wordcrush

Thanks to a visit by featherbone, I discovered this smart little magazine, known, aptly enough, as The Little Magazine. Its mission is to function as an "independent witness" of the reality often skew(er)ed by the Western media. TLM aims to promote a "culture of translation" where non-mainstream voices may be spoken and shared. Though it's based in India, it claims that "It is not India-specific and addresses a community which is more easily defined in terms of mindspace rather than in purely geographical terms."

This issue (4.5) features a section called "Globalization and Its Contents," which makes various arguments for two-way international economics (as opposed to the current, mostly unidirectional system). I have to say, reading arguments that don't rely on the usual slew of Western left-wing clichés and self-promoting nonsense is damned refreshing. TLM also speaks of popular culture while avoiding the usually distractionary entities of celebrities, figureheads and scapegoats. It's all about systems of meaning, rather than their local, easily disregarded manifestations. Woot.

Here's my contribution to globalization: I think it's really important that I keep being able to buy stuff made at the tender hands of third-world children. If there's no exploitation involved, it's so much harder to enjoy. Thanks Nike! (Warning: disturbing link.)


STOLEN FROM TLM:

Oh, if the world stood upside down!
Maybe something would fall
out of its pocket.
A key, perhaps,
that would fit a back door.

--Günther Grass

# posted by Lintropy @ 12:30 PM