Category Archives: Personal Empowerment

My Unorthodox Life is a Netflix original series following the personal and professional experiences of Julia Haart, a fashion mogul and former ultra-Orthodox Jew, as she and her family find the balance between their past, present, and hopes for the future. This nine-part show gives us an insight into why Julia left the insular society, its impact on her familial bonds, and how she transformed her life into a feminist fairytale. Her four children, of course, played a crucial role in every phase, so lets find out all that there is to know about them, shall we?

Julia Haarts eldest child is Batsheva Weinstein. She was simply a recently married 19-year-old girl when her mother chose to flee the community, so Batsheva not only started to question everything shed learned but also felt abandoned, which led to a period where the duo didnt have a relationship at all. She gradually came to terms with Julias desires, gained a new outlook on what it means to be modern and faithful, and is now a religious Jew without any personal restrictions on clothes, careers, or choices. Batsheva is happy and close to her mother today.

Due to a lack of secular education growing up, when Batsheva came into the real world, she had to experiment in different fields and try many new things to discover her passion and pursue it as a profession. Therefore, in her late 20s, she is a Fashion Institute of Technology graduate, a content creator, a lifestyle blogger, and a wife. The accessories designer is slowly establishing herself as a well-known influencer on Instagram, TikTok, and Youtube. Apart from all this, shes also a social media freelancer and focuses on fashion and travel on her Sunnies & Sangria blog.

Shlomo Hendler did not seem to have as much of an issue with his mother cutting ties with Yeshivishe Heimishe as some of his other siblings, but he did find himself questioning some of the orthodox practices. Thus, Shlomo also left Monsey and slowly began to find a path to be a devout Jew while still being a part of modern society. The concepts of dating being reserved for marriage and women having constraints are a few things he found himself moving away from completely. In other words, Shlomo still keeps Shabbat and follows the rules, but hes adapting as he discovers more.

From what we can tell, Shlomo is just starting to date and seems happy to be where he is in life today. He actually appears to be quite intelligent and ambitious, so his dream of becoming an accomplished lawyer in the State of New York might just come true sooner than later. After all, Shlomo did a summer program in the field of sociology and genetics at the University of Cambridge before enrolling at Columbia University in the City of New York for a Bachelors degree in political science and government. He graduated in early 2021 and is looking forward to the next chapter of his life.

Miriam Haart was just a teenager when Julia escaped her society, and its been implied in the documentary series that she played a crucial role in the matter. By inquiring about the why behind everything, something her mother had been doing internally for decades, Miriam helped her realize how life can be different and better for everyone. As a bisexual, outgoing, and confident individual, Miriam did not like that she couldnt sing, dance, and have fun in her previous life, so the transition was the easiest for her. In fact, thats why Miriam decided to change her surname to Haart legally.

After earning her high school diploma from Maayanot High School in 2016, Miriam studied coding and robotics from a few different institutions before enrolling at Stanford University. Shes set to obtain her Bachelors degree in Computer Science from there in 2022. Miriam is not only a Co-teacher in CS11: How to Make Virtual Reality at the prestigious establishment, but shes also the Co-Founder and CPO of Eazitt, a shopping app launched in Africa. Her passion lies in women empowerment, cognitive science, and AI. Shes also partnered with Girl Up to run her first marathon this year.

Aron Hendler is Julia Haarts youngest child and the one who continues to live in Monsey as she and her ex-husband share custody of the teen. Hes pretty conservative despite his familys modern world views. However, as weve seen in the show, peer pressure affects Aron as well. There was a brief time when he believed that social media, television, and talking to girls were not completely okay. Yet, Aron now goes to a co-ed high school, has a public Instagram account, and admitted to his mother that hed watch television under guidance. Aron is figuring out a balance in who he is, and considering his age, thats only expected.

Read More: Are Julia and Silvio Scaglia Haart Still Together?

Read the original:

Julia Haart's Kids Now: Where Are Shlomo and Miriam Haart Today? Update - The Cinemaholic

As we all have heard by now, many retail businesses such as restaurants, hotels, and stores are really struggling to recruit enough new team members to support increased demand post-Covid. When obstacles arise in business or in life in general, the path of least resistance is almost always to blame someone else instead of self-reflecting. True self-reflection leads to rethinking previous behaviors and adopting new strategies. In this case of the Post-Covid world, most businesses are blaming the Federal Governments atypically generous Unemployment Benefits as the reason they can not find the help they need.

Data surrounding the correlation between the extra Unemployment Benefits and the inability of retail businesses to fill job openings is still fairly limited, due to how recent this phenomenon is. According to Econofact, the limited data out there is quite inconclusive.However, the retail industry as a whole is aggressively lobbying with local municipalities and Capitol Hill and the White House to end the extra jobless benefits as soon as possible.

Lets assume for a minute that the theory of excessive unemployment benefits incentivizing would be-workers to stay home is 100% true. For this to be true, a worker is making the financial decision that a little bit of temporary pay increase from the Government is superior to a long term job with slightly less pay but much more stability, upwards earning potential from career advancement opportunity and the sense of fulfillment that can come from providing a product or service that enhances a customers life.

Most economists and financial advisors would probably consider that a questionable, if not outright poor financial decision. If ending excess benefits unleashes this subset of the workforce, what does the outcome really look like? Is this the talent pool businesses really think will solve their current issues? The worker who would rather eat potato chips and watch Netflix than work is going to make their business better ?!

At Pathfinder Development, our Director of People and Development has helped shape a culture that emphasizes passive candidate recruiting and maximizes the reach available to us by tapping into the social and professional networks of current Team Members. We were inspired many years ago when we learned that great companies strive for 35-45% of new hires to come from referrals and adopted this as one of our key goals.

The preponderance of psychological research suggests that compensation is an important element of a workers motivation, but that many other factors also come into play. Daniel Pink has written several best-selling books on business and the motivations of human behavior. In these books, Pink offers evidence to support the theory that intrinsic or non-financial motivations such as autonomy, mastery (the desire to improve) and a sense of purpose are just as, if not more important, than pay. A recent study from the Army analyzed 11,320 cadets entering classes at the US Military Academy at West Point. Cadets with a primary motivation of compensation were less likely to graduate and become commissioned officers than Cadets whose primary motivations were intrinsic, such as learning from Superiors and becoming a leader.

Perhaps what there is really a shortage of is not competent and motivated workers but of good work environments. When a company does not provide a sense of purpose to its employees, doesnt focus on teaching and developing them, and grants them limited autonomy, it can not logically expect the many who are intrinsically motivated to flourish, become the best versions of themselves and shine for their organizations.

One of the more egregious examples of the shortage of quality working environments is the handling of mask-wearing requirements. In accordance with CDC recommendations, the vast majority of retail establishments do not require vaccinated guests to wear masks. However, most retailers, initially still required Team Members to wear masks whether they were vaccinated or not. Many still in fact require Team Members to wear masks. What does it say about how much you value your Team Members when they arent treated with the same level of trust that your guests are? Why would you expect a Team Member treated this way to love his/her job?

Businesses should self-reflect and stop asking When is the government going to stop the excess UE benefits? and ask Why would a Team Member want to work here? The more the latter question is explored, the closer a company can get to developing an environment where people wouldnt see a slightly higher rate of temporary Government benefits as worth giving up the overall benefits of being employed.

After all, our ultimate long-term business success will come from leaders who are intrinsically motivated because they wind up being more successful than people only it for money and their companies are better for their presence. We need more of them and to do that, we have to be fishing in the right talent pool. For most of us, we actually already have a great internal talent pool but struggle to access it. Studies by Gallup have indicated that only 29% of American workers are engaged at work. If 71% of your Team Members are unengaged, the opportunity to grow your business value by doing the hard work necessary to determine what it would take for the 71% majority to be more motivated. But do we have it in us to accomplish this? Or should we rely on our Government policies? The choice is ours as will be the consequences of the route we pursue. It seems more rational to put your faith in yourself than an outside entity as flawed as our Government.

We feel very blessed at Pathfinder Development that we arent facing the labor challenges the retail industry is as a whole. It is a testament to the integrity of everyone on the Pathfinder Team that short-term excess Government benefits have tempted very few of our Team Members to leave for another job or stay home. A few years ago, we evolved into a company that emphasized the empowerment of our Team Members as a bedrock of our culture. As we gave Team Members a more and more prominent seat at the table through activities such as Committees designed to reshape the company and accelerate personal and career growth, Platinum Service became not just a virtue we sought to provide to external guests but to internal guests (Team Members) as well.

For Pathfinder Development, investing in peoples well-being has proven to not only be the right thing to do ethically, but also a good business decision. We can say with strong conviction that any business who dares to make this part of their cultural foundation, will see labor not through the lens of a transactional hassle but as an opportunity to transform themselves into an organization whose biggest strength is creativity and passion of their people.

The rest is here:

The Current Labor Crisis And What Really Might Be The Root Issue | By Rahul Bahl Hospitality Net - Hospitality Net

In a world that is constantly changing, the one thing that should remain the same is your vision for the future - and it needs to align with your personal values.

Schedule a FREE one-on-one session with one of our Franchise Advisors today and well help you start building your franchise organization.

July7, 20215 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

A clear vision has always been a cornerstone on which people build businesses. You need to be able to communicate an understandable, unambiguous concept of what you want. Otherwise, trust and effective strategy are pipedreams. But especially over the past year, weve all been tossed into a pit of uncertainty that makes it hard to know what direction to go in. To lead fearlessly and overcome doubt, its more important now than ever thatyour vision be not just clear, but deeply personal and empathetic, too.

Related: A Personal Mission Statement Can Set You on a Course to Success

Lets not beat around the bush. Manifesting a vision is hard work. Youre going to have naysayers telling you no or to quit. There is beautiful potential in the diversity around the world, but you cant tap into it unless you find ways to overcome the differences that unique experiences and backgrounds create. You have to figure out all kinds of logistical puzzles, think about ethicsand magically make the ideal supply of resources appear on time. Oh, yeah and you might get tired once in a while.

Whats going to motivate you through all this? It comes down to your reason, or why, for striving for a better futureone that has real meaning to you. When you personally understand and crave the change that your vision is going to bring, then it doesnt matter how many or how big the obstacles that stand in your way are;you can stand before them with the courage to keep fighting. You can keep pushing for what others say is unattainable because your belief that you can and must,and that there is no alternative,is genuine.

So, you know why its critical for your vision to be personal, but how do you ensure that youre really connecting the vision to who you are?

1. Define your values to set your ground rules

Everyone has a set of values and philosophies that dictate what they do. The trouble is, people can pressure you into compromising your values and philosophies based on what they believe. This is why you have to connect to your ideals in a really strong way and be willing to stand your ground with kindness, automatically setting boundaries that keep you on a straighter path.

If youre not sure about what your values really are, then look at your habits.Your actions will clue you in about what matters to you. Thenaim to be as consistent as you can in the values you prize. If your values need work, change your habits through small steps until youre living the way you want. To ditch the anxiety that may result from making those changes, focus on how much more powerful your future is going to become.

2.Stop focusing so hard on the trends

Business professionals are taught that they have to pay attention to trends or they will fail. They have to be agile. They have to be adaptable. They have to be flexible.

This isnt total hogwash, but innovation is arguably the willingness to intentionally toss trends out the window. Fearless leadership requires that your motivation not die just when you need it the most. It cannot be a reed in the wind that bends at every shift or opportunity. Your why has to be something that can drive you regardless of what the circumstances around you might look like.

So, set aside what everyone else says. What is important to you? What is so pressing and unique to your mind and heart that it keeps you up at night? Those are the things you can cling to as your compass.

3.Pay attention to your emotions.

When you really connect to a dream you have, the feeling of joy should be so strong that it blocks out fear and erases the word cant. If you talk about the vision youre trying to build and you dont feel real energy, then youre probably trying to build a vision that doesnt actually speak to you. If it doesnt speak to you, then others will be able to tell, and they wont easily follow where you lead.

No work situation or business will ever be 100% perfect. But dreams dont feel off, even if others tell you those dreams are impossible. So, dont try to force it based on what others tell you it should be. Think about and admit which activities lift you the highest. Listen to your gut and use your head to find logical ways to stay oriented toward what makes you happy.

Related: The Vision Board Is Your Internal GPS System to Realizing Your Dreams

Any business leader who wants to succeed needs a vision thats personal. Its what allows you to stay motivated no matter what life throws at you. Defining your values, letting go of your death grip on trends and being hyper-aware of what makes you joyful all ensure that you can create a vision that will always have meaning for you. Once you have that vision, share it far and wide with the transparency, confidenceand empowerment others around you are looking for.

Originally posted here:

How to Create a Personal Vision That Lets You Lead Fearlessly and Drive Success - Entrepreneur

Kathy Hagenian is a true champion of justice.

The Novi resident has been fighting against domestic violence and sexual assault and on behalf of the survivors of these crimes for more than 35 years and was recently recognized for the work that could to someappear to bedark and endless and emotionally exhausting.

Hagenian recalls someone once told her, Theres nothing light about your work.

Its not light work, she agrees, but there is light in the work, and hope in the work and strength in the work, and that is because of survivors, who started our movement and continue the work today.

Hagenian, 59, was recently honored with the Champion of Justice award by the Michigan Domestic and Sexual Violence Prevention and Treatment Board for her lifetime of advocacy on behalf of those survivors.

When she was studying psychology at the University of Michigan in the early '80s, she couldnt have imagined the path she would soon be on, particularly with the scarcity of classes addressing domestic violence and sexual assault. However, she recalls there was one graduate assistant who had interest in these topics, and Hagenian started her own research, driven by many different experiences in my own life.

She came across one particular report that revealed details of womens testimony regarding their domestic assaults.

I was sitting in the library doing research and I felt outrage and injustice about the experiences that these survivors were brave enough to share, but even as they were reaching out for help, they were blamed and disbelieved.

Hagenian began volunteering for womens domestic violence shelters and interned at a facility for youths who had experienced trauma and assault.

Following graduation, she worked as a state social worker specialist briefly, then launched into her years of advocacy for a succession of non-profit organizations, including the Coalition, which she joined in 1988 and now serves as the executive policy director for the Michigan Coalition to End Domestic and Sexual Violence.

Debi Cain, executive director of the Division of Victim Services in the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, noted Hagenian's commitment to survivor empowerment.

Her training and policy focus is centered on honoring the lived experience of survivors, which includes understanding trauma while emphasizing survivors strength, resilience, and healing, Cain said.

In the span of nearly four decades, Hagenian said she has certainly seen remarkable and dramatic change in the culture surrounding the topics of domestic violence and sexual assault.

One of the biggest changes is women feeling able to speak about their experiences, with the unfair blame placed on victims finally being turned to the perpetrators, where it should have been all along.

Survivors often feel blame or shame, but it is incumbent on us to take that away," Hagenian said."This is something that happened to somebody, it is not who they are."

The number of women coming forward to share their stories of being assaulted, including during the past year of pandemic, has certainly increased, but Hagenian clarifies that doesnt mean the number of assaults has necessarily increased.

More: Westland's new advocate wants to help domestic violence victims

More: Novi Schools mourns tragic death of Tanya Vuichard, who 'radiated life'

What the evidence points to is that survivors are trusting that help is available. That they will be believed. That they will be supported.

And, Hagenian adds, as the fear subsides that they will not be blamed or shamed, she expects the numbers to continue to increase and the healing and prevention to mount.

We can all be champions of justice, she said, by listening.

What do we do when we see someone being abusive? Hagenian asked. What do we do to recognize (signs of abuse) and make a decision to do something, rather than ignore because we dont want it to be true, or turn away because we dont know what to do?"

Its never too early to talk to kids about personal respect and boundaries, Hagenian said.

For any age, there is no one way to be approachable, and much could depend on the nature of the relationship, but key is being approachable and genuine and perhaps just starting with asking a simple question: are you OK? while being prepared for a not simple answer and taking cues from the response.

So many we know continue to suffer in silence, whether the trauma was two hours, two days, two weeks, two months, two years or 20 years ago, Hagenian said. We hope they reach out to someone, that they have the opportunity to share what has happened and to get support and to know it is not their fault and they deserve the opportunity to heal in whatever way is best... Things will change when we are all advocates.

For more information on how to help or to receive assistance, visitthe Michigan Coalition to End Domestic & Sexual Violence website.

Contact reporter Susan Bromley at sbromley@hometownlife.com or 517-281-2412. Follow her on Twitter @SusanBromley10.

Excerpt from:

Novi woman is a Champion of Justice, fighting for an end to domestic violence for 30 years - Hometown Life

Today, The Memphis-based soul powerhouse Southern Avenue are thrilled to share "Move Into The Light," a high-energy, horn-filled song co-written with multi-GRAMMY winning pop-sensation Jason Mraz and Platinum-selling producer Michael Goldwasser (Easy Star All-Stars). "Move Into The Light" is the second song to be released from the band's forthcoming album BE THE LOVE YOU WANT. The song premiered earlier this week exclusively via American Songwriter who called the song "earth-shifting" and an "infectious toe-tapper."

Tierinii Jackson spoke with American Songwriter about the song saying, "It's just such a unique collaboration. Jason understands that the vibe of Southern Avenue is very positive, so his approach lyrically perfectly matched the direction for the album. When he turned up with the song, I was so grateful. We reworked it with the band and made it all churchy and soulful and as Memphis-y as we could. It turned out really, really great. It's kind of a wild card because it's more of a dance song, but it's still got that church vibe, it still has the soul."

Preceding the release of "Move Into The Light," Southern Avenue shared "Push Now," along with the official music video - a light-hearted happy-go-lucky visual that showcases the band's personality and incorporates family members from the entire Southern Avenue team.

"We wanted the video to be fun, colorful, and alive. What better way to do that than to make it a raging party filled with super-cute kids," says Southern Avenue frontwoman, the song's co-writer and mom of two of the video's young stars, Tierinii Jackson. "The energy of the track was definitely matched by our adorable friends. It's LIT!"

The third studio album from Southern Avenue, BE THE LOVE YOU WANT, was produced by multi-GRAMMY winner, Steve Berlin (Los Lobos, Deer Tick, Susan Tedeschi, Jackie Greene), and co-produced by Ori Naftaly, and arrives on August 27, 2021 via Renew Records/BMG.

BE THE LOVE YOU WANT sees Southern Avenue pushing themselves towards bold new ideas of what it means to be a blues band in the modern world, bending and reshaping their musical heritage with electrifying performance, vivid production, and a remarkably clear vision. Operating from their distinctively international vantage point, Southern Avenue has produced a wide-ranging collection of original music - predominantly co-written by Israeli-born guitarist Ori Naftaly and powerhouse lead vocalist Tierinii Jackson - that links them to their home city's glorious past while at the same time, demonstrates their ambitious intent to evolve Memphis music to contemporary effect. With BE THE LOVE YOU WANT, Southern Avenue continue driving the Southern soul legacy into the 21st century, preserving its glory and tradition while striving towards something diverse, universal, and altogether their own.

Ahead of the release and into the fall, the band will set out on an extensive tour that includes over a dozen previously announced dates supporting Jason Mraz.

The band brilliantly bridges the power of Memphis soul with jamband liberation, gospel blues, and R&B to craft their own timeless brand of American music. The ambitious sonic approach expertly complements BE THE LOVE YOU WANT's rich themes of self-love, self-empowerment, personal accountability and the desire to push through towards something greater in life.

Southern Avenue is: Tierinii Jackson - Lead Vocals, Background Vocals * Ori Naftaly - Guitars *

Tikyra Jackson - Drums, Background Vocals * Jeremy Powell - Keys * Evan Sarver - Bass

7/17 @ Renaissance at Colony Park |Ridgeland, MS w/ Big Head Todd & The Monsters

7/21 @ Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Park | Rochester, MN

7/22 @ Music at the Meridian | Yankton, SD

7/23 @ Levitt at the Falls | Sioux Falls, SD

7/24 @ Holland Center | Omaha, NE

7/30 @ Stubb's Waller Creek Amphitheater | Austin, TX*

7/31 @ The Lawn at White Oak Music Hall | Houston, TX*

8/1 @ The Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory | Dallas, TX*

8/3 @ Starlight Theatre | Kansas City, MO*

8/4 @ Saint Louis Music Park | St. Louis, MO*

8/6 @ Andrew J. Brady ICON Music Center | Cincinnati, OH*

8/7 @ TCU Amphitheatre at White River State Park | Indianapolis, IN*

8/8 @ Meadow Brook Amphitheatre | Detroit, MI*

8/10 @ Rose Music Center | Huber Heights, OH*

8/11 @ Huntington Bank Pavilion at Northerly Island | Chicago, IL*

8/13 @ Jacobs Pavilion at Nautica | Cleveland, OH*

8/14 @ Stone Pony Summerstage | Asbury Park, NJ*

8/15 @ The Anthem | Washington, DC*

8/19 @ Brooklyn Bowl | Nashville, TN w/ Maggie Rose

8/20 - 21 @ Summer Camp Music Festival | Chillicothe, IL

8/27 @ Performance Pavilion at Sweetwater | Fort Wayne, IN w/ Samantha Fish

8/28 @ Levitt Pavilion | Dayton, OH

8/29 @ Railbird Music Festival | Lexington, KY

9/10 & 11 @ Big Blues Bender | Las Vegas, NV

9/18 @ Shipyard Festival | Cape Girardeau, MO

9/26 @ Roots N Blues Festival | Columbia, MO

10/1 @ Mempho Festival | Memphis, TN

10/8 @ Clay Center for the Arts | Charleston, WV

1/22 - 26 @ Panic en la Playa | Riviera Maya, Mexico

1/29 - 2/5 @ Legendary Rhythm & Blues Cruise | Eastern Caribbean

*w/Jason Mraz

All tour dates and up to date news available at southernavenuemusic.com

Photo Credit: Michael Weintrob

See the article here:

Southern Avenue Collaborate With Jason Mraz for New Song 'Move Into The Light' - Broadway World

You dont need a recipe. Really, you dont.

So chastises the back cover of Sam Siftons new book New York Times Cooking: No-Recipe Recipes, which, despite its own pretensions, is full of recipes. Here we have a delightful-looking Asparagus and Boursin Tart (send to mom, I wrote on a Post-it), some pleasantly 90s-sounding Miso-Glazed Scallops, and a handful of ways to make weeknight chicken, the home cooks holy grail. These are recipes youd expect to find on the New York Times Cooking app, which Sifton helped to launch, and for which he has written a weekly newsletter for years. Theyre dishes you can make in under an hour, without too much fuss or too many ingredients, after getting off work.

No-Recipe Recipes translates the utility of the cooking app into something analog while reworking its central format. Here, the ingredient lists do not include amounts, recipes offer no yields, and directions are kept to a single paragraph. Some include little footnotes for tips (make sure your pasta water is salty as the sea) and modifications (instead of asparagus, cook some frozen peas in butter). Sifton writes in the brusque but encouraging tone of a neighborhood dad coaching a soccer game. That asparagus tart recipe ends with a shout: Lets go!

The aim of the book, as outlined in its three-paragraph introduction, is to get the reader riffing: Cooking without recipes is a kitchen skill, Sifton writes. Its a proficiency to develop, a way to improve your confidence in the kitchen and makes the act of cooking fun. Formal recipes are like sheet music, he explains, a useful tool for learning by mimicking. He doesnt go so far as to say that this book will impart unto its reader the living spirit of kitchen-jazz, but the implication hangs in the pages white space like an echo. On the next page, Sifton encourages the reader to join me in cooking this new, improvisational way, without recipes.

But new to whom, exactly?

I love Sams new book and when I got it, immediately thought of old Viet cookbooks that Ive used for research, and to cook from, Andrea Nguyen, James Beard award-winning cookbook author and occasional New York Times Cooking contributor, wrote when I emailed her for this story. Her favorite of those old books is Lam Bep Gioi (Cooking Well), which she describes as the book of its time and akin to The Joy of Cooking in its popularity among Vietnamese cooks, housewives in particular, upon its first publication in 1940.

In the books recipe for pho bo, author Van Dai omits and assumes just as much as she instructs. She doesnt tell anyone what the seasonings are in the broth, Nguyen told me over the phone, translating the recipe and laughing at its brevity. She just goes, choose your noodles wisely. You need them on the thick side. And dont overcook the meat, you need it to be kinda chewy. The last line echoes the suggestive tone of Siftons modifications: If you want it to be really tasty, add a little MSG into each bowl.

The recipe is what Nguyen calls a talk-through, exclusively prosaic instruction with the necessary ingredients mentioned as they are chopped, sprinkled, or added. Quantities are rare. It actually is formal writing, Nguyen clarifies, but its not a recipe as we would identify it. Not in 2021, at least, where nearly all cookbooks adhere to a standard format: title, headnote, ingredients, yield, instructions.

Dais omissions and assumptions reflect the implied cultural proximity between author and reader. Old cookbooks like Lam Bep Gioi were written for an audience that had a common knowledge of a particular cuisine and culture, Nguyen told me, so you didnt have to say much for people to understand. Her readers know which bones to simmer for pho broth, and for how long. Its a laconic sort of instruction familiar to anyone who has snooped through old community cookbooks or taken a mild interest in cookbook history.

The paragraph form has been around since the 1500s, or as long as cookbooks have been printed. American cookbooks really kicked off in the mid-1800s, and for their first hundred years or so, their recipe formats were scattershot, even within a single title. Some are quick talk-throughs; some include the sort of exacting ingredient lists modern cooks are used to. But most look more like the pho recipe in Lam Bep Gioi than anything recently published in Bon Apptit: They assume more than they explain, and they get to the point quickly. A recipe for macaroni in the 1904 book Cooking in Old Creole Days by Celestine Eustis reads like an older version of something Sifton would include in a newsletter, beginning with the basics and then spiraling out into variations to suit your mood. Like many of Siftons not-recipes, it is less a recipe than a suggestion with guide rails:

Macaroni must be thrown into plenty of boiling water to cook it well. Then drain it off and put it in a dish with salt and a little powdered mustard and put it in the oven until there is a nice crust on top. Grated cheese of any kind may be added, or a few tablespoonfuls of well cooked tomatoes, or a few tablespoonfuls of Italian mushrooms stirred up with chicken livers, or the remnants of pte d foie gras, or chopped ham or salt tongue, in fact almost anything that will give it a nice relish.

This style fell out of favor in the mid-20th century, when, according to Celia Sack of San Franciscos Omnivore Books, women suddenly found themselves without kitchen help help who were raised to cook and not to need delineated recipes and had no idea how to make a batter or how long to bake until done. These women needed more specific guidance, exacting quantities, and cooking times, and thus the modern recipe began to evolve. As the needs and circumstances of housewives shifted, so too did the recipe format. This changing shape, then, can trace the modern history of home cooking.

In a 2020 paper titled Recipes for Reading Recipes? Culinary Writing and the Stakes of Multiethnic Pseudonarrative, Delores B. Phillips attempts to untangle the question of whether recipes count as a narrative form. Narratologists often claim that they dont after all, nothing happens in a recipe but, Phillips explains, recipes adopt narratives sheen like borrowed light, accruing narratives features the closer they are to the stories that give them context.

A 29-word recipe for cornbread published in 1881 and reprinted in Toni Tipton-Martins Jubilee, which traces and celebrates the history of African-American cuisine, doesnt offer the traditional makings of narrative. As with many of the older, excerpted recipes in her book, it exemplifies the brevity of many old recipes, which assumed their readers already knew how to cook. But woven into what Tipton-Martin calls a family tree of cornbread, it begins to light up a story that starts with hot water cornbread and ends with souffle. Conversely, when a recipe is stripped of its narrative, it risks becoming a mere suggestion that deprives its reader of a deeper learned experience. A tree becomes a two-by-four.

What narrative does No-Recipe Recipes reflect? Maybe its the story of our highly digitized culinary world, as exemplified by the Times cooking app. (I should mention here that between 2019 and 2020, I was a regular contributor to the Times Hungry City column, a gig for which Sifton approached me; I am also a paying subscriber and enthusiastic user of the app.) In recent years, the Cooking section and the app have made important efforts toward recipe equity, both by adding bylines for cooks and authors who wrote an original recipe excerpted on the site, and by hiring and promoting the work of a wider range of contributors. But it still reflects an international palate that has historically been shaped by white tastes, and a style of cooking that treats putting food on the table as a primarily bourgeois hobby rather than a necessity. Siftons recipes rely heavily on a well-stocked pantry, which he outlines in the early pages of the book. His is the sort of global pantry newly embraced and encouraged by traditional food media outlets: stocked with gochujang, hoisin sauce, tahini, curry powder, furikake, Aleppo pepper, chile crisp, chutney, fish sauce.

When used like a mix-and-match set, this globalized pantry can quickly remove place from food. A Celery and Beef Stir-Fry with gochujang is, according to its three-line headnote, a fast and loose stir-fry that recalls but does not replicate a classic Sichuan dish with a fantastic name Send the Rice Down. If you dont have gochujang, Sifton explains in the modifications section, you can use chile-bean paste. (He knows his readers are already familiar with the spicy-sweet Korean chile paste, but doubanjiang isnt there yet hasnt yet had its chile crisp moment and needs an anglicized translation.) Once the beef is starting to get crispy and delicious-looking, he tells you to hit it with a big, sloppy tablespoon or two of your paste of choice.

That freewheeling instruction made Nguyen a little jealous. When I was reading this I thought, man, at what point would I feel comfortable doing something like that? she told me. Because Im always trying to push people to make things that theyre unfamiliar with. Nguyen has written three Vietnamese cookbooks, and strategically began with banh mi and pho to hook as many readers as possible. Thats why I love the book so much, because he just says, you can make this. And here, make some Crisp Fish Filets with Delicious Sauce. I couldnt possibly write a recipe title like that, because I would be like, okay, thats not really true to the original language that the recipe is in. But for his audience, they just want to make the food. Those who take up the job of educating readers on a cuisine, particularly a non-Western one, often cant get away with playing things so fast and loose. Their authority, too, is often chained to their heritage, and they are expected to honor externally imposed standards of authenticity. Nguyen had to prove herself by writing definitive, meticulously researched cookbooks on Vietnamese staple dishes. But for white writers and editors with institutional backing, authority is more variable, typically requiring little more than a passion for cooking and a wide-ranging pantry.

As Navneet Alang wrote on this website last year, incorporating ingredients from nonwhite cultures into fusion-y dishes for a majority-white audience deracinates those foods, each of which has its own history and culinary tradition. When mainstream recipes are developed for the widest possible (usually white-assumed) audience, their ridges of identity are often worn away in the service of ease of consumption, turning recipes cultural documents that contain personal history, community history, cultural history, anecdote, contradiction, personality, and fantastic names into highly digestible and endlessly mutable things.

Theres a long-running complaint online that recipe bloggers precede their recipes with too much personal narrative. We dont care about your great-aunts knee surgery, the complainers wail, just give us our casserole. As if their computers scrolling functionality had gone on strike. A website launched a few months ago to try to appease these people: Called Recipeasly, it billed itself as your favorite recipes without the ads or life stories [doughnut emoji]. A righteous uproar ensued, with complaints that the website diminished the labor of these bloggers, stole their ad revenue, and neutered their IP, all without consent. The website quickly shut down.

The project had a whiff of dog-whistle sexism, too, as Jaya Saxena wrote for Eater. Its a modern version of the long-running institutional disrespect for recipe collections, particularly those unpublished, that Phillips outlines. Those who decry recipes and cookbooks as lacking narrative identity imply that household literature doesnt deserve serious consideration. But they are often the richest source material we have for those domestic lives. The annals acquire life, Phillips writes, not as repositories of information to await recovery and deciphering but as innovative textual feats that preserve the character of the communities from which they arise. The political mission here is obvious: Recipes tell stories because groups who write them need an archive, lest their stories disappear.

At their most consequential, cookbooks document the ways in which history lingers and lives in kitchens. A great example of this is Bress n Nyam, the new cookbook from chef and farmer Matthew Raiford. In it, he tells the story of his family six generations of farmers descended from the Tikar people of what is now Cameroon and their land on the Georgia coast. Its a document of Gullah Geechee culinary history, as well as the story of a self-described prodigal son returning to the land that raised him.

Raifords recipe for Smoked Ossabaw Island Hog (or How to Host a Pig Roast) looks about as far from a not-recipe as you can get, but retains some hints of the historical form. Over a spread of six pages, Raiford explains his preferred breed of hog; how to build a roasting pit (for which he uses the old box springs from a mattress); how an apple in the beasts mouth will keep the heat circulating nicely. He briefly explains the traditions historic significance. And as with many recipes in his book, he points the reader toward success rather than holding their hand too tightly. An accompanying recipe for chicharrones instructs the reader to begin here: Remove the skin and the fatback from the roasted hog. Render the fatback into a leaf lard that you can use for frying, pastries, and sausages. It sounds a bit like a hundred-year-old recipe; technically, its older. The instructions for the skin that follow are more precise, but these first lines assume a certain knowledge in the reader, or at least a certain instinct.

One of the things that I learned really early on, even before I became a young chef, was that a recipe is a guide, not the rule, Raiford told me of his recipe-writing ethos. A lot of times people consider it to be a rule and a guide. But that leaves no space for the person thats cooking to realize that if I dont taste it right about now, it might taste like this too salty, say, or not salty enough. Theres a lot of to taste in my book, because thats the way my family cooked. These arent improvisational recipes per se, but they teach the sort of intuition that future improvisation requires.

Roughly half of the recipes in Bress n Nyam (which means bless and eat in Gullah) are family recipes. Research for the book meant not just calling up his mother to ask about her pound cake, but reading through his grandmothers old recipe cards (thorough, written-through recipes) and 10 or so really old cookbooks that Raiford found in the house, from the 19th and early 20th centuries. Many of them only offered a list of ingredients or shorthand notes, Raiford says, and vague directions, like cook it until its soft. As a trained chef and lifelong cook, he was able to make the assumptions that the original readers had been asked to make, a set of assumptions that were obvious back then: Because who would take on cooking who didnt know how to cook?

Adapting his grandmothers recipes was a little more straightforward, partially because so many were written the way he had learned them at her side. All I did was take those recipes and go, okay, if I was telling someone this verbally, what would it come out like? Raiford says. I tried to recreate the things that were written as though you and I are having this conversation right now. It channels an intimacy and trust between writer and reader that defies any lack of personal connection. That intimacy is strengthened by the personal and family histories that accompany Raifords recipes, lending to each dish that narrative sheen that Phillips described.

Most modern cookbooks aim to make their readers more confident cooks; improvisational cooking is an explicit result promised by some, and an implicit one for many. Its also a style that professional cooks and housewives and other sorts of parents have practiced throughout modern history, and its a way many people have learned through watching and listening and doing, in home and professional settings. Cookbooks, in their way, are oral histories in formal dress. This improvisational style of cooking is not new, but trying to codify it is. Siftons book belies the difficulty of that effort: Outlining an improvisation is not the same as teaching someone to improvise on their own. Concision and empowerment dont always go hand in hand.

The teaching of intuition, I wager, requires more space on the page. In considering Siftons book, I kept thinking back to Samin Nosrats Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat, from 2017. The book takes up a similar goal as No-Recipe Recipes to teach the reader to be a more confident, improvisational cook but uses the opposite approach. The first recipe begins on page 217; before that are chapters on the elements of good cooking and flavor, a generous crash course in what makes good food good and how you might create it in your own home. (Nosrat has also contributed to the Times Cooking section, and was until recently a contributor to the Times Magazines Eat column.)

Nosrat takes a good three pages to explain the process of braising. She opens with a story: the memory of being 19 and new in the Chez Panisse kitchen, nervously watching chefs turn their backs on searing hunks of meat to chop onions in preparation for a braise. She explains a braises components, and what defines the category. She walks you through each step carefully, providing tips for things to watch out for, avoid, or expect. She explains the different routes you could take wine or beer to deglaze; which vegetables hold up nicely to the process. With this extensive advice, Nosrat not only gives us all we need to know, she creates a trust, a faith, between herself and the reader. Its a necessary inversion of the trust that authors like Van Dai had in their readers: from you know enough to cook this to Ive written enough for you to learn from.

Later in the book we have a recipe (two full pages) for Pork Braised with Chillies, followed by variations, followed by Everything You Need to Know to Improvise a Braise. This takes the idea of learning to improvise and offers a hypothesis: Youve got to follow the recipe, or at least understand the technique, before you can begin riffing. The beauty of it all, Nosrat writes, is once youve got this braise in your pocket, youve got a hundred others in there, too.

Marian Bull is a writer and ceramicist living in Brooklyn. Allie Sullberg is an illustrator, designer, and artist who lives in Portland, Oregon.

The freshest news from the food world every day

More here:

Sam Siftons No-Recipe Recipes and the Reinvention of Kitchen Improvisation - Eater

Manhasset, NY, July 14, 2021 --(PR.com)--P.O.W.E.R. (Professional Organization of Women of Excellence Recognized) highlights their newest Women of Empowerment members who are being recognized for their achievements and high level of success in the many fields and industries listed.

About The Newest Women of Empowerment MembersP.O.W.E.R. (Professional Organization of Women of Excellence Recognized) is proud to highlight their newest Women of Empowerment members who are now recognized members of P.O.W.E.R.:

Cassandra Ricks--HealthcareAlice Hopkins--Cleaning ServiceAlecia Rae Selden--Food/BeveragesRoxanne A. Miller--EducationRonna A. King--Cleaning ServiceCurressia D. Walton--Retail IndustryDeborah A.M. Vanek Tomeo--Financial ServicesShirley R. Englehorn--SportsKari L. Gibson--Tree ServiceRoxane Maliszewski--Electrical/ElectronicTisha Brandes--InsuranceDiane Rosario--Construction/BuildingAnna Kostanyan--HospitalityLinda Ward--Craft SuppliesRachelle Johnson--Financial ServicesAmy O'Hara--EducationMaxx Brown--EducationSamantha F. Bellina--InsuranceAlexandra C. Jackson--HealthcarePatrice A. Johnson--Health ServicesKameilah L. McKie--Food/BeveragesDelcina O. Smith--ReligionRegina M. Jones--Retail IndustryCeleste Pavone--Real EstateJacqueline Y. Fuqua--Beauty/CosmeticsYvonne L. Webber--EducationVanessa M. Williams--Beauty/CosmeticsMelissa Slider--Retail IndustryEdania C. Rondon--Law/Legal ServicesTamakie B. Mobley--HealthcareCharlotte S. Doyen--AutomotiveShawnsa S. Christy--ConsultingMercedes P. Armstrong--HealthcareKristi L. Fakhri--HealthcareElizabeth Loge--Construction/BuildingCarmen Hunter-Anderson--Real EstateLaura C. Morejon-Bodelo--Law/Legal ServicesLovett M. Ojuri-Davis--HealthcareAndreka Michelle Eberhart--Staffing/RecruitingDonna P. Davidson--HealthcareChrista Ward--Retail IndustryPauline Judy Scott--HospitalityVanessa L. Heights--TransportationTiplance L. Vernon--Beauty/CosmeticsNicole E. Scott--RodeoLouvinia A. Cole--Notary PublicTabitha S. Taylor-Boone--Mental Health CareConsandia Ann Grier--Home HealthcareTerrell L. Wright Jr.--Beauty/CosmeticsNancy L. Green--CommunicationsHanna Benti--Food/BeveragesCatherine Howard--Law/Legal ServicesEmily J. Osborne--Non-Profit/CommunityChauweda E. Smith--Mental Health CareJocelyn L. Johnson--Cleaning ServiceKimberly V. Lewis--Apparel/FashionAcacia Dietz--Non-Profit/CommunityPatty M. Breeze--InsuranceVera M. Johnson--Notary PublicTraci Jackson--Beauty/CosmeticsYvonne Pierce--HealthcareShamira N. Spruill--InsuranceRaashida Shelton--Real EstateCatrina R. Rivera--Financial ServicesJaime Napolitano--VeterinaryKimberly Chin--Food/BeveragesTeresa Stephenson--Real EstateJennifer Lynn Woods Peterka--SalesAmanda Baltz-Gainan--Non-Profit/Boys & Girls ClubDiane M. Stalker--PhotographyCynthia J. Leonard--Cleaning ServiceHeike M. Vogel--Law/Legal ServicesSigne Griffin--Real EstateJanetta A. Thomas-Inniss--HealthcareSue Slater--TravelSueAnn Squire--PublishingAngela M. Maxwell--Animal CareShandell M. Warren--Massage TherapyJessica Strawser--Social ServicesJennifer Melicia--Personal ServicesDebbie Faragoza--Animal CareJeanette Caballero--Beauty/CosmeticsLiz Fernwalt--InsuranceChristy L. Adams--Non-Profit/Breast CancerJosie M. Val--ConsultingLisaleigh Sniffen--Beauty/CosmeticsChristabel Bishop--Beauty/CosmeticsPatricia A. Alford--TransportationKaren A. Watson Williams--HealthcareCinnamon King--Beauty/CosmeticsTakilia S. Banks--HealthcareLeshell Dennis--Non-Profit/Woman EmpowermentJanet Riley-Wright--Human ServicesMonica Labeaud--Apparel/FashionMary L. Garbs--HealthcareAnnie Glenister--Law/Legal ServicesKerri L. Pippen--CoachingIre L. Evans--Food/BeveragesLinda A. Willis--Nutrition/WellnessCrista Lynn Fernandez--PhotographyLeanita J. Rivera--MediaEleanor Maria Goodman--EducationTawanna Johnson--GovernmentCher M. Bourque--PublishingMildred L. Huckleberry--ReligionKathleen McSherry--ArtTricia A. Myers-Hopson--EducationDebra L. Priest--ContractingBernetta L. Simmons--Food/BeveragesCyndy L. Brown--TransportationMaxine Oliver-Benson--Real EstateSandy C. Smith--Non-Profit/Equine TherapyKathleen S. Lang--HealthcareLovonnya L. Hedgepeth--MusicJustina P. Plowden--Non-Profit/Spinal Cord InjuriesChe D. Williamson--Law/Legal ServicesSusan A. Medina--Beauty/CosmeticsLaQuisha Jackson--CoachingHolly S. Underwood--Retail IndustryKyndra Lewis--CoachingRuth Mills--Retail IndustryBelinda M. Preston-Cash--CoachingNicole Marie Rose--Event ServicesWanda Diane Grondin--EducationJanet M. Burke--Information Technology/ITNicole Mahoe--Retail IndustryLoretta F. Hives-Moody--ReligionSimene' Nikio Walden--EducationChrista May Lajoyce Davis--Home HealthcareTiffany S. Northern--HealthcareShyma A. Andrews--HealthcareKrista Lynn Dickman--Real EstateAmarilys Velez--EducationArlene Strugar--Research & DevelopmentLaDenta Martin Wright--Non-Profit/YouthCrystal A. Casteneda--CraftingMary Virginia Boyd--Medical EquipmentCynthia S. Cadorette--Beauty/CosmeticsSofia Solis--ImmigrationSylvia Flores--InsuranceTerrie A. Dusek--Medical EquipmentDawn Desiree Brown--Home HealthcareDoreen M. Guarneri--Beauty/CosmeticsKarrla A. Smith--Financial ServicesMartha Washington--Retail IndustryWanda Kelley--GovernmentTamia Anderson--Massage TherapyHeather McQueen--Nutrition/WellnessRebecca L. Racine--HealthcareKathleen M. Csillag--HealthcareEmily A. DeMarco--HealthcareDebra J. Cunningham--PhotographySabrina L. Tate--Event ServicesAmy M. Ardruino--HealthcareBonnie Curlee Dawson--CraftingPorsha LaShae Robertson--EntertainmentProphetess Lila R. Jackson--Non-Profit/MinistryYvonne Ezell--HospitalityGabrielle Tomeo--Financial ServicesSabrina Bell--EducationMarilyn D. Herfurth--EducationElizabeth Johnsen--Beauty/CosmeticsAshley N. Jackson--Consulting

About P.O.W.E.R. Magazine (Professional Organization of Women of Excellence Recognized) and Powerwoe.comP.O.W.E.R. - Professional Organization of Women of Excellence Recognized is an organization and an online community. P.O.W.E.R. Magazine is a digital and exclusive print magazine featuring celebrities and everyday hardworking professional women. Our mission is to provide a powerful network of women who will mentor, inspire, and empower each other to be the best they can be. Through our valuable services and collaborating with like-minded professionals, our members can potentially gain the recognition and exposure they deserve, as well as obtain knowledge from those who have already achieved success.

See the rest here:

P.O.W.E.R. - Professional Organization of Women of Excellence Recognized Highlights Their Newest Women of Empowerment Members - PR.com

By AGGREY MUTAMBO

The story of South Sudan, had political leaders not overlooked challenges at independence, would have been better on its tenth anniversary.

As the country marked 10 years since it seceded from Sudan, key stakeholders involved in the countrys search for peace, stability and justice say personal interests, lack of unity, and departure from the original vision for independence conspired to derail the country.

Battered by war, South Sudan is celebrating its anniversary with nearly five million people still displaced by violence and considered hungry, another two million staying in neighbouring countries as refugees and a sore lack of basic commodities occasioned by an unstable economy. All these are related to its enduring conflict, only brought to a halt after leaders President Salva Kiir and his then nemesis Riek Machar and 10 other groups signed a peace agreement in 2018 and established a government of national unity last year in February.

Yet even that peace deal has been poorly implemented, with spontaneous violence reported nearly every week across the country. Maj-Gen (Rtd) Charles Tai Gituai, the interim Chairperson of the Revitalised Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission (R-JMEC) says the country is on the path to stability but only if it adopts the peace agreement in full.

When the people of South Sudan voted for independence, they had a vision for their country, he told The EastAfrican on Tuesday, referring to peace, development and prosperity as pledged by the new nation.

Notwithstanding the conflicts that occurred since then, their vision still remains. The peace agreement they signed in September 2018 is evidence that despite the challenges they have faced, the people of South Sudan are committed to working together to achieve their national vision.

That peace agreement demanded that a full government is formed inclusive of the then warring parties, that steps be taken to train, professionalise and merge the army from the then fighting groups and that a hybrid court be established to deal with atrocities and help reconcile the country.

Daniel Y. Deng, a bush-era veteran for South Sudans independence war, called this anniversary a mourning session rather than a celebration.

We have had nothing to bring us hope. The leaders have ruined our economy, mismanaged resources and instilled tribalism, corruption and nepotism, Deng, also the Chairman of the South Sudan Peace Coalition and a member of the South Sudan Civil Society Forum, told The EastAfrican.

These problems, he argued, have added to the humanitarian crisis that emerged from the post-independence bouts of war. And with some of the leaders in the unity government facing sanctions for past atrocities, he argued, only concerted pressure from the region and beyond will help stabilise South Sudan.

Citizens are putting their hopes on the international community, continental and regional bodies to act quickly against KiiRieks administration and the perpetrators who are enjoying leadership immune with impunity against civil population, he lamented, using the portmanteau of Salva Kiir and Riek Machars unity government.

While the two leaders reunion after years of fighting brought hope of the country re-establishing its prosperity path, critics argue that delayed implementation has meant low pace of reforms, delayed formation of institutions such as the transitional legislature and almost no certainty the country will pull off national election and come out of its transition.

Last week, President Kiir revoked the appointment of 35 lawmakers to the Revitalised Transitional Legislative Assembly. He gave no reasons, but it meant the crucial arm of government has still not been established in full, more than a year after the unity government was established. It had been expected that a new list would be gazetted before independence celebrations, but Kiirs office did not immediately confirm this.

The problems of South Sudan, however, are not yesterdays, they began long before the country even attained independence. Refugees, ethnic militia, poverty, illiteracy and hunger have defined the territory of todays South Sudan for decades.

Leaders overlooked them for personal interest. And it began by abandoning the original vision of the Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement, the rebel group led by John Garang which later became the founding ruling party of South Sudan.

One of the cardinal mistakes was that the SPLM/A failed to manage the transition from liberation movement into a political party. It failed to come up with a political programme to build a nation and safeguard the party, James Oryema, a senior member of the Riek Machar-led SPLM-IO told The EastAfrican.

There has been no mechanism of internal power transfer; and, lack of tolerance to different views within the party. I doubt if SPLM as a party has learnt any lessons but the people are learning to live in harmony. War has made everyone to share in the sorrow, he said, referring to the original cause of conflict in December 2013, when SPLM members loyal to Dr Machar bickered with those of Kiir. The divisions broke into the military as war erupted.

Despite all these, there is high hope for the country because majority of the people dislike war and are working for peace, Oryema said.

The countrys immediate challenge is to resolve a humanitarian crisis. But Deng argued there is a need to reopen civil liberties, a free media, youth empowerment and political freedoms. Then mop up the arms, unify the more than 83,000 armed groups into an army and establish punitive measures for those who attempt to break peace.

Maj-Gen (Rtd) Gituai says solutions to all these problems depend on just how far South Sudan adopts the peace deal.

In South Sudan, implementing fully the Revitalised Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan (R-ARCSS) in letter and spirit is the best way of creating an enduring condition of peace, he told The EastAfrican, referring to the agreement mediated by regional bloc Intergovernmental Authority on Development (Igad).

Full implementation of the R-ARCSS will realise the means of bringing stability and prosperity, unify the security forces, atone for the past, undertake key reforms of the judiciary and the economy, and put in place mechanisms ready to harmoniously manage future disagreements among the parties.

R-JMEC, created by Igad, oversees the implementation of chapters of the agreement. And Maj-Gen (rtd) Gituai said he has been prevailing upon all leaders to implement the agreement.

It is a challenging process, and the people of South Sudan need all their friends in the region to lend their support.

See the original post:

Overlooked political challenges return to haunt South Sudan - The East African

At Expo 2020 Dubai, the Women's Pavilion leverages support and contribution from four creators in diverse fields. Image Credit: (From left to right) Maison & Objet, Vincent Tullo/The New York Times, Supplied, Shutterstock

Dubai: Guided by an advisory board consisting of the members of the UN Women, important figures in academia and even prominent UAE personalities, the Womens Pavilion makes sure its conversations resonate with the current global agenda of women and girls. To encapsulate the pavilions vision, it ropes in four change-makers, who add an artistic dimension to the profound task at hand.

We really wanted to enrich this curation with another angle, a more artistic angle, says Sophie Doireau, Managing Director of Cartier Middle East and India, at the press conference for the pavilion. Expo 2020 Dubai and French luxury goods conglomerate Cartier have been working together on the content, programming and the curation of the Womens Pavilion as one team.

We have onboarded four artists from various backgrounds three women and one man, adds Doireau, who says that the gender mix was deliberate to rally the cause from every voice.

Nadine Labaki, director and actress

Known for her realistic portrayal of snapshots of life in Lebanon, Nadine Labaki is a vocal advocate of womens rights and issues, as depicted in her directed works. The Lebanese director and actresswill be in charge of the Womens Pavilion introductory short film, which visually underscores the pavilion's theme of When women thrive, humanity thrives.

I truly believe in the power of art in igniting change, says Labaki on her role in theWomen's Pavilion in an interview film played at the press conference.It's very important that we show this other point of view, which is the women's point of view.

In 2019, Labaki became the first female Arab filmmaker to ever receive a nomination for an Oscar in the best foreign language film category. Her Oscar-nominated film, Capernaum, also received the jury prize at Cannes Film Festival the year before, the movie only being her third feature film.

Mlanie Laurent, actress, director and singer

The French actress, director and singer dons the role of a curator by designing the exhibition on the second floor of the Womens Pavilion, where the experience is divided into three sections, merging cultural, artistic and social facets.

Laurent will showcase her photography and other selected works to paint the universal link between women and their ecosystems. This space in the first section will also include a sculpture.

Moving on to the next section, visitors will find a virtual reality film that tells the stories of women from all over the world, known and unknown, as they navigate through their experiences.

Finally, an audio-visual art piece in the third and final section will reflect womens voices from all over the world.

Laura Gonzalez, architect and interior designer

Gonzalez is the creative behind Cartiers freshly renovated boutique in Dubai Mall. The French designers personal style of art is often described as sophisticated with a whimsical, eclectic twist. She was awarded designer of the year at the 2019 Maison & Objet, a major trade fair for interior design held biannually in Paris.

The architect reimagines the Womens Pavilion faade, which is embellished in a blanket of constellations that look like twinkling jewels in the night sky. Inspired by Cartiers creative heritage, Gonzalez worked on the upper part of the exterior in collaboration with two women artists: young Emirati artist Kholoud Sharafi and French light designer Pauline David.

EL Seed, international multidisciplinary artist

French-Tunisian artist eL Seed works activism and the call for peace into his Arabic calligraphy that he calls calligraffiti. His broad strokes can be notably spotted in the demilitarised zone (DMZ) between North and South Korea, Cairo, Toronto, Lebanon, Philadelphia and Dubai.

The only male ambassador representing the Womens Pavilion, eL Seed is a champion for the womens empowerment cause, showcasing his support through calligraphy painted on the bottom part of the facade in the fresco technique.

In the Women's Pavilion, I'm trying to bring light to some amazing women that I met in Nepal, says eL Seed.

Doireau says that eL Seeds work on the pavilion interprets a poem by a Nepali female poet on the topic of womens empowerment in the 1950s. The same calligraffiti will be mirrored in a Nepali village, which was entirely rebuilt through the collective effort of women after a debilitating earthquake displaced 2.8 million people in 2015.

Visit the Women's Pavilion to learn and reflect on the perspectives offered by the four creative ambassadors that are advocating for women on their own termsthrough their artistic expressions.

- The writer is an intern with Gulf News.

Read more:

Meet the four ambassadors of Womens Pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai - Gulf News

The Branson Regional Arts Council is hosting auditions for its first musical of the fall, 9 to 5 The Musical.

The musical, which features music and lyrics by Dolly Parton and was written by Patricia Resnick, is based on the seminal 1980 hit film. Auditions for the production are being held at the Historic Owen Theatre in downtown Branson on Friday, July 9, from 6 to 9 p.m. and Saturday, July 10, from 2 to 5 p.m.

Set in the late 1970s, this hilarious story of friendship and revenge in the Rolodex era is outrageous, thought-provoking and even a little romantic, said a press release from BRAC. Pushed to the boiling point, there female coworkers concort a plan to get even with the sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot they call their boss. In a hilarious turn of events, Violet, Judy and Doralee live out their wildest fantasy giving their boss the boot.

The production will run for a total of eight performances and will be held from Sept. 9 to 12 and Sept. 16 to 19.

For the musical, strong singers, actors and dancers ages 16 and up will be cast. Those auditioning will need to bring with them an up-to-date headshot and resume, a conflicts list with any conflicts dates from the first cast meeting through the performance dates, clothes and shoes to move and dance in, and a one minute cut of a musical theatre song that is preferably in the style of the show.

An accompanist will not be provided, so auditioners will need to bring tracked accompaniment. They may also be asked to cold read upon request. Anyone who would like to audition, but will be unable to attend the scheduled auditions are encouraged to contact director Kyle Bradley at kylebradley8913@gmail.com.

The first rehearsal and cast meeting will be on Sunday, July 18 at 2 p.m. The rest of the rehearsal schedule for the production will be determined after casting has been completed.

Character breakdowns for the musical are as follows:

Violet Newstead: The companys Head Secretary and Mr. Harts Administrative Assistant, she is a single mother and typically stands up for what she believes in. Attractive, strong, ambitious. Age: 40 to 50 Vocal range top: D5-F3.

Doralee Rhodes: A young, sexy spitfire who works at Mr. Harts office. She is proof that there is more to a woman than just her looks. Age: 20 to 30 Vocal range top: E5-G3.

Judy Bernly: The new girl at the firm, she has been burned by her husbands affair and is searching for personal empowerment. Insecure, determined, and hopeful. Age: 30 to 35 Vocal range top: F5-Ab3.

Franklin Hart, Jr.: One of the firms executives and a notorious chauvinist. He is capable of faking charm but usually shows his true colors as an arrogant, self-absorbed boss. Age: 45 to 50 Vocal range top: Gb4-C3.

Roz Keith: The attentive office gossip queen and snitch. She has an unrequited love for Mr. Hart and will do anything she can to win his approval. Age: 35 to 45 Vocal range top: C5-G3.

Joe: A handsome, young office accountant. Genuine and nice, and smitten with Violet. Age: 25 to 35 Vocal range top: G4-B2.

Dwayne: Doralees attractive husband. He is very supportive of her professional pursuits. Age: 25 to 30 Vocal range top: G4-E2.

Josh Newstead: Violets awkward teenage son. Age: 15 to 18.

Missy: Franklin Harts wife, clueless to her husbands true nature. Age: 20 to 35.

Maria: A young and vibrant secretary in Harts office. Age: 20 to 30 Vocal range top: D5-F4.

Dick: Judys soon-to-be ex-husband. An average guy, he is sporting a little less hair and a little more paunch than he did ten years ago. Age: 35 to 45.

Kathy: A secretary in Harts office with a tendency to gossip. Age: 30 to 40 Vocal range top: D5-G4.

Margaret: A secretary in Harts office with a tendency to drink. Age: 30 to 40.

Tinsworthy: Franklin Harts boss and Chairman of the Board. A good man, who may be wiser to Harts ways than he lets on. Age: 50 to 65.

ENSEMBLE: Office employees, police officers, hospital employees, etc. The ensemble plays a wide variety of roles. Production is seeking a full range of male and female voices including excellent low-reaching Altos, experienced Mezzo and Sopranos, Basses, Baritones and Tenors.

For additional information on the audition process and the production visit bransonarts.org.

Original post:

BRAC to host casting auditions for '9 to 5 The Musical' - Branson Tri-Lakes news