Inherit the Stars

Although we usually avoid some hard science fiction, Hogan's Inherit the Stars throws a number of intriguing scientific mysteries at the reader that are bound to pique everyone's interest. Humans in the late 2020s, beginning to expand beyond the Moon, uncover the remains of a man who died 50,000 years ago. A team of various scientists, linguists, and other specialists, operating under a department of UNSA, begin to investigate what turns out to be the origins of Charlie (the deceased man whose belongings and body is subjected to various tests, revealing him to be essentially human). Anyone familiar with the well-worn tropes of science fiction may guess where this is heading, but Hogan's story handles it well through the likable protagonist, Hunt, an English specialist who is able to collate information from various specialist departments. His willingness to think outside the box make him invaluable, although the novel nicely preserves one of its largest revelations to Danchekker, a biologist who was once an "enemy" of sorts to Hunt. The main flaw appears in the plot, which is advanced through Hunt or others encountering and rethinking conceptualizing evidence after getting stumped. But at one point, the plot inexplicably jumps forward after Hunt accepts Caldwell's secretary's idea of a calendar found in the papers of Charlie. This is somehow followed by sudden leap forward to the cracking of much of the "Lunarian" language and their origins on a planet called Minerva. This sudden advance in the plot is a bit rushed, although the overall novel is a "fun" exploration of a scientific mystery. Even the conclusion in which northern Sudan appears to have played an important role in human history was done well and humorously (Hogan's sense of humor is delightful here).

Lakay

Although we are not usually adept at keeping up with Haitian-American endeavors in animation, we found Lakay to be an interesting project. Better than Laguerre's effort, which was really aimed for a much younger audience, Lakay includes a nice homage to Cap-Haitien and one Haitian-American beginning to understand our homeland. It is also nice to hear most of the dialogue is in Haitian Creole rather than English.

RIP Sonny Rollins

Although it is inevitable that many of the legends of our music have died or will die due to their advanced age, losing them is akin to the loss of the immediately recognizable titans in the field. While jazz will never die, the deaths of our legends brings a sadness. Who will be the future saxophone colossus? And what of the Haiti connection of Sonny Rollins? The vast biography of Rollins published a few years ago scarcely explored the question.

Beauty and the Beast (Live)

So nice to hear one of Wayne Shorter's classic tunes performed live by young people. It really takes one back to the good ol' days. Although Native Dancer was never our favorite Shorter album, this tune always struck us as an effective melding of jazz and funk influences.

Shada

Whilst reading an article on SHADA by Matthew Smith, we were pleasantly reminded me this song by Trio Select quoted at the end. Somehow we did not connect the dots between SHADA and this composition when we first heard this song several years ago. Smith's article is also definitely worth reading for challenging the standard way SHADA has been presented by Haitian historians. Although there is much to criticize, the reality was more nuanced...

On the Kuisa

Something we have been thinking about lately is the so-called kuisa. An important part of the cohoba ritual since participants had to purge themselves before the ceremony, we have never heard this word kuisa before. It would be interesting to know where the Museo del Barrio found this word since we have not encountered any Spanish sources from the early colonial period using it. Was it taken from one of the dictionaries of Taino language revivalists?

From Oral to Written Expression in the Colonial Andes

From Oral to Written Expression: Native Andean Chronicles of the Early Colonial Period is a dense collection of short essays on indigenous chroniclers or history writers of colonial Peru. Some essays require familiarity with Quechua linguistics and oral literatures since the essayists seek to explore how indigenous worldviews, languages, and ideas shaped the production of chronicles or relations in Spanish. But also included among the indigenous writings is the Huarochiri Manuscript, written in a literary Quechua. Pictorial representations are also up for analysis, such as the in the famous work of Guaman Poma de Ayala or the work of Juan de Santa Cruz Pachacuti Yamqui Salcamayhua. Even Diego De Castro Titu Cusi Yupanqui is included among the indigenous chroniclers despite only dictating his words to another to tell a Vilcabamba Inca version of the Spanish conquest. Although dated (published in the early 1980s), this compilation presents an earlier phase in the academic analysis of indigenous chroniclers in the Andean world. Unlike Mexico or Mesoamerica, there were fewer indigenous chroniclers and a lack of a precolonial system of writing like Maya glyphs. Thus, the Andean response to the spread of writing after colonial conquest presents a different "high civilization" adapting writing for its own purposes. As "transitional" literature in the history of historical writings from Latin America, they represent both indigenous and Spanish/Western forms and traditions in a way that was perhaps inaccessible to individuals from distinct worlds. Adorno and Salomon express this quite clearly in the way, particularly the former, tries to juxtapose pictorial representations with an Andean view to elucidate symbolic (and ahistorical) sections of Guaman Poma's work.