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By Our Readers & R.O. Blechman

This article appeared in the July 21, 2008 edition of The Nation.

July 1, 2008

Empire's Tower of Babel

Bloomfield Township, Mich.

I enjoyed R.O. Blechman's June 23 "Comix Nation" cartoon, "Calcutta 2010," for its humor--intended and unintended. Blechman seems to have unintentionally participated in the hubris of empire even as he poked fun at it. He has a Calcuttan asking, "Why can't these Americans speak proper Hindi?" But the language of Calcutta is Bengali, spoken by more than 204 million people. It's like calling a cartoon "Paris 2010" and asking, "Why can't these Americans speak proper German?"

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About R.O. Blechman

R.O. Blechman has recently completed a children's book about a housefly. more...
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