Archive for November, 2009
With a title like Homicide Survivors Picnic and Other Stories, you expect characters haunted by their pasts and present, what you don’t expect is to be so drawn into the stories. Like gawking at a car wreck, I couldn’t pull myself away from the dark histories of the characters that Lorraine M. Lopez created. What I couldn’t decide though was if I felt bad for how they were written or for the circumstances the author places them in.
Published by BKMk Press at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, Lopez’s 10 short stories are set mostly in the south, specifically Georgia, and focus on family relationships with women centered in each story. Only two of these stories connect to each other, “The Flood” and “The Landscape”. In those stories an educated woman struggle with raising the bi-racial daughter of a drug addicted cousin while maintaining her own personal relationship. This is a recurring theme, women taking on the burdens of other less fortunate women and the men that put up with it.
In “Sugar Boots” and “Women Speak” we read of grandmothers taking care of their grandchild because of incarcerated mothers or mothers who struggling with mental illness. After finishing the well written collection, I wonder if too many of the female characters, some who are Latina, play too much of the martyr in the name of the more absent tragic female characters. Take Miss Yolanda in “This Gifting”, as seen thorough the eyes of her Japanese student Daisuke. Are we expected to feel worse for the mother visiting her daughter in jail or la hija?
The stories in this collection are complex with equally complex characters. I need to sit with my feelings on the treatment of women in the stories but that may not be a bad thing and may be exactly what Lopez intended.
The book is 266 pages and retails for $16.95. You can purchase the book through SPD/Small Press Distribution.
Chavez to strengthen ties with Palestine
11:43 am By la Macha · Uncategorized|Venezuela · Comments Off
30 Nov 2009
I found The Libertarian Korner
11:30 am By la Macha · Uncategorized · 3 Comments
30 Nov 2009
It is with much humor that I offer this post. Over and over and over again, we mujeres at VL get nasty vindictive evil comments that have nothing at all to do with the posts that comments are left on. An example: we write a post about Mexicans Picking Their Boogers, and we get every far right Libertarian in Internetville leaving comments asking about why we don’t write about Jews Picking Their Boogers or The Latino That Raped Five Kittens in La La Land or How Latinos Have A Secret Plan (to do…pick your poison).
The thing is, I live embedded in a community of Libertarians. And I really don’t mind them so much in real life. They stick to themselves and I stick to myself. And we do just fine. I even have several fine conversations with Libertarians that are in the family. In real life, Libertarians are not so scared to carry on a conversation that they don’t dictate the rules to.
So. I offer this thread as a place for all Libertarians (etc) that wish to ask comments or leave commentary about this VL site that seems to bother so many of them. I have a sneaky suspicion that not one Libertarian that seems so intent on “getting answers” will leave a comment here (Real Conversation??? What’s that???), but I don’t care. It’ll be good to have a place to refer Lib’s to when they get uppity on other threads.
If you have the guts, leave a comment Libertarians. I’ll answer you in the spirit that you leave your comment.
Do you have the guts?
New Report Says that Urban Immigrants Pay Their Fair Share
10:31 am By Maegan la Mamita Mala · Cities|economy|Immigration|Labor · 1 Comment
30 Nov 2009
One of the biggest excuses given for why the undocumented are so bad is that “they” are bad for the economy. They take resources in disproportionate amounts compared to their population. A report released tells a much different story for the 25 largest urban areas in the United States.
In the 25 largest metropolitan areas combined – comprising more than half of the country’s Gross Domestic Product, and two thirds of all immigrants – foreign-born workers are responsible for 20 percent of economic output and make up 20 percent of the population. The same basic relationship holds true, with slight variation, for each of the 25 areas, from metro Pittsburgh, where immigrants represent 3 percent of population and 4 percent of GDP, to metro Miami, where immigrants make up 37 percent of the population and 38 percent of GDP. The report for the first time estimates immigrant share of Gross Domestic Product in metro areas, based on wage and salary earnings plus proprietors’ income.
Puerto Rico Says Presente for Jorge Steven Lopez Mercado
10:43 am By Maegan la Mamita Mala · GLBT|Justice|Puerto Rico · 8 Comments
27 Nov 2009The day after Jorge Steven Lopez Mercado was laid to rest, Puerto Ricans took to the streets in his memory and in search of justice. Also, the Puerto Rican Department of Justice agreed to investigate the brutal murder of Jorge Steven Lopez Mercado as a hate crime, giving prosecutors and judges the ability to seek more severe punishment. More on that in a separate post later. Pero,having worked with families of those killed in hate crimes, it’s important for me to see that the family and the community that the person came from be centered in the struggles that follow. Here is Jorge Steven’s mother, who has released numerous courageous statements following her son’s death, his father, and his young brother.
Something to think about this “holiday.”
Reflecting the racial structure of the nation’s entire food system, turkey processing relies largely on the hard labor of low-wage workers of color. On plant floors across the country, a predominantly black, Latino and Asian work force kills, guts, cleans, processes and packages the Thanksgiving centerpiece along fast-moving production lines.
Injuries are commonplace. Thousands of individual repetitive motions every shift raise the probability of chronic pain for line workers.
Federal safety inspectors are spread thin, and when they do arrive it is not unusual for supervisors to silence workers. At a recent meeting of Somali immigrants with an Occupational Safety and Health Administration representative, workers were shocked to learn that they had the right to speak when an inspector came to their workplace.
VL At The Cine: Los Abrazos Rotos (Broken Embraces)
2:03 pm By BiancaLaureano · Uncategorized · 1 Comment
25 Nov 2009
The latest Pedro Almodóvar film is very much what we expect, but it’s also what we don’t expect. One of the many things I love about Almodóvar is that he has normalized some of the most marginalized and oppressed people in our society in his films (i.e. Transgender Latinas, mentally ill communities, and queer communities). I also love that he creates relationships with all the people in his cast and allows them to demonstrate their acting range as he cast them in other projects in completely different roles. I will let you know that Almodóvar is one of my favorite screenwriters and directors (Takashi Miike and Karyn Kusama are also on that list).
As a result, Almodóvar’s “usual suspects” are cast in Los Abrazos Rotos: Penélope Cruz (Volver) as Lena, a sex worker turned secretary who seeks to become an actor, Lluís Homar (La Mala Educación/Bad Education) as Mateo Blanco/Harry Caine a screenwriter and director, Blanca Portillo (Volver) as Judit García the agent of screenwriter Mateo/Harry; José Luis Gómez (Goya’s Ghosts) as Ernesto Martel a wealthy Spanish man who produces Mateo’s latest film, Rubén Ochendiano (Che Part 2) as Ray X, Ernesto’s gay son whom he ignores, and Tomar Novas (Goya’s Ghosts) as Diego, Judit’s son who helps Mateo/Harry.
Palin/Dobbs 2012 : The Clueless About Latinos Ticket
8:00 am By Maegan la Mamita Mala · Books|Media|Politics · Comments Off
25 Nov 2009When Latinos fail, lose, or get fired we are statistics, stereotypes even. When the losers are white they get to have book tours and run for president?
For the last two weeks, two media figures who should have been done for are showing their faces more than ever and with followers to boot.
First we have Sarah Palin and her nationwide book tour. No, I haven’t read the book but if Palin’s publisher wants to send VivirLatino a review copy to do a Latino perspective, I will. Seems like she could use some help in the Latino issues department.
“She did not feel comfortable speaking about issues regarding Hispanics and Latin America,” GOP consultant Ana Navarro told Univision anchor Jorge Ramos in an interview. “Those are not topics that come up frequently in Alaska. So she asked to cancel the interview and, unfortunately, you were already there.”
Seems like her target readership could use some help in the issues department in general.
Gutierrez, Napolitano, & Arpaio : Whose Immigration Strategy Will Win?
3:05 pm By Maegan la Mamita Mala · Immigration|Justice|Politics · 1 Comment
24 Nov 2009I have been trying to write this post for days and every time I get to it there has been some additional speech or statement made on comprehensive immigration reform, but statements, speeches and sound bites don’t policy or practice changes make. Where do the recent statements come from different parts of the U.S. Government intersect and where do they differ and most importantly where do they accurately deal with the reality of the millions of undocumented?
Last week, More than 60,000 people joined a call & held more than 1,000 house parties across 45 states, to listen to 3 members of Congress including the headliner, Congressman Luis Gutierrez. Under the Reform Immigration For America campaign umbrella, tens of thousands people mobilized directly via a new cell phone action network.
UC Berkeley to Investigate Police Brutality in Protests
1:58 pm By la Macha · California · Comments Off
24 Nov 2009And speaking of the upheaval in the University of California system, Democracy Now! has some really important updates about the protests that happened after the UC board voted to increase tuition rates by over 30%.
Forty students were arrested Friday night after campus police entered Wheeler Hall, which the students had taken over earlier in the day. The students were part of a statewide movement protesting the UC Board of Regents decision to raise tuition by 32 percent. Students at UCLA, UC-Davis, UC Santa Cruz and San Francisco State also took over campus buildings last week.
On Monday, more than 200 students rallied at Wheeler Hall in Berkeley to protest against what they called overtly aggressive tactics by the police. Organizers say officers hit demonstrators with batons and fired rubber bullets.
Hola!
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