since I am leaving this country I will take the interculturality idea with me to Bangkok!!
thank you all for your contributions!!
thank you all for your contributions!!
Thursday, September 06, 2007
Monday, February 12, 2007
Another Intercultural Experience
Thursday 15 February
6.30 - 7.30pm
Road Show
Photos and Stories from an exiting bike tour through 18 Countries.
An Irish-French couple is arriving in Phnom Penh and talking about their experiences in 4 years on their bicycles.
Venue: ISPP Library
Secondary Campus
It would be great if we could all meet there..
even if it would slightly drift away from the 'love' theme!!
6.30 - 7.30pm
Road Show
Photos and Stories from an exiting bike tour through 18 Countries.
An Irish-French couple is arriving in Phnom Penh and talking about their experiences in 4 years on their bicycles.
Venue: ISPP Library
Secondary Campus
It would be great if we could all meet there..
even if it would slightly drift away from the 'love' theme!!
(the intercultural) concept of love
LOVE
forms of appearance or disappearance
Love is a many splendored thing,
Love lifts us up where we belong,
All you need is love!
(Moulin Rouge, Elephant Love Medley)
forms of appearance or disappearance
Love is a many splendored thing,
Love lifts us up where we belong,
All you need is love!
(Moulin Rouge, Elephant Love Medley)
For our first session on LOVE (a very interesting one again) Silvia collected some great and controversial texts. I am still trying to figure out how I can make them available as downloads. (if somebody knows how that works in blogs please tell me the trick!)
A first glimpse of what is to come:
The Five Kinds of Love
LOVE in English has hundreds of meanings in common usage.
“Love” in the Hebrew is expressed by a variety of words which are somewhat broad in their usage:
Dodim an impulse of heart, sexual attraction
Hamed desire, covet, lust
‘Agav impure love, doting, lust
Re’a Companionship, friendship
Hesed mercy and compassion
Hasheq Strong attachment
Ahav desire, inclination or affection, whether human or divine
“Love” in the Greek, is expressed by five distinct words having much more precise meanings:
Desire – Attraction (epithumia)
Longing – Romance (eros)
Belonging – Affection (storge)
Cherishing – Friendship (phile)
Selfless Giving – Christian Love (agape)
History of Love
Emergence of Twentieth Century
Romantic Love
(1900-1930)
Modern Romantic Love
(1930-Present)
(1985-2080)
Emergence of Twentieth Century
Romantic Love
(1900-1930)
• With the partial emergence of capitalism grew a new age of romantic love. America's increasing divorce rate reflected not the failure of love but the increasing refusal of people to live without love and happiness.
• Love patterns of all modern societies were replaced by America's model because so many people were drawn to the romantic love style that combined sexual outlet, affectionate friendship and family functions, all in a single relationship.
• Romantic attraction not only became desirable, but became the only acceptable basis for choosing a life-long partner.
• Romantic love was made possible by capitalism and the industrial revolution. With romantic love, the sexual desires of both partners could be satisfied within marriage. All the tenderness and excitement of love could coexist with household cares and child rearing. Romantic love was the most difficult and complex human relationship ever attempted... but the most appealing and satisfying.
• Soviets detached individual values from sex (e.g., they promoted the concept that sex was no more than drinking a glass of water).
• The modern Sexual Revolution discarded the 19th Century prudish and patriarchal Victorian-Christian patterns. Sexual liberation made achievement of sexual pleasure increasingly important.
• Children were no longer an economic asset, but a costly luxury valuable only for love. For example, in 1776, Adam Smith estimated an American child was worth [sterling]100 in profit before he left home; by 1910 a city child cost thousands of dollars; by 1944 a child cost about $16 thousand to raise to adulthood; by 1959 a child cost about $25 thousand to raise; by 1975 a child cost about $75 thousand to raise. In 1985, costs for raising a child to adulthood averaged around $150 thousand. Allowing for inflation, future cost will be much higher.
• Isadora Duncan (1878-1927) was a symbol of flaming feminism with her free-love and unwed motherhood stances. She claimed that sexual love should be ecstatic for women. Margaret Sanger staged a heroic fight for birth control claiming that a woman's body belonged to her alone. She published birth control information in 1914 and opened birth control clinics in 1916. Catholic elements had her arrested and jailed. But here work spread. By 1930, over 300 birth control clinics had been established.
• Margaret Sanger separated lovemaking from procreation. This brought the traditional ideal of a monogamous, faithful marriage under attack.
• Complete freedom by each partner was advanced by intellectuals such as H.G. Wells, Bertrand Russell, Havelock Ellis, Judge Ben Lindsay.
• Havelock Ellis offered ideas in 1900 that were remarkably similar to those advanced in 1973 by the O'Neills in their book, Open Marriage.
• The sexual Revolution also stressed the mechanical aspects of the sex act. In Marie Stopes' book, Married Love (1918), the women's right to orgasm was promoted. Orgasm was described as an end-in-itself. Wilhelm Reich proposed that orgasm failure was the cause of major mental and physical diseases. He even advocated masturbation to combat cancer via flow of sexual energy.
• Love patterns of all modern societies were replaced by America's model because so many people were drawn to the romantic love style that combined sexual outlet, affectionate friendship and family functions, all in a single relationship.
• Romantic attraction not only became desirable, but became the only acceptable basis for choosing a life-long partner.
• Romantic love was made possible by capitalism and the industrial revolution. With romantic love, the sexual desires of both partners could be satisfied within marriage. All the tenderness and excitement of love could coexist with household cares and child rearing. Romantic love was the most difficult and complex human relationship ever attempted... but the most appealing and satisfying.
• Soviets detached individual values from sex (e.g., they promoted the concept that sex was no more than drinking a glass of water).
• The modern Sexual Revolution discarded the 19th Century prudish and patriarchal Victorian-Christian patterns. Sexual liberation made achievement of sexual pleasure increasingly important.
• Children were no longer an economic asset, but a costly luxury valuable only for love. For example, in 1776, Adam Smith estimated an American child was worth [sterling]100 in profit before he left home; by 1910 a city child cost thousands of dollars; by 1944 a child cost about $16 thousand to raise to adulthood; by 1959 a child cost about $25 thousand to raise; by 1975 a child cost about $75 thousand to raise. In 1985, costs for raising a child to adulthood averaged around $150 thousand. Allowing for inflation, future cost will be much higher.
• Isadora Duncan (1878-1927) was a symbol of flaming feminism with her free-love and unwed motherhood stances. She claimed that sexual love should be ecstatic for women. Margaret Sanger staged a heroic fight for birth control claiming that a woman's body belonged to her alone. She published birth control information in 1914 and opened birth control clinics in 1916. Catholic elements had her arrested and jailed. But here work spread. By 1930, over 300 birth control clinics had been established.
• Margaret Sanger separated lovemaking from procreation. This brought the traditional ideal of a monogamous, faithful marriage under attack.
• Complete freedom by each partner was advanced by intellectuals such as H.G. Wells, Bertrand Russell, Havelock Ellis, Judge Ben Lindsay.
• Havelock Ellis offered ideas in 1900 that were remarkably similar to those advanced in 1973 by the O'Neills in their book, Open Marriage.
• The sexual Revolution also stressed the mechanical aspects of the sex act. In Marie Stopes' book, Married Love (1918), the women's right to orgasm was promoted. Orgasm was described as an end-in-itself. Wilhelm Reich proposed that orgasm failure was the cause of major mental and physical diseases. He even advocated masturbation to combat cancer via flow of sexual energy.
Modern Romantic Love
(1930-Present)
• Free love and open marriage developed in the 20th Century along with progressive polygamy via repeated marriage and divorce. Sexual enjoyment was accepted as a human right.
• The need for reassurance of one's personal self-esteem made this new form of romantic love popular and desired. Themes of love, heart- break, and eventual happiness became popular and dominated the soap operas.
• Dating started in the 1920s as a new way of mate selection made necessary by city life. Shy, passive femininity was being discarded. The crucial feature of dating was freedom from commitment while young people learned and experimented.
• Dating was criticized by many sociologists and social "intellectuals" as a loveless, competitive contest. But dating was a healthy breakthrough and generally a cheerful and happy activity. Dating was an educational process, leading from playful heterosexual behavior to companionship and love.
• Premarital relationships became more open and intimate than relationships of the past. Potential partners were able to know each other much more deeply through intimate dating.
• This new romanticism was at once both idealistically romantic and practical.
• Many conditions were similar to Roman times (economic and legal emancipation of women, well-to-do city life, children being a luxury rather than an asset, and sexual enjoyment deemed a right for all). One profound difference existed. Romans moved away from married life while Americans became more marriage-minded than ever before. And when marriage failed, Americans would divorce and head right back into another marriage.
• Most sociologists have strongly criticized romantic love while praising conjugal love. Their attacks are, however, distorted and out of context. They project romantic love as it was idealized in the medieval period when love could not exist within marriage.
• Romantic feelings are not only for new loves and adolescents, but are also for long-married couples.
• Women have gained the right to be equal to men, but many women are afraid of the demands and challenges of being an equal; other women hold the erroneous fear that equality might cost them the chance for love and marriage.
• Inequality for females is no longer a matter of law. Men and women now have essentially the same educational and economic opportunities, but most American wives still do not strive for high achievement in the major areas of value production, i.e., business, science, medicine.
• To the average man, his job is what he is. To the average woman, a job is only to make money. And the average American housewife suffers from a chronic, low-grade dissatisfaction, diminished self-esteem, and increasing boredom.
• Most women are confused about their "role" and do not really know what they want to be in life. Surveys of two college campuses indicated that 40% of the coeds admitted "playing dumb" with interesting men because many men feel threatened by overtly intelligent women (M. Kamarovsky, Women in the Modern World, Little, Brown & Co., 1953).
• Modern love makes sense and is exercising its immense appeal all over the world.
• Modern romantic love is almost everyone's goal. Today, the value and purpose of romantic love is, above all else, directed toward the fulfillment of major emotional needs and happiness.
• An ominous rise of overt born-again Christianity and fundamentalist religions signal a turn back toward malevolent views of life, love, sex, and women.
Future Romantic Love• The need for reassurance of one's personal self-esteem made this new form of romantic love popular and desired. Themes of love, heart- break, and eventual happiness became popular and dominated the soap operas.
• Dating started in the 1920s as a new way of mate selection made necessary by city life. Shy, passive femininity was being discarded. The crucial feature of dating was freedom from commitment while young people learned and experimented.
• Dating was criticized by many sociologists and social "intellectuals" as a loveless, competitive contest. But dating was a healthy breakthrough and generally a cheerful and happy activity. Dating was an educational process, leading from playful heterosexual behavior to companionship and love.
• Premarital relationships became more open and intimate than relationships of the past. Potential partners were able to know each other much more deeply through intimate dating.
• This new romanticism was at once both idealistically romantic and practical.
• Many conditions were similar to Roman times (economic and legal emancipation of women, well-to-do city life, children being a luxury rather than an asset, and sexual enjoyment deemed a right for all). One profound difference existed. Romans moved away from married life while Americans became more marriage-minded than ever before. And when marriage failed, Americans would divorce and head right back into another marriage.
• Most sociologists have strongly criticized romantic love while praising conjugal love. Their attacks are, however, distorted and out of context. They project romantic love as it was idealized in the medieval period when love could not exist within marriage.
• Romantic feelings are not only for new loves and adolescents, but are also for long-married couples.
• Women have gained the right to be equal to men, but many women are afraid of the demands and challenges of being an equal; other women hold the erroneous fear that equality might cost them the chance for love and marriage.
• Inequality for females is no longer a matter of law. Men and women now have essentially the same educational and economic opportunities, but most American wives still do not strive for high achievement in the major areas of value production, i.e., business, science, medicine.
• To the average man, his job is what he is. To the average woman, a job is only to make money. And the average American housewife suffers from a chronic, low-grade dissatisfaction, diminished self-esteem, and increasing boredom.
• Most women are confused about their "role" and do not really know what they want to be in life. Surveys of two college campuses indicated that 40% of the coeds admitted "playing dumb" with interesting men because many men feel threatened by overtly intelligent women (M. Kamarovsky, Women in the Modern World, Little, Brown & Co., 1953).
• Modern love makes sense and is exercising its immense appeal all over the world.
• Modern romantic love is almost everyone's goal. Today, the value and purpose of romantic love is, above all else, directed toward the fulfillment of major emotional needs and happiness.
• An ominous rise of overt born-again Christianity and fundamentalist religions signal a turn back toward malevolent views of life, love, sex, and women.
(1985-2080)
• Instruments of force and coercion are identified and eliminated through a philosophical, intellectual, and business revolution. All forms of mysticism and neocheating are identified and exposed as destructive frauds and are rejected. The life and property rights of the individual are fully recognized and protected. Total physical, emotional, and intellectual freedom is possible. Romantic love, psychuous pleasures and long-range happiness are experienced by most people and available to all people through Neo-Tech and the Psychuous Pleasures Discoveries.
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