The Price of Ignorance.

Kony poster- official for 4/20/12 gathering

     Sometimes my students manage to make me incredibly proud and incredibly appalled at the same time.  To understand this, you need to know about Kony- and I am assuming most of us do from the media, one way or the other.  Long story short Kony is a rebel leader in Uganda, head of the Lord's Resistance Army.  The intention of the LRA is to establish a theocracy, the purifying that part of Africa. The religion is an assimilation of Christian fundamentalism, spiritualism and Acholi cultural traditions.  His use of children as a basis for his army- as soldiers, servants and currency (in the form of prostitution).  The majority of the children are abducted from families, but the original abducted children, now adults, are raising their own children in the Kony-culture.  An American group, Invisible Children, has been around for a long time- with the mission to keep this situation in the international awareness and promote action against Kony.  (Kony is considered a war criminal and is on the international 'most wanted list'- not only for the use of children, but for promoting extreme human rights violations).  Anyhoo, a few months ago the Kony2012 video came out on the internet, creating a wave of awareness. (and controversy, and rumors, and all sorts of things- point is that whatever the videos alternative intentions, it did serve to bring this situation to the forefront).

       Ok- now that you have the background, understand that this became popular with the students.  The video was shown in the history classes for discussion, as well as spreading through facebook and the like.  A group of students, led by Lindsay (who is incredible, amazing, talented and a candidate for sainthood- I kid you not, this is one of the few people in the world who actually *lives* her beliefs- which is incredibly difficult considering her circumstances, which includes care of a parent with extreme health issues)- became involved with this.  On Friday, all over the country, students worked to raise awareness by spending Friday evening in shopping centers passing out literature, speaking, singing, performing- anything to get folk's attention.  Our students- being poor- handmade posters, painted their own t-shirts, printed their own flyers, spoke at school during lunch and in classes, gathered at the local Food Lion.  I am proud of them for believing that they can bring about global change through their actions, for being able to be articulate and organized, and most of all for being passionately involved in *something* besides themselves. 

         But.....this brings us to my title and my point and the poster above.  And why students need to be able to read images, and why art is important and visual literacy.  Without knowledge of Kony, looking at the above poster, what do you see?  Patriotic colors- red/white/blue.  And black.  The first reaction is Red/White/Blue = America (backed up with stars, stripes and the political imagery).  Add black for Africa (a bit racial, but we get the point).  Ok- Donkey and Elephant = political parties.  And the Elephant could also represent Africa.  On closer inspection, the donkey's head becomes a dove, and the olive branch is that weird horn-thing sticking out of the elephants head.  The dove is great- the olive branch, unless you see the dove, makes you wonder if the Elephant is some sort of Rhino-mutant-cross, or if the Donkey just has strange donkey-hair.  But that is acceptable.   The big 2012 calls attention to the year- the intended meaning is the election year, and that both political parties should agree to confront the Kony situation- with the subliminal meaning that 2012 is also the apocalyptic year in popular culture, and this is a foreshadowing of that. (Cool coincidence: the traditional beliefs of the Acholi include some of the same base beliefs as other African religions, including the ability to control bodies after death, which we affectionately know as zombies.  The Zombie apocalypse is another part of current popular culture- as if a regular apocalypse isn't bad enough).  Anyway, back to the image.  The name KONY is in big print- calling attention- Invisible children is in small print (and refers to the awareness group, however, this could also be interpreted as the fact that children in our culture have no political power except as images and issues).  'One thing we can all agree on' slogan indicates solidarity- the union of the two parties and the invisible children to stop Kony.

HOWEVER, when I asked my classes to tell me- this was before Linds and company began with their informational speeches- what this graphic meant, the majority of them thought that Kony was a third party candidate running for president this year.  A few of them thought that it referred to Mr. Konny, a former biology teacher/ assistant principal who is now at the middle school.  Some of those few thought it was some sort of bid to replace Dr. Sullivan with Mr. Konny as our principal.  Twisted meanings- but understandable in a way.  

And I am appalled.  Not by the ignorance of the students, because they *are* students, and rely on us to teach them what is important and what is what.  But by the ignorance of those who think that art class is just about 'drawing what I want to' and playing with paint/clay- and is an unimportant educational frill.  No such thing.  The literacy that we teach- the ability to communicate through images, the decoding as well as the creation, is vital to our culture.  At no other time have we been so image-dependent for communication, and the power of the image to persuade is incredible.   And *this* is what I want to do- teach the students that invisible code, those subtle deliberate nuances that make a difference.  Remember- all professional images are created with intention- and you need to be able to discern what those intentions are.  Take a moment and really *see* what is being said.