Michael Lumish
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| The indigenous Marawi Grape from Recanati |
We are a small number of people who are having an ongoing discussion and, I have to say, I very much appreciate you guys who have been hanging around since the beginning... or even before the beginning for the Daily Kos people.
But I want it understood that I am not going to dictate how anyone should express themselves.
That is not going to happen in this tiny Jewish neck of the universe.
I will delete antisemitic anti-Zionism in a New York Minute, but I honestly do not care about foul language.
I do not want us to descend into political graffiti, but I am not going to disallow the word "fuck," either.
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What's more interesting, tho - for me, at least - is that I am working on a short piece for Campus Watch of the Middle East Forum concerning the battle over the indigenous grape in the Land of Israel.
For the moment, this is my opening:
On Monday, last February 5, professor Ariel Handel lectured at the University of California Berkeley's Center for Middle Eastern Studies on his recent paper entitled, Wine-washing: colonization, normalization, and the geopolitics of terroir in the West Bank's settlements.We'll see what actually gets published, but it amazes me that a full-grown Jewish-Israeli political scientist who is looking at the question of indigeneity wanted only to discuss the varying narratives.
Handel is visiting from the University of Tel Aviv in order to discuss, among other things, the meaning of the grape within the contest between Arabs and Jews around the questions of authenticity and indigeneity within the Land of Israel.
When I asked him about the truth of Jewish indigeneity, he said, "The grape is mute."
He is right about that, of course.
The DNA of an ancient seed cannot tell you who grew it.
But history can tell you who was there... and who was not.
Arab Colonization-washing: normalizing the estrangement of indigenous cultures and peoples in their native lands.
ReplyDeleteArabs, the Progressive Left and "Palestine": A mind is a beautiful thing to waste. (Children's mind fuck edition: "P" is for Falesteen)
Arab narratives in western Academia: colonization, normalization, terror, and the loss of western identity.
On the question of Jewish indigeneity, I take the word of an expert on indigeneity, Ryan Bellrose. We all know where he stands.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cuwi.ca/ryan-bellerose.html
Bellerose is an interesting cat.
DeleteA very big interesting cat.
All wine quality grapes are hybrids and grafts. All of them. The vintner takes a root and grafts it to a top. The result is a wine grape vine. There are hundreds of common variants that are mixed and matched this way. The roots are crossed and recrossed to come up with a good mate for the soil and moisture they're intended. The tops are crossed and recrossed for the hundreds of variables that go into flavor and ruggedness of the plant.
ReplyDeleteBTW nearly all wine grapes are red. Even the grapes for white wine. There are very few wines made white grapes outside of a few Rieslings. The process for whites is different too - white wine discards the grape skins but the grapes themselves are red.
Quick quote from Famous Jewish
ReplyDeletemega-donor about Jewish Continuity:
https://shilohmusings.blogspot.com/2018/02/mr-sy-syms.html
I'm feeling (semi) free already!
ReplyDeleteAnd to my friends at #me too, I would just like to say #It ain't me, babe
what I like about this place is that its the one place I can find politically conservative but not super observant types. We're like exotic or something.
ReplyDelete