5 comments about Colored People: A Memoir.

1. Colored People is a wonderful book. It has humor, sadness and illuminates a specific period of time. I liked how his family and town shaped his values and made him what he is today. We are using this book as a Common Reading and also a One Book, One Community Program with the small university town of Shepherdstown. The author is coming and will meet the students who will have all read the book. The topic of race and the civil rights movement are highlighted and will be the topic of many discussions. I highly recommend the book. You will enjoy reading it and if you learn from it, so much the better.



2. An informative, interesting look into the attitudes, situations, and resoucefulness of "Colored People". Henry Louis Gates Jr. is a gifted and sensitive leader of thought and expression of our day.



3. I place Colored People alongside Angela's Ashes as one of the best works of memoir in recent years. He doesn't moralize; he just tells the honest story. This is a story that, to my knowledge, has not been told elsewhere. It is a story about the freedom and comfort and the pain of a segregated commuinty, and the heartbreak that came with leaving some of that world behind. Most things are deeper and more complex than we like to think they are. Colored People brings that concept forward in a way that no other book has. The people whose expressed frustration with not being able to keep the characters straight are missing the point - this isn't a murder mystery and it doesn't make any difference. Buy it. Read it. Share it. I only wish I'd done so when it first came out.



4. Gates fears that Piedmont, West Virginia will cease to exist. His father felt and instructed him that people of the same race should not cling to each other through habit or fear. The author rebels at the notion that he can't be part of other groups, too. Piedmont is in Mineral county. Piedmont as a whole seems to be graying. The town's identity was bound up by the existence of the Westvaco paper mill. Almost all the colored people in Piedmont worked at the paper mill. Until the 1970's the houses were rented from white landowners.
   
   The civil rights era came late to Piedmont. The family watched Dr. King on the news. The author's father was jaundiced about the civil rights movement. His mother was courageous. She sent four brothers to college and was recognized on "The Big Pay-Off". Through his mother, Gates was part of the Coleman clan, a big deal in Piedmont. The Gateses lived in Cumberland. Brown v. Board of Education marked the author and his peers for life. Integration brought interesting cultural clashes.
   
   Gates was marked out to excel from first grade. Gateses had been attending Howard for three generations and Harvard for two. The family, in the beginning, went to the Walden Methodist Church. Gates was afraid of the power of the Holiness Church and he avoided it. His mother became depressed with the change of life when the author was twelve and she was forty six. The mother became a pack rat after a childhood of scarcity. Gates began to cook dinner for the family and he joined the church in his anxiety. A childhood friend urged him to read Dickens and he became a fervid reader. He attended an Episcopal church camp in West Virginia, Peterkin, in 1965. He thought it was like stepping into a dream world. He read NOTES OF A NATIVE SON. For some of the older people in Piedmont integration was experienced as a loss. Gates went to Potomac State for one year and applied for a transfer. He was admitted to Yale.
   
   This is a lovely portrait of a community and a people.



5. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. is an extraordinary scholar, particularly on African-American issues. He was born and raised in Piedmont, West Virginia during the time of early racial desegregation and, as a black man, was directly influenced by this dramatically historical period. Gates graduated summa cum laude from Yale University with a degree in history, then received a Ph.D. in English from Cambridge.
   He has written for The New Yorker, The Village Voice, Time, The New Republic, and other prominent magazines. In addition to Colored People: A Memoir, Gates has authored and co-authored several books including Figures in Black: Works, Signs, and the "Racial" Self (1987), The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of Afro-American Literary Criticism (1988), and Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Man (1997).
   
   The preface to Colored People is a letter from Gates to his daughters, Maggie and Liza and, though the book is dedicated to his father Henry Louis Gates, Sr. and in memory of his mother Pauline Augusta Coleman Gates, the entire autobiography is written in conversational tone, as if Gates were recounting his stories not only to his daughters, but to their entire generation.
   
   Gates' collection of memories describes the era, long since past (both for good and for bad) when blacks and whites were segregated, and the subsequent integration of these colors, and what it was like to live in that world, and be a part of it's evolution. The title Colored People is beautifully appropriate, not only for the shades of black America it represents, but for each and every one of us; black, white, red, yellow: none of us are see-through.
   Henry Louis Gates, Jr. invites us to live with him in Piedmont, West Virginia, and experience life-black life-through his eyes. We walk through his town, invade his cultural rituals as a welcome guest, experience the love of family and community with him, and suffer the pain and frustration of segregation alongside him. I felt privileged to walk with Gates into segregated, comfortable, welcoming, "safe" black cultural spaces I could never enter otherwise: a black funeral, a black church, a black barbershop, a black family reunion. In contrast, I felt anger and pain at being judged, criticized, and belittled because of skin color.
   
   Gates emphasizes to his readers, through his personal life experiences, the fact that color is only an outside condition that changes with the sunshine. He allows us to see that we are all human beings first, experiencing the same emotions, passions and ambitions as the man next to us, regardless of his color.
   
   He doesn't discount white racism though, nor try to "Uncle Tom" it into something to be scoffed at as negligible. He allows us to know what West Virginia was like in the 1950's through the eyes of a young black man. We feel his warm acceptance when he falls for the affections of a white girl, and when he is recognized for superior intellect among his peers, many of whom are white. We share in the camaraderie he feels when he plays ball with his white friends. But then we are appalled when he is forced to leave the company of their table in a restaurant and stand at the counter, because of his skin color. We get angry because those same white friends don't stick up for him when he is forcibly thrown from a dance club, simply because he is black.
   
   Through both the segregation and integration, Gates shares with us what he finds to be of greatest value in his life; that being the love of his family. His memoir is somewhat biographical in this sense, in that the lives of his maternal family, the Colemans, and his paternal family, the Gateses, are shared with us in detail. We learn how Henry Louis Gates, Jr. found the support and strength to become the intellectual force he is today. Through the lives of his family members, we see yet another generation of segregated black America. We learn what it is like to be "kept down" in a dead-end mill job, to be forced to drink from a separate water fountain, to be drawn into a box and dared to cross its lines.
   
   Through the Colemans and the Gateses we experience the freedom of integration, but also the fear and uncertainty of leaving behind a safe and comfortable life we have come to accept, if not love. There is fear and discomfort in change, and we dread its revolution, even as we feel its excitement, through Gates' memories.
   
   Gates' optimistic personality shines throughout his book. It's refreshing to me that, despite his formidable education and vast first-hand knowledge of racism, segregation and integration, his autobiography is not written in lofty, scholarly terminology, but in an easy, relaxed manner that informs, educates and leaves the reader with the impression of having enjoyed a talk with a good friend.
   
   Colored People: A Memoir is a text which, in my opinion, should be a part of every student's university curriculum. Gates' underlying message, that freedom should never be taken for granted, is one that should be ingrained in every American citizen, regardless of color or creed. His personal memoirs, one West Virginia man's record of an era, offer a candid glimpse into the trails of integration few of us today, thankfully, will ever experience. This book is not to be missed by anyone who cares about history, about race, and about multicultural America as we now know it and how it came to be.
   
   Rhonda Browning White

3 comments about Ella Baker and the Black Freedom Movement: A Radical Democratic Vision (Gender and American Culture).

1. This was a great book. Ella Baker was ahead of het time.This is a great read if you like the history of the civil right movement.Ms. Baker I hope to meet you in heaven.



2. Dr. Ransby provides a well-structured and insightful biography of one of the most important, yet least well-known, leaders of the civil rights movement in the United States. This book is strongly recommended for any student of modern U.S. history.



3. Ella Baker must be the most underrated figure in U.S. history. There are plenty of Presidents who have done less to shape their own times than Ella Baker. She decisively shaped two of the most important national civil rights organizations--the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference--and was the single most decisive figure in a third--the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. Only Martin Luther King Jr. can be considered a rival in importance to the African American freedom movement, and yet most Americans have never even heard of Ella Baker. This exhaustively researched and well written biography should go a long way toward filling that gap.

   This is a thoughful, analytical, and well-told story about a uniquely important American political life. It is a work of central importance in United States history and especially the history of the African American freedom movement. It is a cutting edge work of black women's history, too. I plan to buy a stack of them for Christmas presents, and to assign this book to my students for many years to come.

5 comments about An Ordinary Man: An Autobiography.

1. This autobiography was written very well. The author was committed to getting the facts out without glorifying himself. Done very well. I appreciated being told about the genocide in Rwanda without all the gore. I understood perfectly what he was describing without seeing it on screen. I learned so much from both his experience and his trials trying to get help from other nations. Great book!



2. My product arrived in time and in very good condition!
   
   would definitely purchase again



3. I purchased this book two months before I had the courage to read it. I feared it would be too upsetting and entirely depressing to engage myself in.
   
   The book begins with a wonderful history of Paul's life. His vivid descriptions of The Land of A Thousand Hills, the banana beer, the family, his path to hotel management. It is an interesting story about a young man growing up in Africa.
   
   The middle of the book approaches and details the horrific genocide of 800,000 people in as little as three months. The terror, the worry, the perseverence is all conveyed beautifully (if that word can be appropriate). I found inspiration in his ability to use words and intuition to communicate with people who could have taken his life. I felt connected to Paul's belief that nobody is 100% evil, and nobody is 100% good. I like his description of human nature, and felt he truly "gets" what being human is.
   
   The ending of the book focused on his life in Belgium, among other Rwandan expatriates. And the decision to start a business in Africa. What a truly interesting person. I was fascinated by this story. It also shares much of the pre-1994 and post-1994 politics.
   
   Whenever I gently give someone "the kindhearted blow-off" in my mind, I now think, "that was a Rwandan 'no'" I appreciate Paul's sharing of his culture and political environment.
   
   I would enjoy seeing him speak. I appreciated his also sharing a little bit about how the movie came to be.
   
   I really felt the storyteller is a person I could sit and have a beer with, and truly enjoy an afternoon chatting.
   
   The last few pages of the book include a wonderful reference bibliography with information and suggestions on additional books to be read on Rwanda. I appreciated that, and plan to read several.



4. Paul Rusesabagina is an ordinary man. He feels sadness and joy, fear and hope just like the rest of us. He is not a superhero in the ordinary sense of the word--he cannot fly, he does not have an agility belt, and he cannot scale walls. He is an ordinary man by all accounts, but in 1994 when the dark cloud of tense hatred between the Tutsis and the Hutus that had been brewing for decades in the small country of Rwanda erupted into a genocide that left eight hundred thousand dead, Paul Rusesabagina's actions as described in his biography An Ordinary Man were anything but ordinary.
   Rusesabagina was born in a small village in the countryside in 1954. His mother was a Tutsi, and his father was a Hutu. According to Rwandan tradition of heritage passing through the father's bloodlines, Rusesabagina was considered a Hutu as well. Rusesabagina's father was his inspirational role model growing up, and his philosophy that "kindness and justice did not know ethnicity" was embedded in Rusesabagina's actions later in life (12).
   Rusesabagina learned early on in life to fight with his words, not with his fists. He found that by speaking to people face to face, he could connect on some level, and convince them not to do him harm. This technique worked with schoolyard bullies, and later on with murderous, fanatical generals. Rusesabagina found work at the hotel Mille Collines, and eventually became manager of its sister hotel Diplomates.
   After the plane carrying President Habyarimana was shot down, the extremist radio station RTLM began to use powerful diatribes to convince Hutus that it was their duty to murder the Tutsi "cockroaches." Rusesabagina, a moderate Hutu with a Tutsi wife, was able to negotiate, bribe, and flatter those carrying out the murders into sparing the lives of the 1,268 refugees that had fled to the hotel Mille Collines. The world turned a blind eye to the genocide and for a long seventy-six days, Rusesabagina had only himself and his words to save his family and the refugees from certain death. It is estimated that about five people were brutally murdered every minute. Rusesabagina managed to save approximately four hours worth of people. Eventually, he and the refugees were evacuated. Rusesabagina and his family moved to Belgium, where they reside to this day. In 1999, the movie Hotel Rwanda depicted his actions during this "dark bead" in Rwandan history.
   This is one of the most remarkable books that I have ever had the pleasure of reading. It's so morbidly fascinating that even though at several times I felt physically ill, I was unable to put it down. Rusesabagina has a special skill as an author, and is able to paint an accurate and horrifying picture of the events that occurred, but at the same time is able to insert his whole-hearted and stubborn belief in the "triumph of common decency" over evil (203). Rusesabagina is able to argue this in the face of heartache and bloodshed. He is even able to provide concrete examples of people in the book that hacked their neighbors with machetes but still had a drop of human kindness desperate for an excuse to show itself.
   Rusesabagina unapologetically criticizes all the nations that ignored the genocide for far too long. Rusesabagina not only provides criticism but also possible solutions that could have staunched the bloodshed quickly and effectively in the genocide's early stages. He also provides an excellent rhetoric on how extremists were able to convince rational, calm people to take up machetes and kill their neighbors and friends. Rusesabagina is able to counter the extremist rhetoric with words of his own, and uses this same skillful mastery of words that saved so many from slaughter to narrate this fantastic and moving book.
   There are very few weaknesses in An Ordinary Man. Yes, the gore that is described twisted my stomach and left me feeling tainted and disgusted with mankind. After reading too much, I was almost unable to continue, but then again the mass genocide of men, women and children is not supposed to be neat and digestible. The descriptions are meant to shock and sicken. At the end of the novel, I felt ultimately dissatisfied and furious with the abject lack of justice. But this is a specific tactic used to irk the reader, because justice has not occurred in Rwanda and murderers still walk the streets. There is little justice to be found in that, and there is no reason why Rusesabagina should candy coat the issue to make the reader feel better.
   Rusesabagina leaves the reader feeling hungry for more knowledge of the Rwandan genocide. His book inspired me to do outside research on the Rwandan genocide, and all of the other humanitarian crises that have occurred since then. Rusesabagina believes he is an ordinary man because to him saving all of these people seemed the most normal thing to do, something every man ought to have done. His message is a simple message of hope, a message that every man has the capability to give a "Rwandan no" to evil (203). His book serves not only a testimony to what happened in the dark days of the Rwandan massacre, but also serves as a means of getting people to care. He cautions that if the world cannot overcome apathy, then the phrase "never again" will be "one of the most abused phrases" and the "greatest lies" of the time. The book leaves the reader with a sense of hope that ordinary men like Rusesabagina will continue to say "no" to evil and do these extraordinary things as if they nothing more than ordinary.



5. This book was chosen by Middle Tennessee State University for their summer reading book, and being a student there I decided to jump in with all the freshmen and read it as well. I'm excited that he will be speaking at our convocation ( our program to start off the year.)
   
   The thing that interested me most about this book is that he knew not to expect much from his country. He had pride, and he had hope for a better future, but he knew better than to expect anything more than the current situation.
   This book is definitely something to be read by those who are very involved in world politics, sociology, and psychology. Rusesabagina delves into each one with vigor, and I very well believe he could be a professor in any one of these concentrations.
   I am proud to say that I share the world with people such as Rusesabagina.

5 comments about Chief Bender's Burden: The Silent Struggle of a Baseball Star.

1. This book was a delight to read. It is both informative and entertaining. Although it is a work of history it is a very easy and interesting read. Tom Swift has done his homework as the book is filled with many details describing the life and times of this hall of famer. I recommend it to all fans of baseball history and eagerly look forward to his future works.



2. This is the best biography I have read. It provides important details about an player important in baseball history, and also illuminates the history of many Native Americans and how they were assimilated into society in the late 19th early 20th centuries. This is one to purchase and keep.



3. A great book on an early 20th Century forgotten Baseball pitcher who is in the Hall of Fame. "Chief" Bender was one of the mainstays of those early great Philadelphia A's teams. This is a about a native American player who excelled in Major League Baseball in spite of all the racial comments, taunts and low expectations of Native Americans. There is information about his days at the Carlisle School. Tom Swift also uses the racially charged quotes from the papers of those years to demonstrate what he had to live with. His real name was Charles and like Baseball in those days everyone had a nickname some weren't too flattering like "Chief", "Rube" and "Dummy" While this is not a movie where the character has flashbacks of his past, Tom Swift starts with the 1914 World Series game 1 in which the "Chief" lost and continues to go back to that game leading off of many of the chapters of the events surrounding that game. I don't understand by discussing all the racial sterotypes on the man why then does the author keep going back to that same unsuccessful game? To me it is slamning the man all over again. If you can get past this stupid movie technique then the book is a worth while read.



4. When I saw there was a new biography of the great Chief Bender, I grabbed it up. Tom Swift has done a great service by bringing the life of Charles Bender to print. He is one of the all-time greats and should not be overlooked.
   
   Swift also lets the reader get to know the man behind the legend, and the Chief was a Hall-of-Famer in nearly every aspect of his life. His was a great man and a great pitcher. Connie Mack said that if he had to win one big game, there is no one he'd rather have on the mound. And Connie Mack saw them all, from the 1880s to the 1950s -- from Cy Young to Walter Johnson to Lefty Grove to Whitey Ford.
   
   There are a few problems with the book, which keeps it, at least in my mind, from meriting five stars. Swift begins his book with the opening game of the 1914 World Series, and then he keeps coming back to it throughout. This doesn't work for a number of reasons, especially since this is the "big game" the Chief lost (the A's were swept in the series by the "Miracle" Boston Braves). There are also occasional problems with Swift's prose. He uses sentence fragments to good effect in some cases, but in most instances, they just confuse the issue and make it seem as though he doesn't realize that a fragment is not a complete sentence. I also felt that many of his similes were weak.
   
   Lastly, a book about a baseball star should include that player's career statistics, but this Swift fails to do. I found myself going to a web site to view the Chief's stats.
   
   Overall, however, I enjoyed getting to know the great Charles Bender a little better.



5. Speaking as a former archivist, "Chief Bender's Burden" is an archivist's dream: well researched with an exquisitely detailed bibliographic essay, and an index! But more than that, it is a book lover's dream. It is the brilliantly written story of a unique American, "the pitcher who looked in the face of pressure and winked." Author Swift replays the Deadball Era games with the enthusiasm of a modern day radio announcer. The inclusion of Bender's quotes on page 128 and 211, and paragraph one on page 275 alone make this book a gem. More than baseball history, it is pathos and glory and inspiration.
   Beverly Hermes

5 comments about Nigger : An Autobiography.

1. I LOOKED ALL OVER FOR THIS BOOK AND YOU WERE ONLY ONE THAT HAD IT. THANKS
   
   
   
   TERI ANN GARCIA



2. I was attending a prodimently white Junior High School in Brooklyn, NY, at the age of 11 yrs. when our English requested our standard essay. I was reading Dick Gregory's "Nigger" at the time and decided to base my essay on his book. When the teacher reviewed all of the essays, she returned mine to me with an A+, and asked me read it before the class. While initially, the black and white students were at best awed by the word "Nigger", they totally embraced my essay. You see this was a liberal white school, and being in NY were open-minded. I will never forget my black teacher, Mrs Ford nor the liberating experience to read such a controversial essay during the time - 1961.



3. Dick Gregory was a track star, first class entertainer and civil rights supporter. But before each of those, he was a black man. Being a black man was never an easy thing, but Mr. Gregory had the misfortune of being a black man who grew up on "relief" (i.e. welfare) raised by a working, black single mother in a white man's world. His prose is wonderfully direct and honest to the point of discomfort. Nigger : An Autobiography would be required reading in every high school in America if not for its controversial title. In a perfect world, Dick Gregory's memoir would be judged by its content and not its cover, as he was judged by color and not character.
   
   Gregory never glorifies his accomplishments into distortion. This is not the story of a hero. He was a very small player in a civil rights movement filled with brave men and women. Though a nationally recognized high school track star, he faded in college althletics at Southern Illinois. He was not a name comedian like Johnny Carson, Jack Paar or Richard Pryor. Failings in his business and personal life are well-documented. His is a more typical black experience than Medgar Evers, Martin Luther King or Magic Johnson. It is story reflective of millions of northern blacks born in the 1930s and who come of age in the 50s and 60s. Nigger : An Autobiography is the best autobiography I have read, bar none. Because I cannot hope to match the eloquence of Dick Gregory, this review will conclude with his own words.
   
   "It's because we grinned when he wanted us to grin. We cried when he wanted us to cry. We've spent money when he wanted us to spend money. And we've done without when he said do without."
   
   "He owns all the missiles in the world, and when he talked to you about owning a switchblade you become ashamed."
   
   "He started all the wars, and when he talked to you about cutting somebody on Saturday night you become ashamed."
   
   "He makes me feel small. He calls me everything on the job but my name, so I'm aggravated before I get home."
   
   "Then he tells me about my education. Well, if it takes education his-style to produce a clown that would throw dynamite in a church, I hope we never get that."



4. I'm uncomfortable with the title, but the book is insightful and moving. If you did not grow up black and poor, you need to read this classic by Dick Gregory. I also recommend it as required reading for red necks and for anyone interested in the civil rights movement.



5. In short, I enjoyed reading Gregory's autobiography. To come from such extreme poverty to become the successful and noted Black activist/comedian that he is speaks volumes about his tenacity and determination. Follow Gregory as he talks about his struggles as a youth in St. Louis, to his college days at Southern Illinois University, to his adult life when he gets the first inklings of becoming a professional comedian, his marriage, and his time spent as an activist during the civil rights movement in the South. He is definitely one of the last of Black America's freedom fighters.

4 comments about The Art Forgers Handbook.

1. Be warned, this book contains a lot of recipes for art materials - so if you are reading just for the anecdotes you might be a bit lost in some of the process descriptions. However, Eric has done a wonderful job of weaving wit and humor into the text; it is never dry or technical. A painter looking for recipes to create decorative fakes will find this book useful, altho I think it is far too vague to provide any information to the serious forger. It excells in the anecdotes about Erics own forgeries, the art establishment, and the nature of collectors. I found myself laughing out loud at many points - a rare accomplishment for a book.



2. Interesting to read and covers a wide area of the forgers requirements, however its like swimming.
   
   You can read about it all day long but unless you do it the books pretty much useless.



3. The art forgers handbook is an intriguing confession. While having reference worthy material I would advise against
   believing the book is the bible on the subject. Forgery involves a talent for broad and bizarre logic that involves not
   only the crafting but also a mental empathy inside the universal mind of the collector, the dealer, and the expert.

   As far as I'm concerned there are more valuable resources how ever there can be no complete source that one book
   could provide and Hebborns books makes a decent edition. The real success in a forgers ability would be in there
   logic and this is something that Hebborn can't teach. Hebborn never the less seems to be a master and his
   confessions add light on how one might tackle the subject.

   I do hold the book in high regards but in fact I have learned very little from it. A study in the history of artist
   materials and techniques, conservation, authentication, and a study of how these have been flawed, artistic
   competence in craft, creative logic, and ones own trial and error will be the only all inclusive bible into successful
   forgeries.

   The book has a catchy title, is informative and intriguing just don't be misled that the book will give you the ability
   to turn Degas and Rembrants. In my opinion there is only an illusion when it comes to success in forgery. The real
   success of the book is a demonstration that history is flawed and art; mystical and intriguing art is indeed a
   commodity illusion and nobody in the field is safe if fakes are indeed fakes in what ever context a fake is regarded
   in. If you are interested in the subject read the book it may after all have cost the artist his own life. Oh yeah, look for
   my own book in two-three years!

   Good luck




4. Hebborn certainlly knew his stuff and succeeded in selling many of his "creations" through dealers such as London's Colnagi. If you are interested in the nuts and bolts of forging old masters, this will certainly get you started. Other good, though more technical, books to look at are Gettens and Stout (and don't overlook the bibliography) and the immortal Max Doerner. There are some errors in the book, e.g., bistre and orpiment are easily found, if you know where to look. Still, Hebborn writes with rare wit and, quite often, with more humor than you will find in most deliberately humorous books. Well, are ya gonna do it? Assuming, of course, you have the skill.... That's up to you and if this book has a weak spot, it is in its cloying self-justification for doing this.

5 comments about Don't Make a Black Woman Take Off Her Earrings.

1. I was glad that Tyler Perry turned this into an audio book. It is worth every penny to hear him read this as Madea. This is one audio book that you will definitely listen to over and over again. I didn't even consider buying the paperback. I just had to hear Madea tell her story.



2. I am reading this book right now and I am totally enjoying myself. If you love Madea, you will want to read this book. I had to have it when I first saw it.



3. Great book to read, some situations were true, and others were just down right funny, Tyler Perry is so talented.



4. As always, Tyler Perry delivers with this funny "book" with a good message. just like his movies, you learn something while having a good time. I would recommend this to anyone!!



5. Ok, Tyler please stick with the stage plays. You don't have to put them on DVD, TBS or nothing. I like you on the stage only cause that book was awful. I gave that book away to a friend and I never give books away. I did learn two good things...use vaseline for everything and keep a next door neighbor as a friend so you guys can swap playing sitter. I also learned a few things about Tylers childhood...he has been dressing up for a while

1 comments about If I Am Not For Myself: Journey of an Anti-Zionist Jew.

1. As any anti-Zionist knows, raising opposition to Israel and Zionism immediately draws accusations of anti-Semitism, or if the dissenter is Jewish, accusations of self-hatred.
   
   It is precisely these attempts by Zionism to squash all criticism of Israel -- especially criticism by Jews -- that Mike Marqusee takes head on in his latest book, If I Am Not For Myself: Journey of an Anti-Zionist Jew. Starting with the papers of his late grandfather and Marqusee's own personal experiences being raised as a Jew in post-war America, the book beautifully weaves together a broad, yet intimately personal, history of anti-Zionism and radicalism in Judaism. Equal parts biography, autobiography, history, and commentary, Marqusee powerfully strips Zionism of its fundamental claim to represent and speak for all of world Jewry.
   
   Central to Marqusee's task is the re-appropriation of Jewish, anti-Zionist, and leftist history -- a history that is consciously buried by the Zionist establishment. In this process, he shows the strong connections between history, how we understand the present, and the frameworks we can utilize in determining the future.
   
   Marqusee weighs in on an impressively diverse and rich array of subjects including (but far from limited to) the Jewish workers' Bund, Jewish Enlightenment philosophy, political struggles within the New Deal coalition, the parallels between Zionism and right-wing Hindu nationalism, "left-wing anti-Semitism," discussions with Muslims about Zionism, Jews in the Middle East, and the parallels between anti-Semitism and Islamophobia.
   
   These discussions and explorations all radiate out from Marqusee's narrative center: the life of his maternal grandfather -- Edward V. Morand (aka EVM) -- a Jewish leftist active in New York politics in the 1930s and 1940s.
   
   Despite being involved in virtually every left-wing cause of his time, EVM increasingly became an ardent Zionist -- forcing him to unconsciously sacrifice many of his radical principles. Marqusee is particularly horrified by EVM's political positions in 1948 -- the year of Israeli "independence", or al-Nakba (the catastrophe), as it's known to Palestinians. Marqusee writes: "In the midst of [Israel's] one-way process of destruction, displacement and plunder, EVM's constant cry is 'no retreat.' He seems to have entirely lost his former distaste for war and militarism...In this war, there seems to be only one kind of victim, Jewish."
   
   Marqusee attributes EVM's political twists and turns, in part, to "[a] failure to imagine the people on the receiving end of your dreams. It's a failure rooted in Western and white supremacy, a network of unexamined assumptions that has proved much more ineradicable and insidious than anti-semitism. EVM's writings of 1948 resound with it, and offer inadvertent testimony to the racist character of the Nakba and Nakba denial."
   
   These political contradictions and hypocrisies are exactly what led Marqusee himself out of the Zionist trap.
   
   In a very candid section, Marqusee relates an experience that is no doubt familiar to many Jewish anti-Zionists: the first time he was accused of self-hatred. He describes hearing an Israeli soldier speak to his Sunday school class just after the 1967 Israeli war that began the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. The soldier was going on about how "the Arabs are better off now, under Israeli rule. You have to understand these are ignorant people. They go to the toilet in the street." Marqusee responds: "Now something akin to this I had heard before. I had heard it from the white Southerners I'd been taught to look down upon. I had heard it from people my parents and my teachers described as prejudiced and bigoted. So I raised my hand and when called upon I expressed my opinion, as I'd been taught to do. It seemed to me that what our visitor had said was, well, racist." The young Marqusee was immediately denounced. Angrily, he went home to share this experience with his normally supportive parents. At the dinner table, he added to the story, putting forward his opinion, heavily influenced by the anti-Vietnam War movement, that, "'It was wrong for one country to take over another, or part of another, by military force'...Suddenly [my dad] barked, 'Enough already!'...Like my Sunday school teacher, he made me feel that I'd said something obscene...'I think you need to look at why you're saying what you're saying,' he said...'There's some Jewish self-hatred there.'"
   
   In the end, Marqusee answers the question set out by the title, "'If I am not for myself...', then others will claim to be 'for me'...[I]n defining myself as an anti-Zionist Jew, I am for myself, and at the same time and without contradiction for others...I find in anti-Zionism emancipation both as a Jew and as a human being...Jews today can no more escape the question of Zionism than they could the question of anti-semitism in earlier eras. The problem today isn't that Jews are in denial of their Jewishness or of the threat of anti-semitism, but that Jews are in denial about Israel, Zionism, the Nakba, the occupation, the wall...The people who call us self-haters want to steal our selves from us -- appropriate our selves for their cause -- and speaking as a self, I'm damned if I'm going to let them get away with it."
   
   The task of anti-Zionists is to explain the role that Zionism serves in the US imperial project while also breaking the notion that Zionism has anything to do with Jewishness. As Marqusee puts it: "[T]he Zionist dominance of the diaspora, and especially the diaspora in America, is a mutable, historical phenomenon -- not the inevitable expression of 'Jewish self-interest' -- and the continuation of that dominance is by no means guaranteed."
   
   Easier said than done, right? In addition to reclaiming history, we have to understand that Israeli war crimes and the logic of Zionism itself can shake even the most veteran of Zionists. Just look at Marqusee's dad's own development -- the same dad that first called him a self-hater: "[I]n the end, the Zionists tested his humanity beyond endurance. After the news broke about the Sabra and Shatila massacre in 1982, he phoned me from New York. 'Ok,' he said, 'you were right. They're bastards.' He started to make contributions to Palestinian causes and to raise the issue among his friends."
   
   The struggle against Zionism's dominance over Jews and Palestinians won't be easy, but Marqusee has made an important and captivating contribution to that fight. If you've ever had trouble arguing that anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism or if you just want to get a sense of the rich diversity of Jewish history and its relationship to radicalism, then you should pick up this book. I just bought a copy for my dad -- the first person to call me a self-hater. If Marqusee can convince his dad, then I guess I'll hold out hope for mine as well.

5 comments about Prison Writings: My Life Is My Sun Dance.

1. 
   This book, along with almost 50 fawning reviews, merely illustrates the effectiveness of propaganda in spreading mass ignorance. The reviewers are so sure that Peltier is innocent that the facts don't seem to matter. They would just get in the way, as in Peltier bragging about shooting a man in the head who was begging for his life (heard by four others), as in 15 federal judges affirming the original conviction (not one dissenter), and as in incontrovertible evidence that linked Peltier's rifle to the crime scene. I doubt these people are even aware that six months before he murdered two injured and helpless Federal Agents, Peltier put a gun in AIM member Anna Mae Aquash's mouth while interrogating her about being an informant. AIM leaders later had her executed (gun to the head again) partly because she was one of the four who heard Peltier's boast. Anna Mae knew too much.
   
   Yes, ignorance is truly bliss, but truth can cure ignorance. If you want to discover the truth about what happened that day, read American Indian Mafia.



2. The rhetoric of the other reviews aside, Prison Writings would make for a compelling story had Peltier included some truth to support his allegations surrounding the events of June 26, 1975 on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, South Dakota.
   
   By way of a brief background, Peltier was represented by capable and experienced counsel and during his trial the jury heard that FBI agents Jack Coler and Ron Williams were following who they thought was another wanted person. They actually followed Peltier and two teenagers who began shooting at the agents who were then trapped and exposed in an open area. Peltier was joined by several others, including Dino Butler and Robert Robideau who also fired on the agents from another direction. Both Coler and Williams were severely wounded and unable to defend themselves. Peltier's jury heard that Peltier, Robideau and Butler went down to the wounded agents and shot them both in the face at point-blank range with a high powered rife. The jury believed the testimony they heard and Peltier was convicted for, among other things, aiding and abetting and sentenced to two consecutive life sentences. He later received an additional seven year consecutive sentence for an armed escape from Lompoc federal penitentiary. (In a separate and earlier trial, Dino Butler and Robert Robideau were acquitted of the murders. However, this review relates specifically to how Peltier portrays the facts surrounding these events in Prison Writings. There is much more to the entire saga.)
   
   It's important to place Prison Writings in its proper chronological context. Prison Writings was published in 1999. An important related book touted by Peltier and the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee (LPDC) that "immortalizes Leonard Peltier," In The Spirit of Crazy Horse (ITSOCH) by Peter Matthiessen was first published in 1983 and in 1992. A film, Incident at Oglala (Incident), narrated by Robert Redford was released in 1992. Collectively, these sources, in addition to the many public statements made by Peltier, Butler and Robideau, demonstrate that Peltier is not only fabricating the history of his own case but knowingly lies about certain events.
   
   There are many more, but for example:
   
   The scene:
   Peltier initially claimed he was in the AIM camp to the south of the Jumping Bull property, heard shots, responded and "I fired off a few shots above their heads, trying not to hit anything (p.125)." And also "I didn't see their agents die, had no hand in it..." (p.127). Yet in a CNN interview in October, 1999 Peltier admitted being there and told interviewer Mark Potter "I don't know, just two people laying there. I mean, the car door--the car door open and stuff."
   
   The alibi:
   For the better part of nearly two decades Peltier had offered only one alibi about who was responsible for the final killing shots to the agents' faces. He claimed that someone they all knew but would not identify (Mr. X), had driven to the reservation that day in a red pickup truck to deliver dynamite and that it was Mr. X who engaged the agents initially and then, once wounded and unable to defend themselves, killed the agents and drove off. In Incident Robideau is filmed pointing to the area where Mr. X murdered the agents and drove off in the red pickup truck. This claim was so far-fetched that not even Peltier's trial lawyers wanted to go near it, but they did their best to create confusion with the jury over the alleged red pickup truck. Matthiessen, although skeptical himself, spent a great deal of time on Mr. X in ITSOCH. However, in a 1995 interview with News from Indian Country, one of the three participants, Dino Butler, publicly said that the Mr. X story was a lie; "Well, there is no Mr. X. There was no man coming to our camp that day bringing dynamite." "To create this lie to show that someone else pulled the trigger." " That is totally false. Totally untrue. That never happened."
   
   It should come as no surprise that Mr. X. and the red pickup are never mentioned in Prison Writings.
   
   Aiding and abetting:
   Peltier tries to convince the reader that the "vague crime of aiding and abetting" (p162) was somehow later added to the charge of murdering the agents. Yet, during one of the many appeals (one dealing with this specific issue in 1993), the appeals court stated that "Peltier's arguments fail because their underlying premises are fatally flawed. (A) the government tried the case on the alternative theories; it asserted that Peltier personally killed the agents at point blank range, but that if he had not done so, then he was equally guilty of the murder as an aider and abettor."
   
   Preplanned assault:
   Peltier lays the groundwork for claiming that according to a document obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, the government "...had been gathering in the area for a preplanned paramilitary assault on the Pine Ridge reservation," (p.129) comprised of "...dozens, maybe hundreds..." (p.127) of law-enforcement personnel. The document (dated April 24, 1975) he refers to (the noted "sanctioned memo") says nothing of the kind and related to the 1973 takeover by AIM of Wounded Knee. Ironically this memo was still being circulated around FBI headquarters in Washington D.C. even after the murders of agents Coler and Williams with a date at the bottom of the memo of August 11, 1975. This memo is not even in the same universe as Peltier claims. This assertion was so outrageous even Matthiessen shied away from it by claiming after all his research that the initial shooting at the agents was spontaneous, neither a pre-planned government event nor premeditated ambush of the two agents. "...if there is another persuasive explanation of the location and position of their cars, I cannot find it." (ITSOCH p.544).
   
   Further, it was well documented that when the agents were first pinned down in the open field, Agent Williams made desperate calls for help and assistance over his FBI radio. These transmissions were overheard by a number of individuals who all confirmed how quickly the shooting started, and ended, and that the nearest agent was about twelve miles away. That FBI agent, Gary Adams, responded with a BIA officer, the first two to even reach close to the scene. They were also shot at and had to back away to Highway 18 and await more assistance. In the meantime, Coler and Williams were murdered and Peltier and the others escaped.
   
   Robideau:
   Robert Robideau who has been assimilated and rejected by the Peltier organization several times over the years has made damning admissions. Robideau stated publicly on numerous occasions, and in emails to this reviewer, that he's the one who actually killed the agents:
   
   "As far as I have ever been concerned the killing of the agents was justified..." "They were shot in the head at close range..." "I have no remorse..." "I am "Mr X" (which is no lie) and I did kill them with honor befitting a warrior, but they died like worms." "I thought I already told you that I killed the agents."
   
   Of course Robideau has the constitutional protection against double-jeopardy, but this reviewer believes he is even too much of a coward to shoot two severely wounded and incapacitated human beings. But whether he killed the agents himself is immaterial; the Peltier jury heard and accepted the testimony that the three older Indians, Robideau, Butler and Peltier went down to the wounded agents and murdered them by shooting them both in the face.
   
   Of course, Prison Writings suggests none of this but hides behind fabrications and outright lies to further the folklore surrounding Peltier and perpetuating The Myth.
   
   What it does do however is firmly establish that Peltier did not remove himself from the scene of the crime.
   
   Prison Writings is self-serving drivel and should not be used to document in any fashion what happened that June day at Pine Ridge. Anyone interested in going beyond The Myth should spend some time reviewing the very detailed appeals that cover every aspect of this case.
   
   [...]



3. After all is said and done, just read the thousands of pages that the U.S. government, through the FBI, the U.S. Attorney's office and court records, was forced to release about this case. It is their own words about their own deliberate withholding of evidence, fabrication of evidence, deliberate perjured testimony and numerous other violations of U.S. law, rules of evidence, and other assorted felonies.



4. Leonard Peltier, United States Prisoner 89637-132, has been imprisoned since 1977 for the deaths of two FBI agents on the Pine Ridge Reservation of the Lakota Indians during the 1973 siege at Wounded Knee, South Dakota. Most likely the scapegoat for the deaths during a blundered surveillance attempt, Peltier has been a cause celeb during the final throws of every president since Jimmy Carter as many supporters - including the U.S. Prosecutor that put him in jail in the first place - come together to call for his parden.
   
   There are other sources for an in-depth understanding of the events that led to his imprisonment such as Peter Mathiesson's *In the Spirit of Crazy Horse* and the Robert Redford film *Incident at Oglala*. But Prison Writings is a must read in any study of not only the Wounded Knee incident, but the American Indian Movement as a whole and native issues throughout the country.
   
   This book weaves Peltier's life as a prisoner in the U.S. prison system with his account of the events of 1973 and his views on the state of affairs for Native Americans as a whole. Peltier's life evolved from an aimless youth on the reservation to a political activist, and at times it seems that his life sentence is a natural extension of this progression - as if his destiny was to suffer for the cause.
   
   When you look at the evidence of all that transpired at Wounded Knee in 1973 and the years that followed, including what happened to other activists such as Annie Mae Aquash, and the now revealed manipulation of evidence by the FBI and the all-out war against Native American activism in the 1970s, Leonard Peltier's *Prison Writings* become somewhat of a manifesto and call for a better future.
   
   >>>>>>><<<<<<<
   
   A Guide to my Book Rating System:
   
   1 star = The wood pulp would have been better utilized as toilet paper.
   2 stars = Don't bother, clean your bathroom instead.
   3 stars = Wasn't a waste of time, but it was time wasted.
   4 stars = Good book, but not life altering.
   5 stars = This book changed my world in at least some small way.



5. This is a true story of an Indian who is in prison
   just because he's an Indian. I real eye opener and
   interesting facts about the Indians here today.

5 comments about The Accidental Asian: Notes of a Native Speaker.

1. Eric Liu presumes to represent all Asian Americans in this short sighted and pretentious memoir. However, he only represents himself, as most of the "Asian American traits" he writes about are simply reflections of his moderate middle class views and life.
   
   Liu seems to be trying to separate two parts of the Asian American identity: the Asian and American sides. Though is quick to defend himself after writing about Asian American issues and stereotypes, begging to clarify that he is not the same, he subsequently attempts to evoke "sameness" when asking other Asian Americans to see things from his viewpoint. I couldn't stand that he seemed to want to speak for all Asian Americans. His advice could have been left out, with only his history making up the bulk of the book, and it would have been interesting and insightful. Instead, it was borderline offensive. He needs to stop speaking for all Asian Americans and giving terrible advice.



2. An essay collection on the Chinese American experience, that seems, by its title, to be modeled after James Baldwin's seminal NOTES OF A NATIVE SON. In many ways, especially in the earlier essays, Liu reaches a similar level of discourse, with broad historical strokes, and deeply literary, informed and informative poetic writing. Insightful and well-spoken words for the Asian American dichotomy of experiences, and includes powerful and moving sketches, most especially about Liu's father in the first essay. Youthful, searching, contemporary and intelligent.



3. I accidentally read this book but unfortunately found I dislike it. As a Chinese who speaks and write imperfect English, I have read lots of books on Asian American history and memoirs. But I found Eric Liu, while trying to show off his ability to be assimilated and his desire to be accecpted by White American culture, does not really try to understand other Chinese including his own families. For example, when he describes his grandma, he does not show interest in her story and experience and share her opinions, because for what she talks about-Chinese and Taiwanese politics,Hong Kong pop stars, etc., he did not have interest. And he did not speak and read Chinese very well himself. He describes the grandma who has a rich experience, opinion and courage as if she was a mummy, just because she was not well adjusted to the new environment as himself. When Eric Liu describes New York's Chinatown, it seems that he was more American and Americans--it was noisy, "they" looked funny, everything there was exotic...He looks at Chinatown not as a native Chinese who respects and sympathizes people living there, in spite of their somewhat unbecoming habbits, but like cityboy going to the countrysiade for the first time and cried,oh, they are so dirty. "we are Chinese, but we still outsiders", he said. He obviously exaggrated the diffrence between his family and Chinatown people. But if his own family was so elitist, why was he never trained by parents to write a thank you note?
   To be sure, I agree that American born Asians should identify with American culture and be more involved in politics, as Liu sugguests. But Liu is just too proud and pretentious. For Chinese American exprience, I would rather read Joy Luck Club.



4. Eric Liu wrote a memoir - he's entitled to his opinions - and he is not a self-hating Asian. Most of our problems stem from too much emphasis on race and race identity. I think we should all celebrate culture (not race) and diversity of culture (and not deny our culture) - but for those of us who feel that we're losing our parents' culture, we shouldn't feel too bad about it - because we're gaining another culture or developing a new kind or blend of culture (1.5 generation, etc.). Eric Liu mainly explores the question of what exactly Asian-American identity is. What's the point of trying to put ourselves into a box? It ends up being more restrictive and confining - and unnecessarily so. If you're Chinese or Taiwanese or Korean or whatever - learn to be comfortable with that - and with the fact that you're also American. In fact, to be American should not nullify your Chineseness. If you have been blessed with the opportunity (or the desire) to learn (and retain) your parents' language while growing up, be thankful for it and use it to help immigrants who really need help assimilating and adjusting to life in America. I think the group that needs advocacy is not the generation of Asians who have grown up as Asian Americans but the recent immigrants.
   
   The more important question is why this constant yearning for a sense of identity in all of us? And where do we truly get our sense of identity in a world of constant flux and change? If we fix our sense of identity on our culture, culture's bound to change, too. "On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand!"



5. The author gives an account of growing up in America as the child of Chinese immigrants from Taiwan. He mentions his awkward teenage years, attending Yale University, and choosing a career path different from that of the stereotypical Asian-American: Marine officer, political staffer, television commentator, and essayist.
   
   The first essay is a well-written, powerful tribute to the author's father, who immigrated to the United States and ultimately spending a majority of his life in his new country. This essay alone would prompt me to recommend this book to all immigrants and their children, Asian or otherwise.
   
   This book is at its best when the author reflects on his own life and identity. However, when he drifts into pondering questions on assimilation and "omniculturalism," he forgets that he speaks only for well-educated, upper-middle class Asians born in the United States. To uneducated fishermen, indentured domestic servants, restaurant workers, and other blue collar Asians, assimilation will be far more difficult, if not impossible. Because the author appears to ignore this and other barriers to assimilation, I have to disagree with his theory that today's Asians are the "New Jew."
   
   Overall, the book was a good read, and I would recommend it to anyone with an interest in Asian-American culture. However, this book is hardly an authoritative look at Asian-Americans, and it only provides one man's perspective.