On January 13, 2016 The Most Reverend Frederick Bernard Henry, the seventh Catholic Bishop of the diocese of Calgary well and truly lost it. Henry wrote a pastoral letter denouncing Education Minister David Eggen’s “edict” that public, Catholic, French and … Continue reading →
Continue readingTag: Culture
Scripturient: Kanile’a Islander GL6
What a difference two strings make. Late last week, I traded my Jupiter Creek steel-stringed baritone, solid-body uke for one of these Kanile’a nylon-stringed GL6 “guitar-leles” which the company calls a “guilele.” ItR…
Continue readingScripturient: Where Have all the Readers Gone?
No, it’s not a remake of Pete Seeger’s famous 1955 anti-war song. That’s the title of an article that appeared in the Globe and Mail this week, by Peter Denton, lamenting our overall slide into image-based information with the “…
Continue readingDead Wild Roses: Unravelling Our Patriarchal Legacy – Allan G. Johnston
Cultural analysis at its finest. “Cultural mythology is often used in this way to distort what goes on between subordinate and dominant groups. It enables dominant groups to avoid seeing how much they depend on others to perform disagreeable labor in return for the low wages that help make privilege possible. Members of the […]
Continue readingDead Wild Roses: #BeAngry – The experience is different for Women and Men
Here is a just a snapshot of what it’s like… “What’s on my mind, Facebook? Glad you asked. I am angry. I’m angry because before I moved to the UK, I worked at a bar where the manager proposed a new uniform where the men wore waistcoats and button up shirts, while the women […]
Continue readingDead Wild Roses: Things I find Grotesque.
I didn’t realize that I needed a new tag for posts, but indeed I do. Observe.
Yah. Wow. Hard to cram more wrong into a picture.Filed under: Culture Tagged: Things I find grotesque.
Continue readingDead Wild Roses: The Rape/Revenge Genre’s Gender Revelations
“Rape/revenge is replete in tension and bloody cathartic release; there is terrifying violation, and then there is revenge you can feel good about. The films use women’s trauma to justify stereotypically male pleasures of hyperbolic violence. So Thelma and Louise get to pick up guns and shoot people like they’re in a Western, while Furiosa […]
Continue readingScripturient: Who By Fire
I’ve been reading a biography of Leonard Cohen, recently: the 2012 I’m Your Man, by Sylvie Simmons. It’s an interesting journey through the life and thoughts of an exquisite artist who is, by nature, somewhat reclusive and stays out…
Continue readingScripturient: Updated Ukulele Songbook
Even though our local uke group, CPLUG, is not currently meeting, the songbook has not died. I have updated it with new arrangements and made a few editorial changes to the older content this past fall and winter. I, of course, continue to play the uku…
Continue readingDead Wild Roses: Merry Ukrainian Christmas (Eve) – Let the Perogies Flow!
Two Christmases? Yes you can. Oh yah, find some borscht, cabbage roles, nalisnyky and of course perogies and celebrate Ukrainian Christmas. 🙂 Christmas Eve is tonight. 🙂
Filed under: Culture Tagged: Food, Ukraninian Christmas
Scripturient: Cowboy Noir
I hadn’t previously considered western movies as film noir – I always thought of them as crime dramas – until I watched The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance over the holidays, perhaps my third viewing of the 1962 movie. The gloomy shado…
Continue readingScripturient: Judas, a Biography
Long before Darth Vader, long before Lord Voldemort, long before Stephen Harper, Judas Iscariot reigned as the supreme icon of evil in Western mythology. Judas betrayed God. How much worse can you get?* For 2,000 years we’ve used the term Judas
Continue readingDead Wild Roses: The West Wing – In Excelsis Deo
Now a tradition here at DWR, I present the final moments from the episode of the West Wing titled ‘In Excelsis Deo’. A powerful reminder of all the happenings of the holidays and the courage people muster during these forcefully happy times. Be Well All. Warm wishes to you and yours from all of […]
Continue readingScripturient: Myth and Meaning
People say that what we’re all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think that what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our life experiences on the physical pl…
Continue readingScripturient: Why I Still Watch M*A*S*H
The news of Harry Morgan’s death at 96, back in 2011, saddened me. I’m at the age when it seems far too many icons of my youth are dying off. Not from some misspent life or accident; from old age. And the process accelerates as I age. I n…
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: The Popular Front: An “Alternative Year in Review” of 2015 Pop Culture
Photo by Dennis Hill
Most “Year in Review” lists are pretty predictable. Such lists are usually jammed pack with consensus contenders for big industry awards such as the Oscars and Grammys and they tend to b…
Continue readingScripturient: Is This Your Bar of Soap?
This is side five. Follow in your book and repeat after me as we learn three new words in Turkish: Towel. Bath. Border. So begins Waiting for the Electrician or Someone Like Him, from the first album released by the Firesign Theater, in 1968 (on later …
Continue readingDead Wild Roses: Movies that Hollywood Won’t Touch – Neerja Bhanot -The Heroine of the Hijack
This is a heroic tale of a brave woman who sacrificed her saving children from terrorists. Can you ever imagine a Hollywood film portraying this kick ass female hero’s life? … Yah, me neither. It’s too hard for the hollywood dude establishment to tart up the heroine and tell a serious story at the same […]
Continue readingLeft Over: Teach All the Children Well…..
http://www.vintag.es/2015/12/children-with-dolls-15-vintage-photos.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+daily-pics+%28vintage+everyday%29 There is a blog that I go to eagerly, one of few words but many images…the link is above.. This blog is one I visit on a daily basis and I have provided a link to today’s offering..it is … Continue reading →
Continue readingScripturient: Why Do We Make Music?
Musick has Charms to sooth a savage Breast, To soften Rocks, or bend a knotted Oak. I’ve read, that things inanimate have mov’d, And, as with living Souls, have been inform’d, By Magick Numbers and persuasive Sound. What then am I? Am…
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