The spread of hate speech via social media could be tackled using the same "quarantine" approach deployed to combat malicious software, according to University of Cambridge researchers.
Definitions of hate speech vary depending on nation, law and platform, and just blocking keywords is ineffectual: graphic descriptions of violence need not contain obvious ethnic slurs to constitute racist death threats, for example.
As such, hate speech is difficult to detect automatically. It has to be reported by those exposed to it, after the intended "psychological harm" is inflicted, with armies of moderators required to judge every case.
This is the new front line of an ancient debate: freedom of speech versus poisonous language.
Now, an engineer and a linguist have published a proposal in the journal Ethics and Information Technology that harnesses cyber security techniques to give control to those targeted, without resorting to censorship.
Cambridge language and machine learning experts are using databases of threats and violent insults to build algorithms that can provide a score for the likelihood of an online message containing forms of hate speech.
As these algorithms get refined, potential hate speech could be identified and "quarantined". Users would receive a warning alert with a "Hate O'Meter" - the hate speech severity score - the sender's name, and an option to view the content or delete unseen.
This approach is akin to spam and malware filters, and researchers from the 'Giving Voice to Digital Democracies' project believe it could dramatically reduce the amount of hate speech people are forced to experience. They are aiming to have a prototype ready in early 2020.
"Hate speech is a form of intentional online harm, like malware, and can therefore be handled by means of quarantining," said co-author and linguist Dr Stefanie Ullman. "In fact, a lot of hate speech is actually generated by software such as Twitter bots."
"Companies like Facebook, Twitter and Google generally respond reactively to hate speech," said co-author and engineer Dr Marcus Tomalin. "This may be okay for those who don't encounter it often. For others it's too little, too late."
"Many women and people from minority groups in the public eye receive anonymous hate speech for daring to have an online presence. We are seeing this deter people from entering or continuing in public life, often those from groups in need of greater representation," he said.
Former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently told a UK audience that hate speech posed a "threat to democracies", in the wake of many women MPs citing online abuse as part of the reason they will no longer stand for election.
While in a Georgetown University address, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg spoke of "broad disagreements over what qualifies as hate" and argued: "we should err on the side of greater expression".
The researchers say their proposal is not a magic bullet, but it does sit between the "extreme libertarian and authoritarian approaches" of either entirely permitting or prohibiting certain language online.
Importantly, the user becomes the arbiter. "Many people don't like the idea of an unelected corporation or micromanaging government deciding what we can and can't say to each other," said Tomalin.
"Our system will flag when you should be careful, but it's always your call. It doesn't stop people posting or viewing what they like, but it gives much needed control to those being inundated with hate."
In the paper, the researchers refer to detection algorithms achieving 60% accuracy - not much better than chance. Tomalin's machine learning lab has now got this up to 80%, and he anticipates continued improvement of the mathematical modeling.
Meanwhile, Ullman gathers more "training data": verified hate speech from which the algorithms can learn. This helps refine the "confidence scores" that determine a quarantine and subsequent Hate O'Meter read-out, which could be set like a sensitivity dial depending on user preference.
A basic example might involve a word like 'bitch': a misogynistic slur, but also a legitimate term in contexts such as dog breeding. It's the algorithmic analysis of where such a word sits syntactically - the types of surrounding words and semantic relations between them - that informs the hate speech score.
"Identifying individual keywords isn't enough, we are looking at entire sentence structures and far beyond. Sociolinguistic information in user profiles and posting histories can all help improve the classification process," said Ullman.
Added Tomalin: "Through automated quarantines that provide guidance on the strength of hateful content, we can empower those at the receiving end of the hate speech poisoning our online discourses."
However, the researchers, who work in Cambridge's Centre for Research into Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (CRASSH), say that - as with computer viruses - there will always be an arms race between hate speech and systems for limiting it.
The project has also begun to look at "counter-speech": the ways people respond to hate speech. The researchers intend to feed into debates around how virtual assistants such as 'Siri' should respond to threats and intimidation.
Sunday, March 22, 2020
Sunday, January 19, 2020
Toys for Tots top Marine always delivers
After 25 years, Robert “Bob” Harris will step down as local coordinator of Toys for Tots. During his time served, he provided the children of Stark County with more than a million toys.
MASSILLON If Robert Harris had a long white beard, you might call him Santa Claus.
Christmastime is Harris’ busiest season as local coordinator of Toys for Tots. He and his “elves” sort and distribute toys in a Massillon-based workshop.
All is calm when Christmas Day comes around. Each year, Harris starts the day by enjoying a cup of coffee with his wife in their Hartville home.
Though no one can hear them, the couple says a prayer for the families of Stark County.
“Merry Christmas,” they say with a smile.
The retired U.S. Marine has served as the local coordinator of Toys for Tots for 25 years and will have delivered more than a million toys to local children by the end of the season. The 78-year-old plans to step down from his duties in January after final paperwork is completed for the year.
“I love it because it helps so many children,” Harris said. “Without Toys for Tots, millions of children would not have a Christmas.”
Longtime coordinator
When Harris volunteered to be the Stark County coordinator of the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve Toys for Tots in 1994, there weren’t many local chapters in Northeast Ohio.
Kari Harris, who has helped her grandfather with the organization for at least 15 years, said donated items were stored in her grandfather’s basement when the Stark County chapter began. Toys for Tots has had a number of homes since then and is now based in Massillon.
“It just went from there,” Bob Harris said. “I just stuck with it. I kept doing it because I love helping the children.”
Harris, who is nicknamed “The General,” works alongside his granddaughter, who has earned the nickname “The Little General.” The duo wore matching shirts with the titles printed in red glitter as they sorted toys earlier this month.
Kari Harris oversees the sorting of the toys in the warehouse while her grandfather handles all the paperwork, she said. A troop of women assist Harris to sort the toys by gender and age group.
“I figured it would bring us closer together,” Harris said. “We spend a lot of time together this part of the year.”
New leadership
Because Kari Harris is not a Marine, she cannot take over the local Toys for Tots from her grandfather, she said. However, she plans to continue her work with the organization by heading up the sorting as usual.
Jeff Weber, a Marine who served in Desert Storm, will take over the paperwork aspect from Bob Harris. The 1980 Jackson High School grad has been helping the Toys for Tots effort for the past five years.
Weber decided to join the Marine Corps League McKinley Detachment #277 with the vision of getting involved with Toys for Tots.
“I think that you get to the point in your life ... where you just want to do something that matters,” Weber said.
Weber credits three women — including Kari Harris — for organizing the toys at the warehouse.
Bob Harris will continue acting as the local coordinator until Jan. 15, which is the deadline to send the report to the foundation.
The season kicked off in September when Harris attended a conference in Leesburg, Va. and purchased $25,000 new toys for the children of Stark County. Collection began in October and ended Dec. 14.
Each year the toys are distributed to one of six nonprofit agencies, including Salvation Army and A Community Christmas, which Harris oversees and will continue to serve as president after his retirement from Toys for Tots.
“I’ve made a legacy that I didn’t even know I made in stark County,” Harris said. “I’m almost 80 years old. I think it’s time for the young people to step up and take over the responsibility.”
MASSILLON If Robert Harris had a long white beard, you might call him Santa Claus.
Christmastime is Harris’ busiest season as local coordinator of Toys for Tots. He and his “elves” sort and distribute toys in a Massillon-based workshop.
All is calm when Christmas Day comes around. Each year, Harris starts the day by enjoying a cup of coffee with his wife in their Hartville home.
Though no one can hear them, the couple says a prayer for the families of Stark County.
“Merry Christmas,” they say with a smile.
The retired U.S. Marine has served as the local coordinator of Toys for Tots for 25 years and will have delivered more than a million toys to local children by the end of the season. The 78-year-old plans to step down from his duties in January after final paperwork is completed for the year.
“I love it because it helps so many children,” Harris said. “Without Toys for Tots, millions of children would not have a Christmas.”
Longtime coordinator
When Harris volunteered to be the Stark County coordinator of the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve Toys for Tots in 1994, there weren’t many local chapters in Northeast Ohio.
Kari Harris, who has helped her grandfather with the organization for at least 15 years, said donated items were stored in her grandfather’s basement when the Stark County chapter began. Toys for Tots has had a number of homes since then and is now based in Massillon.
“It just went from there,” Bob Harris said. “I just stuck with it. I kept doing it because I love helping the children.”
Harris, who is nicknamed “The General,” works alongside his granddaughter, who has earned the nickname “The Little General.” The duo wore matching shirts with the titles printed in red glitter as they sorted toys earlier this month.
Kari Harris oversees the sorting of the toys in the warehouse while her grandfather handles all the paperwork, she said. A troop of women assist Harris to sort the toys by gender and age group.
“I figured it would bring us closer together,” Harris said. “We spend a lot of time together this part of the year.”
New leadership
Because Kari Harris is not a Marine, she cannot take over the local Toys for Tots from her grandfather, she said. However, she plans to continue her work with the organization by heading up the sorting as usual.
Jeff Weber, a Marine who served in Desert Storm, will take over the paperwork aspect from Bob Harris. The 1980 Jackson High School grad has been helping the Toys for Tots effort for the past five years.
Weber decided to join the Marine Corps League McKinley Detachment #277 with the vision of getting involved with Toys for Tots.
“I think that you get to the point in your life ... where you just want to do something that matters,” Weber said.
Weber credits three women — including Kari Harris — for organizing the toys at the warehouse.
Bob Harris will continue acting as the local coordinator until Jan. 15, which is the deadline to send the report to the foundation.
The season kicked off in September when Harris attended a conference in Leesburg, Va. and purchased $25,000 new toys for the children of Stark County. Collection began in October and ended Dec. 14.
Each year the toys are distributed to one of six nonprofit agencies, including Salvation Army and A Community Christmas, which Harris oversees and will continue to serve as president after his retirement from Toys for Tots.
“I’ve made a legacy that I didn’t even know I made in stark County,” Harris said. “I’m almost 80 years old. I think it’s time for the young people to step up and take over the responsibility.”
Tuesday, November 26, 2019
Times Apologizes for Publishing Anti-Semitic Cartoon
The New York Times on Sunday apologized for a cartoon published in the Opinion pages of its international edition that drew widespread condemnation for being anti-Semitic.
The cartoon, which was published on Thursday in the print newspaper, portrayed a blind President Trump, wearing a skullcap, being led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, drawn as a dog on a leash with a Star of David collar.
“The image was offensive, and it was an error of judgment to publish it,” The New York Times said in an editors’ note that will be published in Monday’s international edition.
Eileen Murphy, a New York Times spokeswoman, said the paper was “deeply sorry” for publishing the cartoon.
“Such imagery is always dangerous, and at a time when anti-Semitism is on the rise worldwide, it’s all the more unacceptable,” Ms. Murphy said in a statement on behalf of the Opinion section. “We are committed to making sure nothing like this happens again.”
The cartoon drew hundreds of critical comments from people worldwide. The Jerusalem Post, The Times of Israel, CNN, Fox News and others published articles about the cartoon.
“Apology not accepted,” the American Jewish Committee said in response to The Times’s editors’ note. “What does this say about your processes or your decision makers? How are you fixing it?”
The cartoon was drawn by the Portuguese cartoonist António Moreira Antunes and originally published by Expresso, a newspaper in Lisbon. It was then picked up by CartoonArts International, a syndicate for cartoons from around the world.
The New York Times Licensing Group sells content from CartoonArts and other publishers along with material from The New York Times to news sites and other customers.
The Times’s United States edition does not typically publish political cartoons and did not run this one, but the international edition frequently includes them. An editor from The Times’s Opinion section downloaded Mr. Antunes’s cartoon from the syndicate and made the decision to publish it, according to Ms. Murphy.
Ms. Murphy declined to identify the editor, who she said was “working without adequate oversight” because of a “faulty process” that is now being reviewed.
“We are evaluating our internal processes and training,” Ms. Murphy said. “We anticipate significant changes.”
James Bennet, the editor who oversees all content on The Times’s editorial pages, declined to comment in detail. “I’m going to let our statement speak for us at this point,” Mr. Bennet said.
Bret Stephens, an opinion columnist for The Times, wrote about the issue on Sunday and called on the newspaper to do “some serious reflection as to how it came to publish that cartoon,” which he called “an astonishing act of ignorance of anti-Semitism.”
And Vice President Mike Pence tweeted on Sunday, “We stand with Israel and we condemn antisemitism in ALL its forms.”
Sergio Florez, the managing editor for The Times’s Licensing Group, said the group took in 30 or more cartoons a week from CartoonArts through an automated feed to its website, where publishers can look through the cartoons and buy a license to reprint them. The group’s editors sporadically review the feed and remove work that is biased or racist, he said.
“Had we seen this cartoon in one of those sweeps, we definitely would have pulled it,” Mr. Florez said. The cartoon has been deleted from the Licensing Group’s collection, he said.
Nancy Lee, the executive editor of the Licensing Group, said the group would review its arrangement with CartoonArts.
The company’s licensing deal with The Times goes back several decades, Ms. Lee said. CartoonArts, based in New York, was founded in 1978 by the cartoonist Jerry Robinson to bring global cartoons to a wider audience. It is now run by his son, Jens Robinson.
“We receive and post cartoons from around the world of many shades of political opinion,” Mr. Robinson said by email. “The cartoon in question was viewed as political commentary. However, we understand the decision to remove it from the website.”
Expresso, the Portuguese newspaper, did not respond to requests for comment, and Mr. Antunes could not be reached. He has been a regular cartoonist for the paper since 1974, according to an online biography.
“The profession of cartoonist is a profession of risk,” Mr. Antunes said in an interview with the Portuguese Observer in 2015, after the fatal attack in Paris on the staff of the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo. “There is always fear, but there is no other option but to defend freedom of expression.”
The cartoon, which was published on Thursday in the print newspaper, portrayed a blind President Trump, wearing a skullcap, being led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, drawn as a dog on a leash with a Star of David collar.
“The image was offensive, and it was an error of judgment to publish it,” The New York Times said in an editors’ note that will be published in Monday’s international edition.
Eileen Murphy, a New York Times spokeswoman, said the paper was “deeply sorry” for publishing the cartoon.
“Such imagery is always dangerous, and at a time when anti-Semitism is on the rise worldwide, it’s all the more unacceptable,” Ms. Murphy said in a statement on behalf of the Opinion section. “We are committed to making sure nothing like this happens again.”
The cartoon drew hundreds of critical comments from people worldwide. The Jerusalem Post, The Times of Israel, CNN, Fox News and others published articles about the cartoon.
“Apology not accepted,” the American Jewish Committee said in response to The Times’s editors’ note. “What does this say about your processes or your decision makers? How are you fixing it?”
The cartoon was drawn by the Portuguese cartoonist António Moreira Antunes and originally published by Expresso, a newspaper in Lisbon. It was then picked up by CartoonArts International, a syndicate for cartoons from around the world.
The New York Times Licensing Group sells content from CartoonArts and other publishers along with material from The New York Times to news sites and other customers.
The Times’s United States edition does not typically publish political cartoons and did not run this one, but the international edition frequently includes them. An editor from The Times’s Opinion section downloaded Mr. Antunes’s cartoon from the syndicate and made the decision to publish it, according to Ms. Murphy.
Ms. Murphy declined to identify the editor, who she said was “working without adequate oversight” because of a “faulty process” that is now being reviewed.
“We are evaluating our internal processes and training,” Ms. Murphy said. “We anticipate significant changes.”
James Bennet, the editor who oversees all content on The Times’s editorial pages, declined to comment in detail. “I’m going to let our statement speak for us at this point,” Mr. Bennet said.
Bret Stephens, an opinion columnist for The Times, wrote about the issue on Sunday and called on the newspaper to do “some serious reflection as to how it came to publish that cartoon,” which he called “an astonishing act of ignorance of anti-Semitism.”
And Vice President Mike Pence tweeted on Sunday, “We stand with Israel and we condemn antisemitism in ALL its forms.”
Sergio Florez, the managing editor for The Times’s Licensing Group, said the group took in 30 or more cartoons a week from CartoonArts through an automated feed to its website, where publishers can look through the cartoons and buy a license to reprint them. The group’s editors sporadically review the feed and remove work that is biased or racist, he said.
“Had we seen this cartoon in one of those sweeps, we definitely would have pulled it,” Mr. Florez said. The cartoon has been deleted from the Licensing Group’s collection, he said.
Nancy Lee, the executive editor of the Licensing Group, said the group would review its arrangement with CartoonArts.
The company’s licensing deal with The Times goes back several decades, Ms. Lee said. CartoonArts, based in New York, was founded in 1978 by the cartoonist Jerry Robinson to bring global cartoons to a wider audience. It is now run by his son, Jens Robinson.
“We receive and post cartoons from around the world of many shades of political opinion,” Mr. Robinson said by email. “The cartoon in question was viewed as political commentary. However, we understand the decision to remove it from the website.”
Expresso, the Portuguese newspaper, did not respond to requests for comment, and Mr. Antunes could not be reached. He has been a regular cartoonist for the paper since 1974, according to an online biography.
“The profession of cartoonist is a profession of risk,” Mr. Antunes said in an interview with the Portuguese Observer in 2015, after the fatal attack in Paris on the staff of the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo. “There is always fear, but there is no other option but to defend freedom of expression.”
Monday, September 23, 2019
Player, Nicklaus rail against the golf ball, green-reading books
Modern technology struggles to get inside the gates at Augusta National Golf Club. Cell phones will get you thrown out, and green-reading books can be left in players’ courtesy cars.
It’s an idyllic trip back in time for some, but for Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player, it’s simply a step in the right direction.
Nicklaus and Player reprised their annual role as honorary starters Thursday morning, kicking off the 83rd Masters with opening tee shots in front of thousands of eager patrons. The two men, who have combined to win nine green jackets, then went to the press building where they reminisced about decades spent together at the club as well as the state of technology in the modern game.
It was on that latter point that they formed a consensus.
“The golf ball has gotten ridiculous. I have so many things on that,” Nicklaus said. “The golf ball from 1930 to about ’95 gained about six yards. From 1995 to 2005, about 15 yards, and that’s a big difference. Probably the organizations won’t tell you that, but that’s exactly about what happened.”
It’s a familiar refrain from Nicklaus, who has railed against the technological advancements in the game for the last several years. He was joined in support by Player, who offered a warning that the governing bodies need to create a bifurcated ball of some sort, lest players begin driving the 445-yard first hole at Augusta National.
“We’d better start thinking. They are going to hit wedges to all the par-5s, and golf courses like St. Andrews, this marvelous golf course, is completely obsolete. They can drive probably six greens,” Player said. “So I don’t know where we’re going. And our leaders of such have got to get together now and form a ball for professionals that’s different to the amateurs. Let the amateurs have anything they’d like. … But we have got to stop this, otherwise it’s going to be a joke, in my opinion.”
Player didn’t just stop with his thoughts on the ball. The 83-year-old also expressed his distaste for green-reading books, which are not allowed at Augusta National and whose details was recently reined in by the USGA and R&A.
“Bobby Locke was the best putter that ever lived, and Tiger Woods was the best putter and so on. I never saw him take out a book to read the damn green,” Player said. “To read the green, you’ve got to look at a book. Well if you can’t read a green, you should be selling beans. It’s part of the game. Where are we going? Everything is so artificial.”
It’s an idyllic trip back in time for some, but for Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player, it’s simply a step in the right direction.
Nicklaus and Player reprised their annual role as honorary starters Thursday morning, kicking off the 83rd Masters with opening tee shots in front of thousands of eager patrons. The two men, who have combined to win nine green jackets, then went to the press building where they reminisced about decades spent together at the club as well as the state of technology in the modern game.
It was on that latter point that they formed a consensus.
“The golf ball has gotten ridiculous. I have so many things on that,” Nicklaus said. “The golf ball from 1930 to about ’95 gained about six yards. From 1995 to 2005, about 15 yards, and that’s a big difference. Probably the organizations won’t tell you that, but that’s exactly about what happened.”
It’s a familiar refrain from Nicklaus, who has railed against the technological advancements in the game for the last several years. He was joined in support by Player, who offered a warning that the governing bodies need to create a bifurcated ball of some sort, lest players begin driving the 445-yard first hole at Augusta National.
“We’d better start thinking. They are going to hit wedges to all the par-5s, and golf courses like St. Andrews, this marvelous golf course, is completely obsolete. They can drive probably six greens,” Player said. “So I don’t know where we’re going. And our leaders of such have got to get together now and form a ball for professionals that’s different to the amateurs. Let the amateurs have anything they’d like. … But we have got to stop this, otherwise it’s going to be a joke, in my opinion.”
Player didn’t just stop with his thoughts on the ball. The 83-year-old also expressed his distaste for green-reading books, which are not allowed at Augusta National and whose details was recently reined in by the USGA and R&A.
“Bobby Locke was the best putter that ever lived, and Tiger Woods was the best putter and so on. I never saw him take out a book to read the damn green,” Player said. “To read the green, you’ve got to look at a book. Well if you can’t read a green, you should be selling beans. It’s part of the game. Where are we going? Everything is so artificial.”
Monday, July 22, 2019
Ebooks are experiencing a crisis of confidence
Microsoft is just the latest in a longline of companies that have shuttered their bookstore and left readers in a larch. This includes Blinkbox Books, Parable Books, Diesel e-books, Scholastic Storia, Sony Reader Store, the Barnes and Noble Nook UK store and a bunch of others have completely closed their doors and left customers with all sorts of questions and concerns when their apps stopped working and their library is deleted.
The vast majority of ebooks from major online retailers have digital rights management from Adobe or have developed their own DRM solution. If you buy an ebook Amazon, it is incompatible with your Kobo or Nook. The only way you can circumvent this is to illegally strip the DRM from your book. Opting into DRM basically is a matter of trust. You are trusting the company to send you the book and that they will provide access to it.
I believe that ebooks are suffering from a crisis of confidence. It is beginning to be quite difficult to trust a retailer to not disappear overnight with your ebooks, no matter how big they are. You can literary spend thousands of dollars and they just disappear overnight. Microsoft is at least offering refunds, but most other retailers are there one minute and gone the next.
Maybe the crux of the ebook issue, is more psychological than anything. People’s sense of psychological ownership is affected by three primary factors: whether they feel as if they have control over the object they own, whether they use the object to define who they are, and whether the object helps give them a sense of belonging in society. A recent study published in the journal Electronic Markets found that the vast majority of people felt a constricted sense of ownership of ebooks versus physical books, based on the fact that they don’t have full control over the products. For example, they expressed frustration that they often could not copy a digital file to multiple devices. Along similar lines, many study participants lamented restrictions on sharing ebooks with friends, or gifting or selling the books, saying this made ebooks feel less valuable as possessions than physical books.
Sabrina Helm, a UA associate professor who researches consumer perceptions and behaviors. said “One of the conclusions of our research was that digital books and physical books are entirely different products,” she said. “ebooks feel like more of a service experience; overall, they seem to offer a more functional or utilitarian experience. You have much more richness if you deal with a physical book, where all your senses are involved.
Digital bookstores rise and fall and thousand of customers are left with nothing to show for the money they spent. This is likely the reason why every year, ebook sales fall a few percentage points and print is on the rise. Print is trustworthy, ebooks are not.
Monday, May 20, 2019
5 Business Books by Family Successes
Adam Witty is an Entrepreneurs' Organization (EO) member in Charleston, South Carolina, and founder and CEO of Advantage | ForbesBooks, the authority marketing specialists in working with business professionals to elevate brands and grow businesses through publishing. Adam has built the company into one of the largest business book publishers in America, serving over 1,000 members in 40 US states and 13 countries. We asked Adam to share some of his favorite family business titles:
Having my Dad by my side during the growth of my company, sharing his invaluable knowledge borne of building and nurturing his own successful company was not only a personal privilege but also a huge business asset.
I needed advice 24/7. He was there. I needed straight talk. He didn't mince words. I needed to be told when I was headed down the wrong path. He was not shy in sharing his opinions.
I'm not advocating starting a new business with family members. The pros and cons of this are well-documented, from the advantages of shared vision and company loyalty, to the disadvantages of festering familial conflict and lack of work-life balance.
What I do know is that taking the entrepreneurial plunge with a family member can lead to a special kind of success.
Here are five excellent business books co-written by family members who have taken that journey together.
1. Double Your Success: Principles to Build a Multimillion-Dollar Business by Stephen Levi Carter and Dr. Sterling Carter
The Carters, twin entrepreneurs and co-founders of Sterling Staffing Solutions, share their journey from children of sharecroppers to owners of a hugely successful healthcare staffing business. The book is divided into four main sections: planning, implementation, a leader's mindset and potential pitfalls. The twins' humble background along with their military careers taught them about discipline and the need for a robust support system, traits that carry over into their business advice. Helpful tips and mnemonic devices (such as their CARES model: Compassion, Attitude, Respect, Excellence and Servant leadership) make it particularly user-friendly.
2. Being Relational: The Seven Ways to Quality Interaction and Lasting Change by Louise Phipps Senft and William Senft
This husband-and-wife team are leaders in the field of mediation and conflict resolution. While it has the feel of self-improvement, the book is effective as a guide to improving business communication. It carries a message about the good that can come when, instead of focusing solely on winning a discussion or negotiation, we take the spotlight off the specific transaction and put it on the relationship, creating a win-win for all parties. Being relational involves focusing on seven attributes during any interaction: Being engaged, centered, grounded, clear, generous, humble and kind. The book contains elements of psychology, philosophy and spirituality, but is written in everyday language with a conversational style.
3. Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip Heath and Dan Heath
The Brothers Heath have written a number of business books together. This is my favorite for students of marketing. The first step in any outreach, from an ad campaign to a sales presentation, is to create bold ideas that "stick"--ideas that "are understood and remembered and have a lasting impact--ones that change your audience's opinions or behavior." The authors identify the essential elements of a sticky idea: simplicity, unexpectedness, concreteness, credibility, emotions and stories. The premise: It's not the best idea that wins; it's the one that's best communicated. The Heaths use plenty of real-world examples of sticky ideas that have worked spectacularly or failed miserably. A little wordy, but that's a minor quibble. Best for anyone who needs to communicate their ideas more effectively and memorably.
4. From Problem Solving To Solution Design: Turning Ideas Into Actions by J. Eduardo Campos and Erica W. Campos
This married couple are the founders of Embedded-Knowledge, Inc., a consulting firm helping business leaders design solutions to complex problems within their companies. They have worked in multicultural environments across four continents, dealing with intricate partnerships involving multinational stakeholders. In other words, they know how to problem-solve. It is this expertise they share here. The book is organized progressively in chapters that take the reader through the practical stages of identifying problems and designing solutions, employing real-life case studies and providing analytical tools that can be applied in virtually any context. Through their "IDEAS (Identify, Design, Engage, Act, Sustain) Framework" they have simplified what could be complicated, giving the reader a recipe for success.
5. Life is Good: The Book by Bert Jacobs and John Jacobs
Life is indeed good for these brothers whose apparel company, Life is Good, is worth more than $100 million. Their book, like their business, is based on an attitude of optimism. Bert and John share the ride from their lower-middle-class upbringing to the runaway success of their business. They illuminate ten key "superpowers" as key to a sunny perspective and a terrific business plan: openness, courage, simplicity, humor, gratitude, fun, compassion, creativity, authenticity and love. Their story, illustrated with the company's iconic artwork, shows how to overcome obstacles, whether it's growing stronger from rejection, letting your imagination loose, or simplifying your life to focus on what matters most. It's a sweet, easy book full of good feelings.
Having my Dad by my side during the growth of my company, sharing his invaluable knowledge borne of building and nurturing his own successful company was not only a personal privilege but also a huge business asset.
I needed advice 24/7. He was there. I needed straight talk. He didn't mince words. I needed to be told when I was headed down the wrong path. He was not shy in sharing his opinions.
I'm not advocating starting a new business with family members. The pros and cons of this are well-documented, from the advantages of shared vision and company loyalty, to the disadvantages of festering familial conflict and lack of work-life balance.
What I do know is that taking the entrepreneurial plunge with a family member can lead to a special kind of success.
Here are five excellent business books co-written by family members who have taken that journey together.
1. Double Your Success: Principles to Build a Multimillion-Dollar Business by Stephen Levi Carter and Dr. Sterling Carter
The Carters, twin entrepreneurs and co-founders of Sterling Staffing Solutions, share their journey from children of sharecroppers to owners of a hugely successful healthcare staffing business. The book is divided into four main sections: planning, implementation, a leader's mindset and potential pitfalls. The twins' humble background along with their military careers taught them about discipline and the need for a robust support system, traits that carry over into their business advice. Helpful tips and mnemonic devices (such as their CARES model: Compassion, Attitude, Respect, Excellence and Servant leadership) make it particularly user-friendly.
2. Being Relational: The Seven Ways to Quality Interaction and Lasting Change by Louise Phipps Senft and William Senft
This husband-and-wife team are leaders in the field of mediation and conflict resolution. While it has the feel of self-improvement, the book is effective as a guide to improving business communication. It carries a message about the good that can come when, instead of focusing solely on winning a discussion or negotiation, we take the spotlight off the specific transaction and put it on the relationship, creating a win-win for all parties. Being relational involves focusing on seven attributes during any interaction: Being engaged, centered, grounded, clear, generous, humble and kind. The book contains elements of psychology, philosophy and spirituality, but is written in everyday language with a conversational style.
3. Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip Heath and Dan Heath
The Brothers Heath have written a number of business books together. This is my favorite for students of marketing. The first step in any outreach, from an ad campaign to a sales presentation, is to create bold ideas that "stick"--ideas that "are understood and remembered and have a lasting impact--ones that change your audience's opinions or behavior." The authors identify the essential elements of a sticky idea: simplicity, unexpectedness, concreteness, credibility, emotions and stories. The premise: It's not the best idea that wins; it's the one that's best communicated. The Heaths use plenty of real-world examples of sticky ideas that have worked spectacularly or failed miserably. A little wordy, but that's a minor quibble. Best for anyone who needs to communicate their ideas more effectively and memorably.
4. From Problem Solving To Solution Design: Turning Ideas Into Actions by J. Eduardo Campos and Erica W. Campos
This married couple are the founders of Embedded-Knowledge, Inc., a consulting firm helping business leaders design solutions to complex problems within their companies. They have worked in multicultural environments across four continents, dealing with intricate partnerships involving multinational stakeholders. In other words, they know how to problem-solve. It is this expertise they share here. The book is organized progressively in chapters that take the reader through the practical stages of identifying problems and designing solutions, employing real-life case studies and providing analytical tools that can be applied in virtually any context. Through their "IDEAS (Identify, Design, Engage, Act, Sustain) Framework" they have simplified what could be complicated, giving the reader a recipe for success.
5. Life is Good: The Book by Bert Jacobs and John Jacobs
Life is indeed good for these brothers whose apparel company, Life is Good, is worth more than $100 million. Their book, like their business, is based on an attitude of optimism. Bert and John share the ride from their lower-middle-class upbringing to the runaway success of their business. They illuminate ten key "superpowers" as key to a sunny perspective and a terrific business plan: openness, courage, simplicity, humor, gratitude, fun, compassion, creativity, authenticity and love. Their story, illustrated with the company's iconic artwork, shows how to overcome obstacles, whether it's growing stronger from rejection, letting your imagination loose, or simplifying your life to focus on what matters most. It's a sweet, easy book full of good feelings.
Thursday, March 21, 2019
The power of books
Finally, the first box had arrived. University of Miami English professor Frank Wills placed it on his desk and pried it opened, finding inside a collection of original black history and literature books that he knew every African-American student should have access to but didn’t.
So to correct that academic injustice, Wills immediately got to work, reproducing the books through his Miami-based publishing company and selling them at break-even cost to academic libraries across the nation.
That was in 1969. Over the next 20 years, other boxes would arrive, and Wills would end up publishing hundreds of existing titles by such famous black scholars and poets as W.E.B. Du Bois, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Booker T. Washington, and Phillis Wheatley. Originally published in the 1800s and early 1900s, the books are in the public domain and not subject to copyright restrictions. Wills published them as facsimile reprints with the original illustrations and typesetting.
But it was that first delivery of books 50 years ago that started it all. Back then, most of the nation’s universities and colleges didn’t have black studies departments. UM had been pondering the idea of starting such a program. One of the roadblocks was a lack of books on black history, culture, and literature.
Wills wanted to help, and one of the keys, he knew, was acquiring the books. But where could he find them? His big break came in 1969 on, of all places, a flight to Nashville, Tennessee.
Aboard the plane, he sat next to a philanthropist who was on his way to present a check to the library at the private and historically black Fisk University. So enthralled was Wills with the philanthropist’s mission that he decided to accompany him to Fisk after they landed, and it was at the Nashville-based university that Wills met librarian Jessie Carney Smith.
Together, they sifted through the Fisk library’s extensive collection of African-American books, selecting hundreds of titles that Wills decided he wanted to republish.
When he returned to Miami, he took out a bank loan to start his Mnemosyne Publishing company. And soon after, Smith, who is now dean of the library at Fisk, sent Wills the first shipment of books for republishing.
Wills would then sell the books to university libraries, giving academics and students access to the texts in their original form and language and helping to pave the way for schools of higher education to launch black studies programs in the years that followed.
He never profited on the sale of any of the books he published. “He wasn’t interested in making money,” said his wife, Susan Wills, a School of Law graduate and retired attorney. “He saw a need and just wanted the books to be there to better the lives of students. He wanted young students, through literature, to accomplish and succeed for their families, themselves, and society. And it was important for him to get the books into their hands.”
The titles ran the gamut—from William Wells Brown’s “The Black Man: His Antecedents, His Genius and His Achievements,” to Charles Chesnutt’s “The Colonel’s Dream,” to Du Bois’ “Quest of the Silver Fleece,” to Dunbar’s “The Love of Landry,” to Washington’s “A New Negro for a New Century.”
Today, Wills, 94, is retired and suffers from Alzheimer’s. Many of the works he published can still be found on the shelves of college and university libraries across the nation, including UM’s Richter Library.
“Every once in a while, I go to the Richter to look at some of the books. It’s such an incredible experience,” said Wills’ daughter, Susan Amat, who served as the founding executive director of UM’s Launch Pad and now heads her own entrepreneurship education company, Venture Hive.
Amat noted that Wills was sympathetic to Cubans who fled their homeland after Castro took power. So after he finished his African-American book series, he collaborated with Juan Manuel Salvat, the former owner of Ediciones Universal, a Miami publishing company that preserves Cuban history and culture, to publish works of major Cuban writers.
Wills’ life story would make an intriguing novel in its own right, said Susan Wills, noting her husband’s military service.
He grew up poor in a mixed Columbus, Ohio, neighborhood of Italian immigrants and blacks. After Pearl Harbor was attacked and the United States entered World War II in 1941, a then-17-year-old Wills dropped out of high school to join the Navy, persuading his mother to sign the papers that allowed him to enlist.
He spent the next four years in the Pacific, serving in the forward engine rooms on three submarines that undertook death-defying missions such as deploying mines, rescuing downed American pilots, and attacking enemy supply ships.
He was a whiz at math, and his proficiency in the discipline helped him get promoted, even over other sailors who had college engineering degrees.
But Wills has never really talked much about his military service. “He’s never wanted to boast about it,” said his wife. “It’s always been difficult getting information out of him. He did what he was asked to do and more. He never whined or complained about how tough it was. He just went about doing it. Service to others, always thinking about the greater good—his whole life is built around that.”
On one of the rare occasions that Wills did share an experience from his days in the Pacific, he recalled being trapped at the bottom of Tokyo Bay aboard a submarine with his shipmates for days, as their commander tried to avoid being detected by enemy ships.
After the war, he enrolled at Ohio State on the G.I. Bill but later transferred to UM, earning a bachelor’s degree in education and then attending the University of Maryland for his master’s.
He returned to UM to teach full-time, instructing students not only in English literature but also math. He also advised students, helped Vietnam War veterans get enrolled on the G.I. Bill, and recruited talented Latin American artists for the art department, according to his wife. An Iron Arrow inductee, he served as the honor society’s faculty advisor. But his true calling was mentoring students, she said.
“He was not an academic, not a scholarly kind of person,” said Susan Wills. “At heart, he was a mentor.”
Wills retired from UM in 1984 but continued to publish books. During Hurricane Andrew, a small tornado blew the doors off of his book warehouse in South Dade, destroying most of their inventory.
“He taught me how to be a much better person,” said Susan Wills. “He’s a part of the Greatest Generation.”
So to correct that academic injustice, Wills immediately got to work, reproducing the books through his Miami-based publishing company and selling them at break-even cost to academic libraries across the nation.
That was in 1969. Over the next 20 years, other boxes would arrive, and Wills would end up publishing hundreds of existing titles by such famous black scholars and poets as W.E.B. Du Bois, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Booker T. Washington, and Phillis Wheatley. Originally published in the 1800s and early 1900s, the books are in the public domain and not subject to copyright restrictions. Wills published them as facsimile reprints with the original illustrations and typesetting.
But it was that first delivery of books 50 years ago that started it all. Back then, most of the nation’s universities and colleges didn’t have black studies departments. UM had been pondering the idea of starting such a program. One of the roadblocks was a lack of books on black history, culture, and literature.
Wills wanted to help, and one of the keys, he knew, was acquiring the books. But where could he find them? His big break came in 1969 on, of all places, a flight to Nashville, Tennessee.
Aboard the plane, he sat next to a philanthropist who was on his way to present a check to the library at the private and historically black Fisk University. So enthralled was Wills with the philanthropist’s mission that he decided to accompany him to Fisk after they landed, and it was at the Nashville-based university that Wills met librarian Jessie Carney Smith.
Together, they sifted through the Fisk library’s extensive collection of African-American books, selecting hundreds of titles that Wills decided he wanted to republish.
When he returned to Miami, he took out a bank loan to start his Mnemosyne Publishing company. And soon after, Smith, who is now dean of the library at Fisk, sent Wills the first shipment of books for republishing.
Wills would then sell the books to university libraries, giving academics and students access to the texts in their original form and language and helping to pave the way for schools of higher education to launch black studies programs in the years that followed.
He never profited on the sale of any of the books he published. “He wasn’t interested in making money,” said his wife, Susan Wills, a School of Law graduate and retired attorney. “He saw a need and just wanted the books to be there to better the lives of students. He wanted young students, through literature, to accomplish and succeed for their families, themselves, and society. And it was important for him to get the books into their hands.”
The titles ran the gamut—from William Wells Brown’s “The Black Man: His Antecedents, His Genius and His Achievements,” to Charles Chesnutt’s “The Colonel’s Dream,” to Du Bois’ “Quest of the Silver Fleece,” to Dunbar’s “The Love of Landry,” to Washington’s “A New Negro for a New Century.”
Today, Wills, 94, is retired and suffers from Alzheimer’s. Many of the works he published can still be found on the shelves of college and university libraries across the nation, including UM’s Richter Library.
“Every once in a while, I go to the Richter to look at some of the books. It’s such an incredible experience,” said Wills’ daughter, Susan Amat, who served as the founding executive director of UM’s Launch Pad and now heads her own entrepreneurship education company, Venture Hive.
Amat noted that Wills was sympathetic to Cubans who fled their homeland after Castro took power. So after he finished his African-American book series, he collaborated with Juan Manuel Salvat, the former owner of Ediciones Universal, a Miami publishing company that preserves Cuban history and culture, to publish works of major Cuban writers.
Wills’ life story would make an intriguing novel in its own right, said Susan Wills, noting her husband’s military service.
He grew up poor in a mixed Columbus, Ohio, neighborhood of Italian immigrants and blacks. After Pearl Harbor was attacked and the United States entered World War II in 1941, a then-17-year-old Wills dropped out of high school to join the Navy, persuading his mother to sign the papers that allowed him to enlist.
He spent the next four years in the Pacific, serving in the forward engine rooms on three submarines that undertook death-defying missions such as deploying mines, rescuing downed American pilots, and attacking enemy supply ships.
He was a whiz at math, and his proficiency in the discipline helped him get promoted, even over other sailors who had college engineering degrees.
But Wills has never really talked much about his military service. “He’s never wanted to boast about it,” said his wife. “It’s always been difficult getting information out of him. He did what he was asked to do and more. He never whined or complained about how tough it was. He just went about doing it. Service to others, always thinking about the greater good—his whole life is built around that.”
On one of the rare occasions that Wills did share an experience from his days in the Pacific, he recalled being trapped at the bottom of Tokyo Bay aboard a submarine with his shipmates for days, as their commander tried to avoid being detected by enemy ships.
After the war, he enrolled at Ohio State on the G.I. Bill but later transferred to UM, earning a bachelor’s degree in education and then attending the University of Maryland for his master’s.
He returned to UM to teach full-time, instructing students not only in English literature but also math. He also advised students, helped Vietnam War veterans get enrolled on the G.I. Bill, and recruited talented Latin American artists for the art department, according to his wife. An Iron Arrow inductee, he served as the honor society’s faculty advisor. But his true calling was mentoring students, she said.
“He was not an academic, not a scholarly kind of person,” said Susan Wills. “At heart, he was a mentor.”
Wills retired from UM in 1984 but continued to publish books. During Hurricane Andrew, a small tornado blew the doors off of his book warehouse in South Dade, destroying most of their inventory.
“He taught me how to be a much better person,” said Susan Wills. “He’s a part of the Greatest Generation.”
Friday, January 25, 2019
Harry Potter and the Half-Wit Dunces
Measured by its impact, the BDS campaign to isolate Israel has been about as successful as the Charge of the Light Brigade, say, or the theatrical run of Michael Cimino's Heaven's Gate, or any other cataclysmic failure that still inspires us, decades later, to ponder the bottomless depths of human ineptitude. And now, not content with their floundering boycotts, the champions of the anti-Israeli left have found a new villain: J.K. Rowling.
Why? Because Rowling is an outspoken critic of the anti-Semitic Jeremy Corbyn and his anti-Semitic Labour Party, a thought crime among those moral and intellectual degenerates who refuse to condemn hatred of Jews when it comes, as it so frequently does these days, from their side of the aisle.
Steven Salaita—the disgraced academic whose muddle-minded attempts at thinking got him jettisoned from a host of universities worldwide and who now spends his days theorizing on why Israeli hummus leads to genocide—entered the anti-Rowling fray, asking if it was possible to hide Harry Potter from his children, because, truly, there's no better mark of an open and curious mind than attempting to censure your children's reading list based on your political beliefs.
Not to be outdone, Rafael Shimunov, of the radical group Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, accused Rowling of depicting “viciously antisemetic [sic] scenes in Harry Potter that destroyed Jewish kids who loved you and now they're grown up and you think you can make it up by using right wing Netanyahu talking points about Corbyn. But that's also antisemetic [sic].”
Just what sort of wicked deeds did the beloved author commit to warrant the accusation of destroying Jewish children, a charge previously limited to, say, the Einsatzgruppen? In a flurry of tweets, the studious Shimunov goes on to explain: In the Harry Potter universe, the banks are controlled by Goblins, and the chief Goblin is called Griphook. Get it? Grip, because he has a tight grip on money, and hook because he has a hooked nose! Which means he's a Jew! Which makes J.K. Rowling some sort of slightly more feminine Goebbels!
The hatred is revealing. In their well-scrubbed moments, the boycotters insist that singling out the world's only Jewish state for opprobrium even though—or even because—it's a pluralistic democracy has nothing to do with Jews. You can, they insist, be an anti-Zionist and not an anti-Semite. L'affaire Rowling proves yet again that you can't: The author had nothing to say about Israel. Her concern was the hatred of Jews in Britain, a hatred the community itself had unanimously and unequivocally characterized as a clear and present threat. And for that the BDS lowlifes pounced, arguing that anyone who bravely stands with Jews and speaks out against anti-Semitism must be some sort of bigoted emissary of the dark King Bibi himself.
Previously, this sort of reasoning was reserved to those who dwelled in padded cells and spent their days lining up for meds. But now we have Twitter, where such mad drivel can pass for sophistication. But hey, it's the holidays, time to be kind and compassionate to each other. So in the spirit of brotherly love, if you believe that singling out the world's only Jewish state for harsh criticism is totally not anti-Semitic but criticizing a man who declared Hamas and Hezbollah his friends truly is, I hope you get all the help you need.
Why? Because Rowling is an outspoken critic of the anti-Semitic Jeremy Corbyn and his anti-Semitic Labour Party, a thought crime among those moral and intellectual degenerates who refuse to condemn hatred of Jews when it comes, as it so frequently does these days, from their side of the aisle.
Steven Salaita—the disgraced academic whose muddle-minded attempts at thinking got him jettisoned from a host of universities worldwide and who now spends his days theorizing on why Israeli hummus leads to genocide—entered the anti-Rowling fray, asking if it was possible to hide Harry Potter from his children, because, truly, there's no better mark of an open and curious mind than attempting to censure your children's reading list based on your political beliefs.
Not to be outdone, Rafael Shimunov, of the radical group Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, accused Rowling of depicting “viciously antisemetic [sic] scenes in Harry Potter that destroyed Jewish kids who loved you and now they're grown up and you think you can make it up by using right wing Netanyahu talking points about Corbyn. But that's also antisemetic [sic].”
Just what sort of wicked deeds did the beloved author commit to warrant the accusation of destroying Jewish children, a charge previously limited to, say, the Einsatzgruppen? In a flurry of tweets, the studious Shimunov goes on to explain: In the Harry Potter universe, the banks are controlled by Goblins, and the chief Goblin is called Griphook. Get it? Grip, because he has a tight grip on money, and hook because he has a hooked nose! Which means he's a Jew! Which makes J.K. Rowling some sort of slightly more feminine Goebbels!
The hatred is revealing. In their well-scrubbed moments, the boycotters insist that singling out the world's only Jewish state for opprobrium even though—or even because—it's a pluralistic democracy has nothing to do with Jews. You can, they insist, be an anti-Zionist and not an anti-Semite. L'affaire Rowling proves yet again that you can't: The author had nothing to say about Israel. Her concern was the hatred of Jews in Britain, a hatred the community itself had unanimously and unequivocally characterized as a clear and present threat. And for that the BDS lowlifes pounced, arguing that anyone who bravely stands with Jews and speaks out against anti-Semitism must be some sort of bigoted emissary of the dark King Bibi himself.
Previously, this sort of reasoning was reserved to those who dwelled in padded cells and spent their days lining up for meds. But now we have Twitter, where such mad drivel can pass for sophistication. But hey, it's the holidays, time to be kind and compassionate to each other. So in the spirit of brotherly love, if you believe that singling out the world's only Jewish state for harsh criticism is totally not anti-Semitic but criticizing a man who declared Hamas and Hezbollah his friends truly is, I hope you get all the help you need.
Wednesday, December 26, 2018
Plucky, Charming New Books for Toddlers
It's possible there has never been a better time to be a toddler. True, you have to put up with grown-ups crashing playtime — today's parents can often be spotted in sandboxes, solemnly instructing their offspring to scoop and dump sand — but on the plus side, the books currently being made for the preschool (and pre-preschool) crowd are setting a new standard for delightfulness, cleverness and flat-out fun.
Board books, those dependable little thick-paged bricks designed to withstand chewing or banging around, are increasingly not just durable, but well written and ingeniously designed. Many other books for toddlers, like those oversize compendiums that have always been perfect for unhurried, lap-sitting reading sessions, are now sensitively updated, keeping the traditional stories and charming old-school art, but losing the racist and sexist stereotypes of yore. Humor, great illustration, lively storytelling, interesting facts about their everyday world, a cheerful surprise at every turn of the page — all of that, and more, awaits toddlers in these thoughtfully made books.
POOR LITTLE RABBIT! (Gecko, 20 pp., $9.99; ages 0 to 4), written and illustrated by Jörg Mühle, is an "interactive" book with no bells and whistles, just an invitation to participate by "helping" Little Rabbit, who's fallen down and scraped his arm. There's a red mark on his arm and we're invited to "try blowing on it." Unfortunately, Little Rabbit wails on the next page, "There's blood!" A Band-Aid (with bunnies on it, of course) appears. "Can you put it on?" comes next, but tears still stream down the distressed bunny's face. Saying a magic rhyme, stroking his ears, wiping away his tears, helping him blow his nose with a tissue and brushing off the dirt all follow.
Besides being fun, this gem is also a way to show toddlers how to put empathy into action. "You've made him all better," they're told at the end, and you can picture a toddler's sigh of altruistic satisfaction. The layout is simple and clean, with single-color pages in a palette of bright tones like turquoise and tangerine, allowing the focus to stay on Mühle's adorable drawings of Little Rabbit as he cycles through sadness and healing.
It might sound strange to call a board book "long awaited," but for those who have puzzled and perhaps even argued over the message of the great Sandra Boynton's 1982 "But Not the Hippopotamus," the arrival of a follow-up called BUT NOT THE ARMADILLO (Simon & Schuster, 14 pp., $5.99; ages 0 to 4) is exciting news. In the previous book, a solitary hippo politely refused to join other animals in various activities — dancing, shopping, drinking juice. Was she rejected and isolated, or just, you know, a bit of a loner? And when, on the last page, she finally agreed to hang out with everyone else, what to make of the armadillo who then appeared, with the line "But not the armadillo"? Some found it off-putting — a testament to the persistence of loneliness and alienation, a "Bartleby" for toddlers. Others applauded the self-determination exhibited by both the hippo and the armadillo.
I am here to tell you that Boynton has settled the question: The armadillo, "with his armadillo nose," really likes to wander around by himself, following that sausage-shaped schnoz "where it goes." He sniffs flowers, picks cranberries, stretches out languidly for a nap. He hears music from far away. A hippo (ahem) rushes busily by — "she wants to run and play." But, you guessed it, "not the armadillo." And that's O.K., we're helped to see: "He doesn't like to hurry." There's one more beat, a moment of parting grace that shows why Boynton is the absolute master of board books. "Please scratch his armadillo nose and tell him not to worry." To each creature his or her own.
The French graphic artist Jean Jullien has been giving Boynton a run for her money with the funny, graphically sophisticated board books "This Is Not a Book" and "Before & After." Now comes WHY THE FACE? (Phaidon, 32 pp., $14.95; ages 0 to 4), another conceptual book that shows off his ability to delight all ages with a few strokes of his thick black paintbrush.
The pages on the left — each rendered in an electric shade like citron or coral — all ask the question of the title, with a drawing in the center of the right page showing a child's face making an outsize expression. You have to guess what's causing it, and the answer comes when you lift a foldout to see the culprit. An unpleasantly scrunched-up face covers an array of smelly stuff like cheese, a trash can and an elephant's rear end ("Whoa, that stinks!"); a face with crossed eyes and a sticking-out tongue conceals a crying baby ("Cheer up!"); a girl with spirals for eyes reveals a montage of computers and other screens ("Five more minutes!"). As with all the best board books, its brilliance lies in its deceptive simplicity.
FRANKIE'S MAGICAL DAY: A FIRST BOOK OF WHIMSICAL WORDS (Abrams Appleseed, 20 pp., $16.99; ages 0 to 4), written and illustrated by Michelle Romo, is much more than just a catalog of words and corresponding images. It's really an heir to Richard Scarry's Busytown books, updated with groovy, neon-bright digital art — somewhere between Hello Kitty and the Jetsons — and a biracial girl named Frankie at the center. Its generous pages are laid out to show toddlers the teeming life and staggering variety of objects inside a house or a store or a garden, with small stories told through the details. There are aerial views of Frankie's town and a look inside her closet, and — in a final bit of whimsy — a last page that offers a peek inside Frankie's phantasmagorical dream. This is a book certain little ones will spend hours poring over and "playing" with.
Sylvia Long is the illustrator of a popular Mother Goose collection and other books for the smallest children, and her new one, SYLVIA LONG'S BIG BOOK FOR SMALL CHILDREN (Chronicle, 104 pp., $22.99; ages 0 to 4), offers a savvy variety of short bits, just the thing for a toddler who tends to want the same book every night. So much classic toddler fodder is packed in here: nursery rhymes, opposites, vehicles, an "I can" page showing achievements like saying goodbye and getting dressed, lullabies.
The art is old-fashioned and painterly, with cozy, saturated watercolor images of animals wearing clothes. They somehow give the suggestion of tolerance and diversity, with the "families" page showing animals holding babies of other species, and what looks like two married grandmas, a goat and a bear.
Like so many books that pitch their material perfectly to toddlers, this one exudes comfort and love without being syrupy.
Board books, those dependable little thick-paged bricks designed to withstand chewing or banging around, are increasingly not just durable, but well written and ingeniously designed. Many other books for toddlers, like those oversize compendiums that have always been perfect for unhurried, lap-sitting reading sessions, are now sensitively updated, keeping the traditional stories and charming old-school art, but losing the racist and sexist stereotypes of yore. Humor, great illustration, lively storytelling, interesting facts about their everyday world, a cheerful surprise at every turn of the page — all of that, and more, awaits toddlers in these thoughtfully made books.
POOR LITTLE RABBIT! (Gecko, 20 pp., $9.99; ages 0 to 4), written and illustrated by Jörg Mühle, is an "interactive" book with no bells and whistles, just an invitation to participate by "helping" Little Rabbit, who's fallen down and scraped his arm. There's a red mark on his arm and we're invited to "try blowing on it." Unfortunately, Little Rabbit wails on the next page, "There's blood!" A Band-Aid (with bunnies on it, of course) appears. "Can you put it on?" comes next, but tears still stream down the distressed bunny's face. Saying a magic rhyme, stroking his ears, wiping away his tears, helping him blow his nose with a tissue and brushing off the dirt all follow.
Besides being fun, this gem is also a way to show toddlers how to put empathy into action. "You've made him all better," they're told at the end, and you can picture a toddler's sigh of altruistic satisfaction. The layout is simple and clean, with single-color pages in a palette of bright tones like turquoise and tangerine, allowing the focus to stay on Mühle's adorable drawings of Little Rabbit as he cycles through sadness and healing.
It might sound strange to call a board book "long awaited," but for those who have puzzled and perhaps even argued over the message of the great Sandra Boynton's 1982 "But Not the Hippopotamus," the arrival of a follow-up called BUT NOT THE ARMADILLO (Simon & Schuster, 14 pp., $5.99; ages 0 to 4) is exciting news. In the previous book, a solitary hippo politely refused to join other animals in various activities — dancing, shopping, drinking juice. Was she rejected and isolated, or just, you know, a bit of a loner? And when, on the last page, she finally agreed to hang out with everyone else, what to make of the armadillo who then appeared, with the line "But not the armadillo"? Some found it off-putting — a testament to the persistence of loneliness and alienation, a "Bartleby" for toddlers. Others applauded the self-determination exhibited by both the hippo and the armadillo.
I am here to tell you that Boynton has settled the question: The armadillo, "with his armadillo nose," really likes to wander around by himself, following that sausage-shaped schnoz "where it goes." He sniffs flowers, picks cranberries, stretches out languidly for a nap. He hears music from far away. A hippo (ahem) rushes busily by — "she wants to run and play." But, you guessed it, "not the armadillo." And that's O.K., we're helped to see: "He doesn't like to hurry." There's one more beat, a moment of parting grace that shows why Boynton is the absolute master of board books. "Please scratch his armadillo nose and tell him not to worry." To each creature his or her own.
The French graphic artist Jean Jullien has been giving Boynton a run for her money with the funny, graphically sophisticated board books "This Is Not a Book" and "Before & After." Now comes WHY THE FACE? (Phaidon, 32 pp., $14.95; ages 0 to 4), another conceptual book that shows off his ability to delight all ages with a few strokes of his thick black paintbrush.
The pages on the left — each rendered in an electric shade like citron or coral — all ask the question of the title, with a drawing in the center of the right page showing a child's face making an outsize expression. You have to guess what's causing it, and the answer comes when you lift a foldout to see the culprit. An unpleasantly scrunched-up face covers an array of smelly stuff like cheese, a trash can and an elephant's rear end ("Whoa, that stinks!"); a face with crossed eyes and a sticking-out tongue conceals a crying baby ("Cheer up!"); a girl with spirals for eyes reveals a montage of computers and other screens ("Five more minutes!"). As with all the best board books, its brilliance lies in its deceptive simplicity.
FRANKIE'S MAGICAL DAY: A FIRST BOOK OF WHIMSICAL WORDS (Abrams Appleseed, 20 pp., $16.99; ages 0 to 4), written and illustrated by Michelle Romo, is much more than just a catalog of words and corresponding images. It's really an heir to Richard Scarry's Busytown books, updated with groovy, neon-bright digital art — somewhere between Hello Kitty and the Jetsons — and a biracial girl named Frankie at the center. Its generous pages are laid out to show toddlers the teeming life and staggering variety of objects inside a house or a store or a garden, with small stories told through the details. There are aerial views of Frankie's town and a look inside her closet, and — in a final bit of whimsy — a last page that offers a peek inside Frankie's phantasmagorical dream. This is a book certain little ones will spend hours poring over and "playing" with.
Sylvia Long is the illustrator of a popular Mother Goose collection and other books for the smallest children, and her new one, SYLVIA LONG'S BIG BOOK FOR SMALL CHILDREN (Chronicle, 104 pp., $22.99; ages 0 to 4), offers a savvy variety of short bits, just the thing for a toddler who tends to want the same book every night. So much classic toddler fodder is packed in here: nursery rhymes, opposites, vehicles, an "I can" page showing achievements like saying goodbye and getting dressed, lullabies.
The art is old-fashioned and painterly, with cozy, saturated watercolor images of animals wearing clothes. They somehow give the suggestion of tolerance and diversity, with the "families" page showing animals holding babies of other species, and what looks like two married grandmas, a goat and a bear.
Like so many books that pitch their material perfectly to toddlers, this one exudes comfort and love without being syrupy.
Wednesday, November 21, 2018
For Riverby Books, a Time to Close
The closing of Riverby Books' Capitol Hill location brings with it all the hallmarks of the great literature that animated its business: a sense of place, change, ambiguity and loss.
"I love the way it looks. I love the way it feels. I have a lot of memories here. It's a neighborly place," owner Paul Cymrot said of what he will miss most about the store he opened at 417 East Capitol St. SE in 2001 with his father, Steve.
The decision to shut down at the end of the year was not an easy one, he said. The family launched its first bookshop two decades ago in the colonial- and Civil War-steeped city of Fredericksburg, Virginia. That branch will stay open.
Riverby has always been a cozy spot to gather on Capitol Hill, a place to drink tea in the afternoon, plop down in the orange chair (procured from the D.C. living room where Cymrot grew up) near the window with the nice natural light, and enjoy what Riverby mainstay Marcel Proust would call lost time.
"It's a place for people to be invisible," Cymrot said, pointing to the nooks and crannies shaped by the bookshelves he built himself.
So why close? According to Cymrot, he still doesn't have one or two easy sentences at the ready to explain it.
It's not the first time he has faced existential questions about this place. In November 2014, his father died after being struck by a vehicle while crossing the street near the store. Afterward, the family left a sign up on the door, reading in part: "Riverby Books is closed for the holidays and perhaps a bit longer while we figure out which way is up."
The next October, the Capitol Hill location reopened, with a new manager, Lori Grisham, who knew the family and had worked at the Fredericksburg store. "The other day I read an old New Yorker article from 2012 that said independent bookstores are reflections of the people who own and work in them. I think that's very true of Riverby," Grisham said at the time.
Leah Daniels, the owner of nearby Hill's Kitchen, voiced a similar sentiment. "The point of Riverby, and honestly, the point of Hill's Kitchen, through Steve, is community," she said. A Capitol Hill native who worked at Riverby from 2002 to 2008, when she left to open her kitchen store, Daniels said she owed her business philosophy to Steve Cymrot, who hired her all those years ago.
The difference between a neighborhood business and others, Daniels said, is a relationship between customers and proprietors that is rooted in shared experience, location and community. "It's not just transactional," she said.
Closing up shop is not a financial decision, Cymrot said, because the business is still doing well. Nor is it a solely personal one, although the loss of his father is still palpable.
"The business was an activity to do with my dad," he said. "But without him here, it's more work, less fun."
His own life increasingly centers around his home in Fredericksburg, with his family, friends and the original Riverby all there. "There's more call on my time there."
The connection to Capitol Hill, though, is not likely to fade anytime soon. This is where he grew up (with the orange chairs), where his mother, Nicky, still lives and oversees the family real estate business. The Capitol Hill Community Foundation, which the Cymrots co-founded, is headquartered next door to Riverby.
But the store's connection to Congress and Washington's political class will end. Among the Capitol Hill location's features was a refuge for congressional ephemera and antiquarian books, be they the personal library of the late New York Rep. Edna Kelly, signed copies of local authors' works, political campaign buttons and stickers, or original photos and planning documents for the capital city.
"I have a funny little belief that these historical things will find a place," he said, gesturing to the Kelly items at the top of a bookcase, though he did allow such items can command a narrow audience. "There was a reason I built them 12 feet high," he said of the shelves. "There was always going to be stuff people didn't need to touch as much."
What's next for the storefront, which Nicky Cymrot owns, is yet to be determined. Another used bookshop, filled with memories and tomes of another time, is unlikely.
Any business — particularly a bookstore in an increasingly digital age — that lasts more than 15 years is not a tragedy, even if its demise leaves a hole in the neighborhood.
"It's hard for people to accept change, but not everything's meant to last forever," Daniels said, adding that she is sad about the closing but understands.
For Paul Cymrot, reflecting on the many factors that went into his decision to close, there may not have been a singular reason, but it all came down to a singular decision. It was just time.
As for the future? "I don't know when the next off-ramp comes," he said, an ending befitting Proust.
"I love the way it looks. I love the way it feels. I have a lot of memories here. It's a neighborly place," owner Paul Cymrot said of what he will miss most about the store he opened at 417 East Capitol St. SE in 2001 with his father, Steve.
The decision to shut down at the end of the year was not an easy one, he said. The family launched its first bookshop two decades ago in the colonial- and Civil War-steeped city of Fredericksburg, Virginia. That branch will stay open.
Riverby has always been a cozy spot to gather on Capitol Hill, a place to drink tea in the afternoon, plop down in the orange chair (procured from the D.C. living room where Cymrot grew up) near the window with the nice natural light, and enjoy what Riverby mainstay Marcel Proust would call lost time.
"It's a place for people to be invisible," Cymrot said, pointing to the nooks and crannies shaped by the bookshelves he built himself.
So why close? According to Cymrot, he still doesn't have one or two easy sentences at the ready to explain it.
It's not the first time he has faced existential questions about this place. In November 2014, his father died after being struck by a vehicle while crossing the street near the store. Afterward, the family left a sign up on the door, reading in part: "Riverby Books is closed for the holidays and perhaps a bit longer while we figure out which way is up."
The next October, the Capitol Hill location reopened, with a new manager, Lori Grisham, who knew the family and had worked at the Fredericksburg store. "The other day I read an old New Yorker article from 2012 that said independent bookstores are reflections of the people who own and work in them. I think that's very true of Riverby," Grisham said at the time.
Leah Daniels, the owner of nearby Hill's Kitchen, voiced a similar sentiment. "The point of Riverby, and honestly, the point of Hill's Kitchen, through Steve, is community," she said. A Capitol Hill native who worked at Riverby from 2002 to 2008, when she left to open her kitchen store, Daniels said she owed her business philosophy to Steve Cymrot, who hired her all those years ago.
The difference between a neighborhood business and others, Daniels said, is a relationship between customers and proprietors that is rooted in shared experience, location and community. "It's not just transactional," she said.
Closing up shop is not a financial decision, Cymrot said, because the business is still doing well. Nor is it a solely personal one, although the loss of his father is still palpable.
"The business was an activity to do with my dad," he said. "But without him here, it's more work, less fun."
His own life increasingly centers around his home in Fredericksburg, with his family, friends and the original Riverby all there. "There's more call on my time there."
The connection to Capitol Hill, though, is not likely to fade anytime soon. This is where he grew up (with the orange chairs), where his mother, Nicky, still lives and oversees the family real estate business. The Capitol Hill Community Foundation, which the Cymrots co-founded, is headquartered next door to Riverby.
But the store's connection to Congress and Washington's political class will end. Among the Capitol Hill location's features was a refuge for congressional ephemera and antiquarian books, be they the personal library of the late New York Rep. Edna Kelly, signed copies of local authors' works, political campaign buttons and stickers, or original photos and planning documents for the capital city.
"I have a funny little belief that these historical things will find a place," he said, gesturing to the Kelly items at the top of a bookcase, though he did allow such items can command a narrow audience. "There was a reason I built them 12 feet high," he said of the shelves. "There was always going to be stuff people didn't need to touch as much."
What's next for the storefront, which Nicky Cymrot owns, is yet to be determined. Another used bookshop, filled with memories and tomes of another time, is unlikely.
Any business — particularly a bookstore in an increasingly digital age — that lasts more than 15 years is not a tragedy, even if its demise leaves a hole in the neighborhood.
"It's hard for people to accept change, but not everything's meant to last forever," Daniels said, adding that she is sad about the closing but understands.
For Paul Cymrot, reflecting on the many factors that went into his decision to close, there may not have been a singular reason, but it all came down to a singular decision. It was just time.
As for the future? "I don't know when the next off-ramp comes," he said, an ending befitting Proust.
Tuesday, October 30, 2018
New wine and food book pairs winning combinations
It may seem a little unattainable for a Sunday family brunch at home, or a casual Friday night dinner.
But that's exactly what the new book "Wine Food" ($25, Lorena Jones Books) is meant for.
Portland culinary experts Andrea Slonecker and Dana Frank just released a gorgeous collaboration they bill as a wine-and-food-lovers' playbook, with 75 affordable wine styles and producers to try along with 75 recipes — several years' worth of inspiration for brunches, salads, vegetable dishes, picnics, weeknight dinners and feasts.
Anyone who loves to throw a party, or just enjoy wine and food at home, should grab this book.
"When we travel, we experience culture through the lens of wine and food," Frank and Slonecker write in their book's introduction. "We don't always speak the local language, but we can communicate at the table because the pleasure of drinking and eating is universal. Those moments expose us to new wines and influence our cooking."
Sections of the book indicate in simple terms why, exactly, the wine pairs well with each rustic, globally inspired dish, as well as how to cook with and store wine, how to taste and serve wine like a pro, how to read labels and how to buy wine (bottle, box, can or keg) at the corner wine shop, grocery store or online.
Frank — a sommelier who has overseen the wine lists at Ava Gene's and other top Portland restaurants — offers three to eight producers for every wine style highlighted, mostly under $25 per bottle, which is a big help for anyone who gets overwhelmed with all of the Oregon, Washington, California and European wines to choose from.
Illustrations show how wine matches with your favorite foods — less high-end dining and more along the lines of rustic pasta, takeout foods and popular sweets.
These authors come with serious creds.
Frank is also co-owner of Portland's Bow & Arrow Wines, an urban winery and wine distributor, and in July opened Bar Norman, a natural wine bar with casual food, on Southeast Division Street.
Slonecker is author of six cookbooks, including "Beer Bites" and "The Picnic," which gives simple tips on picnicking.
The pair say they see the book filling a niche, even in Portland's crowded culinary world.
"We knew each other from the food and wine industry in Portland and felt like there was a need for a new take on the classic food and wine pairing book," they say. "We talked about the idea over lunch one day and decided to start working on a proposal. Three years later, here we are."
As any cookbook author knows, the research isn't all fun and games.
"It was a little bit like putting a puzzle together — making sure there were enough vegetable recipes, fish and seafood recipes, easy recipes and some more complicated ones, seasonal dishes, and then of course the wines to go with those foods," Slonecker and Frank say.
"In some cases, we had a favorite wine so it automatically made the cut. It was definitely tough making decisions about what to include in the book, but the idea was to keep it very well-rounded."
When you're in the mood to hunker down in the kitchen this fall, Slonecker and Frank recommend one of their favorite seasonal dishes to get into the autumnal spirit and the holidays: carmelized onion soup with bruleed blue cheese, paired with Amontillado sherry, or their "giant stuffed pumpkin," paired with red burgundy. Cheers!
Friday, September 28, 2018
Poems that helped shape Chinese thought
Since antiquity, no other text has enjoyed a presence quite like The Book of Songs – in one critic's words, it is "the classic of the human heart and the human mind." It is the first poetic anthology of China; Confucius himself is said to have compiled the "three hundred songs"— another early name for the text – out of a body of 3,000, "removing duplicates and choosing only what could be matched to the principles of ritual". By the end of the Western Han dynasty (202 BCE-9 CE), there were no fewer than four schools of the Songs at the imperial academy, offering a range of different interpretations for each song.
In the same way that Homer's epics took hold within the West, The Book of Songs played a role in spheres far beyond literature, with a lasting influence on Chinese civilisation. The collection had an impact on education, politics and communal life: in antiquity, the Songs were quoted and recited as coded communication in diplomatic exchange; invoked as proof to cap a philosophical argument; read as commentary – satirical more often than not – on historical circumstances; and taught for the purposes of moral edification. It has continued to affect Chinese society since then, both through what the Songs say and the form they take.
The received anthology emerged from the "Mao tradition", one of the four early schools, and is divided into four parts: 160 Airs (guofeng), 74 Minor Court Hymns (xiaoya), 31 Major Court Hymns (daya), and 40 Eulogies (song). Within the Eulogies, the 31 Eulogies of Zhou are considered the oldest segment of the anthology, purportedly dating back to the very early years of the Western Zhou (1046-771 BCE) dynasty.
These hymns, all of them rather short, were performed in sacrifices to the Zhou royal ancestors: multimedia performances containing the aromatic offerings of meat, grain and alcohol; ritual music on drums and bells, wind and string instruments; dance to re-enact the military conquest of the previous Shang dynasty; and the solemn hymns by which the Zhou king praised his ancestors and requested their blessings in return. In short, Chinese poetry begins in religious ritual.
By accompanying rites, in turn, the Eulogies helped regulate social order. Respecting 'heaven's will' was an important element of ancient Chinese politics; by enforcing this message, the Book of Songs could underpin the rule of the Zhou Dynasty. Unlike the Eulogies, many of the Court Hymns are grand, expansive narratives to celebrate the Zhou; they served as the dynasty's core text of political and cultural memory. Like the archaic Eulogies, the Hymns are straightforward; there is no debate about the story they are meant to tell.
Confucius Confusion
Far more challenging are the Airs of the States, assigned to 15 different regions roughly along the Yellow River across northern China. Not one of these songs carries a historical narrative. Some are deceptively easy on their surface: a song of desire, the parting song of lovers at dawn, a farmer's protest against corrupt officials, the lament of a soldier on campaign longing for home, or of his wife waiting for him in vain. It is here where the human condition of thought and emotion finds its full expression – and where all questions of interpretation begin.
The May Fourth Movement of 1919 (anti-imperialist cultural and political protests sparked by students) tried to build a new national literary heritage on the ruins of an empire that after two millennia had finally collapsed. Now, the Airs became something new altogether: folk songs whose charming simplicity and repetitive diction seemed to have sprung directly from the hearts of the common people.
The very first and most famous Air of all, Fishhawks (Guanju), is known as a happy marriage song. Yet was it ever that? Already Zhu Xi (1130-1200) had advocated a return to the words of the songs themselves, in a veritable act of literary excavation after Han and later commentators had buried them under layers upon layers of learned commentary; and there is evidence that the poets – as opposed to the scholars – of imperial China always knew how to appreciate the Airs at face value, invoking their lively imagery taken from nature together with their expressions of desire, love, and pain.
Like no other text from Chinese antiquity, the Songs were cherished, and hence survived, in two parallel traditions: one of learned commentary and the imperial examination system, the other of poetic memory and allusion. Remarkably, no ancient source ever shows us the Airs as innocent folk poetry. Early imperial legend knows of royal officials "collecting" the songs from the "lanes and alleys" to reveal to the ruler the social conditions and sentiments of the common people; purportedly, only then were they adapted to court music. Yet there is nothing to support such pious belief in the folk origins of poetry; instead, every reference to, or quotation from, the Songs before and after the foundation of the empire in 221 BCE shows them as part of the élite curriculum that gradually solidified in the form of the Five Classics of imperial Confucianism.
In that tradition, each line could have multiple meanings. One Han commentary takes Fishhawks as praising the virtue of King Wen (1099-1050 BCE) and his wife; yet another takes it as criticism of King Kang (1005-978 BCE). And finally, several recently discovered tomb manuscripts on bamboo and silk, dating from the 4th through the 2nd Centuries BCE, note that "Fishhawks uses the expression of sexual allure and desire to illustrate propriety" in order to advance moral thought.
Through poetry, rites and music, Confucian education sought to teach moral subtleties – easily memorised in the form of singing, The Book of Songs helped to lay down rules for behaviour. Its poetry, as opposed to the Western tradition, was largely anonymous and apparently simple. Yet beneath the surface, the poems are multi-layered. To this day, the Songs – and especially the Airs – are speaking in multiple voices. In delightful ambiguity, they have survived every attempt to be reduced, and hence diminished, to a single message or meaning.
Listen to what the Confucius of the Analects had to say about them: the Songs "can be covered in one phrase: no wayward thoughts!"; with them, "one can inspire, observe, unite, and express resentment" as well as learn "in great numbers the names of fish, birds, beasts, plants, and trees"; those who fail to master them "have nothing to express themselves with" and are like a man who "stands with his face straight to the wall".
In the same way that Homer's epics took hold within the West, The Book of Songs played a role in spheres far beyond literature, with a lasting influence on Chinese civilisation. The collection had an impact on education, politics and communal life: in antiquity, the Songs were quoted and recited as coded communication in diplomatic exchange; invoked as proof to cap a philosophical argument; read as commentary – satirical more often than not – on historical circumstances; and taught for the purposes of moral edification. It has continued to affect Chinese society since then, both through what the Songs say and the form they take.
The received anthology emerged from the "Mao tradition", one of the four early schools, and is divided into four parts: 160 Airs (guofeng), 74 Minor Court Hymns (xiaoya), 31 Major Court Hymns (daya), and 40 Eulogies (song). Within the Eulogies, the 31 Eulogies of Zhou are considered the oldest segment of the anthology, purportedly dating back to the very early years of the Western Zhou (1046-771 BCE) dynasty.
These hymns, all of them rather short, were performed in sacrifices to the Zhou royal ancestors: multimedia performances containing the aromatic offerings of meat, grain and alcohol; ritual music on drums and bells, wind and string instruments; dance to re-enact the military conquest of the previous Shang dynasty; and the solemn hymns by which the Zhou king praised his ancestors and requested their blessings in return. In short, Chinese poetry begins in religious ritual.
By accompanying rites, in turn, the Eulogies helped regulate social order. Respecting 'heaven's will' was an important element of ancient Chinese politics; by enforcing this message, the Book of Songs could underpin the rule of the Zhou Dynasty. Unlike the Eulogies, many of the Court Hymns are grand, expansive narratives to celebrate the Zhou; they served as the dynasty's core text of political and cultural memory. Like the archaic Eulogies, the Hymns are straightforward; there is no debate about the story they are meant to tell.
Confucius Confusion
Far more challenging are the Airs of the States, assigned to 15 different regions roughly along the Yellow River across northern China. Not one of these songs carries a historical narrative. Some are deceptively easy on their surface: a song of desire, the parting song of lovers at dawn, a farmer's protest against corrupt officials, the lament of a soldier on campaign longing for home, or of his wife waiting for him in vain. It is here where the human condition of thought and emotion finds its full expression – and where all questions of interpretation begin.
The May Fourth Movement of 1919 (anti-imperialist cultural and political protests sparked by students) tried to build a new national literary heritage on the ruins of an empire that after two millennia had finally collapsed. Now, the Airs became something new altogether: folk songs whose charming simplicity and repetitive diction seemed to have sprung directly from the hearts of the common people.
The very first and most famous Air of all, Fishhawks (Guanju), is known as a happy marriage song. Yet was it ever that? Already Zhu Xi (1130-1200) had advocated a return to the words of the songs themselves, in a veritable act of literary excavation after Han and later commentators had buried them under layers upon layers of learned commentary; and there is evidence that the poets – as opposed to the scholars – of imperial China always knew how to appreciate the Airs at face value, invoking their lively imagery taken from nature together with their expressions of desire, love, and pain.
Like no other text from Chinese antiquity, the Songs were cherished, and hence survived, in two parallel traditions: one of learned commentary and the imperial examination system, the other of poetic memory and allusion. Remarkably, no ancient source ever shows us the Airs as innocent folk poetry. Early imperial legend knows of royal officials "collecting" the songs from the "lanes and alleys" to reveal to the ruler the social conditions and sentiments of the common people; purportedly, only then were they adapted to court music. Yet there is nothing to support such pious belief in the folk origins of poetry; instead, every reference to, or quotation from, the Songs before and after the foundation of the empire in 221 BCE shows them as part of the élite curriculum that gradually solidified in the form of the Five Classics of imperial Confucianism.
In that tradition, each line could have multiple meanings. One Han commentary takes Fishhawks as praising the virtue of King Wen (1099-1050 BCE) and his wife; yet another takes it as criticism of King Kang (1005-978 BCE). And finally, several recently discovered tomb manuscripts on bamboo and silk, dating from the 4th through the 2nd Centuries BCE, note that "Fishhawks uses the expression of sexual allure and desire to illustrate propriety" in order to advance moral thought.
Through poetry, rites and music, Confucian education sought to teach moral subtleties – easily memorised in the form of singing, The Book of Songs helped to lay down rules for behaviour. Its poetry, as opposed to the Western tradition, was largely anonymous and apparently simple. Yet beneath the surface, the poems are multi-layered. To this day, the Songs – and especially the Airs – are speaking in multiple voices. In delightful ambiguity, they have survived every attempt to be reduced, and hence diminished, to a single message or meaning.
Listen to what the Confucius of the Analects had to say about them: the Songs "can be covered in one phrase: no wayward thoughts!"; with them, "one can inspire, observe, unite, and express resentment" as well as learn "in great numbers the names of fish, birds, beasts, plants, and trees"; those who fail to master them "have nothing to express themselves with" and are like a man who "stands with his face straight to the wall".
Wednesday, August 29, 2018
Vast Theft of Antiquarian Books Sends a Shudder Through a Cloistered World of Dealers
"If someone else had seen it first, it would have been gone," said the dealer, John Thomson, who owns Bartleby's Books, an online shop.
He had no idea that his seeming good fortune was a byproduct of one of the most expansive rare book thefts in history.
The dealer at a book fair who sold it to him, John Schulman, is now accused of conspiring with a library archivist, Gregory Priore, to steal and sell rare items from the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh.
The two carried out the theft over nearly two decades, the authorities said, stealing about 300 books and other artifacts that, in total, would cost more than $8 million to replace.
Their arrests last month sent a shudder across the rare books industry, a multimillion-dollar business in the United States, according to the Antiquarian Booksellers' Association of America.
In this niche world based on trust, where confidants are currency and handshake deals are commonplace, the arrest of a prominent dealer is a shocking suggestion of deceit.
Mr. Schulman had served on the association's board of governors and had even led its ethics committee, the organization said. His clients included some of the biggest names in the business. Prominent bookshops from New York to London bought stolen books, an affidavit shows.
"It's basically a 'who's who' of people in the rare book field," said Travis McDade, curator of rare books for the University of Illinois College of Law.
None of the buyers are accused of wrongdoing. But the booksellers' association is taking steps to try to prevent a similar wide-scale theft from happening again.
We traced the path of one book, the edition signed by Jefferson, to explain how the theft is suspected to have worked — and why it went undetected for so long.
A nearly 'foolproof' setup
While there have been other infamous rare book thefts, occasionally by industry insiders, the Carnegie Library case, according to prosecutors, notably involved a collaboration between a librarian and a dealer.
"That is absolutely unique," said Mr. McDade, an expert on rare book thefts who has written several books on the subject. "You just don't see it."
As the library archivist, Mr. Priore had access to a collection of rare books and other items at the public Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. As a well-known dealer and owner of the Caliban Book Shop in Pittsburgh, Mr. Schulman had access to a network of potential buyers.
"It was an amazing setup that was close to foolproof," Mr. McDade said, noting that most rare book thieves get caught trying to sell their goods.
In a scheme that dated back to the late 1990s, Mr. Priore told the authorities, he would remove items from the library and drop them off at Mr. Schulman's bookshop, just a block away, on his way home from work.
Mr. Schulman paid Mr. Priore up front, and then worked to sell the goods at higher prices, according to the affidavit.
Lawyers for both Mr. Schulman and Mr. Priore declined to comment. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for Oct. 12.
Among the valuable items they stole, according to the authorities: a 1687 version of Isaac Newton's "Principia," one of the most influential books in science; a rare copy of "The Journal of Major George Washington"; and expensive prints by Edward S. Curtis, a famous photographer who documented Native American life.
The anatomy of a rare book theft
One of the prized items was the book inscribed by Jefferson, "De la France et des Etats-Unis," an important economic work by two French authors.
Mr. Schulman paid the librarian about $1,000 for the volume, Mr. Priore told the authorities, according to the affidavit.
In 2013, Mr. Schulman took the book to a book fair on the East Coast. He shared a booth with Mr. Thomson of Bartleby's Books, whom he had known for about three decades, according to Mr. Thomson. It quickly caught his eye, he said, and he bought it for $5,000, according to investigators.
At some point, Mr. Thomson said, he asked Mr. Schulman about markings in the book, which indicated it had come from a library. Mr. Schulman assuaged his concerns with a letter, bearing Mr. Priore's name, that said that the book had been "de-accessioned," or officially removed from the library's collection.
Now what?
Since then, the book has been handed over to the authorities. It is among about $1 million worth of stolen items that have been recovered, according to the affidavit. Others are still missing.
Dealers said they would be more cautious going forward, but would not allow one case to upend how they do business. "It happened in a small world," Mr. Pedersen said. "A lot of people have known each other for a very long time. I think people are going to rightfully proceed with caution."
Mr. Thomson said that when dealing with high-value items from libraries, he now plans to ask multiple people at the library to sign off. But he and other dealers said the libraries themselves should take more responsibility for keeping track of their collections.
Over the course of almost 20 years, he said, "It's a little unbelievable to me that at some point something wasn't noticed as missing."
A spokeswoman for the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh said that the library was reviewing its policies with outside experts.
Susan Benne, executive director of the antiquarian booksellers' group, said the organization was working to create best practices for handling materials de-accessioned from libraries and is developing training on theft and provenance.
She said she was not aware of any other instances in the last 15 years in which a member had been found in violation of the ethics code for selling stolen goods.
Mr. Schulman has resigned from the booksellers' association.
"I certainly hope that what's alleged is not true," Mr. Thomson said. If it is, he added, "It is a great betrayal of trust."
Monday, July 23, 2018
8 books that can help you increase your net worth
CNBC.com asked financial advisors which books they'd recommend to increase your understanding of how you should invest and manage your money. Here are their top picks.
"I Will Teach You To Be Rich"
This book by Ramit Sethi provides a six-week program aimed at young adults ages 20 to 35.
Financial advisor Michael Kitces recommends the book because it not only teaches good habits, it also emphasizes the value of reinvesting in yourself.
"I find most personal finance books skip this oh-so-important aspect of trying to improve your financial situation by focusing on your earning power, rather than just your expenses or your portfolio investments," Kitces said. "That's what puts his book high on my list."
"The Ultimate Financial Plan: Balancing Your Money and Life"
This financial planning book by Jim Stovall and Tim Maurer covers your overall financial situation, including your cash flow, insurance coverage and estate plan.
"This book is good for the DIY-ers who want take tackle and have the time to manage their own financial household," said advisor Rianka Dorsainvil, founder and president of Your Greatest Contribution.
The book can also help you if you are already working with a financial advisor or planner.
"You will be able to bring ideas and thoughts to the table so it can feel like more of a partnership," Dorsainvil said.
"The Millionaire Next Door"
Written by Thomas J. Stanley and William D. Danko, this book examines how truly wealthy Americans often live frugal lifestyles and rarely show off their wealth with flashy spending.
"It lays the foundation, and shows the impact of how living within your means and spending less than you earn can give you the financial freedom at an early age," Dorsainvil said.
Reading the book should give you an understanding of how all decisions – from buying a home to a car – impacts your long-term wealth, according to Dorsainvil.
"Think and Grow Rich"
Napoleon Hill's book was first published in 1937 and draws lessons from rich men of that era, including Andrew Carnegie, Thomas Edison and Henry Ford.
The book teaches you the "mindset one needs to become wealthy," according to financial advisor Ivory Johnson, founder of Delancey Wealth Management in Washington, D.C.
"Our mind is incredibly powerful and thoughts turn into reality," Johnson said.
"The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves"
Author Matt Ridley makes the case in his book for increased prosperity this century, in spite of what pessimists say.
That message, according to financial advisor Tom West, a partner at Signature Estate & Investment Advisors in Tysons Corner, Virginia, can help investors who shy away from the market because of their fears of what could go wrong.
"Ridley does a masterful job of contextualizing the progress of modern society in an accessible way, laying the groundwork for rationally expecting the world of tomorrow to be materially better," West said. "The book was published after the financial crash but now seems just as timely."
Friday, June 22, 2018
The Masters makes own rules
A year ago at the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play, many players were concerned about golf’s governing bodies taking away their green-reading books. Nothing much has materialized since regarding the legality of those supplemental books. The players increasingly rely on the pages full of arrows.
Except at Augusta National.
In discussing upcoming preparations for the Masters, both Rory McIlroy and Jordan Spieth noted that they won’t be able refer to the detailed readouts.
“Augusta doesn’t provide you with a green-contour book, like the other tournaments do,” McIlroy said. “So you’ve got to sort of figure it out yourself.”
Spieth noted the absence of green-reading books at Augusta as well, forcing him to rely on notes.
“It’s very important to use previous years books, especially on the greens, the fall lines, and where you have access to certain pins,” Spieth said.
As for the impact on their games, McIlroy said he actually stores green-reading books with his caddie to prevent overanalysis.
“When I carry it myself, I find I get into the habit of taking it out on every green and just looking at it needlessly,” McIlroy said.
Spieth said some of this best putting rounds have been without a green-reading book.
“You can overanalyze some of the information you’re given,” Spieth said. “But other than that, I’ve still used greens books and had them been important in wins, as well.”
The discussion provided a fresh reminder that Augusta National sets its own standards and players willingly comply for one special week a year. That could be noteworthy when folks say the Lords of Augusta would never make players comply with different rules, like, you know, asking them to use a different golf ball during Masters week.
Sunday, May 20, 2018
Reading for Precocious Preteens
Dear Match Book,
I am the head librarian at an independent school for children from preschool through 12th grade. I am in the happy position of having many middle-school-age pupils who read significantly above their grade level, but I struggle to find books for them — especially realistic fiction — that are sophisticated but do not overwhelm the students with complex themes. In the years leading up to high school, readers walk a tightrope: They are ready to begin exploring more mature ideas and writing structures, but they aren’t always ready for full-on realistic drama. What titles can you recommend for these avid readers?
JENNIFER FALVEY
COLUMBIA, S.C.
Dear Jennifer,
At school my older children learned the five-finger rule for finding a “just-right book”: If it has more than five unfamiliar words on one page, the book is deemed too challenging for a student to read. I sympathize with the practicality of the guideline, and understand that it is aimed mostly at developing readers, but in practice I find the rubric a little deflating for young bookworms. Part of the joy of unbridled childhood reading lies in the haze of misunderstanding; the mystifying behavior of adult characters and even scads of obscure vocabulary can spur curiosity and spark richly imaginative embellishments to fill in the gaps. Your more expansive approach — to look for books that will challenge your students — allows for who they are and who they will become.
Old Standbys
Your library is probably stocked with classics that your tightrope-walking middle schoolers will enjoy. Fluent, attentive readers of that age will fall for the warm, slyly playful first-person narration and meaty characters in Charles Dickens’s “Great Expectations.” And they might relate to the story of childhood friendship in Willa Cather’s more leisurely paced prairie novel “My Ántonia.”
Everything Old Is New Again
I’m sure your shelves also hold some of my recent favorites: “The Thing About Jellyfish,” by Ali Benjamin (for more science-minded kids); “When You Reach Me,” by Rebecca Stead (a great companion to “A Wrinkle in Time,” by Madeleine L’Engle); and “Brown Girl Dreaming,” by Jacqueline Woodson (a memoir in verse for your budding poets). But I also want to make a pitch for some mid-to-late-20th-century (mostly) realistic books for younger readers that may have fallen off your radar. Robert Cormier’s deeply unsettling, desperately suspenseful and structurally complicated novel from 1977, “I Am the Cheese,” tracks the thoughts of Adam Farmer, a troubled boy on a bicycle who is caught up in sinister events beyond his understanding.
More ordinary tragedies mark the heroines’ lives in both Irene Hunt’s “Up a Road Slowly” and “The High House,” the first installment of Honor Arundel’s Emma series. Each book centers on a motherless girl sent to live with her aunt, setting them on rough, rutted paths toward self-discovery.
The road to adulthood appears similarly dark and uncertain in Katherine Paterson’s novels. Readers who loved “Bridge to Terabithia” in elementary school might also like her moody, openhearted novel for older readers “Jacob Have I Loved,” the story of Louise, a misfit living in the shadow of her twin sister on an island in the Chesapeake Bay in the 1940s.
The Places You’ll Go
Then there are the coming-of-age stories not intended expressly for children. Books for adults told from the points of view of young protagonists keep your readers’ perspectives in mind while still giving them a taste of more advanced literary forms. Esperanza Cordero, a Mexican-American girl living in Chicago, narrates “The House on Mango Street,” Sandra Cisneros’s lyrical, at turns both childlike and mature novel in vignettes. While growing up in Antigua, the sharp-voiced, eponymous heroine of Jamaica Kincaid’s “Annie John” shares a sweet ease with her mother that turns bitter in adolescence.
Steer your most precocious 12- and 13-year-olds toward “Purple Hibiscus,” Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s debut novel — an intense family drama narrated by 15-year-old Kambili and set against a backdrop of political unrest in 1990s Nigeria — and “Black Swan Green,” David Mitchell’s minutely conjured, mystically mundane story of a year in the life of a 13-year-old English boy with a stutter. The first-person perspectives in all these novels for grown-ups get at what is essential and true about childhood, and also provide young readers with startling glimpses of the adult world just as it is coming into view.
Yours truly,
Match Book
JENNIFER FALVEY
COLUMBIA, S.C.
Dear Jennifer,
At school my older children learned the five-finger rule for finding a “just-right book”: If it has more than five unfamiliar words on one page, the book is deemed too challenging for a student to read. I sympathize with the practicality of the guideline, and understand that it is aimed mostly at developing readers, but in practice I find the rubric a little deflating for young bookworms. Part of the joy of unbridled childhood reading lies in the haze of misunderstanding; the mystifying behavior of adult characters and even scads of obscure vocabulary can spur curiosity and spark richly imaginative embellishments to fill in the gaps. Your more expansive approach — to look for books that will challenge your students — allows for who they are and who they will become.
Old Standbys
Your library is probably stocked with classics that your tightrope-walking middle schoolers will enjoy. Fluent, attentive readers of that age will fall for the warm, slyly playful first-person narration and meaty characters in Charles Dickens’s “Great Expectations.” And they might relate to the story of childhood friendship in Willa Cather’s more leisurely paced prairie novel “My Ántonia.”
Everything Old Is New Again
I’m sure your shelves also hold some of my recent favorites: “The Thing About Jellyfish,” by Ali Benjamin (for more science-minded kids); “When You Reach Me,” by Rebecca Stead (a great companion to “A Wrinkle in Time,” by Madeleine L’Engle); and “Brown Girl Dreaming,” by Jacqueline Woodson (a memoir in verse for your budding poets). But I also want to make a pitch for some mid-to-late-20th-century (mostly) realistic books for younger readers that may have fallen off your radar. Robert Cormier’s deeply unsettling, desperately suspenseful and structurally complicated novel from 1977, “I Am the Cheese,” tracks the thoughts of Adam Farmer, a troubled boy on a bicycle who is caught up in sinister events beyond his understanding.
More ordinary tragedies mark the heroines’ lives in both Irene Hunt’s “Up a Road Slowly” and “The High House,” the first installment of Honor Arundel’s Emma series. Each book centers on a motherless girl sent to live with her aunt, setting them on rough, rutted paths toward self-discovery.
The road to adulthood appears similarly dark and uncertain in Katherine Paterson’s novels. Readers who loved “Bridge to Terabithia” in elementary school might also like her moody, openhearted novel for older readers “Jacob Have I Loved,” the story of Louise, a misfit living in the shadow of her twin sister on an island in the Chesapeake Bay in the 1940s.
The Places You’ll Go
Then there are the coming-of-age stories not intended expressly for children. Books for adults told from the points of view of young protagonists keep your readers’ perspectives in mind while still giving them a taste of more advanced literary forms. Esperanza Cordero, a Mexican-American girl living in Chicago, narrates “The House on Mango Street,” Sandra Cisneros’s lyrical, at turns both childlike and mature novel in vignettes. While growing up in Antigua, the sharp-voiced, eponymous heroine of Jamaica Kincaid’s “Annie John” shares a sweet ease with her mother that turns bitter in adolescence.
Steer your most precocious 12- and 13-year-olds toward “Purple Hibiscus,” Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s debut novel — an intense family drama narrated by 15-year-old Kambili and set against a backdrop of political unrest in 1990s Nigeria — and “Black Swan Green,” David Mitchell’s minutely conjured, mystically mundane story of a year in the life of a 13-year-old English boy with a stutter. The first-person perspectives in all these novels for grown-ups get at what is essential and true about childhood, and also provide young readers with startling glimpses of the adult world just as it is coming into view.
Yours truly,
Match Book
Wednesday, April 18, 2018
Children's Book About Mike Pence's Gay Bunny Jumps to No. 1
A little gay bunny who belongs to Vice President Mike Pence.
A little fictional gay bunny whose book is beating the memoir of James B. Comey, the former F.B.I. director, on the Amazon best-seller list.
This is the story of Marlon Bundo, the Instagram star and real-life pet of the vice president’s family, who is also the subject of two dueling children’s books released this week.
The first, “Marlon Bundo’s Day in the Life of the Vice President,” is a picture book written by Mr. Pence’s daughter Charlotte that focuses on the bunny’s observations of the vice president, with illustrations by his wife, Karen.
The other, “Last Week Tonight With John Oliver Presents a Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo,” is a gay romance between two bunnies that was the brainchild of the HBO comedy host John Oliver.
So far, that is the more popular of the two.
Mr. Oliver revealed the book, which was written by Jill Twiss and credits the titular bunny as a co-author, on his weekly late-night show on Sunday. He described it as a mocking rebuke of the vice president’s longtime opposition to gay and transgender rights.
“Please buy it for your children, buy it for any child you know or buy it because you know it would annoy Mike Pence,” Mr. Oliver told his viewers. Parody aside, he assured them, “This is a real book for children.”
And buy it they have. By Tuesday the book, which beat Ms. Pence’s to Amazon by two days, had risen to the No. 1 spot on the website’s best-seller list, knocking pre-ordered copies of the upcoming memoir by James Comey down to No. 2.
Ms. Pence’s book on Marlon Bundo had reached No. 4 on the list by late afternoon.
Mr. Comey’s book, “A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership,” has been highly anticipated for potential insights it could provide into the tumultuous Trump White House and Mr. Comey’s abrupt dismissal as director of the F.B.I. last year.
Dueling tweets over the weekend between President Trump and Mr. Comey appeared to have propelled enough advance orders to lift Mr. Comey’s memoir to the top spot. The memoir, scheduled to be released on April 17, has been advertised as a frank account of Mr. Comey’s “never-before-told experiences from some of the highest-stakes situations of his career.”
Mr. Oliver’s book is very different than that.
In it, Marlon Bundo, a snappily dressed bunny with a penchant for bright bow ties, falls in love with a bespectacled boy bunny named Wesley. Things seem to be going pretty well for the two lovebirds (love bunnies?) until a powerful stinkbug who bears a striking resemblance to Mr. Pence decrees that male bunnies cannot marry each other.
In the grand tradition of children’s literature, the story ends on a happy note. An image released by the book’s publisher, Chronicle Books, shows Marlon Bundo and Wesley standing in a field, wearing tuxedos, as a cat in clerical garb marries them.
The tale also comes in the form of an audiobook voiced by a string of celebrities including Jim Parsons as Marlon Bundo and John Lithgow as the stinkbug, as well as Ellie Kemper, Jesse Tyler Ferguson and RuPaul. On Tuesday, it also beat Mr. Comey’s audiobook to be the No. 1 best-seller on Audible.
Mr. Oliver played clips from a cartoon version of the audiobook on his show on Sunday. In it, Marlon Bundo introduces himself to Wesley as “BOTUS.”
“It’s short for Bunny of the United States,” he says, with typical first-date awkwardness. “It’s a long story.”
Ms. Pence’s book is more sober children’s fare. It is not known if it identifies Marlon Bundo’s sexual orientation at all.
Charlotte Pence seemed to take the John Oliver parody in stride. “His book is contributing to charities that I think we can all get behind,” she said in an interview with Fox Business Network on Tuesday. “We have two books giving to charities that are about bunnies, so I’m all for it really.”
Some of the proceeds from her book will be donated to A21, an organization that fights human trafficking. Mr. Oliver said all of his book’s profits would be donated to The Trevor Project, a charity for L.G.B.T. youth, and AIDS United.
Wednesday, March 21, 2018
Why 'Black Panther' and other comic books belong in the classroom
With the massive success of “Black Panther,” the latest blockbuster from Marvel, the time is ripe for educators to embrace comic books as legitimate teaching and learning tools.
The movie is based on the superhero created by comic book legends Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, first appearing in “Fantastic Four” #52, released in 1966. In that issue, for what turns out to be a defensible reason, the Black Panther, or T’Challa as he is also known, single-handedly takes down each member of the powerful all-white superhero team. During the height of the civil rights movement, this was a powerful statement indeed, providing a clear allegory to the tumultuous time.
My high school history students know how much I love Wednesdays, when new superhero titles are released. But as much as I enjoy getting my geek on, I’m also looking for comics that will help engage learners on important social issues, something comic books have been known to explore head-on.
Marvel’s 1979 Iron Man storyline, “Demon in a Bottle,” explores how a superhero struggles with alcoholism. If a person with a flying, nearly indestructible suit of armor can hit a low point, nobody is above asking for help. In the recently released Supergirl #19, DC Comics tackles school bullying and a non-binary teen opening up to her parents.
Of course, comic books, even those about superheroes, also deserve scholarly scrutiny as legitimate sources.
For example, I’m eager to introduce students to “The Uncanny X-Men,” originally released in 1963, also by Lee and Kirby. The comic features Professor X (a paraplegic and the world’s most powerful psychic), who, with his team of super-powered beings—mutants known as the X-Men—works toward a peaceful coexistence with humanity. The team often faces off against Magneto (a manipulator of magnetism) and his Brotherhood of Mutants, who resort to more aggressive means to achieve peace for their kind.
With the civil rights movement in mind, my juniors will consider how Xavier and Magneto correspond to the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X, respectively. With this creative hook, students explore sources to further enhance their learning. I can’t take credit for this lesson, as other pop-savvy teachers also use it, and I’m uncertain where or from whom I borrowed the idea. What’s clear, though, is that comic books intensify student interest.
But don’t take just my word for it.
I connected with Carol L. Tilley, an associate professor in the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, whose scholarship focuses on comics, libraries and youth.
“Although comics have been making in-roads into K-12 classrooms and libraries in the past decade — following many decades of unnecessary disparagement and condemnation — we should look for opportunities to accelerate that embrace. If more young people can be spurred to engage with topics like colonialism and racism because of comics, we’ll be richer for it,” said Tilley, who was also a judge for the 2016 Will Eisner Comics Industry Awards, the Oscars of the comic book world.
In 1976, I discovered, Marvel printed several issues in which Black Panther confronts the “Klan,” though the Ku Klux Klan is not directly mentioned. In “Jungle Action” #21, the superhero is even tied to a burning cross, before he escapes — through a combination of might, skill, and willpower — and puts the hurt on his captors. This issue is chock-full of worthy discussion, while also providing a seamless segue into discussing resistance movements – including the power to rise against oppression.
I also love that Ta-Nehisi Coates, one of the most influential African-American writers today, wrote two Black Panther series for Marvel and next will pen his own take on Captain America.
The movie is based on the superhero created by comic book legends Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, first appearing in “Fantastic Four” #52, released in 1966. In that issue, for what turns out to be a defensible reason, the Black Panther, or T’Challa as he is also known, single-handedly takes down each member of the powerful all-white superhero team. During the height of the civil rights movement, this was a powerful statement indeed, providing a clear allegory to the tumultuous time.
Marvel’s 1979 Iron Man storyline, “Demon in a Bottle,” explores how a superhero struggles with alcoholism. If a person with a flying, nearly indestructible suit of armor can hit a low point, nobody is above asking for help. In the recently released Supergirl #19, DC Comics tackles school bullying and a non-binary teen opening up to her parents.
Of course, comic books, even those about superheroes, also deserve scholarly scrutiny as legitimate sources.
For example, I’m eager to introduce students to “The Uncanny X-Men,” originally released in 1963, also by Lee and Kirby. The comic features Professor X (a paraplegic and the world’s most powerful psychic), who, with his team of super-powered beings—mutants known as the X-Men—works toward a peaceful coexistence with humanity. The team often faces off against Magneto (a manipulator of magnetism) and his Brotherhood of Mutants, who resort to more aggressive means to achieve peace for their kind.
With the civil rights movement in mind, my juniors will consider how Xavier and Magneto correspond to the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X, respectively. With this creative hook, students explore sources to further enhance their learning. I can’t take credit for this lesson, as other pop-savvy teachers also use it, and I’m uncertain where or from whom I borrowed the idea. What’s clear, though, is that comic books intensify student interest.
But don’t take just my word for it.
I connected with Carol L. Tilley, an associate professor in the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, whose scholarship focuses on comics, libraries and youth.
“Although comics have been making in-roads into K-12 classrooms and libraries in the past decade — following many decades of unnecessary disparagement and condemnation — we should look for opportunities to accelerate that embrace. If more young people can be spurred to engage with topics like colonialism and racism because of comics, we’ll be richer for it,” said Tilley, who was also a judge for the 2016 Will Eisner Comics Industry Awards, the Oscars of the comic book world.
In 1976, I discovered, Marvel printed several issues in which Black Panther confronts the “Klan,” though the Ku Klux Klan is not directly mentioned. In “Jungle Action” #21, the superhero is even tied to a burning cross, before he escapes — through a combination of might, skill, and willpower — and puts the hurt on his captors. This issue is chock-full of worthy discussion, while also providing a seamless segue into discussing resistance movements – including the power to rise against oppression.
I also love that Ta-Nehisi Coates, one of the most influential African-American writers today, wrote two Black Panther series for Marvel and next will pen his own take on Captain America.
Tuesday, February 20, 2018
Four Books Every Woman Entrepreneur Needs To Read
It is a problem created by longstanding and deeply entrenched biases against ambitious women, but that doesn’t mean it’s an intractable one; we can, and must, seek out inspiration, or even inspire ourselves to push through, challenge ourselves, and chase after what we want. That’s why I’m going to share with you some of the books that inspire me as a businesswoman to keep fighting, keep striving, and keep pushing forward. These are leaders – men and women alike – whose insight, work ethic, and vision never fail to call me to be a better leader, a better thinker, and a better doer. I hope they’ll inspire you, too.
Broken Open - Elizabeth Lesser
This might seem like an unexpected place to start, but Elizabeth Lesser’s Broken Open has been a life-changer, not only for my personal life, but for my professional life as well. And why is that? Because it’s all about using moments of failure and hurt to spark positive growth and change. Essentially, it’s about openness and flexibility, and putting together the emotional toolbox to turn perceived failures into opportunities for development.
Simply put, that’s an invaluable skill – and mindset really – for a businesswoman to develop, because the world is very unkind to ambitious women. You will be challenged, attacked, frustrated, and hindered, and you need to have the ability to get right back into the saddle and turn that experience into something worthwhile. And if or when businesses or initiatives fail, it’s absolutely critical to not let that cripple your ambition and drive, but instead to use it as a kind of fuel. Don’t let the fear of failure hold you back; be bold and go forward knowing that every setback brings you one step closer to success. That’s what Broken Open reinstills in me every time I read it.
Wonder Women: Sex, Power, and the Quest for Perfection - Debora Spar
To know where you are, you have to know where you’ve been, and Spar’s retrospective on the decades of Western feminism since the publication of The Feminine Mystique is a good crash course on the gains we’ve made as well as the ones we haven’t. This reality – that we’ve made very real progress but in so many ways remain fundamentally held back – is part of why I’m such a strong advocate for women’s entrepreneurialism: it’s essentially a bold power grab, a revolutionary act of economic and social independence.
That’s what makes Wonder Women such an important book: it’s all about understanding the impossible expectations women are subject to so we can break them down and essentially liberate ourselves from them, freeing us up to pursue our own goals and satisfy our own needs. The critical self-examination this book demands – how am I playing this game of my own volition? How is it harming me? – is a vital part of any woman’s ventures into as stereotypically a “man’s world” as business and a critical skill we must all develop if we seek any kind of meaningful self-freedom as both women and as individuals.
Sunday, January 21, 2018
Used-Book Sale in McLean Changes Location
#People flocked to the used-book sale, held on two separate floors: upstairs was a children's book room with families and kids, and downstairs were the books for adults.
#The book sale was hosted by The American Association of University Women which was founded in 1969. They use the funds raised from selling the books to sponsor scholarships for three local universities, George Mason, Marymount and Trinity University. The association also sponsors STEM programs for young girls and leadership and workforce trainings in the D.C. area.
#The AAUW has raised more than $675,000 over the years towards scholarships for women of all ages to pursue higher education.
#"It's good to get kids to still love books!" said Betsy Schroeder, co-president of the McLean area branch of the AAUW.
#The turnout was impressive as area residents, book lovers, and even independent booksellers showed up in droves to the three-day book sale that ran all weekend.
#"The most amazing thing for me to see is so much here to take your brain in a different direction. I've found books from my teaching to work. It's the best deal in town," said Peter Pin, McLean resident and manager at Verizon. "I just spent $50 and Blaine spent $100."
#Sunday was $10 bag day: Shoppers could bring in a shopping bag and fill it with books.
#"We've been trying to refine our collection to the most sellable books," said Schroeder. History and literature are the most popular genre amongst shoppers.
#Loren Willcock, an independent bookseller from Maryland also attended the used-book sale on Friday, Oct. 6. "It's a very nice book sale, with lots of space, everybody is friendly. A lot of times you can't fit two people shoulder to shoulder down an aisle at book sales," said Willcock. He stood in line for an hour waiting to get inside today and left with around 200 books.
#"This is a well-read area, so the wealth of books here is so important," said Blaine Miller, a McLean resident and consultant.
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