"I certainly never write a review about a book I don't think worth reviewing, a flat-out bad book, unless it's an enormously fashionable bad book." --
says, John Gardner in Conversations with John Gardner
Quoted from 'Dictionary of Library and Information Science Quotations'     Edited by Mohamed Taher & L S Ramaiah. ISBN: 8185689423 (New Delhi , Aditya, 1994) p.150. Available @ Amazon.com

Friday, January 12, 2007

'We brown people are a threat'


NB. This comment, about a book by a South Indian.

Off the Books: The Underground Economy of the Urban Poor by Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh
Review
Publishers Weekly : In this revealing study of a Southside Chicago neighborhood, sociologist Venkatesh opens a window on how the poor live. see more reviews @ Amazon And see Table of Contents @ Barnesandnoble.com
See cataloging information at Library of Congress and World Catalog of libraries
Following comments, and image: Courtesy Rediff.com India Limited. January 11, 2007
There are areas in Chicago like Marquis Park, a black neighbourhood, which some people say are not safe to walk into even on a bright summer's day.
But Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh, who has spent many days this past decade in several desperately poor and dangerous black neighbourhoods in Chicago, would not stay away even at night.

Over six years ago, Venkatesh who grew up in the affluent Orange County area in California, put together his understanding of an endangered community in a book, American Project: The Rise and Fall of Modern Ghetto.

The 40-year-old professor of sociology and African-American studies at Columbia University, New York, has now published another book, Off the Books: The Underground Economy of the Urban Poor.

In his first book, Venkatesh, who earned his PhD from the University of Chicago in 1997 and went on to do another degree at Harvard, revealed a long-drawn struggle in a Chicago ghetto to overcome crime, drug abuse, rape and adultery.

In the new book, he writes about the role of the underground economy in an American neighborhood. While he provides detailed stories about the dynamics of the alternative economy, he also ruminates about the long-term harm such an institution does to the community.

The author and sociologist spoke recently to Rediff India Abroad Managing Editor (Features) Arthur J Pais.
Photograph: Paresh Gandhi

My 2 cents:
This book both by its content and context is a good lead as an eye opener. It is, in shot, visualizing--a system of living off the books that is daily life in the ghetto--and that which was, hitherto, invisible to most of the insiders.

Technorati Tags: Sudhir Alladi

Monday, January 08, 2007

Online - Heidelberg Journal of Religions on the Internet


Journal of Religions on the Internet is a electronic (or e-journal) specializing in religion found on cyberspace.


Editor:
Gregor Ahn (Heidelberg)
Editorial Board:
Christopher Helland (Halifax, Kanada)
Oliver Krüger (Heidelberg/Princeton)
Göran Larsson (Göteborg, Sweden)
Gernot Meier (Heidelberg, Germany)


  • Volume 01.1 Special Issue on Theory and Methodology, ed. by Oliver Krüger
  • Volume 02.1 Special Issue on Rituals on the Internet, ed. by Kerstin Radde-Antweiler

    What others say:"This journal began through the impetus of the second international conference on religion and the internet called: Online-Religions and Rituals-Online, held in Germany in 2004." When Religion Meets New Media

    See in the same section and aisle:
  • Internet Journal of Religion - multiple journal site, includes links to Diskus, Science of Religion, Marburg Journal of Religion, Journal of Southern Religion, Journal of Buddhist Ethics, Journal for Global Buddhism, eSPIRITA [ source: RELIGIOUS STUDIES WEB GUIDE ]
  • see also: Electronic Journals (Academic / Peer-reviewed) @ Wabash Center
  • More Advent Although these are secular, Leslie Har... 5 Dec 2005 by Linda Jones
  • Studying Religion on the Internet