Nathan's Notebook
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Nathan Bierma
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Wednesday, February 11, 2004
This week in my B&C blog: Harvard sociologists' possibly dubious link between religious faith and economic development. Plus: The 'furniture capital' of China, avocado thieves in San Diego, seven myths about evangelical voters, the emptying of the nation's breadbasket, still studying the Soviet Union, what caffeine does (and doesn't do) to you, and more ... LINK/ARCHIVE The Trib's Tempo has a piece this morning on the lingering loose ends from the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. We know Al Capone was behind it, but that's about it. Time to update my related page at my Chicago album. The slogan emblazeoned on the CTA's new Chicago Card Plus and in-car advertisements is rather presumptuous: "On-Time. Clean. Safe. Friendly." The CTA is exactly none of those things. (Well, it's usually safe during daylight.) Why overextend? Why not just say: "Gets you where you need to go" and leave it at that? • Etymology Today from M-W: palindrome \PAL-un-drohm\ : a word, verse, or sentence (as "Able was I ere I saw Elba"), or a number (as 1881) that reads the same backward or forward Palindromic wordplay is nothing new. Palindromes have been around since at least the days of ancient Greece, and our name for them comes from two Greek words, "palin," meaning "back" or "again," and "dramein," meaning "to run." Nowadays, we can all appreciate a clever palindrome (such as "Drab as a fool, aloof as a bard" or "A man, a plan, a canal: Panama"), or even a simple one like "race car," but in the past palindromes were more than just smart wordplay. Until well into the 19th century some folks thought palindromes were actually magical, and they carved them on walls or amulets to protect people or property from harm. • Previous E.T. Thursday, February 05, 2004
Latest B&C Corner: My report from the Calvin Worship Symposium in Grand Rapids, where worship has come a long way from the liturgical stoicism of my Dutch immigrant ancestors. http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2004/105/13.0.html Here's the report from my editor, John Wilson, on the 2000 Symposium. And speaking of my stern ancestors, here's Merriam-Webster on "Dutch" as in "Dutch treat": During the 17th century, the British and the Dutch became bitter rivals in international commerce. As the competition heated up, so did the invectives. One of the earliest verbal abuses directed at the Dutch was the term "Dutch bargain," penned in 1654 to describe a bargain made and sealed as if while drinking. "Dutch courage" (courage artificially stimulated especially by drink), "Dutch uncle" (one who admonishes sternly and bluntly), and "in Dutch" (in disfavor or trouble) are some more examples. The Dutch were also vilified as greedy. Hence, when you're invited to a dutch treat, you're expected to pay your own way. By the 20th century, "dutch" and "dutch treat" were being used as adverbs meaning "with each person paying his or her own way." This week in my B&C blog: January news and book review roundup. LINK/ARCHIVE Trimmed from the news roundup: John Kerry, Pete Rose, Joan Kroc, Mad Cow, Legalizing immigrants, Barbie in a blender, 'Amish in the City', and an Israeli rabbi's programmed prayer for porn surfers. Latest Tribune piece: Q&A in the Sunday Magazine with Kevin Boehm and Rob Katz, owners of a new Lincoln Park restaurant that has a designated cell-phone booth in the front lobby. http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/magazine/chi-0402010546feb01,1,4863381.story • Etymology Today from M-W: bosky \BAHSS-kee\ 1 : having abundant trees or shrubs 2 : of or relating to a woods "Bosk," "busk," "bush" - in Middle English these were all variant spellings of a word meaning "shrub." "Bush" is still familiar to the modern ear, and "busk" can still be heard in a few places in the dialects of northern Britain. "Bosk" too survived in English dialects, although it disappeared from the written language, and in the 16th century it provided the root for the woodsy adjective "bosky." Since its formation, "bosky" has been firmly rooted in our language, and its widespread popularity seems to have resurrected its parental form. By 1814 "bosk" (also spelled "bosque") had reappeared in writing, but this time with the meaning "a small wooded area." • Previous E.T. Friday, January 30, 2004
Latest published piece: My op-ed in the Baltimore Sun on the different lists of Top Ten TV shows for over-50 and under-50 viewers: http://www.sunspot.net/news/opinion/oped/bal-op.television25jan25,1,3225365.story USA Today said last year that 9 TV shows now appear on both of the Top 20 lists of black and white viewers--the most overlap in more than ten years. 
This week in my B&C blog: The state of feminism, and what a new wave of attention to "opt-out" working moms misses (including half the population: men). Plus the Jews of Uganda and the future of Cambodia's Mekong River (pictured). LINK/ARCHIVE Coming next week: January news in review and book blog.  • Urbanism Watch
A couple of articles, from the W.Post and Blair Kamin in the Trib on the city of Houston as it prepares to host the Super Bowl. (Of the many fun facts about Super Bowl Sunday, I came across this one this morning: Domino's Pizza expects to deliver 1.2 million pizzas this Sunday, twice as many as any other Sunday.) Here's Blair: HOUSTON -- Twenty years ago, this was the city of the future. It had ribbons of freeways, not mass-transit rail lines. It had a series of skylines rather than a single downtown skyline. Instead of an open-air ballpark like Wrigley Field, it had the Astrodome, the enclosed, air-conditioned stadium that was dubbed, with characteristic Texas hype, "the eighth wonder of the world." The Houston that will host the Super Bowl on Sunday is a very different place. Or, more accurate, it is trying to be different. The nation's fourth largest city just opened a 7.5-mile light-rail vehicle line that runs from downtown to just past Reliant Stadium, where the Super Bowl will be held. Along the line is a three-block pedestrian mall where "jump jets" shoot water 40 feet into the air. The Astros, meanwhile, have abandoned the Astrodome for a retro stadium, Minute Maid Park, whose brick walls behind home plate mimic -- you guessed it -- Wrigley Field. Something is starting to change here: Since the oil boom went bust in the mid-1980s, city officials, real estate developers, urban planners and architects came to realize that the city of the future wasn't particularly livable or attractive, even though it was studded with trophy skyscrapers. And, staying on the subject of sports and cities, the New Yorker on the latest stadium scheme in New York City: New York is a big town, with a lot of teams, and we don’t have to look nearly so far back in time—or to such nostalgic standbys as the Brooklyn Dodgers—to come up with noteworthy stadium and arena unveilings for comparison. Remember Fred Wilpon, the Mets owner, posing for photographers in 1998 with his Ebbets Field-inspired mockup? At half a billion dollars (retractable roof included), that was a bargain compared with the latest estimates (just last month) for a Yankees home in Macombs Dam Park, in the Bronx: eight hundred million, with about half to come from the public coffers, and half from Mr. Steinbrenner. The West Side Jets stadium dream is more ambitious still, with a price tag above one and a half billion, all told. ... In the past few years, the Islanders, too, have announced plans for a new Coliseum, and the Knicks and the Rangers have continued agitating for a new Garden.... Only the Giants seem content to remain where they are. So if there is a stadium-seat manufacturer looking to expand his business, let him come here, where a quarter million new seat orders await processing. To be fair, unlike just about every town in the land, the New York area hasn’t seen a new big-league stadium or arena built since the Carter Administration, and that was in New Jersey, in the Meadowlands, from which the Nets are now bolting. But it’s hard to think of a city that has built seven. • Previous U.W. More from the Eden of ephemera--the e-mail forward: Each year the Washington Post's Style Invitational asks readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing only one letter and supply a new definition. Here are some of the 2002 winners: • Etymology Today from M-W: satiety \suh-TYE-uh-tee\ 1 : the quality or state of being fed or gratified to or beyond capacity : surfeit, fullness 2 : the revulsion or disgust caused by overindulgence or excess You may have guessed that "satiety" is related to "satisfy," "satiate" (meaning "to satisfy fully or to excess"), or "sate" (which means "to glut" or "to satisfy to the full"). If so, you guessed right. "Satiety," along with the others, ultimately comes from the Latin word "satis," which means "enough." English speakers apparently couldn't get enough of "satis"-derived words in the 15th and 16th centuries, which is when all of these words entered the language. "Satiety" itself was borrowed into English in 1533 from the Middle French word "satieté" of the same meaning. • Previous E.T. Thursday, January 22, 2004
Latest Tribune article: My story on the evolution of historic Maxwell Street, currently being redeveolped by the U of Ill. at Chicago. I'll excerpt the article and include my pictures next month at my Chicago album. http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/custom/Loop ... /chi-0401200323jan21,0,4800232.story • Number of the Day: 11.9 Millions of "major crimes" reported to police in 2002, an increase of less than one-tenth of a percent from 2001, according to the FBI, which also found that crime decreased in cities while suburban and rural crime rose. -Wash. Post -Previous Number • Thought of the Day: Depression in pre-modern times As I mentioned here, I've been intrigued by portions of Jay Griffiths' A Sideways Look At Time, which argues that since industrialization we have lost an organic and spritual sense of time (connected to nature's cycles of daylight and the seasons), and instead are governed by unnatural mechanical measurements of time. (I love her point that the "leap-second" added each year to line up with the earth's rotation goes to show how measured time is more precise than actual time, casting doubt on the idea of temporal precision in the first place.) I agree with much of Griffiths says, in between her ranting against all things modern. I appreciate her poignant and vivid portrayals of what we call "primitive" cultures, and how the rhythms of their lives more fluidly align with the patterns of nature. I also appreciate Juliet Schor's less poetic and more scientific account of "free time" in history in her book The Overworked American (which I quote in one of my book chapters here). Medieval agrarian society, Schor argues, for all its hardships, afforded more leisure time then we have today, despite the supposedly salvific arrival of "modern conveniences." Still agreed. But as I was thinking about the patterns of living in the distant past, I started wondering about--of all things--depression. I struggled with some sort of depression last year, much of which I spent alone and at home. I was trying to free myself from "the tyranny of the urgent" (I forget whose quote that is). No rat race for me. I wanted time to read and reflect in the midst of the rush of this big city. But I was under-stimulated. And isolated. It was an emptiness that may have spared me from stress but was not sustainable. And now I wonder: did people in pre-industrial history, for all the virtues of their "simpler life," ever suffer the same thing? Was there an emotional price to pay for the harsh limits on their imagination and curiosity--the geographical, economic, and technological limits? Granted, the human imagination may have had more depth and breadth before all those modern evils came along and shaved it down. But how much of a psychological blow were the hardships of those medieval agrarian people, especially those who paused from their labor to look up to the lofty spires on the castle of the lord for whom they were slaving away? (For me, getting busier--taking on four part-time jobs and submitting to a big boost in stress has helped relieve signs of depression. If it's a "tyranny of the urgent" I'm under, it's not an altogether unwelcome reign.) Here's my other question about pre-industrial depression: If it existed, was it caused by isolation? What pre-industrial people had that many post-industrial people do not was social connectedness--what Robert Putnam calls (oh-so-capitalistically) social capital. Our isolated suburbs of today (and the possibly related rise in documented depression) are a far cry from the communal campfires of yesteryear. But was there loneliness around the campfire, in the same way there is loneliness today on the crowded city street? Would that social connectedness have worsened the pain of dysfunctional, abusive, or otherwise controlling relationships, from which modernity allows people to (at least physically) distance themselves? Would it have left people feeling trapped? And would that be depressing? Of course, all of these ideas--depression, possibilities, individual needs--are modern inventions that mostly eluded those campfire gatherers (and sorry to be so sloppy and condescending in these generalizations). The rise in documented depression over the last half-century may only reflect a rise in the ability and knowledge to document it, not to mention its victims' awareness of its possibility. But since some forms of depression are biochemical, it would seem likely to have deep roots in human history. I'm sure there have been studies of depression in less modern cultures living in modern times that would answer my question. And I need to read another Christmas present I received--Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fate of Human Societies--to see beyond the generic pre-industrial/post-industrial historical labels. But I wonder what the question of individual psyche and social connectedness in history would teach us. As I was typing this, the sun, which washed out my screen as it ascended in the sky, necessitating shut shades, moved behind a tall building, completely altering the textures of light in my surroundings and allowing me to reopen the blinds. A tall building that was not there before industrialization. There are still natural patterns to life, composing a new rhythm of their own. • Previous E.T.: obligatory Christmas cheer • Etymology Today from M-W: juggernaut \JUG-er-nawt 1 [chiefly British] : a large heavy truck 2 : a massive inexorable force, campaign, movement, or object that crushes whatever is in its path In the early 14th century, Franciscan missionary Friar Odoric brought to Europe the story of an enormous carriage that carried an image of the Hindu god Vishnu (whose title was "Jagannâth," literally, "lord of the world") through the streets of India in religious processions. Odoric reported that some worshippers deliberately allowed themselves to be crushed beneath the vehicle's wheels as a sacrifice to Vishnu. That story was probably an exaggeration or misinterpretation of actual events, but it spread throughout Europe anyway. The tale caught the imagination of English listeners, and by the 19th century, they were using "juggernaut" to refer to any massive vehicle (such as a steam locomotive) or to any other enormous entity with powerful crushing capabilities. • Previous E.T. Monday, January 19, 2004
This week in my B&C blog: Review of NYU's new blog on religion and the press; the news from Embarrass, Minn., and Celebration, Fla.; plus the real state of the Union, the privatization of the military, the scourge of "managerial English," and more ... LINK/ARCHIVE Coming Distractions: Clipped from ABC News' The Note — Jan. 19, 2004: Iowa caucuses — Jan. 20, 2004: President Bush delivers the State of the Union, D.C.; Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Sen. Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) deliver the Democratic response to the State of the Union, D.C. — Jan. 27, 2004: New Hampshire primary — Feb. 1, 2004: Super Bowl XXXVIII, Houston — Feb. 3, 2004: Delaware presidential primary — Feb. 3, 2004: South Carolina Democratic presidential primary — Feb. 3, 2004: Missouri presidential primary — Feb. 3, 2004: Arizona presidential primary — Feb. 3, 2004: New Mexico Democratic caucuses — Feb. 3, 2004: Oklahoma presidential primary — Feb. 3, 2004: North Dakota Democratic caucuses — Feb. 7, 2004: Michigan Democratic caucuses — Feb. 7, 2004: Washington Democratic caucuses — Feb. 8, 2004: Maine Democratic caucuses — Feb. 8, 2004: 46th Annual Grammy Awards, Los Angeles — Feb. 8, 2004: NHL All-Star Game, St. Paul, Minn. — Feb. 10, 2004: Virginia Democratic presidential primary — Feb. 10, 2004: Tennessee presidential primary — Feb. 10, 2004: District of Columbia Republican caucus — Feb. 14, 2004: Nevada Democratic caucuses -- Feb. 15, 2004: NBA All-Star Game, Los Angeles — Feb. 15, 2004: NASCAR Daytona 500, Daytona Beach, Fla. — Feb. 17, 2004: Wisconsin presidential primary — Feb. 24, 2004: Idaho Democratic caucuses — Feb. 24, 2004: Hawaii Democratic caucuses — Feb. 24, 2004: Utah Democratic presidential primary — Feb. 29, 2004: 76th Annual Academy Awards, Los Angeles — March 2, 2004: Super Tuesday: California, Connecticut, Georgia, Maryland, Mass., Minn., New York, Ohio, Rhode Island, Vermont — March 7, 2004: Season premiere of "The Sopranos" on HBO — March 9, 2004: Texas, Florida, Louisiana, Miss. primaries — March 13, 2004: Kansas Democratic caucuses — March 16, 2004: Illinois presidential/state primary — March 20, 2004: Wyoming Democratic caucuses — March 20, 2004: Alaska Democratic caucuses — April 3-5, 2004: NCAA men's basketball Final Four, San Antonio — April 4-6, 2004: NCAA women's basketball Final Four, New Orleans — April 5, 2004: Opening day for Major League Baseball — June 24-27, 2004: Green Party National Convention, Milwaukee — July 13, 2004: 75th Major League Baseball All-Star Game, Houston — July 26-29, 2004: Democratic National Convention, Boston — Aug. 14-29, 2004: Summer Olympic Games, Athens, Greece — Aug. 30-Sept. 2, 2004: Republican National Convention, New York City — Sept. 30, 2004: Proposed presidential debate at the University of Miami, Miami — Oct. 5, 2004: Proposed vice presidential debate at Case Western University, Cleveland — Oct. 8, 2004: Proposed presidential debate at Washington University, St. Louis — Oct. 13, 2004: Proposed presidential debate at Arizona State University, Tempe — Nov. 2, 2004: Election Day • Etymology Today from M-W: nosocomial \nah-suh-KOH-mee-ul\ : acquired or occurring in a hospital "Nosocomial" is a word that usually occurs in formal medical contexts; specifically, in reference to hospital-acquired sickness. We hope you never encounter "nosocomial" as part of your own medical diagnosis, but if you do, you might want to remember that the term descends from "nosocomium," the Late Latin word for "hospital." "Nosocomium" in turn traces to the Greek "nosos," meaning "disease." That root has given English other words as well, including "zoonosis" ("a disease communicable from animals to humans under natural conditions") and "nosology" ("a classification or list of diseases" or "a branch of medical science that deals with classification of diseases"). • Previous E.T. |
