UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH BLOGS
The Office of Undergraduate Research sponsors a number of grant programs, including the Circumnavigator Club Foundation’s Around-the-World Study Grant and the Undergraduate Research Grant. Some of the students on these grants end up traveling and having a variety of amazing experiences. We wanted to give some of them the opportunity to share these experiences with the broader public. It is our hope that this opportunity to blog will deepen the experiences for these students by giving them a forum for reflection; we also hope these blogs can help open the eyes of others to those reflections/experiences as well. Through these blogs, perhaps we all can enjoy the ride as much as they will.
EXPLORE THE BLOGS
- Linguistic Sketchbook
- Birth Control Bans to Contraceptive Care
- A Global Song: Chris LaMountain’s Circumnavigator’s Blog
- Alex Robins’ 2006 Circumnavigator’s Blog
- American Sexual Assault in a Global Context
- Beyond Pro-GMO and Anti-GMO
- Chris Ahern’s 2007 Circumnavigator’s Blog
- Digital Citizen
- From Local Farms to Urban Tables
- Harris Sockel’s Circumnavigator’s Blog 2008
- Kimani Isaac: Adventures Abroad and At Home
- Sarah Rose Graber’s 2004 Circumnavigator’s Blog
- The El Sistema Expedition
- The World is a Book: A Page in Rwand
Malaysia: “comfortable” without GMOs (for now)
Hello! Apologies for the delay in blogging. I just arrived in the Philippines and since I’m a country behind, I’ll update you on what I was up to in Malaysia last week. I spent a total of 10 days in Kuala Lumpur, where I spoke with a variety of researchers and met some great people from around the world.
While in KL I visited the country’s main public research hub, the Malaysian Agricultural Research and Development Institute (MARDI). Here they have a few projects to insert transgenic traits into local varieties of papaya. The main project that I want to discuss is a papaya that MARDI scientists are engineering to ripen up to 10 days later than usual, which will hopefully give it a longer shelf life and reduce waste due to spoilage. This project interested me because in most cases, seed companies develop biotech traits such as resistance to drought, insects and herbicide in order to benefit farmers. Some people argue that one reason consumers are skeptical of GMOs is that they don’t witness the direct benefit of the technology besides possibly lower food prices. On the other hand, delayed ripening papaya would affect all members of the value chain. With delayed ripening, it would be possible to sell Malaysian papayas in more distant markets such as the US, which would improve the price that farmers could fetch. Consumers would also enjoy fresher fruits.
As an environmentalist I’m a bit skeptical of the carbon cost of a trait that would allow my food to come from even farther away. At the same time, we currently waste approximately a third of the food we produce globally, which is a complete loss of resources with no benefit. It’s interesting to see an example of biotechnology being researched to address this issue, and is intriguing to think of other possibilities.
The delayed ripening papaya project is currently in the glasshouse field trials, meaning that it has a long way to go before it reaches farmers or markets. Papaya production in general is currently down in Malaysia because of a bacterial disease. MARDI scientists are also researching a trait for disease resistance, but haven’t even reached the field trial stage yet. Unlike the Ghanaian Bt Cowpea which will almost certainly become commercial next year, it’s unclear what will happen with GM papaya in Malaysia. The country currently imports foods containing GMOs, but they haven’t yet allowed for the cultivation of GM crops. The scientists that I spoke with said for now the country is “comfortable” without the technology, so it isn’t their institute’s main priority. When I met random Malaysians in the hostel or restaurants and said I was researching GMOs, most hadn’t even heard of them.
So while my time in Malaysia didn’t generate as juicy of controversy as my time in Argentina, I think it was still an important research stop because it shows that transgenic crops aren’t essential everywhere. The scientists at MARDI said that they’re already looking beyond current transgenic breeding techniques towards the cutting edge CRISPR-Cas9 system (In case you’re wondering, here’s an article explaining CRISPR-Cas9 pretty well. You should definitely understand this technology because it’s very new, interesting and powerful – they’ve already shown that it would be biologically possible to edit human embryos). The scientists said that with climate change, it may be more important to have these biotech tools in the future, so for now they need to begin ensuring that the public is comfortable with them.
Well, I’m going to leave it at that for now. Sorry if there are sentences in the post that don’t make sense… I’m exhausted from travel and staying up late the night before being worried about travel (have I mentioned I’m afraid of flying?). Tomorrow I’m meeting with scientists in the Philippines who research Golden Rice, which has been fortified with Vitamin A. It’s the classic story of GMO failure or success, depending on how you look at it. This is one of the projects I’ve been most excited to visit, but I’m sad that the trip is coming to a close.
Zombies, The Third Person, Intelligent Dancers, and Katherine Dunham
Monday, August 8 to Thursday, August 11 – “Island Possessed” and “A Touch of Innocence” by Katherine Dunham and “Kaiso!” (a collection of writings)
I’m putting all of Dunham together because the posts would never end if I didn’t.
On Monday, I had work in the morning and it was a wild day, so I stayed at home with my tea and read “Island Possessed.” On Tuesday, I worked out in the morning and spent the afternoon at Kafein. On Wednesday, I spent the morning at La Colombe (another favorite, really great coffee and tons of working space/a great atmosphere) before going to Nando’s (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) for lunch. On Thursday, I worked out some more before going to Sol Cafe in the afternoon (decent coffee, great atmosphere).
I read “Island Possessed” first, and I’m not entirely sure why I did that. “Island Possessed” is a recollection of Dunham’s time studying in Haiti, and starting with this was sort of a weird way to toss myself into her life. Fortunately, from classes and studying her before, I had a general sense of her life so I wasn’t totally thrown off.
“Island Possessed” was a weird one. Dunham considered some really important and interesting issues, like how class and race issues translate internationally, being accepted into new communities, different types of being black, etc. One thing that came back in “Kaiso!” was the notion of research versus experience, and the idea of researching by experiencing–something relatively unheard of in Dunham’s time, from my understanding. But the part I remember most is her discussion of zombies, which she (and apparently the community she was in in Haiti) took very seriously. I don’t really have a lot to expand on that or say about it, but suffice it to say it was bizarre.
“A Touch of Innocence” was SUPER intriguing to my literary side because, although it was a memoir of Dunham’s youth and a collection of anecdotes about it, IT WAS WRITTEN IN THE THIRD PERSON. Dunham refers to herself as “Katherine Dunham” or “the girl,” and it’s written as a novel. It blew my mind. I have so many questions about it. I want to read more about it. I’m sure another of these posts will have to do with that. It was crazy.
“A Touch of Innocence” also continued the trend I’ve seen so far of choreographers of color recounting childhood abuse or struggle; Dunham was physically abused and sexually assaulted by her father multiple times throughout her childhood. Reading about this was harrowing, for multiple reasons–the content, of course, but also the fact that it was in the third person made it feel removed, which was a bizarre way of seeing it.
“Kaiso!” was a MONSTER of a book. It was a huge collection of writings by and about Katherine Dunham, so it naturally covered a lot of area. One recurring theme that I really appreciated was the idea of intelligent dancers. Dunham was HIGHLY educated, more so than any other choreographer I’ve read about thus far. As a result, she believed strongly that dancers should understand and appreciate the history of the dance they’re doing, and that dancers should be educated outside the realm of dance. As a Northwestern student, where the dance program is alllllll about being an intelligent dancer, I appreciated this a lot.
There were tons of other really important and intriguing elements–form versus function, police brutality, screen dance, biorhythms–but I won’t bore you with them just yet. But who knows, maybe they’ll prove relevant later, or even in my eventual thesis!
Immigration, Lows, and Jose Limon
Sunday, August 7 – “An Unfinished Memoir” by Jose Limon
On Sunday, I spent the morning at Osmium Coffee Bar (one of my favorites thus far; lots of work space and a great atmosphere) and the afternoon at Bittersweet Cafe (less of a coffee shop and more of a cafe where you’d stop for lunch).
I’m gonna be totally honest, after “How To Do Things With Dance,” I’m finding it really hard to get back into memoirs and be really captivated by them. Limon is no exception, but there were a few things that stood out to me anyway.
The first of these is low points. Limon writes about his abusive father, which is hard but important to read. This is interesting to me because it seems like all of the choreographers of color that I’ve read thus far have recounted stories of abusive parents or rough childhoods, where the white choreographers didn’t have the same sorts of stories. This makes some sense, of course, because of the socioeconomic status that goes along with being a person of color, but is still noteworthy.
Limon also talks about how World War II instigated a low point in his life when the Nazis occupied France. He was “born and reared a Francophile,” so it hit close to home for him. WWII also affected him because of immigration policy–when Congress required all aliens living in the United States to register and give them relevant information, he realized “with a jolt” that he was an alien. This stood out to me because it reflects the status of so many refugees and immigrants today, especially those who have lived here their whole lives–America is home to them, and the notion that they be deported or sent to a place they’ve never known would be just as shocking.
In addition, Limon’s autobiography is, obviously, unfinished. As a result, it stopped in sort of an odd spot, and didn’t have the same sense of overall understanding or cohesion as the other autobiographies I’ve read. I can’t help but wonder how it would have read if he had had the time to finish.
Social Change and Postwar Modern Dance
Friday, August 5 – “How To Do Things With Dance” by Rebekah Kowal
On Friday I started off by getting lunch at Mariano’s with the lovely Cami, and then I headed to Stan’s Donuts (in Labriola Chicago) on Michigan Avenue (amazing donuts; maybe not the best spot for doing actual work). Then I headed to Julius Meinl (not a huge one, but still a lovely place).
This book is my favorite that I’ve read thus far. It was a really awesome intersection between dance and social change, which, pertinent to my quarter-life crisis, is right up my alley. I emailed my professor after finishing it to ask for similar books, and I’m meeting with her on Monday to get a whole other bibliography of books and articles in this vein, so I’m really excited about that.
There were a lot of really exciting and intriguing things about this book. Each chapter focused on a different choreographer and the social movement to which their work contributed (with the overarching thesis being that movement and dance are a catalyst for social and cultural change).
One thing that Kowal discussed at length when she was considering Katherine Dunham was the separation between race and the self. That is to say: when a white dancer is creating, it is assumed and understood that the work is representative of or comes out of their own individual self and being, and we relate it to them as a person. A white body can create without racial implications. When a person of color creates work, however, there’s a tension between the racial implications–since a colored body can’t create without racial implications–and the artist being themself.
Another tension that Kowal touches on is the difference between originality and authenticity, with relation to culturally-based works (again, Dunham)–what constitutes an original work that is still authentic/can this be created? To be “authentic” does it have to be a direct reproduction of the movement coming out of the culture it claims to represent? Or is there room for authenticity?
Kowal also talks about dance, especially modern dance, as being a universal language that permeates national borders and is able to create social and cultural change because of this. I’m not sure that I’m completely convinced by this; I’ve read plenty of accounts of people being shocked by modern dance or people not being interested in modern dance. But it’s definitely worth considering.
Essentially, I loved this book so much because it had to do with the real-world effects of these choreographers’ works in the time periods in which they were living. Which, obviously, isn’t a totally untouched topic, but is something that I don’t get to read about when I’m just reading the choreographers’ accounts of their lives.
Static versus Dynamic Analysis
If I have learned one thing this summer, it’s that having a clean-cut way to evaluate anything is impossible. There are so many factors to consider. It’s also very easy to become separated from the context of your research subject. Public transit is not an isolated system. It is very much a living system that is constantly responding to the changes in its environment.
Because of this, I have had to rely on both static and dynamic metrics for assessing these light rail systems. By static, I mean looking at a single year, and creating a snapshot of all of the systems and compare them on one or more measures. The dynamic analysis comes into play when I look at trends for a single city. Both approaches are valuable in determining strong systems from weaker ones.
To begin, I’d like to first make observations, using 2014 as our reference year.
This graph shows annual passenger trips versus revenue vehicle miles (RVM). RVM is essentially the amount of service provided by the transit organization. One would expect that the more service you provide, the more people will ride. And we see that with the linear model. In a very over-simplified approach, we can say that cities above the line are doing better than cities below the line. Places such as Portland and Los Angeles are getting much more riders for the amount of service they’re providing in contrast with Dallas and Denver who are getting less riders.
Let’s look at another measure.
In this graph, we have annual passenger trips versus directional route miles (DRM) per service area. This is the amount of track over the boundaries of the transit provider. In other words, this is the coverage.
Again, one would expect that more coverage would lead to more ridership, and while in general, we can see this trend, it is not nearly as strong as with RVM. In a lot of ways, this makes sense. You can have the greatest coverage of any transit system, but to do so you may have a lot of routes that go places where few people live. Sometimes it is more effective to have a more localized coverage. We see this in Houston, LA, Seattle, Minneapolis, Denver and Salt Lake City.
Now let’s take a closer look at Los Angeles to try to have a better understanding.
Los Angeles is always an interesting city to look at. This chart shows the growth of ridership, DRM and RVM. I indexed each value using the equation y(i) = (x(i)/x(first))*100. This sets the first value at 100 and every proceeding value is expressed as a percent increase from the first value. So an index of 200 means that the value is double that of year one. This lets us look at all three metrics on the same scale and from the same starting place. It allows for a quick glance comparison of growth trends.
LA has increasing ridership and directly growing RVM. DRM grew in phases since that was how the light rail in LA was built. One could argue that causality of ridership and RVM goes both ways. Increasing RVM gives more riders, and more riders causes the transit operators to put out more service via RVM. Either way, there is definitely growth happening in LA, which is really good news.
Now I want to look at a city that appeared to not do so well, Denver. In the first graph, Denver is one of the cities giving out a lot of service with RVM, but not getting a lot of riders.
We can see that from 2006 to 2012, there was no increase in DRM. Basically, Denver was not looking to expand its tracks during this time. However, there was a jump in both ridership and RVM from 2006 to 2007. Ridership looks stable from 2007 to 2012, while RVM is jumping around. To me, I think one possible explanation for this is that Denver was trying to increase ridership by putting out more service, but perhaps increased RVM too much and was then adjusting it to meet the actual demand for the light rail. Of course, the issue of causality is up for debate. One could argue that ridership went up and Denver increased service to respond, but again overshot and had to readjust. The later is probably more realistic.
If we look at 2014, which is the year the first graph uses data from, we can see that the RVM is 16x what it was in 1999, but the ridership is only around 6x from where it was in 1997. It makes sense then that Denver fell below the line in the first plot. The amount of service provided has been increasing much faster than the demand for it has.
It is unclear if that is a bad thing or not. We are not sure what pushed the service increase. But this highlights why you cannot rely solely on a single year snapshot to make an assessment. Understanding light rail performance requires you to look at the story from different angles.
Week 3 Musings
I have come to realize that it’s quite odd to be living in a place for three and half weeks, both trying to accomplish a task and be tourist. I’m not here long enough to really know where I’m going; since moving to the YMCA, I still have to use my offline map to figure out how to get to dinner or home from the library at night when the street signs are obscured. I’m not here long enough to feel comfortable “skipping” a museum day on a Sunday – I am, after all, only here for 3 and half weeks, and there is still so much to see.
At the same time, I have to accomplish the typical tasks that come with long-term living, like shopping for groceries, doing laundry, and, most importantly, research. There is a very real contrast there – in some ways, I feel guilty in the library all day, realizing that even on this small island there is so much I won’t have seen in a month’s time. In other ways, I feel guilty leaving the library, because the sources I need are not available through ILL, and I’m on a bit of a clock. Anyway, it’s all a little bittersweet, and something I imagine people who have to travel for research experience often. It’s unreal that I only have a few days left here.
In terms of research “findings,” there isn’t exactly much to report. But believe me, that’s a good thing! The Malaya Tribune was taking me forever to go through on microfilm, if you recall. Before, I was using a strategy of note-taking on my computer when a relevant editorial, letter to the editor, or article came up. This slowed me down by 5-10 minutes every time I came across something relevant, which is why it took me about 4 days just to survey through 1932. Fortunately, I realized that was not going to work given how much time I have here. I have shifted to noting citations (title, author, date, etc.) and photographing all relevant articles for later note taking and analysis once I’m back in the states. That way, I can maximize my time here. I’ve gotten through 5 years total, I have about 500 images, there are about 4 years available in the states, and I suspect I can finish another 3-4 years in the few days I have left here. So, although I don’t have much to report, I’m feeling more confident with my research strategy.
There was one research moment this week that stands out. So far, I’ve been essentially reconstructing a scholar’s bibliography who wrote on a very similar topic to mine, scrutinizing and noting the sources she used to have a baseline for my study and also see if I find anything new. While searching the library’s catalogue for a book this scholar had used, I came across another autobiography from a Chinese woman in Singapore who was in her 20s during the 1930s. I flipped through it, mostly out of curiosity, not expecting to find anything particularly relevant. But I came across this passage:
“After dinner we went to a show. It was at the Capitol Cinema and though we went to the early show we were quite late reaching home. I will never forget the film and the title – “Damaged Lives”, as when I was sent home, I was confronted by father who had a stern look on his face. Kim Wah did not wait and left me to face the music. Father asked where we had been and upon being told that we went to a show demanded to know what type of show it was. I told him the title and said it was a documentary film. He asked me what it was about and when I told him it was about some sort of sickness and marriage and that I could not understand most of it because of the medical terms. He seemed to be more pleased than angry at my ignorance.” Lim San Neo, My Life My Memories My Story (Singapore: Epic Management Services Pte Ltd 1997), 38.
As it turns out, Damaged Lives was a 1933 Columbia Picture, Canadian/American Pre-Code film about an extramarital affair that leads to the violent end of a marriage. I won’t go into a full analysis of this quote because I haven’t analyzed or even collected all of my evidence (and I would probably bore you), but to me, this demonstrates that while Singaporean women and children were seen as especially vulnerable to the influences of film, they also often used the films as a means of negotiating their own agency within a system that typically oppressed them. The discussion of lascivious American films in the Boys’ Corner, Girls’ Corner, and Women’s Corner, as I posted about a couple of weeks ago, yielded a self-conscious negotiation of morals within these groups about modernity and patriarchy. Similarly, in feigning ignorance to her father, Lim San Neo (the author above), negotiates the typical media exposure she was allowed to receive by viewing this seemingly unforgettable film, and getting away with it. Anyway, these are just musings. I’m not certain that this is the take away, or that this will figure into my whole argument, but it’s an interesting angle to consider nonetheless.
It must be noted that my thesis advisor at Northwestern and his wife were visiting Singapore this week, and I got to get dinner with them and vent about my research, ask for advice, ask questions about Singapore, etc. How unbelievably lucky is that? It was so reassuring to see a familiar face and get to talk about how things are going. We ate off of banana leaves at a secluded (for Singapore) restaurant called Samy’s – an undergrad career moment I won’t forget.
And, a typical photo-dump. Here’s what I’ve been doing when I haven’t been in the library:
Exploring Disney-esque Chinatown. I went to the “50 cents fest” where you can try any number of Chinese dishes for just 50c each at food stalls.
Trying dragon fruit for the first time. Yum. I prefer it to durian, the national fruit, the stench you can spot from outside any supermarket.
Went to the Asian Civilizations Museum (the photos captured below), National Museum, National Gallery, Singapore Art Museum, and Peranakan Museum (whew). I think the National Museum and National Gallery were my favorite, but I unfortunately didn’t capture very many photos there.
Saw the famous Raffles Hotel….from the outside at least.
And explored new neighborhoods gearing up for National Day.
National Day commemorates Singapore’s independence from Malaysia on August 9, 1965. Tomorrow, I am going to the junior college that my professor once taught at to see their National Day celebrations – think 4th of July, but more…extravagant. Will report back with details. That’s all for now!
“The Solution to Pollution is Dilution.”
Once a month, the Moms of West Lake Landfill host a community meeting to give updates about the conditions at the site and to give stakeholders and local officials a chance to interact with each other.
It started over four years ago, when Ed Smith from the Missouri Coalition for the Environment met Karen Nickels at a meeting regarding the nuclear waste. She asked him about the landfill fire, which surprised him. At that point, the fire department in the area had only just been notified, and the residents had only just been given an explanation of what was causing the terrible smell that drifted through their neighborhoods. Karen Nickels met Dawn Chapman, another mother from the area who worried about the effects of the fire on her children’s development. When they would call their government officials, they would be asked if they were activists, and they’d reply that they were “just moms.” And so the name of their organization, when they officially became activists, was Just Moms St. Louis, welcome to mothers and non-mothers alike.
I didn’t know what to expect when I arrived at the July meeting. I came in five minutes before the meeting started, and I was one of the last people there and had to sit near the back of the room. 57 other people attended, including a handful of local officials and the county Public Health Director. It is a respectable number for a regularly scheduled meeting, though far less than the two-thousand residents who attended meetings about Weldon Spring. The citizens there were restive, but attentive. When the presenters had breaks in their presentation, or paused to ask a question, eager attendees jumped to add a comment or pose questions of their own. Without prompting, the couple sitting next to me shared their history of living in neighborhoods that have been polluted with nuclear waste.
The Moms have whipped up support and educated their neighbors, in turn putting political pressure on elected officials. “We do have significant bipartisan support,” claimed Dawn Chapman at the opening of the meeting. The representatives stood so that people could see their representatives at work for them. This was not the picture when Chapman and Nickels met Ed Smith.
Still, the help from politicians has only resulted in slow progress. “The solution to pollution is dilution,” Dawn and one of the attendees said in unison at one point, when talking about an EPA proposal to add soil to the top of the landfill, thus lowering the concentration of the waste below cleanup standards.
I’m looking forward to talking more with Dawn Chapman about the amazing work she has done, including getting to meet with Gina McCarthy, administrator of the U.S. EPA.
Africa Wrap-Up
Hello from Dubai! It’s currently Friday afternoon here. I just spent 10 days in Tamale, the capital of the Northern region of Ghana. On Tuesday I traveled to Accra, Ghana, where I spent the night before beginning my travels to Malaysia via Dubai (as someone afraid of flying it was just lovely waking up to news that an Emirates flight had crash-landed in Dubai hours before I was due to board an Emirates flight to Dubai. Of course everything was fine but our landing was a bit delayed because one of the runways was closed). I took yesterday afternoon to go to the beach and relax a bit and am spending today catching up on emails, background research, applications, and of course blogging. Tomorrow I have another long flight to Kuala Lumpur. The heat here is unfathomable: it’s like when you open an oven and it breaths dry burning air into your face, except there isn’t an oven and it’s just the wind breathing dry burning air everywhere. Yesterday the high was 117 F.
I’m going to do this post in two parts, so you can read whichever interests you most (or both!). Part 1 will be a wrap-up of GMOs in Africa and Part 2 will be a wrap-up of the other fun things I’ve done this month. So without further ado…
Part 1: GMOs in Africa
One could write entire books on each country alone (see Robert Paarlberg’s Starved for Science for an overview of GMOs on the continent), but here I’ll talk about my experiences in Ghana and South Africa.
Currently four African countries have produced GM crops (South Africa, Burkina Faso, Egypt and Sudan). The technology hasn’t been used commercially in the other 50 African countries because of a host of factors including lack of regulatory framework and public disapproval. However, in the past few years Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya, Mozambique, Uganda, Malawi and Cameroon have begun research and field trials for a variety of crops and traits, many of which will likely be commercialized soon. Unlike the projects I visited in Brazil and Argentina that focused on improving output of soy – a large-scale commodity crop – the main goals of many of the African research projects are to improve smallholder income, food security, and resilience of staple crops such as bananas and legumes. The African Agricultural Technology Foundation (AATF) is a body that facilitates the public-private-philanthropic partnerships that allow many of the research activities to be not-for-profit. I would highly recommend browsing their website for more info.
In South Africa I visited with some of the leaders of the Water Efficient Maize for Africa (WEMA) project. As the name suggests, the goal of this project is to breed maize varieties that are resistant to drought using conventional breeding practices as well as a biotech trait. Eventually the varieties will be distributed to local seed companies to sell to smallholders in South Africa, Kenya, Mozambique, Tanzania, and Uganda. Several large philanthropic organizations fund the research, which Monsanto and public research institutes in each country carry out. Because Monsanto donated the traits and research royalty-free, the seeds will sell at the competitive market price for maize in each locality.
During field trials the researchers realized that the drought resistance trait wouldn’t benefit smallholders if they lost all of their crops to insects. Hence, Monsanto also donated the Bt trait, a bacterial gene which makes the maize resistant to insects. This gene is the second most commonly used transgenic trait next to glyphosate resistance (which I discussed extensively while in South America). Bt crops can dramatically reduce insecticide sprayings and crop loss, which always made me feel as if it were somehow better than the glyphosate resistant trait, which requires the use of herbicides. This was why I was surprised at a backhanded comment made by a representative from the South Africa’s Agricultural Research Council: “Monsanto donated the Bt trait, but herbicide resistance would have been better.” Why? Smallholder farmers spend 40% of their time weeding their fields by hand. Sometimes the weeds get so bad that they’re forced to abandon their fields, resulting in 100% crop loss. So for improving quality of life and reducing loss, glyphosate resistance has its benefits. A Monsanto representative responded that they didn’t donate the trait because they couldn’t afford to lose out on royalties, and that it would cause a PR problem with people who were against the glyphosate resistant trait.
Ghana isn’t participating in WEMA, but has its own GM field trial of Bt Cowpea that is also under the AATF. Cowpea is staple food in Ghana and as a legume is high in protein and fiber. It’s also delicious, and I ate it almost every day while I was there. I spoke to smallholder farmers in the North of Ghana, who said that in the past an insect used to devastate their cowpea crop, causing up to 30-80% loss. They recently learned that this insect is called Maruca, and it infects the plants at the flowering stage, eventually making its way into the pod and eating the peas inside. Because Maruca lives inside the pod, once a field has been infected it can’t be treated with a topical insecticide. Instead, the farmers say they spray their field up to twice a week to try to kill the Maruca before it burrows into the pod. This practice reduces loss, but it’s extremely costly and limits farmers’ ability to manage more than a couple of acres of land.
The Savanna Agricultural Research Institute (SARI) in Tamale, Ghana is currently trying to address this issue with biotechnology. With funding from USAID, they bred a local variety of cowpea to contain the Bt trait, which Monsanto donated royalty-free. So far field trials have been successful and they’re expecting to distribute the seeds to farmers and seed companies next year. The scientists at SARI said that the Bt trait will lower insecticide application because it will kill the Maruca from inside the pod so farmers don’t have to continuously spray. Furthermore the Bt cowpea is not a hybrid, so the farmers will be able to save and reuse their seeds as they would for any other variety.
Non-Bt cowpeas affected by Maruca (above) vs. Bt cowpeas
Savanna Agricultural Research Institute (SARI) in Tamale, Ghana
Can you tell which are GMO? (The ones on the left)
When I arrived home after interviews my AirBnB host was cooking with cowpea! Red Red is a delicious Ghanaian tomato and cowpea-based stew served with fried plantains
Red Red, me and Pobby (who was fantastic AirBnB host and chef!)
Finished Red Red. It’s typical to eat all foods – even soup – with the hand in Ghana. This new skill came in handy today when my Indian carry out did not come with a fork.
After hearing so much about herbicide resistant weeds and the regulatory roadblocks faced by small institutions, it was nice to hear stories about GMOs engineered specifically to address food insecurity. Of course the distribution of drought resistant maize and Maruca resistant cowpea can’t solve world hunger alone, even if the varieties are royalty-free. Nevertheless, these projects are one way to give smallholder farmers the option to use a technology if they see the benefits.
Part 2: Fun in Africa
Ah you made it this far? Sorry, I know I got your hopes up but but Part 1 took way too long to write and I need to get some other work done. Luckily I have a 7-hour daytime flight tomorrow. Check back soon!
Multiple Selves, Isolation, NEA, and Paul Taylor
Wednesday, August 3 and Thursday, August 4 – “Private Domain” by Paul Taylor
On Wednesday, I spent the morning at Common Cup (not my favorite atmosphere or coffee, but the people who work there are all super, super kind and it seems to be a really great thing for the community to have) and the afternoon at Ellipsis Coffeehouse (one of my favorites thus far; a really lovely space and perfect music) before performing in a drag show at Berlin Nightclub (!!! SO FUN). Today, I went to Other Brother Coffeehouse (not a ton of working room, but good coffee) and Cupitol (far fancier than I was prepared for, but I like it a lot).
Paul Taylor. Where to begin. “Private Domain” is, to say the least, comprehensive. He goes in to so much detail about his life and his travels; he repeats himself quite a bit as well. But he’s so funny–this is one of the only books where I’ve found myself consistently smiling and laughing at the way it was written; Taylor is hilarious.
As far as technical matters go, the two weird things Taylor does in this book are (1) leaving out “I” as a subject of sentences (so they start with the word “Am”) and (2) switching into present tense whenever he feels like it (which, honestly, a lot of choreographers have done so far. I definitely want to track that more closely).
Taylor talks a lot about the notion of multiple selves, the most prominent of which is “thin and elderly George H. Tacet, Ph.D.” who remains with Taylor throughout his life, and whom Taylor credits as being a costume designer and things like that when he doesn’t want to credit himself. In the book, Taylor has a lot of imaginary conversations with Tacet, to the point that I honestly had to go back and make sure I was correct in remembering Tacet as an imaginary friend and not a real person. It’s very odd.
In addition (and maybe in relation to that), Taylor discusses the notion of isolation a lot. This is interesting because he has a roommate for most of his life, and has a company that he often describes as being a “family,” but isolation and solitude are recurring themes nonetheless.
Taylor is also one of the few choreographers thus far who doesn’t delve deeply into sex/sexuality/relationships. He touches on them, but briefly and gently, such that I still have a lot of questions and a lot of curiosity about them. This is especially bizarre considering the detail with which he explains other aspects of his life.
Finally, and the most exciting to me, is the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA). Pertinent to my quarter-life crisis, I’ve been paying closer attention to social issues and policy relationships in the books, and the NEA has been brought up in quite a few of them thus far. Taylor also recounts being caught in the middle of revolts and tension-filled countries, and applying for the CIA three times (he figured since he was traveling anyway he was in a prime position to be a spy). I’m not entirely sure what I would write about (maybe tracking the “success” of NEA initiatives as recounted by the choreographers themselves?), but the NEA as an organization that has been written about over and over again by these choreographers is exciting to me.
Vignettes, Race, NEA, Bill T. Jones, and Alvin Ailey
Wednesday, July 27 – “Story/Time” by Bill T. Jones
Monday, August 1 and Tuesday, August 2 – “Revelations” by Alvin Ailey
On Wednesday, I helped out with Striding Lion in the morning and spent the afternoon at Bourgeois Pig in Lincoln Park (I love the atmosphere, but the coffee is just eh). On Monday and Tuesday, I just stayed in Evanston/at home; I had a lot of miscellaneous things to do so I figured it would be easiest not to travel.
I’m combining these two books into one post because I honestly don’t have a lot to say about “Story/Time.” It was really beautiful, but a super quick read and nothing mind-blowing. It had a lot of little vignettes that were super poignant, but a lot of them had appeared in Jones’s autobiography already.
“Revelations,” on the other hand, was incredible. Ailey writes really candidly about race and sexuality, and it opened up a lot of ideas I’d seen with Bill T. Jones and other choreographers more fully and completely. Ailey also talks very explicitly about his cocaine use, which caught me a little off-guard but was really intriguing.
The biggest thing in “Revelations” that came as a shock to me wasn’t even about Ailey, though–it was a small note he made about Robert Joffrey. As it turns out, Joffrey’s real name was Abdullah Jaffa Bey Khan, and he was half Pashtun and half Italian. In the incredibly white world of dance–especially ballet–this is super, super important. And it’s something I feel that no one really knows or talks about, which is intriguing to me. I honestly feel like I could write my entire thesis on this. It also opens up a lot of questions about the false black vs. white dichotomy in dance (something that Jones and Ailey both talk about a lot is struggling as black dancers), and where other races fit into that equation. There is already such little Pashtun representation in America; the fact that the founder of one of the biggest ballet companies that’s still around today was half Pashtun is so important.
A couple other notable things: Ailey is super self-aware. He repeatedly says things like, “This stayed with me for the rest of my life,” or “This is where X in X dance came from.” The ability to make those connections in one’s own life is super impressive; often it takes an outside look in.
The criminal versus the artistic. This is part of the racial element, but Ailey talks about making a conscious choice to forgo the criminal in favor of the artistic, which is really interesting because it seems that often people don’t feel as though they have a choice.
I like Ailey a lot, but honestly the Joffrey revelation (heh, see what I did there?) sort of overshadowed the rest of the book, unfortunately for Ailey. I’m definitely going to have to take a deeper look at Joffrey and maybe tack a few more books/readings onto the end of these eight weeks.