Doing Something with Soul, Creativity, or Love

The Bloodstained Kleptocracy that Really Keeps on Giving

Continuing our recurring fascination on this blog with the delightful Obiang family of Equatorial Guinea, I thought I might point your collective attentions (assuming anybody is paying any) to the Times' editorial today discussing the fact that President Obiang has pledged $3m a year to UNESCO to sponsor a prize to honor achievements that "improve the quality of human life," and without a hint of irony! And what's even more ironically unironic, they took the money!

The Paris Review

.....has a blog now

in case you hadn't heard :)

Words Without English Equivalents

1. Waldeinsamkeit (German): the feeling of being alone in the woods

2. Ilunga (Tshiluba, Congo): a person who is ready to forgive any abuse for the first time, to tolerate it a second time, but never a third time

3. Taarradhin (Arabic): a way of resolving a problem without anyone losing face (not the same as our concept of a compromise – everyone wins)

4. Litost (Czech): a state of torment created by the sudden sight of one’s own misery

5. Esprit de l’escalier (French): a witty remark that occurs to you too late, literally on the way down the stairs…

6. Meraki (Greek): doing something with soul, creativity, or love

7. Yoko meshi (Japanese): literally ‘a meal eaten sideways’, referring to the peculiar stress induced by speaking a foreign language:

8. Duende (Spanish): a climactic show of spirit in a performance or work of art, which might be fulfilled in flamenco dancing, or bull-fighting, etc.

9. Guanxi (Mandarin): in traditional Chinese society, you would build up good guanxi by giving gifts to people, taking them to dinner, or doing them a favour, but you can also use up your guanxi by asking for a favour to be repaid.

10. Pochemuchka (Russian): a person who asks a lot of questions

11. Tingo (Pascuense language of Easter Island): to borrow objects one by one from a neighbour’s house until there is nothing left

12. Radioukacz (Polish): a person who worked as a telegraphist for the resistance movements on the Soviet side of the Iron Curtain

13. Selathirupavar (Tamil): a word used to define a certain type of absence without official leave in face of duty

Do you guys have any others?

I was thinking : weltangst, zeitgeist....

There is a word in french "rebrousse-poil" which means to "rub the wrong way," literally to brush hair in the wrong direction.

“Do not forget the US imperialist wolves!”

“Let’s extensively raise goats in all families!”

“Do not forget the US imperialist wolves!”

VA and MS Take Hot-Tub Time Machine Back to the (18)'80s

Quite a week for Virginia and Mississippi. First, slavery receives no mention in Governor Robert McDonnel's Confederate History Month. Next, Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour defended McDonnel's decision by claiming that Americans angry at the omission were "trying to make a big deal out of something that doesn't matter for diddly." Today, we learn that one Mississippi county has received an order from a federal judge to cease and desist its segregationist policies. And, going back to Virginia, the editorial page of the Washington Post (Yes, the editorial page of the Washington Post--not exactly Cornell West) proclaims that Virginia's policy of stripping ex-cons of the right to vote amounts to "Jim Crow by another name." I was surprised when Bill Moyers had Michelle Alexander on his program the other week to discuss her book with the same thesis, thinking she was too radical for public television. Good to see the mainstream media not being shy to call out good ol' fashioned racism for what it is.

How Conservatives See the World; Or, Why Jonathan Kozol Is Worse for Black Schoolchildren than George Wallace

I'm always astounded by the extent to which conservative-minded folks see the world in a profoundly different way than liberals. One of Matt Yglesias' favorite topics in this vein is on the issue of race and racism in America. For most conservatives, sometime soon after the Voting Rights Act was passed racism ended in America. Suddenly, the problem of reverse-racism (against white people) became a far greater concern. I'm not sure anyone would deny that individual acts of racism against people of color don't happen anymore, but if you listened to conservatives, you'd slowly come to realize that racist acts against whites is the real issue, and that it far outstrips racism against blacks.

I see similar sorts of discussions in debates around "the problem with the modern public university." Liberals tend to want to steer the conversation toward things like the lack of state responsibility to fund it, the privatization of a once public good, the growth of business schools and profit-driven sciences and marketing within it, etc. Conservatives tend to ignore these rather broad, large-scale problems and point to what seems to liberals like me to be rather trivial issues: that some black or Latin@ professor is not teaching enough Shakespeare, and that the humanities have been overrun by relativists. It may be the case that we are not teaching enough of the white, male "classics," for example--just like it may be the case that acts of discrimination against whites do indeed happen in our society--but this seems like a pretty bizarre place to start a conversation about the problem with universities, or the problem with racism.

I was reminded of this liberal vs. conservative divide when I read John McWhorter's recent piece for the New Republic on the ten people black folks could most do without. For the sake of brevity, I'll focus on one person on the list, #9, Jonathan Kozol. Keeping with the Huffy Crew's recent theme of school funding...Kozol has been a famous proponent of changing the way we fund schools so as to equalize funding between city and suburban districts. McWhorter counters that Kozol is wrong, and that equalized funding doesn't really matter when it comes to black children's academic performance. Fine. Fair enough. I'm even willing for the sake of argument to concede that McWhorther might be right on this particular point. But taking a step back for a moment, I'm left wondering who has been worse for black children's academic performance? Is Jonathan Kozel in the top ten? Let me go through some possible scenarios:

- Jonathan Kozol vs. Louise Day Hicks and the dude who soiled Old Glory in the Boston busing crisis

- Jonathan Kozol vs. George Wallace, a governor who refused to desegregate Alabama's schools and universities, and spread his rhetoric of aggrieved white men throughout the country in the two presidential campaigns.

Jonathan Kozol vs. Lester Maddox, the segregationist Atlantan who rose to governor of Georgia.

Jonathan Kozol vs. Bryant Bowles, founder of his local National Association for the Advancement of White People after the Brown v. Board decision. A great demagogue who arose fierce opposition to desegregation in many communities that otherwise would have been compliant

Jonathan Kozol vs. Charles Murray, advocate of the theory that black children aren't as smart as white children.

Jonathan Kozol vs. The Framers and Voters Who Supported California Proposition 13 and Colorado's Tax Payer Bill of Rights. Less tax money to spend on schools can't be very helpful for anyone, but it disproportionately affects the poor.

Jonathan Kozol vs. William Levitt, one of many postwar suburban planners who's idea of community (and suburban schools) intentionally excluded African Americans.

Jonathan Kozol vs. Richard Nixon, the great advocate for suburban whites and great opponent of busing.

And I'm sure we could add many others. I realize that McWhorter is being purposefully provocative and idiosyncratic with his choices here, but I think the tendency here fits in well with the conservative mindset I've outlined: racists and framers of policies that have disproportionately hurt black people are somehow less harmful than a guy who thinks that giving more money to poor schools would help poor black kids in those poor schools.