There are many grassroots initiatives in Oaxaca. In different towns the struggles vary substantially, although they are all concerned with attempting to improve the material conditions in the lives of the local inhabitants. In reorganizing the website it seemed reasonable to include different local grassroots efforts or struggles in the single "Grassroots Activism!" main folder. Totontepec, with its subfolder, is now one of four such subfolders, one for each of four Oaxaca towns.

      Totontepec is a small indigenous Mixe town in the northern Sierras. The idea of building a locally based university in Totontepec to serve its population and those of nearby mountain communities is the dream of Juan Arelí Bernal Alcántera. When I learned of it, I was inspired to try to help him realize it. His goal is to improve and enrich the lives of three groups of indigenous people in that region, Mixes, Chinantecos and Zapotecos, who live in the three districts, Mixe, Choapam and Villa Alta.

      All education, formal and informal, is for making people fit into a culture, for socializing them.Where conflicts exist between different groups, each group wants people to learn values that support its interests. For example, in a chattel slave society the ruling group teaches that slaves are inferior to the owners, that they are less than human. The slaves of course maintain and teach, as much as possible under the circumstances, that they are fully human, although they may believe that in some ways they are inferior to their owners. In psychological jargon, they may come to "internalize" their supposed inferiority, as also is often the case with women in a male-dominated society. The Mexican anthropologist Guillermo Batalla speaks of the colonization of the minds of the colonized. "A basic characteristic of every colonial society is that the invading group, with a different culture from the dominated, ideologically affirms its immanent superiority in all areas of life and denies and excludes the culture of those colonized." [México Profundo: Reclaiming a Civilization].

      Education is never neutral. It never deals only with objective facts. It always carries with it, both explicitly and implicitly, the ideological framework of either the educational institution, in the case of formalized education, or of the teacher, in the case of informal teaching. In that sense, all education is propaganda, not in a pejorative sense, but in the sense that it is teaching people what to believe. Education and teaching don't need to be formalized to be effective. Slaves are often prohibited from receiving schooling, either totally or more than minimally. That restriction, along with corporal punishment when the master wills it, helps teach them "their place." Clearly, education and teaching are carried out by the whole cultural structure of a society, and by substructures within the larger society. Education, properly rather than narrowly understood, is far more inclusive than merely learning certain subject matter.

      In nation-states formal education is institutionalized. State certification of schools and teachers is required. Only licensed schools are supposed to be "legitimate," and they can retain their certification only by meeting the "standards" established by state boards. In many countries it is obligatory for young people to attend school up through a specified grade level or age. Justification for the high degree of centralized control over education rests on its supposed ability to assure high academic standards. Instead of local people, the children's parents and other interested townsfolk, education in their community is controlled by state-appointed administrators and conducted by teachers who are state certified, supposed professional experts.

      An equally important element of control is the curriculum. Who decides the subject matter? Who selects the books, periodicals, films, etc. to be used? Should materials be used that help inculcate nationalism, the notion that "my country is the best"? In many countries, widespread acceptance of that belief is one of the goals of formal education. Is unreflective patriotism a desirable value to inculcate in young people? How much emphasis ought to be placed on developing critical thinking habits in young people? These questions are highly controversial. I believe critical thinking is always at odds with the status quo in a society governed by a hierarchical power structure.

      State authorities usually look unfavorably on local efforts to establish alternative schools because they are seen as a challenge to the centralized educational establishment. However, if state schools are judged by local people not to be meeting local needs, and incapable of doing so, then their efforts to establish alternative schools are in my view entirely legitimate.

      My initial purpose was to encourage local efforts by providing information, listing possible sources of help, and making it easier for different groups to contact each other; in general, encouraging mutual aid to help support local autonomous popular education. That was in November 1998, soon after an exciting visit to San Sebastian Totontepec Villa de Morelos, or Totontepec for short. I posted on my website an article, "Totontepec, a dream to be realized in the Mountains of Oaxaca." The dream of Juan Arelí Bernal, which captured my imagination, was to establish a university in that mountain town, his home.

      Three years later, and this is a tribute to both the power of the internet, and to the sense of community that exists among people who still feel themselves rooted in the village culture of their ancestors, I received e-mails from several such individuals. One of them, Saúl Alcántara García, wrote,

      I am a Mexican descendent of Mixes [one of the indigenous peoples that live in Oaxaca State] since my parents were born in Totontepec . . . although I was not born in Totontepec I feel as Mixe as though I were . . . I suggest that you return to Totontepec, above all if you can in January when the town fiesta occurs . . .

      And in a later e-mail, he wrote

      I'm now located in Mexico City, but every year, especially in January, I go to Totontepec, aside from the fact that my father lives there, as well as my sister . . .
 

Saúl's sister, his father Espiridion Alcántara and Nancy Davies at
the fiesta, Jan 20, 2002

      Another e-mail, from Martín Julio Reyes Ortega, began enthusiastically,

      Hi George: My name is Martín Reyes, I'm 33 years old and live in the city of Monterrey, in the north of Mexico. While looking for information about Totontepec, where my parents were born, I came upon a note about your visit to the Mixe region in November of 98 . . .

      And in a later e-mail he wrote,

      My father lives in Mexico City, but he goes twice a year to Totontepec to work on decorating the church for both festivities. He's been doing this for many years. His name is Carmelo Reyes, many people know him . . .

      So it happened that, with my compañera Nancy and Juan Giner, a neighbor here in Oaxaca City, I made the great bus ride to Totontepec to be there during the fiesta dedicated to the town's patron saint. Nancy's account of the visit is in her article, "Fiesta in Totontepec", in this subfolder.

      At the fiesta we met the relatives of Saúl Alcántara and Martín Reyes, and I saw again my friends from three years ago, Juan Arelí Bernal Alcántara and his father Otilio Bernal Reyes and other family members. Not only has Juan Arelí's dream of a university in Totontepec not abated, it has expanded to include a medical school. An update on where Arelí's project stands at the moment is in the article, "Integral Development, a Model for the World?" (see below).

Totontepec, a dream to be realized in the mountains of Oaxaca. Introduction to a grassroots effort to build a university that will meet the needs and aspirations of the local people. Written November 1998.

Totontepec Fiesta. Account of a visit to Totontepec during the annual fiesta to celebrate its patron saint, by Nancy Davies, January 2002.

Plan for an indigenous University in Totontepec Mixe. Proposal by Juan Arelí Bernal Alcántera for the university. Prepared in 2001. English translation in preparation.

Integral Development, a Model for the World? is in preparation.

A list of possible resources for popular educational efforts is in preparation.