Salmon Arm. Doug ____(?) was already there?
LORNA No.
REUVEN Not yet.
LORNA Not yet.
REUVEN Uh huh. And you came to Israel. It was a first
encounter with another minority. Cultural minority. What
was the feeling you have had? Didn’t it sound very strange
to you?
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
LORNA What, being here?
REUVEN Ya.
LORNA No. Um ...
REUVEN I think you were, you came to us for a Friday
evening, if I’m not wrong.
LORNA Saturday.
REUVEN Saturday.
LORNA I came to visit you, um, for Shabbot.
REUVEN This is Shabbot dinner.
LORNA Ya.
REUVEN I remember.
LORNA And, um, and we talked about the role of storytelling.
Remember that conversation.
REUVEN Ah yes.
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
LORNA In um, in mediating.
REUVEN That’s an old mediation, old form of mediation which is
pervasive in the Ethiopians because they are pre-literate,
pre-literate kind of society. Ya, I remember, you were
telling us about and I have had such a experience as a story
teller. I had it in Morocco with Balberra(?) and Jewish
story tellers and I have seen some of the Ethiopians who
were doing it. But then I’ve heard from you and we have
discussing it at greater lengths.
And I remember that the idea of opening up instrumental
enrichment to a, to the First Nation children who need it
very badly in order to make them accessible to learn ing,
not only to learning the occidental modern, but to learn it
by themselves was the great issue, because one of the
problems is how do you make children able to value their own
culture. Which was at, was competing so bitterly with the
glamorous culture of the occident, of the modern society,
technological society. And, taking away some of the very
meaningful aspects of one’s own culture. And this was, how
do you open them up for learning.
This was the same question which we have had with the
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
Navahos and I was called to the Cherokees and the ____(?).
Have you ever ... well ...
LORNA No. I don’t know that.
REUVEN ____(?). I was sent to ____(?) by the Kellogg
foundation, the Smithsonian to discuss there with King, Dr.
King, the opening of the museum for the, eh, eh, a Trail of
Tears. A Trail of Tears. This is a trail of the Indians
from the Cherokees who came from Oklahoma, from North
Carolina on their way to Oklahoma and many of them died on
the way. And there’s a museum which reconstructs this
story, this history of the Cherokees. So I was there and I
had this opportunity to learn more about this particular
problem, how do we make Indian children sensitive to Indian
culture? And, eh, and the Navaho group made for me a pow
wow where I have see this one year old children dance the
war dance. I was absolutely amazed with what culture can do
development.
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
LORNA Do you remember, um, do you remember coming to
Vancouver Reuven in, um, I think 198-, 1990 I think it was
when you came? (CLEARS THROAT) With the Hadassah Wizo
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
Canada and you met all the children.
REUVEN Ah yes. The children came to the lunch. Oh it was a
great event. It was a great event. Some of the children,
and the beautiful thing was really the integration. You had
the children from all nations, practically, Chinese, Asian
children and, and Indian children and children from, eh, eh,
Canadian families. And it was such a congenial, eh, group.
Then I had some of them interviewed with me on the
television, the same formation, integrative, integrative
kind of, eh, group, which was very ...
GARY That was the CKVU television appearance?
REUVEN You see one of the things which you have mentioned, the
question of instrumental enrichment as a reshuffling device.
Children who were totally unsuccessful in the classroom were
very successful in instrumental enrichment. And this being
successful in a recognized difficult meaningful task.
Teachers were able to say, children, you know, when I
studied instrumental enrichment, and I studied mediational
interaction I had difficulties I had to work out in order to
master the task. And, to have children who are usually
considered as those who are last in the, in their
achievement, become the first in their mastery of the
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
instrumental enrichment task meant a total change and a
departure from their initial condition which very often
generalized itself to other areas of achievement. The first
thing which is being brought to us by teachers ... I would
have never have believed that he could make it. The very
fact that he started to believe and see this as a
possibility has already affected in a very beneficial way.
This particular child to this particular group or this,
which the generalization, the stereotypization ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
... has made him stay where he is. But, then for the child
himself, coming, becoming the one who is leading and showing
and the first to point out and I have done it and I have
finished and told by the teacher, go over and help the other
guy - who has not yet mentioned - the other guy happens to
be the guy who is usually successful in school, this is a
equating kind of, equalizing kind of device ... in ad-, in
addition of and one of the problems which we have is to turn
the teacher into the individual who can capture this
processes and immed-, immediately capitalizing on them and
using this as devices for further generalization of
successful event.
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
GARY OKAY WE’LL JUST CHANGE REELS HERE.
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
TONE
THIS IS 21, JULY, THE NEXT SLATE WILL BE NUMBER 104.
LORNA ... finding that the fish are being contaminated
before they come to us.
REUVEN With ____(?) with industrial things.
LORNA Ya.
REUVEN Are these fishes which come up the river?
LORNA Mount Currie, the rivers in Mount Currie are
spawning, spawning rivers.
REUVEN Spawning Mount Currie, and then they go down ...
LORNA Into the ocean.
REUVEN And coming back to spawn there.
LORNA Ya.
REUVEN Uh huh. What kind of fish? You don’t have salmon?
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
LORNA Ya, salmon.
REUVEN You have salmon? They climb up?
LORNA Sockeye. Chum. Spring. Yep. Are you rolling?
So Reuven I’m interested, we talked earlier ... oh ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
Reuven I’ve always been really curious to, to know how you
came to understand the, that the cultural difference and
cultural deprivation.
REUVEN Ah, two different entities.
LORNA Yes.
REUVEN Well I must tell you, initially, initially, the initial
hypothesis was the cultural differences responsible for low
functioning. This was the general, eh, way of explaining
why children from, eh, different countries act differently
and the difference are usually in this favour of those who
are not close to the, eh, modern occidental culture. And, I
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
was extremely, eh, curious to see to what extent really the
concept of cultural differentiati-, differences which was
socially, eh, sociologically considered as particularly
effecting individuals who were belonging to traditional
society and the concept of traditional society was usually
related to closed in systems, people who don’t really, eh,
eh, open themselves up to the new elements of modern society
and these were again, related to people who keep on to their
traditional, who are culturally different, and therefore
they are traditional and therefore, they are closed down.
Well this has really made me, eh, question to what extent
are these people who keep on to a tradition necessarily
unable to exceed to other cultures. As a matter of fact,
my, my hypothesis, just in a speculative way was that people
who have learned their own culture, have formed tools to
learn another culture. People who have learned one
language, will be able to learn another language. So, this
was my hypothesis in which then I went out to see and one of
my first groups to study were the Yemenites. The Yemenites
came to Israel and you know the new group which came in now,
they are already very transformed. But the initial were a
very di-, cultural different group. They lived in a society
in which the technology was very, eh, elementary, remote
from our culture. They had wonderful ____(?) but nothing of
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
the technology which we have had and also in terms of
certain basic and elementary concepts which were not well
rooted in their, eh, way of thinking.
(I’ve examined a few hundred of Yemenite children and I’ve
seen with what easiness they went over the mountain ...
... that the tools which they have acquired through the
learning of their own culture, which was a very ...
... in terms of certain basic and elementary concepts which
were not well rooted in their way of thinking...)
I’ve examined a few hundred of Yemenite
children and I’ve seen with what easiness they went over the
mountain. Yet the tool which they have lea-, acquired through
their learning of their own culture, which was a very rich
culture, but very different from ours, has become a, a real way
to, to learn new elements and the schemata which they have had
was, were very rich, were the best passway to reach to new
achievements, new cultures.
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
And it is then that I was able to formulate that being
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
cultural different means actually to be endowed with tools
of learning. Because what makes you different is the fact
that you have learned your own culture. An d your own
culture is different from the culture to which you have to
adapt yourself. And, then, I was able to compare it at a
later stage ... in 1950 with culturally deprived
individuals.
Now one of the very important elements which I have learned
is that cultural deprivation has nothing to do with the
culture in which individual has been brought up. Nor is it
related to a particular kind of class in which the
individual is living. Nor is it related to the amount of
culture which exists in the surrounding of the individual.
I’ve seen ... cultural deprived individuals in the best, in
the highest societal, cultural elite. And I have tens and
hundreds of examples. And I have seen culturally different
individuals in the poorest environments, in the poorest
minority groups. Culturally different in the sense that
they were endowed with tools of learning and therefore, the
concept of cultural deprivation became a very important
hypothesis for explaining cognitive deficiency and the
incapacity of the individual to learn and to benefit from
encounters with stimuli, with cultural stimuli, no matter
how cultural, how high value they were.
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
So this is one of the probably the, eh, elements which have
been most enlightening and counteracting the concept of
intelligence as the source of these differences. The source
of differences are cultural differences and cultural
deprivation. And in many respects, even an organically
effected child is a culturally deprived. Why? Because his
organisity has prevailed as, has, has prevented him from
being, becoming effected by some culture.
LORNA Can you give me an example of that.
REUVEN Okay, listen. Take a, a child, a hyperactive
child. Irrespective of what are the reasons of his being
hyperactive, attempt to mediate to him will always be a real
____(?) type of activity, you have to run after him in order to
make him see what you want him to see. He runs around and sees
everything. There’s no question about him being a sensorial
deprived individual. A hyperactive child sees more than we both
in the shortest time because he runs around, touches everything,
looks at everything, briefly, shortly, so it’s not a matter of
sensorial richness but it is the possibility for you, mediator,
to interpose yourself between him. You have interposed, he is
already far out. And this is a very absolutely observable
phenomena. You can’t mediate to this child.
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
So, he is culturally deprived. Not because you have not
attempted to mediate to him. But because he had an internal
barrier to your mediation. The same is true for the child,
for the autistic child. But, the same can be true also for
the child whom you don’t attempt to mediate, who because of
other priorities, poor mother, has, doesn’t have the time to
think, what do I give to the child in addition to the food
which will make him survive. She is too busy to, eh, deeply
involved in making sure the child survives the hunger and
starvation and has much less interest in time and energy to
think how do I make him sing a song as he eats, or how do I
make him observe where he will best benefit from his food
and at what time, etc. So, time and space and, and what
precedes before and what comes after are much less of
concern to the poor mother who struggles for life. So,
poverty creates priorities which are not always, eh, in the
direction of mediation.
A certain emotional rejection on the part of parents to a
particular child. In a particular family which is otherwise
very mediating may turn one particular child into culturally
deprived individual.
I have a very interesting case just now. Of a boy who never
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
understood. He was considered to be organic, he was
considered to be, to have some, eh, special difficulties in
learning, a learning disabled individual. We examined him.
There were no sign whatsoever. For some reason this boy in
a whole fratre(?), in whole brotherhood, he was the rejected
child. That’s what happens, something between the parents,
before birth, or whether it after birth. This child was not
accepted. And he was the one who didn’t receive mediation
in a family, otherwise, highly mediating. So you may have
many reasons why individual didn’t receive mediation,
mediated learning experience.
GARY Can you be a little bit explicit about what he’s not getting
for people who might not know the term mediation.
REUVEN Well, im-, imagine that such a child doesn’t get the
mother’s attempt to explain, to make him see things, to keep
him on her lap and make him and look at her as she talks to
him. To make him receive the kind of interpretation as to
what is being seen, shown and why it has been shown now.
What is happening particularly in this evening. And to make
him be a part in what’s happening in an explicit way. Not
just let him it happen to him. And, the fact that the
mother doesn’t do it to this child may effect even his
siblings not to do it with him. And because otherwise,
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
siblings may do what the mother doesn’t do in a family which
has been oriented towards mediated learning experience. So
you have a variety of conditions under which the cultural
deprivation will, eh, happen to individuals either because
it is not given to them or because they were not able to
accept it or because of both.
For instance, you have the very interesting phenomena of
children that I call early detected as suffering of a high
risk condition, that after the risk has gone, the
mediational interaction is not reinstated because the
parents don’t believe that it still will work. So a child
may have not been able to benefit in the beginning. He may
have been aloof, he may have been very little alert, and may
have not been responsive. He didn’t smile to the mother
etc., so since he didn’t smile in the early beginning and
since this not smiling was immediately detected as a
particularity of this child, it is very often becoming a
source of perpetuation of this lack of mediation and the
individual doesn’t suffer because of his initial condition,
but more because of the fact that he’s not given mediation.
And this is often observed. This is why I’m so against
early detection.
GARY BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
TONE
THIS IS SR NO. 20 AND THIS IS 21 JULY AND THE NEXT SLATE
WILL BE NUMBER 107 AND WE’RE ON CAMERA ROLL 21.
REUVEN Actually it becomes some kind of a, of a nice, it’s an
important question.
GARY Just after this bus passes Lorna, maybe you could make that
comment again so we’ll be able to pick it up on the tapes.
LORNA Okay.
So, Reuven, it was, um, either when you came to Vancouver or
in ‘88 when I was here that you said that the work that we
were doing, the work that I was doing in Vancouver was, was,
um, very dear to your heart because I was continuing where
you began initially.
REUVEN I want you to know when this happened to me. And I
became aware of it only after I had seen the film. This was
at Simon Fraser University when I, and you introduced me and
you had to run to the court and you had tearing, you were
crying in your way and I was always, eh, considering the way
by which we can really help as a function of the emotional
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
engagement which we afterwards thought(?) when we want to
help. And the emotional engagement which we have had with
the children from the Holocaust was that we can’t afford to
lose any one of them. And the fact that we have had so many
whom we have lost physically, mentally and so on, requires
from us an incredible investment and effort to turn each one
of these ... lost remnants of an enormous culture which has
been lost over the years, to be those who will continue and
the concept of ____(?), those pieces of, of wood which have
been saved from the fire has been, it came up to my mind
when I saw you then, and I understood that actually, your
motives to do what you do is the best guarantee that you
will succeed. And for me it was a very important experience
seeing that we actually have a, a new opening and this is
what I am hoping to see with many of those who have to
become emotionally engaged in saving children’s, not only
life, but quality of life.
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
GARY When Lorna loaned me some tapes of when you were in town,
there was one tape that she asked me if I would look at it
first and it was, I think that was at a Seaport(?), it had a
very emotional, very strong.
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN No, see this is, this was, we have to understand that
without this kind of emotional engagement, people will be
very, eh, intellectually oriented and will eventually enjoy
writing a big book and a nice book and, well, eh, deal with
the thing on an academic, theoretical level. You need more
than just that. In order to turn a theory into a program
which is meant to, eh, to do something more than just
intellectually.
I must tell you, it’s one of the reasons why I’m trying
to ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
... keep myself from engagement in just a pure academic
orientation. Eh, it’s not that I will not help, eh,
academically but, eh, we need more than just that.
GARY I think that’s also why I’ve been drawn into this whole film
about the work with culture because I’m fascinated by the
whole instrumental enrichment and I’m deeply engaged when I
see the way in which it can involve and engage and work with
children in the way it becomes part of the ...
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN One of the ... the, the important things which we have
to stress, that it is not just a program. As a program by
itself, it’s nice, it’s good, it’s fine, it’s dandy. You
need more. You need a theory. You need a belief system.
You need the assessment, which is extremely important. You
need the way by which individuals will be helped by the
assessment in order to change their orientation, their,
their belief system. Re-, it’s a reinforcing element. Each
time I examine a child I’m getting again the same ... sense
of a changed existence. So all these are elements which
have to be taken into consideration and the most important
is, the attempt to create the environment, the modifying
environment by effecting as many people as possible.
And this is also the reason I’m so happy to see such films
happening because they put the parents on the back of the
authorities. They don’t, they can’t escape it. Parents
seeing, being exposed to such a film don’t let the
authorities out and say, there’s something which can be done
better. Our children can benefit from it. Do it. Make it
available to our children. Don’t leave it out. Don’t be
eaten up by your doubts and by ... you know the best way to
postpone, to procrastinate, to, to say, well it’s not yet
fully validated, it’s not yet this. That’s the best way.
You get very cheap out of this thing.
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
Parents who have seen it and who have been exposed to such a
film, what you do and what has been done by Transformers and
the ____(?) University, they are no more ready to swallow
any story. And we have had after the Transformer film, we
had about thousand, eight hundred referrals. And they are
coming in daily. And I must say, it is a source of, of
pleasure, but at the same time a frustration because you
don’t have the means to expound in the same, as rapidly as
you would like to.
GARY You refer to yourself as a, um, a smuggler, getting a theory
into a program. What is it that you would like to see
parents understand in a program like this?
REUVEN Well I must tell you, we have had a great pleasure to
hear parents who have been attending the three days workshop
... were you there?
LORNA No.
REUVEN It’s a pity. You have missed something.
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
They came out and said when we first came we wanted to have
from you some recipes. Tell me what to do. Tell me how to
do. I have a child, don’t tell me about a two-months child,
I have a boy fifteen, sixteen years. Don’t tell me stories
what to do with the two months. That’s gone. And yet, as
we talking theory, we were emphasizing what had been done
even at early childhood. And the parents said, we have
gained through your theory now, more than any recipes. We
understood that what you offer us is an understanding, is a
way to handle the quality of interaction, no matter what we
do. And I must tell you, it was a very, very positive
experience which we have had.
GARY What do you think ...
REUVEN Now, what I am calling this smuggling, my role as a
smuggler, you heard the story of this, the man who goes over
the Frontier between Switzerland to Italy and the custom man
asked, what do you have in this sack? He says, well I have
sand. What? Sand? You going over to sand to Italy? We
don’t have enough sand in Italy? Well, he said sand, and
the man looks through and indeed there was nothing else but
sand. So day by day this man goes with his bicycle over the
Frontier and carries on this sack with sand. The man, the
custom man was mad. Please tell me, what are you smuggling?
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
I know that you are smuggling, but tell me what. I promise
I will not let you ... so, finally the man gave in. Don’t,
you want to know what I am smuggling. Bikes. (LAUGHTER)
And this is what I do. By giving programs such as the LPAD
which is very important, a good program, ___(?) and the
instrumental enrichment. I smuggle in a theory, a belief
system, a way of looking upon yourself as a representative
of a culture which has to be continued. I present the, what
is your roots and your past and its importance in shaping
your future. It’s a way of rendering individuals attentive
to things which they may not read nor ____(?).
LORNA Ya, I’m, um, in the last year I’ve been working with
families who, um, have children who’ve been fetally effected
by alcohol and drugs and, um, ...
BEEP (SOUND NO: ____)
... it’s been very important, the sessions with the parents
because ... it’s a lizard ... um, and I think that this is
an area that, um, will go in Vancouver anyway. We’re going
to be doing a lot of work in, because this is now the group,
a group of children that people say there’s nothing we can
do. Uh, because this happened, it’s physiological and um,
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
it’s effected their nervous system and their neurological
systems, um, but it’s been the parents that have been
pushing because I tell them about mediated learning and what
their role is in this.
REUVEN I must tell you, if I look at the present condition of
many of the adults and the readiness of people to act in a
very irresponsible way, I have the feeling that much of it
has been produced by the fact that parents were taking away
their role of mediators. They were given the feelings that
they are not qualified to mediate to the child. They are,
eh, able to do it. And anyway, what they will do will not
effect the child because they are not representatives of the
culture to which one has to adapt. Children, parents often
tell the children, don’t look me as a model. You look to
the white man, you look to the, to the middle class man,
look to, you look to your neighbours, to your teachers. Not
to us. Don’t ask me who I am, don’t be like me. And, this
has created kind of a minimization(?) of the parental role
and this kind of minimization(?) of the parental role is no
more legitimate. Phrase(?) the parent, I can be the way I
want, I can do what I want. It won’t effect my child and
therefore, I can be delinquent, I can be irresponsible, I
can be abusive to my wife, to my children. Anyway it won’t
change.
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
And one of the great importance of your work is to empower,
re-empower, reinstate the parental role. The role, the
responsibility, the fact that much of what they do will
determine the life and the existence of their children and
the future generations and therefore, they have to control
their behaviour, they have to give up on certain types of
activities and certain types of, of behaviours which they
have taken just out of desperation and out of the fact that
they are no more, do not have any more a legitimate role and
all the social work and all psychology won’t help. Believe
me. What will help is to give them again sense that it is
up, up to them to determine what their progenies will be and
in future.
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
LORNA So how do we go about doing that? Cause I see in many
of our classrooms, um, in instrumental enrichment ...
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
TONE
REUVEN ... are you sure of belonging to, to a community,
not to a nuclear family.
LORNA Uh huh.
ROLL 21, SLATE 112 IS NEXT.
Lorna would you be comfortable if you still moved about two
inches forward.
My life is in inches and centimeters. It goes that way.
But it will work out. I’m ready.
GARY You were in the midst of asking a question when we engaged
in our move here, did you want to follow that?
LORNA Ya, Reuven’s going to answer it. Do you mean for me to
ask it again?
GARY No. No.
REUVEN I consider the only way to achieve goals which today
seem to be out of reach, is by reinforcing the community as
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
a agent. The nuclear family is extremely vulnerable unit of
existence. The security which can be offered by the nuclear
family as a unit is minimal and today even less than it ever
was. There is a philosopher and a, a psychologist, ____(?)
who warns us that are slowly, slowly going back to the
commu-, to the, to the, eh community of dogs. The way dogs
lived where the father is out of the picture, has very
little do with his progenies and his, the single mother, the
single family is prevalent and therefore, if the nuclear
family effected by illness, effected by divorce, effected
by, eh, changes in its structure is offering very little of
stability, of security to the child living in it.
The enlarged family reinforced by the community may become
the only way to ensure the, eh, development and, of the
individual and without necessarily to affect his capacity to
act autonomously and independently. So in the cases where
we have to remediate, particular in certain social classes,
and in certain, eh, groups which have been somehow socially
disorganized in the sense of ____(?), the best way to
affect, to, is by community organization. By making people
belong to a community and to have the community offer
support to the nuclear family and render the nuclear family,
to become the agent of mediation, of cultural transmission,
of the transmission of values and around such communities,
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
the pluralistic development of culture may become a positive
phenomena.
And this is the, I think there is a trend like this now in
Israel. We have suffered in Israel from lack of small
communities. Because somehow we all want to belong to the
Nation which was formed by hundreds of little ethnic groups.
Each one having its, we, there was a trend to create the,
the melting pot and it turned out that the melting pot is
absolutely not a good idea. And you don’t need to be, eh,
uniform in order to have unity between the people, between,
as a nation. Unity is not to be acquired through
uniformity. On the contrary, unity is, can become a product
of, of a pluriformic(?) society. And, but then you need
small communities in which individual belongs and we have
now neighbours in Israel which act this way.
For instance in my son’s environment are enough, there is a
sense of community that’s incredible. They have, each, they
have about 70 types of services which they offer to people
and families take over particular roles. For instance,
certain medicines for children, eh, how do you call it ...
no, what the child needs, a piece, pac-, paci-.
LORNA Pacifiers.
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN Pacifiers. You need a pacifier. Friday evening the,
the, the drugstore is closed. There is a family who has
just pacifiers for you and you can go there. There is the
most sim-, elementary things of, are serviced by the
community. You need, you need chairs. You have a joyful
event in your family. There is a special service for
chairs. You get it without money. And this is something
which is now created in Israel as a community, eh, way of
organizing.
By the way I think it comes from the Jewish community in
the United States. It, there it was very developed. Now we
start it in Israel too. And I think one of the ways to, is
to create small community units.
LORNA And urban centers.
REUVEN And urban centers. To, and it has to be supported, it
has to be given support. For instance, in Israel we have
now something very interesting. May be interest t o know.
The, you know that we have now the cable television and the
people have got the license to, eh, have cable have been
compelled in their contract to offer a cable television to
the community television. Have you heard about it?
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
GARY I didn’t know it was here. That’s where I started making
television in Canada is community television.
REUVEN It’s community television which is supported by the
cable. They give the money for it. They finance it.
GARY And you have to ride them to make sure they’ll put that
money in too.
REUVEN No, but, but this, no, do you have it? This is a
part of their contract.
GARY Ya, it’s a community access.
REUVEN And this creates again a sense of community which
eventually will become a powerful tool in, empowering the
parents and making the parents aware. You belong. You are
with us. You can be a part, not a passive ... an active
partner. And this may be the way in which mediated learning
experience will become the, a powerful tool.
GARY I’m curious to ask Reuven to ask you a question that you
often asked of others. Which is how is working with
Reuven’s techniques, with the theory and philosophy, how has
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
it changed you in what you do as a person, as a teacher, so
I’ll let Reuven ask you.
REUVEN Well, this is a question which I would, it is a
question which I feel I, I would be very interested to know.
How are individuals effected by their encounter with the
theory of structural cognitive modifiability, with the
belief system. I know more about how parents are effected
in the test we do with a special child. I’m getting letters
in which people report on it and they claim that they have
discovered a ... I have also some very, very interesting
reports on behalf of teachers. Eh, and their relation to
their, eh, work. But I’m interested people like you are
more in the direction of creating a policy. How do you feel
as this encounter with, theory which is somehow being
marginal and not very well accepted by others? How did it
affect you?
LORNA Well, I think that, um, slowly over the years it, um,
what it gave me, I think was, um, the strength of, um, of,
uh, moving toward a goal of, and not, I guess in pers-, in
persevering, in persisting, um, so that, um, I had to, for
example, if I believed that um, that through instrumental
enrichment, through the, um, ideas of mediated learning, if
I could make a change in a child’s way of interacting in
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
their environment, that I had to believe that I also, by my
actions, my persistence, my focused energy could change a
society, I could change a system because for First Nations
children who, um, who everyone believed could not learn,
that the principals felt there was nothing they could do in
their schools that could help them to make a difference in
the learning of First Nations. So they said, take them
away. I can’t do anything. And teachers said, I’ve tried
everything that I’ve been taught and I can’t make a
difference. I can’t make a difference in these children’s
ability to learn. And because in research that it said
parents need to be involved in order for children to succeed
in schools, they need, parents need to be involved.
Aboriginal parents were not involved. And so then, then it
confirmed the fact that they could not work with this
population.
And so there were many belief systems then that needed to be
challenged to be changed. And the first one, I think was my
own. I had to believe that I had the tools. I had the
capabilities and the energy and the persistence to be able
to find a way. Like if I can’t do it in, from this way,
then I find another door. And so, I think that that’s what
um, that is the base, is the foundation. Starting, then
from there, I think that the way it has modified me is that
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
I then can look at cultural difference ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
... I can look at cultural deprivation and I can see and
understand that uh, that one, through one, I can effect the
other. And so understanding cultural deprivation, I can see
better the cultural difference.
(TRANSCRIPTION NOTE: SOUND STARTS TO SPEED AND SLOW AT THIS POINT. DON’T KNOW
WHETHER IT’S JUST THIS RECORDING OR ALSO ON THE ORIGINAL ... FROM HERE THROUGH TO
END OF THIS TAPE)
REUVEN And it’s meaning.
LORNA It’s a relationship.
REUVEN Well I, one of the most interesting phenomena which I
observed in many of the teachers is that once they were
given the belief system and they have accepted it as a
function of their need, they became extremely ingenious in
doing things.
LORNA That’s right.
REUVEN The creativity of the teachers has increased in a very
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
meaningful way. Of parents, I’ve seen parents who will give
me the best ideas as to how to do it with a child. Cause,
once the belief existed and they, they immediately became
meaningfully involved in searching for the adequate way to,
to develop.
GARY This has certainly gotten to a whole bunch of questions I
was interested in. Is there anything else you want to say?
LORNA Ya, there’s just one more ... one more, um, area that I
want to ask ... ants. You know they do bite.
SR 21 - PAGE
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN ... know that you were here five years ago, Lorna.
LORNA Ya, in 1988.
REUVEN When did you first hear about me before coming. I
can’t imagine that you just came in without to know
something about ...
LORNA No, I first heard about you Reuven in 1979 when I was
still living in Mount Currie. We had, um, um, taken over,
taken over control of our school, ah, in 1973 and, um, for,
from 1973 onward we were looking for some answers that would
help us to understand why our children were not performing,
um, academically well in school and, um, and I had read the
research in North America which we’re not, um, which had
many discrepancies and so in 1979, I realize now that it
must have been, um, because you were in Vancouver in ‘79, I
didn’t know that ... that I received some articles that, ah,
that you had written and, um, and it talked about, um,
motivation and language, um, cultural depravation and
cultural difference and I think that that probably was what
attracted me most, was that no where else in anything that I
had read had anyone, um, made it, made a distinguishment
between, between those two and also your definition of
cultural deprivation, um, which stated ...
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN Which made me a lot of, a lot of difficulties.
LORNA Right. And I realize why and why it was right for us,
uh, because during the seventies it was said that, that we
did not do well in schools, uh, in Canadian schools and in
American schools because we were culturally deprived of
Canadian culture and, um, American culture. No one had
talked about the importance of one’s own culture in the
development of, um, um, the ability to, to adapt to live and
uh, and so it, it was for those reasons that, um, that I, I,
um, was attracted to it, but on the other hand I rejected it
because of the, because of the term cognitive deficiencies.
And, um, because everything that had been said about was
that we were deficient in some way and I was not ready to
accept any more that, um, that, uh, that we were deficient.
And oft-, because often the deficiencies that people talked
about were that we were genetically deficient and um, so it
took me another few years before I came back to your work
and it resu-, and it resulted only because, um, I had been
looking in so many places in what people were writing about,
ya, so ...
REUVEN I must tell you something. You were among the first to,
um, understand the concept of cultural deprivation as a
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
status, as a state which is not related to be, to the
culture, the culture deprives you but you being deprived of
your own culture. Because usually one des-, describes the
native and First Nation culture or the minority culture as
depriving its people. And I’ve attempted to make it very
clear, it’s not the culture which deprives, it is the fact
that individuals become deprived of their own culture which
makes them acting in a deficient way.
Now, I have had great difficulties also with the concept of
deficiencies. People tell me, why do you have to use a
negative term. Why can’t you say it, put it in a positive
way. Put it that you need clear perception, put it that you
need logical evidence, put it that ... why do you have to
call it deficient in its perceptual processes, in its
capacity, its tendency to use more sources of information,
etc. and the answer, my answer is, if I want to remedy, if I
want to improve, if I want to change, I have to call the
child by its name. I have to create myself a target for
attack, a target for remediation, a target for development,
a target for re-orientation and I have made of this
provoca-, a provocative approach which people will ask the
question and by virtue of just asking the question, I was
able to explain. I have did, I have used my technique, what
I refer to as provoking mediation.
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
LORNA I recognized that very early. (LAUGHS)
REUVEN And I must tell you, I had long talks especially with
our friends, the black, Afro-, Afro-American group in, at
Yale when they came to study with me, ____(?) and ____(?)
and then also Larry Anderson came to Yale in 1980 and took
me some time to explain it.
LORNA Ya, so it took me away, but then I realized that, um,
that it was important that we have a clear image of where
it is we need to go with, um, you know in searching for some
strategies.
REUVEN You know that at this time, I was called by Mr. Barry,
Barry, can’t remember now his name, who belonged to the
lobby at the Congress(?) today, minority lobby in the
Congress(?) ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
... black but also Indian.
LORNA Oh?
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN And the major question was, how do you relate to the
possibility of having schools, Indian schools using the
Indian language, Navaho, Cherokee or whatever it is, rather
than using English as the first language. And, of course,
consonant(?) is my approach which is the revival of a, of
native cultures as a way to ensure mediational processes,
both in the nuclear family and in the society as at large, I
have been very much in favour of reviving native culture and
this was then used and brought up. It was the time when the
question of to whether to allow, this was the time when you,
you won(?) in ‘72, approximately, the right to have your own
school. By the same time, a little bit later eventually,
the Aleutians came to me too. Through this group, lobby
group in the Congress and I was then very much involved in
thinking, how do I convince of the necessity to create
conditions under which an Indian will be a better American,
a better Canadian by being a good Indian.
LORNA I guess, um, that’s another issue. I um, the only way
that we can be better Canadians through being a good Indian,
for me to be able to be a good Canadian by being a good
St’at’yemc can only exist when, um, the Canadians too, can
say, I can be a better Canadian because I can accept, um,
the way of the world view of the St’at’yemc or the Navaho.
You see it can’t only be ...
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN Absolutely.
LORNA ... in one direction.
REUVEN I will tell you, this is one of the things in which I,
which I have already ... the, there are two forces in the
process of belonging. There are two forces. There are
centrifugal forces and centripetal forces. The centrifugal
forces tend to have the individual thrown out of the center
of its existence. And the centripetal is the one which
makes the individual go in, become ins-, in the, in his
group and belonging to his group and this depends as well as
... it, uh, determines that, some of the conditions.
First of course, you have to have an ideology. You have to
have a belief system, you have to have a, a desire to
belong. But, this is not enough. If belonging to a
particular group is necessarily also belonging to a lower
socioeconomic disadvantaged group, then the centrifugal
forces will be ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
... those which will take over and the people will disband
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 17 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
and will run away and they are running away ...
SR 17 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
BEEP BEEP
THIS IS THE 21ST OF JULY AND THE NEXT SLATE WILL BE NO.
99.
BEEP BEEP
REUVEN The readiness to belong is first, eh, dependent on a,
a, on the existence of an ideology, and of a, but it also
depends on the amount of status an individual is getting out
of belonging. If he has to give up on his status, then the
centrifugal forces will take over and, and people will be
disbanded and will run away and I must say, one of the
tragic results of running away are very pervasive. Very few
people who run away and don’t want to know any more of their
group because they belong to another social class, uh, and
they succeed are very minimal compared to those who go down
the drain and certain, because of a feeling of uprootedness.
They are uprooted. This is what happens with the
Aboriginals in Australia. This is what has happened also
with some of the groups in other, eh, urban gathering were
really, because this feeling of belonging is a basic need of
human beings.
LORNA Uh huh.
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN But it has its price. And therefore, what has to be
looked for, what has to be demand, uh, fought for is to
ensure together with the recognition of a pluralistic
approach, also, the rights to exceed to higher levels of
functioning and in terms, not just in terms of, uh, of, uh,
financial, this is, but of the culture.
LORNA I guess that’s what I mean Reuven when I say that it,
that, um, that it’s, that in order for me to be a better
Canadian as a St’at’yemc, Canadians have to be able to
accept us without making a judgment as to our class in
society because when a society devalues another group, then
it establishes a relationship and this is something that I
see in, um, instrumental enrichment classes. Not just with
First Nations children, but with, um, other children who are
considered to be lower than others, is that, um, and it has,
so if in instrumental enrichment, our goal is to become
independent thinkers, to become autonomous, then that
implies freedom and, um, but in order to be independent, I
have to, uh, look at my position in the bigger world and,
um, and sometimes, um, there is a fight to maintain the
status quo. The way things are. Both by the teacher, by
the child, by the student and by the parent. Because
they’re saying, like you can’t go outside of your class.
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
You cannot grow outside of your group and, um, and this is,
I think, um, an area that, um, that we need to, to explore
in, you know, in your work because what you are doing is you
have opened ...
BEEP (SLATE NO:____)
... the gates so to speak. So that we are able to look at
that very concretely within the class and so once you open,
open that out, you’re, you’re upsetting like, everything.
The way the applecart to the way, way that apples are piled
on top of one another and, um, and I know that there are
other teachers and other groups who are struggling with this
because, you know, because then, in a way, in a sense what
we are also doing is, um, is breaking that, that
communication between, you know, between the families and
the student.
REUVEN Well this is something which I have been very concerned
already at a very early stage. When, uh, children were
given a language in the classroom, in the kindergarten and
was, was no more understood by the parents. And, some
parents reacted very badly against it and the gap, school,
parents, school, society has increased in a very meaningful
way. And one of the ways to deal with it was to ...
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
...approach it in more system oriented way. To try to
change the total environment in which a child found himself.
GARY WE’RE JUST GOING TO CHANGE CASSETTES HERE.
BEEP BEEP
REUVEN 195-, 1988. Did you, was it the time when Larry was
here too?
LORNA No, but Larry wrote to you about me.
REUVEN This I remember.
LORNA Ya.
REUVEN But you were not here together during the conference on
mediated learning experience?
LORNA No.
REUVEN Aha. Who else came with you from Vancouver at this
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
time?
LORNA Patrick Maxie.
REUVEN Ah Maxie. Maxie, Patrick. And this is all? Hildy.
You knew already Dan Hildy?
LORNA No I didn’t know Hildy yet.
REUVEN But Maxie you were?
LORNA I knew Max, I new Patrick. I had met him, ah, and
Charlene Goldstein who was also from Vancouver. Okay, so I
knew her and Hildy I knew about but I hadn’t met her at that
point.
REUVEN Because Hildy was the first to come and I think this
was in 19-, what is, what was it? 1973. ‘72. Hildy was
here with a group of people ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
...from Canada and from New York. The first workshop which
we have organized for people from abroad and this was still
done in 1972 I think, in ____(?) Street. It was ____(?)
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
from Toronto who has organized this workshop and Hildy was
among the first to come and she was among the first to bring
back the word and I then followed very closely, I came to
Vancouver and gave a workshop at UBC.
LORNA Uh huh.
REUVEN So, eh, you came in after, quite a little while, but it
was then that Maxie has already done some work with ...
LORNA In Salmon Arm.
REUVEN In Salmon Arm. Doug ____(?) was already there?
LORNA No.
REUVEN Not yet.
LORNA Not yet.
REUVEN Uh huh. And you came to Israel. It was a first
encounter with another minority. Cultural minority. What
was the feeling you have had? Didn’t it sound very strange
to you?
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
LORNA What, being here?
REUVEN Ya.
LORNA No. Um ...
REUVEN I think you were, you came to us for a Friday
evening, if I’m not wrong.
LORNA Saturday.
REUVEN Saturday.
LORNA I came to visit you, um, for Shabbot.
REUVEN This is Shabbot dinner.
LORNA Ya.
REUVEN I remember.
LORNA And, um, and we talked about the role of storytelling.
Remember that conversation.
REUVEN Ah yes.
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
LORNA In um, in mediating.
REUVEN That’s an old mediation, old form of mediation which is
pervasive in the Ethiopians because they are pre-literate,
pre-literate kind of society. Ya, I remember, you were
telling us about and I have had such a experience as a story
teller. I had it in Morocco with Balberra(?) and Jewish
story tellers and I have seen some of the Ethiopians who
were doing it. But then I’ve heard from you and we have
discussing it at greater lengths.
And I remember that the idea of opening up instrumental
enrichment to a, to the First Nation children who need it
very badly in order to make them accessible to learn ing,
not only to learning the occidental modern, but to learn it
by themselves was the great issue, because one of the
problems is how do you make children able to value their own
culture. Which was at, was competing so bitterly with the
glamorous culture of the occident, of the modern society,
technological society. And, taking away some of the very
meaningful aspects of one’s own culture. And this was, how
do you open them up for learning.
This was the same question which we have had with the
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
Navahos and I was called to the Cherokees and the ____(?).
Have you ever ... well ...
LORNA No. I don’t know that.
REUVEN ____(?). I was sent to ____(?) by the Kellogg
foundation, the Smithsonian to discuss there with King, Dr.
King, the opening of the museum for the, eh, eh, a Trail of
Tears. A Trail of Tears. This is a trail of the Indians
from the Cherokees who came from Oklahoma, from North
Carolina on their way to Oklahoma and many of them died on
the way. And there’s a museum which reconstructs this
story, this history of the Cherokees. So I was there and I
had this opportunity to learn more about this particular
problem, how do we make Indian children sensitive to Indian
culture? And, eh, and the Navaho group made for me a pow
wow where I have see this one year old children dance the
war dance. I was absolutely amazed with what culture can do
development.
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
LORNA Do you remember, um, do you remember coming to
Vancouver Reuven in, um, I think 198-, 1990 I think it was
when you came? (CLEARS THROAT) With the Hadassah Wizo
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
Canada and you met all the children.
REUVEN Ah yes. The children came to the lunch. Oh it was a
great event. It was a great event. Some of the children,
and the beautiful thing was really the integration. You had
the children from all nations, practically, Chinese, Asian
children and, and Indian children and children from, eh, eh,
Canadian families. And it was such a congenial, eh, group.
Then I had some of them interviewed with me on the
television, the same formation, integrative, integrative
kind of, eh, group, which was very ...
GARY That was the CKVU television appearance?
REUVEN You see one of the things which you have mentioned, the
question of instrumental enrichment as a reshuffling device.
Children who were totally unsuccessful in the classroom were
very successful in instrumental enrichment. And this being
successful in a recognized difficult meaningful task.
Teachers were able to say, children, you know, when I
studied instrumental enrichment, and I studied mediational
interaction I had difficulties I had to work out in order to
master the task. And, to have children who are usually
considered as those who are last in the, in their
achievement, become the first in their mastery of the
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
instrumental enrichment task meant a total change and a
departure from their initial condition which very often
generalized itself to other areas of achievement. The first
thing which is being brought to us by teachers ... I would
have never have believed that he could make it. The very
fact that he started to believe and see this as a
possibility has already affected in a very beneficial way.
This particular child to this particular group or this,
which the generalization, the stereotypization ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
... has made him stay where he is. But, then for the child
himself, coming, becoming the one who is leading and showing
and the first to point out and I have done it and I have
finished and told by the teacher, go over and help the other
guy - who has not yet mentioned - the other guy happens to
be the guy who is usually successful in school, this is a
equating kind of, equalizing kind of device ... in ad-, in
addition of and one of the problems which we have is to turn
the teacher into the individual who can capture this
processes and immed-, immediately capitalizing on them and
using this as devices for further generalization of
successful event.
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 18 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
GARY OKAY WE’LL JUST CHANGE REELS HERE.
SR 18 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
TONE
THIS IS 21, JULY, THE NEXT SLATE WILL BE NUMBER 104.
LORNA ... finding that the fish are being contaminated
before they come to us.
REUVEN With ____(?) with industrial things.
LORNA Ya.
REUVEN Are these fishes which come up the river?
LORNA Mount Currie, the rivers in Mount Currie are
spawning, spawning rivers.
REUVEN Spawning Mount Currie, and then they go down ...
LORNA Into the ocean.
REUVEN And coming back to spawn there.
LORNA Ya.
REUVEN Uh huh. What kind of fish? You don’t have salmon?
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
LORNA Ya, salmon.
REUVEN You have salmon? They climb up?
LORNA Sockeye. Chum. Spring. Yep. Are you rolling?
So Reuven I’m interested, we talked earlier ... oh ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
Reuven I’ve always been really curious to, to know how you
came to understand the, that the cultural difference and
cultural deprivation.
REUVEN Ah, two different entities.
LORNA Yes.
REUVEN Well I must tell you, initially, initially, the initial
hypothesis was the cultural differences responsible for low
functioning. This was the general, eh, way of explaining
why children from, eh, different countries act differently
and the difference are usually in this favour of those who
are not close to the, eh, modern occidental culture. And, I
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
was extremely, eh, curious to see to what extent really the
concept of cultural differentiati-, differences which was
socially, eh, sociologically considered as particularly
effecting individuals who were belonging to traditional
society and the concept of traditional society was usually
related to closed in systems, people who don’t really, eh,
eh, open themselves up to the new elements of modern society
and these were again, related to people who keep on to their
traditional, who are culturally different, and therefore
they are traditional and therefore, they are closed down.
Well this has really made me, eh, question to what extent
are these people who keep on to a tradition necessarily
unable to exceed to other cultures. As a matter of fact,
my, my hypothesis, just in a speculative way was that people
who have learned their own culture, have formed tools to
learn another culture. People who have learned one
language, will be able to learn another language. So, this
was my hypothesis in which then I went out to see and one of
my first groups to study were the Yemenites. The Yemenites
came to Israel and you know the new group which came in now,
they are already very transformed. But the initial were a
very di-, cultural different group. They lived in a society
in which the technology was very, eh, elementary, remote
from our culture. They had wonderful ____(?) but nothing of
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
the technology which we have had and also in terms of
certain basic and elementary concepts which were not well
rooted in their, eh, way of thinking.
(I’ve examined a few hundred of Yemenite children and I’ve
seen with what easiness they went over the mountain ...
... that the tools which they have acquired through the
learning of their own culture, which was a very ...
... in terms of certain basic and elementary concepts which
were not well rooted in their way of thinking...)
I’ve examined a few hundred of Yemenite
children and I’ve seen with what easiness they went over the
mountain. Yet the tool which they have lea-, acquired through
their learning of their own culture, which was a very rich
culture, but very different from ours, has become a, a real way
to, to learn new elements and the schemata which they have had
was, were very rich, were the best passway to reach to new
achievements, new cultures.
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
And it is then that I was able to formulate that being
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
cultural different means actually to be endowed with tools
of learning. Because what makes you different is the fact
that you have learned your own culture. An d your own
culture is different from the culture to which you have to
adapt yourself. And, then, I was able to compare it at a
later stage ... in 1950 with culturally deprived
individuals.
Now one of the very important elements which I have learned
is that cultural deprivation has nothing to do with the
culture in which individual has been brought up. Nor is it
related to a particular kind of class in which the
individual is living. Nor is it related to the amount of
culture which exists in the surrounding of the individual.
I’ve seen ... cultural deprived individuals in the best, in
the highest societal, cultural elite. And I have tens and
hundreds of examples. And I have seen culturally different
individuals in the poorest environments, in the poorest
minority groups. Culturally different in the sense that
they were endowed with tools of learning and therefore, the
concept of cultural deprivation became a very important
hypothesis for explaining cognitive deficiency and the
incapacity of the individual to learn and to benefit from
encounters with stimuli, with cultural stimuli, no matter
how cultural, how high value they were.
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
So this is one of the probably the, eh, elements which have
been most enlightening and counteracting the concept of
intelligence as the source of these differences. The source
of differences are cultural differences and cultural
deprivation. And in many respects, even an organically
effected child is a culturally deprived. Why? Because his
organisity has prevailed as, has, has prevented him from
being, becoming effected by some culture.
LORNA Can you give me an example of that.
REUVEN Okay, listen. Take a, a child, a hyperactive
child. Irrespective of what are the reasons of his being
hyperactive, attempt to mediate to him will always be a real
____(?) type of activity, you have to run after him in order to
make him see what you want him to see. He runs around and sees
everything. There’s no question about him being a sensorial
deprived individual. A hyperactive child sees more than we both
in the shortest time because he runs around, touches everything,
looks at everything, briefly, shortly, so it’s not a matter of
sensorial richness but it is the possibility for you, mediator,
to interpose yourself between him. You have interposed, he is
already far out. And this is a very absolutely observable
phenomena. You can’t mediate to this child.
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
So, he is culturally deprived. Not because you have not
attempted to mediate to him. But because he had an internal
barrier to your mediation. The same is true for the child,
for the autistic child. But, the same can be true also for
the child whom you don’t attempt to mediate, who because of
other priorities, poor mother, has, doesn’t have the time to
think, what do I give to the child in addition to the food
which will make him survive. She is too busy to, eh, deeply
involved in making sure the child survives the hunger and
starvation and has much less interest in time and energy to
think how do I make him sing a song as he eats, or how do I
make him observe where he will best benefit from his food
and at what time, etc. So, time and space and, and what
precedes before and what comes after are much less of
concern to the poor mother who struggles for life. So,
poverty creates priorities which are not always, eh, in the
direction of mediation.
A certain emotional rejection on the part of parents to a
particular child. In a particular family which is otherwise
very mediating may turn one particular child into culturally
deprived individual.
I have a very interesting case just now. Of a boy who never
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
understood. He was considered to be organic, he was
considered to be, to have some, eh, special difficulties in
learning, a learning disabled individual. We examined him.
There were no sign whatsoever. For some reason this boy in
a whole fratre(?), in whole brotherhood, he was the rejected
child. That’s what happens, something between the parents,
before birth, or whether it after birth. This child was not
accepted. And he was the one who didn’t receive mediation
in a family, otherwise, highly mediating. So you may have
many reasons why individual didn’t receive mediation,
mediated learning experience.
GARY Can you be a little bit explicit about what he’s not getting
for people who might not know the term mediation.
REUVEN Well, im-, imagine that such a child doesn’t get the
mother’s attempt to explain, to make him see things, to keep
him on her lap and make him and look at her as she talks to
him. To make him receive the kind of interpretation as to
what is being seen, shown and why it has been shown now.
What is happening particularly in this evening. And to make
him be a part in what’s happening in an explicit way. Not
just let him it happen to him. And, the fact that the
mother doesn’t do it to this child may effect even his
siblings not to do it with him. And because otherwise,
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 19 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
siblings may do what the mother doesn’t do in a family which
has been oriented towards mediated learning experience. So
you have a variety of conditions under which the cultural
deprivation will, eh, happen to individuals either because
it is not given to them or because they were not able to
accept it or because of both.
For instance, you have the very interesting phenomena of
children that I call early detected as suffering of a high
risk condition, that after the risk has gone, the
mediational interaction is not reinstated because the
parents don’t believe that it still will work. So a child
may have not been able to benefit in the beginning. He may
have been aloof, he may have been very little alert, and may
have not been responsive. He didn’t smile to the mother
etc., so since he didn’t smile in the early beginning and
since this not smiling was immediately detected as a
particularity of this child, it is very often becoming a
source of perpetuation of this lack of mediation and the
individual doesn’t suffer because of his initial condition,
but more because of the fact that he’s not given mediation.
And this is often observed. This is why I’m so against
early detection.
GARY BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
SR 19 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
TONE
THIS IS SR NO. 20 AND THIS IS 21 JULY AND THE NEXT SLATE
WILL BE NUMBER 107 AND WE’RE ON CAMERA ROLL 21.
REUVEN Actually it becomes some kind of a, of a nice, it’s an
important question.
GARY Just after this bus passes Lorna, maybe you could make that
comment again so we’ll be able to pick it up on the tapes.
LORNA Okay.
So, Reuven, it was, um, either when you came to Vancouver or
in ‘88 when I was here that you said that the work that we
were doing, the work that I was doing in Vancouver was, was,
um, very dear to your heart because I was continuing where
you began initially.
REUVEN I want you to know when this happened to me. And I
became aware of it only after I had seen the film. This was
at Simon Fraser University when I, and you introduced me and
you had to run to the court and you had tearing, you were
crying in your way and I was always, eh, considering the way
by which we can really help as a function of the emotional
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
engagement which we afterwards thought(?) when we want to
help. And the emotional engagement which we have had with
the children from the Holocaust was that we can’t afford to
lose any one of them. And the fact that we have had so many
whom we have lost physically, mentally and so on, requires
from us an incredible investment and effort to turn each one
of these ... lost remnants of an enormous culture which has
been lost over the years, to be those who will continue and
the concept of ____(?), those pieces of, of wood which have
been saved from the fire has been, it came up to my mind
when I saw you then, and I understood that actually, your
motives to do what you do is the best guarantee that you
will succeed. And for me it was a very important experience
seeing that we actually have a, a new opening and this is
what I am hoping to see with many of those who have to
become emotionally engaged in saving children’s, not only
life, but quality of life.
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
GARY When Lorna loaned me some tapes of when you were in town,
there was one tape that she asked me if I would look at it
first and it was, I think that was at a Seaport(?), it had a
very emotional, very strong.
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN No, see this is, this was, we have to understand that
without this kind of emotional engagement, people will be
very, eh, intellectually oriented and will eventually enjoy
writing a big book and a nice book and, well, eh, deal with
the thing on an academic, theoretical level. You need more
than just that. In order to turn a theory into a program
which is meant to, eh, to do something more than just
intellectually.
I must tell you, it’s one of the reasons why I’m trying
to ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
... keep myself from engagement in just a pure academic
orientation. Eh, it’s not that I will not help, eh,
academically but, eh, we need more than just that.
GARY I think that’s also why I’ve been drawn into this whole film
about the work with culture because I’m fascinated by the
whole instrumental enrichment and I’m deeply engaged when I
see the way in which it can involve and engage and work with
children in the way it becomes part of the ...
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN One of the ... the, the important things which we have
to stress, that it is not just a program. As a program by
itself, it’s nice, it’s good, it’s fine, it’s dandy. You
need more. You need a theory. You need a belief system.
You need the assessment, which is extremely important. You
need the way by which individuals will be helped by the
assessment in order to change their orientation, their,
their belief system. Re-, it’s a reinforcing element. Each
time I examine a child I’m getting again the same ... sense
of a changed existence. So all these are elements which
have to be taken into consideration and the most important
is, the attempt to create the environment, the modifying
environment by effecting as many people as possible.
And this is also the reason I’m so happy to see such films
happening because they put the parents on the back of the
authorities. They don’t, they can’t escape it. Parents
seeing, being exposed to such a film don’t let the
authorities out and say, there’s something which can be done
better. Our children can benefit from it. Do it. Make it
available to our children. Don’t leave it out. Don’t be
eaten up by your doubts and by ... you know the best way to
postpone, to procrastinate, to, to say, well it’s not yet
fully validated, it’s not yet this. That’s the best way.
You get very cheap out of this thing.
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
Parents who have seen it and who have been exposed to such a
film, what you do and what has been done by Transformers and
the ____(?) University, they are no more ready to swallow
any story. And we have had after the Transformer film, we
had about thousand, eight hundred referrals. And they are
coming in daily. And I must say, it is a source of, of
pleasure, but at the same time a frustration because you
don’t have the means to expound in the same, as rapidly as
you would like to.
GARY You refer to yourself as a, um, a smuggler, getting a theory
into a program. What is it that you would like to see
parents understand in a program like this?
REUVEN Well I must tell you, we have had a great pleasure to
hear parents who have been attending the three days workshop
... were you there?
LORNA No.
REUVEN It’s a pity. You have missed something.
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
They came out and said when we first came we wanted to have
from you some recipes. Tell me what to do. Tell me how to
do. I have a child, don’t tell me about a two-months child,
I have a boy fifteen, sixteen years. Don’t tell me stories
what to do with the two months. That’s gone. And yet, as
we talking theory, we were emphasizing what had been done
even at early childhood. And the parents said, we have
gained through your theory now, more than any recipes. We
understood that what you offer us is an understanding, is a
way to handle the quality of interaction, no matter what we
do. And I must tell you, it was a very, very positive
experience which we have had.
GARY What do you think ...
REUVEN Now, what I am calling this smuggling, my role as a
smuggler, you heard the story of this, the man who goes over
the Frontier between Switzerland to Italy and the custom man
asked, what do you have in this sack? He says, well I have
sand. What? Sand? You going over to sand to Italy? We
don’t have enough sand in Italy? Well, he said sand, and
the man looks through and indeed there was nothing else but
sand. So day by day this man goes with his bicycle over the
Frontier and carries on this sack with sand. The man, the
custom man was mad. Please tell me, what are you smuggling?
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
I know that you are smuggling, but tell me what. I promise
I will not let you ... so, finally the man gave in. Don’t,
you want to know what I am smuggling. Bikes. (LAUGHTER)
And this is what I do. By giving programs such as the LPAD
which is very important, a good program, ___(?) and the
instrumental enrichment. I smuggle in a theory, a belief
system, a way of looking upon yourself as a representative
of a culture which has to be continued. I present the, what
is your roots and your past and its importance in shaping
your future. It’s a way of rendering individuals attentive
to things which they may not read nor ____(?).
LORNA Ya, I’m, um, in the last year I’ve been working with
families who, um, have children who’ve been fetally effected
by alcohol and drugs and, um, ...
BEEP (SOUND NO: ____)
... it’s been very important, the sessions with the parents
because ... it’s a lizard ... um, and I think that this is
an area that, um, will go in Vancouver anyway. We’re going
to be doing a lot of work in, because this is now the group,
a group of children that people say there’s nothing we can
do. Uh, because this happened, it’s physiological and um,
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
it’s effected their nervous system and their neurological
systems, um, but it’s been the parents that have been
pushing because I tell them about mediated learning and what
their role is in this.
REUVEN I must tell you, if I look at the present condition of
many of the adults and the readiness of people to act in a
very irresponsible way, I have the feeling that much of it
has been produced by the fact that parents were taking away
their role of mediators. They were given the feelings that
they are not qualified to mediate to the child. They are,
eh, able to do it. And anyway, what they will do will not
effect the child because they are not representatives of the
culture to which one has to adapt. Children, parents often
tell the children, don’t look me as a model. You look to
the white man, you look to the, to the middle class man,
look to, you look to your neighbours, to your teachers. Not
to us. Don’t ask me who I am, don’t be like me. And, this
has created kind of a minimization(?) of the parental role
and this kind of minimization(?) of the parental role is no
more legitimate. Phrase(?) the parent, I can be the way I
want, I can do what I want. It won’t effect my child and
therefore, I can be delinquent, I can be irresponsible, I
can be abusive to my wife, to my children. Anyway it won’t
change.
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 20 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
And one of the great importance of your work is to empower,
re-empower, reinstate the parental role. The role, the
responsibility, the fact that much of what they do will
determine the life and the existence of their children and
the future generations and therefore, they have to control
their behaviour, they have to give up on certain types of
activities and certain types of, of behaviours which they
have taken just out of desperation and out of the fact that
they are no more, do not have any more a legitimate role and
all the social work and all psychology won’t help. Believe
me. What will help is to give them again sense that it is
up, up to them to determine what their progenies will be and
in future.
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
LORNA So how do we go about doing that? Cause I see in many
of our classrooms, um, in instrumental enrichment ...
SR 20 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
TONE
REUVEN ... are you sure of belonging to, to a community,
not to a nuclear family.
LORNA Uh huh.
ROLL 21, SLATE 112 IS NEXT.
Lorna would you be comfortable if you still moved about two
inches forward.
My life is in inches and centimeters. It goes that way.
But it will work out. I’m ready.
GARY You were in the midst of asking a question when we engaged
in our move here, did you want to follow that?
LORNA Ya, Reuven’s going to answer it. Do you mean for me to
ask it again?
GARY No. No.
REUVEN I consider the only way to achieve goals which today
seem to be out of reach, is by reinforcing the community as
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
a agent. The nuclear family is extremely vulnerable unit of
existence. The security which can be offered by the nuclear
family as a unit is minimal and today even less than it ever
was. There is a philosopher and a, a psychologist, ____(?)
who warns us that are slowly, slowly going back to the
commu-, to the, to the, eh community of dogs. The way dogs
lived where the father is out of the picture, has very
little do with his progenies and his, the single mother, the
single family is prevalent and therefore, if the nuclear
family effected by illness, effected by divorce, effected
by, eh, changes in its structure is offering very little of
stability, of security to the child living in it.
The enlarged family reinforced by the community may become
the only way to ensure the, eh, development and, of the
individual and without necessarily to affect his capacity to
act autonomously and independently. So in the cases where
we have to remediate, particular in certain social classes,
and in certain, eh, groups which have been somehow socially
disorganized in the sense of ____(?), the best way to
affect, to, is by community organization. By making people
belong to a community and to have the community offer
support to the nuclear family and render the nuclear family,
to become the agent of mediation, of cultural transmission,
of the transmission of values and around such communities,
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
the pluralistic development of culture may become a positive
phenomena.
And this is the, I think there is a trend like this now in
Israel. We have suffered in Israel from lack of small
communities. Because somehow we all want to belong to the
Nation which was formed by hundreds of little ethnic groups.
Each one having its, we, there was a trend to create the,
the melting pot and it turned out that the melting pot is
absolutely not a good idea. And you don’t need to be, eh,
uniform in order to have unity between the people, between,
as a nation. Unity is not to be acquired through
uniformity. On the contrary, unity is, can become a product
of, of a pluriformic(?) society. And, but then you need
small communities in which individual belongs and we have
now neighbours in Israel which act this way.
For instance in my son’s environment are enough, there is a
sense of community that’s incredible. They have, each, they
have about 70 types of services which they offer to people
and families take over particular roles. For instance,
certain medicines for children, eh, how do you call it ...
no, what the child needs, a piece, pac-, paci-.
LORNA Pacifiers.
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
REUVEN Pacifiers. You need a pacifier. Friday evening the,
the, the drugstore is closed. There is a family who has
just pacifiers for you and you can go there. There is the
most sim-, elementary things of, are serviced by the
community. You need, you need chairs. You have a joyful
event in your family. There is a special service for
chairs. You get it without money. And this is something
which is now created in Israel as a community, eh, way of
organizing.
By the way I think it comes from the Jewish community in
the United States. It, there it was very developed. Now we
start it in Israel too. And I think one of the ways to, is
to create small community units.
LORNA And urban centers.
REUVEN And urban centers. To, and it has to be supported, it
has to be given support. For instance, in Israel we have
now something very interesting. May be interest t o know.
The, you know that we have now the cable television and the
people have got the license to, eh, have cable have been
compelled in their contract to offer a cable television to
the community television. Have you heard about it?
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
GARY I didn’t know it was here. That’s where I started making
television in Canada is community television.
REUVEN It’s community television which is supported by the
cable. They give the money for it. They finance it.
GARY And you have to ride them to make sure they’ll put that
money in too.
REUVEN No, but, but this, no, do you have it? This is a
part of their contract.
GARY Ya, it’s a community access.
REUVEN And this creates again a sense of community which
eventually will become a powerful tool in, empowering the
parents and making the parents aware. You belong. You are
with us. You can be a part, not a passive ... an active
partner. And this may be the way in which mediated learning
experience will become the, a powerful tool.
GARY I’m curious to ask Reuven to ask you a question that you
often asked of others. Which is how is working with
Reuven’s techniques, with the theory and philosophy, how has
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
it changed you in what you do as a person, as a teacher, so
I’ll let Reuven ask you.
REUVEN Well, this is a question which I would, it is a
question which I feel I, I would be very interested to know.
How are individuals effected by their encounter with the
theory of structural cognitive modifiability, with the
belief system. I know more about how parents are effected
in the test we do with a special child. I’m getting letters
in which people report on it and they claim that they have
discovered a ... I have also some very, very interesting
reports on behalf of teachers. Eh, and their relation to
their, eh, work. But I’m interested people like you are
more in the direction of creating a policy. How do you feel
as this encounter with, theory which is somehow being
marginal and not very well accepted by others? How did it
affect you?
LORNA Well, I think that, um, slowly over the years it, um,
what it gave me, I think was, um, the strength of, um, of,
uh, moving toward a goal of, and not, I guess in pers-, in
persevering, in persisting, um, so that, um, I had to, for
example, if I believed that um, that through instrumental
enrichment, through the, um, ideas of mediated learning, if
I could make a change in a child’s way of interacting in
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
their environment, that I had to believe that I also, by my
actions, my persistence, my focused energy could change a
society, I could change a system because for First Nations
children who, um, who everyone believed could not learn,
that the principals felt there was nothing they could do in
their schools that could help them to make a difference in
the learning of First Nations. So they said, take them
away. I can’t do anything. And teachers said, I’ve tried
everything that I’ve been taught and I can’t make a
difference. I can’t make a difference in these children’s
ability to learn. And because in research that it said
parents need to be involved in order for children to succeed
in schools, they need, parents need to be involved.
Aboriginal parents were not involved. And so then, then it
confirmed the fact that they could not work with this
population.
And so there were many belief systems then that needed to be
challenged to be changed. And the first one, I think was my
own. I had to believe that I had the tools. I had the
capabilities and the energy and the persistence to be able
to find a way. Like if I can’t do it in, from this way,
then I find another door. And so, I think that that’s what
um, that is the base, is the foundation. Starting, then
from there, I think that the way it has modified me is that
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
I then can look at cultural difference ...
BEEP (SLATE NO: ____)
... I can look at cultural deprivation and I can see and
understand that uh, that one, through one, I can effect the
other. And so understanding cultural deprivation, I can see
better the cultural difference.
(TRANSCRIPTION NOTE: SOUND STARTS TO SPEED AND SLOW AT THIS POINT. DON’T KNOW
WHETHER IT’S JUST THIS RECORDING OR ALSO ON THE ORIGINAL ... FROM HERE THROUGH TO
END OF THIS TAPE)
REUVEN And it’s meaning.
LORNA It’s a relationship.
REUVEN Well I, one of the most interesting phenomena which I
observed in many of the teachers is that once they were
given the belief system and they have accepted it as a
function of their need, they became extremely ingenious in
doing things.
LORNA That’s right.
REUVEN The creativity of the teachers has increased in a very
SR 21 - PAGE
The Mind of a Child
Face to Face Media Ltd.
SR 21 - LORNA WILLIAMS AND REUVEN FEUERSTEIN
meaningful way. Of parents, I’ve seen parents who will give
me the best ideas as to how to do it with a child. Cause,
once the belief existed and they, they immediately became
meaningfully involved in searching for the adequate way to,
to develop.
GARY This has certainly gotten to a whole bunch of questions I
was interested in. Is there anything else you want to say?
LORNA Ya, there’s just one more ... one more, um, area that I
want to ask ... ants. You know they do bite.
SR 21 - PAGE
Production material centres around a joint interview conducted with Lorna Wanosts’a7 Williams and Reuven Feuerstein in Shoresh, Isreal. In tape 1, Wanosts’a7 and Feuerstein discuss how she first came to learn of his work while teaching at Ts̓zil Community School; Feuerstein’s conceptualizations of cultural difference and cultural deprivation; the need for respect of cultural differences without devaluing other groups; and Feuerstein’s idea of the forces of belonging. In tape 2, Wanosts’a7 and Feuerstein discuss Wanosts’a7’s experience first coming to Israel for Feuerstein’s international summer workshop; Instrumental Enrichment (FIE); more on cultural difference and cultural deprivation; mediated learning experience and cognitive testing; and the importance of emotional engagement in education, which includes a reflection by Feuerstein’s on his work with children of the Holocaust. In tape 3, Feuerstein discusses the BBC documentary “The Transformers: Out of the Wilderness” created about his work; and the responsibilities of parents in providing mediation, including the importance of Wanosts’a7’s work in re-empowering parents in that role. The filmed segments of the interview run from 12:29 on tape 1, and continue until 14:48 on tape 3. 12:30 on tape 3 to the end of the interview are silent. Additional sequences can be found proceeding and following the interview, including the Old City of Jerusalem; the Western Wall; Shoresh; and the Neve Carmel caravan site in Haifa. Much of this material does not have corresponding audio.
- In Collection:
- Sound roll: SR18
- Camera roll: CR21
- Sound roll: SR20
- Sound roll: SR19
- Camera roll: CR22
- Sound roll: SR21
- Camera roll: CR19
- Camera roll: CR20
- Camera roll: CR17
- Sound roll: SR17
- Camera roll: CR23
- 01:14:52
- 50.31667, -122.71667
- 31.7778, 35.2322
- 49.24966, -123.11934
- 31.79711, 35.06525
- 32.783611, 34.965556
- 3 videocassettes : analog, col., Betacam SP
- Lorna Wánosts’a7 Williams Face to Face Media Collection
- Digitized in collaboration with the Steven Spielberg Jewish Film Archive at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
- Accession Number: 2017-057
- Special Collections Finding Aid: https://uvic2.coppul.archivematica.org/face-to-face-media-fonds
- August 27, 2020 to September 8, 2020
- Originally recorded on 16 mm film and 1/4” reel-to-reel audio later transferred and synced to Betacam SP for use during post-production. Dates on cassettes are believed to reflect date of transfer.Transcripts of the 1/4” sound reels were created by Face to Face Media for use during post-production. These audio transcripts include additional interview segments not found on the videocassettes and have been provided unedited. Sound reels were not transferred to Archives.Digitized by the The MediaPreserve. Access files created by University of Victoria Special Collections and University Archives. Metadata by Matt Innes.
- Rights
- This material is made available on this site for research and private study only.
- DOI
