The Nilgiris Field Learning Course for 2022 has a total of 2 indigenous students, 1 student from Cornell university, and one translator/ intern. The first half of Day 1 was about getting to know one another and understanding the origins and goals of the NFLC program.
The crossing boundaries exercise (CBE) following lunch began with what seemed like a simple exercise: drawing and labelling the human body from head to toe. This activity, however, was packed with information and discussion about vocabulary as each part was labelled in Tamizh, English, Irula, and Kurumba. Listing these words parallelly helped illustrate the variations between Tamizh, Irula, and Kurumba.
This exercise served as the background for the second part of the lesson, which delved into how the body has been (and still is in some contexts) used to measure different objects before other measuring tools were developed. Examples include using the length of the arms for weaving, buying jasmine for the hair or garlands, and checking the length of a saree.
This activity involved walking around the campus and measuring the buildings and the distances between them, as well as taking note of the trees and animals on the way. This activity sparked discussion about which plants and animals the students could recognize and their names in different languages. While the entire activity was a bonding experience, in the brief moments before presenting the map, feelings of giddiness were expressed as contagious laughter– a universal language.
By Shakuntala Ramnath
