Advocating for a Curriculum of the Imagination

Digitalized magic.

I saw it on TV. It was a whole world of blues and greens coming out of a hand-held device. 

But here was the problem.

Digitalized anything is considered virtual. That is, it is almost, nearly, even well-neigh, real. But not quite. So digitalized magic is "near magic." That's okay, I guess, just as "near beer" and decaf coffee are okay.

Still, as I watched this TV ad from my hotel room in Vegas and then looked out the window at the blinking lights of the hotel across the way (more adult-like magic), I realized that I was tired of the virtual, the almost. I was tired of the tease of ads.This sounds pretty grumpy, I know.

The Trouble with the Usual

The trouble is that I want to be caught up in wonder. But the way to wonder involves something else. I haven't really liked parades since I was about nine or so, but a parade I would like to follow involves the imagination, but it does this in a way that is not prepackaged and complete with a warranty. And as is the case when I think about it seriously, as with suggestions for how a class could go better or when I'm thinking about what heaven should be like, when I think about this, about wonder, I'm not even sure what this parade for the imagination should look like. I only know that it wouldn't keep imitating the world of the child that I've already gotten beyond. And it wouldn't veer off into pornography, sentimentality, or violence, the usual patterns of failure of the adult imagination. 

I've decided that what we need now more than anything is a curriculum of the imagination. Perhaps then we will learn what to look for.

I can say what this new curriculum might mean in terms of interpersonal interactions: It means that people can stop looking at each other only in the most reductive of terms of envy: “How does he/she stand up next to me? Don’t let me get to know him/her too much, or I might find out too much information. I might learn that they are better than me, or different from me, or somehow, surprisingly themselves in ways I’ve never really thought about. And that would be more than I would want to think about." 

TMI is, I think, the term we give it. Even our terms are reduced to initials. They are almost digits.

Digitalized magic works this way also. Reduced to our palm pilot or whatever we are calling it now, we can control it. I’m not sure we get to know it. It is just it.

The new curriculum might also involve teaching us to stop reducing the world we live in to terms we can control, or at least think we can control. 

I guess the point is that when we reduce all of reality—and reality includes people—to our own systems, when we unfriend people we disagree with, for example, we control our world. But we also shrink it.

Advocating for the New Curriculum

So I’m not parading yet. But I have decided that the best thing I can do right now is advocate for a curriculum of the imagination. That is, I am helping to make others aware of a program of thinking that would teach against envy of the good or great, against avoiding the interesting, and against fear of the new. We can stop teaching repetitious, familiar patterns, and we can ease up a little on control. That is, of course, what we are doing when we digitalize the magic. Or our best friend.

I know I can’t write to my senator to design a bill for a curriculum of the imagination; I know my letter will not be read.

I know that first I will need to build a network of people who are like-minded and want to see change, and when I have the requisite number of signatures, I can go to Sacramento or Washington. 

But even then I will still have to answer this nagging question: What would a curriculum of the imagination, run through a committee, finally look like? I would like to think that some churches would know this and have answers, but not many. Most teach a way to abundant life, but then there are narrow paths to follow as well. Though there is great potential in that stubborn teaching about loving our neighbor, most churches end up looking like most schools as they return to the basics.

In some sort of final analysis, the new curriculum would probably have to fit into all the systems we currently don’t want to disrupt. 

The whole scheme seems like work, and it probably won't result in the idea I started with.

Not Magic, Imagination

There is also a distinction here that matters, though I'm not sure it will answer this most important question of what it should look like. 

I know that magic I saw on TV is 21st century magic. It is a descendant of 19th century magic, found, for example, in the lie of the famous clock in Prague my daughter told me about. Once an hour, it chimes and all of the amazing things happen, with puppets coming out and doing mechanical things that make the tourists all stop to watch. And while they watch, the children all run through the crowd and pick their pockets. That is how both magic, which is a fun illusion, and thievery, which is not, work. When we are completely diverted, the sneak is done.

I’m advocating for something else. I’m advocating for children who somehow, through a curriculum of parents, teachers, and desire, are not shamed but encouraged to think for themselves. I’m advocating for adults who somehow, having learned their lessons, see more than one or two possibilities in every situation they are engaged in.

As a beginning, I advocate for Rhetoric, which William Covino called “the Art of Wondering.”

The curriculum exists. What we lack is the will to put it in place.

I guess I should get started on those signatures.