Culture Days Presentations

The Five Chosen Ones – My Entry for the KGP

Who gets the connection?

Crime scene: ITAT
Time of the crime: Monday 16^th and Tuesday 17^th of June
Crime: Culture Days

This week, a number of presentations concerning American and Irish history and culture were made by English students of SUK2 (which is basically 99.99% of the readership here). I am myself, in fact, part of this elite and made one as well. However, our task was to attend at least ten of these presentations; seven of the home culture (in my case American) and three of the foreign culture. Apart from that, we have to choose five of them about which we would like to be tested on during the KGP (no NOT the KGB – it’s far more evil, it’s the Kommissionelle Gesamtprüfung).
In this post I want to tell you something about the eleven presentations that I have chosen to attend and the five of them that I will take for the KGP (and why)!

      1.       The Race Around Ireland (Irish)

To start with, I actually thought this was about some kind of war or battle, don’t get me wrong, but after all it’s Ireland and as far as I have learned, Irish history is 90% war and 10% war preparation. However, in this topic no swords were wielded, no people were massacred and the only rivers that flowed were those of sweat. It was literally about a race around Ireland which is a famous extreme cycling race that starts in Navan near Dublin. Felt quite comfortable in that swivel armchair while listening to it.  

      2.       Arab-Americans after 9/11 (American)

Basically, I knew that post-9/11, Arab-Americans were not really regarded as the nice neighbors next door. However, I did not know to which extent they were discriminated against. Racial profiling, workplace discrimination, flight exclusion and hate crimes and all that just because you were or even just looked Arabian; ridiculous. The Prezi was great. 

      3.       American Indian boarding schools (American)

 This was a topic that I just came across a little bit in SUK1 during the learning of the CLI’s. Though, I’m talking about the situation of Native Americans in general now; actually I’ve never heard anything of Indian boarding schools till this presentation. It’s sad how an entire minority which is of such a great importance for American history is treated that disgraceful. 

      4.       The KKK and the Mississippi Burning (American)

The KKK or the dreaded Ku-Klux-Klan; these jerks rather look like a fancy high-school sleepover club. First time I heard of them was in the movie The Jury with Samuel L. Jackson and Matthew McConaughy ( a great movie by the way). This presentation gave an overview from their foundation and their motives to their relevance for American history and their presence nowadays.    

      5.       The Boston Tea Party (American)

Actually I thought this would be about the extremely right-winged Boston Tea Party today, however, it was mainly about its founding fathers and the historical background; quite interesting though. Following the presentation was quite difficult I have to admit, because I was very concerned with that absolutely lovely British accent.  

       6.       Monica Loughman – Ballet in Ireland (Irish)

If you wonder why I chose this exceedingly manly topic from over twenty Irish presentations, well, I actually wanted to watch the previous presentation about the “Fenian Brotherhood and their raids on Canada” (YES, raids, finally some action) but, due to the slight time shift of the presentations, I missed that one and landed in the middle of Monica Loughman’s tutu. However, at least I know now the difference between a ballerina and a primaballerina. (Do you know it?)

      7.       Native American languages (American)

Again, unfortunately, I rushed in the middle of the presentation (the timetable really wasn’t that reliable sadly). This topic I was very interested in (I am generally very interested in such special and old languages that only few people speak anymore) and although the presenter was a little bit too enthusiastic in my humble opinion, she was very informed and the presentation was nice.

While searching for the right expression for “old languages that only few people speak anymore”, I stumbled across this word and just LOOK AT IT, who the hell comes up with such a word? Can anybody pronounce that in one try?   

      8.       The US-Mexican Border Woes – A problem to solve (American)

To be honest, since this was the presentation directly before mine, I really couldn’t concentrate on it even if I tried to, I was just too nervous. However, the title actually says it anyway; it’s about the border war between America and Mexico. 

      9.       Women for women – The will to lead (American)

Introduction question to the presentation – in America there are 49% men, but did you know that 51% of Americans are women? No (…shit Sherlock), but now I do, thank you for the enrichment of my humble knowledge (oh god I’m being cocky right now, forgive me). Seriously, I’m just kidding, this was obviously sarcasm to ease the excitement. This presentation was about American women in leading positions (or rather the missing of American women in leading positions) and in particular about Sheryl Sandberg the executive of Facebook and her book. There was obviously much thought put in that presentation.

Charlie Wilson

      10.   Charlie Wilson’s War (American)

Here, I had absolutely no previous knowledge at all and was thrown in at the deep end so to say, which made it very absorbing to listen though. The presentation was about Charlie Wilson, a congressman, and his role in the war in Afghanistan in which the Americans were involved. Quite interesting how much a single member of the Congress could possibly achieve, didn’t know that.

      11.   Chinese Immigrants in Australia (Australian)

This was my third foreign culture presentation and the overall last presentation. As the title says, it dealt with Chinese immigration in Australia (again a topic about which I had no foreknowledge at all). She told us about the problems Chinese immigrants had back in the days, how they influenced the Australian culture over the time and how this influence is visible today (for example the Chinatowns – really, why has every goddamn city a Chinatown and Graz or even Vienna hasn’t?)

Woo, finally finished, if you have come up to this point, respect!
As a reward, I will tell you the English word for “Bremsstrahlungsisochromatenspektroskopie”, which is bremsstrahlung isochromat spectroscopy (don’t ask me how I have come across that word).
Now you know that bremsstrahlung is one of the Germanisms in the English language (use it wisely)

NOW! The five topics that I choose to be tested on in the KGB:

·         Arab-Americans after 9/11

·         The KKK and the Mississippi Burning

·         Native American languages

·         The US-Mexican Border Woes – A problem to solve

·         Charlie Wilson’s War

I think these five topics provide a valuable insight into American culture and history and are from a range of topics (as required).

With that said, see ya all at the KGP! May the force be with us!

The Silmarillion - Tolkien's Greatest Work

The Silmarillion – Spiders, Dragons and everything else

John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, better known as J.R.R. Tolkien has enriched the fantasy genre to an extent beyond capturing. His dearest fans –among which I count myself- might even go so far as to say that he created or at least reinvented this genre. It is by this time a known fact that he didn’t just write a couple of fantasy books, featuring among others a ring and little hobbits, but embedded all of them in a whole world, a whole saga of his creation including numerous specifically devised languages and scripts, a vast background story and a massive amount of characters and events. All in all, he’s just a genius; I can’t put it in other words and I dare not go too much into detail otherwise you and I would end up completely confused and that’s not the general idea isn’t it?

What am I writing this for, some of you might wonder therefore. Well, in my opinion Tolkien is all too often limited to the Lord of the Rings and the The Hobbit books which doesn’t do justice to him. Even if these might be the more screenable stories (according to producers and screenwriters I guess), the tale doesn’t start nor end here. I therefore want to introduce you to a world beyond Frodo and Sam’s #no-homo companionship. 

You can’t read or watch the LotR trilogy without stumbling across narratives, poems and songs about happenings of the older ages and ancient times. A good example are the Elves who often refer to Eärendel, the carrier of the morning star. Well, all these characters and all these telling actually have a complete story of their own. Eärendel for example isn’t only some kind of goddess or angel, no mere background character that Tolkien has invented just in order to create someone that the Elves admire or worship.
Take for example Joanne K. Rowling and her Harry Potter books in which the reader is introduced to the four houses of Hogwarts: Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Slytherin and Ravenclaw. You also learn that these houses are named after the four founding fathers (and mothers) of Hogwarts like Salazar Slytherin and Godric Gryffindor and every now and then they appear in the storyline. However, none of them is really developed or let alone has his complete story told in another book by Rowling.

 

This is not the fact with Tolkien characters; on the contrary, nearly every one of them is fully developed and has a whole narrative spun around his life and his relevance for the entire world that Tolkien has created. There is only one exception from that, an intended exception though, and this is the character Tom Bombadil (he appears in the Lord of the Rings, but only in the books) whose background story will forever remain unknown according to Tolkien himself (he wanted to let one mystery persist – or simply tease his fans; who knows). 

In short, if you stumble across a character or an event, while reading a Tolkien book, who/which is mentioned only casually, then you can be almost a hundred percent sure that he has his own developed story in another of Tolkien’s works. Isn’t this fascinating? 

You might wonder now which books that might be, as the majority of you probably only knows The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit as yet. Well, just to name a few:  

        The Children of Húrin 

       The Horns of Ulmo 

         The Lay of Eärendel

         The Book of Lost Tales

And last but definitely not least, The Silmarillion. It is the greatest book of Tolkien in which he describes among others how Middle Earth was created, who Sauron was and where he came from, how the Elves were “made” and so on and so forth. It’s like the bible for Tolkien fans since it tells alpha to omega of the created world. However, it really is ONLY for devoted Tolkien fans since the number of names, dates and events mentioned in this book is just massive and makes your head smoke quite quickly. 

There is even a Middle Earth Lexicon, to have all these characters and battles etc. in one book so that you can look it up if quickly if you are in the middle of reading – isn’t this hilarious?

Just to show you one thing that you can learn from The Silmarillion: Do you know Smaug the dragon from the Hobbit? Quite impressive and terrifying, isn’t he? Well, still looks like a grass stalk compared to the greatest dragon that appears in Tolkien’s world.

Or you might know Kankra, the hideous, a-little-bit-more-than-average-sized spider from The Lord of the Rings, do you? What if I told you that she’s just one of the offspring of Ungolianth, which is described in the books as “ginormous” that in turn is a linguistic combination of “gigantic” and “enormous”. 

Now throw away your Twilight, or Fifty Shades of Grey book and get some real literature (nah I’m just kidding)...

... or not? ;)

 

Answers to the questions on my CP handout

Of Artichokes, Nazis and Sleepers.

The Culture Days are over and now we are unstoppably heading towards the great KGP. However, I have decided to take some time to answer the questions that are on the bottom of the handout of my presentation, since I think that they are really interesting and worth looking at. As it says on the handout, I unfortunately couldn’t include them in my presentation because of the strict time limit. Now, let’s get started!

First of all, I hope you still remember my topic, Project MKUltra. Just for a short overview, it was an illegal human research program run by the CIA during the Cold War with the purpose of the study of mind control, interrogation methods and behavior modification in which the CIA abused unwitting American citizens as test subjects by for example surreptitiously drugging them with LSD in order to examine how it alters their behavior. 

Further aspects upon which I stumbled across during my research are outlined in the questions:

• What do the Nazis have to do with Project MKUltra/ Project Artichoke?
  
• What is the FOIA and what role did it play during the revelation?
• What is the connection between the movie The Manchurian Candidate and MKUltra?
• What is psychic driving and how did Dr. Cameron induce the vegetable state in the subjects?
• Were any public lawsuits that were filed against the US government subsequent to the investigations successful?

Human experiments in Buchenwald

1. After WWII there was a race between American and Soviet intelligence agencies for German scientists (mainly rocket scientists and technicians) and their expertise, with the main purpose of denying exactly that to the enemy. The Office of Strategic Services (one of the predecessors of the CIA) for example established Operation Paperclip, trough which they transferred these former Nazi-scientists to America. They created false employment and political biographies in order to “bleach” them of their Nazism and then employed them for research. The most famous of the sometimes Paperclip Boys called scientists would be Wernher von Braun, a rocket scientist.However, the OSS was also interested in Nazi physicians (= Ärzte; don’t mix it up with physicist which is Physiker in German) and their unethical human experiments. Especially after the Allies freed the concentration camps and were confronted with these gruesome experiments, both from reports of detainees as well as from remains, the agents of the OSS have shown interest. Sadly they did not only see which atrocities the camp physicians have inflicted on the inmates but rather what one can generally inflict on someone.
   
   To cut a long story short, some of these camp physicians were prevented by the OSS from a sentence by the Medical Nuremberg Trials and were then allowed to continue with their experiments for Project Artichoke and other covert operations (including chemical and biological warfare) under the protection of the OSS (later the CIA).
   One of these camp physicians would be Kurt Blome who experimented with plague vaccines and nerve gases on concentration camp prisoners and after WWII was employed by the CIA. However, since he was denied a visa for the USA, his research took place in Germany (but still for Project Artichoke)



2. FOIA stands for Freedom of Information Act and was issued in 1967. It is a freedom of information law and allows the disclosure of documents by the US government and agencies like the CIA. However, over the years, it was often limited.
   
   As I have said in my presentation, the majority of MKUltra related documents was destroyed in 1973 by order of then-CIA director Richard Helms, which made the first investigations difficult for they had to rely largely on the sworn testimony of participants. This was in 1975. In 1977, though, they found a new record of MKUltra in form of 20,000 documents (which is still not very much for such a project) which were back then incorrectly stored in a financial records building and thus survived the destruction. This led to the Senate hearings in which most of what we know about MKUltra today was revealed. These documents were incidentally discovered subsequent to a FOIA request.




3. In The Manchurian Candidate two US-American soldiers were brainwashed during the war in Kuwait and featured with implants. They were manipulated and made unwitting sleepers which are normal people who have a normal life until they are “activated” usually by a trigger word or phrase, in order to for example kill somebody or execute something. After being “activated”, they don’t have a will of their own anymore and just obey.
   
   During Project Artichoke and MKUltra they tried to create such sleepers and researched on how to possibly manipulate/brainwash someone in this way and how to make them respond to such a trigger word. They didn’t use implants though of course, but tried the programming of multiple personalities with electroshock therapies etc.
   
   Here’s the trailer of The Manchurian Candidate with Denzel Washington and Meryl Streep just in case you’re interested:
   
   
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGqiVOqxpOo
   
   
4. Psychic driving is a special and extraordinarily vicious brainwashing method introduced and researched by Dr. Ewen Cameron (a renowned psychiatrist who was president of the Canadian, American and World Psychiatric Associations and by the way one of the scientific heads of MKUltra – here you can see which dimensions it had, just unbelievable). 
   It works in two stages as following: Firstly he induced a vegetable (or vegetative) state in the subject trough a combination of massive amounts of electroconvulsive shock, drug-induced coma and sensory deprivation. Once being in that state they were usually unable to feed
   
   themselves, to state even basic information like name, location, the date etc. and incontinent of stool and urine. Subsequently, they were exposed to hundreds of hours of tape loops (tapes that are played continuously) played to them trough earphones, special helmets or speakers in the isolation room. Usually, they were also administered muscular paralytic drugs to restrain them for and during the procedure. Psychic driving purposed to “reprogram” the subject in order to get control of them (or for example to make them a sleeper – see question number 3). 
   
   Here's a short video about Psychic Driving if you are interested (sadly I can't post it directly since Blogger is on the blink ... again):
    
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCEh9VltC2E
   
   
5. After the revelation there were indeed filed public lawsuits against the US government and the CIA. However, these lawsuits were almost always dismissed and not successful.  Nevertheless, the government had to financially compensate several plaintiffs trough court order, out-of-court settlement or even acts of Congress, like the compensation of Frank Olson’s family. He was an US Army scientist who worked for the CIA on biological warfare and committed suicide (reportedly) after having been surreptitiously drugged together with nine other scientists during a conference. His case is probably the most famous of MKUltra.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

Well, I hope I could give you a nice answer to all the questions and hopefully you will remember MKUltra as one of the dark chapters of American history.
If you have by any chance more questions about this topic, then by all means write them in the comments and I will try to answer them as soon as possible.
But for now, have a nice weekend and don’t forget: 

NEVER LEAVE YOUR DRINK IN THE CLUB UNATTENDED – OR A CIA ASSET MIGHT COME AND DRUG YOU!