The first two words that popped into my head were "future-focused" which also counted as two words "future" and "focused". She then asked our group of about 7 students and 3 professors to enact those words expressed through our body into the centre floor space of our group as we were all seated on chairs around in a circle. She explained that she had also enacted this with a group of Pacific post-graduate students at a writing retreat which I wasn't able to attend due to work and family commitments.
Anyway, it was interesting because I could see the hesitation in the other attendees but because she was a Samoan student colleague and in wanting to help her out and having had experiences in drama, I was the first to shoot out into the middle of the floor, on one bended knee and with my right hand placed above my brow as if to be looking for land as I thought my ancestors would have done when arriving near land and I said "future focused".
I did get a few laughs and a couple were surprised but then others jumped in and formed themselves around me expressing their words through their actions such as "humility and wisdom", "innovative and critique" etc. It was an interesting exercise because I think I've come so far in that I no longer have the hang ups that I did as not being confident in drama as a child and having written, directed and produced plays/school productions, it's now normal for me to be out of my earlier comfort zone.
There were some in the room who weren't comfortable with the exercise but it helped me to reflect on how teaching and being in so many different forums has really enabled me to assist others in their work and in moving forward.
In yesterday's forum, she also reminded me about blogging can be a "tool" that can be used to document ideas and thoughts and henceforth, you'll be seeing some of the thoughts that I'm working on in my thesis discussed through this blog and in sharing some of these thoughts, I hope that it will be of some benefit, inspiration, create dialogue or critique from you as the reader.
Some of it may even be controversial and will challenge some of the paradigms out there but I do want to share my findings to assist or create reflection on what's happening in current scholarship (scholarly writings) some of which I will be defending and others of which I will be challenging or critiquing. In fact, I feel that yesterday's workshop helped me to move somewhat on my ideas of my identity as a NZ Samoan woman but also as Pasifika but more on that in my next blog...
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