After watching Monica Haim’s documentary Awake Zion, a question bounced around in my head like a dub track echo effect: Why don’t more countries have a Minister of Culture? As Haim’s movie so adroitly points out, culture- in this case, music – brings people together like nothing else known to humankind.
If folks as seemingly dissimilar as the Jews and Rastafarians in Awake Zion can gain greater understanding of their shared roots in the Old Testament through reggae, why not try to harness this power of oneness in other ways?
It’s not like this is on some wistful bleeding-heart trip either. Travel in foreign countries for even a brief time and you encounter culture from around the globe seeping into the remotest cracks of the earth’s crust. Look at the permeation of American culture, particularly hip hop.
Kids all over Africa are nuts about Tupac. New MCs are popping up by the hour in countries American school kids can’t even find on a labeled map. Can anyone honestly claim that there isn’t the potential for positive action in hundreds of millions of people around the world listening to and participating in the same music?
With Brazil having Gilberto Gil as Minister of Culture, why can’t the U.S. utilize Chuck D in some official capacity? Why can’t there be a United Nations-style organization in which delegates brainstorm methods for using our growing cultural lingua franca for good? Sure, it would be naïve to think that any amount or quality of music or art is going to erase years of pernicious foreign policy or myopic domestic legislation, but it can help bring people together to affect understanding.
If you don’t believe this is possible, just watch Awake Zion.
– Buck Austin
Awake Zion
Director: Monica Haim
60 minutes
www.awakezion.net