Friends of African Village Libraries (I post regularly here)- Daytime session at Sherigu Community Library
- La deuxième journée des activités de café littéraire à la bibliothèque de Boni
- Échanges avec la nouvelle gérante de la bibliothèque de Koho
- Reprise des activités de la bibliothèque mobile Pénélope
- Sortie de la Bibliothèque Mobile Pénélope à l’école Sainte Thérèse
- Bonne nouvelle pour les amoureux de la lecture à Niankorodougou
- Bibliothèque communautaire de Zimtenga ! Les livres attendent patiemment le retour des communautés
- Bilan des activités du mois d’août de la bibliothèque de Bougounam
- Bilan des premières journées du café littéraire
- Nyariga community library, daytime activities
Author Archives: mkevane
Next time you get mad at a retailer for not letting you charge under $5… the law changed
Embarassing… at least I didn;t yell, or throw down my bagels… (but I didn;t threaten to “report them”)…. this morning I got peeved at a $5 minimum sign (my order was $3.8)… but turns out… they were right… the retail … Continue reading
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Richard Ford Reads Harold Brodkey
A very long story by Brodkey, “State of Grace” that I listened to while on a long run. Interesting and precocious. I am sure it is a fine story to teach in undergraduate classes. Almost the same key as Catcher … Continue reading
Posted in Book and film reviews
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Sudanese starting to read books again? Or New York Times reporter with human interest angle?
When Leslie and I were in Khartoum we bought and browsed extensively in the bookstores. At that time mostly English stuff, but as Arabic improved occasionally we purchased simple Arabic texts. On each successive visit, a bookstore would have closed. … Continue reading
Tahar Ben Jelloun’s short story “By Fire” in The New Yorker
Another story to add to “literature about poverty.” I found it pretty powerful, but I knew what the story was about by the third paragraph. So it reinforces a sense of injustice and outrage at the petty abuse of authority … Continue reading
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Macroeconomics for dummies… it takes a Nobel Prize Winner… George Akerlof’s Nobel lecture
Probably the best single guide to the behavioral perspective on macro… why it is relevant, why it is better, and what the models are doing… Can be read over and over again for nuance. Did he have help from Thomas … Continue reading
Posted in United States
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Howard French summarizes Nina Munk’s evisceration of Sachs… Only Easterly left standing, because he didn’t do anything
Maybe Sachs will decide he needs some good PR and fund 20 libraries in Burkina Faso? Who knew FAVL would last longer than MVP! And probably we’re learning more too. With his $100 million, we could have established and operated … Continue reading
Posted in Development thinking
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Cautionary words for Deans and University Presidents
It’s easy for university administrators to ignore the fundamental truth here, and be constantly reaffirmed by their underlings, so that they can (with some old-fashioned cognitive dissonance) tell themselves they are perplexed and befuddled when suddenly a crisis erupts and … Continue reading
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And now… for the traditional chiefs (of the Mossi that is)…
The chiefs (of the Mossi, let’s be precise… and probably in English their title is more like king or prince than chief) visited Presidential palace in Kosyam, and publicly declared their backing of the Senate. It’s like a long line … Continue reading
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Best hype ever… odor-cancellation against mosquitos. Could they noise-cancel the whine too?
Les nouveaux composants que nous étudions rendent la personne inodore. Le moustique entre dans la pièce et ne sent rien. La personne est devenue invisible… via Les humains bientôt «invisibles» pour les moustiques? – Science – RFI.
Posted in Economy
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Marginal Revolution succumbs to gee whizism
I have no doubt the paper is terrific and interesting and insightful, but the broad thrust of the economic history agenda seems to be that people kind of stay the same in many ways for a long time. Well… it’s … Continue reading
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Fédération des Associations Islamiques du Burkina supports the Senate in Burkina Faso
The comments are scathing. Hard not to be. “”Muslims are in favor of Senate.” “Our association is not political.” « La position des musulmans sur le Sénat est connue depuis 2011 parce que nous sommes partie prenante du consensus qui … Continue reading
Posted in Politics
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Africa least happy place… millions of tourists corrected
The gap between perception (Africa? Are you sure? Isn’t it dangerous?) and perception (Everyone is so happy and helpful and hospitable.) finally can be eroded due to some serious social science effort. Africa turns out to have lowest levels of … Continue reading
Posted in Development thinking
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Sahel crop production and vegetation production trends, seen from space…
From a poster by Lund Earth Observation Group. Overall this conforms with what the data generally is saying, that Sahel for last 40 years has been on gentle improvement trend in terms of climate, after the very bad 1970s, and … Continue reading
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Nice little reminder of what makes for better graphics (HT #cblatts)
Posted in Development thinking
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For shame… Santa Clara City council wants to turn only natural area left in the city into soccer fields
The irony is that council itself created Ulistac Natural Area 15 years ago from an abandoned golf course that was “going natural”… Here’s a very recent Yelp review: The beauty of Ulistac is that it is left natural and a … Continue reading
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Decline in child mortality in Africa…
BBC had a news story touting decline in child mortality in Ethiopia. Just blather? Because the same thing is happening in pretty much every African country that has reasonably functioning government.
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What does literature do? Adam Gopnik weighs in, skeptically…
Nor do humanities specialists, let alone English majors, seem to be particularly humane or thoughtful or open-minded people, as the alternative better-people defense insists. No one was better read than the English upper classes who, a hundred years ago, blundered … Continue reading
Posted in Reading
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Are there still people who confuse correlation with causation in 2013? Yes! Pleasure reading makes you better at math?
I love the “might”, “likely,” “makes sense”… why not, “it is also likely this is an expected correlation and has no implications for anything….” Study author Dr Alice Sullivan said: “It may seem surprising that reading for pleasure would help … Continue reading
Posted in Reading
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Welcome to small ‘k’ Kafka hell, courtesy TIAA-CREF
Because this is what blogs are for, right? The TIAA-CREF form for the Keogh electronic delivery (why exactly should I save them money? Did they reduce their service fees?) asks, towards the end, for this: adopting employer as primary authorizer … Continue reading
Posted in Personal Kevane life
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Sahel rainfall – just to temper the whole Sahel conflicts are climate conflicts thing that has restarted….
For example this NPR fairly glib reporting… The region of Africa known as the Sahel is a grassy band running coast to coast along the southern edge of the Sahara. It always has faced periods of drought, but now they’re … Continue reading
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