The comics Amar Chitra Katha (or The Immortal Stories) got started when a newspaper executive watched a quiz show where kids knew little to nothing about the Hindu epic The Ramayana. Now ACK has been a kids’ entertainment empire for decades – but it’s an empire built on bigotry: “ACK’s writing and illustrative team constructed a legendary past for India by tying masculinity, Hinduism, fair skin, and high caste to authority, excellence, and virtue. On top of that, [the] comics often erased non-Hindu subjects from India’s historic and religious fabric.”
Tag: 12.20.17
The Ten Worst Parts Of Being An Arts Fundraiser
Karen Brooks Hopkins, longtime president of the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM): “As fundraisers, we are constantly told to look at the bright side: If at first you don’t succeed; smile though your heart is breaking, etc. But as a former president and chief fundraiser for a large multidisciplinary arts organization, I have decided, in the spirit of the season, to present my ‘bottom 10 list’ delineating the worst, most excruciating parts of the job.”
How Traveling To Learn Lost Its Edge
“In a world where travel has lost many of its mental and physical exertions, one meets people who fly thousands of miles to do a bit of shopping in Dubai, to lie on a beach in Bali, or to watch a cricket match in Adelaide… Some travellers travel enormous distances and keep all their preconceptions intact.”
The First Computer-Generated Christmas Carols Came From Alan Turing’s Lab In 1951
“Now researchers from the Turing Archive at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand have used old recordings to recreate a now-lost 1951 BBC broadcast of a couple of [those] Christmas carols.” (includes sound clips)
Take A Look At The Top Traits Needed To Be Successful Working At Google
“Project Oxygen shocked everyone by concluding that, among the eight most important qualities of Google’s top employees, STEM expertise comes in dead last. The seven top characteristics of success at Google are all soft skills: being a good coach; communicating and listening well; possessing insights into others (including others different values and points of view); having empathy toward and being supportive of one’s colleagues; being a good critical thinker and problem solver; and being able to make connections across complex ideas. Those traits sound more like what one gains as an English or theater major than as a programmer.”
Yu Guangzhong, An Exiled Poet Who Longed For His Homeland Of China, Dies In Taiwan At 89
He was “a prominent poet, essayist and translator whose best-known work, ‘Nostalgia,’ came to symbolize the aching separation, displacement and longing for cultural unity felt by many in mainland China and in the Chinese diaspora.” Generations have memorized ‘Nostalgia,’ and it’s even been used in high levels to argue for the reunification of Taiwan with the mainland.
Why Hoover’s FBI Investigated ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’ For Communist Influences
“An unnamed FBI agent who watched the film as part of a larger FBI program aimed at detecting and neutralizing Commie influences in Hollywood … uncovered that ‘those responsible for making It’s a Wonderful Life had employed two common tricks used by Communists to inject propaganda into the film.'”
New York Law Will Hold The City’s Algorithms Accountable To Residents
Once signed into law by Mayor Bill de Blasio, the legislation will establish a task force to examine the city’s “automated decision systems”—the computerized algorithms that guide the allocation of everything from police officers and firehouses to public housing and food stamps—with an eye toward making them fairer and more open to scrutiny.
US College Enrollments Are Down Again, For The Sixth Straight Year
The 1 percent decline this fall was due to undergraduate enrollments, which fell by nearly 224,000 students, or 1.4 percent. Graduate and professional programs were up by 24,000 students, according to the center, which tracks 97 percent of students who attend degree-granting institutions that are eligible to receive federal financial aid.
How Elizabeth Banks, Actor, Became Elizabeth Banks, Movie Mogul
“There’s such an assertive quality to her, and I mean that in the greatest possible way. She’s like some old studio exec from 1942 – her in a suit and cigar would make perfect sense. Ben always calls her the Mogul.”