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Arts & Culture
Jim Crow America: A Documentary History
Catherine M. Lewis and J. Richard Lewis, eds.
University of Arkansas Press 2009
234 pp
Annotated Bibliography and Index
If slavery was the most pernicious chapter in American history, then Jim Crow is a close second. Defined as the legal, extralegal and customary separation of the black and white races, the system of Jim Crow successfully returned much of the United States, especially the eleven states of the Old Confederacy, back to slavery. It meant the loss of citizenship rights for African Americans, and was accompanied by crushing poverty and terrible hopelessness. A dual society allowed whites to retain financial, emotional and physical control over African Americans and was used to prop up the doctrine of white supremacy.
Catherine M. Lewis and J. Richard Lewis, eds.
University of Arkansas Press 2009
234 pp
Annotated Bibliography and Index
If slavery was the most pernicious chapter in American history, then Jim Crow is a close second. Defined as the legal, extralegal and customary separation of the black and white races, the system of Jim Crow successfully returned much of the United States, especially the eleven states of the Old Confederacy, back to slavery. It meant the loss of citizenship rights for African Americans, and was accompanied by crushing poverty and terrible hopelessness. A dual society allowed whites to retain financial, emotional and physical control over African Americans and was used to prop up the doctrine of white supremacy.
Historians living within their own nations develop within the mythology peculiar to their nation, in which "various spheres of memory coalesced into an imagined universe representing the past." The historian is a combination of his own personal experiences and the larger societal "instilled memories." Recognizing that, Shlomo Sand very capably steps away from the created mythology of Israel, of the national myth of the wandering people for two thousand years before finding home again, in a land that belonged only to that people even though others had lived there during the same two thousand years. The Invention of the Jewish People is his groundbreaking historical study of the nature of the Jewish "nation" and its created mythologies.
Too much awareness is a tough burden to carry. I got an email the other day from a reader who opened up the deep, confusing paradox of being a citizen of the American empire.
“I read that 51 percent of our Federal taxes go to feed the war machine. The fear of the IRS overwhelms the shame I feel, for paying those dollars that go to kill people. Mixing all of the emotions: hypocrisy, shame, guilt, fear, anger, all together equal for me a sense of futility and hopelessness.
“I cannot even point the finger at the biggest killers, when I know that I am part of the problem and am too scared to do anything about it. How can I judge them, when I have blood on my hands also?”
It just so happens this email arrived the same day I sat and talked for an hour with Paul Rogat Loeb, author of the recently updated and re-released Soul of a Citizen, the definitive book on social and political activism — on stepping out of safety and beyond our fear and anger, indeed, beyond all the emotions listed above, and giving public meaning to one’s life.
“I read that 51 percent of our Federal taxes go to feed the war machine. The fear of the IRS overwhelms the shame I feel, for paying those dollars that go to kill people. Mixing all of the emotions: hypocrisy, shame, guilt, fear, anger, all together equal for me a sense of futility and hopelessness.
“I cannot even point the finger at the biggest killers, when I know that I am part of the problem and am too scared to do anything about it. How can I judge them, when I have blood on my hands also?”
It just so happens this email arrived the same day I sat and talked for an hour with Paul Rogat Loeb, author of the recently updated and re-released Soul of a Citizen, the definitive book on social and political activism — on stepping out of safety and beyond our fear and anger, indeed, beyond all the emotions listed above, and giving public meaning to one’s life.
BANGKOK, Thailand -- When Country Joe and The Fish performed their famous satirical protest song "Fixin' To Die" during the 1960s, they influenced many people to oppose America's disastrous Vietnam War.
Today, Barry "The Fish" Melton -- still a self-proclaimed "leftist" -- grimly predicts the U.S. is doomed to also lose its war in Afghanistan.
"I don't think we should be involved in Afghanistan, I think it is a waste of time and energy," Melton said in an interview on Saturday (April 3) when he arrived in Bangkok on his first visit to Southeast Asia.
"I've got to believe that whatever we are doing in Afghanistan will end up in failure, that it can't have an outcome that is particularly positive for anybody."
When Melton and "Country" Joe MacDonald created the San Francisco-based band, one of their most catchy and powerful songs had a vaudeville-style chorus which mockingly taunted:
"And it's one, two, three / What are we fighting for? / Don't ask me I don't give a damn / Next stop is Vietnam."
Gray-haired Melton now performs with other bands in California and Europe.
Gray-haired Melton now performs with other bands in California and Europe.
Assigned on hundreds of campuses in every conceivable discipline and from first-year programs to graduate seminars, Paul Loeb’s Soul of a Citizen has become a classic of civic engagement. An antidote to the sense of political powerlessness and demoralization too many students are feeling these days, Soul has helped students of all backgrounds and perspectives learn to make a difference in their communities and in our country. It has inspired them make their voices heard and actions count—and to begin journeys of involvement that could last their entire lives.
Paul spent a year writing a thoroughly updated edition of Soul, incorporating the suggestions of faculty who’d been teaching the earlier edition in classrooms throughout the country. Soul’s new version keeps all the strengths of the decade-old original, while speaking to the new challenge of our very different time. It’s just been published (St Martin’s Press, $16.95 paperback) and St Martin’s is making free exam copies available if you teach a class or supervise a program where you might be able to assign it.
Paul spent a year writing a thoroughly updated edition of Soul, incorporating the suggestions of faculty who’d been teaching the earlier edition in classrooms throughout the country. Soul’s new version keeps all the strengths of the decade-old original, while speaking to the new challenge of our very different time. It’s just been published (St Martin’s Press, $16.95 paperback) and St Martin’s is making free exam copies available if you teach a class or supervise a program where you might be able to assign it.
If you haven't read "A Terrible Mistake: The Murder of Frank Olson and the CIA's Secret Cold War Experiments," by H.P. Albarelli Jr., I recommend doing so right away. Read every word, cover to cover. You will initially conclude that I, and Albarelli, are crazy. This is the story of one simple murder that asks who done it and doesn't answer the question for over 700 pages, because every time a new character enters the story the author introduces him with background that includes how his grandparents were conceived and where his field of work originated. But there is method to the madness, trust me. Bear with it.
A book that detailed all the military posts around the world would be encyclopaedic in size and nature, for in order to be comprehensive to cover all the bases and all the impacts and affects on human culture and demographics would require a vast array of information. Thankfully that information can be obtained from choosing prime examples of military exploitation as found in The Bases of Empire edited by Catherine Lutz. Lutz’s intention is “to describe both the worldwide network of U.S military bases and the vigorous campaigns to hold the United States accountable for that damage and to reorient their countries’ security policies in other, more human, and truly secure directions.”
Picking Cotton: Our Memoir of Injustice and Redemption
By Jennifer Thompson-Cannino and Ronald Cotton with Erin Toreno
St. Martin’s Press 2009
298 Page
s Prologue, Afterward
Even without its provocative title, Picking Cotton would be a winner. In a way, of course, it is an old, old story. In 1984, then Jennifer Thompson, a white woman and young college student, was raped at knife point by a black man who broke into her apartment while she lay asleep. During the assault she made it a point to look at her assailant and memorize what she could about his appearance. Cunningly, she was able to escape and her assailant fled. At the police department, she gamely assisted in the development of a composite sketch, and Ronald Cotton was arrested shortly thereafter. Ms. Thompson identified Cotton in a police lineup, even though she was unsure he was her rapist. Cotton, who had a shaky alibi and a minor criminal record, was tried and convicted; he was sentenced to life plus fifty years for first-degree rape, first-degree sexual offense, and first-degree breaking and entering.
By Jennifer Thompson-Cannino and Ronald Cotton with Erin Toreno
St. Martin’s Press 2009
298 Page
s Prologue, Afterward
Even without its provocative title, Picking Cotton would be a winner. In a way, of course, it is an old, old story. In 1984, then Jennifer Thompson, a white woman and young college student, was raped at knife point by a black man who broke into her apartment while she lay asleep. During the assault she made it a point to look at her assailant and memorize what she could about his appearance. Cunningly, she was able to escape and her assailant fled. At the police department, she gamely assisted in the development of a composite sketch, and Ronald Cotton was arrested shortly thereafter. Ms. Thompson identified Cotton in a police lineup, even though she was unsure he was her rapist. Cotton, who had a shaky alibi and a minor criminal record, was tried and convicted; he was sentenced to life plus fifty years for first-degree rape, first-degree sexual offense, and first-degree breaking and entering.
More Than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City
by William Julius Wilson
It has been decades since it was fashionable to talk about the poor in the United States, especially if they are black. The last political candidate who was a champion of the disadvantaged was the late Senator Robert F. Kennedy. He truly identified with them, and during his run for the presidency in 1968, he was often heard exhorting America about their plight: “We can do better.”
by William Julius Wilson
It has been decades since it was fashionable to talk about the poor in the United States, especially if they are black. The last political candidate who was a champion of the disadvantaged was the late Senator Robert F. Kennedy. He truly identified with them, and during his run for the presidency in 1968, he was often heard exhorting America about their plight: “We can do better.”
“I ran away from my foster mother, became homeless, lived on the street for three years. Because I was handicapped I couldn’t get into an apartment building to get out of the snow. Your skin feels like it’s on fire when you’re that cold. I’d stand in the doorway, where bright lights shine on the manikins, and psych myself into believing I could feel the heat coming off the light bulb.”
We get, in all, twelve minutes of Daisy. The above words are a condensation of one of those minutes. The other eleven are just as intense, just as shocking, but spiritually soaring, as this wheelchair-bound woman — she contracted polio after swimming in a polluted lake — talks matter-of-factly about a life that seems like it should be broken beyond repair. She talks about her abusive father, the beatings, the flowers on the bedspread (her only toys), her “bright light” spiritual vision in an iron lung. Her words made me cry, not because of the horror, but because she was so happy, so full of a transcendent gratitude for nothing less than life itself.
We get, in all, twelve minutes of Daisy. The above words are a condensation of one of those minutes. The other eleven are just as intense, just as shocking, but spiritually soaring, as this wheelchair-bound woman — she contracted polio after swimming in a polluted lake — talks matter-of-factly about a life that seems like it should be broken beyond repair. She talks about her abusive father, the beatings, the flowers on the bedspread (her only toys), her “bright light” spiritual vision in an iron lung. Her words made me cry, not because of the horror, but because she was so happy, so full of a transcendent gratitude for nothing less than life itself.