happiness without education?

Who says that you can't have happiness without education?

To The Point

“You can’t have happiness without education. The village person is unhappy because he is ignorant.” So said Dr. Gunther, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Papua and New Guinea, according to August’s Pacific Islands Monthly. I find it hard to believe that Dr. Gunther really said this, but if he did he was talking through his hat.

The gentle cynic who wrote the book of “Ecclesiastes” was far nearer the mark when he wrote, “For in much wisdom is much vexation, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow”.

Dr. Gunther goes on to say that “the greatest demand in the House of Assembly has been for schools for the children”. TTiis is true, but it is because those who have made the demand hope that western style schooling will rescue their people from the disorientation into which the clash of cultures has thrown them, not because they are ignorant, not because they are uneducated, not because they are unhappy.

Papuan villagers are not ignorant, unless we arrogantly assume that the only knowledge worth having is the knowledge we possess. Papuan vil lagers certainly do not know many things which Dr. Gunther knows, but they possibly know quite a few things that Dr. Gunther doesn’t know and would be the better for knowing.

"Not unhappy"

Papuan villagers are not un educated, unless we equate education with schooling, or unless we take as our examples villages where the impact of our civilisation has destroyed the indigenous system of education. In communities which we have not disrupted the products of that system are well prepared for adult life and have well-integrated personalities, which is more than can be said for many of the products of our system.

In the past Papuan villagers were not unhappy. I have lived among them and I know. Where they are unhappy now it is because we have disrupted their happiness.

I do not say this in criticism or bitterness. It had to be. But go into any village today and you will be likely to find that it is not the “un educated” who are unhappy, but the “educated”.

Even the women were not the downtrodden drudges they have some-

With

Percy

Cha7Terto’

times been represented to be by superficial observers. They worked hard, very hard, but they had lots of fun too. They were proud of their skills, and happy in the knowledge that it was those skills which kept their children well fed. They enjoyed the contentment of leading purpose ful lives.

No, I am not idealising the past.

I am not seeking to revive the myth of the noble savage. Of course, there were snakes and scorpions in their Eden, There was sickness, warfare and sorcery, and the suffering and fear which these things engendered.

But when all the debit items had been chalked up, there was, I believe, a substantial credit balance of hap piness. And that’s as much as any of us can expect.

They were happy, and why not, with no policemen to arrest them, no public servants to bully them, and no politicians to bamboozle them?

Something like this is the message of Queensland’s part-aboriginal poet, Kath Walker. By the way, I hope that her two books of poems (“We Are Going” and “The Dawn Is At Hand”, published by Jacaranda Press), are to be found on the shelves of the P-NG University library.

Kath Walker is no nostalgic senti mentalist. She recognises that her people must learn a new way of life, but she is insistent that the old way was a happy way.

We who came late to civilisation, Missing a gap of centuries, When you came we marvelled [and admired, But with foreboding.

We had so little but we had [happiness.

And again: No more woomera, no more [boomeran No more playabout, no more the [old way Children of nature we were then, No clocks hurrying crowds to tol Now I am civilised and work in [the white wa Now I have dress, now I have [shoe 'lsn’t she lucky to have a good [jot Better when I had only a dillyba Better when I had nothing but [happinei She is sceptical of the happine of the white man’s way.

Suddenly caught up in white ma [wa: Gladly and gratefully we accept, And this is necessity.

But remember, white man, if life [is for happinei You too, surely, have much to [chang Kath Walker is right, of cours There is no turning back.

Eagerly we must learn to change , Learn new needs we never wante ( New compulsions never needed, The price of survival.

In the Biblical story of the Garde of Eden we read that, followir Adam and Eve’s expulsion, an angi with a flaming sword barred th way by which they might have r< turned. Today’s angel brandishes transistor radio with its extende antenna glitteringly sword-like. An

ven if the young Niuginians he mfronts were to throw away their rist watches, those symbols of their jw-found bondage to time, and ■eep back, they couldn’t re-capture icir old happiness. Perhaps they will ; able to create for themselves a vw happiness. Let’s hope so.

N the same article from which I have already quoted, Dr. Gunther recorded as having said of the ouse of Assembly; “The under cretary system in the last Assembly iled mainly because we expected 0 much from the under-secretaries”, didn’t. It failed because, apart >m tossing them a few files and ports to read and sending them : to officiate at the opening of hos als, schools and council chambers, j Administration never succeeded making up its mind what it inted them to do.

"Mini-truth"

Dr. Gunther is also quoted as dng that “The new Ministerial unbers are better educated”. This a mini-truth. Of the fifteen nisterial members and assistant nisterial members, four are ex ler-secretaries, three are described having had no formal education all, and two as having had only a mary education. Of the remaining not more than three could be 1 to be substantially better icated than the former under retaries.

U 1 this doesn’t mean that they n’t do a good job—if given the nee. tor does it mean that I am “agin” university. I agree with your cor )ondent when he says: “Why uld the Vice-Chancellor have to ify the university’s existence?” y indeed? But if it is felt necessary do so, let the many good argu its that are lying around be put vork.

'here is no need to fall back on it the university’s Professor of tory, in his inaugural lecture, bribed as “fantasy”. There are ly reasons why it is nice to have niversity. But there is one reason r it is essential to have a univer and to have a good one. For ty’s and tomorrow’s Niuginians it a Kath Walker’s phrase, “the price survival” —in a world in which e is more suffering, more fear more unhappiness than their fathers ever knew, am prepared to stand up and be ited among those who say that need the university, we need it

A barbery shop on the campus?

now, we need it to be as good as we can make it, and we can’t expect it to be good if it has to work on an inadequate or a year-to-year budget.

I don’t know how many members of the House of Assembly accepted the university’s invitation to pay it a visit during the Budget meeting of the House. Those who did seem to have been favourably impressed, though one European member com mented, a little unkindly, that if the university did get more money it might advantageously spend some of it in establishing a barber shop on the campus.

However, a few cracks like this won’t do it any harm, and J. K.

McCarthy’s brilliant cartoon in August PIM may do it more good than pages of statistics.

THE debate continues on a name for the territory and has now moved into the House of Assembly.

South Bougainville’s versatile Paul Lapun has brought down a private member’s bill designed to provide for the use of “Niugini” as the ter ritory’s official name. Wisely he con tented himself with presenting and commending the bill, and deferring debate on it to the House’s Nov ember meeting, thus giving members an opportunity of canvassing the views of their constituents in the meantime.

Pretty way out

It seems unlikely that anything ap proaching unanimity will be obtain able at present. The competition recently organised by the South Pacific Post brought in an enormous variety of suggestions, a large pro portion of them showing a desire for a complete break with the “colonial” past and an entirely new name, but whether this can be taken as an indication of the views of the people at large is very doubtful.

Some of the suggested new names were pretty way out, for example “Jinpramesia” and “Pibnib”. If I remember correctly it was not actually one of these two but an equally eccentric one which was put forward by its author as the answer to our problem because, he said, “Niugini sounds ridiculous”.

I have recently received a letter from a very old friend and former missionary colleague, now retired in Sydney, in which he urges me not to

lose heart but to continue to promote “Ha del Oro”. He goes on to suggest that if “Ha del Oro” is too long it might be shortened to “Deloro”.

I’m not sure I like this; it sounds a bit too much like a Latin Ameri can film star. Frankly, I’m afraid that “Ha del Oro” is a non-starter, or at best a rank outsider. However, outsiders have been known to win their races. Anyway, I prefer “Ha del Oro” to “Jinpramesia” —or “Pibnib”.

At the risk of beating again a drum I have beaten before, I must go on to say that agreeing on a

national name, if we can agree oi one, is only the beginning and no the end of the trail to national unit} in an area which has no natural unity If this needed underlining, it has beei well and truly underlined by th< surprise move of a Bougainville grou] asking for a referendum in 1970 01 whether Bougainville should sta; with Niugini, join the British Solo mons or become independent.

Can't be laughed off

This move, spearheaded by tw< of the three members for Bougain ville in the House (and the third being an assistant ministerial membei could hardly lend his name to it) cannot just be laughed off. True, th participants were all Bougainvill men resident in Port Moresby, an< we don’t know yet to what exter they are representative of publi opinion in Bougainville itself. But i they are, the solution must be fouu in persuading the people of Bougain ville that it is in their best interes to remain with Niugini, not in ap peals either to emotion or the bi stick.

With a parliament in which a organised Highlands bloc coul dominate the House, separatist move ments are an ever-present possibility In the last House we managed t avoid the formation of such a bloc Shall we be able to in this House If not, the outlook for national unit is grim. Already some coasts members are getting a trifle tired o being lectured like naughty childre by certain Highlands members when ever they want to move a bit faste than “easy, easy”.

Have to live with

On a “one vote one value” systeir a permanent Highlands majority i assured, and this is something w have to live with. But a too tyrannies use of the power that that majorit gives could end in a Biafran-typ disaster.

Oddly enough, the Papua v. Ne\ Guinea issue is hardly an issue oul side Rugby League circles. In fad it often seems that the men fror the Sepik have more in commoi with the men of the Papuan coas than with their fellow New Guineans Perhaps this is because both live h economically depressed areas. • The Anglican Church in P-NC has started turning away from it schools children whose parents have failed to pay the education fee which were introduced for the firs time by the church this year.