Conversations with Peter

Conversations with Peter

Last night in Research Methods, we had a guest lecturer: Peter Kareithi, Ph.D. Peter is originally from Kenya, and enchanted the class with a story of his education. You see, Peter is a product of apartheid, colonialism, resistance movements, and post colonialism. He told us about his early education – some of which took place around a campfire invoking the power of the story through song, dance, performance, and oral narrative. Ancestral histories were learned, metaphor helped germinate curiosity in the natural sciences, and so on. After Kenyan's won their independence from colonial Britain, Peter found himself in formal church-run schooling. Though annoyed by the confinement of walls, Dr. Kareithi suggested that those students, who like him, had to that point an oral and visual education were exponentially more adept at critical thinking within the classroom than those religious Kenyan British loyalist students who had known nothing but the classroom setting. Critical thinking. It is the skill most important, most critical to good writing. That is why I am particularly fond of Williams's discussion of Talk-Writing. As Williams suggests, "A person has to understand a topic to explain it to others" (111). I like the idea of standing in front of the class and presenting/defending one's ideas. It forces the participant to think critically about their position and ideas – not unlike Dr. Peter Kareithi.