Many college people are often faced with subjects that they never knew they had to take. It’s just that for some schools, these subjects are taken for granted that you will take them as soon as you decide to give that school your high school records and plunk down you parents’ hard-earned money. When people start taking subjects like History and Philosophy, many react negatively.

One college student once asked her American History teacher what significance a subject on Ancient Western Civilization was to her course in Communication. (You really have to give it to her. Very few people have the guts to ask a teacher something like that.) The wise old teacher remarked, “What they actually teach you in communication now may very well be obsolete by the time you start working or shortly after that. History gives you substance.”

There is so much truth to this. Many of the things taught to us in college related to our course have been superseded by newer developments. Take photography for instance. Even quite recently, one chairperson of a school in Manila where I was teaching was insisting that I teach darkroom stuff. I countered that it wasn’t a good thing to do that especially in a basic photography class that only ran a term. I also argued that after my class, the chances of people still even thinking about darkroom stuff, much less actually doing it, was very close to nil.

Since they still will be shooting, however, I argued that it would be best if their time in class were used to hone their shooting skills more. The chair, of course, won that argument (he’s the boss, after all and I normally don’t like talking to someone who’s as receptive to dissenting opinions as a dead rock) and I eventually just asked someone to report on darkroom stuff. Take note: He won the argument but I was proven right. Two students from my class became photographers and still have never touched a darkroom but the other class which concentrated on darkroom stuff have not looked back after their darkroom experience and many have resorted to shooting with a point and shoot.
One person from the darkroom-oriented class explained it this way: My students can become photographers; they can become darkroom technicians. This was towards the end of the term when my students were telling her she wasn’t holding her camera right.

Digital technology has all but supplanted the superiority of film so much so that Kodak has cut down dramatically on its film production worldwide and many of us who were taught the fineries of shooting in film have had to learn so many more new things – exposing for highlights, doing curves in Photoshop, merging layers, HDR, etc.

Meanwhile, there’s still this thing about substance.
While it may be argued that a photographer worth his/her salt will always be able to see a good photograph, someone who’s aware of a place’s unique realities will have an edge by being able to go more deeply into the heart of the matter rather than be tied down by more mundane concerns. It may also save your life once or twice since there are “rules” in some areas that may be alien to you that, if violated, may just get you killed.

On a more positive note, it also gives you the ability to be more than just awed. Perhaps this may be a misuse of the term (and I hope philosophers forgive me) but this is, for me, mysterium tremendum while at the same time mysterium fascinosum. You feel this almost immediately when you enter a holy place and while it awes you (tremendum) and possibly even scares you, it nonetheless draws you (fascinosum) and invites you to come closer. What is incredible about the holy and the other though is that even in its immensity, there seems to be an unending invitation and that invitation is coupled with respect. (How’s that for a tourism mindset?)

Some people brush other cultures aside saying that that’s just how “these people” do things. But that’s really the point, isn’t it? That’s how other people really do things and it’s for you to approach it with as much reverence as you would expect them to approach.

Also, no matter how smart you think you may be, there is still so much to learn out there. For a Filipino, it’s both very exciting and humbling to go to neighboring countries and see what they’ve done with their country and culture. It is easy to see how many neighboring countries have preserved their cultures and continue to celebrate them while ours seems all too often to be willing victims of things like golf courses and subdivisions.

If there is even the slightest danger that something around your cultural neighborhood may just disappear, bring out the camera and record, celebrate and share just what you have. Many people may not realize it but it is in the little things where Filipino-ness survives and with our cameras we can be held in awe, approach in wonder and share this with people around the world.