Service: to supply a person with something.

“I want us to talk about why, in the context of conflicting interests and the historical dominance of one racial or gender group over another, it is possible that ‘service,’ in and of itself, can have racist or sexist outcomes despite good intentions.  For example, I resist the notion of service learning for U.S. students in the Philippines, my country of origin, because I think it perpetuates a ‘colonial mentality’ among Filipinos and a kind of ‘manifest destiny’ amoung U.S. students.  To my way of thinking, the results of the history of U.S. dominance in the Philippines is so overwhelming that it is almost impossible for a U.S. student doing what is regarded on both sides as ‘service’ not to deliver a message of superiority.”

This quote is taken out of A Challenge to the Notion of Service by Nadinne Cruz.  It occurs in the middle of her three page article.  It funtions her to show how one persons thought of service and doing good can really have a negative effect then the intended one.  One may go into service with the thought of having a positive influence or doing something that makes them feel good and as if they’ve done something for someone.  Yet through the ripple effect their so called good intentions can create a bad and negative effect on the people or service they have done.  Is service really that benefical in this case?  Can someone service someone without any negative effects?

Definition: To be service to, to serve, to provide with service

“The idea that every American has something to give and at all times may, can and should give, explains why it occurred to students that they could help Mexican peasants “develop” by spending a few months in their villages.”

In Monsignor Ivan Illich’s piece from 1968 he is addressing the Conference on Inter-American Student Projects. The quote above is relatively in the beginning of his piece where he down and out bashes people (Americans) helping out/volunteering/providing service to other countries, particularly Mexico.

Service: to be of service to, to serve, to provide with a service. 

In his speech, Illich describes why mission trips are so popular among Americans and why people formed the mission organization he is addressing. He declares, “A group like this could not have developed unless a mood in the United States had supported it – the belief that any true American must share God’s blessings with his poorer fellow men. The idea that every American has something to give, and at all times may, can, and should give it, explains why it occurred to students that they could help Mexican peasants ‘develop’ by spending a few months in their villages.” Illich disagrees with this rationale and proceeds to attack it during the rest of his speech. He himself does not feel that American missionaries are “being of service” or “providing a service” to the Mexicans, but as his quote indicates, the missionaries fervently do feel this way. They believe that they have “something to give.”

“I think it is possible to empower learners (through service learning) and not promote the common good (by reinforcing a sense of inferiority among those “served” or a false sense of power among those who “serve”). I found this quote at almost the end of the Nadinne Cruz article. It is functioning as the sentence that sort of explains all of her feelings and concludes her final thoughts. I think that if you insert “process” into the quote you will find how the word “service” functions in this quote: “I think it is possible to empower learners (through service learning) and not promote the common good (by reinforcing a sense of inferiority among those “PROCESSED” or a false sense of power among those who “PROCESS”). I think when you use the definition of process instead of sevice, it shows one of Cruz’s arguements that participating in service learning is a sort of process and does not necessarily come from the heart and support the common good. It extends her arguement that those who “PROCESS” are looking for power and those who are “PROCESSED” are the wounded by-product a processor’s power trip.

 My definition of service is #5, “to supply a person with something”

Illich says that “next to money and guns, the third largest North American Export is the U.S. idealist”. Illich seems to be saying that Americans think that they are supplying Latin Americans with a dream to strive for, motivation and inspiration, while all they are really providing is hopelessness and a pipe dream that many know they can never achieve. Thus, what they think is being supplied and what actually is are two different things, and the US volunteers are not really doing anyone a service at all.

I think this is a good example of my definition; although “to supply a person with something” has more material implications, I think that one can just as well supply people with ideas or goals.

“I am suggesting that reciprocal learning may be more possible if it is not tied to a notion of service.” – Cruz, “A Challenge to the Notion of Service”

Cruz, in her quote from the article she wrote, provides a valid point about people’s perspective of service.  A definition provided defines service “to process” which is very well understood from the quote.  Placed towards the end of the article, Cruz appears to be summarizing the major points, specifically that people can not learn from service learning if they incorporate the literal definition of the word and process the people they interact with  in the same way they’d process the orders in a restaurant.