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A Personal Reflection on Books, Art & Life
I just finished listening to a beautiful interview by Krista Tippett with Kate DiCamillo on the On Being Podcast. It was a poignant and honest exploration of the power of stories to increase our capacity for life and the fullness of experiencing wonder and joy amidst the suffering and seeming chaos of the world around…
Arts of the Arab World I: Material Culture
I have read a lot about the glorious accomplishments of “the Arabs” or “the Muslims” in the distant past. Instead of focusing on some mythic golden age, this site includes any material culture that I find beautiful and noteworthy. So while some examples are historical, some are contemporary. For some incredibly beautiful historic art and…
Israel-Palestine Sources
This is a list of recommendations for people (especially Americans) who want to educate themselves about the history and politics of Israel-Palestine. 1. Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter’s book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, which raised controversy for his description of the situation as apartheid. 2. Classic Fateful Triangle by Noam Chomsky. It can be dense due…
New Warrior Woman Translation
Here’s my new edition and translation of part of the medieval Arabic Sirat al-Amira Dhat al-Himma ‘Epic of the Commander Dhat al-Himma’ https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2151&context=mff Available online and open-access at the above link! Check it out if you’re interested in medieval epics, classical Arabic literature, popular culture, or warrior women. This publication includes the Arabic excerpt, my…
DIY Laundry Soap
So here’s a departure from my usual posts. I have several recipes for products that I prefer to make instead of buying because my family has found them good and easy enough to be worth their minimal effort. Here is the first. This recipe takes me less than one half hour to make, and one…

Juha’s Wife
Using gender to define the core of what makes us human creates huge contradictions: it requires us to define men and women as fundamentally different from each other and yet also as full human beings. – Johnson, The Gender Knot, 58 Just as women appear in limited and occasional historical events universally, so the popular…