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February 14, 2003
Front-Page
News
African Cinema
Born in the 1960s, African cinema continues to wrestle
with significant challenges in attaining financial health, as
well as audience and governmental support. And, as French professor
Samba Gadjigo argues in the article “Trends in African Cinema”
in the January issue of the Africa Journal, the future
of African cinema is still unclear. “There are very talented
individual film makers, and some of the works are very sound artistic
contributions to world cinema,” Gadjigo notes, “and
yet our screens are still colonialized and one ought to wonder
what the future of African cinema will be in the context of a
‘globalized’ world.” In the course of his essay,
Gadjigo writes that lack of government support for the arts in
many African nations, disinclination to finance films by African
business interests, and the propensity of movie theaters and television
stations to show an endless parade of productions from outside
the African continent are proving difficult hurdles for an artistic
enterprise that has the potential to be a potent instrument for
cultural affirmation and liberation.
Nader’s Readers Ralph Nader certainly appreciates
the power of the printed word; it was his 1965 book, Unsafe
at Any Speed, that launched his career as a consumer advocate
and turned Washington’s attention to the neglected issue
of auto safety. Now, Nader’s Center for the Study of Responsive
Law is championing Visiting Lecturer in Complex Organizations
John O. Fox’s If Americans Really Understood the Income
Tax, the acclaimed book that explains the underlying social
and economic outcomes of the federal tax code. The center has
purchased 1,000 copies of the book and intends to distribute them
to professors of political science, law, and other fields, as
well as to public-interest organizations across the United States.
While Nader is identified with liberal causes, Fox says, the book
transcends left-wing/right-wing politics: “Conservatives
as well as liberals should favor vastly simplifying our highly
complicated tax laws, which would mean getting Congress out of
the business of attempting to micromanage our lives through tax
policy,” he says. Fox reports that he and Nader believe
that tax policy, along with health care and corporate malfeasance,
are the crucial domestic issues for the United States. “We
had an extensive conversation about our nation’s ignorance
about tax matters, and he hopes my book will help address this,”
Fox says.
Looking at the Land of the Rising Sun The New York
Times Book Review of February 9 featured a review by MHC
English professor Chris Benfey of Inventing Japan 1853–1964,
Ian Buruma’s short political history of modern Japan. The
book’s primary focus is an analysis of the “chances
and mischances of Japanese democracy,” writes Benfey, who
generally praises the work, calling it “concise and penetrating.”
Benfey also agrees with Buruma’s main argument, which the
MHC professor summarizes as follows: “nations like Japan
are made—they are the result of certain political choices
at certain times—rather than born.” Benfey is himself
the author of the forthcoming book The Great Wave: Gilded Age
Misfits, Japanese Eccentrics, and the Opening of Old Japan.
Not Quiet on the Western Front President Bush’s
diplomatic efforts in preparation for war against Iraq are quite
different from those of his father, and that difference could
put the United States at greater risk in the event of military
action, Jon Western, professor of international relations, told
listeners of WFCR, the local public radio station affiliate. Unlike
the first President Bush, the current president has not made a
strong effort to build an international coalition to conduct war
against Iraq, Western told WFCR news director Bob Paquette in
the conclusion of the station’s “Perspectives on Iraq”
series January 24. “I think the administration would like
to see some coalition partners but again, I think the fundamental
belief is that the threat is of such magnitude that they don’t
need others to join,” Western said. Without friendly nations
contributing troops and opening military bases, “American
forces will have to be fighting from less than the most optimal
scenario. In order to resupply troops on the ground, (the military)
will have to make longer flights, longer logistical networks for
reinforcements for units that might get bogged down. There are
going to be longer flight times, longer delays in getting access
to those units. All of that creates a situation that’s less
than optimal for military planners,” Western said. The interview
can be heard online at http://www.wfcr.org/iraq.html.
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