williamaveryhudson

In the August New Internationalist, guest editor Shahidul Alam features 24 works by the following Majority World photographers:

Lucia Chiriboga (Ecuador)
Bindo Dhungel (Nepal)
Golam Kasem (Bangladesh)
Saiful Huq Omi (Bangladesh)
Gajaani (Sri Lanka)
Shadi Gadhirian (Iran)
Neo Ntsoma (South Africa)
Rashid Talukder (Bangladesh)
Shehab Uddin (Bangladesh)
Abdul Hamid Kotwal (Bangladesh)
Mohammad Amin (Bangladesh)
Naymuzzaman Prince (Bangladesh)
Saibal Das (India)
Shoeb Faruquee (Bangladesh)
Main Uddin (Bangladesh)
Shinzo Hanabusa (Japan)
Rashid Talukder (Bangladesh)

Alam begins his keynote essay with this exasperating story, which I hope NI will abide my quoting in full:

It was a grand opening. The Who’s Who of development in Britain was there, championing the noble cause - the Millennium Development Goals, making poverty history.

The Bob Geldof circus could perhaps be pardoned. Geldof is neither a development worker nor someone particularly knowledgeable about the subject. But for the organizers of the ‘bash’ at the OXO Tower on London’s South Bank to produce such a culturally insensitive event was revealing.

Apart from parading a few young black people from Africa, who extolled the virtues of ‘development’, there was little contribution from the Majority World. The key speakers, typically white Western development workers, spoke of the role they were playing in saving the poor of the Global South. The token dark-skinned people, having played their part, were soon forgotten.

The centerpiece of this celebration was an exhibition entitled Eight Ways to Change the World. All the photographers were taken by white Western photographers. No one questioned the implication of such an exercise. When I confronted one of the organizers he explained that the curator - a director of a Western photographic agency - had decided not to use Majority World photographers because they ‘didn’t have the eye’. The sophisticated visual language possessed by the Western audience was presumably beyond the capacity of a photographer from the South to comprehend, let alone engage at a creative level.

So. Pick up the August issue of New Internationalist, read the articles, and study the photos. And before buying photos of the developing world from the usual sources, check with these contacts and websites that hold or promote Majority World photography (again, hoping for the forbearance of NI, where the list is published):

International
www.drik.net
www.majorityworld.com
www.driknews.com
www.pathshala.net
www.chobimela.org

Africa
Afriphoto - www.afriphoto.com

Asia/Pacific
India
India Picture - www.indiapicture.in
Photo ink - www.photoink.net
China
Fotoe - www.fotoe.com
China Foto Press - http://en.chinafotopress.com
Photomall-Xinhua - www.photomall.info
Afghanistan
Aina - www.ainaworld.org
Nepal
Photo Circle Blog - nepalphotography.org
Bhutan
VAST - www.vast-bhutan.org
Philippines
Konrad Adenauer Center for Journalism, Manila - http://cfj.ateneo.edu

Latin America
ZoneZero - www.zonezero.com

KijijiVision exists to reveal, support, develop and promote indigenous photographers from the Majority World whilst also making it easier for image buyers and the general public to access their work. www.kijiji.org

photography fair trade

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2007 New York International Fringe Festival
Linehart Theatre @440 Studios
440 Lafayette Street, 3rd Floor
www.ledgesandbones.org
www.fringenyc.org

Remaining Performances: 22 Aug at 5:30, 24 Aug at 3:30, 25 Aug at 7:45, 26 Aug at noon

Let me start with the project’s mission statement:

ledges and bones dance project is a collection of artists creating an ongoing laboratory for the development of original choreography. Our process focuses on the exploration of hyper-physical movement, personal risk, and communication through the visceral experience. We are passionate about making dances that stimulate, challenge and inspire us to dynamically live the human condition through the sensations of the body. We are dedicated to the liberated body, the uncensored voice and to making dance from off the ledge.

No lies here. Every word finds its truth in performance, particularly those last three - off the ledge. Strong, disciplined movement. Calligraphic lines. Tangible esprit de corps.

A formidable prologue solo by artistic director Holly Johnston sets out the project’s vocabulary and rhythms with absolute control and breathtaking passion and sweetness.

Credits:

Prologue: “falling and other quirks” 2007
Improvisation created and performed by Holly Johnston
Music: String Theory
Lighting Design: Adam Greene

“departures from common” New York premiere
Created and performed by LABdp Core
Choreography: Holly Johnston in collaboration with the dancers
The LABdp Performing Core: Arletta Anderson, Rachel Butler-Green, Chris Cano, Nick Heitzeberg, Nguyen Nguyen, Sarri Sanchez, Erik Speth, Kindra Windish
Music: David Karagianis
Costume Design: Sheena Salis
Lighting Design: Adam Greene

dance

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2007 New York International Fringe Festival
Linehart Theatre @440 Studios
440 Lafayette Street, 3rd Floor
www.myspace.com/herkindplay
www.fringenyc.org

Remaining Performances: 22 Aug at 3:30, 23 Aug at 9:45, 24 Aug at 7:45, 25 Aug at noon

It’s hard to imagine a better introduction to the work of Anne Sexton. An achievement of love and art - playwright Hannah Wolfe has this poet in her blood, and she shares her knowledge with honesty, intelligence, and grace. During most of the performance, Wolfe is joined by the choreographer Laurel Dugan, who somehow limns this difficult life and work in motions that are by turns fluid and spastic, and always strong.

On the screen, scenes from the 50s, 60s and 70s play - beginning with a set of masterfully edited extracts from Leave It to Beaver (I confess, charming to me), making pointed reference to June Cleaver’s perfect set of pearls, accompanied by The Doors.

Then the life begins.

“I was tired of being a woman…”
“The end of the affair is always death…”

Credits:

Wild Child Presents
HER KIND: The Life & Poetry of Anne Sexton

Video Clips by Franco Barbeite
Featuring Collin Biddle, Debra Kay Anderson & Hannah Wolfe

Video Editing & 1950s-70s Flashback by Alyssa Polacsek

Vintage Photographs Recreated by Alexis Courtney

Choreography by Laurel Dugan

“Music Swims Back to Me” mixed by Daniel Mintseris
Featuring Original Music by Lindsay Rae Spurlock

“Self in 1958″ Mixed by Daniel Mintseris

Co-Directed by Hannah Wolfe & Shanara Gabrielle

Special Thanks to Bricken Sparacino

Stage Manager: Kim Braun

Lighting Design & Operation: Charles Casano

Adapted by Hannah Wolfe from Anne Sexton’s Poetry, Diane Middlebrook’s book Anne Sexton: A Biography, newspaper clippings, essays, articles, collaboration with great artists and various nerve endings.

theatre dance performance poetry

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A little late getting started this year (me, not the festival). But I hope to make up for lost time with these:

Tonight (20 August)
7:15 HER KIND: The Life & Poetry of Anne Sexton 75 minutes VENUE #13: Linhart Theatre @ 440 Studios
9:15 unrest 45 minutes VENUE #13: Linhart Theatre @ 440 Studios

Tuesday (21 August)
7 The Hoarde 90 minutes VENUE #11: Skirball Center for the Performing Arts

Wednesday (22 August)
7:15 Paper Son 90 minutes VENUE #1: The SoHo Playhouse
10 Sodomy & Pedicures 62 minutes VENUE #9: The Players Loft

Thursday (23 August)
7 The Sunshine Play 80 minutes VENUE #16: Theatres at 45 Bleecker Street - The Lafayette Street Theatre
9:15 Pogo & Evie: A Zydeco Musical 115 minutes VENUE #11: Skirball Center for the Performing Arts

Friday (24 August)
7 CHEKHOV JAZZ 120 minutes VENUE #6: The Village Theatre

Saturday (25 August)
12 JOAN OF ARPpO 70 minutes VENUE #2: The Cherry Lane Theatre
2:30 REQUIEM POUR UNE AME SEULE 45 minutes VENUE #14: The Gene Frankel
6:45 Theremin 120 minutes VENUE #6: The Village Theatre

Sunday (26 August)
4:30 Burn 120 minutes VENUE #16: Theatres at 45 Bleecker Street - The Lafayette Street Theatre

Some others that I wish I had time (and money!) to see include:

Too Clever By Half
Princess Sunshine’s Bitter Pill of Truth Funhouse
THE MEDICINE SHOW (A Play With Music)
the terrible girls

theatre dance performance

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Ethics and the Pharmaceutical Industry
Edited by Michael A. Santoro and Thomas M. Gorrie
New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005

I’ve had this book for a year, but read it only just now, for a project. It has been reviewed thoroughly (and favorably) in JAMA, New England Journal of Medicine, and elsewhere.

The text is a study in tensions, beginning with the co-editors. Michael Santoro, who teaches ethics at Rutgers Business School, contends that healthcare as a fundamental human right while Thomas Gorrie, a government affairs officer at Johnson & Johnson, holds that healthcare is a commodity. The chapter authors, drawn from academia, industry, government, not-for-profits, and medicine, write across that continuum.

As a result, Ethics and the Pharmaceutical Industry reveals and explores critical faultlines of this extraordinary, exasperating, and essential business. As Professor Santoro puts it in the introduction, “Perhaps no business engages the worlds of science, medicine, economics, health, human rights, government, and social welfare as much as the pharmaceutical industry…. It is no overstatement to say that the pharmaceutical industry impacts the life of virtually every person in the world.”

Santoro introduces the metaphor of a “grand bargain” between the industry and society, in which pharma provided a never-ending stream of life-saving, life-enhancing miracles in exchange for immense riches. Faustian imagery seems apt, considering how the industry is viewed by many today.

What we are witnessing is the unraveling of a “grand bargain” between the pharmaceutical industry and society. This grand bargain was a complex, implicit social contract that allowed the modern global pharmaceutical industry to emerge in the second half of the twentieth century. Although the industry prospered immensely, society also enjoyed a bountiful array of life-saving and life-enhancing drugs. As the twenty-first century begins, however, this grand bargain is in tatters and public mistrust and resentment of the industry runs feverishly high. Many feel that the enormous industry profits are not sufficiently matched by contributions to the common good….

One issue that cuts through virtually all of the chapters in this book is the imperfect alignment of private profit-maximizing objectives with public health needs. The central paradox of the public policy debate over the pharmaceutical industry stems from the fact that private enterprise drives creativity and innovation, while simultaneously it restricts access and distorts medical priorities.

Santoro, Gorrie and their contributors succeed in assembling a text that presents the signal issues of business conduct for multinational pharmaceutical corporations, in a spirit of dialogue and respect for truly diverse perspectives.

The table of contents, alone, is informative.

Introduction: Charting a sustainable path for the 21st century pharmaceutical industry
Michael A. Santoro

Part I. Profits, Patients’ Rights, and Scientific Progress:
The Ethics of Clinical Research Conducted in Private Enterprises
Introduction: Michael A. Santoro
1. Drug research: between ethical demands and economic constraints
Jürgen Drews
2. Emerging international norms for clinical testing: good clinical trial practice
Juhana E. Idänpään-Heikkilä and Sev Fluss
3. The regulatory and ethical challenges of pediatric research
M. Dianne Murphy and Sara F. Goldkind
4. Including children in research: participation or exploitation?
Robert M. Nelson
5. Racial and ethnic inclusiveness in clinical trials
Valentine J. Burroughs
6. The rights of patients to participate in clinical research
Glenna M. Crooks
7. How should government regulate stem-cell research? Views from a scientist-legislator
Rush Holt

Part II. Marketing and the Efficient Utilization of Healthcare Resources: Ethical and Public Policy Challenges
Introduction: Michael A. Santoro
8. Ethics and prescribing: the clinician’s perspective
Charles L. Bardes
9. Regulation of prescription drug promotion
Thomas Abrams
10. Direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription drugs: a policy dilemma
Meredith B. Rosenthal and Julie M. Donohue
11. Off-label communications in marketing prescription drugs
Scott D. Danzis
12. The need for better health information: advancing the informed patient in Europe
Don E. Detmer, Peter Singleton, and Scott C. Ratzen
13. Who should get access to which drugs? An ethical template for pharmacy benefits
Norman Daniels, James E. Sabin, and J. Russell Teagarden
14. The application of cost-effectiveness and cost-benefit analysis to pharmaceuticals
Joel W. Hay

Part III. Patents, Pricing, and Equal Access
Introduction: Michael A. Santoro
15. Intellectual property rights, access to life-enhancing drugs, and corporate moral responsibilities
Patricia H. Werhane and Michael E. Gorman
16. A future agenda for government-industry relations
William C. Weldon
17. AIDS activism and the pharmaceutical industry
Martin Delaney
18. The campaign against innovation
Sidney Taurel
19. Third world perspectives on global pharmaceutical access
James Thuo Gathii
20. The promise of vaccines and the influenza shortage of 2004: public and private partnerships
Gary R. Noble

Part IV. Charting a Sustainable Path for the 21st Century
Introduction: Michael A. Santoro
21. Evolving approaches to healthcare challenges
Thomas M. Gorrie
22. Property rights in crisis: managers and rescue
Nien-hê Hsieh
23. Blurring the lines: public and private partnerships addressing global health
William H. Foege
24. Renegotiating the grand bargain: balancing prices, profits, people, and principles
Edward Greg Koski

corporate social responsibility pharmaceutical industry

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I think so. Try them - Super Tacos - afternoons/evenings at 96th Street and Broadway…

nyc tacos

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Pretty amazing…

seattle olympic peninsula pacific northwest

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Rem Koolhaas has created a perfect space for people and books. Kudos to the people of Seattle.

architecture seattle rem koolhaas libraries

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What’s not to like? Big gay & asian population, good nightlife, great second-hand music & clothing. And fantastic nature all around. University of Washington has the best dorms I’ve ever seen…

seattle

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