On Being Blog

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It's rare that we write or talk about sport here at On Being. Many of you are devoted sports fans; many others are most adamantly not. I saw Dodge's "So God Made a Farmer" commercial aired during the Super Bowl as an opportunity:

Wow. This Super Bowl commercial is a testament to the power of religious language, Paul Harvey, and the dream of America presented through rural imagery.

Donna Longo DiMichele from Cranston, Rhode Island appreciated the God-talk:

"Ha, I thought it was the voice of Bishop Fulton Sheen. Even so, the power of God imagery was lovely. Yet I was disappointed that the sponsor was an automobile maker."

Many, myself included, echoed Donna's sentiment, waxed a bit nostalgic and identified with our farming lineage. Others saw it as blatant manipulation. Bruce Kinney commented:

"Didn't do anything for me. Using a feel-good piece to sell…what, a truck? American consumerism at its worst."

Others took issue with the lack of diversity, big agribusiness, and environmental issues, as John Wolforth from Michigan points out:

"It is obviously nostalgic. I long for days when more people understood the necessity for the connection to the land too, but playing something like this won't bring that back. The 'green revolution' has helped us feed more people, but it also pushed the problem of hunger further from eyes. It turned food into a commodity, another thing to make someone rich, and did extensive damage to the types of farmers that Harvey talks about. And not just American farmers, Ethiopian and Haitian farmers too. I wish this was how farming really worked, but it's not."

Let's keep this discussion going. Read the many good thoughts in the comments section of my blog post and on our Facebook status update. Please, add your own.

On the global front, Harvard University's Ousmane Kane says we can no longer wax nostalgic about Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa. He writes an informative piece on how the wars in Mali shatter illusions about Islam being more peaceful and different in the Sahel than in other parts of the world. It's a worthy read.

Did you see the "sketchnotes" for last week's show with Rami Nashashibi?

What do you get when you pair Courtney Carmody's arresting photo with Margaret Atwood's prose? Jubilation, and hundreds of reblogs and likes:

"Water does not resist. Water flows. When you plunge your hand into it, all you feel is a caress…"

The larger excerpt of Ms. Atwood's passage is really wonderful.

This tweet from Krista (@KristaTippett) inspired a lot of folks:

The People Can Make Art - community college prof and students iluminate a Seth Godin story. Love this.

The backstory is that Wick Sloane (@wicksloane), a community college professor in Boston and columnist for Inside Higher Ed, heard Krista's interview with Mr. Godin and shared his own, more cheerful story (and poetry) to "cheer up Krista and Seth":

"I pulled out Walt Whitman's 'I Hear America Singing' as a last resort one day and asked the students to write their own versions, saying only that they may choose a verb other than 'singing.' The results the first time astonished me."

These poems offer hope and optimism to counter feelings of despair we often hear in our public discussions about the youth of today.

Picking up on that message of possibility is Virgil Leigh. The retired-exec-turned woodturner follows his compass to reveal the inner beauty of felled trees in massive, delicate works of art. A gorgeous video and an incredible artist.

Krista is in the process of writing her third book, but I don't think it's proceeding too quickly…

Writing Purgatory: the torturous, unromantic actual act of writing. Like childbirth in how we forget this part, and even willingly repeat.

What are we reading this week? A whole lot. From Slate's John Dickerson (@jdickerson), Krista shared this lecture William Deresiewicz gave to West Point cadets on learning how to be alone with your thoughts:

On leadership and solitude - especially provocative connection between "heart of darkness" and bureaucracy.

And another BBC article from astrophysicist Mario Livio (@mario_livio):

"More like a Bond villain's lair" than a hub of physics - a fun read on one search for Dark Matter.

Losing power in politics often hastens internal change. I tweeted out this Politico report:

As Hispanic immigrants fill conservative churches, the Christian Right becomes a vocal advocate of immigration reform.

And, sometimes history isn't kind:

A heart-wrenching read by Jerome Elam on the atrocities of Ireland's Magdalene Laundries. The Church has obligations…

It's Black History Month. I pay tribute to this marvelous woman whom I didn't know until reading her obituary:

A woman of class + dignity. Essie Mae Washington-Williams, child of famous but secret father Strom Thurmond, dies at 87.

As you move through the next week, Krista offers this advice:

Questions elicit answers in their likeness. It's hard to transcend a simplistic question. It's hard to resist a generous one.

There is something redemptive and life-giving about asking a better question.

Freshman students from many different countries create books on cultures for a design seminar at Bunker Hill Community College. (Photo by Matthew White)

"I gave this talk a couple weeks ago to some educators. And a woman in her 50s raised her hand she said, 'Well, I work at a community college. We have a different problem. Our problem is we have to let in everybody. And let me tell you something, mister,' she said, 'those people can't make art.' And I started to cry because here is someone who is trusted to elevate and to teach and to inspire. And she had become so beaten down that in a public setting she turned to me and she said, 'Those people can't make art.' And I just don't believe it."

Seth Godin's story resonated with a number of listeners, including Wick Sloane, a community college professor in Boston. He shares his own, more cheerful story (and poetry) to "cheer up Krista and Seth":

"Bunker Hill Community College in Boston, where I teach College Writing I, has more than 13,000 students, including almost 500 veterans. The average student age is 27. More than half are women, and 77 percent are people of color. Forty-four percent receive Pell Grants.

Many are immigrants, from more than 95 countries. The languages spoken in the class that wrote these poems include Creole, Spanish, Portuguese (one via Brazil, one via Angola), French, and Swahili. The site of Bunker Hill CC, where Charlestown prison once stood, has good, progressive credentials. This is where Sacco and Vanzetti were jailed and executed. The prison library was where Malcolm X went to read. The film Good Will Hunting was set here.

Last summer I was tracking down a student whose family has been lost in the civil war in Mali. After I wrote a column about hunger on college campuses, Bunker Hill hosted its fourth food bank in three months, an eighteen-wheeler filled by the Greater Boston Food Bank. The food was gone in ninety minutes. Amid all this, two students from here will study at MIT this fall.

As these poems show, Bunker Hill students have plenty of intellect. The best are as bright as any I have encountered in my platinum-spoon life. What’s missing for the students here is 'seat time' to master intellectual and academic skills. They have not read the Western canon by the time they are 18. They have not already written half a dozen research papers in MLA style when they arrive in my class. But they are able to understand the books and write such papers when shown the way.

As with any class, sometimes nothing works. I pulled out Walt Whitman’s 'I Hear America Singing' as a last resort one day and asked the students to write their own versions, saying only that they may choose a verb other than 'singing.' The results the first time astonished me. They still do. My hope is that we can encourage teachers everywhere to steal this assignment and flood the U.S. Capitol with the results. Our hope for America is that whatever crimes we may commit, voices like these will keep bubbling up and send the country soaring.

"I Hear America Crying" by Chantal Midgette:

I hear America crying; the varied sounds I hear;
The young teenager ends her dreams because a newborn child interferes

The widow, mother of four who lost her husband in a war
The woman being abused at home, praying to live life no more

The bullied child at school who is in pain
The Afghan family hoping they’ll be accepted again

The black man on death row for killing his own kind
Too late to turn back time, a brown leather cowl will make him blind

The white man judged as a racist for protecting himself from a black gunman
Sad to see that people doesn’t care that he’s a veteran

Crying, with tears, falling down to their ears, the sounds I hear

From Fellipe de Moraes, "I Hear America’s Prayers":

I hear America’s prayers, the beautiful vocals I hear
The mother’s night prayer for her son to make it home safe
The mechanic’s prayer for his back to heal to work
The child’s prayer for his animal companion to not die,
The college student’s prayer for courage to ask a girl out on a date,
The diplomat’s prayer to stop Taliban violence in the Middle East,
Prayers by all, and welcomed by God—their beautiful vocal voices I hear

"I See America Changing" by Neehmias Afonso:

I see America changing, from the very path that got us here.
Rich becoming richer, not wanting to be brethren.
Kids becoming closed-minded, as nonsense is being fed to their brains.
People dying, because a single smile doesn’t hold a meaning anymore.
Parents crying, wondering what ever happened to their pride and joy.
Neighbors shutting out, as if they weren’t people themselves.
I see America deteriorating, from the very morals it stood on.

"I Don’t Hear America Singing" by by Joe Saia:

I don’t hear America singing, I hear shooting and killing.
The killings of American soldiers off duty.
The shooting going on in front of little Lucy as she sits on her porch crying.
The father not coming home, who had been gunned down on Roxbury Ave.
The mother crying over her son’s body, dead for no good reason.
The kid carrying a gun, so he can feel safe walking down the street.
I can even see a toddler pretending to kill, as he sees his father prepare to shoot.
Quick, precise, fast, consistent, easy trigger movements, all to get that bullet out of the gun.
America is shooting and getting the killings over with.

And, from Arlyn Gonzales, "I See the Youth Working":

I see elementary schools working; the various tasks I see,
Those of kindergartners—each one learning their ABCs and 123s;
The first graders work, as they develop their basic sentences and math abilities;
The second graders task, as they prepare for multiplication, or reading stories;
The third graders, as they’re introduced to history—and novels afoot;
The fourth graders working on experiments, as well as the MCAS;
The fifth graders’ job—brainstorming, with ideas through a computer, or presentations they prepared,
The scuffing paperwork of the teachers—or the pans of the cafeteria crew—or of the custodians cleaning
   after the studious youth—each working towards their respective goals;
Working, with great responsibility, the future of the next generation

Wick Sloane is an adjunct English professor at Bunker Hill Community College in Boston. He writes a column about college access, “The Devil's Workshop,” for Inside Higher Ed.

Wow. This SuperBowl commercial is a testament to the power of religious language, Paul Harvey, and the dream of America presented through rural imagery:

And on the eighth day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, "I need a caretaker." So God made a farmer.

God said, "I need somebody willing to get up before dawn, milk cows, work all day in the field, milk cows again, eat supper, then go to town and stay past midnight at a meeting of the school board." So God made a farmer.

God said, "I need somebody willing to sit up all night with a newborn colt and watch it die, then dry his eyes and say,'Maybe next year,' I need somebody who can shape an ax handle from an ash tree, shoe a horse with hunk of car tire, who can make a harness out hay wire, feed sacks and shoe scraps. Who, during planting time and harvest season will finish his 40-hour week by Tuesday noon and then, paining from tractor back, put in another 72 hours." So God made the farmer.

God said, "I need somebody strong enough to clear trees and heave bales, yet gentle enough to yean lambs and wean pigs and tend the pink-comb pullets, who will stop his mower for an hour to splint the leg of a meadowlark."

It had to be somebody who'd plow deep and straight and not cut corners. Somebody to seed, weed, feed, breed, and brake, and disk, and plow, and plant, and tie the fleece and strain the milk, . Somebody who'd bale a family together with the soft, strong bonds of sharing, who would laugh, and then sigh and then reply with smiling eyes when his son says that he wants to spend his life doing what Dad does. "So God made a farmer."

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The unexpected response to last week's sketchnotes of the Seth Godin interview prompted us to reach out to Doug Neill and ask him if he'd be willing to do a series for us. He said yes, and now here's the second installment in our series of sketchnotes. The subject this time is Krista's interview with Rami Nashashibi, an American Muslim activist who founded the Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN) on the South Side of Chicago.

As an editor and producer who has listened to the show many times during the production process, I'm finding it a great feedback loop from an external set of ears. And Doug hit on some of the key points that we hoped our listeners might take away from the conversation: hip hop and the arts as a way of humanizing and connecting our stories, the "incredibly diverse American Muslim experience" of dignity and disparities, and the importance of African-American narrative in the story of Islam in the U.S.

Listen in. Comment here and tell us what take-away phrases and ideas you might have added to the graphic record. And, please, continue to share your feedback about this medium and if you find it a gateway to the podcast.