Globalize Your New Year

I've been pondering my stats. Naw, I'm not secretly an elite athlete. I mean web stats for this site. And I'm learning amazing things. Since SoundRoots launched, we've had trackable visits from at least 120 nations. The top 10 are: USA, UK, Canada, France, Germany, Netherlands, Australia, Belgium, South Africa, and Spain.

The form in which visitors' nations appear is interesting. Most are just one word: Estonia, Cyprus, Zambia. Others are more elaborate, describing the form of government along with the country's name: Iran, Islamic Republic of; Tanzania, United Republic of; Syrian Arab Republic. Oddly concerned with its past identity is Macedonia, the Former Yugoslav Republic of. And then there's Palestinian Territory, Occupied. Even your internet name tells a bit of your national story.

In short, SoundRoots is attracting the global audience that might be expected with our emphasis on global music and culture. I hope in 2006 you'll return often, strike up conversations in the comments, and give me more suggestions for musical and cultural explorations.

Today, I leave you with one last offering for 2006, a song suitable for any new year's party. Okay, okay...two songs. Now stop bugging me and go hang out with your friends in anticipation of a better, more peaceful year to come. Happy New Year!

[mp3] Daktaris: Give It Up Turnit Loose
from the album Soul Explosion

[mp3] Baba Yaga: Back In The USSR
from the album Secret Combination

Bollywood-London-LA

Another fine evening of culture in the Earball household last night, with the viewing of the delightful Bollywood offering "Bride and Prejudice." Though based on the book of almost the same name, the movie spices things up a bit with super-saturated colors, international jet-setting (India-London-LA-London-India), huge dance numbers, great music, and subtle racism. Okay, that last bit isn't spicy, and really isn't subtle. Bollywood seems set on casting light-skinned actors in leading roles, and relegating dark-skinned actors to supporting or comic-relief roles.

That aside, Bride is a greatly entertaining movie. With the dancing, the love lost and found, the annoying American turning out to be more solid than the charming Brit, what's not to like? The people are beautiful, the sound effects amusing, and the cameo by a mariachi band probably the first of its kind for a Bollywood film.

For more Bollywood explorations, information, and mp3s, check out Bollywood for the Skeptical and indiamp3.com

[mp3] Mangal Mangal from the film The Rising: The Ballad of Mangal Pandey

Seasonal Greetings Smackdown!

"Happy Holidays" vs. "Merry Christmas"

Here at SoundRoots we've watched askance as loud people on both sides express their outrage at the offense they've felt over various approaches to seasonal greetings. Should store employees be allowed/required to say "season's Greetings" or "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas"? We've stayed out of the fray until now, largely because we prefer to address more pressing and, frankly, more important issues. (Our local newspaper today ran an editorial entitled "Racism is a serious issue" - to this and the people that find it breaking news, we say "duh!")

Divided by God, a new book by Noah Feldman, helps clarify this, among other issues. Subtitled "America's church-state problem--and what we should do about it," Feldman's book helps shed some light onto this and other heated issues involving faith in the public sphere in the United States.

Unlike constitutionally secular France or Islam-based governments, the United States' founders enshrined the notion that while it emerged in part from their religious beliefs, the government should not promote one religion over another. This has led to various political battles, and Feldman categorizes the two dominant sides today as "values evangelicals" and "legal secularists."

Feldman's prose is sometimes engaging, and elsewhere as dense and dry as your aunt's Christmas fruitcake. But his conclusions deserve widespread discussion. The USA is increasingly a multi-religious nation, and people want to express their faith. Yet most agree that the separation between church and state should be upheld, in some manner. To address these realities, Feldman suggests loosening up on public expressions of faith, while cutting government funding for faith-based initiatives. He calls this the "no coercion, no money" approach.

The core insight is that citizens speak as individuals or as groups, and so long as all citizens have the same right to do so, no one group or person should be threatened or excluded by the symbolic political speech of others, as much as them may disagree. ... Talk can always be reinterpreted, and more talk can always be added, so religious speech and symbols need not exclude. Cold cash, by contrast, is concrete and finite, and thus subject to divisive competition of a different order.

I tend to agree with Feldman that a multicultural approach is better than strict secularism. I'd rather see multi-faith prayer at the National Cathedral, than for the US to sell off the building to the highest bidder. It reflects the national identity to give voice to diverse faiths, as was done at the National Day of Prayer and Remembrance on Sept. 14, 2001, which included prayers by various Christians, a rabbi, and an imam. And such public events are a chance for people of diverse faiths to emerge from their own places of worship and come together with others who have similar values, if a different faith.

One final note on holiday greetings: Rather than focusing on what offends you, why not think about what others might like to hear? If you are Christian and your neighbors are Jewish, what will it cost you to wish them a Happy Hanukkah? If they're dedicated atheists, why antagonize them? Use this as an opportunity to get to know your neighbors, the woman at the checkout stand, the guy on the street. Ask: "Do you celebrate the holidays?" and then greet them appropriately. You might learn something about them, and the world. Or, just use an all-purpose greeting with some substance: "Peace on Earth!"

Other Journeys...

Two recommendations today for global explorations away from music. I just finished reading The Cruelest Journey: Six Hundred Miles to Timbuktu by Kira Salak. It's an account of Salak's solo kayak adventure on the Niger River, from Old Segou to Timbuktu. Along the way she meets with danger, goats, a village where everyone shouts, and the ever-present ghost of explorer Mungo Park, who attempted a similar voyage 206 years earlier (and perished on the river). I've read a fair amount of adventure travel writing, and Salak's is a shining example of how to do it right - with a strong story, a healthy dose of introspection, and enough detail of pain, fear, and doubt that most readers will be happy to be reading it instead of living it.

A thumbs up also to the Iranian movie Baran. It's almost disturbingly slow and quiet, with little dialogue and no simple labels for its complex characters. The story centers on a young Afghan named Rahmat who is forced to replace his injured father at a construction site to support his family. A teenaged Kurd named Lateef is obsessed with Rahmat, first out of anger and jealousy for being forced from an easier job, then for more complex reasons as he discovers Rahmat's closely held secret. Baran is infused with humanity, and will reveal a side of Iran (and Afghanistan) that's not part of the inflated rhetoric of its government, or ours.

Monday's mp3: Light 'Em Up!

I mentioned earlier that I've become a de facto klezmer instructor. This does not extend, however, to the religious side of things Jewish. I know it's the Festival of Lights, and has become a significant holiday largely because its position on the calendar makes it a useful counterbalance to Christmas. But hey - once doesn't need to be a rabbi to appreciate a holiday that has at its heart the lighting of candles on these darkest days of the year. So Happy Hanukkah, and enjoy these unusual holiday tunes.

[mp3] El Vez: The Dreydel Song
El Vez site
[mp3] Craig & Co: Chanukkah Rap
buy CD