#indigenous languages are always so complex its very interesting

[niseamstories]

10 Lessons on Realistic Worldbuilding and Mapmaking I Learned Working With a Professional Cartographer and Geodesist

Hi, fellow writers and worldbuilders,

It’s been over a year since my post on realistic swordfighting, and I figured it’s time for another one. I’m guessing the topic is a little less “sexy”, but I’d find this useful as a writer, so here goes: 10 things I learned about realistic worldbuilding and mapmaking while writing my novel.

I’ve always been a sucker for pretty maps, so when I started on my novel, I hired an artist quite early to create a map for me. It was beautiful, but a few things always bothered me, even though I couldn’t put a finger on it. A year later, I met an old friend of mine, who currently does his Ph.D. in cartography and geodesy, the science of measuring the earth. When the conversation shifted to the novel, I showed him the map and asked for his opinion, and he (respectfully) pointed out that it has an awful lot of issues from a realism perspective.

First off, I’m aware that fiction is fiction, and it’s not always about realism; there are plenty of beautiful maps out there (and my old one was one of them) that are a bit fantastical and unrealistic, and that’s all right. Still, considering the lengths I went to ensure realism for other aspects of my worldbuilding, it felt weird to me to simply ignore these discrepancies. With a heavy heart, I scrapped the old map and started over, this time working in tandem with a professional artist, my cartographer friend, and a linguist. Six months later, I’m not only very happy with the new map, but I also learned a lot of things about geography and coherent worldbuilding, which made my universe a lot more realistic.

1)  Realism Has an Effect: While there’s absolutely nothing wrong with creating an unrealistic world, realism does affect the plausibility of a world. Even if the vast majority of us probably know little about geography, our brains subconsciously notice discrepancies; we simply get this sense that something isn’t quite right, even if we don’t notice or can’t put our finger on it. In other words, if, for some miraculous reason, an evergreen forest borders on a desert in your novel, it will probably help immersion if you at least explain why this is, no matter how simple.

2)  Climate Zones: According to my friend, a cardinal sin in fantasy maps are nonsensical climate zones. A single continent contains hot deserts, forests, and glaciers, and you can get through it all in a single day. This is particularly noticeable in video games, where this is often done to offer visual variety (Enderal, the game I wrote, is very guilty of this). If you aim for realism, run your worldbuilding by someone with a basic grasp of geography and geology, or at least try to match it to real-life examples.

3)  Avoid Island Continent Worlds: Another issue that is quite common in fictional worlds is what I would call the “island continents”: a world that is made up of island-like continents surrounded by vast bodies of water. As lovely and romantic as the idea of those distant and secluded worlds may be, it’s deeply unrealistic. Unless your world was shaped by geological forces that differ substantially from Earth’s, it was probably at one point a single landmass that split up into fragmented landmasses separated by waters. Take a look at a proper map of our world: the vast majority of continents could theoretically be reached by foot and relatively manageable sea passages. If it weren’t so, countries such as Australia could have never been colonized – you can’t cross an entire ocean on a raft.

4)  Logical City Placement: My novel is set in a Polynesian-inspired tropical archipelago; in the early drafts of the book and on my first map, Uunili, the nation’s capital, stretched along the entire western coast of the main island. This is absurd. Not only because this city would have been laughably big, but also because building a settlement along an unprotected coastline is the dumbest thing you could do considering it directly exposes it to storms, floods, and, in my case, monsoons. Unless there’s a logical reason to do otherwise, always place your coastal settlements in bays or fjords.

 Naturally, this extends to city placement in general. If you want realism and coherence, don’t place a city in the middle of a godforsaken wasteland or a swamp just because it’s cool. There needs to be a reason. For example, the wasteland city could have started out as a mining town around a vast mineral deposit, and the swamp town might have a trading post along a vital trade route connecting two nations.

 5)  Realistic Settlement Sizes: As I’ve mentioned before, my capital Uunili originally extended across the entire western coast. Considering Uunili is roughly two thirds the size of Hawaii  the old visuals would have made it twice the size of Mexico City. An easy way to avoid this is to draw the map using a scale and stick to it religiously. For my map, we decided to represent cities and townships with symbols alone.

 6)  Realistic Megacities: Uunili has a population of about 450,000 people. For a city in a Middle Ages-inspired era, this is humongous. While this isn’t an issue, per se (at its height, ancient Alexandria had a population of about 300,000), a city of that size creates its own set of challenges: you’ll need a complex sewage system (to minimize disease spreading like wildfire) and strong agriculture in the surrounding areas to keep the population fed. Also, only a small part of such a megacity would be enclosed within fantasy’s ever-so-present colossal city walls; the majority of citizens would probably concentrate in an enormous urban sprawl in the surrounding areas. To give you a pointer, with a population of about 50,000, Cologne was Germany’s biggest metropolis for most of the Middle Ages. I’ll say it again: it’s fine to disregard realism for coolness in this case, but at least taking these things into consideration will not only give your world more texture but might even provide you with some interesting plot points.

 7)  World Origin: This point can be summed up in a single question: why is your world the way it is? If your novel is set in an archipelago like mine is, are the islands of volcanic origin? Did they use to be a single landmass that got flooded with the years? Do the inhabitants of your country know about this? Were there any natural disasters to speak of? Yes, not all of this may be relevant to the story, and the story should take priority over lore, but just like with my previous point, it will make your world more immersive.

 8)  Maps: Think Purpose! Every map in history had a purpose. Before you start on your map, think about what yours might have been. Was it a map people actually used for navigation? If so, clarity should be paramount. This means little to no distracting ornamentation, a legible font, and a strict focus on relevant information. For example, a map used chiefly for military purposes would naturally highlight different information than a trade map. For my novel, we ultimately decided on a “show-off map” drawn for the Blue Island Coalition, a powerful political entity in the archipelago (depending on your world’s technology level, maps were actually scarce and valuable). Also, think about which technique your in-universe cartographer used to draw your in-universe map. Has copperplate engraving already been invented in your fictional universe? If not, your map shouldn’t use that aesthetic.

9)  Maps: Less Is More. If a spot or an area on a map contains no relevant information, it can (and should) stay blank so that the reader’s attention naturally shifts to the critical information. Think of it this way: if your nav system tells you to follow a highway for 500 miles, that’s the information you’ll get, and not “in 100 meters, you’ll drive past a little petrol station on the left, and, oh, did I tell you about that accident that took place here ten years ago?” Traditional maps follow the same principle: if there’s a road leading a two day’s march through a desolate desert, a black line over a blank white ground is entirely sufficient to convey that information.

10) Settlement and Landmark Names: This point will be a bit of a tangent, but it’s still relevant. I worked with a linguist to create a fully functional language for my novel, and one of the things he criticized about my early drafts were the names of my cities. It’s embarrassing when I think about it now, but I really didn’t pay that much attention to how I named my cities; I wanted it to sound good, and that was it. Again: if realism is your goal, that’s a big mistake. Like Point 5, we went back to the drawing board and dove into the archipelago’s history and established naming conventions. In my novel, for example, the islands were inhabited by indigenes called the Makehu before the colonization four hundred years before the events of the story; as it’s usually the case, all settlements and islands had purely descriptive names back then. For example, the main island was called Uni e Li, which translates as “Mighty Hill,” a reference to the vast mountain ranges in the south and north; townships followed the same example (e.g., Tamakaha meaning “Coarse Sands”). When the colonizers arrived, they adopted the Makehu names and adapted them into their own language, changing the accented, long vowels to double vowels: Uni e Li became “Uunili,” Lehō e Āhe became “Lehowai.” Makehu townships kept their names; colonial cities got “English” monikers named after their geographical location, economic significance, or some other original story. Examples of this are Southport, a—you guessed it—port on the southernmost tip of Uunili, or Cale’s Hope, a settlement named after a businessman’s mining venture. It’s all details, and chances are that most readers won’t even pay attention, but I personally found that this added a lot of plausibility and immersion.

I could cover a lot more, but this post is already way too long, so I’ll leave it at that—if there’s enough interest, I’d be happy to make a part two. If not, well, maybe at least a couple of you got something useful out of this. If you’re looking for inspiration/references to show to your illustrator/cartographer, the David Rumsey archive is a treasure trove. Finally, for anyone who doesn’t know and might be interested, my novel is called Dreams of the Dying, and is a blends fantasy, mystery, and psychological horror set in the universe of Enderal, an indie RPG for which I wrote the story. It’s set in a Polynesian-inspired medieval world and has been described as Inception in a fantasy setting by reviewers.

Credit for the map belongs to Dominik Derow, who did the ornamentation, and my friend Fabian Müller, who created the map in QGIS and answered all my questions with divine patience. The linguist’s name is David Müller (no, they’re not related, and, yes, we Germans all have the same last names.)

#enderal #dreams of the dying #worldbuilding #resource #writeblr #writing tips #mapmaking #cartography #illustration #realism #writeblogging #novelwriting #writing research #research #writing

[urmomsstuntdouble]

Can you do one for america

Since I received this about an hour or two after posting my lithuania analysis, I assume you’re asking for an america character analysis. I was debating whether or not to go through with writing this or not for a while, but i’ve decided that I’ll try. I hope you enjoy it!

Idealism

The first thing that sticks out to me when thinking about america is that he’s super idealistic, and I think this has its roots in his birth. Everything in his life has been about hope and being better than others, even down to the decision to colonise north america. England needs to be the most powerful country in europe. Better set up a colony in america so that it can save us. It’s that sort of logic that i think gives america the idea that he needs to be perfect, or that he can be the ideal person. And though a lot of what we consider to be the “american” identity (intense patriotism, nativism, idealism, etc) took recognizable shape in the 19th century, i think this way of thinking was nothing new to alfred. He’d been raised on it, with the desire to please arthur sort of in his blood? Anyway i feel like the idea that the colonies would be so so prosperous really put the idea into america’s head early on that he was perfect and that he was destined to be such a great person, even if that wasn't true. I often see his daddy issues presented as solely abandonment issues, but my interpretation of america is more of a combination of abandonment issues and the pressure, some of it self inflicted, to be a perfect country. Basically, his idealism is deeply rooted in unhealthy places. 

Also, a religion headcanon i have is that while he was more raised to be a puritan, freddie prefers quakerism. Though he’s not the most compatible with quakerism, as it rejects violence and quakers often refer to themselves as the society of friends, and are very welcoming, i think it gives him some hope. One of freddie’s biggest problems is that he wants people to be better than they are, and quakerism helps a little with that, because it’s a way that he can help himself become better than he currently is. I feel like he’s been a quaker for a very long time, so he’s not a very good quaker, but this is still something that’s very important to him. 

Hero complex and other mental bullshit

America having a hero complex and also being physically 19 is something i think really highly of. First of all, it very much fits with the mythology of america being a sort of world savior. Secondly, a lot of american media focuses on heroism, whether its on the behalf of average people, like the hunger games, or on the behalf of superheroes, like the mcu- especially over the past 20 years. Though i think it’s a good thing to promote heroism, the hero-martyr complex that gen z has is. Oof. And i think alfred fits very well into that toxic sort of “heroism” that most gen z kids have. He thinks he’s somehow able to fix everything wrong with the world, just because he really wants to. Though that desire is genuine, it’s not always something that’s his place to fix or something that even needed fixing. There’s also a selfish component to that- He needs to prove himself, and heroism is the only way he thinks he can do that. It’s why he works out constantly and cares so much, on a personal rather than country-avatar-thing level, about being #1 at everything. He has to be better than everyone else because he has to be the perfect hero. 

I also think it’s interesting how america seems to have more pronounced daddy issues than canada, and i think this is something that harkens back to the 13 colonies (side note i hate the term ‘colonial times’ when referring to the time before the revolutionary war or canadian independence. These are settler states, its always colonial times.) and american independence. Canada sort of only exists because of british loyalists, as they made up the majority of the population around the turn of the 19th century. They saw themselves as being The Better Colonists. Real daddy’s boy types, and I think this is something that contributes to the hero complex. Because matthew refused to rebel so openly, that made arthur favor him as a son, so alfred felt the need to be even better than matthew- even though, of course, alfred was a bit more favored. 

Fighting Style

Freddie is very good at violence, but not in the same way that a lot of other nations are. Where they tend to be more well trained in specific styles of fighting, freddie just sort of has all of them? His mind is very crowded, i think. Also, the way that he would have learned to fight is different from the other super powerful countries by virtue of his youth, and by virtue of the different regional fighting styles in america. One that’s haunted me is a trend in the ability to rip off ears and noses- Particularly by white gangs in the antebellum south, this was seen as being like. A real badass. I think alfred was something of a feral child. If you know the saying “it takes a village to raise a child,” i think it really did with him. He had so many parents, just like a lot of the western hemisphere countries. But anyway because of all his many many parents, there was never any strong parental force in his life, so it’s more like he didn’t have any at all, and because of that, alfred was a very strange child. And because violence is so ingrained in american society, alfred is very good at fighting, both in order to be fun and flashy and for his own self defense. Though he doesn't really like to fight unless he feels like he has to (and other people are very good at convincing him that he does have to)

Sports

Though america is definitely super athletic and could probably naturally be good at most sports, i think there’s a few that he’d more gravitate towards. Those are basketball, track and field, and olympic lifting. I would include american football but it’s a stupid sport that doesn’t make any sense, so it will not be included for spite reasons. In basketball I think he’s sort of an every-man. I think he’s around six feet tall, so he really could play any position on offense, and as for defense, I think he’d play his best defense against the point guard, bc i feel like Alfred is really fast and good at getting up in your face. He’d have a ton of steals whenever defending against the point guard. I think he’d be a good center on offense, because he’s a bit aggressive and that would be useful for getting rebounds and put-backs, though i wouldn’t discount point-guard freddie, because he does like to be very inspiring. He’s pretty energetic as well, and a point guard can really carry the entire team in terms of energy and spirit. As for track and field, he’d also be an every man- I feel like he’d gravitate more towards sprinting events by personality, but his coach would stick him in wherever. Where olympic lifts are concerned, he’s absolutely a snatch specialist. 

Empire and contradictions

America is an empire. No way of getting around that. I think imperialism in hetalia is an interesting subject, especially where america is concerned. @mysticalmusicwhispers did a good job running that down here, but basically my thoughts on the matter are that alfred doesn't really like being an empire. There’s many angles to that. It’s lonely at the top, for one. There’s no one who relates to being a 21st century empire in quite the same way as him. Then you have the fact that a lot of people living in america have suffered under imperialism as well. Because of that, there’s a lot of self hatred and anxiety and a not knowing if he can fully trust himself. Theres also the obsession that many americans have with people from other cultures being able to assimilate to american wasp culture. Because of all the people who live in the states who are very much not wasps and who can never be, it’s really hard on alfred, though he refuses to admit that things are anything but fine. 

Extras/Fun stuff

A book that reminds me of him is The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien. It’s a collection of short stories about O’Brien’s time serving in the military during the Vietnam War. It’s a very haunting book and I think about it at least once a week, but it is very violent and there’s a lot of fucked up stuff in it.

giveme chubby alfred or give me death

i feel like this shouldn’t have to be said, but sometimes there’s people who depict him as being pro-trump or pro-right wing bullshit, which. absolutely not. just because of all the political turmoil that exists within alfred, and because of all the pain he goes through because of all the hate that exists within his borders- hate that the entire world is forced to pay attention to. even though he might not have all the best sympathies or motivations, he’s just so tired of all the pain he personally goes through because of domestic political unrest, and would like it to end in the way that’s the least painful for him as a person. 

Bi king of my heart 

not a natural blond

I hc him as being mixed, though i’m not sure what exactly he’d look like? But i do enjoy alfred but not white, as poc are the driving force behind a lot of american life, right down to the languages we speak. Like. something like half the states names are the words of their indigenous peoples, and even more toponyms are indigenous across the country. Then of course i feel he’s very protective of aave and will always pronounce words in Not English correctly. (if u want to hear more about my language thoughts they’re linked below. Not gonna rehash it here cause those posts are Long™) 

My playlist for him!

Other analyses (age, linguistics) 

writing requests

#@ mystic how does it feel to be tagged in two of my writing request posts #im sorry i love your writing sm #anyway thanks for the ask anon! im not quite so angsty about america right now so this probably #is not as good as it could've been were i in my feelings about him #anywhomst! hope u enjoy this #hetalia #hws #hws america #tw violence #tw imperialism #? #sort of #i dont go into detail about the imperialism but its metnioned #ask #anon #writing requests #character analysis #ceros posting

[mediaevalmusereads]

Pekolah Stories. By Amanda Bales. Cowboy Jamboree Press, 2021.

Rating: 4.5/5 stars

Genre: short stories, literary fiction, contemporary

Part of a Series? No

Summary: “Amanda Bales’s Pekolah Stories reveal the desperation of rural communities eviscerated by economic collapse, steeped in an unforgiving, poisonous religion, and accustomed to everyday meanness and ravaged families. Children growing up in cultural swamps, in these stories and in real life, never recover. Many die of suicide or violence or drugs. Some go to prison, few go to college, and even the ones who appear to survive carry hidden wounds that threaten to drag them back down. Bales’s stories fearlessly trace the grasping tentacles of generational trauma, leaving readers to reckon with truths that land like a punch to the solar plexus.” —Jeanetta Calhoun Mish 

***Full review under the cut.***

Content Warnings: violence, blood, homophobia, references to abuse and drug/alcohol use, self-harm and suicide

Overview: In the interest of full transparency, Bales is a friend and (former?) colleague of mine, so while I will try to be as honest as I can in this review, know that my opinions are not unbiased.

I’m not usually one to read short stories, much less short stories set in contemporary America, but because my friend wrote this, I bought a copy and read it cover to cover. I was pleasantly surprised by how much it resonated with me - I think Bales has a real talent for eliciting complex emotions, and I think her stories challenge us as readers to view small-town, rural America as multifaceted - the opposite of the flattened picture pop culture tends to give us. I give this book 4.5 stars primarily because of personal preference; while I enjoyed Bales’s writing and the way she portrayed her characters, I would have liked to see each individual story feel a little more self-contained. Some stories contained scenes that I felt were set-up for the next story (more on structure below), and I personally like my short fiction to stand on its own a little more. Otherwise, if you’re a fan of literary fiction and want to read a more compassionate, multivalenced take on small-town America, I would highly recommend this collection.

Writing: Bales writes in a very accessible manner. Her sentences flow very well, and they aren’t bogged down by too much figurative language (as is characteristic of some lit fic). Instead, it’s easy to grasp what is happening in any given story and Bales balances showing and telling so the prose doesn’t feel mechanical. It’s the kind of style that I think most readers - regardless of background - will find enjoyable and engaging.

Perhaps my favorite thing about Bales’s writing is the way she evokes small town “feelings” (for lack of a better word). Most of the things that punched me in the gut were not outright declarations of “this town is poor” or “this kid is messed up,” but the little details that evoke atmosphere or mood without much ado. For example, there are sentences here and there about kids needing to be bussed to a different school, about people who commute long distances for jobs, about “bibles weighing [people] down like stones.” A lot is communicated in such little space, and Bales don’t hit you over the head with its significance - she lets it sink into your bones, so to speak, and it’s a technique I find very effective.

If I had any criticism, it would probably be that some stories were in first person, and I didn’t quite understand the creative value of using it. I’m admittedly a little biased on this one, though - first person almost always feels unnatural to me, and I’m always looking for what value it adds to the storytelling.

Plot: This book doesn’t have an overarching plot like a novel, and I’m not keen on reviewing every story individually (not to mention that would spoil so much of the book), so I’ll instead talk more broadly about the construction of Bales’s collection as a whole.

Bales does something very interesting in that her stories are united by setting. Each tale takes place in the small town of Pekolah (Oklahoma, I think), and most characters make multiple appearances. In this, her book reads like a composite novel (as Carrie Gessner notes in her Goodreads review), and I think the effect is a good one. It makes the small town “everyone knows everyone” (and their business) cliché feel real, but more than that, it shows off Bales’s ability to make form match function. If everyone knows each other, and the town really is that small, it makes sense that multiple characters would pop up multiple times or that the same events would be referenced across stories. I also really enjoyed that each story felt like an individual thread and that Bales was weaving those threads together to create a tapestry - a picture of a whole town, if you will. I don’t think I’ve seen that structure used in many other short story collections (though admittedly, my experience is limited), and I enjoyed it very much.

If I had any criticism, it would be that I wish some of these threads were a little more self-contained. Some stories felt like they were setting up others, and some had unclear “messages,” so to speak, that I wish were a little more overt. To Bales’s credit, she does comment on things like conversion therapy, religion, poverty, and the like, and I think these themes do come through in the work. I’m just coming from a background of literature that hits you over the head with its themes and morals, and I tend to like texts that are a little more heavy-handed. But if you like things to be a little more ambiguous or don’t like it when authors hold the reader’s hand, you might like this collection.

Characters: Bales’s characters are complex and nuanced in ways that I didn’t quite expect (though I should have known better than to doubt her). The opening story features an out lesbian, while subsequent stories showcase gay men, Indigenous characters, Trump-loving queer people, etc. I liked the way Bales portrayed these characters as flawed; not all of them are “nice” people, but all of them have something that readers can connect to, whether it’s Jack’s frustration and despair or Teddy’s resentment of (certain) White people. While Bales’s stories are not always uplifting and optimistic, the characters are always interesting, and I think they all work together to create a nuanced view of what small town life is like - not homogenous, but still familiar.

TL;DR: Pekolah Stories is a brilliant collection of short stories that treats small town, rural life with compassion while also implicitly criticizing religious zealotry, violence, and the like, exploring the nuances of family relationships, economic despair, community, and more. 

[fatehbaz]

where can i read more about the devegetation of north africa? (reliable sources that you prefer)

Hey hi.

So just wanna be very clear that this is not really my “area of expertise.” (More focused on North American environmental history; most reading on North Africa limited to megafauna distribution range.) More like a fun side-interest that I revisit from time to time. And these resources are mostly just about the Sahel, specifically. Including the environmental history of the Holocene (past 10,000 years in the Sahel), and also the dynamic and drastic ecological change that took place between 1895-1960, during colonial and post-independence land management schemes. But some of the resources here also deal with the geography of the Sahara. (There is also an interesting history of the Sahara during the Holocene, when the desert was full of lakes and river courses. Up until the 1970s, there were still isolated populations of hippo and crocodile in remote Sahara lakes and oases.)

I’ll recommend some of the older “classics.” As usual, I’d try to recommend writing from local people who are explicitly willing to share their ecological knowledge. But a lot of my recommendations are unfortunately from academics. And I’m sorry for that.

Assuming you’re referencing this:

When searching online for environmental histories or local environmental knowledge case studies of the Sahel, I see a lot of stuff sponsored by NGOs, the UN, and US academia, which will emphasize “rediscovery” or “utility” of “using” traditional knowledge for “combating climate change,” and many mentions of the “green wall” proposals. I’ll also see “white savior complex” kind of stuff, which talks about “crises” and “civil wars” as if they’re “endemic” to the Sahel. But (just my opinion), I don’t like those resources. They engage in cultural appropriation (”acquiring” local Indigenous knowledge), superficial posturing (Euro-American academics using cute language about “local knowledge” without holistically contextualizing the devegetation), weird culturally-insensitive elitist chauvinism (continuously talking about “religious conflicts” and “civil wars” in North Africa and the “urgency” to use “agriculture” to establish stable economics and therefore “law and order”), and reductionism (talking about importance of halting southward desertification and expansion of the Sahara, without acknowledging role of World Bank, IMF, etc. in continuing to use lending/debt to hold West Africa hostage.) Part of my skepticism of these sources is because I’ve met and/or worked with agricultural specialists from institutions in the Sahel and environmental historians who had worked for many years in the region. (They’ve shared some really cool anecdotal stories about the sophistication of dryland gardening in the Sahel, and how local horticulturalists would laugh at the Euro-American corporate agricultural agents and USDA staff sent in with their special “space-age chemically-coated super-moisture-retaining” seed supplies after independence.)

Fair warning: Most of my recommendations are a little old, from the 1970s and 1980s. Two of the main drawbacks of these “outdated” sources: since their publication, scholars have since greatly expanded lit/research about both imperialism and traditional ecological knowledge. (West Africa had only been “independent” for a short period of time, and the hidden machinations of neocolonial institutions weren’t as clearly visible as they are to us, today, I’d imagine. And some academics, writing about the Sahel in the 1980s, weren’t as willingly to openly call-out major institutions.) But I think they provide a brief background for Sahel’s ecology and agroforestry/horticulture.

So both of these are available free, online, through the New Zealand Digital Library. (Don’t wanna link them here, but you can find them online pretty easily.)

Firstly, from 1983/1984, there is this summary of desertification, traditional environmental knowledge, traditional land use systems, and agroforestry in the Sahel: National Research Council. 1983. Agroforestry in the West African Sahel. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.

Something that was always exciting for me ...

Despite how dry and hot the Sahel is, fruit trees and gardens are actually very fertile and productive, for many reasons, mostly related to sophistication of local ecological knowledge of nutrient-replenishing relationships between different plants. An excerpt:

“Today, a number of agro-silvicultural systems appear to be practiced in the Sahel. Gardens are found within settlements where water is available, usually with a tree component that provides shade and shelter and, often, edible fruits or leaves. The same holds true for intensively managed, irrigated, and fertilized gardens near urban centers. Both subsistence home gardens and cash-generating market gardens are highly productive. Fruit and pod-bearing trees, shade trees, and hedges or living fences are the "forestry" components, sometimes supplemented by decorative woody plants. Mangoes, citrus trees, guavas, Zizyphus mauritiana (Indian jujube), cashews, palms, Ficus spp., and wild custard-apples are prominent kinds of fruit trees. Shade is often provided by Azadirachta indica or similar species, while fencing is provided by thorny species of Acacia and Prosopis, and by Commiphora africana, Euphorbia balsamifera, flowery shrubs such as Caesalpinia pulcherrima (paradise-flower), and other species.

Close to the settlements is a ring of suburban gardens, often irrigated, in which cassava, yams, maize, millet, sorghum, rice, groundnuts, and various vegetables are grown, for subsistence as well as sale, depending on the ecozone.”

---

Then this sounds more like what you might be looking for? Basically, a history of environmental knowledge and the ecological trends of the past 10,000 years in the Sahel.

National Research Council. 1983. Environmental Change in the West African Sahel. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.

Though this report from 1983 is now kinda outdated, and has some iffy elitist and vaguely-chauvinist language at times, but it is still accessible, generally easy to read, concise, and  it goes out of its way to say that 1970s drought and current environmental crises in the Sahel cannot be understood without addressing the early Holocene ecology of the Sahara/Sahel.

So the report emphasizes the importance of context, by addressing the drying of river courses and lakes in the Sahara of the Late Pleistocene, the early domestication of crops, the emergence of cattle and goat over-grazing, the importance of gum arabic and acacia trees in maintaining moisture in gardens, early trans-Sahara caravan travel, medievel geographical knowledge of the Sahara, etc.

“Because climatic change and variability are regular features of the Sahel, the native plant and animal communities of the region are generally well adapted to the range of climatic variation existing in the region. [...] Many efforts in "development" or modernization have also contributed to their plight. [...] In order to provide a better understanding of the role of human activity in modifying Sahelian ecosystems, this chapter briefly explores nine agents of anthropogenic change: bush fires, transSaharan trade, site preferences for settlements, gum arabic trade, agricultural expansion, proliferation of cattle, introduction of advanced firearms, development of modern transportation networks, and urbanization. These agents illustrate the breadth and diversity of the human impact on the region.”

----

Then there is this: Jeffrey A. Gritzner. The West African Sahel - Human Agency and Environmental Change. 1989.

And I also recommend the work of Jeffrey A. Gritzner. He’s American, but respectful and knows what he’s talking about. Gritzner works with dryland ecology; human ecology, especially relationships with plants/vegetation; environmental change during the Holocene (past 10 to 12,000 years); and traditional environmental knowledge. And he’s especially knowledgeable about the Sahel, North Africa, and Persia/the Middle East, where he worked with region-specific horticulture in the 1970s in Chad, Senegal, etc. during the peak of the drought, and had personal observations of post-independence neocolonial mismanagement and continued corporate monoculture from World Bank, IMF, etc. His writing contrasts local/traditional gardening/plant knowledge with imported corporate/neocolonial agriculture.

---

Beginning in about the 1990s, it seems to me that Euro-American geography/anthropology departments were much more willing to use words like “empire” and “neocolonialism” and more willing to call-out corporate bodies and institutions, so there are many better articles from after that period.

Keita, J. D. 1981. Plantations in the Sahel. Unasylva 33(134):25-29.

Winterbottom, R. T. 1980. Reforestration in the Sahel: Problems and strategies--An analysis of the problem of deforestation, and a review of the results of forestry projects in Upper Volta. Paper presented at the African Studies Association Annual Meeting, October 15-18, 1980, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA.

Glantz, M. H., ed. 1976. The Politics of Natural Disasters: The Case of the Sahel Drought. Praeger, New York, New York, USA.

National Academy of Sciences. 1979. An Assessment of Agro-Forestry Potential Within the Environmental Framework of Mauritania. Staff Summary Report, Board on Science and Technology for International Development, Washington, D.C., USA.

Huzayyin, S. 1956. Changes in climate, vegetation, and human adjustment in the Saharo-Arabian belt with special reference to Africa. Pp. 304-323 in Man's Role in Changing the Face of the Earth, William L. Thomas, Jr., ed. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois, USA.

Vermeer, D. E. 1981. Collision of climate, cattle, and culture in Mauritania during the 1970s. Geographical Review 71(3):281-297.

Smith, A. B. 1980. Domesticated cattle in the Sahara and their introduction into West Africa. Pp. 489-501 in The Sahara and the Nile, M. A. J. Williams and H. Faure, eds. A. A. Balkema, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.

Again, these resources are mostly just about the Sahel.

Then, since the early 1990s, for better or more specific case studies of local-scale environmental knowledge, I think it might be easier or more fruitful to search based on subregion or specific plants. My perception is that, though much of the woodland and savanna ecology might be similar across the region, the Sahel is still spatially/geographically vast, stretching from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea. And so, there are so many different diverse communities of people, with long histories situated in place, and there are diverse local variations in approach to horticulture. So, if you’re more interested in traditional ecological knowledge and local food cultivation, it might be easier to pick a specific subregion of the Sahel, or to pick a favorite staple food, and then to search those keywords via a university library website, g00gle scholar, etc.

(About the distribution range and local extinction, in the Sahel, Sahara, and Mediterranean coast, of lion, cheetah, elephant, giraffe, rhino, desert hippos, the “sacred crocodile,” etc. More my cup of tea. I’ve got some maps and articles, I’ll try to put them into a list of resources, too.)

[ninja-muse]

Crow Winter - Karen McBride

In brief: Hazel Ellis has an English degree and no job, so she’s back home being a good daughter and grieving her father. Then Nanabush the trickster turns up, saying things like, “end of the world” and “destiny”, and people start talking about developing the quarry on the Ellis land.

Thoughts: This was a satisfying read, a story of a young woman finding her place, reconnecting with her heritage, and fighting injustice. It’s quiet, with tropes and beats that sneak up on you, and has a beautiful, positive portrayal of modern Indigenous life. There’s also some great dialogue. Unfortunately, I’ve read a lot of stories that use the same tropes and beats, and though McBride uses them well, they don’t seem to have much spark here. Still, it’s a solid debut and I’ll be interested to see where she goes from here.

My favourite parts, surprising nobody who knows me, were whenever Nanabush turned up, and the way McBride realizes the spirit world and its “magic”. Nanabush is wonderfully cranky and annoyingly cryptic (though I got frustrated a few times that he couldn’t just say something or understand where Hazel was coming from more), and McBride writes his crow body language wonderfully. And the spirit world? Lovely and eerie at the same time, definitely a timeless and separate world and exactly how it should be. The more magical elements of the story were great, and not overdone. I really liked how those worked and the sense of power behind them. There were a couple scenes where I thought, “Oh, that is cool.”

But enough about that. McBride’s also good with character. Her secondary characters shine especially, every one different and none of them playing to “type”. Even Hazel’s dad, who's only really seen in occasional flashbacks, is rounded and vibrant. Going along with the characterization are a strong ear for dialogue and an ability to create very solid, complex relationships. A lot of the conversations are snappy and realistic—McBride’s great at sass—and Hazel and her mom, to pick one example… that’s a mother and daughter, definitely.

That said, Hazel’s own personality didn’t always feel solid. Sometimes she was a believable twenty-something, and other times she seemed older and more jaded than she probably should have. Trying to get a handle on her was hard. I also struggled with some of her interactions with Nanabush—how long it had been since her last one, why she flipped between annoyance with him and a sort of angry, desperate need for his company, that sort of thing. I’m not sure if these are white reader problems, though. They certainly could be.

The same might go for my problem with the tropes and beats in general, or it could just be that I’ve read a lot of urban fantasy and know how these sorts of stories go. Even if McBride gets to the same places without the same kick as pure urban fantasy does, I was rarely surprised when one chapter had a moment of self-doubt or another featured an antagonist and a setback. That said, I appreciated that so much of the climax was still unexpected, and felt much the same as Hazel afterwards.

The final thing I liked about this book is McBride’s ability to interweave Hazel’s growing confidence in herself with the problems with the quarry, the white guy from town, and the spirit world. I loved seeing Hazel come into herself and her power and solve the mystery, but the parallels and complexities don’t stop there. McBride’s doing some interesting, clever things there, though it might be a white reader thing again that I felt they never quite clicked into place.

So yeah, there’s lots I liked about this, and some things that left me profoundly meh, and that evened out to an all right read. Can’t say I loved it or hated it. It’s a worthwhile read though, and like I said, a solid review. I suspect people who’re less familiar with urban fantasy plots would enjoy this more than I did.

To bear in mind: Contains racist and misguided white people, the past death of a parent, attempted suicide, and land rights … shenanigans, to put it nicely.

6.5/10

#booklr #adult booklr #book reviews #read in 2020 #indigenous fiction #indigenous authors #can lit #canadian fiction #first peoples #authors of colour #diversity in fiction #crow winter #karen mcbride #ownvoices

[pekorosu]

yoooo while looking up stuff on izumo i found this article debunking the idea of japan being a “homogenous” nation and damn it’s interesting :o i mean, ofc i knew about that concept already but i just haven’t read anything that approached it from the “japan has ALWAYS been internally diverse” pov as opposed to tackling it only from the “because of the existence of indigenous ppl/foreign migration” pov. it actually kinda reminded me of our own history, like how there were many distinct countries/kingdoms back then and no singular but nebulous malay “race” (which is actually composed of many ethnic groups).

i’m just gonna save some quotes for my own reference, in case i wanna look further into this next time:

In my research, the term “Yamato Minzoku (people)” did not appear until the year 1888. Following the emergence of the term “Yamato Minzoku (people)”, the term “Izumo Minzoku (people)” also appeared in 1896.

-

After that, the KiKi myth was introduced in schools to justify the Emperor’s rule. However, about 30-40 % of the Kojiki is devoted to the Myth related to Izumo, which says that the emperor’s rule in Japan started when the Izumo gods surrendered their realms to the Yamato gods. Consequently, Meiji historians concluded that there was a country ruled by the Izumo people before the Yamato people came to Japan and that the Izumo were an indigenous people in Japan’s main island. [...]

However, there is another account from the oldest existing book in Japan, from early C.E.700. [...] According to the original Izumo Myth, there is entirely no relation between Okuninushi (Onamuch), Susano or the Sun Goddess. Onamuch, the supreme deity of Izumo myth [...] does not surrender the land of Izumo. He proclaims that he will continue to govern the country of Izumo while entrusting his other lands to the descendants of Amaterasu (the ancestor of the Yamato's king).

The Izumo myth also states that the Izumo gods built the Great Shrine (the oldest and biggest Shinto Shrine in Japan) for Onamuch, contrary to the Yamato myth that Amaterasu built it. The fact that descriptions in Izumo Fudoki are very different from the KiKi has been ignored in Japan’s historical education.

-

Many scholars have pointed out that Izumo religion is different from Ise (Yamato) as the former worships gods that are related to the sea, lakes and rivers (and is thus similar to religion in the Ryukyu (Okinawa) islands) while the latter worships gods related to the sun. It is said that Izumo’s god concept has a horizontal character (the gods come from the sea and have no hierarchy), while Yamato’s has a vertical character (the gods come down from heaven and have a hierarchy structured under Amaterasu who is said to be the ancestor of the Yamato King, emperor).

-

The Izumo ethnic identity is also seen in the “Izumo Nation Study”, written by Tokutani Toyonosuke, in Shimane Hyoron, 1934-1936 (18 issues). In this thesis, he states that “Every time when I met persons from other countries (within Japan) and heard their languages, I noticed they were extremely different from our Izumo language and I felt very strange.” [...] In fact, many authors have even recently asserted that Izumo is very different in history, religion and language from Yamato.

-

In the middle of the 19th century, the present Japanese archipelago (not including Okinawa and Hokkaido) was divided into 68 states and there was no Japanese national identity among ordinary people. Nitta Hitoshi writes in 1999 that “In the Edo period, what was recognized as ‘country’ were domain (han) governed by lords (Daimyo). A Samurai's loyalty was toward their Daimyo, and another domain was a ‘foreign country’. Therefore, even if other domains fought with a European country and lost, they regarded it as a foreign matter that had fundamentally no relation to them.”

-

Kyushu people, in general, tend not to recognize Japan as a homogeneous country not because of the existence of Ainu, Okinawan (Ryukyuan) or Koreans, but because they consider themselves different from the Yamato. My university colleague from Kumamoto, southern Kyushu, once said to me very naturally “I am the Kumaso," a people originally from East China Sea kulturkreis who had resisted Yamato’s aggression until the 7th century.

-

Nishitaka Totsu (1838-1915), an official of the Ministry of Education, wrote in 1873 in the “Ministry of Education Magazine” (文部省雑誌), “The languages of east and west regions are not mutually understandable.” [...] “There is no other country like Japan, whose territory is only 2400km wide from east to west (not including Hokkaido), in which the languages are so different and the people cannot communicate with each other”.

-

“When I took the train from Tokyo to Fukushima, a British man and a woman from Sendai were sitting next to me. The language of the Sendai woman was extremely hard to understand and we could not make conversation at all. On the other hand, I was able to talk with the Britisher a little since I understand a little English.”

-

A famous linguist, Kindaichi Haruhiko wrote in his book “Japanese Language” in 1957 that: If we brought the Kanto, Kansai, Tohoku, Kyushu, Kagoshima and other dialects to Europe, they would be regarded as separate independent languages”. At least, those differences are bigger than the difference between Spanish and Portuguese.

Nishikori Masahiro wrote in 1988 that “Until 20 or 30 years ago, young people (of Izumo) who went to the capital (Tokyo) used to be distressed by a language complex. Now young people can speak the standard language quite well”.

-

Hoshina Koichi wrote in 1898 in his thesis titled Regarding Dialect （方言に就て）that “In order to collect dialects, we have to decide on a language which should be regarded as standard”, “Therefore, we have to take a major language like Kyoto language or Tokyo language and formalize it as the standard one”. We should notice that even at this stage, Kyoto language was considered first. However, Kyoto language did not become the standard language and the Meiji Emperor lost his mother tongue. This fact also implies that the Emperor was not a real sovereign in modern Japan.

So, what is the standard language we are using now? It is an artificial language created in the early 20th century, based on "the words used by an educated middle-class family living in Yamanote area of Tokyo (where bureaucrats gathered)."

-

Sakaiya Taichi, argues in his book “Japan’s Rise and Fall”（日本の盛衰）published in 2002 that during the rapid economic growth era from 1950 to the 1960s, Japan adapted its society to standardized mass production and created the “optimal industrial society”.

In the field of education, they trained human resources (1) to be patient, (2) to be cooperative, (3) to possess common knowledge and skill, but (4) not to display originality or personality. In the field of regional structure, they aimed for the unification of information and culture by concentrating everything around Tokyo.

Thus, the contemporary national consciousness of the Japanese people is rooted in the suppression of an awareness of their own internal diversity.

#ugh i have a whole bunch of other stuff i need to be doing but well.............. #whats new.............. #-_- #/punches self the face #sotong txt #japanese history

[ritualmedicine-blog]

On Being Both Colonized and Colonizer

First off, I don’t expect anyone to actually read this. This blog is a way for me to hone my writing skills while parsing through topics that I care deeply about. That said, I know that I’m making this work public, and as a result people may read it. If something I post here does spark a dialogue, I’ll be very grateful for whatever wisdom is shared with me.

Decolonization is a topic that I’m incredibly passionate about, but at the same time I know that it’s not a topic that I can really lead discussion on, particularly because I am by no means an expert. While I truly believe that decolonization is for everyone and can benefit everyone (except, perhaps, a small group of power-holders), it goes against the very principles of the concept to have settlers lead the conversation on stolen land. This is why I’ve chosen to leave the word “decolonization” out of the name of my blog, despite it being the primary framework from which I will be addressing a variety of topics.

One of the things I hope I can do here is share my perspective on how what Edgar Villanueva calls “the virus of colonization” has severed the sacred ties between people all over the world and their traditional medicines, or ways of healing. This tragedy is not unique to Turtle Island (North America) and the other European colonies, but in fact can be seen all over the world.

[In his book, Decolonizing Wealth: Indigenous Wisdom to Heal Divides and Restore Balance, Edgar Villanueva describes colonization as a “virus” and uses the framework of traditional medicine to talk about money.]

My background is primarily Irish and Ashkenazi Jewish, two ethnic groups with complex relationships to colonization. Both groups have suffered at the hands of colonizers while in turn becoming colonizers themselves. This is why Villanueva’s “virus” terminology makes so much sense. As people’s cultures are destroyed by colonization, they become infected with it and many of them in turn become part of the colonization machinery themselves. There are examples of this all over the world, including the Irish slavers in the Caribbean and American South, the Free Black American colonizers who founded the Republic of Liberia, and, perhaps most controversially, the State of Israel.

200 years ago, my Irish ancestors were among the first white settlers of what is now Arva, Ontario. As native Irish Catholics, they were forced into poverty and prohibited from owning land in the country where their ancestors were buried. Had they stayed, they likely would have fallen victim to the Irish Potato Famine - a crisis with a lie for a name that saw a million Irish starve to death due to the failure of a single crop while their English occupiers continued to reap financial benefits from their otherwise well-functioning agricultural system.

[Like many victims of colonization, the Irish were often portrayed as monkeys or apes in an attempt to dehumanize them.]

In Canada, my ancestors found opportunity in an unoccupied and fertile land, at the time covered in forest. The land was unoccupied because the “Attawandaron”, or “Neutral” Nation had been exterminated 150 years earlier, first by introduced disease, and then by the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois Confederacy). Both their surviving names were given to them by outsiders. “Neutral,” was given to them by French missionaries, in reference to their relative peace with neighbouring nations. “Attawandaron,” which translates roughly to “the people who talk funny” was given to them by the Wyandot (Huron), who spoke a different dialect of the same language. The name they called themselves has been lost.

On a base level, it can be tempting to find comfort in the fact that my ancestors did not participate in the genocide of the first peoples of the land my family still occupies, but regardless of whether or not they held the guns or spread the disease, the fact remains that to this day my family benefits from their extermination. I’m sharing this story not in an attempt to release myself or my ancestors from responsibility for the horrifying effects of colonization, but to illustrate its complexity. So many of us are both colonized and colonizers. As our own Indigeneity was taken from us, we also did our best to take it from others. If we recognize this, it can also help us to recognize the vital similarities in global Indigenous cultures, and their value to our modern world.

[The “Attawandaron”, or “Neutral” Nation occupied much of what is now Southwestern Ontario until their annihilation in the 1650s.]

So what does decolonization actually mean? I can tell you that for the first several months I was talking about it in front of my father, he was sure that it meant kicking all the white people out of Canada. While I’m sure that’s an attractive fantasy for many, it’s not a pragmatic or even achievable solution.

If someone with a deeper understanding happens to read this definition and finds it amiss, I’d very much appreciate being corrected, but my understanding is that decolonization, at its core, is about land sovereignty. It’s about the right not only to self-governance, but to governance over the land itself. Indigenous cultures all over the globe are defined by their relationships not only to each other but to the land. While someone with a colonizer mindset looks at the land and sees “natural resources” to reap and exploit, someone with an Indigenous perspective will look at the land and see a complex system of which they are a part. This perspective is necessary not only for the health of our species, but for the health of our burning planet. If all the governments of the world adopted an Indigenous mindset tomorrow, I have no doubt that the climate crisis would be quickly and easily solved.

Decolonization favours the idea of relational identities over individualism. Just as we are inextricably a part of the ecosystems in which we inhabit, we are also a part of our families and communities. Every Indigenous population on Earth that I’ve read about has some concept of this. On Turtle Island, we see this concept represented most often through the phrase “All My Relations,” but in Indigenous communities all over the world you will hear people referring to their kin by their relational title (for example “Auntie,” or “Sister”) instead of their name. Even in parts of Europe, we see this concept preserved in some naming conventions. Colonization, however, places much more emphasis on the individual than their relations. Perhaps unsurprisingly, those of us who live in colonial societies find ourselves at the centre of a “Loneliness Epidemic.”

[A 2018 survey found that nearly half of Americans report sometimes or always feeling alone or left out.]

While I truly believe that decolonization is the right path forward if we wish to save our burning planet, I am most interested in decolonization from a psychological perspective. I believe very strongly that the ancient medicines of story, ritual, and connection to nature are basic human needs, and that the mental health crises across the colonized world can be connected to their destruction. Luckily, these medicines are not lost. Like the Indigenous languages that have been reconstructed and saved, many of these medicines are only sleeping.

There’s much more that I hope to say on this topic as I educate myself and commit to learning in public. For now, I’d like to express gratitude to any readers who have found their way here and made it to the end of my first post. I hope that we can learn from each other and work together to build a better, more human world.

Go raibh maith agat, Jocelyn

#decolonization #colonization #social justice #mental health #loneliness #irish #canada #southwestern ontario

[flamingfandomtrashcentral]

TFP Ratchet, Knockout, Shockwave, Soundwave, and TFA Prowl (his work could be his meditation or him studying nature) react to a bot reader who isn't the brightest, much like TFP Bulkhead in that they're more useful for strength than smarts, but does show interest in their work (the glances and occasional stares don't go overlooked). Who calls them over and lets them watch, or even teaches them what they're doing, who ignores it and lets them come on their own, and who's a mix of both, and so on?

Ratchet

- To begin with he finds it obstructive. He doesn’t need yetanother Bulkhead breaking things he needs, and yet, there’s something ratherendearing about the state of quiet attentiveness you enter when you’re tryingto subtly watch what he’s doing without him noticing. Of course, he noticesimmediately. There’s a reason you’re not first choice for stealth missions.

- He calls you over after the tenth time he catches you lookingcuriously his way as he tinkers with the ground bridge. There’s no need for youto clank around, finding excuses to pass by his work station and steal glancesfrom the corner of your optic. In fact, it’s much less distracting if you’djust stay still and watch – yip-ip-ip! Watch,not touch. It’s not that he doesn’t trust you, per se, and he is not a control freak despite what somehumans might say, but he’s not comfortable letting you get involved inimportant things that need to be done right, and it will all be done so muchquicker if he does it himself. That said, he’s happy to tell you what he’sdoing, and even talk you through some of the procedures he’s carrying out. Notthat he really expects you to understand, but clearly you won’t stop pesteringhim until he explains it.

- Eventually you become an assistant of sorts. You’ll runerrands for him, pass on messages, fetch and pass instruments (which you beginto learn by name) and even give advice to him on certain things. He won’t admitit, but you make yourself surprisingly useful and he values your company. Nomatter that you aren’t the most eloquent conversationalist, neither is he.He’ll even request your presence himself on occasion, it can be thankless workbeing the one who always stays behind at base and it’s nice to have someone acknowledginghis efforts.

Knockout

- He’s absolutely delighted with the attention. Even if it’s nothis flashy paintjob that’s catching your optic, he’s always proud to be insomeone’s spotlight. He points it out to Breakdown, any excuse to gloat istaken by him. Clearly his skills are just that good that even someone like you,the last bot anyone thought could show an interest in something so technical asthe medical profession, has become enraptured.

- You’re invited over to the medbay to observe him at work assoon as he gets the chance. He’ll strut and preen as he tells you about what hedoes and demonstrates for you. You don’t mind; he’s actually a very informativeand patient teacher, and willing to put up with the many, many questions youhave. The fact that he welcomes them only encourages you. As your presence inthe medbay gets more regular, he finds himself answering your questions byletting you have a go at repairs yourself. Only minor ones of course, and underhis constant supervision, but it turns out you’re quite experienced with yourhands having been on the battlefield and are capable enough to handle the taskof simple operations on your fellow ‘cons.

- Breakdown and yourself become fast friends as you find youhave much in common and some day you hope to become a partner to Knockout likehim. Knockout often jokes that his finish is never in danger while he’s luckyenough to have two bodyguards on the job. The two of you act in a tag team;when one is on a mission, the other will be assisting Knockout in the medbayand when  Knockout and Breakdown are on amission together, you will stand in until they return. Knockout grows toappreciate your continued diligence in participating in his work and discovershe values your company as much as your help.

Shockwave

- It seems illogical to him that someone such as yourself wouldhave the slightest interest in his projects, and yet your intrigue is painfullyobvious as you make no effort to hide it, even resorting to blatant stares whenyou have nothing else to do. It doesn’t faze him in the slightest, and he wouldhave gone on ignoring you for eternity if you didn’t make the decision one dayto approach him yourself.

- He’s a busy mech, and what with the delicate nature of all hisexperiments he won’t ever let you get involved. He won’t stop you from watchingeither though, and lets you spend however much off-duty time you like lending akeen eye as he goes about monitoring chemicals, conducting research andupdating data pads. It becomes routine for you to simply sit and observe,occasionally asking a question but not expecting an answer, and more often thannot you don’t receive one.

- When he gives you the keycode to his lab it comes as rather asurprise – you had thought he’d want to keep you out as you believed he viewedyou as a nuisance, but it seems that was not the case. You express gratitude tothis and remain extra careful not to get in his way. Though it may take awhile, he responds to your questions more and more, and one day it turns into afull-blown conversation. Since then, the two of you will talk far morefrequently and become surprisingly close, much to the bafflement of every othermech on the nemesis.

Soundwave

- As the eyes and ears of the Decepticons, Soundwave catches onto your interest in his work from the moment it blossoms. As long as you don’tmeddle with his efficiency, he thinks little of it. He admires your loyalty toMegatron and the Decepticon cause and your strength on the battlefield, and aslong as you don’t hinder him in what he’s doing he sees no issue in allowingyou to watch, save for occasions when he’s working on a particularly secretiveproject.

- Some days, however, he finds his workload is particularlystrenuous, and even with Laserbeak’s assistance he cannot be in twenty placesat once despite his considerable skill. It occurs to him then that there may besome merit in requesting your aid with his work. You start by simply deliveringnon-sensitive messages but work your way up to more complicated tasks, spendingmore and more time with Soundwave at his workstation. When Megatron suggeststhat Soundwave takes you on as a more official helper, Soundwave is glad forit. He’s found you do wonders to lessen his workload even if you can barelycompute the more complicated areas of his job.

- It turns out yourgut instinct style of thinking comes in handy. While you may not be able tocrunch numbers like Shockwave or formulate plans like Starscream, you offer aunique overview and insight to goings-on in the Decepticon ranks whichSoundwave finds influences his outlook while performing surveillance on thetroops. More than once your intuition proves true such as with Starscream’s latestplot to overthrow Megatron, and Soundwave learns to respect you as a partnerand valued confidant, even if you never do quite manage to perform a reversequantum algorithm encryption.

Prowl

- It takes a while for Prowl to realise that you’re watching himwhen he meditates. He’s normally so deep in exploration of his innerconsciousness that he doesn’t particularly register your presence, but afterrealising that you often seem to be in the room when he comes back into focus itcomes to his attention that you, the vanguard and brawn of the Autobot team seemto have some curiosity about what he would have thought would seem like a veryboring activity to you.

- Of course, he’s eager to encourage your curiosity, and soinvites you to meditate with him one day. You fidget a great deal and struggleto slow your internal systems to the noiseless hum he’s perfected, but he’s a patientteacher and content to allow you to figure things out at your own pace. He’shonestly just glad to have someone take even the vaguest interest on what heconsiders a cemented part of his life and ideals and also someone to pass on MasterYoketron’s teachings to. When you show an additional interest in his studies onorganic life indigenous to Earth he’s thrilled – clearly you’re far more of akindred spirit than he initially would have guessed. It goes to show, oneshouldn’t judge a book by its cover.

- Often he’ll get caught up in explaining a particularlyfascinating discovery he’s made or even just a seemingly simple natural processand you can’t quite follow what he’s saying, but you try to be a diligentstudent. Though he’ll correct himself to more accessible language, you stillfind yourself asking Sari to clarify on ‘Phototropism’ (which is not to do withtaking pictures, much to your befuddlement) and ‘Pigmentation’ (No, not thosefarm animals, that’s different…). Despite the (in your opinion) needlessly complexwords and convoluted explanations, you don’t lose your curiosity. Prowl justmakes everything seem so interesting. Likewise, Prowl is content to re-explainthings as many times as is necessary. It’s good that you’re showing an interestin the planet they protect, and he’s determined to encourage it.

#TFP #TFA #Ratchet #Knockout #Shockwave #Soundwave #Prowl #Headcanon #Admin Snowy #Intelligence comes in many forms #I lack all of them

[rockofeye]

It'd be nice to see sort of a "Creole for beginners" post that talks about what terms are common in Vodou and maybe explains the grammar structure. I've noticed a lot of Creole I can mentally translate myself if I think about it long enough since many French words were taken into English awhile back, but French itself I don't actually know so sometimes it's quite a reach. The evolution of the language seems parallel with the evolution of Vodou and that's really interesting to me.

So, this ask has been sitting for awhile, and I’ve been thinking about it a lot as I am just finishing up an intensive month-long Kreyòl class.

Haitian Kreyòl/Kreyòl Ayisyen is a fascinating, gorgeous, succulent language. In some ways, it is super straightforward and in other ways, it is deeply complex as befits a language that has roots in Romance languages (more than one!), African languages (more than one!), and Indigenous languages. Like vodou, it is a language that embodies the history of Haiti and it has and does evolve as culture and the world advances.

Outside of Haiti, there is the idea that there is no common orthography/common way of speaking and utilizing the language. This is wrong wrong wrong. Largely, this stems from the fact that, until about 50 years ago, Kreyòl was almost entirely an oral only language because of colonialism–Kreyòl has only begun being taught in schools in the last decade, yet almost every Haitian speaks it fluently (the elite class speaks French, but that is largely a class marker–everyone knows Kreyòl). Many Haitians do not know how to write in Kreyòl, and write the best that they are able which leads to widely varied output….which leads outsiders to say that there is no commonly accepted orthography.

It would take a long, LONG time to really deconstruct and explain how Kreyòl works in practice so I’m not going to go there entirely, but here are some basics:

Kreyòl has 32 letter/symbols in its alphabet. Within that, there are 15 vowels/vowel sounds and 18 consonants/consonant sounds. Kreyòl only utilizes one accent (grave accent/aksan grav). Things with the alphabet that trip up Kreyòl learners who are native English speakers include:

‘C’ is not utilized except as a compound sound in ‘ch’, which is a soft sound like ‘shh’ and not a hard sound like ‘chair’.

‘U’ is not utilized except in compound sounds with other vowels.

‘G’ is always hard, never soft.

In Kreyòl, everything written is spoken–there are no silent letters, ever. A professor of mine terms Kreyòl as a truly democratic language; every letter has a sound that is expressed orally. 

Basic sentence structure is Subject-Verb-Object (Li se yon bèl fi/She is a beautiful woman) and Noun-Adjective (Li bèl/She is beautiful). Within that structure:

Tenses and conditions (positive/negation) are assigned by separate verb markers/particles. Absense of a verb marker makes the tense automatically present.

Verbs largely do not conjugate, with some exceptions.

Articles are placed separately from the noun–definite articles are ALWAYS after the noun, indefinite articles are ALWAYS before the noun, and this gives speakers of other languages fits because it is different than the Romance languages most closely related to Kreyòl (my class had several folks who spoke several European-derived languages fluently, and the folks who spoke French or Spanish fluently struggled the most).

Adjectives are mostly after nouns, except when they are not.

Kreyòl is a language of double speak, both in general and in vodou. Words carry multiple meanings depending on context and tone, which can be a struggle when learning and can lead to confusion and sometimes awkward conversation. For example, the word for walk and market is spelled and pronounced the same way, the word for pen can also refer to internal genitalia and/or pubic hair in a female-assigned person in a somewhat rude/abrupt way, and utilizing a nasal versus open vowel sound in ‘I would like to meet you’ in Kreyòl changes that sentence to ‘I would like to fuck you’. Luckily, most Haitians are extremely accommodating to outsiders and understand that mistakes are honest mistakes (but they will laugh…).

Tone and composure (how you fix your face when you speak) is super important. How a sentence is said communicates as much, if not more, than the actual word. How I say ‘yon fanm sa a la’ can change ‘the woman over there’ to ‘can you believe this biiiiiiiitch over there’.

Kreyòl must be spoken with mouth open: no mumbling, etc. To get words across accurately, the mouth must open to make all the sounds.

The language is an independent standalone language with piece of French, Spanish, English, and multiple African languages visible. Much of the sentence structuring is African-derived, particularly from Bantu and Yoruba sources. There is a recent and evolving movement to claim identity of the language as Haitian only, not as Kreyòl.

The language also reflects the lived history of the country and it’s people. A lot of common phraseology reflects the history of enslavement; one of the more common ways to ask where someone lives in-country is ki bò ou ye/kibò ou ye, which translates to ‘what side are you from’. This is directly related to how enslaved Africans lived; plantations were huge and sprawling and so when enslaved Africans met others who were on the same plantation, how they related where they lived on the plantation was in that manner. Like vodou, the language is it’s own living history.

In the religion, language gets more complicated. French is utilized in some specific instances and some spirits, if/when they speak, only speak French, but Kreyòl is the liturgical language of the religion. All the songs and majority of the prayers are in Kreyòl, the community speaks Kreyòl, etc. In general, French is falling away as being a conversational language in Haiti–it is often used in business and medicine, but that’s about it.

There is also langaj, the language of the spirits. This is largely untranslatable language that spirits sometimes use in possession–it can be a combination of Kreyòl and African-descended sounds that are not complete in any African language. What langaj means is often private between the spirit and to whom that spirit is speaking, with the most common uses become accepted parlance (think ritual exclamations, like ‘ayibobo’, ‘awoche Nago’, ‘alaso’,  ‘djarvodo/djavodo/djavado’).

Kreyòl is also spoken differently by spirits than by people. Kreyòl in general has many dialects throughout the country, and it follows that the spirits have many dialects as well. Kreyòl in general is spoken very fast by Haitians, and the spirits follow suit with that. In addition, some spirits speak more rural or localized forms of Kreyòl depending on what part of Haiti they are from. Some spirits speak very nasally, some speak so softly it almost sounds like they are only letting out soft breaths, some mix Kreyòl and langaj, some only speak/yell at top volume. All of that is super different than what a language program or even an in-person class can teach, and soKreyòl learned and used in religious settings is picked up contextually. 

LearningKreyòl can be a daunting pursuit. Since it is SO orally focused, the best way is to learn orally in an immersive setting; either an intensive class or in Haiti or the Haitian community. There are some language programs, most of them are not great. Here’s what I like:

Ann Pale Kreyol by Albert Valdman is an excellent place to start. Though it is older and some of it is dated, it is still pretty foundational and his teaching methods are still used in classroom teaching. It is pricey for a used copy, but there are PDFs easily available online.

Valdman also produced a bilingual English-Haitian Kreyòl dictionary and it is FANTASTIC. I have several dictionaries and this is by far the best–you get definitions of words, what parts of speech they are, and how they are used both in English and in Kreyòl sentences. It is pricey and you could beat someone to death with it, but it is worth it for learning.

Pawol Lakay is as useful as Ann Pale Kreyol is, and it also comes with CDs (if you can threaten Amazon into making sure they send them with the book). It can be a little weak on sentence structure and what parts of speech are, but it’s good. There is a forthcoming language learning system for Kreyòl that beats the pants off of anything else on the market but it is not out yet.

MangoLanguages is good for basic hello/goodbye/my name is fluency, but I did not find it useful for conversational use. Good introduction, though, and the pronunciation in-program is pretty on-point. Most public library systems and college/university libraries have a free subscriptions for this, there are also pay options.

There are other books that are aimed at travelers and casual users which can be useful, but the above are the best resources I have seen so far. I do not like the Pimsleur system for Kreyòl at all, as it is super limited to essentially picking up women in Port-au-Prince which is great if that’s your jam but not useful for much of anything else. Youtube is full of Kreyòl movies and television and music, which is good to throw on in the background to absorb the sound and cadence of the language. Several professors have cautioned about listening to Haitian radio unless it originates in Haiti, saying that most Haitian radio originating in the US is a broadcast in a mix of Kreyòl and bad French, which can trip up a learner.

I hope this helps! Let me know if I can offer more info.

#vodou #haitian vodou #kreyòl #kreyòl ayisyen #haitian creole

[smact-works]

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Cloud users are expected to gain more productivity, better employee experience, and improved workforce insights than those using on-premises solutions. If you still have doubts, here are some of the reasons why you should go for Oracle Cloud implementation:

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When it comes to new technology, people are always hesitant, but Oracle’s Cloud 2.0 apps are built with a smart and straightforward interface that prompts a delightful user experience. Additionally, this Human Capital Management interface augments productivity as it is competent to adjust according to your natural working style. This HCM solution also gradually learns about your preferences and recommends roles that coincide with your interests.

2.Responds to change

Don’t we all need a flexible system that can adapt to the changing business practices rapidly? Of course. Today’s ever-evolving market demands up-to-date systems, and Oracle HCM Cloud provides complete solutions that are easily configurable to your varying needs. You can set up an organizational chart of your company, perform workforce modeling, and do a lot more without IT's hindrance. Moreover, the nested analytics provide you with a personalized experience that can help you with decision-making.

3.Autonomous

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4. Complete Solution

 If you are seeking a complete package that can manage every HR process from hire to retirement, Oracle’s Human Cloud Management is the right choice. It can solely handle talent management, work-life, HR Support, payroll, time and labor, safety, and much more. Moreover, Oracle’s HCM Cloud efficiently unifies your enterprise’s supply chain, finances, sales, and marketing - all into one cloud.

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Oracle HCM cloud implementation has proved to be a game-changer for many successful enterprises. The application not only provides agility in the HR operations but improves employee engagement rates too. Some of the Oracle clients have claimed this application to be a blessing.

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The major benefit of moving your system to the cloud is innovation, and Oracle takes it very seriously. They tirelessly work on improving the features of HCM. Oracle claims over 9,500 updates annually, most of which are based on customers’ feedback. Who wouldn’t love to create an indigenous future with digital assistants, embedded AI systems, and smart devices (IoT)?

 7.Data security

Data Security is a guarantee of Oracle cloud solutions. Advanced data centers of HCM ensure encrypted data and multilayered security. Be it a safety threat or your employee’s data, you can rely on Advanced HCM Controls.

 8.A vibrant HR community

Oracle provides a platform to its customers where they can discuss their practices and advance their careers. Through different webinars, Oracle has been successful in building an environment where people can learn and network. This community surely helps you in expanding your circle globally!

 9.Customer satisfaction

You can completely trust Oracle when it comes to customer satisfaction. With its cutting-edge features and security, you can rely on the cloud. As OCI claims, their 24/7 customer support is now available in 145 countries worldwide.

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Most companies today operate at both the global and local levels, so Oracle HCM Cloud is designed globally to the core to accomplish corporate needs for over 200 jurisdictions and 25+ languages.

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#oracle cloud hcm cloud #oracle hcm cloud

[dzeikobb]

1.09.2020

Chodziłem w Łazienkach sam w czarnym i brązowym zmierzchu

Kupiłem sobie kawę w okienku u młodej dziewczyny

Nie nosiliśmy wtedy jeszcze masek

Ludzie zza granicy też kupowali kawę, albo gofra

Łazienki były idealnie utrzymane, biel ławek idealnie malowana, trawnik idealnie przystrzyżony

Liście idealnie ułożone wokół drzew

W zapadającej ciemności młode pary fotografowały się przed pałacem, przechodzili rodzice z dziećmi, pary na randkach, znajome na spacerach

Chodziłem po Parku Ujazdowskim z D. i H. po deszczu, w dzień

Musiałem przepraszać je za to, że poprowadziłem je po mokrym piasku ścieżek z kałużami i ich drobne białe buty mogły się zabrudzić

Ale to wszystko dlatego że dziewczyny nigdy w tym parku nie były i chciałem, żeby go poznały

To było wtedy kiedy mieliśmy iść na wystawę Żarty Żartami w Zamku Ujazdowskim i pocałowaliśmy klamkę, bo źle zapamiętałem datę i przyszliśmy tydzień przed otwarciem

a D. przestraszyła się w holu wejściowym czarnoskórego artysty, o którym potem dowiedziałem się, że wystawia swoje prace w ramach wystawy, i zaczęła się śmiać histerycznie, a on śmiał się z tego, że ona się śmiała

a w niedzielę trzydziestego sierpnia pocałowałem P. w podzięce za prywatny koncert na pianinie, jakiego mi udzielił w holu kasowym Teatru Studio, za zamkniętymi drzwiami, w trakcie spektaklu na górze

nie słyszałem ani dźwięków burzy, ani odgłosów z baru, kiedy grał mi fragmenty koncertu Rachmaninowa, arie Bacha, fugi Beethovena

wychodziliśmy na portyk, żeby P. mógł zapalić i zapatrywałem się w deszcz i błyski na niebie, stwierdził, że mnie szybko wzięło piwo, a ja byłem tylko zmęczony i pragnąłem milczeć

gdy wyszliśmy, zebrał się na odwagę i sam długo mnie całował przed rozświetlonym wejściem do Pałacu

to było zaledwie dzień po tym, kiedy spałem u innego, nowopoznanego P. na Gocławiu

codziennie rano piszę do Ł. i wymieniam z nim memy i artykuły z gazet

nie zliczę ile razy spotykałem się ostatnio z ludźmi

ogarnia mnie wielki lęk, kiedy nie mam planów na wieczór i nikogo nie spotykam

bardzo nie chcę siedzieć sam w domu i nie wiedzieć, co robić

szedłem za dnia przez pandemiczne bulwary, ludzie zachowywali się tak, jak zawsze, słyszałem też język angielski za plecami, grała muzyka, szedłem spięty, choć starałem się wyglądać naturalnie

niektóre lokale były zamknięte. Tete a tete zniknęło.

Gdy potem czekałem na tramwaj na Moście Gdańskim, napisała do mnie D. Przeraża mnie to, jak ona potrafi wyczuć, kiedy jest się samemu albo nie ma się co robić i natychmiast zarzuca sieci, oplata mackami, żeby się tylko spotkać

więc wypiłem z nią wieczór przed Pałacem Kultury

bolała mnie prawa ręka gdy próbowałem zasnąć w mieszkaniu P. na Krypskiej. Może od tego, że ścierpła, a może to od wilgoci i deszczu.

S. nie wydaje się być mną zainteresowany, ja straciłem zainteresowanie M. (uświadomiłem sobie nierealność całego założenia), z D. już chyba nigdy nie pójdę na imprezę.

próbuję być miły dla wszystkich, ale nie ulegać, nie dawać się zbytnio naciskom ich woli, nie inwestować czasu tam, gdzie nie powinienem

G. zamilkł, chodzi na spacery z D.

Kebab King przy metrze Nowy Świat nie przetrwał. Czupito zniknęło. Nowy chodnik na Mazowieckiej, jakieś nowe kluby. W Zachęcie wystawa Moniki Sosnowskiej. Pomalowane na zielono, poskręcane fragmenty straganów Jarmarku Europa wiszą na stalowych linach kilkanaście centymetrów od podłogi. W centrach medycznych trzeba wypełnić ankiety i zgody, lekarze pokryci cali ochronnymi płachtami, w czepkach, jak do operacji. Deszcz złapał nas, mnie i P., gdy szliśmy Grochowską wieczorem, stare domy, stare bramy, małe sklepy, złapałem klimat, który myślałem, że już nie istnieje.

"Queering is just a marketing mechanism to articulate more discourse to protect the capitalist political order. It doesn't challenge the dominant social order; it streamlines it.

Unless you can reveal living truths of LGBT+ lives under capitalism that:

- break out of its countercultural association with capitalism

- and become their own separate logic, counter to capitalism,

then you're just helping in the process of reforming capitalism. Queer discourse is still discourse, and discourse will always be gobbled up by the market at every turn.

I understand that there is an imperative need for LGBT+ people to express themselves, but don't forget that you are part of a historical mechanism that seeks to gobble you up, that seeks to incorporate you into capitalism, so that the ruling class can feel like it is beyond criticism, and like it doesn't have to capitulate to workers, the colonized, women, LGBT+ people, disabled people, and psychiatric misfits.

Postmodern relativity is killing us, and capitalism is living off our blood like a fucking zombie. Is that not proof enough of absolute truth, aka, our common circumstance? We are being eaten. All of us."

Where there is oppression, there is resistance. 

"It's funny how philosophy is implicitly, often unconsciously taken up by societies throughout history. The rejection of Hegel and the upholding of Kant and Heidegger in the last century couldn't be a more interesting mirror to the decisions that liberals and fascists embarked upon against the communist world.

With some exceptions, Hegel remains an adversary, an object of banal skepticism, while Kant remains the liberal norm; just as well, we can see the almost conscious, Heideggerianism of fascists throughout the world, and their thirst for war and cultural mythology as the only means to change the political landscape, albeit in the victor's favor.

It should come as no surprise that with liberals' obsession with the law and with capitalism, they should come to the same conclusions as the fascists, in the midst of war, political deadlocks, and cynical pessimism - that they must find an excuse to mythologize their own need to justify violence through both the law, and the capitalist state in the bourgeois democratic form.

The major capitalist states know that they must enforce bourgeois democracy and capitalism throughout the world. In order to turn all myths and all laws into commodities, they know full well that capitalism demands they serve the symbolic deadlock - making dead bodies dance and all languages sing the tune of the market, without ever peeking behind the curtain to see the truth of their undoing. Liberals make the whole, proletarian, colonized world live for the curtain, always with the threat of hitting the cast. This is to say that the truth of Liberalism is that its Kantian project has turned a shade of Heideggerian.

We are made to believe that there is nothing but our own death outside our cultural purview, and that our only hope for change is through colonialism, including our sham, colonial democracy, whose very existence is a living threat to the Black and Indigenous peoples within the borders of the US and Europe. Either we uphold the law, which leaves us prey to those who transgress it, or we use imperialism as our perpetual justification for transgression, always in the name of democracy. This reality is the shadow of the postmodern worldview that we aren't allowed to question - this notion that there are no universal narratives.

What does this tell us about the unconsciously held philosophy of Liberalism today? It tells us that its Kantian project of law-bound individualism, abstract humanism, and "perpetual peace" is eroding, to reveal what amounts to a realpolitik, an appeasement of everything conservative and fascist - literally, the hopeless, nostalgic conservation of national ideals sublimated through war with the third world, and the binding of chemically-preserved, processed lumber of cultural legacies whose wood grain is burning at both ends. The life of the world is swallowed up in a Protestant, apocalyptic myth against its will. Being unto death indeed, living proletarian life as dead labor, or rather undead labor, with neither rupture from the order, redemption, nor recompense.

Hegel remains an adversary because capitalism will not die. The hypocrisy of the Heideggerian degradation of Kant is that its raison d'être is never to live out its declared "authenticity" through its decomposition, but for the subjects of its statehood to die in its place - Being unto death for democracy. Being unto death for the law. Being unto death for individual authenticity and agency - none of which can be individual, legal, or democratic, except, conveniently, through the market, through the military and prison industrial complexes. The colonial subject, the gendered subject, the sexual subject, the disabled subject, and the psychical subject find, not war, but a common cause, a common fidelity to the truth of capitalism, which it must overcome as the proletarian subject.

For Hegel, our lived difference is sublimated into an open unity of pure thought, a decision against the bourgeois imperative and the fascist state of exception. To celebrate his work is to celebrate two and a half centuries of philosophers from all walks of life, who were tossed by the wayside, criticized, martyred, murdered, and sometimes forgotten, for criticizing everything that existed about the political order. They are remembered only for their hysteria, disavowed, because they questioned the senseless, violent, and spineless dogmas of their day.

In Hegel's philosophical lineage, we find revolutionary thinkers, who, themselves, might have not been revolutionaries in the way that we usually conceive of them, but whose bodies of work could only ever be taken to revolutionary ends, or otherwise falsified. To celebrate Hegel is to celebrate Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, Mao Zedong, Kwame Nkrumah, Kim il-Sung, Evald Ilyenkov, Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, Frantz Fanon, Georges Bataille, Max Stirner, György Lukács, Anuradha Ghandy, Lise Vogel, Theodor Adorno, Herbert Marcuse, Alain Badiou, Joan Copjec..."

"Ale rzeczywistość jest taka, że nawet gdyby taka Margot i całe Stop Bzdurom posłuchały się rad internetowych wujaszków i ugrzeczniły swój przekaz, to zawsze znajdzie się kolejna osoba, która „skompromituje” LGBT, tym razem na inny sposób" - a nawet jeśli nie... to ją wymyślą. Patrz: małpa na balkonie z baldachimem z IKEA udającym tęczową flagę. Rzekomo profanująca marsz patriotów, w którym - i to już nie fejk - od ładnych paru lat z podniesionym czołem maszeruje faszystowska międzynarodówka. Małpa na balkonie to fejk i prowokacja praktycznie nie do wymazania i nie do sprostowania w czasach zalewu fejków i błyskawicznego obiegu informacji i DEZinformacji. I nawet jeśli obalasz to w dyskusji, to usłyszysz i prędko się zorientujesz, że homofobicznej stronie jest dokładnie wszystko jedno, czy to faktycznie była osoba "ze środowiska LGBT". Chodzę po szczujniach wyborców pisu i tam jest wszystko. Zdjęcia fetyszystów. Zdjęcia gołych heteryków z jakiegoś eventu nudystów. Zdjęcia specyficznych praktyk seksualnych. Robotnikom homofobicznej szczujni jest dokładnie wszystko jedno - nawet gdyby osoby LGBT+ były grzeczniutkie co do jednej, i tak jak nie znajdą, to zmyślą.

A propos wujków i cioć dobra rada - ciągle trafiam na takie wypowiedzi. Że "ja nie mam nic przeciwko, nikomu nie zaglądam, nie wtrącam się, ale po co oni... ... ...?" I jak tak poskrobać, to szybko się okaże, pod jakim warunkiem jest ta tolerancja. Ano proste: nie róbcie marszów, nie obnoście się, nie pokazujcie się, nie afiszujcie się. Krótko mówiąc - bądźcie hetero. Wpisujcie się w nasz obrazek. Baby na lewo, chłopy na prawo. Co inne, od Złego pochodzi.

Nie jest to żadna akceptacja, ale to nie jest nawet tolerancja. To jest wpychanie kolanem do szafy upiora, którego nie chce się oglądać i nawet myśleć o jego istnieniu. Bo nie pasuje do obrazka.

I może jeszcze powinno się dziękować, że jak się w tej szafie zamkniesz, to cię nie pobiją...

Albo po rękach całować, że tylko tak tłamszą, bo przecież "gdyby tu byli muzułmanie, to dopiero by wam dali popalić".

Wszystko to zusammen do kupy jest po prostu przemocowe. Czasem wprost, pięścią w twarz, czasem w białych rękawiczkach. Ale chodzi dokładnie o to samo. Żebyśmy nie istnieli. Żeby o tym naszym istnieniu nawet nie trzeba było myśleć. 100 lat za równymi prawami dla wszystkich obywateli i 100 lat za godnym, bezpiecznym, otwartym życiem."

#dzeikobb #2020

[xtruss]

REVIEW

Feeling Like an Outcast

The bestselling book “Caste” brilliantly frames racial hierarchies in the United States but largely ignores the horrors of India’s caste structure.

— By Yashica Dutt | September 17, 2020 | Foreign Policy

LYDIA ORTIZ ILLUSTRATION FOR FOREIGN POLICY

In early September 2001, at the World Conference Against Racism in Durban, South Africa, Indian Dalit activists were desperately rallying support to get caste recognized as a manifestation of racism. The term Dalit, derived from the Sanskrit word for oppressed, is used to describe people placed by India’s caste system at the very bottom of the social hierarchy and once called “untouchables.”

As delegates from around the world lobbied in Durban, Dalits had reportedly won the backing of the spokesperson of the European Union, as well as that of representatives from Guatemala and Switzerland. A handful of other European countries had also promised their support. But months of strategizing and advocacy failed to materialize when the Dalits were let down by a crucial constituency: their own government.

For decades, New Delhi had championed boycotts against apartheid-era South Africa. But at an international platform designed to hold nations accountable for the continued mistreatment of marginalized populations, the Indian government informed the world that the issue of caste—and the institutionalized suppression of those who fall at the bottom of its hierarchies—was an internal matter.

In the new bestseller Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, a work Oprah Winfrey has said “might be the most important book I’ve ever chosen for my book club,” the Pulitzer Prize-winning Isabel Wilkerson ensures that the topic of caste gets a major platform. Wilkerson introduces caste as a framework to analyze the United States’ graded racial hierarchy that holds African Americans near the bottom and explains why conventional concepts of racism alone are no longer sufficient to explain how it has endured, nearly intact, for four centuries. In order to understand how an unconscious ranking of human characteristics has been “used to justify brutalities against entire groups within our species,” she looks to the concentrated evil of Nazi Germany, which lasted 12 years, and the Hinduism-rooted caste system of varnas in India, which has lasted, in various forms, for millenniums. Wilkerson patiently peels each carefully matted layer of racial hierarchy to lay bare the history of oppression that people such as myself, a Dalit, have inherited from our ancestors. And in some 400 pages, she obliterates decades of New Delhi’s diplomatic attempts to prevent caste from getting the global notoriety it has always deserved.

The parallels between caste and race are not new, and Wilkerson leans heavily on the work of several early 20th-century researchers, notably the pathbreaking African American anthropologist Allison Davis, to trace how racial inequalities in the United States mirrored those in India and how the inhuman life conditions of African Americans reflected those of Dalits. Yet Wilkerson, like many before her, unequivocally centers her work on the United States, with caste as a larger framework—a structure of gradation to explain how race represents the skin atop the bones of the fixed, immovable ranking that is known as caste. In doing so, Wilkerson gives us a language uniquely tailored for our times. As the Black Lives Matter movement forces the United States to contend with its history of racism, many of its white residents now recognize themselves as beneficiaries of centuries of caste privilege (along with many others who resent this interrogation and cling tighter to their assumed superiority).

“Wilkerson gives us a language uniquely tailored for our times.”

While the United States’ liberal ideology of multiculturalism was once content with overlooking the factions and frictions within the various communities labeled as nonwhite, the world is now openly examining the striations within racial hierarchies—and within races themselves. The supposed solidarity of Latinx people, Middle Eastern Americans, and East Asian and South Asian Americans, all of whom gained from the advances made by the often violent struggles of African Americans during the civil rights movement and beyond, is rightfully under scrutiny at a time when Black folk fight to bring attention to their modern-day lynchings at the hands of the police system. An estimated 90 percent of Indian Americans are upper caste—they also comprise the highest-earning ethnic group in the United States—so it is understandable then that discussions about the horrors of the Indian caste system are only just entering mainstream American discourse. This makes Wilkerson’s definitions of dominant caste (white), middle castes (Latinx and Asian), subordinate caste (African American), and indigenous people (Native American) in the United States a radical intervention. It not only makes visible the plainly manifest yet stubbornly obscured reality of racial suppression of African Americans but also supplies other people of color with a vocabulary to understand their place in the lattice of racial and social order in the United States. As a Dalit woman and immigrant from a formerly untouchable manual scavenging caste in India, my place in the Indian social order lies at the very bottom. But as a brown resident in the United States, I fall somewhere in the middle of the racial caste pyramid.

The brilliance of Wilkerson’s book lies in her painstaking research, her clear understanding of the different executions of caste, and her ability to draw a single direct thread that goes from the enslavement of African natives, captured and brought to Virginia in 1619, to nearly every form of inequity inflicted on Black folk—public lynchings, segregation, legal slavery under Jim Crow, redlining, mass incarceration, underrepresentation, voter disenfranchisement, suppression, killings by police, medical mistreatment, and constant microaggressions. She deftly and neatly reveals how systemic coding and learned cultural assumptions of white superiority—along with the unconscious biases—are often responsible for upholding the racial hierarchy of caste.

There is perhaps no aspect of Black life, including the knee-jerk social distancing of newer African immigrants from African Americans, that, in Wilkerson’s telling, is unrelated to the well-worn, comforting grooves of caste. In a later chapter, she describes how a Nigerian student at first did not identify with being Black, something that had no meaning for him back home and which led him to believe that if they were being passed on for jobs and promotions, then “[m]aybe the African-Americans were not working hard enough.” But after spending a few years in the United States, he knew better than to dismiss the reality of his race as a perceived determining factor in his worth.

As she unbraids each knot of the United States’ complex racial caste system, however, the absence of a critique of the capitalist forces that define the American social order is glaring. While Wilkerson connects both the mass incarceration of African Americans and an absence of universal health care to slavery, there is no mention of the prison industrial complex or the crooked lobbying by insurance and pharmaceutical firms to keep the health care system as broken as it is. Ibram X. Kendi, the National Book Award-winning author of How to Be an Antiracist, whom Wilkerson also prominently acknowledges in her book, has noted that the origins of racism cannot be separated from the origins of capitalism in the slave trade that provided the economic fuel of a new world order.

While racism is commonly understood as a form of personal hatred, Wilkerson frames it as a consolidation of power. She explains that for members of the dominant caste to loathe the progress of African Americans, or for them to feel discomfort at seeing Black people in positions of influence, the disgust at an assertion of equality isn’t an individual response but a result of the collective conditioning of white populations. It is a superiority reinforced through nearly every cultural, social, economic, legal, and judicial aspect of American life. Seen through Wilkerson’s framework, when a supposed majority of white women vote for a presidential candidate who has conclusively proved to be harmful to their interests—over a seemingly more competent white woman—they are choosing the cultural aspect of their identity that brings them closest to power. Or when a white working-class voter is willing to suffer from an inflamed liver rather than vote for the Affordable Care Act, he is acting in the interests of the collective superiority of his dominant white male caste that rebukes any shared solidarity with those lower than him on the caste order.

In a culture that defines us often exclusively with our identities (as opposed to, as Wilkerson argues, who we are on the inside), it is staggering to imagine the power of a Black female journalist unpacking how caste structures can hurt even white men when most of the inequality she seems to have faced comes at the behest of that same dominant caste. Making a case for radical empathy, Wilkerson asserts—somewhat tidily and with a mild case of moral grandstanding—that our prejudices are systemic yet our awakening can only be individual. But if that is so, then it’s difficult to imagine how structural power and privilege might spontaneously topple in the wake of the personal recognition of inequality. But this seemingly naive and even simplistic belief in our humanity might possibly be the single most subversive statement in Wilkerson’s laborious undertaking.

Wilkerson’s definition of caste makes one expect that her book would underline the ongoing horrors of the caste system in India and within Indian communities in the United States and elsewhere. Reading Caste, however, it would be hard to know that. Serving a uniquely American argument, Wilkerson expediently relies on B.R. Ambedkar, the Dalit architect of the Indian Constitution and the foremost leader of anti-caste ideology, whom she calls the “Martin Luther King of India.” Readers of Ambedkar’s work will recognize his words and phrases generously sprinkled throughout Wilkerson’s book. For Dalits, who have almost single-handedly kept Ambedkar’s legacy alive despite abject neglect from Indian institutions and have struggled to see him recognized as the preeminent leader of Dalit rights on a global stage, it is a moment of pride. Wilkerson recalls forming her initial theory of the eight pillars of caste, which serve as the foundation of her argument, through a lecture she was invited to deliver at a meeting of Dalit Ambedkarites in Massachusetts. Later, she recounts her visits to India, a caste conference in the United Kingdom, and outlines conversations she had with Dalit academics, researchers, and theorists.

What captures most of Wilkerson’s attention, however, is the treatment of Dalits as it aligned with the enslavement of African Americans and in the Jim Crow era that followed. Wilkerson gives little space to the inequities that affect Dalits today, some of which are more brutal and dehumanizing than even before India’s independence. Describing her first trip to India a few years ago, she mentions the roadside religious shrines lined on the streets of New Delhi and admits to finding them slightly exotic, only to later compare them to the spontaneous memorials that appear at the site of a police shooting or at gun violence in U.S. schools.

“Wilkerson fails to mention how Dalits in India are routinely abused and subjected to violence.”

Yet she fails to mention how Dalits in India are routinely abused and subjected to violence and even murder for supposedly desecrating a religious shrine or a temple with their so-called polluting touch—a concept to which Wilkerson devotes an entire chapter when she explains the different pillars of caste. One such pillar is titled “Endogamy and the Control of Marriage and Mating,” an idea Ambedkar explored extensively as a graduate student at Columbia University in 1916. Endogamy, or the practice of marrying within one’s caste to maintain caste superiority and purity, is the basis of arranged marriages, one of India’s more recognizable cultural exports to the United States. Neither that nor the heartless so-called honor killings (of Dalit and dominant caste couples by their family members) to preserve the superiority of their caste find mention in her pages.

In support of her larger argument, Wilkerson investigates the blood-curdling horrors inflicted by the Third Reich and draws attention to how the miscegenation regulations of the Southern United States were extreme even for the drafters of the Nuremberg laws. But even as the most sensitive analyst, Wilkerson appears to give in to the idea of American exceptionalism and centers Western narratives while failing to dig into the continued brutalization of Dalits who largely reside in India—in the global south. Despite her humanist and internationalist approach to bring all three systems of caste on par with each other, the original Indian version, as Wilkerson calls it, suffers the most in the service of the greater rationalization and possibly in favor of a largely American audience.

Wilkerson’s radical framing of racial injustice as a system of caste, aligning the struggles of Black Americans with those of Dalits, elevates thousands of years of Dalit trauma and struggle into the global spotlight in a single swoop. Her construct unquestionably cements the solidarity between Black and Dalit movements after decades of foiled attempts, from the brief correspondence between Ambedkar and W.E.B. Du Bois to the revolutionary Dalit Panther Party modeled after the Black Panthers. But overlooking the ongoing horrors and implications of the Indian caste system on Dalit lives ultimately serves the dominant caste’s straw man argument that casteism is a fading reality in the Indian subcontinent. Wilkerson plays an assessor shining a spotlight on the decaying foundations of the house that is America, festered with the rot of the racial caste system. She powerfully reveals the American story, unearthing the chapters that have been deliberately buried by a white supremacist version of history. Wilkerson forces readers to confront the implications of a skewed racial hierarchy. Yet for me, a Dalit reader often marginalized and restricted to the bottom of an even more lopsided global order, it often feels like being left out of my own history.

— Yashica Dutt is a New York City-based Indian writer and journalist and the author of Coming Out as Dalit. Twitter: @YashicaDutt

[megwcitycourse]

The Double Life of a College Town

From 2010 until 2018 (with the exception of 10 months in 2012-2013 when I studied abroad in Barcelona) I lived in Urbana, Illinois, USA. This (unremarkable to most of the world) small city has an estimated population of 42,214 (U.S. Census Bureau, Urbana) but sits attached to Champaign with another 88,909 (U.S. Census Bureau, Champaign). While I lived almost exclusively in Urbana, the truth is that the two cities mostly behave as one, whether you call it Champaign-Urbana or Urbana/Champaign or Chambana or Bubble City, etc. (That last one is mostly a gimmick name used for events. Champaign - Champagne - get it?)

Cronin (2006) links his micro-cosmopolitanism to fractal differentialism. He explains, “This term expresses the notion of a cultural complexity which remains constant from the micro to the macro scale. That is to say, the same degree of diversity is to be found at the level of entities judged to be small or insignificant as at the level of large entities” (15).

Champaign-Urbana is mostly known for being the home of the main campus of the University of Illinois, which is my alma mater (I’m told that’s a very American phrase). A large research university of over 50,000 students (“UIUC”), it dominates the twin cities while simultaneously being somewhat discrete from the surrounding area. Champaign and Urbana are technically two cities - Champaign-Urbana is also two cities in a more figurative sense. You have students, and you have townies. You have Campustown, and you have downtown Champaign or Urbana (on either side). I’ve always kind of straddled the two - I joined a group soon after coming to the University that was comprised of both students and townies and I made friends with both. Went to parties off campus and attended classes on. While I was a student, I lived in both Champaign-Urbanas.

I cited Cronin above to highlight the reason why I gave the population sizes of Champaign and Urbana in the first paragraph. I wanted to illustrate that, despite its significantly smaller size than any of the world’s major cities, Champaign/Urbana exhibits many of the same tensions we would expect from places like Toronto, Chicago, London, Tokyo, etc. We can even find some of these tensions just within the University’s campus.

In “Serendipitous City: In Search of an Aleatory Urbanism,” Mervyn Horgan (2014) gives us the “city of birds” and the “city of worms,” two representational modes accounting for different methods in urban studies. Of the city of birds, he writes, “the urban is treated as an object to be described and known through accurate and complete description of what is objectively available and analyzable” (64). By contrast, “In the city of worms, the urban is treated as a subject to be interpreted and understood.” Put another way, “Where the city of birds is populated, the city of worms is peopled” (67). From the city of birds, we get disciplines such as urban planning and demography, whereas the city of worms gives us ethnography and literature (69).

For about a year, I was majoring in Computer Science (until I realized I was not very good at it and did not, in fact, want to spend the rest of my working life doing it). I was also taking German at the time, and between the two classes, I had a bit of a walk across campus, from the southeast corner of the Main Quad to the east side of the Engineering Quad (map below - the Foreign Languages Building, or FLB, is crudely circled in blue and the Siebel Center for Computer Science in red).

(Google Maps)

I took this walk up Mathews Avenue a couple of times a week, and at some point I realized that there was a noticeable demographic shift as I moved from the Main Quad (housing primarily the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences) to the Engineering Quad. Slowly but surely, the students I passed by trended more male. An unfortunate side effect of the (improving, but still prevalent) dominance of men in the engineering disciplines. I was never the only woman in my computer science classes, but it was usually in the single digits, and it showed when I crossed Green Street to arrive on the engineering side of the U of I campus. I see this experience as a meeting of Horgan’s “city of birds” and “city of worms.” In a small city like Champaign-Urbana - in an even smaller “city” like the UIUC campus - you can see how the demographic makeup shifts on just a ten-minute walk.

The buildings around me also changed on this little walk - noticeably more money has been spent on the engineering programs on campus compared to the liberal arts. You can see it in the more modern buildings full of metal and glass and new, functioning equipment, compared to FLB, a building I had most of my courses in and later worked in for about a year and a half, a brick building with a chilly basement and old carpeting, and three usually-working laptops that I had to loan out to grad students who didn’t have their own. Granted, computers are slightly less important to non-computer science students, but, in this day and age, only slightly. More on this dichotomy a bit later on.

Even more stark than the shift in gender demographics from one side of campus to the other was the shift between on and off campus demographics. I moved into an apartment off campus in 2011 and got a car around the same time. Experiencing Champaign/Urbana by car was a whole different world from on foot. Though the areas closest to campus were still dominated by students, the farther away I got, the more variety I saw in the age range of the pedestrians. I also noted a drop in the number of pedestrians overall (this was the reason I frequently stated that I hated driving on campus), as well as a decline in how pedestrian friendly the streets were. Interestingly enough, despite the abundance of crosswalks on campus, jaywalking seemed equally rampant just about everywhere. (Keep jaywalking in mind - I’m going to mention it later on.)

The types of cars I tended to see also changed depending on whether I was in Campustown or elsewhere. Campustown, being prime real estate for proximity to the main campus as well as to bars and restaurants, was (increasingly, as the years went on) full of expensive high rises boasting as many amenities as possible to students who could afford to take advantage. I pulled the image below from the 309 Green website (this was one of the high rises that has been there since I moved to town - several others cropped up later):

(“309 Green”)

I won’t say all of the buildings in Campustown had a pool, but most of them had advertising materials that looked roughly like this. With most off campus apartments, you’d be lucky if they had their own website with more than a couple of photos, and they certainly didn’t come with high-speed internet, central A/C, washer and dryer, fitness center, etc. And while I drove in Campustown only a few times a month, every time, I could tell exactly where I was by both the number of pedestrians and the luxury cars that surrounded my humble Honda.

According to Myria Georgiou (2014), top-down (or hegemonic) cosmopolitanism “represents the project of the neoliberal city… enabled through the close collaboration of local and national government and corporate interests.” On the other hand, “Vernacular cosmopolitanism is about hospitality, which, though conditional… makes the urban landscape’s history and present always a history-in-the-making, a history of newcomers” (65).

I’ve seen echoes of this dichotomy both on the UIUC campus and in Champaign-Urbana more broadly. Near the afore-mentioned FLB is a row of buildings on Nevada Street referred to as the “cultural houses”. Here’s why:

(Google Maps)

That brick one on the right is the Native American House, the pale yellow one on the left is La Casa Cultural Latina. The Departments of Gender and Women’s Studies, Asian American Studies, and African American Studies are also on this street. The idea here is that students of all kinds feel welcome, have a “home” (never mind the graffiti that started showing up outside of La Casa right around, oh, 2016 or so). There’s a bit of irony in having a “Native American House” right in the middle of Kiikaapoi, Miami, Peoria, and Očeti Šakówiŋ lands, but that’s a another post ("Native Land”). (Spoiler alert: the U of I doesn’t have a great history [or present] when it comes to respecting indigenous peoples.)

Then, we have the Siebel Center:

(Ngo 2014)

It’s a hulking mass of a building compared to those cultural houses, full of the kind of money the University and its donors are willing to spend on the Computer Science program (one of the top ten in the country). These buildings and the university departments associated with them serve as UIUC’s “neighborhoods,” and in them we can see the way a city’s tensions play out on a more micro scale. The examples I’ve given here are by no means exhaustive, but I believe they provide a taste of the unique experience of living in a college town.

Off campus, we have a perhaps more traditional, obvious example of hegemonic vs. vernacular cosmopolitanism: the two malls. First, in northern Champaign, there is the Market Place Mall, a traditional shopping center with stores like Bergner’s, JC Penney, Claire’s, Hot Topic, Kay Jewelers, etc. The fact that it is exactly the kind of mall you can find in most US towns makes it, much like Westfield Stratford City, as discussed by Georgiou, “mediated, controlled, commodified.” She says, “Westfield Stratford City is both indistinguishable from other spaces of global consumption and a very specific place…” (54) Indistinguishable though it may be from other places of this type, the Market Place Mall remains a destination for locals and people from the surrounding towns to shop, meet, and eat – much like any other mall.

The Lincoln Square Mall, in downtown Urbana, is much more vernacular in its cosmopolitanism. Aside from several empty storefronts, it is filled with local businesses and organizations including a small art supply store, an organic food co-op, a record shop, a church, and several martial arts/fitness studios. The few restaurants are locally owned – not a Panda Express or Auntie Anne’s Pretzels in sight. Unfortunately, it is clear that Lincoln Square does not benefit from attracting patrons from the surrounding towns in the way that Market Place does. This is not a mall that people go to just to hang out or browse. If you’re at Lincoln Square, it’s probably for a specific reason (the food co-op and the gym are the most popular destinations) and you aren’t likely to spend time just walking around the way you might at a more typical mall. However, it seems to keep itself afloat by engaging with the community. Events such as Pridefest are hosted there each year, and during the warmer months, you can visit the Urbana Farmers’ Market (another example of the vernacular) in the parking lot.

“...what most vividly characterizes the colonial city is its spatial segregation. Such separation is a powerful visual illustration of the ‘paradoxical unity’ of cities, where populations mingle on the streets and yet lead culturally separate lives” (Simon 2006, 22).

At the beginning of this essay, I alluded to the separation between students and townies. “Town-gown” relations are known to be troubled in many college towns, though some universities have taken steps to address the problem. Joshua J. Yates and Michaela Accardi studied this problem in 2019 and published their findings as the “Field Guide for Urban University-Community Partnerships.” While they identified ten universities with innovative community engagement programs (23), they also note that only 16 out of the 100 universities surveyed have a “governance structure inclusive of community members” (21). Regrettably, data for individual universities was not included in the guide, so I am uncertain of where the U of I falls in their evaluation. However, speaking from personal experience, I can say that I do not feel that the University encourages its students to engage with the Champaign/Urbana community. I did because I joined a mixed group soon after becoming a student there, so I straddled the line between students and townies for a long time. (I would say I went “full townie” after I left that group in 2015.) That said, the only time I was ever required to do community service (which is not, by any means, the end all be all of community engagement) was during my brief stint in the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps.

Price (2019), citing Abdelhafid Khatib, writes, “...social location and how you are identified matters in how you move, where you move, with what safety or danger, and that, in turn, has consequences for what you see and perceive” (76).

I’m going to get a bit political here and talk about 2016 and its aftermath. When the US presidential election took place, ending with the election of Donald Trump, Champaign/Urbana was a city divided (and you could hear it on local public radio the next morning). While it is, overall, a dot of blue in a sea of red (those are swapped from what they mean in Canada), the surrounding rural area’s influence can be seen outside of campus (as can the influence of the wealthy white Chicago suburbs that send students to UIUC). At the time, I was working for a local academic publisher and conference producer in what is called Research Park. Research Park is technically part of the U of I campus, though it is not near any residential or academic buildings. It houses both startups and branches of larger companies and is mainly tech-oriented. The company that I worked for skewed very millennial, female, and liberal, and the whole office took on a somber mood in the days following the election. That first day was a mess of tears, ranting, and not much work getting done. Our bosses made a point of checking in on how we were holding up. This was a place where everyone at least appeared to be on the same page, politically, and we all felt a little safer because of it. Personally, because I felt that visibility was important, I chose this time to start being a little more open about being a queer person, and I found it to be a non-issue among this set of coworkers.

Unfortunately, because there are plenty of things aside from politics that can make a job turn sour, I left that company towards the end of 2017 and had to head back to the retail world to make ends come anywhere near meeting. What I found there, in northern Champaign, near the Market Place Mall, was a world very different from the one in which I had been living for the past seven years. Though I wasn’t vocal about my political leanings, I didn’t lie about them either, and that earned me a fair amount of “jokes” and “teasing” (none of which seemed especially funny) from some of my superiors. They, in their positions of power over me, did not seem to understand why such behavior might be inappropriate, and it made more than one day at that job feel nearly like a hostile environment. It never escalated to a point where I felt like any potential retribution I might face was worth a report to Human Resources, but it was the closest I came to facing the urban/rural dichotomy of Champaign/Urbana head-on. By contrast with my publishing job, I did not feel safe outing myself as queer with the majority of these coworkers.

But then, by focusing on my own experience, I am still missing something. In his discussion of translation-as-tuning-in, Price talks about experience-near and experience-distant concepts. He explains, “If you try and reach for a person’s own schema, then you are focused on... ‘experience-near’ concepts; if you go for the abstract, disciplinary categories, and concepts foreign to what a social agent would recognize, then you are using ‘experience-distant’ concepts” (71).

It is one thing for me to recognize that a person of color or a disabled person or a trans person (especially one using a name and pronouns other than their legal ones) might have had an even more hostile experience at that retail workplace (and even, to an extent, at the predominantly white publishing company), and it is quite another for me to “tune in” to the everyday reality of such existences. I could say the same of my experiences as a student at the University. I felt safe there most of the time. How did my Latinx classmates feel when “Build the Wall” chalkings started appearing on campus in 2016 (including right outside of La Casa Cultural Latina - a deliberate act of intimidation)? How did my indigenous classmates feel when being asked to root for the “Fighting Illini?” (Illini refers to the Illinois Confederation, representing about a dozen indigenous tribes from the area [”The Illinois”].) Or when, nearly 15 years after the retirement of Chief Illiniwek (a “mascot” that involved a white student dressing in pseudo-ceremonial garb and performing a pseudo-ceremonial dance), local news outlets still stir up the debate on a regular basis via social media? What about the fact that Black people make up 16% of the population in Champaign/Urbana but the vast majority of arrests (yes, arrests) for jaywalking (88% in Champaign and 91% in Urbana) (Rosen 2012)?

Reaching for these experiences and trying to internalize them is something you might not expect a person from a small town to have any need to do, but, as I cited Cronin near the beginning of this post, the diversity that you see at the macro level also exists at the micro level. Champaign/Urbana has tensions between urban and rural, students and townies, racial tensions, gender disparities, and socio-economic divides, despite containing fewer than 150,000 people, compared to the millions in some of the biggest cities. College towns are their own unique animal with a double life unlike any other kind of city.

References

“309 Green.” 2020. Apartments Near UIUC | 309 Green | Champaign, IL. American Campus Communities. Accessed August 13, 2020. https://www.americancampus.com/student-apartments/il/champaign/309-green#amenities.

Cronin, Michael. 2006. “Translation and the New Cosmopolitanism.” In Translation and Identity, 6-40. London: Routledge.

Georgiou, Myria. 2014. “Consumption: The Hegemonic and the Vernacular.” In Media and the City: Cosmopolitanism and Difference, 44–65. Chichester: Polity Press.

Google Maps. Google. Accessed August 3, 2020. https://maps.google.com/.

Horgan, Mervyn. 2014. “Serendipitous City: In Search of Aleatory Urbanism.” In Cartographies of Place: Navigating the Urban, edited by Michael Darroch and Janine Marchessault, 55–76. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press.

“The Illinois: Identity.” 2000. MuseumLink Illinois. Illinois State Museum. http://www.museum.state.il.us/muslink/nat_amer/post/htmls/il_id.html.

“Native Land.” n.d. Map. Native Land. Native Land Digital. Accessed August 3, 2020. https://native-land.ca/.

Ngo, Johnny. 2014. “Computer Science - Rise in Popularity and Plagiarism.” Uloop. Uloop Inc. October 5, 2014. https://www.uloop.com/news/view.php/138163/Computer-Science---Rise-in-Popularity-and-Plagiarism.

Price, Joshua Martin. 2019. “Taking Sides: Urban Wandering as a Decolonial Translation Practice in the Americas.” Tusaaji: A Translation Review 7 (1): 68–83. doi:10.25071/1925-5624.40385.

Rosen, Rebecca J. 2012. “In Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, 89% of Those Arrested for Jaywalking Are Black.” The Atlantic, August 24. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/08/in-champaign-urbana-illinois-89-of-those-arrested-for-jaywalking-are-black/261522/.

Simon, Sherry. 2006. Translating Montreal: Episodes in the Life of a Divided City. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.

“UIUC Student Enrollment by Curriculum and Student Level Fall 2019.” 2019. University of Illinois Division of Management Information. September 9, 2019. https://www.dmi.illinois.edu/stuenr/class/enrfa19.htm.

U.S. Census Bureau. 2019. “U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts: Champaign City, Illinois.” 2019. https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/urbanacityillinois.

U.S. Census Bureau. 2019. “U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts: Urbana City, Illinois.” 2019. https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/champaigncityillinois.

Yates, Joshua J., and Michaela Accardi. 2019. Field Guide for Urban University-Community Partnerships. Charlottesville: Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture.

[jacquesjulmice]

What Are The Importance Of Taking Creole Classes?

Have you ever considered taking a category during a language that's rarely used? Did you ever believe in living or working in Haiti? The interesting thing is that anyone who wants to relocate or visit a far off and exotic land like Haiti must know a minimum of some conversational openers and words so as to possess a fluent or beginner conversation with the locals living there. There are numerous other reasons that push people towards learning Haiti Creole and taking creole lessons online aside from the very fact that they're going to get to work or reside during this beautiful country. There’s also the greatness and importance of Haitian culture and therefore the desire to understand the new and interesting facts about this land. Whether you're headed for Port au Prince or the other city within the country, you want to know a touch little bit of the local culture. The simplest thanks to finding this out is to use the services of a specialized center for foreign employees that require to be assimilated into the workforce of this country.

Situated within the Greater Antillean archipelago, within the island of Hispaniola, and officially called the Republic of Haiti, this Caribbean country may be a heaven for residents of other countries and foreign nationals that come to go to and live here. Another interesting thing that you simply will learn at the knowledgeable and modern class of Creole language and Haiti culture is that the incontrovertible fact that the indigenous Taino name given to the island was Ayiti, meaning land of high mountains. In French, this beautiful country is known as "La Perle des Antilles", signifying The Pearl of the Antilles, as a result of the breathtaking natural great thing about the Haitian sceneries. Understandably, more interesting facts about the country and its main language are often discovered in specialized classes.

There are three levels of Haitian Creole that you simply can learn: the beginner, the intermediate, and therefore the advanced. Generally, these are all targeted towards the aiding of workers, staff members, and students coming to end their academic background within the island country of Haiti. A number of the programs designed for persons who want to find out Creole last as long as 120 hours and that they are generally led by trained and experienced teachers. If not, it might not be advisable to follow a category with a beginner teacher or a non-professional thanks to the complex nature of the language and its particularities. Each of the three levels that Haitian Creole has is going to be divided into 60 sessions and every session lasts the maximum amount as two hours. You'll take creole to english lessons classes reception before getting to Haiti otherwise you can begin to find out this language after moving to at least one of the cities there, like the capital of the country which is named Port-au-Prince. There also are courses held in other cities of the island, including Petion-Ville, if this location is more suitable for you. Otherwise, you'll always resort to non-public sessions and long-distance tutorials held with modern means of communication and conferencing, like Skype.

For more info :- sentences in creole

[riverflowsthroughit]

Student and Humanitarian, Geneva, Switzerland - RiverFlowsThroughIt               

Carlota was a chance meeting, arranged by a good friend. She is such a shining star, full of hope, energy and enthusiasm. I thoroughly enjoyed her viewpoints on life in Geneva, her take on state of indigenous languages in Peru and hopes for a field position in Africa. I am completely certain that there will be updates about her doing fantastic things in the future and lives of those around her.

1. Name. Ana Carlota Moura 2. Where is your hometown? I always have an interesting time answering this one. I would say Lisbon, because that is where I was physically born, but I feel my heart is in many other places I’ve lived in. However, now that I’m closer to ‘home’, I really feel Lisbon is where I am from. 3. What is your profession/career/title/self-label/designation? Curious and compassionate challenge-seeker/sustainability enthusiast/amateur musician & humanitarian data analyst 4. What was the journey like to get where you are (career wise)? When was the mental shift to start the journey? My mental shift to starting my career journey happened during the close time I was graduating in Anthropology. I was in Brazil at the time, becoming more and more interested in the challenges indigenous peoples face when living in urban settings, and I felt the academic tools I had were not enough to address and engage this reality wholeheartedly. My journey after that realization has taken me different places and allowed me to deepen my knowledge and practical skills in a search to achieve a more just world, in both socioeconomic and environmental dimensions. 5. What did you study in school? I studied fine art and graphic design in high school, Anthropology as a BSc and currently, I am doing a Masters in Sustainability and International Development, with a focus on renewable energy and agricultural transformation. 6. How is your life different from what you pictured at 20? Although 20 is not that long ago (I am 22 now), life is much more beautiful, free and inspiring than I pictured it back then. 7. Biggest accomplishment since making the (physical/mental) move? Travelling different countries out of my own curiosity and for projects I deeply care for, and feeling safe/free in this. Learning to trust people I meet along the way has also been a humbling exercise…People can be so much more generous than we expect them to be, and this is something I feel I have understood more and more: how interrelated we are, and how giving generates giving. 8. What was biggest disappointment and plan to overcome it? Having difficulty in building a relationship of trust and understanding whilst doing fieldwork in Peru. I worked in two NGOs, both involved in projects with Andean farming communities. One of the projects sought to strengthen rural communities’ capacities in tourism. The other project was on assisting indigenous youth in their academic careers, whilst also strengthening and revitalizing Quechua, an Andean indigenous language spoken by many of these communities, but unfortunately being used less and less. We were doing this by creating extra-curricular spaces where children (from primary to high school) could receive tutoring in order to succeed in school (dropout rates in rural areas are very high), whilst strengthening their native language, which most times was not used on a daily basis at their school, but was still the language their parents primarily communicated in. This generational divide, expressed by the chosen language of communication, is due to the prevailing prejudice against indigenous and peasant communities in Peru. So for the parents I was working with, prioritizing Quechua was not always the most strategic option, especially if they saw their children’s futures as being based in nearby cities. My response to the parent’s concerns regarding language preservation was for me to personally let go and respect their space and decisions in their relationship to me, and in the end, I felt my part was to understand their resistance to my hopes as an outsider and respect their own life projects and perceptions. We reformulated our project so as to respond to the real-life concerns of parents, whilst still keeping an expanding component of story-telling in order to support Quechua narratives and native oral history. When I let go of my romantic agenda of helping “save” Quechua, I realized the process of maintaining a language alive has to come from its speakers, especially children, who mostly use it for playing and in their daily chores. A part of this realization was learning the basics of Quechua and living with these families in their rural communities. One cannot judge what one does not know, and, as a European, I came to find my place in facilitating these communities’ intentions and projects, and not directing them. 9. Advice for other women? Putting self-trust and hope  as the first feeling and thought that moves you towards any decision/movement you make, whilst leaving fear behind. 10. Knowing what we know now in current political climate, can women be "all that we can be" in today's world? What is the way forward, as you see it for "feminist values"? It depends on which women, with which past and current constraints, and what is for them being "all they can be". There is still a lot to be done in generating intra-sex equality, even within a country. I think the way forward for feminism and the search for equality between genders is to create communities of support within every workplace or arena that is still difficult for women (in their diversity) to be in. We need to be supportive of each other in order to have a bigger say in the public and private sphere. I believe informing other women (and men, and non-binary persons) of the challenges of representation and participation has an important role in creating this supportive environment at a local and global level. Additionally, these supportive environments should be everywhere we go, especially when travelling. I believe we are unstoppable as a collective. 11. Where in the world do you feel “tallest” (i.e. where is your happy place)? My happy 'place' is more a journey, than a 'place'. I feel the happiest, for example, when in a van/bike, going somewhere beautiful but unknown (a waterfall, a lake...) 12. What extra-curricular activities/hobbies are you most proud of? Why? An activity I am promoting and developing is C4SI (Collaborate for Social Innovation), a student-led programme that seeks to encourage students and international/non-profit organizations in engaging in social problem-solving through human-centred design. There is more and more, a shift to an integrated approach to innovation and entrepreneurship, which is seeking positive social impact, more than merely profit. C4SI tries to respond to this shift, by opening the space for participants to create the innovation processing in a 6-week period: from understanding how to place human beings at the centre of their solutions to a specific challenge (human-centred design); to prototyping, designing and communicating solutions, to presenting them and taking them forward based on an organization’s mission. C4SI is also interdisciplinary and gathers both technological, social and artistic components of innovation. If you’re just as excited about this as me, you can find more information here. At the same time, I am currently interning at CARE International, a humanitarian agency focused on emergency relief and long-term development projects. As an operations intern at the CARE International Emergency Group, I am involved in monitoring, processing, interpreting and presenting emergency response data as it is coming in from CARE’s country offices all over the world, to facilitate communication across sectors, countries and regions, and improve accountability. This has been an interesting process as I am getting an in-depth understanding of the challenges of describing emergencies – especially humanitarian ones – in mere numbers. The complexity of the data appeals to the complexity of the situations lived in settings with long-term crisis and conflicts such as South Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Additionally, this work has allowed me to explore the development-humanitarian nexus, as  social and environmental fragility often facilitates the emergence of a crisis. In my free time, I am returning to playing music and integrating singing/playing songs into my professional/work environment in a way that unites people I know. 13. What do you want to be when you grow up? Future goals/challenges? I want to be someone that is grounded enough in order to be there for others. I want to be someone that has not lost sensitivity towards the world's problems, whilst being practical enough and contributing to solving them in some way. One of the challenges to this is a lack of self-confidence and a big fear of failure. 14. What fears are you still hoping to overcome? Definitely, again, the fear of failing to impact the world in a positive way, fear of being physically hurt, and the fear of not feeling whole alone. 15. Anything you'd do differently (if you had another go at life)? Not too much, but I would try to learn more languages as a child. 16. What inspires you? Seeing dreamers and doers, participating in their joy and creativity. Witnessing compassionate acts. 17. What are you hopeful about? I am hopeful that we are collectively learning from our mistakes, and going on a more positive, understanding path (for example, regarding climate change). I am hopeful that I will also do this personally, especially with my family. 18. What are some ingredients to a good life? A healthy environment/mind/body, and a heart watered with love. Also, being by the sea is always a good thing. 19. What are you reading now? (what books do you gift most and what are your favourite reads?) I am just starting to read "The God of Small Things", by Arundhati Roy. I mostly gift short-story books, mostly of authors whose books I have liked to read. My favourite reads are: The Earthsea Cycle Series by Ursula K. LeGuin, and "The Book of Embraces", by Eduardo Galeano. 20. Who is a “WOW Woman” in your life who inspires you (and why)? My mom, as she is a living example of a strong, intelligent and proactive woman, who always takes on life's challenges with trust and respect, whilst deepening her self-knowledge. 21. Where can others find you/your work (links to websites, blogs, etc.)? I am currently possibly developing an outlet to share my musical side, but for now, LinkedIn is the place where I share what I have been recently been up to, on the professional side of things. Feel free to contact me!

#WOW WOMAN #photography #photographer #women #girls #amazing women #June '17 #stories #original stories #interviews #Geneva #portraits

[joescanlan-blog]

Classism: An Introduction

They cannot represent themselves; they must be represented. — Karl Marx, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte We admire the work, but despise the workman. — Plutarch, Life of Pericles

Art has a long tradition of Class-ism. It will become clear to the reader (and clearer still throughout the pages that follow) that by Class-ism I mean several things, all of them, in my opinion, interdependent. The most readily accepted designation for Class-ism is an academic one, and indeed the label still serves in a number of academic institutions. Anyone who teaches, writes about, or researches popular culture—and this applies whether the person is an cultural critic, sociologist, historian, or economist—either in its specific or its general aspects, is a Class-ist and what he or she does is Class-ism. Compared with American Studies or area studies, it is true that the term Class-ism is distasteful to specialists today, both because it is too vague and general and because it connotes the high-handed executive attitude of nineteenth and early-twentieth-century European colonialism. Nevertheless books are written and congresses held with “ pop culture”  as their main focus, with the cultural critic in his new or old guise as their main authority. The point is that even if it does not survive as it once did, Class-ism lives on academically through its doctrines and theses about the political economy of culture.

Related to this academic tradition, whose fortunes, transmigrations, specializations and transmissions are in part the subject of this essay, is a more general meaning for Class-ism. Class-ism is a style of thought based upon an ontological and epistemological distinction made between “ popular culture”  and (most of the time) “ fine art.”  Thus a very large mass of writers, among whom are poets, novelists, philosophers, political theorists, economists and museum curators, have accepted the basic distinction between pop culture and art as the starting point for elaborate theories, epics, novels, social descriptions and political accounts concerning pop culture, its people, customs, “ mind,”  destiny, and so on. Class-ism can accommodate Aeschylus, say, and Victor Hugo, Dante and Karl Marx. A little later in this article I shall deal with the methodological problems one encounters in so broadly construed a “ field”  as this.

The interchange between the academic and the more or less imaginative meanings of Class-ism is a constant one, and since the late nineteenth century there has been a considerable, quite disciplined—perhaps even regulated—traffic between the two. Here I come to the third meaning of Class-ism, which is something more historically and materially defined than either of the other two. Taking the late nineteenth century as a very roughly defined starting point, Class-ism can be discussed and analyzed as the corporate institution for dealing with pop culture—dealing with it by making statements about it, authorizing views of it, describing it, teaching it, settling it, ruling over it: in short, Class-ism as a sophisticated style for dominating, restructuring and having authority over pop culture. I have found it useful here to employ Michel Foucault’s notion of a discourse, as described by him in The Archaeology of Knowledge and Discipline and Punish, to identify Class-ism. My contention is that without examining Class-ism as a discourse one cannot possibly understand the enormously systematic discipline by which the art world is able to manage—and even produce—pop culture politically, sociologically, aesthetically, ideologically, critically and imaginatively during the twentieth century. Moreover, so authoritative a position does Class-ism have that I believe no one writing, thinking, or acting on pop culture could do so without taking account of the limitations on thought and action imposed by Class-ism. In brief, because of Class-ism, pop culture was not (and is not) a free subject of thought or action. This is not to say that Class-ism unilaterally determines what can be said about popular culture, but that it is the whole network of interests inevitably brought to bear on (and therefore always involved in) any occasion when that peculiar entity “ popular culture”  is in question. How this happens is what this article tries to demonstrate. It also tries to show that art gains in strength and identity by setting itself off against pop culture as a sort of surrogate and even underground self.

In the most benign sense, Class-ism is a way for art to come to terms with popular culture and the special place it holds in daily life. Indigenous or “pop” cultures are not only adjacent to art; they are also the place of art’s greatest and richest and oldest traditions, the source of its imagery and its languages, its cultural contestant, and one of its deepest and most recurring specters of the Other. In the United States in particular, pop culture has helped to define art (and its institutions) as its contrasting image, idea, personality, experience. Yet none of pop culture is merely imaginative. Popular culture is an integral part of visual art’s material organization and context. As a mode of discourse, Class-ism expresses and represents that part culturally and even ideologically through supporting institutions, vocabulary, scholarship, imagery, doctrines, even bureaucracies and styles. In America, the understanding of pop culture is considerably more complicated than in Europe, although the influence of China, India and global consumerism in general is creating a more sober, more realistic awareness of the cultural power of consumers. In response, the vastly expanded political and economic role of art museums and international biennials makes great claims on our understanding of exactly where art originates and how its cultural value is determined. This expanded role—and the assumed usurpation and dominance that is inherent to it—is what I call Class-ism.

Historically and culturally there is a quantitative as well as a qualitative difference between the art world’s involvement with popular culture and—until the ascendancy of the Independent Group and Pop Art after World War II—the involvement of every other middle class consumer. To speak of Class-ism therefore is to speak mainly, although not exclusively, of a detached, ruling class cultural enterprise, a project whose dimensions take in such disparate realms as the imagination itself, thewhole of America and Madison Avenue, cinema and Hollywood, consumer products, fashion and a long tradition of taste makers, a formidable scholarly corpus, innumerable pop culture “ experts”  and “ hands,”  a pop culture professorate, a complex array of “ pop culture”  ideas (glamour, gender, camp, sensuality, “ dumbness” ), many popular subcultures, philosophies and wisdoms domesticated for local use—the list can be extended more or less indefinitely. My point is that Class-ism derives from a particular closeness experienced between the “detached” class and popular culture, which until the early twentieth century was an extremely local affair, its broad definition being largely limited to common knowledge of the Bible, Greek mythology and archetypal notions of Nature. Out of that closeness, whose dynamic is enormously productive even if it always demonstrates the comparatively greater strength and performance of the ruling class, comes the large body of texts and strategies I call Class-ism.

It should be said at once that even with the generous number of books, artworks, authors and artists that I have examined, there is a much larger number that I have had to leave out. My argument, however, depends neither upon an exhaustive catalogue of texts dealing with pop culture nor upon a clearly delimited set of artworks, authors and ideas that together make up the canon of Class-ism. I have depended instead upon a different methodological alternative—whose backbone in a sense is the set of historical generalizations I have so far been making—and it is these I want now to discuss in more detail.

II

Pop culture, or even indigenous culture, is not an inert fact of nature. It is not merely there, just as art is not just there either. We must take seriously Vico’s great observation that men make their own history, that what they can know is what they have made, and extend it to economics: as both economic and cultural entities—to say nothing of historical entities—such communities, locales and economic values as “ popular culture”  and “ fine art”  are manmade. Therefore, as much as art itself, pop culture is an idea that has a history and a tradition of thought, imagery and vocabulary that have given it reality and presence in and for the ruling class. The two economic entities thus support and to an extent reflect each other.

Having said that, one must go on to state a number of reasonable qualifications. In the first place, it would be wrong to conclude that pop culture was essentially an idea, or a creation with no corresponding reality. When Hal Foster said in his exhibition Damaged Goods that appropriation strategy was a career, he meant that to be interested in commodity display was something bright young artists would find to be an all-consuming passion; he should not be interpreted as saying it was only a career. There were—and are—nations and cultures whose daily lives are organized around sites of commerce, be they Vancouver, the Niger River or suburban shopping malls. Their lives, histories and customs have a brute reality obviously greater than anything that could be said about them in the

world of art. About that fact this study of Class-ism has very little to contribute, except to acknowledge it tacitly. But the phenomenon of Class-ism as I study it deals principally, not with a correspondence between Class-ism and its ideas about pop culture, but with the internal consistency of Class-ism and its ideas about pop culture (appropriation strategy as a career, etc.) despite or beyond any correspondence with, or lack thereof, a “ real”  popular culture. My point is that Foster’s statement about appropriation strategy mainly refers to that fabricated consistency, that regular constellation of ideas, as the pre-eminent thing about pop culture and not to its mere being, as the Wallace Stevens’s phrase has it.  Pop culture only exists to the extent that it conforms to what the art world thinks of it.A second qualification is that ideas, cultures and histories cannot seriously be understood or studied without their force, or more precisely their configurations of power, also being studied. To believe that pop culture was created—or more precisely, “ aestheticized”—and to believe that such things happen simply as a necessity of the imagination, is to be disingenuous. The relationship between the art world and pop or indigenous culture is a relationship of power, of domination, of varying degrees of a complex hegemony, as is quite accurately indicated in the title of William Rubin’s classic, Primitivism in 20th Century Art: Affinity of the Tribal and the Modern. Pop culture—and we would be prejudiced to think of Rubin’s “ primitive”  African artifacts as anything other than just another form of popular culture, as examples of a particular society’s daily objects, no more or less fetishized than our cars and stoves and handbags—has been aestheticized not only because it was discovered to be “ popular”  in all those ways considered commonplace by the Baby Boom generation, but also because it could be—that is, submitted to being—made popular. There is very little consent to be found, for example, in the fact that Jack Kerouac’s encounters with jazz music produced a widely influential model of the African-American man. In On The Road, the black man never spoke of himself, he never represented his emotions, presence, or history. Kerouac spoke for and represented him. Kerouac was white, comparatively wealthy and male, and these were historical facts of domination that allowed him not only to possess that musician creatively but to speak for him and tell his readers in what way he was “ typically black.”  My argument is that Kerouac’s situation of strength in relation to the jazz musician was not an isolated instance. It fairly stands for the pattern of relative strength between art (in this case, literature) and popular culture and the discourse about popular culture that it enabled.

This brings us to a third qualification. One ought never to assume that the structure of Class-ism is nothing more than a structure of lies or myths which, were the truth be told about them, would simply blow away. I myself believe that Class-ism is more particularly valuable as a sign of curatorial-theoretical power over pop culture than it is a reliable discourse about pop culture (which is what, in its glossy or scholarly form, it claims to be). Nevertheless, what we must respect and try to grasp is the sheer knitted-together strength of Class-ist discourse, its very close ties to the enabling socio-economic and political network of high-powered commercial galleries, trade journals and museums and its redoubtable durability. After all, any system of ideas that can remain unchanged as teachable wisdom in the United States (in academies, books, congresses, universities, biennials) from the period of Jasper

Johns in the late 1950s until the present must be something more formidable than a mere collection of lies. Class-ism, therefore, is not an airy, ivory tower fantasy about pop culture, but a created body of theory and practice in which, for many generations, there has been a considerable material investment. Continued investment made Class-ism, as a system of knowledge about popular culture, an accepted grid for filtering pop culture through and into high art consciousness, just as that same investment multiplied—indeed, made truly productive—the statements proliferating out of Class-ism into the general culture.Gramsci has made the useful analytic distinction between civil and political society in which the former is made up of voluntary (or at least rational and noncoercive) affiliations like schools, families and unions, the latter of state institutions (the army, the police, the central bureaucracy) whose role in the polity is direct domination. Culture, of course, is to be found operating within civil society, where the influence of ideas, institutions and colleagues works not through domination but by what Gramsci calls consent. In any society not totalitarian, then, certain cultural forms predominate over others, just as certain ideas are more influential than others; the form of this cultural leadership is what Gramsci has identified as hegemony, an indispensable concept for any understanding of cultural life in the industrialized world. It is hegemony, or rather the result of cultural hegemony at work, that gives Class-ism the durability and the strength I have been speaking about so far. Class-ism is never far from what Reyner Banham has called the pretense of Art, a collective notion identifying “ us”  cultural authorities as against all “ those”  mere consumers, and indeed it can be argued that the major component in high art is precisely what made it hegemonic both inside and outside the art world: the idea of art appreciation as superior to the everyday actions of consumers, however similar (indeed, identical) their preferences often are to those of art professionals. There is in addition the hegemony of art world ideas about pop culture, themselves reiterating aesthetic sensitivity over commercial crassness, usually overriding the possibility that a more independent, or more skeptical, thinker might have different views on the matter.

In a quite constant way, Class-ism depends for its strategy on this flexible positional superiority, which puts the art professional in a whole series of possible relationships with pop culture without ever losing the relative upper hand. And why should it be otherwise, especially during the period of extraordinary artistic ascendancy from World War II to the present? The artist, the critic, the curator, the collector, or the viewer is in, or thinks about, pop culture because he or she can be, or can think about it, with very little resistance on pop culture’s part. Under the general heading of knowledge about popular culture and within the umbrella of high art’s hegemony over pop culture since World War II, there emerged a complex pop culture suitable for study in the academy, for display in the museum, for reconstruction in the artist’s studio, for theoretical illustration in art historical, curatorial, linguistic, pictorial and racial theses about mankind and the universe, for instances of economic and sociological theories of development, revolution, cultural personality, national character or religious affiliation. Additionally, the imaginative examination of things popular was based more or less exclusively upon a sovereign art consciousness out of whose unchallenged centrality a popular world emerged, first according to general ideas about who or what constituted popularity, then according to a detailed logic governed not simply by empirical reality but by a battery of desires, repressions, investments and projections. If we can point to great Class-ist works of genuine scholarship like Lucy Lippard’s Pop Art or Dave Hickey’s AirGuitar, we should note that Lippard’s and Hickey’s ideas come out of the same impulse (as did a great many postmodern novels by the likes of Donald Barthelme or Don Delillo). This impulse, by turns respectful, awestruck or contemptuous, recognizes the shiny, lurid, delusional, melancholic absurdities of popular culture, marvels at them and  resigns itself to them, and even makes use of them. Ultimately, though, such uses, however skeptical or sympathetic, can only have the consequence of proposing that this or that fragment of popular culture is worthy of consideration as Art. In other words, is a worthy subject of Class-ism.