The Smithian

May 19th, 2013

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Every spring, hundreds of thousands of devotees converge at a shrine to pay homage to the Virgin del Rocio during an annual pilgrimage…

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May 15th, 2013

thesmithian

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acknickulous:

“A Second Look At The First Communion”
Paterson, New Jersey
May 2013

[look of the hour]

Reblogged from "stillness in time."

May 14th, 2013

thesmithian

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‘…in today’s China, an author can feel a true sense of freedom if he doesn’t pander to the authorities to have his works published. It requires courage, tolerance of isolation, a strong belief of the future and a deep passion for literature—like a pious religious believer. It requires deep belief that the progress of human society is unstoppable and that China will become a truly democratic, free and open country. Freedom of publishing will come one day sooner or later.’ — Yan Lianke

‘…in today’s China, an author can feel a true sense of freedom if he doesn’t pander to the authorities to have his works published. It requires courage, tolerance of isolation, a strong belief of the future and a deep passion for literature—like a pious religious believer. It requires deep belief that the progress of human society is unstoppable and that China will become a truly democratic, free and open country. Freedom of publishing will come one day sooner or later.’ — Yan Lianke

May 9th, 2013

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This is a strange book.

May 7th, 2013

thesmithian

‘…think what America would look like without its mostly Southern states…’

…Universal health care. No guns. Strong unions. A humane minimum wage. A humane immigration policy. High revenues from a fair tax structure. A massive public-works program. Legal gay marriage. A ban on carbon emissions. Electric cars. Stronger workplace protections. Extended family leave from work in case of pregnancy or illness. Longer unemployment benefits. In short, a society on a par with most of the rest of the industrialized world—a place whose politics have finally caught up with its social and economic realities.

…a sundering of the union would make the other half of America equally fulfilled. The red-state republic could…establish a theocracy in which the fundamentalist Christian church would legislate all the important aspects of civic life…It could, taking the lead from the pioneering Kansas legislature, abolish the income tax, raising revenue from, for example, a “pay to work” program. It could ban abortion in all instances, including rape and incest, and use the growing population of orphans to establish an impressive standing army.

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May 7th, 2013

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…according to most sources, the King James Bible has 788,000 words or more. [Phillip] Patterson uses sheets of 19-by-13-inch watercolor paper for his task, which he rules by hand with pencil lines. Sitting at a desk by his bed, he tracks the page of his hardcover Bible with one hand, and writes, using felt-tip pens, with the other. When the page is finished, he erases the pencil lines, leaving black ink on a clear white page.

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May 6th, 2013

thesmithian

‘For law enforcement to equate increased religiosity or radicalism with violence isn’t only a bad investigative strategy and arguably unconstitutional…’

…it fundamentally damages the character of society. “To be a radical means to reject the status quo, which in some cases propels society forward…Equating radicalism with terrorism can produce a dampening effect on free expression—either by government or by self-censorship.”

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May 4th, 2013

thesmithian

‘The breadth and quality of religion reporting in the United States has atrophied in recent years…’

…with once-robust religion sections now all but erased from the pages of the nation’s leading newspapers. Meanwhile, religion reporters have either been laid off or forced to re-shift their professional focus to covering religion “on the side.” The result is a mainstream media sorely lacking in quality religion reporting, a fact that calls into question the press’ ability to paint an accurate picture of modern American life.

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May 4th, 2013

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Central and northern Nigeria exemplify what happens when a country abandons certain regions so completely, failing to provide adequate education, social services, development, employment, and transparent political culture: extreme results rise up. In Plateau, I have spent time with a Christian who makes and sells guns, a reflective twenty-two-year old man with melancholic eyes who once thought he would go to college and start his own business, until his hometown became an undeclared war zone.

Alexis Okeowo, in the New Yorker

May 1st, 2013

thesmithian

We were all asleep when a group of men set fire to our house…

Fatima Ahmad

a grandmother, who lost three relatives during the violence, described fleeing for her life after the battle started.

and

in the battle’s aftermath, the number of people killed during the April 16 clash between Nigerian security forces and the armed group Boko Haram was subject to wildly conflicting reports.

April 30th, 2013

thesmithian

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…we need more Keith Ellisons in Congress. Not just because he’s a great progressive voice, supporting the president but challenging him strongly on his questionable austerity politics, but also because he’s a patriotic American who’s also a Muslim. He’s crucial right now. On “Meet the Press” David Gregory tried to pigeonhole Ellison a little: “You’re a Muslim—this concerns you on civil libertarian grounds and other areas.” Ellison shot back: “I’m an American,” Ellison replied. “And I’m concerned about national safety—public safety—just like everyone is.”

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April 27th, 2013

thesmithian

Superficially, the America of [President] McKinley’s time—a nation of 76 million people dominated by an Anglo-Saxon Protestant elite, in which only a handful of nonwhites and women were even permitted to vote—has little in common with the America of Barack Obama. But the nativist paranoia about alien ideologies and alien religions remains strikingly familiar, as does the quest for “enemy combatants” behind every door and under every sofa. If you ask me, the real enemy combatants, now as in 1901, are right here at home, ready and willing to surrender our remaining rights and freedoms in the name of rooting out the supposedly imported virus of evil.

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Superficially, the America of [President] McKinley’s time—a nation of 76 million people dominated by an Anglo-Saxon Protestant elite, in which only a handful of nonwhites and women were even permitted to vote—has little in common with the America of Barack Obama. But the nativist paranoia about alien ideologies and alien religions remains strikingly familiar, as does the quest for “enemy combatants” behind every door and under every sofa. If you ask me, the real enemy combatants, now as in 1901, are right here at home, ready and willing to surrender our remaining rights and freedoms in the name of rooting out the supposedly imported virus of evil.

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April 26th, 2013

thesmithian

We have got to look at the roots of all of this because it exists across the whole [Asian] subcontinent and the Islamic world around the world. I think we also have to examine [America’s] use of drones [because] there are a lot of civilians who are innocently killed in a drone attack in Pakistan, in Afghanistan and in Iraq. And I can tell you having spent a lot of time over there, young people will come up to me on the streets and say, ‘We love America, but if you harm one hair on the head of my sister, I will fight you forever.’ And there is this enormous rage against what they see in that part of the world as a presumptuousness of the United States.

Tom Brokaw, on Meet The Press

also:

Back in 1968, opponents of the Vietnam War were being marginalized in much the same way critics of today’s wars now are. But when such a revered voice as Cronkite took to television to declare the conflict an unwinnable “stalemate,” he helped create a tipping point whereby Americans began to reconsider their assumptions.

April 19th, 2013

thesmithian

…Why not cast female Jewish Indian dancers as Hindu heroines, since their families allowed them to perform onstage? In a largely untold and nearly forgotten story, Indian Jewish actresses rose to become some of the most famous starlets during the golden age of Bollywood.

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art: Nadira

…Why not cast female Jewish Indian dancers as Hindu heroines, since their families allowed them to perform onstage? In a largely untold and nearly forgotten story, Indian Jewish actresses rose to become some of the most famous starlets during the golden age of Bollywood.

more.

art: Nadira

April 19th, 2013

thesmithian

…challenges those who believe that all history is the history of conflict, whether over class…or over religion, nationality, race, gender or civilization. The fact is, mankind’s divisions may not be the most important part of the story. As Cannadine…puts it, “humanity is still here.” This is so hopeful a book, and so authoritative in its coverage of history, that a reader wants to believe its thesis.

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…challenges those who believe that all history is the history of conflict, whether over class…or over religion, nationality, race, gender or civilization. The fact is, mankind’s divisions may not be the most important part of the story. As Cannadine…puts it, “humanity is still here.” This is so hopeful a book, and so authoritative in its coverage of history, that a reader wants to believe its thesis.

more.