Sunday, March 14, 2010

“Students lead cultural program for children - Canton Repository” plus 3 more

“Students lead cultural program for children - Canton Repository” plus 3 more

Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

Students lead cultural program for children - Canton Repository

Posted: 14 Mar 2010 08:38 PM PDT

 With the video camera rolling and their 3-year-old son, Ryan, grinning ear to ear, Colleen and Robert Wolfe watched their 7-year-old daughter, Megan, perform a traditional Spanish dance called "El Tiburón" — or "The Shark" — and shake homemade maracas.

Megan was one of about 55 children who attended a Saturday morning program at Jackson High School, the culmination of six weeks of Spanish lessons taught to them by high school students who are members of the Sociedad Honoraria Hispánica, or Spanish Honor Society.

The morning included stops in Mexico, Argentina, Costa Rica, Ecuador, and Spain, where the children had their passports stamped, learned fun facts, made crafts, learned dances and tried traditional cuisine.

"I think this is really good," said Wolfe, "It's important to have two languages and when kids start young, it will be easier for them."

That was what the honor society had in mind when its members started weekly classes after school, teaching the younger children the language they have come to speak fluently as high school Spanish students.

Saturday's cultural event was the idea of senior Carli Williams, who spearheaded the day, along with Stephanie Schneider and Kelly Loveless.

"It's exciting for the kids to explore the different countries," said Williams (who appeared later in the day as the National Hamburger Queen in Akron's St. Patrick's Day Parade).

Schneider, who also studies French, Chinese, and Italian, is president of the honor society and hopes to one day be president of the United States.

"We are teaching these kids a respect for other languages," she said. "It's one of the most important things we can communicate."

Parthena Draggett, chairman of the language department at Jackson and the group's adviser and teacher, was obviously and understandably proud of her students.

"They have to be the best kids in Stark County," she said, adding "They've reimpassioned me as a teacher."

At only two years old, Jackson's Spanish Honor Society is the only one in Stark County and one of 1,600 chapters in the United States. They already have won a national award for teaching Spanish to firefighters.

One member, junior Chené Benger, had an easy job at the event. She taught the children about Mexico, where she lived for five years, until seven months ago.

Before that, said her mother, Nadine Benger, who helped supervise the event, their family lived in South Africa. Chené's father works for the Timken Co.

They also have a freshman son at Jackson who takes Spanish. Even though they have been speaking it for five years, they enjoy learning more in the classroom.

"Their teacher (Draggett) is so enthusiastic. The kids love her," Nadine Benger said. "She makes them want to learn."

For Loveless, a senior, teaching the younger kids was a rewarding experience. "Going back and seeing they actually remembered (what we taught) was so cool," she said.

The group hopes to do the event again next year and grow to at least 200 children. They already were making lists as to how to make it better.

What was the best part of the day? According to third-grader Krishna Saminathan, it was all fun, but "Definitely all the eating."

Note to next year's planners: Keep the treats.

Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

Women Trailblazers in the Cultural and Creative ... - Art Daily

Posted: 14 Mar 2010 06:58 PM PDT

 LONDON.- The Cultural Leadership Programme (CLP) has unveiled its first-ever list of 'Women to Watch'. Featuring 50 female leaders, directors, producers and curators from across the UK, the list celebrates women who are who are already making a huge contribution to the rich cultural life of the UK, and have the potential to rise to the very top.

In the coming years, these 'Women to Watch' will be leading the way in design, libraries, literature, museums, heritage, music, performing and visual arts, the historic environment and creative businesses; redressing the gender balance at senior leadership levels in the cultural and creative sector.

The list also celebrates the rich diversity of women in the sector, highlighting talent from a variety of backgrounds - from independent consultants to business directors and those working within some of our leading organisations - and aims to inspire future generations to be equally dynamic and ambitious.

The list includes five women in dance; six in music; five in design, branding and digital media; five in theatre; eight in literature and libraries and four in museums and heritage.

CLP received a large number of high-quality nominations from across the UK and the final 50 were chosen by an eminent judging panel, made up of figures from the cultural and creative industries: the media and popular culture. Broadcaster Jenni Murray OBE chaired the panel, made up of Jenny Sealey, Artistic Director of Graeae; Kwame Kwei-Armah, actor and director; Dame Liz Forgan, Chair of Arts Council England; Rita Clifton, CEO of Interbrand; Sarah Weir, Head of Arts and Cultural Strategy for the Olympic Delivery Authority and multi award-winning choreographer Wayne McGregor.

Jenni Murray, said: "The final 50 women were chosen after a great deal of consideration by the judging panel and represent some of our most ambitious and talented cultural leaders.

"I speak for the whole judging panel when I say that choosing a final list from amongst so many high quality nominations was both a delight and a challenge. While we are obviously celebrating the achievements of outstanding individuals, it is also important to see these women as a collective force and as representative of women's potential to reach the top of their game within this, and any other, sector."

Sophie Thomas, founder of sustainable design agency Thomas.Matthews and one of the 50 Women to Watch, has led on many significant projects including the highly acclaimed 'No Shop' campaign for Friends of The Earth. "For me, building a successful design business has never been focused on creating enough profit to be able to buy myself a yacht," she says. "Like many female headed practices we are powered by passion and drive to build up benefit for all. It is therefore great to be recognised for this and I am enormously proud of all our achievements"

Seonaid Daly, Producer of the Glasgow Film Festival, has secured a 25% increase in total attendance from 2008 to 2009: "I believe a national campaign such as this is very important and will inspire younger generations to enter the creative industries and strive to succeed at the highest level," she says.

Appointed to the role of Chief Curator of Historic Royal Palaces at the age of 28, Lucy Worsley has since created a team of young and creative curators who are re-inventing what curatorship means in historic sites. She says: "There are some great role models for ambitious and clever women in heritage and museums, but there should be so many more."

Other 'Women to Watch' include Sally Goldsworthy, Director of Discover, the children's story making centre in Stratford, East London; Ruth Gould, who has excelled in leading a once small disability arts organisation to host one of the biggest Deaf & Disability Arts Festivals in the UK, DaDaFest and Juliana Farha, the first entrepreneur to innovate in the fields of social media and classical music, through her online website Dilettante Music.

Cumbria-based Julie Tait, has become one of the leading players in the Street Arts sector over the past few years, through heading up the popular festival Lakes Alive: "I think the cumulative effect of recognising the impact of 50 women working in this important sector cannot be underestimated," she says.

"It is all about recognising talent and achievements but it's also about showcasing the distinctive contribution women are making through new and creative approaches to leadership which I hope will inspire and motivate future generations to be ambitious in this sector."

The achievements of all 50 women will be celebrated at an evening reception tonight (10 March) and all women will become part of an ongoing Women to Watch network, to aid their career development.

Madrid could add siesta to list of protected Spanish ... - Daily Telegraph

Posted: 14 Mar 2010 03:23 PM PDT

Fiona Govan in Madrid
Published: 10:25PM GMT 14 Mar 2010

An application has been presented to Madrid authorities calling for the 'siesta' to be given a special cultural status to ensure its preservation.

It comes following the announcement earlier this month by Esperanza Aguirre, the President of the conservative regional government in Madrid, that the bullfight was to be included on the list of items of "special cultural value" that were protected by law.

The controversial decision to put bullfighting on the same cultural level as Madrid's most important historical monuments caused outrage amongst animal rights activists.

Daniel Dorado, a lawyer who campaigns for the protection of animals, filed an application last week arguing that the siesta fulfills the same criteria for protected cultural patrimony as bullfighting.

"The siesta is a cultural fact of special relevance and significance, an art which deserves protection," he declared in the request presented last week.

"It has been part of Mediterranean and Spanish culture for time immemorial," he said echoing the argument used to justify the inclusion of bullfighting on the list.

Mr Dorado argues that the siesta - traditionally a post lunch snooze of up to an hour - was being threatened by the pressures of modern working practices and that its loss could bring about the demise of the country.

In an attempt to mock the law which protects the culture of bullfighting above the prevention of cruelty to animals he argued that Madrid was under obligation to preserve the siesta and should consider installing beds in the street.

Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.

Which 'China Model' Is Iran Following? - Salon

Posted: 14 Mar 2010 07:41 PM PDT

Many have speculated in recent years that Iran's regime would eventually embrace the 'China Model' in order to maintain power. This notion has grown especially salient since June's election unrest. The weeks and months following have arguably been Iran's Tiananmen. Following the brutal crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing's Tiananmen Square in 1989, China judged that the best way to hedge against further unrest was to relax ideological rigidity and help the people get rich. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was no longer just the representative of the proletariat; it co-opted the urban intelligentsia and bourgeoisie by providing them opportunities for economic upward mobility. Whereas students had long eschewed CCP membership, 80 percent were applying just a decade after the Tiananmen crackdown (see Journal of Democracy, July 2009).

The Iranian regime appears to embrace no such model today. Instead, a second and much more frightening 'China Model' may better apply - that of the Cultural Revolution. By 1966 Mao Zedong had grown dissatisfied with his people's revolutionary fervor. He feared that pro-Western and capitalist forces lurked just below the surface, ready to undermine his revolutionary achievement. Mao and the CCP's most radical elements thus launched a cultural revolution to purge China's bureaucracies and academies of any such influences and re-affirm the primacy of 'Mao Zedong Thought.' Even regime stalwarts such as Deng Xiaoping fell victim, losing their posts and their public standing (at least temporarily). The CCP unleashed bands of youths known as the Red Guards to harass those who did not comply with Mao's re-enforced strictures. Intellectuals died or languished in prison; libraries were destroyed.

Fast-forward to Iran, 2010. At a recent gather of the Revolutionary Guards (who seem to be taking over everything in Iran these days), IRGC officials and 'cultural elites' decried the state of Iran's educational system, which they deem to be lacking an acceptable level of respect for and deference to the Islamic Revolution (see article by insideIRAN.org). Supreme Leader Khamenei's representative to the Revolutionary Guards suggested that a cultural revolution in Iran must be undertaken in order to preserve the theocratic system, no matter how tiring and time-consuming such an initiative may be. Tangible steps as well as talk suggest that just such an effort is underway. Iran quadrupled funding after last summer's unrest for the Basij -- the loose, IRGC-affiliated vigilante group that committed most of the violence against election protesters. Much of the increased funding is likely to go toward recruitment, especially of youths (the Basij is estimated at one million foot soldiers). The Basij already plays a prominent role in mosques and schools; its role in monitoring academic instructors and curricula is likely to grow. It is, potentially, Iran's own version of Mao's Red Guards.

Iran's leadership knows that it is engaged in a long-term struggle. I have posited since last summer that generational change is the most likely avenue to regime change. Khamenei, et al, appear to agree, and appear poised to do whatever it takes to win a long cultural war. Iran watchers and policy-makers should stay attuned to the possibility of Iran following an altogether different 'China Model.'

The writer is a PhD candidate in foreign affairs at the University of Virginia and founder of US-IRAN-RELATIONS.COM. 

 

Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction.
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