‘Culture Learning’ is a topic that will hold my interest endlessly; not only because linguistics and how we communicate fascinate me, but also because I am a cultural transplant myself. When I talk about culture I mean language, conventions, traditions and rituals, as well as the sub textual behaviors of a civilization: communication in its broadest sense.
The popular philosopher and critical theorist Slavoy Zizek talks about how we are embedded in ideology and defines identity as follows: “Identity lives in the space between invention and reality.” (Slavoy Zizek, “How are we Embedded in Ideology”, Prague 2007).
What is reality, or said differently, what is truth? Truth is the sum of a society’s conventions. There are rules and meta-rules, which are unknown knowns, call them habits or unspoken conventions that set the parameters for moving flawlessly through a society. It is a social network of implicit rules that tell you how to deal with the explicit rules.
Immigrants come into a new set of rules that are the makeup of their host society. Some rules are obvious, some are not. Assimilation and integration starts with learning of the explicit rules. But the meta-rules or implicit rules we only learn over time by trial and error, by using our intuition and assessing situations and reactions to us.
When too many people do not know the implicit rules of a society, the context for these rules weakens. Once the rules lose their context, they collapse. That is what ‘fear of the Other’ really is – a fear of losing one’s own truth.
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Sunday, May 15, 2011
Taking off the Gloves
I’ve been writing for my blog over a year now – my audience, I imagine are a few friends and people who happen across my blog on the website to my documentary film Abraham’s Children. I’ve been keeping the blog on topic mostly writing about experiences in the independent documentary world and about Muslims in America and “Fear of the Other” – topics that interest me deeply and that I’m learning about as I go.
Each time I write I wonder how the reader will respond and how much of my personal self I should or should not reveal and how much of what I write is properly researched. “Properly” researched? I’m not writing for The New Yorker, it’s my blog with my name on it and it’s my opinion. Still, I’m not espousing my opinion as much as I carefully (more or less) write AN opinion slanted towards MY opinion.
I am part of a group of people who will – soon – publish blog entries about the future of the film business. It’s actually about a heck more: Quo Vadis: staying ahead of hindsight; our mission: Quo Vadis thinks ahead by asking the right questions about creation, distribution and monetization of media. Our members come from across the creative and professional spectrum. We think, we explore, we blog and we meet.
The questions we ask, other than the obvious: where are we headed? How do we stay ahead of the curve? How does content evolve on the internet? How do we monetize the internet? Where are the lines drawn between consumers, content providers, creators, producer, distributors and advertisers? Is there a need to draw those lines? What happens to copyright, licensing fees and royalties?
Why am I part of this group? Because I can. Because the paradigm shift we have seen in our business in the past 15 years is great and leaves some of us – me – with the uneasy feeling of a middle aged person about to miss the connecting train. The train of course, has left the station a long time ago – and I would like to think I’m on board – for now in the freight haul – I’d like to make it to 1st class – no, correction, I’d like to make it to the conductor’s cabin. And I know I can. Quo Vadis is one of many ways to get there with the help of my friends.
I’m not a natural writer – I’m a hands-on production person with an opinion. It’s my opinion – not researched, but lived. And it is that opinion I will have to learn to put forward. The gloves have to come off.
They will and this blog will be my exercise for the next few months until we go ‘live’. I want to know: how much do you hold back, research, evaluate and weigh your voice before YOU publish your blog entries?
Each time I write I wonder how the reader will respond and how much of my personal self I should or should not reveal and how much of what I write is properly researched. “Properly” researched? I’m not writing for The New Yorker, it’s my blog with my name on it and it’s my opinion. Still, I’m not espousing my opinion as much as I carefully (more or less) write AN opinion slanted towards MY opinion.
I am part of a group of people who will – soon – publish blog entries about the future of the film business. It’s actually about a heck more: Quo Vadis: staying ahead of hindsight; our mission: Quo Vadis thinks ahead by asking the right questions about creation, distribution and monetization of media. Our members come from across the creative and professional spectrum. We think, we explore, we blog and we meet.
The questions we ask, other than the obvious: where are we headed? How do we stay ahead of the curve? How does content evolve on the internet? How do we monetize the internet? Where are the lines drawn between consumers, content providers, creators, producer, distributors and advertisers? Is there a need to draw those lines? What happens to copyright, licensing fees and royalties?
Why am I part of this group? Because I can. Because the paradigm shift we have seen in our business in the past 15 years is great and leaves some of us – me – with the uneasy feeling of a middle aged person about to miss the connecting train. The train of course, has left the station a long time ago – and I would like to think I’m on board – for now in the freight haul – I’d like to make it to 1st class – no, correction, I’d like to make it to the conductor’s cabin. And I know I can. Quo Vadis is one of many ways to get there with the help of my friends.
I’m not a natural writer – I’m a hands-on production person with an opinion. It’s my opinion – not researched, but lived. And it is that opinion I will have to learn to put forward. The gloves have to come off.
They will and this blog will be my exercise for the next few months until we go ‘live’. I want to know: how much do you hold back, research, evaluate and weigh your voice before YOU publish your blog entries?
Sunday, April 24, 2011
60 Minutes, Greg Mortenson, Nicholas Kristof and my friend Martina Radwan
While I watched the 60 Minute piece on Greg Mortensen, his book “Three Cups of Tea” and his Central Asia Institute, an organization that builds schools in Afghanistan, I had a very uneasy feeling. I’m a big fan of 60 Minutes, but as little as I know about Greg Mortensen the piece seemed to be a fishing expedition – with smelly fish at the tackle.
I kept thinking: don’t you have bigger fish to fry? So Mortensen took some liberties with his book (big deal) and there are allegations (no proof from what I can tell) that there are irregularities in the books of his charity. REALLY? This man has built many schools for Afghan children, has put many girls back to school and has had the guts to try and fix from the inside with little means. And you go after him? I can think of a hundred stinky other stories that are more deserving of 60 Minute scrutiny.
My friend Martina Radwan who started a wonderful organization “Children of the Blue Sky” talks about the Mortensen ‘affair’ from her point of view as an activist, visionary and executive director of her own organization: check it out.
And while you’re at it read what Nicholas Kristof has to say about Greg Mortensen in his op-ed in the Seattle Times of last week just after the 60 Minute piece aired. As always he keeps a wonderful balance between facts and questions and his description of the ‘real’ Greg Mortensen is quite charming.
Don’t go and punish the wrong guy and as Martina said: if you are going the throw the first stone think long and hard as to how big it is going to be and where it will land. I for one will throw now stones but blow some fresh air gently into Greg Mortensen’s corner and hope we will see more of his great advocacy work to come.
I kept thinking: don’t you have bigger fish to fry? So Mortensen took some liberties with his book (big deal) and there are allegations (no proof from what I can tell) that there are irregularities in the books of his charity. REALLY? This man has built many schools for Afghan children, has put many girls back to school and has had the guts to try and fix from the inside with little means. And you go after him? I can think of a hundred stinky other stories that are more deserving of 60 Minute scrutiny.
My friend Martina Radwan who started a wonderful organization “Children of the Blue Sky” talks about the Mortensen ‘affair’ from her point of view as an activist, visionary and executive director of her own organization: check it out.
And while you’re at it read what Nicholas Kristof has to say about Greg Mortensen in his op-ed in the Seattle Times of last week just after the 60 Minute piece aired. As always he keeps a wonderful balance between facts and questions and his description of the ‘real’ Greg Mortensen is quite charming.
Don’t go and punish the wrong guy and as Martina said: if you are going the throw the first stone think long and hard as to how big it is going to be and where it will land. I for one will throw now stones but blow some fresh air gently into Greg Mortensen’s corner and hope we will see more of his great advocacy work to come.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Plagiarism Optional
My dear friend and brilliant filmmaker Anne Flournoy has gone far into the future and into many hearts and laughing muscles with her web series “The Louise Log” – I’m a fan, I’m a big fan. Apparently so are some people at Chrysler too! Check out Anne’s response to a commercial put out by Chrysler Town and Country that has an uncanny (on purpose?) similarity to “The Louise Log”.
Commerce imitating art, commerce plagiarizing? Coincidence? You be the judge.
Commerce imitating art, commerce plagiarizing? Coincidence? You be the judge.
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
The Cyber-Gap
The internet has opened up doors to unimaginable wealth of information, education and commerce opportunities; it has enabled emerging pro-democracy movements in Egypt and Algiers, has empowered dissidents around the world and is closing geographical and physical gaps around the world.
The Internet is hands-down a great enabler. At the same time the gap between educated and under-educated, poor and rich, rural and urban, empowered and disenfranchised is growing – rapidly.
How are young people around the world going to engage when they have no internet access? No access to on-line education, commerce, potential jobs and clients, information, social exchange, passing of ideas, or civic engagement? The more our world moves onto the internet the wider the gaps becomes between the haves and have not’s of internet access and economic power. This is also a problem for large patches of rural areas in the United States.
There are huge patches of land, some spanning entire states with a few urban exceptions with no cell phone and internet access through wireless towers, cable or T1 lines. In the US Satellite dishes are the only solution for those remote areas, if they want internet access. Satellites are expensive to install and their monthly fees can be too much of a burden for a house hold budget.
If we want to keep up economically with the rest of the world (Asia foremost and Europe too) we have to make sure that all areas of the United States have access to broadband internet. The lost potential of talent is too great to ignore.
The Internet is hands-down a great enabler. At the same time the gap between educated and under-educated, poor and rich, rural and urban, empowered and disenfranchised is growing – rapidly.
How are young people around the world going to engage when they have no internet access? No access to on-line education, commerce, potential jobs and clients, information, social exchange, passing of ideas, or civic engagement? The more our world moves onto the internet the wider the gaps becomes between the haves and have not’s of internet access and economic power. This is also a problem for large patches of rural areas in the United States.
There are huge patches of land, some spanning entire states with a few urban exceptions with no cell phone and internet access through wireless towers, cable or T1 lines. In the US Satellite dishes are the only solution for those remote areas, if they want internet access. Satellites are expensive to install and their monthly fees can be too much of a burden for a house hold budget.
If we want to keep up economically with the rest of the world (Asia foremost and Europe too) we have to make sure that all areas of the United States have access to broadband internet. The lost potential of talent is too great to ignore.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
9 Women can’t Make a Baby in a Month
Techcrunch had this very poignant post yesterday and I had to steal the title. The jest of it is that sometimes too much money is no good. Or that even with all the resources in the world nine women cannot produce a baby in one month – but sometimes it sure feels like we try.
So, even if you DO have your entire budget in the piggy bank, put it into a interest bearing CD and allow yourself to sit on your idea. Of course nobody in the independent film world has their piggy bank stocked. As you scramble for your budget for the next film remember that the universe is giving you ample time to gestate your next, perfect project. Voila.
So, even if you DO have your entire budget in the piggy bank, put it into a interest bearing CD and allow yourself to sit on your idea. Of course nobody in the independent film world has their piggy bank stocked. As you scramble for your budget for the next film remember that the universe is giving you ample time to gestate your next, perfect project. Voila.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Truth - Part 2
“Identity lives in the space between invention and reality.”
What is truth? Truth is the sum of a society’s conventions. There are rules and meta-rules, which are unknown knowns, call them habits or unspoken conventions that set the parameters for moving flawlessly through a society. It is a social network of implicit rules that tell you how to deal with the explicit rules.
Immigrants come into a new set of rules that are the makeup of their host society. Some rules are obvious, some are not. Assimilation and integration starts with learning of the explicit rules. But the meta-rules or implicit rules we only learn over time by trial and error, by using our intuition and assessing situations and reactions to us.
When too many people do not know the implicit rules of a society, the context for these rules weakens. Once the rules lose their context, they collapse. That is what ‘fear of the Other’ really is – a fear of losing one’s own truth.
[Watch 90 absolutely fascinating minutes of Slavoy Zizek’s discourse in Prague (2007) on “How are we Embedded in Ideology”.]
What is truth? Truth is the sum of a society’s conventions. There are rules and meta-rules, which are unknown knowns, call them habits or unspoken conventions that set the parameters for moving flawlessly through a society. It is a social network of implicit rules that tell you how to deal with the explicit rules.
Immigrants come into a new set of rules that are the makeup of their host society. Some rules are obvious, some are not. Assimilation and integration starts with learning of the explicit rules. But the meta-rules or implicit rules we only learn over time by trial and error, by using our intuition and assessing situations and reactions to us.
When too many people do not know the implicit rules of a society, the context for these rules weakens. Once the rules lose their context, they collapse. That is what ‘fear of the Other’ really is – a fear of losing one’s own truth.
[Watch 90 absolutely fascinating minutes of Slavoy Zizek’s discourse in Prague (2007) on “How are we Embedded in Ideology”.]
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