In my last entry I described the way we acquire a taste for something — a taste for coffee, or Shakespeare, or musical theater. 

Today I’d like to outline the argument that I will be developing over the next several posts.

1. We can learn anything that we have a taste for / that we are brought to like and be interested in.
2. We like and are interested in subjects (whether hair metal or mathematics) that offer us desirable identities.
3. Therefore, if we want individuals to learn new things, we have to offer them desirable identities related to those subjects; having done so they will take care of the learning.
4. That said, we can ease their passage into these new identities by making the process of learning those subjects as “natural” as possible.
5. Learning and schooling are currently very colonial processes — learners are treated like colonial subjects, with whom we more enlightened educators can beneficently share the fruits of our knowledge and wisdom. In the past, we could offer colonial identities — ask learners to break with their culture, their past, their current selves, and create a new self modeled on those of the colonizers. Thankfully, we have begun moving past this model (though perhaps have moved less far past it as we might think). If we want those with whom we work to acquire a taste for learning whatever we hope to teach them, we must ourselves acquire a taste for learning what they have to share. 

Over the next several posts I will expand on each of these points (and point 5 might require more than a single post, I fear…)

In addition, this final point will serve as a transition into my next topic — how we can help others acquire a taste for learning….