4,400-year-old shaman's 'snake staff' discovered in Finland

Researchers said the carved, wooden lifelike snake matches “magical” staffs portrayed in ancient rock art from the region.

Archaeologists in Finland have unearthed a 4,000-year-old life-size wooden carving of a snake believed to be a ritual staff of a Neolithic shaman.

Satu Koivisto

June 29, 2021
By Tom Metcalfe

A 4,400-year-old life-size wooden snake unearthed in Finland may have been a staff used in “magical” rituals by a Stone Age shaman, according to a study released Monday.

The lifelike figurine, which was carved from a single piece of wood, is 21 inches long and about an inch thick at its widest, with what seems to be a very snake-like head with its mouth open.

It was found perfectly preserved in a buried layer of peat near the town of Järvensuo, about 75 miles northwest of Helsinki, at a prehistoric wetland site that archaeologists think was occupied by Neolithic (late Stone Age) peoples 4,000 to 6,000 years ago.

It’s unlike anything else ever found in Finland, although a few stylized snake figurines have been found at Neolithic archaeological sites elsewhere in the eastern Baltic region and Russia.

“They don’t resemble a real snake, like this one,” University of Turku archaeologist Satu Koivisto said in an email. “My colleague found it in one of our trenches last summer. … I thought she was joking, but when I saw the snake’s head it gave me the shivers.”

“Personally I do not like living snakes, but after this discovery I have started to like them,” she added.

The wooden carving of a snake is unlike anything else ever found in Finland.

Satu Koivisto

Koivisto and her colleague Antti Lahelma, an archaeologist at the University of Helsinki, are the co-authors of the study on the wooden snake published in the journal Antiquity.

They think it may have been a staff used in supposedly magical rituals by a shaman — someone who communicated with spirits in a similar way to the “medicine people” of traditional Native American lore.

It’s thought the ancient peoples of this region practiced such shamanic beliefs, in which the natural world is inhabited by multitudes of usually unseen supernatural spirits or ghosts — a traditional belief that persists today in some of the remote northern regions of Scandinavia, Europe and Asia.

Ancient rock art from Finland and northern Russia shows human figures with what look like snakes in their hands, which are thought to be portrayals of shamans wielding ritual staffs of wood carved to look like snakes. Lahelma said snakes were regarded as especially sacred in the region.

“There seems to be a certain connection between snakes and people,” Lahelma told Antiquity. “This brings to mind northern shamanism of the historical period, where snakes had a special role as spirit-helper animals of the shaman … Even though the time gap is immense, the possibility of some kind of continuity is tantalizing: Do we have a Stone Age shaman's staff?”

Archaeologists work at an excavation site in Finland.

Satu Koivisto

The figurine from Järvensuo certainly looks like a real snake. Its slender body is formed by two sinuously carved bends that continue to a tapered tail. The flat, angular head with its open mouth is especially realistic. Koivisto and Lahelma suggest it resembles a grass snake or European adder in the act of slithering or swimming away. The place where it was found was probably a lush water meadow at the time when it was “lost, discarded or intentionally deposited,” the researchers wrote.

Wood usually rots away when exposed to oxygen in the air or water, but sediments at the bottoms of swamps, rivers and lakes can cover some organic objects and preserve them for thousands of years.

The site near Järvensuo is thought to have been on the shores of a shallow lake when it was inhabited by groups of people in the late Stone Age. Recent excavations have yielded a trove of organic remains that have enabled archaeologists to create a more complete record of the site, Koivisto said. The finds have included a wooden tool with a handle shaped like a bear, wooden paddles and fishnet floats made of pine and birch bark.

“What a remarkable thing,” said Peter Rowley-Conwy, an archaeologist and professor emeritus of Durham University in the United Kingdom, who was not involved in the research. “The ‘head’ appears definitely to have been carved to shape.”

But he was cautious about ascribing greater meaning to it: “A skeptic might wonder whether the sinuous shape was deliberate, or an accidental result of four millennia of waterlogging,” he said in an email. “I have worked on various bog sites with preserved wood, and wood fragments can be considerably distorted.”

Koivisto warns that artifacts like the “snake staff” may be lost as many wetland archaeological sites dry up.

“Wetlands are more important to us than ever before, because of their vulnerability and degradation of fragile organic data sources [from] drainage, land use and climate change,” she said “We have to hurry, before these valuable materials will be gone for good.”

Shamanism Endures In Both Koreas — But In The North, Shamans Risk Arrest Or Worse

ANTHONY KUHN

NPR

May 8, 20217:01 AM ET

Shaman Jeong Soon-deok (center) dances during the initiation ceremony for a new shaman (left) at a temple in Seoul.

Anthony Kuhn/NPR

SEOUL — The cold light of winter shines down on a hillside temple in Seoul. It gleams on the billowing red, yellow and blue robes of shaman Jeong Soon-deok, as she twirls in circles. It glints off the ceremonial knives, bells and fans she waves through the air.

The man standing before her in simple white robes is her newest initiate. Jeong's aim is to throw open the doors of the spirit world so the gods of sun, moon and mountains and the spirits of ancestors and children may enter him.

An estimated 50,000 shamanic ceremonies are held each year in greater Seoul, according to Kim Dong-kyu, a scholar of religion at Sogang University. Some South Koreans see shamanism — which predates Buddhism and Christianity — as a vibrant cultural treasure, while others consider it a primitive embarrassment to their modern, cosmopolitan society. But its appeal endures — in North Korea, too, where it is illegal.

Shamanic rituals are intended to bring good harvests, help villages or communities prosper and assist the souls of the dead in their journey into the afterlife. Shamans tell fortunes based on the Chinese calendar system and communication with the spirit world. They help clients choose names for children, serve as matchmakers and pick auspicious dates for weddings, moving house or opening businesses.

During a break in the ceremony, Jeong reports that this initiation is going smoothly.

"When we were welcoming the heavenly spirits of the sun and moon, they descended to him in the form of light," she explains.

Parts of the ritual, known in Korean as naerim-gut, are accompanied by singing or the playing of drums, gongs and wind instruments — sometimes fast and raucous, at other times slow and hypnotic. Jeong says the bells she uses have a special significance.

Shaman Jeong Soon-deok holds up a fan, bells and other ceremonial objects during an initiation ceremony at a temple in Seoul.

Anthony Kuhn/NPR

"The sound of the bells awakens the universe," she explains. "It also symbolizes the opening of the gate of words for the shaman."

That's the climax of the ceremony, when one spirit finally possesses and speaks through the shaman. This can take some time, and the initiation ceremonies are often all-day affairs with plenty of eating and socializing. Some temples have several ceremonies in progress at the same time.

Kim says shamanism, combining elements of animism, ancestor worship and folk religion, seeks to explain both natural and supernatural influences on human life.

"When someone suffers, there can be two explanations," he says. "One is that it's the ancestors or spirits that are intervening and inflicting pain. The other is that it's the person's destiny to suffer."

North Koreans rely on shamans for similar reasons, Kim says. But they must do so in secret.

"In South Korea, shamanistic rituals are visually flashy and involve a lot of sound," he says, "whereas in the North, from what I've heard, they are very small-scale and quieter."

In fact, shamanism in the North is completely underground and without formal organization, defectors and rights groups report. Practitioners can be jailed, sent to reeducation and labor camps or executed for taking part in what's considered an illegal superstition.

Shaman Jeong Soon-deok (rear) performs ritual purification of a new shaman during an initiation ceremony at a temple in Seoul.

Anthony Kuhn/NPR

A survey of religious persecution in North Korea released last October by the U.K.-based Korea Future Initiative found that 56 of 273 documented victims of persecution were believers in shamanism.

The State Department reported "an apparent continued increase in shamanistic practices, including in Pyongyang" in its 2018 report on religious freedom in North Korea, noting that "authorities continued to react by taking measures against the practice of shamanism... Defector reports cited an increase in party members consulting fortunetellers in order to gauge the best time to defect."

Because North Korean shamans who hold rituals risk being discovered and arrested, some "shamans there simply do fortune-telling," Kim says, "which can still be effective in explaining the reasons for clients' problems."

Lee Ye-joo told fortunes in North Korea before defecting to the South in 2006 at age 33. She now lives in Chungnam province, south of Seoul.

Participants clean up following a shamanic initiation ceremony at a temple in Seoul.

Anthony Kuhn/NPR

When she was 12, Lee began studying a book of divination called the Four Pillars of Destiny, based on the Chinese calendar system. She began telling fortunes eight years later.

"All people who came to me were officials," she recalls.

Because ordinary North Koreans "don't even have enough to eat, the only people who seek out fortune-tellers are those with money, like big-name officials," she explains. "They usually ask when they might lose their job or who their children should marry."

Lee built up her clientele surreptitiously, by word of mouth. She had to be careful not to get caught, she says — but then again, so did her clients.

"They were all linked to other officials who introduced me to them," she says. "So if one of them got me into trouble, I could tell on all the others."

Telling fortunes didn't pay well, so she turned to trading. She says she bought and smuggled goods out of a special trade zone to sell, often making a perilous trek through the mountains to evade authorities.

"What a relief it is not having to carry a knife," she exclaims. "In North Korea, when you carry a bundle of money, you always have to carry a knife, so you don't get robbed."

Her journey out of North Korea was harrowing. Human traffickers sold her into a marriage in China, which she later escaped. But she says her ordeal was worth it.

Lee Ye-joo, a defector from North Korea, speaks during an interview at her home in Chungnam Province, South Korea. She worked as a fortune teller in the North, where, she says, "the only people who seek out fortune-tellers are those with money, like big-name officials. They usually ask when they might lose their job or who their children should marry." She is training to be a shaman in the South.

Anthony Kuhn/NPR

"It's so good to live in this country," she says. "You can make money at 3 or 5 in the morning, if you just try. I'm in this great world now."

But since arriving in the South, she's had some health problems that have been hard to pinpoint.

"I'd been feeling unwell for about five years, and the hospitals couldn't diagnose the problem," she says. "So I visited a shaman and was told that the spirit has entered my body, the spirit of my grandmother."

The only cure for this shinbyeong, or spiritual ailment, was for her to formally become a shaman herself.

So now Lee is preparing for her own initiation. She believes this will help her tell fortunes more accurately. Her spiritual strength as a shaman will depend on her link with her grandmother, so workers are building a temple outside her house dedicated to her grandmother's spirit.

Just as North Korean defectors begin new lives in the South, becoming a shaman is also seen as a kind of spiritual rebirth. As both a defector and a shaman in training, that puts Lee in the unusual position of being born again — and again.

Se Eun Gong contributed to this report in Seoul.

Emperor moths in the rock art of the Namib Desert shed new light on shamanic ritual

Emperor moth cocoon rattles on the ankles of a ritual dancer, Kalahari, 1959. 

Jurgen Schadeberg, courtesy Claudia Schadeberg via Rock Art Research Institute, Wits University

December 15, 2021 9.33am EST

Not every archaeological discovery is made by opening the tomb of a long dead king. Indeed, some important finds seem inconsequential at first. Such as ostrich feathers stained with ochre, a leather bag containing emperor moth cocoons and a strange vessel made from the cranium of an African wild dog I unearthed from a sterile layer at Falls Rock Shelter. The site lies just below the summit of the remote Dâures (or Brandberg) massif in the desert region of western Namibia.

Perplexed, I consigned these finds, first buried 4,500 years ago, to a box beneath my desk. They lay there for another 40 years until, in a flash of realisation, I saw that the emperor moth cocoons were pierced to be strung as rattles worn around the ankles of a shaman in ritual dance.

As set out in my new book Namib – the archaeology of an African desert, these delicate, brittle things were to provide a new understanding of shamanic ritual performance as depicted in the rock art in Namibia and elsewhere in southern Africa.

The role of the shaman as a ritual specialist and healer among southern African hunter-gatherer societies is known mainly from rock art depictions. Until now, no archaeological evidence of shamanic ritual paraphernalia had been discovered in southern Africa.

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A new era

When I excavated the site, rock art studies had just entered an exciting new era. They left behind antiquarian musings for a theoretically rigorous approach. This was informed by modern anthropology and the great trove of late 1800s historical ethnographic material on the inhabitants of the region compiled by the German linguist Wilhelm Bleek.

Read more: South Africa's bandit slaves and the rock art of resistance

Scholars were able to offer detailed and convincing explanations of mysterious rituals in which shamans drew upon supernatural sources of potency to heal, guide and protect their people. Paintings which had seemed inexplicable – some were dismissed as irrational fantasies – yielded their meaning. The spiritual world of southern African hunter-gatherer opened to enquiry.

Many puzzles remained, of course, but some rock paintings offered such depths of insight that one even became known as the Rosetta Stone of rock art studies. The key to deciphering the rock art was the trance dance, a public ritual in which the shaman achieved a state of altered consciousness through rhythmic dancing, accompanied by clapping and singing.
Evidence from the Namib Desert

Southern African scholars argue that rock art and shamanic practice was not hidden: it was open for all to see. An egalitarian hunter-gatherer society had no place for specialist ritual practitioners. Other shamanic traditions are described by scholars of religion as essentially “polyphase”. This means having a phase of occultation, when the shaman is hidden or concealed, followed by his emergence or reappearance.

Shaman figure enveloped in an animal skin cloak, Snake Rock, Dâures massif. Joris Komen

Namib Desert rock art has many hidden sites, including paintings in dark crevices that cannot admit more than one person. These sites were part of a preparatory process which preceded a ritual performance. A striking feature of the rock art is its highly individualised figures, clearly shamans, overwhelmingly male and replete with specialised ritual equipment, including fly whisks, moth cocoon dancing rattles and long animal skin cloaks almost concealing the body. Significantly, these figures are not shown as participating in communal trance dance.

The evidence suggests that shamans in the Namib were individual specialists who travelled from place to place. They prepared themselves for ritual action in places of physical seclusion, rather than during the large communal trance dance events that rock art scholars have insisted were the fundamental social mechanism for trance experience throughout this region.

Enigmatically, no trace of ritual paraphernalia had been found elsewhere in southern Africa. This has led scholars to suggest that there probably were no such items and that the rock art represents concepts such as power and control rather than actual items of material culture.

So, what of the emperor moth dancing rattles? Are they no more than an unusual and accidental find, adding a little texture to our understanding of the rock art? On the contrary, they show that occultation, as an element of performance not previously considered by scholars of the region, is of fundamental importance to an understanding of the art and ritual practice of southern African hunter-gatherers. The rattles expose a critical weakness in conventional explanations.
The emperor moth dancing rattles

Moth cocoons with small pebbles placed inside and strung about the lower limbs, issue a characteristic rustling sound, a rhythmic accompaniment to the ritual dance. Their significance goes much further, for the cocoon represents the stage of occultation when the moth larva is hidden from view. The moth itself is the emergent stage represented by the dancing shaman: once hidden, now apparent.

Emergent emperor moths with extended wings, Naib ravine, Dâures massif. Rodney Lichtman

Paintings of emperor moths are rare but those in the Dâures massif are shown with the wings extended as in the emergent stage. The painted moth represents the shaman with his knee-length animal hide cloak which resembles the wings. The cocoon rattle, the moth and the cloaked shaman thus combine the two essential stages of ritual performance: concealment and reappearance.

Cloaked figures are, of course, not confined to the rock art of the Namib Desert. The fact that they occur over much of southern Africa shows that they refer to a basic trope in this ritual tradition, overlooked until now.

The occultation and emergence of the emperor moth has further ramifications, too. It explains the importance of physical seclusion, such as in the deep rock crevices found in the desert, as sites of ritual preparation from which the shaman emerges to perform his work. It also explains why the cocoons and other ritual items were buried at the site; these are objects imbued with supernatural potency and therefore kept hidden, in a state of latency, lest their powers be misused.

Now we see that these small items are more important than they might at first appear. Indeed, they provide the first integration of southern African rock art and hunter-gatherer ritual practice on the basis of firmly dated archaeological evidence. They alleviate a long-standing and counter-productive separation of rock art studies and the less glamorous field of “dirt” archaeology.

Perhaps the evidence from the Namib is not unique after all; there may well be cocoon rattles elsewhere, and dark crevices with hidden rock art still waiting to be found.

Namib – the archaeology of an African desert was originally published by the University of Namibia Press. It is available from Wits University Press and is also available internationally from Boydell & Brewer.

Author

John Kinahan
Honorary Research Fellow at the School of Geography, Archaeology and Environmental Studies, University of the Witwatersrand

University of the Witwatersrand provides support as a hosting partner of The Conversation AFRICA.

2021: Changes in abortion laws worldwide

Poland has virtually banned abortion, and the United States is also looking at tightening restrictions. But other countries, like Thailand and Benin, have started to loosen their restrictive measures. An overview.

Around the world in 2021, people came out to march for abortion rights — as here in Bogota, Colombia in November

Access to abortion has become easier over the decades, according to Leah Hoctor, the senior regional director for Europe at the Center for Reproductive Rights. She said that, with some exceptions, the global trend clearly points at liberalization. Several countries saw developments on the controversial issue over the last year.
Mexico: Penalizing abortion ruled unconstitutional

In September, the Supreme Court in Mexico, Latin America's second most populous country, declared an absolute ban on abortion unconstitutional. The right of women to reproductive self-determination is to be valued more highly than the protection of the fetus, the court said. With the ruling, the judges overturned an abortion ban in the northern Mexican state of Coahuila.

The court ruled that abortion performed in the early stages of pregnancy — without defining that stage more clearly — as well as in cases of rape, or in cases of fetal viability or where the woman's health is in danger, may not be criminalized. As a result, many of the country's 31 states were forced to relax abortion legislation to comply with Mexico's first-ever nationwide regulation.

Elsewhere in Latin America, abortions are only legal in Argentina, Uruguay, Cuba, Guyana and French Guiana.

El Salvador: The case of Manuela

Abortion is prohibited in the small Central American country, and those who violate the law can be punished with long prison sentences.

Map accurate as of February 2021

But the case of a woman known only as Manuela has sparked some change. She suffered a miscarriage in 2008, and was sentenced to prison because authorities accused her of having had an abortion. The woman died of cancer while serving her 30-year sentence.

In a landmark ruling this year, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights said Manuela died because she did not receive proper health care while in prison, which violated her right to life, health and judicial protections. In its ruling, the court said the state must make full reparations to the woman's family and reform its legal and health care policies. Human rights activists have called the ruling a beacon of hope for women in El Salvador and other countries in the region with strict abortion laws.

According to Leah Hoctor, bans and restrictions don't really help lower abortion rates. Instead, they just raise the risk of people choosing to undergo riskier procedures, with women who can afford it going abroad for an abortion.
US: Ready to overturn Roe v. Wade?

In the United States, abortion is handled differently depending on the state. Abortion legislation in California is comparatively liberal, unlike in Texas, which passed legislation in September banning abortions after the detection of what anti-abortion campaigners call a fetal heartbeat, as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. The strict law provides no exceptions, even in the case of rape or incest.

US Supreme Court could restrict abortion

Both the new regulation in Texas and tightened laws in Mississippi and other states could still be overturned by the Supreme Court. In the 1973 landmark Roe v. Wade case, the court declared unduly restrictive state regulation of abortion unconstitutional. That ruling stipulated that abortions are generally permitted until the fetus is viable outside the womb, which is about 24 weeks into pregnancy.

These days, however, a majority of justices on the Supreme Court are conservative, so it's doubtful whether the court will put conservative states in their place. The court might even overturn or restrict Roe v. Wade; a decision is expected in mid-2022.
Poland: Society split over restrictions

New Polish abortion legislation, among the most restrictive in Europe, came into force at the beginning of 2021. In a controversial ruling, the Constitutional Court said that terminating pregnancies due to fetal defects should be banned, essentially implementing a near total ban on abortion.

In Poland, activists took to the streets after the death of a pregnant woman

Polish society has been split over issue. Supporters of the right to abortion organized several mass protests throughout the year, most recently in early November after the death of a 30-year-old pregnant woman, who died of septic shock after being denied an abortion despite severe complications.

Abortion-rights activists and the Catholic Church want to further tighten the laws, and are pushing a legislative initiative that would ban terminating a pregnancy even if it results from rape, incest or if the mother's life is in danger. The Polish parliament recently rejected the bill in its first reading, but it's unlikely the country's conservative forces will be satisfied with that outcome.
Germany: Measures still 'stigmatize' women

Germany's criminal code outlaws abortion, but women do not face penalties for going through with the procedure — if they get mandatory counseling within 12 weeks after conception, if the pregnancy creates health risks, or if the pregnancy is the result of rape.

The new Social Democrat-led coalition government plans to get rid of a controversial law banning advertisement for abortions. Currently, doctors who want to inform women about the procedure online face legal consequences.

In Germany, abortion is still outlawed but generally not punished

Even if women in Germany technically have access to abortion, they still face obstacles, said Hoctor, arguing that these measures still serve to "stigmatize" women.
Thailand: Only legal in the first trimester

In early 2021, Thailand's parliament voted by a large majority to allow abortions up to the 12th week of pregnancy. Previously, with some exceptions, the procedure was considered a criminal offense and could carry prison time. Fines and imprisonment are still possible, if the 12-week period is exceeded.

Ahead of the vote, Shine Waradhammo, a Buddhist monk and LGBTQ activist, campaigned for the decriminalization of abortion. The move angered many people, in a country where Buddhism is by far the most widespread religion. Like many faiths, Buddhism is highly critical of abortion.

Benin: Groundbreaking law a rarity in Africa

Despite opposition from the Catholic Church, the Beninese parliament approved a new law in October that helped facilitate abortion. Ratification by the constitutional court is considered a formality.

Previously only allowed on a very limited basis, abortions in the West African country will now be legal if the pregnancy "is likely to aggravate or cause a situation of material, educational, professional or moral distress incompatible with the interest of the woman and/or the unborn child."

The law will "ease the pain of many women who, faced with the distress of an unwanted pregnancy, find themselves obliged to risk their lives by using unsafe abortion methods," said Health Minister Benjamin Hounkpatin. He estimated that unsafe abortions are responsible for 20% of maternal deaths nationwide.

In many neighboring countries in Africa, abortions are only possible under very strict conditions and are seen as a social taboo.

This article was originally in German

Germany's long anti-nuclear protest ends

Activists have been protesting in front of the nuclear power plant in Brokdorf, northern Germany for 35 years. But now that the plant is set to be removed from the grid, their vigil is finally over.

Protesters have gathered at the Brokdorf nuclear reactor every month since 1986

An icy wind is blowing across the Brokdorf nuclear power plant that stands between damp meadows and a dike covered in a thin layer of snow.

A small group of mostly elderly people have hung up a yellow banner on the guarded gate to the nuclear reactor which reads: "Shut down nuclear power plants."

Gathered on this wintry, gray day in the northernmost state of Schleswig-Holstein, the activists are mostly from the area — though some have come from Hamburg and beyond.

Singing peace songs and chatting while standing in a circle, the groups appear well-adjusted to the freezing cold, having met at the power plant's gate on the sixth day of each month for the last 35 years.

Today, the activists are once again holding a vigil to commemorate the victims of nuclear catastrophes while also demanding the shutdown of the nuclear reactor in their neighborhood.

Today is different, however. This 425th vigil will be the last. Later this month, the Brokdorf nuclear power plant will be shut down as part of Germany's 2022 nuclear phaseout.

The reactor has been both one of Germany's most controversial and one of the world's most productive.

"I'm glad it's being phased out," said Hans-Günter Werner, a pastor and co-founder of the activist initiative. "I'm not sad, but I am a little nostalgic because I know that we won't meet again soon.

"But for the most part, I feel relieved that the operation of the nuclear power plant is finally coming to an end," he added. "At the time, we didn't expect that we would need to stand here for so long."

First nuclear reactor after Chernobyl

Amid the growing anti-nuclear movement in the 1980s, hundreds of thousands protested against the construction of the nuclear plant in Brokdorf.

Time and again, the protesters clashed with the police — especially after the nuclear accident in Chernobyl in 1986 saw increased radiation levels in soil and foods across Germany.

"I had small children who were not allowed to play in the sandbox. We all panicked," said Werner at the sidelines of the vigil.

Opening in late 1986, Brokdorf was the first nuclear reactor in the world to go into operation after the Chernobyl disaster.

At that time, Werner and a few allies protested peacefully and decided to continue their protests in the future. They vowed to meet once a month until Brokdorf was shut down.

He said that "showing opposition" and protesting also "helped us to combat our own fears."

Police clashed with some of the 100,000 anti-nuclear demonstrators marching against the Brokdorf plant in February 1981

Increased cancer risk, and an ice rink

His fears weren't unjustified. In 2008, a study found that children growing up in close proximity to a German nuclear power plant face a higher risk of developing leukemia.

Yet plants stayed open amid such health threats. One reason might be the decades of high revenues earned by the Brokdorf municipality through a commercial tax on the plant. Local politicians were loath to give up this income.

The village, which has no more than 1,000 inhabitants, was able to fund a €7 million ($8 million) ice rink with the nuclear plant tax, and ticket prices for the public swimming pool with a 100 meter water slide were kept extremely low.

"It's a commercial activity in our municipality, and as a municipality we always support our local enterprises," said Brokdorf Mayor Elke Göttsche of the plant.

Göttsche would have preferred that the nuclear facility remain on the grid a while longer, arguing that this would have eased the transition to renewable energy. Now, however, the funding bonanza from the nuclear reactor is no more.

Werner has helped organize the monthly protests against the Brokdorf nuclear reactor since 1986

Nuclear power claims climate credentials

While Germany is phasing out all its remaining nuclear plants by the end of 2022, other countries like France, the United Kingdom, the United States, India, Russia and China continue to rely on nuclear energy.

Globally, around 440 nuclear reactors are still operating, providing around 10% of the global energy supply. Some 50 nuclear reactors were under construction this year, 18 of which are being built in China.

Three hundred more nuclear plants are currently in the planning phase. Meanwhile, the nuclear power lobby is promoting nuclear energy as an allegedly clean and, most importantly, climate-friendly alternative.

French President Emanuel Macron even announced this year that in order to achieve climate neutrality by 2050, France would restart plans to build new smaller nuclear plants for the first time in decades.

Emissions from nuclear energy are significantly lower than those from coal, oil and natural gas.

Yet, compared to power from wind and solar energy, the technology costs are much higher, and the construction of nuclear plants takes significantly longer.

Military motives

The fact that states still stick with nuclear power clearly also has another reason, said Andrew Stirling, professor of science and technology policy at the University of Sussex.

"Globally speaking, those countries that are the most truly dedicated to a civil use of nuclear energy either also have nuclear weapons or they are very keen on getting them," he said.

According to Stirling, the civil use of nuclear energy is often needed for the realization of nuclear weapons programs, a point admitted by nuclear armed France and the US.

Without the engineers and specialists working in the commercial nuclear power sector, it would be impossible to build nuclear-powered submarines, for example, Stirling explained.

"The reports from the USA are absolutely clear. Even if the costs of nuclear energy were twice as high, it would still make sense for them to build reactors because this allows them to keep up their military activities," he said.
Last vigil

Sharing coffee, cake and pumpkin soup, the Brokdorf activists look back together on 35 years of protests.

Photo collages are rolled out, including images from private photo albums.

Yet although Brokdorf will be removed from the grid on December 31, the plant will continue to serve as a temporary storage facility for nuclear waste for decades. There is still no final repository for radioactive waste.

"Therefore, our commitment is not yet over," said one of the activists. Shortly after, someone starts playing the guitar.

The protesters leave the Brokdorf plant singing. For the first time in 35 years, they're also leaving as winners.

Patti Smith: Poet with a punk heart turns 75

An icon for over half a century, Patti Smith remains an enigma to those who try to pigeonhole her. At 75 years young, Smith continues to find poetry in unlikely places. Happy birthday to the reluctant Godmother of Punk!

PATTI SMITH'S BIGGEST HITS
Poetry meets Rock'n'Roll
Patti Smith had French poetry and 1960s rock icons on her mind - a combination that became her very own style. Her songs were covered, mixed, and new lyrics were added all the time. By the means of poetry, she transported the wild, rebellious rock of the 1960s into a new era.
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Some have called her the Godmother of Punk, others the Grande Dame of Alternative Rock. But what Patti Smith really is, deep down in her heart, is a poet. Her music takes second.

Born on December, 30, 1946, in Chicago, Smith grew up in New Jersey together with three siblings. While her father was an atheist, her mother was a Jehovah's Witness, raising her kids to be religious.

She wanted to become a teacher. During her studies, she got pregnant and had the baby, but gave it up for adoption. Then she quit her studies, and — not even 20 years old — found her way to New York's art scene where she got involved in art, drugs, parties and music.

Back then, her idols were the poets Charles Baudelaire and Arthur Rimbaud, and the musicians Jimi Hendrix, Brian Jones and Jim Morrison.

Poetry in a punk club

In clubs and bars, Smith opened for rock bands by reciting her poems on stage. She had her first big performance in February 1971. As part of a planned poetry series, Smith recited her work for New York stars like Allen Ginsberg, Andy Warhol, Lou Reed, Sam Shepherd and others, eventually publishing two volumes of poetry.

During that time she also jammed with guitarist Lenny Kaye and keyboarder Richard Sohl.

Patti Smith is seen here performing at the Rainbow Theatre in London in 1978

"Our songs consisted of three chords," she told the US radio magazine "Fresh Air" in 2006, "so that I could improvise on them."

The three musicians kept playing around with Van Morrison's song "Gloria" for a long time until Smith decided to work in her famous poem "Oath" into that song:

"Christ died for somebody's sins, but not mine (...) Christ, I'm giving you the goodbye, firing you tonight. I can make my own light shine."

The reference to her mother's suffocating religiosity could not be overlooked.

The birth of garage rock

In 1975, the Patti Smith Group was complete. The first album, "Horses," was created with the help of producer and Velvet Underground veteran John Cale. On the cover, Smith looks androgynous with dishevelled hair — slim, clad in a men's shirt and jacket, and wearing a black ribbon looking like a loose tie.

An iconic album cover

The album contained pure poetry, sometimes loud and uncontrolled, sometimes intense and enchanting. Smith made full use of her voice, implementing melody, rap, recitations and improvisations.

"Horses" made it into the charts as the very first so-called new underground album. The magazine "Rolling Stone" included the disc in its list of 500 best albums of all time.

Godmother of Punk?

Reacting to Smith's wild performances, the music world put her squarely in the punk box, and even called her the Godmother of Punk. In an interview with BBC, she later said she regretted having been given all kinds of titles, like "princess of piss," or "wild rock 'n' roll mustang."

She also said she and her band were never really punk. And yet, Smith definitely played a key role in punk - at least in the US. Yet the essence of Smith's music wasn't anarchism and nihilism, but rather the firm belief that rock 'n' roll could change the world - just as her rock heroes of the 1960s had demonstrated.

Even today, "Horses" still stands for music that comes from the streets, transports dirt and feelings, and is ruthless, honest, unsparing and uncomfortable. Smith said she speaks to those who are like her - the disenfranchised, the mavericks - and tells them, "Don't lose heart, don't give up."

A break after 'Frederick'

The second album of the Patti Smith Group, "Radio Ethiopia" (1976), wasn't quite as successful. According to some observers, Smith was overdoing it a bit with her intensity that at times bordered on "extravagant confusion" ("Rock Rough Guide"). At the same time, though, the album was respected for its rough rock sound.

In 1978, the album "Easter" followed with Smith's first big commercial hit. She released "Because the Night," with some support from Bruce Springsteen. It became her international breakthrough, and was followed by even more hits. The album "Wave" (1979) contained two famous songs, "Dancing Barefoot," and "Frederick," both lacking some of Smith's original wildness.

After that, Smith's musical life came to an end - for a while, at least. With her husband Fred Smith and their children, she withdrew into family life. Once again, she wrote poems, and in 1988 she produced a record with her husband that nobody wanted to listen to.

The mid 1990s were a dark period for her, as, within a few months only, she lost her husband, her best friend, and her brother. She also went broke - but was not forgotten. After all, she always continued to fascinate musicians, among them Kurt Cobain and Michael Stipe of R.E.M. So she started to perform again, here and there, as old friends started calling on her once again.

And then came Bob Dylan

Finally, Bob Dylan brought her back into the limelight. Smith reactivated her old band, and before they knew it they were opening for Dylan's show. The audience was thrilled. Twenty years after the release of "Horses," the band returned into the studio to produce the album "Gone Again" - a collection of somber and touching songs in memory of her deceased husband.

Smith still continues to produce music today. Her hair has turned grey but the power of her songs hasn't diminished a bit. Whether she sings her old hits, attempts to cover rock classics like "Smells like Teen Spirit" by Nirvana, she remains a poet who transports her verses via music.

This story was originally written in German.

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Patti Smith's biggest hits

Patti Smith never wanted to be a punk rock icon, but her music had a strong influence on rock music in the 1970s. "Three chord rock merged with the power of the word" - that's how she described her style. (30.12.2016)  

Photographer Sabine Weiss dies aged 97

She was the last of the French humanist photographers. For nearly eight decades, she photographed social change with a unique eye.

Weiss was one of the people to define the 'Photographie Humaniste,' or humanist photography, genre

Swiss-French photographer Sabine Weiss has died at the age of 97, her family announced on Wednesday.

She was regarded as the last of the French humanist photography school of post-World War II. Her work covered eight decades, pioneering what was to become known as street photography.

Weiss photographed the condition of ordinary people in Paris, often at night, saying she wanted to immortalize "the snotty-nosed kids," "the beggars" and "the little piss-takers" in her photos.

"A good picture must move you, have a good composition and be sober," she told the French daily La Croix. "People's sensitiveness must jump out at you."

Weiss pioneered a style of work that was to become known as street photography

She captured scenes such as a stolen kiss, crowds rushing to the metro or construction sites. Her contemporaries included Robert Doisneau, Willy Ronis and Brassai.

But she was also in high demand as a portrait photographer, particularly of other artists, including composers Benjamin Britten and Igor Stravinsky, renowned cellist Pablo Casals and French painter Fernand Leger.

Weiss has been the subject of many retrospective exhibitions

"From the start I had to make a living from photography — it wasn't something artistic," Weiss told AFP news agency in a 2014 interview. "It was a craft," she said. "I was a craftswoman of photography."

Her work is held in permanent collections of several leading museums, including the Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and the Centre Pompidou in Paris.

Weiss coined the "photographie humaniste" with her everyday images, and traveled the world for magazines such as Vogue, Life, Time and Newsweek.

Born in Switzerland, she took French citizenship and worked in her studio in Paris from 1949.

aw/msh (AFP, dpa)

Looming mass extinction could be biggest 'since the dinosaurs,' says WWF

More plants and animals than ever before are on a global list of threatened species, with the World Wildlife Fund Germany warning that more than 1 million species could go extinct within the next 10 years


African forest elephants, and thousands of other species, could cease to exist within a few years, the WWF said


Ever-growing environmental threats are pushing many animals and plants to the brink of extinction — the scale of which hasn't been seen since dinosaurs died out, the German branch of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) said on Wednesday.

The stark warnings came as WWF Germany released its "Winners and Losers of 2021," an annual list of animals whose existence is now acutely under threat — as well as conservation victories.
Facing a mass extinction event 'within the next decade'

There are currently 142,500 animal and plant species on the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) — 40,000 of which are "threatened with extinction."

It is the largest number of species to be included on the Red List since it was established in 1964, according to WWF Germany.

"Around one million species could go extinct within the next decade — which would be the largest mass extinction event since the end of the dinosaur age," the organization said in a statement.

WWF Germany director Eberhard Brandes said decisive environmental protection policies were urgently needed, particularly in the fight against climate change.

"Species conservation is no longer just about defeating an environmental problem, but is rather about the question of whether or not humanity will eventually end up on the Red List in an endangered category — and thereby become a victim of its own lifestyle," he said.
Polar bears and other species on thin ice in 2021

Among the animals most acutely threatened — and among the "losers" on this year's WWF list — are the African forest elephant, whose population has declined by 86% within just 31 years.

Polar bears made the list as well, as the rapid melting of pack ice in the Arctic Ocean is making it impossible for the animals to adapt. Experts estimate the Arctic Ocean could be completely ice-free in the summer of 2035, WWF Germany said.

The familiar green faces and loud summer chirping of Germany's tree frogs and toads are also under threat — with 50% of Germany's native amphibian species currently listed as endangered on the national Red List. Unabated construction is limiting their habitats while roads have become death traps.

Grey cranes and migratory fish that move on land also earned a spot on the 2021 "losers" list, as well as the noble pen shell — the largest clam in the Mediterranean Sea.
Lucky Bustards and other 2021 animal 'winners'

The WWF noted that there were some "rays of hope" in the world of environmental conservation this year.

One of the rarest big cats in the world, the Iberian lynx, saw a "successful comeback" in Spain and Portugal. In 2002, only 94 of the lynx were found. The population has grown more than tenfold, with the most recent count in 2020 showing over 1,100 are currently alive.

The population of great bustards in Germany saw significant progress in 2021, with their population reaching the highest level in 40 years. Researchers counted 347 of the birds this year — compared with just 57 birds in 1997.

The lavishly-feathered great bustard is making a comeback in Germany

The WWF also logged a success in efforts to conserve the Indian rhinoceros population in Nepal. As part of a cooperation with the government, stricter protection measures were implemented — which have helped the rhino's population grow by 16% since 2015.

Bearded vultures, blue whales and crocodiles in Cambodia also saw their population numbers grow.

rs/msh (epd, AFP)


SEEMINGLY EXTINCT ANIMALS WHO ARE BACK FROM THE DEAD
Bouvier's Red Colobus Monkey
This monkey is rated "endangered" on the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The twist: Until 2015, when some of the red monkeys were seen in the Congo, the species was believed to be extinct. This is called the Romeo error ― when a species is declared extinct while it is still alive, named after the tragically mistaken lover in Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet."
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US names envoy to step up fight for Afghan women's rights



Rina Amiri, the newly appointed US envoy on women's rights, speaks at an event in Los Angeles in September 2021 (AFP/Randy Shropshire)


Shaun TANDON
Wed, December 29, 2021, 9:53 AM·3 min read

The United States on Wednesday appointed an envoy to defend the rights of Afghan women, stepping up efforts on a key priority as the Taliban ratchet up restrictions.

Rina Amiri, an Afghan-born US mediation expert who served at the State Department under former president Barack Obama, will take the role of special envoy for Afghan women, girls and human rights, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced.

Months after the United States ended its 20-year war in Afghanistan, Blinken said that Amiri will address issues of "critical importance to me" and the rest of President Joe Biden's administration.

"We desire a peaceful, stable and secure Afghanistan, where all Afghans can live and thrive in political, economic and social inclusivity," Blinken said in a statement.

The Taliban imposed an ultra-austere brand of Islam on Afghanistan during their 1996-2001 regime toppled by a US invasion, including banning women from working and girls from education.

Despite Taliban pledges to act differently after their August takeover, many women remain barred from returning to work and girls are largely cut off from secondary schooling.

On Sunday, the Taliban said that women would not be allowed to travel long distances without a male escort.

- Return of 'draconian' policies -

Writing on Twitter shortly before her appointment, Amiri asked, "I wonder how those that rehabilitated the Taliban by reassuring the world that they had evolved explain the Taliban's reinstatement of regressive and draconian policies against women."

The Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice earlier asked television channels to stop showing dramas and soap operas featuring women actors and, while not barring female television journalists, called on them to wear headscarves.

Groups of Afghan women have persisted in speaking out, including through sporadic public protests.

Asked about Amiri's appointment, Mohammad Naeem, spokesman for the political office of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, told AFP, "Strangers can't heal our people's wounds. If they could they would have done that in these 20 years."

He rejected linking aid to human rights, saying, "We want unconditional help for our people in the light of our Islamic values and national interests."

- 'Principled' engagement with Taliban -

Amiri left Afghanistan as a child, with her family settling in California. She became outspoken about Afghans living under Taliban rule, especially women, while still a student as the September 11 attacks prompted the US war.

She went on to become an adviser to Richard Holbrooke, the storied US diplomat whose last assignment was on Afghanistan and Pakistan, and has also worked with the United Nations.

In a recent essay, Amiri called for "principled yet pragmatic diplomatic engagement" with the Taliban while continuing to hold off diplomatic recognition.

"The United States and Europe should also go beyond limiting engagement with the Taliban for the purposes of evacuating their citizens and allies and coordinating humanitarian access," Amiri, now at New York University, wrote in Foreign Affairs in September.

"Humanitarian aid alone will not prevent the collapse of the economy or forestall further radicalization and instability."

But she also doubted that Afghans, most of whom were born after the Taliban's last regime, would accept a return to the previous treatment of women, saying that the country has "internalized the progress and cultural changes of the past 20 years."

In a letter last month to Biden, all 24 women serving in the US Senate urged him to develop an "interagency plan" to support Afghan women's rights.

US policymakers frequently highlighted the treatment of women when then president George W. Bush ordered the invasion.

Biden was a longstanding critic of America's longest war. In a fiery exchange with Holbrooke recounted in George Packer's biography of the diplomat, the then vice president was quoted as shouting at him, "I am not sending my boy back there to risk his life on behalf of women's rights!"

sct-jds/md

Tutu remembered at Cape Town interfaith tribute





Kate BARTLETT
Wed, December 29, 2021

An interfaith, musical memorial to South Africa's revered anti-apartheid icon Desmond Tutu had a rabbi and a monk dancing in their seats on Wednesday as Cape Town said farewell to its first black Anglican Archbishop.

The colourful service at City Hall to Tutu, who died at the weekend, was attended by his family members and politicians, many wearing purple in honour of the Nobel peace laureate's famed purple robes.

The event peaked when the 1980 chart-topper "Paradise Road", which became an unofficial anthem for the struggle against apartheid, was emotionally performed by bare-footed South African singer Zolani Mahola.

Tutu died peacefully at a care centre on Sunday, just three months after his 90th birthday, prompting tributes to pour in from around the world.

Ahead of his funeral on Saturday numerous events are being held across South Africa to remember the apartheid foe and stalwart of the liberation struggle, who was also an outspoken critic of human rights abuses across the world.

He coined the phrase "Rainbow Nation" at the advent of South Africa's democracy, and that ideal was on full display at the memorial on Wednesday night.

Despite limited numbers due to the Covid-19 pandemic, there was plenty of pomp and ceremony at the event, with music from the South African Youth Choir and guitarist Jonathan Butler, among others.

The Cape Town-born Grammy nominated Butler, who flew in from Los Angeles and whose music was popular during the apartheid struggle, had some in the audience -- including a rabbi and a Buddhist monk -- dancing in their seats.

- 'We will pick up your baton' -

Prayers were offered from Christian, Buddhist, Jewish, Traditional African and Muslim leaders.

Indigenous Khoisan people, dressed in skins and holding aloft an animal skull, also presented a tribute to Tutu.

All week, Cape Town's famous Table Mountain and the City Hall building are being lit up in purple at night, also in honour of Tutu's robes.

Cape Town Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis told AFP the colour had darker historical relevance because during the years of white-minority rule in the 1980s police often sprayed pro-democracy protesters with water cannon and purple dye to make them easier to identify and arrest.

"The large part of his ministry was spent under oppression, harried and harassed," Hill-Lewis told the memorial service.

"In the years most recently when our fragile democracy took blow after institutional blow, he was there bringing rebuke."

Cheryl Carolus, an apartheid-struggle veteran member of the ruling ANC party attending the event, called on South Africans to keep striving for a better democracy.

"Freedom is not a spectator sport, it needs to be hands-on.... Tata, we will pick up your baton," she said, using Tutu's nickname.

"We give thanks for having 90 years of our father, almost against all odds," said Carolus.

"We know that he was not well over the last while, and that he himself was ready to go, and that he left us in peace".

On Thursday, the coffin carrying Tutu's remains will be brought in a procession to Cape Town's St George's Cathedral, where he once rallied against white minority rule.

There he will lie in state for two days for the public to say their final goodbyes before a private cremation.

His ashes will ultimately be interred inside the church, where bells have been ringing bells for 10 minutes at midday in his memory since Monday.

kb-sn/dl