For those celebrating Easter
Topic: Odds and ends

And those wondering how exactly it all fits together, my favorite Easter TV moment, courtesy of YouTube and the late, great Sports Night:

 

Horrifying
Topic: Incredibly Bad

Baby locked up at Honolulu airport dies

US immigration agent solicits sex from, and assaults, a green card applicant
  

Help the Book Thing of Baltimore
Topic: PSAs

When I got back to the States after my posting in Macedonia and moved in to my not-quite-gentrified northern Baltimore neighborhood, I spent a lot of time wandering around on weekends, getting reacclimated.  It's a nice neighborhood to wander in; there are lots of trees, long lines of brick rowhomes, some lovely postage-stamp front gardens - and, as I discovered one morning as I turned a corner on my way home, FREE BOOKS.  A handlettered wooden sign has never said anything sweeter. 

I followed its arrow, and in the concrete gap behind one corner house there were crates and crates of books stacked on the ground, and people clambering up and down a narrow concrete stairwell into a basement from which the odor of slightly damp print and paper wafted.  I didn't often venture into the basement after that first expedition. It was an entrancing mess, with books on shelves and in piles in every available nook, but too closed in for me.  I was generally content to have a quick browse among the crates outside on my way home from the farmers' market.  Even a quick browse often sent me home with more books than I could comfortably manage.  And I could visit all weekend, every weekend, whenever the urge to hunt up a new book struck. 

I soon learned that my little oasis was The Book Thing of Baltimore, a non-profit dedicated to "put[ting] unwanted books into the hands of those who want them."  Launched out of the back of a van in the late 1990s, by the time I discovered it, the Book Thing was already an institution, and soon became the home, or at least the transit point, for a large part of my book collection.  It was one of the first things I went looking for when I came back to Baltimore last year.  But the house was shut up tight, and the donation bin was gone.  I hurried home in a panic to hit Google, learned that the Book Thing was alive and kicking in a more spacious location and made it a part of my weekend routine again.

Now, the Book Thing needs help paying its mortgage.  They're trying to make a $120,000 balloon payment by 1 April.  Cash donations can be made through Network for Good.  Information about donating other items can be found here.  (Oh, and here's a good article about the Book Thing I found when I was looking for their website.)  The Book Thing is one of the best things about Baltimore - people from every walk of life come through its doors, and leave with as many books as they can carry.  It's unpretentious, improbably successful, and constantly struggling.  Please help keep it going!

Different perspectives on Obama's speech
Topic: Politics

While I was focused on a few narrow aspects of Obama's speech that crystallized for me why I have not found him an energizing leader, other people found a whole lot more to comment on.  I want to share what I've been reading, because my post was a narcissistic take on an important moment in the public conversation about race in this country.  I'm going to leave the post up because it was an important moment for me, but I wanted to point to more important things being said about Obama's speech.

On La Chola, BfP found Obama's speech stirring, but thinks that "Obama’s candidacy hangs on a thread at the moment. ... His patriotism, his loyalty–they are all suspect, and they are all suspect because Obama KNOWS somebody who believes in racial justice."  Read the comments, too: these are just a few I'm chewing on.

Anxious Black Woman describes Obama's speech as a call to conscience (and also has an excellent comments conversation - this post in particular raises some substantive, but fair, critiques of Obama's rhetoric).  She subsequently pointed to Cynthia McKinney's response, "A Conversation About Race Worth Having."  If you can't read the whole thing, here's the thought I would like you to carry away right now:

I am deeply offended that in the middle of a Presidential campaign, remarks–be they from a pastor or a communications mogul, or a former Vice Presidential nominee–are the cause of a focus on race, and not the deep racial disparities that communities are forced to endure on a daily basis in this country.

Myriad reports and studies that have been done all come up with the same basic conclusion: in order to resolve deep and persisting racial disparities in this country, a public policy initiative is urgently needed. A real discussion of race, in the context of a Presidential election, ought to include a discussion of the various public policy initiatives offered by the various candidates to eliminate all forms and vestiges of racial discrimination, including the racial disparities that cloud the hopes, dreams, and futures of millions of Americans.

... when Harvard University/The Kaiser Family Foundation did a study on White attitudes about race several years ago, it found that Whites have little appreciation for the reality of Black life in America, from police harassment and intimidation, to imprisonment, to family income, unemployment, housing, and health care. But without an appreciation of the reality faced by many of our fellow Americans, the necessary public policy initiatives to change those realities will find difficulty gaining acceptance in the public discourse.

An awful anniversary
Topic: PSAs

Dear Friend of the IRC, Today marks the fifth anniversary of the war in Iraq. Regardless of our political beliefs, this day is a solemn reminder of our special responsibility to assist millions of Iraqis who have been driven from their homes because of the ongoing violence. The International Rescue Committee is on the ground expanding our critical relief efforts for Iraqi refugees who have fled to Syria and Jordan — just as we do for millions of others fleeing violence in war-torn countries around the world. Today, I hope you will make a gift to help IRC provide lifesaving services — including food, health care, education, and counseling — to countless Iraqi families and others around the world who have been uprooted by violent conflict. The Iraqi refugee crisis is one of enormous scale, and today it is the fastest growing refugee emergency in the world. The statistics are alarming: 60,000 — Iraqi refugees fleeing their homes every month, mostly because they have been threatened with death, torture, or kidnapping 4,400,000 — displaced Iraqis 220,000 — displaced Iraqi children who have stopped going to school 12,000 — United States goal for the number resettled Iraqi refugees to enter the country in 2008 1,432 — Iraqi refugees actually resettled in the United States in 2008 Behind each one of these numbers stands a real person whose life has been drastically altered by violence and fear. Ibrahim, an Iraqi man the IRC is helping, is one of those people. His life began to unravel two years ago when he began to receive death threats. He was working as a photographer for an Iraqi magazine - documenting the worsening sectarian violence on the streets of Baghdad. Local militiamen demanded the articles stop, and when they did not, they began to kidnap and kill his colleagues. After narrowly escaping a bomb blast in front of his home, he and his wife packed a few belongings and fled to East Amman where they now live with their six-month old son in a dark, frigid room. With your support, the IRC will provide Ibrahim's family and countless others with food, clothing, mattresses, blankets, health care, and education. Please make a gift today and help the IRC continue to provide critical relief services and advocate on behalf of millions of refugees who have fled from Iraq and 24 other war-torn countries around the world. At the IRC, we feel a deep connection to every person whose life has been shattered by conflict. With your continued partnership, we will continue to serve as a beacon of hope for millions of refugees. You can help us bring them from harm to home. Thank you for your support. Sincerely, George Rupp President, International Rescue Committee P.S. Forbes, Worth, Newsweek and SmartMoney have rated the IRC among the most efficient humanitarian agencies, because 90 cents of each dollar we spend goes to programs and services that directly benefit refugees. Please make a gift today.      We have a special responsibility to assist millions of Iraqi refugees who have fled the violence of the war in Iraq. With your help, the IRC will provide lifesaving services to Iraqi refugees and other victims of violent conflict all over the world. Invite your loved ones to join the IRC's global family.  Tell-a-friend! If you received this message from a friend, you can sign up for International Rescue Committee.

Why Obama leaves me cold
Topic: Politics

"I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together – unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction – towards a better future for of [sic] children and our grandchildren."

I have trouble getting excited about Barack Obama's campaign.  I have this difficulty with presidential politics in general, but in an election year where Obama and Clinton are polarizing so many of my friends, I find they both leave me cold.  Reading the text of today's speech on the NYT website helped me clarify why I have that reaction to Obama:  I don't find him a persuasive thinker.  In fact, I object to Obama's deployment of false unity and the rhetoric of American exceptionalism. 

What do I mean by that?  The quote above is an example of false unity: "we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for our children and grandchildren."  Not only do I believe that there are plenty of people who don't give much thought to their own futures, let alone those of their children and grandchildren, I'm skeptical of the idea that a critical mass of people share the same vision of what the future should be - I'm pretty sure they don't share mine, for instance.  In a microcosm, isn't an election (theoretically, at least) about a struggle among different ideas of what the future ought to be?  In Obama's rhetoric about "being a unifier" I tend to see a failure to honor difference and creative tension among people.  Perhaps that's too complicated a concept for the campaign trail - but it puts me off Obama.

What puts me off even more, though, and what I see as a curious point of tension with the support that Obama has generated among expatriate Americans and people around the world is his deployment of the rhetoric of American exceptionalism, as when he says things like:

I’ve gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world’s poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners – an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.

Actually, this is a story that could, at least in theory, have occurred in Britain, or Canada, both countries where men of ancestry that includes African forebears have achieved excellent educations and entered high political office, and could have married women who number slaves and slaveowners among their ancestors.  Now, the legacy of slavery in the UK and Canada is different - neither economy was as dependent on the enslavement of Africans and their descendents within national borders for as long a period as in the United States - but Obama's point here is not to try to reframe mainstream perceptions of slavery (that it was bad, that it's over, and that the playing field is pretty level now since it's all in the past and America is such a great country).  What makes Obama's story exceptional is the extraordinarily negative impact slavery had on American society, especially descendents of African slaves, and the fact that that impact is not a thing of the past.  Obama's choice to frame his story as a triumph without situating it in that context (though, to his credit, he does address the ongoing legacy of slavery later in his speech) is to my mind an attempt to make America seem like something more than it is. Frankly, statements like these veer far too close to jingoism for my comfort.

Also, this passage bothered me:

"a view that sees white racism as endemic, and that elevates what is wrong with America above all that we know is right with America; a view that sees the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam."

There's a lot wrong with the US.  I think dealing with it sometimes requires people to point that out in pretty stark terms.  And one of the things I have problems with is some of the support that the US provides to Israel.  The state of Israel should not get a pass on its policies that are detrimental to peace, any more than the leaders of Palestinian extremism should.  Again, this framing, though carefully modified (Obama is, after all, an astute politician), swings close to the "Israel good/Islam bad" dichotomy that has poisoned US portrayals of politics in the Middle East for quite some time. 

Moments like these are why I find it hard to see Obama as more than an accomplished politician, and accomplished politicans - while far more interesting to watch work than the thugs and bullies that make up most of our current administration - are not the sort of people who generate a lot of excitement in me.

Support the Department of Women's Studies at USF
Topic: PSAs
HELP SUPPORT THE ONLY AUTONOMOUS DEPARTMENT OF WOMEN'S STUDIES IN THE STATE OF FLORIDA

Dear Friends of Women's and Gender Studies:

These are hard times for Higher Education in the state of Florida in general, and for the University of South Florida in particular.

We write on behalf of the faculty, students, and members of the University community concerned with preserving the Department of Women's Studies.

Due to a severe budget crisis, the Department of Women's Studies faces the potential loss of its status as an autonomous department.  As the only free-standing Department of Women's Studies in the state of Florida, and among the oldest in the nation, we believe that curtailing our autonomy will have a negative impact on our discipline and on our university as a whole.

We ask you to lend your support to us by agreeing to sign the letter below urging the University to maintain the integrity and independent status of the Department of Women's Studies.  Please send your name, e-mail, and affiliation to usfwst@gmail.com.  We will compile all names and present them to the Administration.

Thanks!

Sincerely,

The Department of Women's Studies, University of South Florida

Kim Vaz, Ph.D., Associate Professor and Chair

Marilyn Myerson, Ph.D., Associate Professor

Gurleen Grewal, Ph.D., Associate Professor

Carolyn J. Eichner, Ph.D., Associate Professor

Sara Crawley, Ph.D., Assistant Professor

Nagwa Dajani, M.D., Ph.D., Assistant Professor

Linda Lucas, Ph.D., Visiting Professor


__________________________________________________________________

March 6, 2008

Dear President Genshaft and Provost Wilcox,

We are scholars, students, activists, and community members.  We express our deep concern at the planned restructuring of Women's Studies at USF and integration of the Department faculty into other disciplines or the merging of the Department as a subdivision of another disciplinary unit.

USF has been a leader in Women's Studies; the Department of Women's Studies at USF is among the oldest in the nation, celebrating its 36th anniversary this Spring semester, and it is the only Department of Women's Studies in the state of Florida.

We stress the value of Women's Studies as a discipline: In 1991, the American Association of Colleges identified Women's Studies as "one of twelve learned disciplines most conducive to the promotion of undergraduate liberal learning."

We are concerned that the University might consider closing or merging the Department.  This would effectively undermine a discipline that according to the AAC report, has "transformed knowledge in the humanities, social sciences and life sciences, challenging long-established beliefs, contesting dominant paradigms, identifying new areas of research, and introducing new strategies of analysis."

According to the AAC report, "the strength of the women's studies major lies in its commitment to criticize existing theories and methodologies and to formulate new paradigms and organizing concepts across academic fields, its adoption of a complex matrix of gender, class, race, age, ethnicity, and nationality as fundamental categories of social, cultural, and historical analysis, its reliance upon interdisciplinary inquiry in structuring a sequence of coherently interrelated courses, its unrelenting attention to pedagogy designed to create an equitable learning opportunity for all students, and its ability to foster the student's critical and analytical skills."

We urge the University not to entertain any drastic plan to eliminate Women's Studies as an autonomous Department at the University of South Florida.

Yours Sincerely,



Please sign in support by sending your name, e-mail address, and
affiliation to usfwst@gmail.com.

Oh, dear
Topic: Catching up

I disappeared again - I hadn't realized for quite how long.  The last half of February went a bit haywire, and so did my laptop, so I was without good internet access, or much energy, for a while.

I had been working at a synagogue for a few months, with very nice people and a very easy job that left me lots of time to work on job applications and play around on line.  But it wasn't full time, and that just wasn't working out for me financially.  So I put the synagogue and the temp agency on notice, and really expected that by about mid-January I would have another assignment.

No such luck.  Fortunately for me, the senior staff at the synagogue were kind enough to insist on keeping me on until I got a new assignment.  And January and February dragged on, with me wondering what was going on with temp agency and watching the national economic forecasts with growing unease.

And wouldn't you know, after a month and a half of silence on any job front, I got a new full-time temp job, and several interviews all within a week and a half?  I was frantically juggling my work schedule with my interview schedule, and trying to do online research for interviews with my laptop on the fritz, and a work computer located where everyone in the office has a clear view of my monitor, so I consider it prudent to be obviously online as little as possible. 

Now I'm back to sending out applications and waiting ... but at least for now I'm waiting on the results of the interviews, not waiting for just any response at all.  Keep your fingers crossed for me.

A few of my favorite things
Topic: Whatever

I love books, reading, and good causes, not necessarily in that order.  And today (I like to think it's to make up for the stomach-turning dreck being churned out by corporations desperate to make me buy something chocolate and/or shiny and/or red and/or disgustingly tacky before nightfall) the internet has given me all three.  Internet, I love you.

I spent a lot of time reading when I went to my grandparents' houses when I was younger - especially when I reached the age where I was too young to be welcomed into the adults' conversations, and too old to find playing with my siblings or cousins entertaining for very long.  For some reason, my favorite place to read was on the stairs.  I don't really know why.  Maybe because both my grandparents' houses had out-of-the-way staircases that weren't heavily trafficked, where I could reliably go mostly undisturbed without entirely separating myself from everything else going on.  Whatever the reasons, I spent a lot of time tucked away on the stairs, reading. 

I would've thought I was in heaven if I'd had a staircase that was a library at the same time:

(more pictures here, and a hat tip to 50 Books) 

What generates even more bookish happiness, though, is the announcement that the Dewey Donation System, after a hiatus last year, will be launching its 2008 book drive on Monday, 18 February.  Dewey got its start five years ago as a humble little book drive on Pamie.com and just grew and grew.  I think I discovered it during the post-Katrina drive in 2006, and following the updates and the thank you letters from the librarians was amazing.  I may just spend the weekend reading about past book drives as I wait to hear about this year's, and whether there's something my very broke self can contribute.

Australia is sorry
Topic: Events

Today, Kevin Rudd, Australia's prime minister, apologized to Aboriginal Australians for government policies which, from 1869 to 1969, separated Aboriginal children from their families in an attempt to wipe out Aboriginal cultures through assimilation into colonial Australian society:

We apologise for the laws and policies of successive Parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians.

We apologise especially for the removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families, their communities and their country.

For the pain, suffering and hurt of these Stolen Generations, their descendants and for their families left behind, we say sorry.

To the mothers and the fathers, the brothers and the sisters, for the breaking up of families and communities, we say sorry.

And for the indignity and degradation thus inflicted on a proud people and a proud culture, we say sorry.

I would love to say more - the desire for this apology was a subject that many of my friends and classmates talked about with passion in Melbourne - but I have an interview to prepare for, so I will leave you instead with links to the reactions on some of my favorite Australian blogs:

Hexpletive
Hoydens About Town
Sorrow at Sills Bend
View from Elsewhere