So, this week's compositions were varied. I really liked the art group's use of levels and surprise entrance. Kristin slowly rising as everyone else stood still was very interesting. I felt, however, that our composition was a bit of a disappointment.

I thought that drinking the blood of the Turkish was an obvious metaphor and that only partially burying "the dead" was also fairly blatantly conveyed. And that the vampire, as a figment of imagination, or flight of fancy, was a really good symbol for the forced integration: no one seems to think it is a "monster." I guess we just failed to make that clear.

Maybe next time we should chose something simpler.

Jugend und Religion

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/episode/0,2144,3236744,00.html

Gegen die Wand

I saw the movie for class last year. While I appreciated the insight into the Turkish German culture, I really was not fond of the movie over all. In all fairness, when I went to see it at the German film night last year, everyone had been raving about how wonderful of a movie it was and I went in expecting something a little bit more....happy, I guess. I felt really bad for Cahit throughout the entire movie.

As far as themes? Self-destruction. The inability to escape one's failures. Addiction. Other happy stuff.

More information on religious education in Germany

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2006/71382.htm

http://www.euro-islam.info/spip/article.php3?id_article=299

http://www.islamische-foederation.de/

Ballet

So I just realized I never blogged about the ballet. I suppose "better late than never" comes into play here. Anyways, here it goes.

I really enjoyed the performance. I never inherited any of the coordination or balance to dance well, so I admire anyone who can. I particularly liked the way exaggerated movements of the shoulders, neck and head were used to convey emotion, where (I think) tone of voice would have been used in the play.

At the risk of incurring the disapproval of my undoubtedly more fashionable classmates, I must say that I quite liked the costumes. They were bright and colourful and entirely fitting for an adaptation of a play in which the characters are also quite colourful. I especially liked the use of similar colours and similar styles to emphasize association between the characters.

BBC archive results..and some Deutsche Welle

BBC results on the search "Berlin headscarves schools":

November 11, 2003
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3261147.stm
Note: "The ban will not apply in religious education classes, and Christian and Jewish symbols will not be banned."
March 29, 2008
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6506889.stm

Also Deutsche Welle had a ton of articles. When I have finished with my homework actually due tomorrow, I shall look through them more thoroughly. Until then:
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,1047227,00.html
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,978888,00.html
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,1152539_page_2,00.html
That last one has a quote from an Islamic Studies lecturer at Humboldt.

Topic

In order, my three areas of interest are:
Immigration and Migration
Youth Culture
Memorials

In specific, I would like to explore the competition between the Abrahamic traditions for representation in the public education system, contrasting the classes for younger grades with those for high school.