SNOWY OWL- TORONTO ZOO..The Zoo is a nice Reading place, where we made friends with many with whom we share our Planet

And how was it that Kader Mia would be seen as having only one identity — that of being Muslim — by Hindus who were, like him, out in the unprotected open because they too were starving? “For a bewildered child,” Sen remembers, “the violence of identity was extraordinarily hard to grasp.” And, he confesses, “it is not particularly easy even for a still bewildered elderly adult.”

Amartya Sen

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/14/books/review/14yoshino.html?_r=0

Over many long walks through Riverwood, Port Credit, Toronto Zoo, Central Don region parks  followed by a review of the Great courses, we did some attempt at Summary and Synthesis.

FRANK SCHOFIELD MEMORIAL PARK- A WONDERFUL READING PLACE –Toronto Zoo.       A park modeled on Confucian parks, with symmetry of lines and rectangles, it is a peaceful reading place, in the Eurasian section of the zoo

We tried to discuss some lectures of Art of Reading, Art of Public Speaking and the Magic of Mathematics and what is their application in our work.

EXTENDED READINGS

Sitting in Frank Schofield Memorial park of Toronto zoo, we read Amartya Sen’s (Nobel Prize-Economics-1998) writings  on Multiculturalism.

How we relate to different systems in this multicultural world. Watching the Zoo mobile pass towards it’s last stop, before it crosses the Giant Panda enclosure. It was in these lawns, around a fortnight ago (June 24) that we had gone through some pictures of Art works of different civilizations. Today (6.7) we sat and saw how Amartya Sen traces the work of Multiculturalism done in British society over the past 25 years. There are many different voices which are coming forward after the 2005 attacks.

In 2016- as our family shifted from Mumbai, through Malta to Mississauga, we faced these currents in different ways.

READING GROUP PERSPECTIVE- I have read this book-Identity and Violence- in different phases, from the Manori Arabian sea beaches of Mumbai area, to the Tripoli region Mediterranean beaches (where now-2016-7 there are warnings to not go swimming as bodies of illegal migrants are being washed ashore) to the Lake Ontario-Credit River-Rouge Valley regions with my sons.

In an attempt to synthesize and apply the lessons learnt in Art of Reading – by Tim Spurgin, on a Non-Fiction work, we came across the characters like Kader Mia (a worker who was killed in the violence that followed the partition of British India ) whom Amartya Sen mentioned in his book and also in his acceptance speech  for the Nobel Prize.

In trying to apply those lessons of Reading to a Non-Fiction work, we found ourselves navigating through the multiple layers of society, education, immigration.

READING GROUP QUESTIONS-EXERCISES

• Read this review of Identity and Violence-An Illusion of Destiny ..Link http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/14/books/review/14yoshino.html?_r=0
• and answer in true or false

• Vindaloo is an Indian origin dish
• Trignometry came from India to west
• The weakness of Sen’s argument is in its failure to explain why, at critical junctures, we disown that knowledge of our multiple identities as we see ourselves part of various groups

2-Read the following Biographical speech of Amartya Sen (1998-Economics Nobel Laureate) http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economic-sciences/laureates/1998/sen-bio.html

And answer in true or false

2-1-The Bengal Famine of 1943 in which around 2 to 3 million people died mainly affected the landless rural laborers

2-2- Sen tells about the tradition of political tolerance by quoting 3^rd century BC Emperor Ashoka

“For he who does reverence to his own sect while disparaging the sects of others wholly from attachment to his own, with intent to enhance the splendour of his own sect, in reality by such conduct inflicts the severest injury on his own sect.”

2-3- In Trinity-  Robertson  accepted the Marxist Maurice Dobb    as faculty by writing this one line answer

“ Dear Dobb, so long as you give us a fortnight’s notice before blowing up the Chapel, it will be all right.”

2-4- Amartya Sen is happy that his feet are not planted on the ground

Robert Goheen has remarked, “if you feel that you have both feet planted on level ground, then the university has failed you.”

SUGGESTED FURTHER READING

SNOWY OWL- TORONTO ZOO..The Zoo is a nice Reading place, where we made friends with many with whom we share our Planet