The death toll of the April 24 collapse of a garment factory outside Dhaka, Bangladesh, has passed 1,000 people, making it the worst industrial accident since the 1984 gas leak at a Union Carbide India Limited pesticide plant in Bhopal. The Rana Plaza complex collapsed just one day after an engineer declared it unsafe. Britain’s […]
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Publication Day for Chinese Characters
Today is publication day for Chinese Characters! The first shipments via Amazon have reached readers and the book is now easily available to anyone. We’ve got a lot going on, including East (New York City) and West (Los Angeles) Coast book launches and talks and seminars in China, Boston, Philadelphia and around Southern California. Please do […]
Ai-jen Poo: The Rock Star of Community Organizing
At a conference about social movements in Los Angeles last month, all it took was the mention of her name and the crowd erupted in applause. In the world of community organizing, Ai-jen Poo, the director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, is a rock star. As the crowd sat, though, Poo asked the women to […]
Women and Guns: Hype vs Reality
Pro-gun organizations and retailers have been hailing the rise of women gun owners for years and the mass media has not been far behind. Reports about women with guns and stores that are seeing a rise female customers have been circulating newspapers since the 1980s. Today’s “pink pistols” are reminiscent of the Ladysmith handguns of […]
SXSW Interactive: Learn from scientists for better journalism
Both journalism and science are about “the quest for truth” said the presenters at the SXSW Interactive panel “What Journalism Can Learn from Science.” Journalists know something is true when two people say so, said Gideon Lichfield, media editor of The Economist, and Matt Thompson, editorial product manager at NPR and adjunct faculty the Poynter […]
SXSW Interactive: Health media junkies spoiled with choices
Even though I’m no longer a SXSW Interactive newbie, this year’s huge selection of health-related panels has my head spinning. The geek in me is drawn to all the mobile application and gadget panels which will showcase eyes-light-up technology that promise everything from help losing weight to pocket-size medical devices that can collect and send […]
Bollywood in L.A.
Growing up in Kashmir, Raj Singh loved going to the theater. “In Kashmir, I was watching two movies in a day,” Singh recalls. “Here, I have no time to see movies.” Movies, instead, are Singh’s job. As general manager of the Naz 8 cinema in Artesia, which is northeast of Long Beach, he runs an […]
Geek Looks Like a Lady
It’s not that the PyLadies are intimidated by the men who dominate computer programmer events and workshops. It’s just that they got tired of feeling like outsiders. Katharine Jarmul, 29, remembers the day they first identified the problem. She and three other women found themselves chatting in a circle at a meet-up in March last […]
Tina’s Mouth: A Graphic Novel That Gives Indian-American Stereotypes the Finger
Tina Malhotra’s journey through a high school existential crisis was difficult. Bringing her world to life was just as wrenching. Author Keshni Kashyap and illustrator Mari Araki spent four years working on the graphic novel Tina’s Mouth: An Existential Diary, which was published in January. Kashyap was trained as a filmmaker and Araki is a […]
A man of faith
The offices of L.A. Voice, where Umar Hakim is in residency, are on the third floor of the First Baptist Church of Los Angeles. So when it comes time for Hakim to offer his daily prayers, he finds a quiet room, faces Mecca and turns his thoughts to God. “Most people don’t object to prayer,” […]