Author: Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Douglas Carlton Abrams
Illustrator: LeUyen Pham
Publisher : Candlewick Press
Audience: Preschool children
Summary: The story, as well as the illustrations, draw children towards empathy and forgiveness and the understanding that they are all part of God’s family. God’s dream is that we all play together, laugh together, love one another as family should and the book reminds us that we can all take part in making God’s dream come true.
Literary elements at work in the story: (genre/setting/characterization/plot/theme/point of view/style) Picture storybook with a lovely message of hope, love, and joy.
Perspective on gender/race/culture/economics/ability: Illustrations depict children of different genders, colors, and religions playing together, worshipping together, forgiving one another, and sharing with each other.
Theology: This book emphasizes that all children everywhere, no matter their differences, are children of God, beloved by Him. In caring, sharing, playing, and laughing with one another, God is pleased. The authors state that “God does not force us to be friends or to love one another.” This would indicate that we are free to choose to act in ways that make God happy or not. Free will is an issue I still struggle with myself. From Martin Luther to Martin Luther King, Jr., I have not heard an explanation that completely satisfied me deep in my soul. I think therefore, that I would not move the discussion in that theological direction with young children. Instead, we focus on the concept of forgiveness in the book…that in forgiving each other, we wipe away our own tears and God’s tears showing that God is saddened when we’re angry and happy when we forgive.
Faith Talk Questions:
What makes all of us, no matter how different we look, sound, or live, brothers and sisters?
What are some things that you think God would dream about?
Look closely at the picture on pages 13 & 14. What do you think is happening here?
What do you think the girl that’s holding the ball is thinking?
What about the girl with the striped socks?
How do you think the little boy sitting alone feels?
Tell me about some times that you remember feeling some of these things…what happened to you?
What do you see happening on the next page? How do you think you would feel if you were that little girl now? Or the little boy?
Remember a time when you felt angry or sad. What made you feel better?
From time to time, we will post different reviews of the same book. This can help you to see several ways that one book might useful to you in your work. Another review of God’s Dream was posted on 10/24/2009. This review was prepared by Kelly Hames, MACE, Entering Cohort Fall 2008.
I must begin with deepest thanks to Rinku Sen and Fekkah Mamdouh for sharing the story of The Accidental American. This is not just an important book; it is a masterful book, educating and engrossing the reader on many levels. Its scope provides a look at conditions for immigrants from pre-9/11 New York to New York in 2008. Its focus shifts between close-ups of individual immigrants and wide-angle views of immigration policy. The reader closes this book in a completely different place from where she opened it.
Rinku Sen is the president and executive director of the Applied Research Center (ARC), and Fekkak Mamdouh is the cofounder of the Restaurant Opportunities Center of New York (ROC-NY) and the codirector of the Restaurant Opportunities Center United (ROC-U). These are busy people doing worthwhile things. The “accidental American” is Fekkak, called Mamdouh throughout the book. Ms. Sen begins by telling the story of his reaction to losing his job at the Windows on the World restaurant when the Twin Towers fell on September 11, 2001. Mamdouh is a Morrocan immigrant, and from his history Sen seamlessly moves to the stories of other Windows workers.
These people are immigrants, many of them undocumented, and Sen stresses the fact that they want to work, have skills and goals, and want to be legal, but are forced by the current global trade structure to leave their impoverished countries and then forced by the current immigration policy to live in a class below that of American citizens and below that of legal immigrants.
The book’s most powerful sentence refers to how these people are called illegals: “When people break other laws,” Sen writes, “we don’t attach the stigma of illegality to their entire beings.” She is right.
So many stories and perspectives are gathered here into one epic mosaic of the immigrant experience and its relation to globalization: there is Mamdouh’s transformation from a union shop steward to a labor organizer, and the creation of the Restaurant Opportunities Center, which helps mistreated immigrant restaurant workers achieve their rights; there is Sen’s reasoned explanation of how neoliberal policies created the climate for the current unsatisfactory conditions surrounding immigration, and there is her bravura chapter describing how businesses and those who wish to restrict immigration have control over the debate on the subject, while immigrants themselves have no voice.
When placed next to the shiny, attention-catching covers of other current-affairs books, The Accidental American may look grim and text-book-like. It is not. The story is one of hard work, hope, and longing—longing for a kind of globalization in which immigrants can freely choose to become citizens and then do so in a cooperative atmosphere—with no stigmas attached.
Ela R Bhatt (born on 7th September 1933 in Ahmedabad) is the founder of Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA). While she was leading the women wing of Textile Labour Association (TLA), she realized the fact that thousands of women who are working as textile workers elsewhere to supplement their family income, but there were state laws protecting the industrial workers but not these self-employed women. In 1972, she started SEWA to organize the self employed women into a union. In 2006, she wrote a book named “We Are Poor but So Many- The story of Self-employed Women in India”
Review of the book:
The Book “We are Poor but So Many”, is an account of journey of the author and SEWA (Self Employed Women’s Association) in bringing self-employed women at different places into a single union. In this narrative account, the author provides some close glimpses of the lives of the poor, self-employed women. Author also discusses the forces that overpower them, the conditions that perpetuate their poverty, the battles they fight, the prejudices they face, and their working and living conditions. In the book, the author mentions about various cases (Rag Pickers, Chindi and Garment stitchers, vendors, Banking, Health Care, Embroiders, Gram Haat and Sukhi) where SEWA has to struggle to make the women to be the part of the union.
The book is a journey through the condition of being poor, of being self employed and of being a women and how these conditions compound the problems of a person. Author also draws interesting contrast of the prevailing condition.
It begins by addressing the plight of a neglected section of the society, the RAGPICKERS, which mainly comprised of women from landless artisan community, the dalits who have been always oppressed by the higher caste. Though the work is hazardous and hectic, though the profits were less, they had no complaints as they had no bargaining power. The author mentions about the way SEWA has mobilized the women to join SEWA and fight for their rights. It speaks of how the women had eliminated the middlemen and increased their profits and how the women have succeeded in the formation of various cooperatives like Vijaya (for weavers), Gitanjali (young ragpickers and their daughters were trained to make stationery by recycling paper), Saundarya (for cleaners) and Sujata (for ragpicking).
There is mention of the chindi and garment stitchers. Chindi industry was also another informal trade center in Ahmedabad. Chindi are scrap strips of fabric 2-8 inches in length which are by products of textile manufacturing industry. The chindi stitchers were mostly muslim women, living in inner city area of Dariapur. After putting a lot of hard work in stitching the chindi into khol, they used to get a very less price. SEWA succeeded in organizing the chindi stitchers and motivating them to fight for increase in the price per khol and finally they succeeded in the struggle. Later Sabina cooperative was formed which provided economic security to women and this made them to also face the domestic problems with confidence. Similar was the case of garment stitchers where SEWA managed to increase the price from 2.5 rupees to 7.5 rupees. The author highlights the importance of merging the informal sector with formal sector in order to do justice to the women workers, majority of who are the workers in informal sector.
The book tries to describe the problems faced by the vegetable vendors who lose their space in the market due to increased shopping malls and other factors. In addition to this, they have to pay the local mafia and police. Here the role of SEWA has been talked of beautifully as to how it helped the group both financially and legally.
The book talks of the evolution of cooperative bank movement SEWA for uplifting the status of women working in unorganized sector. SEWA as Banker to the Poor Women. The need for bank among poor but economically active women was glaringly apparent because of the fact that these women were large in numbers and were in the debt trap of moneylenders, pawn shops or landlords who were charging exorbitantly high interest rate ranging from 10% per day to 25% per month. In 1972 SEWA approached the bank to help it reaching the poor. But when Ela Bhatt went to register the cooperative bank, she was dissuaded by the Registrar to forget about bank for poor people. He told Ela that these people never repay their loans on one hand and secondly they are illiterate. But Ela never deterred, she had answers for both the questions of the Registrar, firstly though they are poor but they are so many and secondly though they are illiterate they can understand signs, symbols and photographs. With these clarifications Shri Mahila SEWA Sahakari Bank Ltd, a cooperative bank was formed in 1974, especially for poor women with an initial share capital of meager Rs. 71,320 from 6,287 members. The bank was owned and operated by the members of SEWA. SEWA Bank went step by step to help the poor women working in informal sector. First it collected savings in door to door basis and once the credit worthiness was established these people were granted loan for different purposes like loan for consumption need, household needs and emergency need as well. As the poor people are prone to natural disasters and emergencies the bank also provided insurance to mitigate them. Bank appointed BankSathis who were the bank frontline operators, one among the SEWA members. They are responsible for collecting, savings and availing loans. The major challenge for the bank is to stand tall even in the times of disaster and risks. SEWA has proved itself in balancing risk and security to the poor women. With this SEWA has broken the myths that poor are not bankable.
Vulnerability of the poor people due to health problems is an issue discussed by the author. Sickness is recurring crisis in the lives of poor women which attributes due to many reasons like their poor living, working and financial condition. The maximum loan is taken for health reasons and maximum default also occurs due to health reasons only. In 1990, Peoples’ Health Cooperative called Lokswasthya Cooperative was registered which was run by the traditional dais. Death after pregnancy was very common among these slum dwelling women working in unorganized sector. So the cooperative aimed at providing training to the dais for six 12 days session. Health camps were organized in urban slums and also in neighboring villages. Of all the TB centers, SEWA outperformed with highest conversion ratio of 91%. Later drug shops were started selling generic drugs at cheaper price to the poor. Apart from this SEWA introduced health insurance plan, called Vimo SEWA, to cover the risk due to any health problems. As a result of the success story of these dais in handling child births, the government was forced to include the role of dias in Reproductive and Child Health Policy. And probably this movement led the government to think about ASHA to be integral part of National Rural Health Mission.
The author speaks about how SEWA succeeded in helping embroiders of Rajasthan to become a part of SEWA. She has tried to show how many difficulties the women in the area had to face to join SEWA by fighting against their culture, how they succeeded in convincing the society and how they have proved that they can also be leaders. The role played by SEWA in empowering the women, by creating market to their products, providing work even under crisis to maintain the trust, by providing better price to their products, etc. is explained as well.
The author throws light on the problems faced by the gum collecting and salt producing women. SEWA succeeded in helping the gum collectors not only in getting good price but also in getting the license. SEWA provided the financial facility to the salt producers thereby helped them from the clutches of the local traders and provided education to their children. SEWA realized the importance of a market for marketing the products produced by the self-employed women and formed SEWA Gram Mahila Haat with the help of District associations, and Govt. of Gujarat with a vision to meet the marketing requirements of the producer group.
The book also presents a typical case of resettlement pattern followed by the Government. The case talks about the sorry state of affairs of the villagers who were displaced due to the construction of a dam over Sukhi river and the failure of the Government in providing rehabilitation to them. SEWA intervened in the area to look into the plight of the women and suggested a plethora of steps to help them improve their own condition. Village meetings, visits to successful ventures organized in other villages greatly improved their confidence levels. They helped in improving the condition of drinking water and irrigation of the village which were the first steps towards development. SEWA helped them by training them in nursery raising and by providing banking facilities.
The reforms for the workers in the informal sector are also discussed by Ela Bhatt. The informal sector employes 92% of the work force and contribute 63% of the country’s GDP, 50% of savings and 40% of exports. Yet this sector is largely neglected by the Government due to the absence of a proper union. The situation in India finds comparison with that of South Africa where SEWU (Self-Employed Women’s Union in South Africa), the sister organization of SEWA works. The author strongly feels for the plight of poor women who needs to be given scope for self-employment to enable them to come out of the clutches of poverty.
Only a holistic approach to development which promotes self-help, support local cooperative economic initiatives and emphasize sharing and pooling of resources at every level can attain significant success. Sewa is the journey that talks about the success that these women carved for themselves. It is an inspiration for many who could walk on similar lines and bring about similar changes in their lives.
“Creating a world without Poverty” is yet another attempt by Muhammad Yunus to reinforce his vision of a world sans the poor. In his debut bestseller he has outlined the ingredients of his innovative microcredit programme & how it had helped over 100 million poor families. Capitalism & free markets have done little to alleviate the woes of the hitherto marginalised sections of the population. Yunus reiterates this with facts & figures with the precision expected of a seasoned economist. Sample this, 94% of the world income goes to 40 %of world population, while the other 60% live with only 6% of the world income. (p.3).He is extremely critical of the elitist approach to free trade & the dominance of few countries in the borderless trading environment. Not one to mince his words, Yunus launches a virulent attack on the efficacy & credibility of multilateral organizations like World Bank, IMF & IFC. He disapproves of the mode of functioning of various bilateral & multilateral organizations & briefly illustrates his ideas for overhauling them.
The book written by Nobel Laureate Mohd Yunus, founder of Grameen Bank speaks on the much forgotten topic of contemporary significance, social business and future of capitalism and the kind of realignment that is desired to make the process more effective and its benefits more distributive to the poor of the world.
The narrative begins with Dr. Yunus meeting Mr Frank Riboud, the chairman and CEO of Group Danone. This meeting was about to be a watershed moment slated to affect the lives of millions. In this meeting Dr Yunus proposed to Mr Riboud a new company, a joint venture between Danone and Grameen and named it as Grameen Danone. He proposed it as a social business exercise. The notion of social responsibility was still a nascent concept in those times and the proposal was indeed a bold one. The broader agenda was to improve the nutritional status of poor families in Bangladesh. The impetus for future broad reaching change was arrived at Danone committing to the project, making it the world’s very first consciously designed multinational social business.
The narrative moves almost like a ballerina slowly unfurling the hidden nuances and each and every step looking in perfect synchrony. Reflecting over his experience with microcredit in Bangladesh the inspiration for which was received in a manner that can be best described as serendipitous. This was an event that put in perspective the flaws that current economic models and studies had, making him all the more determined to evolve a model that would be able to include the poor as well.
THE EVOLUTION OF THE GRAMEEN BANK…
The manner in which he went ahead could be put across in the following manner:
He helped these farmers by paying their debt from his own pocket.
He then tried to persuade the bank located on university campus to lend to the poor.
The banks refused to do so by saying that the poor were not credit-worthy.
They had no credit histories and no collateral to offer and because of their illiteracy they could not even fill necessary paperwork.
Then Dr Yunus offered too become a guarantor for the loans to the poor, that is, bank would lend money to him and he on his own would lend the money to the poor. The result of this approach was that the poor lend back the loans every time.
The pinnacle moment arrived when the managing director of Bangladesh krishi bank stepped forward to promote the idea of lending to the poor. However field level officers were sceptical of the idea of lending to the poor and the mental block of viewing poor people as unbankable and unreliable appeared as an impediment. However Dr. Younus still felt that he had atleast initiated a degree of mindset change and all he now needed was some good experiences which if documented adequately would propel interest in this sector by the bigger formal players.
Seeing no prospect of changing the rules of banks Dr Younus decided to create a separate bank for the poor, one that would give loans without collateral to offer, without requiring a credit history, without any legal instruments.
After making further efforts, in 1983, the bank for the poor was born within the framework of a new law created especially for the purpose. The bank was named as Grameen Bank.
GRAMEEN BANK DEFIES ALL….
Grameen Bank was expected by many that it would not sustain for long. They believed that it would soon explode and disappear. But not only Grameen Bank survived but it also expanded and continued to make profit just like any other bank. Besides they also began to offer housing loan in 1984. The lending program of Grameen Bank also promotes a strong social agenda.
With the evolving system GrameenII came to existence, which was intended to further optimise service delivery to the poor and reduce overheads in a manner that access improves.
ISSUES WITH MICROFINANCE:
Dr. Younus in the course of his narrative does delve on the crucial challenges that microfinance faces and the measures that need to be put in place so that the only affordable source of credit to the poor doesn’t get severed.
Professor younus believes that market mechanisms do hold the key to a lot many problems that we are faced with. He believes in using the efficiency factor of the markets to iron out the inconsistencies in the sector. He provides market based solutions to the funding problem.
One of them is that if an international or domestic organization can act as a guarantor, local banks can provide loan to microfinance companies.
Another solution is that if MFIs can start accepting saving deposits.
Dr Yunus gives some suggestions to improve the condition of microcredit faculties.
He speaks of increasing the aid volume in microfinance to Bangladesh to reach out to a bigger mass.
He also says that each country should have a number of independent, nongovernmental wholesale funds.
According to him conventional banks can also run microcredit programs if they have trained people, a methodology, and a management structure that will do the job. This can be done by forming a microcredit subsidiary. This is something that we are beginning to witness off late in India as well.
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Capitalism according to Younus is a half-developed structure & the multidimensional nature of human beings needs to be factored into it. He talks about developing three models within this structure i.e.
Companies focussing on social benefits rather than financial rewards
Companies focussing on profits but owned by disadvantaged or poor
A Hybrid Model
Poverty according to him is the single biggest threat to world peace. According to him the capacity of poor people are never recognised. Grameen bank has also come up with a 10 point system that can be used to define if an individual has crossed the poverty line. Given the quantum of poor people, prioritisation of beneficiaries becomes of utmost importance.
An interesting point that is made here is that one needs to look at the poor through the asset base point of view and not the skill set lens. This is critical as the poor have skills that if bettered and given adequate linkage could work wonders, rather wasting time on imparting new skills, their domain expertise needs to be tapped into and developed. He emphasises on the need to establish good governance and reduction in the corruption level at all government levels.
THE DANONE EXPERIENCE…
The Grameen Danone joint venture was launched in March 2006 by Franck Riboud in Dhaka. The MOU indicated that the Grameen Danone would be a social business that would focus on maximising social benefit rather than financial profit. It also specified how they intended to help the poor. To sum up .The strategy was defined as “unique proximity business model”. The MOU combined social aspirations with practical business details in a way that captures the power of social business.
The main objective of Grameen Danone was to reach malnourished children with fortified yogurt. The strategy to reach out was clear and meant marketing a higher priced yogurt for more affluent consumers. Profit from these sales could help subsidise expansion to benefit the poor.
The objective was financial/operational efficiency to maximise social benefit. The idea was to make tasty and nutritious food and serve the community. Milk was sourced from local suppliers who had bought their first cows with a small loan from Grameen bank. These people would act both as supplier as well as customers for them. They involved the Grameen ladies in the distribution system that was to act as a key to the sales program for the yogurt produced by Grameen Danone.
THE CRITICAL QUESTIONS…
The questions that plague future entrepreneurs has been raised by the nobel laureate
“where will the money for social business come from”?
“Who will invest in the business which has social motive”?
The rationale that Professor Younus advances is that Investing in a social business at least make sense because when you invest your money in social business you get your money back and retain the ownership of a company that supports itself through earned income.
He actually believes that in time, more institutions to support the burgeoning universe of social business will emerge. A full fledge social stock market dedicated to trading social business share will be needed. There will be a social Dow Jones Index, reflecting the share value of some of the world’s largest, most important and most broadly representative social businesses.
ROLE OF NEW IT…
On the role that IT could play in taking resources to the masses, Younus is optimistic. The New IT cannot be controlled by a single owner or authority. It will help in giving dignity and self reliance to poor women. The science that however comes in has to adopt a strong bottom up model in the manner of its platform and design styles.
He talks about opening an organization which will be named as IT Solutions to End Poverty (ISEP). ISEP will generate ready to apply social –business ideas for using IT for poor, it could develop prototype for IT infrastructure and information system, it could study the interface between the informational needs of the poor and existing IT capabilities
PARTING SHOTS….
The book in its concluding part speaks about the vision that Dr. Younus has for the poor and marginalised of the world and how it is all about giving access to the poor that would be the panacea to the ills of the world.
He urges on redistribution as a strategy along with business accepting the fact that they cannot go on with the current strategy of unlimited profit maximisation as the process, the means and the end state.
He draws from his experience in Bangladesh which despite having very little emissions is currently at the receiving end of the global warming menace. With sea levels rising what needs to be done is strict enforcement of regulations and belt tightening rather waste time on more meaningless conferences, the fact that Bangladesh is sinking is proof enough to develop consensus. the associated fact is that with high population densities, any development intervention shall be successful only when these inter alia issues get addressed, else all interventions and financial aids shall fall flat on their faces.
Prof Younus does criticise the existing model of capitalism with its obsession with monetary profits, utter disregard for the interests of the poor and free markets that operate sans regulation. nevertheless Prof Younus is a believer in the goodness of the human spirit and believes that human beings don’t differ in capacity, it is all about access and a chance to prove oneself, once that is done the solution to global poverty can be met and the process of consigning it to the museums can be initiated.
He believes that the poor resemble the bonsai, even the best seed planted in a flower pot would grow as much as the space it gets….given a chance the poor can prove to be as competitive as the ‘riche’ of the world….its time we move ahead and truly globalise the cause of the poor and reach out all out…..
Christopher from Doolittle’s read and reviewed The Last Stand of the Tin Can Soldiers: The Extraordinary World War II Story of the U.S. Navy’s Finest Hour by James D. Hornfischer for the WWII challenge. Here’s what he had to say:
The story of Taffy Three is the first time in a WWII history that I have found myself this amazed at the courage under fire of American servicemen.
Read his complete review here.
**Attention participants: Remember to email us a link to your reviews, and we’ll post them here so we can see what everyone is reading!**
A couple of participants in the WWII challenge reviewed The Shawl by Cynthia Orzick. Here are excerpts from their reviews; click the links to read their complete posts.
Lorri from Jew Wishes says:
The book is haunting on many levels, disturbing, and filled with intensity. She demonstrates the loss of a child in a dramatic and masterful manner. The novella and short story are not pretty, nothing is sugar-coated, and the book is extremely compelling. Ozick is often poetic, even within the brutality and harshness she depicts.
Lezlie from Books ‘N Border Collies says:
While the premise sounds and is somber, the beauty of Cynthia Ozick’s writing and the surrender to hope with which the novella ends make it all up to the reader.
**Attention participants: Remember to email us a link to your reviews, and we’ll post them here so we can see what everyone is reading!**
Can’t Buy Me Love, like Brothers (about the Kennedys) was a chance for me to catch up with the cultural touchstones of my parents’ generation. I grew up listening to the Beatles and aware of Beatlemania in a general sense, but appreciated this chance to learn more.
Gould takes an interesting tack in examining the Beatles phenomenon – combining a decently thorough biography of each Beatle with detailed descriptions of their music. This was my first significant exposure to music criticism and the vocabulary was occasionally beyond me. Because I have the One album on my iPod, I was able to listen to the songs while reading their descriptions and learned a bit. For example, I had never noticed the double-tracking of the vocals on many songs, and I am used to listening to them as Greatest Hits, divorced from their original context, so I learned a lot about the structure of each album.
The biographical material, however, was probably excessive. For one, Ringo didn’t do much interesting musically or otherwise and he throws off the attempt to balance all four Beatles; George takes quite awhile to establish himself as a musician, so coverage of him is also weak until he starts writing songs and learning the sitar. As the group started falling apart in 1968 and 1969, 500 pages in, I just ran out of interest. I knew enough about each’s post-Beatles performing life that I felt I knew how the story was going to end. A die-hard Beatles fan would probably know most of this already and for a newcomer to Beatles writing, it was a bit too much.
Christopher from Doolittle’s read and reviewed The Last Stand of the Tin Can Soldiers: The Extraordinary World War II Story of the U.S. Navy’s Finest Hour by James D. Hornfischer for the WWII challenge. Here’s what he had to say:
A couple of participants in the WWII challenge reviewed The Shawl by Cynthia Orzick. Here are excerpts from their reviews; click the links to read their complete posts.