The Butterfly Effect

In 1961, when MIT meteorology professor Edward Lorenz walked away from his weather simulation to fill a cup of coffee, he didn't know that he would disrupt the understanding of determinism in science. A miniscule change in a calculation created vastly different results. If the theory transfers to my context, teaching English in an international school, a slight shift in content will alter the trajectories of my students. The butterflies I unleash in my classroom will become the revolutionary storms of a new age.

Did Lorenz, while observing the weather, ever ask why the initial conditions were present? I know he must have.  The current context is material to predicting activity and direction and change. Perhaps I am a meteorologist of a different kind, gauging the background knowledge and skill levels of students through measurements to determine their direction of travel, their speed, their force. So why are they in my classroom? Why would Polish parents enroll their son in an American high school? Why is the daughter of Greeks occupying that chair? The answer:  the butterfly effect. The decision, these parents assert, will alter their student's outcome. In the role of classroom leader, I am the prevailing wind, the jet stream: I am an agent of change.

These parents know the hegemony of the English language, so first on their minds is the facility of its use. They know if their student is adept at speaking and writing English, he will be better equipped to succeed in the world. But language use isn't as powerful without knowledge of cultural norms, so what is communicated through reading and discussions must impart the mindset and traditions of the American culture--not merely at the level of the citizen but at the levels of government and science and art and economy.

Therefore, text selection is paramount to the magnitude and direction of study, our vectors of understanding in the classroom. Exposure to texts of diverse voices and histories, some of which may create controversy, are imperative to the "dissolution of sanctified literary boundaries," as Lisle suggests (268). No one text, no single voice can prevail in a hegemonic role without a social mandate, so critiquing the literary traditions and unearthing colonization in texts, essentially engaging in literary criticism, must be the heart of what I facilitate in the classroom. This is the surest way to hear diverse perspectives, to share more than one story, as Adichie recommends.

These stories, like storms, form in specific conditions, which must be analyzed and interrogated to comprehend their lasting impact. Stories arise from a collaborative legacy, and that nature engenders "a collective commitment to a multicultural future" (Lisle 261). Fostering discussions that allow ideas to be shared equitably and that confer respect on all students equitably will create a culture that functions as Spurr suggests: to "combine and transcend what already exists" (200).

"It is impossible to stand outside of the world in order to judge it" (Lisle 263). In this school, all of the students are in that position, standing outside of their normal contexts and inside a foreign land. This is unique for a teaching environment, for all of us are travelers, displaced but on neutral ground. The texts that we assail or laud will be a collaboration and collective of thought and principle that do not yield to one culture. It is my hope that our learning transcends implied boundaries to remix, sending subtle flutters of possibility on the winds to encourage change.

Sources:

Lisle, Debbie. The Global Politics of Contemporary Travel Writing. Cambridge University Press, 2006.

Spurr, David. The Rhetoric of Empire: Colonial Discourse in Journalism, Travel Writing, and Imperial Administration. Duke University Press, Durham, 1993.