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Murgy 'proud and privileged' on his big night out
OLDHAM RL Club's David Murgatroyd, better known around the club as 'Murgy', said he was 'proud and privileged' to be involved in the Oldham Sports Awards at the Queen Elizabeth Hall on Friday night, September 20.
As official club photographer, member of the Roughyeds' management team, a leading light in the club's media team, founder and organiser of Roary's Pride (our new group for under-16s) and a man who will turn his hand or his mic to anything in which he can help his beloved Roughyeds, Murgy was nominated at the Awards Night in the Volunteer of the Year category.
He was well supported by two full tables of his friends and fellow Oldham RLFC fans, including chairman Chris Hamilton.
Murgy and the other Volunteer-of-the-Year nominees — Ian Ward of Santos FC, Kirsty Mallen of Chadderton Park Sports Club and Pam Hazelton of Oldham Netball Club — were called on stage to receive their certificates from netball's one and only Tracey Neville MBE.
The award went to Pam Hazelton, head coach of Oldham Netball Club, which holds three national titles at under-14s, under-16s and senior levels.
Oldham Netball Club was also named Club of the Year.
Added Murgy (50): "Just to be part of a wonderful event like this is a great honour and a great privilege.
"Pam Hazelton and the Oldham Netball Club fully deserved their awards. My personal congratulations go to them and I would love nothing better than to see Oldham Netball Club at one of our home games one day soon, perhaps acting as flag bearers."
Picture shows (left to right): John Abrahams (former captain of Lancashire Cricket Club); the Youth Mayor of Oldham, Samah Khalil; the Worshipful the Mayor, Councillor Ginny Alexander; Debbie Abrahams MP; Chris Hamilton; David Murgatroyd.
Kay, Beckett fit after head tests
Roughyeds power their way to Promotion Final
Community, News
Frank Foster's funeral in Barrow on Friday, January 3
The funeral of former Oldham forward and Barrow coach Frank Foster will be on Friday, January 3 at St George's Church, Barrow at noon
Frank Foster dies, aged 79
TOUGH-GUY forward Frank Foster, who transformed Oldham's fortunes in his one and a half seasons at Watersheddings in the early 1970s, has died in Barrow, aged 79.
Safeguard breakfast for upwardly mobile Roughyeds
OLDHAM RL Club's players are moving up in the world.
ORL Heritage Trust collection to be held at Gallery Oldham
ONE of the best and most extensive collections of club memorabilia in world rugby, either code, was officially handed over to the care of Oldham Council at a function in Gallery Oldham on Saturday


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Religion as the Ultimate Human Evolutionary Survival Strategy
Author: Baskin, Ken
Almanac: Evolution:Evolutionary Trends, Aspects, and Patterns
This paper begins exploring an alternative model for thinking about religion. In this alternative view, religion emerged as our evolutionary ancestors faced a challenge common to members of all species: evolving body structures that enabled them to know exactly what they needed to survive in a highly complex, continually shifting environment. In this way, bats rely mostly on sound to model the world, and dogs depend mostly on smell. For our evolutionary ancestors, natural selection chose the genes that would create a brain that transformed the world around them into story-like constructions. Religion emerges in myth as those ancestors faced the powerful forces that often overwhelmed them, driving events such as birth and death, abundance and famine. Moreover, as our ancestors moved out from the rainforests of East Africa to the savannah, natural selection further chose for the ability to cooperate, first through brain developments and then rituals. The stories and rituals that developed as these two developments intertwined enabled hunter-gatherers not only to survive, but to spread across Eurasia. In fact, these myths and rituals proved so powerful that they would enable human beings to create societies of increasing social complexity, as their communities skyrocketed from bands of 20 to cities of 20 million.
Keywords: natural selection, umwelt, ritualized behavior, social complexity.
We are what we remember, which is another way of saying that we are nothing other than the stories we tell about ourselves and our past.
Jan Assmann (2003)
In this paper[1], I propose that religion emerged as part of the survival process by which human beings evolved from the Great Apes over the last several million years. Like its sisters, science and philosophy, religion seems to have emerged as the uniquely human response to the awe- and terror-provoking 'forces that permeate things but cannot ordinarily be seen' (Hayden 2003: 57). Religion, in particular, has helped our species understand and deal with these forces and the experiences they create – birth and death, sickness and healing, famine and abundance. In the end, human history would make religion so central that to understand religion, one has to examine what it means to be human, and to understand what it means to be human, one has to examine religion.
Many people will find this a radical position. Yet, this sort of radical departure seems necessary. For example, when anthropologist Robert Winzeler opens his book, Anthropology and Religion, by asking, 'What is religion?' he can only answer: 'There clearly is something in society that we can call religion, although exactly what it is may not be that simple to specify' (Winzeler 2012: 1). Over the last two centuries, thinkers have characterized religion as a childhood neurosis (Freud 1989 [1927]), a tool of the Capitalist class (Marx 1844), a disease of the human mind (Russell 1957), and a guide to what is best in human beings (James 1950 [1890]). Religion has been described in so many, often contradictory ways that bioanthropologist David Sloan Wilson (2002: 132) suggests the real problem in finding a generally accepted scientific understanding of religion is that 'the ideas that govern [thinkers'] perception' have become an obstacle, rather than a useful guide, to understanding it.
To overcome that obstacle, my discussion begins with a look at three critical differences between Homo sapiens and the Great Apes from which our evolutionary line diverged. Then, I want to examine two challenges that these evolutionary differences reflect: First, the challenge of every evolving species to 'know' exactly what they must know to survive; and, second, the challenge of every social species to encourage cooperation, even to the point of individuals giving up their lives, even though their primary instinct is survival. The human response to these two challenges includes myth, which helps us understand what we must know, and ritual, which encourages strong group ties and cooperation. When myth and ritual became integrated in human behavior – I speculate it might have been between 1.5 and 2 million years ago – they would provide the critical process by which the human social complexity skyrocketed, as communities grew from bands of about 20 to cities of 20 million.
Let us begin with a look at the shifts by which Homo sapiens evolved from the Great Apes.
From Great Ape to Homo Sapiens
To be human, I suggest, is to have the advantages, disadvantages, and challenges that evolved as our species transformed from Great Ape to Homo sapiens. This process was extremely complex, including issues connected with the prehensile thumb, walking on two legs, and the shift to a higher protein diet. In this essay, however, I want to focus on three key shifts – our evolution as an adventurer, exploring new environments; the developing need to see the world in terms of 'stories' that explain experience; and movement toward being highly social.
Much of what follows is speculative. For instance, our knowledge about the brain structure of our evolutionary ancestors such as Homo erectus is based on the endocasts of fossil skulls; so what we know about their brains is grounded partly in the assumptions we adopt to explain the endocasts (e.g., Tattersall and Schwartz 2001). In addition, our understanding of religion before writing developed in Mesopotamia and Egypt around 3000 BCE is grounded in assumptions, as with the conclusions anthropologists have drawn about hunter-gatherer religion from studying contemporary hunter-gatherers (e.g., Hayden 2003). Still, I have drawn on what seems to me the best work in a variety of fields to create conclusions that may well be valid as future studies confirm
or reject them.
Let me begin with life among the Great Apes, such as gorillas, from which Homo sapiens evolved. The Great Apes lived in the rain forests of East Africa, where their ancestors had lived for more than 20 million years. These rain forests were relatively comfortable places for them. Dense foliage provided hiding places from predators; fruit and vegetables were easily available; and the more than 20 million years in which their ancestors had lived in the forests made it familiar. Largely because of these conditions, the Great Apes were relatively solitary, living in groups where close social relationships were unusual. The one strong relationship was that between a mother and her children (e.g., Fagan 2004; Turner et al. 2018).
Sometime around 9 million years ago – it is important to remember that these numbers are estimates – a new evolutionary line, the Last Common Ancestors (LCA) of humans, chimpanzees, and bonobos, broke off. Then, by about 6–7 million years ago, the evolutionary line of our ancestors broke off from that of the chimpanzees and bonobos. While the chimps and bonobos would remain in the rain forests, our ancestors would, sometime before 4 million years ago, come down from the trees and begin walking on two legs, taking advantage of the new environmental niche opening up, as climate change turned parts of the rain forest into woodland, savannah, even desert, and then back again (Sarmiento et al. 2007).
Taking advantage of that new niche created the first key shift: our ancestors' nature was forged in a world in which, in order to survive, they had to become adventurers, exploring environments they had never known, which were also shifting with the climate. Remember: in the process of evolution, natural selection does not 'choose' for behaviors. Rather, it chooses those genetic changes that enable members of a species to survive and reproduce more effectively. To do so, evolution rarely creates ex nihilo, from scratch; it 'prefers tinkering with or exploiting what already exists over creating the brand new' (Everett 2017: 88). Or, as biophysicist Stuart Kauffman (2008) puts it, evolution explores the 'adjacent possible', making gradual changes. Often, those genetic changes are not expressed in body structures until a new challenge makes it possible to express those changes in a new and striking way (Jablonka and Lamb 2005). Our evolutionary ancestors need, about 4–6 million years ago, to explore new environments would produce exactly such a set of striking changes. The second and third shifts I want to mention are examples of these changes; both emerge as a side-product of the first shift, the larger brain, structured to meet the challenges of an adventurer primate.
That brain evolved over the last 5 million years, as the average size of the cranium roughly quadrupled from the chimpanzee's 350 cc to the Homo sapiens' 1350 cc (see Table 1), although, in terms of body size, brain size tripled (Donald 1991). Current paleoanthropology suggests that, by the time of Homo erectus, the shifts in brain structure were essentially complete (e.g., Everett 2017; Donald 1991; Laughlin et al. 1990). Much of this growth of the brain seems to have come with an expansion of the neo-cortex and associated areas, such as the hippocampus. These areas expanded memory capacity, allowed for more complex interconnection between brain subsystem, and provide the 'executive functions' by which we can plan and teach, become self-conscious, learn more intensely, and read the behavior of others (Donald 2001).
Table 1. Evolution of the Human Brain
Estimated Cranial Size
c. 5 million years ago
Australophithecus
africanus
c. 1.8 million years ago
c. 250,000 years ago
Source: Sarmiento et al. 2007.
Natural selection may have chosen the genetic changes that caused this expansion because they gave our adventurous evolutionary ancestors important advantages, such as expanded memory and the executive functions, such as planning and problem solving. These ancestors were moving into environments in which they had little or no experience; so it was essential to remember the details of this new world, including the predators and natural catastrophes they faced, as well as how to respond to them. Moreover, the fruit and vegetables they ate were no longer plentifully available, as in the rain forest. So they had to remember where and when they could gather them and plan to do so. Expanded memory and the ability to plan were also essential for the scavenging, and later hunting, which complemented their fruit and vegetable gathering (e.g., Everett 2017).
In the second shift, the larger, more complex brain produced a 'storytelling' umwelt (subjective, constructed perceptual world), which I will explain in detail in the next section. For now, it is enough to note that, as early as Homo erectus, this larger brain created its perceptual world by mixing sense impressions with memory and structuring the results according to their expectations (Laughlin et al. 1990). As a result, what humans and proto-humans perceive is not the full world-as-it-is, but models of that world that show them what they unconsciously assume they need to survive (Gefter 2016). The result is the impression that they – and we – are walking through a 'living movie' in which they can identify a variety of 'storylines'.
Experiencing the world in perceptual story-like models provided a critical advantage. With expanded memory and some executive functions, our ancestors, starting with Homo erectus, would have been able to transform new experiences into story-lines that would further enable them to plan how to respond to current experiences, based on different past experiences. That is, they may have been able to invent new story-lines, creating possible futures as the world around them shifted. These are abilities that the Great Apes, living in their familiar, abundant environments did not need. As a result, the Great Apes needed only 'episodic' memory, the ability to remember specific events (Donald 1991). For Homo erectus, however, this ability to create new story-lines proved essential, especially when those ancestors moved across the various environments of Eurasia.
The third shift involves the transformation from the mostly solitary life of the Great Apes to the intensely social life of Homo erectus. As Jonathan Turner and his associates (2018) point out, many of the changes contributing to the larger brains of our ancestors were also preparing the way for our intense sociality, as with the evolution of such social emotions as shame and guilt. Again, I will discuss this later in more length. What is important here is that being human requires a far higher level of group cooperation to survive. No longer protected by the lush foliage of the rain forest, Homo erectus had to seek safety in numbers, as well as with technology, likely including fire (Wrangham 2009; Everett 2017). As they found ways to build on the changes that encouraged sociality, they would be able to scavenge for and hunt large animals in teams. Ultimately, this sociality would combine with their storytelling umwelt to prepare the way for human culture, the 'as-if' world (Rappaport 1999) that we live in and continually reconstruct.
From this perspective, religion, along with its sisters' philosophy and science, would integrate the behaviors driven by these three shifts so that Homo sapiens could adapt to the widest variety of life challenges – living in tropical jungles, icy plains, and everything between them. In this way, we can see religion, conceptually, as part of the process of adaptation driven by natural selection. Religion, then, along with philosophy and science, form the complex system of thoughts, practices, and interactions that any group of people use to address the fundamental challenges of being human. In the pages that follow,
I will explore this description in terms of three issues:
• how the brain structure of our evolutionary ancestors drove them to create myth, the stories that explained the forces that surrounded and sometimes overwhelmed them;
• how those ancestors would incorporate myths and the rituals that would enable them to evolve from highly individualistic Great Apes to intensely social animals; and
• how the combination of these adaptations enabled the species to adapt to increased social complexity, moving the ability to live in bands of 20 to cities of 20 million.
I will conclude with some thoughts on the advantages of this interpretation.
'Knowing' to Survive
The first challenge religion evolved to address is: how does any species perceive what it must to survive in a complex, constantly changing world? After all, the world-as-it-is, the world that we can only model in perception, is overwhelmingly abundant. We, Homo sapiens, for example, can see only a small fraction of all light waves, and our senses of smell and hearing are far duller than those of dogs. Moreover, no living thing is able to sense more than a tiny sliver of that world, a 'tiny subset of the real patterns in the world of any agent' (Dennett 2017: 128; see also Laughlin and d'Aquili 1974). How then do species evolve so that they know what they must to survive?
Current evolutionary thought suggests that, in the process of evolution, the forces of natural selection choose for mechanisms that enable members of any species to experience the information they need (Hoffmeyer 2008). Jacob von Uexküll (2010 [1934]) called the result an animal's umwelt, its inner, subjective world. A bat's umwelt consists largely of the reflection of sound; a dog's, mostly of smell. Homo sapiens evolved sophisticated brain structures that automatically reduce the world spinning around them to a meaningful order by translating what happens around us into coherent story-like models that give us the impression of walking through a living 'movie' (Laughlin et al. 1990; Gazzaniga 2011).
As I am using the word, any 'story' collapses a fictional or real world of events and details into a coherent structure, a model of the world-as-it-is, with which people can make meaning (Boje 2001). That is how people use the word when they ask a friend to give them the 'real story' or a TV news personality tells us to stay tuned for the 'whole story'. This process of creating 'make-sense' stories, as neurobiologist Michael Gazzaniga (2011: 80) calls them, is also the way human brains, at an unconscious level, construct models of the world and make them conscious. Faced with an unfamiliar experience, the brain integrates a mélange of sense impression and memory, examines it all in light of the mental models in which we encode our meaning structures, creates a series of possible explanatory stories for any event, and settles on the one that seems most likely to help us survive (see also Ramachandran 2011).
Every such story must answer three questions (Laughlin and d'Aquili 1974): 1) What is happening right now?; 2) What must I do to respond to it?; and 3) Why did that happen? The brain processes the first two in the amygdala instantaneously. Whether confronted with a lion on the savannahs of Kenya or a child darting out into traffic, our brains immediately answer those two questions. The resulting stories enable us to choose to fight or run away from the lion, or to stop for the child. Unless they are very lucky, people whose models cannot answer these questions successfully are less likely to survive.
The brain processes the third question a fraction of a second later in the neo-cortex. As anyone's who has ever had a three-year-old knows, the 'why' question has a special urgency. The human mind demands a meaning structure with which to explain what is happening. To build that structure, the human mind constructs a set of 'mental models' that define the way the world is supposed to be and others are supposed to act. The coherence of these models comes from the symbolic order that religion often embodies; the world can make sense because everything is symbolically consistent. This structure is so vital that people who cannot fit events into their personal models of the world will feel disturbingly anxious (Laughlin et al. 1990). The vote for Brexit in the UK and the elections of both Barak Obama and Donald Trump in the US demonstrate how profound that anxiety can be. After all, if my model of the world cannot explain national events that can overwhelm me, how much can I trust my mental models, which I must trust to survive?
For me, religion begins with this need to explain events, specifically those that can overwhelm people, either physically or emotionally, as they emerge from powerful, invisible forces (Hayden 2003). Such events range from the birth or early death of a child to war and famine or the experience of 'feeling one with the universe'. Myth fulfills this human need, as the question 'Why did this happen?' seems to translate into two others: What is this wonderful yet frightening world of which I feel part? And how should I behave in order to thrive, or at least survive, in the face of such overwhelming forces? In this way, these potentially overwhelming events call for Gazzaniga's 'make-sense' stories, which become myth.
From this evolutionary point of view, myth examines these questions for a specific society facing specific challenges. The forces that create these challenges are often invisible and more powerful than the people experiencing them. Ultimately, as with 'Why do we have to die?' they may be impossible to answer definitively. So myth answers them with the poetic metaphor of an 'other', transcendent world. Some talked about the spirits of ancestors; others, many gods, the One God, or an even more abstract concepts such as Hinduism's Brahman or the Dao (the Way) of Chinese religion. Myth, then, enables humans to remember and reinterpret the 'important past' as they work to meet the challenges of the impersonal forces of the world today (Assmann 2011).
As I noted, philosophy and science are religion's sisters. My speculation is that, to answer the question, 'What's happening?' early humans would observe and work to understand their environments, often by counting repeated events – creating the beginnings of science and mathematics. Philosophy would then arise as those people began discussing how they should respond to events in their environments. Religion presented important events poetically, describing a metaphoric 'other' world, which represented the powerful forces any group must confront, as well as how to deal with them. It seems likely that these ways of dealing with powerful impersonal forces all emerged together. By the time of the earliest religions we know about, these three ways of knowing the world appear integrated. As a result, the Egyptian philosophy of ma'at – the right order of the cosmos and society – and the sciences of astronomy and engineering are integrated into Ancient Egyptian religion (Assmann 2001), just as a variety of philosophies and the science that would make China the technological wonder of the post-Axial Age world (Schwartz 1985; Graham 1989; Temple 2007). It would only be with Axial Age Greece, and then more intensely with Modernity, that religion, philosophy, and science would be differentiated.
One difficulty with much current literature on religion is its literalism. That is, thinkers assume religion's transcendent world is 'supernatural' (e.g., Dennett 2007), or 'counterfactual' (Atran 2002). Yes, many, perhaps most, people who practice their religions do seem to think of their transcendent world as a 'real' place beyond the everyday world. Perhaps, they always have. But the assumption that religious texts should be interpreted literally took hold throughout society largely with the rise of modern science and Protestantism (Harrison 1998). Social scientists, however, have a responsibility to dig deeper, and to remember, for example, that, before Modernity, the Catholic Church generally treated the Bible allegorically. Even more to the point, the forces any religion's transcendent world represents are very real parts of the natural world. As a result, I examine it as a 'world of impersonal forces', rather than a 'supernatural world'. This, I think, is what Joseph Campbell (1969) means when he explains that we pervert myth when we interpret it literally. Myth is not a literal rendering of an 'other' world; rather it is made up of metaphoric explanatory stories about life here and now (see also Rue 2005).
Many literalists disagree. Dennett (2007), for example writes myth off as the result of an overactive desire to find agents that explain frightening events. This desire to identify agents is a result of the structure the human brain, as Boyer (2001) explains in more detail. But that is only one element, and not the most important, in a far more complex phenomenon. Neuroscientist Andrew Newberg has worked extensively scanning the brain's responses to religious and spiritual experience. As a result, he has located several brain circuits associated with processing stories about such supernatural agents, including circuits that help human beings identify 'God as an object that exists in the world'; allow them to 'experience God's presence'; assign 'emotional meaning' to the concept of God; and create the impression of 'frightening, authoritative,
and punishing God' (Newberg and Waldman 2010: 43). For whatever reason, the ability to think in terms of such agents seems to have been so important that natural selection chose for genetic mutations that made experiencing them a human universal.
To see just how important those agents can be, consider the example of Ancient Egyptian mythology. By the time Ancient Egypt was unified, c. 3000 BCE, the lands surrounding the Nile River had been desert for more than two millennia. The agricultural abundance that enabled its people to survive depended on the annual flood of the Nile and the cycle of rebirth that it made possible. If my perspective is accurate, then Egyptian religion should be a symbolic meditation on the mystery of this rebirth and the meaning of the abundance it provided, punctuated by periods of drought or flood. As classicist Susan Brind Morrow (2015: 272) notes, this is not what much of current interpretation of Egyptian myth holds. Rather, the Pyramid Text, the first existing 'religious' text, dated c. 2323 BCE, is often interpreted literally as 'a primitive text about African animals as monsters and gods'. For Morrow, this traditional interpretation is a misunderstanding that treats hieroglyphics, an Egyptian word that literally means 'mysterious', as prose rather than poetry.
She continues that a more accurate reading, the reading I am arguing for, treats this text as poetry examining questions such as, 'What is life on earth, how does it relate to time and the interrelationship of all things, what is death, what survives death?' (Ibid.: 13). Note that these are philosophical questions. From this point of view, Egyptian mythology struggles with the fundamental challenges of human life. In Egypt, we would expect stories reflecting the concern with the cycle of birth, growth, death, and resurrection so important to Egyptian agriculture. One such myth is the story of Seth's murder and dismemberment of his father Osiris and his battle with his brother Horus, as Horus avenges his father's murder and Osiris is reborn. Here, we have not only an examination of resurrection, but also of the battle between the forces of order (good) and chaos (evil). Additionally, it was used as a justification for Egypt's pharaoh and the power structure he represented (see Assmann 2001). Ultimately, Morrow (Ibid.: 191) concludes, 'Resurrection is not a mystery. It is the fundamental nature of life on earth. Death precedes life. The only thing that is lost is the ephemeral human personality'.
In this way, myth provides the social umwelt that humans need, both individually and in groups. For one thing, it offers an explanation for the annual rebirth of vegetation, on which the society depended, grounded in a story about the transcendent world. For another, it articulates the symbolic order through which Egyptians came to understand the world. For instance, Egyptian mythology explains the Sun's daily journey across the sky as the story of the Sun god Ra's daily journey and trip to the underworld, from which he would return the following morning. Compare this story's emphasis on rebirth with that of Greek mythology – where Apollo, the symbol of knowledge, rides his chariot across the sky, illuminating the world – or of the Western explanation – where the daily revolution of the Earth reflects the workings of the Laws of Nature.
In all three cases, these explanatory stories enable individuals to collapse the chaotic field of possible meaning in the world into a coherent constructed, symbolic world, which they need to survive (Laughlin and d'Aquili 1974). [For a fuller examination of the human need for this sort of symbolic order, see anthropologist Terrence Deacon's The Symbolic Species (1997).] Socially, this shared symbolic umwelt – the understanding of the way the world should be ordered – provides the logic that lets people know what to pay attention to and to ignore, as well as how to put together their experiences in a way that makes sense, creating shared group meaning.
It is important to remember that the umwelt of any living thing – whether the sonic umwelt of a bat or the cultural umwelt of Ancient Egypt – is a matter of survival. However, the fact that humans depend on their story-like umwelten to survive creates two problems. First, it means that any challenge to a group's symbolic order may be experienced as an attack on members' survival. Current political battles over such questions, as whether abortion should be legal, often seem experienced as an attack on the worldview of group members. To criticize my position is to question whether the symbolic order I survive with is true. Second, if the conditions of any group of people change enough, the umwelt that enabled its members to survive can blind them to those new conditions: the umwelt that saves you today can kill you tomorrow. Call it the Umwelt Paradox. Enabling a group to transform its social umwelt is one of the key functions of religious mythology, and, also, of philosophy and science (Baskin and Bondarenko 2014).
When societies go through disruptive change, their old ways of living and governing society break down. If the society is to continue thriving, its mythic stories must be rewritten (e.g., Wallace 1966; Baskin and Bondarenko 2014). This is the Umwelt Paradox writ large. Let us take the case of China. From about 200 BCE to at least 1500 CE, it was the wealthiest, most civilized, most technologically advanced state in the world. So, when Europeans started appearing around 1500, the Chinese were unimpressed. Their social umwelt had created a model that convinced them that these dirty, uncivilized people were no different from the many other subordinate peoples who had always collapsed in the face of their superiority. Only this time, they were wrong, victims of the Umwelt Paradox. By 1800, they were becoming colonial subjects of the Western powers. Today, the Chinese have transformed their social umwelt and returned as one of the world's great powers. But to do that, they had first to re-
create their symbolic order.
The power of religion – the reason that it is universal to human groups – lies in these many functions it fills. Consider some of the functions we have looked at. A myth enables us to create a symbolic order, which, in turn, allows us to construct the coherent images of the world that help us survive; that order also allows people in groups to communicate with shared meaning and to create a shared identity. And myths make it possible for humans to fulfill anthropologist Jan Assmann's (2003: 10) dictum: 'We are what we remember'. As a result, we can create a shared past and memory of our collective triumphs, as well as the disasters that might lie ahead, and how we overcame and, in the future, can overcome them.
These few functions might well be enough to explain why religion is such an important part of being human. But it is just the beginning. At the same time our evolutionary ancestors were learning to live in new environments, they also had to learn to meet another survival challenge – to live as social animals.
The Puzzle of Social Order
Julian Huxley (1966) called the resulting survival strategy the 'ritualization of behavior'. It seems to have emerged over the last 150 million years as some animals became more and more dependent on cooperation to survive. These 'social animals' range from ants and bees to cockatoos, wolves, and chimpanzees. They often rear their young cooperatively, live with several generations in permanent settings, hunt and defend the group together, and rely on group learning. Social animals can have complex societies, with defined roles and hierarchy. As a result, they need ways to communicate complex messages quickly and effectively, as well as to commit to the demands of their hierarchies (d'Aquili et al. 1979).
Some of this behavior, which ethologists call 'fixed action patterns', is mostly a matter of genetic programming (Huxley 1966), for example the mating ritual. A butterfly, called the silverwashed fritillary, has a seven-step ritual: the male begins with a first signal, and the female makes a countersignal, through seven steps (d'Aquili et al. 1979). This 'ritual' is fixed in the butterfly's genes. However, with the emergence of sophisticated brains in birds and mammals, much ritualized behavior became learned. A good example is the songs birds in some species sing to signal they are members of a specific group.
The more complex the social group is, the more important these ritualized behaviors become. Many mammals, wolves for instance, have highly complex group dynamics. Wolves within a pack can have different temperaments and roles; they cooperate in hunting and have social hierarchies. So, they need ways to communicate complex messages. In one ritualized pattern, the leader parades a bone in front of the pack, then drops it so the rest of the pack can inspect, and then ignore it (Ibid.).
As a result, social animals are able to communicate complex messages – 'I am your leader/follower' or 'I am approaching you not to hurt you but to negotiate sex'. They also enable group members to commit to the social hierarchy, as with wolves. And Robin Dunbar (1966) discusses primate grooming as a behavioral way of communicating to build trust.[2]
When our evolutionary ancestors were still Great Apes in the East African rain forests, they were social animals, but needed much less sophisticated communication and group coherence than humans. Great Apes, as well as chimpanzees and bonobos are far more individualistic animals with looser social structures. However, once our ancestors came down from the trees and started their wanderings on the savannah, they had to depend on each other for survival (e.g., Dunbar 2016). Not surprisingly, then, natural selection would favor genetic changes that enhanced and rewarded tighter social structures. As a result, natural selection chose for a wider 'palette' of emotions, including powerful social emotions such as guilt and shame, starting about 3 million years ago; according to Turner et al. (2018: 2), this sort of change became the 'biologically-based propensities for human reliance on religion'. They suggest that even the tightly-knit nuclear family may have developed partly as a result of changes in the brain: the septum, associated with sexual pleasure, doubled in size from the Great Apes to humans, enabling a much more intense relationship between partners. And, so, at the same time that storytelling brains developed, our ancestors' biology was also beginning to encourage tighter social structures.
In this way, the individualistic Great Apes could evolve toward being intensely social Homo sapiens. In current literature on religion, this issue is indirectly discussed in the Great Altruism Debate. Dawkins (1996: 381) refers to it as 'that perennial problem, the evolution of "altruistic" behavior in individuals' (see also Boyer 2001; Johnson 2016; Boehm 2012). In evolution, some writers argue, survival always comes first, favoring the 'selfish'. Yet, human society demands cooperation, especially in today's large societies where most people do not know each other. How, then, can essentially selfish people be brought to cooperate and even act in ways that risk their own well-being for others, as New York City's first-responders did during the events of 9/11? One element may be religion's all-seeing, punishing divine powers (e.g., Norenzayan 2015; Johnson 2016). More fundamentally, however, as Turner and his co-authors detail, the conditions our evolutionary ancestors faced as they left the rain forests demanded highly social behavior, and natural selection chose for those genetic adaptations that would transform individualistic Great Apes into highly social humans.
By the emergence of Homo erectus, about 1.8 million years ago, it seems possible that our ancestors were explaining the powerful impersonal forces that surrounded them with some sort of 'proto-religious' ceremonial rituals (Donald 1991), a form of ritualized behavior. Such rituals would have been very different from what we think of as religion. After all, the symbolic coherence that is central to human culture probably did not develop before 70,000 years ago (Fagan 2010). Homo erectus may have had language. The majority position is that they did not (e.g., Deacon 1999; Fagan 2004). However, a linguist Daniel Everett (2017) recently argued that language developed with Homo erectus, which would have allowed them to tell explanatory stories. Even if they did have language, such 'stories' would have been very different from what we now consider myth. Still, as Donald points out, it would also have been possible to tell those stories with ritualized behavior – dance, mime, and imitation. These early religious rituals, with or without language, would have enabled them to tell some sort of stories about the often-terrifying impersonal forces they faced as they migrated across Eurasia. Those rituals would evolve into the rituals humans have practiced for tens of thousands of years, fulfilling a number of functions.[3]
First of all, because humans need symbolically ordered, meaningful umwelten, ritualized activity enables groups to remember that order by ritually recreating that shared umwelten repeatedly. That is, ritual helps us remember who we are. This function has become increasingly critical over the last 10–12 thousand years, as what Benedict Anderson (2006) calls 'imaginary communities' have grown in population from a few hundred to more than a billion, in nations such as China and India. Before that time, humans lived mostly in small hunter-gatherer bands. By 5,000 years ago, Uruk in Mesopotamia was a city of 40,000, with extremes of wealth and poverty, a variety of social roles, and fixed hierarchy (Modelski 2003).
Survival in this brave new world of agriculture and cities would require very different behaviors from that of hunter-gatherer bands (van Schaik and Michel 2016). To adapt to these mismatches, people seem to have negotiated increasingly complex mythic stories about the world of impersonal forces. These stories would not only explain the new social world, but also justify its constructed conventional 'as-if' worlds (Rappaport 1999), so unlike that of hunter-gatherer bands. Ritual enabled them both to remember and maintain that order; as Rappaport (Ibid.: 137) puts it, 'the existence, acceptance, and morality of conventions are joined together indissolubly in rituals'.
These rituals also educate the young on the nature of their symbolic, 'as-if' world. Many elements of children's play end up being practice for the behaviors and roles they learn in those rituals (Seligman et al. 2008). This should hardly be surprising. Human beings can only create and share meaning by learning the symbolic order they have in common (Rappaport 1999). That is, children have a biological imperative to learn their society's order. Play enough at the behaviors and roles coded into these rituals, and they become second nature. Through physical recreation of our social stories, every child learns to remember and live by a variation on the umwelt shared in their societies.
Rituals also enable group members to communicate historically important memories, such as action plans for previously experienced disasters, periodic famines or floods for instance (Ibid.). In pre-literate societies, preserving such action plans would have required oral mythic stories, enacted in ritual. This sort of ritual is also valuable in literate cultures, as in the Jewish ritual of the Pesach sedar. The sedar ceremony is an annual discussion of the exodus from Egypt, which God commands in Exodus 13:8, during which participants are encouraged to experience the story as if they were actually leaving Egypt. I do not think it is mere coincidence that this ritual has been enacted through much of Jewish history. It became a yearly rehearsal for the next cycle of being valued strangers in a strange land, becoming oppressed, and leaving, repeated, for
example, in England and Russia, Spain and Germany.
When explanatory stories and ritual come together in religion, they provide a way for people in their societies to remember and enact their symbolic orders, to commit to their groups and pass on knowledge of it. And when their worlds change so much that the old symbolic orders no longer work, religion provides the tools that enable members of those societies to evolve new survival strategies and resolve the Umwelt Paradox (see Wallace 1966).
Resolving the Cultural Umwelt Paradox
From one perspective (see Baskin and Bondarenko 2014), human history seems to contain three periods when long-stable social structures were overwhelmed by growing population and new technologies – the Agricultural Revolution (c. 11,000 to 5,000 years ago), the Axial Age (c. 800–200 BCE), and Modernity (c. 1500 CE to present). The first one occurred when the end of the Ice Age and agriculture made increasingly larger communities possible, and human communities jumped from 20-person bands to cities of 40,000. The result would be the early states of the pre-Axial period, such as Ancient Egypt, Sumeria, or Shang China. The second one occurred as cities grew to populations of 100,000; iron weapons and widespread use of horses made warfare far more devastating; and the spread of writing became a driver of social change. The result would be the bureaucratic empires, such as the Chinese dynasties or Islamic empires. The third one occurred after the Mongols created the first Eurasian world system; the gun and other mechanical weapons again made warfare far deadlier; and the printing press made mass literacy possible. Modernity, then, can be seen as humanity's response to the beginnings of globalization. The result is still unfolding (see Fig. 1).
Of course, writing did not emerge until the pre-axial state. So we can only guess at the nature of religion in the Agrarian Revolution. But the transformation process in Greece and Israel, India and China during the Axial Age and throughout Modernity is very much the same, and the renegotiation of mythic stories and the rituals that expressed them seems to have been central in driving these transformations, as several thinkers have noted (Wallace 1966; Yinger 1970; Assmann 2011). These were periods of crisis. In all these cases of cultural transformation, the pressures of social change overwhelmed long-established styles of government, resulting in devastating wars with far more advanced technologies for killing. The chaos and terror these wars caused plunged all these societies into a reevaluation. Whether we look to the Peloponnesian Wars in Greece, the Warring States Period in China, or the Thirty Years War in Central Europe, people in these societies were overwhelmed by the type of force that drove the emergence of new religions. As a result, they asked the questions the human brain is structured to answer: What is happening? What should we do? Why is this happening to us?
As Assmann (2011: 59) notes, myth gives us the stories 'one tells in order to give direction to oneself and the world'. So, for societies in crisis, this function of myth (and religion) demands that people reevaluate their mythologies. That process begins with the restatement of the old mythology, which Assmann calls 'foundational texts'. In China, those texts examined the time of peace during the Western Zhou Dynasty (c. 100–771 BCE) (Schwartz 1985); in Greece, the epics of Homer explored an earlier time of conflict. In early Modernity, these would be stories that combined the Christian emphasis on seeking God's salvation with the restless spirit of the German tribes that had conquered the Western Roman Empire, most notably the stories of the Quest for the Holy Grail (Spengler 1932).
As the society enacted these texts, its people experienced consequences that would be fed back into the myth-creation process (see Yinger 1970: 89). In China, that would result in experiments in government – at first, as many as 170 small kingdoms in the Spring-and-Autumn Period (772–481 BCE) and almost constant war; in Greece, it resulted in hundreds of poleis, city-states, and the Persian Wars in 490 and 480 BCE. In Modernity, the mythology of spiritual quest in the world would have a double result: on the one hand, Protestant Reformation reflected the quest of the individual for salvation; on the other, many leading thinkers would pursue the quest to read God's Second Book, Nature, as they were increasingly exposed to earlier scientific thought from Ancient Greece, China, India and Islam (Baskin and Bondarenko 2014).
Assmann's next phase of this process is establishing a canon for the emerging social umwelt, which reflected what enacting the foundational texts had helped people learn. In China, this canon included the classic texts from Zhou times, such as the I Ching (Book of Changes) and the works that reflected the thought of philosophers such as Confucius, The Analects, and Laotzi, The Dao De Ching (The Book of the Way and Integrity). In Greece, that cannon included both philosophy, from Thales of Miletus to Plato, and the Greek tragedies of the 5th century BCE. The Greek experience would begin the split of religion from philosophy and science that would intensify in Modernity. Modernity's scientific cannon emerged from explorations of Kepler, Galileo, and Newton, and the philosophy of Francis Bacon and Descartes, led by such works as Descartes' Meditations and Newton's Principia (e.g., Gillespie 2009; Kuhn 1962).
As these social umwelten shaped their societies more and more, the behavior suggested in their canonical texts would create another round of feedback, which would result in Assmann's third phase of this process, commentary. In China, this phase witnessed a large body of writings that include reinterpretation of the ideas of Confucius, Laotzi, and others. These ideas played out in the last century of the Axial Age and through the post-axial period, continually bringing China's philosophical religion in line with changes in society (e.g., Schwartz 1985). In Greece, the philosophy and science at the heart of its social umwelt would be reinterpreted in commentary, first, by Aristotle in the 4th century CE and, later, by a variety of thinkers, including Ptolemy in Alexandria during the 2nd century CE. During the early post-axial period, this social umwelt would have evolved into the Hellenism that Alexander's conquests spread across the Mediterranean world, eventually shaping the Roman Empire and Christianity.
In many ways, Modernity is one long commentary on the scientific umwelt canonized in the work of Descartes and Newton. That commentary extended beyond the growing body of knowledge in such fields as physics, chemistry, and biology. It would stand at the heart of Capitalism and set the stage for Nationalism. The issues the world faces today – from the danger of nuclear proliferation to extensive pollution and climate change – all seem grounded in the modern social umwelt (Bondarenko and Baskin 2017). Ironically, the advance of modern science has undermined its basic assumptions and created another scientific revolution that appears to be leading thinkers back to many of the ideas associated with the philosophical religions of India and China (e.g., Pagels 1988; Laughlin 2005; Kauffman 2008; Smolin 2013). This 'religious' thought appears in the work of theoretical physicist Amit Goswami (1993), quantum physicist David Bohm (1980), and Kauffman's (2008) identification of radical creativity with the sacred.
Could the emerging scientific paradigm offer the social umwelt our world needs for globalization, just as the monotheism and Chinese religion that came out of the Axial Age did for the bureaucratic empires of the post-Axial period? Could the mysteries of Quantum Mechanics and the dynamic processes demonstrated in Complexity Theory enable our children to remember the world in a way that will allow them to address the apparently insoluble questions of the early 21st century? These are the sorts of questions that my evolutionary approach to religion provokes.
Religion, then, along with science and philosophy, forms the complex system of thoughts, practices, and interactions that any group of people uses to address the fundamental challenges of being human. In this way, religion and its sisters enable groups of people to define what they must remember and prepare them to meet what has not happened yet; it gives every society its most powerful stories and brings their members together as coherent groups, sometimes willing to give their lives for each other; it offers spiritual paths, protection from the fear of a world that can overwhelm them, and the tools to dominate and manipulate whole societies.
My hope is that this interpretation of religion has implications that go beyond the academic community. As the readers of this journal know, we live in a world that is in transition between an old world of nation states, each with their own social umwelt, and a far more globalized world. Today, most people use their social umwelten to define those with different umwelten as Others. How can our societies encourage people to experience the otherness of those who do not share their umwelten as brothers and sisters, rather than enemies? I would like to think that the ideas I have presented may help us get one step closer to answering that question.
Ultimately, religion is universal to human societies because we are all brothers and sisters – the large-brained primates who survive by cooperating so intensely. And today, we face several challenges that could quite literally overwhelm us – from nuclear holocaust to another mass extinction – unless we can work together as a global community. Perhaps, beginning with some of the ideas I have presented, we can move toward a global umwelt that can put science, religion, and philosophy together again, in a way that enables us to respect our local differences while working for our common good.
Some people will say that Human Nature simply will not allow this to happen. They may be right. We all do cling to our models of the world. And, yet, I have to wonder, what would happen if we could talk with some hunter-gatherers who lived 40,000 years ago and tell them that people are now living in communities of 10 million. Wouldn't they say something to the effect that Human Nature just won't allow that to happen? Faced with a threat to our survival, we, humans, have done apparently impossible things over and over. Perhaps, what we need is a religion that will enable us to remember that we achieve those impossible things. After all, we are what we remember.
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[1] This paper grew from presentations I made at the International Big History Conference in Amsterdam (Baskin 2016) and the Globalistics Conference in Moscow (Baskin 2017). The feedback at both proved invaluable.
[2] For a fuller discussion of the pre-human origins of such 'ritual' behavior, see d'Aquili et al. 1979.
[3] For a fuller discussion, see Rappaport 1999; Seligman et al. 2008.

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Home » Motorcycle Accidents » What to Do After a Motorcycle Accident
What to Do After a Kansas Motorcycle Accident - Our Wichita Attorneys Fight on Behalf of Injured Victims and Families
Motorcycles are popular way to enjoy the open road in Kansas. With hundreds of miles of open highway along U.S. 400, the Kansas Turnpike and other roads, motorcyclists are a familiar sight to all drivers. But while most drivers of cars and trucks know how important it is to drive defensively around motorcycles, accidents happen all too often. And no matter how cautious motorcyclists may be, severe car accidents involving motorcycles happen every day in Kansas. Serious injuries from motorcycle accidents are not unusual.
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How do motorcycle accidents happen?
What are common motorcycle accident injuries?
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Can I file a lawsuit after my motorcycle accident?
Motorcycle accidents in Kansas can happen for a variety of different reasons. Oftentimes, the driver of the vehicle that hit the motorcyclist may claim he or she simply "failed to see" a motorcyclist. We know that this typically means the driver did not check his or her mirrors when changing lanes or was distracted when going through an intersection and colliding with a motorcycle that had the right of way. We know that a car driver's negligence is at the root of many crashes involving motorcycles. The driver might have been texting while driving or under the influence of alcohol at the time of a crash. He or she may have been speeding or recklessly switching between lanes. We can help determine the cause of your crash and hold negligent parties accountable for their reckless behavior.
Injuries in motorcycle accidents are rarely minor. Due to the unprotected nature of the motorcycle rider, a collision between a larger car or truck and a motorcyclist can result in catastrophic injuries. Broken bones, road rash and internal organ injuries are common. An accident may result in paralysis due to spinal cord injuries, amputation of one or multiple limbs or traumatic brain injuries. In particularly severe accidents a rider may lose his or her life, leaving loved ones with grounds to file a wrongful death lawsuit.
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Contributing Factors in Car Accidents
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Common Injuries Sustained in Car Accidents
When Cars Strike Pedestrians
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Imogene () est une comédie américaine réalisée par Shari Springer Berman et Robert Pulcini, sortie en salles en 2013.

Synopsis
Imogene Duncan (Kristen Wiig) était autrefois une dramaturge prometteuse qui travaille maintenant pour un magazine à New York, dans un emploi mal rémunéré. Après que son petit ami aisé la quitte et qu'elle soit renvoyée de son emploi dans le magazine, elle organise une tentative de suicide dans le but d'attirer l'attention de son ex et est accidentellement découverte par son amie Dara. Retenue à l'hôpital sur un 5150 (détention psychiatrique involontaire), elle est finalement libérée par les soins de sa mère (Annette Bening), qui l'amène dans sa maison d'enfance dans le New Jersey.

Peu de temps après son retour, elle entend une conversation entre sa mère et son nouveau petit ami, George Bousch, et apprend que son père n'est jamais mort, mais a plutôt quitté la famille pour suivre un doctorat. Après avoir appris que ce dernier a écrit un livre, elle se rend à la bibliothèque locale et le vole. Elle découvre sur la couverture arrière qu'il vit à New York et convainc le pensionnaire de sa mère, Lee (Darren Criss), de l'emmener là-bas, mais est obligée de rentrer après s'être vu interdire l'accès de son appartement et son amie, Dara, refuse de l'accueillir chez elle.

Pour rembourser Lee de l'avoir conduite en ville, Imogene va le voir jouer dans son groupe hommage aux Backstreet Boys. Ensuite, ils parlent de la carrière ratée d'Imogene en tant que dramaturge. Il y a des années, après avoir remporté une bourse prestigieuse, Imogene n'a pas réussi à écrire une pièce réelle et croit maintenant qu'elle ne peut pas écrire. Lee a accidentellement découvert ses anciennes pièces en vivant dans sa chambre et pense qu'elle a du talent et qu'elle devrait essayer d'écrire à nouveau. Ils dorment ensemble et le lendemain matin, Lee et son frère Ralph retournent en ville pour assister à la soirée de lancement du livre de Dara.

Le lancement se passe mal car personne n'est particulièrement heureux de la voir. Son frère Ralph est sur le point d'être arrêté et est amené à la fête par la police. Après avoir quitté la fête, Ralph les emmène chez leur père où Ralph révèle qu'il savait que son père était en vie tout ce temps. Imogene et Ralph dînent avec leur riche père et sa nouvelle épouse, et avoue qu'il ne regrette pas sa décision de les avoir quittés. Après que leur père ait offert de l'argent à Imogene pour l'aider à réparer sa vie, elle le quitte et retourne chez sa mère. Après qu'Imogene et sa mère aient discuté de son père, un assassin arrive à la recherche de Bousch et menace de tuer la famille. Il est contré par Imogene, qui revêt le costume d'exosquelette humain de son frère et l'attaque.

Fiche technique
 Titre : Imogene
 Titre original :
 Réalisation : Shari Springer Berman et Robert Pulcini
 Scénario : Michelle Morgan
 Image : Steve Yedlin
 Distribution des rôles : Ann Goulder
 Direction artistique :
 Décors : Annie Spitz
 Décoratrice de plateau : Shannon Finnerty
 Costumes : Tom Broecker
 Musique : Rob Simonsen
 Montage : Robert Pulcini
 Production :
 Sociétés de production : Maven Pictures, Anonymous Content, Ambush Entertainment et 10th Hole Productions
 Distribution :  Roadside Attractions;  Eurozoom
 Pays d'origine :
 Genre : Comédie
 Durée : 103 minutes
 Dates de sortie :
  :  (Festival international du film de Toronto)
  :
 ,  :

Distribution
 Kristen Wiig : Imogene Duncan
 Sidney Lucas : Imogene jeune
 Julia Stiles : Imogene sur scène
 Annette Bening : Zelda Duncan
 Darren Criss : Lee
 Matt Dillon : George Bousch
 Christopher Fitzgerald : Ralph
 Natasha Lyonne : Allyson
 June Diane Raphael : Dara
 Nate Corddry : Larry
 Michelle Hurd : Libby
 Brian Petsos : Peter
 Mickey Sumner : Hannah
 Murray Bartlett : James Whitney
 Bob Balaban : Monsieur Duncan

Production

Présentation
Le film fut diffusé au Festival de Toronto sous le titre Imogene en . Le même mois, Lionsgate achète les droits de distribution aux États-Unis à la suite de la première au festival et sera distribué par Roadside Attractions en  sous le titre . Le film est sorti en France sous son titre initial le  après avoir été présenté au Champs-Élysées Film Festival en .

Réception

Box-office
Distribué dans 351 salles pour sa première semaine, Imogene totalise  et s'empare de la dix-huitième position du box-office, dont  en premier week-end d'exploitation. Le film dégringole du classement au cours des trois semaines suivantes avec un cumul de . Finalement, après huit semaines à l'affiche, il totalise .

À l'international, aux Pays-Bas, distribué en salles la veille de sa sortie sur le territoire américain, se positionne en dix-neuvième position du box-office néerlandais, avec . En France, sorti dans 101 salles, Imogene ne parvient qu'à s'emparer de la quinzième position du box-office avec  entrées en une semaine d'exploitation en salles. Imogene quitte le top 20 la semaine suivante et totalise  entrées.

Accueil critique
Le film a rencontré un accueil négatif, obtenant 14% d'avis favorables sur le site Rotten Tomatoes, basé sur 65 commentaires collectés et une note moyenne de  et un score moyen de  sur le site Metacritic, basé sur 30 commentaires collectés.

Notes et références

Liens externes

Film américain sorti en 2012
Comédie américaine
Film indépendant américain
Film tourné au New Jersey
Film tourné dans l'État de New York
Film tourné à New York
Film se déroulant au New Jersey

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


With a shortage of creative spaces in San Diego, SWISH PROJECTS aims to engage and inspire the San Diego community through art exhibitions, poetry readings, installations and live music. Contributions to the space will support the philosophy of making art accessible to San Diego's diverse community through our program initiative to exhibit emerging, established and international artists — while creating a platform for local artists to reach an international audience. Art and culture has proven to increase social well-being and we believe that the space will create rewarding experiences for our community by bringing it together.
SWISH PROJECTS will be managed by Edwin Negado (Gym Standard), Julian Klincewicz (Artist) and John Itiola (Artist/Musician). Together, we bring over 6 years (Over 150 events) of art, music and literary programing to the city of San Diego. Through our professional* experience, we aim to create a sustainable operating model through innovative partnerships, sponsorships and engaging events.
Since 2013, with the assistance of local venues including the San Diego Art Institute, Helmuth Projects, Gym Standard, Lux Art Institute and Bread & Salt, we've had the honor to showcase the work of notable artists and entities including; Grant Brittain, Rae Armantrout (Pulitzer prize recipient), Aperture Foundation and the Woodbury School of Architecture.
MENTORSHIP: Many of our collaborators are emerging creatives that we've mentored along the way. Through art, music and design, we've built a hands-on learning environment for event coordination, art handling, marketing, design, print production and brand building. With your help, we hope that SWISH PROJECTS will continue to provide as a vehicle for collaboration, growth and discovery.
The space will be located within the heart of NORTH PARK, home to some of San Diego's most renowned restaurants and locally-owned businesses. Centrally located, the neighborhood is easily accessible through public transportation and its proximity to Interstate 805 and Interstate 8.
Donations to SWISH PROJECTS will help build a space that will stay with the community for a long time. Please join us to help enrich our hometown by sharing this with your friends and colleagues. Every little bit goes a long way.
*Special thanks to Jared Kylstad and Natalia Valerdi-Rogers.
On behalf of SWISH PROJECTS, we wanted to say thank you so much for your generosity in helping us meet our campaign goal. You donations, kind messages and words of encouragement are all appreciated.
As an update, we've spent the last 2-weeks demoing the existing fixtures, building the gallery walls, installing new electrical outlets and prepping the floor for resurfacing. We'll be utilizing the remaining budget on lighting fixtures, sound equipment, shelving, flooring epoxy, exterior/interior painting, smoke detectors, new doors, a drill set, leveling tools, gallery sinage and renovations to the SWISH office (Admin areas of the space).
Again, much thanks for your support and future patronage. SWISH will allow us to engage our community for years to come!


text:
Hanahan High School
Hanahan High School Remembers
Hanahan, South Carolina
Elizabeth Lousie Whisenand
Elizabeth Lousie Whisenand , 90, of Charleston, SC Friday December 10. J. Henry Stuhr, Inc. Mt. Pleasant Chapel. *DATE OF DEATH 12/10/2021* Read More
J. Henry Stuhr Mount Pleasant Chapel
Published in Charleston Post & Courier on Dec. 15, 2021.
Elizabeth Louise Whisenand
Elizabeth Louise Whisenand Charleston - Elizabeth Louise Whisenand, 90, passed away Friday, December 10, 2021, at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston. Her funeral service will be held Thursday, December 16, 2021, in the J. Henry Stuhr, Inc., Mount Pleasant Chapel... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Dec. 13 to Dec. 14, 2021.
Melissa Gayle Antley
Melissa Gayle Antley HANAHAN - Melissa Gayle Antley, 56, of Hanahan, South Carolina, passed away September 19, 2021. She was born on December 28, 1964 in Charleston and lived with her family in Hanahan. She graduated from Hanahan High School with the class of 1983. After graduating... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Oct. 16 to Oct. 17, 2021.
Henry Wyatt Hammack III
Henry Wyatt Hammack III MERRITT ISLAND, FL - Henry Wyatt Hammack III, known to all as Tripp, moved to heaven on September 23, 2021. The son of Patricia Thrift Hammack and Henry Wyatt Hammack Jr. (deceased) and the brother of Julie Hammack Poncar (Gregory) and Jason E Hammack (deceased)... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Sep. 28 to Sep. 29, 2021.
William Bart Whitley
William Bart Whitley's passing has been publicly announced by Russell Funeral Chapel in Moncks Corner, SC. Legacy invites you to offer condolences and share memories of William in the Guest Book below. The most recent obituary and service information is available at the Russell Funeral... Read More
Russell Funeral Chapel
Published in Russell Funeral Chapel on Aug. 14, 2021.
Dennis Ellyson
Dennis Ellyson Social Circle, GA - Dennis Robert Ellyson, age 72, son of H.W. "Red" Ellyson and Betty Haines Ellyson, passed away on July 25, 2021. Dennis was a 1967 graduate of Hanahan High School, and is survived by his wife, Susan Ellyson, his sister, Peggy Ellyson, 4 children... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Jul. 29 to Jul. 30, 2021.
Sheila Jean Hinson
Sheila Jean Hinson Hanahan - HINSON, SHEILA JEAN, age 56 of Hanahan, passed away Monday, June 28, 2021. She was preceded in death by her father, Lawrence Jared McClammy and her stepfather, Ronald McDowell. She is survived by her mother, Carolyn McDowell, her husband, Michael Hinson... Read More
Carolina Funeral Home and Memorial Gardens
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Jun. 30 to Jul. 1, 2021.
Daniel C. "Danny" Douglas Jr.
Daniel "Danny" C. Douglas, Jr. Hanahan - Daniel "Danny" C. Douglas Jr., of Hanahan, SC, loving husband of Sandy Tyler Douglas, went to be with his Lord Jesus on June 3, 2021. He was at home, surrounded by loved ones. His Funeral Service will be held Sunday, June 6, 2021 in the Restoration... Read More
J. Henry Stuhr Northwoods Chapel
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Jun. 3 to Jun. 4, 2021.
Linda Brown
Linda Brown's passing has been publicly announced by Simplicity Lowcountry Crematory & Burial Services in North Charleston, SC. Legacy invites you to offer condolences and share memories of Linda in the Guest Book below. The most recent obituary and service information is available... Read More
Simplicity Lowcountry Crematory & Burial Services
Published in Simplicity Lowcountry Crematory & Burial Services on Apr. 20, 2021.
Dr. Michael "Mike" Strong
Dr. Michael "Mike" Strong March 5, 1950 - April 12, 2021 Columbia, South Carolina - Dr. Michael "Mike" Strong, 71, of Columbia, South Carolina, peacefully passed away Monday, April 12, 2021, at his residence surrounded by family after a battle with Progressive Supranuclear Palsy... Read More
Dunbar Funeral Home - Devine
Published in The State on Apr. 14, 2021.
Dr. Michael 'Mike' Strong COLUMBIA -- Dr. Michael "Mike" Strong, 71, of Columbia, peacefully passed away Monday, April 12, 2021, at his residence surrounded by family after a battle with progressive supranuclear palsy. Mike was born March 5, 1950, in Charleston, to the... Read More
Published in The Times and Democrat on Apr. 14, 2021.
Jessie David Luten
Jessie David Luten SUMMERVILLE - David Luten, 76, passed away on February 11, 2021. Born in Quitman, Arkansas, David moved to the Charleston area as a young boy and attended Hanahan High School. David was in the Automobile business in Charleston for over 30 years and then went to... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Feb. 16 to Feb. 17, 2021.
Virgle Harold Nelson
Virgle Harold Nelson Hanahan - Virgle Harold Nelson, 85, of Hanahan, entered into eternal rest peacefully on January 31, 2021. Born in Harriman, TN, he was the son of the late James and Ida Lou (Schubert) Nelson. He is survived by his loving wife of 65 years, Barbara Nelson, and two... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Feb. 8 to Feb. 9, 2021.
Thomas E. Williamson
Thomas E. Williamson CROSS, SC - Thomas E. "Tommy" Williamson, 73, passed away on January 11, 20201 He was born on July 4, 1947 to Kathlene Stevenson and E.E. "Bill" Williamson. He attended Hanahan High School and graduated from Swansea High School in 1965. He served as a radio operator... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Jan. 25 to Jan. 26, 2021.
William Thomas Blackman II
William Thomas Blackman, II ROUND O, SC - William Thomas Blackman, II of Round O, SC died 31 December at MUSC. Bill was born in Charleston 21 April 1948, graduated from Hanahan High School and served 20 years in the Navy. He then retired from AGFA Materials Corporation, Bushy Park... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Jan. 4 to Jan. 5, 2021.
Charles D. Stello Sr.
Charles D. Stello, Sr. PALM HARBOR, FL - Charles D. Stello, Sr. "Chuck", 69, entered into eternal rest on the evening of December 23, 2020, in his home with his family by his side. Chuck was born in Franklin, MA and spent most of his life in Charleston, SC. He graduated from Hanahan... Read More
Patricia Brinson
Patricia Brinson Moncks Corner - Patricia G. Brinson, 77, Fine Art Exhibition Competitor, lost her battle with terminal cancer on April 5th this year. Her memorial service will be held at Moncks Corner Pentecostal Holiness Church on Saturday, December 12th at 1:00 p.m. Visitation... Read More
Dial-Murray Funeral Home, Inc. - Moncks Corner
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Dec. 9 to Dec. 10, 2020.
Kathy Benton Heilman
Kathy Benton Heilman MT. PLEASANT - Kathy Benton Heilman went to be with her Lord on September 29, 2020. Born September 6, 1950 in Thomasville, North Carolina, she was the daughter of the late Carolyn Josey Benton, and the late Joseph Benton. She attended Hanahan High School where... Read More
Dolores Mary Rickens
Dolores Mary Rickens Summerville - Dolores Mary Rickens, 62, of Summerville, answered the Lord's call home on May 14, 2020. Dolores was loved and loved all without reserve. She was an avid reader and enjoyed traveling, especially to Greenville and western North Carolina. Dolores was... Read More
Palmetto Cremation Society
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Jun. 13 to Jun. 14, 2020.
Nellie Agnes Morris
Nellie Agnes Morris Hanahan - Nellie Agnes Morris, 90, of Hanahan, SC, widow of Ira M. Morris entered into eternal rest Sunday, May 3, 2020. In consideration of the health of all, all services will be private. The family encourages everyone to visit Nellie's Tribute at jhenrystuhr... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from May 4 to May 5, 2020.
FRANCIS ARCHIBALD
ARCHIBALD Francis X. Archibald (Age 64) Loving and devoted husband of Lisa Perry Archibald, and retired Director of the CIA's National Clandestine Service, died peacefully March 13, 2020 with his wife and family at his side in Phoenix, Arizona. Born July 31, 1955, in Charleston, SC... Read More
Published in The Washington Post on Mar. 18, 2020.
Francis X. Archibald
Francis X Archibald Mt. Pleasant - Francis X. Archibald (Frank), 64, loving and devoted husband of Lisa Perry Archibald, and retired Director of the CIA's National Clandestine Service, died peacefully March 13, 2020 with his wife and family at his side in Phoenix, Arizona. Born July... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Mar. 16 to Mar. 17, 2020.
Trent Jay Hesseltine
Trent Jay Hesseltine MORGANTON, NC - Trent Jay Hesseltine, of Morganton, NC., passed away on February 23, 2020. He was born in San Diego, CA. and lived most of his life in Hanahan, S.C. Upon graduation from Hanahan High School in 1976, he worked as a car salesperson, a real estate... Read More
Sossoman Funeral Home
Norma "Jean" Coffman
Norma "Jean" Coffman Hanahan - Norma Jean Coffman, 85, of Hanahan, SC, passed away November 29, 2019. Jean was born on March 4, 1934 in Greenville, SC to the late Marcus Alexander and Lillie Mae Perry McCall. Jean loved to travel the world, especially cruising. Jean liked to stay... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Dec. 3 to Dec. 4, 2019.
Betty L. Sharpe
Betty L. Sharpe Goose Creek - Betty L. Sharpe, daughter of Joseph Daniel and Vivian Collier Sharpe, born October 18, 1949, went to her heavenly home on November 9, 2019. She was a graduate of Hanahan High School and of Newberry College where she was an active member of Kappa Delta... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Nov. 22 to Nov. 24, 2019.
Charles "Kevin" Cox
Charles "Kevin" Cox Hanahan - Charles "Kevin" Cox, 55, husband of Janet Watson Cox, a retired federal special agent, passed away on Thursday, September 26, 2019. Born in Charleston, SC to Charles M. Cox, Jr. and Louise Waples Cox, Kevin was a graduate of Hanahan High School, Class... Read More
Cynthia Chubb-Tamsberg
Cynthia Chubb-Tamsberg Goose Creek - Cynthia "Cindy" Chubb-Tamsberg, 61, of Goose Creek, SC died peacefully Sunday, September 1, 2019 at a local hospital with family at her side. Cindy was born on April 12, 1958, in Charleston, SC, daughter of Leona Keyser Chubb and the late G. Heyward... Read More
Thomas Etheridge
Thomas Etheridge Hanahan - Thomas Hoyt Etheridge, Lt. Col. United States Army (Ret). During the afternoon of Sunday, May 26, 2019, Tom Etheridge of Hanahan, SC passed from this world to the glory of Heaven just as he lived, surrounded by his loving family and friends. Tom or Tommy... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from May 28 to May 29, 2019.
Jody C. Smith
Jody C. Smith HANAHAN - Jody C. Smith of Hanahan, Berkeley County, SC Birth September 6, 1970. Death April 21, 2019. Attended Hanahan High School. Survived by: wife Tanya Hazel, Hanahan; daughter Cassidy Smith (2 years old) Hanahan; mother Carolyn Smith (Reed), Hanahan; step-father... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Apr. 25 to Apr. 26, 2019.
Ola Jackson
Ola Jackson Moncks Corner - Ola Belle Miller Jackson, 81, of Moncks Corner, SC, widow of Gerald (Jerry) Carlyle Jackson, died at home on Saturday, January 12, 2019. Born on November 27, 1937, she was the daughter of the late Henry Jefferson Miller and Janie Gibbs Miller of Vinton... Read More
Tina Barthelemy
Tina Barthelemy Summerville - Tina Michael Thelen Barthelemy, age 68, of Summerville, SC, entered the Lord's embrace on Sunday, November 18, 2018, after a short struggle with cancer. Tina, daughter of the late Walter F. Thelen and Marie A. Scruggs Thelen, was born on October 6, 1950... Read More
McAlister-Smith Funeral & Cremation - Goose Creek Location
Phillip Todd Carter
Phillip Todd Carter HANAHAN - Friends and family of Todd are invited to attend a Service in Todd's memory at Highland Park Baptist Church in Hanahan at 1:00 p.m. on Saturday February 17th. Todd Carter, 53, died on February 3rd while working in Tyler, Texas. He is the second son of... Read More
Alexander Clifford Peiser
Alexander Clifford Peiser HANAHAN - Alexander Clifford Peiser passed away on October 10, 2017. Alex was a junior at Hanahan High School who was a member of the National Honor Society and Beta Clubs, and he was active in theater and the Hanahan Marching Pride Band. His interest in... Read More
Mary Lynch McQueen
Mary Lynch McQueen Charleston - Mary Lynch McQueen, a retired history teacher and widow of John Ross Copeland, died Friday, September 1, 2017, at the Hospice Center of Charleston. She was 88. She was a teacher in the public schools of Charleston and Berkeley Counties for over 25 years... Read More
James A. McAlister Cremation
Bryon Bouton Leatherwood
Bryon Bouton Leatherwood HANAHAN - In profound sorrow we announce the passing of Bryon Bouton Leatherwood, 22, of Hanahan, SC on Saturday, February 25, 2017. He was the only son of Brian Scott Leatherwood (Cindy) of Hanahan and Mother, Barbara Jane Osburn (Jeffrey) of Moncks Corner... Read More
Joseph D. "Jake" Williams
Joseph D. "Jake" Williams SUMMERVILLE - Joseph D. "Jake" Williams, 51, of Summerville, SC entered into eternal rest July 23, 2016. Jake was born August 26, 1964 in Spartanburg, SC. He was the son of Jarvis "Joe" Williams and the late Betty Williams of Hanahan, SC. Jake is also survived... Read More
Shawn A. Cahalan
Shawn A. Cahalan SUMMERVILLE - Shawn A. Cahalan, 43, of Summerville, SC passed away at his residence from diabetic complications on July 11, 2016. He is the son of David and Jane Cahalan of Summerville. He was raised in Hanahan SC where he was a 1992 graduate of Hanahan High School... Read More
Gwen Robinson
Gwen Swindler Robinson COLUMBIA - Gwen Swindler Robinson, 69, passed away at her home on Tuesday, June 7, 2016. Born on November 27, 1946, she was the only child of the late Ernest R. and Travis D. "Boo" Swindler. She grew up in Hanahan, S.C. Upon graduation from Hanahan High School... Read More
Dunbar Funeral Home - Dutch Fork
Published in The State on Jun. 14, 2016.
Julie Ann Smith Brewer
Julie Ann Smith Brewer NEWVILLE, PA - Mrs. Julie Ann Smith Brewer, wife of Brian Scott Brewer, passed away Thursday at her home in Newville. She was 51. Mrs. Brewer was born in Hanahan, SC, July 25, 1964, a daughter of "B.J." Smith and Sarah Bowers Smith. She was a 1982 graduate of... Read More
Peeples-Rhoden Funeral Home - Hampton
Hilda Elaine Cordes (Rowland)
Hilda Elaine (Rowland) Cordes RAPID CITY, SD - Hilda Elaine (Rowland) Cordes went to be with her Savior on May 17, 2015 at the Regional Hospital Auxiliary Hospice House in Rapid City, SD. She was born on January 12, 1953 in Phenix City, AL to Irvine and Inez (Alexander) Rowland. Her... Read More
Behrens-Wilson Funeral Home
Jarrod Brent Howard
Jarrod Brent Howard HANAHAN - Jarrod Brent Howard, 19, of Hanahan, born November 9, 1994, entered into eternal rest October 10, 2014. Born in Hanahan, he was the son of Barbara and Holland "Shorty" Howard. He graduated from Hanahan High School in 2013. Jarrod enjoyed music and always... Read More
Barry Dean Biddlecomb Ph.D.
Barry Dean Biddlecomb, Ph.D ATHENS, GA - Barry Dean Biddlecomb, Ph.D, formerly of Hanahan, S.C., passed away August 20, 2014, in Athens, GA. He is the son of Richard and Keiko "Kay" Biddlecomb of Hanahan. In addition to his parents, he is survived by his loving wife, Martha M. Carr... Read More
Published in Charleston Post & Courier from Aug. 28 to Aug. 29, 2014.
Roddie Singletary
Roddie Singletary, Jr., 57, of Ridgeville passed away on June 19, 2014 surrounded by family at his home. Roddie was born on April 18, 1957 to R.B. and Helen Singletary in Charleston. He graduated from Hanahan High School. He was a machinist at the Charleston Naval Shipyard for 10... Read More
Published in Carolina Funeral Home and Memorial Gardens on Jun. 19, 2014.
Rodney Singletary
Roddie Singletary, Jr. RIDGEVILLE, SC - Roddie Singletary, Jr., 57, of Ridgeville passed away on June 19, 2014 surrounded by family at his home. Roddie was born on April 18, 1957 to R.B. and Helen Singletary in Charleston. He graduated from Hanahan High School. He was a machinist... Read More
Milan Ross Glumac
Milan Ross Glumac MANASSAS, VA - Milan Ross Glumac, 46, died on April 25th, 2014. Ross was a 1985 graduate of Hanahan High School. He was preceded in death by his mother, Lorraine, in 1997, and his Father, Milan, in 2014. Ross leaves one brother, a stepbrother, 5 nieces and nephews... Read More
Brenda Nobles Ross
Brenda Nobles Ross RICHMOND, VA - Brenda Nobles Ross of Richmond, VA, formerly of Hanahan, SC and the wife of J.T. Ross died December 6, 2013 surrounded by family and friends under the care of hospice. Mrs. Brenda Nobles Ross was born November 14, 1951 in Mullins, SC, a daughter of... Read More
Kenneth Lamar Kurts
MCPO Kenneth Lamar Kurts, USN (Ret.) HANAHAN - "If a man loses pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured, or far away." Henry David Thoreau When Kenneth Lamar Kurts was born on March 18... Read More
Andria Renee Cole
Andria Renee Cole HANAHAN - Miss Andria Renee Cole, 33, of Hanahan, SC, entered into eternal rest on Monday April 15, 2013. The relatives and friends of Miss Andria R. Cole are invited to attend her funeral services on Friday, April 19, 2013 at eleven o'clock a.m. at Highland Park... Read More
Gideon Mizell Jr.
Gideon Mizell, Jr. MARIETTA, GA - Gideon Mizell Jr., age 57 of Marietta, formerly of Charleston, S.C., died Tuesday, January 15, 2013 in Atlanta. A native of Charleston, he was born on January 13, 1956 to the late Gideon Mizell Sr. and Faye Irene Broome Mizell. He is survived by his... Read More
Allen Bryant
Allen Bryant HANAHAN - Entered into eternal rest on Monday, January 7, 2013, Allen M. Bryant, 57, of Hanahan, SC, son of J.C. Bryant, Shirley Bryant, and brother of J. Carroll Bryant. He is survived by several uncles and aunts, Larry and Gynelle Lane of Moncks Corner, Barbara Lane... Read More
The friends they made. The lives they led. The memories they cherished. Here we mourn and celebrate the lives of Hawks who have passed, but whose legacies persist.
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This European Exploration Worksheet is suitable for 5th - 8th Grade. Students complete a chart about European exploration and the explorers that conquered. In this European exploration lesson plan, students list explorers, technology, obstacles, motivations, and more.
Famous Explorers Lesson Plans & Activities We found 51 items Utilize these printables, lessons, and activities to teach your students about the many explorers who have contributed to society.


NIGER, November 28, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – The government of Niger has shut down two facilities run by the UK-based Marie Stopes International (MSI) for committing abortions in defiance of a 2006 pro-life law.
Currently, Niger only permits abortions deemed necessary to save a mother's life, but a government inquiry determined that MSI locations in the capital of Niamey and city of Maradi had been engaged in "manual vacuum aspiration [abortions] for a fee of 30,000 CFA francs (46 euros/$52)," the Daily Mail reports.
"We have decided to close this charity on grounds of a 2006 law which bans abortions," Niger's Health Minister Idi Illiassou said Tuesday. "Our inquiries have shown that this non-governmental organisation is enabling the voluntary interruption of pregnancy," something MSI's agreement with the government "does not authorise."
The health ministry also says it will pursue legal action against people involved in the illegal abortions, and that police are currently looking for MSI's "accomplices" in Niger, who have fled.
MSI has not yet commented on the situation, but its "Where We Work" page for Niger suggests it only provides contraception in the country (contraception is regularly framed as an alternative to abortion, but several methods actually function by killing already-conceived embryonic humans).
Niger's move follows a decision by the Kenyan government earlier this month ordering Marie Stopes to "immediately cease and desist offering any form of abortion services in all its facilities within the republic." The move was a response to suspicions that MSI was trying to get around the country's pro-life laws with advertising hinting at its willingness to commit abortions. The pro-life group CitizenGo Africa is still working to drive MSI out of Kenya entirely.
Marie Stopes was forced to close hundreds of locations across Africa this year as a result of U.S. President Donald Trump reinstating and expanding the Mexico City Policy, now called Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance, which bans foreign aid money to any entities that commit or promote abortions.


text:
Broadley is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:

Alexander Meyrick Broadley (1847–1916), British historian, author, and barrister
Denise Broadley (1913–2007), British artist
Donald George Broadley (1932–2016), British herpetologist living in Zimbabwe
Eric Broadley (1928–2017), British entrepreneur, engineer, founder and former chief designer of Lola Cars
Henry Broadley (1793–1851), British Conservative politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1837 to 1851
Henry Harrison-Broadley (1853–1914), British Conservative politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1906 to 1914
Ian Rank-Broadley (born 1952), British sculptor and coin designer
Pascal Broadley (born 1972), English cricketer
William Harrison-Broadley (1820–1896), British Conservative politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1868 to 1885

See also
Broadley's dwarf gecko
Broadley's flat lizard
Broadley's ridged frog
Broadley railway station, which served Broadley in Rochdale, England, from 1870 until 1947