The Decency Project

The Decency Project is an ongoing partic­i­pa­tory work forming connec­tion through shared labor. Seeking a bond between people of unlike lived expe­ri­ence, I invite strangers to join me in carving a spoon while having a ​“diffi­cult” conver­sa­tion. We are guided by a peda­gogy of aware­ness embrac­ing concep­tual and crit­i­cal think­ing. We find crit­i­cal discourse using abstracted ideals about our ability to coexist, despite our differ­ences. We ques­tion what it means to be human: What must I do? What can I do? What must I not do? 

Bonding through our shared labor and distracted by the dexter­ity of hand and mate­r­ial, partic­i­pants are empow­ered to explore break­downs of soci­etal struc­ture and nurture rela­tion­ships in good faith, in this historic moment of conflict and disconnection.

Together, we ques­tion our foun­da­tional beliefs and our percep­tions of progress, even consider the basis for ever forming coop­er­a­tive commu­ni­ties at all. Build­ing new tools for inter­ac­tion, we discover the neces­sity to under­stand why we form civi­liza­tions before can deter­mine how we might be civil.