MIA, Baile Funk and HIV

I've listened to a lot of M.I.A. Argued about her writing with friends, ref to her randomly in my own writing. Love how she's eclectic and fearless and borrows from everything. mixes everything up. I've major issues with her lyrics and videos though. But all that'll feature in another post. Reason I mention her today: one of her influences is Baile Funk - music of the shanty towns of Brazil.

Baile Funk and Techno Braga ("Kitsch Techno" - played in the Brazilian state Para) are forms of Brazilian music that are not available in stores - they're distributed exclusively through street vendors. and this is part of a revolution in the way music is made and passed around - involving a radical approach to intellectual property. I heard Ronaldo Lemos talk about this recently. and it got me thinking about how something similar could be done for ARV drugs - HIV medication.

(Out of time. Aaarg. Will post the second half soon)

Freshly Ground (Part II)

In a recent post I wrote about afro-fusion. I think one reason I like this sort of music (or any fusion, basically) is because it involves mixing bits and pieces of different cultures and worldviews - hybrid music

Similar thing: while listening to Alex Ross (music critic at the New Yorker) talk at google headquarters, I heard him play an excerpt composed by Osvaldo Golijov. The piece was called "Tancas serradas a muru" from a longer work named "Ayre". At the gut level, I liked it because it wasn't like the classical music I was used to - had Dawn Upshaw witch-cackling - makes me feel a little nuts listening to it.

At a different level, I liked it because Golijov was trying to borrow from the sounds of Moorish Spain: The idea of a Spain under Islamic rule (relatively broadminded rule - Moorish Cordoba had 70 libraries in the city, around the same as the number of branches of the public library in NY today - and the Islam of the time involved "Itihad"- critical thinking) fascinates me. The idea that an Argentine Jewish composer (who also relies on his own ethnic heritage) would rely on this sort of source, I think, rocks.

Rosling, TED, and the White Man's Burden

Saw two presentations on development and the artificiality of the labels "Developed" and "Developing", by Hans Rosling - one at TED 2006 and one at TED 2007. Great presence, great sense of humour, absolutely amazing graphics using Trendalyzer, developed by the Gapminder Foundation (inspired by "mind the gap"). I've never been a fan of a heavy focus on quality of presentation when arguing something in public, but the way Rosling brought development issues to life is forcing me to re-evaluate that bias.

Anyway, both presentations focused on the multi-faceted nature of development, and the fact that most countries have unique features which make a broad categorization into developed and developing very deceptive.

Interesting corollary - Rosling argues that, if you take into account how long traditional "developed" countries took to get to their level of development, several countries in the past couple of decades have rocketed up the HDI. (He didn't say the HDI, but the factors he sketched seemed similar).

Was good to listen to Rosling, especially since I had recently listened to William Easterly, famous for writing "The White Man’s Burden: Why the West’s Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good". Not a cheerful guy, Easterly.

His arguments, when examined in detail, are sound. Basically, he says the Aid project (globally) won't work if it is a) the only approach b) a top down approach c) if you don't discriminate between initiatives that work and that don't work. He says development projects need CIAO (Customer feedback, Incentives, Accountability, Outcomes) - all of which are lacking in the current planned-at-macro-level environment. All ideas I agree with. Easterly is not an aid-skeptic. Only the title of his book is. Maybe his publicist chose the title.

He doesn't like the Millenium Development Goals, tends to be a little rude about Jeff Sachs, even ruder about Bono, and is allergic to the UN.

What bugs me about Easterly is
(a) I like U2. One should not speak ill of members of U2. Only Bill Bailey should be allowed to speak ill of U2 (I like Bill Bailey more than U2)
(b) Despite his fine-print being sound, Easterly tends to speak in sweeping generalizations which are not helpful (e.g. his dismissal of the UN). Even his choice of title for the book feels unhealthy - describing aid-for-development as the burden of the west is not a great way to motivate an interdependant and constructive approach to development. Regardless of the pros and cons of Kipling's poetry, describing the West as "White" = aarg. (aarg arrg).
c) He doesn't realize the value of ideas as a catalyst for mobilization: He's right about the fact that some of the Millenium Development Goals are dangerously faffy and that there is no one accountable for achieving them, but he doesn't seem to see their value as rallying points.

All this being said, I wish Sachs would also work-in a bigger CIAO element (as well as a bottom-up element) into his writing, and ease up on the grandiose statements before random Google.org audiences.

Anyway, point of the post:

watch Rosling's TED performances. They rock.

Freshly Ground

Listening to Freshly Ground. They play what wiki calls Afro-fusion - mixing traditional South African music with blues/jazz. I'm beginning like a lot of this sort of fusion - sort of a middle ground between imitating another culture wholesale and being parochial. Tshila (Ugandan songwriter/poet/singer) is the same - heard her sing Namboozo and Scientific Love. Amazing.

I like how they're dealing with their colonial baggage - not whining about it, but not losing identity - synthesizing. Tshila talks about this.

(Oops. Got a call. Will finish later)

SAMAs

Just discovered the South African Music Awards (SAMAs). Features several musicians that I like - like Vusi Mahlasela. His songs feature on the soundtrack of Tsotsi. Also played at TED recently - briliant version of Thula Mama. He's amazingly free and almost uncontrolled in his singing - something I like in musicians and writers. Also, he was an apartheid activist (another thing I like in musicians and writers :-)) - dedicated Thula Mama to his grandmother who protected him from apartheid era police.

Will dig around the SAMAs more and mebbe post on other people I come across. Just started listening to Simphiwe Dana. More soon...

Twitter not so hot

I've been trying to use Twitter as a specialized news-source, like an RSS feed off of IRIN or AllAfrica.com. Annoyingly, none of the UN or humanitarian agencies seem to have started using the service effectively. Bugger. Will keep hunting.

Google.org course on poverty and development

I found the the Google.org course on poverty and development on the home page of the Stanford Center for Social Innovation . All the lectures are posted on youtube. The course is pitched for business people who are new to development issues, but its still great. I liked the case studies on the successes and failures of development assistance, and the final sum-up lecture at the end. There's also a good discussion of Pro Mujer, a microfinance initiative in South America modeled on the Grameen bank started by Muhammad Yunus.

Wish I could find a similar online resource on post-conflict peace-building.

Re-starting RageforLight

Decided to get blogging again. Not much time for it, so mostly, I'll cross- post off of writeclique - but only (future) pieces which are vaguely activist - along with a brief discussion mebbe.

I've also added a twitter widget to the blog. Hoping it'll serve some useful purpose. Not sure what that purpose is though :-)