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Gateway of India, Mumbai
Romney and Obama debate how to bring more Classical Indian music to America
Click here for the video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVhc0L8hVbs&feature=em-share_video_user
Raj Chetty, 33, winner of $500,000 MacArthur Fellowship is Economics Professor at Harvard University
Raj Chetty is an economist whose rigorous theoretical and empirical studies are informing the design of effective government policy. His initial work focused on resolving inconsistencies in earlier theories of specific questions in public finance, such as how dividend tax cuts affect corporate behavior and how unemployment insurance affects job-seeking behavior. More recently, he and colleagues designed novel empirical tests to gauge the impact of sales taxes on demand. In a study at a large supermarket chain, they demonstrated that, although most customers were well-informed about the retail sales tax rates, consumers purchased less of a product when posted prices indicated the associated sales tax than when the tax was simply added to the product’s base price at checkout.
Raj Chetty received a B.A. (2000) and a Ph.D. (2003) from Harvard
University. He was a faculty member at the University of California at
Berkeley (2003–2009) prior to his appointment at Harvard University,
where he is currently a professor in the Department of Economics and
director of the Lab for Economic Applications and Policy. His articles
have appeared in such publications as the Quarterly Journal of Economics, American Economic Review, Annual Review of Economics, and Econometrica, among others.
For more information go to:
For more information go to:
http://www.macfound.org/fellows/861/
Sikh Woman with facial hair defends Rowling portrayal of Sikh woman with mustache.
Writing in The Guardian, London, Balpreet Kaur, defends Harry Potter author JK Rowling's portrayal of a Sikh woman with facial hair. Kaur states:JK Rowling's new book, Casual Vacancy, perhaps aimed to do just that. Her novel, which features a Sikh family and portrays them in a realistic way, required her to do extensive research into my faith. And with the attention that Casual Vacancy has been getting comes the chance to start a dialogue and open our minds and hearts to stories of people different than us, people we did not know about before, people, who, at a second glance, are just like us. Unfortunately, the novel enraged Sikh leaders in India, where it is currently the subject of protests over Rowling's portrayal of a Sikh girl teased for her body hair.
For more on the article go to:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2012/oct/02/sikh-protests-jk-rowling-misplaced
Sikhs in New York launch campaign to enable police recruits to wear turbans
According to a news release, New York City Comptroller John C. Liu, the Sikh Coalition, and United Sikhs launched a petition today calling on the City to reform the NYPD dress code policies that forbid Sikh officers from wearing turbans and beards, practices that are required by their faith.For more go to:
http://comptroller.nyc.gov/press/2012_releases/pr12-09-107.shtm
Over half of American Hindus believe in astrology and reincarnation, says Pew study
According to a comprehensive, nationwide survey of Asian Americans conducted by the Pew Research Center: More than half of Asian-American Hindus say they believe in reincarnation and moksha, defined in the survey as “the ultimate state transcending pain and desire in which individual consciousness ends” (59% each). About half also believe in astrology (53%), defined in the survey as the belief “that the position of the stars and planets can affect people’s lives.”For more go to:
http://www.pewforum.org/Asian-Americans-A-Mosaic-of-Faiths-overview.aspx#hindus
A Pakistani and five Indians, including K. Ram Shriram and Vinod Khosla, on Forbes 400 list of American billionaires
Five Indians and a Pakistani are on Forbes 400 list of wealthy Americans for 2012. According to Forbes, "Other foreign born immigrants include Indian-born Manoj Bhargava ($1.5 billion), the former monk responsible for 5-Hour Energy (and its unfortunate advertising), Pakistan-born Shahid Khan ($2.5 billion) who fixed the auto industry’s bumper problem and is hoping to turn around the NFL’s least valuable team, the Jacksonville Jaguars " For more go to:http://www.forbes.com/forbes-400/
Prabal Gurung elated that Kate Middleton wears his printed skirt soon after New York fashion week
Gurung, who declines to give his age, got a bigger boost after his show at New York Fashion Week, when Kate Middleton, the Duchess of Cambridge, wore a printed dress from his spring 2012 collection during her visit to Singapore. As he told The New York Times “I can’t even tell you how amazing it is professionally and how surreal,” he said. “It’s a dream and very emotional for me, and it solidifies my belief in what I am trying to do as a designer.” He added that he had no idea that Ms. Middleton was going to don the bold dress or where she might have bought it, the Times report added. For more on Gurung's show, as well as other Indian designers like Naeem Khan, Sheena Trivedi and Bhibu Mohapatra, see:http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/17/south-asian-designers-make-their-mark-at-fashion-week/
Divya Narendra's Sum Zero gets $1 million from Facebook co-founders & Harvard class mates
In a report the Wall Street Journal notes that, "Flush with at least $65 million from the settlement of a legal battle with Mr. Zuckerberg and Facebook Inc., FB +1.20% Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss are backing fellow Harvard alumnus Divya Narendra, their ally in the Facebook fight, in the investment website. The Winklevosses have put $1 million into SumZero, which was founded by Mr. Narendra and another Harvard alum Aalap Mahadevia, in 2008."For more on the story:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444433504577651750662070974.html
Janaki Bhakle of Columbia University to discuss is Hindu fundamentalism an oxymoron?
What is Hindu fundamentalism? How can fundamentalism be self-consciously modern and progressively science-driven? Listen to Bakhle discuss Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, famous as the author of Hindu fundamentalism and as a revolutionary nationalist deeply devoted to the idea of India as a Hindu state and infamous for his alleged involvement in the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi. How can a study of this fundamentalist serve as the political biography of a distinctly non-monotheistic fundamentalism?
https://secure.www.alumniconnections.com/olc/pub/COUC/event/showEventForm.jsp?form_id=133222
Siddhartha Deb gets PEN author of color $5000 award
It appears that Siddhartha Deb and/or his publisher Faber & Faber must have identified Deb as an Asian minority in the US when submitting his memoir "The Beautiful and the Damned: A Portrait of the New India" for the PEN award. The submission form for the PEN award states, "To be eligible, candidates must be writers of color who have not received wide media coverage."Further, "The PEN Open Book Award, formerly the Beyond Margins Awards, celebrate outstanding books by writers of color published in the United States during the previous year.
Sponsored by the Open Book Program, this award is one of the many ways in which the Open Book Program encourages racial and ethnic diversity within the literary and publishing communities. The Open Book Committee works to increase the literature by, for, and about African, Arab, Asian, Caribbean, Latin, and Native Americans, and to establish access for these groups to the publishing industry. "
Last year Deb's book was discussed in The New Yorker.
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2011/08/siddhartha-debs-publishing-odyssey.html
Maybe Deb and his publisher will submit his next book for the main PEN award.
The news from PEN about Deb's award:
"Fiction and nonfiction writer Siddhartha Deb won the PEN Open Book Award for his memoir, The Beautiful and the Damned: A Portrait of the New India (Faber & Faber, 2011). The $5,000 prize is given for a book by an author of color published in 2011. Alexander Chee, Mat Johnson, and Natasha Trethewey judged."
http://www.pw.org/content/pen_american_center_announces_winners_of_2012_literary_awards?cmnt_all=1
Hyde Park Corner: An Open Forum
Indians should press Harvard and other top US universities to abolish 20% Asian quota
Good education is very important to Indian parents since a degree from a good college, preferably a professional one, largely determines income and perhaps even eligibility for a good "catch", as in marriage. But Indians and other Asians are finding their avenues for success limited by the Asian ceiling - unstated quota limiting total Asian admissions to a maximum 20% as apparently is the case at Harvard and other elite Universities in the US. According to article below, while Asian students at the University of California Berkeley has risen to 40% that at Harvard has stayed stagnant around 18% for the past decade.So Indians in the US, especially those donating money and holding influential posts, should voice opposition and team up with other Asians to press elite universities to abolish the Asian ceiling.
"Admissions officers deny capping the number of Asian-American students at schools, but a 2009 book called No Longer Separate, Not Yet Equal posited that Asian Americans needed nearly perfect SAT scores to gain entrance to a top private university ........".
Ivy League Discrimination? Harvard's Asian student admissions static around 17% while Asians at UC Berkeley have risen to 40%
Khan Academy: effective and free online education help
How to do better at an exam or just improve your knowledge?
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A free world-class education for anyone anywhere."
www.khanacademy.org/
