Book Review… Promoting ethics as key to social growth

Jul 10, 2016 Book Review…, Features / Columnists

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Book: Marking Milestones: 21-Keynote Speeches about Successful Institutions and Outstanding Leaders 

Author: Errol Miller

Reviewer: Dr Glenville Ashby

Professor Errol Miller’s decision to present his seminal lectures on a literary format is a coup for a global audience that can now keep his counsel to its bosom, reading and reflecting at will.

Miller’s scholastic credentials are renowned. His post-doctoral fellowship in science education is testament to his insight and accomplishments in natural sciences. His service in pedagogy and public service is nothing short of exemplary. That he was asked to deliver keynote addresses at established social institutions is fitting.

Marking Milestones is really a discourse on bioethics and its quintessential place in society. Miller explores the persistent malaise infecting social institutions and offers a holistic panacea centered on bioethical principles. He embraces the philosophy that we are our brother’s keeper, that institutional responsibilities do not exist in vacuum, nor are they tangential.

Indeed, we are connected existentially, part of a social gestalt, of sorts. Throughout his presentation, ethics, theology, education, and social progress are locked in step.

Miller uses comparative history, detailing the similar social forces at play today as they were decades, if not centuries ago.

History is vibrant and an instrument toward self-discovery. He examines the social forces that birthed these many institutions he addressed, and the existing climate that make for their relevance and stature.

For example, in his 1979 speech commemorating the opening of the Calvary Baptist Education Centre, he compares the factors that engineered Moravian prominence to contemporary conditions marked by crime, partisan politics, social injustice and a compromised economy.

Miller’s clinical definition of education is worth studying and implementing. At the 2012 centenary anniversary of Calabar High School, his words ring with passion. Of the educational system, he says, “Schools are shaped not only by relations between students and teachers, but through relations among students, among teachers and these with their predecessors and successors.” He adds, “Schools are the precursors of society of the future. Look into schools and you get a glimpse of what is to come in society and well as from when society has come.”

At the 50th anniversary of Jamaica Teachers’ Association, Miller echoes like sentiments when he emphasized that “teachers, education, civilization and the future of a people are so intertwined that they are virtually impossible to separate.”

In his address at the 100th anniversary at St Hugh’s High School, Miller credits Bishop Enos Nuttall and Sister Madeline Thomas for their pioneering work with the Anglican Deaconess Order in the mid 19th century that transformed the education and health sectors. He injects his special affinity for its teaching branch at the time, recounting the stories his grandmother shared as an alumnus.

“Public health was [also] a major challenge at the time,” he notes as “life expectancy in Jamaica in the last decade of the 19th century was about 39 years and infant mortality was in the region 200 deaths per 1000 live births.”

His thesis that the church and economics fit hand-in-glove at the launching of the United Theological College of the West Indies (UTCWI) stands out if only because it goes against the grain of today’s belief that the church’s role is basically pastoral.. Here, Miller examines history, revealing a little known fact: “The issue of economic exchange, bartering with another lineage of another bloodline was no small matter. Such exchanges needed to be transacted in the temple so that they could be sanctioned by the God, witnessed by priests and sealed by sacred vows. Economic exchanges needed to be increasingly ethical and sacred.”

That Jesus drove gamblers from the temple only cements Miller’s stance for transparency and accountability and his support for “profits in training prophets.” He adds, “It is against this background that UTCWI now launches a foundation to generate profits to support its mission to prepare prophets and priests for the Caribbean region.”

In that vein, the Victoria Mutual Building Society was established to meet the financial needs of the working and middle class sector.

Miller states, “First, the idea of building societies originated in the church by a missionary of the Congregational Church…In other words, the early building societies had strong connections with the church and gave every appearance that they were firmly grounded on an ethical base.”

Miller’s inimitable undertaking beckons us toward change on a personal level. Social transformation will inevitably follow.

Detailing the accomplishments of each organization and accompanying pioneers is beyond the scope of any review. We can only share Miller’s enthusiasm and overriding theme of responsibility, selflessness and ethics in every presentation.

And there is one more triumph worth mentioning: Miller’s mastery as a public speaker.

With befitting titles, he sets the tone for each presentation, deftly employing colour and tone to effectively convey his timeless message of social equanimity and justice.

“The speaker,” he says at the outset, has to engage with the audience in a sensitive manner which includes inputs, verbal and non-verbal, from the audience. If public speaking is a performance, it is more a dance with a partner than soliloquy.”

Speeches he advances “have to come to a conclusion that leaves audiences satisfied.”

No doubt, instructive words for students of this specialized and challenging art.

 

Rating: Recommended

Feedback: [email protected] or follow me at Twitter@glenvilleashby

Dr Glenville Ashby is the author of Anam Cara: Your Soul Friend and Bridge to Enlightenment and Creativity.

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