Week 2 - Guatemala

After two weeks here in GA, I am absolutely loving this field school. We have performed over 25 observations of social work visits and educational promoter observations. Our research is based in a small town called San Miguel Milpas Altas, a mostly sustenance farming village further into the mountains. We visit for approximately 4-5 hours a day and I and my partner follow an educational promoter around within the classrooms she is working or hike up and down the very steep streets to visit different homes and check on families and children with a social worker.

We have visited multiple levels of the tiered Guatemalan Health System and I believe I am beginning to understand some of the many barriers to health care delivery. The complex system of State organizations and NGOs create a healthcare system that is often inefficient and not client centered. However, on paper, the healthcare system and educational system look fantastic with multiculturalism, equality, and equal opportunity built right in. The caveat to this paper paradise is the actual enforcement and implementation of the laws that have been put in place. Based on different sources, somewhere between 2-5% of homicides are investigated, let alone convicted. This statistic parallels the implementation and resources allocated to the education and health care system by a largely corrupt government.

We began the process of Qualitative Data Analysis this week by forming the beginning ideas for a code book. We still have some data collection to finish up next week but because we have little time we are beginning early. We will be producing a 60 page written report from our findings hopefully at the end of the 4 weeks.

This week we spoke with the dean of the college of social sciences at a large university in Guatemala City concerning the history of structural violence in Nicaragua and the niece of a former president of Guatemala who is doing anthropological (and in my opinion occupational) research into safety perceptions and environmental risks for young girls. Her project is actually very interesting in that it first has multiple levels. She has a complex process of finding and working with women and young girls who have experienced domestic or sexual violence. Using the occupation of not only documenting the issues facing these girls but also allowing the girls to tell their story on a larger scale through videos this anthropologist is empowering and rehabilitating. 

The second level of her project is something they have named Safe Scaping. The young girls take GPSs throughout their town and mark down coordinates of where they feel safe, mildly safe, and unsafe. Using this activity the researchers have been able to pin point locations that are problematic for young girls and are now taking steps to alleviate those problems.

Ashley and Ryan

Also this week, I was indigenously married, for the second time. This is what I get for always being one of the only boys in this profession.

My best moment this week probably was discussing within our smaller group  a seeming cultural norm that may be impeding huge amounts of progress for Guatemalans. In reviewing and  discussing our observations within the classroom, we have realized that critical thinking and imaginative play are severely lacking within the education system as well as in general. Granted a generalization at this point, but it seems that ingenuity and imaginative thinking are simply not taught or at least not taught often. The main technique is rote memorization. For this reason, Common Hope has made it a particular goal to increase critical thinking within the school setting. 

The most exciting realization then was that the educational promoters, after looking back on our notes, were actively working to resolve this problem. For example a teacher asked questions about a book, "What color was the lion?", "Where did the mouse like to run?", whereas the promoter stepped in and began asking questions like, "If you were the mouse what would you have done?", "If you were a hunter and saw the mouse eating the rope, what would you have done?". The promoter then praised those students who were able to think outside the box and create answers that weren't based on pure memory of the story.

Worst moment... definitely tripping in the street and straining a tendon in my knee. It definitely reminded me of the many physical accessibility barriers that are still very present within Guatemala. But before we make Guatemala wheelchair accessible, we may want to also focus on decreasing barriers to actually receiving a legitimate wheelchair through the Guatemalan health system.

This is a very typical dilemma of a socially or otherwise oppressed group. The sufficient provision of resources is being prevented not only because resources are scarce, but also because the systems (international and domestic) are built in such a way that removes the power from the oppressed, effectively creating a web created to keep them trapped. 

We have learned that this can be referred to as the "core" and the "periphery". For example, countries who are part of the "core" hold the power to manipulate and form structures that then affect the periphery. An example of this might be CAFTA. Much of Central America currently could not function without the aid and economic interaction from the US. Therefore they have no ability to refuse or bargain for a more appropriate agreement that does not tip the scales in favor of the core. Because the oppressed countries are functioning on a baseline of survivorship, they have no room to take risks or make bargains. Literally, one day of bargaining or community organizing for some members of the community we are working in would mean no food for the family sometime later.

We are exploring and attempting to understand how the complex systems of economies, politics, healthcare, and education negatively affect the ability of everyday Guatemalans to perform in meaningful and sometimes even necessary areas of occupations.