#nit

I think the Lower East Side inspires me. That whole neighborhood, a lot of the people that I worked with, seeing what we've gone through in life, being given an opportunity to understand who I am; my identity, my culture, and my roots. ↗

— Luis Guzman

#being #culture #east #east side #given

Osama bin Laden, the person, more likely serves the function of a stand-in. Compare the new terrorists with partisans or conventional terrorists in Israel. These people often fight in a decentralized manner in small, autonomous units, too. ↗

— Jurgen Habermas

#bin #compare #conventional #fight #function

Given the devaluation of literature and of the study of foreign languages per se in the United States, as well as the preponderance of theory over text in graduate literature studies, creative writing programs keep literature courses populated. ↗

— Marilyn Hacker

#creative #creative writing #creative writing programs #foreign #foreign languages

Our foreign policy needs to support our energy, economic, defense and domestic policies. It all falls within the arch of national interest. There will be windows of opportunity, but they will open and close quickly. ↗

— Chuck Hagel

#close #defense #domestic #economic #energy

The United Nations has a critical role to play in promoting stability, security, democracy, human rights, and economic development. The UN is as relevant today as at any time in its history, but it needs reform. ↗

— Chuck Hagel

#critical #critical role #democracy #development #economic

It's really necessary for the United States to continue to give strong leadership to the Middle East peace process, supported by European countries at the same time. ↗

— William Hague

#countries #east #european #european countries #give

We didn't do anything wrong, but among the lessons learned, given the magnitude of the problems we now face in Afghanistan, a major U.S. force on the ground would convince the world we were in for the long-haul recovery of a country devastated by 21 years of warfare. ↗

— Alexander Haig

#among #anything #convince #country #devastated

We'll be launching the new public prosecution service in Northern Ireland tomorrow. I'll be doing it in Belfast tomorrow. This is an entirely new era, in which criminal justice now exercised on an equal basis, not the old basis in which community division was a feature. ↗

— Peter Hain

#belfast #community #criminal #criminal justice #division

No one today is purely one thing. Labels like Indian, or woman, or Muslim, or American are not more than starting-points, which if followed into actual experience for only a moment are quickly left behind. Imperialism consolidated the mixture of cultures and identities on a global scale. But its worst and most paradoxical gift was to allow people to believe that they were only, mainly, exclusively, white, or Black, or Western, or Oriental. Yet just as human beings make their own history, they also make their cultures and ethnic identities. No one can deny the persisting continuities of long traditions, sustained habitations, national languages, and cultural geographies, but there seems no reason except fear and prejudice to keep insisting on their separation and distinctiveness, as if that was all human life was about. Survival in fact is about the connections between things; in Eliot’s phrase, reality cannot be deprived of the “other echoes [that] inhabit the garden.” It is more rewarding - and more difficult - to think concretely and sympathetically, contrapuntally, about others than only about “us.” But this also means not trying to rule others, not trying to classify them or put them in hierarchies, above all, not constantly reiterating how “our” culture or country is number one (or not number one, for that matter). ↗

— Edward W. Said

#culture #humanity #imperialism #labels #survival

I know I did the right thing by taking time off to raise my son. But it also came at a price. I turned down many opportunities over the years because I didn't want to leave him for long periods of time. And in Hollywood, as in any business, the calls stop coming when you don't answer. ↗

— Arsenio Hall

#answer #any #because #business #calls