Danica 4-9-10

Today was my last mandatory at PEN. Today was very interesting because we used our learning to help PEN and actually be a part of what PEN does. Josh, Catherine, Nathaniel and I went to the PEN American Center offices without knowing what we were going to do, but basically willing to do anything. Stacy Leigh spoke to us about what we wee going to do and what impact it would have on the people around us. Stacy told us about two events that PEN had had in the past couple of weeks. The first event was a speech and discussion with Professor Taric Ramadan, the other was an event devoted to writing that breaks boundaries. We were to listen to the audio pod casts of one of these events and pick out the key information within the audio to post on PEN’s website. These little tid-bits were being posted to not only promote people to listen to the pod cast, but they were also used to pin point moments in the audio where there was a certain topic of discussion. We were split up by audio recordings. Josh and Nathaniel had the event about writing that broke boundaries, while Catherine and I listened to Professor Ramadan’s speech and discussions with other writers. Professor Ramadan was denied access to the United States by the Bush Administration because he was muslim. Fear overcame America after 9/11 but that should not give the nation the right to get rid of a culture. Professor Ramadan has recently been given access to the nation and this event was his first on American soil. He discussed the differences between Western Muslims and European Muslims and how after 9/11 it was us vs. them (them being the muslims). Basically Professor Ramadan was addressing what Bush truly meant “Here is the problem with Muslims”. Professor Ramadan wants to change the mindset from perceptions to facts and figures. The Professor wants change, but healthy and progressive change. He doesn’t want the world to think “the muslim presence is a threat to society”. There are two lines that particularly struck me. First Professor Ramadan said” we are advocating a new ‘we’, look at this room, muslims, non-muslims, jews, christians, we have a common future”. He bluntly told the world, we are together now, this is what the world should be like. The other quotation I would like to share is also from Professor Ramadan “There is a lack of knowledge. There is a lack of memory, because we are scared of the present and reducing the past”. This audio pod cast is an hour long so I could only listen to Professor Ramadan’s speech, but it was powerful. I’m so glad I was able to listen to this speech and if you would like to go to pen.org and it should be on the homepage.