Belonging gives meaning to our identity. Belonging to a school of thought, to a place, to a community to a family- where there are people that understand us, value our feelings and thoughts although they be unworthy of serious attention. Communities give meaning to these weak and oppressed ideas, nourish them, clothe them, and make them presentable to the outside world. Our language is what connects us to our society. It is a community endeavor and to place a value upon our intimate feelings we have to value our language. One is always the ?Other? as long as he does not switch back to his ?own? language. African Kenyan writer Nguigi wa thiango, who after attaining fame and recognition as a English fiction writer, declared that African writers should write in African languages in order to counter the ill effects of the colonizers diabolical legacy. Ngugi argues that colonization was not simply a process of physical force. Rather, the bullet was the means of physical subjugation. Language was the means of the spiritual subjugation (Ngugi 9). Being at odds with one?s language means to be at odds with the very self. The development and changes that takes place in a particular language encompass the needs of a particular society. The very purpose of the language is to communicate and nothing comes closer to performing this function effectively than the mother tongue of a particular individual. Use of other than mother tongue for purposes of communication between natives of a particular society asks for serious and inquisitive understanding.
In response to Ngugi?s arguments against use of colonizers language, Achebe comments, ?Language is a weapon, and we use it, theres no point in fighting a language? (qtd. in Gallagher). Therefore, the colonizers language could be used to counter the very discourse that enslaves the colonized. Time has come to accept this fact but with a word of caution. We have not been able to do away with English language but in the process of accepting it; we have changed its structure, its pronunciations and its functions in our postcolonial societies. Our society has given a privileged status to English language. We are using it to counter discourses and frame new avenues and byways for survival in our postcolonial societies. It can be equated with a chain that had been used in the past to enslave us and now it is up to us to determine as to what use we intend to put it to. We can use it the way it had been used against us or we can reverse its use to counter cultural assaults and hegemonic discourses. Our dialects and our language structures are contrastingly different from that of the native English speakers. In addition, it is the need of the hour to realize this difference, evaluate them and macadamize them. Moreover, we should refrain from its unnecessary use in places where our mother tongue would suffice. Only then can we assume to be free from debasing treatment of ?our? languages. Its role needs to be accepted and understood in a proper perspective. Internalizing English language does not mean internalizing the outsider?s literature. Nor does it mean that we should give primary place to this language at the cost of our indigenous languages.
Languages do not become superior and inferior by any logical reasoning or any supernatural orientation. As long as they perform their role and those that speak them express themselves in their indigenous languages, they grow and are enriched thus. The struggle between countries, communities and societies to force upon the `other something to subjugate and debase what does not belong and is incomprehensible, is what changes a particular communities outlook towards its language. This process starts to put to action its malicious designs from the beginning of an individual?s existence.
Take the kid out of the parental lap into a system of thought wherein it is taught to value some languages more than his own. Based upon sheer prejudice and colonial legacy our preference is to give an inferiority sense to our young generation right from the word go. Our intellect is wasted in futile exercises of understanding alien cultures and alien texts from outside. Our intellect has to work twice as compared to the colonizer that has limited us to first understand their products and then value them by applying the systems fed to us and then at best translating or explaining to our people as to what the master colonizer has to offer to us as alms. Where do we count? Nothing is acknowledged by the very nature of its creation it is a process wherein various social institutions play multiple roles to form a seat of values which then offers a place for a second wave of writers and intellectuals to put forward a creative product. Among these institutions, universities are the most influential agencies that provide a ground for healthy intellect in a society to put forth products of artistic creation. Universities are like an umbrella that provides the shelter to a growing mind in its initial phase.
Universities should not consist of minds that debase and ridicule the local the indigenous, persistently valuing by means of a process of comparing with a colonial master who sets the norm. Instead, it has to step forward to defend and modify the prescribed norm rather than attacking the local. It has to step forward to explain to the outsider what it means to write from this seat of learning. Take the case of learning pronunciation, it takes a lifetime for a non-native English speaker to learn English language, its proper pronunciation and its syntax, and by the time, the individual has finished doing the exercise and he reaches the level of a native English kid, he feels alienated from his peoples, his culture and his roots. It is surprising to think about the waste of our intellect involved in understanding the western culture, western philosophy and western historical progress and the meager contribution made by the same towards its society. We debate about their issues, their concerns and
their products and debase our efforts as such by paying no serious attention to it. We must learn to understand our place, our culture and the various delicate factors that contribute in its making at different levels; we must learn to place a value upon it.
We have ever since been confusing English language and literature, and the sole use of later has ever appeared to be that it is to be to be learned and then taught for no good of anybody but the colonizer. Ideologies are enforced thus, primarily by means of such tools as language and literature. Our educational institutions are just falling in line to propagate rather than resist outsider?s ideas and prejudiced concepts in upon our younger generations.

Lastupdate on : Wed, 8 Feb 2012 21:30:00 Mecca time
Lastupdate on : Wed, 8 Feb 2012 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Thu, 9 Feb 2012 00:00:00 IST

Like many collectives Rhubaba, established in 2009,started off with mostly temporary events and locations. In 2010 they moved to their current,more permanent residence and despite some recent weather damage seem to have established a strong affinity with the current location.

In their project Built Overnight (2010) the collective took over a small abandoned betting shop on North Forth Street to great reactions of support from the surrounding businesses and community. This support has not waned in recent years, with Rhubaba making an impressive impact on the Edinburgh art scene in their short period of operation.

Last summer they were selected as one of the venues for the 2011 Art Festival and have continued to occupy a prominent position in grassroots collectives across Edinburgh. Over recent yearsRhubaba artists Rachel Adams, Ash Ried and Catherine Payton have all been selected for the New Work Scotland Programme at the Collective Gallery. Another, Craig Coultard, is representing Scotland for the 2012 Cultural Olympiad which supports projects inspired by the Olympic and Paralympic Games. This esteemed run of shows and events that have placed Rhubaba on Scotlands contemporary arts map.

Rhubabas studiosare tucked away behind a housing estatein the middle of an industrial complex in Pilrig.While it isnt much to look at, it can be seen from cities such as Berlin that the modern bohemian thrives in low-cost and ex-industrialised areas. Stepping through the corrugated steel shutters, this presumption would not be faulted.The interior looks a lot more exciting than you would expect on first impressions.Within the building is a gallery space as well as artists studios, with the gallery space on the ground floor and the studios on the mezzanine above.

Rhubaba regularly hold shows, curating them from the pool of members who happen to be occupying the studios at the time.The last show was Claire Davies and Sacha Imrie in a collaborative exhibition entitledWithin the space of…..

Like the exterior of the building, Claire and Sachas title didnt give much away.The binding factor in their collaborativeexhibition was the book Breakfast of Championsby Kurt Vonnegut.Their press release included an excerpt from the book, and the titles of their works were all phrases from the text, hence the open ended exhibition title. Despite their collaboration the two artists could not be more polarised in what inspires them and how they work.

Claire makes it apparent that she takes influence from carefully researched literary texts and authors such as Italo Calvino as well as stories of morality such as The Tower of Babel. These narratives become abstracted within her rigid forms and wonderfully detailed pencil drawings.

Sacha, on the other hand, takes a more scatter gun approach to her sources. Her work seems minimalistic, much like Claires, yet draws on her own ideas and reactions to philosophical debates such as the nature of time and space. In the context of this exhibition her works were inspired by the concept of mirrors becoming portals into other dimensions, an inter-textual reference to the Vonnegut publication. Sachas work, varied and ad hoc, seems to serve as a way to guide her mind through spells of creative hyperactivity, to capture her thoughts in a concise and considered way.

Despite Davies and Imries varying working processes their styles have become merged with the help of Vonneguts intermediary text. The concepts and discourse of Breakfast of Champions have fascinated them both and served as a good platform for these two very different artists to create work that does not conflict with each other within the space.

Imrie and Davies answered a lot of questions in relation to thepost-artcollegeworld . There is no doubt that it is a difficult life to lead as an artist. In an Arts Management talk last week at the University of Edinburgh one member of Creative Scotland stated that …dedicating your life to arts, its dedicating your life to poverty. Questions of exploitation of interns within the creative industries, the decreasing wages and ever-inflating prices of the art world are all factors that have been debated rigorously throughout recent months. Claire and Sachas advice for surviving in this difficult sector is youjust have to stick with it, balancing your time between your artwork and a paid job seems to be the current format that these artists live by.

Rhubabas Artists Studios are a fine example of how the close-knit community and rapport between artists can play a vital role in the longevity of contemporary artistic creation. With reference to the opening paragraph and in light of their previous show, history has shown that these are a group of exciting and talented emerging artists. Each and every one of their careers should be watched with great interest in the not too distant future.

A city like Berlin is an ill-mannered, impertinent, intelligent scoundrel, constantly affirming the things that suit him and tossing aside everything he tires of. Here in the big city you can definitely feel the waves of intellect washing over the life of Berlin society like a sort of bath. An artist here has no choice but to pay attention. Elsewhere he is permitted to stop up his ears and sink into willful ignorance. Here this is not allowed. Rather, he must constantly pull himself together as a human being, and this compulsion encircling him redounds to his advantage. But there are yet other things as well.

Berlin never rests, and this is glorious. Each dawning day brings with it a new, agreeably disagreeable attack on complacency, and this does the general sense of indolence good. An artist possesses, much like a child, an inborn propensity for beautiful, noble sluggardizing. Well, this slug-a-beddishness, this kingdom, is constantly being buffeted by fresh storm-winds of inspiration. The refined, silent creature is suddenly blustered full of something coarse, loud, and unrefined. There is an incessant blurring together of various things, and this is good, this is Berlin, and Berlin is outstanding.

The excellent gentleman from the provinces, however, should by no means imagine that here in the city there are not lonelinesses as well. The metropolis contains lonelinesses of the most frightful sort, and anyone who wishes to sample this exquisite dish can eat his fill of it here. He can experience what it means to live in deserts and wastes. The metropolitan artist has no dearth of opportunities to see and speak to no one at all. All he has to do is make himself unpopular among certain arbiters of taste or else consistently fixate on failures, and in no time he’ll have sunk into the most splendid, most blossoming of abandonments.

The artist who is crowned with success lives in the metropolis as if in an enchanting Oriental dream. He hastens from one elegant household to the affluent next, sits down unhesitatingly at the opulently laden dining tables, and while chewing and slurping provides the entertainment. He passes his days in a virtual state of intoxication. And his talent? Does an artist such as this neglect his talent? What a question! As if one might cast off one’s gifts without so much as a by-your-leave. On the contrary. Talent unconsciously grows stronger when one throws oneself into life. You mustn’t be constantly tending and coddling it like a sickly something. It shrivels up when it’s too timidly cared for.

The artistic individual is nonetheless permitted to pace up and down, like a tiger, in his cave of artistic creation, mad with desire and worry over achieving some output of beauty. As no one sees this, there is no one to hold it against him. In company, he should be as breezy, affable, and charming as he can manage, neither too self-important nor too unimportant either. One thing he must never forget: he is all but required to pay court to beautiful, wealthy women at least a little.

After approximately five or six years have passed, the artist–even if he comes from peasant stock–will feel at home in the metropolis. His parents would appear to have lived and given birth to him here. He feels indebted, bound, and beholden to this strange rattling, clattering racket. All the scurrying and fluttering about now seem to him a sort of nebulous, beloved maternal figure. He no longer thinks of ever leaving again. Whether things go well with him or poorly, whether he comes down in the world or flourishes, no matter, it “has” him, he is forever under its spell, and it would be impossible for him to bid this magnificent restlessness adieu.

–translated by Susan Bernofsky

February 3, 2012, 2:21 pm

Kids exercise when they have gym class at school, soccer
practice or dance class. Theyre also exercising when theyre at
recess, riding bikes, playing tag or going for a walk with their
family. Most children need at least an hour of physical activity
every day.

Parents should limit TV, video games and computer time. Parents
can set a good example by being active themselves. Exercising as a
family will create bonding time and quality time spent together to
catch up on each others day – making lasting memories.

Reasons why children should exercise:

- Kids who exercise are more likely to keep exercising as an
adult.

- Exercise helps kids achieve and maintain a healthy body
weight.

- Regular physical activity helps build and maintain strong,
healthy muscles, bones and joints.

- Exercise aids in the development of important interpersonal
skills; this is especially true for participation in team
sports.

- Exercise improves the quantity and quality of sleep.

- Exercise promotes improved school attendance and enhances
academic performance, according to research.

- Kids who exercise have greater self-esteem and better
self-images.

- Participating in regular physical activity prevents or delays
the development of many chronic diseases (heart disease, diabetes,
obesity, hypertension) and promotes health.

- Children who are active report fewer symptoms of anxiety and
depression and a better overall mood.

It really is important that kids learn to enjoy exercise and
have fun. Not only will it help them stay healthy, it will teach
them to build healthy habits that will last them a lifetime.

Carol A. White is a personal fitness specialist. Contact her at
fithappens studio@ymail.com or go to www.carolwhitesstudio.com

One of Arizonas best kept secrets is Ballet Arizona, whose Artistic Director Ib Andersen was critically celebrated and won legions of fans during his decade of performing as a principal dancer with New York City Ballet. The Phoenix-based company makes its long-awaited New York City debut, February 22-26, at The Joyce Theater, where it will present the New York premiere of Andersens Play.

Using a cast of 28 dancers, Play is about play,playof all kinds, in all senses and all meanings of the word. With its witty look at the classical ballet vocabulary, the 90-minute dance offers suggestions of ballet school experiences (Andersen began classes at the School of the Royal Danish Ballet at age seven), a play of emotions, and a childs joy of discovery, which Andersen considers no different from the open spirit and playfulness demanded for artistic creation. The first act is set to Mozart, Schubert, Britten, and Avro Pauml;rt, and the second to Stravinsky.

Resulting from the merger of three separate Arizona ballet companies, Ballet Arizona was created in 1986 and co-directed by Jean-Paul Comelin and Malcolm Burn until 1992, when Michael Uthoff was named artistic director. During his tenure, Uthoff expanded the companys repertoire by commissioning works from contemporary choreographers such as Peter Pucci, Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, Neta Pulvermacher and Moses Pendleton, among others. Financial difficulties forced a separation of the school and the company in the late 1990s.

In 2000, the Board of Directors appointed Ib Andersen as Artistic Director. Andersen set about reshaping the company by creating a demanding repertory of classical and contemporary ballets, including world premieres of his own pieces. Four years later, the school merged with the company.

Ballet Arizona will move to new and expanded headquarters in Phoenix this spring. The new facilitys larger space will allow it to further develop the school, and have a black box theater in which it can present showcases and more experimental work.

In 2006, The Arizona Republic called Ballet Arizona, probably the most consistently excellent arts organization in the state, saying This is why Ballet Arizona is such a treasure for Phoenix. In 2007, The Republic stated, Under Director Ib Andersen, Ballet Arizona has achieved ever new heights of finish and professionalism.

The Artistic Director of Ballet Arizona since 2000, Ib Andersen has had a major international career as a dancer, choreographer and ballet master. Born in Copenhagen, he began his dance training at the School of the Royal Danish Ballet when he was seven years old. He joined the Royal Danish Ballet at16, and at age 20 became the youngest principal dancer in the companys 250 year history.

He was invited to join New York City Ballet in 1980, where he learned an astonishing 35 new ballets in his first three months with the company. In addition to performing in a wide range of the NYCB repertory, Balanchine created principal roles for him in Ballade, Davidsbundlertanze, and Mozartiana.

While Andersen was still at City Ballet, the Royal Danish Ballet offered him his first choreographic commission for which he created 1-2-31-2. After leaving City Ballet in 1990, Andersen served as guest ballet master for companies around the world and staged ballets by August Bournonville, Michel Fokine, Jerome Robbins and George Balanchine, among others. In addition to choreographing over a dozen ballets for Ballet Arizona, he has made works for companies in Slovenia, Belgium, Norway, Japan, Canada and the US

In May, Ballet Arizona will present the world premiere of Andersens Topia, a site-specific work that will be performed outdoors in the Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix.