Latest news with #JuliaWardHowe
Scoop
13-05-2025
- General
- Scoop
Commemorating Mummy: Reflections On Mother's Day
Commercial gimmicks are sometimes impossible to beat off. Their stench and pull follows, even as you look the other way. One occasion is most prominent in this regard. Nostrils get clogged and eyes get fogged, and the message is this: Remember Mommy. Mothers' Day is rarely more than the draw and pull of extracted business and mined guilt. This is the worshipped and leveraged, the human breeder elevated and remembered, if only for one day. It resembles, in some ways, the link between poverty and the church box of charity. Give a few coins and save the child. Your conscience can rest easy. The day itself denigrates the mother in false respect and guilts the family for ignorance to that fact. It sanctifies a family relation for reasons of commercial worth. Suddenly, Mummy escapes her metaphorical sarcophagus, the nursing home, the flat, and finds herself seated at the end of a table with regrets. The hideous spectacle follows. The grumbling, the sneers. Mummy wonders what she is doing there. Monument? Reminder? A disgusting reminder to die off? Thoughts turn to the will. It was not necessarily intended that way. In the aftermath of the American Civil War (1861-65), Julia Ward Howe, author of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, proposed that women unite in common cause and promote peace. In time, it would become the Mother's Day Proclamation. In 1908, the idea became more concrete with West Virginian Anna Marie Jarvis's church memorial in honour of her mother, Ann Reeves Jarvis. Ann Jarvis had been a committed peace activist aiding wounded soldiers during the Civil War. On May 9, 1914, US President Woodrow Wilson officially announced the establishment of Mother's Day as an occasion of national observance to be annually held on the second Sunday of May. Such observance was to involve the display of the American flag on government buildings and private residences 'as a public expression of our love and reverence for the mothers of our country.' Mother's Day in Australia only took off with Sydney's Janet Heyden, who insisted in 1924 on remembering the aging mothers at Newington State Hospital, many of whom had been widowed by the calamitous slaughter of the First World War. As an activist, she encouraged local schools and businesses to furnish the ladies with donated gifts. In its more modern iteration, it has evolved into a family affair. As Australian historian Richard Waterhouse benignly describes it, 'It's not just about recognising the role of mothers, though that's still there, but it's really recognising Mother's Day as a day in which families can get together.' As with other days of elected memory, Mother's Day draws in the retail and restaurant dollars. Guilty emotions are easy fodder for the capitalist impulse. Unremarkably, it was the United States that propelled its commercialisation, beginning with card companies like Hallmark and enterprising florists keen to make a profit. Jarvis, so instrumental in establishing the tradition, took to loathing it, attacking such marketing gimmicks as 'Mother's Day Salad'. For years, she harangued politicians, organised protests and sought audiences with presidents to arrest the trend towards commodification. Such efforts eventually exhausted her, leading to a lonely, poor death in a sanatorium. Even as the Second World War raged, the scope of merchandise in anticipation of the day burgeoned. An April 1941 issue of New York's Women's Wear Daily notes how 'Mother's Day as a gift event has continued to grow in importance, and is now second only to Christmas'. In Dallas, one Margaret Evans, promotion manager of A. Harris & Co., enthused at the growing number of departments offering gift choices for the occasion. These included bags, gloves, hosiery, handkerchiefs, toiletries, and jewellery. Eventually, women's libbers cottoned on to the idea that a commemorative occasion supposedly emphasising the importance of mothers had been hijacked and shamelessly exploited. In 1971, a pamphlet issued by the Adelaide women's liberationists suggested that the woman remained invisible, a chained martyr to the home, a slave to domestic chores and the cult of domesticity. Mother's Day was that one occasion of the year that a woman's invaluable role in the home was acknowledged, and even then, only imperfectly. Such a mother's 'basic needs', including a degree of independence from their children, remained unmet. But the pamphlet went further, arguing that women 'renounce [their] martyrdom' and reenvisage themselves as human beings and 'not just 'mum'.' The nexus with children was also a point of comment in that decade. Radical feminist Shulamith Firestone's The Dialectic of Sex: The Case for Feminist Revolution, took solid aim at the distorting role played by parenting, and mothering, in the formation of children. Implicit in her argument was that both the mother and the child needed emancipation. It remains a pertinent point, even as the swamp of commercialisation looks deeper than ever.
Yahoo
08-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Mother's Day celebration at Otsiningo Park
BINGHAMTON, NY (WIVT/WBGH) – A Mother's Day celebration Saturday at Otsiningo Park seeks to remind people of the original purpose of the holiday. Broome County Veterans for Peace and Peace Action are holding a concert, performance and silent peace walk around the Children's Peace Garden at the park. Actor Narani O'Shaughnessy will portray Julia Ward Howe, whose proclamation in 1870 lead to the creation of Mother's Day. O'Shaughnessy says Howe was motivated by the carnage of the Civil War to create a holiday the honored peace so that mothers did not have to send their sons off to war. 'It's bringing people together to remember to put peace back on the agenda big time. I think it's really a good reawakening and awakening of we can create peace and maybe we should be doing that in every way that we can at this point,' she says. The free event runs from noon to 2 on Saturday and begins at the South Shelter at the park. There will be live music, refreshments and flowers for mothers. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to WIVT - News 34.
Technical.ly
06-05-2025
- Business
- Technical.ly
This Week in Jobs: The mother of all career roundups with 26 tech opportunities
Mother's Day is this coming Sunday — and this year happens to be the 100th anniversary of a notable Mother's Day in history. Often considered a commercial 'Hallmark holiday,' Mother's Day was not, in fact, invented by the greeting card company, or the floral industry that does about a quarter of its business for the year on the day. It was first started in the US by a woman named Julia Ward Howe, whose precursor to modern Mother's Day, 'Mothers' Peace Day,' was created in the 1870s as an anti-war holiday. In 1908, a woman's activist named Anna Jarvis held the first organized Mother's Day celebration in honor of her own late mother, also an activist, in Philadelphia in 1908. It became a national holiday in 1914. Jarvis was far from a greedy company profiting from Mother's Day — in fact, by 1922, she was boycotting floral companies for raising the price of carnations in May. Then, on Mother's Day 1925, Jarvis crashed a convention of the American War Mothers, protesting what she saw as exploitation of the holiday to make money. Needless to say, Jarvis lost the war against commercializing the holiday. Whether it's a holiday you observe or not, it's a good day to remember that not everything is as it seems. In the meantime, check out this week's job listings below. The News If you want to make connections in your local tech community, you'll want to know these folks — 2025 RealLIST Connectors for Philly, DC, Baltimore and Pittsburgh are out now. Philly Tech Week is here! But that's not the only community event this month — check out this roundup of virtual and in-person gatherings across the mid-Atlantic and keep busy all May. Speaking of Philly Tech Week, here are some of the fantastic folks you can expect to meet at the Builders Conference on May 8-9. Learn how AI is both wiping out and creating jobs in Pittsburgh. Don't park in the bus lane: SEPTA and the Philadelphia Parking Authority are adopting AI to enforce parking regulations in the city. Immigrant entrepreneurs and workers in the mid-Atlantic discuss how things are going for them in 2025. Join the University of Pennsylvania tomorrow, Wednesday May 7, for a panel discussion exploring the balance between AI advancements and responsible development. Client Spotlight Step into Perpay's Center City Philadelphia office and experience a space designed for comfort and collaboration. With floor-to-ceiling windows, cozy meeting rooms, and a chef's kitchen stocked with daily breakfasts and weekly catered lunches, Perpay makes it easy to spend your day there. Learn more about Perpay's culture and explore career opportunities. The Jobs Greater Philly Vanguard has several new listings: Machine Learning Engineer Public Relations Consultant, Senior Specialist Senior Data Analyst – Python, SQL & Tableau Lead Data Analyst – Python, SQL & Tableau Senior Front-End Developer – GenAI Brooksource needs a Junior Data Engineer and a Business Analyst. Comcast is seeking a Full Stack Developer (React/Django). Forbes Advisor is looking for an SEO Director. The City of Philadelphia is hiring a Help Desk Analyst. DC + Baltimore PRS Guitars is looking for a Creative Project Coordinator. T-Mobile needs a Graphic Designer. Environmental Working Group has a listing for a Digital Marketing Copywriter. IKEA needs a Local Marketing Specialist in Baltimore. Under Armor is hiring a hybrid Presentation Designer. Pittsburgh Grey Swan AI wants a new Operations Manager. PNC needs a Software Engineer. Oculus VR is seeking a Unity Software Engineer iHeartMedia has an opening for a Regional Engineer. Aurora is hiring a Software Engineer II. Remote The End Till next time, may your job hunt be a success.
