The Peace Corps

  Thirster meetings have been described as “a salon that comes together for camaraderie, beer, and to discuss issues of common interest.” Dr. Robert Textor was a young cultural anthropologist who worked at Peace Corps in the very first year.  He created the “In, Up, and Out,” policy, helped to train Thailand I, and edited the classic “Cultural Frontiers of the Peace Corps.” When he moved to Portland, Oregon after his retirement from Stanford, he organized the Thirsters – A moveable Feast!  John Dougherty now co-coordinates this group and would be willing to help start a Thirsters in Washington, DC. Here is the description by John Dougherty: “Thirsters:  Originally organized by Robert B. Textor (Professor Emeritus of Anthropology, Stanford) as a worldwide network in about 1997, Thirsters is an informal group of Peace Corps graduates, academics, public servants, business leaders, and other questioning individuals who discuss issues of peace, freedom, . . .

Marian Haley Beil and I will be holding two workshops at the upcoming NPCA Conference in Washington, D.C. on the afternoon of September 21. As the registration for the Conference says:  a workshop led by John Coyne, co-founder of Peace Corps Writers (2:45-3:45 pm, repeated 4:00-5:00 pm) a panel discussion with published RPCV authors led by Marian Haley Beil, co-founder of Peace Corps Writers (2:45-3:45 pm, repeated 4:00-5:00 pm) Marian’s two panel discussions will feature RPCV authors who have published memoirs of their experiences as Peace Corps Volunteers. It will be an opportunity for you to listen to published authors talk about their books and how they went through the process of bringing their stories to print. My two sessions will be on the history of Peace Corps writers, how RPCV books fit into the long American tradition of expatriate writers and what RPCV writers are doing today in writing their . . .

Here is another link to the essay by Kathleen Kanne about De-Selection.  Please comment if the link does not work. This is the research that John just described. https://files.acrobat.com/a/preview/4cf4286b-0f17-4adf-ba0d-2eb361f2b254

In her last year as an undergraduate, Kathleen Kanne, began to write about the training experiences of 1960s and 1970s Peace Corps Volunteers, specifically focusing on the controversial phenomenon of “Deselection.” The result was a 25 page academic paper that won the 2014 Best Senior Thesis award in the American Studies undergraduate program at the University of Minnesota. This summer, Kathleen is a graduate student in the Augsburg Creative Nonfiction MFA program and working on expanding the original idea into an investigative memoir about early Peace Corps training. She is collecting stories that Trainees are willing to share about their experiences. She is also “relaunching” her efforts to obtain actual training documents. Recently she wrote, “Thank you so much for your help with the initial paper. My inbox is open again, so if you would let people know that I want to interview them about  deselection or training psychology, feel . . .

The Peace Corps at 55 As we celebrate at the NPCA Conference this September, the 55th anniversary of an  agency that appears to be ‘disappearing’ from the view of most Americans, if not Congress and the White House, we might ask why? How often do we hear, “Is there still a Peace Corps?” from the men and women on the street. It seems that for the public the Peace Corps failed away with the “Kennedy Generation.”   But what brought about the Peace Corps in the first place? I thought I might try and chart the impulses that brought about its creation. These ‘impulses’ we might say are close to being lost in the fog of history. There were, however, several generally accepted desires that coalesced in the last days of the Fifties, framed by a number of people in speeches and in prose, and with the election of John F. . . .

Dick Joyce (Philippines 1962-64) sent me a “heads up” on what RPCVs in his group are doing.  this political season. Dick writes: “At least three of the former Peace Corps Volunteers in our group are running for office in the coming election.  Paul Clements (The Gambia, 85-87; clements@wmich.edu), who has hosted our group and spoken to us about his Peace Corps experiences is running for U.S. Congress (the 6th district, which includes most of our members).  Pat Crowley (Western Samoa, 76-79;pat@pat-crowley.com), one of our most active members, is running for reelection as Kalamazoo County Drain Commissioner. And Mike Quinn (Nicaragua, 75-77; mikedquinn@sbcglobal.net), who has hosted our group at the Shamrock Montessori School, is running to represent District 10 (i.e. much of Portage) on the Kalamazoo County Commission.  I’m sure they would all appreciate our support.”  

One of the features of the Washington, D.C. Peace Corps House will be a Peace Corps Café. The idea behind the Peace Corps Café, independent but related to Peace Corps House, comes from the Press Café in Batumi, Georgia, that far corner of eastern Europe. Happily; it was the project of Craig Schwinck. Craig served in the coastal city of Batumi. Here is what Craig had to say about his Peace Corps assignment in Batumi, Georgia: “My assignment was to establish a place where the free press in Georgia was able to come, discuss, debate, develop and learn from each other. We who started the café had a goal to create a safe haven for that expression. It became a place not only for the press, but for everyone in the state of Adjara to share diverse ideas, experiences and good food. Would it work in Washington? “I believe so. . . .

Purpose If realized, Peace Corps House will be a settlement house, also known as a community or neighborhood center. Thus, the aim of Peace Corps House is to contribute to the improvement of the quality of life for residents of a Washington neighborhood where, as the District of Columbia’s Comprehensive Plan states, “poverty, unemployment, illiteracy, crime and other social issues must be addressed because for revitalization to truly succeed, all residents must be given opportunities to advance.” Peace Corps House could help. In this spirit, the aim of Peace Corps House is to bring about a new kind of community life. Because it is in the community or neighborhood that people seek and fight for solutions to their concrete, daily, local and immediate problems. And so Peace Corps House will provide essential social services with related assistance and space to individuals and groups in efforts to solve community problems or . . .

Gearan Announces Conclusion of Presidency Mark D. Gearan, the longest serving president in the history of Hobart and William Smith Colleges, has announced to the Board of Trustees that he will conclude his duties as president at the end of the 2016-17 academic year. At the time of his appointment in 1999, Gearan was one of the youngest college presidents in the nation and a ‘non-traditional’ choice given his background as Director of the Peace Corps and White House senior staff member. When he concludes his presidency in 2017, he will have served for 18 years, leading the Colleges through a period of unprecedented growth. Under Gearan’s leadership, Hobart and William Smith have expanded its academic reach and advanced its reputation as a prominent liberal arts institution. By strengthening the Colleges’ financial resources and increasing its fundraising range, Hobart and William Smith have transformed the physical campus, adding and expanding . . .

  For 20 years, Joe Lurie was executive director of International House at UC Berkeley, a cultural center for the campus and residence for over 1,500 U.S. and international students and scholars annually from over 80 countries. In honor of his service, the International House Board of Directors and UC Berkeley alumni established The Joe Lurie Returned Peace Corps Gateway Fellowship, an endowed doctoral fellowship. Each year one RPCV is awarded full UC Berkeley tuition, fees and a stipend to complete the first year of doctoral studies. With full room and board at International House, awardees continue their cross-cultural experiences while sharing Peace Corps discoveries with American and international residents. In July 2015, Lurie’s book, Perception and Deception: A Mind-Opening Journey Across Cultures  was published. Like the RPCV Fellowship, it was largely inspired by his years in the Peace Corps. In the book, he describes cultural misunderstanding in the Peace Corps and at International . . .

  Finally. Just finished assembling the definitive (as far as we know) list of books by RPCVs about the Peace Corps experience. CLICK “Books” at the top right of any page, then CLICK “Peace Corps Experience Books.”

 Chia Alphonse Tasah is a team-building and cultural-diversity consultant at All World Languages and Cultures, Inc., in Kansas City, Missouri, where he makes presentations at conferences, seminars, churches, and schools. Chia was born and received his early education in Cameroon. During his secondary school years there, he was supported by Peace Corps Volunteers. Later he earned his master of education (MEd) in human resource development at the University of Minnesota. He recently publish a memoir The Life of An African Peace Corps Child: The Life and Experiences of a Peace Corps Child of Kom, Cameroon that is obtainable at www.chiatasah.com or iuniverse.com, (but not Amazon). I asked Chia if he would write a short essay about how three PCVs impacted his education and helped him in his career. He was nice enough to send me this account. — JC •  The Impact of Peace Corps Volunteers in My Life by Chia Alphonse Tasah The Peace Corps program brought three . . .

Reference: New: Annotated Bibliography of Peace Corps Writers’ Books in the Library of Congress Filed by Gary Price on September 22, 2011 From the Bibliography Web Site: The Library of Congress celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Peace Corps with this annotated bibliography of selected books in the Library of Congress collections authored by returned Peace Corps volunteers and a few former staff members. It contains a listing of 284 books published between 1964 and 2011. Each entry links to a Library of Congress Online Catalog record, which contains more information about the book. Although far from comprehensive, this selected bibliography is representative of the creativity, scholarship, and knowledge of the developing world of more than 1,000 Peace Corps writers. About 70 percent of the cited books are nonfiction and 30 percent, fiction. Less than a quarter are memoirs of the Peace Corps experience. The 233 authors served in the Peace Corps in 83 . . .

Writer At Work As you know from the announcements from the NPCA and emails from me, the Peace Corps cohort is comprised of current or returned PCVs, employees of the NPCA, or other members of the NPCA that have been closely involved with the Peace Corps. All members of the cohort must also be members of the NPCA to receive the 15% tuition discount for the program. The cohort is a unique opportunity. As a student you would be in a small cohort with other Peace Corps volunteers (current or former) who all want to pursue an MFA degree and write about their experiences in the Peace Corps or things inspired by that experience. The cohort will share three classes all instructed by me. But the program isn’t just about the Peace Corps experience. National University has had a long-standing MFA program that has produced hundreds of graduates in poetry, fiction, . . .