/Autumn Edition 4: Black History Edition

Multicultural Britain must confront its identity question >>p8 Atlanta: hip hop hub or divided city? >>p19

the

15 films to celebrate Black History Month >>p12

Akala: a profile >>p10

FR

Big Debate: western countries should pay reparations for colonialism >>p7

EE

Black History Edition Letter: decolonising our curriculum >>p21

Serena Williams: the greatest athlete ever? >>p24

Badger

The Official Weekly Term-time Newspaper of Sussex’s Student Union

Funded by the Student Union • Edition 4 • 17th October 2016 • thebadgeronline.com • Twitter: @TheBadgerNews • Facebook: /thebadgersussex • Printed on recycled paper

SOUTHERN FAIL

Ex-Sussex student to take DfT to court as strike chaos continues Daniel Green News Editor

A commuter group co-founded by a former Sussex student is set to take the Department of Transport (DfT) to court over the ongoing Southern rail strike.

The Association of British Commuters, set up in May this year in protest to the ongoing strike action, reached a target of £25,000 through a crowdfunding website to sue the DfT for their “failure to hold Southern Rail to account.”

Summer Dean, a former Media Practice student and campaign

spokesperson for the Association of British Commuters, said: “Reaching the £25k target is a huge achievement and just shows how strong the feeling is that something has to change.

“Our lawyers have already been hard at work and now their hard work will continue to fight for transparency.”

The Association of British Consumers, which works with Bring Back British Rail and the Campaign for Better Transport, claims that Southern operates far below its contractual and wider legal obligations, and argues that it is time the

government stepped in to address issues that “endanger lives on a daily basis.”

Ms Dean added: “This campaign belongs to every single person who has stood on a dangerously overcrowded platform, for every person who has lost out on family time, for those who have had pressures at work or at school, for every person that has been unable to use the network because of this ongoing rail crisis.”

Southern’s dispute with the RMT union has led to months of disruption across the south-east, with eight walkouts within the last year

and more planned over the next two months.

Former Lewes MP Norman Baker has also condemned Southern and called on the government to strip the company of its franchise.

A spokesperson for Southern Rail said: “This is a dispute between the RMT union and Southern, and as such does not require intervention by the Government, nor would we expect it.

“We made an extremely good offer to the RMT, but [the union] rejected this offer.”

A Department of Transport spokesperson said: “Improving rail

services for Southern passengers is a priority for us and the operator.

“We announced last month that Network Rail would deliver £20m of improvements and appointed a rail industry expert to lead a project board to drive up performance.”

They added: “We have responded to correspondance from lawyers acting on behalf of the Association of British Commuters.”

The RMT union defended their continued strike action, saying: “The programme of industrial action goes ahead with the union remaining committed to genuine and meaningful talks.”

“Groping happens so frequently I don’t even think that much of it anymore” PRYZM night club to support I Heart Consent >> page 4

2 the

The Badger 17.10.2016

BADGER

Editor-in-Chief Freya Marshall Payne

badger@sussexstudent.com

Badger Time Capsule 28 November 2001.

Deputy Editor Glenn Houlihan

This is an old copy we have on the wall of the Badger office. In 2001,the former Head Porter at Falmer House was moved to Essex House before he was “suspended on full pay, had his keys taken and was then humiliatingly escorted off campus.”

The incident seems to have sparked outrage at the time, with The Badger reporting that a petition to keep the porter was launched and many students had written to the Registrar complaining about the handling of the incident.

The whole thing kicked off after two Seaboard employees vsited Falmer House, making jokes at the expense of the porter - but ultimately claiming that he had threated them, which he denied. It’s a confusing and complex story, and didn’t result in him being deported from the country as the headline may at first glance suggest. However, it seems like these events sparked uproar at the time and students and academic staff clubbed together to support this porter.

If anyone is curious who the ‘masked maverick’ on page 2 is, we had a look for you - it’s an advert for “reduced price condoms” to be given out on World Aids Day! There was also a feature on police brutality, and a piece asking if Sussex was really as open-minded as it seemed.

Online Editor Remel Logan Crichlow badger@sussexstudent.com

The News Team Daniel Green Luke Richards Tom Robinson

badger-news@sussexstudent.com

The Arts Team Bianca Serafini thebadger-arts@sussexstudent.com

Miles Fagge thebadger.theatre@gmail.com

Rosie Dodds thebadger.culture@gmail.com

Lucie Andrau thebadger.culture@gmail.com

Monica Cherrie thebadger.film@gmail.com

Lauren Wade badger-music@ussu.sussex.ac.uk

The Comment Team William Singh Devin Thomas

badger-opinion@sussexstudent.com

Letters Editor Fraser Coppin

badger-letters@sussexstudent.com

Features Editor Charlotte Tuxworth-Holden

badger-features@sussexstudent.com

Lifestyle Alex Carter badger-lifestyle@sussexstudent.com

Science Editors Duncan Michie Kate Dearling badger-science@sussexstudent.com

Sports Editor Aaron Stephen badger-sport@sussexstudent.com

Events and Publicity Coordinator Sophie Clark

badger-publicity@sussexstudent.com

Proof Reader: Billie-Jean Johnson Front page headline image: Wikimedia Commons.

All other images: credited on the article they illustrate within the paper.

Editorial:

Culture, activism and history in Black History Month

Freya Marshall Payne Welcome to the Badger’s Black History themed edition!

Our aim with this edition is to create a celebration of black history, with its long and radical routes, and draw attention to the continuing and necessary work of black liberation movements across the world. We have centered black and minority ethnic students both as contributors and readers, and we’re happy to present you with an edition which showcases the submissions and content ideas we received.

The pieces centering around the black histrory theme range from the local to the global, the historical to the contemporary, the personal to the communal.

In Comment, we have a truly

brilliant piece on the experience of growing up multiethnic in Britain, and how identity can be shaped.

In Letters, we have a piece about decolonising the corriculum - a movement which challenges the control and respect which white and predominantly male - voices have in the education system.

Especially in countries like Britain where we have the history of the Britsh Empire and its dominance over other parts of the world, this is vital: reclaiming and giving space to voices is a huge part of this work, and part also of what we have aimed to do with The Badger this week.

On the topic of colonialism and the ways to deal with the aftermath of the damage it caused, our Big Debate feature centers on

the motion ‘Western countries should pay reparations for colonialism’.

This week we also have a profile of Akala, and the work he does re-examening history to show the voices and importance of black and minority ethnic figures. He is prominent in British culture as well as activism.

Akala recently visited Sussex through the I, too, am Sussex society, which focusse; last week, another famous figure came to campus as part of the Black History Month events taking place on campus - Princess Nokia. In News, we have a report on the event, and the way she spoke about reclaiming history.

In Film, we have a feature on 15 films to enjoy watching during

Badger fact: Wildlife TV presenter Bill Oddie has joined campaigners in opposing the Badger cull, calling it ‘inhumane’.

Black History Month. And on a similar note of examening culture, we have 2 pieces centering on music: a piece addressing the lack of recognition for black and minority artists in the music industry, and a piece by a student who went on their year abroad to Atlanta and experienced both the music and the divisive racism.

All in all, this is a varied edition, with themed pieces peppered through the paper - and we hope everyone finds something they find interesting and enjoy.

3

The Badger 17.10.16

NEWS

Princess Nokia receives standing ovation at sold out event Georgia Foxwell Princess Nokia moved students to tears as she addressed a sold out audience in the Attenborough Centre.

The New York based artist and activist, also known as Destiny Frasqueri, was a guest speaker for a talk hosted by I, Too, Am Sussex, held in celebration of Black History Month.

Frasqueri spoke on an enormous range of feminist issues and discussed ‘urban feminism’, a term she personally coined that specifically specifically explores issues for black and brown women to discuss

their experiences.

It is no understatement to say that the entire room was captivated

by Frasqueri, whose flow naturally varied from intensely honest to furiously passionate, interspersed with humour, personal anecdotes and moments of sadness.

She spoke out against the feelings of self doubt and inferiority that women and non-cisgender people so often feel and endorsed the importance of sharing one another’s experiences as ways of helping and healing.

The artist received an overwhelming standing ovation which moved her and many others to

tears.

The I, Too, Am Sussex event organisers said: ‘’[We are] proud to have witnessed Destiny open up a space where black/brown girls were comfortable to come forward and share their happiness/struggles and be empowered to keep going.”

She spoke about realising her talent as a performer and how she has used it as a platform, as well as the struggles she faces as a woman of colour in the music industry.

Through Frasqueri’s genuineness and charismatic approach, she had created an atmosphere in which people to express themselves in the Q&A session that followed.

Her interactions with the participants who expressed themselves in hugely personal ways were compassionate and insightful, reiterating the importance of platforms in which women of colour can share their experiences with one another.

I, Too, Am Sussex hold a variety of events across the University to do with issues surrounding race and its intersection with gender, class, disability, sexual orientation, sexual identities and more.

For more information about upcoming events visit: sussexstudent. com/organisation/6752/

Tom Robinson News Sub-editor EU students have been reassured that they will receive the same funding if they apply to study in Britain, even as the country begins the process to leave the European Union.

Students from the 28-member union applying to study at English universities during the 2017 to 2018 academic year will continue to pay the same fees as domestic undergraduates and will remain eligible for the same loans and grants, even if the UK leaves the EU during that period.

The same reassurances were given in June to existing EU students and those who started their studies in

June.

Announcing the decision on the 11th October, the move will give Universities much-needed breathing space as they continue to deal with the uncertainty left by the referendum vote to leave the EU. The higher education sector has become increasingly dependent on EU students, who have been the fastest growing proportion of young graduates in UK universities, at a time when the number of 18-yearolds in the British population has been decreasing.

EU students currently make up 8% of undergraduate students at Sussex, in comparison to a national average of 5%.

Picture credit

Georgia Foxwell

EU students guaranteed funding despite Brexit

Wikimedia Commons

Jo Johnson, the Minister for Universities said: “International students make an important contribution to our world-class universities, and we want that to continue.

This latest assurance that students applying to study next year will not only be eligible to apply for student funding under current terms, but will have their eligibility maintained throughout the duration of their course, will provide important stability for both universities and students.”

Annie Pickering, President of Sussex Students’ Union said: “this is reassuring news for EU student wanting to study in the UK as of next year.”

Sussex launches corruption course in corrupt Qatar Matt Finn Sussex has launched a postgraduate course in Qatar aimed at tackling corruption, despite high profile corruption allegations surrounding the Gulf country’s successful bid to host the 2022 FIFA World Cup. Some of Qatar’s leading figures have long been criticised for allegedly bribing FIFA members, who vote for the tournament’s host, to choose Qatar to host the World Cup. The country has also been condemned for human rights concerns

the

surrounding reports of over 1,000 deaths of workers building the stadiums for it.

Sussex Student’s Union President Annie Pickering said: “This seems like a much needed course, although it seems strange to be launching this course in Qatar, a country with such high corruption and low human rights standards.”

The two-year ‘Corruption, Law and Governance’ masters was officially launched in Qatar’s capital city of Doha by the country’s Prime Minis-

Badger

ter earlier this month.

Qatar and FIFA have denied corruption accusations, despite whistleblowers from inside the Qatari bid alleging such claims.

However, Professor Andrew Sanders, Head of Law, Politics and Sociology at Sussex believes that the country may not be overall as corrupt as is perceived.

He said: “In the latest round of Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index, Qatar came 22nd (out of 168), with Den-

mark at #1 and the UK at #10.”

“All governments, even the ones at the very top of the CPI, have corruption challenges.”

However, he did also admit that Qatar can do more to tackle human rights abuses, and that the Index has received criticism for not fully representing the full picture of corruption.

Professor of Politics and Director of the Sussex Centre for the Study of Corruption, Dan Hough said: “This Masters course is the perfect vehicle

for professionals across the Gulf region to gain in-depth knowledge of how the fight against corruption can be taken forward – not just now, but implementing long-term change.”

Leading Sussex academics specialising in corruption will teach the course, which will be run in collaboration with the Rule of Law and Anti-Corruption Centre (ROLACC) in Doha and working closely with organisations such as the United Nations and G20.

Complete the Badger drugs survey at tinyurl.com/badgerdrugssurvey

All answers are completely anonymous and will not be shared with third parties

4

The Badger 17.10.2016

NEWS

Tories stance on foreign students condemned Luke Richards News Sub-editor The Conservative’s policies towards international students and foreign workers have been met with strong words from the university’s Vice Chancellor Adam Tickell and the Student Union.

The government has recently announced a set of policies in which it has been branded as being xenophobic and inwards looking.

The rhetoric came straight from the Conservative Party conference, which saw the Home Secretary pick out foreign students and employees, both of which could have a negative impact on the university sector in the UK. During the conference the Home

Secretary, Amber Rudd, took aim at foreign students in a speech in which she suggested that the government would make it harder for overseas students from poorer quality universities to gain visas as well as having a crackdown on work-visas.

The Prime Minister also seemed to turn her back on British liberalism stating that: “If you believe you are a citizen of the world, you’re a citizen of nowhere.”

UKIP MEP Roger Helmer was quoted in the Guardian accusing Theresa May of going “far beyond what we’d done” and claimed if his party suggested these policies they would have been accused of being fascist and that they were a step too far.

In response to the government’s stance, Sussex Vice-Chancellor Adam Tickell has said: “Sussex is an international community with staff and students from all around the world.

“Last year we celebrated graduation with students from 104 different nations. We want all our students to become citizens of the world and we want them to begin that journey while studying at Sussex.”

He added: “This week we welcomed the important clarification from the Government that EU students wishing to apply in 2017 will be able to receive the current funding they are entitled to for the duration of their studies here, regardless of when we leave the EU.

“However, we still don’t fully know what Brexit means and we probably still won’t know for some time.

“I will do everything I can to make representations to the Government and work with our umbrella organisation, Universities UK, to get as much clarification for our international staff and students and to make clear the huge benefits they bring to our University.

“Many of the implications of Brexit are out of our hands, but I will do whatever I can to give clarity at the earliest opportunity.

“As a community, we must all be very mindful about how unsettling it must be for our friends, fellow students and colleagues who are coming

to Sussex from outside the UK. I am acutely aware of how some people are feeling worried about the future.

“Whether you working at Sussex as a member of staff, or you’re a student here for several months or more, Sussex is your home and we must all be conscious of showing our support, care and concern at all times.”

Students’ Union President, Annie Pickering, has said: “I think Thersa’s May rhetoric on immigration is scary and xenophobic and that she hopes I hope international students feel welcome and part of our campus community and that all students fight against Thersa May’s horrible ideas about foreign students in the UK.”

AMEX to explore introducing safe standing Glenn Houlihan Deputy Editor Brighton and Hove Albion have announced the club is looking into the possibility of introducing safe standing at the AMEX stadium.

Fans will be consulted in the coming weeks and months over the plans, which have long polarised the football community.

Government legislation currently prevents the construction of the new standing areas for teams in the top two tiers, which has led to the proliferation of modern all seater stadia.

FA Chairman Greg Clarke has publicly endorsed safe standing, having dealt with the issue several times during his time as chairman of the Football Leagure.

He said: “In the end, if people want to stand and you can make it safe for them to stand, why wouldn’t you let them?”

The legislation preventing safe standing has not pleased some fans, with some claiming it should be their right to choose whether to sit or stand.

Safe standing is a subject charged with emotion, with the Hillsborough disaster still looming over the football community.

During an FA Cup semi-final in 1989, 96 Liverpool supporters lost their lives after severe mismanagement of the terraces created fatal human crushes.

A further 766 were injured and the tragedy sparked an overhaul in stadium safety policy.

Despite Hillsborough’s legacy, the campaign for the return of standing in English football has grown in recent years, especially in light of its successful implementation on the continent, with Germany and Scotland among the countries leading the way in building safe standing areas.

Albon chief excecutive Paul Barber said: “Having personally experienced rail seating for a game at Bourussia Dortmund, it is a very different experience to the terracing of old, but it does offer a safe alternative to those who wish to stand at football.”

Safety officer for Brighton and Hove Albion Adrian Morris stressed the long-term nature of the proposal, and said: “It’s impossible for the club to move forward, even if the economics worked and the local authority were supportive, until the government reaches a decision on whether it will change legislation.”

However, a government spokesperson said: “The government currently has no plans to change its position and introduce standing accommodation at grounds covered by the all-seater requirement.”

Further discussion and fan consultation is set to continue as the season progresses.

Dominic Alves: Flickr

Wikimedia Commons

Pryzm is supporting I Heart Consent - USSU

Tom Robinson News Sub-editor Pryzm is working with Sussex Students’ Union on the ‘I Heart Consent campaign’ in an attempt to make clubbing a safer experience in Brighton.

The move is part of an ongoing campaign to tackle sexual violence both on and off campus.

Students’ Union Activities Officer Adele Duvillier, who has played a key role in the campaign said: “I met with Pryzm in August and they agreed to put up I heart consent posters in the club on Wednesdays.

“We also have an I Heart Consent

stamp for the sports (societies) queue.”

Grainne Gahan, Students’ Union Welfare Officer, another vital member of the campaign added: “We already have links with Pryzm through the sports societies, we are hoping by taking part in the campaign they will set the example of what all clubs will be doing.”

In a statement, Pryzm said: “We are currently working with Sussex Union to set up a fundraising awareness event for one of our student Wednesdays.

“We are the only venue to have an official partnership with both Brighton and Sussex Uni for our Wednesday

Google Maps

Student night and actively do our upmost to work with both unions in dealing and supporting any issues that our students/ customers may face.”

In a 2014 study conducted by the Students Union of 341 Sussex students, 61% reported they had experienced sexual harassment, with more than 50% had experienced nonconsensual sexual contact.

Sexual harassment, is defined as behaviour that is unwanted, intimidating or humiliating for the victim.

Touching another person in a sexual way when they haven’t consented is defined by the police as sexual assault.

90.7% of those who had experienced non-consensual sexual contact and sexual harassment stated that the offender was male.

The vast majority reported that their incidents took place in a nightclub.

Speaking to The Badger, one student who wanted to remain anonymous said “I can’t go to a nightclub without being pinched on the bum by strangers”.

They went on to describe an incident in which they were constantly harrassed by an individual unknown to

them on a night out forcing them to return home, where they found “he had sent me a Facebook friend request, bearing in mind I had lied about my first and last name.”

Another finding of the study was that 97% of all respondents did not report incidents of sexual harassment and non-consensual sexual contact, with the majority feeling that the incident was not serious enough to report.

Another student, who is currently in their third year studying International Development told of how they got their drink spiked in Pryzm.

They said: “I remember the first twenty minutes, then it’s just a big blackout until 3am. It was then I realised I wasn’t in control and didn’t remember much, that’s when I grabbed a friend and said I think I’ve been spiked and he got me home.”

However, when asked whether they felt safe in Pryzm, they said “Yeah I do.

“It’s good they have lots of bouncers on the way out when you leave so that they will hopefully spot anyone who looks like they are being coerced into leaving with someone”.

Charlotte Eaton, a second year Biology student said: “This is going to sound bad but groping happens so frequently, I don’t even think that much of it anymore, like sometimes I make a fuss but there’s no point really because guys will always do it and who’s going to stop them?”

She added: “The I heart consent campaign might have an impact on stopping guys taking advantage of girls who are clearly too drunk, I don’t know though, it’s a nice idea in theory but I doubt it’s convincing guys to stop grabbing at girls.”

Commenting on the campaign, a final year student said: “I think that it’s an appropriate course of action for Pryzm to take, particularly as it’s such a popular venue for student nights though I also think it’s unfortunate that we’re still in a situation where people need reminding that consent is required.”

If you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this article the Student Life Centre, the counselling service and the Students’ Union provide free and confidential support.

5

The Badger 17.10.2016

NEWS

Sussex academic launches book Luke Richards News Sub-editor

Sussex academic Mariana Mazzucato launched the book, Rethinking Capitalism: Economics and Policy for Sustainable and Inclusive Growth, at an event held on campus.

The event last Wednesday was held to mark the fact Mazzucato, along with Michael Jacobs, a visiting professor at University College London, have released a volume which they have edited.

Rethinking Capitalism, written by a collection of leading progressive economists, looks at Western capitalism’s crisis and the failures of economists and of economic policy in dealing with it.

The event has the same theme with the speaker’s addressing the “deeply abnormal situation” capitalism is in.

Michael Jacobs brought up an anecdote: in 2008, during a briefing by academics at the London School of Economics, the Queen asked why no one has saw the financial crisis coming. This he said was met

by much feet shuffling by those present.

Jacobs said there was a failure in the economy and in the economics discipline.

He added that economists didn’t have a rich enough account of what had happened and had failed to understand what was going on in the economy.

In response to this he said policies have been inadequate and poor. The theme of the paucity of orthodox economics to address crisis was continued by the other speakers.

Mazzucato was drawn to writing the book after the 2010 election. She questioned why upon Labour, upon losing, had attempted to reason why they lost the election by blamed it on their inability to speak to the ‘wealth creators’ in society.

She said they did this without addressing where wealth comes from in the first place – a collective effort of outcomes, public and private.

The speakers talked around how Western capitalism has seen stagnant or declin-

ing standards of living, substantial rises in inequality and crisis in which economic policy has failed to restore financial stability or economic growth.

They asked the question of how we can address these problems. They suggested that this could be done by: reforming governance through making it more agile and less bureaucratic, and having a proactive state and looking at how public and private institutions interact.

One speaker stated that there is “huge technological potential”, but what it lacks is a “stable synergistic direction.”

The speakers focussed on looming crises, such as climate change and Trump, as well as the failure to address longstanding structural issues in the economy. Both of which could undo years of progress.

They were not looking to replace capitalism but instead drew on ways in which we can adapt and extend capitalism before

any form of collapse.

TED Flikr - NonCommercial

Lincoln votes to rejoin NUS... months after leaving

Wikimedia Commons

NUS

Badger

the

needs you!

Eric Swindon The University of Lincoln has voted to rejoin the National Union of Students (NUS), only months after voting to disaffliate from the union.

An overwhelming 74 per cent of students voted to remain members of the union.

President of Lincoln’s Students’ Union Sammi Storey said: “It has been clear that a majority of our members believed that being part of a wider movement is vital to lobby the government on academic issues that affect our members and ensure Lincoln has a national voice.

“However, they are also clear that NUS needs to change and listen to students to become more relevant and focus on issues important to our members.”

Lincoln had been the first university to vote to disaffiliate as part of a wave of discontent surrounding the direction of the organisation and whether it is truly representative of students.

A referendum in May on the same issue saw 50.8 per cent of students vote to disaffiliate from the NUS, sparking a series of votes at universities across the country, with another three voting to leave.

Hayley Jayne, Lincoln’s SU President at the time of the original vote, said that a vote was needed as representatives at NUS’ national conference felt like the union did not truly represent students.

She said: “We returned very disil-

lusioned with the conference and a number of motions passed.

“We do not feel that many of the decisions taken are in the best interests of our members in Lincoln.”

Lincoln had been due to officially leave the union on December 31.

President of the NUS Malia Bouattia, who has received criticism over remarks considered anti-Semitic, said on Twitter: “Delighted Lincoln SU have voted to reaffiliate to NUS! Together we are stronger, together we can win.”

Ms Storey defended the need for a second referendum, claiming several students had demanded one take place, and also the need to consult new students on a decision made before they arrived.

Lincoln SU have strongly ruled out holding another referendum this academic year.

Annie Pickering, Sussex’s Students’ Union President, said: “As Sussex Students’ Union is a member of the NUS, I would welcome any student union returning to be a part of it.

“NUS is a great campaigning and representative organisation that can help build national solidarity around issues affecting all students, such as rising rents, rising tuition fees and substandard mental health provision.”

A petition calling for Sussex to hold a similar referendum failed to reach the required number of signatures last term.

Contributors’ meetings Friday 11am-12pm in Falmer Common Room

We want to meet writers and photographers interested in every section, as well as creatives Pitch your ideas and sign up to take on stories

6

The Badger 17.10.2016

COMMENT

THE BIG DEBATE ‘Western countries should pay reparations for colonialism’

IN FAVOUR William Singh Comment Editor

Colonialism is not an irrelevant issue of the past for which the people of today have no responsibility. It is a long series of vast and horrific crimes perpetrated with the explicit support of European states. By a systematic process of destruction of local industries, breakdown of civil society and agricultural restructuring, the actions of colonial powers have had an undeniable lasting impact, and continues to shape the inequality of the modern world.

Anyone who doubts the power of the colonial legacy need only look at the inability of Haitian infrastructure to cope with natural disasters, or the stark economic divide between the global ‘north’ and ‘south’ and ask themselves if these, like all things, don’t have historic origins.

Calls for reparations are often dismissed as symbolism and gesture politics. And symbolic it certainly would be, but symbols are important for a reason - they send out signals about how we view ourselves and the world that go on to shape the reality. It is ‘symbolic’ of the fraudulent way that colonial powers addressed their role that upon the abolition of slavery in Britain in 1833 the government did pay out reparations to the tune of £70 billion in today’s money - but to the owners of slaves, not to the victims.

The uncomfortable truth is that we as a country benefited from colonialism, and we still do. Much that we cherish about British history, from the impressive architecture of our cities to the growth of the middle class and opening up of democracy in the nineteenth century, to our legitimate constructive role as a world leader in the twentieth century, was built on the backs of the suffering of millions of people across the world. Out of sight, too often and for too long out of mind.

Reframing our current paying of ‘aid’ to reparations would be a gesture, but by no means an empty one. ‘Aid’ implies

charity, that we are out of the goodness of our hearts helping other countries who, perhaps by natural causes or some quirk of unknown historical origin, have become poor. Reparations implies a recognition of responsibility, that we are facing up to the fact that countries are not rich or poor by accident, or because some worked harder or were more morally virtuous than others, but because a global system was put in place that was systematically biased in favour of Western economies and against those of the vast majority of the world’s population - and that that system has its origins in violent repression perpetrated by states.

There is a worrying trend in British society to implicitly sweep our role in colonial crimes under the rug, that it doesn’t concern us and we have no role to play in it. A symbolic message from our own government - even one so simple as the rephrasing of existing monetary payments - would have an important impact in reframing the way we as a country think about these issues, and shift the terms of debate towards asking how we can play a more constructive role in the world, not regarding our international contributions as wasted money that should be spent here at home.

“There is a worrying trend in British society to implicitly sweep our role in colonial crimes under the rug” Then there is a strategic argument.

International poverty and inequality is not a settled and buried issue. Just flicking through news articles from the last couple of weeks I quickly stumble upon statements that 43% of young children in the world will fail to reach their potential because of stunting and extreme poverty, that most countries will need complete reversals of current trajectory in order to meet Sustainable Development Goals agreed in 2015, and the head of the IMF saying that global growth had been too low and benefitted too few, with trade being used as a

“political football”.

I make this point because it is easy to forget in the relatively privileged bubble of western life that there is real progress that needs to be made if the human species is to continue to become better off, and extend the freedoms we enjoy to those all over our planet. Given this vast inequality, and our own undeniable role in creating it, we should be asking ourselves what the best we can do is, not what the minimum we can get away with is.

It is frequent to hear that trade is the only viable solution to achieve real development, and I would not deny the positive effect of its impact. But trade benefits first and foremost private companies, and has only a secondary (often minimal due to low taxation and wages paid by said companies) benefit to states.

The role of state investment in building infrastructure, setting up welfare states and employment and skills programmes and ensuring the growth of democratic participation should not be underplayed, and it is these government actions which are a necessary part of development. To argue, then, that reparations would be the empty throwing of money at governments which won’t benefit their people by spending it, is unfair.

If we accept that current social and economic situations have historic origins, that the role of colonialism was a significant part of those origins, and that reparations would have a legitimate positive impact today, the case for Western countries paying reparations for colonialism must be seriously considered.

AGAINST

Daniel Terrence There is no other way to say it - the idea that we still should still be trying to make reparations for the distant times when Britain, or any other Western country, was a colonial power is ridiculous. There is not a person alive who remembers these times, or even was alive to see their direct effects - lingering on this unsettling period of our history, and ignoring the real progress that should currently be being made for the third world in the present, is a hollow and self-serving inflation of a non-issue.

If you examine the protests and petition demanding the government make reparations for colonisation that took place a few months ago, you won’t be surprised to see that no change was really expected to be made - like many left-wing protests it was the equivalent of a child screaming just to see how loud it can get, and repeating the action after everyone around it tells it to shut up out of smug self-satisfaction in their ability to elicit some amount of recognition and response, no matter how meaningless.

As these frequent public demonstrations of white guilt are a way for those who undertake them to flaunt how progressive and forward-thinking they are by showing they’re still angry over what their ancestors did and for some reason hate themselves for it, it seems difficult to argue against the idea that they’re only

Wikipedia

The Comment section are always looking for writers to submit content every week. If you hold an opinion you would like to air, we welcome you to contact us to pitch an idea or submit an article by email at Badger-Opinion@Sussex.ac.uk or to come along to one of our regular writers’ meetings on Fridays at 11am.

doing so to massage their own egos, and probably couldn’t care less about the people they’re speaking for.

We don’t expect Italians to pay reparations to Christians for the Roman Empire’s actions. If your response to this statement is “but that’s because it was so long ago”, then you’ve proved my point - what matters is the present, not the long-distant past, and repairing the shattered ego of the white liberal middle class is far less important than making change for people living in poverty in the more disadvantaged areas of the world.

And this is something these protesters choose to ignore - we do give to these disadvantaged people, and we also already give the wealthier and more high-performing countries that suffered under colonisation more than they need. The UK gives £295 million to India in aid. The only explanation for our giving a middle income country who is a nuclear power and has a space programme this much money is that it is out of guilt and regret for our actions over them in the past.

We are currently giving £1.5 billion in aid to six countries, four of which already have their own space programmes, evidencing their wealth and advanced status. Nigeria, Ethiopia and India, it can be argued, no longer need the benefits of our aid to flourish and survive- meanwhile, however, the UK is cancelling aid to 16 countries including China, Vietnam and Iraq as we apparently do not have the budget.

There is a clear divide between what needs to be done and what we feel we will be expected to do, and we unfortunately are focusing on fulfilling the requirements of the latter. Yes, the horrors of our colonial era should not be ignored or forgotten, but they should be remembered in a way which does not cripple our own economy and stop us giving aid to those who actually need it just to meaninglessly placate our feelings of guilt.

It is important that we acknowledge our country’s past, something black history month aims to enable us to do.

It is also important that we identify and combat the inequalities and oppressions that minorities still undergo in the present day. It is wholly unimportant and does nothing, however, to ignore these issues to swing punches at the ghost of our nation’s past. I hope more people realise this and agree that we do not need to be paying reparations to victims of our colonisation.

7

The Badger 17.10.2016

COMMENT

Multicultural Britain must confront its identity question William Singh Comment Editor The subject of identity is far from an easy one. That is not to say merely that it is difficult to solve - that much is a statement of the obvious. It’s more than that: it has no solution at all. Each of us have not one but many identities, and the course of our lives - particularly as young people figuring out who we are and what our place is in the world - is a constant process of reconciling conflicts and contradictions within ourselves. It is, of course, an intensely personal process, but there are things that we can say about how we as a society should think about identity in order that we might best understand and live with each other.

‘Integration’ is a loaded term, but it is also incredibly important. That might be an unpopular starting point for some, but it is a vital one; we are all part of one country, and for that to be a liberal, open country we must all buy into the belief that we live, work, love as one people. But equally we must recognise that people place tremendous value in personal traditions and being part of their own conception of their heritage.

Misguided attempts to legislate ‘Britishness’, or artificially determine the precise qualities of what ‘the citizen’ must be - what they believe, what they look like, how they behave - do not help. Examples like the French Burqa ban are counter-productive precisely because they send a message that people must choose one identity - that you can be a Muslim as you understand and interpret it, or you can be a French citizen, but you cannot be both.

Like many people, I’ve spent most of my lifetime not aware of my own identity; I didn’t think about it, I just

assumed life was as I had experienced it, that everyone was basically the same give or take a few arbitrary differences of genetics. ‘Identity’ was a concern, perhaps, for people on the news having their rights trampled by their government, or for political movements representing rigidly defined nationalities; but not for me.

But of course all of us have have identities, whether we notice them or not. I have a personal example to illustrate this. In September of this year, I was returning to Brighton when the car radio began reading a story about what they called a “local dispute” in Leamington Spa. A group of young Sikhs had occupied a gurdwara (a Sikh temple) in protest against an inter-faith couple being married in a traditional wedding ceremony.

“Each of us have not one but many identities. Our history is a rope braided of many strands” Now, listening to this in the car along me were my Sikh Indian-born father, my white British mother, and - just to compound the point - our dog, whose dad was a poodle and mum a springer spaniel. You usually hear about ‘culture shocks’ being experienced when going to exotic locations far abroad, not so much in Leamington Spa - but this was certainly a cultural shock to me.

I mention this for two reasons: first, because we should not assume that remaining culturally distinct is always good for people of minority descent, and integration always the tool of the oppressor. Multiculturalism is to be valued, but it should not

stop us from applying liberal ideas to traditional customs, see how they measure up and sometimes opt for liberalism. That doesn’t mean we are abandoning our heritage, or implicitly supporting oppression as some would claim, it is simply a statement of the reality that all of us have within us not one but many strands of identity, that they are sometimes in contradiction with each other, and that they must be resolved based on how we feel and what we think we believe without easy answers.

Second, that a multicultural country - and that is what we are now whether we like it or not - must face up to its issue of identity if it is to reconcile its differences and bring itself together as one people, and that those differences are far from resolved. Between a society too often split between the winners and losers of globalisation, an economy which since 2008 has too often left a whole generation of young people feeling left behind and let down, and unreconciled issues of identity and culture, a retreat into the most basic or fundamentalist traditional ideas of religion, community and custom is all too appealing. We must recnogise this and reach out to unite people, not simply blunder on and assume these issues will resolve themselves in time.

Disproportionate social biases and oppression exist, and we must work together to defeat them; but

things take time and happen on a gradual, individual basis, and people must live their lives in the face of those oppressions. It is not good enough simply to retreat to the comfort of an established identity and understood place in the world, and demand that ‘the system’ recognises your right to respect.

“Giving value to different conceptions of history is essential not because it is in opposition to ‘Britishness’ but because it compliments it” We have as liberals at the core of our being certain core ideas - democracy, individual liberty, the rule of law and so on. They are ‘British values’ not in the sense that we have a monopoly on them, or that they should be used to try and rigidly force minority groups to assimilate totally to the majority way of thinking, but in the sense that there are certain ideas that we can all come together around. Ideas that are accepted by everyone, regardless of creed or colour, background or belief, that allow us to build upon them the foundations of a society in which the same freedoms and opportunities are extended to every one of us.

But we must have a more nuanced

Wikipedia

understanding of identity. We are, whether you like the term or not, a melting pot of different identities, with an increasingly mixed and diverse heritage. I mean that of society as a whole and of each of us as individuals.

Giving value to different conceptions of identity and history is essential not because it is in opposition to traditional ‘Britishness’ but because it compliments it. It allows people to understand where they came from, who they are, and where they’re going. Because the bottom line is we are all moving into the future together.

We are one country, but more than that we are one people.

That’s why the idea of a black history month is so important - our history is a rope braided of many strands; it is so much more complicated than we are taught, and the experiences of different groups of people have too often been wildly different. We must promote those experiences which are too often forgotten or suppressed, and we must all of us understand different experiences if we are to truly understand each other.

We should celebrate the diversity of our pasts and histories, and move forward to building a better country together. There is no contradiction there - it is not just the right option, it is the only one.

Wikipedia

What does the fall in the pound’s value mean for the UK? notoriously volatile - now even more so than usually - so it is Despite the almost universal proc- perfectly plausible that the value lamations from the media that the of the pound will pick back up if pound has ‘suffered a blow’ from the government’s negotiations brexit, the actual implications for restore confidence. the UK economy are much more The flipside of that is that the ambiguous. opposite is equally as likely, and There is certainly a negative we may yet not have seen the component. The fall in value low-point in sterling’s value; a suggests that the markets have decline to near-parity against reacted with trepidation to the the euro or dollar if it becomes increasing likelihood of a ‘hard the new normal could represent Brexit’ - that is, that the UK may a problem for the UK’s internanot be a part of the single martional competitiveness. ket. But this should perhaps be One initial impact which most treated more as a symptom of people will notice is that the general worry on the part of busi- price of imported goods will go nesses than a bad thing in and up. Since the UK is so heavily of itself. Markets, and especially reliant on imports for day-to-day international currency values, are purchases, that means we can Bill Sedgwick

expect food and consumer goods to become more expensive. That amounts to an increase in inflation, which combined with relatively stagnant growth in wages, will make the average person in real terms poorer.

It’s also bad news for British holidaymakers. Converting £1 into euros or dollars will get you nearly 20% less than it would

Wikipedia

have at the start of the year, making funding trips abroad more expensive.

The flipside is that the prices of British exports will become more competitive. That will be a boost for manufacturing, and should help to address the UK’s persistent balance of payments deficit - that is, we chronically import much more than we export. The devaluation could, therefore, be beneficial in the long run if it facilitates an economy more balanced between sectors, and less dependent on imports for consumption and services for production.

The former Governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, this week said that the lower value of the pound post-Brexit vote could

lead to higher interest rates, lower house prices and a lower exchange rate, and that’s no bad thing. “It’s not a bed of roses, but nor is it the end of the world”.

So the picture is complex.

Doom-laden cries of the pound being “hit” or taking a “blow” are unhelpful, but it may well be that Brexit makes the average Briton poorer in the short-run, and day-to-day expenses may be more difficult to cover. The long-run implications for the economy, however, are harder to predict.

Perhaps all we can say for sure at the moment is the coming few months and years will be turbulent and volatile times for the British economy.

8

FEATURES

The Badger 17.10.16

Akala: redefining history

Kingslee James Daley, AKA Akala, has been influencing political culture through his music and academia for over a decade. His activism has and continues to challenge the United Kingdom’s colonial history.

Charlotte Tuxworth-Holden Features Editor

“T

ime is a cycle, not a line,” is a stand-out lyric of a 2011 episode of Radio 1Xtra’s Fire in the Booth. The voice behind the microphone is that of Kingslee James Daley - better known by his stage name, Akala. Now 32, Akala’s involvement in activism, academia and music has spanned for over a decade.

Akala spoke at Sussex last month for the second time - he also gave a lecture in April as part of Decolonizing Education Week. All students who were lucly enough to see him took a lot from the experience. In celebration of Black History Month, The Badger examines his contribution to political thought and culture.

The tradition of Black History Month was inspired by its creation in the United States. The motivation to establish a specific time period devoted to celebrating the U.S.’s black social, cultural and political history was voiced by Carter G. Woodson.

“The cruel obstacles of white supremacy aimed to dehumanise, control and terrorise the black population” An historian and academic, Woodson was one of the first AfricanAmericans to receive a PhD from Harvard University. He was born in 1875 to parents who had previously been enslaved in Virginia and he – like all people of African descent living in the States at the time – stood against the cruel obstacles of white supremacy that aimed to dehumanise, control and terrorise the black population. Woodson grew up at the height of the Jim Crow era: laws enforced racial segregation and fostered white power, violence against and killing of black citizens was encouraged by government policy and occurred rampantly. Against all odds, Woodson received an education and devoted his life to activism and education contesting the societal structures of white supremacy.

And so, in February 1926, Negro History Week was established by Woodson as part of an effort to encourage schools and institutions to teach African-American history.

The month was chosen to honour

Kingslee James Daley, better known by his stage name, Akala Covered PR the birthdays of abolitionist and writer Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, the U.S. President under which the abolition of slavery occurred. In 1969, the week was extended and February became known as Black History Month.

In the United Kingdom, Black History Month was established in 1987.

Here, October was chosen to coincide with the African Jubilee celebrations organised by London’s Race Equality Unit. The solidification of the event in the UK was pioneered by Akyaaba Addai Sebo, who worked for the Greater London Council (GLC) at the time. Sebo grew up in Ghana, and went on to work in politics in the U.K. His career led him to spend time in the U.S. in the 1970s, and he was inspired by Black History Month celebrations there.

The U.K. – one of the European fountainheads of imperialism and racism – had spent centuries enslaving black populations and undermining black identity, and Sebo thought Black History Month would renew a sense of pride and raise awareness of

the U.K.’s history of racism.

Today, Black History Month celebrates the societal contributions of Black and Ethnic Minority populations, and commemorates the losses to those communities that have been imposed by the white-washing of political, economic and social life. It aims to heighten the confidence and awareness of Black people to their cultural heritage.

Broadly, Black History Month is about recognising that mainstream historical narratives have been shaped by centuries of racial inequality: it’s about recognising that history, as most of us learn it, is biased. Racial relationships that have been defined by colonialism, extraction and slavery have made white populations more powerful in every realm of life. This power has allowed white populations to narrate the past according to their interests: history is white, and Black History Month draws attention to and challenges this dominance.

One person who strives to challenge the skew of history is Akala.

He is Jamaican and Scottish, and grew up in Kentish Town, North London. He is an MC, an educator and a champion of post-colonial and Pan-African thought. His interest and knowledge has evolved from his experience growing up as a mixed race member of British society.

“Akala’s interest and knowledge has evolved from his experience growing up as a mixed race member of British society,” Akala’s rhetoric is one of empowerment and education. It is impossible to summarise all the issues that he covers in his work: they range from English literature, to the Transatlantic Slave Trade, to the nature of Black masculinity. His central motive

is to renegotiate history, to expose his audiences – black and white – to the inequalities that have influenced both our perceptions of society and how we experience it.

Akala draws attention to the brutality of the British Empire and to Britain’s dominant role in the slave trade, with a focus on the impact that the past continues to have on the present. In mainstream primary and secondary education, the United Kingdom’s dark history is often overlooked – the realities of conquest are sugar-coated, and colonialism is presented as a stand-alone period that is strictly defined as ‘the past’. Often it is not until a student reaches University that syllabuses begin to detail the central role that Britain has played in destroying the fabric of life in so many countries. Only in the last four years of my life have I known that ‘developing countries’ are doing so now because their development was shackled by colonial powers for hundreds of years. The dominant narrative is to present Britain’s wealth and power as a given – Akala tells us, unapologetically, how this nation’s brutality has earned us a place among the most powerful nations in a globalised world.

In challenging history, Akala challenges the racism and discrimination that exists in Britain. In an interview for The Guardian in 2013, he discussed the elitist and narrow nature of the perceived intellectual: “I hate to say it, but this country is not comfortable with the idea of young, intelligent black people – especially men… It’s the same with chavs – I have plenty of white, working-class friends from east London who read Max Planck ad Niels Bohr and Albert Enstein. But their story is never going to be told because they’re not supposed to be like that.”

Akala has a way with words; they are his art. Many have credited him for his energy, his matter-of-fact, eloquent style. Although I have not yet been lucky enough to see him speak, these qualities are more than visible in recordings: Akala, as with some intellectuals, certainly doesn’t alienate anyone with jargon. His academic style is sadly a rare one: he seeks the understanding of everyone he can possibly reach, not just those who have prior knowledge of his field.

This is a quality that hasn’t reduced as his acclaim has risen.

As well as hosting lectures and talks, Akala spreads his message through his music. He is currently performing in the UK, showcasing his 10 Years of Akala Tour, which is...

Continued on p11 >>

9

The Badger 17.10.2016

FEATURES

“Akala’s many talents merge in his thriving project, the Hip Hop Shakespeare Company.”

Continued from p9... coming to Brighton on 28th October. His first album, It’s Not a Rumour, was released in 2006, and he has since released six more, including a collection of favourites from his career to coincide with his current tour. A Little Darker is a collaboration with Ms. Dynamite, legendary female rapper and Akala’s older sister. In 2006, he won the MOBO award for Best Hip-Hop.

“On top of everything else, Akala is a successful entrepreneur” On top of everything else, Akala is a successful entrepreneur. When he was just 18, he and family members set up a West Indian restaurant in London, which operated for a year.

Akala releases his music via Illa State Records, his independent music label that started operating in 2003.

Akala’s many talents merge in his thriving project, the Hip Hop Shakespeare Company (THSC). Founded in 2009, the music theatre production business – through educational workshops, theatre productions and live events – explores the linguistic parallels between the works of William Shakespeare and of contemporary hip-hop artists.

Two years after the company’s founding, Akala spoke at a TED talk event in Snape, Suffolk, about the visions of the THSC. He started the lecture – as he does his workshops – with a guessing game: hip hop or Shakespeare? Akala read quotes to his audience and asked them to raise their hands as to what they believed the source to be.

Most members attributed the lyrical lines to William Shakespeare, who has become known as the father of modern English. The lines – about beauty, morality, and the nature of man – came from a number of artists, including Jay-Z and RZA of Wu-Tang Clan, as well as Shakespeare. The intention of this exercise? To demonstrate how much of a difference context can make in the receiving of language – with perception withdrawn, it is difficult to tell the difference between the lyrics of hip-hop legends and those of Shakespeare.

Akala and the rest of the THSC wish to break down the barriers between two art forms which, informed by cultural history, could not seem further apart. The impression most of us have of Shakespeare, Akala emphasises, is that his work speaks to the elite. His name has become synonymous with what it means to be posh, English, and

white. But, as Akala often points out, the Queen’s English that we associate with poshness – received pronunciation – didn’t emerge until long after Shakespeare’s death. He also points out that most of Shakespeare’s audience were illiterate.

The elite label has been attached to Shakespearian productions and language because of historical bias towards wealthy white populations.

Hip-hop, on the other hand, has become synonymous with negative stereotypes of black people, and is often demonised in mainstream white culture.

In merging Shakespeare and hip-hop, Akala and the THSC take two perceived extremes in society and demonstrate how history has created the illusion of their difference. Akala’s conclusions to his TED Talk included the statement that art and lyricism demonstrate a “unity in human culture and in the ideas that humans pursue.”

“A key element of unity is understanding, and understanding is essential to progress.

Black History Month promotes understanding in the name of progress” A key element of unity is understanding, and that is essential to progress. Black History Month promotes understanding in the name of progress: it aims to voice the black history that has been overlooked by white dominant narratives. Akala’s contribution to this education is a means for celebration: he is a symbol of the change Britain could see with an enhanced understanding of the past.

Unity is precious, and post-Brexit Britain will struggle to maintain it. Economic and racial divides are becoming deeper, but Akala’s work represents a move in the right direction.

The 10 Years of Akala Tour is coming to Brighton on Friday 28th October.

Tickets are available on the Concorde 2 website.

Covered PR

10

The Badger 17.10.2016

ARTS George Routledge

Brighton Photo Biennial

The month of October sees the Brighton Biennial return for its 7th year. All across Brighton the festival offers free photographic exhibitions themed around the title “Beyond the Bias – Reshaping Image”. The aim?

To inform and innovate understandings of personal and projected image in topics such as gender, sexuality and race. Seems then, like I had my work cut out for me, it being my first photography review. As daunting as it seemed, I was pleasantly surprised by the festival’s accessibility when I visited two of the displays.

Lucie Andrau

Reimagine, the exhibition by photographers Olivia Arthur and Bharat Sikka, parallels the lives of LGBTQ+ between Brighton and Mumbai, and how each expresses and performs gender. Walking between the photographs, you are struck by the frankness of the images, comforted by the simultaneous flamboyance and vulnerability of the subjects, who have kindly allowed the photographers

Lucie Andrau

to exhibit the most intimate aspects of their lives. The budding LGBTQ+ community in India provides a striking contrast to the extravagant, ‘in your face’, attitude of Brighton. This is by no means any less empowering, with the former unveiling a raw and original take on sexual expression against Brighton’s more established LGBTQ+ scene, one perfectly complimenting the other. Together they raise a dialogue between the presentation of the self in public and private spheres and how sites influence expressions of sexuality and gender.

The exhibition set the scene for the Biennial, one that proudly celebrates personal and projected image, informing us as to why and how we should be represented.

It was no surprise then, that The Dandy Lion Project, continued in

the same vein; Curated by Shantrelle P.Lewis, the photographs illustrated the collision of two very different worlds, “Edwardian-Era European fashion with African Diasporan aesthetics and sensibilities” to bring

us Black Dandyism. The first comprehensive exhibition of its kind, it charts the journey of ambitious men and women defying stereotypical understandings of black identity.

Again, the photographs felt powerful; bursting with colour and confidence to distinctly convey how Dandyism is more than fashion, it is a lifestyle choice right down to your attitude and behaviour. You feel happy wandering between the pictures, as if the positivity of the photographer, and subjects, is pouring out to flood the room.

Exemplar of post-colonial retaliation, the images constructively negotiate class, independence, identity and fashion. Challenging tradition, they stand Lucie Andrau

defiantly in the face of adversity, much in the way Reimagine guides us away from homogenised understanding of sex and identity. These exhibitions offer a powerful insight to what the Brighton Biennial has to offer this year, with so many different displays actively engaging with crucial and relevant topics, the festival acts as a poignant reminder that physiology need not define who we want to be.

Lucie Andrau

gal-dem and Born n Bread: fighting the Media’s lack of diversity Ella Tanqueray The Internet has made it easier than ever to create and publish whatever you like. We live in a culture saturated with opinions in 140 characters, where everyday people are live- streaming their daily activities and where anybody who wants to can quickly and easily share their work.

Although this can make it difficult for individual enterprises to stand out, it allows people who have been left out of the media industry and confined to certain spaces, to change that and to alter the discourse.

Gal-dem Magazine and the Born n Bread collective are two groups of women of colour who have successfully been doing just that. Galdem is an online magazine started by editor Liv Little to create a platform for women of colour to share their voice, after being frustrated with the lack of representation in the media.

It covers everything from fashion and music, to culture and news.

The team consists of over 70 wom-

en, and the articles present a wealth of different experiences and voices, and the writing has been picked up by culture and fashion publications like Dazed and Confused and I-D Magazine.

The editors have just released their inaugural print magazine, the galhood issue, which is ‘a celebration

gal-dem.com

and exploration of what it’s like to grow up as a girl of colour.’ At 246 pages it is an incredible feat for a company that celebrated it’s first birthday in September.

In a short period of time the magazine has grown to be regarded as an incredibly important publication, and it’s popularity has highlighted what Little had been frustrated with.

People want to read different narratives in the media, and people want to be fairly represented. Gal-dem fill a very necessary role, and in creating a magazine by women of colour they have made a start in resolving the media’s lack of diversity.

Adelaide Lawson, one of the founding members of Born n Bread, said to The Fader magazine, “We wanted to represent ourselves as the missing voice in media.” They are a collective of young women also concerned with accurate representation, and alternative discourse. These women are taking it into their own hands to bring under-represented people and stories into the spotlight.

Their first issue, Black, put a focus on local black artists, and they also have a monthly show on NTS Radio, allowing them autonomy over the content they choose to present and release. They are currently on issue three of their zine, and have created a collage of content, with their most recent publication, African Tales, concerning African culture in Western society.

Meg Lavender

The ease of self-publishing has allowed people that are normally pushed into the margins of the media to create spaces where their voices can be heard. Gal-dem and Born n Bread’s dedication to what they create has attracted readers and other online publications alike, highlight-

ing the need for original content and diversity in the media. It is a refreshing anecdote to the often stiflingly white and male industry.

Get Born n Bread’s zine African Tales on their website, you can also catch them on NTS Radio. You can grab Gal-dem’s inaugural issue on their website and visit their Friday Late event at the V&A in London on October 28th.

Do you have something to say about the cultural side of life in Brighton?

Contact our Culture Editor Rosie Dodds at thebadger.culture@gmail. com

11

The Badger 17.10.2016

ARTS

Film Staircase Monica Cherrie Film Editor I personally can’t think of a more enjoyable way to celebrate Black History month than to order food from Cummin Up, make some peanut punch and binge watch all of these films.

The Weinstein Company

Django Unchained (2012) Django Unchained is Tarantino’s wonderful interpretation of what a spaghetti western would look like if the hero wasn’t just another surly white dude. The film’s script is full of cool conversation and chilling shots of gore. The film will have you thirsting for retribution and oh boy does it deliver. Jamie Foxx’s Django is finally a western protagonist I can get behind.

Lionsgate

first democratically elected presi dent of South Africa. This film will have you singing the Specials’ Nelson Mandela.

Apparition Black Dynamite (2009)

Walt Disney Studios The Help (2011)

New Line Cinema Hairspray (2007) This musical has been put in the list as a form of comic relief for some of the more heavy-handed films on here. It deals with the issue of TV segregation in the 60s with music and laughter. Queen Latifa’s character has all the best lines and the film’s songs such as “Run And Tell That” will make you realise the blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice.

The Help’s ability to remain reasonably light hearted while dealing with the severity of the racism maids working in white households face is nothing short of amazing. Viola Davis’ performance is heart wrenching.

I guarantee you will laugh out loud and if you’re as sensitive as me, you will also cry bucket loads.

Bring It On (2000)

Warner Bros.

Malcolm X (1992) This epic biopic directed by our lord and saviour Spike Jones, follows the controversial and influential Black Nationalist leader, from his early life and career as a small-time gangster, to his ministry as a member of the Nation of Islam. Denzel Washington’s performance is truly outstanding. This is a must watch for those in support of the Black Lives Matter movement.

This film is here not only because it is in it’s own right a great film, but also because I believe there are healing properties in the act of looking at Denzel Washington’s face for a few hours. The film follows the true story of a newly appointed AfricanAmerican coach and his high school team on their first season as a racially integrated unit.

Ray (2004)

Warner Bros. Pictures The Color Purple (1985)

Universal Pictures

Buena Vista Pictures Remember the Titans (2000)

Far more tongue in cheek than shaft, Black Dynamite is a modern rebirth of the Blaxploitation genre. It details the story of Black Dynamite, the greatest African-American action star of the 1970s. When his only brother is killed by The Man, it’s up to him to find justice. This film is an absolute must for those who love the word “cracker”.

This film taught us about cultural appropriation years before we were all having a conversation about it on social media. After a champion high school cheerleading squad discovers its previous captain stole all their best routines from an innercity school where the students are predominately black. If you love teen movies with surprisingly good scripts you will love this one.

Dear White People (2014) Dear White People tells the story of four black students at an Ivy League college. Given its very recent release date, this film is perhaps the most pertinent in it’s ability to speak within the context of racism in our current society.

Stephen Spielberg’s brings Alice Walker’s novel to life in a way that will please fans of the original work.

The film tells the sad story of a black Southern woman who struggles to find her identity after suffering years of abuse from her father and others over 40 years. It’s still an absolute travesty that the film didn’t win any Academy Awards.

Universal Pictures

Ray tells the story of the life and career of the legendary rhythm and blues musician Ray Charles, from his humble beginnings in the South, where he went blind at age seven, to his meteoric rise to stardom during the 1950s and 1960s and his subsequent battle with heroin addiction.

Jamie Foxx gives yet another amazing performance in this beautiful biopic.

Jive Trapped in the Closet (2005) Universal Pictures Half Baked (1998) Again as a form of comic relief, I offer you Dave Chappelle’s Half Baked. Though this film doesn’t concern itself with any serious issues surrounding civil rights, Dave Chappelle wrote the film so it definitely deserves a place here. If you’re into stoner comedy, this one’s for you.

While this isn’t a film, it’s a very important piece of work. While Remix Ignition is a certified staple at every house party across the globe, Trapped in the Closet remains R Kelly’s Magnum Opus. The 33 chapter hip hopera series tells a story of a onenight stand which sets off a chain of events, gradually revealing a greater web of lies, sex, and deceit.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Shaft (1971) Orion Pictures Mississippi Burning (1988)

20th Century Fox Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom (2013) This film chronicles the life of the late and great Nelson Mandela. This film will capture your imagination and send chills down your spine as you learn of Mandela’s life journey from his childhood in a rural village through to his inauguration as the

Two FBI agents with wildly different styles arrive in Mississippi to investigate the disappearance of some civil rights activists. The film is loosely based on the real story of the FBI investigation of the murder of three civil rights workers in 1964. The fact that this film is not set in a dystopian world far different from our own is terrifying and really puts into perspective why we need to learn black history every month of the year.

Shaft is Blaxploitation at it’s best.

It follows the story of a private detective who was hired by a Harlem mobster to rescue his daughter from the Italian mobsters who kidnapped her. The film’s soundtrack, written by Isaac Hayes, won a Grammy for Best Score Soundtrack Album for a Motion Picture.

email Monica with any more suggestions for our Online edition at badger.film@gmail.com!

15 Films To Celebrate Black History Month

The Badger 17.10.2016

12

ARTS

Reviews

Film

Amanda Knox Documentary Sophie Clark Amanda Knox was just an ordinary American student until the murder of her housemate, Meredith Kercher, catapulted her into the public eye.

She was accused of murder, labelled a sex maniac, and had every aspect of her personal life invaded by the courts and the media. In a matter of weeks, the curious and tragic events of one November night in Perugia, Italy turned the 20-year-old student into an international household name. People around the globe leapt to judgements about her innocence or lack of it, and continue to do so today. Two guilty verdicts and two acquittals later, it’s very possible that we will never know for certain what exactly happened to Kercher.

However, the celebrity of and obsession with the enigma that is Amanda Knox lives on.

“either I’m a psychopath in sheep’s clothing, or I am you” Almost 9 year since the horrific murder, Netflix has released the simply named ‘Amanda Knox’, a documentary about the events, directed by Brian McGinn and Rod Blackhurst, in which Knox speaks directly about the case on camera for the first time in years. In the past decade, much has been churned out speculating about whether or not Knox is guilty, so instead, what the filmmakers have focused on the most is the witch-hunt led by the media and the prosecution. Whatever your personal opinion of the case is, it is hard to be appalled by the treatment of Knox – the criticism of her somewhat modest sexual history and headlines denouncing her as a “Satanic Sex

Music Jamie-T

Trick Tour 02 Brixton, London Bianca Serafini, Arts Editor Ten minutes before the doors opened at seven, the queue for Jamie-T’s Sunday concert went around the street and more, as crowds of people arrived in what seemed to be the hundreds to the O2. The area filled up to the brink by the time the sold-out show started, and as everyone could have anticipated the audience went mad when Jamie walked on stage.

Although his opening act — a band named The Wytches — were a bit bizarre, and after a while their screaming got tiresome (but my judgement may have been blurred for my anticipation to see the main act), Jamie-T

Demon” that are shown in the documentary make one wonder how far we’ve really come from 1690’s Salem and its witch trials.

Theatre Sweeny Todd

“the documentary is a must-watch it sheds light to an undeniably intriguing case”

88 London Road Theatre

Shots such as that of the court’s hallway brimming full of reporters and cameras, and the description of intrusions into Knox’s personal life provide a toe-curling insight into the media circus. The most sickening point of the film is when Daily Mail journalist Nick Pisa compares the drama of Kercher’s murder to sex, a gruesome comparison amplified by the following shot of Kercher’s coffin.

While the documentary has done a brilliant job of capturing the heartlessness of one area of journalism, it makes it a difficult watch. Instead of being yet another media outlet playing jury, Netflix has created a gripping documentary that speaks volumes about the way media treats women.

No doubt the documentary has its flaws, at times it falls into the documentary trope of being melodramati almost to the point where it feels overplayed and predictable. References to victim Meredith Kercher’s beauty within minutes of condemnation of the media’s obsession with Knox’s appearance seems somewhat hypocritical and borderline disrespectful to Kercher and her family.

That being said, the documentary is a must-watch, as it sheds light to an undeniably intriguing case and, more importantly, holds a mirror up to society, forcing us to witness how the media can tear apart those who fall victim to it. Innocent or guilty, Amanda Knox represents more than just a girl acquitted of murder, instead she embodies society’s views of and fascination with women. In the words of the lady herself, “either I'm a psychopath in sheep's clothing, or I am you."

Sweeny Todd, directed and musically directed by Conor Baum and Ellen Campbell, tells the tale of an exiled barber who has been transported for life (was an alternative punishment to hanging. Criminals were transported to the colonies to serve their prison sentences) returns to London to find the happy life he left behind destroyed by the sinister and obsessed Judge Turpin. Todd goes on to seek revenge on all the people who have wronged him in a blood thirsty frenzy with the help of old friend, baker and landlady Mrs Lovett.

On entering the theatre, one is greeted by an impressive venue and intimate seating which set the tone for this demonic tale. The small set, cast and band gave one a mildly sceptical feeling however as the play progressed it quickly became apparent that each part of the set and cast would be used to their absolute fullest potential.

The opening number of the play set the tone for the creepy nature of the musical. The cast were present on the stage before the play began which then lead to the dramatic start with the lights blacking out and the band starting to play loud, atmospheric and dissident music.

What can be worrying about smaller local productions is the lack of funding or space for complex sets and lighting. In this production, the set did not change throughout the whole play, but was cleverly utilised, making sure it sufficiently inspired people’s imaginations in each scene.

The multi-storey set was integral to the plot, embodying scenes of Fleet street, Judge Turpin’s house, Todd’s barber shop and the streets of Lon-

made up for it with his wild energy and amazing stage presence.

I hadn’t actually listened to the entire new album Trick, as I wanted to leave the element of surprise for at least some of it, and I must admit I wasn’t disappointed. “Tinfoil Boy” was far better live then in the debut video released as a teaser for

the album launch, which I found somewhat underwhelming. New songs like “Joan of Arc”, “Power Over Men”, and “Drone Strike” will surely become Jamie-T classics, like “Zombie” and “Sheila” (to name a few). As he sang, he continued to remind the audience of how happy he was to be playing at the O2, jumping back and

Emma Taylor, Sarah Kingsmill and Kristian Harris

Jamie-T

don. The props were impressive, with attention to detail to the point of storyline-specific newspapers being printed, and headline posters put up throughout the play to fit with the narrative.

Mcardle’s performance as the wronged and vengeful Todd was thoroughly convincing. With strong vocals and emotive acting throughout, particularly showcasing themselves in ‘My Friends’, he was consistent in delivering to the audience.

The entrance of Mrs Lovett, played

by Redmond, equally resonated with the audience with the contrast of her unrequited love for Todd and sinister comedic relief. Redmond’s performances of ‘The Worst Pies in London’ and ‘A Little Priest’ stood out as two of the most entertaining numbers.

88London Road Theatre

The entire cast simply consisted of eight people but each actor gave an impressive performance, with most playing multiple roles. Their performance was immersive with the actors regularly rhetorically addressing the audience, including them in the story and coming down the stairs amongst the spectators. The last character who significantly resonated with the audience was Toby, whose childlike innocence is reflected in the amusing number ‘Pirelli’s Miracle Elixir’.

His powerful performance as he gradually turns to insanity after exforth between the stage, pointing at people and turning his microphone to the crowd for the most popular songs. If it weren’t for the incessant moshing in the standing area, I would have been in paradise. I have seldom witnessed such intense and aggressive behavior during an indie rock concert; I was in the front row (to better idolize the demi-God) and was constantly pushed and plummeted about by rowdy men who kept taking their shirts off and tackling one another for the entire concert.

Makes me wonder if they were actually there to enjoy Jamie-T or if they spent money to wrestle each other to a good tune. Besides them, I found Jamie to be just as marvelous live as he is in the studio, particularly when he sang older songs such as “If You Got The Money” and “Rabbit Hole,” truly rendering him, in my opinion, the ‘one man Arctic Monkey’ he was pumped up to be.

periencing the horror of Todd and Lovett’s actions stays with the audience as they go on to contemplate his fate after the play finishes. As well as the vocal performances of the actors mentioned, the chorus numbers were filled with precise and full harmonies which blended well together, which is so important to this musical particularly.

The clever framed repetition of songs gave an easy to follow narrative structure to the play. However, due to the narrative nature of the lyrics, they are imperative to following the story. It was therefore a shame that on occasion the band, who were incredibly skilled, flexible and integral for creating the sinister tone, drowned some of the voices out. This was one of the only faults that could be found within this production.

Another important part to this play is the recurrent theme of the corrupting nature of money, power and jealously onto characters who then impose this supremacy on those beneath them. This is a play that not only concentrates on the journey of a brooding, broken man but brings attention to the clashes in class which was an integral feature of this period within history. This resonates with the audience also as a relevant and contemporary issue of the influence and status of power on individuals.

This play is very enjoyable however is not for the faint hearted. There are some incredibly sinister moments including themes of rape, prostitution and flagellation which coupled with the red lighting created a very intense atmosphere, plus it’s well worth the reasonable price of the ticket for an exciting night at the theatre. With the conveniently placed, nicely lit bar in the next room it is only right to enjoy a drink as you’re watching the play/ f you want a fun, immersive , entertaining experience within the heart of Brighton and to do something different from a standard student night out, we highly reccomend this.

Unfortunately, Jamie-T fell ill after that gig and was unable to perform on his last day at the O2, on Monday, which is sad, yet makes me feel relieved I was able to catch a show. Our Theatre Editor, Miles, is still wallowing in self-pity about not being able to see him.

Jamie-T

13

The Badger 17.10.2016

ARTS

Music

Black artists snubbed at the awards

Lauren Wade Music Editor In celebration of Black History Month, we explore the struggles black artists and musicians have faced in the past when it comes to fitting in and finding their voice within the music industry. Recognition should be given to artists for their musical talent and expertise, regardless of race, but not everyone has always viewed it that way.

At the 2016 Grammys, Kendrick Lamar’s incredible ‘To Pimp A Butterfly’ was overlooked in favour of Taylor Swift’s ‘1989’ for the Album of the Year gong. However, Lamar did go on to win various other rap-focused awards: Best Rap Album, Best Rap Song, Best Rap Performance, Best Rap/Sung Collaboration. What is notable, though, to point out is that the biggest awards (Album, Record and Song of the Year) were ones that some argue he wrongfully missed out on receiving.

“Recognition should be given to artists for their musical talent and expertise, regardless of race” Lamar’s fans took to Twitter in the aftermath of the awards ceremony to vent their anger and frustration at his awards snub. One user commented “It’s totally OK we overlooked the most racially significant record in decades because we have Pitbull closing the show!” (sic).

In cases like these, we have to look

to the likes of Taylor Swift and co who currently run the show and dictate popular trends within the music industry, with their slices of pop perfection and every move ideally placed to aid them in the current consumerist climate. Swift doesn’t deliberately shut black artists out of the business, although it could be seen as difficult to make themselves heard when age-old racism still exists in the entertainment to an extent.

The issue of favouring white music in the industry crops up time and time again and is also a problem prevalent in British music awards. In this year’s Brit award nominations, the list was arguably overwhelmingly white and it seems as if critics are struggling to acknowledge black artists at awards ceremonies, on both sides of the Atlantic.

Beyonce’s latest single ‘Formation’ serves as a form of black protest music and has recently received the mainstream attention that many would argue it deserves.

Denying black artists the right to make their voices heard and receive recognition for their talents is a social injustice. They are musicians as equal and talented as the likes of Taylor and Ed Sheeran and it is time the music industry steered towards equality and celebrated them.

Black artist, Omar is signed to the label Freestyle. His manager, Greg Boraman spoke out about black artists remaining on the sidelines of the music industry. “It does seem that black soul music artists are often engaged in an uphill

struggle to compete with the current crop of white-major label soul-influenced, but firmly pop based artists.

‘The issue of favouring white music in the industry crops up time and time again” “Whilst I don’t doubt the sincerity of those artists’ love of soul music, the industry, especially mainstream radio, seems institutionally uncomfortable with music that’s more soul than pop.”

It should be originality and popularity that makes an artist stand out and reap the recognition, rather than ethnicity. Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye were also artists that faced this issue in the past and now there’s a new line-up of modern day artists seeing history repeat itself.

It’s not all doom and gloom, things are starting to change for the better and with the work of Beyoncé, Kanye West and similar

artists making themselves heard and standing up for black artists in the music industry, it won’t be long before they’re no longer ruled out of awards nominations.

The change is inevitable anyway.

The public grow angrier and angrier each time black artists are snubbed at awards ceremonies and if the music industry continues to fail to acknowledge the artists then this will massively highlight the racial issues that are being swept under the rug.

It’s time for critics to stop turning a blind eye to the talent black artists are producing. They should be acknowledged in record sales, streaming figures and awards nominations.

Let’s measure them equally with their white counterparts and see a change in who scoops the awards on the night.

Grime artists are paving the way forward but there’s still so much more to be done. Maybe next year will be the year Kendrick Lamar wins big - fingers crossed.

Gigs this week Oct 18 Porches Sticky Mike’s Frog Bar £9.20 Oct 18 She Drew The Gun The Prince Albert £8.80 Oct 20 Buzzcocks Concorde 2 £24.75 Oct 20 Slow Club The Haunt £13.75 Oct 20 Marsicans Bleach £6.00 Oct 22 Glass Animals Brighton Dome £16.87

Getting all the awards: Taylor Swift. Reuters Xavier Clarke

The power of two: musical duos Louisa Streeting The surge of musical duos rising to fame in recent years has enveloped all genres. It is often the simplicity and rawness of their music that attracts people to a nuance and originality in the sound. Whether the band plays their instruments live or to a backing track, the effect of just two people on stage is remarkably striking.

Simon and Garfunkel were the pair that popularised the singersongwriter genre. They propelled themselves into the limelight in the 1960s becoming counterculture icons of the decade’s social revolution. Although their turbulent partnership led to their split in 1970, they produced some of the most recognisable hits of their genre, such as ‘The Sound of Silence’ (1964) and ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’ (1969). Although they’ve

had multiple reunions in their time, Simon has had a hugely successful solo career after writing most of the duo’s hits.

Looking ahead to the 1990s, The White Stripes emerged as part of the garage-rock revival scene. After many years of writing intricate and increasingly layered songs, it was the six-note riff conceived in a sound check that the pair are most remembered by, ‘Seven Nation Army’ (2003). Meg and Jack White, were divorced but promoted themselves as siblings. After a prolonged hiatus and Meg’s difficulty with anxiety and performing live, the band dissolved in 2011. Jack White is known for his musical feud with blues-rock duo, The Black Keys. Patrick Carney, drummer of The Black Keys, claimed White tried to fight him in a bar in New York. He also claimed that The Black Keys stole his sound, ironic, as both bands are famous off the back of the rhythms from blues artists from the Deep South in Northern

America.

A band who challenge the complex, structured musical style are postpunk duo Sleaford Mods. They’re known for their abrasive, minimalist style and their embittered explorations of austerity-era Britain, epitomising the spirit of working class life. The band is led by vocalist Jason Williamson, and accompanied by musician Andrew Robert Lindsay Fearn, whose onstage role consists of pressing play on the backing track and drinking a can of lager.

“Simon and Garfunkel were the pair that popularised the singer-songwriter genre” The duo partnership expands to multiple genres of music, not solely rock. The mystery of French electronic duo, Daft Punk, meant that their debut album, “Homework”, was

hugely awaited, launching them into worldwide fame. They both started their musical career in an indie-rock band known as Darlin’. Their image is one of the most striking parts about them, claiming in interviews that they don’t want to be photographed.

They began donning robotic outfits to combine humanistic and machinelike qualities, utilising their shyness to their advantage, as it is visually exciting to an audience.

OutKast were heralded as one of the most successful hip-hop partnerships of all time through their distinctive personas and idiosyncratic sound. The pair met in Atlanta and formed in 1992 after having fought in rap battles at their high school.

They have gone on to receive six Grammy awards for their work, with the popular 2003 single, “Hey Ya!” helped revitalise the Polariod corporation and the public’s perception of their products.

There are several notable Brightonbased duos to look out for at the mo-

ment. Frank & Beans’ impeccable live performances are combined with intricate drumbeats and strong guitar riffs.

“The duo partnership expands to multiple genres of music, not solely rock” Originally from Northern Ireland, the duo encompasses the sound of post-hardcore band, Fugazi, mirroring their DIY ethical stance. Their most commended song “God And His Bikini Girls” can be found on their SoundCloud. Garage-rock band, Fuoco, have attracted attention through their music videos on Youtube and their performances supporting The Amazing Snakeheads and Crows.

They released their first EP, “Perverted Gaze” in 2014. The pair are often praised for their high energy onstage and their complex, distorted sound.

14

The Badger 03.17.2016

ARTS

The Street Some of Brighton’s most captivating aspects can be found in its colourful streets; you can find just about anything over here, all you have to do is look.

On this Street corner we will be displaying Sussex students’ very own creative work, and just like the streets of Brighton, it will be truly one of a kind.

We’re always looking for new submissions — poetry, photography, cartoons, and everything in between — to showcase any and all creative talent.

Help us fill up this new page!

So free If you want to talk, with a glass of wine in hand Come here I know how to listen and let you flow in the currents of my heart I will savour your words like the sweet juice of life If you let me, I will absorb the sweat off your intellect and bathe it gently in my silence And if I don’t say much, it’s because I want us to just be Shake off the parched layers of thought and breathe tenderly from the dew of our lungs, alive Let the perfumed air of the night drench our skins in the experience of our closeness If it’s love that you need, then I’ve got that to give Because I know how to love the right way Love is a maze, and I’m forever wandering on its paths Joy is an art that I’ll learn for the rest of my life And I hope that so will you I hope you’ll take your fears and chains for the insidious lies they are And wrest them away into the past, where they belong Or rather – let them fall away, like the dead leaves of an old tree As you moon in the astonishing light of your own being And then, you can walk tall like a mighty Mountain Ash You are free So free

The meeting

Do you want to take a dive into this moon-bathed sky skinny-dip our souls in the cosmic ocean strip off our ego pants the shirts of our pride and the intimates of our fear and remain painfully naked meet me in the sky where our souls collide

Contact Lucie Andrau at thebadger.street@ gmail.com for any contributions

ever since I was young, and I am utterly in love with the feelings that a simple snapshot of reality can trigger. It’s about acknowledging the magnificence of life and turning it into a material slice of beauty.

My inspiration springs from my emotional experiences, out of which comes poetry, and in the beauty of nature all around us, a beauty we should notice more often. My plans for the future Stefania Chihaia, Media and are unclear - all I know is that I Communication student, 3rd will live a passionate life, and I year will bring something good into the world, transcending societal ‘‘I started writing poetry a year norms and limitations. The ultiago, and discovered that the words mate dream for me would be to would just come flowing out of me. become a writer !

Ever since, I have seen poetry as a The purpose of my project – way of being. It’s that one form of The Universe Blooming – is to communication where the soul is see nature and humans as exstripped completely bare. By being pressions of the same energy, inopen and exploring my connection extricably connected. While the to the cosmos and to my own emo- photos express the simple beauty tions, I seek to move and inspire of nature on all levels, the poems others to discover the same connec- are a reflection of the human tion and live their own inner light. soul, its connection to nature As for photography - I have liked it and its infinite potential. ’’

15

LIFESTYLE The Badger 17.10.2016

Hot-Lanta?

My year abroad in Atlanta: Hip-hop hub vs segregated city of Atlanta, proclaimed during a concert that I attended that Georgia Tech is a school for which “only the upper Atlanta’s presence in popular culture echelons attend”. The presence of African American students was largepaints a very different picture from ly to be found on the basketball and what I found to be the reality. football teams where they had been The image that is sold by hip-hop awarded scholarships in exchange for music and television shows is one their talent. For many, this remains that is not fully accessible by all, and to be the only outlet into prestigit glosses over a number of tensions ious universities, which I believe are that reflect the current state of race designed for the white middle classes relations in America as a whole.

It must be emphasised that there is and above.

In many places outside of campus, much to praise the city on, which is the racial divide changes dynamic as referred to colloquially as Hot-Lanta you travel to areas that are predomibecause of its exciting and vibrant feel. There is no doubt that spending nantly black. The neighbourhood a year in Atlanta was the best choice I of Edgewood stood out to me as somewhere that was quite difficult could have made. to visit. It is characterised by derelict Like anyone, I had many expectaand uninhabited buildings, but also tions of what my year abroad would by quaint brunch spots and artsy cofbe like and my experience proved to be eye opening. There is so much that fee shops, with murals reflecting the angst of the black population bridging the city, has to offer – quirky areas the gaps between the run down and such as Edgewood in Atlanta’s eastthe gentrified. side or the BeltLine, clustered with Edgewood demonstrated to me a independent boutiques, coffee shops cycle that is embedded in institutionand bars. It was hard to remember alised racism. A particular mural drew that such pockets of Atlanta were often a product of gentrification and I upon the underrepresentation of came to realise that the city was actu- African Americans in academia, but it was also emblematic of the situation ally deeply segregated. as a whole. The artist created a simple What was most prominent for me was the racial segregation of Georgia painting of African American history books being fed through a system Tech – the university I attended – that both reduced and altered them. both within the campus itself and the disparity between the institution For me it constructed a metaphor that represents the corruption in and the rest of Atlanta. For a city place that works to disadvantage that is composed mostly of African Americans, only 1,406 black students racial minorities in the US. Just a short 15-minute walk away, in the enrolled in September of 2015. By such a margin, 11,571 white students same neighbourhood, the Martin Luther King Jr. National Historic Site joined the university, which spoke volumes about the racial divide of op- can be found. For a city that was a portunities in the US. Hip-hop artist hub for the Civil Rights Movement, it is senseless to see poverty and B.oB, who is from a city just outside Arizona Rodriguez

homeless African Americans in the same neighbourhood as Martin Luther King’s gravesite. Atlanta’s black musical achievements perhaps distract from the reality of the situation in some parts of the city. It is undeniable that many rap and hiphop successes have been born out of Atlanta, but lyrics that sell the city as a place to “see gangsters roaming” and “where the players play” sensationalise the situation and cover up its failures.

Arizona Rodriguez Racial tensions also frequented my everyday life in the city in the form of interactions with people both inside and outside of my classes.

Aside from the most obvious strain between blacks and whites I experienced hostility towards blacks from the Hispanic population (a very small minority in Atlanta). One evening a Hispanic man warned me that a security guard, who was conversing with my friend and happened to be black, would rape her if she were not careful.

In response to my horrified reaction,

the man said I was naïve to think otherwise and that I had a lot to learn about racism. I was astonished to have witnessed such nonchalant and bigoted behaviour, but I came to realise that instances like this were not uncommon.

Racial tensions also frequented my everyday life in the city in the form of interactions with people both inside and outside of my classes. Aside from the most obvious strain between blacks and whites I experienced hostility towards blacks from the Hispanic population (a very small minority in Atlanta). One evening a Hispanic man warned me that a security guard, who was conversing with my friend and happened to be black, would rape her if she were not careful. In response to my horrified reaction, the man said I was naïve to think otherwise and that I had a lot to learn about racism. I was astonished to have witnessed such nonchalant and bigoted behaviour, but I came to realise that instances like this were not uncommon.

In both this class, and a class I took on the Civil Rights Movement, I was able to learn about race relations in a different light. One of the main objectives of my Civil Rights class was to move away from the traditional narrative of the movement, and to explore the longue durée of events.

It is clear that the Civil Rights Movement exceeded far beyond and before the 1960s, and is still relevant today. This brings me back to the Mural I came across in Edgewood, showing society’s attempt to shrink the importance of African American history. Now more than ever there is a need to celebrate both the history

and achievements of black people in America.

Arizona Rodriguez

Interested in writing for Lifestyle? We want you!

Contact Lifestyle Editor Alex Carter at ac572@sussex. ac.uk

Don’t get on with your housemates?

Lauren Wade Music Editor Before students embark on the university experience most, if not all, of students living in halls will remain hopeful that they’ll be placed in accommodation with, what will become, their best friends for life.

However, the reality often turns out to be very different. The Housing Office on campus randomly decide who will be living where, so your chances of striking gold and clicking with your flatmates isn’t as likely as you might anticipate.

Upon your arrival, freshers week will often draw a false sense of hope that things will remain peachy with your flatmates for the rest of the year; this isn’t always the case. The heightened experience of constant socialising is designed to help you overcome any nervousness and to settle down in your new environment more easily than if you closed yourself off in your room and hid for

Don’t let them get you down!

the first few days. When you’re at these student union led events and you’re caught in the moment having fun with your new peers, some people will genuinely bond over common ground and make friends for life with their flatmates, whereas in other cases people will be putting up a front and not having as much fun as they might appear to be externally.

There are many reasons why you might not get on with the people you live with. It might just be that you’re very different people with conflicting views or political ideologies. Otherwise, issues might arise because of standard self-inflicted student behaviour. It’s never a good idea to steal and consume your flatmates’ food supply, so don’t even go there if you want them to like you. Similarly, playing reggae (or any other genre of music) as loud as your speakers can go at 3am when your neighbour has a 9am is a sure-fire way to ensure you two never see eye to eye. Be respectful and save it for the weekend.

Avoiding conflict is pretty straightforward if you just remember to be a decent human being and respect your flatmates’ right to privacy and peace and quiet in halls. But what happens when you really don’t get on with the people you live with?

You could wait it out and hope that the situation improves over time, but it’s a risky strategy to adopt and if you’re in a position where you feel too anxious to leave your room, you should probably get out of there sharpish.

The Housing Office are helpful and will assist you in any way they can. There’s a swap list that can be used to find alternative accommodation on or off campus and students often find somewhere else to live that suits them better this way.

Whilst that might be the best option available, we appreciate that it’s not the route for everyone. The Student Life Centre and residential advisors in halls are always there to listen and help. Give them a quick email

if you’re in need of assistance and you might find your problems solved that way instead.

Don’t despair if your friendships are few and far between in your accommodation. Joining societies provides a great way of making friends with guaranteed like-minded individuals. There’s over 200 societies on campus; you’re sure to find a few that interest you. Going to as many meetings and socials as you can will increase your likelihood of allowing new friendships to blossom – it’s never too late to join a society either. Alternatively, try socialising and getting to know the people in the flats around you, upstairs and downstairs. It may be that those flats have people living in that you just ‘click’ with better. This can be vouched from a previous personal experience of my own where I met a girl from the flat next door who would later go on to be one of my closest friends. If it’s clear from the start that you’re not going to

get on with your flatmates. Don’t suffer in silence and let it affect your academic and social life. There is help out there and the sooner you access it, the better off you will be. If you’re in a situation that’s harming you, speaking out is one of the best things you can do. Your life will improve tenfold and you’ll feel more confident and happier in yourself overall.

It’s not the end of the world if you don’t get on with the people you live with, although it certainly makes your life easier. Remember that the people you end up living with in halls only last for a mere nine months, and then you’ll have the whole of Brighton’s wondrous letting agents to trawl through.

On a final note – choose second year housemates wisely and don’t give in to any last minute panicked decision-making.

LETTERS

16

The Outrageous Hypocriscy of Natwest’s Ad campaign

Dear Badger, At risk of sounding like the most captious man in Britain, I’m going to complain about an advert. My issue is less concerned with the advertising culture itself, and more the ethical framework which stands watch over these seemingly harmless reels of film.

Take, for instance, NatWest’s latest offering, an emotionally moving clip showing the best and worst side to humanity. On the best side, you have images of suffragettes, men off to war, a mother carrying her child, siblings sharing an ice cream; and on the worst, footage of global warming, white skinhead violence, a criminal covering his face, a girl begging for money being ignored by commuters. The ad ends with a soothing mother figure stepping forward affectionately, her voice kindly proclaiming, we all have a duty to do the right thing. We are no different,” before the slogan “We are what we do” seeps into view.

Actually, in terms of aesthetics, it’s a good advert. But for that very reason all the more dangerous. It’s the Child Catcher as the Candy Man, the Grim Reaper in the visage of a Chuckle brother. Through the juxtaposition of such iconography, and the moral platitude proffered at the end, NatWest’s message is clear – “We’re the good guys. We believe in racial inclusivity, economic equity, and sustainable energy.” But for any bank to claim the moral high ground on these three issues is not only misleading, but down right abhorrent.

Placing themselves as champions of the poor is the most blatant of these tall tales, considering that RBS’s ineptitude in the lead up to the 2008 financial crisis led to a £45 Billion Bailout by the government (in other words, the tax payer). And since then, the banking group has been plagued with corruption and scandals, which has inevitably led to eight consecutive years of losses, yet, and pretend to act surprised, the top management team were handed future bonuses in shares worth £17.4 million. Seen in this context, it’s wholly inconceivable that they should be allowed to draw on the viewer’s empathy for the girl begging

in the advert, and use this in their moral rebranding of the bank.

Similarly, the bank seeks to prove its racial and gender inclusivity through the fact the NatWest worker, the aforementioned mother figure, is both black and female.

Yet the message rings hollow. Few women occupy senior positions in the bank, whilst the bank’s inclusion aspiration (set in 2013), to have 30% women in the company’s top 5000 roles by 2020, shows not only the bank’s current gross imbalance with regard to gender currently, but also a woefully limited plan for change in the future. However when scrolling through the faces of each and every Board or Management Committee’s website it’s clear that those who profit are white, and the majority are men.

Admittedly, with regard to environmental work, there is a grain of truth in all the prattle. The bank’s cutting of 70 percent in funding for oil and gas companies in 2015, whilst also doubling green energy loans to £1 billion, is noteworthy. In the context of their latest ad campaign though, it’s a derisory cop out. They still fund gambling companies, and they’re still guilty of backing arms and defence companies. Death and misery is still the game, but toned down.

Ultimately I’m sure many will still say “it’s just an advert. Get over it.”

And to a degree, fair enough. But Banks are some of the most powerful institutions in the world, and so should be judged by a far harsher ethical code. NatWest’s ability to forego truthful representation is part of a wider culture of deception, one which allows banks to run riot at the expense of the majority, without any government so much as batting an eye lid.

Were NatWest held to their own catechism, “We are what we do”, the ad would probably run more like this –images of death, disease, and famine, followed by a boardroom of old, white executives throwing money in the air, cackling and dancing as it fell. But then again, it’s just an advert, isn’t it?

Yours, Felix Thompson

The Badger 17.10.2016

Black History Month needs to face up to problems with consumerism

Dear Badger, When Carter G. Woodson began ‘Negro History Week’ in 1926, he could hardly have imagined its evolution into an entire month’s celebration of the achievements and central roles played by African Americans in U.S History. However, over recent years, the purpose of Black History Month has been all the more subverted through the focus on key individuals and the worrying increase of consumerism associating itself with the celebrations.

Instead of focusing on its namesake, Black History, the celebrations are limited to famous Black Americans, namely Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks.

Whilst the importance of Dr. King and Rosa Parks cannot be downplayed, to focus primarily on these individuals reduces the entire Month to little more than a ‘time and place’ historical study into individuals, rather than acknowledging other historical figures and their rightful importance. For example, what do the names of Claudette Colvin and Sarah Keys have in common? They are the names of two women, out of numerous others, who both refused to move on public transport, before Rosa Parks’ more famous refusal.

What about Archibald Carey, the man whose speech inspired Dr.

King’s famous ‘I Have a Dream’?

These are the forgotten Black Americans who influenced their more famous counterparts; the people that should be featured in this month’s celebrations.

With regards to my latter point, major corporations have recently starting involving themselves with Black History Month. Companies such as Nike, McDonald’s and Heineken have all attached a Black History theme to their advertising and marketing campaigns, with Nike having annual ‘Black History Month’ trainers, starting this year at £100 as a minimum. This is what Black History Month has become; not a celebration of the achievements of Black Americans, not an acknowledgment of the central roles played in changing both political and social values, but rather an event used to sell products and make more profit.

When Morgan Freeman’s immortal statement that ‘Black History is American History’ is taken into account, and when the emphasis on the celebration of this event is more widespread than a corporation’s new advertising campaign, the problems with Black History Month will finally be resolved.

Yours,

For me, decolonising the curriculum means representation.

I would like to see our diverse student body reflected back to us by the institution that we all go to; from our faculty members, to the reading we are set, to the study abroad options.

What does it mean when some continents are significantly less represented than others, as a study abroad or post graduate research options? As a student born in one these underrepresented continents it sends a clear message.

There is value-judgement placed on the education that we

Jordan Wright

WRITE US A LETTER Read something in The Badger that you want to respond to? Have an opinion on a topical issue? Or just want to complain about something? Write us a letter!

Feel free to email submissions to badger-letters@sussexstudent.com or join the Badger Letter Writers Facebook group.

receive and some things hold up to our standards while others are declared sub-standard.

But who placed these valuejudgments in the first place? And why are some groups in society more represented within our curriculum than other groups?

Our student body and values in society have changed since Sussex opened in the 1960’s. I want to see other points of views and I want representation.

Yours, M Nanu

The best tweets of the week @rosentweets: With Trump grabbing vaginas and Clinton shaming rapevictims can’t help but think we were a bit harsh on Miliband about that bacon sandwich. @itskatcombs: Trump writing a term paper: Sources Cited: 1. You Know It 2. I know It 3. Everybody Knows It @Kumailn: It’s #WorldMentalHealthDay. If you’re struggling with something, seek help. You are not alone.

Decolonising Our Curriculum Dear Badger,

#TheBadger

@frasercoppin: Was great to meet @normanlamb earlier, nice chap. The current government should listen to him re: drug policy, because he’s right @PresidentUSSU: Join hip-hop star Jordan Stephens, the NHS & YMCA by fighting mental health stigma. Together we are whole #IAMWHOLE

Tweet us at #TheBadger and you could be published here next week!

The views and opinions expressed in this publication do not necessarily represent those of the Student’s Union, unless explicitly stated.

University of Sussex Students’ Union Falmer, East Sussex, BN1 9QF

17

SCIENCE

The Badger 17.10.2016

Keep an eye on the police

A research group at the University of Cambridge has found that providing police officers with body-worn reduces complaints against the police.

Kate Dearling Science Sub-editor What would you do if the people supposed to be protecting you started to become a threat? For black people living in America this is a reality as the number of African Americans killed by the police continues to rise. Police misconduct in America has been hitting the headlines frequently this year and calls for change, led by the Black Lives Matter campaign, is widespread. Researchers at the University of Cambridge may now have hard evidence in favour for one of the reforms preposed – providing police with cameras.

The study was carried out in both the UK and the US and found that the use of body-worn cameras stopped almost all complaints against the police. Every week police officers participating in the study

were randomly assigned to either wear a camera (treatment) or not (control) so all officers in the study were used in both conditions. At the beginning of the study a total of 1,539 complaints were made against the 6 police departments involved in the study, by the end of the study complaints had dropped to 113 for all sites - a huge 93% reduction.

“One of the most interesting points about the study was that they found no difference between the control and treatment groups” There are several theories as to what caused the drop in complaints: first wearing cameras means that officers are more accountable for their actions so less likely to use exces-

How long can we live?

Eduard Campillo-Funollet A research letter published in Nature at the beginning of the month studies data from a variety of databases to conclude that there is a limit to the human lifespan. Even more, the results suggests that we,ve already reached the limit: 115 years. According to the paper, it is unlikely that the maximum age at death will rise in the future. The maximum documented age of death worldwide is that of Jeanne Calment, a French woman who died in 1997 at 122 years. The oldest individual in UK was Charlotte Hughes, who died in 1993 at the age of 115. Today, the oldest living person in UK is 112 years old. In view of the new study, it is not probable for a human to live longer than Mrs. Calment.

“Their motivation was to settle a long term controversy in the field of aging: is there a natural limit to the human lifespan?”

The authors of the paper are from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. Their motivation was to settle a long term controversy in the field of aging: is there a natural limit to the human lifespan? Using statistical techniques, the authors conclude that the maximum lifespan is 115 years, and that it was reached in the 1990s; the chance of a human dying at an age of 125 years is less than 1 over 10000 in any given year.

Already in the 1980s it was suggested that the duration of life may

be limited. Upper limits for human maximum lifespan were already estimated but the lack of data did not allow definite conclusions to be made. There are many confounders that make the analysis of aging data difficult; the most important one is that only a few countries in the world have high-quality, long term mortality records, and in consequence only a small number of maximum ages at death can be studied. To conclude that the humans reached our maximum lifespan, Xiao Dong and his colleagues studied two types of data. First, they observed that the life expectancy is generally increasing since the beginning of the 20th century in most of the developed countries. Furthermore, the number of individuals per 100000 living until old age is also increasing steadily. But if one focuses on what age group is growing faster, it turns out that after a steep increase during the 1970s, since 1980 the fastest growing group of people are between 95 and 100 years old.

To further confirm their findings, the authors studied a second type of data: the maximum age at death in several countries, including UK. They charted the maximum age at death for each year since 1960, and observed that since the mid 1990s the values are not increasing anymore.

The study is not free of controversy. James W. Vaupel, from the Max Planck Institute Odense Center on the Biodemography of Aging and the curator of one of the databases that provided the data for the new study, rejects the conclusion of the paper, claiming that it just repeats mistakes from the past.

sive force. Secondly members of the public are less likely to make false complaints about officers when they know that the encounter has been recorded. Additionally any complaints that are made are more easily resolved when there is evidence, saving governments time and money.

One of the most interesting points about the study was that they found no difference between the control and treatment groups. Under standard experimental conditions this would be bad news but in this case it’s a great sign. It means that officers not wearing a camera were also getting fewer complaints suggesting that a behavioural change had occurred throughout the police force resulting in all shifts being carried out with improved conduct. This is great news for rolling out the initiative on a wider scale as police departments could benefit from the effects of wearing cameras at half the cost as only half the officers would need to be randomly allocated cameras on a day-to-day basis.

Though body-worn cameras keep the public safe from officers using excessive force, it could put officers themselves at risk. Partway through

the study it was found that wearing cameras increased assaults against the police, potentially because officers were less assertive when they were being filmed when in certain situations more force is required.

Also huge amounts of data will be recorded about each officer as they conduct their shift, including any private conversations between themselves and colleagues. These personal conversations could be used against said officer if the data is widely accessible, a reasonable solution to this issue is to only

CC0 Public Domain allow recordings to be accessed if a complaint is made and not for any other purpose.

Ultimately body-worn cameras help both parties - they prevent police from being wrongly accused of misconduct and they protect the public from being assaulted by police officers. As long as the footage collected is handled with the appropriate protection, these cameras could provide a simple solution to a desperate problem.

A Coffee a Day Keeps Dementia Away Hannah Richards

High caffeine intake in older women is associated with reduced odds of developing dementia or other cognitive impairments, according to the results of a recent study.

Research conducted by Dr Ira Driscoll found that postmenopausal women who consumed more caffeine a day were at lower risk of developing dementia and other cognitive problems. The data came from participants in the Women’s Health Initiative Memory Study. Driscoll and colleagues examined data from 6,467 postmenopausal women, who self-reported their daily caffeine intake by frequency and serving size.

The cognitive function of the women was assessed annually by trained technicians for a period up to 10

years, 388 participants received diagnosis of probable dementia.

Caffeine intake and time taken to display signs of dementia and cognitive impairment were analysed.

The results were then adjusted to take into account other dementia risk factors including age, BMI, race, hormone therapy, sleep quality, high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, smoking and alcohol consumption.

The results found that women who consumed more than 172mg of caffeine per day (approximately two cups of coffee) had a 26% lower risk of developing dementia compared to women who drank less.

It is known that caffeine binds to adenosine receptors in the brain, the study results suggest a potential mechanism to investigate in order to

understand how caffeine can provide protection against dementia.

Caffeine is an easily modifiable part of our diet, it is therefore important to quantify its relationship with cognitive function and understand the underlying mechanisms with regards to preventing dementia. This is especially important as dementia is a growing concern in the aging population.

CC0 License

Factarama The USSR’s Venera 7 was the first successful landing of a spacecraft on another planet

The colour of a pill changes its effectiveness - blue pills make better sedatives, while pain releif is more effective when coloured white

Jupiter has the shortest day of all the planets - it rotates on its axis once every 9 hours and 55 minutes

Coackroach milk is 4 times more nutritious than cows milk - scientists are now rying to sequence the genes of the milk portein crystals so that it can be produced in the lab

Flamingoes are pink because the veta-caratene in the alga they eat is poisonous to them so they filter it out through theire feathers, colouring them pink

The molecule limonene is responsible for the smell of oranges and lemons - they smell different because they contain different mirror images of the same molecule

18

The Badger 17.10.2016

SPORT

Serena Williams: The greatest athlete ever?

Esther Alcock In 2016 what does it mean to be a woman in sport? When we think about throwing or running “like a girl” do we think of power and speed, or a pathetic attempt at such things?

Serena Williams, now known to some as the greatest sports athlete ever, is redefining what it means to be a female athlete. She has overcome not only the lack of representation of women in sport, but also of black women. There is no other athlete at her level. No athlete that has overcome such adversity that has also had the capability to set the standard for all future sports persons.

Although woman are included in sport, there is much debate about whether they are truly supported.

For example, the lack of televised women’s sport and sex verification testing, known as the “femininity police”, continue to be huge obstacles in women’s sport.

In 2009 Caster Semenya was wrongly publicly embarrassed when she was forced to undergo invasive sex verification tests. Pundits, at the time and now, argue that this type of investigation is not necessary in sport. But is the extremity of this just another way of pushing women out of sport?

Questioning if they’re “too good”

for a woman?

Serena Williams has often been labelled “aggressive” and “masculine”, but her muscular physique and competitive attitude towards tennis are the things that make her one of the greatest athletes of our time.

But Williams’ body was also the source of a different controversy when she danced in Beyoncé’s “Sorry” video in a black leotard.

Williams featured in the video, which celebrated African American women and their bodies, and was then criticised for being “too sexy” in. The double standard that women in sport are set doesn’t support their inclusion in the sporting world.

It has long been a topic of debate of whether women in sport are over sexualised, objectified and under-represented. Although the last football world cup was seen as a milestone for women’s football, as it had the most viewers on record, it is clear that they are nowhere near the dizzy heights of fame male footballers receive.

The U.S. women’s football team is, in fact, suing for wage inequality as they earn not even 40% of what the male football team earn.

They are the best in the world, in comparison to the U.S. men’s team who are 29th, generate the most revenue out of the two teams, £20

million more, and have played the most games. So why do they face such wage discrimination?

Similarly, if Serena Williams is at the top at her game, as pundits have been commenting, then why is she paid less than the women she is beating, such as Maria Sharapova?

Racism and representation is still a massive problem in sport. In the 2016 Australian open Williams herself admitted that “Tennis is a very white sport” after a fan holding sign that said “Keep Calm and be Serena” covered her face in black paint.

But that wasn’t the first time Williams faced racism whilst competing; her whole family, including sister Venus, have boycotted the Indian Wells tournament since 2001 after the crowds chanted “I wish it was ’75 (a reference to the 1975 Los Angeles race riots); we’d skin you alive!”.

Many people find Serena Williams a true inspiration, not only for consistently being at the top of her game but also for the values she brings to it. She is unashamed of her body, her talent, and her race. But others are still intimidated by a strong black woman that is reinventing what it means to be a woman in sport.

Wikimedia Commons

Is English football failing in its quest for equality?

Patrick Isitt In the wake of the scandal that saw Sam Allardyce axed as England manager at the end of September, the managerial roundabout

circulates the media once again.

The list, though impressive in candidate credentials, scarcely features black managers; in fact there have been no previous black managers in charge of the national

Wikimedia Commons

team and only four across the English football league.

During Black History Month of last year, the BBC reported that black and minority ethnic managers (BME) were extremely underrepresented in English football, but why is that? Though a high number of BME players feature across the top divisions in the UK in 2015, only 5% of elite coaching roles were held by those of black and minority ethnic backgrounds.

As the predictable turnover of managers in English football continues, there hasn’t been significant change in these figures over the last year. Whilst it’s perhaps naive to suggest that a lack of black managers can be put down to racism in the sport, are there hints that racism represses the contribution of BME coaches at a grassroots level?

As is the case with most sports, a greater number of participants at grassroots, in this case black managers earning introductory FA

coaching badges, will provide an increased number of products at the top of the game.

However in the increasing modernity of football, it is usually ex-players that take managerial positions, and therefore the prior statement seems meaningless. But how then, do we explain that in a game of an increasing number of black players, the number of black managers has dwindled to a near halt?

Arguably the problem stems from the still - now well reported issues of racism in football; the FA recently claimed there had been a 70% increase in reports of racism within the sport, perhaps accounting for a lack of black coaches and managers.

Combatting this issue involves a variety of solutions. Perhaps the key one, though, is to promote more opportunities and pathways into management in BME communities; absence of these opportunities is arguably stalling the

potential of seeing black managers at the pinnacle of the management game.

Last year the BBC concluded that, with the slow - and almost unnoticeable - growth of black managers in English football, it could be 30 years before we see racial equality in this respect.

The FA, who appointed Heather Rabbats as their first black member of the board in 2011, should aim to disregard this prediction of 2030 equality and seek the immediate racial equality that the rest of football now holds in abundance.

Would you like to write a sports article for the badger?

If so get in contact with our sports editor: badgersport@sussexstudent.com