NOTICE: RIP, Georges Condominas

I’m deeply saddened to hear that the great anthropologist Georges Condominas, whose work has been an important influence in my own approach, has passed away. His amazing ethnographic style, on display in We Have Eaten the Forest, would have been sufficient to make him a master. But his thoughts on ritual, agriculture, religion, and ethnic identity (via the concept of emboîtement – ‘emboxment’) have influenced so many at this point, that his presence in the field is undoubtedly assured for a great while.

The Vietnamese Language Centre in Singapore has this excellent obituary.

Rest in Peace, Mr. Condominas.

The passing away of Georges Condominas is very sad news for all those who are interested in the study of Vietnamese culture and society. As an anthropologist he was recognized as a giant in the field in France and in Vietnam, but somehow less so in the English speaking world. ‘Condo’ was born in Vietnam in 1921 from a mixed background, went to Lycée in France in the 1930s and came back to Vietnam to study visual arts at the École des Beaux-Arts d … Read More

via VIETNAM LANGUAGE CENTRE IN SINGAPORE

RIP, Yoneo Ishii, great scholar of Southeast Asia

The great scholar and historian of Southeast Asia, Yosheo Ishii, has passed.  He passed on February 12, 2010, at the age of 81.  His published work on Buddhism in Thailand, including most especially his influential and magisterial work, Sangha, State, and Society.

A guru of Southeast Asian scholars, the great professor cultivated, encouraged, and influenced an enormous number of students, some of whom are themselves continuing this tradition of  generosity to their next generation. The memorials on the Thailand/Laos/Cambodia email list continue, and some of these scholars have made touching declarations, including this excerpt from one of my own teachers, Professor Charles Keyes of the University of Washington, who wrote touchingly that

Although Aj. Ishii has left behind his moral remains, his karmic legacy will continue to have very positive influences on generations of scholars of Thailand to come. I personally owe him a great debt for providing a model for being a student of Thai culture and history.

Rest in Peace, Ajaan Ishii.

RIP, Howard Zinn

The sad news is echoing around the interwebs, so very little is necessary here in the way of comment. Comrade, teacher, fellow worker, anti-imperialist, and decent human being Howard Zinn, has passed on. He was a heroic and decent inspiration to generations seeking a model of humane, radical opposition. From the Boston Globe obituary:

On his last day at BU, Dr. Zinn ended class 30 minutes early so he could join a picket line and urged the 500 students attending his lecture to come along. A hundred did.

Thank you, Howard.

• boingboing [also responsible for the photo]
• university diaries
• Democracy Now! show on the day after Howard’s Death

R.I.P, Svay Ken

Thanks to Jinja for putting this out at his blog. RIP, លោក​គ្រូ Svay Ken

Svay Ken

Gifted artist Svay Ken passed away today at the age of the age of 76.

[Above: self-portrait from The Advisor #4]

via Webbed Feet, Web Log » Blog Archive » Svay Ken: 1933 – 2008.

RIP Studs – 96 Years was not enough

Studs Terkel died a few days back, and I was unable to write about him at the time. Studs was an astonishing man – fearless and gentle, a fighter for the people, and unfraid of reporting, straightforwardly, what those people were like, no matter what that was. His style of oral history was driven, I thought, by a sense that people were smarter, and better, than anyone – including themselves – ever gave them credit for.

I met Studs only once – at a party/celebration dedicated to the martyrs of the Lincoln Brigades from the Spanish Revolution/Civil War – at the Hothouse Club in Chicago’s South Loop. I had no more than a moment to shake his hand and say thank you. He was already very elderly, but it was clear that he wanted to sit down with every person he made eye contact with, and a tape recorder, and tell their story.

His moral compass seemed always to run true, and when the United States was patting itself on the back for having once fought a ‘decent war,’ in World War II, Studs himself (who had served in the Army Air Force during that war) wrote a book which directly undermined the myth-making that was underway.

Here’s a link to 3 stories about the Angola 3, about which I’ve blogged once previously, that Studs would not have been afraid to tell. NPR is starting to tell it, decades too late. Goodbye Studs. You will be remembered in this month of memory. [see also Danny Fisher's tribute].

Below, find the 9-minute tribute video to Studs from Democracy Now!

more about “RIP Studs – 96 Years was not enough“, posted with vodpod

Is the Vietnamese Government Going to Try to Control Thich Huyen Quang's Funeral?

[via Danny Fisher's blog]

“Thich Huyen Quang gave up his liberty for 30 years in a quest for greater human rights and religious freedom in Vietnam,” said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “His followers should be allowed to pay their last respects without government interference, at a ceremony of their own choosing.”

The UBCV plans to hold funeral services for Thich Huyen Quang on July 11 at Nguyen Thieu Monastery in Binh Dinh province. Thich Quang Do – the patriarch’s deputy, close associate, and likely successor – will preside over the ceremony. However, the Vietnamese government has already taken steps to wrest control over the funeral and the patriarch’s legacy by announcing that the proceedings will be organized by the state-sanctioned Vietnam Buddhist Church. Government-controlled media has run vitriolic denunciations of Thich Quang Do, accusing him and “extremist elements disguised as Buddhist monks” of plotting “devious schemes” to exploit the patriarch’s death for political purposes. On July 6 the state television station, VTV1, broadcast a statement saying: “Confronting the immoral actions of the Quang Do group, the students and disciples [of Thich Huyen Quang], as well as the genuine monks of Nguyen Thieu Monastery, have vehemently reacted and they are determined not to let the Quang Do group organize the funeral ceremonies.”

“The Vietnamese government is risking unnecessary confrontation with the patriarch’s followers by trying to control him in death as in life,” Adams said.

You’d think governments would have learned at this point. While an uncontrolled funeral may spiral into a situation that challenges their control, interference in a funeral is almost guaranteed to do so. see also, Katherine Verdery, The Political Lives of Dead Bodies.

RIP, Fellow Worker Bruce "U. Utah" Phillips

Bruce “U. Utah” Phillips has passed, dying of the congestive heart failure that had plagued him for nearly a decade, and which had destroyed his ability to tour and make a living. For a guy who works on death for a living, and writes obituaries for ‘fun,’ you might imagine I would deal better with the passing of Utah Phillips than I have.

It’s true, I haven’t broken down in tears, or called all my friends, but losing the Golden Voice of the American Southwest and a fifty-year member of my union, the IWW – which Utah claimed was the only organization he’d ever encountered that “never broke faith with its elders;” something I’m particularly proud of. I believe he was the only individual ever issued a ‘lifetime membership card’ in the One Big Union. Utah also met with a number of our local members here in the Twin Cities about a year ago, when he performed at a benefit. I was, unfortunately, not among them

As a folk singer (he started out playing the Hawaiian ‘traditional’ music popular during his youth), he has been tremendously influential. It is possible that bigger names – Pete Seeger, etc. – had more influence on an individual generation, but it would be difficult to find a person whose influence passed more effectively to the current generation.

His most famous song is one of his funniest – “Moose Turd Pie,” which you can hear on youtube.

One of the best introductions to who Utah was as a political person and a human being was rebroadcast on DemocracyNow! today, which dedicated nearly its entire hour to remembering Utah.

Want to learn more about his music? Buy a copy of Starlight On The Rails, which is not only a nearly comprehensive catalog of his music, but includes a spoken introduction to each and every song on the album, in true folksinger style.

Utah is survived by his family, to whom I send my condolences and best wishes that humanity will soon realize the dream of peace, freedom, and true democracy – anarchy – to which Utah dedicated his life. I’m deeply grateful to Utah, and miss him already.

Utah’s official website

Utah’s Last Public Letter

Here is the family’s obituary (after the jump…)

Letter of Condolence To Roxanna Brown's Family

From the Thailand/Laos/Cambodia Studies group list:

Dear Family, Friends, and Colleagues of Dr. Roxanna Brown,

When a great and good person is taken from us, the shock calls upon us to freeze the daily whirl of activities and face an irreparable loss in our lives.

Your sister, your mother, your daughter, Roxanna Maude Brown was such a person. She touched so many lives over the course of her own. A growing chorus of admiration and affection attests to the broad reach of her life and work.

Roxanna’s journey took her from the role of journalist, the conscience of a nation,
documenting from the ground the unfolding tragedy of Vietnam, to her discovery of what
would be her life’s work buried literally beneath her feet: the ceramics of Southeast
Asia. More than once her pursuit of ceramics study through the countryside of Southeast Asia aroused the suspicion of the forces locked in mortal combat swirling around her. Amidst the horror of war, it must have been hard for them to see the innocence of her search for kilns and shards.

RIP, Roxanna Brown

Roxanna Brown, director of the Southeast Asian Ceramics Museum in Thailand, and a person who, along with two or three others, is supposed to have ‘created the field of Southeast Asian Ceramics,’ has died in strange circumstances in the custody of Federal US agents.

She had been indicted on one count of wire fraud, in which she was alleged to have allowed others to use her electronic signature on faked appraisal forms, which inflated the values of pieces that were being sent to US museums from Ban Chiang, one of the most important archaeological sites in mainland Southeast Asia.

Her family immediately and aggressively began to turn the tables on the officials: they pointed out that Brown had been so ill, with something resembling the flu, that her initial court appearance had been postponed.

An autopsy was performed by the King County Medical Examiner’s Office on Wednesday. Results were not immediately available but her brother, Fred Brown, of Chicago, told The Associated Press she appeared to have had a heart attack.

Mr Brown said his sister maintained she was innocent, and he blamed the stress of her arrest for her death.

“She wasn’t in good health to begin with, but they definitely brought on the heart attack,” he said. [link]

There’s a lot more that’s been being written on the academic lists for regional studies, and undoubtedly much much more in the coming days.

My deep condolences to Ms. Brown’s family, friends, colleagues and admirers.

Democracy Now! has a brief headline mention of Ms. Brown’s passing as well.

RIP, Abe Osheroff

Abe, you remain a hero. We love you.