River and Keynote

A river's colours change -  not obvious unless observed over time.  The Thames, for instance, sometimes muddy brown or metallic silver.  Even blue or ocra. Occasionally clear, but most rarely.  We live about a mile from the river (.8 miles, to be Google) and while the water rarely visible, it is always there. I enjoy it most when jogging my five-mile loop from work to the Hammersmith Bridge then back via the Chiswick Bridge.  Since tidal,  the Thames has some real personality - as extremes, empty and weak (tide OUT), overflowing, washing out my path (tied IN).  The displacement: 70,000 million gallons of water from low to high tide.  But it is the colours that fascinate and suggest a mood - when ebbing, fast moving - so dark or grey(ish).  When flowing, a slower action so .. brown or dirty, like a martini.  The air temperature plays a part, too, and it all mellows into a vibe somehow. Of course the Thames provides London's vital energy and without it, the city would be .. nothing.


Here is Katie's KEYNOTE 2 (Catherine Orenstein):  Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: 500 Years of Sex, Morality, and Stories about  Women: 
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A girl, a wolf, a meeting in the woods.  Who doesn’t know the story?   “Little Red Riding Hood” is one of the best-known tales of all time.  But most people don’t know it as well as they think. Based on Orenstein’s book of the same title, this keynote speech, accompanied by a slide show of historical and contemporary images,  traces the fairy tale through time to reveal our changing ideas about men and women, sex and morality. From the werewolf trials of old Europe (when the story's villain was part of 'true history') to the tales' literary debut as a chastity parable in the 17th century court of Versailles (from whence the term ‘wolf’ to mean a seducer), on up to the sexual symbolism of Madison Avenue ads, the sharp revisions of Anne Sexton’s poetry, modern-day Hollywood film, rock songs, drag theater and even S&M fairy-tale pornography, this talk explores the evolution of one of our most powerful and enduring heroines.  The message of this talk – and of Orenstein’s book – is that the stories we tell surround us, define us, shape history and our future—and at any given moment they can change, or be changed.  The book has been featured on ABC-TV, CNN and NPR, and is under consideration for a TV show. Newsweek magazine called it "revelatory," the Wall Street Journal called it "beguiling," and Naomi Wolf wrote,  "Let us hope that Catherine Orenstein's laid-back, readable brilliance sets the tone for an emerging generation of feminist scholars."