2014 MacArthur 'Genius' Grants Laud Creatives Who 'Improve Our Lives and Better Our World'

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Source: by Andrea Germanos, Common Dreams

Published on Wednesday, September 17, 2014

Fellows include National Domestic Workers Alliance ddirector Ai-jen Poo.

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation on Wednesday announced the newest winners of its "genius" awards," lauding 21 creative individuals it says "improve our lives and better our world."

Among the 2014 MacArthur Fellows are cartoonist and graphic memoirist Alison Bechdel, jazz composer and saxophonist Steve Coleman, poet-translator Khaled Mattawa, civil rights lawyer Mary L. Bonauto and labor organizer Ai-jen Poo.

Poo is director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, an organization that advocates for fair treatment and protections for the country's domestic workers. As the organization states on its website: "Domestic workers care for the things we value the most: our families and our homes." They "deserve respect, dignity and basic labor protections."

"I am so honored to be among the Class of 2014 MacArthur Fellows," Poo said in a prepared statement. "I am humbled to see my name among visionaries whose work is transforming our world."

Read more: http://www.commondreams.org/news/2014/09/17/2014-macarthur-genius-grants-laud-creatives-who-improve-our-lives-and-better-our

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1. My kids' generation seems most enthusiastic about Alison Bechdel

Ever hear of the Bechdel test?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/09/17/alison-bechdel-just-won-a-macarthur-foundation-genius-grant-shes-already-changed-the-way-we-talk-about-film/

With one test, cartoonist Alison Bechdel changed the way we think about and discuss film.

In her comic strip, “Dykes to Watch Out For,” which ran from 1983 to 2008, she offered a basic metric used to illustrate just how male-dominated the film industry actually is.

The test, which Bechdel coined in 1985 in a strip titled “The Rule,” consists of three questions which set a baseline not for gender parity, but for the simple inclusion of women in a film in any meaningful way:

1) Does it have two female characters?

2) Who talk to each other?

3) About something other than a man?

If the answer to all three questions is yes, the film passes the Bechdel test. The concept has made the jump from mostly feminist circles to the mainstream as a bare-bones indicator of women’s roles in film.