Author: Priya C.

Hodge Podge: Going to the Theatre, Television and the Future of History

I thought I needed a post that sort of cleaned out the attic. Something that talked about all the little random things that I’ve been thinking about in the last two weeks, but don’t really fit into a larger post.

All’s Well That Ends…..

Meh. Well, that’s not being entirely fair. As usual the Shakespeare Theatre Company did not disappoint. Beautiful set, great acting, however I do think I may have found a Shakespeare play I didn’t love. At first glance the show seems to turn the usual Shakespeare woman on her head–Helena is forward, a little bit manipulative-while Bertram is weak and less…realistic (as loosely as the term may be applied). An argument can be made that my dislike is grounded in the fact that this is one tale of the Bard’s that I have never read, but there was something about the way Bertram had to be tricked into loving Helena that just seemed wrong.

But I guess I’m looking at it from a “today” perspective–but apparently in Shakespeare’s own lifetime it was not well received due to the break from the expected “role” of  a woman of Helena’s class–and maybe that is what makes this typical Shakespeare. Changing role’s, identity switches, all a commentary on established norms of the time. Maybe, but I don’t buy Bertram’s one line switch from hate to adoration for his wife–just because she managed to fulfill the two impossible conditions he had put before her (get his family ring, and have his child).

On a random note I was listening to this episode of Radio Lab and was surprised to find out how many words and phrases that are now part of day-to-day speech that are all a part of Shakespearean Lexicon. Cool.

Television

So my dad taped two segments of the CBS show 60 Minutes for me from this past week. The first was on the archaeological dig at what is believed to be the City of David in Jerusalem. In short, the story was about the meaning of the City of David to the Jews in the city, and how the current political situation and peace talks will effect the dig. The story also emphasized the difficulty and the role of the past in the identities of the Jewish and Arab people in that region–along with the volatility of the conflict between settlers and the Palestinians. As I’ve said over, and over, that the connection of people to history is alive and well–and you could see the passion for that history in the eyes of both sides in the dispute.

The second story was a detective story surrounding an 11 minute reel of film that depicts the trolly ride down Market Street in San Francisco. What’s remarkable about the story, aside from seeing all the pieces come together, was just how a film historian pinpointed the date of the film by looking at the water on the ground, the construction levels of the building–the license plates on the cars in each frame to narrow the time frame of the film down to early April 1906. Having just been to San Francisco I knew the meaning of this date before the story actually told us–that just days after this film was shot the city, this street, was destroyed by the earthquake and subsequent fire.  What this segment really illustrated for me was just how a piece of the past, an object or a filmstrip can evoke wonder and awe–especially when that last connection is made, that glimpse pack to a past on the brink of catastrophe, a world that would no longer exist in the same way again.

Then there was this week’s episode of How I Met Your Mother entitled “Architect of Destruction.” The episode as a whole was hilarious, as usual, but the storyline that dealt with the destruction of a New York City landmark hotel (that had fallen to hard times) with a new construction (though well designed) bank building. I hated how the one who wanted to protect the building was depicted as a crazy activist loon, and that the idea of incorporating the existing structure into the design was merely a ploy for Ted to get the girl…and when he couldn’t he didn’t consider it worth his time. I know, I know its a sitcom and shouldn’t be taken seriously, but really?

Not to mention that during the whole episode no one used the words historic preservation even once. Food for thought.

NaNoWriMo: The Future of History

So this year I am participating in National Novel Writing Month for the second time. Unlike last year where I jumped into the process on November 1 with no planning, I’ve been thinking about what I want this year’s project to be about. It’s a bit complex (translation–not completely formed) so I won’t bore you with details, but I am aiming to mix my two loves science-fiction/fantasy and history and am looking for ideas for what futuristic historical tools might look like. One of my characters is a sort of an archaeological detective, and is trying to suss out the past using updated digital versions of what we use in the historical trade. For example–archaeologists look at stratigraphy as one way of dating the objects they find in the ground–would a future version of dating a midden, or a series of objects be as simple as a fast, instant scan? Is it going to be about getting information faster, or would it be a flashier version of ground penetrating radar–just dressed up differently? Anyway–just looking for some ideas from fellow historians to kick off the brainstorming.

Note: In the next week I’ll be at the National Preservation Conference in Austin, Texas. Check out the virtual attendee page to keep track of what’s going on, and check back on the blog to see what I’m up to!

Go Go Goa….and Endings

The third part of my trip involved a long needed vacation within my vacation. At this point my sisters and I had shopped for six days straight and it was time to kick up our feet. So we traveled (a quick 1 hour flight) to South Goa, but because it was right before the start of peak season everything was fairly quiet…so we took it in stride and did a whole lot of nothing.

First, let’s clear  up some confusion. Before deciding to go on this trip I had concocted a vision of Goa—one smallish city filled with sandy beaches as far as the eye can see. I was half right. One side of Goa is covered with beaches, but it is actually a small state in India with many localities. An allusion to the state’s history can be seen in the name of its largest city “Vasco de Gama.” While the area has an ancient history, it was colonized by the Portuguese in the sixteenth century and was annexed by the Indian government in 1961. Consequently, this state is filled with historical sites that range from the ancient to the modern.

Here are a few of the places we traveled to during our stay:

Vargota Beach: The infamous rocky beach. The pictures speak for themselves.

Fort Aguada: Built in the sixteenth century, the fort was meant as a way to guard the Portuguese from attacks by sea. While the lower part of the fort is now a beach resort, the upper part provided some awesome vistas.

Bom Jesus Basilica: A World Heritage Site, this basilica is also the site of Saint Francis Xavier’s body. A friend of Ignatius Loyola, Xavier was also a co-founder of the Jesuits. I couldn’t get any pictures of the actual casket (and couldn’t see the body), but from others who have seen it before its apparently extra creepy.

Food, Glorious Food

In general, I eat a lot of home cooked Indian food when I go to Mumbai, mostly due to our tendency to succumb to what my cousins’ call the “weak American stomach.”  So most days our meal includes the traditional Indian meal, with slight twists that depend on the house we are eating at. This consists of what I call Dhal, Bhat, Rotli, Shak (so Lentils, Rice, Bread, and Vegetable). When we ate out the food included South Indian Dosa’s and Uttapum–and some delicious butter chicken/tandoori and some food in the non-Indian variety. For anyone heading out to Mumbai here are some suggestions:

American Continental: Just Around the Corner (Mumbai–Andheri)

Chinese: China House, Mainland China (Mumbai: Bandra)

In Goa (at the “shacks”): Zeebop, Brittos, Martin’s Corner

The Homestretch

The last three days here were filled with the usual end of vacation running around, but first let’s talk about the verdict. Here in the United States, the one verdict that I remember EVERYONE paying attention to was the OJ Simpson trial.  That was a verdict filled with racial tension and class tension. This was not that kind of verdict.  One week before we were supposed to leave the High Court in India was to give the verdict in the Babri Masjid Case, a sixty year old dispute between Muslims and Hindus that involved the destruction of a Mosque on what Hindu’s believe is the holy birthplace of Lord Rama. I won’t go into detail about the actual case, just that the verdict has been long anticipated, and will probably still go up to the Indian Supreme Court before it is laid to rest.  In talking about what might happen family members reminisced about the riots in the 1990s, when it was too dangerous to even step outside the home. The insanity and the fear, and the worry that the decision in this case might launch the city and the country into another round of craziness.

Postponed to the day before we had to leave, the good news is that the verdict, coming from three different judges, divided the land into three parts for the three disputing parties (1/3 to the Hindus, 1/3 to the Muslims, 1/3 to the wrestling group that used to have property on the land) fair and even. However, since the tension was palatable–you could almost sense the city and the country breathing in relief as the decision was read. And so…business went on as usual.

And by usual I mean last minute visits to relatives, collecting clothing post-alteration, and my favorite activity whenever I visit the other city that never sleeps–bangle shopping! Like fabric shopping the rows and rows of colorful bangles provide so much potential for pretty, and is also a highly valued art form. You walk in, give your price point and the bangle vendors put the set’s together according to the outfit’s they match up with. Super fun. Check out this video at Priya Bangles (Yes, I do think its funny that the store has the same name as me).

My trip ended in the same way it progressed, with a mad rush. My cousin got stuck in traffic so I ended up going to the airport three hours before I needed to for a 1:45 am flight. I ended up getting into a great conversation about World Cup Soccer and American Sports with a South African-Indian family (4th generation South African, whose history in South Africa began with indentured servitude for the British).  I also got to take a quick break in London (six hour layover) to visit some cousins for breakfast (Giraffe in Richmond–two thumbs up).

Back to the story. I did learn something about my family while I was in India. My grandmother told me about her father and how he made his way up in the world–taking care of everyone around him and how to this day his name is respected. I also learned that my family is full of singers, and are talented in many, many, ways that I never expected.  It was a great three weeks–and I came away with more than just clothes. I came back full of memories.

Click here to view the full photo album from the trip.

A Mountain Retreat (with Sari shopping, a Movie and a Play)

One of the great things about India is that it is a place you have to experience. I can describe how we get from one place to another—squeezing into a rickshaw in damp heat, or the terror I have in crossing the street—especially when cars don’t maintain lanes…but it’s not the same as being here. However, the last few days have been a hodgepodge of new experiences, though I will report that I am no closer to getting information out of my grandmother than I was five days ago despite having an excellent birthday party, with some amazing images from her past, present and future (great-grand kids who are absolutely adorable).

Baar baar din ye aaye, baar baar dil ye gaaye
Tu jiye hazaaron saal, ye meri hai aarzoo
Happy Birthday to you

Time And Again, Let This Day Return, Time And Again Let The Heart Sing This
May You Live Thousands Of Years, This Is My Wish
Happy Birthday to you

From Faarz (1967)|Listen to the song here|

The birthday celebrations launched with a trip to Khandala—a mountain retreat about an hour outside of Mumbai. The gaggle of family members that came with me (21 in all) ranged from 80 to 3. It included uncles, aunts, cousins, cousin-in-law’s who came from India and the UAE. Aside from the general family revelry (who doesn’t love 21 people in a room with a Karaoke machine) we visited some waterfalls and had exciting encounters with crabs. The one in the picture here is one that decided it lived in my cousin’s toilet—and sometime in the night crawled out to visit.

That being said, Khandala was beautiful. A tad cooler than the city, it boasted amazing view shed’s of lush greenery, though due to low rainfall the waterfalls had been reduced to a trickle. At one point we found ourselves driving up the windy roadway engulfed in a fog bank, unable to see more than a foot in front or behind. Then there were the monkey’s that hung out on the expressway as we took pictures of the Duke’s nose on our way home.

Silky Saris and Other Shopping Fun

After our trip the shopping for the wedding began in earnest. Its hard to explain the magic of a sari shop which holds rows upon rows of the six yard long garment in varying prices, sizes, and fabrics. Some come in dual tone with nothing but embroidery while others are filled with jari (translation lots and lots of beading and stones, almost like someone ran a muck with a beadazzler). When you step into a shop you sit in front of a table and give one of two things—a price point or a description of what you are looking for. Then the sales clerks pull out product after product trying to gauge your reaction. The fun in all this is seeing the flashing color swirl around you olive greens, deep purples, pinks and lavenders, oranges and blues (sometimes on the same garment) while checking out how the blouse piece contrasts with the actual sari. Then once you decide on the color you have to remember to take a a critical eye to the “palu” the end of the garment that drapes down your back (or in front depending on how you drape the fabric—trust me, there are many, many ways). Click here for a video of how we try on Saris at the store (starring my sister).

Another way that we shop is to take older sari’s of my mothers and take it to a tailor who transforms them into gaghra choli’s (basically a blouse/skirt/scarf) or a punjabi suit (a long top with pants). In order to get those made you have to buy lining which involves a whole other type of shopping—as seen here. I know that fabric shops exist in the United States but the process of making and buying clothes here is a full-service one that uses a different set of skills than one usually uses.

Bollywood & Kaanji

I’m not going to lie. We didn’t spend all our time inside stores, ogling clothing. When we first got back from Khandala we went to see a Hindi movie called Dabaang (Fearless). It stars Salmaan Kahn, an actor who I don’t particularly like but was what we call a timepass movie. Turn off your brain and enjoy….the colors, the fights (which were a combination of Kill Bill and Matrix style feats and acrobatics). Not to mention the song and dance numbers which I still can’t get out of my head. (Click on the link for a music video).

Then on Viserajan— we decided to brave the crowds to go see my cousin’s husband in a Gujarati play, something we’ve always wanted to do but have never had the chance. I know I mentioned earlier that I don’t have a firm grasp on either Hindi or Gujarati, something I always vow to fix, but I was amazed at how much I understood. Entitled Kaanji versus Kaanji (Kaanji being another name for Lord Krishna)it was essentially an adapted piece about a man who loses his lively hood due to an earthquake (“an act of God”)  and upon being turned down for insurance decides to sue god.

It was fantastic. I’m not saying this just because my cousin was in it, but it was funny, serious, and meaningful all at the same time. It dealt with issues of spirituality, ritual, and made some cutting observations about the practice of Hinduism in the modern (and digital) age.

The final part of the play, which dealt with belief, practice, life and death asked the audience to first find god within yourself before looking for him/she/it out in the world.

This is India I suppose, one part spirituality, one part entertainment, and another part full of vivid color and family. A portrait, a rendering of philosophical theory, mixed in with millions of unique stories and lives.

Click here to view more pictures of Khandala and Shopping.

Roots. Roots. Roots. (And Lord Ganesha)

For those of you who don’t know me, I am a first generation Indian-American. My parents came to this country in the 1970s (my dad for graduate school, my mother after marriage). I’ve been back to their country of birth many times in my life, and every time I gain an increased appreciation and love for my extended family and the country in which they live.

No….this is not an Eat. Pray. Love. moment. I’m not going to tell you all of my innermost thoughts about the wonders of India and my life, but I thought I might try and blog every few days about the sights, smells, and sounds of my trip.

We are here for three reasons.

  1. My grandmother is turning eighty years old.
  2. My older sister is getting married, so naturally we are doing a little shopping.
  3. A few days of fun in Goa.

The first two are probably the most relevant for this blog—because they have to do with my personal history. Mostly because of a communication barrier, I never really asked my dad’s mom about her life growing up in India or for stories about my father—something that I regret.  And both my grandfathers passed on before I was born/old enough to ask questions. Therefore, one of my missions for the next three weeks is to get my remaining grandmother to talk. It will be tough, since in her words, she has lived eighty years’ so now all there is left to think about is eating well, living well, and having fun.

A Word About Roots

I am an ABD. An American Born Desi. I take out the “C” which stands for confused, because I don’t really believe that is an issue (and for those who don’t know a Desi is another word for someone of South Asian descent). I know where I stand—both as an American and as an individual of Indian heritage. That being said, I don’t have family that came over on the Mayflower (or the Susan Constant), or a relative that fought in the Civil War. Both sets of grandparents lived during the time of Mahatma Gandhi and Partition—both things that shaped the way my parents grew up, and consequently the way I was raised.

11 Days of Lord Ganesha

Mumbai is in full on celebratory mode. For ten days India, especially the State of Maharashtra, celebrates the birth of Lord Ganesha (otherwise known to some as the Elephant god).

A quick interlude:

Here is a one sentence crash course on Hinduism (as I see it). Hinduism is a monotheistic religion. There is one god, fathomless and infinite. In order for humans to recognize the unfathomable, God—known as Brahman is qualified into three deities—Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva. These three—the Trimurti (representing the creator, maintainer/preserver, destroyer) are further broken into avatars as a means of giving a face and a name to something that is beyond human understanding. Lord Ganesha is the “child” of Lord Shiva and Parvati, and is the god of many things including new beginnings and opportunities.

So for 11 days Hindus, particularly in the State of Maharashtra (where I am) celebrate Lord Ganesha’s birth with ten days of prayer, pomp and revelry (Ganesh Chaturthi), and on the 11th day (Visarjan.)the statues are immersed and returned to the sea/ocean. This symbolizes sending Ganesh back home where he takes the misfortunes of his devotees with him. I wanted to share a few pictures of one of the statues from the city of Pune (above).

It has been an impressive cultural experience with four days filled with songs of devotion and prayer booming from loudspeakers until well past midnight, and loud bursts of fireworks coupled with dancing in the streets—right now a group is playing a flute and drums in a steady, rapid fire beat. (Click on the link to watch a video/hear the music. It is a bit dark, but makes the point).

This is one of the things I love about coming to India every few years. No experience is the same, and aside from touching base with my extended family it is nice to be fully immersed in a world that is in my blood—and is very much a part of my Indian-American life.

Understanding another culture is hard, and while India is a mix between the old and the new, it is a Nation much more complex than what you see in a Bollywood movie. So while investigating my roots, I’m going to sally forth on another one of my missions: to bring a little bit of India to this blog.

As an aside, one interesting note is the environmental impact of this festival (there is some information about it in the article linked above)–how the plaster of Paris that the statues are made of effect the bodies of water in which they are immersed.

Click here to view full album from India.

Rome in A Day: An Exhibit Review

Here is the Rome & American exhibition review that I promised a few weeks back.

Context Matters

It was an intensely sweltering July when I traveled up to the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, PA for the exhibition Ancient Rome & America. On the website for the exhibition (www.constitutioncenter.org/rome) there is the following statement.

Rome, like the United States, overcame a monarchy to become a republic. Long after the fall of ancient Rome, its heroes and legends have continued to influence future generations. From the battlefields of the revolution to the chambers of Congress, Rome became a part of America’s foundation. Through marble sculptures, paintings, jewelry, coins, and ceramics, Ancient Rome & America draws striking comparisons between Roman and American culture, from theories of government to slavery and civil war, to continental expansion and worldwide influence.

First of all, I would like to agree with the premise of the exhibition that the comparisons between Rome and America do certainly exist, especially during the early years of our republic. The significance and history of the classical period to our Founding Fathers is evidenced in our Constitution, and through our architecture. The problem with this exhibition isn’t proving that the connection exists, rather it is the way the information is presented that makes the argument seem almost superficial.

Organization:
The exhibit was divided up into a few different galleries. Three sections smaller in stature, followed by a longer gallery with an alcove, and then a fifth/sixth section that wound its way to a final, exhibit capping video that asked the requisite open ended question: “What does ancient Rome foretell about the fate of America?”

As I walked around I took note of the major section headings that to me, were grouped into these rough sections:

Section Headings:

Building a Republic: Legends and Founding Myths, Tale of 2 Generals (Cincinnatius and George Washington), Military Triumphs-Carthage

By the People for the People: Census, inspiration/Role of Written Law, Oration-Classically Speaking, Comparisons to Caesar


A Classical Revival: Architecture/Style, Remnants in the Ancient World: Grand Tour/Influences. Pompeii Herculaneum, American Documentation Founding Fathers/Mothers

Classical Style, Architecture/Entertainment, Monumental Cities, Brad and Circuses, Hollywood

Expansion/Empire Establishing Empire, Trade/Treasure,Enduring Legacy

It ends up I was close enough to the actual intended organization for the exhibition: Introduction, Building a Republic, A Classical Revival, and Expansion and Empire, Epilogue, but that didn’t matter much, because the flow from room to room (which incidentally was in a very odd exhibit gallery) broke up the sections in a way that seemed illogical and made the narrative of the exhibition feel sloppy. For example, the first room held a small introductory object/case display, and then hopped immediately into a comparison of the founding myths of Rome (Romulus & Remus) with the founding myths of the United States (George Washington and the Cherry Tree). The section was then broken up into another room that held a description of the role of Cincinnatius in American and Roman history, without any clear connection between the two sections of the story. Each case was color coded to indicate what part of the story was being told—red or blue with a spattering of gray in between. However the colors weren’t used consistently or all the way through the exhibit.

Narrative/Artifact Choices
One of the first things I learned in graduate school (and various internships) was that just putting two pieces of evidence together doesn’t make them connected. This exhibition repeatedly placed two “objects” or “themes” together and tried to point the finger to say “hey! Rome did influence America!” The first one was the two founding myths. While it is true that both nations/empires has myths and stories that surround the founding, they aren’t the only ones. The display tries to make it seem that Rome & America are the only two with grand myths that define/represent the countries ideals.

Additionally each major section began with two quotations….here is one set.

Virtues are held in the highest estimation in the very times which bring them forth. Tacitus
Great necessities call out great virtues. Abigail Adams

Sure, both quotations talk about virtue, a concept rooted in the British foundation of the American nation state, and Rome certainly had its own ideas about honor, virtue and war—but it doesn’t mean that Abigail was talking about the same thing as Tacitus. All through the exhibition these quotations have been isolated and presented without context or even contextual clues. We are to take it on face value that a true connection exists between the two ideas, born hundreds upon hundreds of years apart.

Lastly I’d like to make a note about objects. While it was really great to see the artifacts from Herculaneum and Pompeii there were points in the exhibition where the objects were really just out of place. While I recognize the need to acknowledge modern connects with Hollywood that section seemed like an afterthought (that existed in the middle of the exhibit) rather than incorporated into script. Also, this section was only music, and a variety of movie posters without much explanation or analysis of what those movies may say about 20th century America. Then there are the Super Bowl tickets.

At one point in the second to last section of the exhibit the designers presented two Super Bowl tickets (actually to the first Super Bowl I believe). The description starts to talk about how our sports arenas are reminiscent of gladiator arenas (though less brutal), but uses the fact that the Super Bowl still uses roman numerals as a “viola!” connection between modern society and Ancient Rome. Not a strong argument, or even a credible one. My fear is that this entire section of the exhibition was added as a way to create relevance/engage younger visitors. I doubt, that they were very successful.

Clearly I had much to say about the exhibit, but instead of going on about how the Expansion/Empire section may have been stronger if they had extended the idea of the American Empire out beyond the ideas of manifest destiny and westward expansion, I’m going to let Sarah Fell and Tony Torres let you know what they think.

Sarah Fell

As a classics nerd, I was excited to see the Ancient Rome in America exhibit at the Constitution Center. I think the exhibit started out strong, showing the influence Rome had on the Founding Fathers, the symbols of power America chose to use (eagles!), and the federal-style architecture we used for our seats of power. One of the more interesting points, to me, was the similarity between George Washington and Cincinnatus. I would have liked to see more about how America’s mythologizing about its own origins and heros compares to Rome’s. And I will not forget seeing a slave collar from America side-by-side with a slave collar from Rome. That was chilling.

Soon the exhibit started to lose me, though. As Priya mentions, one of the more perplexing choices was the Super Bowl tickets. Surely most cultures have some form of large sporting event, so apart from the Roman numerals, what makes the Super Bowl especially reminiscent of Roman gladiator games? There was also a wall of movie posters of different American films about Rome. But I left that, too, with more questions. Why the glut of movies about Rome at this point in America’s history? How do the portrayals of Rome in these movies compare or differ from reality? What does each film’s portrayal of Rome reveal about America? Why do we latch on to certain themes–decadence and excess, gladiators, slaves? These were two of the more provocative points in the exhibit so I wished the connections had been unpacked a lot more.

In the end the exhibit showed us a lot of things but didn’t really say anything. The video at the end consisted of a lot of Roman and American historians saying, essentially, that Rome and America are similar in a lot of ways, and in a lot of ways they are different. Maybe America will fall, like Rome did, or maybe it won’t. Had the exhibit been pared down to have a specific focus–say, America’s mythologizing about its founding, or American visions of Rome in film and literature–it would have been much more effective.

Tony Torres
I’ve always had a love affair with ancient Rome and with the Founding era of American history due to my once passionate libertarian beliefs.  My passion for both led me to look forward to seeing the Ancient Rome & America exhibit in Philadelphia.  Unfortunately, I too came away from the exhibit mostly disappointed.  I thought that the exhibit displayed a lot of great artifacts, but presented very tenuous connections between most of them. Instead of delving in deeply into strong similarities between Rome and America, it chose to focus on superficial similarities. Some areas of the exhibit were stronger than others – the comparison of Washington to Cincinnatus and the comparisons of slavery in Rome and the American South, for example.  Unfortunately, even those comparisons failed to show how they were similar or why Americans emulated Rome.  It also ignored key differences.  It would have been useful for example to discuss why George Washington felt Cincinnatus was a great model to follow as statesman, rather than say Julius Caesar.  When comparing slavery, the exhibit had some great artifacts such as the slave collars that Sarah mentioned.  What I would have liked to see, however, was discussion of the differences.  There was little or no discussion of the fact that slavery had a racial element in the United States, but was based on conquest in Rome.  There was no mention that the son of a freed slave became emperor of Rom Cincinnatus e, while the son of an American slave had zero chance of being president.  Speaking of presidents, the exhibit failed to examine in critical ways the fears early Americans had about executive power and the fear that a president could become an American Caesar.  This failure dovetails nicely with its failure to “go there” on the issue of imperialism.

The exhibit covered Roman conquest of Europe and the Mediterranean and compared it to the spread of American power across North America.  While I think the comparison has some validity, it missed the point.  America’s founding generation admired Roman republican virtues and institutions and the long stability they provided that civilization.  They actively sought to emulate those admirable aspects of Roman society.  What they feared though, was the darker side of Rome.  America was to be a “New Rome” in republican form that set up institutions to prevent the accumulation of two much power in the hands of a king or emperor.  America was also to be a country that sought peaceful relations and trade with all, but not conflict.  This is most famously represented by John Quincy Adams’ famous statement that “America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.” Of course, America would fail to live up to those ideals in many ways over the next century in a half.  Presidents, beginning with Lincoln, and then continuing with Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, FDR and every president since accumulated great powers far beyond what the founders intended.  America would seek out its Manifest Destiny and conquer a continent.  Where the exhibit fell short, is that it covered imperialism and Manifest Destiny and tried to link those to Rome.  While the comparison is valid, I think modern American imperialism is a much better point of comparison.  Roman imperialism eventually overextended Rome and caused it to rot from within.  Similarly American adventurism abroad and the rise of our national security state has led to similar results at home.  We’ve just lived through a decade in which Americans watched their standard of living decline, their personal and government debt skyrocket, while we’ve engaged in near permanent wars and continued to garrison the planet…even in places that have questionable value to the country as a whole and to the current wars we’re fighting.

My post is rambling a bit, so I’ll wrap up just by pointing out that while the comparison between Rome and America is tempting to make the two societies are still very different.  Rome was never anywhere near as democratic as the modern United States.  While the United States is one of the least egalitarian modern developed societies in the world today, it is far more equal than Rome.  Education levels and literacy levels are much higher.  Estimates of literacy rates in ancient Rome suggest that about ten percent of the population could read and write. While that was a great achievement compared to other pre-modern societies (including the Greeks who were far less literate), it pales in comparison to the nearly 100% literacy rates in the United States.  America has always been highly literate, from colonial times on down to the present.

If I had designed the exhibit, I would have touched on all these themes in some detail.  I would not have included movie posters without context.  I would not have included super bowl tickets.  I think the most important lesson Rome offers the United States is the following: history does repeat itself in some ways.  The most important of which is a lesson that we fail to heed at our own peril.  Every great power has fallen eventually. Nearly all of them have fallen for similar reasons.  Many of them probably realized they were in decline and knew what needed to change.  None of them made the necessary changes.

A Layered Past, An Immortal Life

Henrietta Lacks

Let’s take a moment and think about her name. Henrietta. Lacks. Our names serve as an identifying marker–the gateway into our personalities, our history, our lives. Henrietta had two names, the one that she died with, and HeLa, the name that made her immortal.

For the RPSNE book club this month we decided to read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, a non-fiction book that tells the story of the life, death–and life of a poor African American woman from Baltimore, Maryland.  In short, in the 1950’s Henrietta Lacks died of cervical cancer at Johns Hopkins University. During treatment and upon her death, her cells were taken for research–and were found to be the first cells grown in culture–cells that to this day could encircle the Earth hundreds, upon hundreds, of times. As the book states, her death allowed for scientists to develop the polio vaccine, and investigate the causes for cancer, major virus’, and the effect of an atom bomb on the human cellular structure.

But that is the story of HeLa–not Henrietta Lacks. Her story is one of growing up in rural Virginia, of going to school, and almost dropping out after becoming pregnant–if not for her sister-in-law, and of raising five kids in a segregated Baltimore city. Her story is also the story of her death, and the very real experiences of someone dying of cancer. And it is the story of her five children, of her youngest daughter Deborah who never really knew her mother–and how the knowledge of HeLa cells changed her life.

History is often told along a distinct timeline. We have a birth, we have a death–and the story is best told in chronological order.

Henrietta’s story (soon to be a TV movie by Alan Ball, Oprah and  HBO) is a layered story, and Rebecca Skloot does an incredible job of weaving the scientific history/the history of the HeLa cells, the Lacks’ family history, and Henrietta’s own personal history.

I don’t want to spoil the book for those interested in reading it, but I did want to point out a few details about this very public history. First, methodology. Rebecca Skloot is nothing if not meticulous in her writing. She is very clear in laying out the various controversies in the field, pulling together public perception on cell culture with current discussions on privacy and the human genome project. She makes it easy for someone who is not a scientist to understand the role that HeLa played in scientific discoveries for the last sixty years.

Second, narrative. I found that this story was as much of a memoir on Skloot’s perseverance and connection with the Lacks’ family….and the development of trust. In putting the pieces together Skloot is honest, fair, and open in describing the faults and flaws no one is described in a vacuum or prettied up for the sake of the publication.  Taking place against the the backdrop of  The Civil Rights movement, Nixon’s War on Cancer, 9/11 she weaves together scientific discourse, american history, the Lacks’ history, and her personal history all together to create a distinct, interdisciplinary image that you can’t help but relate to and understand.

Third, implications. Many history books of a popular bent tell a story rooted only in the past. They look back and say, “hey, isn’t it nice that things aren’t that bad anymore?” Not so with this book–which really emphasizes the new frontier for scientific (and ultimately our own) history. What will Henrietta’s cells do next? What diseases will HeLa help to cure? A few year’s back when the new federal medical privacy laws went into effect (HIPAA, in 1996) I didn’t think anything of it–but I think that this book has helped me to become more aware and educated.

Of course the strength of this narrative is that an ordinary woman unknowingly and without giving permission, has made an impact on the world. The fact that none of us knew about her until recently does not matter. Without Henrietta Lacks our lives would not be the same.

~*~*~

The Immmortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot

Doctors took her cells without asking. Those cells never died. They launched a medical revolution and a multimillion-dollar industry. More than twenty years later, her children found out. Their lives would never be the same. Learn more here. You can also learn more about Henrietta Lacks through NPR’s Radio Lab segment here.

On Historic Trees and Bearing Witness

On August 23, after standing tall for many years, a tree fell. Under normal circumstances it would be only of note to the occupants living beneath it. They would worry about repair, and fixing the damage, and about hauling away the excess wood for fire-wood to be recycled for some other common purposes. Not this tree.

“Nearly every morning I go to the attic to blow the stuffy air out of my lungs,” she wrote on Feb. 23, 1944. “From my favorite spot on the floor I look up at the blue sky and the bare chestnut tree, on whose branches little raindrops shine, appearing like silver, and at the seagulls and other birds as they glide on the wind.”

I’ve talked before about Anne Frank, and how her words made an impact on me when I was just a young girl, and continues to do so today. These are her words. This is her tree.

During my last year of graduate school I wrote these words about historic trees and American identity:

American’s connect to history through museums, artifacts owned by presidents, everyday objects, and even popular movies. Part of this experience involves the acknowledgment of the past through monuments and memorials—from simple plaques to great marble pillars often with physical inscriptions denoting a person or site as historic. In particular, there is one unusual monument to the American past—historic trees—which serve to connect the public to the past. These trees can be found intertwined with the natural landscape of a battlefield, a botanical garden, or lining the streets of a growing nation—and when threatened, their importance as identifying markers of the American experience comes to the forefront. They evoke the memory of famous men (and women), battles, and stood at attention as George Washington summoned his troops. Although these trees are not the singular in their role as monuments and memorials to the past, the shadows they cast when threatened and celebrated reflects an American expression of local and national identity—one deeply rooted in the surrounding historical landscape.

My research involved looking at newspaper clippings, mostly eulogies, on lost trees from the early 20th century, though I did include narratives on some present day discussions on historic trees– one of which was the infamous Connecticut Charter Oak. When it died after a great storm in 1856, the New York Times remarked how “proudly it stood, and when tottering with age and reduced to a mere shell of a few inches, by the steady inroads of time itself, it still clung with fondness to the loved spot on which it had witnessed the decay and downfall of many of its associates…” But this tree lived on–through seedlings, furniture, carvings from wood, a monument, pictorial representations on envelopes and, more recently, the Connecticut state quarter.  The linkages between the Connecticut Charter Oak, and the identity of the state solidified its importance to a pre-revolution period in history. (In short, when Britain decided to create the Dominion of New England in 1687, the colony fought back, hiding its charter within the mighty oak).

Witness Tree at Gettysburg National Battlefield Park (Source: Linda Neylon)
Witness Tree at Gettysburg National Battlefield Park (Source: Linda Neylon)

A more recent battle, and one that is perhaps a more fitting comparison to Anne’s magnificent chestnut, involves the Gettysburg Witness trees. A few years ago, some believed that some of the original trees form the Civil War would be torn down–they were not. However most of the language against the supposed destruction spoke of “bearing witness,” or “seeing things that no man alive had seen.”

The same applies for the tree we lost today. For some, as is depicted in the comments for this MSNBC.com article, the tree is a footnote, unimportant and lacking in meaning. For others it is filled with resonance–of a life lost too young, of a people forever changed. With the death of Miep Gies, there really is no human alive who knew and witnessed the lives of those families hiding in the attic. This tree, which inhaled and exhaled, was, in effect, the last living witness to their trials.

These arboreal monuments are all that is left of the past and so will always continue to be revered, honored, and lamented–not just in death, but also for the memories of the past that they invoke.

Beech
Robert Frost

Where my imaginary line
Bends square in woods, an iron spine
And pile of real rocks have been founded
And off this corner in the wild
Where these are driven in and piled,
One tree, by being deeply wounded,
Has been impressed as Witness Tree
And made commit to memory
My proof of being not unbounded.
Thus truth’s established and born out,
Though circumstanced with dark and doubt—
Though by a world of doubt surrounded.
The Moodie Forester

Source of quotation: The Diary of Anne Frank, via Washington Post.com article here. To see two other representations of the Charter Oak click here and here.

Telling Stories and Written in Bone: Exhibit Review from Three Angles

What do an art exhibition, a viewing of bones, and a link between Rome and America have in common? All are representations of three different types of exhibition methodology—one that is traditional, another interdisciplinary, and the third disappointing in scope and intention. A longer review on the National Constitution Center’s exhibition on Rome will follow in a week, but today here are some of my thoughts on Telling Stories: Norman Rockwell from the Collections of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg (through January 2, 2011) and Written in Bone:Forensic Files of the 17th Century Chesapeake (through January 6, 2013).

When I go to an exhibition I look at it from three different ways. The first is the “narrative” what is the story that is being told, why are we here, why should we care? The second is the artifacts themselves. How well do these objects illustrate/emphasize the overarching narrative? The third angle is a little bit more emotional. It’s the gut check. How did I feel as a visitor walking away from the exhibition—did I learn something? Was I confused?

In the Norman Rockwell exhibit, the ‘story’ is easy to identify in that his paintings of ordinary life  reflect some simple storytelling techniques–evoking emotion and nostalgia through vivid colors and simple structure. The canvases from Lucas and Spielberg’s collection also have a distinct connection to an idea of Hollywood glamor: classic, constructed, simple; or as the exhibits website states “Rockwell’s paintings and the films of Lucas and Spielberg evoke love of country, small town values, children growing up, unlikely heroes, acts of imagination and life’s ironies.”

I was drawn to a series of four paintings, all of which told a story within a story, a complex idea to do in a single snapshot or frame. In And Daniel Boone Comes to Life on the Underwood Portable, Boy Reading Adventure Story, Shadow Artist, The Toy Maker (see them here) I found myself identifying with the second level of the image, into the writer’s imagination, the boy’s book, the life of the shadow bunny, and the world of toys. All are pictures within pictures, visions within visions. Since each of these paintings belonged to George Lucas or Stephen Spielberg they are uniquely representative of how Rockwell influenced their films. At one point in an interview (link below) Lucas states that “When we were in film school, we would say, “We’re not making movies about the way things are, we’re making movies about the way things should be.” And that’s the power you have as an artist, to be able to put your spin on reality and make it the way you think it should be. Rockwell created his art to relate to people, but at the same time he showed generations to come what it was like in those year”, so in effect these paintings tell more than just the story that Rockwell wanted to tell, they also tell the story of George Lucas the filmmaker and Stephen Spielberg the filmmaker. They emphasize that what we see on the silver and small screens are often invoking/influenced by images and windows into times past present and future.

Gut Check? I wish there had been more textual narration besides the live film and the introductory panels/quotations, but otherwise loved it.

Written in Bone is a different type of exhibition. First of all its in the Smithsonian Institutions Natural History Museum, which already indicates that it will be of scientific or natural in nature, but the second title of the exhibition Forensic Files of 17th Century Chesapeake made me walk through the doors. I spent a lot of time in college learning about 17th, 18th, and 19th century Virginia through coursework at William and Mary. So I wanted to see how they put together an exhibition that told the story of that period through the human remains.

The exhibition began with a lesson in basic forensic pathology. How can you tell the age of remains from the size of the skull, the length of a leg bone etc. Once you left the first room you were introduced to the idea of making connections between the forensic evidence and the documentary materials that historians generally use. This led to a third section where the remains of a man from Jamestown and a couple from St. Mary’s County were displayed. Step by step, piece by piece they walked us through identification and context.

This was an excellent exhibition. Not only because it emphasized the importance of using interdisciplinary evidence to put the puzzle together, but also because it was structured in a clear and organized fashion—leading the audience to the historical and forensic conclusions. In prepping this post I also took the time to look at the online portion of the website, and stumbled across “Secrets in the Cellar” a web comic that virtually relays all of this information to those who are unable to visit the exhibition personally. It maybe a slight oversimplification of the work that actually goes into identifying old human remains, but it gets the job done.

Gut Check? Highly recommended. Engaging, mysterious, and a great example of how history can be told through many different lenses for a fuller story.

Norman Rockwell Exhibition Links:

Official Site for Telling Stories
George Lucas on Norman Rockwell and the Movies
Steven Spielberg on Norman Rockwell and the Movies
CBS Review of Exhibition

Written in Bone Exhibition Links:
Written in Bone Official Site
The Secret in the Cellar (webcomic)

We Are One: The National Asian Pacific Islander American Historic Preservation Forum

Also posted on the PreservationNation.org Blog. I’m working on a post of some exhibits I recently attended but wanted to post this here as well.

We are one.

At the end of the first day of the Asian Pacific Islander American Historic Preservation Forum (APIAHPF) I found myself at a banquet hosted by Guam Preservation willingly participating in a group sing-a-long complete with traditional hand motions and live music. For those who attended the two and a half day conference this moment represented everything that the meeting had offered to attendees: camaraderie, energy, synergy and determination – all in a forum to encourage, educate and mobilize Asian Pacific Islander American (APIA) communities that are working to preserve their American story.

About two years in the making, this conference served two distinct purposes. The first was to provide educational sessions that would give attendees basic preservation tools to save their historic communities. Context matters, so the fact that we were at the Kabuki Hotel in the heart of San Francisco’s Japantown definitely added to the atmosphere. I moderated a session that gave an introduction to historic preservation, and quickly learned that all of the attendees who had gathered brought with them a particular story and vision for APIA preservation. One of the major components of this session was recognizing that preservation, especially in the case of Asian Americans, is more than just buildings and structures, but also includes the intangible heritage—the folklore, the language, the dance.

The second part of the Forum involved thinking organically as a group about what APIA historic preservation means and consequently what it needs in order to become a broader and successful movement. I mentioned synergy earlier and this is where all of our minds worked together to brainstorm. Every meal was a working meal and breakfast (both days) and lunch were reserved for the task of identifying what tools the APIA community needs to preserve their unique American past. Using the World Café format we looked at three central questions that served as jumping off point for what we as a group wanted for APIA preservation:

  • What inspires and motivates you personally to preserve APIA culture?
  • What does historic preservation mean in an APIA context? What changes?
  • What next steps would you like to see for API cultural preservation?

This allowed us, on the final morning, to develop a series of product-based next steps that ranged from developing a “basics” toolkit from existing materials, developing a social media strategy for the group that includes advocacy alerts and networking, and determining that the conversation needs to continue with others—especially with stake holders who were unable to attend the Forum.

Perhaps the most important piece of this Forum was the recognition that the APIA and historic preservation community needs to work together in order to be successful. That…

We are One
With the Earth
With the Sun
With the Sky
With the Sea
We are One

California Bound: San Francisco, Fog, and the History of Asian Pacific Americans

There are words in the remnants of the registration building at Angel Island, a footprint of history, lost to time.

Courage                                                                                    Seperation
Segregation                                                                            Confinement
Bravery Lonliness                                                               Frustration   Anger
Exclusion                                                                                Inclusion
Appeals   Hearings  Examinations                                Denial       Perseverance     Entry
Human Spirit   Opportunities                                         Acceptance     Rejection
Dreams   Hope  Fear  Faith                                              Civil Rights  Realities  Social Justice

I recently wrote the post below for the PreservationNation.org blog, but I wanted to add a few thoughts regarding the importance of tangible and intangible heritage in telling the stories of immigrant America.  My travels around San Francisco emphasized just how important history is in the broader community. Documenting the past has never been more important–not only in terms of producing an archive for posterity, but also for the next generation as a means of forming a broader American identity.

A brief tangent: while at the College of William and Mary I had a chance to read the text from Colonial Williamsburg known as “Becoming Americans“. This publication, a thematic interpretation plan for CW,  pulls out the following main ideas in examining and interpreting the colonial period for the public.

  • Diverse Peoples
  • Clashing Interests
  • Shared Values
  • Formative Institutions
  • Partial Freedoms
  • Revolutionary Promise

While it isn’t a perfect interpretive plan, the main themes do lend themselves as a basic framework for stories of other immigrants to the United States. The interactions between cultures, their individual identities and the process of adapting in a new world may  not be a direct parallel to the stories of the colonial era “immigrants” but they do perhaps offer a glimpse into how American democracy and history constantly evolves and follows the similar arcs throughout time.

In early American the hypocrisy of the revolutionary fervor and the culture of slavery that had taken root in Virgina and other colonies was not lost on individuals like Thomas Jefferson and George Washington. Despite that recognition it took hundreds of years before we, as Americans, began seriously to work to end the legacies of slavery in this country (which includes post-reconstruction Jim Crow laws and segregation).

If you look at later groups that came to this country–the Irish and Scots, the Chinese and Japanese, the Eastern Europeans or African immigrants–all have experienced a level of discrimination and hardships before being accepted into mainstream America. Some would claim that it is a process still in progress for many of the more recent immigrant groups. At various points in time APA immigrants experienced, for a variety of reasons, discrimination and censure whether it is due to the Chinese Exclusion Act or the reactions to the 1942 bombings of Pearl Harbor and the subsequent internments.

For Asian Pacific American communities the preservation of their communities, buildings, stories, music, language and artifacts are essential to documenting the APIA narrative of “Becoming Americans.” So those words that I saw on the stairway to the Angel Island Immigration Station barracks are more than just thought provoking phrases, or poetry to evoke emotion at the site, they are representative of what it means to be American, and that to understand the stories from Angel Island is to understand the story of every single citizen of the United States.

Below is the text from my blog on PreservationNation.org. Click here to view the slide show of my trip to San Francisco.

San Francisco Tours Offer a Glimpse at the Asian Pacific American Experience

A letter speaking about the events of April 18, 1906 in San Francisco, California

For me to describe the scenes and events of the past few days would be an impossibility at present, and no doubt you would have had more news regarding the awful fate of this city than I myself know. All that I can say at this writing is, that about 5:15 a.m., Wednesday morning, I was thrown out of bed and in a twinkling of an eye the side of our house [at 151—24th Ave.] was dashed to the ground. How we go into the street I will never be able to tell, as I fell and crawled down the stairs amid flying glass and timber and plaster. When the dust cleared away I saw nothing but a ruin of a house and home that it had taken twenty years to build…

The Peace Pagoda in Japantown.
The Peace Pagoda in Japantown.

The Peace Pagoda in Japantown.

On my first day in San Francisco I attended a reception for the National Asian Pacific Islander American Historic Preservation Forum (more on this in a blog post next week) at the Chinese Historical Society of America. Amidst the exhibitions, I found myself standing before a pair of slippers belonging to a Mrs. Lee Yoke Suey, a woman who came to America and found herself detained at Angel Island for over 15 months. These slippers were unfathomably tiny, a witness to the Chinese custom of foot binding, but also a part of Mrs. Suey’s American story, for as I talked about the practice with another conference attendee I learned that during the great earthquake of 1906 many of the fatalities included Chinese women whose bound feet rendered them unable to walk, and consequently unable to escape from the resulting fire.

Now, before coming to California I knew that my visit would include three typical tourist experiences. A view of Alcatraz Island? Check. A visit to Fisherman’s Wharf? Check, Check. Taking a lot of pictures of fog as it rolled over the Golden Gate Bridge? Triple check.

But during the last weekend in June I found myself experiencing a different view of San Francisco, one that looked at the history of the city through the lens of APA America.

While in San Francisco I stayed in an area known as Japantown, a small community that includes community-run stores, the headquarters for the National Japanese American Historical Society(NJAHS) and places for the Japanese-American community to gather and live. My first introduction to the history of San Francisco came from my tour of Japantown by youth tour guides from NJAHS. As with most things in the city the history of Japantown begins with the 1906 earthquake.

Even though APA communities lived in San Francisco before the earthquake, this area—known as the Western Addition—is where the Japanese community re-established themselves following the destruction of their former homes. By 1940 the neighborhood had grown into a vibrant community center with Japanese-American run businesses and places for the community to gather; something that changed following the 1942 bombing of Pearl Harbor and the subsequent internment of Japanese-Americans.

This is where most of my tour of the current Japantown began. At NJAHS headquarters I saw Sa sa E, or Camp Objects of Memories—material objects made by residents of internment camps. These artifacts are made of whatever materials the artists could find reflecting the scarcity and solitude of those years. The guides walked us to the place where citizens stood in line to register for the camps, and on a faded staircase we can see remnants of graffiti that proclaims “Japs Keep Out.” It is an interesting glimpse for me, a life-long East Coaster, to actually stand and view facets of American history that I had only seen in textbooks.

Eventually, we walked across the street to the Peace Pagoda, which opened in 1968 as a gift from the people of Osaka, Japan. The structure is centered on a plaza that exhibits four basic elements: fire, earth, water and stone, but also represents the late-20th century story of Japantown, a place stuck in a cycle of redevelopment threats that began with urban renewal and continue on to the present day. This serves as an excellent backdrop to the conversations going on in the Forum, where community members across the Pacific Rim have gathered to identify how best to preserve what’s left of their American-legacy before it is too late.

Orig. Chinese (Cantonese) of the "Wooden House" poem by a detainee.
Orig. Chinese (Cantonese) of the "Wooden House" poem by a detainee.

Orig. Chinese (Cantonese) of the “Wooden House” poem by a detainee.

The second major site I visited while I was in San Francisco was the Angel Island Immigration Station, which is where immigrants from Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Mexico, Central and South America, Russians and Asians were detained. While many call this site the “Ellis Island of the West,” my guide emphasized that this was more like the “Guardian of the West.” Not all immigrants coming to San Francisco went through Angel Island, but rather this is where those (during the years of 1910-1940) who needed “further scrutiny” were held. This is particularly true for the Chinese immigrants who were escaping economic woes (amongst other reasons) in China who found them being held due to the Chinese Exclusion Act. There is a lengthy history of the act and its role in American immigration policy but I want to emphasize that for many the stay at Angel Island was brief, while for others it lasted as long as two years.

Many of the structures at the station are closed to visitors due to decay, but what I found most amazing about the building that we were allowed to tour (where the male detainees were kept) was that many of the detainees took their emotion and reactions to being held and transcribed them onto the walls in the forms of poetry. These poems represent heartache, loneliness, and uncertainty, and what I love about Angel Island is that despite the poems and writings being covered over after the military took over the station to house POWs they can still be seen—revealing the human emotion and a fragment of one life in the APA immigrant story.

Over the course of the weekend I did see some other sites—the Presidio, Golden Gate Park, and Haight-Ashbury—but I think that I left with a broader understanding regarding the many different stories that we, as Americans, have to offer. Stories of sadness, but also of courage and determination—and how we can preserve those stories as time goes by.