Maori Culture in New Zealand

The past week, we saw a movie called “Whale Rider” this particular movie, shows the story of Pai, the descendent of Paikea, the whale rider. The Maori traditions say that only a male can inherit the leadership, and the current leader, Koro, who’s also paikea’s grandfather, tells her, that she cannot lead because she’s a female. The story shows a big part of how the Maori culture is. 

The Maori culture nowadays is an important part of New Zealand’s culture. This one has been shaped by the tradition of its rich cultural heritage. It’s said that the Maori people arrived to New Zealand in the thirteen century AD.

14.6% of the total New Zealand population is Maori descendent. And it has a big influence in the country. Even when the main cities do not have aboriginal names, there’s a important part that use the native names.

Something really interesting is that the Maori culture has not being lost, due the whole cultural change that lot of other countries  have had with the aborigine people inside their boundaries. For example, the Maori language, is one of the three official languages in New Zealand (www.maori.com/language) and some schools teach the language to their students. 

There aren’t many countries where you can say that the aboriginal people live peacefully with the rest of the country. New Zealand is an exception, because the cultural diversity has been accepted. Maori people in the country have their own traditions and rituals, but that doesn’t seem to be a problem with the rest of the country.

Do you think that the Maori culture has being accepted in New Zealand in a good way? What happens when we compare this to Chile? Are the different aboriginal cultures accepted? 

http://www.newzealand.com/int/maori-culture/

http://whales.fieldmuseum.org/behind/people/maori-whale-riders

http://kidworldcitizen.org/2012/06/21/maori-culture-shines-in-the-film-whale-rider/

http://www.maori.com/

Emmett Till's Death

Emmett Till

The Afroamerican Civil Rights Movement was impulsed by several figures, some of them were activists, some of them were just victims of the segregation and discrimination present in The USA during the first half of the twentieth century.

Emmett Till’s death changed the direction of the movement, it encouraged the already unsettled mass to keep fighting against the violation of their rights, only because of their skin color.

On August 24, 1955, while visiting his relatives in Mississippi, Emmett told his friends that he had a white girlfriend back home, none of them believed it and dared him to flirt with a white girl who was working in a store and he agreed. No one witnessed the event, but Carolyn Bryant claimed that Emmett that he grabbed her, made lewd advances, and then wolf-whistled at her as he sauntered out. (www.history.com)

Carolyn Bryant

When Roy Bryant, Carolyn’s husband, arrived home a few days later, Carolyn told him that a black boy flirted with her in the store. Next he went to Emmett’s uncle house with his brother in law J.W. Milam, and demanded to see the 14-year old-boy, after a struggle, he took Emmett to his car, beat him and then shot him in the head, finally he threw his dead body to the Tallahatchie River.

When his body was found the authorities suggested that it should be buried quickly, instead of it, Emmett’s mother decided to do an open-casket funeral to show what the killers did to her only son.

Less than two weeks later, Milam and Bryant went on trial and found not guilty.

This case helped the movement to go on, it showed how black people didn’t have any right, and how necessary was to stop racial segregation inside a country that claims that every person must bre treated equally.

That being said, how do you think that cases like this encourage people?

How does it connect with the reality of our country?

Sources:
Emmett Till Biography
The Death of Emmett Till

Maories sexims

The Maoríes are descendants of warrior aborigines, and are the real owners of these lands. Of indigenous facial features and brown skin, robust for nature, resistant and strong, as their warrior roots indicate it. This difference make that they speak and walk different than the New Zealanders. Probably they were players or ex-players of rugby at some time in their life, because they are named the group of the strongest men of New Zealand, and not only for their physical aspect and personality, but also for the way they give more value to the man than to the woman. The Maoríes venerate the man for being the ones who gives the orders in the family, whereas the woman is the one who has to obey him, remaining quiet and taking little part in the custom of their culture.

An example where this Maorí sexism appears, is in the movie “Whale Rider”. In this film we can perceive the difference between being born as a man or a woman inside this community, and how this factor determines the future life of many people.

The movie talks about agreeing or rejecting the cultural changes  the society faces nowadays, showing a grandfather that remains anchored in his ancient beliefs, and his granddaughter, who from her birth was raise by him and his wife in response of the death of the girl’s mother, and the decision of her father in travel abroad to forget his pain, the grandfather, being the Chief of the village, does not want to recognize her as the heiress of the tradition just because she is not a man.

Other prominent characters are the ones who show their own features. For example; a grandmother who understands maleness, but does not accept it in her believes; adults moving away increasingly from his traditions when adopting other customs, and teenagers who just think of going away of the village without taking the sentimental weight. With everything against the tradition, there arises an unexpected interest in this girl named Paikea in keeping their customs and learn how to recover the harmony of the village.

Sadly for Paikea, she is despised by her gender, being not recognized as the natural inheritor to lead her people. Moreover, her grandfather thinks she is the reason ofr all the problems of his tribe since the moment of her birth.

Meanwhile, the grandfather creates a school in order to look for the inheritor, but among ancient chants, tribal rites,  and the warrior techniques, the future leader will be reveal, demonstrating to her village that she is the legitimate inheritor as a whale rider. The scene in the minute 36, shows the maleness in the grandfather where he says to Paikea "you sit behind, because you are a girl" and Pai defies him by having a sit in front of him, and as a result, the man ends expelling her from the ceremony.

 

Stolen Children

We know that every country has a story; most of the time is a bad story, full of suffering, screams or blood. We watched a movie (Rabbit Proof Fence) which showed us part of the Australian story and it really captured my attention so I searched for more, that’s why I’m going to share what Stolen Generations or Stolen Children means.

Some decades ago (between 1909 and 1969) the Australian Government started kidnapping Aboriginals children because of two reasons:

- First of all because they didn´t want to mix different racial groups (Aborigines and British), they didn’t want miscegenation.

-And because they thought that the Aborigines couldn’t take care of their children. Some of those kids were abused or abandoned but the thing is that the Government still taken the children even though they were find, most of them were find, they had a normal life, they were safe without any big trouble. But P. McGarry, a politician, said that those people should still being stolen to prevent any dangerous situation.

They sent the children into institutional care and there they received food, education, religion, etc. but they really wanted to get away and come back with their families. The worst thing is that they thought that they were doing the right thing. So they did that until 1970 in some cases. 

On February 2008 the Prime Minister of Australia gave a speech to apologize to Aborigines for all the things that they lived. Nowadays there are a lot of people who still alive and there are a lot of testimonies if you want to look up for more.

I also found a video similar to this but this happened in our country, Chile.  Now I would like to know if you liked this and what do you think.

http://www.elciudadanotv.cl/cortometrajes/cortometraje-animacion-selknam/

THE DREAM IS STILL ALIVE

Baltimore is an independent city and the largest city in the US state of Maryland. This, along with other US cities, has been marked by controversy regarding the civil rights of African Americans in this country.

 Indeed, in 1968, after Martin Luther King Jr.’s death, which is known as The Holy Week Uprising, the people took to the streets with a lot of violence, which left a total of 6 people dead. 700 injured, 4,500 arrested and over 1,000 fires set. More than a thousand businesses had been looted or burned, many of which never reopened. 

Today, despite the achievements of activists of the aforementioned period, the struggle for civil rights is still present due to the injustices by the police against African Americans. Since 2009, there are 12 killed by the police, 7 of which were African Americans and only 3 cases allowed imprison the guilty policemen. One occurred precisely in Baltimore in Sandtown neighborhood, where six officers arrested the young Freddie Gray by simply running from the police the April 12, 2015. 

 After this unwarranted detention, the prosecutor who handled the case, Marilyn Mosby said that according to a medical report, Gray’s death was a homicide, resulting from spinal injuries by the officers who took him prisoner. His death sparked protest against police in Baltimore, where citizens went out the streets in a violent way, in order to end the police abuse against African Americans.

 Beyond justify the violence, in my opinion, this was crucial to understand that it is the lives of people, something that has nothing to do with race of people. Despite the contradictory opinion by the Mayor Rawlings-Blake and President Obama, in my view, the facts accelerated the trial in the death of 25 year old Freddie Gray, in which already defined that the police are guilty. 

 What is the logic to establish superiority of race in some people? Which suggests an officer overlooking human rights? What are we doing wrong? The dream is still alive. 

By Jorge Vidal Salinas

 List of web pages that I used for writing this post:

• http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-32400497
• http://edition.cnn.com/2015/05/01/us/freddie-gray-who-is-he/
• http://www.bbc.co.uk/mundo/noticias/2015/04/150427_baltimore_disturbios_protestas_freddie_gray_fp
• http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/crime/2015/04/_1968_baltimore_do_the_riots_after_martin_luther_king_jr_s_assassination.html
• http://noticias.univision.com/article/2321541/2015-05-02/estados-unidos/noticias/manifestaciones-por-baltimore-en-la-costa-oeste-derivaron-en-disturbios-y-detenciones

    

What does racism look like today?

As a matter of fact, the days where racism inhabited the minds of the young and the ignorant are slowly fading away, but they are not over yet. We talk about equality and end of segregation in public places, but the true origin of discrimination lies inside us, in our everyday actions.

Of course we, as a generation, have grown and evolved beyond the racist conventions that polluted our society in the past, but still, we might not realize of what we do and even teach those kind of practices to the upcoming generations, merely disguising the damage by making it look normal.

 “Over two hundred years of racial prejudice in the forms of slavery and Jim Crowe laws have worked their way into American consciousness.” –Kevin Hannon for The Beacon (2012)

Now, some may argue that there is no such thing as racism nowadays, that we live in a fair, inclusive society ruled by the acceptance of our differences, but that idea might sound a little bit overoptimistic for other people. Here's a example:

Last year, in Houston, Texas, local police arrested two African American dancers, both men who were escorting a 13-year-old white girl to an event, which was cause enough for police to react. “They just pulled us out of the car and put our hands behind our backs like we were criminals,” said one of the men.

The two dancers explained that the girl was their student, and even offered to show officers a notarized letter stating that they had “full guardianship” while they were in the state. But police didn’t budge. They brought the two men to the station and took the girl into Child Protective Services.

Cases like this one occur everyday, all around the world, when will we come to the realisation that the struggle is not over yet?

Elizabeth I, Queen without a King

Elizabeth Tudor was a Princess, daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. She become a Queen after the dead of her half-sister Maria I.

Scene from Elizabeth (movie 1998)

Her reign is considered one of the most important in English history and it lasted for 45 years, but one thing for she is remembered is because she never gets married.

Why is so important this? Well, for this time, the royal marriage was something merely politic, it was a best way for alliance between 2 countries or 2 allies and produced an inheritor was a proof of the alliance, but Why Elizabeth I chose never to marry? There are some theories about this, one theory refers she had a loving trauma and she didn´t believe in love.  I think that she had a father who commands to cut off the head of his wife; probably I would not want to marry either.

Scene from Elizabeth (movie 1998)

Other theories are that she was a man, she was lesbian or she had a genital malformation, but officially, she didn’t marry because if she had chosen a foreign prince he would use to England for his own purposes and she had chosen an English subject could have a division inside of the country.  

Scene from Elizabeth (movie 1998)

In England she is recognized like a woman who sacrificed her happiness for the good of the nation, they said that she didn’t marry to a man because she was already married to England.

Scene from Elizabeth (movie 1998)

Finally Elizabeth was a Queen, she didn’t need a man for to reign and probably she had some hiding lovers, but still is called the “Virgin Queen”.

Reference
http://www.royal.gov.uk/historyofthemonarchy/kingsandqueensofengland/thetudors/elizabethi.aspx

Just Football

Have you ever heard about it? No doubts you have.

The beautiful sport has its roots in many civilizations such as Mayan or Chinese.  In England the practice of a ball sport can be traced down till 1170 when some report describes youths going to the fields for a game of a ball this game was pretty much different than the one we all know but it represents sort of ancestor for our football.

 Through the following years the game went on growing and taking more and more people involved in. By the age of Edward the second football get banned for being considered a distraction on archers training, by that time they were getting ready to go to war with Scotland.

During the Elizabethan age football quickly gained popularity back but it has to be banned again because of it was the responsibly for too many fights and riots. However none of this bans could kill the spirit of the ball game that reached the entire globe thanks, in great part, to the England sailors.

England was also the responsible for officiate the game like we know it nowadays, it was in 1863 when the first Football Association rule book appeared and gave birth to the nonstop passion of multitudes.

             I want to say thank you England for such a magnificent contribution to the world, for me the greatest England significant addition to the mankind because of its pacific character and the fact that it has the property of being an universal spoken language since almost everyone can play it (sadly not everyone because of health issues) but anyone can enjoy the pleasure of seeing or hearing it.

            Football doesn’t know about religious beliefs, skin colors, sex, political thinking, age, height or weight. As Bob Marley said "Football is freedom", Don’t you think so?

The first part of a good documental about football history, the second part is displayed automatically by youtube.

References: 

http://www.tomecek.com/jay/recreationandsports.html

http://www.history.co.uk/study-topics/history-of-football-tennis/history-of-football

Smoking ban and pub culture in Ireland

As we’ve heard before, Ireland is known for having a strong connection with pubs (THERE ARE MORE THAN 10.000 OF THEM!) and they represent the friendship and camaraderie between the customers. In Ireland a pub is not only a place where you can get drunk and do silly stuff – it’s more like a social center. A lot of people go to pubs to have a good talk with their friends, the barstaff and even strangers.

Smoking was one of the main attractions of pubs, but everything changed in March 29^th, 2004, when the Irish government decided that smoking in workplaces was a big deal, so they decided to ban it.

In 2004, 29% of the population were smokers, but they were not the only ones affected by the habit. A lot of people were exposed by second-hand smoke. Until now, the smoking rate has been on the decline, reaching a 22% in 2014.

People accepted it and pubs are cleaner now, but is it enough? Ireland consumes 11.6 liters per capita of alcohol, placing them as the third country with the highest alcohol consumption in the world in 2012. Could they change their habits without losing their customs? If the government decides to ban alcohol consumption in certain circumstances, will it affect their social life? Maybe people will find it difficult to change such an historical tradition, but it would be worth the effort.

Canadian Lifestyle

Canadians come from diverse cultural, racial and religious backgrounds.  In the collective identity of the nation projecting the three founding peoples: natives, the French and the British.

Peaceful and simple but cordial, Canadians live in an atmosphere of calm and very nice kindness. They celebrate popular holidays like Christmas, birthdays and national holidays in a harmonious environment. However, Canada has values, principles and traditions that guide the behavior of its nationals and whose respect and follow up the duty of all citizens.

Canadians are characterized by being friendly and receive good way to all who come to their country. It is customary to thank and greet all people, regardless of race or sex. As also have a habit of being on time for an appointment. The most common form of greeting is shaking hands, both women, men and children. It is not customary hug or kiss when greeting people exception is Quebec where the custom among friends is a kiss on each cheek, the best European style.

                                          

To introduce yourself you need to use your first name and family name, last goodbyes Eternal friends in Latin America used are unusual in this country people quickly dismissed.

They are sorted so we recommend queuing for treatment when you want to buy something or ask a service. An example of this is that when using escalators can travel walking down the left, those who prefer to stay unemployed to be carried up the stairs have to row on the right side and to leave others move to the left.

Traffic rules are very strict in Canada and must be respected at all times. Although pedestrians have priority in the city, you must cross the street only at the corners when the traffic light for pedestrians tells you to. If you drive a vehicle, be sure to give priority to pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists, be courteous to other drivers and strictly follow the signs.

Most Canadians are quite regionalist, including many feel more connected to their province or territory to the country in general. Each province chooses whether English, French or bilingual. Quebec chose to be only French. In schools, teachers have to accept written work in both French terms in English.

Canadians love to exercise and eat healthy. They like outdoor activities such as yoga, running, hiking (walking in forests and mountains) and numerous sports. Lots of people prefer walking or cycling to school or work instead of using car.

They care deeply about the environment and therefore recycle all waste. Get used to deposit the remains of garbage in the can where it belongs. Garbage always mainly separated into: organic waste, plastics, metals, paper and cardboard.

Kettlewell Scarecrow Festival

Kettlewell, Yorkshire Dales, England is a nice and quiet village situated just in the perfect place, at the junction of the main and the river valleys. Its’ name come from the Anglo Saxon Cetel Wella which means a bubbling spring or stream.

Every year since 1994 at August's second week there takes place a funny, interesting and entertaining tradition that consists on setting scarecrows in every corner or open space around the village, even the most unexpected places get taken by this singularly interesting fake people. They can be seen doing different human activities such as fishing, drinking, resting and even riding a bike, among others.

This all started as a fund raising event for the local school and even when they expected the support of just a third of the fathers, they were considered by whole community and in the first year there were more than a hundred scarecrows all over the village.

The event has been growing year after year. Since 1998 it has been organized with the benefit of St. Mary's Parish Church and Kettlewell Village Hall so now it has become a remarkable tradition among villagers whose every year get prepared to receive the visitors by making amazing scarecrows, preparing delicious food and organizing parking and traffic

Sources:-http://www.kettlewellscarecrowfestival.co.uk/
             -http://kettlewellvillage.co.uk/

Groundskeeper Willie Wants an Independent Scotland, but he might end up losing the war. (By Orlando Fuente-Alba Dominguez)

(This entry belongs to Orlando Fuente-Alba from parallel 2. Due to problems at the time of accepting Matias's invitation to the blog, I saw myself forced to upload this through Javiera's account. I hope you understand)

When you meet someone from the UK you commonly call them “British”. But if this person comes from Scotland, he will tell you “I’m not British”.

This is because its thousand-year relashionship with england is based on resentments from all the wars they have been in. The first one, for example, started when the English king Edward I invaded Scotland, beginning with this the figure of the national hero William Wallace (Yes, the one from the movie.)

Ever since then, Scotland has had a nationalist, independent feeling, but what they don’t know is that separating from the UK might be even worse than being part of it.

Here are four reasons that the blind, nationalist eyes of Willie don’t see when talking about Independence:

1.      What currency should they use?

Independence would force them to change their currency, which might affect their economy, exposing the contributors to the financial risks of being a foreigner country to the UK.

2.    Will they form part of the European Union as an independent country?

This would mean having to convince the other 28 members of the EU and then arguing with OTAN and ONU.

       3. Scotch oil in English territory?

Scotch nationalists claim that more than 80% of the oil reserves in Great Britain belong to them, just because they are inside Scotland’s sea borders. The big question is: Will England allow this? Without the oil, they would lose the most of their income.

       4.      Will they have their own army?

Scotland is the hangar of all the nuclear submarines of the UK. If Scotland becomes an independent country, they must manage a self-sufficient fiscal system and a consistent public expenses, assuming new responsibilities that go from the creation of its own army to the handover of specific passports.

States of death

At the moment of speaking on controversial topics that have caught my attention on The United States, the first thing that one comes to my mind is the death penalty. The United States they are considered to be pioneers in the incorporation of social and cultural rights, are those who implement chairs opposite to the acceptance (due to the multiple problems of discrimination). On the other hand, this nation has been characterized for being a country advanced and developed in different matters (technology, communications, economic models, between others), nevertheless, they continue being primitive in what to sentences for crimes it concerns. 

They are 32 the States that, according to the eighth amendment to the Constitution of The United States, they apply the death sentence, or the capital, against adults (mentally competent) that have committed aggravated homicides. In the remaining States, these laws change, having been as Michigan, where the death sentence has never been applied. To federal level, the death penalty is legal, but they are the conditions those that decide to suppress, to abolish it it or to apply it. Nevertheless, there exist a series of crimes of federal character, where indepéndiente of the laws of the condition where they are committed, the president of the republic is the one who decides if it finishes with the life of the defendant or life imprisonment is granted to him. Some of them are the perfidy to the mother land, the espionage, the war crimes, the genocide, the use of chemical weapon that cause death, between others. 

The current methods that use the conditions and to federal level, are basically the lethal injection, then (with very little I use) the electric chair or the gallows (that already is not in use). In Texas, Oklahoma, Florida, Ohio and Arizona assassins execute often. Texas has carried out the major number of executions. With the previous thing, is it possible to deal to the United States as a developed nation?, is it the State the manager of taking the life from someone? that exists on our cultural penal one?. I wait for progress on the part of the progressives.