Stacia that is so great you’re doing that doctorate! For what it’s worth: the vibe I encountered with y’all at Kheprw was totally unique among all the “progressive” spaces I visited in the US. Maybe your research can figure out what are the ingredients that make it work!

Here’s some of the distinctive elements that come to mind for me:

• culture shaping through an abundance of praise (little or no shaming)
• long conversations full of complex minutae of everyone’s daily life (priority on relationship not outcome)
• an apparently very comfortable role for elders (hold context, share status + encouragement)
• space for many different ways of knowing/being/expressing (everyone is qualified to participate so long as they are being real)
• structural analysis as a background reality rather than foreground focus
• priority on practical, physical, and emotional mutual aid: people giving and receiving meals, rides, space to work, and amateur therapy
• soft boundaries between play and work

Hard to know how much of that is my projection — what do you think?