ERIC Number: EJ1449939
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2024
Pages: 15
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0835-4944
EISSN: EISSN-1925-993X
Stepping Forward, Stepping Back, and into the Unknown: An Autoethnography of Solidarity
Cindy Hanson
Canadian Journal for the Study of Adult Education, v36 n2 p33-47 2024
My social position emerges from years of activism and a rural, working-class history. For decades, I have worked in adult/lifelong learning and development--inside communities and post-secondary institutions--always with the goal of achieving a more just and equitable world. While I aspire to these ideals, I have also had to learn that acts of solidarity involve learning when to step forward and when to step back, and a willingness to step into the unknown. In this autoethnography I choose a few examples from life experience that illustrate solidarity in action and what might be termed revolutionary praxis. Using examples from my work in global/international development, settler-Indigenous relations, feminism, and public transportation, I explore activism and solidarity. Finally, I offer insights into how solidarity functions in spaces of adult learning, including attention to paradoxes or attempting to "do good" while reinforcing inequalities embedded in neoliberal funding, social histories, and authority structures. Positions of solidarity require deep levels of consciousness raising. In my experience, no transformation is without challenges, risk, and acts of courage.
Descriptors: Social Action, Social Change, Activism, Global Approach, Salaries, Transportation, Feminism, Foreign Countries, Colonialism, Indigenous Personnel, Residential Schools, Educational Experience, Cooperative Programs
Mount Saint Vincent University. e-mail: cjsaerceea@gmail.com; Web site: https://cjsae.library.dal.ca/index.php/cjsae
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Evaluative
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Canada; Ethiopia
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A