What do we do in Global Perspectives (GP)?
Global Perspectives is an interdisciplinary, research-based course that stretches beyond traditional subject boundaries that promotes us to think about and explore solutions to significant global issues and global happenings in a variety of perspectives. In Global Perspectives, we learn how to process information, filter information, and analyze information for research. We identify issues and present a conclusion by bringing up views from different perspectives and finding its middle point.
“Tradition, Culture, and Identity” project is a typical Global Perspectives project where we create an audio-visual outcome to raise awareness of an issue relating to tradition, culture, and identity. We would also need to write a reflective essay that evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of the project, our individual work, and our teamwork, turning these achievements into the power of personal growth.
How will social attitudes towards the living circumstances of people with disability change depending on different cultures? Our group (Lucy, Rain, Zimu, and Yaoyao) had been exploring this issue over the previous weeks.
First, we modeled people with limb disabilities who rely on wheelchairs and the issues they face on a daily basis by traveling throughout the SCIE campus while sitting on a wheelchair. When entering chemistry labs, wheelchairs cannot fit into the narrow aisles; there are currently no accessible ramps or elevators in the cafe and the sports hall, which significantly limit the areas that disabled people can access in the SCIE campus. We also simulated the world of blind people by covering one of our teammate’s eyes with blindfolds while he walks on the sidewalk. Despite the blind roads exist, they are often blocked by obstacles like trash bags, which could cause potential injuries in blind people as they travel around the community. Our determinations were further enhanced by these difficulties: even the smallest improvements can involve people with disabilities to embracing their lives.
Based on these discoveries, we interviewed several teachers from different cultural perspectives, including European, Asian, American and African perspectives, and conducted analysis and comparisons with their responses towards the living conditions disabled people face and the attitudes people show towards disabled people in different culture communities.
As we successfully identified an issue, collected different cultural perspectives towards this issue, and generated an outcome that includes views from people with different backgrounds, we got a clearer image of the accessibility and efficiency of the facilities for people with disabilities in our culture. Meanwhile, as we kept track of many potential obstacles in our community as possible that may trigger difficulties for people with disabilities, together with the feedback from teachers with different cultural backgrounds, we are able to seek opportunities in order to improve the status quo and the level of living independence and the degree of respect and engagement of people with disabilities.
The methodology of learning that we develop in a GP course significantly guide us to view an issue from an unbiased perspective by considering various source of information. We learn to be independent, to be critical, to be open and to be inclusive. Still, we, as Global Perspectives students, can explore, enrich and enjoy our delicate and sophisticated world with profound confidence.
- Article / Yaoyao Yuan
- Pictures / Zimu, Rain
