Recommended Books about Modern-Day Slavery & Human Trafficking
Posted: January 19, 2013 12:57 PM
In 2011, President Obama proclaimed January 2012 National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month:
"With the start of each year, we commemorate the anniversaries of the Emancipation Proclamation, which became effective on January 1, 1863, and the 13th Amendment to abolish slavery, which was signed by President Abraham Lincoln and submitted to the States for ratification on February 1, 1865.
These documents stand as testaments to the gains we have made in pursuit of freedom and justice for all, and they remind us of the work that remains to be done. This month, I urge all Americans to educate themselves about all forms of modern slavery and the signs and consequences of human trafficking. Together, and in cooperation with our partners around the world, we can work to end this terrible injustice and protect the rights to life and liberty entrusted to us by our forebears and owed to our children."
Quick Facts:
- There are an estimated 20-30 million people enslaved today (believed to be more than at any point in human history). People forced to work without pay, under threat of violence and unable to walk away.
- Human trafficking is a $32 billion industry; $15.5 billion is made in industrialized countries.
- Between 14,500-17,500 people are trafficked in the USA each year, according to a US State Dept. report.
Source: http://thecnnfreedomproject.blogs.cnn.com/category/the-facts
Recommended Reading
A Crime So Monstrous: Face-to-Face with Modern-Day Slavery by E. Benjamin Skinner (2008)
As Samantha Power and Philip Gourevitch did for genocide, Skinner has done for modern-day slavery. With years of reporting in such places as Haiti, Sudan, India, Eastern Europe, The Netherlands, and, yes, even suburban America, he has produced a vivid testament and moving reportage on one of the great evils of our time.
Decipher this well-known saying and you could win the book of your choice.
For example 'K The B' = kick the bucket.
Wordplays are open to BookBrowse visitors worldwide.
Wordplays usually run for two weeks on an ongoing basis. In each contest one winner will be selected at random from the correct entries. The winner will be notified by email shortly after the draw closes.
This Wordplay will end on Feb 5, 2013.
Please do not use multiple email addresses to submit more than one entry from the same person - this is unfair to other visitors who play by the rules and may lead to disqualification of all entries.
This wordplay ended on 02/5/2013
Past Wordplays | Past Winners | Rules
Question: T S's C Always G B
Answer: The shoemaker's children always go barefoot
Meaning: Often those closest to a person don't benefit from the person's expertise
Source:
The earliest recording of this proverb is in John Heywood's 1546 book of proverbs. A similar sentiment is found in Robert Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy, first published in 1621: "Him that makes shoes go barefoot himself".
Other variants include "the shoemaker's son always goes barefoot" and "the cobbler's children go barefoot." Children or child is sometimes replaced with the more colloquial kids.
Publishing Feb 26
by Jodi Picoult (26 Feb 2013)
480 pages
Publisher: Atria Books
ISBN-13: 9781439102763
Sage Singer is a baker. She works through the night, preparing the day's breads and pastries, trying to escape a reality of loneliness, bad memories, and the shadow of her mother's death. When Josef Weber, an elderly man in Sage's grief support group, begins stopping by the bakery, they strike up an unlikely friendship. Despite their differences, they see in each other the hidden scars that others can't, and they become companions.
Everything changes on the day that Josef confesses a long-buried and shameful secret - one that nobody else in town would ever suspect - and asks Sage for an extraordinary favor. If she says yes, she faces not only moral repercussions, but potentially legal ones as well. With her own identity suddenly challenged, and the integrity of the closest friend she's ever had clouded, Sage begins to question the assumptions and expectations she's made about her life and her family. When does a moral choice become a moral imperative? And where does one draw the line between punishment and justice, forgiveness and mercy?
In this searingly honest novel, Jodi Picoult gracefully explores the lengths we will go in order to protect our families and to keep the past from dictating the future.
- This giveaway closed on January 23, 2013.
Education is the period during which you are being instructed by somebody you do not know, about something you do not want to know.
"Education is the period during which you are being instructed by somebody you do not know, about something you do not want to know."
— Gilbert K. Chesterton
The critic, novelist and poet, Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936), was born in
London, England. He studied at the Slade School of Art before starting to
write. Much of his work was in the form of articles for periodicals,
including his own publication which he took over from his brother in 1916
- originally named The New Witness, he renamed it The G.K. Weekly
in 1925 and edited it up until his death. He is best
known today for his 50 or so short stories about the seemingly benign Father
Brown (who uses his distinctive style of deduction to solve the seemingly
unsolvable - his cherubic face, thick glasses and air of outward confusion
disguising an amazing perspicacity,) which he wrote between 1911 and 1935.
Chesterton converted to Catholism in 1922, after which he devoted much of his
time to writing on religious topics.
According to those who knew him, he had an extraordinary mind. He could
quote entire chapters of Dickens and other authors from memory and proved on a
dare that he remembered the plots of all the 10,000 novels he had evaluated
while working as a publisher's reader. Several of his secretaries reported
that he was able to simultaneously dictate one essay while writing another by
hand on a different subject. He was able to connect ideas by tracing their
logical, philosophical and historical basis, while also projecting their
practical implications for human behavior - his writings are full of such
connections.
He maintained lifelong friendships with many including, to his credit, some of
those who were his antagonists in journalism, including George Bernard Shaw, H.G.
Wells and J.M. Barrie.