Editorial:

Levesque_Manifestation_Volume1_Number1_November_2008.pdf

Peter Levesque

Contact Information

Manifestation Journal, 1961 rue Caprihani Way, Ottawa (ON) K4A 4R6, Canada, pnlevesque@gmail.com, +1.613.841.0858

A conversation that has no end

The idea for Manifestation: Journal of Community Engaged Research and Learning Partnerships arrived during a dinner conversation in March 2007.  Conversations are a fundamental part of what it means to be human.  In conversation we develop association and fellowship.  We create detailed understanding about the meaning of words, art, habits, health, environment, family, power, commerce, and an endless array of objects, subjects, and relationships.

When a conversation ends, we hope it leads to another, for the end of a conversation often translates into the end of a relationship.  The idea of a conversation that has no end is not meant to suggest that Manifestation is all talk and no action – rather it is discourse that learns from and leads to action.  It is also a manifestation of our collective desire to create lasting and meaningful relationships.

As founder and editor-in-chief, I have had hundreds of conversations with people who are interested and supportive of the effort to create an open-access, electronic, peer-reviewed journal dedicated to the conversations about how to most beneficially support and engage in community-based research, community-campus partnerships, service-learning, action research, and other inclusive methods and practices that build and empower our communities.

In hindsight, I occasionally wish I had listened better to those who suggested that this might be a more difficult endeavor than I was admitting to, especially with volunteer editors, volunteer reviewers, and without financial donations or grants to buy people’s time - including my own.  If anything, I am patient and resourceful (read stubborn): willing to wait until the time, the energy, perhaps the winds are blowing in the right direction.  The winds currently seem to be favorable for the type of conversations presented here.

We are at a turning point in world history – not the first or the last, but a turning point nonetheless.  The economic crisis sweeping our world is in part due to a lack of conversation: about the value of property, about greed and expectation, about how to share power and influence, and about how to live together as individuals in community within societies, interdependent with all others who are part of the complex organism we call Earth.

This first edition, Volume 1, Number 1 is dedicated to conversations about building and sustaining community partnerships, with a focus on health.  I decided that trying to bring together too many articles did not make for a better whole.  Instead, I have chosen to group the refereed articles and essays according to overlapping or complementary themes and produce several numbers within this freshman volume.  The next number (Volume 1, Number 2: building and sustaining community partnerships, with a focus on tools and methods) should be released in January 2009.

It is my privilege to introduce you to an extraordinary set of contributions.  The first is from Laura Nimmon, a graduate student at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.  Her cover photo, entitled Attraversiamo: Crossing-Over struck me as both a powerful image and one of powerlessness, of potential energy both from the oil in the Gulf as well as from women around the world, who change the world when they are not restricted.  In Canada, it was only in 1917 that women began to have the right to vote and be considered persons – the battle for equality continues.  Laura also contributed a poem entitled Currency and there is a narrative associated with this poem.  We have also included Laura’s essay on participation in women’s health literacy.

From Massachusetts, USA, Karen Hacker and colleagues bring us the efforts of the Institute for Community Health – a model for others looking to implement and use participatory methods for public health.  Their story is an interesting one of ongoing conversations and the challenges of growing in a manner that respects and serves those who make up the community.

The conversation from Arizona, USA, brought to us by Martha Monroy and colleagues, illustrates that creative solutions can be developed and implemented by a diverse coalition.  The challenges and methods employed in these two neighborhoods are of value to many of us trying to bring people together into meaningful relationships and actions that not only have immediate impact but also may provide long-term impact for our communities and the people who live in them.

From Alberta, Canada, Lori Baugh Littlejohns and Neale Smith help us understand what success is in a healthy community initiative with their insights into community capacity.  They bring the words of real people to the abstract concepts of participation, critical learning, shared vision, sense of community, leadership, knowledge, skill and resources, and communication.  I found these voices continuing to resonate as I work through a healthy community project we are developing in my own community of Orleans, Ontario, Canada.

From the resilient and renewing community of New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, comes the voice of Jonathan West and his colleagues at Center for Hazards Assessment Response and Technology with a Declaration of Principles for Participatory Action Research.  Their conversation about power, reflexivity and decolonialisation through a discussion of community entrée and the challenges of internal review board process is valuable to all of us attempting to come to a fuller understanding of power and how it may best be shared.

Finally, from Western Australia, comes an introduction to an emerging conversation led by Juli Coffin.  A Nyangumarta (Aboriginal) woman from the Pilbara, Juli works at the Combined Universities Centre For Rural Health in Geraldton.  She starts by stating that this is a story that needs to be told - I cannot agree more.  She reminds us that in 1967, Aboriginal people in Australia were still classified as part of the flora and fauna act.  She also reminds us Aboriginal community strengths include extended family, commitment to community, neighborhood networks, community organizations, and community events.  While the project is specifically focused on bullying, there are lessons for all of us working to build on strengths in community.

Building of the strengths of community is what flows through each of these contributions.  This journal is part of that flow.  Hopefully it does not stop with publication.  Hopefully these words, thoughts, and deeds do not find themselves only on a lonely, dusty bookshelf.  Hopefully, “you the reader” will continue to be “you the actor” and “you the facilitator”.

Manifestation is an electronic, open-access journal.  Each article is posted together as a part of a collection and as a stand-alone piece that may be shared, emailed, copied, and disseminated to wherever the ideas can grow.  Each article will also be posted as a blog entry where the flow of ideas can continue – where we can all add to the ideas and keep the conversation going.  Finally, so that the bookshelf does not forget these ideas, each number of Manifestation will be available for purchase from a print on demand service (www.lulu.com).

This first number of the first volume of Manifestation is an effort of love.  This is a concept that does not always arise in “scientific” discussions but it is clearly there in the passion, the concern, the effort to do the very best that we can for our families, our communities, and our societies.  The trend towards evidence-based decision-making and practice is rooted in love – they are acts of deep desire to do our best for each other.  I am reminded, as I prepare to send this document off into the world, of the words of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin: “We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.” 

I wish to thank all of you for sharing your life’s energy in the manner that you do.  Thank you for sharing your projects, your words, your ideas, and your dreams.  By capturing them here, perhaps we come a little closer to realizing our fullness – perhaps.