#francis leitmotif

[365days365movies]

31 (Films) to Life: End of Year Round-Up I

Well, here we are: the start of another year of movies!

Geez, 2022 was interesting. Changed up the format from doing daily films and monthly genres, and focused mostly on films in one genre: crime. Aimed for 31 films, and out of that goal hit...24. Which, honestly, not too shabby. Didn't get as many reviews out as intended, but that is honestly OK. Was a busy-as-hell year for me, so I'm pretty well satisfied.

So, what did I see last year, exactly? Well, this post is about to be a round-up, which includes the films I wrote about, and the ones I didn't get the chance to. And at the end, I'll get into my plans for 2023. So, before I hit the "Keep Reading" button, here's the full list of crime films I saw in 2022.

M (1931); directed by Fritz Lang

The Maltese Falcon (1941); directed by John Huston

The Third Man (1949); directed by Carol Reed

Rashomon (1950); directed by Akira Kurosawa

The Killing (1956); directed by Stanley Kubrick

Cool Hand Luke (1967); directed by Stuart Rosenberg

The Italian Job (1969); directed by Peter Collinson

The Godfather (1972); directed by Francis Ford Coppola

Chinatown (1974); directed by Roman Polanski)

Dog Day Afternoon (1975); directed by Sidney Lumet

Taxi Driver (1976); directed by Martin Scorcese

Scarface (1983); directed by Brian de Palma

Once Upon a Time in America (1984); directed by Martin Scorcese

Thelma and Louise (1991); directed by Ridley Scott

Reservoir Dogs (1992); directed by Quentin Tarantino

Casino (1995); directed by Martin Scorcese

Heat (1995); directed by Michael Mann

The Usual Suspects (1995); directed by Bryan Singer

L.A. Confidential (1997); directed by Curtis Hanson

American Psycho (2000); directed by Mary Harron

Catch Me if You Can (2002); directed by Stephen Spielberg

Monster (2003); directed by Patty Jenkins

The Departed (2006); directed by Martin Scorcese

Zodiac (2007); directed by David Fincher

And there you have it! Now, this upcoming short set of summaries (behind the Keep Reading wall) may be a little too long for one post, so we'll split it up a little bit. But in any case, let's get this started!

M (1931), dir. Fritz Lang - 92%

This one, you can check out my full recap and essay about if you're curious, but here's the summary: I loved this movie. Lorre's brilliant as the titular killer, the simple story is well-constructed and effective, the ending is beautiful, and the film as a whole is so impactful. Direction and shot composition is top-notch, the sound and music usage is genuinely revolutionary (having essentially invented the leitmotif), and while it's not the most iconic-looking film, it's still brilliant. PLEASE check this movie out if you haven't already.

The Maltese Falcon (1941), dir. John Huston - 92%

Holy shit, I forgot I tried writing that whole review in noir-speak. Anyway, here's another classic film that I really like! Haven't seen many noir films, especially prior to this year, but this was a great one to start with. Definitely the prototypical noir detective movie, complete with Bogart's private eye, Astor's dangerous love interest, and the twists and turns that come with the genre. Beautifully shot, excellent plot and writing, wonderful music, and great acting. No complaints; check this one out.

The Third Man (1949); dir. Carol Reed - 96%

Holy shit, this movie! Absolutely my favorite Orson Welles performance, and that very much includes Citizen Kane. He's extremely good in this movie, which is a sort of non-traditional noir in a number of ways. The cast is perfect, from Cotten to Valli to Howard to Welles (especially the last one). Plot is perfect, and contains more twists than I know what to do with. Directing is great, if a little overly-tilted at times. Production and art design is beautiful. Music is...a lot of zither music. It's...it's a LOT of zither music. As I'm typing this, the score is BACK IN MY HEAD, and I haven't seen this film in 10 months. Let that shit sink in. And yeah, watch this movie, ASAP, please. You won't regret it, I promise you that.

Rashomon (1950); dir. Akira Kurosawa - 100%

It's a perfect movie. A trope-maker, and revolutionary film in its own right, this movie...dear shit, this fuckin' movie. No words. Nothing needed. Just trust me when I say watch this film immediately. It's stellar. Man, I hit a lot of bangers early on this year.

The Killing (1956); dir. Stanley Kubrick - 90%

First of all, before anything else...fuck Sherry. And secondly, this movie is a great one, too. Still have more Kubrick movies to watch, but this one was absolutely worth it. Nail-biting and anxiety-inducing, yes, but also with one of the strongest plots I've seen thus far this year. A fantastic heist movie, it's only real weak points are a kinda normal production and art design, and sorta forgettable music. Other than that, it's an amazing film that people don't talk about. And, honestly, they really should. Check this one out if you're into heist movies and classic films!

Cool Hand Luke (1967); dir. Stuart Rosenberg - 90%

First one of these I didn't post a review on! And honestly...yeah, I'm OK with that. This Paul Newman vehicle is complicated to describe. On one hand, it's an interesting character study full of interesting characters. Newman's Luke is a great example of a rebellious character forced to face consequences for his actions, only to revert to his original nature, Frog and the Scorpion style. It's technically a trope-originator in that way, or at least a major trope-definer. And with a number of interesting supporting characters, especially George Kennedy's Dragline and Struther Martin's Captain, this is a surprisingly memorable movie...in some ways.

But it also...isn't that memorable? Don't get me wrong, there are a number of moments that come to mind in my head, as well as some shots and compositions that are great (the sunglasses of the Captain come to mind immediately), but it's also not exactly Lawrence of Arabia. Rosenberg and Hall are fantastic as director and cinematographer, for sure, but not always the most memorable and iconic. Also...there's the car wash scene. Like, I get the point of that scene, but it definitely cuts through the tone in a way that puts a weird taste in my mouth. Is it an effective scene for what it's trying to do? Um...yeah. Very, very much so. Possibly TOO much, in fact. And I realize that this is a huge nitpick that shouldn't make me give points off for editing, but it speaks to a weirdly inconsistent tone in some places. That scene isn't the only example of that, is all I'm saying. Still, excellent film, check it out if you're into prison movies.

The Italian Job (1969); dir. Peter Collinson - 92%

Holy shit, this movie is fun! I genuinely love this film so much, even if it has its flaws here and there. Other than being a movie that was absolutely made at the cusp of the 1970s, it's one of the most British heist films I've ever seen. And that's not a bad thing in the slightest, believe me. But, it may be an acquired taste for some. But that said, here are the main things to know. This is a British heist film that stars Michael Caine and features a lot of car tricks, as well as one of the most iconic film endings of all time. And that about covers it. Michael Caine is the most Michael Caine you'll ever see him, and if you ever wondered why he was cast as Austin Powers' father in Goldmember, this movie will make you understand why. Supporting cast is also very good, but everyone takes a passenger seat to the car stunts, which are some of the best care stunts I've ever seen on film. If you want Ocean's Eleven with cars, this is the movie for you. Love this one.

The Godfather (1972); dir. F. F. Coppola - 100%

Cliché? Absolutely. The obvious choice to praise universally? For sure. The most mainstream, boring, dull, basic bitch film I could possibly like? Yeah. Yeah. BUT I DON'T GIVE A SHIT, BECAUSE IT'S FLAWLESS. Even if I didn't think this movie was essentially perfect, there isn't really anything I can say was wrong with this movie, in my inexperienced opinion. Cast and acting? Perfect. Plot and writing? Twisted and perfect. Direction? Iconic and perfect. Production design? Immersive and perfect. Music and editing? I CAN HEAR THE THEME SONG RIGHT FUCKING NOW, THIS MOVIE IS PERFECT. And you gotta understand, I put off watching this movie for YEARS because I thought it was gonna be boring. And then, I watched it. And post watching it? It's amazing. Watch. This. Movie. NOW.

Chinatown (1974); dir. Roman Polanski - 96%

...I saw a lot of good movies this year, OK? Look, this is also an excellent film, despite its reprehensible director. Just divorce the art from the artist and all that, and go into this movie completely blind if you haven't seen it. Taking it from me, it's essentially perfect. Only issues I had were that the Production Design wasn't particularly distinctive, and the music was mostly forgettable after the fact. And those were nitpicks. Watch this movie!

Dog Day Afternoon (1975); dir. Sidney Lumet - 90%

Did...did I watch a bad movie this year? I mean...yeah, I did. Black Adam sucked. And, like...Violent Night was...well, no, I liked Violent Night. Ooh, I was forced to watch Minions 2: The Rise of Gru, which was mediocre at best! I...OK, OK, look, you've heard this before at this point, but...watch this movie, OK? Another heist film, based on a true story this time, as well as being a benchmark in LGBTQ film representation, this film is a great one. Maybe I didn't like an acting performance, maybe the plot wasn't perfectly accurate to real life, maybe the cinematography wasn't always iconic, and maybe it could've used literally any music...but it's a great movie. Watch it.

Taxi Driver (1976); dir. Martin Scorcese - 90%

The "good movie" train keeps chugging forward with this one, because yeah...Taxi Driver is also fantastic. Truly one of the best character dissections I've ever seen, as well as a fascinating look at one of the most dangerous and crime-ridden environments in American history, Scorcese makes a really morally complicated film with...well, frankly, troubling consequences and implications. I didn't put out a review on this one (sorry, got stuck in the wasteland that is my Drafts page), but this film was partially responsible for Reagan getting shot, fun fact. And that may be because the shooter partially identified with Travis Bickle, who is a troubled and fascinating character. And for the record, the rest of this is fantastic as well, but De Niro's Bickle and Scorcese's NYC are the most prominent and most important parts of this movie. Love this one, too. Watch this film if you like character dissections!

Scarface (1983); dir. Brian de Palma - 90%

OK, so...is this the most stereotypical college-age dumb jock poster-in-the-dorm-room movie in the fucking world? Yeah. Yeah, it really is. But is it a great movie despite that? I mean...holy shit, yeah, it's a very good movie. Sure, Italian actor Al Pacino playing a Cuban immigrant is a weird casting choice that's aged poorly in today's sociopolitical landscape...but he's also really fucking good at it. Seriously. Over the top, absolutely, but an extremely enjoyable watch all the same. Watching him slide into depravity and chaos when he already started there is fascinating, and Pacino just EATS the movie with how hard he chews the scenery. Look...it's a fun fucking movie to watch, and that's not even talking about the iconic lines, the supporting cast, the well-structured plot and story, the iconic costumes, and every other enjoyable part of this ride of a movie. I resisted watching Scarface for a LONG time, because I associated it with college-age fuckbois, but...shit, it's a good movie. Watch it if you haven't seen it.

OK, lemme pause here. Part Two coming next!

#user365 #31 to life #crime films #crime genre #365days365movies #365 days 365 movies #m 1931 #the maltese falcon #the third man #rashomon #the killing #cool hand luke #the italian job #the godfather #chinatown #dog day afternoon #taxi draiver #scarface #films i watched #watchlist #films i saw in 2022

[abybweisse]

Crack theory: Sins of the dead

@stainedglass-wings had some late night thoughts and shared them on another post, and it got me to thinking. I still think the last initials of the lockets could represent musical notes, and the order could represent a leitmotif.

However, this new idea would shed light on the motives for their deaths, since I think we can probably all agree they didn't die simply from natural causes. And then Yana-san had to choose specific words for these things, so that the initials could still represent musical notes and not repeat each other (wouldn't be confused which locket was for which thing).

But what do I mean by "things"? Sins. Cardinal or deadly sins. This would be another parallel to s1's Ash Landers' obsession with purging the world of "impure" humans. And it would work very well, if John Brown turns out to be an angel or something bent on a deranged version of divine justice.

Ok, so here are the lockets again, with their order:

Emile C. -- Lust. The "C" could stand for "cravings". Lust is sometimes thought of as a type of gluttony, and "cravings" (as well as "appetite") can describe aspects of one's libido just as well as one's desire for food. So, this Emile fellow (if Yana-san isn't playing with name genders again) could have been killed for the sin of lust. And considering I've long thought the "C" might be for the name Chambers (the Viscount of Druitt's family name), this would make sense. The Chambers line could have a particular penchant for the more lustful or hedonistic pursuits.

Oliver A. -- Avarice. That's an extreme form of Greed. I have no idea what last name this would be or where they might fall into place within the narrative, but this Oliver dude might have been seen as far too greedy for his own good.

Alex B. -- Blasphemy. It's not what's typically listed as one of the "seven deadly sins", but it's considered one of the unforgivable ones. I came to this one because I couldn't think of a "b" word for Wrath. However, when our earl watched his older twin being stabbed to death, his unbridled anger led to him making a blasphemous statement. That blasphemy is apparently what really interested the demon that was summoned.

So, Alex could have been blasphemous and/or wrathful. Again, I don't know what last name the "B" might be.

Cloudia/Claudia P. -- Pride. We know the Phantomhives can be a prideful lot, and Vincent says the Phantomhive women tend to be particularly strong-willed. Apparently, Undertaker repeatedly warns them about it, too... saying they keep losing touch with the fact their power comes from support they receive from others, and how they will fall if they lose that support. Our earl wearing that ring like a collar around his neck by his own volition also seems to be a matter of pride, and Undertaker warns it could end up "choking" him someday. So, perhaps our earl's grandmother was a particularly prideful sort of person. Vincent might have been, too. Francis/Frances sure seems to be....

Molly/Mally G. -- Gluttony. No idea who she is, but she's the one who died first, among the people represented by lockets. I'm reminded by some old research I did on Queen Victoria and her early scandals, back when she was new to the throne. She ascended the throne in 1837 (coronated in 1838), and an early scandal involved a female servant whom Victoria accused of getting pregnant out of wedlock. Her belly was so swollen that she looked pregnant, but it turned out to be a horribly large tumor in her abdomen. I had once wondered if Molly/Mally was a Kuroverse version of that unfortunate woman. The possible "sin of gluttony" reminded me of that swollen belly mistaken for pregnancy. And pregnant people are said to be "eating for two".... 🤔 It's a long-shot, but she could have been a royal servant repeatedly caught stealing food, or something? Accusations against her could have been some huge misunderstanding, too, particularly if Victoria acted against her before John Brown was by her side... or if he was there and knew the truth but did the queen's bidding anyway. It seems like a weak motive to kill someone, but the queen might not see it that way. Not if she truly believes the person is committing a deadly or unforgivable sin.

Gilbert D. -- Dejection. That's the term sometimes used by the orthodoxy instead of Sloth. Gilbert could have been someone who was too overcome by depression or even just apathy. If we are talking about someone who specifically pissed off the queen, it could be that he neglected to follow her orders. I used to think the "D" could stand for Dalles/Durless, which is apparently Madam Red's married name. If the death was in 1885, it could have been Madam Red's husband, supposedly killed in that carriage accident, but I don't think the accident was really an accident. He was the Baron of Burnett, and he showed deep affection for his wife and unborn child, despite the fact Madam Red was still in love with Vincent. If it was him (another long-shot), then he could have been killed for not giving a toss about the queen's intentions or goals. If the death was in 1862, as one image of the locket shows, then who knows. March 1, 1862 was a few months after Prince Albert died, so it could have something to do with Albert's death. Like a physician whom the queen blames for not doing enough to save her beloved Albert's life. This is me using a lot of words to say idk who Gilbert is.

Harry E. -- Envy. How Harry's envy leads to him being targeted for death, idk. I also have no clue who he might be. Perhaps he was envious of the queen herself. There were many attempts on her life, especially early in her reign. I found a total of 8 known attempts on her life, committed by 7 different people (one failed twice), but none of them happened in 1851. However, Vincent was born in 1851. Harry could have been involved in some plot to kill or overthrow the queen. Otherwise, I got nothin'.

Well, I don't know if any of this will pan out, but it sure is an interesting idea! Also, it doesn't take anything away from my leitmotif theory, so I kind of like it. We all want to know why and how these people died, right? Deeply hidden clues about their "sins" is a cool concept, and I think it's still worth pursuing, even if their last initials don't end up being that clue.

#black butler #kuroshitsuji #stainedglass wings #stainedglass-wings #hair lockets #mourning jewelry #mourning lockets #leitmotif #motives #sins #cardinal sins #deadly sins #queen victoria #john brown #theories #crack theories #jun 4 2022

[hellframe]

In the beginning of Chapter 5, when Francis came home after rendezvous with Bunny to discover there Henry in the middle of brainwashing Richard, Henry tried to console his nervous friend in Latin:

[‘Deprendi miserum est,’ he said. To my surprise Francis laughed, a humorless little snort.]

Henry quoted Horace, Satires I.II, which elaborates on the problem of practicing extremes in financial and sexual affairs. I’ve got an impression that Henry had already cited this line to Francis, maybe after that mysterious scandal with Marion, or on another occasion, either way.

The quote was picked from the final verse of satire:

No fear, while I fuck, of husbands back from the country,

Doors bursting, dogs howling, the whole house echoing

With the sound of his knocking, the girl deathly pale,

Leaping the bed, her knowing maid shouting afraid

For her limbs, the adulteress for her dowry, I for myself.

Nor, clothes awry, of having to flee bare-foot, scared

For my cash, my skin, or at the very least my reputation.

It’s bad news to be caught: even with Fabio judging.

It looks quite similar to events after the bacchanal, but turned inside-out: the ‘husband’ (Bunny) was home while the bacchants arrived back from the country, and all the shouting and fear as well belonged to Bunny.

This fragment also reminds of how Charles caught Francis and Richard making out, almost word-for-word: Charles, violently knocking on the door, Richard, clothes awry, leaping the bed, bare-foot Francis, both of them scared. This satire definitely inspired, or at least shaped some events in the novel.

The first part reminds of complicated situation with money between Henry, Francis and Bunny, and a bit of Richard:

The last statement echoed in Henry’s dialogue with Richard, when he compared Bunny’s ingratitude and wastefulness with Richard’s severely reserved manner: ‘you’re so scrupulous about not borrowing money that it’s rather silly.’

Following verses are about love affairs, but also about getting oneself in trouble for silly whims (just like desire to set up a risky ritual, or obsession with picturesque elitists):

A leitmotif of inability to see things as they are:

(It seems, Horace would’ve disapproved of Richard's fascination with Camilla’s boyish feet and masculine posture, as well as those suspicious remarks about Francis’ delicate hands and slim ankles.)

And here's something about being a trophy hunter (true for Richard, Francis, and even Henry):

The following explains that comment of Francis about kissing Richard, ‘You were there’:

It can explain Charles’ attitude towards Francis and their hook-ups as well.

Full translation of the satire by A. S. Kline: https://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/Latin/HoraceSatiresBkISatII.php

[manorlake22]

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They present a selection of companies, corresponding to caring for a specialized medical condition, monitoring an ongoing persistent situation and addressing acute diseases that arise. Our providers supply two options for care – a reminiscence clinic, located on the campus of Atrium Health University, and first care services to residents of long-term care amenities nursing home canton. Castle Peak provides many amenities, providers and living options to reside well right now with peace of mind for tomorrow. Plus, you’ll have the reassurance that as well being wants change, a variety of senior care is true on web site.

AAFECare grew out of a powerful dedication to increasing our tenant providers program, directly addressing the wants of senior residents in AAFE-managed buildings. The overarching objective is to assist tenants successfully age in place, giving seniors the flexibility to stay in their senior care center own homes and community safely, independently, and comfortably, no matter age or earnings. In some locations, residents enjoy the beautiful native panorama that surrounds the buildings or take advantage of social activities in enclosed courtyards.

Our multidisciplinary group of pros understands the distinctive needs of seniors in the treatment setting. Patients will obtain an individualized plan specializing in their specific psychiatric and medical needs. The D’Youville Foundation was founded in 2003 to provide “niceties, not simply necessities” for our residents.

Atrium Health Senior Care makes use of a team approach, which includes a geriatric doctor, nurse and social worker, to offer compassionate care to those dealing with reminiscence loss. On my final day, I visited a church initiative that was a faith-based bookend to the St. Joseph’s experience that started my journey. Margaret’s is a well-established Anglican congregation close to the National University of Singapore. The church is within the midst of making a big senior living facility and early childhood center, having damaged floor on it in mid-2017. As in much of the world, the change is caused by growing longevity and decreasing delivery charges. A leitmotif is participating older people to support the following era behind them.

St. Francis ParkOpened in 2018, St. Francis Park offers a singular unbiased living choice for seniors aged sixty five and older. Beautiful studio apartments are a spot to call home for residents who could also be seeking to downsize or reduce the burdens of home upkeep. Maintaining independence turns into extra important as we age, or perhaps lose some mobility. Nursing aides additionally present assistance with day by day living actions – those important abilities that fulfill our most basic wants.

Google Singapore is subsequent door; on the opposite side is the Boys’ Home, which homes younger individuals who have been in bother with the authorities. The large Supply Chain City constructing — a facility “that serves as Asia’s supply-chain nerve center” — is less than 100 yards away. Many couples depend on each other for companionship and assist, especially as they age. Even if a pair is aware of each other so well that they end each other’s sentences, they most likely won’t expertise aging in the identical method. Our religious care packages serve individuals of all traditions and backgrounds.

They permit her to stay in her own residence and she is 97 years old and we now have a fantastic group taking care of her. They are so supportive and so they make my mother's life so pleasant. We simply know that most seniors wish canton nursing home to stay in their houses for as lengthy as potential. We fastidiously display each of our caregivers and prepare them as Certified Companion Aides, Certified Nursing Assistants, or each. Our in-home care providers can be found anyplace from two hours a day to 24/7.

We encourage and nurture family, resident, and workers interplay at all levels in a loving and respectful surroundings. Offering a full range of award-winning well being providers and living choices for seniors, multi function place. Our historical past begins in 1958 when Cap and Mabel Burrow started operating the county home in Randolph County. The Burrows moved into the county home with their children, and the folks living in the home quickly became part of the family as the Burrows and their kids lived, performed, shared meals, and worked alongside the residents. Today, we remain a family-owned and operated company, dedicated to serving folks for over 60 years.

#assisted living

[edwin--artifex]

Edwin Alexander Francis did the voice over for the audioguide of this great exhibition. We maintained the original interview given by Scianna at a relatively high audio level as if it were a simultaneous translation...

...and - as a spin off - Edwin produced this (video) test sample for Room 6 " Marpessa".

Enjoy! ->

FERDINANDO SCIANNA. JOURNEY. STORY. MEMORY.

VENICE/TRE OCI Gallery

31.08.2019 > 16.02.2020

From 31 August 2019 to 16 February 2020, the Casa dei Tre Oci in Venice will be hosting an anthological show by Ferdinando Scianna (Bagheria, Sicily, 1943), one of the reference figures of contemporary international photography.

 The show is  curated by Denis Curti, Paola Bergna, and Alberto Bianda, art director, organised by Civita Mostre e Musei and Civita Tre Venezie and promoted by Fondazione di Venezia: it covers more than fifty years of this Sicilian photographer’s career, through 180 works in black and white, divided into three wide-ranging themes: Journey, Story, Memory.

On this occasion a series of fashion photos that Scianna made in Venice will be exhibited, a testimony to his strong link to the city.

Ferdinando Scianna began to be enthusiastic about photography in the 1960s when he began to recount the culture and traditions of his native Sicily through images. During his long career in art he has touched on many themes – current events, war, travel, popular religion – all united by a single leitmotif: the constant search for a form in the chaos of life. In more than fifty years of narration there has not been, of course, any lack of propositions: from Bagheria to the Bolivian Andes and to religious festivals – at the beginning of his career - to his experiences of the fashion world, begun with Dolce & Gabbana and the iconic model Marpessa. Then there was reportage (from 1982 the first Italian to be part of the Magnum photojournalism agency), landscape, and such thematic obsessions as mirrors, animals, things and, finally, portraits of his friends, masters of the art and culture world like Leonardo Sciascia, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and Jorge Louis Borges, to mention just a few.

The show will be supplied with a catalogue published by Marsilio Editori.

Casa dei Tre Oci, Fondamenta delle Zitelle, 43 - 30133 Giudecca, Venice

[womenintranslation]

From the Book Culture event page:

Event date: 05/30/2019 - 7:00pm

Join us at Book Culture 112th on Thursday, May 30th at 7pm as we welcome poets Gemma Gorga and Sharon Dolin in celebration of Gemma's collection translated by Sharon, Book of Minutes.  The reading will feature poems in both English and Catalan.

Imagine a book of hours condensed into a book of minutes: that is the project of the compact lyrical prose poems found in Gemma Gorga's Book of Minutes, the first English-language translation of this emerging poet, widely known and loved in her native Catalonia yet little known outside it. The poems in Book of Minutes move seamlessly from philosophical speculation to aphorism, condensed narrative, brief love letter, and prayer, finding the metaphysical in even the most mundane. In the space of one or two paragraphs, they ponder God, love, language, existence, and beginnings and endings both large and small. In her openness to explore these and many other subjects, Gorga's leitmotif might well be "light." Carrying with them echoes of Wallace Stevens, Rainer Maria Rilke, Hans Christian Andersen, Francis Ponge, George Herbert, and Emily Dickinson, the poems in Book of Minutes are nonetheless firmly in the twenty-first century, moving in a single breath from the soul to diopters or benzodiazepine.   In deft, idiomatic translation from Sharon Dolin, Book of Minutes also retains the original Catalan texts on facing pages.

Gorga’s Book of Minutes is a diminutive, metaphysical book of hours consisting of 60 prose poems. They display a disarming simplicity, at times offering meditations on the soul and on language itself. Gorga uses the prose poem as the site of exploration—of the self and the cosmos, of time and relationships. The more one meditates on these poems, the more they unfold in the mind’s eye, like paper flowers blossoming in water.

Gemma Gorga's Book of Minutes, in Sharon Dolin's beautiful translation, is by far the best book of prose poems I have read in the past decade. Like a house mirror, each prose poem here "retains the memory of all the souls who have gazed at themselves inside it." The result is spellbinding and surprising, as the voice of these poems searches for the mystery within the mundane.

—Ilya Kaminsky, author of Deaf Republic and Dancing in Odessa, Editor-in-Chief & Poetry Editor, Poetry International

Gemma Gorga has published six collections of poetry in Catalan. Her most recent collection Mur (2015) won the Premi de la Critica de Poesia Catalana. She has also published a book of translations by the Indian poet Dilip Chitre and co-translated a book of poems by Edward Hirsch. She is Professor of Medieval and Renaissance Spanish Literature at the University of Barcelona.

Sharon Dolin is the author of six poetry collections, most recently Manual for Living (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2016).  She has received grants from PEN and the Ramond Llull Institute for her translation of Gemma Gorga’s Llibre dels Minuts:Book of Minutes (Field Translation Series/Oberlin College Press, 2019). She lives in New York City and directs Writing About Art in Barcelona each June: www.sharondolin.com.    

Event address: Book Culture

536 W 112th Street

New York, NY 10025

#book culture #gemma gorga #sharon dolin #catalan literature #womenintranslation #book of minutes

[barneycblog]

Cinematic Trivia

Toto, Dorothy’s dog in the Wizard of Oz, was played by Terry, a female Cairn Terrier owned and trained by Carl Spitz. Terry, whose name was officially changed to Toto in 1942, appeared in 16 films all together, including The Women, Bad Little Angel and Tortilla Flat. Oz was her only credited role. She performed her own stunts and was paid $125 a week, more than many of her non-canine fellow actors. Judy Garland got $500 a week. Toto died in 1945 at age 11 and by all accounts led a happy life. Toto’s biography, I Toto, is available from Amazon.

Speaking of Oz, actress Billie Burke, who played Glinda, the Good Witch of the North, was considered a great beauty and style trendsetter in her early career on the stage. In the movies, she typically played ditsy socialites, for example her role as Millicent Jordan in George Cukor’s Dinner at Eight. She was married to famed impresario Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr. for 18 years until his death in 1932. She turned to film acting in an attempt to pay off Ziegfeld’s debts.

In George Cukor’s The Women (1939), not a single male actor or extra appears on screen. Men aren’t seen, but they’re talked about constantly. David Lean’s epic Lawrence of Arabia (1962) is 227 minutes long. There’s not a single line of dialog spoken by a women during the entire film.

Cukor was known as a women’s director. He put up with all kinds of prima donna behavior from the stars of The Women. Norma Shearer complained that her part was too light and that her more colorful co-stars were upstaging her.  Joan Crawford, who had envied Shearer’s success for years, banged knitting needles during one of Shearer’s line readings, causing an angry Cukor to throw Crawford off the set. Rosalind Russell called in sick until she got equal billing to her co-stars. Her health suddenly improved. Despite this, Cukor said that he would rather direct 10 actresses than one actor because “females are less vain.”

Francis the talking mule, who starred in a popular series of seven films, was not a he but a she; her real name was “Molly.” Universal Studios paid $350 for the animal, but made millions from the film series. Molly was trained by Les Hilton, a former apprentice of Will Rogers, who would also go on to train Bamboo Harvester, the horse who played Mister Ed on TV. Donald O’Connor, Francis’ co-star, claimed the mule got more fan mail than he did. Francis’ unique voice was provided by actor Chill Wills who never received an on-screen credit for the voice overs (then a standard practice). Francis lived until the ripe old age of 47.

Casablanca is the most quotable movie of all time. And that’s not just an arbitrary distinction: The AFI’s 100 Years … 100 Movie Quotes list, assembled in 2005 and based on the opinions of 1500 filmmakers, critics, and historians, includes six Casablanca quotes, by far more than any other movie. The famous lines are: “Here’s looking at you, kid” (#5); “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship” (#20); “Play it, Sam. Play As Time Goes By” (#28); “Round up the usual suspects” (#32); “We’ll always have Paris” (#43); and “Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine” (#67).

Incidentally, As “Time Goes By” wasn’t written for Casablanca. Herman Hupfeld wrote the song for the 1931 Broadway musical Everybody’s Welcome. In the film, “Sam,” played by Dooley Wilson, sings the song. Wilson was actually a drummer, not a pianist. Sam’s piano accompaniment was played by Elliot Carpenter and the song is heard throughout the film as a leitmotif. The AFI listed it among its “top 100” movie songs. National Public Radio included it in its NPR 100, a 1999 list of the most important American musical works of the 20th Century as compiled by NPR’s music editors.

#movie trivia

[anastpaul]

Blessed Memorial of – Bl Cesar de Bus - 15 April -  (1544-1607) Priest, teacher, Founder of two religious congregations: the Secular Priests of the Christian Doctrine and the Daughters of the Christian Doctrine – Patron of Catechists.

Cesar was born at Cavaillon, France and little is known about his early life, with the exception that he was middle child – the seventh of thirteen children and raised as a pious child.lived both piously and virtuously.    At eighteen years old, he joined the French army,and took part in the king’s war against the Huguenots.      Back in his home town of Cavaillon, he took over the position of his late brother as canon of Salon, a position he wanted for its income and connections instead of its spiritual significance. One night while on his way to a masked ball, he passed a shrine where a small light was burning before an image of the Virgin Mary. He was suddenly overwhelmed by the memory that a friend, Antoinette Reveillade, had prayed fervently for his salvation.   He realised that there was no way he could live a life offending God and then expect to be accepted in the end.  There, on the road, he had a complete conversion.  He returned to his studies, resumed his pious lifestyle and was soon ordained to the priesthood at the age of 38.

Upon ordination, Cesar immediately distinguished himself by his works of charity, serving all in need.    He was profoundly affected reading a biography of Saint Charles Borromeo and tried to take him as a model in all things, especially his devotion to catechesis. He worked as a catechist in Aix-in-Provence, France, an area in turmoil following the Religious Wars. Saint Francis de Sales called him “a star of the first magnitude in the firmament of Catechesis.”    He founded the Ursulines of Province and the Fathers of Christian Doctrine (Doctrinarians).   The Fathers were destroyed during the French Revolution but an Italian branch, the Doctrinarian Fathers continues today with houses in Italy, France and Brazil.   He further demonstrated great effectiveness and zeal in preaching.    He focused primarily on those who would receive the Word of God from no one else—those living in horrible conditions, living out of city in the countryside and those marginalised by society.    He further focused on catechesis of the family, instructing the parents alongside the children, something which had previously not been done.    The congregation was approved by Pope Clement VIII. A few years later, Cesar founded a companion congregation, the Daughters of the Christian Doctrine.

Blessed Cesar wrote five volumes on the Catechism, portions of which continue in use today.    His Instructions for the Family on the Four Parts of the Roman Catechism, was published 60 years after his death.   He died on Easter Sunday, 15 April 1607 in Avignon, Vaucluse, France of natural causes and his remains are interred in the church of Saint Mary in Monticelli in Rome, Italy.   Blessed Pope Paul VI at his Beatification:  “He learns in this way to seek and love sacrifice, for sacrifice configures one with Christ Suffering and Victorious. To offer himself as a libation, to leave everything in God’s hand at the cost of the greatest renunciations, this seems to have been the leitmotif, the perpetual aim of his efforts. And when, at the end of his life, suffering and afflicted with blindness for 14 years, he is at last able to prepare for the supreme gift, he will realize how useful asceticism has been to master the old Adam. He will be ready to meet the Lord. His joy will be perfect.”

He was beatified on 27 April 1975 by Blessed Pope Paul VI who said at the ceremony:

“The work of Cesar de Bus continues to generate, after three centuries, our admiration. Here’s someone who got it right.    He recognised the needs of his time and he responded with equal generosity and efficiency.    Attracted by his vision and influence, other enthusiastic men were gradually gathered around him, learning how to approach the catechism and taking a lead from him.    Quickly they formed a religious family who, despite the vicissitudes of history, still flourishes today in various countries.    Now located in Cavaillon, France, the Fathers of Christian Doctrine know this day our special concern for them, our esteem, and they receive our wishes and encouragement!    We are pleased to honour them now in the person of their founder.

And we wish the pastors and those responsible for catechetical use, who have followed Blessed Cesar’s example and writings, guiding their thinking and their work.    Blessed Caesar de Bus, you who left us the admirable example of a life given to God, who burned with a desire to communicate God’s life with your brothers, now intercedes for us with the Lord, for the same Fire consumes us and the same charity urges us.   And you, dear brothers and sons, we entrust you to him and we bless you from my heart.”

#blcesardebus #april15blcesardebus #stmaryinmonticelli

[pope-francis-quotes]

https://youtu.be/zewf8OHnLYc

1st August >> (@VaticanNews By Robin Gomes) #Pope Francis #PopeFrancis sends a video message to the National Missionary Congress of #Indonesia, saying a Christian always strives forward in life spreading the message of Jesus.

Pope Francis’ video message for Indonesia’s National Missionary Congress

Pope Francis has sent a video message to the National Missionary Congress of Indonesia, which kicked off in the capital Jakarta on Thursday.

By Robin Gomes

A Christian is a missionary who, urged forward by the Holy Spirit, lives his or her Baptism as yeast in society, spreading the message of Jesus.

This is the heart of a brief video message that Pope Francis sent to the participants a 3-day National Missionary Congress, organized by Indonesia’s Catholic Church.

"Baptized and Sent"

The August 1 to 4 conference, being held at the Mercure Convention Center, Ancol, in Jakarta, has as its theme, "Baptized and Sent".

Speaking in Italian, the Pope exhorts the Congress participants to reflect well on the theme. “When we are baptized, we receive the Holy Spirit, who is a treasure; we receive the message of Jesus, the Gospel within us,” the Pope says in the video message that was projected during the opening ceremony.

The Pope draws attention to the two words of the theme, “Baptized and Sent”. “When you have a beautiful thing and are enthusiastic about it,” he says, “you feel the impetus to share it and give it to others.” “Baptized and Sent”, he says, are the two things that must be the leitmotif of the Congress.

Yeast of Baptism

He asks how a Christian lives his or her Baptism, not only in personal life but also as “yeast, social leaven in society, to carry forward this message of Jesus.”

Walking forward – urged by the Spirit

The Argentine Pope reminds the congress participants that a Christian always walks forward. According to the Bible, he explains, “we are not people who go backwards”; “we are people who go forward, always.”

“When one goes back,” he stresses, “one is not a Christian.”

When a Christian goes forward, he points out, he or she is “sent”. "It is the Holy Spirit that impels me to go forward”.

“So, take courage, go forward, always forward: baptized and sent,” the Pope urges and asks them to pray to our Lady that she may protect them and help them forge ahead.

Pope Francis also asks the Congress participants to pray for him and concludes imparting his blessing on them.

Topics

POPE FRANCIS

VIDEO MESSAGE

INDONESIA

MISSIONARIES

CONFERENCE

01st August 2019, 13:26

[filmsbyme-blog]

Ran is the 1985 Japanese masterpiece by award winning screen writer and director Akira Kurosawa. Ran is based on Shakespeare’s King Lear and the history of Mōri Motonari (1497–1571), a sixteenth-century Japanese feudal lord with three sons. Ran’s story of the three arrows – unbreakable in their unity, but easily snapped one by one – comes from a lesson Motonari imparted to his three sons in order to keep them from fighting each other and dissolving his empire. The film also indirectly addresses Kurosawa’s fears that the three superpowers – the US, the Soviet Union, and China – would destroy the world without unifying behind the idea of nuclear disarmament. Kurosawa created a powerful hybrid by mixing an adaptation of Shakespeare with his classic samurai epic and modern strife. 

The movie begins by introducing Ichimonji Hidetora and his three sons Tarō, Jirō, and Saburō. Hidetora, who is now 70 years old, decides to retire and chooses Tarō as his successor with his brother Jirō's support. However, the youngest Saburo objects to his plans and consequently, is banished. “Ran” in Japanese means “chaos” “revolt” and “madness”.  The story of ran is a story of bloody betrayals and treachery between the father, the brothers, their advisors, and their wives.  

The driving force behind Kurosawa writing Ran was his dissatisfaction with how King Lear suffered despite doing little wrong. Unlike Lear, Ran is heavy with Buddhist influence and shows human suffering is determined by how one has behaved previously. The godlike detachment of Ran shows human folly, barbarity, and war in order to analyze the foolish games of men. As Kyoami says, “Man is born crying. When he has cried enough, he dies.” The law of Karma is very present. Kurosawa suggests that violent environment and behavior will only breed future violence in the generations to come. “You have spilled so much human blood you cannot measure it. You have lived without mercy or pity. But father, we, too, are children of this degraded age of strife,” Saburo says, implying that a father who as demonstrated the laws of power and the practice of cruelty could not expect his sons to live any other way.   “I am lost,” Hidetora says. “Such is the is human condition,” Kyoami reponds. Hidetora continues, "This path I remember; we came this way before.” “Men always travel the same road,” Kyoami explains. Kurosawa shows that the history of the world is foolish and crazed mankind repeating its mistakes and never learning. In narration, he also demonstrates how mankind has nothing to blame except itself. Tango exclaims, “Do not slander God or the Buddha! They are the ones who are crying! The evil of human beings... the stupidity of the sinful creatures, who believe their survival depends on killing others, repeated and again throughout all the time.” 

Another example of Buddhist influence in the film comes when the oldest son Taro and his wife Lady Kaede seize authority from Hidetora. They sit side by side, with a scroll hung above them and the three figures form a triangle. The scroll reads “Bodhisattva” which represents compassion, mercy, and wisdom. This imagery is ironic when compared to the anarchy of the story.  

Despite the film’s critical acclaim Kurosawa could not gain financing for the epic and spent years creating gouache and watercolor-based concept art of the characters and sets for the film. In this film, Kurosawa strived for the austere Japanese aesthetic ideal of wabi: the minimum is expressed and the maximum left for the beholder to supply. The elaborate and ornate was to be avoided. A hint, a suggestion should suffice.

Ran features one of Japan’s most distinguished living actors, Tatsuya Nakadai, who has made well over 100 movies. Still, he is best known to American audiences as a role in which he is nearly unrecognizable- Hidetora, the 70-something feudal patriarch of the Ichimonji clan. Nakadai, then in his early 50s, wore heavy makeup intended not only to age him but also to resemble a Noh mask. He said, ''They had to draw in every single wrinkle; the only parts of that face that were actually mine were the eyes.'' They are, however, no ordinary eyes. They're large and expressive. No one who has seen Hidetora will soon forget what they look like, huge with horror, as the mad lord descends the steps of his burning castle. This detail helped Ran win a BAFTA award for hair and makeup.  

Costuming is an important aspect for the mis-en-scene and characterization in Ran. Japanese costume design emerged from a fabric history involving high-toned color and ornate weaves and embroideries, and films have capitalized on this tradition. Ran was costumed to enormous acclaim by Emi Wada winning an Oscar and Academy Award for Costume Design. Since their introduction, Taro wears yellow; Jiro, red; and Saburo, blue. This color coordination heightens the sense of chaos in the battle scenes. This battle is a melee of red and yellow banners blowing freely, falling out of sight as troops fall, and finally the yellow is simply engulfed by the red. Additionally, Lady Kaede is based on two important Leitmotifs in Japanese cultural. Emi Wada noted the influence of noh (nō) costumes and masks. The glassy, immobile white face, and uplifted eyebrows resembles the mask of serpent-women in noh theater. The snake is an important leitmotif as the transformation of woman’s jealous nature. The manipulation of a fox leitmotif is also present. For example, when Lady Kaede demands the head of Jiro’s wife Lady Sue, Kurogane brings the fox statue head from the Inari shrine and warns Jiro about her.  Kurogane claims to have been tricked by the fox. He then tells the most famous tale of fox impersonation in Japanese drama, the story of Tamamo-no-Mae. He warns Jirō, “There are a lot of foxes in this area, and according to hearsay they often cheat men... It is said that at last she turned into a white fox with nine tails... Well, after that the traces of the nine-tailed fox were lost. It is possible that the fox has settled down in this vicinity (1:49).” Kaede wears a white uchikake (long outer white kimono) symbolically indicating the white nine tailed fox, which conceals an inner kimono bearing serpent image. The fox has traditional seductive sexual characteristics embodied in female transformation and is a symbol of false love. The white also represent her position as a widow after the death of the oldest brother Taro. Her true self revealed where she admits she was trying to destroy the family. When Kaede is killed, she wears a kimono worn by demonic woman such as the costume in the nō play Dōjōji, the story of a women who takes revenge when the priest will not marry her, she turns into a serpent. The gold, black, and white triangles resemble serpent scales. The creation of each character in Ran is complimented by the detailed costuming.

Samurai have become one of the most recognizable aspect of Japanese culture, even though they were effectively banned in the 19th century. Kurosawa’s father was proud of his samurai heritage. The samurai genre remains popular. The themes of honor still resonate with Japanese and international audiences today. However, the Ichimonji family breaks this idea of honor with their backstabbing and ignoble treachery. Another theme is inheritance, a tradition taken very seriously in Japan and is strictly regulated. The Ichimonji also breaks this tradition, demonstrating the greed that disrupts society.  The story of Ran is a warning for those who do not uphold the tradition’s of society. 

The end of Ran summarizes Kurosawa’s view of the human condition. A blind youth- Tsurumaru- wanders to the edge of a precipice, oblivious of being poised unseeing between life and death. Ignorant of the tragedies (the many deaths), alone, blind, and unaware of his perilous state. This signifies the human race, who acts blindly and recklessly. However, the Buddha watches over Tsurumaru and humanity- the opportunity for goodness to prevail.  

Works Cited

Jan, Feei-Ching. Buddhism in Kurosawa's Films: A Critical Analysis, California State University, Fresno, Ann Arbor, 1989. ProQuest, https://search.proquest.com/docview/303805650?accountid=14882. 

Joseph McLellan, “Oscar-Nominated Kurosawa Stands Tall Among Directors,” The Frenso Bee, 9 Feb. 1986: 14. 

Winning, Rob. "Ran." International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers, edited by Sara Pendergast and Tom Pendergast, 4th ed., vol. 1: Films, St. James Press, 2000, pp. 995-997. Gale Virtual Reference Library, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/CX3406800729/GVRL?u=vic_wlu&sid=GVRL&xid=b85760af. Accessed 16 Oct. 2018. 

"Costume." Schirmer Encyclopedia of Film, edited by Barry Keith Grant, vol. 1, Schirmer Reference, 2007, pp. 375-382. Gale Virtual Reference Library, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/CX2587600053/GVRL?u=vic_wlu&sid=GVRL&xid=69de0231. Accessed 16 Oct. 2018. 

Krasilovsky, Alexis. Great Adaptations: Screenwriting and Global Storytelling. Routledge, 2018. 

Muchnik, Federico. The Strategic Producer: on the Art and Craft of Making Your First Feature. Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2017. 

Rafferty, Terrence. "The Actor with Stardom in His Eyes." New York Times (1923-Current file), Jun 15, 2008, pp. 1. ProQuest, https://search.proquest.com/docview/897789484?accountid=14882. 

Serper, Zvika. “Lady Kaede in Kurosawa’s Ran: Verbal and Visual Characterization through Animal Traditions.” Japan Forum, vol. 13, no. 2, Sept. 2001, pp. 145–158. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1080/09555800120081367. 

Richie, Donald. The Films of Akira Kurosawa. Berkeley: U of California P, 1984. Humphreys, Christmas. Buddhism: An Introduction and Guide. London: Penguin Books, 1951, rept. 1962. 

“Episode 1.” Miro Motonari. Kiku TV. NHK, Shibuya. 14 December 1997. Television. 

Kurosawa, Akira, Director. Ran. Toho, 1985.

[iprayunceasingly-blog]

Pope: God doesn't meet our expectations – he surprises us instead

New Post has been published on https://pray-unceasingly.com/catholic-living/catholic-news/pope-god-doesnt-meet-our-expectations-he-surprises-us-instead/

Pope: God doesn't meet our expectations – he surprises us instead

Vatican City, Jul 8, 2018 / 04:24 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis said Sunday that God always surprises people with the way he works, and because of this, believers should be open to the Lord's way of thinking and acting, rather than expecting him to conform to their aspirations.

“Today the Lord invites us to assume an attitude of humble listening and docile waiting, because the grace of God often presents itself to us in surprising ways, which don't line up with our expectations,” the pope said July 8.

He noted how certain “prejudices” can be nurtured in Christians which prevent them from accepting the reality of how God works, however, “the Lord does not conform to prejudices. We have to force ourselves to open the mind and heart to welcome the divine reality that comes to meet us.”

Pope Francis spoke to pilgrims gathered in St. Peter's Square for his Sunday Angelus address, which focused on the day's Gospel reading from Mark. In the passage, Jesus returned to his native land to do ministry, but was unable to perform the same miraculous works he had done in other places since people knew him and were skeptical of his preaching and ministry.

In his speech, Francis said the people were “scandalized” by what Jesus was doing, since they recognized him as one of them.

Asking how it is possible for Jesus' fellow citizens to go from marvel to disbelief, the pope said this is because they made a comparison between the “humble origins” of Jesus and his current abilities to preach and perform miracles.

“He is a carpenter, he did not study, yet he preaches better than the scribes and performs miracles. And instead of opening themselves to the reality, [the people] are scandalized,” he said, noting that for the inhabitants of Nazareth, “God is too great to lower himself to speak through such a simple man!”

This, he said, is “the scandal of the incarnation: the shocking event of a God made flesh, who thinks with a human mind, works and acts with human hands, loves with a human heart; a God who struggles, eats and sleeps as one of us.”

However, in becoming flesh, Jesus “overturns every human scheme: it is not the disciples who washed the feet of the Lord, but it is the Lord who washed the feet of the disciples,” the pope said, noting that this fact is “a cause of scandal and disbelief in every age, even today.”

In off-the-cuff remarks, Francis pointed to St. Teresa of Calcutta, who he canonized in September 2016, as a modern-day example of someone simple who performed great works. Even though she was “a small sister,”  St. Teresa through prayer and simplicity was able to “work wonders,” he said, adding that “she is an example from our day.”

Closing his address, Pope Francis said learning to have a mind and heart open to God's logic above all means having faith.

“The lack of faith is an obstacle to God's grace,” he said, noting that many baptized Catholics “live as if Christ does not exist: they repeat the signs and acts of faith, but they do not correspond to a real adhesion to the person of Jesus and his Gospel.”

Every Christian, he said, “is called to deepen this fundamental belonging, trying to bear witness with a coherent conduct of life, whose leitmotif is charity.”

After leading pilgrims in the traditional Angelus prayer, the pope gave a shout-out to patriarchs and representatives from Eastern Catholic and Orthodox churches in the Middle East who were present for an July 7 ecumenical gathering in Bari to pray for peace in the region.

Francis said the event was “an eloquent sign of Christian unity,” and thanked all those who participated.

He also noted how July 8 marks the “Sunday of the Sea,” which is dedicated to seafarers and fisherman, and prayed for them and their families, and for the chaplains and volunteers who do ministry to them.

The pope offered a special prayer for those who live at sea in situations of “undignified work,” and for all those who are committed to freeing the sea of pollution.

CNA Daily News

#doesn't #expectations #instead #meet #Pope #surprises #Catholic News

[hottytoddynews]

Joseph Raymond Conniff left us in 2002, but he also left a musical legacy very few will ever match.

Ray Conniff was an American bandleader and arranger—and one of the most gifted in American history! Between 1957 and 1968, Conniff had 28 albums in America’s Top 40, with the most famous, “Somewhere My Love,” arriving in 1966.

Following WWII, Ray joined Artie Shaw’s big band and then affiliated with Mitch Miller. Later, as house arranger at Columbia Records, he worked with superstars the likes of Marty Robbins, Frankie Laine, Johnny Mathis, and Rosemary Clooney, plus a host of others. One footnote to his Hall of Fame-worthy career: He was the first popular American artist to record in Russia.

In 1959, Conniff formed The Ray Conniff Singers, a combination of 12 women and 13 men who would record some of the most beautiful sounds to ever grace the American landscape, not to mention the world’s. (Thanks to my new Alexa, a recent birthday gift, I’ve been “shuffling” songs by The Ray Conniff Singers daily.)

For today’s Top Tune Throwback, we’re showcasing “Somewhere My Love,” also known as “Lara’s Theme” from the movie classic, “Doctor Zhivago.” The lyrics were written by Maurice Jarre and Paul Francis Webster. The leitmotif for the motion picture, however, was written by Ray Davies of The Kinks fame. Next to the Beatles, the Kinks were my favorite group of all time, but that’s a story for another day!

“Doctor Zhivago” was released in 1965 and won an Academy Award for Best Original Music Score.

Steve Vassallo is a HottyToddy.com contributor. Steve writes on Ole Miss athletics, Oxford business, politics and other subjects. He is an Ole Miss grad and former radio announcer for the basketball team. Currently, Steve is a highly successful leader in the real estate business who lives in Oxford with his wife Rosie. You can contact Steve at [email protected] or call him at 985-852-7745.

The post Thursday’s Top Tune Throwback: ‘Somewhere My Love” by the Ray Conniff Singers appeared first on HottyToddy.com.

#hottytoddy #olemiss #oxfordms #oxford ms #mississippi #university of mississippi #the grove

[limetoblue]

Marvel Studios Still Haven’t Solved Their Film Score Problem

“Spider-Man: Homecoming” starts with a familiar melody. It was the famous “Spider-Man” theme composed by Paul Francis Webster and Robert J. Harris for the 1960 cartoon show “Spider-Man”. It was also played a couple of times during “Spider-Man” movies in 2002, 2004 and 2007 featured Tobey Maguire as Peter Parker and also in “The Amazing Spider-Man 2” in a scene where we could hear this melody as Peter Parker’s ringtone, who was played by Andrew Garfield.

A couple of weeks before the movie release, Michael Giacchino, the composer of the “Spider-Man: Homecoming”, tweeted about this leitmotif coming back to the latest movie. It was so exciting to hear his arrangement on that melody.

After I heard that, I was wondering if I would hear that melody in a scene when Peter Parker first received his Spider Suit, or when he’s doing his duty as the friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man, or when he fights the villain in this movie, which is Vulture. Nope, it appeared only in the beginning.

Pauline Reay in “Music in Film: Soundtracks and Synergy” quoted a line from Russell Lack; “If the audience came out of the theatre almost unaware of the musical accompaniment to the film, the work of the musical director has been successful.” The is no place for the best melody in a movie. Music itself should support the story, not creating its own. When it’s an emotional scene, the strings instruments start playing slow with minor notes. When it’s a funny scene, the music becomes playful.

I’m not saying that is wrong. I believe that is the basic of film scoring. But that is also what I always feel in Marvel movies. Their music always sounds ‘safe’ and the more we watch it with this kind of scoring, the more easily we get bored. Same thing happened when I watch “Spider-Man: Homecoming”. It’s a great movie but after that I didn’t feel anything special with the scoring. Especially when I adore “Ratatouille” and “Up” so much and those two are Michael Giacchino’s best works so far in my opinion.

So, what is wrong with Marvel movies? Or has it always been an extra challenge for any composer to create a music for any superhero movie?

Last year, Hans Zimmer announced that he retired from composing for superhero movies. We know very well he had done a lot for DC and Marvel. His work for “The Amazing Spider-Man 2” was also a great one. Hans Zimmer with The Magnificent Six made a great theme for the villain, Electro, and the scene where he fought Spider-Man was something I could never forget after years. That was a great example of music supporting the scene with the existence of the music itself was something we would very well notice.

If we look at his other work, DC was very lucky with Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL leaving quite a legacy for “Wonder Woman”. "Is She With You?”, the Wonder Woman theme, was so powerful that it wouldn’t just make you humming the melody, but also associate the music with a badass, powerful heroine Wonder Woman is.

I don’t remember any memorable theme Hans Zimmer created for Ben Affleck’s Batman, but as for Superman, there is one. Or if we’re talking about the whole history of Superman appearance on screen, you also remember that melody, right?

What I mean is the masterpiece John Williams created for Superman. I remember very well when I was a kid, my brother sang it and ran around as if he’s having a red cape behind him, and I knew right away what was the figure he’s trying to impersonate. Not just a memorable melody, but also the instrumentation was easily setting the association of some things. When you hear the brass sounds, it represents the heroism, the heroic character Superman is who’s ready to save the world once again. It’s so powerful that the music itself is the storyteller, it brings back the clip of the movies hidden in your memories.

In Hans Zimmer’s work for “Man of Steel”, he added percussion alongside brass instruments. I always feel percussion give a sense of tribal, a beginning of something, or an origin. And yes, “Man of Steel” told us the story of where Kal-El came from.

I never have the intention to compare DC movies with Marvel movies. But in this case, I wonder what happen with Marvel? They spend a lot of time building the universe, but none of the music score is quite memorable, except for the “Spider-Man” theme but it was created years ago before the beginning of MCU. Are they forcing the composers to use temp music instead of letting their creativity goes wild? Or is it because film score is something they take lightly?

What if they take a look once again on every elements in a movie and maximise everything as a storytelling tool. Music is part of Sound, one of the four techniques used as the ‘language’ of film, alongside with mise-en-scène , cinematography and editing. The unique side of music is that this communicates not just the story, but also affects the audience’ emotions.

If you have watched “The Girl With All The Gifts”, you know that it’s a story of children grew up in a world post zombie apocalypse and the children themselves are the by product of it. In that movie, you’ll hear that Cristobal Tapia De Veer, the film composer, created the score from the sound of children humming and something like a muffled voice of zombie of which are two important aspects in this film. It’s always great to see a composer does this kind of thing in their work. It helps you feel more relate with the story and in the long run, it’s a great way to make the audience return to this once again whenever they hear the score.

So, I’m not saying an easy-to-remember score should be Marvel’s goal in producing their next movies. I’m saying that something like “The Girl With All The Gifts” or another more challenging way of creating a film score are worth the try.

#film score #spider-man #homecoming #marvel #wonder woman #dc #hans zimmer #michael giacchino #john williams

[bluewatsons]

Keith Bates et al., Precarious lives and resistant possibilities: the labour of people with learning disabilities in times of austerity, Disability & Society 1 (Epub ahead of print, 2017)

Abstract

This paper draws on feminist and queer philosophers? discussions of precarity and employment, too often absent from disability studies, to explore the working lives of people with learning disabilities in England in a time of austerity. Recent policy shifts from welfare to work welcome more disabled people into the job market. The reality is that disabled people remain under-represented in labour statistics and are conspicuously absent in cultures of work. We live in neoliberal-able times where we all find ourselves precarious. But, people with learning disabilities experience high levels of uncertainty in every aspect of their lives, including work, relationships and community living. Our research reveals an important analytical finding: that when people with learning disabilities are supported in imaginative and novel ways they are able to work effectively and cohesively participate in their local communities (even in a time of cuts to welfare). We conclude by acknowledging that we are witnessing a global politics of precarity and austerity. Our urgent task is to redress the unequal spread of precaritization across our society that risks leaving people with learning disabilities experiencing disproportionately perilous lives. One of our key recommendations is that it makes no economic sense (never mind moral sense) to pull funding from organisations that support people with intellectual disabilities to work.

Points of interest

Disability studies have always engaged with labour.

Many disabled people want to work but are not allowed.

The last five years of British political life have made things even worse, with disabled people finding it harder than ever to find work when opportunities for labour are scarce for everyone.

As work chances decrease, so opportunities for employment support level out.

People with learning disabilities find themselves in a precarious position in relation to the workforce.

We do know, however, that people with learning disabilities, their representative organisations and their supporters have found innovative ways of supporting people so-labelled into work.

Financial cuts to these organisations and other services – known as austerity measures – risk undermining these innovative practices.

We therefore need to urgently address the precarious lives of people with learning disabilities in society.

Introduction

Disability studies have always engaged with labour. A leitmotif of the British social model of disability is that disabled people want to work but are not allowed (for example, Oliver 1996Oliver, M. 1996. Understanding Disability: From Theory to Practice. Basingstoke: Macmillan. 10.1007/978-1-349-24269-6[CrossRef]). These materialist scholars unveiled exclusionary workings of capitalist societies where disabled people are institutionalised as objects of labour (linked to practices of rehabilitative and medical practitioners) or made unemployable (associated with distinctions between those deemed work capable and those deficient). This literature exposed deeply disablist ideas underpinning work as a signifier of valued citizenship (Goodley 2016 Goodley, D. 2016. Disability Studies: An Interdisciplinary Introduction. 2nd ed. London: Sage.). The last five years of British political life have made things even worse, with disabled people finding it harder than ever to find work when opportunities for labour are scarce for everyone. As work chances decrease, so opportunities for employment support level out. Welfare interventions (for disabled and non-disabled people) around employment access and support are reduced by austerity. These new human landscapes demand nuanced theoretical responses encapsulated by a critical disability studies approach (Goodley 2014 Goodley, D. 2014. Dis/Ability Studies: Theorising Disablism and Ableism. London: Routledge., 2016 Goodley, D. 2016. Disability Studies: An Interdisciplinary Introduction. 2nd ed. London: Sage.; Meekosha and Shuttleworth 2009 Meekosha, H., and R. Shuttleworth. 2009. “What’s So ‘Critical’ about Critical Disability Studies?” Australian Journal of Human Rights 15 (1): 47–75.; Shildrick 2012 Shildrick, M. 2012. “Critical Disability Studies: Rethinking the Conventions for the Age of Postmodernity.” In Routledge Handbook of Disability Studies, edited by N. Watson, A. Roulstone and C. Thomas, 30–41. London: Routledge.). This position starts with disability but brings in other identities – such as feminist and queer (McRuer 2012 McRuer, R. 2012. Disability and the Globalisation of Austerity Politics. Keynote paper presented at the Contact Zone: Disability, Culture, Theory conference, 25-27 October, University of Cologne.; Shildrick 2012 Shildrick, M. 2012. “Critical Disability Studies: Rethinking the Conventions for the Age of Postmodernity.” In Routledge Handbook of Disability Studies, edited by N. Watson, A. Roulstone and C. Thomas, 30–41. London: Routledge.) – to strengthen our analytical grip on the shifting sands of late capitalist societies. This approach includes recognising psychological impacts of oppression and the politicisation of emotional life (Goodley 2014Goodley, D. 2014. Dis/Ability Studies: Theorising Disablism and Ableism. London: Routledge.). Experiences of discrimination – and incidents of marginalisation in relation to the labour force – are deeply unsettling. One concept that encapsulates this personal and political feeling of uncertainty is precarity, which:

designates that politically induced condition in which certain populations suffer from failing social and economic networks of support and become differentially exposed to injury, violence, and death. Such populations are at heightened risk of disease, poverty, starvation, displacement, and of exposure to violence without protection. (Butler 2009 Butler, J. 2009. “Performativity, Precarity and Sexual Politics.” AIBR. Revista De Antropología Iberoamericana 4 (3) i–xiii. 10.11156/aibr[CrossRef], [Web of Science ®], ii)

Feminist philosophers understand precarity as a core element of the human condition and an organising trope for political action (Puar 2012 Puar, J. K. 2012. “Precarity Talk: A Virtual Roundtable with Lauren Berlant.” Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar, and Ana Vujanovic, TDR: The Drama Review 56 (4): 163–177.). Our own take is that we disavow precarity. We are drawn to it as a human quality and attracted to its potential as a politicised phenomenon around which to agitate. Simultaneously, we are repulsed by precarity, especially when some human beings are made more vulnerable than others. Our understanding of the differential spread of precarity is enhanced by our engagement with dis/ability. This split term acknowledges that disability can never exist without implicit reference to its opposite, ability (see Goodley 2014 Goodley, D. 2014. Dis/Ability Studies: Theorising Disablism and Ableism. London: Routledge.). While our article is interested in the work that is done by disability to the world, we also deploy dis/ability to keep in mind that our social world values ability over disability. Vulnerability is being human. But the marks of ability or disability lead to very different relationships with vulnerability. Dis/ability emerges in our contemporary times:

as a moment of relational ethics: urging us to think again about how we are all made through our connections with others and encouraging us to embrace ways of living that are not rigidly framed by humanistic values of independence and autonomy. (Goodley, Lawthom, and Runswick-Cole 2014Goodley, D., R. Lawthom, and K. Runswick-Cole. 2014. “Dis/Ability and Austerity: Beyond Work and Slow Death.” Disability & Society 29 (6): 980–984. doi:10.1080/09687599.2014.920125.[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®], 349)

Our article attends to an under-represented consideration; that employment in the lives of people with learning disabilities shines significant light on our precarious lives. The lives and labour of people so-labelled have been sidelined by studies of dis/ability and ignored by mainstream social theories (Goodley 2016 Goodley, D. 2016. Disability Studies: An Interdisciplinary Introduction. 2nd ed. London: Sage.). This absence is a human tragedy. But by ignoring disability we are also missing a trick. Our research has demonstrated that not only is the meaning of precarity made coherent by people with learning disabilities but people so-labelled and their supporters have developed many imaginative ways of resisting precarity and working austerity. Turning to the politics of learning disability is not simply being inclusive; it might actually reveal tactics of opposition. In this article we begin by exploring the precaritisation of the lives of the many in neoliberal capitalist Britain. We then go on to consider the ways in which precarity is differentially spread, thinking specifically about the lives of people with learning disabilities. We resist what might be seen as a gloomy prognosis by following Butler ( 2009 Butler, J. 2009. “Performativity, Precarity and Sexual Politics.” AIBR. Revista De Antropología Iberoamericana 4 (3) i–xiii. 10.11156/aibr [CrossRef], [Web of Science ®]) and focusing on the bonds that bind people together to support people into work; bonds that in part emerge as a product of (and response to) precarity. Finally, we celebrate the productive potential that dis/ability displays in demanding us to think creatively and differently about work.

Theorising precarity and work

We draw on feminist and queer philosophers’ theoretical understandings of precarity, including the work of Lauren Berlant, Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar and Ana Vujanovic in their roundtable discussion Precarity Talk (Puar 2012Puar, J. K. 2012. “Precarity Talk: A Virtual Roundtable with Lauren Berlant.” Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar, and Ana Vujanovic, TDR: The Drama Review 56 (4): 163–177.). We agree with Lorey (as quoted in Puar 2012Puar, J. K. 2012. “Precarity Talk: A Virtual Roundtable with Lauren Berlant.” Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar, and Ana Vujanovic, TDR: The Drama Review 56 (4): 163–177., 165) that we are all precarious: ‘all contingent beings, and life proceeds without guarantees just with more or less reliable infrastructures of continuity’. Living in precarity has become normalised as an ‘ongoing structural economic problem’ (2012Puar, J. K. 2012. “Precarity Talk: A Virtual Roundtable with Lauren Berlant.” Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar, and Ana Vujanovic, TDR: The Drama Review 56 (4): 163–177., 166). Austere times augment the schism between those who are deemed able enough to work and those who remain jobless (Goodley 2014Goodley, D. 2014. Dis/Ability Studies: Theorising Disablism and Ableism. London: Routledge.; Puar 2012Puar, J. K. 2012. “Precarity Talk: A Virtual Roundtable with Lauren Berlant.” Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar, and Ana Vujanovic, TDR: The Drama Review 56 (4): 163–177.). We live in neoliberal-ableism, where the neoliberal imperative for self-sufficiency (fuelled by economic disasters and austerity policies) is enhanced through the valuing of ableism (an ideological position that assumes people are ready, willing and able to labour and consume) (Goodley 2014Goodley, D. 2014. Dis/Ability Studies: Theorising Disablism and Ableism. London: Routledge.). Ableism is the love child of individualism and independence: a hidden referent to the kind of citizen we should be. We all fail to live up to ableism’s aspirations. Precarity is one psycho-political consequence of this failure. But some are found to be more wanting than others (such as people with learning disabilities). Austerity is a perfect accompaniment to neoliberal-ableist societies; driving forward self-sufficiency through work and shopping in order to make us free. Austerity normalises short-term, insecure and low-wage jobs. The rise in ‘zero hours’ contracts ensures employers are not obliged to provide employees with any minimum working hours although it is assumed that the worker is always available to labour. Precarious arrangements enable markets to thrive, while bodies and minds are made hazardous as promises of work are held out but denied (Puar 2012Puar, J. K. 2012. “Precarity Talk: A Virtual Roundtable with Lauren Berlant.” Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar, and Ana Vujanovic, TDR: The Drama Review 56 (4): 163–177.; Runswick-Cole and Goodley 2015Runswick-Cole, K., and D. Goodley. 2015. “Disability, Austerity and Cruel Optimism in Big Society: Resistance and ‘the Disability Commons’.” Canadian Journal of Disability Studies 4 (2): 162–186. 10.15353/cjds.v4i2[CrossRef]).

Material attacks on the welfare state, underpinned by a zealous adherence to austerity, make us all vulnerable. But precarity is differentially, rather than equally, spread (Butler as quoted in Puar 2012, 170). This is the ‘special genius’ of neoliberal-ableism in which there is wealth for the few and misery for the many (McRuer 2012McRuer, R. 2012. Disability and the Globalisation of Austerity Politics. Keynote paper presented at the Contact Zone: Disability, Culture, Theory conference, 25-27 October, University of Cologne.). Britain has become a ‘5–75–20 society’ (Morton 2015Morton, M. 2015. Something’s Not Right: Insecurity and an Anxious Nation. London: Compass.): a 5% elite with access to economic and social capital shielding them from austerity impacts; 20% marginalised, living in poverty; and the remaining 75% characterised as the ‘new insecure’ living in fear of becoming homeless and destitute. While the white middle-class experience precarity as a new ontology (Lorey as quoted in Puar 2012Puar, J. K. 2012. “Precarity Talk: A Virtual Roundtable with Lauren Berlant.” Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar, and Ana Vujanovic, TDR: The Drama Review 56 (4): 163–177., 172), precaritisation has a long history exposing our fragility as human beings (Butler as quoted in Puar 2012Puar, J. K. 2012. “Precarity Talk: A Virtual Roundtable with Lauren Berlant.” Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar, and Ana Vujanovic, TDR: The Drama Review 56 (4): 163–177., 160), augmented further when work – and the promise of work – shapes what it means to be a valued global citizen. Paid work is tantalisingly held up as the object of desire but remains obstinately out of reach for many people with learning disabilities (Runswick-Cole and Goodley 2015Runswick-Cole, K., and D. Goodley. 2015. “Disability, Austerity and Cruel Optimism in Big Society: Resistance and ‘the Disability Commons’.” Canadian Journal of Disability Studies 4 (2): 162–186. 10.15353/cjds.v4i2[CrossRef]). Unattainable desires are nourished by neoliberal-ableism.

Inter/national policy discourses of employment

Work has held much promise for people with learning disabilities. In the 1980s, the Kings Fund (1984Kings Fund. 1984. An Ordinary Working Life: Vocational Services for People with Mental Handicap. London: Kings Fund Publications.) published An Ordinary Working Life that built on O’Connor and Tizard’s 1950s discussion about the value of employment (Humber 2013Humber, L. A. 2013. “Social Inclusion through Employment: The Marketisation of Employment Support for People with Learning Disabilities in the United Kingdom.” Disability & Society 29 (2): 275–289. doi:10.1080/09687599.2013.776490.[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®], 132). But still we know that less than 10% of people with learning disabilities in the United Kingdom are in paid work, and this figure has stubbornly refused to change for over 20 years (Humber 2013Humber, L. A. 2013. “Social Inclusion through Employment: The Marketisation of Employment Support for People with Learning Disabilities in the United Kingdom.” Disability & Society 29 (2): 275–289. doi:10.1080/09687599.2013.776490.[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®]). Many people so-labelled want employment experiences (Sayce 2011Sayce, L. 2011. Getting in, Staying in and Getting on: Disability Employment Support for the Future. London: Department for Work and Pensions.). But disabled people are twice as likely to live in poverty (compared with non-disabled people) and live in fear of claiming benefits for being portrayed as ‘scroungers’ (Sayce 2011Sayce, L. 2011. Getting in, Staying in and Getting on: Disability Employment Support for the Future. London: Department for Work and Pensions., 10). Employment is linked to better health outcomes, higher social status and increased economic well-being (Sayce 2011Sayce, L. 2011. Getting in, Staying in and Getting on: Disability Employment Support for the Future. London: Department for Work and Pensions.). Work builds relationships, enables community participation and promotes positive self-identities. As Sayce (2011Sayce, L. 2011. Getting in, Staying in and Getting on: Disability Employment Support for the Future. London: Department for Work and Pensions., 6) reminds us, the right to work is enshrined in the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities as ‘the right to work on an equal basis with others in a labour market and work environment that is open, inclusive and accessible’. The United Kingdom is a signatory to the Convention and successive governments have promised work to people with learning disabilities. In 2005 Improving the Life Chances of Disabled People (Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit’s 2005Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit. 2005. Improving the Life Chances of Disabled People. Accessed January 22, 2015.http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/+/http:/www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/media/cabinetoffice/strategy/assets/disability.pdf) articulated a vision that by 2025 disabled people should have full opportunities to improve their quality of life, be included as equal members of society and be afforded opportunities for paid work (Purvis et al. 2012A. Purvis, L. Small, J. Lowrey, D. Whitehurst, M. Davies. 2012. Project SEARCH Evalution: Final Report, London: Office for Disability Issues., 6). In 2009, Valuing Employment Now (Department of Work and Pensions & Department of Health 2009Department of Work and Pensions & Department of Health. 2009. Valuing Employment Now: Real Jobs for Real People. London: HMSO.) recognised the marginalisation of people with learning disabilities. The previous Coalition Government endorsed Valuing Employment Now in 2010 (Beyer 2012Beyer, S. 2012. “The Progress towards Integrated Employment in the UK.” Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation 37: 185–194., 187) and the current British government believes that disabled people can and should be supported to work. This aspiration was also reflected in the introduction of the Employment Support Allowance by the then Labour Government – an out-of-work benefit that makes the promise of an employment pathway through a Work Capability Assessment. The Work Choice programme, introduced in 2010, commissioned a small number of prime contractors, reducing the main contracts from around 200 to eight across the United Kingdom, to move disabled people into work. Work Choice providers do not generally provide recognised supported employment provision and it is estimated that only 4.8% of those on the programme have a moderate to severe learning disability and less than 0.5% have ‘severe mental health needs’ (Beyer 2012Beyer, S. 2012. “The Progress towards Integrated Employment in the UK.” Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation 37: 185–194. 187–188). People with learning disabilities find themselves in a risky position in relation to the Work Choice programme. Work Choice providers stand accused of cherry picking; focusing resources on disabled people who are already ‘close to the labour market’ and thus ignoring people with learning disabilities and people with mental health issues who might require more intensive support (Beyer 2012Beyer, S. 2012. “The Progress towards Integrated Employment in the UK.” Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation 37: 185–194., 192; Department for Work and Pensions 2013Department for Work and Pensions. 2013. Evaluation of the Work Choice Specialist Disability Employment Programme Findings from the 2011 Early Implementation and 2012 Steady State Waves of the research Online at. Accessed January 18, 2015. https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/210683/rrep846.pdf., 20).

In addition to Work Choice, Access to Work offers employment funding to support disabled people once they find a job. Access to Work funds up to £25,000 per year on physical adaptation to workplaces, personal aids (e.g. seats, reading machines), job coaches and transport. However, as minority users, people with learning disabilities occupy a perilous position in relation to the scheme (Beyer 2012Beyer, S. 2012. “The Progress towards Integrated Employment in the UK.” Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation 37: 185–194., 188). Access to Work is not widely known by disabled people or employers, leading Sayce (2011Sayce, L. 2011. Getting in, Staying in and Getting on: Disability Employment Support for the Future. London: Department for Work and Pensions.) to describe the programme as the government’s best-kept secret. The persistent exclusion of people with learning disabilities from paid work demonstrates their differential precarity. Those failed by these work programmes – who remain unemployed – risk being understood as feckless, idle, benefit-scrounging citizens (Runswick-Cole and Goodley 2015Runswick-Cole, K., and D. Goodley. 2015. “Disability, Austerity and Cruel Optimism in Big Society: Resistance and ‘the Disability Commons’.” Canadian Journal of Disability Studies 4 (2): 162–186. 10.15353/cjds.v4i2[CrossRef]).

Cultural attitudes persist that emphasise the innate incapacity of people with learning disabilities. Despite attempts to change attitudes, many people think those with learning disabilities cannot work; a view strengthened by inadequate transitions from school to adult life. There is no statutory requirement to discuss employment as part of the transition reviews from school to life as an adult. Hence employment ‘is not universally considered to be a viable option for these young people by all professionals involved in transition planning’ (Beyer et al. 2008Beyer, S., A. Kaehne, J. Grey, K. Sheppard, and A. Meek. 2008. What Works? Transition to Employment for Young People with Learning Disabilities. Cardiff: Welsh Centre for Learning Disabilities., 5).

A lack of urgent commitment to end the precarious position of people with learning disabilities is made evident by the government’s failure to set outcome targets by which to measure success or failure (Humber 2013Humber, L. A. 2013. “Social Inclusion through Employment: The Marketisation of Employment Support for People with Learning Disabilities in the United Kingdom.” Disability & Society 29 (2): 275–289. doi:10.1080/09687599.2013.776490.[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®]). People so-labelled are offered only the vague promise of moving closer to the labour market. In practice, this has sometimes simply meant moving people from Employment and Support Allowance (a disability and employment-related benefit) to Jobseekers Allowance (an employment benefit) (Humber 2013Humber, L. A. 2013. “Social Inclusion through Employment: The Marketisation of Employment Support for People with Learning Disabilities in the United Kingdom.” Disability & Society 29 (2): 275–289. doi:10.1080/09687599.2013.776490.[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®], 5); seeking rather than doing work.

Supported employment

The main approach to enable people with learning disabilities to enter employment is supported employment (Wilson 2003Wilson, A. 2003. “‘Real Jobs’, ‘Learning Difficulties’ and Supported Employment.” Disability & Society 18 (2): 99–115. 10.1080/0968759032000052770[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®], 99); increasingly cited in policy documents as a successful model for work mobility (Beyer, de Borja Jordan de Urries, and Verdugo 2010Beyer, S., de Borja Jordan de Urries, F. and Verdugo, M. A.2010. “A Comparative Study of the Situaion of Supported Employment in Europe.” Journal of Policy and Practice in Intellectual Disabilities 7 (2): 130–136. 10.1111/jppi.2010.7.issue-2[CrossRef], [Web of Science ®], 129), replacing traditional day services that offered few paid labour opportunities (Wilson 2003 Wilson, A. 2003. “‘Real Jobs’, ‘Learning Difficulties’ and Supported Employment.” Disability & Society 18 (2): 99–115. 10.1080/0968759032000052770[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®], 99). This approach shifts from segregated sheltered workshops and training schemes to open employment, enabled by personal support workers funded by individual budgets (Wilson 2003 Wilson, A. 2003. “‘Real Jobs’, ‘Learning Difficulties’ and Supported Employment.” Disability & Society 18 (2): 99–115. 10.1080/0968759032000052770[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®], 100). Crucially, support is provided on an individual basis to both employer and employee for as long as it is required (Bryan et al. 2000Bryan, A., K. Simons, S. Beyer, and B. Grove. 2000. A Framework for Supported Employment. York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation., iv). A supported employment approach does not subscribe to the view that potential workers have to be ‘work-ready’ before they can start a job, arguing instead that ‘the best place to learn about work is in the workplace’ (2000, 2 Bryan, A., K. Simons, S. Beyer, and B. Grove. 2000. A Framework for Supported Employment. York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation.). Supported employment embeds people within their local communities. Sometimes, a job coach22. A job coach uses matching techniques to identify suitable jobs for individuals and provides on-the-job training, often withdrawing when the person becomes established in their job but offering ongoing support where needed (Bates 2013Bates, K. 2013. “Building the Capacity of Job Coaching Support (Sixteen).”http://www.learningdisabilities.org.uk/our-work/employment-education/building-the-capacity-of-job-coaching-sixteen/).View all notes works closely with the person and the employer to consider a range of different jobs and identify the opportunities to mark out certain tasks that match an individual’s interests and skills.

Support is sometimes offered through job carving, which tailors a job to suit a particular worker. While job carving has been criticised (these jobs are sometimes not thought of as ‘real’ jobs) it has enabled people with learning disabilities to gain jobs (Wilson 2003Wilson, A. 2003. “‘Real Jobs’, ‘Learning Difficulties’ and Supported Employment.” Disability & Society 18 (2): 99–115. 10.1080/0968759032000052770[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®]). Guidance around setting up their own businesses or social enterprises has also been developed (Bates and MacIntosh 2009Bates, K., and K. MacIntosh2009. In Business: Developing a Business Idea. London: the Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities.). Although one in 10 of the population is self-employed, very few people with learning disabilities run their own business (Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities 2012Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities. 2012. Employment. Accessed January 22, 2015.http://www.learningdisabilities.org.uk/help-information/learning-disability-a-z/e/employment-careers/.). The data on work and people with learning disabilities boasts an empirical adequacy to support the view that people so-labelled experience a precarity that is differentiated from their non-disabled peers. Our urgent task is to redress these perilous life chances.

Framing our research questions

Butler (as quoted in Puar 2012Puar, J. K. 2012. “Precarity Talk: A Virtual Roundtable with Lauren Berlant.” Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar, and Ana Vujanovic, TDR: The Drama Review 56 (4): 163–177., 170) argues that no one ‘escapes the precarious dimensions of social life’, but it is possible to ‘establish the bonds that sustain us’. We are encouraged to evidence the human costs of precarity and to find resistant possibilities. The Equality and Human Rights Commission and Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities (FPLD) found that people with learning disabilities3:

are 2.5 times more likely to have health problems than other people;

have a much greater propensity to develop physical and mental health problems compared with the general population;

experience higher rates of hospital admission (76 per 1000 adults) compared with non-disabled people (15 in 1000); and

are subjected to systematic abuse, dangerous restraint methods and needless suffering in the care of the NHS.

Add these experiences to marginalisation from the labour force and we get a clear sense of the predicaments faced by people with learning disabilities. These analytical guides from the theoretical and policy literature led us to pose the following three questions:

In what ways are people with learning disabilities experiencing differential precariousness?

What common bonds sustain people so-labelled in times of austerity?

In what ways does a consideration of learning disabilities expand our understandings of life and labour?

Underpinning research

This article draws upon qualitative data from the Research Council United Kingdom (RCUK)-funded research project ‘Big Society? Disabled People with Learning Disabilities and Civil Society’. This inter-disciplinary, cross-institutional project ran from June 2013 to September 2015 as a partnership between four universities and community partners.44. The project involved the University of Sheffield, Manchester Metropolitan University, Northumbria University and The University of Bristol, and the community partners were Speakup Self-advocacy in Rotherham, BOSS Employment in Bristol, Pete and Wendy Crane (inclusive living advisors), Helen Smith and Max Neill (community circles coordinators, Lancashire), Molly Mattingly (Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities) and David Fiddament (MENCAP).View all notes Community partners worked as co-researchers at various points in the project as we discovered how disabled people with learning disabilities were participating in their communities, in public services and in social action. The team explored access to networks of interdependence as well as their social emotional well-being in a context of austerity.55. See Humanactivism.org (accessed 1st October 2016).View all notes The research was carried out through seven overlapping and interconnected phases as follows:

Key stakeholder interviews with people with learning disabilities, the third sector, policy-makers, lawyers and family members (n = 11 stakeholders).

Longitudinal documentary analysis of academic and policy literature over three years of the project.

Ethnographic case studies with community partners – observing, talking with and learning from our three partners about self-advocacy, work and community living (in Yorkshire, Lancashire and Bristol respectively) (n = 60 days).

Analysis of data collected in the first three phases.Impact workshops (n = 10) – findings were shared with people with learning disabilities, their supporters, service providers, disability organisations and policy-makers. This included individual feedback with people with learning disabilities (n = 15 participants).

Researcher in residence – involved Katherine giving her time to the community partners to help promote their good practice to others (n = 21 days).

Public engagement events – inter/national events to share research and increase the impact of the project (n = 18 events).

Ethical clearance was gained from the University of Sheffield Research Ethics Committee. The research team, including the university and partners, has extensive experience of working with people with learning disabilities in research. This article mainly draws on the findings from the third phase of the research (ethnographic encounters). The participants in the work group were visited three times over a period of 18 months. The ethnographic encounters took the form of interviews that were carried out at a time and place of the participants’ choosing. The interviews were supported by workplace tours and the use of Photovoice66. Uses photographic methods with participants to document and capture important aspects of their lives.View all notes (Booth and Booth 2003Booth, T., and W. Booth. 2003. “In the Frame: Photovoice and Mothers with Learning Difficulties. (2003).” Disability and Society 18 (4): 431–442. 10.1080/0968759032000080986[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®]) to support the conversations.

Our focus participants

Ethnographic research invites intimate prolonged engagements with participants. Over 18 months we developed close research relationships with five participants. Their accounts illuminate complex relationships with work and are chosen here because they allow rich qualitative snapshots of the employment experiences of people with learning disabilities in a time of austerity. We provide the following pen portraits:

Robin is in his thirties. He is very interested in local history and art. He is very active in the self-advocacy movement. He lives with his grandmother and has extended support from other members of his family in a small town in the south-west of England. Robin has two jobs. He works in retail at a local supermarket two days a week. He has worked there for 15 years. Robin is also self-employed and runs a small business. Robin is a talented artist and is a ‘conference facilitator’. He uses images to support the spoken word and text at meetings and conferences. He does not simply provide direct representations, but his artwork provides a level of interpretation to support understanding.

Charlie is in his fifties and lives with his wife in a city in the south of England. He enjoys local amateur dramatics, runs and dances. Charlie works for the city council in their meals service. The meals service provides hot lunches for people in the city who are in need of their support. Charlie works every day and does a range of tasks during the week including recycling, shredding, scanning, filing, cleaning and making teas and coffees. When Charlie applied for the job he was offered a ‘working interview’ where he tried out tasks in order to secure the post. He also had the support of a job coach when he started work. The job coach worked with Charlie to make a checklist for daily and weekly tasks that Charlie uses on a day-to-day basis.

Maria is in her forties, she lives with her mum and dad in a city in the south-west of England. Maria is a keen gardener. She has two jobs. She works two days a week at a drama group running drama workshops with a group of young people with learning disabilities as well as performing herself. She takes part in performances for practitioners teaching them about a range of topics that affect people with learning disabilities, including: how to listen well, independence and sex, relationships and parenting. On Fridays, Maria works at a cleaning company. The company is a social enterprise run by and employing people with learning disabilities. Maria has been involved in the company since it started in 1995. She is a company director.

Poppy is in her twenties, she lives with her parents in a city in the south-west of England. She enjoys music and dancing and being part of her church community. Poppy has just completed a supported internship77. The supported internships scheme helps young disabled people aged 16–24 to find work. The scheme is run by further education colleges who work with employers to find a job that suits the abilities of each intern and to create a person-centred programme. For more information, see: https://www.gov.uk/government/policies/increasing-options-and-improving-provision-for-children-with-special-educational-needs-sen/supporting-pages/supported-internships-for-young-people-with-sen (accessed 1st October 2016).View all notes with the city council. She is still volunteering at two of her work placements – a café and a baby music session – but she has yet to find paid work. The rest of her week is made up of horse riding and volunteering at the local food bank with her father. She has had three job coaches since she completed her supported internship.

Sunshine is in her thirties and lives in supported living in a city in the south-west of England. Sunshine arrived in the United Kingdom with her family when she was 15 years old. Sunshine loves buying and selling goods at local markets. Sunshine has two jobs. She works as a cleaner two days a week for a local charity and she works at a café for one day a week. Sunshine is planning to move house so that she can live in her own flat with on-call support. She would like to earn more money and to have one job.

Analysis

Authors individually and collectively subjected transcripts to thematic analysis and responses were pooled (Snow, Morrill, and Anderson 2004 Snow, D. A., C. Morrill, and L. Anderson. 2004. “Elaborating Analytic Ethnography: Linking Fieldwork and Theory.” Ethnography 4 (2): 153–155.). We reflected on our research questions, connected themes with the broader literature and read for tropes of precarity, common bonds and meanings of work. Theoretical readings of the ethnographic material (led by Dan and Katherine) were supplemented by the policy and practice lens offered by Keith (drawing on 25 years of experience in the field of supported employment). Findings revealed complex engagements with paid work by people with learning disabilities (see Runswick-Cole and Goodley 2015 Runswick-Cole, K., and D. Goodley. 2015. “Disability, Austerity and Cruel Optimism in Big Society: Resistance and ‘the Disability Commons’.” Canadian Journal of Disability Studies 4 (2): 162–186. 10.15353/cjds.v4i2[CrossRef]).

In what ways are people with learning disabilities experiencing differential precariousness?

All of our participants were living with uncertainties in their working and personal lives. The longitudinal nature of the study revealed the ongoing changes in people’s circumstances. For Robin, uncertainty about employment was framed in positive ways. He has set up his own business with the help of his business Circle of Support88. A business Circle of Support is a group of people who come together to support a person to run their own business. The business circle will include people with expertise in running their own business and with business-specific knowledge (Bates and MacIntosh 2009 Bates, K., and K. MacIntosh2009. In Business: Developing a Business Idea. London: the Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities.).View all notes and he is hopeful that it will develop into a bigger enterprise:

One day, I hope that I will run my own business and have a little office. I would like to start employing people who are interested in doing artwork. (Robin)

Nevertheless, for most of the participants, uncertainty was the result of more negative life changes. Charlie had worked at the meals service9 in his city for a number of years. However, due to local authority funding cuts, the service was moving premises, and the planned move had been delayed, leading to doubts over whether or not the move would go ahead. This was worrying Charlie. He had been told that his job would change after the move but he did not know exactly how:

We were supposed to be moving to new buildings in September but it hasn’t happened, it will be February now … We might have to stand up all day, I don’t mind standing up but I don’t want to stand up for too long. I want move about a lot and find all the jobs. (Charlie)

Charlie’s anxieties were heightened by his manager leaving her position. She had been a key mentor for Charlie in his time at the meals service. More generally, there was an increasing sense of low staff morale and anxiety about the impending move and possible changes to staffing levels and job losses. By 2016, the National Audit Office stated that funding for local authorities will have fallen by 37% in real terms (BBC News Online 2014 BBC News Online. 2014. Auditors’ Warning over Council Cuts. Accessed January 22, 2015. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-30108142). Charlie’s colleagues were concerned about their own job futures and felt themselves to be at risk. Their continued support for Charlie was being tested. In addition to the uncertainty in Charlie’s job, his wife’s situation had also changed:

Since I’ve last seen you, things have changed a bit. My wife isn’t working in the café any more, they’ve closed that down, it’s gone. She’s going to have a meeting with her job coach. She’s still working at the [supermarket] stacking shelves but would like to work a bit more. (Charlie)

Maria’s work was also changing:

Since the last time I’ve seen you, things have changed a bit. I’ve stepped down as director of [cleaning company] because I was finding it a bit difficult. I was finding it a bit difficult sometimes, like when the new directors were having meetings on a morning I was always here doing drama. And I also felt like it was time to step down because I’d been doing it a long time and I wanted to give other people a chance in the group.

The change of directors prompted Maria to vacate her role. She felt a responsibility to a company she had worked with for 20 years but felt no longer able to carry on. Changes in her family life as a carer for her elderly parents also seemed to play a part in her decision. Life was also uncertain for Poppy. She told us:

I didn’t find a job after [supported internship scheme]. I have had three different job coaches since it finished. (Poppy)

The lack of continuity of support to find employment was difficult for Poppy. When we first met her she was enthusiastic about the possibility of a paid job. Later on she told us she had changed her mind and she wanted to stay at the café where she was a volunteer:

I still do the café work but I don’t want another [paid] job because I want to stay at my cafes. I like it there. I like wiping up and clearing away. If I could be paid at the café where I work that would be good. (Poppy)

Without the benefit of continued support, the prospect of paid work was perceived as a risk. Leaving the job she loved and people that she liked being with was more important to her than paid work. She valued stability and friendships above the prospect of paid employment. Her desires rested with her friendships rather than salary.

When we first met Sunshine, she too was looking for another job. Sunshine had two part-time jobs, but she wanted one job, and one that paid more money:

I like my jobs but I’m looking for another one. I went looking for another job but they didn’t get back to me so I don’t know what is going on. I would like to have one job and to earn more money, that would be nice.

But the second time we met Sunshine, she revealed the shaky position which she found herself in and why she had been so keen to get another job:

My Personal Independence Payment (PIP) has come through now, they backdated my money and I’m getting quite a lot of money so I’m fine for money now. Last time you saw me, I was only getting Employment Support Allowance but now my PIP has come through I’ve got enough money. I had to wait for the money while my PIP came through. It has taken ages to pay me back.

Sunshine’s financial position was becoming increasingly unstable as she faced redundancy from her café job at the same time as waiting for her PIP payment to come through. She explained:

I didn’t get my assessment in on time so they stopped my money [Disability Living Allowance], but luckily the PIP came through just before my job at the café finished. (Sunshine)

Disabled people are twice as likely to live in poverty as non-disabled people (Office for Disability Issues 2013 Office for Disability Issues (ODI). 2013. Individuals Living in Persistent Poverty. Accessed January 29, 2015. http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20131128110838/http:/odi.dwp.gov.uk/disability-statistics-and-research/disability-equality-indicators.php). Waiting for a benefit to be paid put Sunshine under financial and emotional stress and at risk of personal financial shock.

While all participants faced changes at work, home life too was often shifting. Charlie was living with less money since his wife had been made redundant. Robin hinted that there might be changes to his family life because his grandmother had become ‘a bit unwell’. Poppy was about to spend a week with a Shared Lives1010. Shared Lives is an alternative to home care and care homes for disabled adults and older people, used by around 15,000 people in the United Kingdom. In Shared Lives, a Shared Lives carer and someone who needs support get to know each other and, if they both feel that they will be able to form a long-term bond, they share family and community life. See more at: http://www.sharedlivesplus.org.uk/what-is-shared-lives/shared-lives#sthash.PiGQBD2Q.dpuf (accessed 1st October 2016).View all notes family while her parents went on holiday, with a view to this becoming a longer-term future placement. Maria’s decision to step down from the cleaning company was shaped by her increased caring responsibilities for her older parents:

My dad has been unwell, not himself at all, and that has been adding to it. I’m trying not to be worried about it and to get on with my work because you have to.

Sunshine’s move to a flat on her own was on hold but the prospect of change was there for her too as she continued to consider a move. While Sunshine was initiating the change in her home life, the uncertainty experienced by Robin, Charlie, Maria and Poppy was beyond their control. As Maria told us, to live well with precarity means ‘you just have to try not to worry and get on’. Robin expressed concerns about cuts to self-advocacy:11

Since I last saw you I’ve been working with the story telling group and the advocacy group. But the advocacy group, there’s been cuts there, really fast. And there are only a few people on the partnership board now. They are still have Partnership Board12  meetings, but they aren’t going to have big grand meetings with lots of people there. Lots of jobs have gone, the self advocacy jobs have been taken over by large organisations and they are employing less self advocates now. I’m still on the management group but I don’t get paid, I volunteer. People haven’t got the money to travel to meetings. People who live in residential places don’t really have a choice about whether they can go to a meeting or not. There is no support worker to take them. And the creative arts groups are struggling to get money, there’s less people at those meetings.

In times of austerity, the erosion of self-advocacy services denies people a voice, when they most need one. People with learning disabilities experience an unequal distribution of precarity due to complex arrangements associated with inflexible support, experiences of poverty, changes to advocacy and unstable home lives.

What common bonds sustain people so-labelled in times of austerity?

Thus far we have presented a rather gloomy prognosis for people with learning disabilities. But this reveals only part of the story. Robin, Charlie, Maria, Poppy and Sunshine all talked about the interconnections and bonds that sustained them. Robin described the support from his business circle:

I’ve got my secretary Claire and Paul my artistic advisor. Rob who is the area coordinator the supported employment team here and Alison, my PA, which is funded through my personal budget.

Charlie was supported in applying for his job at the meals service:

To get this job, I did a ‘working interview’, I tried out some of the jobs for the interview as well as answering some questions. At first it was very tiring working here, but I didn’t give up. I said to myself: ‘don’t give up, just do it, don’t give up’. And I got lots of support from my job coaches form the local Council at first. I needed them a lot at first, but not so much now.

Charlie was sustained in his role, by his job coach. Together they developed a checklist that details tasks to be completed each day and each week:

I have a list of the jobs I need to do each day and the jobs that need to be done once a week and I tick them off so I know what I’ve done and what I need to do next. (Charlie)

His colleagues offered him support that went beyond the usual boundaries of a workplace. Together Charlie and his manager had agreed that he would be weighed at work each week:

I get weighed at work too. I wanted help to be healthy, I don’t want any heart attacks.

For Charlie, rather than this being seen as intrusively overstepping the boundaries of an employer–employee relationship, he enjoyed the ‘weigh in’ and found it supportive. Work was a place to build mutually beneficial support networks. Maria talked about her work with younger people:

[Place name] is a place where I come to drama every week, and I work in a core group on a Monday, and on a Wednesday I help another lady teach a young group of adults with learning difficulties under the age of 13 to do drama. [Place name] is a place where there are lots of different courses there are lots of people in the community can come too.

She described the ways in which the cleaning company was a supportive community for its members:

We have meetings to talk about whether there are any problems with any of the cleaning – that gets sorted out at the meetings. (Maria)

Maria’s work also involved reaching out to the wider community, doing disability equality training and informing professional practice:

One of the things I like about working in the drama group is the training. We work with people who are working with adults with learning difficulties. With doctors, nurses and others. We do plays for them. We’ve also done plays in schools … We did one about salt in food. The teachers didn’t realise how much salt they was eating in a day, and one even pulled a big sandwich out in front of me and starting eating it. I said ‘do you know how much salt is in that?’ I’ve done an animation film with artists.

Participants were supported by their relationships with family members, colleagues, local communities and paid support workers. Indeed, as the debate captured by Puar (2012 Puar, J. K. 2012. “Precarity Talk: A Virtual Roundtable with Lauren Berlant.” Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar, and Ana Vujanovic, TDR: The Drama Review 56 (4): 163–177.) acknowledges, in thinking about our vulnerabilities we are asked to consider the kinds of assemblages and interdependencies that are the hallmarks of being human. These relationships enabled our participants to live. But, as we saw earlier, there is also a sense of fragility to these affiliations. Truly recognising precarity alerts us to its liminalities as well as its possibilities. Moreover, the presence of disability further enhances these limits and opportunities.

In what ways does a consideration of learning disabilities expand our understandings of life and labour?

We have written elsewhere about the ways in which dis/ability enlarges, disrupts and expand understandings of labour (Goodley and Runswick-Cole 2014 Goodley, D., and K. Runswick-Cole. 2014.” Becoming Dis/Human: Thinking about the Human through Disability, Discourse.” Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education 7 (1): 1–15. doi: 10.1080/01596306.2014.930021.[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®]). Critical disability studies illuminates the ways in which dis/ability urges all of us to think again about what it means to be human (for example, Titchkosky 2016 Titchkosky, T. 2016. “Monitoring Disability: The Question of the ‘Human’ in Human Rights Projects.” In Collection on Disability, Human Rights, and Humanitarianism, edited by C. Schlund-Vials and M. Gill, 119–136. Publisher Ashgate Press.). Disability research has emphasised notions of interdependence, community and support – not as markers of deficiency or lack – but as extended notions of what it means to live as a self intimately connected to others. Shakespeare (2000 Shakespeare, T. 2000. Help. Birmingham, AL: Venture Press.), for example, argued against narrow notions of independence (and its distinction from the socially devalued position of dependency), emphasising instead mutuality and interdependence with one another. Research on families of disabled children has maintained the need to think about parenting and support of disabled children not simply in terms of the actions of parents and family units but instead as products of inclusive communities that recognise and support children and their families (for example, Ryan and Runswick-Cole 2008 Ryan, S., and K. Runswick-Cole. 2008. “Repositioning Mothers: Mothers.” Disabled Children and Disability Studies, Disability and Society 23 (3): 199–210.[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®]; Traustadóttir 1995Traustadóttir, R. 1995. “A Mother’s Work is Never Done, Constructing a ‘Normal’ Family Life.” In The Variety of Community Experience: Qualitative Studies of Family and Community Life, edited by S. J. Taylor, R. Bogdan and Z. M. Lutfiyya, 47–65. Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes.). Furthermore, the political work of disability organisations such as People First – the international activist movement of people associated with the label of intellectual disabilities – has exemplified the ways in which competence, autonomy and self-determination are distributed phenomena (tied to the connections with supportive others) rather than individualised traits (Goodley 2000 Goodley, D. 2000. Self-Advocacy in the Lives of People with Learning Disabilities. Buckingham: Open University Press.; Williams and Shoultz 1982 Williams, P., and B. Shoultz. 1982. We Can Speak for Ourselves. London: Souvenir Press.).

Even in precarious times, we see the productive potential of the presence of dis/ability in the participants’ accounts. Robin’s business emerges because of the presence of dis/ability; as he says, ‘I offer accessible transcription for all’. What starts as a demand or need associated with dis/ability becomes a form of support to be offered to all. Moving forward he is able to work the dis/ability complex to develop his business and to support other people in understanding new information and ideas. He describes his business circle as being ‘a bit like King Arthur’s Round Table’. Dis/ability prompts an imaginative response to the need to support Robin in developing his business.

Maria’s cleaning company is yet another example of a positive and productive response to dis/ability. The cleaning company opened 20 years ago, and Maria describes the attitudes she faced (that sadly still persist today) that people with learning disabilities cannot work. In challenging these attitudes, Maria reveals the productive presence of dis/ability to spark innovation:

And I felt really horrible by that because just because a person has got a learning disability you can’t really say that, because you don’t know the person. I mean I didn’t even know I could get a job myself, and I did it all by myself because I wanted to and I weren’t going to let anybody stand in my way and tell me it’s wrong. And when I used to go to a Job Centre with my mum and they used to say ‘she can’t do any work, she’s got a learning disability and she won’t be able to work’. And then I met some people on the bus from [day centre] and they said they’d got jobs going, and that’s how I started … people told us we couldn’t – and we have. So stick your fingers up at them!

Supporting disabled people into work is not simply a moral argument. In pragmatic terms we have uncovered clear evidence that many people with learning disabilities – co-existing in their communities with families, job coaches, employers, support workers and friends –have the requisite skill sets to work. We know that when people with learning disabilities are supported well, they can access workplaces and contribute in significant ways. Yet, too often, support is inconsistent. The availability of supported internships, supporting employment methods and access to job coaches is patchy across the country to the extent that a postcode lottery persists (Greig et al. 2014Greig, R., P. Chapman, A. Eley, R. Watts, and G. Bourlet. 2014. The Cost Effectiveness of Employment Support for People with Disabilities Final Detailed Research Report. Bristol: National Development Team for Inclusion.). A national register for job coaches and the rolling out of professional qualifications to develop the job coach might begin to address some of these issues. After all, we have uncovered innovation around work that, well, works. Supporting the work experiences of people with learning disabilities should never be an act of tragedy, pity, calling or guilt. The split term of dis/ability reminds us that successful work experiences are associated with feeling able to participate. These work abilities are crucially tied to the interconnections we have with others who support and enable us.

Conclusion

Our research invites us to put forward a number of significant recommendations for thinking of precarity and work in a time of austerity. First, we need to address the differential precarity associated with dis/ability. Disabled people are at the foreground of the anti-austerity movement precisely because they are among the first to suffer the cuts of austerity (Goodley 2014 Goodley, D. 2014. Dis/Ability Studies: Theorising Disablism and Ableism. London: Routledge., 2016 Goodley, D. 2016. Disability Studies: An Interdisciplinary Introduction. 2nd ed. London: Sage.). A review of the economic and policy context in which people with learning disabilities are looking for work reveals a host of broken promises (on the part of successive governments) in relation to promoting work opportunities. This clearly needs to change, not least in raising aspirations and opportunities for young people in the school years. People with learning disabilities are experiencing a form of double disadvantage as welfare cuts threaten their own job opportunities as well as those of their colleagues who provide the support for them to work. These perilous positions experienced in work life are often repeated in home life where uncertainty, often about ageing family member, tends to persist.

Second, we need to tackle different kinds of precarity. We demand new conversations about austerity’s impact on cultural, societal and psychological realms. The British government clearly had enough wealth to bail out the banks whilst rendering many poor people destitute by austerity policies. These cuts to essential services risk undermining human networks of competence that people with learning disabilities draw upon and contribute to. Precarity is felt just as acutely at the relational level as it is the economic (Butler 2009 Butler, J. 2009. “Performativity, Precarity and Sexual Politics.” AIBR. Revista De Antropología Iberoamericana 4 (3) i–xiii. 10.11156/aibr[CrossRef], [Web of Science ®]).

Third, we need to resource organisations of disabled people to address precarity. The novel ways of working developed by these organisations need to be funded even in a time of austerity (Sayce 2011 Sayce, L. 2011. Getting in, Staying in and Getting on: Disability Employment Support for the Future. London: Department for Work and Pensions.). We need to see early investment now for long-term gain and policy-makers should turn to disabled people and their allies first when seeking examples of good practice.

Fourth, we must disavow work. We desire employment. Supporting people with learning disabilities into work makes sense economically. Work is a place where people with intellectual disabilities can craft identities that sit in counter-distinction to the passive subject positions afforded by the psychiatric and psychological literature: contrast, for example, ‘I work’ with ‘I go to a day centre’. Labour has the potential to deconstruct intellectual disability. Labouring shows you are doing something: you are able. Work is enabling. But work also debilitates and exploits (Puar 2009 Puar, J. K. 2009. “Prognosis Time: Towards a Geopolitics of Affect, Debility and Capacity.” Women & Performance: A Journal of Feminist Theory 19 (2): 161–172. 10.1080/07407700903034147[Taylor & Francis Online]). We must always treat work with caution.

Finally, we must ask what does dis/ability do to employment? Dis/ability and work collide in some fascinating, unexpected and frictional ways. How we conceptualise work is refashioned through an encounter with learning disabilities (Goodley, Lawthom, and Runswick-Cole 2014 Goodley, D., R. Lawthom, and K. Runswick-Cole. 2014. “Dis/Ability and Austerity: Beyond Work and Slow Death.” Disability & Society 29 (6): 980–984. doi:10.1080/09687599.2014.920125.[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®]). Care, support and mutuality are key conditions of what it means to be human – illuminated by the presence of dis/ability – and too often are missing from workplaces. Many disabled people permit the labour of others – such as carers and Personal Assistant (PA) – and there is still a body of work to be done on the affirmative possibilities of caring relationships offered by disabled people (Shakespeare 2000 Shakespeare, T. 2000. Help. Birmingham, AL: Venture Press.).

Notes

We use the term ‘learning disability’ here to reflect the terminology within current UK policy documents. We acknowledge that this is a highly contested label.

 A job coach uses matching techniques to identify suitable jobs for individuals and provides on-the-job training, often withdrawing when the person becomes established in their job but offering ongoing support where needed (Bates 2013 Bates, K. 2013. “Building the Capacity of Job Coaching Support (Sixteen).”http://www.learningdisabilities.org.uk/our-work/employment-education/building-the-capacity-of-job-coaching-sixteen/).

See http://www.learningdisabilities.org.uk/help-information/Learning-Disability-Statistics-/187705/ and www.equalityhumanrights.com/IsEnglandFairer (accessed 1st October 2016).

The project involved the University of Sheffield, Manchester Metropolitan University, Northumbria University and The University of Bristol, and the community partners were Speakup Self-advocacy in Rotherham, BOSS Employment in Bristol, Pete and Wendy Crane (inclusive living advisors), Helen Smith and Max Neill (community circles coordinators, Lancashire), Molly Mattingly (Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities) and David Fiddament (MENCAP).

See Humanactivism.org (accessed 1st October 2016).

Uses photographic methods with participants to document and capture important aspects of their lives.

The supported internships scheme helps young disabled people aged 16–24 to find work. The scheme is run by further education colleges who work with employers to find a job that suits the abilities of each intern and to create a person-centred programme. For more information, see: https://www.gov.uk/government/policies/increasing-options-and-improving-provision-for-children-with-special-educational-needs-sen/supporting-pages/supported-internships-for-young-people-with-sen (accessed 1st October 2016).

A business Circle of Support is a group of people who come together to support a person to run their own business. The business circle will include people with expertise in running their own business and with business-specific knowledge (Bates and MacIntosh 2009 Bates, K., and K. MacIntosh 2009. In Business: Developing a Business Idea. London: the Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities.).

Meals services in the United Kingdom provide hot meals to people living in their own homes, who are unable to cook for themselves. Their clients are often older people and disabled people.

Shared Lives is an alternative to home care and care homes for disabled adults and older people, used by around 15,000 people in the United Kingdom. In Shared Lives, a Shared Lives carer and someone who needs support get to know each other and, if they both feel that they will be able to form a long-term bond, they share family and community life. See more at: http://www.sharedlivesplus.org.uk/what-is-shared-lives/shared-lives#sthash.PiGQBD2Q.dpuf (accessed 1st October 2016).

Self-advocacy is about people with learning disabilities speaking up for themselves (Goodley 2000 Goodley, D. 2000. Self-Advocacy in the Lives of People with Learning Disabilities. Buckingham: Open University Press.).

Learning Disability Partnership Boards meet in specific local authorities. They are made up of people with learning disabilities, family members and carers and representatives. Partnership Boards intend to give people with a learning disability a say in how local services are delivered.

#precarity #queer #feminism #learning disability #austerity #employment #united kingdom #Other Countries #other countries' problems #society #participation #inclusion #social welfare

[nofomoartworld]

Hyperallergic: Diana Copperwhite: Signal to Noise

Diana Cooperwhite, “Depend on the morning sun” (2016), 150 x 150 cm (all images courtesy Gallery Thomas Jaeckel, NY)

Sometimes a single, simple pictorial device is all it takes to set your work apart from your contemporaries. At mid-career, the Dublin-based painter Diana Copperwhite has hit upon a crazily recognizable way of applying paint that both updates (somewhat tongue-in-cheekily) the concept of the “autographic mark” so prized by the analysts of Abstract Expressionism, and simultaneously taps into a leitmotif of contemporary, computer-inflected visuality, the color gradient.

The new Diana Copperwhite monograph with an essay by Gail Levin and the painting “Confucious confused” (2016) on the cover.

She hasn’t totally figured out yet what to do with it, but her command of painting’s essentials is sure and her determination to work through the ramifications of this particular device amply evident, so it seems like just a matter of time before she starts making truly magnificent work.

Six oil-on-canvas paintings dated 2016 constitute Depend on the Morning Sun, Copperwhite’s second solo show at 532 Gallery Thomas Jaeckel. They are broadly and energetically painted, using (apparently) an array of tools for scraping, wiping, splashing, and smearing— nothing unfamiliar there.

But Copperwhite also uses wide, flat brushes that were evidently loaded with a precise sequence of hues along the bristles’ tips, so that the resulting stroke is a multi-colored band. The constituent colors blend a bit where they meet but generally hold their places in the line-up whether the mark is short and choppy, drawn out into a meandering trail, or (most often) something in-between, taking a curve or two. It is a flashy move — it could become gimmicky if Copperwhite’s not careful — but for the moment, at least, the artist’s mark-making chutzpah is working in her paintings’ favor.

Diana Cooperwhite, “Weird glamour” (2016), 230 x 180 cm

These blended blurs tend to be the paintings’ focal points. A tricolor swatch in red, pale yellow and yellow-green pops up near the center of “Green light,” flapping like a flag in the wind. Nearby, crimson and blue striations (merging into purple and violet variations) punctuate the canvas, structuring the otherwise chaotic space. Just above the centerline, an incongruous semicircular curve, fat with phthalo blue, naphthol red, and a salmon-pink core, puts a brake on the action around it— ultimately, it is the composition’s primary figure, and the rest of the painting is ground.

It may be an abbreviated human figure, as well — a cranium, to be exact. At the center of the 90-by-70-inch “Weird glamour” and the smaller but compositionally similar “A pale thunder” are juicy strokes tracing the unmistakable contour of head to neck to shoulder to upper back (or upper arm). In “Weird glamour,” a window of deep space behind the head and a subtle but telling diagonal descending from the upper left are enough to place the figure in an architectural interior: an office, maybe, full of free-floating banners and awnings in orange, scarlet, magenta and teal.

Diana Copperwhite, “A pale thunder” (2016), 100 x 100 cm

My American eye detects the possibility that California painters such as David Park and Elmer Bischoff, who painted figures and their immediate surroundings with both precision and laden brushes, lurk at the back of Copperwhite’s mind. (For that matter, so might the British painters Leon Kossoff and Frank Auerbach.) But beyond the matter of Copperwhite’s touch is the strong sense that the personage in the picture is going it alone in a hostile (or anyway bewildering) environment, making his or her way through a signifying blizzard of signs (be they icon, index, or symbol). As such, they are second cousins to Francis Bacon’s forsaken souls.

Bacon often isolated his subjects at the center of oppressively stark settings in which details are scarce. Copperwhite goes in the opposite direction but arrives at the same place; though nearly engulfed by the sensations that accrue to their situation, her head-and-shoulder figural units are no less isolated than Bacon’s naked, abject loners.

Not much in painting is truly new, but some tropes, once adopted, can be amplified and recontextualized, their potential rediscovered by another artist’s creative imagination. I associate this banded-brushstroke technique with Howard Hodgkin, who has for many years made occasional use of a rougher sort of proto-gradient, loading his brushes with multiple colors and laying in blunt and/or sensuous strokes of thick, multicolored paint.

In my read of Hodgkin, whose eye-hand coordination was formed well before the digital era, the device accentuates the manual; the much younger Copperwhite (b. 1969) makes it look technological, potentially abrasive and slightly hallucinatory. Not as hallucinatory as Bernard Frize does, mind you — though Frize seems to me to be concerned primarily with painterly procedure for its own sake. I’ve no doubt there are others working with this method. (There must be someone in L.A.)

“Predilection for fiction” contains no overt figurative hook. There are few indicators of architecture but for a pretty arch — two strokes of the brush — peeking out from behind the painting’s main event, a central, horizontal rectangle streaked vertically with some of the punchiest chroma in the show. Here as elsewhere, it appears that Copperwhite used a blending brush to further soften the transitions between the bars of color. The painting’s interior framing of this cloistered, intensified core echoes another of Hodgkins’ pictorial inclinations. It is a take on the painting-within-a-painting idea, or (if you shift the scale to landscape) maybe a drive-in-movie-screen-within-a-painting.

Diana Copperwhite, “Predilection for fiction”(2016), 170 x 230

At about five feet square, “Depend on the morning sun” is among the smaller paintings in the show, but it contains one of the broadest gradients — two horizontal-ish swipes of a brush outfitted with crimson, titanate yellow, Prussian blue and orange-pink, about a foot wide — slapped onto the upper right corner like a warning sign. Secondary, vertical banding on this patch looks like a blurred reflection such as you might see on the side of a passing train, and thus creates the illusion of rapid movement (which, interestingly, most of these blended passages don’t). Copperwhite uses whites, light grays and pale tints (especially pinks and violets) extensively, but here her snowy palette becomes chalky, and the artificial light she seems to be pursuing dissipates.

When a painting or other artwork is titled after a song lyric, you’ve got to wonder what aspect of the music is reflected in the art. New Order’s “True Faith” contains the phrase “depend on the morning sun,” so we surmise that a wistful daybreak epiphany of self-worth and personal agency is somehow relevant to Copperwhite’s motivation for the eponymous painting. But actually, looking at the show I found myself thinking about the great Dublin band My Bloody Valentine.

Phenomenally loud, MBV’s guitar-driven avant-rock features drifting, haunted melodic lines that emerge from a deluge of electronic distortion, dissonance, and pure noise. There are correspondences in the way Copperwhite’s squalls of non-depictive paint frame and support her shimmering pools and polychrome slipstreams, which seem to border on description (acid rainbows? ribbon candy streamers?) but sidestep mimesis. The music’s layered construction, cavernous scale, and otherworldly glissando effects call out for a Copperwhite painting on the band’s next album cover.

Diana Copperwhite, “Green light” (2016), 175 x 235 cm

The presence of an elliptical narrative is clearly discernible, if not readily deciphered, in Copperwhite’s paintings of just a few years ago. While the artist has eliminated (or temporarily set aside, as time will tell) all but traces of narrative from her working method in larger canvases, she continues to paint heads, roughly life-sized (though this show includes none). The attitude and disposition of these heads is so specific that they function as portraits, even though facial features are usually absent, partially obscured, or eclipsed entirely by passages of brushy paint.

On the same scale as these heads is “Confucius confused,” a real gem. It’s a raspy, slithering, half-head-shaped arc — purple into red into pink into a yellow or two into charcoal gray — against a tar-black ground. As usual, the palest hue (in this case, the pink) is the centermost stripe, so the whole stroke seems to radiate light, to glow. It’s both a curiosity in this show of ambitiously-scaled paintings, and its most succinct embodiment of Copperwhite’s paradoxically impersonal “signature” move. If only it were seven or eight feet wide!

So is Copperwhite’s work Ab Ex redux? No, but not because it isn’t truly abstract — why, de Kooning himself almost never quit the figure entirely. If a key strategy of historical Abstract Expressionism was to trim the lag time between impulse and response — the belief being that doing so would allow form to emerge from the subconscious, unmediated by culture, the “literary,” or the artist’s internal editors — then Copperwhite’s calculatedly eye-grabbing tricks with the brush are in quite the opposite spirit. (And anyway, you can’t go home again.) Rather, Copperwhite approaches “action painting” as an inherited language, to which she contributes some striking dialect of her own.

Diana Copperwhite: Depend on the Morning Sun continues at 532 Gallery Thomas Jaeckel (532 West 25th Street, Chelsea, Manhattan) through January 28.

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