As stated previously, we feel that each woman in our program deserves a sacred space so she can learn, create, imagine, and explore. However, does one really need space to become fully human? In a piece of freewriting Professor Rivera shared with me, she asks, “Are people who live in crowded environments throughout the world – i.e. the poor – less likely to realize their human potential? Are they less than human because they are poor?”
After reading this, I asked the question, “Who constructs the idea of space?”
I believe those with power in this country value individual space and one’s own material possessions. Power usually designates who can even have space. For example, men determine that women cannot enter a mosque. Money, another form of power, also affects the space that one occupies. The ideal of the “great American dream” in the United States is to work one’s way up from owning nothing to owning more material possessions, including property. For many women on welfare, the government determines how much she can or cannot have. Welfare will declare if she can have a house, food for her children, childcare. Does this mean that if one does not have her own personal space then she is not worthy or is not valued? In a recent conversation I had with Jenny Horsman, she affirmed that U.S. media creates an ideal of what life should look like. Those who cannot live up to this ideal, then they are viewed as not having value. In turn, they feel as if they have no worth or value. However, she also added, “If you have little when everyone has little, too, that doesn’t hold the same meaning (personal conversation).”
Later in her freewriting, Professor Rivera added, “What matters most are the supportive, loving, trusting relationships we develop with people in our lives.”
I agree with her because I believe human nature pulls us towards those places and other people who offer a sense of place, safety, and emotional support.