Accidental Blogger
A general interest blog
Category: Educational, Cultural & Social Matters
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One of the things I most enjoy about vacation is the chance to catch up on my reading — as well as my junk pop culture consumption. So I recently had the chance to read The Fight Club, the novel on which the popular 1999 movie is based, about severely-depressed white-collar workers who find succor…
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A new story of bonded child labor in an expose by the UK newspaper The Observer came out early yesterday, prompting indignant and horrified commentary on the blogosphere. The investigation highlighted the plight of several children essentially ‘sold into servitude’ by their families:Amitosh, a 10 year old pushed into embroidering toddler blouses says: ‘I…
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Once after giving a talk on a seminal piece of work, the brilliant Indian physicist Meghnad Saha was told by an elderly member in the audience, "There is nothing new here. It’s all in the Vedas." From then on, whenever Saha came across a new or intriguing development in physics, he is said to have quipped,…
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In his op-ed piece in the Washington Post, George Will describes the democratization of luxury. With the profusion of millionaires world wide, increased wealth in the hands of the middle and upper middle class and mass production of luxury goods, conspicuous consumption is no longer what it once was. It has become easier to keep up…
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David Horowitz is a silly and dangerous man. He has an agenda and he will go to any length to promote it even if it means resorting to extreme incivility and the occasional lie. I first came across his latest plan of spreading hatred on US campuses a week or so ago. I had little…
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Inhabitants of the Indian subcontinent have traveled the world far and wide for centuries. Before colonial times the travel was mostly voluntary. Indian influence in the far and middle east spread mainly through trade and religion. Later during the British rule when Britain got busy expanding its colonial reach on several continents, Indian indentured labor…
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When Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited Columbia, Lee Bollinger (the university’s president) introduced him by way of diatribe: You’re a dangerous liar and also a jerk! As previously noted, this was inappropriate in light of the university’s role as a university. Basically, the argument is that Bollinger was speaking in his representative capacity and Columbia should not…
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Lester Hunt is in the mood for Kurt Vonnegut – revisiting a favorite book from his youth and its iconic author. He recently re-read Cat’s Cradle after a gap of many years and enjoyed it the second time around. In a very good review, Lester grants the book its place on the "classics" pedestal but he…
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Sam Fentress is a Jack Kerouac of sorts. He travels the roads of America looking to find not himself but Biblical signs and bill boards – messages to praise and persuade. In his many sojourns he has found farmhouses, grain silos, restaurants, hair salons, gas stations and even traffic signs bearing Biblical messages. An artist…
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Immigrants wishing to become US citizens are required to take an exam to test their knowledge of American history, politics and civics. The US Citizen and Immigration Services has a designed a new set of questions to make the test a bit more in-depth than the older one. The 100 questions were whittled from an…
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Did you know Holocaust denial is "dangerous"? It’s a well known fact; everybody says so. But dangerous to whom and how? It’s stupid, certainly. But with all due respect, the never forget meme isn’t going to prevent the occurrence of atrocities in the future (one might note that we–the West generally, and perhaps in particular…
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Immigrants to a new country bring with them their language, culture and cuisine. They also bring along other ingrained habits of day to day existence. Some learn and adjust to the norms of the new country, others have a harder time shaking off old ones. "Drive like you never left home." That seems to be…
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Usha Alexander and Namit Arora recently returned from a trip to China. Their observations on China’s Forbidden City and wide range of gastronomical delights at Shunya’s Notes.
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The New York Times has an article about vanishing languages. The author quotes linguists who claim that almost half of the existing languages of today are in danger of becoming extinct – some as early as next week! Of the estimated 7,000 languages spoken in the world today, linguists say, nearly half are in danger of…
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In the comments section of my recent post "The Lingering Smell of Fear" I brought attention to the University of Florida incident where student Andrew Meyer was tasered by the campus police for what was judged as "aggressive" questioning of Senator John Kerry. (see the video here and the report here) Meyer was asked to…
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