July 8, 2025 • 28 mins
Last week’s episode from the ancient Great House of Pueblo Bonito in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, left something out. Before my guest Dana Scott and I headed back to the car, we went back towards the entrance and plaza, because I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to talk about how Dana’s path has arrived at a transformational restorative justice approach to education, how that evolved from our time in Guatemala together, and how being at Chaco relates to it all.
We quipped at the outset that this could be another podcast, and really, it was. I hope you enjoy it.
And for those of you who enjoyed the conversation with Jenny Finn at Springhouse Community School, it was Dana, through Dwanna (who you’ll hear about here) who introduced us.
I’ll share more photos of our visit to Chaco, in addition to those appearing on the website, with paid subscribers today also, with great thanks for making all this possible.
Recorded 15 April 2025.
Title slide photo by Olivia Cheng.
See more photos on the episode web page, and for more behind the scenes, become a supporting listener below.
Music:
Chauen, Angel Salazar (sourced from Artlist).
The RegenNarration playlist, music chosen by guests.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
AJ (00:07):
G'day Anthony James here for The RegenNarration, your
independent, listener-supportedpodcast on regenerating the
systems and stories we live by.
Last week's episode from theancient great house of Pueblo
Bonito, in Chaco Canyon, NewMexico, left out something.
Before my guest, dana Scott,and I headed back to the car, we
(00:30):
went back towards the entranceand plaza because I couldn't
pass up the opportunity to talkabout how Dana's path has
arrived at a restorative justiceapproach to education, how that
evolved from our time inGuatemala together and how being
at Chaco relates to it all.
We quipped at the outset thatthis could be another podcast,
(00:52):
and really it was.
So here you go.
I hope you enjoy it and forthose of you who enjoyed the
conversation with Jenny Finn atSpringhouse Community School,
you might remember it was Dana,through Duana, who you'll hear
about here, who introduced us.
I'll share more photos of ourvisit to Chaco, in addition to
those appearing on the websitewith paid subscribers this week.
(01:15):
For now, here's Dana.
So we're walking back towardsthe sunset, towards the west,
back to the entrance to theplaza, and I might just round it
out there, but let's do thattoo, with a bit of what you've
been exploring.
I'm curious where the journeyhas led for you.
Dana (01:38):
You know, 21 years after I left you going on 22 now since
I left you in Guatemala.
AJ (01:43):
I mean what did Guatemala shift for you that is relevant
today, perhaps.
Dana (01:48):
Oh, I mean how much time you got Everything.
AJ (01:52):
Could be another podcast.
Dana (01:54):
Yeah, several.
I went to Peace Corps.
I went to Guatemala as a PeaceCorps volunteer in the wake of
9-11.
In the wake of 9-11.
And so I kind of signed on in2001, and just as I was
graduating college in May of2002, I was on a plane and
(02:21):
really not knowing what was infront of me at the time, and it
was a big leap of faith to dothat, but can you say a safe
leap of faith?
I don't know, because I knewthat at the time the US
government, I could make a phonecall and they'd have a
helicopter to get me out ofthere.
At least that was my hope.
(02:42):
My belief Can't say that thatis now the case still anymore,
you know.
Yeah, so, you know, showing upin Fry and meeting you and you
know our friends, our collectionof Westerners who'd sort of
found themselves in thisunlikely town in northeastern
(03:06):
Alta Verapaz, it was anexperience for me of becoming
familiar with what it meant tobe American, because I'd never
left the country before, really,you know, and didn't really
have a sense that being anAmerican was anything
particularly different thananything else in the world.
But, um, so, in that sense,understanding, coming into an
(03:30):
understanding of what it meansto be an American in the world,
uh, what it means to be, um, anAmerican in Central America, uh,
was humbling, humbling and attimes, gosh, I felt a lot of
(03:50):
shame.
I won't, and that I still sitwith, you know, in our role as
the American people in the CivilWar.
well, I thought their Civil Wartheir civil right, not the
American Civil War, the, I'mtalking about the Guatemalan
Civil War and just the number ofsort of acts.
You know, all the differentcivil unrest sort of civil wars
(04:10):
that were happening in CentralAmerica and South America
throughout the 70s and 80s andkind of coming into Guatemala in
the wake of that.
And, anthony, you were a bigpart of kind of me understanding
really what that meant.
Like I mentioned, you put,you're the first person to put a
noam chomsky book in my handsand it opened up a huge path for
(04:31):
me.
AJ (04:32):
Um, but I got, and then we end up working in some of the
education projects that I'd wellthat's the thing I mean.
Dana (04:40):
Gosh, if you hadn't gotten dengue, uh, I would never have
had to fill in for you in thatproject you were doing in the
schools and discovered, you know, a love of education and need
for education.
Really, that was from that.
Yeah, that was from that.
Currently I do work in thepublic school system in Maryland
(05:02):
and that journey began inGuatemala.
The first time I stood in frontof a classroom and came alive,
and that was all.
Because you got dengue.
You thought I was dying, right?
No, you know.
And for the backstop drop there, anthony was very sick and had
taken on this amazing projectteaching globalization in the
(05:25):
Basico, which is the Americanequivalent to, I guess, like a
middle school, high school kindof you know, age group, and you
were too sick to do it, tofinish it.
AJ (05:37):
It was a lost beat.
It was where they paintedmurals over the Coca-Cola.
Dana (05:41):
Oh, and it was such a beautiful project and it was
really exciting to be a part ofit.
But it was one of those momentswhere you kind of had to say,
okay, looking around, no oneelse is going to do this if I
don't step up.
It was very thoughtful.
It was a moment of me kind ofstepping in to some power, and,
(06:02):
yeah, that was a life-changingmoment for me.
What do you know?
What I'll say too, though, isthat, like in my own sort of
coming to terms with being anAmerican in Central America, so
hot on the heels of a reallyhorrific civil war, largely
funded by my government, I felta sense of I spent days
(06:31):
wondering why I was even thereand what my purpose was, and I
remember very vividly having amoment of looking in the mirror
and thinking, looking at mywhite face and my blonde hair
and my blue eyes, and thinkingthese people shouldn't trust me,
and feeling really sad aboutthat, you know, feeling really
(06:53):
like I wanted to do good work,to do good work, but I felt that
being born American meant thatI was set on a path of not doing
the kind of work that I feltneeded to be done, that I valued
the human work, and I had.
(07:15):
No, I didn't have a lot ofexamples of that in my life
growing up, certainly not a lotof examples of that in my public
education of.
Uh, you know, I mean, theheroes are the, and who we learn
about in history are theconquerors, you know the violent
men who yeah, um, but again youcame from the empire, but you
were feeling crap oh sure, well,and so I I think you know.
(07:38):
So, to kind of pick up where wewere a little earlier, like I
had, I came to this realizationthat, like um, I couldn't do any
work if I lived in that placeof shame and if I lived in that
place of of uh gosh, feeling um,you know, I, I self loathing
(08:02):
feels a little melodramatic, butthat was kind of where I was
honestly and it didn't feel good.
And then I remember reading atthe back of a gosh at this point
it was the third or fourthChomsky book, and I don't even
remember which one, to be honestwith you, because I was just
consuming- every kind of they dofold into each other.
Sure, they really do, and allthose little thin
pamphlet-looking ones you knowlike.
(08:55):
Sure, they really do.
And all those little thinpamphlet looking ones, you know,
like I had all of them.
But one said you know, gosh, asan American, if you're reading
this and you can do something tohelp, by God do it.
You know, and I'm paraphrasingbecause I don't remember the
exact, but I mean, it hit melike a lightning bolt.
I was like I have to dosomething.
I can't just sit here and feelsorry for myself and, you know,
hate myself for what we did toGuatemala.
I have to try to help.
I have to try to do what I can,you know, use the power that I
to my own spirituality and moreearth-based, you know, faiths
and yeah, I don't know justfeeling like all we have is that
(09:16):
choice.
That's all we have and thatchoice.
You can't ignore the context inwhich you're making that choice
, because there are so manythings and people are going to
see you in so many ways just bywho you are in the space that
you're in.
But it's still your choice tomake and you have to make it.
(09:38):
And so that's what I've beensitting with and it has been an
evolving choice.
I would say it's a choice thatI'm still choosing.
It's a verb, not a noun.
You know, and it is somethingthat I'd say, every day you
reveal new truths, or the waysthat we were raised that maybe
aren't in alignment with therhythms of the earth, or maybe a
(10:02):
truth that might be disparagingto a particular group of people
that you just had never eventhought of or questioned.
And then you hear anotherperspective and it opens your
eyes and you think, holy god, Ihad no idea, I had no, never
meant to hurt anyone.
Um, with, you know, making thatoffhanded comment, and and then
you make your choice, say okay,now I choose.
(10:24):
You can only and I guess thatgoes to say too, you can only
choose based on the informationyou have.
And so we make our choice inthis context of history and
culture, with the informationthat we have directly in front
of us, and that's why theirconnections and our
relationships are so important,because we can help each other
(10:45):
to make a good choice as we moveforward on our human journey I
do want to fast forward in somebrief fashion, because again
it'd be another podcast.
AJ (10:56):
But to where?
Because when you say you're inpublic education, I mean you're
doing some extraordinary work,yeah, really connecting with
students in well.
I guess it's in a way, we cutour teeth on back in Guatemala
and see you doing it here inchallenging urban situations, in
, you could argue, somewhatdecaying structures of this
(11:18):
civilization we've been part of,and you've come to a point of,
yeah, yeah, a bit of a leap, asyou've been inferring, yep, and
so we don't need to go intodetails because obviously
they're to be revealed in a way,but.
But I do want to at least speaka bit into the restorative
justice edge, sure, just briefly, as to, I mean, as you've
described it, to be getting tothe front of problems, not just
(11:40):
dealing with the symptoms withinan education system, of when
students hit the rocks in oneform or another, but getting
ahead of it with a different wayof connecting which relates to
all this?
Dana (11:53):
I think it does.
I mean, I think so.
I think what you're referringto is restorative justice and
there's a lot of different waysthat restorative justice shows
up in pop culture, on theinternet.
I mean, if you Googlerestorative justice, I think
still we think of it as atechnique to limit recidivism in
(12:14):
the US incarceration system ormaybe global incarceration
systems, but it's come up for methrough education.
I was, but it's come up for methrough education.
I was very, very fortunate tohave accepted a job at a high
school where we were part of apilot program that was looking
at exploring ways to incorporaterestorative justice into the
(12:37):
high school curriculum.
And my first time sitting incircle with colleagues, with
adults too, and that's anotherpart.
I'll get to that in a second.
But getting personal, but notin a way of like a hippie
crystals sort of thing, nothingto do with that Go crystal,
(12:59):
crystal it up.
Go crystal, crystal it up.
But it was very like justtalking about our experiences of
being a human in an educationsetting and connecting that to
our experiences of being a human, you know, and this sense of
(13:21):
all of us in this moment, withcoworkers, just being people,
you know.
And so the philosophy that I'vereally picked up and I want to
credit my teacher, dewana Nicole, who would hate it if I called
her a teacher, but she is ateacher for me and she's who
taught me this practice, and Ido my best to honor duana every
(13:46):
time I keep circle.
But the kind of the philosophyhere is we start with the adults
in the education setting andthat, you know, for so long at
least in the us education system, we've been looking at ways of
bridging the of the educationgap, the the test scoring gap,
(14:06):
and talking about ways to closethe gap, and that refers to
traditionally minoritizedchildren of minoritized
populations.
We use the same language backhome too.
AJ (14:18):
And it's not working, by the way.
Dana (14:19):
Oh, it's not working at all.
No, because we've been focusingour efforts working, by the way
.
Oh, it's not working at all.
No, because we've been focusingour efforts.
And this was, you know, in theus we had no child, uh, left
behind through the early 2000sand um, right, and it's.
It's shifted and changed in inin its sort of dress and names
and maybe different metrics thatwe're looking at, but it's
still all very student-centeredand um which is interesting,
(14:43):
isn't it?
AJ (14:44):
That Indigenous people have experienced is that you're the
problem.
Dana (14:47):
We're fixing here.
Right, you're the problem we'refixing, yeah, and I think it
gets back to the factory modelof at least the US public
education system too, of like,if we're not stamping out the
right kind of widget, then wehave to look at the widgets and
fix the widgets.
AJ (15:04):
you know, because it applies , I should say, to landscape too
, or climate.
Sure, You're the problem.
We need to fix it Right.
Dana (15:29):
So this is a profound shift you're talking about, with
biases as humans, because weall grew up in this system.
It's not to say that any ofthese folks are bad folks.
They're just doing what they'retold Stuff we were sharing
before so doing what they'redoing.
(15:50):
there might be that the act ofthe education system writ large
the way it's developed, theattitudes and the sort of the
preconceived ideas that teachershave about particular
populations of kids or whatever,coming into the classroom.
Maybe that's limiting our kidsand maybe, if we turn our
(16:15):
attention to the kids or to theadults rather sorry that we can,
um, begin to move the needle,because it's not to say that the
adults are the problem,although I have heard lots of
people say that understandably,um, I've been a problem.
AJ (16:33):
Yeah, sure, yeah, yeah.
Dana (16:36):
But I think, as the folks who are in these leadership
capacities and facilitationcapacities of our education
systems, like, we have a lensand maybe if we work on that
lens that we can actually changethings.
You know.
AJ (16:53):
So your experience of it, so far as it pertains to education
, has really inspired.
Dana (17:00):
You I mean my first circle .
I said and I thought this wasit.
This is it why this is the pathforward because what will it do
in an education setting?
and you are not just just inthat hierarchical
teacher-student role anymore.
You are people in a spacetogether and we all have
(17:23):
challenges in their spaces,especially in the way our
systems are designed Likethey're not all the way always
designed for humans to besuccessful, you know.
And being able to talk aboutthat, being able to level the
playing field, you know, andwhat we're talking about now is
(17:44):
the playing field amongdifferent educators, right?
So teachers, counselors,administrators, the school
nurses, that kind of thingwithin those hierarchies, within
those systems, I guess, arehierarchies.
And as adults, when we sit downtogether and just talk and just
be through a structured format,we can begin to peel back some
(18:10):
of the layers.
And I think the other piece ofthis, too, that I, the system
that you use, is super important, right, it can't just be people
talking, because when peopleare just talking, all of our
programming shows up.
All the ways that we believewe're supposed to act and the
things that we believe we'resupposed to say, show up, um,
(18:40):
show up.
And, in my experience, um, whenyou have a system like in the
united states, where sort ofwhite culture was, uh, the
dominant culture and then wehave minoritized cultures, um,
that have been.
Uh, you know whose voices havebeen silenced, um, muted volumes
turned down.
You know, whatever metaphor youwant to use, that the folks who
identify with those minoritizedpopulations are really, really
(19:01):
good at just letting the whiteperson talk and say whatever the
hell they're going to say, andjust kind of nodding and saying,
sure, and then going back later, you know, to their friends in
spaces, in safe spaces, and belike can you believe what this
guy said?
Well, this is something, thisis the trust thing back in
Guatemala.
Sure, friends in in spaces, insafe spaces, and be like can you
believe what this guy said?
AJ (19:16):
um well, this is something, this is the trust thing back in
guatemala sure we had, we knewthat it was there.
Yeah, too, the white guy lobsup, and to get to get behind
that to some genuine trust is,well, one of the most beautiful
experiences of my life.
Dana (19:30):
It, yes it that trust has to be earned.
It has to be, you have to beopen to receiving it, you have
to be open to hearing it.
And I'll tell you, as a memberof the dominant culture, you
have to be willing to hear somehard truths about things that
(19:50):
your people have done and thingsthat you've done that you
didn't even realize you weredoing.
You have to be open to that andthat's a hard.
That's a hard ask sometimes,but it's an important ask.
And if we're going to actually,you know, work on, you know,
air quotes, closing the gap, wehave to be willing to get
uncomfortable.
AJ (20:10):
You know there's an indigenous woman, Malikaajasat,
in the Kimberley, who turnedthat closing the gap around to
be, instead of closing the gapwith, you know, the idea that
this education system is whatconstitutes an education in
itself, let alone the otherindicators that there are that
we're not meeting, inevitablybecause the system's geared a
particular way, et cetera, etcetera.
(20:31):
And she said I think her wordswere something like closing the
gap of understanding orsomething you know it was
bringing the symptoms sortthemselves out if you can get
the core relating right.
It was brilliant, I thought.
And she's a young Indigenouswoman just starting a family.
But wow, landed an insightthere.
Dana (20:53):
No, well, I think the beauty of being able to sit in
circle when you've chosen to bein that space and you've chosen
to allow yourself to feeldiscomfort and hopefully with a
sense of something for thegreater good, um, you learn so
much about the humans around you.
(21:14):
There's so much of ourexperience that is just a shared
human.
AJ (21:20):
You know experience of, yes, raising children and and
falling in love, and I thinkabout where we sit, which, by
the way, is back in where westart yeah, now we've walked
back to the little alcove andthe light gets a bit golden as
we go.
I know it's extraordinary.
Dana (21:35):
Yeah, these cliff faces are just singing.
AJ (21:38):
They're so beautiful, that's what I think of here.
I'm imagining the families,yeah, that came in here, the
families that came in here withsome of these, I mean, if it was
such a center of ceremony andritual that they were going
through this stuff.
Dana (21:53):
I mean humans do we love our children.
Sometimes they make us mad.
You know we love our partners.
Sometimes they make us mad, andall of that is like just part
of the human experience and it'sbeautiful and messy and crazy
and like, but like it is also insharing the stories of these
(22:16):
things, which I've also come tounderstand is a huge part of
indigenous education, or maybemore.
You know, uh, you knowearth-based, you know
educational systems andtraditions, but sharing the
stories is what connects us.
AJ (22:31):
That's the key in the lock underline yeah, the more I learn
, yeah, the more I see and, Iguess, the more I keep going on
where I've ended up?
Yeah, all these fortuitousaccidents or whatever, yeah, I
want to call them.
Dana (22:46):
Yeah, so you know, to kind of finish the answer to your
question a long time ago, theprocess of circle, when followed
honestly and diligently, it isa process that is based on
indigenous practices.
It is a process that has beenmeted out over time and by a lot
(23:11):
of different practitioners.
But when followed honestly, ithelps you unlock that truth as
another human in the struggle,on the journey, on the path, and
you find yourself connected,more willing to take risks, to
(23:32):
try new things, because whatyou've done in circle, when it's
done well and followed what Ifeel are correct protocols not
unlike a ritual very, verysimilar, I feel are correct
protocols, you know, not unlikea ritual very, very similar, you
know.
But when you follow thosepractices and you're in a space
with another human that trustsyou and who you trust, you can
(23:55):
try new things out, you can bevulnerable and you can move
education.
I think you know that's reallyand I think that's the thing we
are so stuck in a way of doingthings.
It's working great for some,for for a percentage of the
(24:15):
population, but by and large alot of us are are getting left
behind in different ways, youknow, and not just by the
traditional metrics, you know,but also in in kind of finding
meaning on our life path.
That's right.
AJ (24:24):
I don't even use the words left behind anymore.
I think that's the closing thegap in the wrong direction.
Sure sure, sure, I use thewords being disconnected Humans
are meant to hold each other.
Dana (24:34):
We're meant to live in community and in the kinship
with the rest.
AJ (24:36):
I mean, I think of what you're saying about circle and
I'm looking over that Kiva.
That moved me.
So the other day, the day, yeahin golden light right now yeah,
absolutely deep, deeply duginto the earth circular
structure, and imagined whatthey were doing, at least of a
similar ilk.
And you say it sort of sharesthe roots with those sorts of
cultures.
It does it does.
Dana (24:54):
You know?
I don't know if you've ever satin a sweat lodge I should.
It's past seven o'clock wemight give it the ass here, but
anyway, go for a sweat lodge.
I I had the privilege ofsitting in some sweat lodges
with a practitioner inPhiladelphia gosh a couple of
years ago.
You walk out of a sweat lodgeand it is an uncomfortable
experience.
It is not.
I wouldn't say this is a greattime, right, you're sitting
(25:16):
close, you know, shoulder toshoulder with let's talk to this
guy.
AJ (25:20):
Hello, we need to move on, all right, ok, thanks Sorry, we
lost track of time.
Just got here.
Got to right, okay, thanksSorry we lost track of time.
Dana (25:25):
That's all right.
Just got here, got to talking.
Thanks so much.
Thank you, have a good night.
Have a good one, all right.
I didn't realize it closed atseven.
AJ (25:34):
I knew the front gate did yeah, but it makes sense that
the structure would.
I'm glad they didn't lock us in, thoughtful of them there's no
gate at the other side, so Iknew we'd be right.
All right anyway go ahead, mate.
Dana (25:46):
Oh, just to you know, you walk out, you're sitting in the
sweat lodge and it's kind ofuncomfortable and weird and
you're like I don't so totally.
I mean, I was with a bunch ofpeople, I didn't really know, I
just went with a friend.
But man, you come out of thatthing after half an hour, 45
minutes and you love everysingle person that you were
sitting in there with and Ican't explain it to you.
(26:06):
But the feeling of love is realand you, just you come, you
walk into those sweat lodges,total strangers.
You walk out family.
AJ (26:17):
Well, you know it's funny because I wrote an article
recently on Substack about aplane that flipped on the runway
, Remember?
Dana (26:24):
that yeah, oh gosh, yes.
AJ (26:25):
And the quote from one of the people in there because they
all survived about, uh, a planethat flipped on the runway.
Remember that, yeah, oh gosh,yes.
And.
And the quote from one of thepeople in there because they all
survived, it was toronto, right, it's incredible.
Yeah, I can't remember, but thequote from the the passenger
was uh, everybody got real closereal quick.
Yeah, and in the crucible ofthe moment that humans have,
that is, uh, pertains to ourbroader context big time right
(26:47):
now.
Yeah, but hey, mate as we moveon and we get back towards the
car.
Look at this light over thebuilding as we go along the
east-west wall.
Dana (26:55):
I mean this is what we were going for yesterday, right?
Oh my God, pretty excited todrive up on the Fajada Butte
right now.
AJ (27:01):
Exactly we're going to come to the sun.
The Fajada Butte will have thewestern sun on the western side,
which we don't see from ourcampground when the sun's
setting.
So we actually haven't seenthis golden light on the Butte
at the end of the day, and it isperfectly clear over that
horizon right now.
Dana (27:20):
Oh, my gosh.
AJ (27:21):
So that will be a wonder.
Yeah, mate, yeah, thank you, itwas fun, fun thanks for having
me on incredible reconnect.
Dana (27:28):
This is beautiful frankly.
AJ (27:30):
Yeah, yeah and uh to be able to do that in there beautiful,
all right.
Dana (27:35):
All right, let's do it back to camp.
yo
G'day Anthony James here for The RegenNarration, your
independent, listener-supportedpodcast on regenerating the
systems and stories we live by.
Last week's episode from theancient great house of Pueblo
Bonito, in Chaco Canyon, NewMexico, left out something.
Before my guest, dana Scott,and I headed back to the car, we
(00:30):
went back towards the entranceand plaza because I couldn't
pass up the opportunity to talkabout how Dana's path has
arrived at a restorative justiceapproach to education, how that
evolved from our time inGuatemala together and how being
at Chaco relates to it all.
We quipped at the outset thatthis could be another podcast,
(00:52):
and really it was.
So here you go.
I hope you enjoy it and forthose of you who enjoyed the
conversation with Jenny Finn atSpringhouse Community School,
you might remember it was Dana,through Duana, who you'll hear
about here, who introduced us.
I'll share more photos of ourvisit to Chaco, in addition to
those appearing on the websitewith paid subscribers this week.
(01:15):
For now, here's Dana.
So we're walking back towardsthe sunset, towards the west,
back to the entrance to theplaza, and I might just round it
out there, but let's do thattoo, with a bit of what you've
been exploring.
I'm curious where the journeyhas led for you.
Dana (01:38):
You know, 21 years after I left you going on 22 now since
I left you in Guatemala.
AJ (01:43):
I mean what did Guatemala shift for you that is relevant
today, perhaps.
Dana (01:48):
Oh, I mean how much time you got Everything.
AJ (01:52):
Could be another podcast.
Dana (01:54):
Yeah, several.
I went to Peace Corps.
I went to Guatemala as a PeaceCorps volunteer in the wake of
9-11.
In the wake of 9-11.
And so I kind of signed on in2001, and just as I was
graduating college in May of2002, I was on a plane and
(02:21):
really not knowing what was infront of me at the time, and it
was a big leap of faith to dothat, but can you say a safe
leap of faith?
I don't know, because I knewthat at the time the US
government, I could make a phonecall and they'd have a
helicopter to get me out ofthere.
At least that was my hope.
(02:42):
My belief Can't say that thatis now the case still anymore,
you know.
Yeah, so, you know, showing upin Fry and meeting you and you
know our friends, our collectionof Westerners who'd sort of
found themselves in thisunlikely town in northeastern
(03:06):
Alta Verapaz, it was anexperience for me of becoming
familiar with what it meant tobe American, because I'd never
left the country before, really,you know, and didn't really
have a sense that being anAmerican was anything
particularly different thananything else in the world.
But, um, so, in that sense,understanding, coming into an
(03:30):
understanding of what it meansto be an American in the world,
uh, what it means to be, um, anAmerican in Central America, uh,
was humbling, humbling and attimes, gosh, I felt a lot of
(03:50):
shame.
I won't, and that I still sitwith, you know, in our role as
the American people in the CivilWar.
well, I thought their Civil Wartheir civil right, not the
American Civil War, the, I'mtalking about the Guatemalan
Civil War and just the number ofsort of acts.
You know, all the differentcivil unrest sort of civil wars
(04:10):
that were happening in CentralAmerica and South America
throughout the 70s and 80s andkind of coming into Guatemala in
the wake of that.
And, anthony, you were a bigpart of kind of me understanding
really what that meant.
Like I mentioned, you put,you're the first person to put a
noam chomsky book in my handsand it opened up a huge path for
(04:31):
me.
AJ (04:32):
Um, but I got, and then we end up working in some of the
education projects that I'd wellthat's the thing I mean.
Dana (04:40):
Gosh, if you hadn't gotten dengue, uh, I would never have
had to fill in for you in thatproject you were doing in the
schools and discovered, you know, a love of education and need
for education.
Really, that was from that.
Yeah, that was from that.
Currently I do work in thepublic school system in Maryland
(05:02):
and that journey began inGuatemala.
The first time I stood in frontof a classroom and came alive,
and that was all.
Because you got dengue.
You thought I was dying, right?
No, you know.
And for the backstop drop there, anthony was very sick and had
taken on this amazing projectteaching globalization in the
(05:25):
Basico, which is the Americanequivalent to, I guess, like a
middle school, high school kindof you know, age group, and you
were too sick to do it, tofinish it.
AJ (05:37):
It was a lost beat.
It was where they paintedmurals over the Coca-Cola.
Dana (05:41):
Oh, and it was such a beautiful project and it was
really exciting to be a part ofit.
But it was one of those momentswhere you kind of had to say,
okay, looking around, no oneelse is going to do this if I
don't step up.
It was very thoughtful.
It was a moment of me kind ofstepping in to some power, and,
(06:02):
yeah, that was a life-changingmoment for me.
What do you know?
What I'll say too, though, isthat, like in my own sort of
coming to terms with being anAmerican in Central America, so
hot on the heels of a reallyhorrific civil war, largely
funded by my government, I felta sense of I spent days
(06:31):
wondering why I was even thereand what my purpose was, and I
remember very vividly having amoment of looking in the mirror
and thinking, looking at mywhite face and my blonde hair
and my blue eyes, and thinkingthese people shouldn't trust me,
and feeling really sad aboutthat, you know, feeling really
(06:53):
like I wanted to do good work,to do good work, but I felt that
being born American meant thatI was set on a path of not doing
the kind of work that I feltneeded to be done, that I valued
the human work, and I had.
(07:15):
No, I didn't have a lot ofexamples of that in my life
growing up, certainly not a lotof examples of that in my public
education of.
Uh, you know, I mean, theheroes are the, and who we learn
about in history are theconquerors, you know the violent
men who yeah, um, but again youcame from the empire, but you
were feeling crap oh sure, well,and so I I think you know.
(07:38):
So, to kind of pick up where wewere a little earlier, like I
had, I came to this realizationthat, like um, I couldn't do any
work if I lived in that placeof shame and if I lived in that
place of of uh gosh, feeling um,you know, I, I self loathing
(08:02):
feels a little melodramatic, butthat was kind of where I was
honestly and it didn't feel good.
And then I remember reading atthe back of a gosh at this point
it was the third or fourthChomsky book, and I don't even
remember which one, to be honestwith you, because I was just
consuming- every kind of they dofold into each other.
Sure, they really do, and allthose little thin
pamphlet-looking ones you knowlike.
(08:55):
Sure, they really do.
And all those little thinpamphlet looking ones, you know,
like I had all of them.
But one said you know, gosh, asan American, if you're reading
this and you can do something tohelp, by God do it.
You know, and I'm paraphrasingbecause I don't remember the
exact, but I mean, it hit melike a lightning bolt.
I was like I have to dosomething.
I can't just sit here and feelsorry for myself and, you know,
hate myself for what we did toGuatemala.
I have to try to help.
I have to try to do what I can,you know, use the power that I
to my own spirituality and moreearth-based, you know, faiths
and yeah, I don't know justfeeling like all we have is that
(09:16):
choice.
That's all we have and thatchoice.
You can't ignore the context inwhich you're making that choice
, because there are so manythings and people are going to
see you in so many ways just bywho you are in the space that
you're in.
But it's still your choice tomake and you have to make it.
(09:38):
And so that's what I've beensitting with and it has been an
evolving choice.
I would say it's a choice thatI'm still choosing.
It's a verb, not a noun.
You know, and it is somethingthat I'd say, every day you
reveal new truths, or the waysthat we were raised that maybe
aren't in alignment with therhythms of the earth, or maybe a
(10:02):
truth that might be disparagingto a particular group of people
that you just had never eventhought of or questioned.
And then you hear anotherperspective and it opens your
eyes and you think, holy god, Ihad no idea, I had no, never
meant to hurt anyone.
Um, with, you know, making thatoffhanded comment, and and then
you make your choice, say okay,now I choose.
(10:24):
You can only and I guess thatgoes to say too, you can only
choose based on the informationyou have.
And so we make our choice inthis context of history and
culture, with the informationthat we have directly in front
of us, and that's why theirconnections and our
relationships are so important,because we can help each other
(10:45):
to make a good choice as we moveforward on our human journey I
do want to fast forward in somebrief fashion, because again
it'd be another podcast.
AJ (10:56):
But to where?
Because when you say you're inpublic education, I mean you're
doing some extraordinary work,yeah, really connecting with
students in well.
I guess it's in a way, we cutour teeth on back in Guatemala
and see you doing it here inchallenging urban situations, in
, you could argue, somewhatdecaying structures of this
(11:18):
civilization we've been part of,and you've come to a point of,
yeah, yeah, a bit of a leap, asyou've been inferring, yep, and
so we don't need to go intodetails because obviously
they're to be revealed in a way,but.
But I do want to at least speaka bit into the restorative
justice edge, sure, just briefly, as to, I mean, as you've
described it, to be getting tothe front of problems, not just
(11:40):
dealing with the symptoms withinan education system, of when
students hit the rocks in oneform or another, but getting
ahead of it with a different wayof connecting which relates to
all this?
Dana (11:53):
I think it does.
I mean, I think so.
I think what you're referringto is restorative justice and
there's a lot of different waysthat restorative justice shows
up in pop culture, on theinternet.
I mean, if you Googlerestorative justice, I think
still we think of it as atechnique to limit recidivism in
(12:14):
the US incarceration system ormaybe global incarceration
systems, but it's come up for methrough education.
I was, but it's come up for methrough education.
I was very, very fortunate tohave accepted a job at a high
school where we were part of apilot program that was looking
at exploring ways to incorporaterestorative justice into the
(12:37):
high school curriculum.
And my first time sitting incircle with colleagues, with
adults too, and that's anotherpart.
I'll get to that in a second.
But getting personal, but notin a way of like a hippie
crystals sort of thing, nothingto do with that Go crystal,
(12:59):
crystal it up.
Go crystal, crystal it up.
But it was very like justtalking about our experiences of
being a human in an educationsetting and connecting that to
our experiences of being a human, you know, and this sense of
(13:21):
all of us in this moment, withcoworkers, just being people,
you know.
And so the philosophy that I'vereally picked up and I want to
credit my teacher, dewana Nicole, who would hate it if I called
her a teacher, but she is ateacher for me and she's who
taught me this practice, and Ido my best to honor duana every
(13:46):
time I keep circle.
But the kind of the philosophyhere is we start with the adults
in the education setting andthat, you know, for so long at
least in the us education system, we've been looking at ways of
bridging the of the educationgap, the the test scoring gap,
(14:06):
and talking about ways to closethe gap, and that refers to
traditionally minoritizedchildren of minoritized
populations.
We use the same language backhome too.
AJ (14:18):
And it's not working, by the way.
Dana (14:19):
Oh, it's not working at all.
No, because we've been focusingour efforts working, by the way
.
Oh, it's not working at all.
No, because we've been focusingour efforts.
And this was, you know, in theus we had no child, uh, left
behind through the early 2000sand um, right, and it's.
It's shifted and changed in inin its sort of dress and names
and maybe different metrics thatwe're looking at, but it's
still all very student-centeredand um which is interesting,
(14:43):
isn't it?
AJ (14:44):
That Indigenous people have experienced is that you're the
problem.
Dana (14:47):
We're fixing here.
Right, you're the problem we'refixing, yeah, and I think it
gets back to the factory modelof at least the US public
education system too, of like,if we're not stamping out the
right kind of widget, then wehave to look at the widgets and
fix the widgets.
AJ (15:04):
you know, because it applies , I should say, to landscape too
, or climate.
Sure, You're the problem.
We need to fix it Right.
Dana (15:29):
So this is a profound shift you're talking about, with
biases as humans, because weall grew up in this system.
It's not to say that any ofthese folks are bad folks.
They're just doing what they'retold Stuff we were sharing
before so doing what they'redoing.
(15:50):
there might be that the act ofthe education system writ large
the way it's developed, theattitudes and the sort of the
preconceived ideas that teachershave about particular
populations of kids or whatever,coming into the classroom.
Maybe that's limiting our kidsand maybe, if we turn our
(16:15):
attention to the kids or to theadults rather sorry that we can,
um, begin to move the needle,because it's not to say that the
adults are the problem,although I have heard lots of
people say that understandably,um, I've been a problem.
AJ (16:33):
Yeah, sure, yeah, yeah.
Dana (16:36):
But I think, as the folks who are in these leadership
capacities and facilitationcapacities of our education
systems, like, we have a lensand maybe if we work on that
lens that we can actually changethings.
You know.
AJ (16:53):
So your experience of it, so far as it pertains to education
, has really inspired.
Dana (17:00):
You I mean my first circle .
I said and I thought this wasit.
This is it why this is the pathforward because what will it do
in an education setting?
and you are not just just inthat hierarchical
teacher-student role anymore.
You are people in a spacetogether and we all have
(17:23):
challenges in their spaces,especially in the way our
systems are designed Likethey're not all the way always
designed for humans to besuccessful, you know.
And being able to talk aboutthat, being able to level the
playing field, you know, andwhat we're talking about now is
(17:44):
the playing field amongdifferent educators, right?
So teachers, counselors,administrators, the school
nurses, that kind of thingwithin those hierarchies, within
those systems, I guess, arehierarchies.
And as adults, when we sit downtogether and just talk and just
be through a structured format,we can begin to peel back some
(18:10):
of the layers.
And I think the other piece ofthis, too, that I, the system
that you use, is super important, right, it can't just be people
talking, because when peopleare just talking, all of our
programming shows up.
All the ways that we believewe're supposed to act and the
things that we believe we'resupposed to say, show up, um,
(18:40):
show up.
And, in my experience, um, whenyou have a system like in the
united states, where sort ofwhite culture was, uh, the
dominant culture and then wehave minoritized cultures, um,
that have been.
Uh, you know whose voices havebeen silenced, um, muted volumes
turned down.
You know, whatever metaphor youwant to use, that the folks who
identify with those minoritizedpopulations are really, really
(19:01):
good at just letting the whiteperson talk and say whatever the
hell they're going to say, andjust kind of nodding and saying,
sure, and then going back later, you know, to their friends in
spaces, in safe spaces, and belike can you believe what this
guy said?
Well, this is something, thisis the trust thing back in
Guatemala.
Sure, friends in in spaces, insafe spaces, and be like can you
believe what this guy said?
AJ (19:16):
um well, this is something, this is the trust thing back in
guatemala sure we had, we knewthat it was there.
Yeah, too, the white guy lobsup, and to get to get behind
that to some genuine trust is,well, one of the most beautiful
experiences of my life.
Dana (19:30):
It, yes it that trust has to be earned.
It has to be, you have to beopen to receiving it, you have
to be open to hearing it.
And I'll tell you, as a memberof the dominant culture, you
have to be willing to hear somehard truths about things that
(19:50):
your people have done and thingsthat you've done that you
didn't even realize you weredoing.
You have to be open to that andthat's a hard.
That's a hard ask sometimes,but it's an important ask.
And if we're going to actually,you know, work on, you know,
air quotes, closing the gap, wehave to be willing to get
uncomfortable.
AJ (20:10):
You know there's an indigenous woman, Malikaajasat,
in the Kimberley, who turnedthat closing the gap around to
be, instead of closing the gapwith, you know, the idea that
this education system is whatconstitutes an education in
itself, let alone the otherindicators that there are that
we're not meeting, inevitablybecause the system's geared a
particular way, et cetera, etcetera.
(20:31):
And she said I think her wordswere something like closing the
gap of understanding orsomething you know it was
bringing the symptoms sortthemselves out if you can get
the core relating right.
It was brilliant, I thought.
And she's a young Indigenouswoman just starting a family.
But wow, landed an insightthere.
Dana (20:53):
No, well, I think the beauty of being able to sit in
circle when you've chosen to bein that space and you've chosen
to allow yourself to feeldiscomfort and hopefully with a
sense of something for thegreater good, um, you learn so
much about the humans around you.
(21:14):
There's so much of ourexperience that is just a shared
human.
AJ (21:20):
You know experience of, yes, raising children and and
falling in love, and I thinkabout where we sit, which, by
the way, is back in where westart yeah, now we've walked
back to the little alcove andthe light gets a bit golden as
we go.
I know it's extraordinary.
Dana (21:35):
Yeah, these cliff faces are just singing.
AJ (21:38):
They're so beautiful, that's what I think of here.
I'm imagining the families,yeah, that came in here, the
families that came in here withsome of these, I mean, if it was
such a center of ceremony andritual that they were going
through this stuff.
Dana (21:53):
I mean humans do we love our children.
Sometimes they make us mad.
You know we love our partners.
Sometimes they make us mad, andall of that is like just part
of the human experience and it'sbeautiful and messy and crazy
and like, but like it is also insharing the stories of these
(22:16):
things, which I've also come tounderstand is a huge part of
indigenous education, or maybemore.
You know, uh, you knowearth-based, you know
educational systems andtraditions, but sharing the
stories is what connects us.
AJ (22:31):
That's the key in the lock underline yeah, the more I learn
, yeah, the more I see and, Iguess, the more I keep going on
where I've ended up?
Yeah, all these fortuitousaccidents or whatever, yeah, I
want to call them.
Dana (22:46):
Yeah, so you know, to kind of finish the answer to your
question a long time ago, theprocess of circle, when followed
honestly and diligently, it isa process that is based on
indigenous practices.
It is a process that has beenmeted out over time and by a lot
(23:11):
of different practitioners.
But when followed honestly, ithelps you unlock that truth as
another human in the struggle,on the journey, on the path, and
you find yourself connected,more willing to take risks, to
(23:32):
try new things, because whatyou've done in circle, when it's
done well and followed what Ifeel are correct protocols not
unlike a ritual very, verysimilar, I feel are correct
protocols, you know, not unlikea ritual very, very similar, you
know.
But when you follow thosepractices and you're in a space
with another human that trustsyou and who you trust, you can
(23:55):
try new things out, you can bevulnerable and you can move
education.
I think you know that's reallyand I think that's the thing we
are so stuck in a way of doingthings.
It's working great for some,for for a percentage of the
(24:15):
population, but by and large alot of us are are getting left
behind in different ways, youknow, and not just by the
traditional metrics, you know,but also in in kind of finding
meaning on our life path.
That's right.
AJ (24:24):
I don't even use the words left behind anymore.
I think that's the closing thegap in the wrong direction.
Sure sure, sure, I use thewords being disconnected Humans
are meant to hold each other.
Dana (24:34):
We're meant to live in community and in the kinship
with the rest.
AJ (24:36):
I mean, I think of what you're saying about circle and
I'm looking over that Kiva.
That moved me.
So the other day, the day, yeahin golden light right now yeah,
absolutely deep, deeply duginto the earth circular
structure, and imagined whatthey were doing, at least of a
similar ilk.
And you say it sort of sharesthe roots with those sorts of
cultures.
It does it does.
Dana (24:54):
You know?
I don't know if you've ever satin a sweat lodge I should.
It's past seven o'clock wemight give it the ass here, but
anyway, go for a sweat lodge.
I I had the privilege ofsitting in some sweat lodges
with a practitioner inPhiladelphia gosh a couple of
years ago.
You walk out of a sweat lodgeand it is an uncomfortable
experience.
It is not.
I wouldn't say this is a greattime, right, you're sitting
(25:16):
close, you know, shoulder toshoulder with let's talk to this
guy.
AJ (25:20):
Hello, we need to move on, all right, ok, thanks Sorry, we
lost track of time.
Just got here.
Got to right, okay, thanksSorry we lost track of time.
Dana (25:25):
That's all right.
Just got here, got to talking.
Thanks so much.
Thank you, have a good night.
Have a good one, all right.
I didn't realize it closed atseven.
AJ (25:34):
I knew the front gate did yeah, but it makes sense that
the structure would.
I'm glad they didn't lock us in, thoughtful of them there's no
gate at the other side, so Iknew we'd be right.
All right anyway go ahead, mate.
Dana (25:46):
Oh, just to you know, you walk out, you're sitting in the
sweat lodge and it's kind ofuncomfortable and weird and
you're like I don't so totally.
I mean, I was with a bunch ofpeople, I didn't really know, I
just went with a friend.
But man, you come out of thatthing after half an hour, 45
minutes and you love everysingle person that you were
sitting in there with and Ican't explain it to you.
(26:06):
But the feeling of love is realand you, just you come, you
walk into those sweat lodges,total strangers.
You walk out family.
AJ (26:17):
Well, you know it's funny because I wrote an article
recently on Substack about aplane that flipped on the runway
, Remember?
Dana (26:24):
that yeah, oh gosh, yes.
AJ (26:25):
And the quote from one of the people in there because they
all survived about, uh, a planethat flipped on the runway.
Remember that, yeah, oh gosh,yes.
And.
And the quote from one of thepeople in there because they all
survived, it was toronto, right, it's incredible.
Yeah, I can't remember, but thequote from the the passenger
was uh, everybody got real closereal quick.
Yeah, and in the crucible ofthe moment that humans have,
that is, uh, pertains to ourbroader context big time right
(26:47):
now.
Yeah, but hey, mate as we moveon and we get back towards the
car.
Look at this light over thebuilding as we go along the
east-west wall.
Dana (26:55):
I mean this is what we were going for yesterday, right?
Oh my God, pretty excited todrive up on the Fajada Butte
right now.
AJ (27:01):
Exactly we're going to come to the sun.
The Fajada Butte will have thewestern sun on the western side,
which we don't see from ourcampground when the sun's
setting.
So we actually haven't seenthis golden light on the Butte
at the end of the day, and it isperfectly clear over that
horizon right now.
Dana (27:20):
Oh, my gosh.
AJ (27:21):
So that will be a wonder.
Yeah, mate, yeah, thank you, itwas fun, fun thanks for having
me on incredible reconnect.
Dana (27:28):
This is beautiful frankly.
AJ (27:30):
Yeah, yeah and uh to be able to do that in there beautiful,
all right.
Dana (27:35):
All right, let's do it back to camp.
yo
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