American History

[nytempsperdu]

As it happens, I do share a characteristic with Deborah in that my mother died when I was 6 mo. old and I have almost no information about her.  I thought Skloot did a beautiful job of making the reader understand Deborah and others in the family/community, but I can't personalize that enough to imagine my own reaction to learning anything like what Deborah learned about her mother, there are just too many differences.  I do hope I would arrive at a state of mind like hers when she said "Like I'm always telling my brothers, if you gonna go into history, you can't do it with a hate attitude.  You got to remember times was different." (p. 276)

But the questions the Skloot book raised for me were of a different kind altogether, such as
Who owns our bodies and at what age does ownership vest?  Does the concept of ownership apply to tissue, cells, DNA?   What about tissue extracted in medical procedures, medical waste, body waste?   Hey, what if something beneficial to humankind was found present in body waste--do the public sewage systems have ownership once we flush? HA!  And what if it were not waste products but breast milk, or something common to all humans but the beneficial kind was only present in a particular group?   Some serious socio-economic-political hoo-hah there!!! 

Wake up out there you sci-fi writers, filmmakers!!!!

As for the individual vs. the group, if ownership applies, does the individual have the right to assert such, and perhaps deny access to those who could use them to make something useful/beneficial/necessary to the general welfare.  What power would the state have to compel the individual to surrender the cells/tissues/body product in the public interest?    

See what keeps me occupied when I'm sleepless?

[weezo]

NYTemp,

Our subconscious minds are quite a distance apart! Once I'm done with something, it is no longer mine. Yet, I feel that the researchers could have learned the deep poverty Henrietta Lack's descendants lived in and offered the family a banquet on the yacht now and then .... Seriously, lifetime service at Johns Hopkins would be a welcome prize for having the Mom with the Mostest!

Speaking of mostest, Archway, Iced Molasses, soft snacking cookies...... addictive!

[madupont]

Maddie, it is Miss Anne  not Miss Ann .... Miss Ann is my friend in Buffalo.

I would not be doing fair by my web audience if I did not check out if the family wants to be kept abreast of what is going on.

There is more than one way to "do" history. Yes, read as many books as interest you. Check for further information online. But sometimes you gotta get you boots muddy and tread the ground.

No, but you may have forgotten telling us that you  are Anne Pemberton.  Miss Ann, however, is something else. In case you never heard the expression, perhaps you better know it before you go calling.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZuEc-nFULY8&feature=related

[bosox18d]

So Mad goes on ignore with the other wack job asshole.Have fun.

[weezo]

Maddie, it is Miss Anne  not Miss Ann .... Miss Ann is my friend in Buffalo.

No, but you may have forgotten telling us that you  are Anne Pemberton.  Miss Ann, however, is something else. In case you never heard the expression, perhaps you better know it before you go calling.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZuEc-nFULY8&feature=related

Funny, but what does this have to do with American History in literature?

What you DON'T know about African American culture in southside VA would fill volumes.

[Westwood]

One more from the grand old man.

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/news/after-keeping-us-waiting-for-a-century-mark-twain-will-finally-reveal-all-1980695.html

[madupont]

Maddie, it is Miss Anne  not Miss Ann .... Miss Ann is my friend in Buffalo.

No, but you may have forgotten telling us that you  are Anne Pemberton.  Miss Ann, however, is something else. In case you never heard the expression, perhaps you better know it before you go calling.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZuEc-nFULY8&feature=related

Funny, but what does this have to do with American History in literature?

What you DON'T know about African American culture in southside VA would fill volumes.

Gee, whiz, weezie,  Since when is this American History in literature? Could have fooled me. We used to have an American History forum, to which was added "a World History forum" here at Melba.  But ....

since, you can't take a joke, of the traditional kind as told by people who told the jokes because they invented them, let's be clear. Before Melba, when you were busy educating people and I didn't know your butt from broadside, at the nytimes.com Books Forums, we had an African-American Literature forum in which some of the people here were participants: Thanatopsy, Hegemony who did med.work in Africa and was a friend of the person you refer to as Incadove who of course also had a real name under which she posted at nytimes.com; then there was qpowellx whom I knew that I could rely on as to changes in politicians infighting the way mere posters do here as if the Black Caucus wouldn't be here tomorrow because some idiot at FOX promised you that too shall come to pass; the veritable expert, in literature and music from Mosley to Baldwin back to Wright, was Red (which is skin-tone; not a political euphemism from the past).

But if you need any help in your expertise about "southside Virginia". I know a resident who joined the military like her Dad from whom she inherits much more land that makes yours look like what it does who could surely straighten you out.
                                            Which name should I use to sign out?
Oh, I know, Guns and Roses to you too!

[madupont]

Don't worry, Westwood, it must be something in the water....

My own theory about the missing posters, who supposedly wrote imaginative letters to Pugetopolis, might have more to do with figuring out how to boycott Arizona.  The lies that get told here at escape... are bigger than Burl Ives waistline when he pronounced, "Mendacity!".

[madupont]

nytempsperdu,
Does the concept of ownership apply to tissue, cells, DNA?   What about tissue extracted in medical procedures, medical waste, body waste? 

As a matter of fact, they go from pathology lab. on a cart to the incinerator.

A friend of mine, back when I was transcribing in about 1980, for the record of the diagnosis and findings from the tissue samples which was now medical waste, was a woman of our age  who was part of the new movement of Feminist artists ala Judy Chicago.

When she showed me her latest developments for an installation she was doing in a co-op gallery, there were various packets in different sizes suspended by thread and hanging from the top piece of the structure. I noted a certain gruesome pink not fading through but enwrapped in the gauze , which reminded me of the disposal cart that gets topped with some heavy gauge plastic before it reaches the incinerator. The boy who had this job of pushing the cart had neither gloves nor mask as worn in the laboratory.  I wondered had I actually described this in detail to Carolyn?

[Lhoffman]

I think in the case of Harriet, that they didn't go to the incinerator.   

All cells, tissue, DNA doesn't go to the incinerator, some is used for research.   The question related to the Skloot book and Henrietta Lacks is whether permission is now required.   I haven't read the book.   Perhaps this question was part of Skloots purpose in writing it?

[weezo]

Skloots purpose was to bring the story of these cells to our consciousness. Probably most people alive have benefited from the research provided by Henrietta's cells. Depending on how FIL does in surgery Tuesday, I may go  out to Clover on Thursday.

[madupont]

I think in the case of Harriet, that they didn't go to the incinerator.  

All cells, tissue, DNA doesn't go to the incinerator, some is used for research.   The question related to the Skloot book and Henrietta Lacks is whether permission is now required.   I haven't read the book.   Perhaps this question was part of Skloots purpose in writing it?

That was my point exactly. The research had already been done on the tissue in question which was on the way to the incinerator. This was why it was submitted to Pathology Laboratory

I realize this was about Henrietta Lacks, as the topic was rather well covered in press and posts other than here.

[weezo]

I think in the case of Harriet, that they didn't go to the incinerator.  

All cells, tissue, DNA doesn't go to the incinerator, some is used for research.   The question related to the Skloot book and Henrietta Lacks is whether permission is now required.   I haven't read the book.   Perhaps this question was part of Skloots purpose in writing it?

That was my point exactly. The research had already been done on the tissue in question which was on the way to the incinerator. This was why it was submitted to Pathology Laboratory

I realize this was about Henrietta Lacks, as the topic was rather well covered in press and posts other than here.

What tissue are you saying was "on the way to the incinerator"? If that's what you got from the "press and other posts", you didn't get facts!

READ THE BOOK!!!!!

[Lhoffman]

Here's a documentary made by Adam Curtis for the BBC on the topic. 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/2010/06/the_undead_henrietta_lacks_and.html

[weezo]

Here's a documentary made by Adam Curtis for the BBC on the topic. 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/2010/06/the_undead_henrietta_lacks_and.html

Thanks, Laurie,

Looks like the link has some additions to what I put on her Famous Americans page. After all this hoopla, I hope Henrietta Lacks, born in Lynchburg, VA, grew up in Clover, VA, will be added to the Virginia SOLs next revision.

One of the more interesting stories I read since her tombstone was put in place (which I didn't find on my visits to two cemetaries in Clover several weeks ago), was that a great-great nephew, of the Pleasants name, was in med school learning about the HeLa cells and realized he was kin to her!