Tribes

Sonofabitch, if I wasn't complaining to my friends last night about not being a part of a tribe... (Obviously it has been on my mind after reading that article about the guilds in the June 3rd edition of The Week Magazine.) And then the very next day this review of a new book entitled Tribe comes out printed in the Guardian UK, forwarded to me by the very friend listening to me bitch.

I guess, actually, it has been on my mind for a long time, as researching my German branches I learned that the early German settlers in New York clearly helped one another with organizations and politics. One of my great, great grandfathers was a founder of several banks and insurance companies. There is nothing today that I might rely on... even family is a little too dispersed to be counted on. (And, of course there is this scam among amateur genealogists of people claiming to be your cousin and then asking for financial support.)  

Photo taken from here

During John Ford’s celebrated western film The Searchers, John Wayne’s character spends years hunting for his niece Debbie, kidnapped as a child by Comanche Indians.

When he finally finds her, she initially wants to stay with her Comanche husband rather than return home.

Although shocking in the film, it’s historically accurate. White people captured by American Indians (author Sebastian Junger’s preferred name for Native Americans) commonly chose to stay with their captors - and the book cites a case of a captive woman who hid from her would-be rescuers.

Even more astonishingly, from the earliest days of Europeans in America, settlers of both sexes ran away to join Indian tribes. This wasn’t just a few people, it was hundreds and hundreds. The practice was so rife that in the early 1600s settler leaders made it an offence with harsh punishments, but over the following centuries people still ran off in huge numbers.

And it hardly ever happened the other way. Indians didn’t want to join white society.

The attraction, argues Junger, was the sense of community, the importance of the tribe, evident in other primates and in primitive human societies. The superficial attractions of American Indian life were obvious: sexual mores were more relaxed, clothing was more comfortable, religion less harsh.

But mostly it was the structure of Indian society that appealed. It was less hierarchical, essentially classless and egalitarian. As the people were nomadic, personal property hardly mattered, since it was limited to what you or your horses could carry.

What changed this natural way of living for humans was first agriculture, then industry. Accumulation of personal property led to people doing what they thought best for themselves, rather than for the common good. But, suggests Junger, we’re not happy like this. We’re wired to the lifestyle of the tribe.

Take the London Blitz during World War II. Before it began the government feared there would be riots and maybe even revolution as people fought one another for space in bomb shelters or for food.

In fact, exactly the reverse happened. People from different classes mixed in a way they hadn’t before and joined together in the face of a common enemy.
Historians credit the ‘spirit of the Blitz’ as the cause of the Labour landslide victory in the 1945 election, its strong feeling for community leading to the foundation of the NHS and a robust welfare state.

Those caught up in the bloody conflict in Bosnia often say they were happier during the war. The reason, they say, was they all pulled together, felt connected and part of something bigger than themselves.Junger, an American journalist and former war correspondent, gives many examples of what our modern way of living has cost us. In a modern city or suburb you can go through an entire day meeting only strangers. As affluence and urbanisation rise, rates of suicide and depression go up. According to the World Health Organisation, people in wealthy countries suffer eight times the depression rate of those in poorer ones. But when we revert to the tribe, things improve.

Junger spent time embedded with U.S. troops in Afghanistan, and says he was never alone there. Soldiers slept a dozen to a shelter. You couldn’t stretch out an arm without touching someone. Men of all colours, classes and creeds bonded as they had to look out for one another.

In a tribe the survival of the individual depends upon the survival of the group. The lack of this brotherhood is what makes it so hard for returning combat veterans to reintegrate into contemporary, fragmented societies.Community spirit in the U.S. rocketed after 9/11. The suicide rate dropped dramatically. There were no rampage shootings in public places like schools and colleges for two years.

Interestingly, such shootings happen only in middle-class rural or suburban areas. There has never been one in a poor inner-city location, where gangs provide a tribal sense of belonging.

This sense of bonding with the larger group begins almost at birth. In less developed countries, children sleep with or in close proximity to their parents and often an extended family group.

It’s only in Northern European countries (and the U.S.) that small children sleep alone. It’s only here that they go through a well-known developmental stage of bonding with stuffed animals or so-called ‘comfort’ blankets.

In Junger’s small, but convincingly argued, book he quotes the self-determination theory, the things necessary for contentment. People need to feel competent at what they do. They need to feel authentic in their lives.

Above all, they need to feel connected with others. It’s a good starting point for rethinking the way we live our troubled modern lives.

In the book I mentioned the other day, New Orleans: Race and Americanization, at least one of the essayists mentions how enslaved Africans would flee to the Indigenous Peoples, in this case the Choctaws and the Chickasaws, but it wasn't a matter of "sexual mores were more relaxed, clothing was more comfortable, religion less harsh", obviously.

Here's an update... I was looking back on some old posts and apparently I was bitching about tribes (or not being a part of one) way back in May 2015

Where Wealth Endures Centuries

Isn't this interesting? If only shoemakers from Northern Ireland were wealthy.... (Though I have an article below from the Week Magazine, it is not their article which I read first which talked about the showmaker's guild being one of the wealthiest guilds. The article may have mentioned the Medicis, but that was not the original thrust...)

I was thinking about this for present time. Where do those of us who are not associated with a profession fit in when writing about or studying history? What are the current merchant's guilds? I was never a member of a union which has rosters and meeting minutes. And any professional organization of which I was a part was not for life; and in many cases there were no meeting minutes. How will that group be studied? How will historians deal with gathering primary source material? With blogs, for example, will they be archived? And how much information do we need and whose job is it to sort out what should or shouldn't be kept?  I have journals from a great uncle chronicling a road trip when cars were new. It's not all that interesting, but it is precious to me. Particularly given he died at 20 of appendicitis.  (We all die, so why that makes him more special, I have no idea. I was told my grandmother adored him, but that is inevitable when you are a decade younger and he died when you are a child of the opposite sex.)

Image taken from Found the World

Previous economic research has suggested that a family's economic advantages (or disadvantages) usually dissipate within a few generations. New research by Italian economists Guglielmo Barone and Sauro Moretti begs to differ. The Bank of Italy economists used a unique tool, a 1427 census of Florence, to compare the wealth and occupation of Florentine families 600 years ago to those same families in 2011. "The top earners among the current taxpayers were found to have already been at the top of the socioeconomic ladder six centuries ago," Barone and Moretti explain in an essay on their findings at the Center for Economic Policy Research's Vox site.

If you're looking to see how the Medici family has fared, you're out of luck — the researchers replaced family last names with letters to maintain confidentiality. But Barone and Moretti did find "evidence of dynasties in certain (elite) professions,"they write, noting that there's a higher probability a Florentine today will be a lawyers, banker (like the Medici family), medical doctor, pharmacist, or goldsmith if he or she has the last name of a family that was intensely involved in the same profession in Renaissance Florence. They also report finding "some evidence of the existence of a glass floor that protects the descendants of the upper class from falling down the economic ladder."

Barone and Moretti say they can't universalize their findings, noting in their working paper, "Intergenerational mobility in the very long run: Florence 1427-2011," that "Florence in the 15th century was already an advanced and complex society, characterized by a significant level of inequality and by a rich variety of professions and occupational stratification." But Quartz's Aamna Mohdin says that the new findings are "further evidence on how the rich remain rich," including research in England that a family's socioeconomic status can persist for more than 800 years. You can read more about Florence's lack of economic mobility, including Barone and Moretti's methodology and caveats, at Vox or in their research paper. Peter Weber

Taken from the June 3rd edition of the Week Magazine. 

Cheese as medicine

I took this image from here.

OMG, in "Cooked" one of the scientists studying the rinds of cheeses suggested that a day may come, when we understand the microbiome better, that medicine may come in the form of cheese! How brilliant is that? Killed off all your gut bacteria? Just eat Camembert for two weeks and then top it off with a little L'Explorateur. Like the belly button beer, maybe they will harvest some of your gut microbes before you take that course of antibiotics or chemo, harvest some additional microbes from your healthy child and then blend with some rennet and raw milk and voilà, you are better than before.

If, as suggested in a podcast I listened to years ago, the combination of microbes (or lack thereof) in our bellies gives us Parkinsons or MS, we might eat some cheese from a healthy donor to clear it right up. I suppose some of the cheeses resulting from this engineered cheese medicine might task more revolting than some of the cheeses considered delicacies around the world.

Looking to find some links to share I came across this criticism of Michael Pollan.  I still remain a fan and I do believe that what we eat is the basis of all our health problems, so I really think we should do what we can to get back to eating the way he suggests, regardless of the time/money because it is cheaper in the long run. I suppose if you push off the cost of health care to the government then the scales are stacked against investing in the food you eat for your own health.

Book Idea - Coureurs-de-Bois

I'm reading Creole New Orleans: Race and Americanization edited by Hirsch and Logsdon. I just started it, but so far, very good. It is a series of essays.

The first essay, by Jerah Johnson, mentions coureurs-de-bois, young men/boys who were sent to live among the indigenous peoples in order to learn the language and customs. I should think a novel or story from the perspective of these young men about the formation of current day Louisiana would be good. And vice versa, as young Indian men went to France. (Mostly this trading of young men occurred with the French settlements in Canada.)

Taken from here

The essay has been very helpful to understand the French policy which explains some of the backstory to what we descendants of the English settlements call the French and Indian Wars. I certainly know about them, but never really understood why the French and Indians were fighting together against the British. 

I don't recall the story of The Last of the Mohicans, but I suppose there might be some overlap in the story context, but with an English sensibility, which I believe was markedly different than the French approach to policy in North America.  

Michael Pollan's 'Cooked' Netflix Series & BREAD

I did have other thoughts while listening to the television show, besides belly button beer.

Mr. Pollan talks about big, bad gluten and how we are all avoiding it. (I have recently learned by an elimination process that eating bread/flour will swell my fingers over night and make my knuckles sore in the morning; the soreness does go away as the day goes on. I can choose, now, if I want that feeling in the morning or not.)

What did excite me, though, was his thoughts that perhaps if we returned to real flour and a fermentation process, eschewing the commercially made quick-rise yeasts, we might be able to eat bread again. I did rather feel that I didn't particularly have a problem after enjoying the bread at the New Orleans restaurant Coquette, which is made with a starter/sponge and 'rests' overnight. They will kindly share their recipe for bread, if you ask. As I understand it, the recipe originated with the chef's mother.

While listening to Splendid Table I learned about a group of women who have opened up a flour mill in Asheville, NC called Carolina Ground. Their whole deal is to make healthy flour and to keep it closer to the community. Even in the television show they talk about a wheat economy and how wheat is being shipped all over the world, with real ripples in the system when invasions happen in the world's 'breadbaskets' (i.e. Ukraine). We, in America, are not as effected by that kind of thing, but cultures/countries which eat bread as a staple are hardest hit.



I may be back in the business of making and eating bread... my bread, from my home, from my yeast.

Making a starter, apparently the yeast is robust!

Now I am just thinking that I need to visit Carolina Ground as I travel between New Orleans and DC. Perhaps I can visit a newly discovered cousin when I take my night-time break 9 hours in to the trip.

Michael Pollan's "Cooked" Series and Belly Button Beer

I enjoyed the second 2 episodes of "Cooked" last night (as I started a new needle point. I mention that because I could stitch and listen, rather than watch.) I read, and loved, the book a couple of years ago. As my readers might imagine, I was particularly intrigued by the 'earth' section of the book, about fermentation. As perhaps my readers recall, I make my own kefir (both milk and water), pickles, yogurt, kombucha (I've tried both coffee and tea), and hard cidre. I even have a 1/2 bottle of concord grapes percolating, but I do not have high hopes for that.

I was going to share this following tidbit from the Week Magazine regardless, but combining these two pieces of information seemed worthwhile.

In the television show, Michael Pollan indicates that we do not know when humanity took the bubbling wheat porridge and cooked it to make bread. He does indicate that perhaps we started farming so that we might have alcohol... as we gathered and then located a source of sugar that we might turn in to alcohol. He does not mention, as one might conclude, that bread is the solid form of beer.... But that is neither here nor there for my observation.

I was intrigued by Michael Pollan's idea that a bowl of porridge was left on it's own by mistake and yeast and other microbial life forms found their way to that source of food. For here we have a delightful story of young people naturally recreating that fermentation 'Big Bang':

Australian brewers have created a tangy new beer using an unusual, locally sourced ingredient: yeast grown from their own belly-button fluff. Staff at Melbourne’s 7 Cent craft brewery began by swabbing their belly buttons and cultivating yeast colonies. One fragrant strain went into Belly Button Beer, a white beer with hints of “fresh orange zest and toasted coriander seeds,” the brewery said. Company founder Doug Bremner said drinkers shouldn’t be put off by the yeast’s origins. “Yeast is yeast,” he said. “This beer is no different from any other beer out there.

Though the Week Magazine put the above tidbit in their 'It Must Be True, I Read it in the Tabloids' section of their publication, the Smithsonian shared it here: Australians make beer out of belly button lint

Comcast/Xfinity

I know this is not the place, but I decided not to use Facebook as my place to broadcast to the universe how dissatisfied I am with Comcast/Xfinity, but that here might be an opportunity.

Now, I am dissatisfied with the way my call went with them and I will not share this here. What I want to share is that before the call really began, the automated voice asked me if after the call I wanted to participate in a brief customer satisfaction survey - I opted yes, I would.

I just got the call back and the first question they asked was if I was satisfied with my experience... 5 being very satisfied and 1 being very dissatisfied. I pushed 1.... and they promptly hung up on me.  Hmmmm... will my answer be recorded in their database?

Printing body parts

Holy crap. And ewww. But if I were missing my nose I would want to have one... So, I need to zip it.

In a medical first, researchers have successfully “printed” living human body parts that are large and strong enough to replace human tissues. Previous attempts to engineer lifelike body parts had failed because the structures were too flimsy or lacked the complexity to remain viable. But a Wake Forest University research team has circumvented those issues using a new device called an integrated tissue-organ printer, which has manufactured ears, muscles, and jawbones using precise 3-D models. The printer mixes live cells with a special gel that hardens to the consistency of living tissues. Oxygen and nutrients are delivered to the new cells through layers of tiny tunnels until blood vessels grow and perform this vital function naturally. The engineered structures were stable enough to be successfully implanted in rodents. More study is needed to determine whether these tissues are safe for humans, but researchers hope the technology can one day enable patients to get customized vital-organ transplants using their own cells. “This novel tissue and organ printer is an important advance,” study author Dr. Anthony Atala tells LiveScience.com. “It can fabricate stable, human-scale tissue of any shape.”

And, I got it from the Week Magazine... Though I don't recall which print edition.

Breasts Are Healthy

A Maryland woman has spent the past three years going bare-chested in public, in the hope of “normalizing” naked breasts. Chelsea Covington, 27, spends most of her time in places where it is legal to be topless in public, such as New York, New Hampshire, and Washington, D.C. The photos on her blog, Breasts Are Healthy, show her going about normal life—enjoying a picnic in the park, riding her bike—while nude from the waist up. Going “bare-chested is still a powerful act for a woman,” Covington said, “especially when done quietly, confidently, and peacefully.”

I was alerted to this concept of Topfreedom by my May 27th edition of The Week Magazine.

She exposes (ha! pun intended!) a very interesting point with her essay published on May 4th about defining female and defining breasts. Nowadays with all the obesity with men, they can have some breasts which look very similar to those of many women. And all the issues with sexuality and transgender. Any way, a very interesting discussion.

Dr. Stewart Wolf, Jr.

Man, I have just found some cousins... cousins through cousins. I mean, they are as close to me as some cousins who I see almost every summer, but yet I had not known of them. I am optimistic they will accept my invitation to be friends through Facebook.

I learned that one of these cousins lived in New Orleans. Unfortunately, he passed as a young man - 51 - in 2002. It would have been great to have family here in NOLA. He was a professor at the University of New Orleans. (I haven't yet located his obituary...)

In any event, the father did medical research and was very highly regarded; I found this obituary about him through his wikipedia page. Interesting because we talked about the happiest places in America are here in Louisiana, where family and a support group makes you happy, not wealth. (Wait, I can't find that study... I thought I had written about it already. I will have to see what I can find and post it!)

Dr. Stewart Wolf Jr., who studied health of Roseto residents, dies at age 91

It was 42 years ago that Dr. Stewart Wolf Jr. took a close look at the people who lived in Roseto, determining their close family relationships gave them an edge to a healthier lifestyle and lessened their chance of having fatal heart attacks.

Wolf, who worked until his mid-80s, died Sept. 24 in Oklahoma City. He was 91.

His 1963 study, which detailed why Rosetans had fewer heart attacks than people in nearby communities, brought him professional praise and brought Roseto international recognition.

His daughter, Angeline Wolf Gloria, and son, Thomas Wolf, have kept their roots in Upper Mount Bethel Township, both living on or near their father's famed research facility on Totts Gap Road.

But the doors have closed at the Totts Gap Institute that Wolf founded in 1958 to bring together the concepts and findings of biomedical and behavioral sciences.

"Father was not able to pass the torch on to a single person who would be able to take charge in the direction he had originally planned for it," Gloria said Friday.

Through his 60-year medical career, Wolf was affiliated with medical, clinical and research departments at the University of Oklahoma, Cornell University Medical School, the University of Texas Medical Branch and St. Luke's Hospital-Fountain Hill.

Gloria said although Totts Gap is closed, its assets were given to the Warren Foundation at the Oklahoma University School of Medicine in Tulsa, Okla.

"They matched 150 percent our contribution, which was about $1.5 million," Gloria said. "It is being used to establish the Stewart Wolf Scholar Trust to benefit a student, doing specific research, for one year."

A couple of years before his death, his daughter said, the Stewart Wolf Endowed Chair was established by the Oklahoma University Health and Science Alumni Foundation.

The Wolf children may not have had a father who played ball with them because of his extensive travel and working hours, but they did not feel deprived.

Gloria said her father was a busy man, who, like his own mother, felt travel was vital to their upbringing.

"His mother took he and his siblings to Europe in the summer," Gloria said, "and he replicated that for us."

When the children were young, Wolf took them; his older brother, George, who died in 2002; and their mother, Virginia, to Paris where they lived for a year while he did his research.

When the children were in their late teens, they took turns traveling abroad with their father for his work.

That is Gloria's legacy from her father.

"One of the most important things our dad taught us was that travel was mind-expanding," she said. "I have held onto that, traveling all over the world in my career."

She and her husband of 15 years, Jim Gloria, have continue the tradition of traveling. They have adopted two children abroad, a son, now 12, from Russia, and a daughter, 8, from the Ukraine.

Gloria, who uses the name Gloria Wolf in her career as a professional dancer, teaches repertory dance theater in Allentown and at Bravo Dance in Scranton, and has taught at DeSales University. Her husband, an artist, teaches various forms of art at their home.

Thomas Wolf, who lives with wife Peggy and son on the Totts Gap property, serves as overseer for the grounds. A photographer, he worked with his father at the institute and in the laboratory as a computer engineer before it was closed.

After Wolf's famous Roseto study, he predicted that Rosetans would change as they became more "Americanized." A later study proved him correct: As residents moved away from their close-knit community, the heart disease statistics matched those of neighboring communities.

October 08, 2005|By Madeleine Mathias Of The Morning Call

Emma Morano

Emma Morano of Verbania, Italy, 116, has become the oldest woman in the world, after the death of Susannah Mushatt Jones of New York City, who was also 116. Morano attributes her long life span to her decision to leave an unhappy marriage to a dominating man in 1938. She may be the last living person on Earth born in the 19th century.
Associated Press

Taken from the Week Magazine...



Lovely to see the beautiful portrait next to her.