Post written by Christa Avampato. You can follow Christa on Twitter.

A few weeks ago, I went to the 92Y to hear Dr. Muhammed Yunus speak. He is considered by many to be the founder of the micro-credit movement and he’s one of my heroes.

By his own will and ability to inspire hope in others, he has lifted thousands up out of poverty, or rather helped thousands lift themselves up out of poverty.

He glows with good energy.

What struck me most about him is how casual and ordinary he is. Moderated by the brilliant Matthew Bishop of The Economist, Dr. Yunus’s talk made every person in that crowd believe that we could do just as much good in the world as he has done. (He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 and was awarded a Fulbright in Economics. Aim high!)

Most of the good he’s done was against all odds, when nearly everyone told him his dream of ending poverty was just foolish and unattainable. He is a man who never gives up. “I just ignore the nay-sayers,” he said, “because I know I’m right.”

In the hour-long conversation, he shared roughly a million nuggets of truth and goodness. One nugget that has stuck with me, and that I continue to repeat to myself every day, is his idea that we should just focus on helping 5 people in our social change efforts. If we think about having to help an entire city or country, we’ll never do anything. We’ll be come paralyzed by the enormity of the task.

As a young professional, Dr. Yunus concerned himself with 1 village in Bangladesh. Just one. He wanted to help a handful of people there live better lives with a little help from those around them who had a little help to give. That tiny idea over time became Grameen Bank, which has led to numerous Grameen ventures all over the world, including one in Jackson Heights, Queens in New York.

Big change starts with a very small idea. We’d love to hear your thoughts. Here are five to get you going.

1.) Develop an after-school program that helps 5 kids gain job skills. Citizenschools.org and juniorachievement.org are great organizations to get involved with.

2.) Connect five people with similar interests who may be able to help one another

3.) Make a donation to a nonprofit that serves 5 hot meals to people who are hungry, plants 5 trees in a local park, or provides shelter for 5 homeless animals for one night

4.) Spend 5 hours a month dedicated to helping someone else with absolutely no benefit to you. This could be done through volunteer work in your community or just helping out a friend, neighbor, co-worker, or family member.

5.) Pick 5 people in your life who have helped you when you really needed them and do something kind for each of them to show your appreciation.

What ideas do you have that we can add to this list? Nothing is too big or small.

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By Laura & Christa, The Journal of Cultural Conversation’s Chief Storytellers.

We’re so excited to launch the new look and feel of TJCC – but we’re also thrilled to share our new focus and what we’re all about.

Please note – If you were originally subscribed to the previous site, you will need to update your RSS feed or re-enter your email address to receive regular updates.

As always, we welcome your comments and thoughts. So glad you’ve joined us!

**

Once upon a time, someone told a story.

And the story was passed on across generations and cultures. Perhaps the story sparked a new idea, inspired a person or fueled a larger change. Or maybe the story just made people happier.

But sometimes stories are lost. World-changing people, events and innovations often go unnoticed.

We want to change that.

Authored by two experienced storytellers and cultural explorers, The Journal of Cultural Conversation (TJCC) features stories about the creative people, places and things that are changing our world.

But TJCC is more than just a collection of stories. Through commentary, interviews and reviews, our writings aim to offer innovative ideas for change or inspire you to try something new, think differently or pioneer an unexplored trail.

Change Starts With You. What’s Your Story?

Change is the only certainty in life. We know it, we hear it, we live it.

But the concept of actually changing our culture is a big one. Doing it? Well, that’s an even larger feat.

So let’s start small. In our everyday lives, we already make little changes. We learn lessons. We share them. And those little changes add up to something big.

Change happens when we:

Decide to pursue our deepest passions in life – consider the entrepreneur who takes a leap of faith on a new business idea;

Embrace the new while celebrating the old – traveling to new places, meeting new people, and having new experiences that make our lives richer while also helping us to appreciate all the wonderful things we have in our lives already;

Open up our minds to what’s possible – rather than limiting our vision to what’s already right in front of us, we use our imagination to work toward building a better world.

The Journal of Cultural Conversation is your library for learning about how you and others are changing the world in small and big ways. So, consider this your classroom – the fun kind. Your only homework: Explore. Share. Have fun.

Then go change it up. One story at a time. We’re excited to hear what you have to say.

–

jour·nal (n.) – a periodical presenting articles on a particular subject

cul⋅ture (n.) – the sum of total ways of living built up by a group of human beings and transmitted from one generation to another

con⋅ver⋅sa⋅tion (n.) – an informal interchange of thoughts and information

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Post written by Christa Avampato. You can follow Christa on Twitter.

“There will come a time when you believe that everything is finished. That will be the beginning.” ~ Louis L’Amour

A few weeks ago I attended a screening of Pray the Devil Back to Hell, a documentary that tells the story of the how the women of Liberia ended the civil war that ravaged their country for well over a decade. Donning identical white t-shirts, no weapons, 2500+ women linked arms and made their opinions and demands known, loudly and publicly, week after week, until Charles Taylor and the warlords sat down together.

These were ordinary women: mothers, wives, daughters. They had had enough of war; they had seen enough blood and senseless loss of life. And they made the decision to stop this, or die trying. Sitting idly by was no longer an option, warlords or no warlords, Charles Taylor or no Charles Taylor, this war would end.

The screening had one of the most diverse audiences I’ve seen at an event like this. Men and women, old and young, many races, a variety of languages being spoken all around me, some in jeans, some in suits. I sat behind a block of people from UNIFEM. They all wore shirts that said simply “half the world deserves a whole voice.” The event coincided, quite purposefully, with the United Nations International Day of Peace, and while we watched the movie, thousands of other people around the world were engaged in the same activity.

The feeling of unity was palpable.

While some of the images were difficult to watch, some of the stories so gruesome as to be almost unimaginable, the majority of the movie is uplifting. And this one has a happy conclusion. While still a country with more than its fair share of challenges and issues, many serious, Liberia became the first and only country in Africa to have a female President, put into office by a free, fair, and open majority election.

And it is all thanks to the women of Liberia who refused to be silent, who refused to let history take its course. They wrote their own history.

Consider something difficult in your life, something that you fear you cannot do. “How can little me do something to improve the big world around me?” Now consider the women of Liberia. They got arguably the most ruthless dictator in history to sit down at the bargaining table with equally ruthless warlords and negotiate peace.

They locked those men in a room and refused to let them come out until a peace agreement was signed and free majority elections were scheduled. Now what was it again that you thought you weren’t able to do?

And while their work in that instance is done, all of the women interviewed in Pray the Devil Back to Hell said they would continue to be there, no matter what, to make sure that their country never endured the horrid history they had to witness with their own eyes and hearts. The war may be over, but their work has only just begun.

Pray the Devil Back to Hell will be released on DVD through Amazon on November 10, 2009. To find future screenings of the film in your area, click here.

To find out more about how you can get involved in this cause, visit UNIFEM, the women’s fund at the United Nations, dedicated to advancing women’s rights and achieving gender equality, and Peace is Loud, an NGO that supports organizations and individuals focused specifically on peace-building around the world through non-violent methods.

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Post written by Laura Cococcia. You can follow Laura on Twitter.

Hmm. Those who know me know that I don’t follow conventional gender role rules. Need I say more?

And, for the record, I didn’t choose this book. I won it in a Secret Santa gift swap.

I’m not sure if I can even summarize this book – it’s monumentally disturbing. This isn’t even one of those books that’s making fun of gender roles. It’s real. It scares me.

Instead, I will give you the most interesting “rules” in this “guidebook,” share my responses and let you judge for yourselves.

Rule 1: At a concert or any other musical performance, a lady does not applaud until the end of a complete musical number. If she is unsure, she follows the lead of the others in the audience.

My response: Oops. I clapped really loud about one measure before Duran Duran ended “The Reflex” at their concert 20 years ago.

Rule 2: When a lady initiates a telephone conversation, she knows it is her responsibility to end that conversation.

My response: Does hanging up on a boyfriend count as being a lady?

Rule 3: A lady does not raise her voice when angry. It is only proper to shout at someone when she is in danger or about to score a touchdown.

My response: Last time I checked, women weren’t allowed to play American football.

Rule 4: A lady uses the word ‘companion’ when introducing two friends who live together. She realizes the term denotes a special relationship that is beyond boyfriend/girlfriend.

My response: I guess introducing my mom to my friends that live together as “living in sin” was probably not very lady-like.

Rule 5: At the office, as at home, a lady always refills the ice trays.

My response: I can’t even comment on this one.

Most of these rules are ridiculous, but the other ones that discuss how “a lady should never be late for a meeting” or “a lady says thank you” are just human things to do. Let’s not leave men out – I love men. Rules based on physical parts are outlandish.

Enough of my rant. Comments welcome. Maybe I’ve just been out of touch for too long and this is how ladies are supposed to be. Or maybe I’m just a “regular” person who is nice, gracious and occasionally witty.

Is a rule book for normal people out yet?

Author: Candace Simpson-Giles
Published: 2001, Rutledge Hill Press
Genre: Nonfiction

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Guest post by Amanda Hirsch. You can read more about Amanda on her site and follow her on Twitter.

Washington DC is cool again.

At least, that’s the word on the street now that one Barack Hussein Obama has taken up residence at 1600 Pennsylvania. Then again, some cultural gatekeepers were calling the capital cool even before B-dawg came to town.

But those of us who live here know that DC will never be cool. “Cool” is about image — what’s hot, what’s fresh, what’s new. But the images of DC culture were set in stone long ago: The Smithsonian. The embassies. The Kennedy Center.

In certain crowds, punk and go-go music might get a shout-out, but they’re treated as anomalies — not clues to a larger puzzle.

If you’re an artist here, chances are you’ll feel like a fish out of water.

Despite the fact that Washington is a city full of artists and other creative people, it doesn’t feel like it is.

And the feeling of a place matters.

Feelings drive stories. Creativity will never be DC’s primary narrative, the story it tells about itself, or to itself. Living here leaves the young, creative individual feeling constantly displaced.

Never fully rooted.

Our friends leave for New York or L.A. “It’s a transient city,” we tell ourselves, soothingly, as though the fact that people come and go is as inevitable as the tides. We get our hackles up when people criticize DC, as in the inevitable, periodic “DC vs. NY” smack down (including this one by native son Frank Rich, which I remember finding infuriating when it came out in the early aughts).

We doth protest too much. Is it possible to be happy in DC? Of course. Does DC culture go well beyond marbleized officialdom? Of course. But I do not love DC, and after a decade of living here — and three years writing about the city’s creative culture – I do not know anyone who does.

The one exception: my Mom, who lives in Maryland. She refuses to live in the city, due to its poor citizen services and because — crazy! — she wants Congressional representation. Still, she loves Washington and, as I prepare for my upcoming move to New York, I can finally understand why. Washington, perhaps, is a place best loved from afar.

As the Magnetic Fields sing in the aptly named “Washington, DC”:

Washington, D.C.
It’s paradise to me
It’s not because it is the grand old seat
Of precious freedom and democracy
No, no, no
It’s not the greenery turning gold in fall
The scenery circling the Mall
It’s just that’s where my baby lives
That’s all.
Washington D.C.!

In other words, we who’ve made our home here find much to love, but our love affairs are with people and work and lives being lived, not with the city itself. There are no love affairs with Washington the way there are with New York, or Paris, or San Francisco.

Still, as I prepare to leave DC, everything I love here comes into sharp focus. I will miss it when it’s gone.

How uncool.

**

Amanda Hirsch is a writer and performer. She earns a living as a freelancer, helping independent media companies and nonprofits strengthen their web content.

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