Patti, You are quite right here to note that the statement need not be taken genetically. Let me cite the original quotation, your comment, and then I'll add a couple final thoughts on this topic. -----Original Message----- From: Patti Goebel [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
". . . they have always excelled all other peoples in endowments conferred by birth. Persia herself, moreover!" ________ Another way to look at this is that the "endowments conferred by birth" are not anything genetic, but rather the circumstances into which a child is born, including natural resources, culture, knowledge base, spiritual base, etc. In 'Abdu'l-Baha's statement, it is important to note that he writes "endowments conferred by birth." That which is genetic is there at conception. At birth, one is brought into a family, a community, a culture, a language, etc. all of which determines those particular endowments "conferred by birth" to a person. I remember a story a number of years back when a famous delicatessen was closing in Brooklyn, NYC. Many patrons were coming by for their final orders of gefilte fish, lox, knishes, etc. A reporter was covering the closing of a century's long institution in the community. As one customer left with her order of knishes, the reporter approached her and requested a brief interview about the deli. She agreed, and the reporter asked her why she had come by for her ceremonial final order . . . particularly noting that she was African-American. In New York, folks are pretty direct with questions, so she understood the question and did not take offense. Her response? . . . She looked at the reporter for _The Christian Science Monitor_ as if he was a bit clueless, and then she replied, "Don't you understand? This is New York! Here we're all Jews! It's part of the dominant culture, part of all of us." Of course, she was not saying that she was ethnically nor religiously Jewish, but that part of her respective "endowments conferred by birth" included growing up within a part of NYC that was predominantly Jewish and that it was part of her culture thereby as a local resident. This is very much the case in the northwestern part of New Mexico where the predominant culture is Navajo. Everyone connected with that region is informed by the dominant Navajo culture, and of course, everyone in New Mexico is part Hispanic since the culture pervades the entire state (albeit differently in different regions). Many Native American writers from New Mexico or who have spent many formative years there include Navajo/Dine' concepts and words in their writing, even though their genetic tribal backgrounds are not Navajo. [Of course, there is an important and, sometimes, a very fine line between being part of a culture versus problematic (and, at times, outright racist) appropriations. One infamous example was the book published a number of years back by Asa Carter entitled _The Education of Little Tree_ that purported to be the author's romanticized and nostalgized growing years as a Cherokee boy. As it turns out, the author was not Cherokee, and, in fact, had been an active member of the Ku Klux Klan throughout his life. The book was an outright fabrication, but its romanticized Euroamerican views of Native culture spoke strongly to Euroamericans who loved the book whose sales propelled the tranformation of the book into a financially successful, yet racially stereoptypic film.] Native American appropriation is a very loaded and sensitive issue throughout Indian country . . . and a very \\HOT// topic here in Illinois. Post-modernism notwithstanding, essentialist racial appropriations endure, even though as Native writer and filmmaker Sherman Alexie says, "The endgame of essentialism was flying airplanes into buildings." Would that all people would take to heart Baha'u'llah's words that "The well-being of mankind, its peace and security, are unattainable unless and until its unity is firmly established." We all need to start listening to each others' stories and making choices truly based on conversive consultation. My state of Illinois is very divided because of the issue of Native American mascots even at the highest levels of state government. Mark, as a Sociologist, you must be very aware of our situation here since I understand that the University of Illinois is one of the primary current examples of institutional racism in contemporary Sociology texts. The difference between being part of a culture versus an outside appropriation is hard for many to understand. Anyway, greetings to all online here. Even when I do not post for awhile, I am an active reader of your posts and have learned so much from the friends on this list. Thank you, Mark and Susan, for this listserve. Susan Dr. Susan Berry Brill de Ramirez, Professor of English Department of English, Bradley University, Peoria, IL 61625 U.S.A. (309) 677-3888, fax: (309) 677-2460, email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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