Teachings From the Deep South: North-South Contributions to Integral Education

• Main Author: Adrian Villasenor-Galarza
• Format: Article
• Language: deu
• Published: ARINA, Inc. 2011-06-01
• Series: Integral Review
• Subjects: integral education; Axis mundi; indigenous wisdom; multidimensionality; North–South axis.; Adrian Villasenor-Galarza
• Online Access: http://integral-review.org/pdf-template-issue.php?pdfName=vol_7_no_1_villasenor-galarza_teaching_from_the_deep_south.pdf

The present paper addresses the need to incorporate often ignored perspectives and formulations derived from what I refer to as the “deep south” into the field of integral education as currently practiced at the California Institute of Integra Studies (CIIS), in San Francisco, CA. The deep south, or the metaphorical conglomerate of wisdom ascribed to the global south and associated epistemologies, is used as a broad framework from which I propose, through the exploration of shamanic practices and symbols, the creation of an organizing vertical metaphor, a North–South axis of dialogue. I start with a brief exposition of the one of the main challenges that integral education faces, a cognicentric focus, and proceed to explore alternatives to it by addressing some repressed aspects of the field, the notion of multidimensionality, and the symbol of the axis mundi. The paper ends with an invitation for a marriage to take place between the East–West and North–South axes of knowing and learning as an adequate and necessary development for integral education.