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By Caitlin Tyler-Richards

It’s been awhile, but the Oral History Review on OUPblog podcast is back! Today’s episode features OHR contributors Drs. Linda Crane and Tracy McDonough answering OHR Managing Editor Troy Reeves’s questions about the Schizophrenia Oral History Project and their article, “Living with Schizophrenia: Coping, Resilience, and Purpose,” which appears in the most recent Oral History Review. This interview sets the record for our shortest podcast, clocking in at 9 minutes, 30 seconds. But what it lack in quantity it makes up for in quality!

Professor Emeritus Lynda L. Crane, PhD, and Associate Professor Tracy A. McDonough, PhD, are in the Department of Psychology at the Mount St. Joseph University in Cincinnati, Ohio. Over the last several years, they have created an oral history project of life stories of persons with schizophrenia. Their website, Facebook page, and Twitter feed are all ways to learn more about and connect to their work.

The Oral History Review, published by the Oral History Association, is the U.S. journal of record for the theory and practice of oral history. Its primary mission is to explore the nature and significance of oral history and advance understanding of the field among scholars, educators, practitioners, and the general public. Follow them on Twitter at @oralhistreview, like them on Facebook, add them to your circles on Google Plus, follow them on Tumblr, listen to them on Soundcloud, or follow their latest OUPblog posts via email or RSS to preview, learn, connect, discover, and study oral history.

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The post Schizophrenia and oral history appeared first on OUPblog.

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Hello all! I wanted to let you know about my latest work hanging at the very wonderful Moden Eden gallery in San Francisco, CA! I was lucky enough to be part of their latest group show, "Myth," and returned to a subject I find myself coming back to time and time again; the Japanese folktale The Crane Wife.

I didn't get to post about the opening reception back on July 14th, but luckily, there is a closing reception in conjunction with North Beach First Fridays on Friday, August 3, 2012.   The closing reception will be held at 403 Francisco Street from 6-9pm.

Facebook event invite here!
http://www.facebook.com/events/449331605088376/

Thanks everyone! : D <3
www.daisychurch.com

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Yesterday's poem involved Shakespeare's statements about the immortality of his verse. Hubris? Maybe, but it seems to have proven true. Today's poem looks, however, at the flip side. Known best for his realistic prose, including The Red Badge of Courage, one of the texts that was (and still is) widely read in U.S. high schools, Stephen Crane also wrote poems (that he referred to as "lines" - think, perhaps, of Wordsworth's "Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey", and one can readily see that the use of the word "lines" to discuss poetry isn't his alone).

A Man Said to the Universe
by Stephen Crane

A man said to the universe:
“Sir, I exist!
“However,” replied the universe,
“The fact has not created in me
“A sense of obligation.”

Form: Free verse. No fixed metrical pattern or rhyme scheme.

Discussion: It's small, but it packs a wallop, does it not? The man goes with a simple declarative sentence, and the universe answers back with a rather more complicated sort of response. What is the point of the man's statement? Is he simply trying to get a bit of attention, or is he trying for something more? Is he trying to establish some sort of authority? And how does he expect the universe to respond? Probably not the way it does.

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I had to get a new A/C Unit installed at my Mom’s townhouse yesterday so we can sell the house. The Unit is on the roof, making it very tricky to maneuver - thus the crane. Naturally I brought my camera. It was a perfectly sunny day…

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Ok, so, I finally checked out JacketFlap and it's totally eaten my life. Holy Cow. You should check it out too. It'll eat your life as well, but in a good way. Basically, it aggregates all those kidlit blogs out there in one handy place. Holy Cow.

Apparently, Chasing Ray has instigated the first Monday of the month as overlooked book day. I couldn't think of any unblogged overlooked books. It's crunch time with school and my brain, she has stopped working.

So! Instead! I'm blogging about 2 books about an overlooked slice of history, and that is the European Jewish refugee settlement in Shanghai during WWII. Because Shanghai was a free port, you didn't need papers and its doors stayed open long after most of the world stopped accepting Jews trying to escape Hitler. (You did, however, need papers to get out of Europe.)

Ten Green Bottles: The True Story of One Family's Journey from War-torn Austria to the Ghettos of Shanghai by Vivian Jeanette Kaplan is the story of the author's mother's escape from Vienna. Offering stunning portrait of pre-war Vienna, one is struck by how quickly things happened in shutting down Jewish life, and how much of it occurred before Kristelnacht. Once in Shanghai, one is also struck by the sheer poverty of the people--both native and refugee. When you read or think of Shanghai, especially during the 30s and 40s, you have images of swanky nightclubs, Chinese jazz, and communists having secret meetings. (Or, rather, that's what I think of when I think of Shanghai during this time period.)

But the Austrians set up a little Vienna and Nini survives-- even marrying and buying part of a bar. Then the Japanese take control of the city and force all the Jews to the Hongkew ghetto, which they are not allowed to leave. News is scarce and as WWII winds down, rumors of extermination plot are rife. Then, once the war is over and they're free, it's time for the Communist Revolution and once again, the survivors need to find a place to live.

What's most striking about this book is the portrait of Vienna--especially the juxtaposition of Nini's cafe culture and political discussions with her friends and the proper uptightness of the female relatives in her mother's living room.

Nini doesn't interact much with the Chinese people in Shanghai and doesn't speak about them much outside small mentions of her horror at their poverty and the corpses left to rot, or freeze, depending on the season. This is distressing, but understandable as her fight for survival doesn't allow for this interaction. There are also a few minor historical misstatements-- she has Paris falling to the Nazis in May of 1940, when really it was June (ooo! shamless plug for one of my favorite books, Suite Française).

The book is written in the first person present tense, which at first seems a really odd choice, but works as the story unfolds, and adds an immediacy to the language in the plot as Nini's world crumbles around her in horror. I highly recommend.

A fictional YA-level account of the same time period is Shanghai Shadows by Lois Ruby. Ilse Shpann is also from Vienna, but the bulk of her story takes place in China, not Austria. Ilse is younger and better-off than Nini and it shows. Nini is almost an adult when she goes to Shanghai--Ilse is, IIRC, twelve. And it shows. Like Esperanza from Esperanza Rising, Ilse is a brat that really grated on me. And she should be a brat--a girl this age who is used to a high end lifestyle and forced to live a very poor lifestyle is going to throw a fit now and then.

This has a more exciting plot than mere survival. Because of Ilse's age, she's not involved in the day-to-day decisions that her parents have to make to survive. Ilse spends a lot more time exploring Shanghai and gets involved in the resistance. There is also more information about the life led by non-Jewish foreigners.

What this book lacks is a strong sense of place, which Ten Green Bottles has in spades. Ruby's Shanghai is generically Chinese--you don't get a solid sense of Shanghai (which has a weird architecture) or the time period. I was confused on how her mother was able to study at Cal Berkeley, because for a long time, American universities had quotas on how many Jewish people they could let in, and I was curious on how that would have affected her chances...

One major bone to pick comes with the language. Some background: Standard Mandarin, or putonghua is based on the Beijing (northern) accent. This involves sticking a lot of "r" sounds on the end of words. Shanghai has its own dialect, Shanghaiese, which is crazy, but counts seperately from Standard Mandarin as one of the most widely spoken languages in the world.

Now, Ilse learns Chinese on the streets from her urchin friend. She would have learned Shanghaiese, so when she utters Xihu zai nar (Where is West Lake?), I cringe. This is perfect textbook Mandarin. Nar doesn't exsist outside northern China except in textbooks. Even non-Shanghaiese general Mandarin woudld be Na li in the South--Xihu zai na li. Gargh.

But all of a sudden, it is July, here's a rundown on the major events of the month in my world:

July 4: Holiday! No work! Final exam due! no fireworks for me :(
July 6: Amazon's projected delivery date for Love Is a Many Trousered Thing!
July 11: Final Project/Presention due! Last day of class! Harry Potter Movie!
July 14-15: See Harry Potter movie!
July 16: First day of class!
July 19: Harry Potter party at work
July 21: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
July 25: Amazon's projected delivery date for Thursday Next: First Among Sequels!
July 27: GOLDEN BIRTHDAY! (For those not from the MidWest, I'm turning 27)

*phew* And then August involves a trip to Wisonsin, and one to Iowa. State Fair, HERE I COME!

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