Joy of Giving and Receiving

Do you have a list of favourite places that you would want to visit in your lifetime?

My cyberfriend, VB once told me there are two places that she must visit in her lifetime. It is not so much of the 'place' but the 'scenery' she wants to view. One of which is to be able to see maple leaves turning red in autumn. The timing has to be right and the weather has to be good too. I am glad she was able to catch the red maple leaves in 'full bloom' on her recent trip to Korea. I was very happy for her when she sent me a photo of her standing under an astonishing sea of golden yellow maple leaves. Me being so ignorant, didn't even know that maple leaves could turn yellow too (^^')

I got to know VB when she left her first comment on this blog 3 years ago. Even though we have never met each other, this kind lady has been sending me gifts 'on a regular-basis', so much so that I think she has even made it a point to mail me a 'goodies parcel' each time after her holiday trip :)

I grew up in a family where everyone got to learn to be independent. As much as we can, we try not to rely on others for help. We prefer to give than to take. I used to have this mindset that whatever kind gestures I received from others, I have to return it back one day, and, as soon as possible. As such, I prefer to give, as I find receiving any gifts in any form from others, could become an invisible burden. I will only have peace in my mind after I have duly returned the kind gestures.

I understand the joy of giving, and it is a tremendous pleasure knowing that the receiver loves and appreciates what you have given. But, it was only in recent years that I appreciate the joy of receiving, minus the self-imposed obligation. I am now able to view the whole situation in a different perspective. By receiving, you are actually giving the chance for the giver to enjoy the pleasure of giving and sharing. I hope I am right to say so.

It is with these thoughts that I enjoyed this cup of icy cold omija tea VB sent me...along with many other goodies :)

I am sure most of you would be quite familiar with Korean Yuja tea or commonly known as citron or yuzu tea (柚子茶). This is the first time I have heard of omija tea.

I googled and learned that omija tea, a traditional Korean tea, is made from dried fruits of Schisandra chinensis. Also known as 五味子 in Chinese or "five flavor berry" as it has a mixture of sour, sweet, salty, spicy, and bitter taste. 五味子 is also commonly known as 山花椒 (wild peppers?). No wonder, I thought I could smell pepper from a cup of steaming hot omjia tea!

This lovely pinkish tea has a slight tang to it and it tastes really refreshing when served cold. The tea is neither bitter or salty. It reminds me very much of drinks made with Roselle (洛神果) and it has a similar sourish sweet taste like hawthorn (山楂). The tea comes with tiny bits of nuts, I believe they are either pine nuts, almond bits, or sunflower seeds. When served hot, this lovely sweet and tangy tea is a great way to end a meal, especially if it is a heavy one ;) If you happen to go to a Korean restaurant, do check whether it serves this beverage, I am sure you will enjoy this drink, be it cold or hot.

As the season of giving draws nearer, here's wishing all my readers Happy Shopping for your gifts and presents for your friends and loved ones! And, in case you ask, my favourite places to visit in my lifetime: flower fields at Furano and tulips in Holland, what about yours? 

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BUTTER IS BETTER

Butter makes everything better. 

Trust me.

I have 7 pounds of it in my refrigerator.  Today, with the stacks of essays and comment codes a fading memory, I am embarking on another yearly round of frenzied Christmas cookie baking.

Always on the lookout for the best butter cookie ever, I came across a recipe for sablé cookies.  It is similar to my favourite butter cookie in technique:  mix, roll into logs, refrigerate, bake.  How idiot-proof is that?  I love that the logs can hang out in the refrigerator and at a moment’s notice, I can whip up a batch by simply rolling the logs in organic cane sugar or sanding sugar, slice and bake.  Hot cookies!  There’s nothing like the smell of freshly baked butter cookies.

A sablé, as the French name implies, should be sandy in texture.  It is in fact a type of French shortbread cookie.  This recipe by Dorie Greenspan is certainly sandy in texture (if made properly).  I think I like it but I cannot decide if it’s better than the Vanilla Bean Chocolate Diamonds (bulls-eye cookies) I made a couple of years ago by Jacques Torres.  My go-to slice and bake butter cookie  recipe is always a winner and a staple in my Christmas Cookie Boxes.   I think the bulls-eye cookies are gorgeous and I may have to make them again to compare.  The sparkly diamond-like crust around the perimeter of the cookies are evocative of winter to me. 

Along with this plain butter sablé, I have a chocolate batch from Greenspan’s new cookbook sitting in my refrigerator “aging”.  They will be sliced and baked tomorrow and I’ll post some pics and the recipe then.  After testing a few new recipes, I’ll incorporate the winning cookies into my yearly Christmas Cookie boxes.  I have a few gluten-free friends and I may have to resort to making macarons this year.  Since they are a tad finicky, I’ll leave those until the end because they are kind of delicate and can’t be made that far ahead unless I decide I want to give previously frozen macarons. nah. Not so Christmassy.

I have decided that although pretty coloured sanding sugars can be lovely for Christmas, the red or green sparkles aren’t aesthetically pleasing to my eyes for these particular cookies.  Kids love it but it is just not so chic if you get what I mean.  It looks so unnatural (and like they came from the supermarket bakery!)   I found that using plain old granulated sugar works fine if you don’t have sanding sugar.   What I tend to do for Christmas is use organic Cane sugar for rolling the logs before slicing.  It’s not so white but I like it that way.

I used organic butter, organic sugar, organic flour and free range organic eggs for this recipe.   In Vancouver, I found that Superstore is a great source for organic baking products.  The newly renovated one on Grandview Hwy has a huge section dedicated to organic foods.  I was in heaven.  I even found Manuka honey in no-drip squeeze bottles.
Interestingly enough, I had time to take these pictures but after the first batch of cookies were baked, my daughters hoovered up the whole sheet pan’s worth before I could take a pictured of the finished product.  I didn’t even taste one.  I think they liked it I’m guessing!

I didn’t get an opportunity to take a picture of the next baked batch of the logs because I took it to work for my colleagues the next morning and they in turn hoovered up that batch.  It’s a good sign, but you never know because they tend to hoover up pretty much anything that hits the staffroom tables. 

So, I will post sans finished product.  I think the raw cookie dough logs look kind of pretty anyway and look “winterish”.

I slice my refrigerator-cold dough logs with a serrated knife.  I use my bread knife for this purpose.  It works fabulously and you don’t get a misshapen cookie this way.

Space them evenly on parchment paper, giving them plenty of room to spread.

SABLÉS (from Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From My Home to Yours)

• 2 sticks (8 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup confectioners’ sugar, sifted
• 1/2 teaspoon salt, preferably fine sea salt
• 2 large egg yolks, at room temperature
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• decorating (coarse) sugar

[cakebrains’ note: I doubled this recipe easily as it’s Christmas and that way I use up the whole pound of butter at once.  Besides, these prepared logs store well in the fridge or freezer]

1. Working with a stand mixer, preferably fitted with a paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the butter at medium speed until smooth and very creamy.  Add the sugars and salt and beat until well blended, about 1 minutes.  The mixture should be smooth and velvety, not fluffy and airy.  Reduce the mixer speed to low and beat in the egg yolks, again beating until the mixture is homogenous.
2. Turn off the mixer.  Pour in the four, drape a kitchen towel over the stand mixer to protect yourself and the counter from flying flour and pulse the mixer at low speed about 5 times, a second or two each time.  Take a peek—if there is still a lot of flour on the surface of the dough, pulse a couple more times; if not, remove the towel.  Continuing at low speed, mix for about 30 seconds more, just until the flour disappears into the dough and the dough looks uniformly moist.  (If most of the flour is incorporated but you’ve still got some in the bottom of the bowl, use a rubber spatula to work the rest of the flour into the dough.)  The dough will not clean the sides of the bowl, nor will it come together in a ball—and it shouldn’t.  You want to work the dough as little as possible.  What you’re aiming for is a soft, moist, clumpy (rather than smooth) dough.  Pinch it, and it will feel like Play-Doh.
3. Scrape the dough out onto a smooth work surface, gather it into a ball and divide it in half.  Shape each piece into a smooth log about 9 inches long:  it’s easiest to work on a piece of plastic wrap and use the plastic to help form the log.  Wrap the logs well and refrigerate them for at least 3 hours, preferably longer.  (The dough can be kept in the refrigerator for up to 3 days or frozen for up to 2 months.)
4. Centre a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment or silicone mats.
5. Remove a log of dough from the refrigerator, unwrap it and place it on a piece of parchment or wax paper.  Whisk the egg yolk until it is smooth, and brush some of the yolk all over the sides or the dough—this is the glue—then sprinkle the entire surface of the log with decorating sugar. [*cakebrain’s note: I DO NOT brush egg yolk on my cold logs.  I just roll them in sugar and it sticks; no problems!] 
6. Trim the ends of the roll if they’re ragged, and slice the log into 1/3 inch thick cookies.  (You can make these as thick as 1/2 inch or as thin as—but no thinnger than 1/4 inch).  Place the rounds on the baking sheets, leaving an inche of space between them.
7. Bake one sheet at a time for 17 to 20 minutes, rotating the baking sheet at the midway point.  When properly baked, the cookies will be light brown on the bottom, lightly golden around the edges and pale on top; they may feel tender when you touch the top gently, and that’s fine.  Remove from the oven and let the cookies rest a minute or two before carefully lifting them onto a rack with a wide metal spatula to cool to room temperature.
8. Repeat with the remaining log of dough, making sure the baking sheets are cool before you bake the second batch.

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Media Fields Journal on Video Stores

Melonie Diaz, Jack Black, and  Mos Def  in Be Kind, Rewind (Michel Gondry, 2008 - See FSFF's post on Gondry for some reading on this film)



Film Studies For Free is thrilled to be able to pass on news of the launch of MEDIA FIELDS JOURNAL: Critical Explorations in Media and Space, a new graduate online journal based in the University of California, Santa Barbara's Department of Film and Media Studies.

The first issue (1.1, 2010) on VIDEO STORES, edited by Joshua Neves and Jeff Scheible, is now available at http://www.mediafieldsjournal.org/.

Neves and Scheible introduce their special issue as follows:

This new online journal represents the latest development in a research initiative launched in UCSB’s Department of Film and Media Studies in 2007. The goal of Media Fields is to provide a forum focused on the critical study of media and space, where we can dynamically present and openly debate the latest work from established and emerging scholars and practitioners. Each issue will have a theme—whether it is a topic of contemporary relevance; an exploration of a particular concept, media form, genre, or practice; or, as in this issue, a specific media space: the video rental store.
     We were compelled to focus on the space of the video store in this issue because it is a “media field” that at once allows for the kind of tangible, site-specific fieldwork that is at the heart of Media Fields and, at the same time, is a site where a range of important issues intersect: “new” media’s consequences for “old” media; uses, developments, and failures of media technologies; the cultivation of knowledge about cinema and television; global media distribution; piracy and the law; the circulation of pornography; configurations of cultural communities; relations between public and private space; and contemporary media reception. [read more]

The issue contents are linked to below. Also see the following great site mentioned by the special issue: Video Cultures.
Issue Contents:

• "Video Stores: Introduction" by Jeff Scheible and Joshua Neves
• "Home, Home (Video) on the Range: Reflections on Small-Town Video
• Stores in 2010" by Daniel Herbert
• "Things and Movies: DVD Store Culture in Fiji" by Nicole Starosielski
• "Exchange and Circulation: An Anthropological Perspective on Video
• Stores in Kinshasa" by Katrien Pype
• "A Business without a Future? The Parisian Vidéo-Club, Past and Present" by Brian R. Jacobson and Joshua Neves
• "The Death and Life of the Back Room" by Peter Alilunas
• "Mapping Hardcore Space" by J. Steven Witkowski
• "Riviera Adult Superstore" by Constance Penley
• "Pedagogical Spaces, or, What We’ve Lost in the Post-Video-Store Era" by Roger Beebe
• "Browsing for Dissonance: Paratexts, Box-Art Iconography, and Genre" by Kevin M. Flanagan
• "EVERYTHING IS TERRIBLE! An Interview with Future Schlock" by Jeff Scheible
• "Video Stores, Media Technologies, and Memory" by Rowan Wilken
• "Video Rental Store: An Interview with Suzanne Carte-Blanchenot and Su-Ying Lee" by Mél Hogan
• "The Long Tail of the Video Store" by Frederick Wasser
• "Free Lifetime Membership" by Matt Kaelin

Please also note that a call for submissions for an issue on DOCUMENTARY AND SPACE is now open and can be viewed here.

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War, Conflict and Commemoration in the Age of Digital Reproduction

Image from Avalon (Mamoru Oshii, 2001)

Below are links to some of the most interesting items to have come Film Studies For Free's way in the last weeks: a special issue of the high quality online, Open Access journal Digital Icons: Studies in Russian, Eurasian, and Central European New Media on War, Conflict and Commemoration. Not all of the items are film-related, though most are, in some way (asbtracts are included for easy skimming to see which). And there are two great essays on Mamoru Oshii's 2001 film Avalon, which FSFF particularly rated.

Issue 4, 2010: War, Conflict and Commemoration in the Age of Digital Reproduction (guest-edited by Adi Kuntsman (University of Manchester).)

4.0 Editorial | Vlad Strukov

4.1 Online Memories, Digital Conflicts and the Cybertouch of War | Adi Kuntsman 

This opening essay addresses the political and intellectual necessity that enabled me to assemble this special issue. Firstly, I argue for the need to examine the role of digital media in negotiating and commemorating wars in countries outside of the USA and Western Europe and in languages other than English. Secondly, drawing on some recent developments in research on digital media, on one hand, and war, conflict and commemoration, on the other, I claim the importance of examining the two fields together. I argue for a complex approach that would capture the ways digital media and computer technologies affect the warfare itself, its social perception as well as the ways of remembrance and commemoration. I also present several theoretical concepts – cyberscapes of memory, digital battlefields, the aftermath, passionate politics and the cybertouch of war – and outline the structure of the special issue.

4.2 The Commemoration of Nazi ‘Children’s Euthanasia’ Online and On Site | Lutz Kaelber

An integral part of the German National Socialist ‘bio-political developmental dictatorship’ programme (Schmuhl 2008), ‘euthanasia’ involved the murder of over 300,000 physically or mentally disabled persons in National Socialist Germany and its occupied territories, including children in ‘special children’s wards’ (Kinderfachabteilungen). Using the concept of traumascape as past trauma embodied at a site and brought into the present through commemoration, this article analyses the emergence of virtual traumascapes created by local memory agents who use new digital media as a means to represent these crimes and commemorate the victims of ‘special children’s wards’ in Germany, Austria, Poland and the Czech Republic. This article shows that virtual traumascapes have contributed to a diverse landscape of memory concerning the murder of disabled children and youths described in five case studies. It also briefly discusses their impact on national memory regimes and the future of commemoration. 

4.3 World War 2.0: Commemorating War and Holocaust in Poland Through Facebook | Dieter De Bruyn 

The Internet seems to have become the area where instances of individual and collective remembrance, of private and public commemoration, and of memory and postmemory intersect in a new and effective way. This article explores two Polish examples of World War II and Holocaust commemoration that have recently been issued on Facebook: the Warsaw Rising commemorative campaign and the educational project on the young Holocaust victim Henio Zytomirski. As the analysis demonstrates, what determines the value of such online projects is their performative effectiveness. The examination of both examples aims to contribute to the current debate on cultural memory, in which the focus is increasingly on the dynamical and processual character of remembering, rather than on memory as a static product.

4.4 Past Wars in the Russian Blogosphere: On the Emergence of Cosmopolitan Memory | Elena Trubina 

In Russia, for decades, the collective memory of World War II has served two major functions. It has provided the major source of legitimatising the state and the ethical ground for sustaining the collective identity of those whose country now is very different from the one defended by their grandparents. Along with the state-imposed versions of the war and tired rituals and clichéd expressions of pride and gratitude, new ways of reflecting on the war began emerging. These are facilitated by new socio-technical practices made possible by globalisation and, in particular, by the Internet. Based on an analysis of selected Russian-language blogs, this article argues that although the nationalistic master narratives continue to function as glue for the nation, they become combined with stories and recollections that are attuned to the growing openness and interconnectedness of the world, problematising exclusionary renderings of the country’s contribution to the victory.

4.5 Deadly Game along the Wistula: East European Imagery in Oshii’s ‘Avalon’ (2001) | Gérard Kraus 

Mamoru Oshii’s Avalon stands firmly engrained in the director’s science fiction oeuvre of completely visually controlled films, focusing on a strong female protagonist shown in critical situations. At the same time the film marks Oshii’s return to live action cinema and takes him outside of Asia. This essay seeks to combine biographical information on the director with an aesthetic analysis of some of the images created for the purpose of this film. In particular the essay addresses Oshii’s interests in the relations between futuristic technologies and militarised societies, and his use of Polish and Eastern European imagery. I will argue that their combination can be seen as remediating and recontextualising images of war and conflict for a new generation that, through digital media, has developed a new dynamic relationship with history and the conflicts that build Europe and the world.

4.6 Oshii’s ‘Avalon’ (2001) and Military-Entertainment Technoculture | Patrick Crogan 

This essay takes Mamoru Oshii’s Avalon (2001) as a starting point for consideration of the impact of simulational interactive media on contemporary technoculture. The connections made in the film between virtual reality games and military research and development, and its quasi-simulational modelling of various historical ‘Polands’ in re-sequencing a dystopian end of history are the most valuable resources it brings to this study of how simulation’s predominant development represents a major challenge to the forms of critical cultural reflection associated with narrative-based forms of recording and interrogating experience. Analysis of the methods and rhetorics of simulation design in the military-industrial (and now military-entertainment) complex will elaborate the nature and stakes of this challenge for today’s globalising technoculture of ‘militainment’.

4.7 ‘The Weight of Meaninglessness’ | Naida Zukić 

The Weight of Meaninglessness is a video performance that evokes the atrocities of the recent Bosnian history in an effort to highlight the ethical urgencies, complexities and paradoxes of externalising trauma within a site that collapses meaning and creates possibilities for the return of traumatic memory. The performance shows the artist violently and continuously scrubbing clean her permanently marked arm, withstanding bodily pain and struggling to breathe. The video also confronts the viewer with Srebrenica Genocide; the images of mass graves render the memory of the atrocity traumatising in its insufferable intensity. In the moment of examining trauma and locating its agency, the artist lays bare the paradox of violent memories that can only be externalised through inflicting violence on oneself. The artist’s essay addresses the historical and ideological conditions under which The Weight of Meaninglessness critiques and exercises violence.

4.8 ‘Roma Snapshots: A Day in Sarajevo’ | Vanja Čelebičić 

The recent war in Bosnia-Herzegovina serves as an undercurrent in this short ethnographic film Roma Snapshots: a Day in Sarajevo. The film attempts to enquire into Sarajevan Roma’s sense of identification, belonging and memory. It portrays the daily lives of Roma through snapshots of their concurrent realities, where painful memories, laughter and religious beliefs exist side by side. The film comprises of simultaneous screening of four episodes, drawing attention to the filmmaker’s dilemma of how to best represent her subjects and which aspects of their lives to highlight. The film addresses visual anthropology’s concerns regarding ways of portraying reality and challenges the standard narrative approach to documentary filmmaking. Roma Snapshots: a Day in Sarajevo is accompanied by the filmmaker’s reflexive essay on anthropological filmmaking, digital media and life in post-war zones.

4.9 The Portrayal of Russian Hackers During Cyber Conflict Incidents | Athina Karatzogianni 

This article analyses various cyber conflicts and cyber crime incidents attributed to Russian hackers, such as the Estonian and Georgian cyber conflicts and the ‘Climategate hack’. The article argues that Russian hackers were blamed by dozens of outlets for the Climategate hack, because that was consistent with global media coverage of cyber crime incidents which portrayed Russians as highly powerful hackers responsible for many hacking incidents. This narrative also was congruent with the new Cold War rhetoric that consistently takes issue with Russia acting on its geopolitical interests. These interests are seen to manifest themselves in Russia’s objection to countries, formerly under its influence, participating in the NATO alliance and its seemingly obstructive stance at the Copenhagen summit on climate change. 

4.10 A Study on a Russian-American Non-Reflexive Discourse | Olga Baysha 

This study investigates one such case study – the outburst of anti-Americanism among Russia Internet users during the Russia-Georgia military crisis of 2008. The paper analyzes the discussions of Washington Post articles at the Washington PostForeign Media Russian Internet site. The study shows that, despite numerous attempts by Russian users to deliver their messages to the American readers, their postings were ignored by the American users and global dialogue did not occur. It is this exclusion from the conversation, together with the denigration of Russia by writers in the United States that led to the intensification of anti-American sentiments among the Russians. The study makes clear that for the establishment of effective global public spheres access to new communication technologies and knowledge of English are inadequate, unless accompanied by the willingness to listen to others and a desire to understand them.   

4.11 Web Wars: Digital Diasporas and the Language of Memory | Ellen Rutten 

Web Wars: Digital Diasporas and the Language of Memory in Russia & Ukraine is a three-year research project within the collaborative HERA-funded project Memory at War: Cultural Dynamics in Russia, Poland & Ukraine. Led by Dr Alexander Etkind (Cambridge University), this project zeroes in on the ongoing memory wars between Russia, Ukraine, and Poland – nations where political conflicts take the shape of heated debates about the recent past. For Memory at War, five European universities – Cambridge, Helsinki, Tartu, Groningen and Bergen – cooperate to scrutinize Eastern Europe’s memory wars from varying angles. Web Wars is the Bergen pendant, which focuses on their outlines in digital media, and Russian and Ukrainian social media in particular. This submission maps the project design, methods and research objectives.

4.12 Book Reviews

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GOLDEN GREAT WALL

Xiao long bao. 6/6
Excellent skins and plenty of broth inside!


Gailan with garlic.  Rating:  5/6 
Gargantuan trees of gai lan.  Pretty good garlic flavour


Dan dan noodles.
A heavier spicy peanutty broth.  This one is okay but very rich tasting.  Rating:  4/6


Green onion pancake.  Rating:  5/6
Yummy, oniony goodness.  A favourite place for this version of the dish.


Shanghai noodles.
Excellent flavour and you can taste the wok’s fiery power here. Unfortunately, the pic is fuzzy because the kiddies were scrambling for the noodles. I barely got a shot in. Rating: 5.5/6

Golden Great Wall Szechuan Restaurant is located near the Holiday Inn on W. Broadway.  The restaurant is on the corner and there is ample free parking (if you know about it) in the parkade attached to the Holiday Inn.  You have to remember to tell the host at the restaurant what your licence plate is.  There is also metered parking on the streets and various other pay lots around the area due to the proliferation of medical buildings.  As well, there is good access by transit because it’s located along bus routes on W. Broadway.

We primarily come here for lunch and for the Shanghai Noodles, green onion pancake and Xiao Long Bau. 
I have had dinner here and must say that the authentic Northern dishes are my preference over the Cantonese style ones.  I like eating lunch here rather than dinner  because we like the good dim sum type Northern dishes, such as the dumplings and the breads.  I personally like deep fried Mantao (steamed bread) dipped in condensed milk.  It’s so good!  

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Interview with a Kitavan

Kitava is a Melanesian island that has maintained an almost entirely traditional, non-industrial diet until very recently. It was the subject of a study by Dr. Staffan Lindeberg and colleagues, which I have written about many times, in which they demonstrated that Kitavans have a very low (undetectable) rate of heart attack, stroke, diabetes and overweight. Dr. Lindeberg described their diet as consisting mostly of yam, sweet potato, taro, cassava, coconut, fruit, fish and vegetables. Over the seven days that Dr. Lindeberg measured food intake, they ate 69% of their calories as carbohydrate, 21% as fat (mostly from coconut) and 10% as protein.

I recently received an e-mail from a Kitavan by the name of Job Daniel. He's working at the Papua New Guinea Institute of Medical Research in Madang, studying the social and economic impacts of malaria and related health issues in Papua New Guinea. He recalls many details of Dr. Lindeberg's visit to Kitava, which Dr. Lindeberg has confirmed are correct. Job generously offered to answer some of my questions about the traditional Kitavan diet. My questions are in bold, and his responses are below.

How many meals a day do Kitavans eat?
People on the island eat mostly two meals a day. But nowadays, breakfast is mainly comprised of tubers (yam and sweet potato and greens all cooked in coconut cream and salt) and dinner is the same with the inclusion of fish as protein most often. In between these two meals, lunch is seen as a light refreshment with fruits or young coconut only to mention these two popular ones. In between the morning and the evening, we mostly eat fruits as snack or lunch. Generally speaking, there are only two main meals per day, i.e breakfast and dinner.

Do Kitavans eat any fermented food?
There are fermented fruits and nuts like you've said for breadfruit, nuts, yams and not forgetting fish. We ferment them by using the traditional method of drying them over the fire for months. And this fermented foods last for almost one to two years without getting stale or spoiled. Food preservation is a skill inherited from our great grand fathers taking into consideration the island's location and availability of food. Foods such as bread fruit and fish are fermented and preserved to serve as substitutes to fresh food in times of trouble or shortage. Otherwise, they're eaten along the way.

Is this really fermentation or simply drying?
To your query about the fermentation methods we use, apart from drying food over the fire, we also use this method like the Hawaiians do with taro [poi- SJG]. For our case we bury a special kind of fruit collected from the tree and buried in the ground to ripen, which takes about 2 - 3 days. I don't really know the English name, but we call it 'Natu' in vernecular. There's also a certain nut when it falls from the tree, women collect them and peel off the rotten skin, then mumu [earth oven- SJG] them in the ground covered with leaves to protect them from burning from the extreme heat of the fire, both from the open fire on top and hot stones underneath. After a day, the nuts are removed from the mumu and loaded into very big baskets which are then shifted to the sea for fermentation. This takes a week (minimum) to ferment or be ready for consumption at last. After the fermentation period is over, i.e one week some days or two
weeks to be exact, then the nuts are finally ready for eating. The length of time it takes before the nuts are no longer edible is roughly one week.

What parts of the fish are eaten?
As islanders, we eat almost every creature and body part of a sea creature. Especially fish eggs, it is one of the favorites of children. They always prefer it burnt on the fire and consumed greedily. Every part of the fish is eaten except for the feces, gall bladder, bones and the scales.

Is food shortage really rare on Kitava?
Generally speaking it is rare. BUT sometimes we run out of food only if there is a drought and the sea is useless. Otherwise, we tend to use the preserved or fermented foods on the dryer in the kitchen. As you would understand, we have seasons and they affect the type and availability of food on the island. In the beginning of the year, we eat sweet potato, cassava and mostly tuna for protein. During mid year, before yam comes in to replace sweet potato and cassava, taro is then ready for harvest. And then yams are ready for harvesting so the food supply is continued on. OK when yams are harvested, some are eaten, some are stored away for reserve and seedlings. In this way, we don't run out food towards the end of the year before sweet potato would be ready for harvest. So as you can see, the food supply on the island is somewhat planned by our ancestral economists where it continues throughout the year without stopping.

Do Kitavans traditionally eat pork, and if so, how often?
We do eat pork but not that often because pork meat is chiefly regarded important on the island. We only eat pork on special occasions so I'd rather say that pork is only eaten occasionally. In most cases in the middle of the year when the yams are harvested (yam harvest celebrations and towards the end of the year for certain rites and activities). Otherwise the everyday meal is always topped with fish.

How long are infants breast fed on Kitava?
Women breast feed for a minimum of 2 years. But breast feeding is again determined by the size and health situation of the baby. If the baby is looking healthy and big, it is most likely that this baby would be adopted temporarily by someone else so as to be removed from breast milk after two years of age minimum. Child care nowadays is paramount as people start to realize the importance of health and hygiene in general. But Kitavans are well known in that part of the country for their hygiene practices. They also got the provincial and district awards for a 'clean community' in early 90s and right now, they still maintain their hygiene level and awareness.

Are there any other foods that are commonly eaten on Kitava that I might not be aware of?
Bananas, pineapple, corn and watermelons. For watermelon and corn, they are plentiful especially at this time of the year.

Thanks for your help, Job! I know many people will appreciate reading these responses.

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25 great Godard gifts!

 Laura Forde’s brilliant videoed presentation of her thesis:

Objects to be Read, Words to be Seen: Design and Visual Language in the Films of Jean-Luc Godard 1959–1967
(link from Atelier Carvalho Bernau) Check out Laura Forde's great blog Thesis Anxiety. It has a lot more Godard material.

The films of Jean-Luc Godard have been written about perhaps more than any other cinematic works, often through the lens of cultural theory, but not nearly enough attention has been paid to the role of designed objects in his films. Collages of art, literature, language, objects, and words, Godard’s films have an instant, impactful, graphic quality, but are far from simple pop artifacts. The thesis this presentation derives from, “Objects to be Read, Words to be Seen: Design and Visual Language in the Films of Jean-Luc Godard 1959–1967,” explores and interprets the role of visual language within the films—title sequences, intertitles, handwritten utterances, and printed matter in the form of newspapers, magazines, and posters.

   By examining le graphisme within the cultural context of Paris during the 1960s, this thesis seeks to amplify the significance of graphic design in Godard’s first fifteen films, beginning with 1960’s À Bout de Souffle (Breathless) and ending with 1967’s Weekend. While Godard was not a practicing graphic designer in the traditional sense, he was an amateur de design, an autodidact whose obsession with designed objects, graphic language and print media resulted in the most iconic body of work in 1960s France. [Laura Forde]

Désolée mais...Film Studies For Free's author has had a bit of a busy week blogging elsewhere on urgent matters.

Had things been different, today's post might have appeared on the intended date of December 3: Jean-Luc Godard's 80th birthday. Oh well... FSFF is pretty hopeful that Godard himself would approve of revolting students and academics and of their creative responses to proposed devastating cuts! 

Most of the links below were tweeted on the happy day itself by @filmstudiesff (FSFF's nifty, nippier, microblogging twin).

Don't miss a much publicised on the day "Godard Birthday gift to everyone" from Atelier Carvalho Bernau,  a wonderful Jean-Luc typeface. Don't forget FSFF's recent study of Godard's 1980 film Sauve qui peut (la Vie). Et, pour les francophones: Rencontre publique avec Jean-Luc Godard. 

A belated Happy Birthday, Jean-Luc!

Godard Theses Online:

• Gary Elshawe, 'The Depiction of late 1960's Counter Culture in the 1968',  MA thesis, Victoria University of Wellington, 2004

• André Habib, 'Origine et fin : Méthode(s). À partir et autour des Histoire(s) du cinéma de Jean-Luc Godard', Masters thesis, Concordia University, 2001(in French)

• Douglas Morrey, Jean-Luc Godard and the other history of cinema, PhD Thesis,  University of Warwick, 2002

• Thibaut Schilt, 'Marginal Pleasure and Auteurist Cinema: the Sexual Politics of Robert Bresson, Jean-Luc Godard, Catherine Breillat and François Ozon', PhD e-thesis, Ohio State University 2005

 Other freely accessible, good quality resources:

• Idit Alphandary, 'Radical Hope or the Moral Imperative of Images in the Work of Susan Sontag and Jean-Luc Godard', Culture Unbound, Volume 1, 2009: 487–501

• Scott Durham, 'On the Authenticity of Jargon: From Barthes and Adorno to Godard', World Picture 1.1, 2008

• Judith Halasz, 'Gender Politics and the Critical Gaze: Jean-Luc Godard’s Masculin-Feminin', PhD Thesis excerpt, The Graduate Center City University of New York, 2004

• Andrea Hyde, 'Godard's Intertitles', Walker Art Centre Blog, November 10, 2009

• Laleen Jayamanne, '"Jean-Luc Godard’s Histoire(s) du cinéma OR “Memory of the world”, Screening the Past, Issue 23, 2008

• Olivia Keung, 'The cinematic rendering of unconscious space: Jean-Luc Godard's Alphaville and Jean-Jacques Beineix's Diva', Faculty Project, University of Waterloo, 2004

• Roland-François Lack, The point in time: precise chronology in early Godard',  First published in Studies in French Cinema 3:2 (2003), 101-109

• Roland-François Lack, 'Good work, little soldier: text and pretext', (on Godard’s Le Petit soldat and Denis’s Beau travail), first published in Journal of European Studies 34:1-2 (2004)

• Roland-François Lack, 'A Bout de souffle: The Film of the Book", first published in Literature Film Quarterly 32:3 (2004)

• Roland-François Lack,‘Sa voix’ (on Godard’s voice), originally published in M. Temple, J. Williams, M. Witt (eds), For Ever Godard ( London: Black Dog, 2004)

• Roland-François Lack,‘Vivre sa vie: an Introduction and A to Z’, Senses of Cinema 48 (2008)

• Tony McKibbin, 'THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT: High Mimetics in Godard’s Histoire(s) du cinéma', Experimental Conversations, Issue 3, Spring 2009

• Richard Raskin, 'Five explanations for the jump cuts in Godard's Breathless', in 'The Art of Film Editing', Special Issue of P.O.V: A Danish Journal of Film Studies, edited by Richard Raskin, Number 6 December 1998

• Jonathan Rosenbaum, 'Trailer for Godard’s Histoire(s) du cinéma', JonathanRosenbaum.com, May 21, 2009

• Jonathan Rosenbaum, 'LE VRAI COUPABLE: Two Kinds of Criticism in Godard’s Work', JonathanRosenbaum.com, May 14, 2009

• Daniel Yacavone, 'Jean-Luc Godard and Roy Lichtenstein: Originality, Reflexivity, and the Re-Presented Image', Forum, Issue 1, Autumn 2005

More about → 25 great Godard gifts!