FILM: Challenging 500 Years of Globalisation
By Lucy Komisar
NEW YORK - To end poverty, you have to know how it began - with globalisation. No, not the 20th century variety engendered by multinationals and their friends at the IMF, World Bank and WTO. They just codified practices that kept developing countries poor.
MORE >>

ARGENTINA: 'Grandma, Will You Read to Me?'
By Marcela Valente
BUENOS AIRES - "Moving," "rewarding," "therapeutic" are some of the terms used to describe their volunteer work by some of the women taking part in the Storytelling Grandmothers Programme aimed at awakening a love of reading among youngsters from poor families in Argentina.
MORE >>

CHILE: Women in Arms
By Daniela Estrada
SANTIAGO - The official version of Chilean history renders women’s political participation "invisible" and relegates them to a secondary or anecdotal role, says journalist Cherie Zalaquett, author of a new book, "Chilenas en armas" (Chilean Women in Arms).
MORE >>

ECUADOR: Oil Giant Is Gone, Legal and Environmental Mess Remains
By Matthew Berger
WASHINGTON - The story began almost 40 years ago, but when filmmaker Joe Berlinger "saw villagers eating canned tuna fish because the fish in their rivers were too contaminated to eat, [he] knew [he] had to do something".
MORE >>

CHILE: Fashion Finds Green Style
By Daniela Estrada*
SANTIAGO - Young Chilean designers are turning their creative energy to recycling, natural fibres and working with disadvantaged groups as they produce clothing and accessories - but it is an effort that is not free of tensions.
MORE >>

PORTUGAL: Bible Is "A Catalogue of Cruelties," Says Saramago
By Mario de Queiroz
LISBON - After a nearly two-decade truce, Portuguese Nobel literature laureate José Saramago has returned to the charge against the Catholic Church. This time his target is the Bible itself, which he describes as "a manual of bad morals," and a "catalogue of cruelties and of the worst of human nature."
MORE >>

FILM: The Man Is Steel, the Tank Is Only Iron
By Matteo Fracassi
NEW YORK - "War is not made by heroes or Hollywood studs," says director Samuel Maoz. "War is mostly made by young and inexperienced guys. Children that are sent to go after and kill the ones they used to play with. That's what this really is about."
MORE >>

Q&A: Africans Won’t Just Be on Receiving End of Arts and Culture
By Christi van der Westhuizen interviews MIKE VAN GRAAN, playwright and activist
CAPE TOWN - Global initiatives have in recent years stressed the contribution that arts and culture can make to development. This has led African and European artists, bureaucrats and policy makers to increasingly confront the unequal relations in North-South cultural and artistic exchanges.
MORE >>

EL SALVADOR: An Indigenous Language That Refuses to Die
By Edgardo Ayala
SAN SALVADOR - "Yek shiajfikan" reads a sign hanging above the gate of the "Dr. Mario Calvo Marroquín" elementary school in the Salvadoran town of Izalco, welcoming pupils in Nawat, the language that was spoken by the area’s native communities.
MORE >>

Q&A : The Desire To Be An Outsider
By Moses Magadza interviews MEMORY CHIRERE about the legacy of writer Dambudzo Marechera
WINDHOEK - "The old man died beneath the wheels of the twentieth century. There was nothing left but stains, bloodstains and fragments of flesh... And the same thing is happening to my generation." - Dambudzo Marechera, House of Hunger
MORE >>

Next >>