some naive questions world history seems to erase details that deep data now needed to be openly grounded on
1 until early 1900 was bengal the most important world trade area in asia at least for the sterling economy at that time the de facto world currency and trade rules- i assume it may have been looking at the map and recognising kolkata was the capital of the whole of british india until 1912?
2 was the reason why britain changed capitals to delhi a defensive one for administering the region not a logical one for maximising positive trades locally to globally
3 was there ever a time when trade with china passed through this region - we know that from the birth of bangladesh the miracle of a billion villagers rising emerged around a coalition between fazle abed and friends in chinese regions facing similar health and starvation and historical inequality of women- in particular this was a revolution in bottom up health services including oral rehydration, and massive immunisation and america's best epidemiologists including james grant and larry brilliant were involved- later when jim kim befriended soros he was surprised to find that bangladesh had solutions eg to tuberculosis that he paul farmer and boson global health movements needed- and soon he found these also extended to first 1000 day nutrition movements too- without this asian ending poverty aka women empowerment never could have scaled -and it is still unclear to me if most of india has operationalised these deep local health service networks
3a when larry brilliant first appointed to google.org he said he had added climate resolution to his overall goals on health and end poverty particularly because bangladesh region with all its low lying deltas would be the earliest loser of ocean warming - is this the case and eg does this also meal kolkata will get flooded out too
3b it seems that between 1900 and 1948 the people who lived in the region we now call bangladesh lost every advantage both their region and their hard work deserved- is this a fair comment or do geographic neighbors see this differently- i understand faiths complicate all this but isnt it time natures rules united peoples and places- is it constitutionally impossible for the un to stand up for this dynamic of livesmatter
4 i keep on hearing about tagore as a cultural hero- did his reach unite peoples or did it segment them
5 because of my family's relationships with gandhi i have tried to understand how the maps of the west coast of india evolved over time but i feel really clueless about india's east coast- in particular was kamala harris' mother region significant in how world history from 1850-1945 onwards evolved- if she had a briefing on her desk from november of what she should know at least to maximise geocultural intelligence of usa and her motherland what would it say
5a ironically the other half of harris' black" lineage is with her father's jamaican origin- in spite of his post as an elderly emeritus professor at stanford she seems to have been estranged from him and so one cannot assume she has and deep knowledge of carribean lives matter either-any comments -give the chaos in usa this winter of peak virus, peak hatred of democrats-republicans, deep data briefings on ethnicities need to bet to the offices of biden and harris in ways that i dont yet see anyone supplying transparently- of course if a university existed where every peoples positive stories were told one might innocently have though un/unicef/unesco/unwomen/unrefugee partnerships could have made that happen by now
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-related readings from this week's newsletters:
IEA Head of Education Dr Stephen Davies recently wrote a briefing paper urging us to resist calls to bail out the sector. Doing so, he said, would simply enable universities to continue as before. Read his briefing paper on reshaping the UK’s Higher Education for the post-pandemic world here.
This sixth episode in our “Speaking of Gandhi” podcast series features stories from Gandhi and Tagore and the inspiration of their writing and actions from the rivers of India and the oceans of the world. Srimati Karuna offers reflections with readings of Tagore from Dr. Sudeshna Basu.
