Beyond African religious homophobia: how Christianity is a source of African LGBT activism

The emergence of anti-homosexuality politics in Africa is often explained with reference to religion. Although religion is a major factor in fuelling homophobia in Africa, the Bible and the Christian faith are not only sites of struggle but have also been appropriated by African LGBT activists in support of their cause. Adriaan van Klinken says we need to move beyond a narrow focus on African religious homophobia as religion plays multiple and complex roles in contemporary dynamics of African sexualities

History has become a trump card: historical research and the climate crisis in Southeast Asia

The climate crisis is above all a human crisis, not simply a technical one. Are the sciences of the humanities ready to offer intellectual leadership? This paper makes three suggestions for Indonesian historians to take a guiding role in bringing about a better, more sustainable, happier future for all Indonesians. The first is to write new kinds of histories. Material environmental histories could focus on deforestation and the petroleum industry. Cultural environmental histories could highlight traditional ecological knowledges that once flourished in villages that are today considered “backward.” The second suggestion is to engage in some of the biggest debates the country has ever had about how to achieve a more sustainable future. All these debates are really historical in nature, but only historians have the knowledge to offer a long-term perspective on them. The third suggestion is to dare to be imaginative – to dream of utopias, and not simply to report “facts” as if we ourselves were not part of them. Krisis iklim terutama sekali adalah krisis kemanusiaan, bukanlah krisis teknis. Apakah ilmu-ilmu humaniora siap memberikan kepemimpinan intelektual? Makalah ini mengajukan tiga saran bagi sejarahwan/wati Indonesia yang ingin berperan aktif menawarkan masa depan yang lebih bahagia kepada keluarga besar Indonesia. Yang pertama adalah, tulislah sejarah dalam bentuk baru. Sejarah lingkungan hidup material dapat menyoroti pembabatan hutan atau industri minyak. Sejarah LH budaya bisa fokus kepada kearifan ekologis tradisional di pedesaan dulu, tempat yang kini dianggap “terbelakang.” Saran kedua adalah: terjunlah ke dalam perdebatan paling dahsyat yang akan terdengar di Indonesia, yaitu bagaimana kita dapat mencapai masa depan yang berkelanjutan. Perdebatan ini pada intinya berpijak pada sejarah, dan hanya sejarahwan yang memiliki pengetahuan yang berwibawa untuk bicara tentang jangka panjang. Saran ketiga: beranikanlah diri untuk berimajinasi – untuk bermimpi tentang utopi, tidak hanya melaporkan “fakta” seolah kita berdiri di luar fakta itu

Strategic Audit of Proxibid

Proxibid is a platform for connecting buyers and sellers of high-value items. As part of their continued growth, they are running into issues with the categorization of their goods into their hierarchy since the classification of these items is becoming a monumental task that will become unreasonable for humans to do. They have dedicated employees to manually classify well over 10,000 incoming items into over 2000 categories every week. The bulk of those items come in the later half of the work week. This paper will focus on how to tackle this problem while remaining competitive and preventing future growth from overwhelming them. This is done by attempting to allocate company resources in the best way possible given internal and external factors through SWOT and PEST analysis

Religion, politics and class divisions in Indonesia

It is not easy to tell how significant either group is in today’s politics. On the one hand, the expectation that democratization in 1998 would lead to a rapid increase in the Islamic vote – the Turkish scenario – failed to eventuate. It rose to nearly 40% in 1999 but then declined to less than 30% in 2009, and of that only half or less went to Islamist parties. Polls indicate that the collapse of religious parties continues today.2 On the other hand, transgressive politics are often more religious than formal ones. Indonesia saw a spate of Islamist terror attacks in the early years of democratization; intolerant preaching is normal in most mosques, and aggressive acts against religious minorities and non- Islamic cultural icons continues to grow. Conservative regulations against alcohol and sexual freedoms are formally in place in many districts and provinces around the country (though not always enforced)