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At Colgate, Afghan official talks about restoring education
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Said Tayeb Jawad, Afghanistan's ambassador to the U.S., said Thursday that the people of Afghanistan didn't ignore their educational system during the past 30 years of turmoil, they "purposely destroyed it."
The ambassador was the featured speaker at a Colgate University event that reflects Colgate's connections to Afghanistan, which focus on restoring that country's educational system.
Jawad said 69 percent of the women in his country are unable to read and more than 80 percent of the schools or libraries have been either damaged or destroyed in a country that has seen war and oppression since the Soviet invasion in 1979. Of the remaining schools, only 29 percent have roofs, he said. "But despite all this, kids are going back to school by the hundreds, even thousands," he said.
The Afghanistan government, installed after U.S. troops unseated the repressive Taliban regime, now provides total financial support for students from kindergarten through the college level, Jawad said. The effort is part of the Afghan government's desire to reconnect with the rest of the world.
"We feel it's important to invest in the education of our people -- for they are our future," he said. "Our young people are eager to learn, very eager to partner with that international community."
The presentation was part of "Education and Development: Building Sustainable Systems of Higher Education in Developing Countries," a three-day conference on the Colgate campus. One focus of the conference has been the role American institutions can play in supporting educational systems of developing nations, specifically Afghanistan. |
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Picturing the prophet; Though Muslims have depicted Muhammad in the past, today debate rages
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Shimron, Yonat
News & Observer
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While Christians are accustomed to seeing images of their holiest figures -- Jesus, Mary, the saints -- Islam frowns upon such representations. But lost in the protesting and rioting that have erupted over the Danish cartoons that depict the Prophet Muhammad is one historic fact: Muslims themselves have portrayed the prophet in art.
Although such depictions were never widely seen -- and are now rejected by the mainstream of the faith -- these older works are respectful, even reverential, as opposed to the representations that appeared in the Danish paper Jyllands-Posten.
The historic artworks portray various scenes from the prophet's life -- his encounter with the angel Gabriel, his family and his ascension to heaven. Many of these exquisitely colorful images, mostly from the 14th to the 16th centuries, remain available.
When Omid Safi took his students to Turkey last summer, the Colgate University religion professor found reproductions of the originals in postcards and posters sold in shops and kiosks all over Istanbul, and especially outside the Mosque of Sultan Ahmet, commonly known as the Blue Mosque.
"You're hearing all this conversation about how Islam has prohibited images, while forgetting a large part of the rich tradition of representation," said Safi, a Duke University graduate.
When it comes to images of the Prophet Muhammad, the real issue, said Safi, is not whether the prophet should be depicted, but how and for what purpose. The incendiary cartoons of the prophet with a turban in the shape of a ticking bomb, for example, were obviously meant to provoke.
Muslims across the world reacted by boycotting Danish products, setting fire to Danish and Norwegian missions in Damascus, protesting and rioting. To Muslims, Muhammad is an exemplar of humankind. The cartoons implied to some that he was a terrorist.
Islam's tradition of avoiding the representation goes back to the religion's origins. The faith was born into a culture of idol worshippers in the seventh century. Fearing a return to those practices, early Muslim jurists discouraged any visual representation.
Such an aversion to images is not just a Muslim practice. The scribes of the Hebrew Bible saw idols as the chief competitors to the God of Israel. Christians, too, feared idolatry. In the eighth century, Christian "iconoclasts" destroyed devotional artwork and shrines from Rome to Constantinople. In the 16th century, Protestant Reformers and later the Puritans opposed any images of Jesus and stripped their churches of all art, with the exception of the unadorned cross.
But the inspiration to create artistic depictions of holy figures persisted, even in Muslim cultures. In historic Turkey, Afghanistan and Persia, which is now Iran, artistic portrayals of the Prophet Muhammad proliferated.
"We have lots of pictures of Muhammad in history and biography books," said Carl Ernst, a professor of religion at UNC-Chapel Hill. "These were not sacred books. They were made for the elite, the nobility. They were given as gifts by one ruler to another."
Still, mosques have, for the most part, avoided all representation, and that may be fueling the current furor over the Danish cartoons.
The Islamic Association of Raleigh has responded to the controversy by organizing a series of Friday lectures on the Prophet Muhammad. It recently took out a half-page ad in The News & Observer inviting the public to an open house from 2 to 5 p.m., March 18 at its mosque on Ligon Street in Raleigh, at which it plans to screen a PBS documentary on the prophet's life.
"A lot of people are uneducated on who the prophet is," said Zakir Hussain, a spokesman for the Islamic Association of Raleigh. "What we're trying to do is tell people who he really was and eliminate confusion."
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Now forbidden
Leaders of the Islamic association objected to any representations of the prophet for this story, saying it would violate a key tenet of the faith. While depictions of the prophet may have been considered less blasphemous in the past, modern practice strictly disavows it. Because of their objections, The News & Observer is not publishing the historical images of Muhammad, but they can be viewed at www.zombietime.com.
"Muslim sentiments are frayed," said Ebrahim Moosa, professor of Islamic studies at Duke University. "They would see it as a way to add insult to injury."
Some scholars have suggested the rise of fundamentalism has driven mainstream Muslims to take extreme positions. Some Muslim jurists are so anti-image they even object to the display of family photos. It is this kind of extremism that led the Taliban, for example, to destroy two large Buddhist statues in Afghanistan in 2001. More recently, when Time magazine did a cover story on the afterlife, the Asian edition omitted a picture of the Prophet Muhammad ascending to heaven.
"Sadly," Emran Qureshi, a scholar and journalist, wrote in a recent New York Times op-ed piece, "the recent polarization obscures a rich humanistic tradition within Islam -- one in which cosmopolitanism, pluralism and a spirit of open-minded inquiry once constituted a dominant ethos."
The U.S. Supreme Court building in Washington, D.C., includes a frieze of the "great lawgivers of history," and includes Muhammad alongside Confucius and Charlemagne. Sculpted in 1931, the frieze shows the prophet holding the Quran in his left hand and a sword in his right.
Various Muslim organizations have at times objected to the representation, but the court has turned down requests to remove Muhammad from the frieze. The court's Web site says the inclusion of Muhammad was a "well-intentioned attempt by the sculptor, Adolph Weinman, to honor Muhammad, and it bears no resemblance to Muhammad."
For Muslims, the frieze remains a thorny issue. Marc Conaghan, a spokesman for the Muslim American Public Affairs Council, an advocacy group for Triangle Muslims, said he thinks representation is wrong, period.
"Anything that can lead to worship anything other than God should not be done," Conaghan said. "It can lead to idolatry." |
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Quartet to play for familiar audience
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Boyle, Bryan
Denver Post, The
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You can go home again. Or is it: You can't go home again? That literary reference has always lurked beyond my depth.
A small group of college kids won't have it either way. They much prefer the former.
Four lacrosse players from Colgate University in Hamilton, N.Y., return to their Colorado roots for a matchup tomorrow with the University of Denver. It's the first-ever trip to Colorado for the Colgate program, and a heckuva homecoming for senior captains Andrew Jarolimek (Arapahoe High School), Brian Robinson (Colorado Academy) and Peter Whitcomb (George Washington) as well as freshman Spencer Cooperman (Cherry Creek).
What lures a crop of prep-lacrosse standouts in Denver to the middle of nowhere -- er, I mean New York -- to play college ball?
For one, good education. With approximately 2,750 undergraduates, Colgate is ranked 15th in this year's U.S. News & World Report list of America's top liberal-arts colleges.
Colgate goalie Andrew Jarolimek: "I'm excited for my former lacrosse coaches who will be in attendance. They coached a number of us that will be playing, and it's going to be rewarding for them to see what has become of their hard work and dedication."
And two, good lacrosse. Despite its relatively small enrollment, Colgate competes at the Division I level within the Patriot League, which leads the NCAA in D-I graduation rates among student-athletes. And according to this week's Inside Lacrosse media poll, Colgate ranks 25th in the country.
"The academics are incredible here, and my coach at Creek had mentioned to me that this program was a good program with a great coach," said Cooperman of his decision to go east. "He had sent a player here before, so he knew the coach. And it went from there.
"The fact that there were some Coloradoans on the team was a big plus. They're all real good guys and real good lacrosse players, too."
Asked what he missed about Denver, Cooperman quickly quipped, "The sun."
Rays aren't all the fellas will get reacquainted with this weekend.
"I am really looking forward to playing in my hometown," said Jarolimek, Colgate's goaltender, "so my friends and family who have not had the opportunity to watch me play in many years finally get their chance.
NCAA LACROSSE
No. 25 Colgate vs. No. 15 Univ. of Denver
When: Saturday, 1:30 p.m.
Where: Peter Barton Stadium, DU campus
Tickets: All seats are general admission: adults $9, children/seniors $5, under-2 FREE, DU faculty/staff $7, students $3.
More info: Call 303-871-2336 or visit Ticketmaster's Lacrosse Page.
"I am also looking forward to the opportunity to compete against some old high-school rivals and summer-lacrosse teammates. Finally, I'm excited for my former lacrosse coaches who will be in attendance. They coached a number of us that will be playing, and it's going to be rewarding for them to see what has become of their hard work and dedication."
The homecoming reunion also turns out to be a true test for the Colgate team. DU is ranked 15th following a victory over then-No. 13 North Carolina, so the 1:30 p.m. game at Peter Barton Stadium will not only be a chance to bask in the warmth of some sun, family and friends, but also some glory.
"It's a big opportunity for us to prove something to the lacrosse world," said Cooperman. "We feel -- we know -- that we're a great team. We're excited about the opportunity to prove that this weekend." |
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The Misunderstood Fourth Amendment
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It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a government in want of information must be in possession of a warrant. Or, if one prefers to quote the Warren Court, as do critics of NSA surveillance and the Patriot Act: "Searches conducted outside the judicial process, without prior approval by judge or magistrate, are per se unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment."
Well, sort of. Unless, that is, the police are in hot pursuit, or conducting a search incident to a lawful arrest, or have "reasonable suspicion" that a crime is about to be committed, or a suspect has given consent to a search, or a suspect's joint possessor (or roommate) has given consent--then no warrant is required. Or, come to think of it, unless federal administrators are checking whether a shop has followed minimum wage and maximum hour regulations, or a chemical company has complied with environmental regulations, or a liquor store's bookkeeping conforms to federal standards. Or unless the IRS wishes to see whether your income tax return squares with your bank records, or HHS wants to see if you have kept up your child support payments. Or unless you are visiting the House or the Senate or entering most any other government building. Or unless you are a high school student and the principal has reason to believe that you have cigarettes in your purse. Or unless you are hoping to board a plane, or a train, or to leave the country, or return to it. Each of these instances involves a government search; none requires a warrant.
In the 1967 case of Katz v. United States, Justice Potter Stewart qualified the "per se unreasonable" statement above by adding--"subject only to a few specifically established and well-delineated exceptions." But in the face of such pervasive, and hardly "well-delineated," examples of warrantless government searches, one must wonder if it isn't warrants that are the exception.
And indeed, if one consults the text and history of the Fourth Amendment, an exercise often disdained by the Warren Court, one will find that such is the case. Ironically, a more originalist reading reveals a Fourth Amendment that is better suited both to protecting civil liberties and to fighting the war on terror.
Start with the simple text of the Fourth Amendment, which contains two clauses, as emphasized in the formatting below:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Note that these are independent clauses--the first concerning "unreasonable searches and seizures," the second concerning "warrants" and "probable cause." What is their relation to each other?
The Warren Court encouraged a "second clause dominant" approach. That is, the second clause defines what is meant by the first clause. What, under this approach, is a "reasonable search"? It is one in which a warrant has been issued by a judge upon probable cause, etc.
This reading is possible, but hardly compelling. If this is what the Founders meant, why didn't they say just say so? It would not have been difficult to subordinate the first clause to the second. They could have written, for instance, "As the people have a right to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable search or seizures, no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, etc." Or, even better, and in keeping with the Constitution's celebrated concision, they could have simply eliminated the first clause entirely and stuffed its gist into the second. "No warrant shall issue [for search or seizure of persons, houses, papers, and effects], but upon probable cause. . . ."
Of course, neither of these rephrasings leaves much room for Justice Stewart's "few well-delineated exceptions." But then, if room for exceptions was the point, the original phrasing, "The right of the people to be secure . . . against unreasonable searches," seems an odd way of making it.
A growing number of jurists and scholars--most notably, Yale's Akhil Amar--are coming to see that a "first clause dominant" approach to the Fourth Amendment better comports with the text, history, and common sense. The first clause states the general rule: All searches must be "reasonable." The second clause provides an important specification of the first: If a warrant does issue, it is per se unreasonable unless supported by probable cause, etc. Lacking such a warrant, the official can be sued for trespass if the search is otherwise unreasonable.
This reading is by far the more cogent one. It allows us to see the numerous and ill-defined "exceptions" not as exceptions at all, but simply as applications of the general standard of reasonableness. It gains additional force when we realize that throughout the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, the warrant requirement was not the primary way in which the people were rendered secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects. Instead, as Bradford Wilson of Princeton has shown, the people were rendered secure against errant public officials by the right to sue them for trespass before a local jury. In the colonial period, in fact, warrants were viewed with suspicion precisely because they immunized the public official from such a suit. And for that very reason, the Founders sought to limit the circumstances in which a warrant could issue; otherwise, a warrant would license officials to barge into your home, rough you up, peruse your diary, rifle your private letters, and take some incriminating or embarrassing materials--all with literal impunity.
Understanding the original function of a warrant also allows us to see what a bizarrely ill-fashioned substitute the Warren Court gave us with the exclusionary rule--the doctrine that excludes from criminal trial evidence procured in violation of the Court's warrant requirement, regardless of its reliability. Not only is the criminal to go free, as Benjamin Cardozo famously derided the idea, "because the constable has blundered," but the constable is to go free despite his blundering, and the suspect is to go uncompensated despite his injury. (That is, unless one considers acquittal--or better odds thereof--a form of compensation.)
Members of the Warren Court no doubt believed they were broadening the scope of civil liberties and the rights of criminal defendants. But by teaching that every search under the Fourth Amendment requires a warrant and probable cause, they also implied the obverse: A search that by custom does not require warrant and probable cause--the installation of a device recording the telephone numbers of those you call or of those who call you, for example, or a subpoena of your bank records-is not really a "search," under the Fourth Amendment. Which is what the Burger Court concluded in precedents that still stand.
More disturbing is that the Warren Court's exclusionary rule fostered the massive misunderstanding that the Fourth Amendment primarily concerns criminal procedure. Neither the constitutional text nor its history implies any such restriction. Regardless of the purpose of a search--criminal, civil, regulatory, disciplinary, or national security-the Fourth Amendment requires that it be "reasonable."
Beyond its disregard of text and history, the Warren Court's "second clause dominant" approach denuded the Fourth Amendment of the robust common sense implied in the concept of "reasonable." "Probable cause" does focus on an important question: What basis do you have for believing something? But that is only one element of a reasonable search, which allows and requires a broader array of considerations that interact in complex ways. How grave is the danger? Are we talking about teens smoking cigarettes in the school bathroom or terrorists smuggling VX nerve gas into the Capitol? How urgent? A ticking time bomb or the acquisition of potentially dangerous materials that will require months of processing? How intrusive is the search? Are there alternative, less intrusive means for conducting it? Are we talking about a metal detector or a strip search?
What if we face the worst concatenation of these dimensions? A grave and urgent danger--say, imminent detonation of a radioactive device--where only swift and drastic measures can succeed. Common sense demands that we allow them. Probable cause demands that government first say with a 51 percent certainty who holds the bomb or where it is--which it cannot do. And at the other extreme? Consider a minor infraction presenting no harm to others--a teenage girl has swallowed forbidden chewing gum, physical evidence of which is needed by the school for disciplinary action. It can only be obtained by an emetic. Common sense says forget it. Probable cause, standing alone, demands that government first say with a 51 percent certainty who holds the gum or where it is--which it can do. Of course, no sane jurist would forbid drastic action for the radioactive device or allow an emetic for the chewing gum, but that's because they would be guided by the criterion of reasonableness, rather than by the Warren Court's per se formulations.
Once we remove the mounds of misunderstanding that have covered it, we find a Fourth Amendment in far better shape to deal with the war on terror than the misshapen caricature bequeathed by the Warren Court. It is a robust and unstinting Amendment that properly brings within its purview airport screenings and border searches, pen registers and track and trace devices, "national security letters" and other administrative subpoenas, FISA production orders, NSA taps of international communications, and more. At the same time, the protection it provides is against "unreasonable searches and seizures," not ones measured by the narrow and rigid criteria of probable cause and particular description. The probability is minuscule that any given air passenger plots a shoe-bomb attack, yet the danger is so grave and the search so minimally intrusive that few could deem it unreasonable to place one's shoes on a conveyer belt as a condition of boarding a plane.
The Fourth is also an agile amendment--misunderestimated, one might say--by those who think of it primarily as a rule of criminal procedure. In the war on terror, as jurist Richard Posner has pointed out, the urgent and grave task is knowing who the agents are. Too often, as with September 11, we can identify a terrorist with a probable-cause level of confidence only after an attack has occurred. Surveillance of international calls, where we have identified one party as an agent of terrorism, to take a current example, seems like an eminently reasonable way of obtaining such vital information.
And for the abuses of warrantless searches done in the name of national security, the original understanding of the Fourth Amendment suggests a remedy admirably fit: civil suits for compensatory damages. Warrants should still play their traditional role of conferring immunity. FISA court orders authorizing surveillance should afford individual officers immunity. (It is worth noting that FISA courts issue "orders," not "warrants," so all electronic surveillance for foreign intelligence, contrary to the rhetoric of the critics, is "warrantless.") Already FISA affords such civil remedies, supplemented through the Patriot Act, for unauthorized disclosures, with special procedures to maintain national security. FISA and NSA guidelines might be similarly reviewed through similar procedures in case of a civil suit. Of course, even in camera inspection of such guidelines presents legitimate concerns about national security. But on such issues, in time of authorized conflict, courts should recognize that they are not the only body with responsibility for determining the reasonableness of searches.
Moreover, the traditional tort remedy implies the traditional tort threshold for getting into court in the first place--a concrete legal harm. The J. Edgar Hoover era affords ample evidence that surveillance power can be abused. But internal guidelines, developed by professional legal staff of the FBI and NSA; inspectors general, acting as independent watchdogs; and administrative reporting requirements to the intelligence committees and other congressional overseers--all seem to function effectively to limit such abuses. Indeed, in spite of the frenzied attention brought to NSA surveillance by the leaks to the media, the only legal harm so far alleged is that of government spying on Iyman Faris, the Ohio trucker, who ironically makes essentially the same claim as the Bush administration: The evidence used to induce his guilty plea of plotting with al Qaeda to collapse the Brooklyn Bridge would not have been obtained but for this spying program.
Such "harm" also reminds us of the other side of the fundamental right to be secure in our person and property against unreasonable searches and seizures: the government's fundamental obligation to secure us against those who seek to destroy us and our freedom.
Stanley C. Brubaker is a professor of political science at Colgate University. |
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Volunteers build Eaton family a home
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Alvarado, Nadia
Post-Standard, The
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The eighth house to be erected by Madison County Habitat for Humanity soon will be completed.
The 1,300-square-foot home in Eaton is one of more than 200,000 built by Habitat for Humanity International, a nonprofit, ecumenical Christian housing ministry. Since construction on the two acres began in August, thousands of hours of volunteer work have been invested into the future home of Richard Insel, a Morrisville State College graduate, and his family.
Families apply to local Habitat affiliates and are selected based on their level of need, ability to repay a no-interest loan, and willingness to become partners in the program. In addition to a down payment and the monthly mortgage payments, homeowners work on their house and the houses of others.
The houses are sold at no profit and have mortgages that range from seven to 30 years. Monthly mortgage payments are used to build other Habitat houses, according to the organization.
Flooring, cabinets and trim work are all that's left to do before the family can move in, which will be in four to six weeks, said Doug Taber, who sits on the chapter's board of directors.
"I'm very happy with the progress we've done," Taber said. "It's been very gratifying."
Taber said about 15 volunteers worked on the four-bedroom, two-bathroom house on Huntington Camp Road Saturday, finishing the drywall and applying the first interior coat of paint. He said he's seen "a lot of dedicated people come out weekend after weekend" since the project began.
Habitat homes are built using donated money, supplies and volunteer labor. Some dedicated volunteers at the Eaton house are students from the campus chapter of Habitat for Humanity at Colgate University. Every weekend when classes are in session, a group of about six students carpools to the house from campus.
"It's definitely been rewarding; seeing the progress has been amazing," said John Demler, the chapter's co-president. He said everyone has a great time volunteering, but the number of volunteers started to decrease a little once snow started falling.
"It's tougher to get people out in the winter 'cause it's cold and it's hard to get up early, but once you're up, it's not so bad," the sophomore said. "We try to go as often as we can. . . ."
"We leave at 8:30 a.m. and get back to Colgate about 1:30 p.m. or 2 p.m. They usually have lunch there for us and it's really good."
Hot lunches are often provided for the volunteers by one of the home's future occupants, Tanya LeBeau-Insel. While her husband works on the house every Saturday, LeBeau-Insel watches their three children - Patrick, Veronika and Thomas - and makes meals. She said the best part of this experience has been watching her community come together.
"It has been so unbelievable," LeBeau-Insel said. "Before we had this opportunity I would have thought so many people have forgotten how to help out their neighbors. This has definitely opened my eyes to see how generous and caring some people still are."
Volunteers are needed to paint the house in Eaton Saturday. To help, call (866) 751-6340. |
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The conflicted career of actress Anna May Wong
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Whitty, Stephen
Star-Ledger, The
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America was founded by explorers and built by pioneers and we continue to salute their spirit. Inventors, innovators, iconoclasts - these have always been our heroes, whether their adventures took place along a dusty wagon trail or in a New Jersey laboratory.
What isn't often written about is how lonely being first can be.
Anna May Wong was born of two cultures, and made singular strides in both of them. As a young Chinese woman, she broke with timeless tradition to pursue an independent life and career. As a young American actress, she broke the Hollywood color line to establish herself as a sex symbol and star. She blazed trails.
Yet her successes were bittersweet. Her family viewed her fame with suspicion, at best. Her Hollywood bosses stereotyped her as a China Doll, or Dragon Lady. The Chinese press mocked her as a sell-out. And although her career spanned more than 40 years, when she died in 1961, at 56, she was largely forgotten.
Lately, she's been remembered.
Two years ago, "Piccadilly," a 1929 silent and one of her best films, was restored and re-released and "Anna May Wong," a popular biography, was published. At least two documentaries about Wong's life are in production and beginning March 4, the Museum of the Moving Image begins a seven-week retrospective of her films, including many rare and restored titles.
It is an overdue appreciation.
"I think what she says now to us is different from what she seemed to say in the '70s, when she was seen as a dupe of Hollywood," says Shirley Jennifer Lim, whose books include "A Feeling of Belonging: Asian-American Women's Public Culture" and an upcoming study of Wong and Josephine Baker. "Today, people see her as being a much more complex figure. . . . Even though there were gender and racial stereotypes, her characters still had power."
Born in California in 1905, to a family that had come to America during the first Gold Rush, Wong grew up in Los Angeles, where her father owned a laundry. Prosperous enough to be able to live outside of Chinatown and send his children to good schools, Wong Sam Sing expected a family of dutiful daughters and ambitious sons.
Anna May turned out to be a surprise.
In love with the movies from an early age, she cut classes to sneak off for the latest chapter of "The Perils of Pauline." By 12 - already demurely pretty, with a heart-shaped face and graceful hands - she was modeling for local department stores. She got her break two years later, when Metro Pictures - still years away from the mergers that would make it MGM - came to Chinatown to shoot location sequences for "The Red Lantern." The teenage Wong begged her way into some extra work.
Her career had begun.
"She was a quick learner," says biographer Graham Russell Gao Hodges, who writes of how that first movie crew dubbed her CCC - for Curious Chinese Child. "She had watched Alla Nazimova on `The Red Lantern,' so she was aware of Method acting long before Strasberg. She knew how to put herself forth and she was strikingly beautiful. There was something uncanny about her."
Wong soon moved on to bigger parts, and bigger movies. She was the star of "The Toll of the Sea," a new version of "Madame Butterfly"; she was the duplicitous Mongol slave in Douglas Fairbanks' epic "The Thief of Baghdad," one of the silent era's best-remembered hits.
Yet the two roles summed up the actress' limited options. She could play the victim, and end tragically; she could play the villainess, and end badly. It was a pattern that Hollywood would later repeat with other minorities, as it grudgingly made room for African-American actors in the '50s, or started featuring gay characters in the '60s. It was as if some silent bargain had been made with the bigots; you let us put these people on screen, and we'll be sure they suffer.
The bias was even more painful, and personal, offscreen.
"The young Chinese-Americans born in the U.S., who lived in L.A., they would report seeing her in her fur coats, looking every inch the movie star, our movie star," says Lim, an associate professor of history at SUNY-Stony Brook. "But to the older generation, being an actress was not that many steps above being a prostitute. And although the money from her films supported Wong's family, even put her brothers through college, they were somewhat ashamed of her."
There was institutionalized prejudice as well, racist edicts that effectively kept this third-generation American a second-class citizen.
"At the time, the law prohibited her from marrying a white man," says Hodges, a professor of history at Colgate University. "The law also essentially prohibited her from marrying a citizen of another country - if she did, she lost her own citizenship. . . . And the chance of her marrying an Asian-American and still continuing her career as an actress was highly unlikely."
Wong - who stayed single, but had affairs with several filmmakers, including "Dracula" director Tod Browning - could do little to change her family's opinions, or the laws. But she did what she could to change the culture.
Even when the parts she was given were mere stereotypes, Wong insisted on culturally appropriate hairstyles, costumes and attitudes. Even faced with filmmakers who knew little of Asia, Wong showed them choreography from the Cantonese troupes she had seen as a child, or suggested bits of folklore for the scripts. Onscreen, she tried to make her characters as authentically Chinese as she could.
Offscreen, she lived her life as a modern American woman, enjoying Jazz Age music and fashion. If the fan magazines of the period liked to use her for an easy, condescending laugh - more than one marveled at an Asian-American who spoke in the slang of a flapper - Wong was clever enough to use them, too. She posed in stylish Western clothes, and gave frank interviews about the censorship that prohibited her from kissing a white actor on screen.
Yet as hard as she worked, her career seemed stalled. There was a certain amount of fame, to be sure, and money, but the parts were often window-dressing, Chinatown characters inserted to give the film a bit of "atmosphere." "Mr. Wu," a new Lon Chaney film about an interracial romance, seemed promising, but Wong only got a supporting part; the lead went to a white actress in "Oriental" makeup. The next year, Wong left for Europe. She was 23.
"I think I left America for Europe because I was tired of dying so often," she said later. "Pathetic dying seemed to be the best thing I did."
She was talking, ostensibly, about the melodramas that invariably required her to exit the movie in time for the white actress to get the man. But she was also dying a little emotionally, still living behind her family's laundry, under her father's eye. She was also dying a little spiritually, forever stuck in the role of exotic curiosity.
Europe, however, offered a second life. In Germany, in 1928, she made "Song," a tragic romantic-triangle drama which gave her several dancing numbers and a white co-star. In England, the next year, she starred in "Piccadilly," a backstage melodrama. Even as the plots retained much of the same defeatist East-is-East nonsense that Wong had faced in Hollywood, they were huge leaps forward for her as an actress.
Wong was making her own leaps forward as a person too, living her own life in sophisticated Europe. She developed a taste for cocktails, and late-night parties. Chummy pictures of her with Marlene Dietrich in Berlin suggest she may have developed a fondness for pretty women, too.
"The '20s produced the modern woman," says Hodges, who says he could neither prove nor disprove the rumors of bisexuality. "Anna May lived up to that and pushed the boundaries even further."
After two years, however, Wong returned home, eager to capitalize on her European successes. She had a Broadway hit on "On the Spot," an Edgar Wallace thriller; she teamed with Dietrich in 1932 for the ultra-stylish "Shanghai Express," making an impression as the determined Hui Fei. It was, notably, the first time since she had played Tiger Lily in the 1925 "Peter Pan" that her character survived the picture. Wong was poised for the next opportunity.
It never came.
There was a good part waiting for her in "The Son-Daughter," based on a David Belasco play. It went to Helen Hayes. There was a new version being planned of "Madame Butterfly." The studio wanted Sylvia Sidney. Even less prestigious films were considered too important for Wong; the leading female role in "The Hatchet Man," a Tong thriller, went to Loretta Young. (Edward G. Robinson, of all people, was cast as the Chinatown assassin.)
The ugly fact remained that, although Hollywood had been shamed into nearly abandoning blackface, "yellowface" was still considered appropriate. (It almost still is - as recently as the early '80s, Peter Ustinov was starring in a Charlie Chan movie and Peter Sellers was ending his career playing Fu Manchu.) "It went on for years," says Lim. "You see Mickey Rooney in `Breakfast at Tiffanys,' or pictures of Shirley MacLaine in geisha makeup, and you think it can't be. . . . It has a lot to do with the way Asian-Americans are racialized, seen as foreigners."
For Wong, the final insult came in 1936 with "The Good Earth," MGM's epic adaptation of the Pearl S. Buck novel about Chinese peasant life. The role of O-Lan, the persevering heroine, was one Wong longed to play; the studio preferred the German actress Luise Rainer. Perhaps if Wong was interested, the studio said, she might be right. |
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Recognition at last for children's 'naive' images
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THE children's naive art of Carrolup, an Aboriginal settlement operating in the late 1940s and early '50s, is a significant movement whose impact has been overlooked for decades, art specialists say.
An exhibition of Carrolup art opened at the weekend, near the original settlement in the southwest of Western Australia, as part of the Perth International Arts Festival.
Howard Morphy, the director of the Centre for Cross-Cultural Research at the Australian National University, says the work was for years dismissed as the naive output of untutored Aboriginal children, aged between eight and 14.
There has been little recognition, he says, that their distinctive and brightly hued drawings of landscapes and hunting scenes had gone on to inspire several generations of Nyoongar artists in southwestern Australia.
"It's much less easy to have that dismissive attitude today because people find it striking, interesting and beautiful," he says. "And it continues to strongly influence artists in this region: it is part of their ongoing tradition."
Morphy was speaking at the launch of Koorah Coolingah: Children Long Ago at the Katanning Art Gallery, near the Carrolup settlement. On display are 20 artworks selected from a large US collection of more than 100 Carrolup pastel, crayon and pencil drawings donated to Colgate University in New York State in the '60s by a former student. They were identified as rare Carrolup art by Morphy during a chance visit to the university in early 2004.
A larger exhibition of Carrolup works, from the Berndt Museum at the University of Western Australia, will open at the Western Australian Museum in Perth today.
The twin exhibitions coincide with the announcement by Colgate University's Picker Art Gallery that it is planning an international touring show of Carrolup art.
Gallery director Elizabeth Barker, who is in Perth for the exhibitions, says the Picker aims to assemble about 170 works from various sources to tour internationally.
"We hope to have a few venues in the US, Australia and Europe, with some obvious players being American museums that have important collections of Australian indigenous art," she says. "Another major institution might be the British Museum, which owns a small collection of Carrolup artworks.
"If done properly, it will be an extraordinary opportunity to shine a very bright international spotlight on this region and this very important tradition."
She says the children's drawings represent "a very powerful historical experience that translates into art of the finest quality", but their significance had been underrated for being naive and unsophisticated.
A specialist in British art of the late 18th and 19th centuries, Barker says William Blake's drawings had also once been considered too naive to qualify as fine art.
"But now we consider his brilliantly coloured visionary paintings [done] in a manner that he adapted himself to be some of the greatest works of the Western tradition.
"I think the works of the Carrolup school hold up to close scrutiny and will come as a wonderful surprise for art historians and museum visitors around the world."
Morphy's chance rediscovery of unknown Australian child artists' work in the Picker gallery's archives attracted huge media coverage, including a feature article in The New York Times.
Barker says: "It didn't really surprise me, because the works are so extraordinarily good and the story is so compelling."
In the early '50s there was international interest in Carrolup art, and buyers wrote to the settlement wanting to buy pictures. It is thought the new exhibitions may encourage private collectors to come forward with more paintings.
The Katanning exhibition was opened with an emotional ceremony attended by relatives of Carrolup's child artists.
Former Carrolup child inmate Ezzard Flowers says the temporary loan from the US gallery was a significant return to the country for drawings that had disappeared into private collections after being sent overseas for display.
"We welcome the spirits of those wandering kids back to where they belong," he told a Perth festival crowd, which included US Consul-General Robyn McClelland and festival director Lindy Hume. |
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Higher education has high impact on economy
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Baber, Cassaundra
Observer-Dispatch, The
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Colleges and universities have an economic impact on the region totaling tens of millions of dollars, college leaders and experts say.
Take Utica College for example.
According to figures provided by the college's public relations office, the college currently employs 312 full-time employees and 236 part-time employees- a payroll of $18.25 million.
Each year, the institution purchases goods and services from local businesses in the amount of $22 million. Over the past six years, the college locally has spent $22 million on construction projects.
Utica College Vice President and Treasurer R. Barry White said the college runs like a small city. That activity spills into the surrounding community creating an economic partnership.
"Obviously we interact with all the city services - police, fire department and county as well. As a result, we find ourselves in partnership many times," White said. "We've invested in the Utica Memorial Auditorium with our hockey program. The locker facilities we have there are state-of-the-art."
White also pointed to the college's growth as an opportunity for the economic growth in the region.
"The college itself supports local business," he said "We buy a lot of our goods and services locally. We have roughly a $40 million operating expense budget. A good portion goes to food service that we provide here ... As we grow we support local contractors."
Impact has broad reach
Mohawk Valley Community College has similar figures.
The two-year college's payroll reached almost $20 million last year, according to numbers provided by the public information office. Currently, the college employs 392 full-time employees and 241 part-time employees.
In 2005, MVCC completed the construction of a three-story, 155-bed residence hall. That project sunk $6 million dollars into the local economy.
Hamilton College has seen applications boom and touts its heavy involvement in programs designed to help the community.
Herkimer County Community College has seen building expansions in the recent decade as well. The 2005 graduating class of 559 was the largest ever, And of those, 86 did their studies via the Internet.
SUNYIT continues its search for a new president. The Marcy campus also is home to the Mohawk Valley Institute for Learning in Retirement, which provides non-credit opportunities for hundreds of area adult learners, and the Small Business Development Center, which assists entrepreneurs and existing small businesses.
The impact of local colleges is extensive, almost immeasurable, said Matthew Stubley, president of the Mohawk Valley Chamber of Commerce.
"The overall impact is enormous and needs to be appreciated and embraced at all levels of community and government," Stubley said.
The first step to capitalizing on the potential of these institutions is to create partnerships with the schools and the smaller high-tech businesses cropping up in the area, he said.
David L. Mathis, director of Working Solutions for the Oneida County Workforce Development, has seen the way colleges and the work force can create a solid working relationship.
From July 1, 2003 to June 30, 2004, Working Solutions spent about $400,000 to send displaced workers to trainings offered by the colleges.
COLLEGE HIGHLIGHTS
Colgate University
Located in Hamilton, Colgate has about 2,750 undergraduates enrolled in 51 programs. At the May 21 commencement, state Attorney General Elliot Spitzer will deliver the keynote address.
Hamilton College
Hamilton College students and faculty are involved in a broad range of community-based projects.
Some of these include service learning projects: Hamilton College has expanded its involvement through service-learning courses offered by faculty across the curriculum – philosophy, government, women's studies, anthropology and communication.
Herkimer County Community College
Herkimer County Community College offers a variety of community-focused classes and activities.
Classes are offered to community members for a fee, including yoga, pilates and tai chi.
The college opens its swimming pool to the community daily.
Community members also are encourage to participate in arts shows and athletic events.
Mohawk Valley Community College
Mohawk Valley Community College completed the construction of a three-story, 155-bed residence hall. That project sunk $6 million dollars into the local economy.
The two-year college's payroll reached almost $20 million last year, according to numbers provided by the public information office.
The college employs 392 full-time employees and 241 part-time employees.
SUNYIT
SUNYIT hosts meetings, conferences, events and activities for the community.
The athletics department sponsors "Kids Night Out" recreation programs in the Campus Center for students from area school districts. SUNYIT also hosts the annual Mohawk Valley Pre-Engineering and Technology Showcase in March. The Institute for Local Government provides both courses for local governmental staff members and technical assistance of various kinds.
Utica College
Utica College, at the midpoint of a 10-year strategic plan, is in the process of transforming the physical campus and broadening its academic curriculum through the development of graduate degree programs that complement the appeal of its undergraduate offerings.
Plans include groundbreaking for the college's new science and technology complex. |
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A Year Abroad (or 3) as a Career Move
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Chura, Hillary
New York Times, The
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It was a few months before she was to graduate from Colgate University in 2002, but Lauren DiCioccio was not ready for the briefcase or the Brooks Brothers look.
Armed with a bachelor's degree in art and art history, she did what an increasing number of college graduates are doing: she bought a plane ticket to a country she had never visited, backpacked around the region, got a job in that country and then traveled some more.
According to one estimate, 35,000 young Americans realize that working abroad, whether teaching, bartending, taking care of children, typing or picking grapes, has moved well beyond just trust-fund children. Far from being career suicide, it can actually provide a professional boost.
"When I went, I was hesitant because people looked at me and were surprised that I would graduate with a degree from Colgate and take time off to work and backpack around Australia," said Ms. DiCioccio, who picked grapes and was a short-order cook at a roadhouse in the outback. "So when I came back and had it on my résumé, I couldn't believe all of the interviews were about my time in Australia."
Once back in the United States, she said, she applied for 10 jobs, received 5 interviews and was offered 2 positions at the beginning of 2004. She became a program assistant at the Djerassi Resident Artists Program in Woodside, Calif.
Ms. DiCioccio, now 25, obtained her working papers through Bunac, an organization that helps graduates obtain work permits, volunteer opportunities or community work in foreign countries. Other programs include WorldTeach, Princeton in Asia and the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program, as well as offerings by religious groups like the Jesuits and the Quakers.
People unencumbered by technicalities — like working legally — will branch off on their own with little more than a debit card, confidence and a copy of "Work Your Way Around the World."
Caroline Miceli, 26, chose the legal route. As she was preparing to graduate from Scripps College in Claremont, Calif., in 2002, she responded to a posting through her college for a year's international project management internship at BMW headquarters in Germany. She earned 880 euros a month (about $1,000 in today's money) and went into credit card debt to travel.
"I ate bread and sausage, but I got experience working for a world-class brand that everybody recognizes," she said. Working abroad "is a career move."
"It's not a money-making move," she said. "It puts you in a position to leverage yourself."
When her year ended, she returned to BMW in North America, then an interim project in China with a BMW supplier and then to a Toyota Motor Sales management training program in Torrance, Calif. She said her time in Germany convinced her that she could be on her own in Asia for five months. "Four years from graduation, I have international experience with a couple of different major automotive companies and fashion companies," she said.
Many aspiring expatriates live at home and work a few months to save money before they leave. Ms. DiCioccio, for example, worked for nine months doing office work, retail jobs and house sitting to give herself a financial cushion, but ended up saving another $700 or so from her Australian jobs.
Many travelers depart not knowing how they will earn a living once they hit the ground. With hustle, they often find employment before the jet lag wanes (to the relief of worried parents), according to some who have taken the plunge. Those working legally tend to earn more, but their stays have a set duration — generally, four months to three years, depending on the country or program. People working illegally may earn less but can slip under the radar and stay in a country longer. A word of warning: that can result in deportation in extreme circumstances.
No nationwide survey measures the number of young Americans working abroad, but William Nolting, director for international opportunities at the International Center of the University of Michigan, maintains a rough estimate. From tracking the major organizations, he said at least 34,900 people worked and volunteered abroad in formal programs in the academic year 2002 through the summer of 2003. That is up from about 29,000 a year earlier. Mr. Nolting said the actual figure could be twice as high since he does not count participants in small organizations or those working illegally.
By comparison, about 191,000 students studied abroad for credit in 2003-4, out of an estimated 14 million college and university students, according to figures from the Institute of International Education.
Years ago, recent graduates headed for Britain and other parts of Europe. That has changed.
"Most students and young people have been to Europe on vacation and seem to be thinking much further afield," said Anna Crew, director of Bunac USA. Australia and New Zealand are popular. Her group is starting a volunteer program in Cambodia.
Brandon Steiner, 24, is in his first year as a teacher with the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program. Though he does not plan to teach after Japan, he will stay another two years or so. A 2005 graduate of Virginia Tech, he earns about $32,000, has minimal expenses since he lives in a rural area about three hours from Tokyo, and pays no United States or Japanese taxes.
"Admittedly, it is a way to goof off and have a good time in a foreign country," he said, but he added that "having international experience under your belt — employers are enthusiastic."
"It looks good and is not a bad step out of college," he said. "It shows you already are open-minded."
Sometimes those who have worked abroad do not realize the benefits until long after the adventure has ended.
Julie Androshick, now 41, spent two years teaching English, history and algebra to high school students in American Samoa from 1987 to 1989 with the Jesuit Volunteer Corps. Room and board were free, and she taught algebra on the side. After Samoa, Ms. Androshick spent more than a year tending bar and getting a master's degree in international relations from the University of St. Andrews in Scotland.
Ms. Androshick later worked as a journalist and a McKinsey & Company analyst. She now helps big clients manage internal information as a partner with Kenning Associates, a small consulting firm. Based in Manhattan, Ms. Androshick said working abroad had expanded her worldview, gave her the courage to purse long-shot jobs and made her a more loyal employee.
"Because I did it for three and a half years and traveled so much, I wanted to settle down and establish a career and focus on that," she said. "The thought of picking up now and living abroad actually stresses me out."
Foreign experience demonstrates entrepreneurship, resourcefulness and independence, according to recruiters. Rosalind Clay Carter, senior vice president for human resources at A&E Television Networks, said people who work and support themselves overseas tend to be inquisitive, flexible and adaptive — valuable skills in today's workplace.
"You are interested in that person who can move quickly and is nimble and has an inquiring mind," she said. |
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A Credit with Too Few Takers
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Crenshaw, Albert
Washington Post, The
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At an income level of less than about $38,000 a year, many taxpayers aren't really tax payers. To the contrary, there is a special provision of the tax law that is designed not only to wipe out any taxes they might otherwise owe, but to give them cash back even beyond that.
This provision is called the Earned Income Tax Credit, and today it is the government's largest program for aiding low-income working families. The EITC, as it is widely known, shells out about $40 billion a year to low-income earners and their dependents.
But the EITC is not a simple program. It involves phaseouts and dependency requirements, and other twists and turns that, while typical of today's tax laws, can be intimidating to people not accustomed to filling out forms.
Also, many low-income people are either unaware of the program or they underestimate its benefits, so they don't apply.
"This is a big problem. These households are such low income they don't owe taxes, and they know they don't owe, [so] they are not going to bother with the hassle," said Nicole Simpson, assistant professor of economics at Colgate University and coordinator of Volunteer Income Tax Assistance, which is based at the school. The nationwide assistance program is sponsored by the Internal Revenue Service and volunteers provide free tax preparation help.
Simpson said "it's very costly" to go to a commercial tax preparer for help. "They report paying over $150 on average for H&R Block," and they figure "it's risky to pay that much not knowing what they are going to get back."
The EITC is also prone to error because of its complexity, and to fraud because of its generosity, so it is one of the most heavily audited credits in the tax law.
But for many low-income working families -- and even singles, who can also be eligible -- the effort can be well worthwhile.
The average refund turned up by Simpson's volunteers is nearly $2,500, almost 20 percent of the $14,000 average annual income her group's clients report. "They have no idea" they could get that much, she said.
One reason the refunds are so large is that the EITC is both a credit and "refundable."
A credit reduces your taxes dollar for dollar. Thus, if you owe $3,000 in taxes and your situation entitles you to a credit of, say, $2,000, the credit wipes out $2,000 of your taxes, leaving you owing $1,000.
(This is in contrast to a deduction, which reduces your taxable income, and thus reduces your taxes indirectly. Deductions save you the taxes you would have paid on that income, so they are of greater benefit to people in higher brackets. A $1 deduction saves a taxpayer in the 35 percent bracket 35 cents; it saves a taxpayer in the 10 percent bracket 10 cents.)
If a credit is refundable, it means that when the credit exceeds the tax you owe, you also get whatever amount of the credit is left over. Thus, if you have a $2,000 refundable credit and you owe $1,000, it not only wipes out your tax, but you get the leftover $1,000 back along with any tax you may have paid through withholding.
To qualify for the EITC, you must have "earned income," such as wages from a job; your "investment income," such as interest on savings accounts, cannot exceed $2,700; and your adjusted gross income cannot exceed certain limits:
· $11,750 if you're single and have no child, or $13,750 if you're married and filing jointly with your spouse and do not have a child.
· $31,030 if you are single and have one child, or $33,030 if you are married filing jointly and have one child.
· $35,263 if you are single and have more than one child, or $37,263 if you are married filing jointly and have more than one child.
That may sound simple enough, but it's not. Any "child" you claim must be a "qualifying child."
To be a qualifying child for purposes of the EITC, your child must pass a three-step test based on relationship, age and residence.
The child must be your child or grandchild, or your brother, sister, half brother or half sister, step-brother or step-sister, or one of their children, such as a niece or nephew. A foster child can qualify, but only if he or she was placed in your home by a court or authorized placement agency.
The child must also be younger than 19 at the end of 2005 for this tax season, or younger than 24 if a full-time student.
And the child must have lived with you, in this country, for more than half the year.
This isn't all, of course.
The child cannot be claimed by another person to qualify for the credit, which often creates problems for divorced couples. The parents are allowed to decide between themselves who can claim a child for tax purposes, but if they don't agree then the IRS has a flow chart to work out who gets priority.
And if you are the qualifying child of another person, you can't claim the EITC, even if the other person doesn't claim the credit. This can be a problem for three-generation families, where, say, the middle generation has income and could benefit from the credit but can't claim it because he or she is the grandparent's qualifying child.
By some estimates 25 percent of the low-income people eligible for the EITC don't claim it, and it's easy to understand why. But for people within the income limits above, the benefit could be worth thousands -- as much as $4,400 for a family with two children -- so it's worth searching out a free-assistance site or perhaps a commercial preparer. To locate a Volunteer Income Tax Assistance site, call the IRS at 800-829-1040. |
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