Statues of Libertad Grandmother’s hands all feel the same when they reach that certain age: smooth, dry, papery with a hint of invisible talcum powder. And the questions that we would ask them as they approach the end are perhaps universals with our grandmothers, abuelas, setis, and so forth. What answers to what questions that would keep the link intact from generation to generation from the first grandmother. Viviana wrote about her grandmother in the English as a Second Language class … The teacher had said that you should ask “What is your ethnic origin?” rather than “Where are you from?” He wrote that Wittgenstein played chess, insisting that it was not a “Game.”
The next assignment was tougher …. Semantic Categorization of America …. It would be an A + paper following the Sidharrtha paper … The Irish student wrote ….. At first glance, nothing seemed objectional about Carl Sagan … but the pervasive faithlessness began to astonound …. The scientific pronouncments that religion is “nonsense” seemed to invite Biblical arrogance ….. Constructing America As an idea, a primitive semantic category, a paradise ….. that would have been invented even if there were no twin continents with a wasp like connection in Panama …