About Michèle

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Luxury, then, is a way of
being ignorant, comfortably
An approach to the open market
of least information. Where theories
can thrive, under heavy tarpaulins
without being cracked by ideas.

This first part of Amiri Baraka’s Political Poem reminds me that I live entangled in systems that keep me disconnected and unaware of how to truly contribute to human flourishing. I believe traveling can help open my eyes and move me to action. As I travel, I want to explore how this change takes place. This blog documents this educational experiment that has already long begun and continued in India, Bangladesh, Burma, Lao, Thailand, as well as Malaysia, and Indonesia.

From 2007 to 2009, I worked as program associate in the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Global Initiatives at the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U). Primarily, my efforts centered on AAC&U’s initiative, Core Commitments: Educating Students for Personal and Social Responsibility, which focuses on the importance of students exploring questions about their ethical responsibility to self and others in our interdependent world.

Since 2007, along with my travel partners Sabrina and Ryan, I also developed What moves you? South and Southeast Asia, a curriculum for a traveling learning community that explores life’s big questions and pressing global issues. The challenges of long-term travel in unfamiliar places make the implications of studied theories more readily apparent and facilitate the integration of thought and action. The purpose of such a traveling learning community is to figure out what kind of knowledge and skills we need in order to contribute to human flourishing in increasingly interdependent world.

I grew up in Munich, Germany. I received a B.A. in philosophy and economics from Messiah College and a M.A. in philosophy from the Institute for Christian Studies in Toronto, Canada. My master’s thesis explored themes of subjectivity and violence in feminist ethics, deconstruction, and psychoanalysis. In 2006, an interest in non-violent resistance led me to travel in India for four months, passing from the Hindu temples of Kerala to the Stok Kangri summit (20,161 ft.) in the Buddhist region of Ladakh in the Himalayas, and made me a firm believer in the importance of travel.

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