Ethnicity and Race in a Changing World

Ethnicity and Race in a Changing World: A Review Journalpast to the present and the future.This book was a very interesting read and can be enjoyed by anyone from any background,not necessarily those from a mixed-heritage background only. The stories are themed around cars,recipes, hairstyles, music and letter writing. The overarching theme of being different, travellingthrough different countries and continents and finding oneself comes through in each of the tales.Most of the stories are amusing and entertaining such as the story by Tina Freeth (Growing upon Lard) concerning her experiences as a young Chinese girl adopted by White British parents whofeed her greasy fry-ups and fattening food which result in her weighing ten stone at the age of tenyears! Her connections with Chinese culture being an occasional visit to a Chinese restaurant to eatrice with chopsticks, which she hates and can never get the hang of !But amongst the collection were stories of frustration and anger, such as the one by Rashid Adamson(Torn) which describes the experiences of a young boy who has a White British mother and PakistaniMuslim father. Reminiscent of the ‘East is East’ script, as the title suggests, he constantly feels tornbetween the two cultures. He does not agree with much of what his father says or does, but througha sense of loyalty is even prepared to have an arranged marriage at the age of sixteen, even thoughhis heart tells him this is wrong. His father looks to Rashid as his saviour in life and strive to connectback to his Pakistani roots after a life of ‘Westernisation’. The momentary point in his life when herealises he could see ‘a lot more clearly’, is after the futile death of his cousin Talib over a dispute oversome land in a village in Pakistan. In an instant he beings to hate his father’s culture and religion andeverything it stands for.Some of the stories have a romantic and reminiscent quality of life, proving that howeverdifficult life may have been, memories of family life and growing up are filled with affection andsentiment such as the story by Radhika Praveen (The Amruthur Iyengar family) concerning intercastemarriages. The author cleverly weaves a string of delicious Indian recipes throughout the storyhighlighting the importance of food and social gatherings in South Asian culture.This book is worth reading, throughout each story we hear the ‘voice’ of honesty that tells uswhat it is really like being Irish and Muslim, English and Pakistani, Chinese and Brummie and muchmore.ECONOMICS AND GLOBALISATIONTHE TROUBLE WITH AID: WHY LESS COULD MEAN MORE FOR AFRICAJonathan GlenniePublisher: Zed BooksYear: 2008Pagination: 192ppISBN: 978-1848130401Price: £12.99The Trouble with Aid, claims Jonathan Glennie, is that it has served to worsen rather than better theeconomic plight of Africa. Instead of throwing money at the problem, Glennie instead urges us totake action to encourage financial independence for the nation of Africa.The opening chapter – ‘Time to Think Again’ – describes 2005 as the year which saw morecampaigns than ever targeting the eradication of poverty, including the Make Poverty Historycampaign in the UK and the ONE campaign in the US. The author claims that campaigning of thissort was successful in mobilising public support to put the issue of ending poverty in Africa on thepolitical agenda and, by extension to increase government aid to poorer countries. However, arguesGlennie, such campaigns were naïve and fundamentally flawed, failing as they did to understand thefull complexity of the political situation.The book sets out to show how, rather than increasing aid to African countries, the governmentshould instead be reducing the amount of official aid offers. His ambivalent view is in keeping withAfrican policy analysts rather than Non-Government Organisations (NGOs), who, he claims, are too64