miscellaneous
"Within the process of shaping a simultaneously Brazilian and modern identity for themselves, the members of Flor do Abacate and other recreational workers’ societies would help to construct new images of dance and Carnival clubs of the kind. With each new event, the 'tireless twosomes' enjoying themselves there danced enthusiastically till dawn found them in 'absolute harmony,' rocked by a musical style that one cronista would define, years later, as 'leg-shattering.' It was hardly surprising that their dances drew considerable crowds, as evidenced by the “mass of people” squeezed outside its headquarters during one of the parties put on by the club in 1911.
"Roots of the 21st Century"
Pedro Meira Monteiro
"Why does no-one write essays of national interpretation anymore?
Some will say that this kind of essay has no place nowadays. Gilberto Freyre and Sérgio Buarque de Holanda wrote The Masters and the Slaves and Roots of Brazil nearly 80 years ago. We simply didn’t know as much as we do today, thanks to intervening decades of work by social scientists and historians. But if all this knowledge lets us write about Brazil with more nuance, it also stays our hand with the reminder that any attempt to set down national characteristics will be a merely impressionistic exercise, one that cannot hold up to a rigorous analysis of society and history."
"21st Century Welfare"
Lena Lavinas
"The distinction is crucial: instead of being one dimension of a wider, universal system of social protection, such programmes enforce a principle of selectivity, targeting the poor as a residual category while insisting they assume individualized responsibility for their fates—thus working to diminish social solidarity and cohesion. The schemes are also designed to extend commodification, on the one hand disbursing monetary rewards to the poor in exchange for their participation as consumers, while on the other offering governments an alibi for scaling back provision of public goods. They thus pave the way for a retrenchment of welfare rather than its expansion."
"In El Quebrachal, Honduras, Sabas Ramón had lived the life he was destined to. He was the oldest of nine siblings, the father of two sons and two daughters whom he baptized with Biblical names. His persistence and courage distinguished him, and not just when he played central back in soccer games. Of all his siblings, he was the only one who dared to cross. "
"Brazil's One Laptop Per Child Program: Impact Evaluation and Implementation Assessment"
Lena Lavinas and Alinne Veiga
"Here lies the so-called digital enigma. The acquisition of information technology skills certainly allows for a new type of interaction between new generations, avid as they are to innovate, and schools, where everyone suffers from the fatigue of the old methods, the lack of public resources and the dwindling prestige of teachers. That being said, technology per se does not seem to guarantee success in learning."
"There was Tião Leite, Santana, Sebastião de Jesus, Gregório, Big Manuel, Bindoia, Chico Moreira, me, and João Rosa. And Aquiles, too, a guitar player. Ah, and a kid who got left out. He didn’t wind up in the story, he was a boy, but he came along every day, he oughta been in it."
"Venosa was part of a young generation that revolted against the rituals of modern autonomy and its utopic visions, employing practices that, with their eclecticism and their skeptical rereading of art history, seemed to fly in the face of the purist ideals of modernism. The idea was to contaminate the genres and languages of the past with works that flatly rejected the specializations and rationality of the modern age."
"Too much,
too much on the front page of the newspapers,
everywhere, throughout the television programs,
flowing, obscene.
There is the blood of Ancient History
the bleeding of the Atreidae
there is contemporary blood, cutthroat and woodpecker
the blood of the sacrificial victim,
always in vain as well,
the blood of the plotters
the blood of the
rest" [...]
Jacques Leenhardt, on Karin Lambrecht
"In the old bank safe in the basement, a joke and a new piece.
The joke: I filled the safe with dust.
The new piece: a sort of poem written in relief on metal boxes. A pump-operated refrigeration system made water and glycol circulate all throughout the room, always keeping the mixture below freezing. As it came into contact with the air, the humidity of the environment condensed, forming ice on all the boxes and tubes.
The text spoke of the movement of a river, alluding to the circular character of the room: the white of the river passes / passed the liquid river, back / watery with river, bends back / stirs the river water, back / step of wind that blows / threads of river soak the water / in long drops of silver gleam / of cold water."
"A female figure supports herself, sitting on a mass of green, which is interrupted from within in the form of the presence of drawing, of small circumferences which pile up on top of each other. From this, shall we say, green support, emerges a drawing in two very close lines, curving from right to left and winding up in another drawing, pointing towards a slender and narrow vertical rectangle of a slightly lighter green than the starting-point. The painting is constructed in a circle: whether our point of departure is the green mass or the red circle above it, the circular motion passing through both the figure and the flower separating the figure’s head from the circle, is what gives the work tension and maintains the chromatic – and formal – effort of the painting."
"Since the death of painting...
(I never went along with the indignant arguments of those who claimed it still survives.
I like the idea of its being dead, and I feel proud that it was the first to be sacrificed. Attributed its proper importance. It is beautiful that it should die as well, and I have no intention of extending its life.)"
"The trip was a long one, with a layover in London. I arrived at Cyprus in the company of Michael Asbury, the curator of the exhibition. In Nicosia, the capital, I suddenly felt at home; anthropologically, its inhabitants are my cousins. They and I were made of the same mortar, the mixture of cultures of the peoples that ring the Mediterranean, and who came here to drop anchor. [...] I raise the cup of red wine to the starry sky and toast to the gods, my joy in silence. "