Blog beginning
hi! I'm excited to venture more into this class... I think there was a commentlast class about how people often didn't want to educate themselves about these global power issues because they were affraid they would have to change their lifestyles and do something... I was left thinking "Yeah, I feel like I'm affraid to learn too much too!" Anyhow, my main feeling is that there seems like so many issues that it's possible that they seem unrelated, and I feel like a lot of activists put their energy into different areas-- say, someone who is working for issues that they haven't connected in three different continents.What I really want to understand for myself, the approach I want to take, is understanding how our consumerism in America effects different parts of the world that might be left as "producers" for our goods or be left in deprivation when we are living in abundance. This is a lot more relative for me because then I know how I can change my own life and educate others... it's more down to Earth for me than being an activist whose concerns all live on the other side of the world... I think there is a lot of potential for change in "enlightenned consumption"... it's definitely what I want to do research on :)
More later when I've read this weeks selections, I just wanted to put something up on the blog...
posted by Unknown @ 8:02 PM
8 Comments:
A great beginning. Perhaps you research project can be about consumerism. That is something that I, too, long to know more about. We are so materialistic, so driven by money and greed in this country compared to others, and it's hard not to be "taken up" by the whole thing. I look forward to watching your conversations.
Have you gotten to see Inconvenient Turth yet? I was in Canada for most of the time that was in the theaters, so I missed it...
I totally understand feeling overwhelmed.... more in a few minutes....
The reading was a bit short (“Heck, I could have done that before working on my papers!”) but I thought it was pretty interesting… I’ve read a few books that are chronologies of case study after case study of people in one bad condition or another and they were all really effective, but I thought it was something else that Dr. Farmer was saying that he wasn’t trying to do that, that he was focused, I suppose, more on analyzing the “structural violence” that causes the suffering. I jotted down this quote as I was reading:
“Writing of the plight of the repressed is not a particularly effective way of assisting them.”
And I guess all in all this chapter didn’t leave me with much other than a desire to read the rest of the book…
Haven't seen Inconvenient Truth or Maria Full of Grace yet myself.... I have a DVD of Maria though... man... my relaxation time is backlogged...
Trans Siberian / Moving Mind:
Ha... when I read the article, I highlighted the same quote about the camera framing you as an outsider controlling the message... :)
I really like how you drew a parallel to this class. Maybe that extends to the whole university experience... about a year ago, when I attended my sisters' Masters degree graduation from Oregon State (it was the first college graduation I attended), as I sat in the stands, I had the feeling like the community of academia was this completely awesome force in society. All the profs and masters and doctors walking with their unique tassels and cloaks and bands around their arms and stripes and all of that-- they seemed like Jedi Knights or something-- the amazing pillars of "the force" that keep knowledge and progress structured into our society. Hrm... a tangent? maybe not.
I liked this quote, too:
"There is no sense of achievement. Except what you went through. [...] you are in a moving direction and if you can stay with it you will learn so much. [...] You’re there, and your references shift. "
Good words to live by, I suppose!
Anyway, the whole article spoke to my interest in consumerism (capitalistic society and the sort of "standardizing objects for exchange"... hrm... I should be doing more research for that presentation...
Katha, pt 1:
I have to pause for this, in the authors grasping for wax poetic, this paragraph is Orientalist and distorted:
"Amidst the haze and smoke, I felt transported to another world. Signs in Hindi perplexed me. Lines leading to the immigration booths zigzagged throughout the wide room. We faced a barrage of forms and paperwork. As I waited in line after line, I soaked in the immediate differences. Saris outnumbered Levis. Turbans far outnumbered baseball caps. The smell of smoke and incense filled the air. And fluorescent lights dutifully flickered above my head, threatening to go out at any moment. "
I've been through immigration in Mumbai three times... there is exactly one form you have to fill out, it's about the size of an 8 1/2 by 11.... and the scent, by all accounts, is usually the pan-India scent of a mix of 50% air pollution from vehicles and 50% the smell of urine, burning trash, and burning cow dung combined.... maybe some spices. I spent about 4 hours in the arrival area of New Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport in April, waiting for my sister to arrive, I can attest that it is not much different from the Mumbai airport other than maybe being a bit cleaner... more when I finish the article...
Suzanne?!?! You out there? This lady is had not done her homework:
"everyone stops to enjoy a bit of beetle wrapped in leaves or to sip a cup of chai. "
People are eating betel-nut, AKA acacia nut, AKA (Hindi) "pan" it's an herb that acts as a mild stimulant. I'll try to bring some to class on thursday. Indians do not eat beetle, I'm so certain they would consider that statement: A) Really funny that the author made the mistake and/or B) pretty offensive...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betel-Nut
:/ <-- That's probably the second most used smiley in my personal lexicon... it's the "something ain't sitting right" smiley...
After reading the Katha article, I think the organization is a pretty cool thing, and I wish I had gotten a better sense of the staff and the different ways they engage children (and/or the greater community?) and I think the artist, Amanda Lichtenstein, is no doubt a profound and innovative teacher and inspiration for children and probably a good poet... but man, I kind of wish that the article wasn't half on Indian history and Indian culture because so much of it seemed *wrong* :) (<-- most used smiley)
For example, small facts, such as, Indian Partition was 1947, not 1936, and that the biggest influx of people during partition was Sikhs, not Hindus.
Mostly, I feel like she really didn't highlight the cultural context that I would imagine the Katha organization operated out of: South Asia's uncommonly strong history of stories... the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Ramayana are all known to be texts that underpin many / most social customs and cosmologies in Hinduism, and they were all transmitted verbally. Another quintessential set of texts in Hinduism is the Puranas, which is actually a group of texts that compile stories of Ancient sages and local deities.
Similarly, Buddhism was transmitted orally for at least three to four hundred years before bhikshus commited the Buddha's teachings to scripture and created the Pali canon. I don't know much about the Jain faith, but it is usually said to be in other ways comparable to Buddhism, so I imagine that this holds true for this religion of the contemporary prophet to the Buddha.
Oral tradition is notably strong in Muslim traditions as well. One need only look as far as 1,001 Arabian Nights for a certain example, and yet, Sufism, the mystical branch of Islam, and the form of Islam that is strongest in India, is even more story-based than other branches of the faith.
I can not think of any specific examples for Sikhism's oral traditions, but it is based in (and generally greatly respects) the Hindu and Muslim faiths, and I know that their scripture, the Guru Granth Sahib, is considered the living embodiment of divinity and that reading it aloud is a central practice to the faith (not unlike recitations of the Qu'ran or the Vedas.)
So, I kind of feel like that cultural relativity was left out, when it's "story time" in India, adults melt into innocent, loving children, and you can see love and curiosity bloom in the sternest of hearts... you'll never see an Indian so happy as when they get to tell you a story. (And good luck trying to interrupt!)
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