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| Wednesday, August 31, 2005 Free & Fun, this Saturday... Rum, not tea, was the cause of the American Revolution. And the roots of the American Revolution are to be found... where else? In the Caribbean, of course. Come to Pershing Hall, Governors Island (212.440.2202)and learn about the social (yet sociable) history of ... RUM. Ian Williams will enlighten and instruct on the many many reasons for appreciating (and imbibing) rum. His book is also a quick, funny entertaining read! Painless history about a sometimes painful subject. Thursday, August 04, 2005 Integrated Compared to What? In his latest NY Times column, David Brooks clumsily suggests that nonwhite males from the former British colonies are "trading cricket for jihad." During my visit to London, what stood out were headlines like this: "The cricket-loving terrorist whose father runs the local chip shop"... "From cricket-lover who enjoyed a laugh to terror suspect"... Alleged bomber Shehzad Tanweer grew up in Yorkshire and played cricket. A local friend told the Guardian he had "played cricket in the park with him around 10 days ago." (my italics) His cricket-playing was noted by the Telegraph, the Mail, the BBC. The Yorkshire Post recently reported that Tanweer played cricket "hours before he set off for London." If he had forsaken cricket for political violence, how much simpler the world would be. Tanweer was not alone! These young men played cricket -- which normalized them, making people like me stop and wonder "WHY?" (Niall Ferguson, of all people, managed to put some of this visceral bafflement into words: http://www.opinion.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2005/07/17/do1703.xml&sSheet=/opinion/2005/07/17/ixopinion.html) So, if they were suicide bombers (or amateurs tricked into killing themselves), they were not necessarily rejecting the game of cricket. For some reason, this made me very sad. I don't follow cricket, certainly don't play it, but whenever I see a black, brown or beige person playing cricket, I feel instant kinship -- another child, grandchild, orphan of Empire -- and I sense a cultural cousinhood. Cricket is not huge in the US but I have seen it played in certain parts of New York -- for example, Van Cortland Park -- and I found this comforting like a home-cooked meal. Niall Ferguson is right -- the cricket factor in these bombings makes it harder to sleep at night. As I read about these shortened lives, I wondered about the cricket, and I wondered what CLR James -- cricket reporter turned cricket scholar -- would have said about Tanweer, if he (CLR) were still alive. There was a two-minute silence a few days after July 7. For me, silence occurred without ceremony, while reading the papers and feeling wistful about CLR (whom I never met.) Everybody's clock runs out eventually and 1989 was an appropriate year for CLR James. He lived a long time. But I wanted to exhume this man, and get him to write about the events of the last 16 years. Talk to us about some of the wars, political-religious movements and gory explosions that have taken place since his death. Oddly enough, July 7 was pub date of this very timely reprint which (with and without cricket-playing terrorists) has a big following in the UK: Beyond a Boundary C.L.R. James, ISBN 022407427X I can't help feeling that Brooks is the one dismissing cricket -- or its cultural and personal impact. But I'm not surprised. Here's some linkage to CLR and the news: http://www.revolutionary-history.co.uk/backiss/Vol2/No3/Jamesobt.html I just found this nice piece by Darcus Howe. Scroll down to essay #3: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/osm/story/0,6903,1476388,00.html http://www.yorkshireposttoday.co.uk/ViewArticle2.aspx?SectionID=55&ArticleID=1103153 http://www.guardian.co.uk/attackonlondon/story/0,16132,1527429,00.html?79%3A+Uk+news+-+guardian+-+do+not+use -- Another bogus generalization getting too much play is that "Britain does not expect its immigrants to assimilate while the US does." Now this is a hard thing to prove or disprove. I don't know of any laws in the US stating that all new arrivals "must assimilate" but I have lived in both the US and UK, and my parents have been immigrants in both countries. Many of my relatives arrived in the UK as nonwhite immigrants and some were born there. I can only offer my personal impressions but -- I just go !?HUH??! when I see American journalists opining about how Britain doesn't encourage people like us to assimilate. My family itself is multi-ethnic and multi-colored, by the way, so the discrimination narratives vary. In his latest, Brooks also babbles about "countries that do not encourage assimilation" -- implying heavily that this must be the problem with Britain -- and says they are "not only causing themselves trouble, but endangering others around the world as well." Many recent arrivals in Britain -- people who arrived after the 1940s-- came from the Caribbean; many are of African or part-Afro origin. I have noticed that these immigrants and their children are more integrated into local society than are many Americans who happen to be of African ancestry. In other words, nonwhite immigrants in the UK might be more integrated than nonwhite Americans in "their own country." While this might shift the conversation a bit, it's worth thinking about, is it not? In my experience, interracial courtship and marriage are more normal in the UK. I have endured far too many remarks in the US about my interracial love life, but I never encounter such attitudes in the UK! All my cousins, elders and siblings in the UK feel free to mingle and mate with any color, ethnicity, etc. And by the way some of them live in Yorkshire, where Tanweer lived. I read recently of a British TV show featuring interracial couples and it was said that this couldn't fly on American TV -- so when they adapted it for America, they made the couples monotone. But now we have NY Times reporters speaking about how "unintegrated" Britain is -- as if this were a statement of fact rather than a very subjective opinion. Or a lazy reporter's way of dressing up the news. Brooks made a few good points in his column (for example, "medieval" is a boring and silly one at best) but he repeats some faddish nonsense -- because he can -- and that really annoys me. If these kids did blow up two buses and two trains, it is just simple-minded to cluck about the lack of integration as if that explains or excuses their behavior. They are, in my humble opinion, more integrated than their parents were. Oddly enough, the night before the bombing of July 7, I was having lamb fries in a Middle Eastern restaurant and feeling enormously happy to be in such a multiethnic, integrated city. The bombings disturbed me greatly but didn’t make the city seem less integrated. Actually, if you look at the victims of the bombing -- I just can't imagine a more integrated bunch of people. Perhaps the violence -- in this particular case -- has less to do with "integration" than people would like to think... What do they know of assimilation who only "assimilation" know? -- Perhaps you don't agree; feel free to tell me if you think I'm talking rubbish! Wednesday, August 03, 2005 Fantastic News, if you're a Helen Fielding fan! Bridget is back. The charming and cheeky John Walsh pays tribute to Helen Fielding's creature here http://enjoyment.independent.co.uk/books/features/article303356.ece and was quoted in the NY Times today: "Where has she been since 1997? What does she think should be the correct attitude to Iraq? Has she bought a peasant skirt this summer? Does she think the Duchess of Cornwall looks rather beautiful since she's gone legit?" http://news.independent.co.uk/people/profiles/article302731.ece I greatly admire The Bridget Project, I enjoyed Olivia Joules and I admit to being under the influence. The Bridget Columns begin on Thursday August 4, here. http://comment.independent.co.uk/columnists_a_l/helen_fielding/article303450.ece Monday, August 01, 2005 Brilliant piece by Andrian Kreye in Suddeutsche Zeitung today: Ever since Marcel Duchamp mounted the front wheel of a bicycle onto a bar stool, the anarchic use of everyday technologies has been part of the standard repertoire of Modern Art. Usually such works question our perception by distorting reality. The flower images by the New York artist Katinka Matson are different for their exactness and completeness: the surreal aura of her pictures come from their enormous clarity. Original German text: http://www.katinkamatson.com/sz.g.html Katinka Matson's work is startling, modern, quite beautiful! http://www.katinkamatson.com/prints.html |