Week of October 8

Here, in Roger Williams Land, the Vikings have captured Monday and are holding it for ransom.

The Administration has decided to retaliate by canceling Tuesday and holding Monday, instead.Monday classes are transferred to Tuesday, and Tuesday classes are not held. We owe this to the celebration of the day when Europeans discovered the “New World,” as they called it sometime later. Christopher Columbus, an Italian mariner working for Spain, is the person in whose name the holiday is celebrated. The real day of discovery was October 12, 1492. A number of years ago several holidays were moved to the nearest Monday (this year, October 8). So I like to think we’re “really” celebrating Leif Eriksson day, in honor of the Viking who discovered the New World centuries before Columbus.did.

I guess I don't have to feel too sorry that you don't get a holiday in class this week, seeing as you got an unintended one last week. I have allergies--all of which settle in my nose and eyes, and last Monday I had a sneezing fit all morning--one which would have qualified me for the Olympics, if they included that particular sport. I'd win points for execution and style and most likely cop a gold medal. Any how, I'm sorry I didn't get the news out to you sooner. I kept hoping the sneezes would yield to the meds, but they didn't and I went home about 11:45. Consequently, we'll move Friday's work to Tuesday of this week.

How important is friendship, and how have concepts of friendship changed across the centuries? How does a person's concept of friendship change across the span of his or her life? The illustration at the left is linked to an interesting article on this. Friendship may have different aspects in different social classes, as well, and to change one's class may require changing one's friends. Is it worth it?

A few years back it was not unusual for graduating seniors to decorate their caps and occasionally their gowns with signs like Thanks, Mom and Dad, and You’ve Always been There for Me. Chapter 7 brings home the importance of kinship as an asset when life takes a horrific turn. Note that kin as Shipler uses the term extends beyond relatives by blood or marriage into the larger network of friends, church members, and others who provide support in times of need. Today, we might call this our "social network>

When those networks fail we can find ourselves in dire times, indeed. Some of this chapter may bring some of you close to tears, but it may also give you a sense of how, occasionally, persons rise to bad occasions through noble actions.

Chapter 8 brings us back to the biology of poverty. Some of you who took U. S. History one will remember that Virginians like William Byrd of Westover complained of the laziness of those who lived on the fringes of society–in places like the edge of the Great Swamp. If you haven’t taken the course, this link will let you read from his History of the Dividing Line Betwixt Virginia and North Carolina. The section beginning at number 114 is the most pertinent. We now know that malnutrition has its own set of burdens, some of them visible, some of them invisible, and that some of the charges that the poor are lazy or ignorant may neglect some of the effects of bad diet, including mental retardation. We’ll look at this today.

Philanthropist Alan Shawn Feinstein has devoted much of his energy to abolishing hunger in the United States. The map at the left links to the Feinstein Center for a Hunger Free America at the University of Rhode Island. As for the picture above, Click for a view of some amazing photographs by a Dane, Jacob Holdt, who took them while hitchhiking across America.

Feeding America (formerly known as America’s Second Harvest) produces an annual report on the status of hunger in America. Click on the name and you'll find resources through which you can become involved. Feeding America is

the nation's leading domestic hunger-relief charity. Our mission is to feed America's hungry through a nationwide network of member food banks and engage our country in the fight to end hunger.

Each year, the Feeding America network provides food to more than 37 million low-income people facing hunger in the United States, including 14 million children and nearly 3 million seniors.

Our network of more than 200 food banks serves all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, securing and distributing more than 2.5 billion pounds of food and grocery products annually. Those member food banks support approximately 61,000 local charitable agencies and 70,000 programs, which provide food directly to individuals and families in need. The NPR logo above links to a story on the 2006 annual report. The Feeding America logo links to the 2011 version. What's changed in the last 5 years?

I want to try something a little different on Friday. I would like to have us divide into "breakout groups" to have a final discussion of Samaritan before you undertake to write your paper on the book. I'd like each group to share their reactions to the book with each other, and to think of any issues the book raises among you. I'd also like to have you share your reactions to the principal characters. Suppose you could spend some time with one of them. Who would you choose? What would you like to talk about? What questions would you like to ask?

The easiest way to do this would be to have me do the divvying up, but I'm not sure that the easiest would be the best. I envision the groups being composed of 4-5 persons each. I'd like to have the groups become a way to get people to know new people, and not be composed exclusively of people already known to each other. I may call for volunteers to organize groups, and then let them get on with it. Stay tuned.