It’s getting tense over at the Khmer Rouge Tribunal (ECCC)

So, Things are getting a bit intense over at the Khmer Rouge Tribunal (Extraordinary Chambers of the Courts of Cambodia).  Newish Co-Investigating Judge Siegfried Blunk, whose go-it-alone style and brusque treatment of pre-existing staff at the courts has not made him a lot of friends there, talked in his typical style to the Phnom Penh Post yesterday.  He had this to say about Professor Steve Heder’s departure from the staff of the Extraordinary Chambers:

After the contract of this consultant was not renewed by our Office for certain reasons, he obviously had an axe to grind, and in a toxic letter tried to portray the termination of his contract as his “resignation” levelling all sorts of allegations at our Office. He would be well advised to bear in mind his post-contractual obligations.

This is a very serious accusation against Professor Steve Heder.  Judge Blunk essentially accuses Heder of attempting to sabotage the progress of the tribunal for reasons limited to personal satisfaction of employment. Not cool, if true.  But Heder deserves a great deal of confidence here.  Heder is the author, along with Brian Tittemore, of “Seven Candidates for Prosecution: Accountability for the Crimes of the Khmer Rouge.” Published in 2001, this paper must be considered the most influential and significant published contribution to the prosecution of Khmer Rouge leaders prior to the convening of the ECCC.

The departure appears to have something to do with the way in which the important term “those most responsible” for the crimes of the Khmer Rouge. This term is important because “those most responsible” are the ones who will be charged. So the way in which the term is defined for the purposes of the court will determine how many people will eventually be tried in the courts.  Heder discusses this obliquely in a short article here, and in a longer article titled A Review of the Negotiations Leading to the Establishment of the Personal Jurisdiction of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, available here.

Heder’s contributions are significant, in other words. That’s not just my opinion, but obviously shared not only by historians of the Khmer Rouge, but also by other ECCC observers, like David Scheffer, here.

Whatever the actual situation behind Heder’s departure from the Chambers, his response to Blunk’s public shot across the bow probably didn’t lower the temperature. After rehearsing his account of the events behind his departure, he responds directly to Blunk’s threat:

As for my post-contractual obligations, I continue to reserve the right of reply to any inaccurate or misleading information published about my work for the ECCC, such as this statement by Judge Blunk, who would be well advised to get his facts straight.

The whole letter is here, and worth a read.

 

Quote: A Few Nice Thoughts From Roy Rappaport

Working on some of my thoughts on Ritual and Imagination right now, and it’s always good to go back to Mr. Rappaport. Here are some good quotes from, and about, his thought:

“The nature of humanity…is that of a species that lives and can only live, in terms of meanings it itself must fabricate in a world devoid of intrinsic meanings but subject to physical law.” (Ritual and Religion, 451)

Roy defines ritual as “the performance of more or less invariant sequences of acts and utterances not entirely encoded by the performers.” (Ritual and Religion, 24)

“The meaning of ritual’s informationlessness is certainty.” (Ritual and Religion, 285)

According to Rappaport, social truths are hierarchically organized so that “the ultimately sacred forms an unchanging ground upon which all else in adaptive social structures can change continuously without loss of orderliness.” (Ritual and Religion, 427)

“Rituals create conventional states of affairs and conventional understandings. Magic is the extension of the process ‘beyond the domain of the conventional in which it is effective into the domain of the physical where it is not.; A war can be ended by a properly conducted ritual of peace, but a drought cannot. However, the domains are hard to distinguish: ‘people occasionally die of witchcraft.’” (Ecology, meaning, religion, 191).

“[A]s Rappaport himself so ably argues, precisely because the cooperative act of symbolic communication enables – indeed demands (cf. Wagner 1981) – individuals’ continual invention of new meanings, ritual’s speechless form and performance persist within already established systems of symbolic communication as a way of defending ourselves from the arbitrary power of our own symbolic formulations to imagine alternatives, sanctify the inappropriate, and intentionally lie.” Watanabe and Smuts, (“Explaining Religion without….” 105)

Why am I interested?  I find in ritual a far less ‘noisy’ set of cultural ‘rules’ or ‘norms’ (I’m not being at all precise in my language here) than the discourses about such rituals – either emic or etic – could ever provide.  I am convinced that these basic sets of meaning, or certainty, are extremely generative and powerful, and construct themselves around particular sets of social closure, a topic I’ve begun to address – also unfortunately elliptically, which seems to be my curse – here.

The Role of Metrics in Racist Science

**Trigger Warning for those who find the predatory collection and scientific examination of human remains disturbing.**

Stephen J. Gould’s enormously influential book, The Mismeasure of Man, took on the most influential examples of racist science, ranging from IQ tests to phrenology. In this excellent book, he demolished the racist preconceptions of such science, and demonstrated convincingly that these pseudoscientific measures of racial intelligence (how big is cranial capacity, what’s the shape of the skull, etc.) were not only wrong in the details, but far more importantly, useless in proving their points: that intelligence is influenced by racial inheritance.

With the current rise in extreme right-wing, racialist ideology in the United States, and its increasing acceptance and popularity in the mass media, some academics have predictably joined the bandwagon, and are attempting to recuperate some of the most egregious examples of racist science.  Murray and Herrnstein tried this with IQ tests back in the 90s with their wildly popular and now debunked book The Bell Curve. Even stranger, these current academics are attempting to recuperate the work of Samuel G. Morton, grand head-collector of the racist science.

In earlier work of mine on the collection of Native American remains by museums and private collectors, I had an opportunity to examine an original edition of Morton’s Crania Americana, which included a hand-written note from Morton, encouraging the recipient of the book to collect as many Indian skulls as he could get his hands on, for Morton’s collection.

The report in question is “The mismeasure of science: Stephen J. Gould versus Samuel George Morton on Skulls and Bias.” published by PLoS Biology.  In this article, funded by the University of Philadelphia, whose museum houses Morton’s collection, the curators and physical anthropologists, almost all of whom currently work for the university or have a significant connection to it, remeasured the skulls in Morton’s collection.

Ignoring for a moment that these skulls should not be in this collection, but be repatriated to their descendants, their argument is both interesting and facile.  Having re-measured the skulls, they determine that Morton’s measurements were indeed correct.  They acknowledge that Morton was a racist, but argue that his measurements and science were sound, that Gould was the hostage of his own ‘anti-racist ideology’ (a strange phrase, that), and that his book should be repudiated.

Hogwash. I accept that Gould’s measurements may have been inaccurate, but that’s really neither here nor there: the larger point is that these measurements are understood to not have a relationship to intelligence.  The seemingly sympathetic statements made by these folks, including Janet Monge in the video below, are loaded with assertions and implications that ought to disturb not only other ‘anti-racist ideologists (like myself), but also scientists and teachers who would like to help people distinguish between evidence and conclusions.

There’s so much to say about this, but I’ll attempt to let this be enough.

In watching this, I *almost* feel sorry for Monge, who is standing in the front here, trying to defend racist conclusions from irrelevant metrics without sounding like a racist.  On the other hand, like Murray and Herrnstein’s best-seller The Bell Curve, the article has received enormously positive responses from academics and non-academics alike.

Now that it has apparently been shown that all non-African peoples are partially descended from Neanderthals, I wonder if the racists will adjust their positions, so that neanderthals will suddenly start to appear somehow smarter and more superior than full homo sapiens sapiens.

Cemetery Taboo discussed on Thinking Allowed

I’m a great fan of Laurie Taylor’s wonderful Radio Program “Thinking Allowed,” which reviews, on a weekly basis, recent sociological scholarship.  It’s  a great way to keep up on a wide variety of scholarship, when you are only generally interested. For instance, I just listened to a great show about the ‘chav’ stereotype in Britain, and how it is part of an overall demonization of working class culture.  They didn’t bring up the proposed etymology that the word ‘chav’ comes from Romani (aka, ‘gypsies’) word ‘chavo,’ or ‘Boy,’ and likely therefore began with an association between negative young working-class masculine behavior, and the nearly universally-despised Romani.  But that’s the sort of thing that make me keep listening.

But even better, sometimes they focus on something that is part of your primary focus. In my work, of course, that means either Cambodia, Buddhism, or Death. Or maybe Religion, or Ritual.  The podcast I just finished listening to was based on contemporary grave-side behavior and interviews, and continues the recent challenge to the received notion that there is a dominant ‘death taboo’ associated with impurity, decomposition, and contagion. Here’s the summary (second part of the paragraph deals with the part i’m interested in):

Cities are growing at an enormous rate all over the world. As they wrestle with overcrowding, pollution, resource vulnerability and an increasing gulf between the rich and poor what will be the dominant factor to define them? Which forces will shape the experience of urban life for the individual and will our imagination and creativity enable cities to survive into the future? The sociologist Sophie Watson and the geographer Matthew Gandy join Laurie Taylor to discuss the future of the city.
Also, the taboo of the body in the cemetery. Kate Woodthorpe reveals her research into what remains unmentionable at the graveside.

BBC – BBC Radio 4 Programmes – Thinking Allowed, Cemetery Taboo – The City.

Note: Star Trek Thoughts on Religion in The Next Generation

I previously noted that the “Star Trek Hypothesis” on religion (essentially, the Secularization thesis projected into the future) was a very consistent part of the Star Trek narrative world.  I also noted that this seemed to be more consistently true of the Original Series than of the Next Generation series. Really, I’m not a trekker, so this is all relatively new.  But, since posting that, I came across this brief gem of Lieutenant Worf (Klingon) describing his religion.  Takes a bit of a Nietzschean turn, I thought. And yes, it made me laugh.

Sounding on Cambodia for April 18, 2011

Happy Khmer New Year, everybody! សួស្តី ឆ្នាំ​ថ្មី! I’m a few days late of course, but my wishes are sincere for all of that.  May your upcoming year be full of health, success, happiness, and peace. I was not able, this year, to attend the awesome (and increasingly awesome) New Year’s events at my local Khmer temple – Wat Munisota [I can't ever say that name without wanting to point out how fantastically funny and smart the namers were: Munisota means (in Sanskrit and Khmer): "That which is heard from the sage" (the Dharma), but of course, it also sounds very much like "Minnesota," which was intentional. Brilliant, good humor], in spite of some excellent invitations.  But I’m hopeful I might be able to make it to the Madison temple‘s New Year celebration this coming Saturday.

In this week’s Sounding on Cambodia, I talk about:

• The 36th anniversary of the Fall of Phnom Penh, April 17, 1975 [The picture above is Lon Nol Buddhist-inspired propaganda which characterizes the communist insurgency as Vietnamese anti-Buddhist monsters, defeated by the power of Nang Thorani's hair in the scene of the Buddha's enlightenment].
• “Aid to Cambodia Rarely Reaches the People it’s Intended to Help,” by Joel Brinkley, and a review of Joel Brinkley’s new book, “Cambodia’s Curse,” by Elizabeth Becker
• PM Hun Sen rumored to have lung cancer – no confirmation

More after the jump…

South Korean Coffin Rejuvenation Ceremony

Looks like the new Pansukula ceremonies in Thailand are catching on elsewhere, though I have no idea if there’s any actual transmission, or if this is mere ‘morphic resonance.’

“Terrible Karma” Cambodian Female Garment Worker Song, with translation (via imagining the real world)

From a story by Uon Chin, Radio Free Asia, accessed on August 9, of a union rally in Phnom Penh, from July 25, of an estimate 5-7 thousand unionists.  A very sad song by female garment workers, titled "Terrible Karma."  I typed out the song lyrics, and have included a first attempt at a translation (I am a bit intimidated by poetic translation, and found some of the lines difficult; suggestions … Read More

via imagining the real world

The so-called ‘Ground Zero Mosque,’ and my letter to the Catholic Archdiocese of OKC

The furor surrounding Park51, the so-called “Ground Zero Mosque” (not at Ground Zero, not a mosque, etc.), shows no sign of abating.  Even some of my liberal acquaintances are joining in the game of religious intolerance, and playing games with the aspirations and lives of American Muslims.  I won’t spend any time refuting the Islamophobia, because from I can see, there is no talking to these people.

I have, however, written to the Archdiocese of the Catholic Church in Oklahoma City, and to St. Joseph’s Old Cathedral.  St. Joseph’s actually is a neighbor to the bombed Alfred P. Murrah building, destroyed by Christian Identity movement member, White Supremacist, and life-long Catholic, Timothy McVeigh, America’s most famous home-grown terrorist.  St. Joseph’s was permitted not only to repair and rebuild its beautiful Cathedral, but was even permitted to contribute a statue of a ‘Weeping Jesus’ to the memorial garden.  If that is acceptable, and I believe strongly that it is, and indeed is a positive thing, then the Catholic Church should stand up and make its voice heard in defense of Park 51.  Now.

Jesus Wept.

After the jump, you can read my letter to the diocese and the Church. I encourage all readers to send similar letters to them.  Please be polite.

Cambodia Sounding for August 16, 2010

Some stories I’ve been following lately, or that just caught my eye:

Lower Mekong Archaeology Project (LoMAP) gets some more much-deserved attention from Bora Touch, whose original article, “The Mekong Delta Before Angkor: origins, landscapes and emergent complexity,” was retitled in their classically nationalistic style here. Very much worth a read.

The Mirror, a Cambodian Newspaper translation blog online, run by Norbert Klein, has been doing its important work more frequently, and with more precision, sometimes lining of a sort of “We Said/They Said” set of quotes to attempt to set stories straight, among other crucial issues.  Go check them out and subscribe to the feed. Some stories from the Mirror recently:

• Cambodian People’s Party Officials were Accused to be behind the creation of reservoirs
• The arrest of journalists is worrying
• and an editorial, “Words can reveal, or obscure.”

And just for fun, some local Christian group in California has received its 15 minutes of fame and made lots of self-aggrandizing comments about their work.  Check it out here, in “Christians Fight Evils For Kids In Cambodia.”  Since I just accidentally ran across some particularly awful manuals for missionization of Sino-Khmer in Cambodia, this struck me as just dumb and rude, but perhaps I’m over-reacting.