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Showing posts with label culture. Show all posts
Showing posts with label culture. Show all posts
Friday, June 19, 2026
Monday, May 18, 2026
"Engaging With Art May Slow Biological Aging"
This is a fascinating, wonderful article form Designboom about the positive health effects of engaging with the arts. I have suspected this for a long while now...
Scientists now link museums, concerts, and creative hobbies to slower aging
Designboom
May 15,2026
What if visiting museums, attending concerts, singing in a choir, or regularly engaging with creative hobbies did more than improve mood or reduce stress? A new scientific study led by Daisy Fancourt suggests that arts and cultural engagement may also influence the biological pace at which we age.
Published in Innovation in Aging, the new research builds on years of work connecting the arts with physical and mental health outcomes. But while previous studies largely focused on wellbeing, depression, loneliness, or longevity, this latest paper moves into far more microscopic territory: epigenetic ageing, the molecular processes that shape how quickly the body biologically ages over time.
Drawing on data from more than 3,500 adults in the UK Household Longitudinal Study, the researchers found that people who engaged more frequently and more diversely with arts and cultural activities showed signs of slower biological aging across several advanced epigenetic aging clocks. Remarkably, the associations were found to be comparable in magnitude to those linked with physical activity.
from emotional wellbeing to molecular ageing
Over the last decade, Daisy Fancourt’s research has helped establish the growing field of arts and health, demonstrating how cultural participation can affect stress regulation, immune function, mental health, cognitive resilience, and even mortality risk. Her 2026 book Art Cure: The Science of How the Arts Transform Our Health argued that the arts should be considered a foundational pillar of wellbeing alongside sleep, diet, exercise, and nature.
This new study by Fancourt together with Lehané Masebo, Saoirse Finn, Hei Wan Mak, and Feifei Bu pushes that argument further. The research investigates whether cultural engagement may be linked to measurable biological aging processes inside the body itself. The study focuses on epigenetic aging, a field of molecular biology that examines how environmental and behavioral factors influence patterns of DNA methylation over time.
Scientists increasingly use so-called epigenetic clocks to estimate biological age, which may differ from chronological age. While someone may be 50 years old chronologically, their biological aging markers could suggest a body aging faster or slower depending on lifestyle, stress exposure, and health behaviors.
The researchers analyzed seven different epigenetic clocks, ranging from earlier models based primarily on chronological age to newer generations designed to measure physiological decline and pace of aging. The strongest associations appeared in newer second- and third-generation clocks, including PhenoAge and DunedinPACE, which are considered more sensitive to health-related behavioral factors.
museums, concerts, choirs, and creative hobbies
The study defines arts and cultural engagement broadly, including visiting museums, galleries, and heritage sites; attending concerts, theater performances, and exhibitions; singing, dancing, painting, photography, and crafts; and participating in libraries, archives, and community cultural spaces.
Researchers evaluated both the frequency and diversity of engagement. Participants who engaged monthly or weekly with cultural activities generally showed slower biological ageing markers than those who participated only once or twice a year.
One of the most striking findings of the paper is that diversity mattered almost as much as frequency. People participating across many different kinds of cultural activities appeared to show stronger associations with slower aging than those engaging in only one or two forms.
The authors suggest this may be because different forms of arts engagement activate multiple systems simultaneously, including cognitive stimulation, emotional processing, sensory immersion, social interaction, creativity, identity formation, and stress reduction.
the comparison with exercise
Perhaps the most consequential aspect of the research is its direct comparison between arts engagement and physical activity. Alongside cultural participation, the study also analyzed exercise habits, including activities such as running, swimming, yoga, cycling, and walking. Both arts engagement and physical activity were associated with slower epigenetic aging, and the effect sizes were found to be broadly comparable across several measures.
The findings do not suggest that museums replace exercise or that attending a concert functions identically to physical training. But they do position arts and cultural participation as a potentially meaningful health behavior in its own right, rather than merely a form of leisure or entertainment.
For decades, exercise, diet, smoking cessation, and sleep have dominated discussions around healthy aging and longevity. The study proposes that cultural participation may deserve consideration within that same framework.
Importantly, the strongest findings appeared among adults over the age of 40, a period increasingly understood as a key threshold in the acceleration of biological aging processes.
a new role for cultural spaces
Beyond the biological findings themselves, the research also carries broader implications for how cities and societies value cultural infrastructure. If museums, libraries, performance venues, choirs, and community arts programs contribute to healthier aging trajectories, cultural access begins to look like part of a preventative health ecosystem. This perspective aligns with a growing movement around social prescribing, where healthcare systems refer patients to community and cultural activities alongside medical treatment. Architecture, urban planning, exhibition design, acoustics, accessibility, and public cultural funding all become intertwined with questions of health and longevity.
The paper remains cautious in its conclusions. The researchers highlight that epigenetic aging science is still evolving and that associations do not prove direct causation. Biological aging clocks themselves remain an emerging and sometimes debated area of research.
Still, the study marks one of the clearest attempts yet to connect arts engagement with measurable molecular aging processes, suggesting that cultural participation may become increasingly important to how societies think about ageing itself. Daisy Fancourt’s research points toward a larger cultural shift, proposing that the arts also help shape the biological conditions through which people age, recover, and remain resilient over time.
project info:
name: Does leisure activity matter for epigenetic ageing? Analyses of arts engagement and physical activity in the UK Household Longitudinal Study
authors: Daisy Fancourt, Lehané Masebo, Saoirse Finn, Hei Wan Mak, and Feifei Bu
journal: Innovation in Aging
publisher: Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America
institution: University College London
Original article on Designboom:
https://www.designboom.com/art/scientists-museums-concerts-creative-hobbies-slower-aging-daisy-fancourt/
Scientists now link museums, concerts, and creative hobbies to slower aging
Designboom
May 15,2026
What if visiting museums, attending concerts, singing in a choir, or regularly engaging with creative hobbies did more than improve mood or reduce stress? A new scientific study led by Daisy Fancourt suggests that arts and cultural engagement may also influence the biological pace at which we age.
Published in Innovation in Aging, the new research builds on years of work connecting the arts with physical and mental health outcomes. But while previous studies largely focused on wellbeing, depression, loneliness, or longevity, this latest paper moves into far more microscopic territory: epigenetic ageing, the molecular processes that shape how quickly the body biologically ages over time.
Drawing on data from more than 3,500 adults in the UK Household Longitudinal Study, the researchers found that people who engaged more frequently and more diversely with arts and cultural activities showed signs of slower biological aging across several advanced epigenetic aging clocks. Remarkably, the associations were found to be comparable in magnitude to those linked with physical activity.
from emotional wellbeing to molecular ageing
Over the last decade, Daisy Fancourt’s research has helped establish the growing field of arts and health, demonstrating how cultural participation can affect stress regulation, immune function, mental health, cognitive resilience, and even mortality risk. Her 2026 book Art Cure: The Science of How the Arts Transform Our Health argued that the arts should be considered a foundational pillar of wellbeing alongside sleep, diet, exercise, and nature.
This new study by Fancourt together with Lehané Masebo, Saoirse Finn, Hei Wan Mak, and Feifei Bu pushes that argument further. The research investigates whether cultural engagement may be linked to measurable biological aging processes inside the body itself. The study focuses on epigenetic aging, a field of molecular biology that examines how environmental and behavioral factors influence patterns of DNA methylation over time.
Scientists increasingly use so-called epigenetic clocks to estimate biological age, which may differ from chronological age. While someone may be 50 years old chronologically, their biological aging markers could suggest a body aging faster or slower depending on lifestyle, stress exposure, and health behaviors.
The researchers analyzed seven different epigenetic clocks, ranging from earlier models based primarily on chronological age to newer generations designed to measure physiological decline and pace of aging. The strongest associations appeared in newer second- and third-generation clocks, including PhenoAge and DunedinPACE, which are considered more sensitive to health-related behavioral factors.
museums, concerts, choirs, and creative hobbies
The study defines arts and cultural engagement broadly, including visiting museums, galleries, and heritage sites; attending concerts, theater performances, and exhibitions; singing, dancing, painting, photography, and crafts; and participating in libraries, archives, and community cultural spaces.
Researchers evaluated both the frequency and diversity of engagement. Participants who engaged monthly or weekly with cultural activities generally showed slower biological ageing markers than those who participated only once or twice a year.
One of the most striking findings of the paper is that diversity mattered almost as much as frequency. People participating across many different kinds of cultural activities appeared to show stronger associations with slower aging than those engaging in only one or two forms.
The authors suggest this may be because different forms of arts engagement activate multiple systems simultaneously, including cognitive stimulation, emotional processing, sensory immersion, social interaction, creativity, identity formation, and stress reduction.
the comparison with exercise
Perhaps the most consequential aspect of the research is its direct comparison between arts engagement and physical activity. Alongside cultural participation, the study also analyzed exercise habits, including activities such as running, swimming, yoga, cycling, and walking. Both arts engagement and physical activity were associated with slower epigenetic aging, and the effect sizes were found to be broadly comparable across several measures.
The findings do not suggest that museums replace exercise or that attending a concert functions identically to physical training. But they do position arts and cultural participation as a potentially meaningful health behavior in its own right, rather than merely a form of leisure or entertainment.
For decades, exercise, diet, smoking cessation, and sleep have dominated discussions around healthy aging and longevity. The study proposes that cultural participation may deserve consideration within that same framework.
Importantly, the strongest findings appeared among adults over the age of 40, a period increasingly understood as a key threshold in the acceleration of biological aging processes.
a new role for cultural spaces
Beyond the biological findings themselves, the research also carries broader implications for how cities and societies value cultural infrastructure. If museums, libraries, performance venues, choirs, and community arts programs contribute to healthier aging trajectories, cultural access begins to look like part of a preventative health ecosystem. This perspective aligns with a growing movement around social prescribing, where healthcare systems refer patients to community and cultural activities alongside medical treatment. Architecture, urban planning, exhibition design, acoustics, accessibility, and public cultural funding all become intertwined with questions of health and longevity.
The paper remains cautious in its conclusions. The researchers highlight that epigenetic aging science is still evolving and that associations do not prove direct causation. Biological aging clocks themselves remain an emerging and sometimes debated area of research.
Still, the study marks one of the clearest attempts yet to connect arts engagement with measurable molecular aging processes, suggesting that cultural participation may become increasingly important to how societies think about ageing itself. Daisy Fancourt’s research points toward a larger cultural shift, proposing that the arts also help shape the biological conditions through which people age, recover, and remain resilient over time.
project info:
name: Does leisure activity matter for epigenetic ageing? Analyses of arts engagement and physical activity in the UK Household Longitudinal Study
authors: Daisy Fancourt, Lehané Masebo, Saoirse Finn, Hei Wan Mak, and Feifei Bu
journal: Innovation in Aging
publisher: Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America
institution: University College London
Original article on Designboom:
https://www.designboom.com/art/scientists-museums-concerts-creative-hobbies-slower-aging-daisy-fancourt/
Thursday, June 19, 2025
Wednesday, July 3, 2024
Dolce and Gabbana Alta Sartoria 2024
WOW. Dolce and Gabbana's Alta Sartoria show of menswear opened with a DAZZLING parade, literally, of traditional Sardinian clothing and costumes, including Carnevale costumes (previously here) and oxen carrying carts full of singing Sardinians, all on a carpet of flower petals. It is just incredible. Please do watch the video below which starts at the beginning of the parade with peeling bells. I think D&G have done an incredible job of exposing the world to Sardinian culture...it is all stunningly beautiful.
Of course please do stay for the runway show because the garments are all based on the traditional costumes just seen in the parade. All gorgeous...
altamoda.dolcegabbana.com
Of course please do stay for the runway show because the garments are all based on the traditional costumes just seen in the parade. All gorgeous...
altamoda.dolcegabbana.com
Wednesday, June 19, 2024
Tuesday, March 12, 2024
NONE OF THE ABOVE
Why people are reluctant to call themselves atheists
By Harmeet Kaur, CNN
Sun March 10, 2024
In September, standing before a room full of Christian conservatives, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis made a bold pronouncement: “I don’t know how you could be a leader without having faith in God.”
Being an atheist is still a political liability in the US — though it’s not as bad as DeSantis would have you think. While a 2020 Gallup poll found that six in 10 people would vote for a well-qualified atheist presidential candidate, fewer people said they would be willing to vote for an atheist than a candidate who was gay, lesbian or Muslim. Only socialists ranked lower among poll respondents.
Though the share of Americans who say they don’t believe in a higher power has increased in the past decade, some people still view atheists negatively. A 2017 study found that people believe atheists are more likely to be serial killers than believers, even though federal data suggests they are far less likely to commit crimes than religious people.
Just like people of faith, not all atheists believe the same things. Aside from their lack of belief in a higher power or powers, atheists vary widely in their answers to spiritual and existential questions.
Given the misconceptions surrounding this group, many people are reluctant to say that they’re atheists — which means it’s hard to pinpoint connections and differences among their numbers.
What is atheism?
An atheist is someone “who does not believe in the existence of a god or any gods,” according to Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary.
Because atheists are defined by what they don’t believe, it’s difficult to generalize what they do believe. In the words of comedian and outspoken atheist Ricky Gervais on X, “Saying ‘Atheism is a belief system’ is like saying ‘not going skiing, is a hobby.’”
Some atheists, like evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins and neuroscientist Sam Harris, are steadfast in their rejection of organized religion. Others are skeptical or apathetic when it comes to philosophical questions of whether a god exists.
Because of the social stigma atheists may face in the US and around the world, some people have complicated feelings about the term, said Nick Fish, president of the organization American Atheists. Plenty of people who fit the definition of an atheist don’t self-identify as such, instead preferring less fraught terms such as agnostic, humanist or freethinker, he added.
Then there are the cultural Catholics, the non-practicing Jews, the secular Muslims — people who don’t necessarily believe in a deity but identify with a particular faith because of their family upbringing, ethnicity or culture.
“A simple dictionary definition doesn’t necessarily encapsulate people’s self identity, and people use a variety of terms even when ultimately they believe the same thing,” Fish said.
What do atheists believe?
Atheists also have different interpretations of what it means to not believe. While nearly all self-described atheists don’t believe in the God described in the Judeo-Christian Bible, 23% do believe in God or some other higher power or spiritual force in the universe, according to a Pew Research Center report published in January.
Belief for atheists goes deeper than the question of whether there is a higher power.
Notably, a fifth of self-described atheists consider themselves spiritual, Pew’s recent survey on the religious “nones” found. The report contains other surprising insights, too: Most atheists say the natural world is all there is, but nearly a quarter believe there’s something spiritual beyond our present environment. About a third believe animals other than humans can have spirits or spiritual energies, and a slightly smaller share believe spiritual energies can be found in parts of nature, like mountains, trees or rivers. Just under one in five atheists believe cemeteries or memorial sites can have spiritual energies, while fewer than one in 10 say the same about objects such as crystals. Nearly a third of atheists believe humans have souls or spirits in addition to their physical body.
These responses might seem confusing or contradictory, but atheism and spirituality aren’t necessarily at odds. Though some people associate spirituality with a connection to a god, for others it can mean feeling connected to other people or to something else bigger than oneself.
Indeed, there are atheists who believe in cosmic interconnectedness or in transcendent moments of wonder without considering themselves religious. Long distance swimmer and self-proclaimed atheist Diana Nyad discussed this distinction in a 2013 interview with Oprah.
“I’m an atheist who’s in awe,” she said. “I think you can be an atheist who doesn’t believe in an overarching being who created all of this and sees over it. But there’s spirituality because we human beings, and we animals and maybe even we plants — but certainly the ocean and the moon and the stars — we all live with something that is cherished and we feel the treasure of it.”
How many atheists are there?
It’s hard to know just how many atheists there are when some people are reluctant to claim the label.
While a 2018 Pew survey found that 10% of US adults say they don’t believe in any higher power or spiritual force, only about 4% of US adults identify as atheists. A 2022 Gallup poll puts the number of nonbelievers higher, with 17% of Americans saying they don’t believe in God.
Some scholars, however, consider these numbers underestimates — an analysis by psychologists Will Gervais and Maxine B. Najle suggests the true count is closer to 26%. Gervais points to Cold War era associations of atheists as “godless communists,” as well as Christianity’s enduring influence on American culture, as some reasons people may be hesitant to identify as nonbelievers.
“The term atheist has attracted some unsavory connotations,” he added. “Also, religion (in the US) is politically and socially rewarded, so people might be reluctant to out themselves as an atheist.”
It’s also worth noting that atheism — at least in the West — is often defined in relation to monotheistic traditions, namely the Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. As the organization American Atheists notes on its website, older dictionaries previously defined atheism as a “belief that there is no God” — the singular, proper noun typically used by Christians and some Jews. Even Gallup’s 2022 poll asked about belief in “God.”
Framing atheism in these terms doesn’t capture a range of other beliefs that atheists could conceivably hold. Strands of atheist thought can be found in non-theistic traditions such as Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism, as well cultures around the world that practice animism.
What is the difference between an atheist and an agnostic?
There are all kinds of labels to describe nonbelievers. While atheism and agnosticism are among the most common, there are some differences between those terms.
Though the two are often considered distinct worldviews, technically, they aren’t mutually exclusive. Rather, the terms atheism and agnosticism answer different questions, Nick Fish of American Atheists said. Atheism answers whether a person believes in a god or gods, and agnosticism answers whether it is possible to know if a supreme being exists.
But again, dictionary definitions prove limiting here. In reality, many people think of agnosticism as a less stringent form of atheism.
“If you spend a bit of time digging in, I think (many agnostics) will ultimately say, ‘I don’t believe in a God but I’m not sure, so I’m agnostic,’” Fish said.
Jocelyn Williamson, co-founder of the Central Florida Freethought Community, doesn’t believe in a higher power but says she can’t be certain. Technically, that fits the definition of an agnostic atheist. But she said she typically tells people who ask about her religious beliefs that she’s a secular humanist.
“Most people don’t know what that means, and then I can actually have a conversation,” Williamson said. “There’s too many preconceived notions if I just say I’m an atheist.”
The term atheist only conveys what she doesn’t believe in, Williamson said. The term humanist, meanwhile, signals that she’s motivated by compassion for others and that she believes societal decision-making should be grounded in reason and science.
What do people get wrong about atheists?
One of the most common misconceptions about atheists is that they lack morals that others typically attribute to religion.
In a 2019 Pew survey, 44% of US residents said belief in God was necessary to be moral and have good values — in other countries, that share is much higher.
Williamson is all too familiar with such notions. When she was first getting to know faith leaders in her state, through her work with the Central Florida Freethought Community, she recalls a clergy member asking her what stops her from killing other people if she doesn’t believe in a higher power.
“I had always thought that was a meme, a trope,” she said. “I didn’t think anybody actually believed that.”
In fact, various studies suggest that atheists are no more immoral than religious people. They’re also just as likely to participate in civic life as those who are affiliated with a religion and just as likely to engage in community service, according to Pew’s recent survey of religious “nones.”
Atheists also get stereotyped as angry people who vehemently oppose religion and its followers. Like any other population, though, they aren’t a monolith. Williamson, for example, is part of the Interfaith Council of Central Florida and works with faith leaders toward common goals. Plenty of nonbelievers volunteer with religious organizations out of a desire to serve their communities, she added — her father worked as a local director for the Christian nonprofit Habitat for Humanity despite not being religious.
Another misconception about atheists is that they’re certain or unwavering in their beliefs, Fish said. People often tell him that they aren’t sure on the big existential questions, and therefore can’t be atheists. But many atheists are figuring it all out, too.
“Just because we don’t believe in a god doesn’t mean that we have all the answers to everything else,” he said. “In fact, for many, for most of us, it’s the opposite. We recognize that we don’t.”
Link to original article on CNN:
https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/10/us/atheism-beliefs-explained-cec/index.html
By Harmeet Kaur, CNN
Sun March 10, 2024
In September, standing before a room full of Christian conservatives, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis made a bold pronouncement: “I don’t know how you could be a leader without having faith in God.”
Being an atheist is still a political liability in the US — though it’s not as bad as DeSantis would have you think. While a 2020 Gallup poll found that six in 10 people would vote for a well-qualified atheist presidential candidate, fewer people said they would be willing to vote for an atheist than a candidate who was gay, lesbian or Muslim. Only socialists ranked lower among poll respondents.
Though the share of Americans who say they don’t believe in a higher power has increased in the past decade, some people still view atheists negatively. A 2017 study found that people believe atheists are more likely to be serial killers than believers, even though federal data suggests they are far less likely to commit crimes than religious people.
Just like people of faith, not all atheists believe the same things. Aside from their lack of belief in a higher power or powers, atheists vary widely in their answers to spiritual and existential questions.
Given the misconceptions surrounding this group, many people are reluctant to say that they’re atheists — which means it’s hard to pinpoint connections and differences among their numbers.
What is atheism?
An atheist is someone “who does not believe in the existence of a god or any gods,” according to Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary.
Because atheists are defined by what they don’t believe, it’s difficult to generalize what they do believe. In the words of comedian and outspoken atheist Ricky Gervais on X, “Saying ‘Atheism is a belief system’ is like saying ‘not going skiing, is a hobby.’”
Some atheists, like evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins and neuroscientist Sam Harris, are steadfast in their rejection of organized religion. Others are skeptical or apathetic when it comes to philosophical questions of whether a god exists.
Because of the social stigma atheists may face in the US and around the world, some people have complicated feelings about the term, said Nick Fish, president of the organization American Atheists. Plenty of people who fit the definition of an atheist don’t self-identify as such, instead preferring less fraught terms such as agnostic, humanist or freethinker, he added.
Then there are the cultural Catholics, the non-practicing Jews, the secular Muslims — people who don’t necessarily believe in a deity but identify with a particular faith because of their family upbringing, ethnicity or culture.
“A simple dictionary definition doesn’t necessarily encapsulate people’s self identity, and people use a variety of terms even when ultimately they believe the same thing,” Fish said.
What do atheists believe?
Atheists also have different interpretations of what it means to not believe. While nearly all self-described atheists don’t believe in the God described in the Judeo-Christian Bible, 23% do believe in God or some other higher power or spiritual force in the universe, according to a Pew Research Center report published in January.
Belief for atheists goes deeper than the question of whether there is a higher power.
Notably, a fifth of self-described atheists consider themselves spiritual, Pew’s recent survey on the religious “nones” found. The report contains other surprising insights, too: Most atheists say the natural world is all there is, but nearly a quarter believe there’s something spiritual beyond our present environment. About a third believe animals other than humans can have spirits or spiritual energies, and a slightly smaller share believe spiritual energies can be found in parts of nature, like mountains, trees or rivers. Just under one in five atheists believe cemeteries or memorial sites can have spiritual energies, while fewer than one in 10 say the same about objects such as crystals. Nearly a third of atheists believe humans have souls or spirits in addition to their physical body.
These responses might seem confusing or contradictory, but atheism and spirituality aren’t necessarily at odds. Though some people associate spirituality with a connection to a god, for others it can mean feeling connected to other people or to something else bigger than oneself.
Indeed, there are atheists who believe in cosmic interconnectedness or in transcendent moments of wonder without considering themselves religious. Long distance swimmer and self-proclaimed atheist Diana Nyad discussed this distinction in a 2013 interview with Oprah.
“I’m an atheist who’s in awe,” she said. “I think you can be an atheist who doesn’t believe in an overarching being who created all of this and sees over it. But there’s spirituality because we human beings, and we animals and maybe even we plants — but certainly the ocean and the moon and the stars — we all live with something that is cherished and we feel the treasure of it.”
How many atheists are there?
It’s hard to know just how many atheists there are when some people are reluctant to claim the label.
While a 2018 Pew survey found that 10% of US adults say they don’t believe in any higher power or spiritual force, only about 4% of US adults identify as atheists. A 2022 Gallup poll puts the number of nonbelievers higher, with 17% of Americans saying they don’t believe in God.
Some scholars, however, consider these numbers underestimates — an analysis by psychologists Will Gervais and Maxine B. Najle suggests the true count is closer to 26%. Gervais points to Cold War era associations of atheists as “godless communists,” as well as Christianity’s enduring influence on American culture, as some reasons people may be hesitant to identify as nonbelievers.
“The term atheist has attracted some unsavory connotations,” he added. “Also, religion (in the US) is politically and socially rewarded, so people might be reluctant to out themselves as an atheist.”
It’s also worth noting that atheism — at least in the West — is often defined in relation to monotheistic traditions, namely the Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. As the organization American Atheists notes on its website, older dictionaries previously defined atheism as a “belief that there is no God” — the singular, proper noun typically used by Christians and some Jews. Even Gallup’s 2022 poll asked about belief in “God.”
Framing atheism in these terms doesn’t capture a range of other beliefs that atheists could conceivably hold. Strands of atheist thought can be found in non-theistic traditions such as Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism, as well cultures around the world that practice animism.
What is the difference between an atheist and an agnostic?
There are all kinds of labels to describe nonbelievers. While atheism and agnosticism are among the most common, there are some differences between those terms.
Though the two are often considered distinct worldviews, technically, they aren’t mutually exclusive. Rather, the terms atheism and agnosticism answer different questions, Nick Fish of American Atheists said. Atheism answers whether a person believes in a god or gods, and agnosticism answers whether it is possible to know if a supreme being exists.
But again, dictionary definitions prove limiting here. In reality, many people think of agnosticism as a less stringent form of atheism.
“If you spend a bit of time digging in, I think (many agnostics) will ultimately say, ‘I don’t believe in a God but I’m not sure, so I’m agnostic,’” Fish said.
Jocelyn Williamson, co-founder of the Central Florida Freethought Community, doesn’t believe in a higher power but says she can’t be certain. Technically, that fits the definition of an agnostic atheist. But she said she typically tells people who ask about her religious beliefs that she’s a secular humanist.
“Most people don’t know what that means, and then I can actually have a conversation,” Williamson said. “There’s too many preconceived notions if I just say I’m an atheist.”
The term atheist only conveys what she doesn’t believe in, Williamson said. The term humanist, meanwhile, signals that she’s motivated by compassion for others and that she believes societal decision-making should be grounded in reason and science.
What do people get wrong about atheists?
One of the most common misconceptions about atheists is that they lack morals that others typically attribute to religion.
In a 2019 Pew survey, 44% of US residents said belief in God was necessary to be moral and have good values — in other countries, that share is much higher.
Williamson is all too familiar with such notions. When she was first getting to know faith leaders in her state, through her work with the Central Florida Freethought Community, she recalls a clergy member asking her what stops her from killing other people if she doesn’t believe in a higher power.
“I had always thought that was a meme, a trope,” she said. “I didn’t think anybody actually believed that.”
In fact, various studies suggest that atheists are no more immoral than religious people. They’re also just as likely to participate in civic life as those who are affiliated with a religion and just as likely to engage in community service, according to Pew’s recent survey of religious “nones.”
Atheists also get stereotyped as angry people who vehemently oppose religion and its followers. Like any other population, though, they aren’t a monolith. Williamson, for example, is part of the Interfaith Council of Central Florida and works with faith leaders toward common goals. Plenty of nonbelievers volunteer with religious organizations out of a desire to serve their communities, she added — her father worked as a local director for the Christian nonprofit Habitat for Humanity despite not being religious.
Another misconception about atheists is that they’re certain or unwavering in their beliefs, Fish said. People often tell him that they aren’t sure on the big existential questions, and therefore can’t be atheists. But many atheists are figuring it all out, too.
“Just because we don’t believe in a god doesn’t mean that we have all the answers to everything else,” he said. “In fact, for many, for most of us, it’s the opposite. We recognize that we don’t.”
Link to original article on CNN:
https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/10/us/atheism-beliefs-explained-cec/index.html
Monday, June 19, 2023
Wednesday, April 5, 2023
"The fight against ‘woke’ is really conservative gaslighting"
I found this opinion piece from author Clay Cane very insightful...
Opinion: The fight against ‘woke’ is really conservative gaslighting
Opinion by Clay Cane
Updated 7:35 AM EDT, Wed April 5, 2023
(CNN) I was at the barbershop recently when Childish Gambino’s 2016 track “Redbone” popped up on a playlist. Singing about infidelity, Gambino — also known as Donald Glover — belts out, “Stay woke!” in the chorus. As we nodded our heads in unison to the song, someone asked, “How did ‘woke’ become the new scary term? Do they even know what it means?”
We all had a wry laugh about language that has been misappropriated over the years, but the distortion of “woke” has been particularly insidious.
I must give credit to the Silent Majority, the Moral Majority, MAGA, Q-Anon and all the other iterations of conservatism that Republicans have transmogrified into over the past five decades: They are masterminds at coming up with messaging that scares the Jim Crow hell out of their base. “Woke” is their latest stunt.
In the 1960s, it was “Black Power,” a term about empowerment and self-reliance popularized by Kwame Ture, also known as Stokely Carmichael. Conservatives rebranded the term, which became a catch-all phrase to scare White voters that “Negroes” were taking over. Those two words would then be twisted by “White Power” adherents who, according to the ADL, deliberately mimicked the term “Black Power.”
Some years later, former California governor and later President Ronald Reagan famously deployed the “welfare queen” narrative, framing public assistance as a Black issue, even though more White people than Black have been helped over the years by those federal aid programs.
After Reagan, George H. W. Bush invoked the name of Willie Horton, a convicted Black man on weekend release from prison to rile up his base, during the 1988 presidential campaign. The Bush team made Horton a symbol of allegedly lenient prison furlough programs that were supposedly sending murderers and rapists into the suburbs.
Bush rocketed in the polls, framing his opponent, Democrat Michael Dukakis, as weak on crime. Bush won the presidential election and the Willie Horton television commercial — an ad General Colin Powell described as being “racist… cold political calculation” — was a turning point in the campaign. Yet again, Republicans had found a potent symbol of how to effectively manipulate voters’ fears.
Over the past several years, co-optation of language by the GOP has been on overdrive, due in part to the advent of social media. Once upon a time, politicians hammered incendiary language in speeches and interviews; Today, they have the ability to disseminate a similarly noxious narrative almost instantly online. Lee Atwater -— the brain behind the Willie Horton ad and other Southern Strategy tactics — would be proud. As he lay dying from cancer in the final months of his life, Atwater reportedly said he regretted the Horton ad, but the legacy of his racist actions lives on.
The current list of terms that conservatives have weaponized is long and growing: Black Lives Matter. Defund the police. Critical race theory. Intersectionality. Now, add to it the ubiquitous — almost inescapable — word “woke.”
To be clear, woke is not political, but it has been politically weaponized by bad-faith actors, mostly on the right. Being “woke” is not a term exclusive to the realm of social justice; it’s a decades-old slang in Black communities, meaning to “be aware.” For example: “I heard your man is cheating — stay woke!”
Blues icon Lead Belly, at the end of his recording of the 1938 song “Scottsboro Boys,” talked about the need to “stay woke” after Black men and children were wrongfully accused of raping two White women in Alabama.
In other words, be alert, keep your eyes open and watch your back — figuratively and literally.
The mangling of “woke” cannot be solely placed on politicians. Celebrities and comedians have played a role: Bill Maher, Sean Penn, Russell Brand, Kanye West and Dave Chappelle to name a few, have all misused the word in recent years, contributing to the despoiling of a cherished cultural term. Either out of willful ignorance or arrogance, they deploy the term out of context, often while pouting about “cancel culture.”
Meanwhile, pushing back against “woke-ism” has become a profitable business model for anti-woke warriors. John McWhorter wrote a 2021 book titled, “Woke Racism: How a New Religion Has Betrayed Black America,” this New York Times bestseller was partly popular because a Black writer was denouncing “wokeness.”
Bethany Mandel recently released “Stolen Youth: How Radicals Are Erasing Innocence and Indoctrinating a Generation,” which, according to her, included a whole chapter on “wokeness” yet she famously struggled to provide a definition in an eye-rolling television interview. She later complained about being lampooned on Twitter — but also bragged about how many copies of her book that she had sold as a result. Journalist Bari Weiss, meanwhile, who rants incessantly about wokeness, has been dubbed an “anti-woke warrior” and is a co-founder of the “anti-woke” University of Austin.
What’s more dangerous than any of the misappropriation, however, is the way that attacks on “woke-ism” have made their way into policy.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law the “Stop WOKE Act,” which is wreaking havoc on Florida’s colleges, universities, libraries and schools. “Woke-ism” now somehow has expanded to encompass sexual orientation and gender identity. It’s even being cited as the real reason for prosecuting the former president on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records.
Even the most anodyne mention of civil rights is suppressed, as seen recently with revered figures like Rosa Parks and Ruby Bridges.
The boogeyman framing around “woke” is intentional. In 2021, South Carolina Senator Tim Scott complained about “woke supremacy,” a term with inescapable echoes of “White supremacy”— creating a deeply racist, false equivalency that pandered to a faction of the GOP in his state.
It was a move that perhaps was not all that surprising coming from the only Black Republican in the US Senate, who is fond of saying that his family had gone from “cotton to Congress” when he downplays racism in his party. Not even Lee Atwater could have predicted the Southern Strategy tactics being used by Black politicians.
There are no “woke” villains attempting to take over America. Is there sometimes unnecessary word policing? Can people be oversensitive? Can corporations overreact to the latest scandal or a trending topic? Absolutely, but that is not “woke-ism.” Labeling so-called overreactions or something you don’t like with a term rooted in Black communities, racializes — and shuts down — discourse many people claim we need.
Here’s what my friends at the barbershop say about right-wing politicians, conservative media outlets, privileged celebrities, Twitter trolls: You can’t have the word “woke.” It doesn’t belong to you, and never did. Be creative and think up your own dog whistles. What you refer to as “woke-ism” is old school, political gaslighting.
I will keep using “woke” in its proper context. And if you don’t understand it, then maybe the word is not yours to use.
Thank you, Clay!
Link to original article:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/05/opinions/woke-weaponized-racism-gaslighting-cane-ctpr/index.html
Opinion: The fight against ‘woke’ is really conservative gaslighting
Opinion by Clay Cane
Updated 7:35 AM EDT, Wed April 5, 2023
(CNN) I was at the barbershop recently when Childish Gambino’s 2016 track “Redbone” popped up on a playlist. Singing about infidelity, Gambino — also known as Donald Glover — belts out, “Stay woke!” in the chorus. As we nodded our heads in unison to the song, someone asked, “How did ‘woke’ become the new scary term? Do they even know what it means?”
We all had a wry laugh about language that has been misappropriated over the years, but the distortion of “woke” has been particularly insidious.
I must give credit to the Silent Majority, the Moral Majority, MAGA, Q-Anon and all the other iterations of conservatism that Republicans have transmogrified into over the past five decades: They are masterminds at coming up with messaging that scares the Jim Crow hell out of their base. “Woke” is their latest stunt.
In the 1960s, it was “Black Power,” a term about empowerment and self-reliance popularized by Kwame Ture, also known as Stokely Carmichael. Conservatives rebranded the term, which became a catch-all phrase to scare White voters that “Negroes” were taking over. Those two words would then be twisted by “White Power” adherents who, according to the ADL, deliberately mimicked the term “Black Power.”
Some years later, former California governor and later President Ronald Reagan famously deployed the “welfare queen” narrative, framing public assistance as a Black issue, even though more White people than Black have been helped over the years by those federal aid programs.
After Reagan, George H. W. Bush invoked the name of Willie Horton, a convicted Black man on weekend release from prison to rile up his base, during the 1988 presidential campaign. The Bush team made Horton a symbol of allegedly lenient prison furlough programs that were supposedly sending murderers and rapists into the suburbs.
Bush rocketed in the polls, framing his opponent, Democrat Michael Dukakis, as weak on crime. Bush won the presidential election and the Willie Horton television commercial — an ad General Colin Powell described as being “racist… cold political calculation” — was a turning point in the campaign. Yet again, Republicans had found a potent symbol of how to effectively manipulate voters’ fears.
Over the past several years, co-optation of language by the GOP has been on overdrive, due in part to the advent of social media. Once upon a time, politicians hammered incendiary language in speeches and interviews; Today, they have the ability to disseminate a similarly noxious narrative almost instantly online. Lee Atwater -— the brain behind the Willie Horton ad and other Southern Strategy tactics — would be proud. As he lay dying from cancer in the final months of his life, Atwater reportedly said he regretted the Horton ad, but the legacy of his racist actions lives on.
The current list of terms that conservatives have weaponized is long and growing: Black Lives Matter. Defund the police. Critical race theory. Intersectionality. Now, add to it the ubiquitous — almost inescapable — word “woke.”
To be clear, woke is not political, but it has been politically weaponized by bad-faith actors, mostly on the right. Being “woke” is not a term exclusive to the realm of social justice; it’s a decades-old slang in Black communities, meaning to “be aware.” For example: “I heard your man is cheating — stay woke!”
Blues icon Lead Belly, at the end of his recording of the 1938 song “Scottsboro Boys,” talked about the need to “stay woke” after Black men and children were wrongfully accused of raping two White women in Alabama.
In other words, be alert, keep your eyes open and watch your back — figuratively and literally.
The mangling of “woke” cannot be solely placed on politicians. Celebrities and comedians have played a role: Bill Maher, Sean Penn, Russell Brand, Kanye West and Dave Chappelle to name a few, have all misused the word in recent years, contributing to the despoiling of a cherished cultural term. Either out of willful ignorance or arrogance, they deploy the term out of context, often while pouting about “cancel culture.”
Meanwhile, pushing back against “woke-ism” has become a profitable business model for anti-woke warriors. John McWhorter wrote a 2021 book titled, “Woke Racism: How a New Religion Has Betrayed Black America,” this New York Times bestseller was partly popular because a Black writer was denouncing “wokeness.”
Bethany Mandel recently released “Stolen Youth: How Radicals Are Erasing Innocence and Indoctrinating a Generation,” which, according to her, included a whole chapter on “wokeness” yet she famously struggled to provide a definition in an eye-rolling television interview. She later complained about being lampooned on Twitter — but also bragged about how many copies of her book that she had sold as a result. Journalist Bari Weiss, meanwhile, who rants incessantly about wokeness, has been dubbed an “anti-woke warrior” and is a co-founder of the “anti-woke” University of Austin.
What’s more dangerous than any of the misappropriation, however, is the way that attacks on “woke-ism” have made their way into policy.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law the “Stop WOKE Act,” which is wreaking havoc on Florida’s colleges, universities, libraries and schools. “Woke-ism” now somehow has expanded to encompass sexual orientation and gender identity. It’s even being cited as the real reason for prosecuting the former president on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records.
Even the most anodyne mention of civil rights is suppressed, as seen recently with revered figures like Rosa Parks and Ruby Bridges.
The boogeyman framing around “woke” is intentional. In 2021, South Carolina Senator Tim Scott complained about “woke supremacy,” a term with inescapable echoes of “White supremacy”— creating a deeply racist, false equivalency that pandered to a faction of the GOP in his state.
It was a move that perhaps was not all that surprising coming from the only Black Republican in the US Senate, who is fond of saying that his family had gone from “cotton to Congress” when he downplays racism in his party. Not even Lee Atwater could have predicted the Southern Strategy tactics being used by Black politicians.
There are no “woke” villains attempting to take over America. Is there sometimes unnecessary word policing? Can people be oversensitive? Can corporations overreact to the latest scandal or a trending topic? Absolutely, but that is not “woke-ism.” Labeling so-called overreactions or something you don’t like with a term rooted in Black communities, racializes — and shuts down — discourse many people claim we need.
Here’s what my friends at the barbershop say about right-wing politicians, conservative media outlets, privileged celebrities, Twitter trolls: You can’t have the word “woke.” It doesn’t belong to you, and never did. Be creative and think up your own dog whistles. What you refer to as “woke-ism” is old school, political gaslighting.
I will keep using “woke” in its proper context. And if you don’t understand it, then maybe the word is not yours to use.
Thank you, Clay!
Link to original article:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/05/opinions/woke-weaponized-racism-gaslighting-cane-ctpr/index.html
Friday, August 5, 2022
Three-Sisters Sagamité
I found this BBC Travel article fascinating because it spoke to preserving First Nation cultures and food!
By Diane Selkirk
In Quebec, the tale of the "three sisters" isn't just a myth about cooperation; it's a message from Wendat ancestors that teaches modern people about ancient, life-sustaining food.
According to Huron-Wendat legend, when the daughter of the original mother passed away, her body gave the world three sisters. In the story, each sister is unique: one stands tall, her long yellow hair blows in the wind. Another wears a bright yellow dress and is known to run off on her own. The third is so young she can only crawl along the ground. Only by working together are they able to flourish and grow – so the trio became inseparable.
But the sisters aren't people. They're crops: corn, squash and beans. And the story isn't just an old myth about cooperation, now shared with tourists who visit the Ekionkiestha' National Longhouse at the Huron-Wendat Museum, just outside Quebec City. It's a message from the ancestors of the First Nation that teaches modern Wendat people about the ancient, life-sustaining foods – and a companion planting technique called intercropping that's so important it survived all the turmoil and cultural losses that came with colonisation.
"Before our dispossession, Lake Huron was our home for centuries," said Johanne Paquet Sioui, a Wendat seed keeper and farmer. With arable land that stretched from Georgian Bay on Lake Huron to the shores of Lake Simcoe, the region known historically as Wendake or Huronia supported 30,000 to 35,000 Wendat people.
They lived in settlements surrounded by defensive palisades, with each village containing as many as 100 longhouses. Shared by four or five families, the large rectangular homes were built from log frames and covered with rounded roofs and walls made of cedar, fir or spruce bark. Windowless – the longhouses had two entrances, one at each end. Inside, the walls would have been lined with shelf-like beds that had food storage above them and wood piles beneath. Running in a row down the centre would have been cooking fires where a one-pot meal made from corn, beans and squash, called sagamité, may have simmered.
Back then, the three sisters made up some 60-80% of the Wendat diet, and the Wendat culture, like many others across North America, was centred on the plants' cultivation. Sioui said the men cleared the land and then the women and children would build up dirt piles and plant the beans. As the small seedlings began to grow, the farmers returned and placed corn kernels in the centre of the mounds (theories vary on whether it was corn or beans that were planted first). Next, winter squash was sown. As the plants matured, the cornstalks served as bean poles while the large squash leaves shaded the soil, creating a microclimate that preserved moisture and inhibited weeds.
Today we know that planting corn, beans and squash together results in better disease resistance, less reliance on fertilisers and improved crop yields. But for the Wendat people, it was a sacred act that respected ancient teachings. "We don't pray, instead we're taught to make thanksgiving," said Sioui. "For everything we are grateful for, we learn we have a responsibility to keep it that way."
At the end of the growing season, the vegetables were harvested and stored for winter. Corn and beans were dried and kept in the longhouse in bark or wooden containers. As far as possible, everything was used. Corn husks were braided for rope and twine, or used as filling for pillows and mattresses. The best seeds were selected and saved for the next season's planting by the seed keepers, whose job it is to collect and protect seeds.
But by 1650, the farms and village sites of Huronia or Wendake were empty. Thousands of Huron-Wendat people had succumbed to diseases including smallpox, influenza and measles, while others perished in the French and Iroquois Wars – a series of territorial and trade battles between the French, Haudenosaunee (Iroquois), English and other First Nations.
Only some 500 Huron-Wendat are said to have survived and escaped, and for 200 years, they didn't have a homeland. "The old and the young died. They lost almost everything… their homes, their culture, their skills," said Sioui. What they didn't lose were their seeds, and every year, as they moved across the landscape, the men prepared the land, and the women planted the three sisters. And every year, after the harvest, the seed keepers saved seeds for the next spring.
Then, in 1853, the Huron-Wendat People were allotted reserve land; according to the Indian Act, it measured three by five miles and was located at the edge of Quebec City in what was then Lower Canada. They had a home, but as on most reserves in Canada, there was no arable space provided for agriculture or other food production.
"The last garden we harvested was in 1853," said Sioui.
The three sisters don't just nurture the soil and each other. According to Sioui, the three vegetables combined are exceptionally nutritious. Studies say that a diet based on maize, beans and squash can meet peoples' basic energy and protein requirements and can also help guard against diabetes. They're also high in antioxidants and provide trace minerals and folate, which guards against birth defects. But with the loss of farmland and the introduction of European staples including sugar, flour and butter, this ancient diet was almost completely replaced. The results were catastrophic.
Elders say that the loss of traditional foods is almost as damaging as the loss of language. Losing food systems severs a people's relationship with the natural world, the land, the plants and the seasons. It also takes away the intergenerational skills and celebrations that revolve around food sovereignty: spreading seeds or saving them, gathering together for harvests or for feasts.
Kyle Bobiwash, assistant professor in the Department of Entomology and the Indigenous scholar for the faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences at the University of Manitoba, said this is why it's so important for Indigenous people to be supported by governments and scientists as they relearn their traditions. "First Nations people have forgotten they were farmers. For a long time, we've just been survivors."
As one of the collaborators on the Three Sisters research project in Quebec, which focuses on Indigenous-led agriculture alongside Huron-Wendat and Haudenosaunee people and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Bobiwash said the project is guided by the ongoing goals of the Indigenous participants. After moving through the first phase in 2015, which included a search for ancestral seeds –that turned up Algonquin white and red Mohawk maize, Amish nuttle (also called corn hill) and macuzalito beans, and Algonquin Canada crookneck squash – the project turned to studying the comparative nutritional components of the ancestral plants. After that, they experimented with bean and corn flours to make a modern version of traditional Mohawk cornbread.
"We (scientists) are not here to validate this type of food or of intercropping – we can already look back at thousands of years and see the productivity," Bobiwash said.
Instead, the project is designed to offer support and agency while Indigenous communities decide what they want to know or learn about their traditional crops. At the same time, the scholars and scientists are trying to discover what else the three sisters can teach us about biodiversity and sustainability. "We know we need to do agriculture differently… to think about food systems differently," said Bobiwash, and bringing Indigenous knowledge and values into agriculture might be one solution. "The ancestors knew these systems worked; they may not have known why, but maybe that information was lost along the way."
As the Huron-Wendat begin to reclaim their traditional food systems through the Three Sister's project, small community gardens and demonstration plantings at Huron-Wendat Museum, they've been able to strengthen their culture. At the same time, other aspects of Wendat heritage are also being revitalised. The Wendat language, which nearly went extinct, is now taught in primary schools and to interested adults. And tourism is offering a way for young people to be proud of their culture while sharing their knowledge and history.
The Huron-Wendat Museum and the Huron Traditional Site Onhoüa Chetek8e show how rich the past was – with full-size replica longhouses and opportunities for visitors to learn about the culture through hands-on experiences like canoeing or making a traditional talking stick, which was used in longhouses to determine who had the right to speak. The new Onhwa' Lumina night walk helps bring the language and culture to life with a high-tech collaboration that tells ancient Wendat stories through lights and sound in a forested setting.
Three-Sisters Sagamité (serves 4)
By Marc de Passorio (La Traite)
Makes a light soup, suitable for a starter
Ingredients:
40g dried black beans
20g dried white beans
0.4kg butternut squash
20g corn
¼ onion, diced
2l vegetable broth
5g fresh sage, chopped
fleur de sel to taste
pepper to taste
Instructions:
1. Soak the beans in water overnight.
2. The next day, drain the beans, and then fill a pot with water and add the beans to it.
3. Cook over low heat for two hours or until tender. Drain the beans.
4. Cut the butternut squash into pieces and add it to the corn and onion, and then sauté in oil for 30 minutes.
5. Season with salt and pepper and add sage and beans.
6. Separately, heat the broth and then pour over even portions of the three sisters' preparation.
7. Serve.
Here is a link to the original article:
https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20220801-the-sacred-sisters-of-ancient-america
And if you are or will be in Quebec, visit La Traite! It looks phenomenal. Check out the amazing menus (featuring the AWAKENING THE BEAVER Lunch menu, the FROM OUR MOTHER EARTH Midday menu, and the THE HUNGER OF THE WOLF Evening menu) at their site:
https://restaurantlatraite.ca/
The sacred 'sisters' of ancient America
By Diane Selkirk
2nd August 2022
According to Huron-Wendat legend, when the daughter of the original mother passed away, her body gave the world three sisters. In the story, each sister is unique: one stands tall, her long yellow hair blows in the wind. Another wears a bright yellow dress and is known to run off on her own. The third is so young she can only crawl along the ground. Only by working together are they able to flourish and grow – so the trio became inseparable.
But the sisters aren't people. They're crops: corn, squash and beans. And the story isn't just an old myth about cooperation, now shared with tourists who visit the Ekionkiestha' National Longhouse at the Huron-Wendat Museum, just outside Quebec City. It's a message from the ancestors of the First Nation that teaches modern Wendat people about the ancient, life-sustaining foods – and a companion planting technique called intercropping that's so important it survived all the turmoil and cultural losses that came with colonisation.
"Before our dispossession, Lake Huron was our home for centuries," said Johanne Paquet Sioui, a Wendat seed keeper and farmer. With arable land that stretched from Georgian Bay on Lake Huron to the shores of Lake Simcoe, the region known historically as Wendake or Huronia supported 30,000 to 35,000 Wendat people.
They lived in settlements surrounded by defensive palisades, with each village containing as many as 100 longhouses. Shared by four or five families, the large rectangular homes were built from log frames and covered with rounded roofs and walls made of cedar, fir or spruce bark. Windowless – the longhouses had two entrances, one at each end. Inside, the walls would have been lined with shelf-like beds that had food storage above them and wood piles beneath. Running in a row down the centre would have been cooking fires where a one-pot meal made from corn, beans and squash, called sagamité, may have simmered.
Back then, the three sisters made up some 60-80% of the Wendat diet, and the Wendat culture, like many others across North America, was centred on the plants' cultivation. Sioui said the men cleared the land and then the women and children would build up dirt piles and plant the beans. As the small seedlings began to grow, the farmers returned and placed corn kernels in the centre of the mounds (theories vary on whether it was corn or beans that were planted first). Next, winter squash was sown. As the plants matured, the cornstalks served as bean poles while the large squash leaves shaded the soil, creating a microclimate that preserved moisture and inhibited weeds.
Today we know that planting corn, beans and squash together results in better disease resistance, less reliance on fertilisers and improved crop yields. But for the Wendat people, it was a sacred act that respected ancient teachings. "We don't pray, instead we're taught to make thanksgiving," said Sioui. "For everything we are grateful for, we learn we have a responsibility to keep it that way."
At the end of the growing season, the vegetables were harvested and stored for winter. Corn and beans were dried and kept in the longhouse in bark or wooden containers. As far as possible, everything was used. Corn husks were braided for rope and twine, or used as filling for pillows and mattresses. The best seeds were selected and saved for the next season's planting by the seed keepers, whose job it is to collect and protect seeds.
But by 1650, the farms and village sites of Huronia or Wendake were empty. Thousands of Huron-Wendat people had succumbed to diseases including smallpox, influenza and measles, while others perished in the French and Iroquois Wars – a series of territorial and trade battles between the French, Haudenosaunee (Iroquois), English and other First Nations.
Only some 500 Huron-Wendat are said to have survived and escaped, and for 200 years, they didn't have a homeland. "The old and the young died. They lost almost everything… their homes, their culture, their skills," said Sioui. What they didn't lose were their seeds, and every year, as they moved across the landscape, the men prepared the land, and the women planted the three sisters. And every year, after the harvest, the seed keepers saved seeds for the next spring.
Then, in 1853, the Huron-Wendat People were allotted reserve land; according to the Indian Act, it measured three by five miles and was located at the edge of Quebec City in what was then Lower Canada. They had a home, but as on most reserves in Canada, there was no arable space provided for agriculture or other food production.
"The last garden we harvested was in 1853," said Sioui.
The three sisters don't just nurture the soil and each other. According to Sioui, the three vegetables combined are exceptionally nutritious. Studies say that a diet based on maize, beans and squash can meet peoples' basic energy and protein requirements and can also help guard against diabetes. They're also high in antioxidants and provide trace minerals and folate, which guards against birth defects. But with the loss of farmland and the introduction of European staples including sugar, flour and butter, this ancient diet was almost completely replaced. The results were catastrophic.
Elders say that the loss of traditional foods is almost as damaging as the loss of language. Losing food systems severs a people's relationship with the natural world, the land, the plants and the seasons. It also takes away the intergenerational skills and celebrations that revolve around food sovereignty: spreading seeds or saving them, gathering together for harvests or for feasts.
Kyle Bobiwash, assistant professor in the Department of Entomology and the Indigenous scholar for the faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences at the University of Manitoba, said this is why it's so important for Indigenous people to be supported by governments and scientists as they relearn their traditions. "First Nations people have forgotten they were farmers. For a long time, we've just been survivors."
As one of the collaborators on the Three Sisters research project in Quebec, which focuses on Indigenous-led agriculture alongside Huron-Wendat and Haudenosaunee people and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Bobiwash said the project is guided by the ongoing goals of the Indigenous participants. After moving through the first phase in 2015, which included a search for ancestral seeds –that turned up Algonquin white and red Mohawk maize, Amish nuttle (also called corn hill) and macuzalito beans, and Algonquin Canada crookneck squash – the project turned to studying the comparative nutritional components of the ancestral plants. After that, they experimented with bean and corn flours to make a modern version of traditional Mohawk cornbread.
"We (scientists) are not here to validate this type of food or of intercropping – we can already look back at thousands of years and see the productivity," Bobiwash said.
Instead, the project is designed to offer support and agency while Indigenous communities decide what they want to know or learn about their traditional crops. At the same time, the scholars and scientists are trying to discover what else the three sisters can teach us about biodiversity and sustainability. "We know we need to do agriculture differently… to think about food systems differently," said Bobiwash, and bringing Indigenous knowledge and values into agriculture might be one solution. "The ancestors knew these systems worked; they may not have known why, but maybe that information was lost along the way."
As the Huron-Wendat begin to reclaim their traditional food systems through the Three Sister's project, small community gardens and demonstration plantings at Huron-Wendat Museum, they've been able to strengthen their culture. At the same time, other aspects of Wendat heritage are also being revitalised. The Wendat language, which nearly went extinct, is now taught in primary schools and to interested adults. And tourism is offering a way for young people to be proud of their culture while sharing their knowledge and history.
The Huron-Wendat Museum and the Huron Traditional Site Onhoüa Chetek8e show how rich the past was – with full-size replica longhouses and opportunities for visitors to learn about the culture through hands-on experiences like canoeing or making a traditional talking stick, which was used in longhouses to determine who had the right to speak. The new Onhwa' Lumina night walk helps bring the language and culture to life with a high-tech collaboration that tells ancient Wendat stories through lights and sound in a forested setting.
 |
| Chef Marc de Passorio prepares sagamité (Credit: Hôtel-Musée Premières Nations) |
And at La Traite, a gourmet restaurant in Wendake, patrons are able to taste dishes influenced by Indigenous foods – including a modern take on sagamité. The kitchen is newly helmed by Marc de Passorio, a Michelin-starred chef who came to Le Traite for the opportunity to learn from Indigenous cooks and Elders. "Today I am a complete apprentice: I try to see, understand and experience as much as possible from the First Nations," he said.
With 11 Indigenous Nations spread across Quebec in 55 communities, de Passorio is making a point of getting out on the land and to learn how Indigenous elders hunt, fish, harvest and prepare their traditional foods. Then he and his all-Indigenous kitchen team adapt the ingredients and cooking techniques for contemporary palates. "The First Nations people didn't use salt, so we add that. But we don't play too much with tradition. We want to be respectful."
The goal is to have a seasonal menu that incorporates the different berries, spices, woods, meats and vegetables he learns about as he travels to communities around the province. "People in different places harvest different foods at different times and use them in different ways, so I am gathering recipes and ideas," he said. "I ask everyone what they eat."
While the seasonal menu will reflect what he learns; the simple soup of beans, corn and squash will always remain the star. "I learned the story of the three sisters when I came. Before then, I had cooked beans, corn and squash, but never together. But together they are… fantastic," he said. "Our menu will change, but the sagamité will never come off – it's too important."
Sioui, who is culturally tasked with saving the seeds after each harvest and for the future, agrees. When she thinks of what it took for the seeds to survive, it becomes hard for her to speak, "They are good for our health, good for our heritage. They are holy."
With 11 Indigenous Nations spread across Quebec in 55 communities, de Passorio is making a point of getting out on the land and to learn how Indigenous elders hunt, fish, harvest and prepare their traditional foods. Then he and his all-Indigenous kitchen team adapt the ingredients and cooking techniques for contemporary palates. "The First Nations people didn't use salt, so we add that. But we don't play too much with tradition. We want to be respectful."
The goal is to have a seasonal menu that incorporates the different berries, spices, woods, meats and vegetables he learns about as he travels to communities around the province. "People in different places harvest different foods at different times and use them in different ways, so I am gathering recipes and ideas," he said. "I ask everyone what they eat."
While the seasonal menu will reflect what he learns; the simple soup of beans, corn and squash will always remain the star. "I learned the story of the three sisters when I came. Before then, I had cooked beans, corn and squash, but never together. But together they are… fantastic," he said. "Our menu will change, but the sagamité will never come off – it's too important."
Sioui, who is culturally tasked with saving the seeds after each harvest and for the future, agrees. When she thinks of what it took for the seeds to survive, it becomes hard for her to speak, "They are good for our health, good for our heritage. They are holy."
 |
| Chef Marc de Passorio’s version of "three sisters" sagamité (Credit: Hôtel-Musée Premières Nations) |
Three-Sisters Sagamité (serves 4)
By Marc de Passorio (La Traite)
Makes a light soup, suitable for a starter
Ingredients:
40g dried black beans
20g dried white beans
0.4kg butternut squash
20g corn
¼ onion, diced
2l vegetable broth
5g fresh sage, chopped
fleur de sel to taste
pepper to taste
Instructions:
1. Soak the beans in water overnight.
2. The next day, drain the beans, and then fill a pot with water and add the beans to it.
3. Cook over low heat for two hours or until tender. Drain the beans.
4. Cut the butternut squash into pieces and add it to the corn and onion, and then sauté in oil for 30 minutes.
5. Season with salt and pepper and add sage and beans.
6. Separately, heat the broth and then pour over even portions of the three sisters' preparation.
7. Serve.
Here is a link to the original article:
https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20220801-the-sacred-sisters-of-ancient-america
And if you are or will be in Quebec, visit La Traite! It looks phenomenal. Check out the amazing menus (featuring the AWAKENING THE BEAVER Lunch menu, the FROM OUR MOTHER EARTH Midday menu, and the THE HUNGER OF THE WOLF Evening menu) at their site:
https://restaurantlatraite.ca/
Monday, August 2, 2021
Zen and a Post-COVID World
In a conversation on NHK World Japan, internationally renowned garden designer, chief priest of the Sōtō Zen temple Kenkō-ji, professor at Tama Art University, and president of his own design firm Shunmyō Masuno told design strategist Eisuke Tachikawa that Buddhist principles will guide the post-COVID world.
Friday, July 23, 2021
HOW TO SAVE LIVES
Vaccine mandates are controversial. They’re also an effective way to save lives.
By David Leonhardt and Ian Prasad Philbrick | The New York TimesJuly 23, 2021
How to save lives
Vaccine mandates are controversial. They’re also effective.
Vaccine mandates are controversial. They’re also effective.
- Before Houston Methodist became one of the first hospital systems in the U.S. to mandate Covid-19 vaccines, about 85 percent of its employees were vaccinated. After the mandate, the share rose to about 98 percent, with the remaining 2 percent receiving exemptions for medical or religious reasons, Bloomberg’s Carey Goldberg reported. Only about 0.6 percent of employees quit or were fired.
- Schools — including Indiana University and many private colleges — that require students and workers to get vaccinated have reported extremely high uptake.
- A recent Kaiser Family Foundation survey of Americans who had been opposed to getting vaccinated and later changed their minds found that mandates — or restrictions on the unvaccinated — were one common reason. One 51-year-old man told Kaiser that he began to feel as if he had “limited options without it.”
- The French government will soon require that people show proof of vaccination or a recent negative test to eat at a restaurant, attend a movie or participate in many other activities. After President Emmanuel Macron announced the policy last week, the number of vaccine appointments surged. Italy announced a similar policy yesterday, The Times’s Marc Santora explains.
It’s true that these mandates often generate intense criticism. In France, more than 100,000 people marched to protest Macron’s policy. In the U.S., critics sued, unsuccessfully so far, to stop Indiana University’s mandate. Some Republican politicians have also tried to stop mandates, including Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida and Gov. Mike DeWine of Ohio.
The mandates are also not 100 percent effective. Some people will receive exemptions, as was the case at Houston Methodist. A small number may forge vaccine records. And some vaccinated people will still contract mild versions of Covid, through so-called breakthrough infections.
But even with the opposition and the exceptions, mandates can play a major role in reducing the spread of Covid and saving lives. That’s especially true now that the Delta variant is fueling a rise in cases. “The takeaway message remains, if you’re vaccinated, you are protected,” Dr. Céline Gounder, an infectious disease specialist, told our colleague Apoorva Mandavilli. “You are not going to end up with severe disease, hospitalization or death.”
Throughout history, societies have struggled with when and how to require vaccines. Opponents of mandates have argued that individuals should be allowed to make their own health decisions — and bear the consequences: What, they ask, is more personal than deciding whether to inject a medicine into one’s body? Supporters of mandates have replied that society has a duty to protect its citizens, including those who cannot be inoculated (like young children and some immunocompromised people, in the case of Covid) and are therefore put at risk by people who voluntarily refuse vaccines.
For these reasons, vaccine mandates cause intense disputes. But when supporters win the argument, public health has often benefited. Guy Nicolette, an administrator at the University of California, Berkeley, pointed out to The Washington Post that colleges have long required other vaccines, like the one for measles. “It’s staggering how well a mandate works on a college campus,” he said.
Dr. Aaron Carroll, Indiana University’s chief health officer, has noted that the country’s victories over many diseases — including smallpox, polio, mumps, rubella and diphtheria — have depended on vaccine mandates by states or local governments. “That’s how the country achieves real herd immunity,” Carroll wrote in The Times. (In the U.S., a national mandate may be unconstitutional.)
When states and school districts have opted not to require vaccines, a disease can often spread needlessly, Carroll explained. That has been the case with human papillomavirus, a sexually transmitted disease known as HPV that can cause cancer. It’s also been the case with influenza, which kills about 35,000 Americans in a typical flu season.
Covid now seems certain to join influenza and HPV as diseases that American society chooses to accept. But it is a choice. Companies, schools and communities that decide to enact vaccine mandates will almost certainly save American lives by doing so.
Mark Barnes, a former health official in New York City, told Bloomberg that he expected the number of these mandates to grow in coming months. “We’re going to see more vaccine mandates by large organizations of all kinds,” he predicted.
Link to original article:
The mandates are also not 100 percent effective. Some people will receive exemptions, as was the case at Houston Methodist. A small number may forge vaccine records. And some vaccinated people will still contract mild versions of Covid, through so-called breakthrough infections.
But even with the opposition and the exceptions, mandates can play a major role in reducing the spread of Covid and saving lives. That’s especially true now that the Delta variant is fueling a rise in cases. “The takeaway message remains, if you’re vaccinated, you are protected,” Dr. Céline Gounder, an infectious disease specialist, told our colleague Apoorva Mandavilli. “You are not going to end up with severe disease, hospitalization or death.”
A ‘staggering’ success
Covid is a new disease, and the debates over Covid policy can seem new, as well. But they’re often not wholly new. They instead echo longstanding debates. Vaccine mandates fall into this category.Throughout history, societies have struggled with when and how to require vaccines. Opponents of mandates have argued that individuals should be allowed to make their own health decisions — and bear the consequences: What, they ask, is more personal than deciding whether to inject a medicine into one’s body? Supporters of mandates have replied that society has a duty to protect its citizens, including those who cannot be inoculated (like young children and some immunocompromised people, in the case of Covid) and are therefore put at risk by people who voluntarily refuse vaccines.
For these reasons, vaccine mandates cause intense disputes. But when supporters win the argument, public health has often benefited. Guy Nicolette, an administrator at the University of California, Berkeley, pointed out to The Washington Post that colleges have long required other vaccines, like the one for measles. “It’s staggering how well a mandate works on a college campus,” he said.
Dr. Aaron Carroll, Indiana University’s chief health officer, has noted that the country’s victories over many diseases — including smallpox, polio, mumps, rubella and diphtheria — have depended on vaccine mandates by states or local governments. “That’s how the country achieves real herd immunity,” Carroll wrote in The Times. (In the U.S., a national mandate may be unconstitutional.)
When states and school districts have opted not to require vaccines, a disease can often spread needlessly, Carroll explained. That has been the case with human papillomavirus, a sexually transmitted disease known as HPV that can cause cancer. It’s also been the case with influenza, which kills about 35,000 Americans in a typical flu season.
Covid now seems certain to join influenza and HPV as diseases that American society chooses to accept. But it is a choice. Companies, schools and communities that decide to enact vaccine mandates will almost certainly save American lives by doing so.
Mark Barnes, a former health official in New York City, told Bloomberg that he expected the number of these mandates to grow in coming months. “We’re going to see more vaccine mandates by large organizations of all kinds,” he predicted.
Link to original article:
Saturday, June 19, 2021
Friday, November 13, 2020
Tips To Learning A New Language Quickly
The 75 most common words make up 40% of occurrences
EXPRESSIONS OF POLITENESS (about 50 expressions)
The 200 most common words make up 50% of occurrences
The 524 most common words make up 60% of occurrences
The 1257 most common words make up 70% of occurrences
The 2925 most common words make up 80% of occurrences
The 7444 most common words make up 90% of occurrences
The 13374 most common words make up 95% of occurrences
The 25508 most common words make up 99% of occurrences
--‘Yes’ and 'no’: yes, no, absolutely, no way, exactly.
--Question words: when? where? how? how much? how many? why? what? who? which? whose?
--Apologizing: excuse me, sorry to interrupt, well now, I’m afraid so, I’m afraid not.
--Meeting and parting: good morning, good afternoon, good evening, hello, goodbye, cheers, see you later, pleased to meet you, nice to have met.
--Interjections: please, thank you, don’t mention it, sorry, it’ll be done, I agree, congratulations, thank heavens, nonsense.
--Question words: when? where? how? how much? how many? why? what? who? which? whose?
--Apologizing: excuse me, sorry to interrupt, well now, I’m afraid so, I’m afraid not.
--Meeting and parting: good morning, good afternoon, good evening, hello, goodbye, cheers, see you later, pleased to meet you, nice to have met.
--Interjections: please, thank you, don’t mention it, sorry, it’ll be done, I agree, congratulations, thank heavens, nonsense.
NOUNS (about 120 words)
--Time: morning, afternoon, evening, night; Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday; spring, summer, autumn, winter; time, occasion, minute, half-hour, hour, day, week, month, year.
--People: family, relative, mother, father, son, daughter, sister, brother, husband, wife; colleague, friend, boyfriend, girlfriend; people, person, human being, man, woman, lady, gentleman, boy, girl, child.
--Objects: address, bag, book, car, clothes, key, letter (=to post), light (=lamp), money, name, newspaper, pen, pencil, picture, suitcase, thing, ticket.
--Places: place, world, country, town, street, road, school, shop, house, apartment, room, ground; Britain, name of the foreign country, British town-names, foreign town-names.
--Abstract: accident, beginning, change, color, damage, fun, half, help, joke, journey, language, English, name of the foreign language, letter (of alphabet), life, love, mistake, news, page, pain, part, question, reason, sort, surprise, way (=method), weather, work.
--Other: hand, foot, head, eye, mouth, voice; the left, the right; the top, the bottom, the side; air, water, sun, bread, food, paper, noise.
--Time: morning, afternoon, evening, night; Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday; spring, summer, autumn, winter; time, occasion, minute, half-hour, hour, day, week, month, year.
--People: family, relative, mother, father, son, daughter, sister, brother, husband, wife; colleague, friend, boyfriend, girlfriend; people, person, human being, man, woman, lady, gentleman, boy, girl, child.
--Objects: address, bag, book, car, clothes, key, letter (=to post), light (=lamp), money, name, newspaper, pen, pencil, picture, suitcase, thing, ticket.
--Places: place, world, country, town, street, road, school, shop, house, apartment, room, ground; Britain, name of the foreign country, British town-names, foreign town-names.
--Abstract: accident, beginning, change, color, damage, fun, half, help, joke, journey, language, English, name of the foreign language, letter (of alphabet), life, love, mistake, news, page, pain, part, question, reason, sort, surprise, way (=method), weather, work.
--Other: hand, foot, head, eye, mouth, voice; the left, the right; the top, the bottom, the side; air, water, sun, bread, food, paper, noise.
PREPOSITIONS (about 40 words)
--General: of, to, at, for, from, in, on.
--Logical: about, according-to, except, like, against, with, without, by, despite, instead of.
--Space: into, out of, outside, towards, away from, behind, in front of, beside, next to, between, above, on top of, below, under, underneath, near to, a long way from, through.
--Time: after, ago, before, during, since, until.
--General: of, to, at, for, from, in, on.
--Logical: about, according-to, except, like, against, with, without, by, despite, instead of.
--Space: into, out of, outside, towards, away from, behind, in front of, beside, next to, between, above, on top of, below, under, underneath, near to, a long way from, through.
--Time: after, ago, before, during, since, until.
DETERMINERS (about 80 words)
--Articles and numbers: a, the; nos. 0–20; nos. 30–100; nos. 200–1000; last, next, 1st–12th.
--Demonstrative: this, that.
--Possessive: my, your, his, her, its, our, their.
--Quantifiers: all, some, no, any, many, much, more, less, a few, several, whole, a little, a lot of.
--Comparators: both, neither, each, every, other, another, same, different, such.
--Articles and numbers: a, the; nos. 0–20; nos. 30–100; nos. 200–1000; last, next, 1st–12th.
--Demonstrative: this, that.
--Possessive: my, your, his, her, its, our, their.
--Quantifiers: all, some, no, any, many, much, more, less, a few, several, whole, a little, a lot of.
--Comparators: both, neither, each, every, other, another, same, different, such.
ADJECTIVES (about 80 words)
--Color: black, blue, green, red, white, yellow.
--Evaluative: bad, good, terrible; important, urgent, necessary; possible, impossible; right, wrong, true.
--General: big, little, small, heavy; high, low; hot, cold, warm; easy, difficult; cheap, expensive; clean, dirty; beautiful, funny (=comical), funny (=odd), usual, common (=shared), nice, pretty, wonderful; boring, interesting, dangerous, safe; short, tall, long; new, old; calm, clear, dry; fast, slow; finished, free, full, light (=not dark), open, quiet, ready, strong.
--Personal: afraid, alone, angry, certain, cheerful, dead, famous, glad, happy, ill, kind, married, pleased, sorry, stupid, surprised, tired, well, worried, young.
--Color: black, blue, green, red, white, yellow.
--Evaluative: bad, good, terrible; important, urgent, necessary; possible, impossible; right, wrong, true.
--General: big, little, small, heavy; high, low; hot, cold, warm; easy, difficult; cheap, expensive; clean, dirty; beautiful, funny (=comical), funny (=odd), usual, common (=shared), nice, pretty, wonderful; boring, interesting, dangerous, safe; short, tall, long; new, old; calm, clear, dry; fast, slow; finished, free, full, light (=not dark), open, quiet, ready, strong.
--Personal: afraid, alone, angry, certain, cheerful, dead, famous, glad, happy, ill, kind, married, pleased, sorry, stupid, surprised, tired, well, worried, young.
VERBS (about 100 words)
arrive, ask, be, be able to, become, begin, believe, borrow, bring, buy, can, change, check, collect, come, continue, cry, do, drop, eat, fall, feel, find, finish, forget, give, going to, have, have to, hear, help, hold, hope, hurt (oneself), hurt (someone else), keep, know, laugh, learn, leave, lend, let (=allow), lie down, like, listen, live (=be alive), live (=reside), look (at), look for, lose, love, make, may (=permission), may (=possibility), mean, meet, must, need, obtain, open, ought to, pay, play, put, read, remember, say, see, sell, send, should, show, shut, sing, sleep, speak, stand, stay, stop, suggest, take, talk, teach, think, travel, try, understand, use, used to, wait for, walk, want, watch, will, work (=operate), work (=toil), worry, would, write.
arrive, ask, be, be able to, become, begin, believe, borrow, bring, buy, can, change, check, collect, come, continue, cry, do, drop, eat, fall, feel, find, finish, forget, give, going to, have, have to, hear, help, hold, hope, hurt (oneself), hurt (someone else), keep, know, laugh, learn, leave, lend, let (=allow), lie down, like, listen, live (=be alive), live (=reside), look (at), look for, lose, love, make, may (=permission), may (=possibility), mean, meet, must, need, obtain, open, ought to, pay, play, put, read, remember, say, see, sell, send, should, show, shut, sing, sleep, speak, stand, stay, stop, suggest, take, talk, teach, think, travel, try, understand, use, used to, wait for, walk, want, watch, will, work (=operate), work (=toil), worry, would, write.
PRONOUNS (about 40 words)
--Personal: I, you, he, she, it, we, they, one; myself, yourself, himself, herself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, themselves.
--Possessive: mine, yours, his, hers, its, ours, theirs.
--Demonstrative: this, that.
--Universal: everyone, everybody, everything, each, both, all, one, another.
--Indefinite: someone, somebody, something, some, a few, a little, more, less; anyone, anybody, anything, any, either, much, many.
--Negative: no-one, nobody, nothing, none, neither.
--Personal: I, you, he, she, it, we, they, one; myself, yourself, himself, herself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, themselves.
--Possessive: mine, yours, his, hers, its, ours, theirs.
--Demonstrative: this, that.
--Universal: everyone, everybody, everything, each, both, all, one, another.
--Indefinite: someone, somebody, something, some, a few, a little, more, less; anyone, anybody, anything, any, either, much, many.
--Negative: no-one, nobody, nothing, none, neither.
ADVERBS (about 60 words)
--Place: here, there, above, over, below, in front, behind, nearby, a long way away, inside, outside, to the right, to the left, somewhere, anywhere, everywhere, nowhere, home, upstairs, downstairs.
--Time: now, soon, immediately, quickly, finally, again, once, for a long time, today, generally, sometimes, always, often, before, after, early, late, never, not yet, still, already, then (=at that time), then (=next), yesterday, tomorrow, tonight.
--Quantifiers: a little, about (=approximately), almost, at least, completely, very, enough, exactly, just, not, too much, more, less.
--Manner: also, especially, gradually, of course, only, otherwise, perhaps, probably, quite, so, then (=therefore), too (=also), unfortunately, very much, well.
--Place: here, there, above, over, below, in front, behind, nearby, a long way away, inside, outside, to the right, to the left, somewhere, anywhere, everywhere, nowhere, home, upstairs, downstairs.
--Time: now, soon, immediately, quickly, finally, again, once, for a long time, today, generally, sometimes, always, often, before, after, early, late, never, not yet, still, already, then (=at that time), then (=next), yesterday, tomorrow, tonight.
--Quantifiers: a little, about (=approximately), almost, at least, completely, very, enough, exactly, just, not, too much, more, less.
--Manner: also, especially, gradually, of course, only, otherwise, perhaps, probably, quite, so, then (=therefore), too (=also), unfortunately, very much, well.
CONJUNCTIONS (about 30 words)
--Coordinating: and, but, or; as, than, like.
--Time & Place: when, while, before, after, since (=time), until; where.
--Manner & Logic: how, why, because, since (=because), although, if; what, who, whom, whose, which, that.
--Coordinating: and, but, or; as, than, like.
--Time & Place: when, while, before, after, since (=time), until; where.
--Manner & Logic: how, why, because, since (=because), although, if; what, who, whom, whose, which, that.
Monday, November 2, 2020
Thursday, October 29, 2020
The Humane Middle by John Pavlovitz
I’m Not The Radical Left, I’m The Humane Middle
John Pavlovitz
Apparently, I’ve been radicalized and I wasn’t aware.
Certain people call me the “radical Left” all the time.
I never considered myself radical before.
I just thought I was normal, ordinary, usual.
I thought equity was important to everyone.
I imagined America was filled with people who took that Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of Happiness stuff seriously—for all people.
I thought the Golden Rule was actually mainstream.
Recently I took an inventory of my positions, screening for the extremism:
I believe in full LGBTQ rights.
I believe we should protect the planet.
I believe everyone deserves healthcare.
I believe all religions are equally valid.
I believe the world is bigger than America.
I believe to be “pro-life,” means to treasure all of it.
I believe women should have autonomy over their own bodies.
I believe whiteness isn’t superior and it is not the baseline of humanity.
I believe we are all one interdependent community.
I believe people and places are made better by diversity.
I believe people shouldn’t be forced to abide by anyone else’s religion.
I believe non-American human beings have as much value as American ones.
I believe generosity is greater than greed, compassion better than contempt, and kindness superior to derision.
I believe there is enough in this world for everyone: enough food, enough money, enough room, enough care—if we unleash our creativity and unclench our fists.
I’m not sure how these ideas became radical, though it seems to have happened in the last few years.
I grew up being taught they were just part of being a decent human being.
I grew up believing that loving my neighbor as myself, meant that I actually worked for their welfare as much as my own.
I was taught that caring for the least in the world, was the measure of my devotion to God.
I thought that inalienable rights of other people were supposed to be a priority as a decent participant in the world.
I don’t think I’m alone.
In fact, I’m pretty sure that most people reside here in this place alongside me: the desire for compassion and diversity and equality and justice; that these things aren’t fringe ideologies or extremist positions—but simply the best way to be human.
I think most people want more humanity, not less.
I think the vast middle is exhausted by the cruelty of these days.
That these aspirations seem radical to some people, is probably an alarm that they’ve moved so far into the extremes of their fortified ideological bunkers and been so poisoned by the propaganda, that normal now seems excessive, that equality now seems oppressive, that goodness feels reckless.
Maybe the problem is, these people are so filled with fear for those who are different, so conditioned to be at war with the world, so indoctrinated into a white nationalistic religion of malice—that they’ve lost sight of what being a human being looks like anymore.
I am pretty sure that I don’t represent the “radical Left,” but the vast, disparate, compassionate, humane Middle; people who are not threatened by someone else’s presence, who do not see another person’s gain as their loss, who don’t worship a Caucasian, American god.
I suppose humanity feels radical to inhumane people.
In that case, I’ll gladly be here in my extremism.
Apparently, I’ve been radicalized and I wasn’t aware.
Certain people call me the “radical Left” all the time.
I never considered myself radical before.
I just thought I was normal, ordinary, usual.
I thought equity was important to everyone.
I imagined America was filled with people who took that Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of Happiness stuff seriously—for all people.
I thought the Golden Rule was actually mainstream.
Recently I took an inventory of my positions, screening for the extremism:
I believe in full LGBTQ rights.
I believe we should protect the planet.
I believe everyone deserves healthcare.
I believe all religions are equally valid.
I believe the world is bigger than America.
I believe to be “pro-life,” means to treasure all of it.
I believe women should have autonomy over their own bodies.
I believe whiteness isn’t superior and it is not the baseline of humanity.
I believe we are all one interdependent community.
I believe people and places are made better by diversity.
I believe people shouldn’t be forced to abide by anyone else’s religion.
I believe non-American human beings have as much value as American ones.
I believe generosity is greater than greed, compassion better than contempt, and kindness superior to derision.
I believe there is enough in this world for everyone: enough food, enough money, enough room, enough care—if we unleash our creativity and unclench our fists.
I’m not sure how these ideas became radical, though it seems to have happened in the last few years.
I grew up being taught they were just part of being a decent human being.
I grew up believing that loving my neighbor as myself, meant that I actually worked for their welfare as much as my own.
I was taught that caring for the least in the world, was the measure of my devotion to God.
I thought that inalienable rights of other people were supposed to be a priority as a decent participant in the world.
I don’t think I’m alone.
In fact, I’m pretty sure that most people reside here in this place alongside me: the desire for compassion and diversity and equality and justice; that these things aren’t fringe ideologies or extremist positions—but simply the best way to be human.
I think most people want more humanity, not less.
I think the vast middle is exhausted by the cruelty of these days.
That these aspirations seem radical to some people, is probably an alarm that they’ve moved so far into the extremes of their fortified ideological bunkers and been so poisoned by the propaganda, that normal now seems excessive, that equality now seems oppressive, that goodness feels reckless.
Maybe the problem is, these people are so filled with fear for those who are different, so conditioned to be at war with the world, so indoctrinated into a white nationalistic religion of malice—that they’ve lost sight of what being a human being looks like anymore.
I am pretty sure that I don’t represent the “radical Left,” but the vast, disparate, compassionate, humane Middle; people who are not threatened by someone else’s presence, who do not see another person’s gain as their loss, who don’t worship a Caucasian, American god.
I suppose humanity feels radical to inhumane people.
In that case, I’ll gladly be here in my extremism.
Wednesday, September 16, 2020
Friday, June 19, 2020
Tuesday, June 2, 2020
Tuesday, April 14, 2020
"In these strange, uncertain times..."
The phrase "strange, uncertain times" has quickly and unfortunately become overused, and will soon join its sibling "shock and awe" in the dustbin of newscycle and talking-head clichés.
Although what is happening is undeniably tragic and unlike anything in our living memories, I suspect there are some interesting transformations going on in people's lives and hearts. And they will continue to evolve in response to the changes happening in the topography of culture and our new and changing ways of interacting with each other and the world.
Illustrator and comedian Ramin Nazer captures both the expected clichéd reactions and the epiphanies...
https://www.raminnazer.com/
Although what is happening is undeniably tragic and unlike anything in our living memories, I suspect there are some interesting transformations going on in people's lives and hearts. And they will continue to evolve in response to the changes happening in the topography of culture and our new and changing ways of interacting with each other and the world.
Illustrator and comedian Ramin Nazer captures both the expected clichéd reactions and the epiphanies...
https://www.raminnazer.com/
Thursday, April 9, 2020
Coronavirus reveals just how deep macho stereotypes run through society by Stephen Burrell and Sandy Ruxton
Yet more proof of toxic masculinity...a fascinating article from The Conversation US.
Coronavirus reveals just how deep macho stereotypes run through society
April 9, 2020 6.59am EDT
by Stephen Burrell and Sandy Ruxton
Early indications suggest more men are dying from COVID-19 than women – although some countries, including the UK, are not publishing data on this.
Experts are unsure exactly why this might be. It may in part be due to differences in biology. Suggestions have been made, for example, that it might be because men and women have a different immune response, and that men’s immune systems may not activate in the same way as women’s to fight the virus. But lifestyle and behaviour are also likely to play a role.
For a start, men are more likely to have underlying health problems relevant to COVID-19 – such as high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease and some chronic lung diseases. This is in part because men are more likely to engage in risky behaviour such as smoking, drinking and drug-taking.
Research also seems to indicate that some men may take personal hygiene – such as handwashing – less seriously than women. This could be due to the fact that cleanliness is often associated with femininity, domesticity and beautification.
However, the writer Caroline Criado-Perez has also pointed out that because most medical research focuses on male bodies, there is a lack of understanding about why women may be better able to fend off this virus.
Loneliness and social isolation
The COVID-19 pandemic has also highlighted the different roles men and women are still expected to play in society – men are not only less likely to take care of themselves, but also less likely to be involved in caring for others.
It is striking how much women are depended on to deliver both low-paid and unpaid care work – whether for children, disabled people, older people, or those in ill health. Indeed, the pandemic is placing additional caring responsibilities on women.
COVID-19 is forcing people to reflect upon human fragility, mutuality and interdependence. But gender norms also require men to be invulnerable – always strong and self-sufficient.
Men, who also tend to socialise more in groups in public, may take social distancing less seriously than women. They may find it difficult to accept they need help, too – seeing it as “unmanly” to do so.
Older men in particular are more likely to experience loneliness and social isolation – and this could put them at increased risk of mental health problems.
Lockdown impacts
Gender norms also expect men to be powerful and in control. So while many men may relish the opportunity to be more involved at home, some have used it to assert more dominance and control over their partners and children.
For many women and children, the home is the most dangerous place to be. The UK’s National Domestic Abuse Helpline has seen a 25% increase in calls since lockdown began – which highlights how quarantine can compound domestic and sexual abuse.
Porn sites have also seen increased traffic and some are offering free access during lockdown. Campaigners have warned that this, along with an increased reliance on technology, could contribute to a rise in online harassment and sexual abuse.
Responses to COVID-19
Men’s voices are dominating government responses to COVID-19, and the approaches of many governments are increasingly shaped by masculinist politics.
The UK government and its nearly all male “war-cabinet”, for example, declared “war” on the coronavirus. This is a problematic analogy as what is mainly needed to tackle COVID-19 is care, social solidarity and community support – not fighting and violence.
Some world leaders on the other hand have been alarmingly dismissive of the pandemic, as if their countries were too tough to be affected by the disease.
These patriarchal discourses can have serious implications for government policy, such as encouraging overly militaristic, authoritarian approaches, and prioritising male-dominated sectors of the economy and society. For instance, women are more likely to be in temporary, informal or precarious work which falls outside the protection packages being established.
There is also a danger that, as with previous crises, government support will prioritise industries seen as “strongest for the economy” – and dominated by men – such as aviation, car production and construction. This could again result in vital sectors where women are more prominent being neglected: such as education, care and retail.
This is why there is an urgent need for gender analysis of government measures related to COVID-19, and the impact these have on different social groups. There must also be a dramatic increase in funding for services to help those at risk of domestic and sexual abuse.
But more broadly this crisis is a huge opportunity to reassess political priorities and gender relations. It offers the chance to overturn years of neglect by recognising the essential contribution of care to society. This will not only help to encourage men to play their part, but it will go some way towards shifting harmful gender norms in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Link to the original article:
https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-reveals-just-how-deep-macho-stereotypes-run-through-society-134968
Coronavirus reveals just how deep macho stereotypes run through society
April 9, 2020 6.59am EDT
by Stephen Burrell and Sandy Ruxton
Early indications suggest more men are dying from COVID-19 than women – although some countries, including the UK, are not publishing data on this.
Experts are unsure exactly why this might be. It may in part be due to differences in biology. Suggestions have been made, for example, that it might be because men and women have a different immune response, and that men’s immune systems may not activate in the same way as women’s to fight the virus. But lifestyle and behaviour are also likely to play a role.
For a start, men are more likely to have underlying health problems relevant to COVID-19 – such as high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease and some chronic lung diseases. This is in part because men are more likely to engage in risky behaviour such as smoking, drinking and drug-taking.
Research also seems to indicate that some men may take personal hygiene – such as handwashing – less seriously than women. This could be due to the fact that cleanliness is often associated with femininity, domesticity and beautification.
However, the writer Caroline Criado-Perez has also pointed out that because most medical research focuses on male bodies, there is a lack of understanding about why women may be better able to fend off this virus.
Loneliness and social isolation
The COVID-19 pandemic has also highlighted the different roles men and women are still expected to play in society – men are not only less likely to take care of themselves, but also less likely to be involved in caring for others.
It is striking how much women are depended on to deliver both low-paid and unpaid care work – whether for children, disabled people, older people, or those in ill health. Indeed, the pandemic is placing additional caring responsibilities on women.
COVID-19 is forcing people to reflect upon human fragility, mutuality and interdependence. But gender norms also require men to be invulnerable – always strong and self-sufficient.
Men, who also tend to socialise more in groups in public, may take social distancing less seriously than women. They may find it difficult to accept they need help, too – seeing it as “unmanly” to do so.
Older men in particular are more likely to experience loneliness and social isolation – and this could put them at increased risk of mental health problems.
Lockdown impacts
Gender norms also expect men to be powerful and in control. So while many men may relish the opportunity to be more involved at home, some have used it to assert more dominance and control over their partners and children.
For many women and children, the home is the most dangerous place to be. The UK’s National Domestic Abuse Helpline has seen a 25% increase in calls since lockdown began – which highlights how quarantine can compound domestic and sexual abuse.
Porn sites have also seen increased traffic and some are offering free access during lockdown. Campaigners have warned that this, along with an increased reliance on technology, could contribute to a rise in online harassment and sexual abuse.
Responses to COVID-19
Men’s voices are dominating government responses to COVID-19, and the approaches of many governments are increasingly shaped by masculinist politics.
The UK government and its nearly all male “war-cabinet”, for example, declared “war” on the coronavirus. This is a problematic analogy as what is mainly needed to tackle COVID-19 is care, social solidarity and community support – not fighting and violence.
Some world leaders on the other hand have been alarmingly dismissive of the pandemic, as if their countries were too tough to be affected by the disease.
These patriarchal discourses can have serious implications for government policy, such as encouraging overly militaristic, authoritarian approaches, and prioritising male-dominated sectors of the economy and society. For instance, women are more likely to be in temporary, informal or precarious work which falls outside the protection packages being established.
There is also a danger that, as with previous crises, government support will prioritise industries seen as “strongest for the economy” – and dominated by men – such as aviation, car production and construction. This could again result in vital sectors where women are more prominent being neglected: such as education, care and retail.
This is why there is an urgent need for gender analysis of government measures related to COVID-19, and the impact these have on different social groups. There must also be a dramatic increase in funding for services to help those at risk of domestic and sexual abuse.
But more broadly this crisis is a huge opportunity to reassess political priorities and gender relations. It offers the chance to overturn years of neglect by recognising the essential contribution of care to society. This will not only help to encourage men to play their part, but it will go some way towards shifting harmful gender norms in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Link to the original article:
https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-reveals-just-how-deep-macho-stereotypes-run-through-society-134968
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