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Mountains Beyond Mountains: Critical Thinking

A look at the SPC 2013/14 choice for the One Book, One College program.

Questions

In Mountains Beyond Mountains, Paul farmer uses the phrase "preferential option for the poor".   How does this relate to liberation theology? cultural beliefs in Haiti?

Mountains Beyond Mountains opens with an encounter between Paul Farmer and a United States Special Forces Captain. What is the United States role in "nation building". Explore the United States Foreigh Policy  as it relates to Haiti....

Center

  • In Mountains Beyond Mountains, Paul farmer uses the phrase "preferential option for the poor."   How does this relate to liberation theology? the cultural beliefs in Haiti?
  • Mountains Beyond Mountains opens with an encounter between Paul Farmer and a United States Special Forces Captain in which both Paul Farmer and the Captain express frustration with limits on the military intervention in the area.  How would you describe the effectiveness of the  United States' foreign policy and intervention in Haiti?
  • In Mountains Beyond Mountains, Jim Kim and Paul Farmer refer to People magazine as the Journal of Popular Studies (JPS). While most people read People magazine as a source of entertainment, Dr. Farmer considers the publication as an anthropological artifact.

a.      What is the significance of cultural media?
b.      What do cultural magazines such as People tell us about society?
c.       How might an anthropologist or historian five hundred years from now interpret People magazine?

  • In Chapter 19 of Mountains Beyond Mountains, Jim spearheads an effort to lower the cost of capreomycin, the drug most commonly used to treat MDR-TB. How do economic and political factors affect the production, cost, and distribution of prescription drugs?

  • Why do you think the author, Tracy Kidder, decided to make himself a character in Mountains Beyond Mountains?

  • Take stock of your assets (personal and financial).  Paul Farmer took time in college to identify and  determine how to he would use his assets. What steps might you take to determine how to use your assets? What resources does SPC have to help you do that?

  • "The only real nation is humanity" according to Paul Farmer.  Do you agree? Why or why not?