In the Spring semester of my senior year as an undergraduate student at the University of Cincinnati, I chose to take a course entitled Humanitarianism: Design Thinking Across The Disciplines. This course was taught by Michael Zaretsky and was taken by ten students from many different majors and educational backgrounds. The course included a critical look at humanitarianism, what it has meant in the past, and what it means today. For this course, our class was to go to Tanzania to work with three villages in rural Tanzania through a local non-profit, Village Life Outreach. Before heading around the world, we defined what projects we could feasibly do during our week there, we learned about Tanzanian culture, etiquette, and history, and we learned many principles involved in design thinking, which is a way of thinking I have not considered before.
In Tanzania, our class began meeting with the villagers to find out what we should spend our limited time on. These meetings were valuable, because it gave us students more insight as to what life is really like in rural Tanzania, which in turn allowed us to more effectively work with these communities to solve issues they are facing.
The main project I worked on when I wasn't in meetings with other villages was to build a cookstove. This cookstove was built at a very large primary school in a village called Roche. They have cooks at their school to make sure the students are well-fed. However, the stove they were using previously was not up to par, and needed to be greatly improved to meet all of the needs of the many primary school students.
Overall, I acquired many different thoughts to life in East Africa. It was humbling and inspiring to talk to villagers in Tanzania simply to hear what their life is like, and how vastly different it is in the United States.
In Tanzania, our class began meeting with the villagers to find out what we should spend our limited time on. These meetings were valuable, because it gave us students more insight as to what life is really like in rural Tanzania, which in turn allowed us to more effectively work with these communities to solve issues they are facing.
The main project I worked on when I wasn't in meetings with other villages was to build a cookstove. This cookstove was built at a very large primary school in a village called Roche. They have cooks at their school to make sure the students are well-fed. However, the stove they were using previously was not up to par, and needed to be greatly improved to meet all of the needs of the many primary school students.
Overall, I acquired many different thoughts to life in East Africa. It was humbling and inspiring to talk to villagers in Tanzania simply to hear what their life is like, and how vastly different it is in the United States.
WHAT IS HUMANITARIANISM?
BEFORE THE TRIP
In an investigation of how humanitarianism has evolved, it is clear that it has taken on several different forms throughout modern history, and thus, has a much broader meaning than one would think had they just followed today’s popular media outlets. However, when one considers the accepted formal definition of humanitarianism as a general benevolence and sympathy for all human beings, the fact that humanitarianism has manifested itself in many ways is unsurprising. Historically, humanitarianism has been applied to marginalized populations, before these groups were able to enjoy freedom and equal rights. Examples of what this looked like are in the abolishment of slavery across the world in the 19th century and women’s suffrage. Additionally, challenging the status quo for the efforts of humanitarianism includes the ceasing of inhumane forms of torture and punishment especially in the prison system, the treatment of the mentally ill, the treatment of women, and improving conditions for workers throughout the various industrial revolutions that have occurred throughout history. As systematically oppressed groups of people were granted equal rights and the treatment of all people began to improve, humanitarianism evolved to more global efforts. Humanitarianism took on a more international role in the twentieth century, resembling more closely what humanitarianism looks like today. International humanitarian law sought to lessen the effects of warfare on those not involved in battle, but may still be otherwise adversely affected. The Red Cross, while formed before much of formal international humanitarian law was penned, was the first instance of organized international humanitarian action. Due to its focus on healthcare, this first and arguably largest humanitarian organization has inspired much of what humanitarianism means today. Humanitarianism today seems to focus mostly on healthcare and the improving of infrastructure and the general quality of living for those in what we still call third world countries. These modern efforts sometimes include a religious basis, are supported by religious institutions, and are carried out by missionaries. In this way, humanitarianism today has received some criticism due to “the white-savior industrial complex,” and the motivation and effects of this humanitarianism are called into question. The Kony2012 campaign started by an American organization is the one of the most notable efforts that drew much publicity. This campaign was carried out mostly through social media, and resulted in many Facebook users sharing a video of a type of government that was appalling to many American millennial. Kony2012 marked the role that social media has had in modern humanitarianism. Today, college-students would be hard-pressed to say they don’t have a friend that depicts them interacting with children in third world countries through an alternative spring break trip. Social media has not only heightened the world’s knowledge of what areas of the world live in stark contrast to countries with easy access to the internet, but has also popularized humanitarianism in all its various forms. As humanitarianism has been rapidly accelerated by something so ubiquitous as social media, the formal definition of humanitarianism has shifted. Now, when one thinks of humanitarianism, those Facebook profile pictures are the first to come to mind. In this way, humanitarianism as the general population understands it has narrowed to going to third world countries and doing anything that might resemble helping out the native people there. With this popularization of humanitarianism, it has been met with more scrutiny and criticism than before. With this closer examination of the motivation and lasting affects (positive and negative) of popular forms of humanitarianism, humanitarianism has already started to try and get back to the aforementioned broader definition, ensuring that the welfare of all humans is truly improved as these acts are carried out. It is my belief that this trend will continue in the years to come, as more people are forced to examine why they’re going on such mission trips and what affects they’re actions could have in cultures they are less familiar with. It is difficult to avoid the countless articles that pop up through online media questioning the effectiveness of humanitarianism today. Now that it is much easier to carry out humanitarianism internationally and there are most resources and means to attend to the quality of living for all people, the social implications of humanitarianism will be much more widely known. If I keep in mind the original, broad definition of humanitarianism, my life will intersect with humanitarianism more than I originally thought. While I may not make trips to Africa every March, I began studying engineering because of the potential I would have to use my talents to make the world a better place to live. This mission clearly aligns with the true efforts of humanitarianism, and as such, I believe my life will intersect with humanitarianism in my small, daily efforts in the years to come, even though it may not always be as direct as humanitarian design projects being carried out in Tanzania. |
AFTER THE TRIP
At the beginning of the semester, prior to taking a course critically studying humanitarianism, it’s efforts, and carrying out “humanitarianism” through design thinking, I had investigated what humanitarianism has looked like in the past, and what I thought it meant today. This involved applying the broad definition of “a general benevolence and sympathy for all human beings,” which can lend itself to many different interpretations. At the time, I found that humanitarianism throughout history has manifested itself in such efforts as the women’s rights movement and women’s suffrage to the formation of the Red Cross, which resulted in a shift to what we see today as humanitarianism. Much of humanitarianism today focuses on healthcare, as health is the highest basic human priority. And very recently, we are seeing more “voluntourism” coming into play and become quite pervasive, especially among college-aged people, which can result in droves of excited students joining humanitarian efforts they may or may not have not critically examined. This is a large reason why I enjoyed discussing and putting humanitarianism today under a microscope. Through this course, I was able to learn of real stories of many humanitarian efforts that seem outstanding and are done on a huge scale. But if we fast-forward a few years, find out that these efforts are almost futile. Things like dropping thousands of mosquito nets from the air, introducing PUR water filters into a community, and using other unattainable technologies in areas with little to no power are all things we as a class were able to discuss and examine. Prior to taking this class, I think I could only really view humanitarianism as what it wasn’t. I knew of things that didn’t work, that were absurd, that were self-serving, etc. After traveling to Africa and attempting to make a positive change in the lives of other people, I can fully understand why it’s easy to criticize efforts that fail: because humanitarianism is not an easy task to carry out. It requires an unbelievable amount of planning and careful, slow execution. It also requires something that I believe little humanitarian efforts groups really take the time to do, which is working with the communities they are trying to help to learn what is needed, talking with the people there to learn of their individual and collective struggles, and executing solutions with the help of those they are attempting to help. After spending a week trying my hand at this process, I have a little more tangible idea about what humanitarianism is. I don’t think that that necessarily has changed my ideas on what humanitarianism is, but it at least has given me actual experiences and insights as to what positive change that really works looks like. Trying to grasp the process of carrying out humanitarian work is the piece that was missing from my definition of humanitarianism. It’s very easy to tell people that I’m going to Tanzania to carry out these projects and it’s easy to talk about what I plan to do and what I did, but it’s another thing entirely to actually do that work. I think anything meanwhile takes a lot of time and work and is toiling, and humanitarian work is just that. Humanitarianism is both physically and emotionally toiling, it takes more time than many people believe they have to devote, and it requires admitting that you don’t have all the answers. My definition of humanitarianism is much less a historical or tangible idea now as it is what I believe it takes to make positive change in someone else’s life or the lives of many people at once. And as such, I don’t think my definition of humanitarianism has drastically changed, but I now at least have stories and experiences to back up why certain things in the past don’t work and the pitfalls of many “humanitarian” organizations today. I think that this experience has been invaluable and has led me to reexamine how humanitarianism will intersect with my own life. I view my part in humanitarianism through my chosen profession of engineering, and using those skills to make the world a better place to live in. I now have much more insight as to what it will take to execute that life mission. This process will take more time than I had imagined, will be more physically and emotionally demanding, but will result in more long-lasting, impactful change in the end. |