Experimental Blog #20

Comments on 2 books

"Not Quite Paradise - An American Sojourn in Sri Lanka" by Adele Barker

It seems that the author arrived in Sri Lanka in October 2001 to be a teacher for about a year, and stayed until August 2002. Adele Barker gives a very good description of the long ongoing civil war between the mostly northern Tamil - Tigers minority, a Hindu Dravidian language speaking people; and the Sinhalese speaking{an Indo-European language} Buddhist majority. The Sinhalese dominate the government, and are centered primarily in the southern part of the island nation, Sri Lanka.
The author also mentions an earlier violent Marxist movement that was suppressed, or died out somehow, in the 1970s and 1980s.
The author returned to Sri Lanka in October 2005 and gives a very good report on the terrible tsunami that occurred on December 28, 2004 and its after affects. During this visit the author managed to go to the Tamil held territory in the north and reported on the violence still occurring there. She soon left Sri Lanka after that trip.
Adele Barker reports on the end of the civil war in May 2009, but I can't tell whether she had been back to the country or not.


"Fugitive Denim" - A Moving Story of People and Pants in the Borderless World of Global Trade by Rachel Louise Snyder

I have nothing to add to the content of the subtitle, "A <> Story of People <> in the Borderless World of Global Trade", except my usually silent complaints.
This author, Rachel Snyder, and others keep saying that we live, not in the modern era, but in the "post modern", or even, "post post-modern" era. The "Modern Era" is said to have ended in 1989, with the fall of the Berlin Wall, or 1991, with the collapse of the Soviet Union. It is also said that the "Modern Era" begins with the ideas of Karl Marx, and continues with the influences of his many followers, and others also influenced, although not Marxist followers.
Does this mean that this "Modern Era" began way back in 1848{I think} with the publication of "The Communist Manifesto"? Could this era really last for 141 to 143 years?
Finally it seems, that this "old Modern Era" should be renamed by historians, both liberal and conservative. Isn't it true that people always live in modern times, or in the modern era, by definition?