24/11/2020
DEAN OF SCHOOL OF ARTS & SCIENCES OPENS TODAY’S WEBINAR
Dean Lio Munalim opened today's webinar titled, "Family Dynamics and Relationships During Pandemic."
FULL TEXT reads:
"To our University President, Mr. Marco Alfredo Moya Benitez; to our Chancellor and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs, Dr. Felina Young; PWU officials, deans, program heads, students, online viewers, ladies and gentlemen, good morning.
I hold an impression that the participants in today’s webinar are now asking this question, “What is more about family that I need to know?”
Family of course is an already known idea, and many must be looking forward to knowing more about Family in today’s webinar.
But I would say, FAMILY is a timeless topic.
There are too many words in the English Language. But to me FAMILY remains the most beautiful word with regard to our social life. In fact, it seems to us that the word family looks “imperialistic,” “pluralistic,” and “ubiquitous.”
For example, you treat your friends as family; your colleagues and co-workers as family; your company as your family. We also find solace, belongingness, companionship and acceptance in a family of friends, boardmates, organization members, fraternity, among others. But so often, we tend to take for granted the true family that we have, believing that they are just there.
Our recent human civilizations have made us more of a “less-family oriented.” We have become individualistic in our attempts to gratify ourselves using social media. We take photos first before eating instead of praying. We remain busy with our gadgets when dining, and fail to engage in an open communication with our family members. Some millennials have become prone to anxiety and depression.
Then COVID-19 pandemic came like a thief in the night, has made us prisoners of our own homes and abodes. Depression has multiplied.
The COVID-19 pandemic may be characterized as a disruptive moment in history. For the past 8 months, we have witnessed how the world has been paralyzed by the pandemic.
And I would like to ask these questions:
(1) Has the pandemic changed the way we treat the word “Family.?”
(2) Has the pandemic allowed us to reconnect with our family members?
(3) During the pandemic, have there been creative and healthy tensions? Or just painful tensions between and among the family members?
Andersen (2016) in the book titled, “Families in the 21st century,” asked these essential questions: “Is the family eroding? Is the family an increasingly endangered species? Or is it reviving?"
I personally hope that our FAMILIES are now reviving and rebounding for the past 8 months of lockdown.
The single most revealing fact is that one cannot effectively study the family as a socializing agency without an understanding of the processes of love, compassion and understanding during the crisis. Indeed, re-emphasis on the indispensable role of the family has become much more urgent during these extraordinary times.
That is why, the Office of Family Life and Children of PWU, feels that this webinar constitutes a particularly strategic move to revisiting the concepts of family during a social crisis.
This session titled “Family Dynamics and Relationships During Pandemic” will help us better understand the dynamics in our own families during these difficult times and to learn and re-learn to be much more patient, tolerant, forgiving, and resilient.
We would like to thank Dr. Lina B Laigo, the Director of the Institute of Family Life and Children for organizing this webinar under the PWU Wellness Kumustahan Series.
After the webinar, we hope that you will be able to tie the strands of insights of family, health crisis, depression, anxiety, mental health, and family reunion together and to remind ourselves all over again that FAMILY IS FOREVER! Just as PWU Family is FOREVER.
Thank you so much."
