St Benedict Novena - July 2

Tomorrow is the day to start your Novena to St Benedict, leading up to the feast on July 11.

If you do say it, could I ask that you make one of your intentions the spiritual health and growth of all those participating in the Learn the Office mini-course I'm going to run?

Learn the Office Course

And for those still thinking about it, it is not too late.

The course is aimed at absolute beginners or people still struggling with the Diurnal, and will begin on July 11.  It is aimed at helping participants learn more about the traditional form of the Benedictine Office, including:

• what the Office is, and how to prepare to say it;
• finding your way around the Monastic Diurnal (or other Office books you can use);
• how to say/sing Compline and Prime; and
• how to get started on the other hours of the Office.

It will be structured so you can work through the material at your own pace, but to get the most out of it though, you will want to keep up with the group so you can participate in discussions on the material posted each week.

In order to follow the course you will need a copy of the Monastic Diurnal (ideally one of the recent editions published by Farnborough Abbey in English and Latin, but earlier/other versions can be used as well).

If you are interested, drop me an email so I can grant you access to the blog I will be using for this.

Feast of SS Peter and Paul

El Greco

We celebrate, over the three days from July 28-30, the martyrdom of SS Peter and Paul.  You can read more about the main feast, in a homily of Pope Benedict XVI here.

Appropriate Appropriation

Dear Korean,

I am an art student and I am currently interested in Asian art. I am really intrigued by traditional Asian art, including Indian, Chinese, Japanese and Korean but I am worried that because I’m white people may believe I am appropriating Asian culture, I truly just wish to explore this style of art, i.e. prints, ink works and make artworks that are relevant to my culture in an Asian style. I know that you do not speak for every Asian country and I also know about the many differences in culture and art but I would just like an insight to if what I am doing is in anyway offensive because the last thing I would want is to offend anyone or lead anyone to believe I am racist or ignorant.

Cait

Here, we have the biggest conversation among Asian Americans. "Cultural appropriation" is a fairly recently crafted set of ethical rules, and its boundaries are still very fuzzy. But the boundaries do become a lot more visible once we understand the core principle behind cultural appropriation.

(source)

What is cultural appropriation? Cultural appropriation is a use of cultural artifacts as a prop. People generally tend to know this much. But they are often unclear on exactly why cultural appropriation is bad. Expressed as simply as possible, here is why: cultural appropriation is bad because using cultural artifacts as a prop leads to treating the people of that culture as a prop, rather than whole persons. This is the core principle behind cultural appropriation.

Understanding this core principle alone answers many tricky questions that are emerging cultural appropriation. For example: take this infamous instance of Katy Perry's kimono get-up. Asian Americans were nearly unanimous in their denunciation, but the Japanese in Japan seemed not to care. This disconnect is easier to understand once we understand the core principle: what matters is objectification, humans being turned into a prop. Asian Americans are constantly surrounded by non-Asian Americans who always stand ready to objectify them. Japanese in Japan belong to the nation of 127 million of the same ethnicity, and are almost never in danger of being objectified by the person next to them. Of course there will be a difference in reaction between the two groups.

But the mainstream society is hardly the only one that is ignorant of the core principle; Asian American themselves likewise often are unaware of it. This leads to a variation of "magic word racism." Previously, I explained that "magic word racism" is an attempt to detect racism by the presence or absence of certain words or phrases. Utter the forbidden "Word X," and you must be considered a racist. The same dumb logic can be found in at least some charges of cultural appropriation. Using any cultural artifact in any way must be cultural appropriation, regardless of the particular context and manner of the particular usage. This is wrong, just as much as magic word racism is wrong.

What, then, is an art student like Cait to do? The first thing is: study. Context-sensitive exploration of Asian arts cannot happen if you don't know the context. The ultimate challenge is to develop an internal view of the culture that you're exploring. Through whose eyes are you viewing the culture? Are you seeing it from the perspective of the people who created that culture, or are you seeing it from the eyes of the outsider? Do you understand the sense of aesthetics that led the people to create a cultural artifact, or does your mind stop at the outside shell of the artifact? Do you see the flow of history that led to the creation of this culture, or do you only see the here and now as if the culture fell on your lap from another dimension? Are you actively exploring what the people are saying about themselves, among themselves, in their own language, or are you merely hearing what other white people are saying about the exotic colored people?

These questions naturally lead to self-reflection. What is it about Asian culture and art that attracts you, the non-Asian artist? Lesser people would simply say they "just want it"--a bad answer, because in most cases, they are simply filtering the mainstream society that stands ready to use Asian culture as a prop. Stop the unthinking, and ask this essential question for understanding yourself: why do you want what you want?

This study need not be in isolation. You will keep talking and keep creating, and learn more from the reactions. And in the process, you will offend some people--usually those who are in the hunt for magic word racism, ready to pounce on their made-up rules. Don't get discouraged; keep plugging away. Because more often than not, a sincere willingness to learn overcomes any mistakes along the way.

Got a question or a comment for the Korean? Email away at askakorean@gmail.com.

Companion Planting

Companion planting is the practice of arranging plants next to one another for beneficial effects. It can look kind of wild.

Chard, Carrot and  Lettuce nestled
under Pole Bean vines. 

A well known example of companion planting is "three sisters", corn, beans and squash. Others include tomato with basil, and blueberry with rhubarb and raspberries. It also seems that many things which go well together in a meal or snack also grow well together. But not always- I love an apple pie with walnuts and raisins baked in. While grape and apple get along fairly well, the grape will overwhelm the apple without lots of care, and if you put either too close to a black walnut you might as well have soak them with kerosene.

One can find numerous examples of companion planting with a quick google search, and if all a person is interested in is are few hints on what combinations work, that will do just fine. How a specific group of companion plants work together is a completely different set of inquiries. Chemical, structural, and spatial relationships, or 'niches', drive the compatibility- and adversity- of plants. In any given planting these three qualities interface in dynamic relationships that change over both the course of the season and the life of the plant.

Peas are leguminous, and, working with soil bacteria, make nitrogen in the soil available to other plants. Peas benefit most things that they can be grown next to by increasing the soil fertility. Beets, celery and potatoes can all benefit from this. Take it up a notch by planting them next to perennials such as small fruit trees, open structure shrubs, and deciduous bushes where they can climb and vine.

Plant 'niches' are a plant's structural habit and soil/light/heat preferences. The habit of tomatoes is lightly vining and sprawling. They don't need deep soil, but do prefer well drained, warm spots with lots of water. In the tropics I have seen cherry tomatoes growing in massive tangled mats at the high mark of water scour on swift moving streams. They like an acidic soil rich in minerals but have a high tolerance for low organic content. For instance, the San Marzano, a cultivar developed nearly 300 years ago following a gift of Seed from the Viceroy Of Peru to the Kingdom of Naples. Treasured for its rich paste and hearty soup flavors, it grows prolifically and has naturalized in the ground up basaltic soils inundated with springs and seeps at the base of Mt. Vesuvius.

When we know a plants soil needs and growth habit, we can begin to consider who it might thrive with. For instance, blueberries do well in well drained, acidic soils and find vigor in high mineral soils. They also can provide some woody structure for a weak vine to hang from and climb in. However, tomatoes, and the San Marzano in particular need  heat to get ripe- enough to  burn a blueberry. Peas are a better choice, ripening early enough to be harvested and removed from the blueberry before it produces fruit. Still, peas may struggle with the soil acidity and water tolerance blueberries are known for. Companion planting asks us to consider plants niches and how they will interface with neighboring plants.

Early I mentioned one might as well go about watering apples with kerosene as planting them next to a black walnut. Walnuts are part of a genus called Juglans, and are known for producing juglones, powerful chemical hormones which prevent many other plants near them from growing- this is why the ground under large old walnuts is often bare or sparsely vegetated. Apples don't do well when exposed to juglones. However, a solid handful of plants are not only able to survive and thrive in this environment, some actually create buffers so that the tendency of juglones to saturate the soil is mitigated. Examples of these plants include Serviceberry, Persimmon, Mayhaw, Pawpaw, Elderberry, Goji Berry, Redbud, Mints, and Daylillies. However, the Walnut will outlive many of these, and in time a young walnut will grow over and heavily shade these companions. So we must think about the assembly over time, rotating in new companions every few years to decade as the tree grows, using plants that can tolerate the high juglone and heavily shaded conditions under the canopy.

This year in the Learning Garden we put in several known companions: Kale, peas, and turnips; rosemary, chives, and strawberries, carrots, peas, and lettuce. Kale, peas, and turnips work largely because they fill different structural places in the garden. They don't get in each others way. Rosemary, fava, chives, and strawberries  are similar. While rosemary's strong volatiles drive away aphids and leaf miners, fava's nitrogen fixing effect provide chemical benefits to the soil.

Comfrey used as a 'chop and drop' mulch around a small tree.

Let us not forget the weeds. Many 'weeds' are powerful allies in the garden assembly. Dandelions, comfrey, and dock, pull nutrients up from deep soil. when the leaves decay those nutrients can be reached by shallower rooted plants like lettuce and peas. By letting these garden allies grow just to the point of flowering, and then leaving the root but pulling the flower or unripe seed pods and leafy greens, we can excellent minerals and nutrients to the soil. Nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium, as well as magnesium, selenium, boron, iodine and other trace nutrients plants (and our bodies) need become available to plants this way. They also provide ground cover, providing moisture retaining shade at the ground level as a living mulch.  Dandelion, comfrey, and dock, will re-sprout if you leave the root in the soil and remove just 3/4 to 7/8 of the greens. The leaves, etc., can be used in compost or just as 'chop and drop' mulch.

Companion planting is kind of wild. But then so is a forest. And just like a forest, the plants in our garden aren't here just for us, they also are bound to one another. By recognizing the  natural relationships plant communities use to create prosperity and resilience, we can learn something of how to best meet our needs while remaining in harmony with nature.