Update

Hi there tout la gang,

We don't have much to say about research in practice at the Café right now

but we are talking policy and practice over here now: Literacy Enquirers.

Thursday, July 26, 2007

joy in the machine

Maria over at Alpha sent me the link to this video yesterday.
I thought it fit with our theme earlier this week.


Have you ever seen anyone have so much fun installing anything on a computer?


At the Ubuntu website, the operating system is described as "a community developed, linux-based operating system that is perfect for laptops, desktops and servers. It contains all the applications you need - a web browser, presentation, document and spreadsheet software, instant messaging and much more."

The word Ubuntu has its origin in the Bantu languages of Southern Africa. and refers to a humanist ideology focusing on people's allegiances and relations with each other. Ubuntu is seen as a traditional African concept.

Bishop Desmond Tutu describes it this way:
A person with ubuntu is open and available to others, affirming of others, does not feel threatened that others are able and good, for he or she has a proper self-assurance that comes from knowing that he or she belongs in a greater whole and is diminished when others are humiliated or diminished, when others are tortured or oppressed.
And Nelson Mandela, like this:


A traveller through our country would stop at a village, and he didn't have to ask for food or for water. Once he stops, the people give him food, entertain him. That is one aspect of Ubuntu but Ubuntu has various aspects. Ubuntu does not mean that people should not address themselves. The question therefore is: Are you going to do so in order to enable the community around you to improve?

So whether we install Ubuntu onto our computers or into our hearts, it seems that joy will be part of our experience.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

There is a certain joy that comes when a community comes together to work for the betterment and blessing of others.

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