True Story 1.11
Mohawk and Anglo educators attempt to collaborate
The setting for this story
In superintendent Bob Kimball’s school district in upstate New York, members of the Mohawk tribe and local Anglo educators decided to jointly plan ways of dealing more responsively with a growing number of Mohawk students in a district’s schools.
A story of misaligned minds13
After a series of mostly unproductive meetings had occurred, it was clear to all observers – including Bob Kimball – that the Anglo educators were dominating the discussions. In fact, on-site research revealed that the three main Anglo participants had taken a total of 2,057 turns at speaking, whereas the three leading Mohawk participants had taken only 1,023 turns.
Anglo participants said, when interviewed, that they had been assuming the Mohawks were in agreement whenever they did not contradict or question the Anglos’ talking points. Mohawk participants said, when interviewed, that they ardently disagreed with many of the Anglos’ talking points, and with what were emerging as the group’s conclusions.
The more the Mohawks disagreed, the quieter they became. When asked about this, they said they had come to believe that the Anglo educators were demonstrating unwillingness or inability to grasp the Mohawks’ perspectives. Therefore, further attempts at discussion seemed pointless.
Superintendent Kimball’s question
How can this persistent imbalance between Anglo and Mohawk talk be explained?
Critique of story 1.11
During conversations, Mohawk people and members of many other indigenous North American groups respond to another person’s statement after a period of silence during which they reflect on what their discussion partner just said. By our standards, these silences are not brief. For most of us, the norm for turn-taking is that a listener begins speaking either immediately or within a couple of seconds after a speaker stops talking. If you or I stop speaking and are met by silence, we often jump back in and continue. During conversational exchanges, we’re uncomfortable with silences. We sometimes wonder if “silence implies consent” by the other party. Another tendency is that we label a slow-to-speak person or a quiet group as passive, compliant, apathetic – or worse.
For a Native American who remains silent while respectfully reflecting on what was just said, the discussion partner who jumps back in with more talk is revealing his or her disinterest in the Native person’s perspective. Such overt disregard causes feelings of engagement and trust to plummet.
After the meetings described in this story, researchers found that the Anglos believed that they had engaged in a meaningful cross-cultural dialogue. They were flummoxed by the statistics shared by the researchers revealing that they had dominated every meeting.
For thought
Upon hearing the data from the researchers, some of the Anglos seemed to have an “ah-ha moment” and gave the impression that they were now receptive to waiting for and listening respectfully to their Mohawk counterparts’ contributions. If you were superintendent Kimball, would this news encourage you to arrange a second round of meetings?
Related stories
Stories 1.06, 1.15, 1.18, 4.10, 4.14, and 7.09 also involve Native American groups, usually Navajos in the U.S. Southwest. Several other stories describe mental misalignments involving indigenous groups in Alaska, Hawaii, and British Columbia.
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Endnotes:
13 Williams (2009), 190–206; and Williams (2013), 35–36.
Full citations are available at misalignedminds.info/References.