Send-click-like

The need for communication in theological education can be strongly felt when we look at the bible passages from the perspective of our media rich lives today. The real does not only exist in person but in the virtual as well. Words used speak differently today.

The healing of the centurion’s servant (Luke 7:1-10) is a very popular gospel story. The narrative of the centurion sending people to ask Jesus to visit his house and heal his servant then shifts to the power of the word and the twist in the tale offered by the centurion by his words go, come and do. Jesus is very impressed by this immense faith which was rare in those times.

The knowledge and power that belonged to Jesus usually was asked to be transferred in person by people who found him special. But in the centurion’s case a virtual miracle is what he asks for. Do not trouble yourself with this, but just say the word. The go, come and do mentioned by him are the send, click and like of today. In essence this is a dissemination of information horizontally.

Jesus was informed about the centurion by certain elders and they recommend the centurion to Jesus. But the message from the centurion does away with this peculiar mediation and puts the message in the public domain for everyone to see and comment on. This is the need of the hour now. Words captured in books and publications should then become free to share and distributed online. Send-click-like.

(Excerpt from the meditation preached for the BTESSC-UTC programme for librarians)

Questioning the question: Guru= shishya…shishya= guru???

The early concept of gurukulam in which a guru (teacher) teaches and guides his (sic) shishyas (students) was one which was tried and tested to a great extend in the Indian context. Even now it continues to rule the roost in many institutions. This concept even made perfect sense. The message would travel from the guru in the direction of the students with minimal disturbance, since the students would usually sit in rapt attention of their teacher. Any alteration would be dealt with sternly. Feedback was not expected since the guru was the authority on the subject.

Students who dared to question what was taught would be ousted and some of them were creative and brave enough to start their own schools. These days the balance of power has shifted. Information is available (not for all in India) and this, when converted into knowledge can put an individual in a position of privilege. The traditional model of communication therefore stands exposed in it’s weakness. A relevant model would then be a criss-cross between two centres of knowledge, where the distinction between guru and shishya is blurred.

This would make perfect sense to many. But there is a catch here. The feedback and two way communication is only between two power centres. What then happens to those who can’t catch up into the realm of these power centres? In effect they are left out of the process of communication. This converts the guru-shishya into the insider-outsider. (Interestingly the outsider is a construction of the insider)

The democratization or the new face of education is then a new face of discrimination and neglect. What then could be a solution to this? One of the answers could well be the disruption of the communication process. Small centres of protest will form human chains of protest to prevent a skewed and selective communication. This will last till we accept every shishya as a guru in his/her capacity or moment (This is a very popular usage these days) rather than accepting a selective phase of blurring where selective gurus and shishyas switch into each others domain.