#European traders

[sputnikodin]

i like transmasc dyke kira for projection reasons but i really like transfem dyke kira too

[awetistic-things]

just watched the woman king and oh boy did they rewrite the history between dahoney and the slave trade 😭

[kakusu-shipping]

TELL ME ABOUT YOUR MUSHISHI S/I!! Where did he come from?? Does he have a relationship with Ginko or anyone else?? I bet he researches Mushi, right? That seems on brand with you and your curious lil brain

Aaaaah you'd think right. I am once again answering an S/I ask with Actually I have two different Self Inserts for this fandom fdkgjfdkg

The other one, an adult who lives alone and runs a hot spring in the mountains Ginko regularly visits does Research Mushi, and writes about them in his novels. He's part of the ever growing Aro Ginko Polycule, I've talked about him a few times, he's not interesting, just kind of domestic and in love with Ginko who pays him a visit once a year or so.

A lot of my younger self inserts are much more Head Empty than my older ones, the one your asking about especially

He's a kid inflicted by the Ginko who just showed up one day in Adashino's village. Adashino assumed him some sort of love child of Ginko's and sent a letter telling him to get his ass over here as soon as possible.

He appears about 7 or 8 years old, but it's hard to tell sense his knowledge seems toddler like. He doesn't know how to use chop sticks, or what he can and can't eat, or how to dress himself, and doesn't speak or seem to understand much of what anyone says to him.

He has a bad tenancy to grab Mushi by the handful and shove them in his Tokoyami filled eye, which is what lead Doctor Adashino to bandaging up the opening, sense he assumed that probably wasn't a good thing to be doing.

In the few weeks it took Ginko to arrive, Adashino got pretty attached to the kid, getting rather use to parenting his larger than most toddler. However, like Ginko, if in one place for too long Mushi will begin to swarm around him, making it dangerous for him to stay in the villager, or anywhere for that matter.

It took a lot of convincing, but Ginko eventually agreed to take the kid on as his apprentice, taking him on his travels and teaching him the dangers and nuances of Mushi.

Basically, he becomes Ginko and Adashino's adopted son over time. Whenever he gets to talking he calls Adashino "Papa", but Ginko remains just Ginko or some form of "Master"/"Sensei" when he's learning. He also calls Tanyuu variations of "Mama" or "Auntie", with Tama being "Grandma" exclusively. He doesn't like Kumado at all.

[croutoncat]

every so often I’m reminded of the existence of Trader Joe’s and suddenly life doesn’t seem so burdensome anymore

[viaxen]

actually… period dramas are always set in the period where globalism is accelerating at unpredicted rates, and yet all the representation doesn’t reflect that or everyone is white? Be so fucking forreal

[head-post]

Trade unions alarmed by EU industrial collapse

Europe’s largest trade union organisations have warned that the EU is in a “very worrying situation” as the continent faces industrial decline due to soaring energy prices.

A Eurostat survey showed industrial protection in the trading bloc fell 0.2 per cent month-on-month in November 2023.

This is the third consecutive monthly decline, while year-on-year industrial production also fell 5.8 per cent over the period.

Speaking at a press conference, Ludovic Voet, confederal secretary of the European Trade Union Confederation, described the crisis as a “very worrying situation”. He added:

“These figures are a canary in a coal mine: the biggest hit are the long-term investments in buildings and equipment.”

Read more HERE

[uniqueartisanconnoisseur]

The Campbell House, beauty, history and more!

St. Louis Missouri has a lot of amazing sites. My friend Janna Seiz and I just decided to stop giving each other presents for the holiday. We do experiences instead! For Christmas, she took me to tour the beautiful Campbell House Museum. The mansion was home to the Robert Campbell family from a few years after it was built in 1851 – 1938. The house is full of history, beauty, and almost all…

[alliedmoto]

Trusted Japanese Car Trading Experts

Being a veteran in the automobile industry, we have reliable sources to procure all types of Japanese vehicles like Toyota, Lexus, Nissan, Mitsubishi, Honda, Suzuki, etc., as per the customer requirements and customize it with additional features. Call us at +971 4 608 4666 for more details.

[alwaysbewoke]

Jean-Baptiste Pointe DuSable was born in Saint-Domingue, Haiti (French colony) during the Haitian Revolution. At some point he settled in the part of North America that is now known as the city of Chicago and was described in historical documents as "a handsome negro" He married a Native American woman, Kitiwaha, and they had two children. In 1779, during the American Revolutionary War, he was arrested by the British on suspicion of being an American Patriot sympathizer. In the early 1780s he worked for the British lieutenant-governor of Michilimackinac on an estate at what is now the city of St. Clair, Michigan north of Detroit. In the late 1700's, Jean-Baptiste was the first person to establish an extensive and prosperous trading settlement in what would become the city of Chicago. Historic documents confirm that his property was right at the mouth of the Chicago River. Many people, however, believe that John Kinzie (a white trader) and his family were the first to settle in the area that is now known as Chicago, and it is true that the Kinzie family were Chicago's first "permanent" European settlers. But the truth is that the Kinzie family purchased their property from a French trader who had purchased it from Jean-Baptiste. He died in August 1818, and because he was a Black man, many people tried to white wash the story of Chicago's founding. But in 1912, after the Great Migration, a plaque commemorating Jean-Baptiste appeared in downtown Chicago on the site of his former home. Later in 1913, a white historian named Dr. Milo Milton Quaife also recognized Jean-Baptiste as the founder of Chicago. And as the years went by, more and more Black notables such as Carter G. Woodson and Langston Hughes began to include Jean-Baptiste in their writings as "the brownskin pioneer who founded the Windy City." In 2009, a bronze bust of Jean-Baptiste was designed and placed in Pioneer Square in Chicago along the Magnificent Mile. There is also a popular museum in Chicago named after him called the DuSable Museum of African American History.

x

[marxism-transgenderism]

Okay I started that last post as a joke but this is actually fascinating so the reason trade between Indigenous people and settlers up to the mid 19th century is nearly always called the fur trade is because that was the primary product settlers were buying to be processed and shipped back to Europe and later to prominent coastal cities. But according to historians of the lower Great Lakes specifically like Susan Sleeper-Smith, it should really be called the cloth trade if we're just going based on the largest quantity of product being shipped.

The idea that European traders were just plying Indigenous people with "useless beads and shells" (as they would disparaging describe wampum) and alcohol in exchange for mountains of furs is just not the reality. Indigenous traders at thus time did value and acquire those things, but collectively they were shipping thousands of tons of one of the most valued commodities settlers wanted and they used that power to get guns, iron cookware, silver and gold commodities, and colored textiles.

Indeed the amount of textiles coming from all the European powers, but most of all from Britain where their manufacture was booming is incredible. Specific designs and colors were manufactured specifically to appeal to the fashion trends of Indigenous people in the lower Great Lakes all in the interest of getting better furs than their other colonial competitors got.

We have records of American raiders robbing Indigenous towns and looting intricately designed clothing adorned with hundered—sometimes over a thousand—pieces of silver and jewelry. Very clear examples of Indigenous people flaunting their fashion, connections, and immense wealth. Most often Indigenous women as they were the ones most active in trade with Europeans.

We just often have such an image of Indigenous societies during this time being devastated, poverty stricken, and peripheral to the big changes happening back in Europe. But when we take a look at the raw numbers of trade during this time, we see a prosperous, wealthy, and interconnected society. One that knew it's currently advantageous position in global trade and took advantage of that to gain more wealth. It's true that since 1492 they had been devastated by disease and colonial warfare, but the mere presence of guns, germs, and steel did not cause Indigenous poverty just by simply having one so called "advanced civilization" come into contact with a so called "primitive society."

Indigenous poverty was something created very specifically when all the other imperial competitors had fled the scene after the American revolution, leaving only this one genocidal entity left with a monopoly of colonial claims to this region to fight for decades to take away the wealth these Indigenous people had built on their land in the centuries prior, inch by bloody inch.

Btw I didn't feel like citing sources here but most all of this is taken from Susan Sleeper-Smith's book Indigenous Prosperity and American Conquest

[writergeekrhw]

There's been a lot of talk over the years about whether Ferengi are a antisemitic stereotyoe. Given that DS9 had more Jewish actors and creative staff, what do you think of that discourse?

Was this something that was kept in mind when reinventing the Ferengi from how they were in TNG?

I can tell you the INTENTION of the Ferengi was to satirize capitalism and the West. Ferengi derives from the Persian "Farangi," i.e. Franks, people from France. More broadly, it came to mean "Western European." Hence "Farangistan" = Europe. Farang/i spread to other languages, notably Thai where it now means "foreigner."

Farang - Wikipedia

So, the Ferengi are intended to be us. Westerners, even more specifically Americans. The original TNG bible compares them to 18th and 19th century Yankee traders. Sexist and greedy, patriarchal and dishonest.

I'm pretty sure this was the intention of their look too, especially the noses. Big noses are common in Asian caricatures of Westerners. Check out the Thai sculpture in the link above. According to my father, for example, the Rhade tribe from the Vietnamese Highlands called Americans "big noses" and when he was their military advisor, he was Captain Big Nose.

And then TNG cast a ton of Jewish actors as early Ferengi, and a lot of people saw them completely differently. (Aside, I've heard from some Asian fans that they perceive Ferengi as caricatures of the Cantonese, which speaks to how different cultures see them.)

We were definitely aware of this issue when DS9 came along, and I largely followed the lead of our Jewish-American showrunners on how to handle it. Generally, by digging deep into three different main Ferengi characters and several recurring, I hope we transcended the stereotypes.

We showed Ferengi not as whip-wielding pirate/raiders (not a Jewish trope btw, see Yankee traders), but as a small business owner, a handyman/engineer, and an aspiring Starfleet officer, all struggling with issues of cultural assimilation and grappling with their own culture's shortcomings when it comes to women and greed.

When writing the Ferengi, I drew from my own (white bread, Catholic, Army brat) background, so for example, I saw the Rules of Acquisition not as some kind of take on the Talmud, but as a satire of Western self-help business books, a kind of "How to Win Friends and Influence People," meets "The Devil's Dictionary." The Ferengi afterlife is based on my vague understanding of Chinese traditions I grew up around in San Francisco, etc.

I'm not sure we fully separated the Ferengi from the baggage they came to us with, but we definitely tried.

[nobrashfestivity]

Unknown, Chokwe Royal chair 19th or early 20th century Chairs decorated with representational scenes were considered the most important insignia of Chokwe rulers well into the 20th century. They were modeled after European chairs that can be associated with Portuguese and Afro-Portuguese merchants. In Africa seats generally are exceedingly symbolic in significance. The fact that this form was taken over from traders illustrates the equal standing Chokwe rulers felt in their trade relations. Genre scenes are also unusual in the art of the region and can probably be attributed to European influence.

[gothhabiba]

What makes most "uninhabited wilderness narratives" more similar to like. The European settlement of the Americas than the Polynesian exploration of islands. Like I also get that vibe but I can't form a coherent ideological reason and you seem like maybe you could put it to words.

You’re getting it backwards if you think that the criticism of the “terra nullius” narrative consists of “it’s unethical to go to, poke around, or settle a place that was actually previously uninhabited by human beings.”

Rather, "terra nullius" is a set of concepts and frameworks created and disseminated by Europeans over the course of European settler-colonisation. It consists, roughly, of ideas about land (it is inactive, to-be-acted-upon, eternally stagnant if not acted upon; it must be 'worked' and this work is backbreaking, unpleasant, and a moral and religious duty; 'working' the land completely transforms it; the land is valuable and ownable insofar as it is worked and transformed; land can be bought, sold, and traded)—

—ideas about exploration (another way to act upon land, which is to-be-acted-upon, is by 'exploring' it; 'exploring' land, naming it, mapping it, viewing it from above, even painting landscapes of it. are activities that give you authority and ownership over the land; 'exploration' produces knowledge about land, which only Europeans can produce and disseminate)—

—and ideas about Indigenous peoples (they have not 'worked' the land or claimed ownership in a way we recognise; thus they have no control, authority, or ownership of the land; because of this they are the land, part of the flora, fauna, and landscape to be explored, mapped out [as in linguistics and anthropology], controlled, moved, worked [read: enslaved], and killed; and, crucially, in a final move, once they have been moved or killed, they were never here in the first place).

These ideas arose variously in European scientific, literary, religious, legal, and literary discourses; in sermons, in travel narratives, in paintings, in memoirs and folk stories written by settler-colonists and sailors and traders. They arose partly as a development of things that had already been happening in Europe in the transition to capitalism (enclosure and other forms of primitive accumulation that rendered once-public resources, including land, private property), and partly as a response to the fact that this land was not empty of human life.

Plainly, there were people in the Americas, in Oceania. In fact, they had altered the land in various ways. The scientific and anthropologic majority, at least in Europe from the 17th to the 19th centuries, even held that they were descended from the same stock as Europeans were (though there was debate on that score). Nevertheless, there were resources and money and land (among other things) to be gained through colonisation and genocide.

The idea that these lands, then, were terrae nullius, empty lands, arose as justification for said settling and genocide. There were never people here, and if there were, then they didn't really have the right to be here; they didn't claim the land in ways that Europeans or their descendents legally recognised (in other words, Europeans created property laws on purpose in such a way to deny Indigenous peoples property rights); perhaps they didn't work the land because they were inherently lazy, or promiscuous, or gluttonous, or savage, and that's how a legal discourse becomes a 'racial' one.

So the answer to your question is basically: because Europeans are the ones who wrote "uninhabited wilderness narratives." Because (the peoples who would become) Polynesians in 3000 BC did not invent a bunch of related popular, religious, scientific, legal, and literary discourses in order to deny or justify the fact that they were enslaving, driving off, or slaughtering millions of human beings, this just has nothing to do with them.

[apricitystudies]

crimes of the elite: a deep dive

voted on here. (other editions) bold = favourite

corporate harms

behind the smiles at amazon

the long, dark shadow of bhopal (bhopal gas disaster)

how lobbying blocked european safety checks for dangerous medical implants

7-eleven revealed

who controls the world's food supply?

the true cost of tuna: marine observers dying at sea

how a big pharma company stalled a potentially lifesaving vaccine in pursuit of bigger profits

24 years after, some victims not compensated and still can't live normal lives (pfizer's nigeria vaccine trials)

the corporate crime of the century

uber broke laws, duped police and secretly lobbied governments, leak reveals (the uber files)

the baby killer (nestle infant formula scandal)

2 paths of bayer drug in 80's: riskier one steered overseas (hiv-risk contaminated blood product scandal)

global banks defy u.s. crackdowns by serving oligarchs, criminals and terrorists (fincen files)

the ultra-rich

eliminalia: a reputation laundromat for criminals

the fall of the god of cars (international fugitive carlos ghosn)

a u.s. billionaire took over a tropical island pension fund. then hundreds of millions of dollars allegedly went missing (cyprus confidential)

how the wealthiest avoid income tax (the irs files)

the haves and the have-yachts

madoff and his models (madoff ponzi scheme)

the imposter (blockchain terminal fraud)

the ultra-rich: (allegedly) stolen antiquities

crime of the centuries

stolen treasure traders

a hunt for cambodia's looted heritage leads to top museums (pandora papers)

an art crime for the ages

[maxknightley]

Since Moses canonically parted the red sea with a beyblade, does that mean dreidel are a sub-category of beyblade, or are beyblades a sub-catagory of dreidel?

Since Moses necessarily predates the Maccabees, and thus the miracle for which Chanukah is celebrated, the beyblade logically has seniority.

Thinking of it phylogenetically, the dreidel is the "descendant," and thus should be considered the same sort of thing as any other "descendants" of the beyblade - e.g. the glaive from Krull. Therefore, in much the same way that "birds are dinosaurs," dreidels are beyblades.

Interestingly, the term "beyblade" was actually introduced by Christians - in a roundabout way. Byzantine accounts of the Ottoman conquests of the 14th and early 15th century often mention "a sort of perpetually whirling sabre, set in motion by the enemy's mystics and commanded by their beys to wreak havoc on our walls and troops." (See The Oxford History of Byzantium, Mango, 2002).

Of course, cannons would eclipse these blades by the mid-15th century, at least as far as practical military deployment was concerned. Many of the now-obsolete blades would later be sold off to European traders, who would in turn sell them to nobles and scholars in Italy and France - where they would become known as Lames de les Beys, i.e., "Blades of the Beys." From there the etymology is straightforward.

All of this is from a historical standpoint, of course. Halachically speaking, the dreidel is considered a beetle.

[whencyclopedia]

The Fabric of Civilization: How Textiles Made the World

In "The Fabric of Civilization," Virginia Postrel explores how the history of textiles is akin to the story of civilization as we know it. As evidenced throughout her book, Postrel treats each chapter as a standalone story of its production and journey, all the while masterfully weaving it together to show the story of human ingenuity. While academic in nature due to its incredibly well-researched methodology, the general reader will enjoy the book's unique style and approach to world history.

In The Fabric of Civilization: How Textiles Made the World, Virginia Postrel expertly demonstrates how the history of textiles is the story of human progress. Although textiles have shaped society in many ways, their central role in the development of technology and impact on socio-economics have been exceedingly overlooked. Attempting to remedy this issue, Postrel organizes her book into two distinct sections: one focusing on the different stages of textile production (fiber, thread, cloth, and dye) and the other on the consumers, traders, and future innovators of said textiles. To strengthen her argument, Postrel pulls from different primary sources across many regions and cultures, such as the works of people like entomologist Agostino Bassi and the accounts of disgruntled Assyrian merchants. However, Postrel goes beyond relying solely on books and peer-reviewed articles; she personally interviewed textile historians, scientists, businesspeople, and artisans who offered their own insight regarding the importance of textiles in the world. To help the reader envision the intricacies of textile manufacturing, the book is riddled with images that range from ancient spindle whorls and Andean textile patterns to nineteenth-century pamphlets raging over improved cotton seeds. It is quite a laborious task to explain the history of textiles, but Postrel’s way of organizing her chapters and style of writing does an excellent job of conveying her argument.

In Chapter One, Postrel illustrates the many uses of fibers and how their multipurpose functionality served its role in world economies. From the domestication of cotton in the Americas to sericulture in ancient China, such fibers left an indelible mark on trade and technology. Chapter Two looks at the use of thread's connection with social and gender roles as Postrel argues that dismissing fabric as feminine domesticity ignores its integral role in the social innovations that products like clothing and sails provided. Chapter Three connects mathematics with weaving through handwoven textiles by Andean artisans and in the notations written down in Marx Ziegler’s manual, The Weaver’s Art and Tie-Up Book (1677). Chapter Four explains how dyes not only contributed to the distinction between social classes, such as the use of Tyrian purple by Roman emperors but also the ingenuity of humans to ascribe meaning and beauty to a variety of colors. Furthermore, the increasing and competitive trading of dyes in the 16th and 17th centuries would eventually contribute to the discovery of synthetic dyes.

Textile traders and consumers also helped to foster cultural exchanges. Postrel then highlights how traders often also served as innovators. The implementation of the Fibonacci sequence in European trading not only helped traders with bookkeeping but also gave a new perspective to the practicality of learning math by helping traders understand profits and calculate prices. Readers explore in Chapter Six how the Mongol Empire expanded across many different lands for their desire for valuable woven textiles. Under the Pax Mongolica, the textile trade flourished as the Mongols protected the Silk Road, resulting in cross-cultural and technological exchange between Europe and Asia. Lastly, in Chapter Seven, Postrel introduces synthetic polymers like nylon and polyester, where the efforts made by scientists like Wallace Carothers, Rex Whinfield, and James Dickson have revolutionized the use of textiles. Companies like Under Armour use polyester to create water-repellent clothing. Despite synthetic polymers currently being used innovatively, many still seek to look into the future of textiles. As Postrel explains, imagine your pockets can charge your phone or your hat could give you directions. The future of textiles is incredibly exciting.

As an avid writer of socio-economics, Postrel expertly showcases her knowledge of the subject. Postrel’s previous books, such as The Future and its Enemies (1998) and The Power of Glamour: Longing and the Art of Visual Persuasion (2013), cover the interconnectedness between culture, technology, and the economy. Postrel has also worked as a columnist for several news sites, is the contributing editor for the magazine Works in Progress, and was a visiting fellow at the Smith Institute for Political Economy and Philosophy at Chapman University. This book is a wonderful intellectual contribution that feels like a documentary series, perfectly threading the reader through cultures and regions like a needle through fabric.

Continue reading...