Lorelei Blackburn
March 2, 2010
Community Literacy
Book Review
Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace…One School at a Time.
Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin. London: Penguin Books, 2006.
Lorelei Blackburn, Michigan State University
Perhaps it seems odd to review a New York Times best-seller—published in 39 countries, with more than 3.5 million copies sold—for an academic journal. However, as much of the work of community literacy involves collaboration between scholars and the public, it makes sense for people doing work in community literacy to see what their work might look like from the outside. Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace…One School at a Time, by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin, tells the story of people doing community literacy internationally. However, because the work is being done by those outside the discipline, it doesn’t use our shared terminology. Even so, it makes sense for us to take a nuanced look at Three Cups of Tea, as it can offer us a visualization of what nonscholars consider community literacy and how community literacy is enacted internationally within one organization.
As the story begins, Mortenson, with degrees in both nursing and chemistry, and some graduate work in neurophysiology, is on an ill-fated endeavor to reach the top of Pakistan’s K2, the second tallest mountain in the world, when he is forced to turn back before reaching the peak. On his way down, affected by exhaustion and the altitude, he wanders far off the trail and ends up stumbling into Korphe, a small Pakistani village above the Braldu River. He spends several months recuperating there, in the care of the villagers, and in the process, becomes inextricably entangled with the Balti community. One day, Mortenson asks Haji Ali, the nurmadhar, the chief, to let him visit the school, thinking he might be able to repay some of the kindness he was shown by purchasing textbooks or supplies for the children. To Mortenson’s surprise, Haji Ali takes him to an open ledge where 78 boys and four girls were studying outside on the frosted ground. The nurmadhar explains to him that the village does not have a school, and that the Pakistani government did not provide a teacher. Mortenson then makes a solemn promise to Haji Ali to build a school for the children of Korphe. Guided by the memory of his younger sister who had recently died, by his sense of indebtedness to the hosts who saved his life, and by the promise he made, Mortenson heads back to the United States with a goal in mind but no idea of how to turn the goal into a brick and mortar school.
The rest of the book focuses on the practical realities of fundraising (Mortenson typed more than 200 letters that he sent asking for donations), forming a foundation (The Central Asia Institute), completing the building of Korphe’s school, and finally, and perhaps most importantly, on building relationships with the communities within which he was working. As a text from outside the discipline, this book brings up some very real postcolonial issues, and at first, it might seem like a typical and all-too-familiar narrative—white American male, former military, travels to Pakistan and takes up the mission to bring literacy to thousands of oppressed Pakistanis. However, in Mortenson’s defense, he seems to take the time to “draw out the voices of the silenced and the expertise of marginalized people” (Flower, 20). Mortenson gained this invaluable sense of humility after Haji Ali pointed out to him that his American ways were not working with the Balti people. The following quote is indicative of his desire to work within the discourse and traditions of the community: “We Americans think you have to accomplish everything quickly. We’re the country of thirty-minute power lunches and two-minute football drills. Our leaders through their ‘shock and awe’ campaign could end the war in Iraq before it even started. Haji Ali taught me to share three cups of tea, to slow down and make building relationships as important as building projects. He taught me that I had more to learn from the people I work with than I could ever hope to teach them.” (150).
This theme of relationships is repeated again and again, as Mortenson continues to learn from those with whom he is working, and it reflects our field’s current trend to work within communities in reciprocal relationships, deferring to the expertise of those within the culture. Mortenson does not bring in EFL or ESL specialists to teach English; he doesn’t bring in any teachers at all. He simply partners with the Pakistanis to build spaces in which their communities can meet and learn. Interestingly, this reciprocity does not end once Morentson returns home. In one instance, he is at a copy shop in America, and the Pakistani man working there, seeing him struggle with a manual typewriter and discovering what he is doing, spends time teaching him how to use a computer to produce the copious amounts of letters to be sent out for fundraising purposes. Mortenson is quoted in the book as saying: “It was pretty interesting…someone from Pakistan helping me become computer literate so I could help Pakistani kids get literate” (50). Here, he recognizes that he needs to gain a functional literacy in technology from a Pakistani in America in order to better assist his friends in Pakistan. This action, this act of community literacy, “is practiced as people cross boundaries, share various perspectives, and move into action” (Peck et al., 220).
Linda Flower, in her book What Is Community Literacy, defines community literacy as “a rhetorical practice for inquiry and social change” (16). Considered in this light, Mortenson’s book is most definitely about community literacy, although not explicitly identified as such, as his goal is to partner with the communities within which he works to bring about social change—most notably, to bring education to girls in an area in which the Taliban believes educating women is not a priority. In the article “Community Literacy” by Peck et al., the authors assert: “Research agendas, framed in the armchair of theory and untested in the context of real people and problems, misrepresent factors that matter” (219). Mortenson does work in the mountains of Pakistan, not from an armchair; he works with real people, in real situations. As such, the book provides examples of action, not agenda, and practical application, not theory.
It is important to note that Mortenson does not simply barge into communities with the intention of throwing down existing institutions to further his own ideas of what those communities should look like. Instead, he waits for invitations from community leaders and works, as Jeffery Grabill suggests we should, “within institutions to design programs which benefit everyone” (58).
I examined this book in hopes of reconciling the disconnect between popular literature and the literature in our field. In the introduction to a recent volume of Reflections, the editors state: “When our work within various communities demands creativity, flexibility, and deep collaboration…traditional scholarship seems inadequate for expressing what we’ve found” (4). I agree wholehearted with this assertion, and as a community literacy scholar, I think it is important to consider the impact of popular literature as a means of helping us complicate our understanding of the ways in which the world outside the academy works and as a way to reconsider many critical questions in the discipline. Emerging scholars and those new to the field may find this book both inspirational and practical. Veterans and current practitioners of community literacy may want to read it as a simple reminder of the practical effects community literacy can have in the world.