What Is a Good Person? [] Lifelong Learning Program

Research shows that the vast majority of people consider themselves to be “good,” while rating a much higher percentage of the rest of humanity as “bad.”  Most of us perceive the world and ourselves through our own lens of place and time, different for each of us.  When, where and in what circumstances we live dictate our perception of goodness and what constitutes a “good person.”  Through an interdisciplinary look from history, philosophy, religion and sociology at the concept of goodness in three cultures — Western Europe/North America, China, and Latin America — we can better understand the basic fluidity of the notion of a good person.  So many factors can influence our concepts of good and evil and what makes a person one or the other – or perhaps neither.  Or both.

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Tammy Belden completed her undergraduate work in English literature and her graduate work in cultural anthropology.  She has lived in Washington D.C. for the past forty-five years, working at the Library of Congress for almost thirty years.  Since retiring from the Library, she has pursued various consultancies and has served as a tour guide in Washington for eleven years.  Meeting and conversing with individuals from all walks of life and from throughout the country and abroad have helped to break the bubble of judging life and people through the narrow lens of a large United States city.