COLUMNISTS, CONTRIBUTORS, & BLOGGERS
Julián Esteban Torres López, Heavy Words Director, Editor-in-Chief of "The Budding Politician," and Columnist for "El Dorado"
I’ve chosen “El Dorado” as the name for my column for a couple of reasons. “El Dorado” implies a search for something deemed valuable that was both perceived as near but distant (“just over those mountains,” as the Amerindians would reply to their European counterparts).
For the conquistadores the value resided in the “open veins of America” where gold earth, silver lakes, and emerald mountains would produce unheard of riches. For others it meant “discovering” an ancient peoples living an utopian lifestyle who could possibly afford us some guidance in finding balance and harmony with ourselves and our environment.
Five centuries have passed and the search for “El Dorado” continues in the Americas. With this column I intend to capture the spectrum of moments punctuated at one pole by (i) the incessant desire to pillage in the name of “God, progress, civilization, and/or development;” and (ii) the yearnings for a new (or ancient) relationship of peaceful coexistence marked at another pole by cooperation, partnership, and enhanced cultural exchange in a multipolar world.
*Note: Some of my posts are reproductions of my Colombia Reports column articles.*
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Maryte Gurekas, HW Columnist for "The Conscious Objector"
Maryte was born and raised in Montréal, Québec. She is of Lithuanian heritage, able to speak and write the language, and as a result her work often reflects this sensibility.
Her boundless curiosity in human behaviour led to a degree in Clinical Psychology, as well as Integrated Arts (Drama & Dance). She has been the director of a youth creative arts school, teaching ballet and modern dance, has worked in children’s hospitals, and just ended her 38-year career teaching drama and directing community theatre. Within her classes, many have come to understand Constantine Stanislavski’s edict: “The actor must believe in everything that takes place on the stage—and most of all—in what he himself is doing—and one can only believe in the truth.”
Maryte also became the publisher and editor of a small literary press, Morgaine House (1990-2010), that published books of poetry and short-fiction. She has also been the editor-in-chief of the literary journal (Ex)Cite. Her own work has appeared in numerous Canadian and U.S. journals and within the online publishing community.
She continues to live and write in Montréal and is currently working with special needs/at risk students in a high school.
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Jim Cavan, HW Columnist for "Deep Left Field"
Jim Cavan is the Director of Media for the Seacoast New Hampshire-based Green Alliance, a “green business union” and guerrilla PR firm dedicated to raising the profile of sustainability-minded companies throughout the region.
Jim’s work has been published in a number of regional newspapers, magazines, and online, including Coastal Home, Taste of the Seacoast, Portsmouth Herald, Fosters Daily Democrat, Business NH magazine, and more.
A native Michigander, Jim is a 2005 graduate of University of New Hampshire, where he studied philosophy and sociology. When not fighting the good fight for the GA, Jim also works part-time for a Dover, New Hampshire, rare book and map seller.
In his free time Jim enjoys spending time with his fiance Deana, playing basketball, disc golf, yoga, cooking, and getting worked up over politics.
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Lindsay Naito, HW Blogger for "Visions of Japan"
My name is Lindsay Naito and I’m a Canadian photographer / English teacher residing in rural Japan. Having recently obtained an MA in English from the University of British Columbia – Okanagan, I’m currently overseas teaching English, travelling, brushing up on my Japanese, and pursuing my true passion, photography.
Through my blog I hope to share some unique visions of Japan – ones seen through the eyes of a foreigner living worlds away from the country that most tourists see.
Additional entries and photography can be found at www.lindsaynaito.com
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Mason Breed, HW Columnist for "Rambling Grit"
Mason Breed is a confrontational agnostic atheist from Arkansas. His complete lack of interest in Jesus, music, dancing, alcohol, fashion, and football gave him an atypical worldview for his ilk.
He does enjoy gaming, and all the interwebz has to offer. If you have ever played anything online there is a good chance that he has PWND you.
His training is in Biology, Computer Science, and Genetic Epidemiology, and he is currently working as a researcher applying his technical skills to biological issues.
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Richard Matthews, HW Columnist
Rich Matthews is a systems integrator for a software company in Northern Massachusetts. Discussing political theories and current events started in his youth from long car rides with a father who loved discussing everything from theoretical physics to the current state of the economy. Rich is the work in progress resulting from political discussions starting at the age of 4 or 5 years old.
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David Jefferess, HW Contributor via his UBCO "Culture and Decolonization" blog
Greetings. I’m David Jefferess, currently the chair of the Cultural Studies program at UBC’s Okanagan campus. I’m an assistant professor in the Critical Studies department, and I teach courses that are cross-listed as English and Cultural Studies. My area is postcolonial literature and culture, including colonial discourse, decolonization, and globalization.
This blog is part of the Cultural Studies blog collective, a group of blogs kept by faculty and students involved with the Cultural Studies program at the Okanagan campus. In this blog I seek to engage with current issues in a way that highlights ongoing colonial relations of power and the research of scholars working in the fields of postcolonial studies, critical race and anti-oppression studies, etc.
Links to my posts will be shared with the Heavy Words collective. The original blog can be found at the following web address:
http://blogs.ubc.ca/davidjefferess/
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Guillaume Delloue, HW Columnist for "Twilight of Cinema"
Originally from France, I moved to the United States with my family in 1998. Graduating from the University of New Hampshire in 2008 in Philosophy and French literature, I am currently finishing a Master’s Thesis on Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America.
Presently I have spent as many years in Europe as in America and my intellectual interests have often reflected this biculturalism. In particular, the special cinematic relationship between the United States and France—exemplified by the French New Wave—is a topic I am very fond of studying.
More recently I have rediscovered the Ancients via the writings of Leo Strauss and his students. Returning to the works of Plato and Aristotle as well as reading for the first time the likes of Xenophon and Thucydides has had a tremendous impact on my thinking, and has propelled me towards vast oceans of wisdom I did not know existed.
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Heavy Words Art by Alëna Guseva
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