New Internationalist articles from August 2007

New Internationalist archives from August 2007

Southern exposure.(From this month's guest editor)
August 1, 2007... New Internationalist editor Dinyar Godrej's email asking us to participate in the 400th issue of the magazine a few months ago was a great opportunity. But with Dhaka in flames and our own struggles to ensure some semblance of fairness in the...

Unjustified complaint.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2007... I fail to find any justification for Ms Amatullah Matthews' complaint ('The Islamophobia debate', Edible Earth, NI 402) about the article in your May issue 'The Making of an Islamic Jack the Ripper' (NI 400). She complains that the use of the...

Away, complacency.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2007... Thanks for the wonderful articles on Darfur (NI 401). This issue is awe-inspiring, the level of research breathtaking. The articles have shocked me out of my complacency. I am determined do everything possible to try and end this genocide. ...

Pause for thought.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2007... The article 'Don't Ignore Darfur: Take Action' (NI 401) refers to September 2005 when 'UN members agreed that... the "international community" has a... right to intervene... ' Then it encourages us to call on our governments 'to fulfil this...

Deluded Dawkins.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2007... I was appalled to see Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion, with its diatribic advertising, offered for sale in the June insert 'Global Learning Guide 2007'. I almost didn't order the books I was interested in for fear they might be covertly...

Set text.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2007... John McMurtry's essay on 'Myths of the Global Market' (NI 401) is worth the price of a year's subscription! It should be required reading for every high-school student. Margaret Morgan North Vancouver, Canada

For the record.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2007... An incorrect reference does not detract from the argument or the value of John McMurtry's excellent Essay (NI 401) but does make follow up difficult. The paper 'A strategy to reduce cardiovascular disease by more than 80 per cent' by NJ Wald...

Contentious language.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2007... However repugnant the attitudes of many of the West Bank settlers to most people--including Jews like myself--it is highly contentious to invoke the phrase 'ethnic cleansing'. This implies government policy to eradicate a people both spatially...

Ex-Baha'i.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2007... The two letters about the plight of Baha'is in Iran (NI 401) are extremely misleading. I know, because I was a member of the Baha'i faith for a number of years. Baha'is have a well-oiled media (you could read 'propaganda') department, and...

System error.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2007... Paul Ramsay is way off the mark in branding China as the 'main protagonist' in the depressed world price of cotton (Letters, Daring to dream, NI 400). Although I can agree that the US gets more than its fair share of negative press on this and...

Ropes in the water.(Letter from Mauritius)
August 1, 2007... An early-rising tourist could be forgiven for seeing only peace. The sun hasn't risen from behind dark-green mountains yet, but the sky is already a luminous blue and the lagoon, flat as a mirror, is a gentle grey. The Black River Bay, huge and...

The Majority World looks back: with the advent of the internet and digital photography it should be easier than ever for photographers from the Majority World to present their own reality in the global media. But old prejudices die hard. Shahidul Alam explains why and tells an inspiring tale of resistance and success.(KEYNOTE)
August 1, 2007... It was a grand opening. The 'Who's Who' of development in Britain was there, championing the noble cause--the Millennium Development Goals, making poverty history. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The Bob Geldof circus could perhaps be pardoned....

Belongings: felt, presented, challenged.(GALLERY)(Brief article)
August 1, 2007... Clockwise from right Saiful Huq Omi was the first Bangladeshi to win the National Geographic All Roads Photography Award. In his essay on victims of political violence, Omi remembers the young man maimed by a bomb saying 'When I had my leg...

A true Pathshala: Shahidul Alam describes the birth of an unusual school.(PATHSHALA)
August 1, 2007... The word Pathshala, a traditional Sanskrit word for a seat of learning, was generally associated with the shade of mango trees in open fields. There were no walls, no classrooms, no formal structures, but children gathered to listen to wise...

We were going to change the world.(PATHSHALA)
August 1, 2007... Sameera Huque, one of Pathshala's first students, takes a measured look. When Pathshala started, I remember, Dhaka's photography circles reacted by forming two camps. One was thrilled at the prospect of 'real' photography education...

Lifecycle: with few exits.(GALLERY)(Brief article)(Photograph)
August 1, 2007... Clockwise from right Residents of Old Dhaka, who live in buildings in dangerous states of disrepair, often cling to their homes out of poverty, or fear of homelessness. A child being lifted from the rubble of a collapsed building bears the...

Coping with pain.(GALLERY)(Brief article)(Photograph)
August 1, 2007... Clockwise from right The sheer abandon of the flautist takes on a different meaning when one realizes he is standing on the edge of a raging river. With global warming becoming a major threat to Bangladesh, erosion by the river and rising...

Lifestyles: disappearing and aspired.(GALLERY)(Brief article)(Photograph)
August 1, 2007... Clockwise from right Women in green paddy fields, and cows, are a common rural scene. The late afternoon light is also common and known in Bangla literature as kone dekhano alo--'light to show off the bride in'. Sher e Khwaja is a...

Action: contacts and websites for agencies that hold or promote Majority World photography.(ACTION)
August 1, 2007... INTERNATIONAL Drik related sites: www.drik.net/ www.majorityworld.com/ www.driknews.com/ www.pathshala.net/ www.chobimela.org/ KijijiVision exists to reveal, support, develop and promote indigenous photographers...

The long wait for peace.
August 1, 2007... While international attention increasingly focuses on Sudan, just a few kilometres south of the country's border with Uganda the fallout from a rebel war has continued mostly unnoticed for nearly 20 years. The war began when cult leader Joseph...

Freedom radio: weekly show in the Brazilian Amazon fights slavery.(MEDIA)
August 1, 2007... There's a flurry of pipe music and the radio programme crackles onto the air. 'In this week's edition: 20 people freed from a ranch called Iraq... companies using slave labour blacklisted... and find out how to avoid being forced into...

Iran's uncivil treatment.(HUMAN RIGHTS)(Brief article)
August 1, 2007... The detention in May of senior Iranian-American scholar Haleh Esfandiari is another indication that the erratic Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's unpopular government is seeking foreign scapegoats to divert attention. Esfandiari, who heads up the Middle...

The language of tourism ...(Currents)(Brief article)
August 1, 2007... Word power 30 globetrotter n. gross, pig-like creature, devouring everything in its path; only stopping to spit out local customs resort v. to turn to tourism to generate income tourist n. short-term visitor buying access to local...

The phantom menace: G8 fails on all counts, again.(AID)
August 1, 2007... With anti-poverty campaigners demanding action not just more promises, cynicism and razor wire surrounded June's G8 Summit in Heiligendamm, Germany. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The host, Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel, had positioned...

The 'Yes Men' strike oil.(CORPORATIONS)
August 1, 2007... Corporate impersonators the 'Yes Men', posing as ExxonMobil and National Petroleum Council (NPC) representatives, have delivered a keynote speech to 300 excited oil executives which advocated melting down human bodies to meet the world's future...

Speechmarks.(Currents)(Brief article)
August 1, 2007... "There's no need to hate in order to fight for freedom. Without hate one can build tunnels, erect dykes on rivers, without hate one can open the ground to sow grain, without hate despotism can be annihilated... rebellion does not imply...

Whose army? Controversial US company put in charge of military reform.(LIBERIA)
August 1, 2007... Despite providing millions of dollars in military assistance to Liberia's brutal dictator Samuel K Doe in the 1980s, the US Government has now taken responsibility for 'reforming' the country's military. Following the end of a devastating...

Taiwan's health scandal.(From Radio New Internationalist)(Brief article)
August 1, 2007... China was recently elected to head the World Health Organization. This is bad news for Taiwan, which has been seeking membership for 10 years. It has just been knocked back yet again because China does not recognize it as an independent nation....

The mouse that roared.(Seriously)
August 1, 2007... Another G8 Summit has passed and the hardly earth-shattering resolutions that have sprung forth from the leaders of the world's eight most industrialized nations have largely failed to impress just about anyone. What did truly amaze people...

NI prize crossword.
August 1, 2007... 122 by AXE Win a copy of the latest World Guide reference book... All correct solutions received by the 25th of the cover month will be put into a draw--though only the winner will be notified. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Post your...

Big bad world.(Cartoon)
August 1, 2007... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Interview with David Sylvian: on his musical and spiritual journey as a World Citizen.(Making Waves)(Interview)
August 1, 2007... David Sylvian becomes ever more interesting with time. He first captured the hearts of many angst-ridden teens back in the 1980s with his band Japan but opted out of pop stardom just as he seemed to have found a new and more alternative voice...

Zandisile.(Sound recording review)(Brief article)
August 1, 2007... Zandisile by Simphiwe Dana (Gallo GURB 063CD) 'Afro-soul music' is how Simphiwe Dana describes what she sounds like. But a glance at Zandisile's lyric sheet suggests that the young South African diva has very much more on her mind than...

The War on Democracy.(Movie review)(Brief article)
August 1, 2007... The War on Democracy directed by Chris Martin and John Pilger John Pilger (left) has a long track record as a campaigning journalist. His print journalism for Britain's Daily Mirror and his many TV documentary films have been welcome...

Ghosts of Cite Soleil.(Movie review)(Brief article)
August 1, 2007... Ghosts of Cite Soleil directed by Asger Leth and Milos Loncarevic You may get off on everyday slum violence in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. But if you don't, this doc hasn't a lot to offer you. Brothers Bily and 2pac are gang leaders...

Acustico.(Sound recording review)(Brief article)
August 1, 2007... Acustico by Tito Paris (World Connection WC 024 CD) For any morna singer hailing from Cape Verde, Cesaria Evora is certainly a hard act to follow. But this hasn't put off a new generation of fadoistas from the former Portuguese...

War on Terror--the Boardgame.(Product/service evaluation)(Brief article)
August 1, 2007... War on Terror--the Boardgame Terror Bull Games At last--a board game with attitude! War on Terror--The Boardgame is a satirical broadside against the hypocrisy of US-British foreign policy. Every aspect of the fight for 'truth,...

DIY Handbook for changing our world.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 1, 2007... DIY Handbook for changing our world edited by the Trapese Collective (Pluto Press ISBN 978 0 7453 2637 5) Though the black-and-yellow cover playfully apes the old Teach Yourself language guides, what's inside is something else. From...

Streetwise.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 1, 2007... Streetwise by Mohammed Choukri trans by Ed Emery (Telegram, ISBN 978 184859 027 6) Mohammed Choukri's best-known book, the autobiographical For Bread Alone, was written in 1972 and covered his childhood years. His path to becoming...

Southern exposure: highlighting the work of artists and photographers from the Majority World.(Brief article)
August 1, 2007... Kingsley Maigwa is my name; I live for art and paint to live. From the moment I received a slate and pencil at primary school, I became obsessed with drawing. I use oil or acrylic paint on canvas but like to experiment using fabric and other...

The joy of rereading.(View from Havana)
August 1, 2007... About ten years ago, with the beneficent delay that usually settles things into their proper places, I discovered the writings of Paul Auster. The first of his books that ended up in my hands was the famous New York Trilogy. I remember that I...

Enemy of the state: Shane Leavy enters the world of Falun Gong--China's spiritual alter-ego.(Essay)
August 1, 2007... On Dublin's O'Connell Street, just under the Millennium Spire, a small group of Chinese people are gathered, attracting hurried glances from the shoppers pouring past them. Some hold a large white banner; others are sitting on the ground in the...

Cambodia.(Country Profile)
August 1, 2007... An unlikely tourist attraction, Toul Sleng prison in the centre of Cambodia's capital Phnom Penh receives a steady trickle of visitors each day. A former high school, its classrooms were transformed into torture chambers during the Khmer Rouge...