Book Reviewed: Fugitive Pedagogy: Carter G. Woodson and the Art of Black Teaching by Jarvis R. Givens

Was African American education in early 20th century was forged in slavery? A young black kid growing up in Michigan once told his eighth-grade teacher about his intention of becoming a lawyer. But his teacher killed his enthusiasm instantly stating that his ambitions were unrealistic for a “nig*er” and suggested to become a carpenter. This kid would come to be known as Malcolm X, described as how this encounter became a turning point in his childhood, and later, trouble with the law in his adolescent years. His fascinating perspective of racism in America is narrated in in his autobiography. Despite this, black education continued against a background of increased violence against African Americans in the South. After Democrats regained power in state governments, they instituted legal racial segregation and a variety of racist laws. They also disfranchised Black people by constitutional amendments and electoral rules from 1890 until 1964. But the enslaved people learned to read despite widespread challenges. Teachers developed covert instructional strategies, and creative responses to the persistence of White opposition, from slavery through the Jim Crow era. Forged in slavery, embodied by Carter Woodson and W.E.B. Dubois is a tradition of escape mentality of slaves and later for black teachers says the author of this book. One major flaw is that the author is using the same material he wrote for his PhD dissertation. This book leaves out the role played by many African American educators. I understand the PhD dissertation focuses on a specific narrative of educator Carter G. Woodson. But the author missed out numerous achievements early in the African American history. Some of the highlights that could have been incorporated in this book includes the creation of Clark Atlanta University founded in 1865. Lucy Craft Laney founded Haines Normal and Industrial Institute in Augusta, Georgia. Hired as principal of the new normal school (for the training of teachers) in Tuskegee, Alabama, Booker T. Washington opened his school in 1881. Based on his experience at the Hampton Institute, Washington intended to train students in skills, morals, and religious life, in addition to academic subjects. Washington urged the teachers he trained to return to the plantation districts and show the people how to put new energy and new ideas into farming as well as into the intellectual and moral and religious life of the people. Later he became the President of the Tuskegee University, Alabama. Mary Bethune Cookman, well known for starting a private school for African-American students in Daytona Beach, Florida, later became Bethune-Cookman University. George Washington Carver, a well-known plant biologist worked at Tuskegee when Booker Washington was the president of the university. In 1897, W.E.B DuBois became a professor in history and economics at the historically black Atlanta University in Georgia.

Book Reviewed: Killing for Krishna: The Danger of Deranged Devotion by Henry Doktorski

Hare Krishnas and the New Vrindaban community “Killing for Krishna” is an intelligent and impeccably researched work on the early events of ISKCON - New Vrindaban, a rural community of Hare Krishnas in Moundsville, West Virginia. The author who lived and witnessed events during his stay acknowledges ambiguity in this inherently complex narrative. He offers clarity to the history of one of the major temples in the United States. The main character of the story is Swami Kirtananda also called Bhaktipada, the charismatic man who was the first disciple of Srila Prabhupada. Kirtananda helped build the very first temple in New York City before he moved to Moundsville. He was primarily responsible for expanding the spiritual movement of Hare Krishnas in the United States. The major event in the history of the commune was the 1986 murder of the devotee Steven Bryant (Sulochan Dasa), and the involvement of senior disciples of Swami Kirtananda in this crime. Bryant was a resident-devotee of New Vrindaban and worked for Kirtananda at the temple for few years before the relationship soured. The hostility of Bryant towards Kirtananda became personal when he blamed Kirtananda for breaking his family and separation from his wife and children. His first book, “The Guru Business,” attempts to exposes illegal activities at New Vrindaban and put the blame on Kirtananda, but his attempts fail. He refuses to give up, upon more research at Bhaktivedanta Book Trust (BBT) in Los Angeles, California, he digs more dirt on Kirtananda and start campaigning with devotees at various American temples. The close followers of Kirtananda become involved in the murder of Steven Bryant. ISKCON leaders denounce the murder and distance themselves from New Vrindaban. The ISKCON Governing Body Commission (GBC) urges Kirtananda to resign from the GBC if he is indicted. Kirtananda agrees, but when he is indicted, he refuses to resign. In September 1986, New Vrindaban lays off their entire work force of 187 employees. All money at New Vrindaban goes to Kirtananda’s legal fund. All projects are neglected, including the dairy, and many protected cows at the New Vrindaban community die from starvation. The closure of New Vrindaban Elementary School directly affects forty children of the devotees. Kirtananda Swami inaugurates a year-long “First Amendment Freedom Tour,” during which he appears on ninety radio shows and sixty television shows, including CBS Evening News with Dan Rather, Larry King Live, and the Sally Jesse Raphael Talk Show and West 57th Street. In April 1987, Rolling Stone publishes an article entitled “Dial OM For Murder,” about the murder of Steven Bryant. The authors claim that Kirtananda ordered the assassination of Bryant to silence him from sharing information about Kirtananda’s illegal and immoral activities. Most New Vrindaban devotees believe the charges against their spiritual master are “rumors and hearsay.” The book offers a one-sided look at the dark history of the temple, but several things written in this book are unsubstantiated from independent sources. Despite all the ills, the New Vrindaban at present is a prosperous community for a large population of devotees in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. Over the past twenty years, this temple has emerged as one of the important spiritual centers of ISKCON organization that has lived up to the teachings of Srila Prabhupada.

Book Reviewed: The Origin of Satan: How Christians Demonized Jews, Pagans and Heretics by Elaine Pagels

The spiritual battles with Satan (five stars) The study of the Satan in the biblical literature is fascinating. Author Elaine Pagels offers an interesting discussion largely from the point of New Testament. The crucial issue is the irreconcilable paradox: if God is benevolent and omnipotent, then why does He permit evil? Or do we live in a world made of two forces, God, and the Devil? Satan is also called Lucifer. In Judaism, Satan is seen as an agent subservient to God, often identified as the serpent in the Garden of Eden. In Christianism, he is considered as a fallen angel who rebelled against God but retained power over human beings. In the Synoptic Gospels, Satan tempts Jesus in the desert. He is identified as the cause of illness and temptation (Mark 1:12–13, Matthew 4:1–11, and Luke 4:1–13). Satan plays a role in some of the parables of Jesus, namely the Parable of the Sower, the Parable of the Weeds, Parable of the Sheep and the Goats, and the Parable of the Strong Man. According to the Parable of the Sower, Satan influences those who fail to understand the gospel. The gospel of Mark mentions angels only in the opening verse (1:13) and in the final verses of the original manuscript (Mark 16:5-7). He characterizes Jesus' ministry as involving continual struggle between God's spirit and the demons who belong to Satan's "kingdom" (Mark 3:23-27). For nearly two thousand years Christians believed that Jews killed Jesus and the Romans were merely their agents. Examination of synoptic gospels in the historical context reveals that they are theological treatise of a historical biography. The authors of Matthew and Luke based on the gospel of Mark revised in different ways. They each added their own interpretation of the source materials from earlier traditions like, oral tradition, anecdotes, and parables. The gospel of Mark was written more than a generation after Jesus' death, and the other synoptic gospels nearly two generations later. The gospel writers tended to downplay the role of Romans in the aftermath of the unsuccessful Jewish war against Rome. In fact, the Jesus' execution was imposed by the Romans for activities they considered seditious. Each author of synoptic gospels shapes a narrative to respond to circumstances that surrounded them in ancient Israel. Christians as they read the gospels have identified themselves with the apostles. They have also identified their opponents, Romans, Jews, pagans, and heretics with forces of evil. The book is academic but numerous references are provided for readers interested in the history of gospels and the evolving idea of Satan in the New Testament. Highly recommended to those interested in the ancient history of Israel and the early Christian traditions.

Book Reviewed: Mae West by George Eells

Mae West, an America icon This is a fascinating study of Mae West, an actress, playwright, screenwriter, and iconic sex symbol. The author reveals a radically subversive artist consciously creating her own image. Her screenplays made her a cultural icon for sexuality and social subversion. In the 1930s, she was not only considered scandalous but dangerous to the American society. She achieved her success through hard work and dogged persistence by employing fair or foul means, trickery, and ruthlessness in the rough-and­ tumble world of show-business. She dimmed Marlene Dietrich's allure, outshone glossy Joan Crawford, and overpowered Greta Garbo's subtle eroticism. Depression era audiences were stimulated by her unapologetic exhibitionism and cynical behavior. In her films she was the first woman to function as a leading man. For all the variety of the scripts she wrote, the constant factor was West’s personality to ridicule social attitudes toward sex. She was a sensation on Broadway with her play “Sex.” In 1926, she was convicted of obscenity, and spent ten-days in prison but emerged as a star. The movie “She Done Him Wrong” single-handedly saved Paramount Studios from probable bankruptcy, or it may have improved Paramount's fiscal condition and probably saved it from being merged with MGM Studios. Enigmatic life of Mae West was spent in the Brooklyn subculture of boxers and underworld figures. Her journey through burlesque, vaudeville, Broadway, and Hollywood, where she became one of the big screen's most popular and colorful stars. This book is well-written and the author’s narratives of West’s life and her interactions with other leading ladies is fascinating. Reading this book is a pleasure!

Book Reviewed: Microbes: The Life-Changing Story of Germs by Phillip K. Peterson

Living with microbes Microorganisms like bacteria, fungi, archaea, protozoa, algae, and viruses are too small but they have tremendous impact on our lives. The wilds of the human microbiome, where for thousands of years, bacterial and human cells existed in a peaceful symbiosis and in equilibrium to foster healthier bodies. The dialogue between the gut and the brain has been recognized by ancient healing traditions such as Ayurvedic medicine in ancient India, which is confirmed by the recent studies that show the microbes in the human body communicate with mind from the gut. Our personality may be shaped by your microbiome, the lack of biodiversity can make one sick which is supported by an old proverb, “you are what you eat.” Because diet has a profound effect on both physical and mental health. Most of the body’s immune system is in the gut, so pathology and dysfunction in the gut and imbalanced gut flora can cause neuroinflammation and neurodegenerative disease. This book will fascinate you about the intriguing world of good and bad bugs discussed in three sections. In the first part, the author discusses friendly microbes responsible for our current oxygen-rich environment that supports life and how they are our intimate bodyguards in making our very existence possible. The second part deals with infectious microbes that can harm us, and the final section is a futuristic story of how we can harness the power of microbes to make us healthier and safer. In this book you learn that most microbes are beneficial to humans, animals, and plants, but the belief that germs are our mortal enemies-hasn't changed. A vast majority of germs are either harmless or genuinely essential to human health. This book is written for a casual reader with very little scientific data. There are several books available in bookstore that is creative and generate enthusiasm and curiosity to learn more about microbes than this book.

Book Reviewed: The Gnostic Paul: Gnostic Exegesis of the Pauline Letters by Elaine Pagels

Was Paul a gnostic believer? The New Testament describes apostle Paul preached Christian communities all his life as the leader of the ministry of Jesus Christ in the first century. But what is known about Paul comes from Sunday school stories that were meant to keep kids reverent and obedient. Volumes have been written after the discovery of early Christian and Gnostic texts discovered in Nag Hammadi in 1945. These texts shed light on early Christianity and give glimpses of Paul, and project him as the apostle of the heretics. What does divinity school scholarship tell us about the enigmatic thirteenth apostle who looms larger than life in the New Testament? Gnostic beliefs clashed strongly with accepted Christian doctrine in the first two centuries. By the end of the second century, Gnostics broke away from the church. Their core belief was dualistic in nature which proposes that that there are two realities, the physical and spiritual realms. They believed that the material world (matter) is evil and therefore one must achieve spiritual realm to find everlasting peace. This concept is remarkably like the Sankhya Philosophy of Hinduism founded by the sage Kapila in 800 B.C.E. In this book, the author examines and interprets the texts of the Pauline Epistles; 1 & 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and Hebrews in the historical and cultural context. She considers each of these non-pastoral epistles, and questions about their authorship. She examines how the Pauline epistles were read by second century Valentinian Gnostics and argues that Paul was in fact gnostic. Valentinus, a leading gnostic and follower of Paul in the second century preached that only spiritual people received the gnosis (knowledge) and they would find the Divine Pleroma, while non-gnostic Christians with material nature will perish. Maricon, another major gnostic leader from Sinope (present-day Turkey) in 150 C.E., preached Gnosticism followed a version of New Testament that included a redacted gospel of Luke and ten edited epistles of Paul. One of the difficulties in understanding Paul with the earliest Christianity has been explaining his lack of relationship to the early “sayings” tradition (the transmission and quoting of the sayings of Jesus also called “Oral” tradition). Paul quotes few sayings of Jesus in his epistles. But he became a Christian in Syria and spent the first fifteen years of his ministry there. It is in this area, the “sayings” tradition was the strongest in the first century C.E., Was this because his heretic beliefs conflicted with the parables and canonical gospels? Princeton University Professor Elaine Pagels offers a thorough analysis of the early Christian beliefs and the gnostic traditions that influenced apostles like Paul, Thomas, and Mary Magdalene

Book Reviewed: River of Blood: American Slavery from the People Who Lived It by Richard Cahan

Amazing Grace: Words and wisdom of American slaves The book is about the formerly enslaved people who lived to tell the story of their bondage and freedom. This is a human account of what it meant to assert a place in this country, as Black people and as Americans. The words and the photographs are profound, and they offer vivid reality of how tough it was for African Americans to have basic dignity in everyday life. There are intimate details provided by the last survivors of slavery, and the violence perpetrated by the KKK . This is a well-researched book on the legacy of slavery and its imprint on centuries of American history. In 1936, the Federal Writers' Project (FWP), a branch of the Works Progress Administration, a government agency was set up to provide work to the one-quarter of Americans during Great Depression. Notable projects of the FWP included the Slave Narrative Collection, a set of interviews that culminated in over 2,300 first-person accounts of slavery and five hundred black-and-white photographs of former slaves. These narratives are available online from the above-named collection at the Library of Congress website. More than seventy years after the Civil War, the people interviewed for this project were in their seventies, eighties, and nineties. Notable pictures are of Sarah Gudger born into slavery in 1816 in North Carolina and believed to be one of the oldest people when she died at the age of 122. Betty Boomer, born into slavery in Texas, and she was one of the African Americans terrorized by the Ku Klux Klan. Donaville Broussard born into slavery in 1850 in Lafayette, Louisiana. but like so many others he lived in the ominous shadow of the Ku Klux Klan and white hostility. Many formerly enslaved recall torture, dislocation, extreme overwork, severe abuse, inadequate nutrition, constant stress, and a multitude of other trauma produced serious psychological and physical scars. The book also highlights the cabin of former slave in Putnam County, Georgia, slave quarters in Cecil County, Maryland; Caruthersville, Missouri; and St. Charles Parish, Louisiana; and an African American cemetery in Person County, North Carolina. The book is a tremendous illustration of formerly enslaved people and I recommend this to anyone interested African American history.