Wishing for What We Already Have
by Robin Nixon
Genewatch, May-June 2007
“This spring, 450 acres of Kansas will be planted with rice that has been modified to contain human genes. It will look much like any normal field of rice, but the biotechnological innovation within each stalk is being sold as if it were magic from the Land of Oz. Essentially, the Kansas field will be a factory. The machinery is the rice plant itself. The inputs are human genes. The outputs are human proteins — lactoferrin and lysozyme — normally found in breast milk and other secretions, such as tears…” [read more]

Out Came the First Coming Out Play
by Laurence Senelick
The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide, May-June 2007
“‘Outing’ in our sense comes on stage with the homosexual law-reform movements. In several German plays of the early twentieth century, characters are ‘outed’ involuntarily. From Ludwig Dilsner’s Jasmine Blossoms (1899) to Reinhart Kluge’s Who Is to Blame? (1923), the exposure of the protagonist’s homosexuality is effected by blackmail or vice-squad raids or the maneuvers of jilted lovers. It is a traumatic and embarrassing experience that blights one’s life. The upshot is almost invariably suicide. Although the goal of these plays was to enlighten the general public as to the sorry lot of those with ‘contrary sexual feelings,’ the effect upon the homosexual individual was probably a determination to stay under wraps.

It is therefore surprising to find a play about coming out, in the current sense, on the Dutch stage shortly after the First World War…” [read more]

Mommas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Pollute: Quick, Summer Reads
Check out these hot summer reads picked by The Green Guide editors.

It’s not ugly, but it is BIG!

The Big Ugly Review, Issue 6, “The Body Issue” includes:

Fiction by Peter Orner, Mary Kolesnikova, Wendy Van Landingham, Mark MacNamara, Kristina Moriconi, Chad Morgan, Angela Marino, RG McCartney, Sabrina Tom, Michelle Morrison

Non-fiction by Laura Fraser, Joe Loya, Derek Patton Pearcy, Mimi Ghez, Laura Barcella, Andy Raskin

Poetry by John M. Anderson, Amanda Field, Denise Dooley, Grey Held, Edward Smallfield

Music by Audrey Howard, Sez Giulian, Thomas Kilts, Vanessa Peters

Photo essays by Daniel Hernandez, Stephanie Gene Morgan

Film by Kia Simon (*the most absorbingly gorgeous four minutes you could spend staring at the computer today – trust me – open in your own player to watch full screen for best effect)

Whew! Big!

“Dear Friends,
As much as it breaks our hearts to write these words, the final issue of Punk Planet is in the post, possibly heading toward you right now. Over the last 80 issues and 13 years, we’ve covered every aspect of the financially independent, emotionally autonomous, free culture we refer to as “the underground.” In that time we’ve sounded many alarms from our editorial offices: about threats of co-optation, big-media emulation, and unseen corporate sponsorship. We’ve also done everything in our power to create a support network for independent media, experiment with revenue streams, and correct the distribution issues that have increasingly plagued independent magazines. But now we’ve come to the impossible decision to stop printing, having sounded all the alarms and reenvisioned all the systems we can. Benefit shows are no longer enough to make up for bad distribution deals, disappearing advertisers, and a decreasing audience of subscribers.”

Read more as to why and what next: Punk Planet

By one of NewPages contributors, Sheheryar Badar Sheikh:

-struck life
I.
Watch the walk, especially the strut, jingle. Hear the curious tinktink of coins, metallic sound in his pocket like rhythm. He lingers in air, suspended, arced in step suspended still in air suspended like air like substance in air. The god in him set to roast out the truth and go deeper until evaporation, until rain. Broad shoulders, cool expanse swarthy balmy calm sea, his shoulders the morph of a sun’s arc. Hear jingle, see arcs, see strut, see rhythm in flesh, the timing. Sunchoked sun split sunblonde, dancer in walks sunkissed. Almost god, mostly sun, younger brother of the murderer.

Read the rest: Cricket Online Review

How the News Media Handicap Those with Disabilities
by Susan M. LoTempio

“It’s a good month when the usual reporting on disability is balanced by even a single good story. Those months are few and far between, but in May The New York Times gave me reason to hope that thoughtful, stereotype-free stories about people with disabilities can actually see the light of day.

But before we get to that, let’s first note a few high-profile media events that took place in May that illustrate the status quo…”

Read the rest and other articles on Poynter Online: Everything You Need to be a Better Journalist.

From one of NewPages own review writers, Andrew Madigan:

Dale’s faded bluejeans

are getting tighter
so the brass zippertop buckles
and his coconut-hairy beergut
flaps over like a fanny pack
[…]

Read the rest online at Bath House

The Barcelona Review, June – August 2007

13 June 2007
Chinua Achebe, the father of modern African writing, wins 2007 Man Booker International Prize.

“The Man Booker International Prize is worth

For an anthology of contemporary poetry on girlhood aimed at high school and college level readers, co-editors Arielle Greenberg and Becca Klaver seek submission of poems on or relevant to any aspect of the experience of girlhood, from childhood to young adulthood by poets with at least one published or forthcoming poetry collection from a nationally-distributed press.

For more information: Switchback Books

The War on Dandelions
by John A. Johnson

“The lawn is a symbol that humankind, with its big brains, has fought nature for survival, and won. And because nature got it wrong the first time, we’re re-making it the right way. The idea is that we take nasty, ‘undeveloped’ land, and reshape it, groom it, and reconfigure it into proper, ‘developed’ land, which can be sold for a nice chunk of change. Sans dandelions, of course…”

More serious irreverence can be found at Eat the State! A Forum for Anti-Authoritarian Political Opinion, Research and Humor.

Bono, I Presume? Covering Africa Through Celebrities
By Julie Hollar
Extra! May/June 2007

“Africa is sexy and people need to know that,” declared U2 singer Bono (New York Times, 3/5/07), promoting his new (RED) line of products that propose to save Africa one iPod at a time.

Celebrity interest in Africa is not particularly new, but today more stars than ever seem to be converging upon the continent, with television crews seldom far behind. But, as Bono clearly understands, what media tend to find sexy about Africa is not Africa itself, but the stars like himself who have taken up causes in the region. In television news in particular, with its typically cursory treatment of subjects and emphasis on the visual, African countries and issues are to a striking degree seen through the prism of celebrity.

Read this and more from Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) at Extra! online.

Jerome Anthology Call for Submissions
Milkweed Editions seeks works of short fiction for an anthology to be published in fall 2008. The editors hope to solicit work suggestive of the increasingly diverse and multicultural nature of Minnesota, and the volume’s publication is timed to mark the sesquicentennial of the founding of the state. Authors must be residents of Minnesota, and may not have more than one previous book-length publication. Unpublished writers and writers of color are encouraged to submit manuscripts for consideration. All contributors will receive an honorarium of at least $500 (the final amount to be determined according to the number of contributors included).

For more information visit Milkweed Editions.

Wax Poetic
“This is the first in a three-part series from Nublu founder and band leader Ilhan Ersahin’s Wax Poetic project. On this record, there’s a subdued Northern European energy creeping through the rocky, Garbage-esque tracks. This series will take Ersahin to different countries to collaborate with its musicians. Next up is ‘Wax Poetic Istanbul,’ followed by ‘Wax Poetic Brasil.'”

The online sampler for Copenhagen includes two music videos and two songs, and for Istanbul and Brasil, two songs each. Full album available for purchase via Amazon and iTunes. Worth the Quicktime download to check this smack out!

Malik Rahim: Spreading Common Ground
An interview with the cofounder of New Orleans’ Common Ground Collective
by Doug Pibel

Doug: What has the experience of Common Ground taught you about how communities can learn to act together?
Malik: I’m going to tell you, that’s the reason why I continue on. Not only has it taught me what we can do, it has shown me the true greatness of this nation. Yes we are a rich nation; yes we are one of the most powerful nations. But, the greatness of our nation is not in our government—it is in our people. I have seen the essence of that greatness in those who made sacrifices to come down to help us in our time of need.

Read the rest of this interview and more on Yes! Magazine, Summer 2007 Issue: Latin America Rising.

Truman State University, Division of Language and Literature
Two Positions: English/Creative Writing – Temporary Instructor or Temporary Assistant Professor (posted 6/12/07)

MS: What message, if any, do you have for the several thousand people who are going to graduate this year with MFAs?
BH: Remember that, when I say I want my root beer without ice, I mean it.

Read the full interview in Gulf Coast, Volume 19 Number 2, Summer/Fall 2007, where you’ll find more humor as well as insight in response to questions such as:
MS: So many poets are rushing to get that first book out, spending hundreds of dollars on contests and reading fees. Do you believe this is the best way for young poets to get noticed?
and
MS: Some of your newer poems seem to be much more meditative and less “witty” than your earlier work. Also, I’ve been told that you are trying to turn away from this perception of you being a “funny” poet. Is this true” If so, what do you find troubling about being called a “funny” poet?

Muckraking Around the Globe
“BBC investigative reporter and international gadfly Greg Palast has dug into many critical stories in recent years—particularly those, like the vulture funds saga (see Palast’s article in the current issue of D&S), that lie at the intersection of political decision-making and corporate greed. Dollars & Sense recently interviewed Palast about the sometimes-surprising appraisals that he offers in his latest book, Armed Madhouse, which came out in a revised paperback edition in April.”

Also from the current issue of Dollars and Sense and available online:

The Homeownership Myth by Howard Karger
A contrarian asks whether homeownership really benefits low-income families.

The Real Political Purpose of the ICE Raids by David Bacon
Using immigration raids as a pressure tactic to get Congress to approve new guest worker programs is not a legitimate use of enforcement.

Fidelity and Genocide by Chris Sturr
Activists are calling on Fidelity and other investment houses to divest from Chinese oil companies that help fund the killing in Darfur.

Check out the National Coalition Against Censorship Newsletter: Censorship News, No. 104. Available online and as PDF, “NCAC’s newsletter, published quarterly, contains information and discussion about freedom of expression issues, including current school censorship controversies, threats to the free flow of information, and obscenity laws.” In this issue:

A Minor History of Miniature Writing
By Joshua Foer
Cabinet Magazine Online
“Miniature book collector George Salomon of Paris disperses his seven-hundred-title collection, a library that reportedly “could be carried in a moderate-sized portmanteau.” His spirit lives on today in the Miniature Book Society, an organization whose interests extend only to printed works three inches or smaller.”

Read the article and see images of miniature writing through history on Cabinet Magazine Online.

Poetry Northwest Web Exclusive
“On March 21, 2007, in Portland, some 400 people crammed the sold-out Wonder Ballroom to hear to hear the former poet laureate speak, read poems, & launch the Music Issue. Robert Pinsky condemned educational administrators who want to break the chain of culture by cutting funding to music, arts, & creative writing programs. ‘Woe unto them,’ said Pinsky, who also read recent & new poems, & closed the night with an electrifying reading of John Keats’s hymn to music & poetry, ‘Ode to a Nightingale.'”

Listen to an excerpt (apprx 45min) of this performance lecture on Poetry Northwest.

Love’s Labour Lost?: Working for a sustainable alternative press
By Nicole Cohen
Briarpatch Magazine
June/July 2007

“I don’t recall the exact moment I became skeptical of the term labour of love, but I do remember the day it began feeling like an inappropriate descriptor for Shameless, the independent, feminist magazine for teens I co-founded in 2003 and edited until recently.
[. . .]
While it is critical for media activists to talk seriously about the business of producing alternative media and to find innovative ways to boost circulation, it is dangerous to believe that the only way to become commercially viable is to make content more mainstream. Alternative media exist to disseminate an oppositional or radical stance, and the development of creative, sustainable business models should centre on strengthening that goal, not abandoning it.”

Read the rest of the article HERE, with Cohen’s assessment as well as advice for small, independents who wish to remain alternative.

The June 2007 issue of Dark Sky Magazine is now online, featuring literature by Jenny Steele, Michael Phillips, Charlie Geer, Meredith Doench, Jack Emery, Martin Brick, Luke Boyd, Richard O’Connell, Richard O’Connell, Louise Snowden, Rupert Fike, John Grey, and artwork by Elizabeth Cadwell, Isabel Barnes, Miranda Clark.

From “Bend” by Meredith Doench:

I.
“No one’s ever loved me before. People have told me they did, like my mom. But she only said so when I’d done something to please her, or after she’d had too much to drink or smoke. So when Alison Rogers said, Nicole, I love you, I cried harder than I’ve ever cried before. And the weird thing was Alison cried too, hugging me close, her tears getting the shoulder of my old t-shirt wet and warm.

Now the staff at Lakeridge Psychiatric Center would have called this inappropriate touch between patients, so we were wedged tight into the cubby hole of a maintenance closet that someone left open while getting a mop. I could hear…”

Read and see much more on Dark Sky Magazine.

Sustaining Change from the Middle Ground
James Biggar and Michael M’Gonigle
Alternatives Journal Online, April 2007

“‘Climate porn.’ That’s how the Institute for Public Policy Research in Britain depicts the portrayal of the climate crisis by media and governments. In the organization’s report, ‘Warm Words,’ the authors claim the apocalyptic and external framing of global warming convinces the public that climate change is inevitable and therefore beyond human control. In the context of that frame, appeals for changes in individual behaviour, such as the Liberals’ One Tonne Challenge and the endless ‘Ten Things you Can Do’ lists, seem pretty lame, even to advocates. After all, how many times can a dutiful bicyclist be squeezed into the curb by a lumbering SUV before she feels there is no point to her action?”

Read the rest of the article at: Alternative Journal Online

From “Movie Marathon” by Alonso Duralde, The Advocate, June 4, 2007:

“Well, it’s June again, and for many cable networks that means it’s time to mark Pride Month with a halfhearted rerun of every notable post-1990 queer film they can get their hands on. But leave it to Turner Classic Movies to dig deeply into its vaults for ‘Screened Out: Gay Images in Film,’ a 44-film series running Mondays and Wednesdays all month long. Based on Richard Barrios’s book Screened Out: Playing Gay in Hollywood from Edison to Stonewall, the series offers a varied look at gay characters in American film: from swishy supporting roles (mostly banished from the screen after the Hays Code went into effect) to butch prison matrons to seductive, unscrupulous, exotic inverts of any gender.”

For more on this, see the rest of Alonso Duralde’s article on The Advocate.

Photography After the Flood
By Nicolaus Mills
Dissent Magazine, Spring 2007

A review and commentary on the photography of Robert Polidori:

“Robert Polidori’s photographs of New Orleans challenge our sense of how the world is supposed to look. Cars stand upside down. Uprooted trees rest on houses. In contrast to the familiar photos of bombed-out Hiroshima, where everything but the walls of a few buildings lies flattened on the ground, Polidori’s post-flood New Orleans is a collage of random disorder. Nothing is where it should be.”

Read the review/commentary and view the photos at Dissent Magazine.

“Founded in 1876, Appalachia is the Appalachian Mountain Club’s mountaineering and conservation journal, published twice a year in June and December.

Appalachia welcomes nonfiction submissions on the following topics: hiking; trekking; rock climbing; canoeing and kayaking; nature; mountain history and lore; and conservation. We recommend reading a sample issue before submitting materials.

Writers should submit unsolicited material by December 1 for the June issue, and by June 1 for the December issue.

Original poems about the above topics are also welcome. Shorter poems are preferred. Only eight poems are published per issue, which makes this the most competitive section of the journal; on average, one in 50 submissions is accepted.”

For more information, visit Appalachia online.

HRIC Supports Campaign to Free Golden Pen of Freedom Recipient Shi Tao
June 05, 2007

“Human Rights in China (HRIC) congratulates imprisoned Chinese journalist Shi Tao and his family on his receiving the 2007 Golden Pen of Freedom on June 4 at the opening ceremony of the World Newspaper Congress (WNC) and World Editors Forum (WEF).

The Golden Pen of Freedom, established in 1961 and awarded by the Paris-based World Association of Newspapers, is an annual award recognizing individuals who have made an outstanding contribution to the defense and promotion of press freedom.

Shi Tao’s mother, Gao Qinsheng, accepted the award on her son’s behalf, thanking everyone for not forgetting Shi Tao, and stating that her son had ‘only done what a courageous journalist should do.'”

Read the full article at HRIC.

THE NEW VERSE NEWS covers the news and public affairs with poems on issues, large and small, international and local. It relies on the submission of poems (especially those of a politically progressive bent) by writers from all over the world.

The editors update the website every day or two with the best work received.

See the website at http://www.newversenews.com for guidelines and for examples of the kinds of poems THE NEW VERSE NEWS publishes.

Thought you recognized those lines tucked into Million Dollar Baby? Now you can know for sure!

Poetry in Movies: A Partial List
Created/Edited by Stacey Harwood

Michigan Quarterly Review is featuring this list “of the appearance of recognizable, often canonical, poems, or excerpts from poems, in mainly American and British sound films. The catalog is necessarily incomplete; readers are invited to submit new entries to the journal at [email protected] or to Stacey Harwood at [email protected]. The filmography will be revised and updated regularly.”