Instruction guide for jonin' (pronounced jone-in')
1. Identify an noticeable yet sort of odd physical feature
2. Think of as many metaphors or references to that feature as possible
3. Bring up that feature in every possible conversation
4. Laugh heartily after every vague reference to that feature.
My first period class does this CONSTANTLY. One kid it's his lips (they are fairly prominent) another kid it's his skin tone (dark) and they go back and forth (Lip! Shadow!) while the rest of the class howls in laughter. At least this semester we laugh instead of curse. I prefer the light-hearted Jonin' to the hateful mockery that prevailed last semester, despite all my efforts to stop it.
Question--in your culture, if you wish to identify someone to someone else, what feature do you start with? I'll never forget going to Honduras, having to identify someone out of a crowd, and realizing that my Caucasian upbringing did not prepare me for this task since in my culture we start with hair color/length, then eye color. (You know, that blond girl, blue eyes, she's really sweet) In Honduras people start with skin tone and then body build. In the African American culture I've heard so far at Ben Davis, skin tone also prevails (she light-skinned) which is no help to me at all since I still can't visualize what the kids mean exactly when they describe someone as light skinned, since I'm still stuck on hair and facial features and don't have categories in my brain that match how they define light-skinned or not.
Of course, it's high school, so everyone is obsessed with finding identity. Except at Ben Davis, it's more about racial identity, sexual identity, not so much spiritual identity. Some of the questions are really complicated. The kids who are biracial or multiracial and feel strongly about that. The gender-confused kids. On and on it goes. To start a lengthy class discussion all you have to do is ask "what are you" to anyone in the room and immediately a lengthy discussion about racial identity emerges.
The sad thing for me is that my primary identity still isn't what it should be. When I get asked "Profe, what are you?" the response that jumps to mind first and foremost is not yet "I am a Chr!st!@n". I am still stuck in those boxes. I usually throw the question back first (why does it matter? What do you think? Why do you ask?) but my gut instinct is not to answer about the Narrow Way but rather the same identity questions they ask. This is challenging, as I need to make my primary identity the same as my eternal identity.
What are you? What is your identity?
