Jodi Archambault: “As COVID-19 takes a fearsome toll on our people, it also threatens the progress we have made to save our languages. The average age of our speakers — our treasured elders who have the greatest knowledge and depth of the language — is 70. They are also those who are at most risk of dying from COVID-19.” Three native speakers who taught the Lakota language on the Standing Rock Reservation have died in the pandemic so far — out of only 230 native speakers there in total; their average age is 70. – The New York Times
The Most Valuable Award In British Poetry Goes To Bhanu Kapil
Poet Lavinia Greenlaw, who chaired the committee for the T.S. Eliot prize, said of Kapil’s How to Wash a Heart, “This is a unique work that exemplifies how poetry can be tested and remade to accommodate uncomfortable and unresolvable truths. … It’s a book that one of the judges said, ‘Every time you start it, you have to finish it.’ There’s nothing like it.” – The Guardian (UK)
The Lonely Struggle Of The Street Artists Of Paris
The artists of the Place du Tetre are feeling squeezed out by restaurants, and then there’s the emptiness. One of the artists: “It’s a hard time for everyone, but it’s especially depressing here. … Usually, this place is better than a studio because you are in contact with people from all over the place and that’s the pleasure. But at the moment it’s a desert; there’s no tourists, and no ambience.” – The Observer (UK)
What Did CBS Do With, And In, Its Supposedly Thorough Investigation Into A Racist, Sexist Culture?
Some things have changed. But the news affiliates? Oof. The details of CBS Television Stations President Peter Dunn’s racism – saying of an anchor, “He’s not doing that ‘jive talking’ anymore? Sometimes, he’s just not speaking my language,” for instance – and sexism are damning. – Los Angeles Times
Despite The Pandemic, Honolulu’s Bishop Museum Is Taking Visitors Through The Experience Of Surfing
The designer of the exhibit: “Duke Kahanamoku, on a wooden board with no fins, surfed a wave that was over 25 feet tall on its face. And he surfed it for over a mile. And we wanted to have the audience experience that moment. So we built a 27-foot tall wave and put a replica of Duke’s board in it. And people can stand on that board and feel like they are there in the presence of this wave.” – NPR
During Pandemic Lockdowns, Thousands Turn To Online Nude Drawing Classes For Solace
Online drawing classes are, for many people in lockdown in Britain, a lifeline to the outside world. And there’s a plus: “Individual sessions can attract hundreds, sometimes thousands, of people, and moving everything online has made life drawing more accessible to a diverse crowd.” – The Observer (UK)
Can Virtual Reality Deliver The Benefits Of Nature?
It’s an urgent question for many in lockdown – and in the UK, “whether we are in lockdown or not, four fifths of the UK population lives in an urban environment and one in eight homes do not have a garden.”- BBC
Spike Lee Gives Fiery Speech Comparing Trump To Hitler
Lee’s speech for the New York Film Critics Circle Awards was filmed on January 6 – the day when insurrectionists broke into the U.S. Capitol Building, hunting legislators and raiding offices. “We’re at the crossroads now. And everyone please be safe, this is not a game. These people have guns with ammunition. … This president, President Agent Orange, will go down in history with the likes of Hitler. These guys, all his boys, they are going down on the wrong side of history.” – USA Today
Totally Reimagining The Sundance Festival For Its Pandemic Year
Director Tabitha Jackson was lucky in 2020 – her hiring was big news at last year’s Sundance Film Festival. Then, of course, a global pandemic hit. “To say her inaugural year heading the most influential film festival in America was rife with unpredictable challenges is an understatement.” – Los Angeles Times
Junior Mance, ‘One Of The Most Swinging And Utterly Delightful Pianists In Jazz,’ 92
Mance was “a buoyant, bluesy jazz pianist who worked with some of the biggest names in jazz, including Lester Young, Dizzy Gillespie, Cannonball Adderley and Dinah Washington, before establishing himself as the leader of his own groups.” – The New York Times
Iconic Architecture Is Urban (And Insta) Clickbait
And, because of social media and marketing, it’s making a serious comeback. The projects “are magnified again by technology, by the software that enables architects to visualise complex shapes and engineers to calculate them, by the photorealistic visualisation techniques that make a project seem physical before it is, by the construction techniques that turn these shapes into reality and, finally, by the internet’s crowded global marketplace of imagery.” – The Observer (UK)
The Creativity, Therapy, And Writing Skill It Takes To Co-Create Celebrity Memoirs
Michelle Burford has co-written, or really, written after many hours of absorbing interviews, quite a few celebrity memoirs. She calls herself a “story architect,” and her name appears on the covers of the memoirs alongside the famous counterparts. But as a Black woman, she has to tell publishers not only to think of her for Black women’s memoirs: “I’ve learned to not just hint at that but to say it outright, to say, you know, consider me for, Adele and Taylor Swift as much as you would, say, Beyoncé.” – The New York Times
Dungeons And Dragons, And Other Gaming Too, Must Find A Way To Rid Itself Of Fantasy’s Legacy Of Racism
It’s not going to be easy: “Genetic determinism is a fantasy tradition. … As both a ruleset and a fantasy backdrop, D&D is in the business of translating these racial differences into numerical scores.” – Wired
Scottish Gymnastics Told To Speed Up A Ballet School Abuse Investigation
“Several parents raised concerns with Scottish Gymnastics a year ago over dance classes for eight to 12-year-olds at the prestigious Ballet West school in Taynuilt, Argyll. Allegations were made that children at Ballet West’s lower school were shouted at by coaches and ‘body shamed,’ causing distress and anxiety.” – The Sunday Times (UK)