Bird statues to comment on Damien Hirst and speakers encased in vintage luggage. And the sun was out! Chicago, I may start to love you after all.
30
Jan 11
Richard Buchanan @ SCAD
Design for Service has posted a transcript and video of Buchanan’s October 2010 lecture at the Savannah College of Art and Design. He talks about his work at Case Western’s Weatherhead school. That day he had also given a lecture to a small group of design students and he covers some of the same ground.
If anyone has any of the other lectures from Design Ethos or COINs, let me know and I’ll link to those as well.
18
Jan 11
New Voices in Theater
I had the pleasure of attending a staging of The Convert by Danai Gurira at the Goodman Theater over the weekend. The play centers on a young Zimbabwean woman who initially poses as a convert to Catholicism to escape an unwanted marriage set up by her uncle at the end of the 19th Century. The story pushes the audience to consider the role of faith in both freedom and oppression. Particularly poignant is the idea of hierarchy within a faith, the presumption and inherent arrogance of the idea that a student or convert is not permitted to challenge the teacher with any authority. The issue of authority is compounded by the role of white colonialists in the domination of the country and in the spread of the faith. The woman is asked to turn from her family and her traditions to embrace an expression of Catholicism that does not in turn fully embrace her, bending its doctrines to suit its purposes.
The play is a work in progress and as such a little heavy handed at times. The writer drives home her message instead of letting the audience discover the many layers of intention. We’re reminded to consider the oft diminished role of women in ministry during that time. A speech by one of the characters preaches that both the offender and the injured can be victims of greater forces at work.
I’m still wrestling with some of the ideas, but the play is a strong testament to the issues surrounding an adopted faith. Even beyond the issue of religion, we can be so eager to transfer a value or ideology that we can neglect to care for the person we are attempting to teach.
04
Dec 10
Campaign for Black Male Achievement
I’m still processing my time in Milwaukee at the CBMA Mid-West Gathering. While the stated goal of developing goals and benchmarks that if accomplished would dramatically improve the lives of black men and boys throughout the region seems lofty, it also sounds decidedly academic and sterile. The conversation over those two days was anything but.
Here is some of the wisdom from the conference that was captured via Twitter: (#cbma)
Continue reading →
01
Dec 10
Getting everyone in the room
:::Twitter: #CBMA:::
This week I’m excited to be in Milwaukee (snow!) for the Campaign for Black Male Achievement Mid-West Gathering. For two days people who are active in work that improves life for black men and boys will meet to talk about their challenges and goals. The Interaction Institute for Social Change organized the workshop with the help of the Kirwin Institute as part of the Open Society Foundation’s national initiative.
I’m excited because there are young people, scholars, workers, nonprofit execs, etc. who are all gathering to talk beyond their isolated offices and build together. In work that is meant to help people it’s easy to get caught in either the day to day realities or the financial needs of the organization. This time of reflection is only two days long, but it’s valuable in building relationships, using our resources to their best advantage and in taking advantage of the greater pool of wisdom that we sometimes forget is available to us.
Follow the conversation on Twitter and catch us on Facebook.
26
Oct 10
Undercovers vs. The Good Wife
Every fall I’m interested in seeing the ways television networks choose to portray African Americans on screen. NBC put a lot of press and energy behind the J.J. Abrams vehicle Undercovers which features a black couple (Boris Kodjoe and Gugu Mbatha-Raw) as caterers who return to their former lives as spies. CBS took its Emmy winning show the Good Wife and has added a black partner (Mike Ealy) and a black political candidate (Anika Noni Rose) this season.
Undercovers is the lightest of fare, presenting blacks whose only struggle seems to be not pricing their catering services appropriately and a doubting handler who always seems to trust them in the end. Their characters seem detached from time and place. They could be any couple anywhere in the world. While that’s great if they were spies all the time, their non-spy selves feel like the confections they serve dinner guests. While J.J. Abrams usually reveals more of his characters as the show progresses, the possibility of depth lies only in the details of previous missions, not in the people themselves. If the masks are to come off, the audience must first see where there are masks to be removed.
Enter the Good Wife. The role of the firm’s third partner is unclear. After one of the original partners sided with the newcomer, the jilted partner started an investigation into his background to look for previous connections. Because he joins an already intriguing ensemble cast, he is able to evolve while other story lines swirl around him. Last week, the show revealed a new candidate in the states attorney race that is a relatively unknown black woman who may have leaked sensitive information to the press to weaken the position of the two other candidates to secure her position in the race. These additions to the Good Wife are intriguing and mysterious. The characters and the viewers get to know them at the same time; and more information promptly leads to more questions.
And while the Good Wife threw in Corbin Bleu for just for kicks in last week’s episode, the plot lines on Undercovers rarely have the leads crossing paths with other African Americans with the exception of the wife’s sister.
While I hope Undercovers succeeds, I hope it does so with intriguing, multidimensional black characters rather than caricatures whose tiny imperfections only exaggerate how perfect they’re supposed to be. Their characters remind me of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner where the black suitor was so inoffensive as to be unreal in any culture.
No one is entirely virtuous or villainous. The writers for the Good Wife understand that and give all of the characters the full opportunity to go either way. Here’s hoping they don’t mess it up.
20
Oct 10
Faith and Design
I heard Jessica Jackley speak in August while visiting my sister’s church in Chicago. The next week I listened to an episode of Fresh Air with Terry Gross. The show presented two stories about religion, the first on Franklin Graham’s visit to Sudan and the second on a the legal consequences of being gay in Uganda.
I’m realizing now how those stories have stayed with me. A comment on Fresh Air says that the real “battle” isn’t between Muslims and Christians as some would make it out to be. The true battleground is within Christianity and in who gets to speak for the faith. Who are the “true Christians” and who even gets to decide what that means?
So much of life seems to come back to questions of identity and whether it is conferred or self-determined.
20
Oct 10
Emerging from an industrial past.
As part of a special topics class, my classmates and I spent a week in Dalton, Ga. interviewing residents and preparing for a community workshop as part of our effort to help the city look at ways to attract young, creative professionals to the area. On the way to Dalton I had lunch in Dublin, Ga. and was struck by how many small towns are (or should be) competing for the same pool of young, energetic, entrepreneurial talent. While I crave urban life, I wonder what would happen if every SCAD graduate went back to his or her home town and worked to transform their environment into one that supported the creative life.
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