Inter-Culturalism

Reagan’s Refugees: Why Undocumented Migrants Have a Right to Work Here

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Undocumented migrants have a right to work here because they deserve economic reparations for failed U.S. economic policies and disastrous military interventions. We hardly need another symptom of the spiritual and social bankruptcy of the system, but this new Arizona law targeting and criminalizing undocumented migrants is a good example. You might know that Gov. Jan Brewer signed last week a new law that broadens police power to stop anyone at anytime for virtually any reason simply for looking suspiciously like an undocumented immigrant. It is supposed to take effect in August, but this is unlikely since it is probably unconstitutional and will face a barrage of court challenges. This Saturday, May Day, the traditional day for workers rights, more than 70 cities are planning protests against the law, and boycotts against Arizona are spontaneously spreading — as they should.

Christianity

Seismic Shift in Seminary Education

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How should future religious leaders be trained so that they can at once be rooted in their traditions and equipped to work with people of others? This question has been asked with increased urgency, as American theological seminaries have tried to adapt to what has become the most religiously diverse country in history. Answers have proven somewhat elusive. This week, from April 14 – 16, a group of remarkable visionaries and emerging inter-religious leaders convened at Andover Newton Theological School and Hebrew College to discuss potential answers during the pioneering CIRCLE National Conference 2010. Participants included Brad Hirshfield, co-Founder of CLAL: The National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership, Ingrid Mattson, Director of the Macdonald Center for the Study of Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations at Hartford Seminary and Executive Director of the Islamic Society of North America, and Stephen Graham, Director of Faculty Development and Initiatives in Theological Education at the Association of Theological Schools.

Culture

Be Ready for Overwhelming Joy

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Last week, I had the privilege of reading from my novel, Hold Love Strong, at Pete’s Candystore, a great venue in Brooklyn, a few blocks from 334 Manhattan Avenue, where once I lived in the middle of a friend’s apartment and often climbed the fire escape to the roof where I began to piece my life back together; or rather, began the process of reflection and self-possession necessary for living a full and meaningful life. After I read, Nadia and I had the chance to speak with Mira Jacobs, one of the curators of the event and a mother to a one-and-a-half-year-old son, Zakir, a name that means remembering and/or grateful. Talking about new motherhood, pregnancy, and childbirth, Nadia repeated a phrase a friend had recently said to her, and although she meant it in reference to having a baby, it is, I think, at the very core to the solutions of our present social and political problems, and thus what we — those of us who wish for a peaceful, humane world if not for ourselves then for our children — must do and anchor ourselves to in order for there to be the chance for the world we can imagine, the world we deserve. “Be ready,” she said, “for overwhelming joy.” Mira agreed with Nadia, and she expanded on the statement, speaking about her son and motherhood with exuberant reverence.

Inter-Culturalism

Considering Race and the Census on the Cusp of Fatherhood

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I met my wife Nadia when we were twelve, and although I’d like to say that our relationship has been that frog and princess story we all love, life is never so perfectly simple. Thus, the fact that we are married means we have accepted the responsibilities and overcome the institutionalized social constructions that pervade our greater world, and more intimately my Jewish and her African American culture. Some of these social constructions are positive forces in our lives, and some we have mastered or manipulated and made such. Of course, there are also those that continue to serve to do nothing more than tear us down and apart and we have to find a way to overcome despite the fact that we were infected with a degree of first love syndrome that has thus far proven to be eternal, and the more days we share a life together, vital; at least, that is, for me. What I am talking about is race, and racism, and what it means to be an interracial, intercultural couple on the cusp of parenthood in Brooklyn, New York in the year 2010.

Inter-Culturalism

The Obama Cult: Part Two

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In my last piece, I argued that a very special almost intimate resonance existed between Obama and large numbers of intellectuals and opinion-makers, and that this resonance gave a distinctive stamp to his Presidency. This resonance has deep roots in such things as the special character of the American Presidency, the decline of the party system, and the rise and character of the media. Here, however, I simply want to identify Obama’s particular and unique appeal, without yet judging or even analyzing, except briefly at the end. The first major characteristic that gives Obama his special, in many ways unconscious, appeal is the fact that he is an African-American. Since the days of slavery, when the spirituals identified the slaves as the chosen people, Americans have believed that a young, black Moses would save them from what WEB DuBois called this “empty desert of dust and dollars.”

Culture

April Fools: Jokes, Friendship, and Erasmus?

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“Have a seat!” I’d say on April Fool’s Day, offering a classmate a little wooden chair. If she were foolish enough to accept my kindness, I’d jerk it back and she’d fall on her butt. Or I’d point to a friend’s shirt: “Oh my God! There’s a spider on your pocket!”

Culture

Mo'nique's Oscar, Racial Stereotypes, A Black Man Gives Up On Hollywood

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Novelist and Tikkun Daily reader Gwendoline Y. Fortune wrote us these comments about a critique of Monique’s Oscar that she likes and adds her own son’s experience of trying to make a difference in Hollywood. The following is from a college friend. The author is the president of Bennett College for Women, where I attended during my first two–and crucial–years of college. Knowing that her position will be critiqued, I am comfortable with the values, training and attitudes I was taught that are congruent with Dr. Malveaux’s, and not with less. Mo’nique’s Oscar — Victory and Setback By Julianne Malveaux
The comedienne, talk show host and actress Mo’nique became just the fifth African American woman to win an Oscar last week.

General News

Starhawk (3) — Voices for Peace in Palestine

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Human Rights Watch (HRW) has accused Israel of increasing its arbitrary repression of Palestinian non-violent activism lately. Abdullah Abu Rahma’s arrest — which I reported on in the second segment of my interview with Starhawk — is part of this crack-down in Bil’in, Nil’in, and Ramallah, where grassroots demonstrations have begun to mobilize Palestinians, Israelis, and international solidarity against the wall being built between the occupied territories and Israel. According to HRW,
Israel is building most of the barrier inside the West Bank rather than along the Green Line, in violation of international humanitarian law. In recent months, Israeli military authorities have arbitrarily arrested and denied due process rights to several dozen Palestinian anti-wall protesters. Starhawk believes that the Israeli government fears this non-violent resistance more than the violent action they’ve contended with for years.

General News

Starhawk (2) — An American Jew's Story

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Like most Jewish kids in postwar America, Starhawk grew up believing that Israel was the salvation of the Jewish people. She collected pennnies to plant trees in the Holy Land, learned Israeli folk songs and Israeli dances, and dreamed of going to Israel. At 15 she finally attended a Zionist program in Israel. Star believes that she was raised with a compelling story — that Jews were kicked around for 2,000 years, almost exterminated in the Holocaust, and out of those ashes, finally got their own land again. “And by God,” she adds, “nobody’s going to take an inch of it away from us.”

General News

Starhawk's Activist View of Palestine

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For those of you who don’t know her, Starhawk is the best-known Wiccan author alive today. She’s published eleven books, including The Spiral Dance, which introduced many of us to Wicca. And from the beginning of her career, she’s been very involved as an activist, most recently supporting Palestinians in the occupied territories. After spending last week with Starhawk, I realized that she’s a “meta-activist,” a node of many different types of activism, and a font of knowledge about how to act most effectively when demonstrating, educating, and building a new world. She’s been active in the women’s movement, the anti-nuclear movement, the anti-globalization movement, in creating greater sustainability and a permaculture for the Earth, as well as in supporting Palestinian non-violence for the creation of a Palestinian state.