Pelican Volume 92 Edition 2 - Heritage

booladarlung Heritage

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CAMILA EMMA PRESI TORIAL TORIAL TORIAL A H W llinllachu Pelicankuna.

Kachkanki,

En esta edición, decidí escribir mi Camila Torial en Español y Quechua para honrar las dos lenguas que conforman mi herencia cultural.

La palabra herencia es complicada.

Para muchos es una conexión profunda con nuestros antepasados y para otros es un amargo recuerdo de un pasado oscuro que todavía tenemos que cambiar. Es importante mirar al pasado para construir un futuro mejor. Pelican Magazine tiene noventa y tres años de herencia la cual debemos recordar, honrar, y aprender de ella.

Tupananchikama, ñañay turikuna!

--Warm greetings, Pelicans.

In this edition, I decided my Camila Torial in and Quechua to honour languages that are part cultural heritage.

to write Spanish the two of my

Heritage is a complex word. For many, it means a deep connection with our ancestors, and for others, it is a reminder of a dark past we still need to change. It is important to look at the past to build a better future. Pelican Magazine has ninetythree years of heritage which we should remember, honour and learn from.

hen googled, Heritage is defined as a property or an inheritance. To an extent this is true, it is your property as it is a story that is owned by you that only you can tell. You inherit a different type of story from your family and your ancestors; that can also be defined as Heritage.

Yet Heritage also signifies the tales of our land, remnants of the past, and what lessons we must remember for better or for worse to improve our future. As we move forward, I hope we can embrace each other’s heritage and give people the power to take control of their own narrative.

Pelican has 93 years of stories to tell and I hope that this edition makes you proud of your own Heritage, whilst bringing you a new story.

eritage is such an interesting topic to me. So much of our individual identity is made up of what we feel our heritage is – for better or for worse. Sometimes it can make you feel like you are part of something bigger than yourself.

Other times it can make you feel like you’re locked inside a box you didn’t choose to be in.

This uni has Heritage. The Guild has Heritage (109 years of it, in fact). Every part of our lives is dripping in expectation and tradition. But just between you and me, I’ve never liked expectations. I like to do my own thing, and if that means rocking the boat a little, so be it.

So, rock the boat! Do things you believe in, things that make you feel real emotions. Look after yourself and give yourself the time and space to screw things up (because trust me, it will happen). Keep learning, living life, and most importantly, keep reading Pelican.

Love you lots, Ami xx

Goodbye for now, my brothers and sisters.

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INSIDE HERITAGE

ARTS

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Family Crest

By Ethan Dodson

VOLUME_93

ISSUE_2

48 61

Heritage

By Pauline Wong Colouring art

By Savannah Regan

ASTROLOGY

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April Horoscopes

By Holly Carter-Turner and Abbey Durrant

CAMPUS AFFAIRS

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Tertiary Education: A Long Time Sacrifice

By Jelena Kovacevic

COMEDY

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Artwork by Pauline Wong

ARTWORK

31 49

Cottage Blues

By Sally Thomas Heritage

By Pelican Magazine

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Wet cement

By David Paik

DIVERSITY

46 52

Stuck in the Middle (of Two Cultures)

By Kassandra Fernando Thai Food

By Jake Phillips

FASHION

14 16

Get Away Collective

By Izabela Barakovska A Kmart King Dethroned

By Perry Caswell

FILM

18 40

The Lord of the Rings and Respect to the Original Literature

By Ben Marshall Film Review of Prisoners (2013)

By Benji Steinberg

FINANCE AND ECONOMICS

20 22

Where is the Financial Education in Our Schools?

Evolution of Money

By Brando Arimborgo and Neha Bolla

PHOTOGRAPHY

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Bushland

By James Culnane

POLITICS

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Your Guide to the Ukraine-Russia Crisis

By Izzy Hamer and Maggie Leung

SCIENCE

LIFESTYLE

10 50

How to Time Travel in Perth – A Little Slice of History

By Gabrielle Fitzpatrick Not So Subtle Desi Traits

By Sabine Singh

LITERATURE AND CREATIVE WRITING

32 36 41

ISLAND

By Georgia Grubelich Through the Frosted Glass and Confusion

By Anonymous Spaces In Between

By Arabella Broshan

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By Crystal Ngo

TECH AND GAMING

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The Heritage of Women in Computing

By Kimberely Harrison

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Wordsearch

By Sarah Sheikh

MUSIC

The views expressed within this magazine are not the opinions of the UWA Student Guild or Pelican Editorial Staff but of the individual artists and writers.

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The Pelican team acknowledges that the UWA Campuses are located on the lands of the Whadjuk and Mineng peoples of the Noongar nation, the original and continuing storytellers and custodians of their lands. These lands were stolen, and sovereignty was never ceded.

Edited by Camila Egusquiza & Emma Forsyth Layout by Xander Sinclair 5

Family Crests Ethan Dodson

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y family does not have a traditional family crest. This is not particularly interesting. It would be almost impossible to pin down an ancient crest (some go as far back as the 12th century) and be able to trace it to a family living today, in this year 2022. In fact, it would be much more interesting if we did have a family crest.

Even with all of this in mind, both of my uncles have matching tattoos of a family crest on their shoulders. I’ve never asked, but l assume that the crest was drawn up by a tattoo artist and not one of our direct descendants from the 12th century.

What brought them to get matching tattoos of a lion fighting a dragon atop the word ‘Dodson’?

Do they both sleep easier feeling, though falsely, that their proud bloodline fought against such beasts?

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Who’s to even say that families got their crest tattooed onto them? Though there is evidence of tattooing dating back even further than the tradition of family crests, the two almost certainly didn’t cross paths (until my uncles, that is). If they had, it would not have been applied to them by the sterilised needle of a tattoo gun, a technology that would only become popular after 1891.

Would knowledge of any of this affect them in any way? I must admit, l have never had the stones to say any of this to their face, so there’s no way of knowing. Maybe it’s the intimidation of their matching family crest tattoos that has stopped me from voicing these concerns or maybe, it’s the number of mental hurdles they had to jump through to get them that is truly scary.

Artwork by Alyssa Lewis

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Wet Cement David Paik’s only goal in life is to somehow fit in a dad joke into whatever thing you are talking about.

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o, I was walking through my calm, suburban neighbourhood when the wet, glimmering shine of freshly placed cement caught my eye. “F.A.N.-TASTIC,” I said as I approached it with a hunter-like determination, but from a third-party perspective, my cringing towards the cement paralleled the awkwardness of saying goodbye to a friend and then proceeding to walk with them in the same direction.

I got there, eventually. There, I was, a few steps away from destiny. In my head, I was already painting a mural or the classic, “Candice was here,” in the centre of the cement canvas. My name isn’t Candice, but I find that name funny for some reason. As I stuck my oversized index finger over the cement, I noticed a mannequin dressed as a construction worker holding a sign. At the top of the sign, in big, bold letters it said: “Helloooo Stranger! Don’t do It,” proceeded below by a small font size message that only a viewer who was as close as I could observe.

Helloooo Stranger! Don’t do it.

This cement floor was finely handcrafted by hard-working folks around these parks, and it would be a complete, painful shame if we had to clear out another one of your creative doo-doos. Could we possibly interest you in walking a few blocks down and defacing a different cement floor? Or, there is a great coffee shop up the street that you could go to?

Ok. I see you are still standing before this wet cement.

And I understand that maybe you’re right to do this. It is not often that you walk across a chance like this. And now that the opportunity has risen once more, you are bound to take it.

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I’d like to invite you to think about why you would do this.

To ruin a day’s work? To solve your immediate urges? Or are you desperate to leave a permanent mark in this world? Who the heck knows why you are here today, but one thing is for sure, you woke up today and told yourself: “I’m gonna fu#$ up a nice, smooth cement floor!”

Maybe there’s an off chance you might change your mind. Maybe you might continue to walk, perhaps pet a dog, or wait for a stranger to ask you about that amazing new haircut you got. But no, who are we kidding?

If someone asked you that question, you might as well book the first flight to California,find your way to that Hollywood actor you really like, and ask them to marry you, because buddy, you’re dreaming. I guess I can understand. Sometimes you have the urge to resolve your immediate emotions (although taking it all out on our floor is less than desirable), it’s overwhelming, I get it. I’m guessing if I told you that if you continue on without getting your fingers dirty, this deeply encoded need to ruin our pretty neighbourhood floor with a silly little smiley face will go away eventually, you wouldn’t believe me. But it’s true. You can put your trust in my fake, plastic hands. Maybe you’ve been lied to before. Been told this before, yet that fearful feeling and desire to do wrong is still there. Those fears and emotions riddle your heart with scars, yet you are strong to have come this far. Unlike me, you are no dummy. Yet, often, you stumble over the cracks of your cobblestone heart. Perhaps every floor was wet enough to ruin, and you continued to deface it with your silly, overthought emotions - stupidly.

And every time you realize the cruel fiction of your solace after imitating Banksy, you swear to yourself you’ll try a little less next time. A little less open, a little quieter. You’ve told yourself it’s not worth your time. You’re smarter than this. And I’m here to tell you that things will be different, even though I have absolutely no evidence to support that claim. This time is different, I promise. Why would I lie to you? Why would I want to hurt you? This time, perhaps, there is no wet cement for you to draw on. This time, things are going to be different.

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How to Time Travel in Perth A Little Slice of History

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erth has an intensely rich history. The city was founded in 1829 by British settlers. But its history extends for thousands of years before this. Nyoongar of Beeliar (what we now call the Swan River) supported life for the First Nations.

Architectural gems, despite being protected by the state government, are often overlooked.

The aim of this article is to draw attention to the historic value of the city we know and love.

Below are my top three must-see locations to visit if you want to take a trip back in time.

Gabrielle Fitzpatrick

3. VICTORIA PARK You don’t need to look very far to understand why the eastern suburb of Victoria Park has made this list. Established in the 1890s prior to federation, the town prides itself on its balance of old and new. Walking down the streets, it isn’t long before you are greeted by the architectural finesse of grandiose front facades. Preservation of this domestic history is what makes the Vic Park community special and unique. Here, heritage oozes from the eclectic housing market into its streets, creating a vibrant culture. For example, local high schools hold true to their past through the safeguarding of old structures.

Elements of their campuses, such as the fully maintained facade of St Joachim’s at Ursula 10

Frayne College, which greets Albany Highway, or the original 1930s buildings within Kent Street High School that preserve the Inter-War Classical style defined by exposed brick, tiled floors, and mature greenery. The local police station and post office still operate under the original infrastructure. You can even dine in the style of the 1800s at the Broken Hill Hotel on the main Albany Highway strip, designed by the first mayor of the town. Overall, this innercity suburb is a must-visit for those seeking an immersive historical day trip.

2. THE PERTH CBD ITSELF Yes, I know what you are thinking. With the hustle and bustle of the business and technology sector, this seems like an odd mention. However, dig a little deeper, and you might find some gems buried in this concrete jungle. Perth City has twenty-eight listed heritage sites earning its rightful spot at number three. From the Town Hall, which has stood in the heart of the city since the 1870s, to the St Mary’s Cathedral built fifty years later. The architecture exemplifies the best of each decade. Even the Royal Perth Hospital consists of eight heritage buildings, each marking distinctive features of the eras in which they were built. The hospital in itself is an ancestral icon. It has its own museum

detailing the history of medicine in Perth.

For those who are more nature orientated, the Supreme Court Gardens are delightful, with mature age trees that have been growing since 1903 such as the flooded gum and marri eucalyptus. We must not forget the kangaroo paws, the roots of which are a part of the traditional Nyoongar diet. Each Perth highlight mentioned offers official tours for those wanting to unleash their inner tourist. There is even the “Historic Heart of Perth Web App”, which allows you to go on a self-directed heritage walk of the city centre 11

1. FREMANTLE The Fremantle Prison and Fremantle Market complexes alone give this community a heavily weighted heritage factor. It is home to one of the oldest buildings in Perth, The Round House - which was an active part of the Fremantle Prison in the 1830s.

For those who are more arts orientated, The Fremantle Arts Centre explores the art history of the city, establishing its permanence through its characteristic limestone. Culturally, Fremantle is very diverse due to East and Southeast Asian immigration in the 70s and 80s. It is also home to a lot of Indigenous Artists. I would advise

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anyone reading this list to not miss out on all this seaside settlement has to offer. Fremantle’s historical roots span deep and wide. There is something sure to appeal to everyone, from the Freo Social, which while accommodating up and coming local bands, also rests on the site of an old Artillery Drill Hall. For old souls, you can have a cup of tea at Mr Chapple in the Old Synagogue complex. For all these reasons and more, Fremantle has well and truly earned its winning position.

Bushland by James Culnane 13

Gateway Collective Izabela Barakovska

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n the fashion industry, heritage is not just a concept, but rather, it is an institution that underpins the credibility, legitimacy, stature, and status of a brand beyond just clothes, shoes, and accessories. Having heritage elevates a label to become an entity, a true force to be reckoned with.

This is exemplified by the luxury fashion houses of the world - Balenciaga, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Dior, Chanel, Armani, Yves Saint Laurent, Hermès, Fendi, Dolce & Gabbana, Prada, and many more. These internationally renowned brands are household names even for those without the slightest interest in the world of fashion.

Gateway Collective, founded by Isaac Baulch and Karl Sauerwein in 2021, is challenging the norms of the fashion industry’s landscape - bringing a fresh, minimalistic, and cleancut streetwear label to compete on the scene with luxury brands, who have in recent years themselves diverted attention to the growing mass of the streetwear scene.

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Honoured to spend the afternoon on the set of their shoot for their inaugural clothing drop, I was able to see first hand the artistic vision the pair of high school friends, turned business partners, have for their label.

founded and are project managing the launch of a startup to honour decades of their passions and pursuits.

They began with an early romance with sneakers and the streetwear industry on their international travels. They have immersed themselves in vintage and limited edition flipping circles in the Australian scene and have

This brand is underpinned by the unique understanding of a long-term friendship, a mutual adoration of football and fashion alike, and years of catch-ups blessed by suburban proximity.

Their first collection - Capsule 1: Elevate - features two kits - colour matched sets of hoodies and shorts in the shades cloud, a pastel blue, and obsidian (ash black).

of their target audience, and customs officers alike to work out the perfect combination of textures, materials, colours, sizes, and branding to create the pieces we see today.

There’s much to be said for the attention to detail these two have put towards each item of clothing and its place in the aesthetics of the brand as a whole.

“Our focus is equally a producer and consumer mindset - we put just as much effort into the clothes and their quality, as we do with the way we shoot and style. We’re moving away from brands and labels, not just to create something for a customer, but to create something for ourselves”

From the hand-sewn aluminium Gateway tags, un-obstructively featured on the top apex of the hoods, to the clever sizing and care tags, reading “a capsule assimilating time and freedom” - the features create a sharp statement for the eye of the beholder.

My personal favourite is the embroidered logo that nods to the cubist and brutalist art and architecture made famous in the 20th century, which in comparison to the alternative of printing, rather than sewing, indicates a sense of timelessness and durability to the pieces and their style.

“For this shoot, we picked a blank, openly-lit warehouse, kept the models natural with neural expressions, and created a space for the pieces, rather than something printed on them, to be this statement of art and fashion.”

The garments are all custom cut-and-sew designs by our up-and-coming entrepreneurs, who undertook a year of back and forth dancing with international suppliers, samples

The heavyweight, cotton-blend, 450 gsm, thick, and boxy look works to create a collection that feels soft, comfortable, and luxurious, but with its minimalistic designs and balanced colour saturation; having the versatility of being equally a ‘work from home’ fit, and a ‘deserves to be seen’ fit as well.

“Our vision was to create a brand that emphasises minimalism, essentialism, and art within the fashion industry - a luxury brand without an astronomical luxury price tag. We wanted a brand that was intentionally simple - not blank, but not loud - something easy to style and worth investing in.”

I look forward to seeing the heritage these boys create for themselves with Gateway Collective in the years to come.

Photos by Foxx Creative 15

A Kmart King Dethroned Perry Caswell actually hates artificial grass so much, but now he has to go water the turf

A journey of self-expression and fashion development throughout my teenage years.

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his article will be a slightly long winded anecdote about my personal journey and understanding of fashion, from my teenage years through to retirement (at 20 years old). I’ve come quite a long way, chopping and changing styles, trying out new trends and finding out what I enjoy and like to wear. Fashion is quite a visible form of expression, and through this, I’ve started to find myself.

You’ve got to give it to Kmart, their clothes are pretty cheap with an acceptable quality. It was an Applecross SHS tradition to go to Kmart after school, mess around in the shop, and avoid being kicked out. I spy with my little eye? That’s right, it was the five dollars or less plain crew cut T-Shirts in the men’s section. Inspired by the fashionistas of the era with their timeless looks, Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates. So, a young teenage boy - with a small amount of disposable income - decided to start buying his own goddamn clothes. I adored those shirts and wore them exclusively for three years of my life.

In high school, there was a running joke about how creative my fashion choices were. In that time I collected all the colours of the rainbow in T-shirts, providing that those colours were white, black, blue, green and grey. These were always paired with exquisite and delicate generic denim jeans. I was the talk of the town.

Seeing the growing selection of floral clothing

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around me, at the end of year ten. I started dabbling in other clothes that were not from Kmart. Using a Myer’s gift card I got for my birthday, I decided to invest in a lovely Hawaiian shirt that I still wear today. The same could not be said about the other garish and quite frankly ugly patterned shirts. Neon stripes, saturated flowers on a canvas drenched in even bolder colours. At least, it wasn’t a plain blue T-shirt with some plain blue denim jeans.

From there I began experimenting more.

Various patterns and colours, albeit a bit more toned down. I found that 70s or 80s inspired clothes looked really good on me. I adopted my first corduroy pants last year, and took some lovely statement pieces into my home. I decided that I needed to try items on in person, and thus an eclectic and impulsive style grew.

Does this vintage jumper look like Grandma’s carpet? Damn right it did, but I looked hot in it. I started to appreciate the different qualities of the fabric, how silky it felt, or how tight it fit around my body.

The day before Rotto 2020, I woke up and thought, “Fuck it I’m getting my ears pierced”.

So, I went straight to Lovisa and did so. It was an interesting experience doing it abruptly, as the staff at Lovisa were hyper fixated upon my earlobes. The person who sanitised my earlobes started squeezing them for about ten seconds,

kind of like a stress ball. She then pondered out loud, “Huh, your earlobes are so thick and squishy”. I reacted with an “um ya I’m aware”. I was just surprised at her genuinely innocent and curious expression. I was even more surprised when she called over another staff member to play with my bloody earlobes. Now, I have jewellery under my belt. You can often see me walking around with a necklace, wrist chain and some fruity earrings about.

I guess what I’m trying to say through these anecdotes is that you shouldn’t be afraid to try

out new fashion trends, or get into old ones.

You’re not limited to what people believe your personal brand is, or what is currently popular.

Fashion is an expression of the self, so what have you got to lose? You will always look back and think about why you wore those clothes.

But hey, in the moment you thought you looked good and that’s all that matters.

Collage by Udhaya SK

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The Lord of the Rings and Respect to the Original Literature Ben Marshall

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hat The Lord of the Rings trilogy is of distinguished quality remains an uncontroversial statement to any person who has had the privilege of watching the movies. I personally consider The Lord of the Rings trilogy (Extended Edition) to be the single greatest work of cinema I have ever viewed. I cannot help but conceptualise this trilogy as a single, inextricable cinematic entity, as I dare say do most others too. It appears to me that the legitimacy of such a notion speaks fundamentally to the quality of consistency between the three pictures. Truly, they are analogous to a sprawling, intricately woven mosaic. The tiles fit together seamlessly to form the grandest of epics ever put to film. During my many hours of viewing, I have been struck by how the genesis of these films seems to have predicted their success as all-time cinema classics. Specifically, how the dogmatic fervour surrounding Tolkein’s original literary works invested the overarching and minute methodology of Peter Jackson (Director) and his team with the focus and determination to honour and elevate the source material.

How is it that eleven hours and twenty-two minutes of content demonstrates a consistency most films could only dream of ? It is beyond obvious to state that Tolkein’s works played an essential creative role in the making of the films. However, what may be underestimated is the psychological approach that its status engendered. It is evident that the filmmaking was inspired by the three hours of appendices on the making of Middle Earth from head to humongous-hairy-hobbit-toe in the entire team.

Richard Taylor, creative supervisor of the Weta Workshop that generated the hundreds of thousands of props, recalled telling a small team of intern designers freshly plucked from local New Zealand colleges that if they did not invest every part of effort possible, they were not worthy of their work. Sean Astin (Samwise Gamgee) remembered Ian McKellen (Gandalf) instructing him on how his hands should be placed in one scene to ensure faithfulness according to the pages of the book he carried with him to set. It does not seem coincidental to me that the project was able to succeed on every creative and technical level.

It appears that the complete respect for the books ran to the very core of the project, and manifested itself in the efforts of each crew and cast member. Listening to senior personnel speak about their roles sounds as if each came from the mouth of Tolkien, reverent in their comments, and invigorated in their approach to realising his vision. A most vivid example is the lack of a physical embodiment of the main villain: Sauron, throughout the films. Such an un-Hollywood move would, in my estimation, never make it to the screen in modern movies of the same spectacle and budget. Indeed, Sauron almost did make an appearance, with footage shot of the big battle of the Black Gate.

However, Peter Jackson in the commentary discusses how it was untrue to Tolkein’s vision to have such a flashy villain, as it would distract from the central storyline of the two hobbits, unaccounted for in their mighty adversary’s arrogance - achieving what eleven hours ago (in movie time) looked like just a fantasy.

Perhaps because of the aesthetic of the epoch and by the small army of people required to bring it to life, my mind finds an interesting connection between this movie and the teachings of Sun Tzu and how the Art of War may be compared to cinematic undertakings. His wisdom about not advancing relying on sheer military power alone appears apposite when considering how a $300 million film like The Justice League (2017) pales, in comparison to just one of the trilogy’s films. The significance of foreknowledge concerning the source material is also fitting, like the fact that all three films were drafted, shot, and edited successfully was central to their cohesiveness. However, the sagacity of moral character’s value to a fighting force I would argue is the most fitting. A general must maintain the will of the people. The existence of and esteem held for the literature acted as a creative and technical backbone for the entire filmmaking process, providing every worker a constant reference to the end goal.

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Where is the Financial Education in Our Schools?

Opinion piece

Nathan Cuthbertson

L

ooking back on my secondary education I notice a glaring gap - financial education.

This is woefully mismanaged to the point of travesty in today’s education system. Defined as the ability to use financial tools to suit one’s own goals, financial literacy includes topics such as budgeting, saving, or investing as well as the knowledge of risk, understanding credit and debit, and how to plan. The benefits of educating students at an early age in financial literacy cannot be understated.

All our lives, we as consumers are told to spend. Governments use stimulus packages to stir the economy. We live in a materialistic and consumerist culture where consumption and instant gratification is the goal. We must work long hours each day, to pay for things that we really do not need. We are taught bad spending habits from the day we are born. Savings and investments are worth far more overall than spending and excess consumption.

A survey conducted by ME Bank found that

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40% of people wish that they had learnt more about financial education growing up. The same survey demonstrated a link between people who were taught about money as a child and their financial wellness as an adult. Of those that were taught about money as a child, 74% claimed that they were effective savers. Of the respondents that received little or no financial education, only 43% reported themselves as financially comfortable.

As a recent graduate of the Western Australian high school system, I can personally attest to the lack of any real financial education. Students are not taught budgeting or investing. Students are not taught how financial risk operates, or what the difference is between variable or fixed rate loans. They are not taught how to calculate whether we can afford the repayments on a loan.

It is these essential financial tools that have not been communicated to those who need it most.

Financial literacy also has a deep impact on mental and physical health. Studies have shown

that financial health is intricately linked with wellbeing. Likewise, it has been shown to reduce stress and anxiety, along with their physical manifestations of sleep loss and raised blood pressure. It has been reported in the US that 70% of people found that increased financial health had a positive impact on their physical health.

A study conducted in 2013 found that one of the leading causes of poor financial wellbeing and likewise financial stress was financial illiteracy.

The ability to afford holidays, leisure activities, retirement, or being able to spend time with family and friends instead of working - will raise the quality of life and improve mental and physical health.

Furthermore, the benefits to society and the economy cannot be overlooked. Financial literacy and improved financial health decreases reliance on social services and welfare. By having sound savings and investments, individuals are less likely to use pensions and welfare payments, because they can self-fund retirement and their own lifestyles. This can help to reduce government expenditure and therefore reduce taxation and public debt. Conversely, the increase in understanding credit and loans will afford people the ability to purchase houses, cars, and other assets, boosting the economy. Not to mention that a market economy will function much more effectively if consumers understand risks and seek to maximise their returns around it.

Why is financial literacy not taught well in

schools? The simple answer may be apathy, but I believe (perhaps quite cynically) that governments simply do not want a financially independent and stable population. They do not want people saving. The GDP model which is commonly used for measuring the output of an economy comprises consumption as an important component. Under the same model, if the population were to substantially reduce consumption and instead save, aggregate demand would fall, and thus economic growth may decline, or the economy may go into recession.

Furthermore, if a population is financially selfsufficient, then the need for government services will fall. As individuals’ wealth increases, health and wellbeing rises. Governments would not be needed to provide as many services such as healthcare, regulation, and welfare; thus reducing government power. Politicians and bureaucrats in their own self-interest to preserve power, prevent the public from becoming financially literate.

Financial education could revolutionise our economy. It has the power to help people with their personal finance and improve the quality of life for millions of Australians. Yet it is not taught. This is perhaps the greatest failure of previous generations. In their apathy towards financial education, they have left the future generations to suffer.

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Evolution of Money Brando Arimborgo & Neha Bolla

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ave you ever asked yourself how humanity spends most of their time working, and in return receive a piece of paper with a person at the front and a number next to it or even further, just some numbers on a screen? This wasn’t always the case, and here is how what we consider money has changed over time.

At first, humans exchanged goods for things they had found. Then they started to cultivate and specialise, resulting in trading becoming a necessity. The issue with trading a good for another is that you assume that both parties would like each other’s product, but if one doesn’t, then the trade doesn’t occur. Now, if in this scenario both parties were trading things they wanted but didn’t need, that would be okay. However, if it’s a matter of exchanging food for a shirt, and one party already has enough shirts, then the person wanting to trade the shirt wouldn’t be able to survive. This results in the need for a third good that both parties want, and mutually agree has value. Money itself in its physical form, or nowadays, in its digital form, has no intrinsic value. It is only given value through a collective belief in it.

The very first form of money originated

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around the time of the domestication of cattle. Livestock and plant products were used as money since they were durable, long-term, practicable, and scarce.

Alcohol then becomes more popular, along with tools and even limestone doughnuts. If you think about the value of money in the past, you’ll think of commodity money because there is intrinsic value in the commodity itself. From the establishment of the first cities in Mesopotamia (3000 BCE) came clay tablets, recording grain from farmers. These clay tablets represented the value of the grain, allowing them to be used as a medium of economic exchange.

From around 1000 BCE onwards, the first manufactured coins began to appear separately in India, China, and cities around the Aegean Sea. All modern coins appear to have descended from coins invented in the kingdom of Lydia around the 7th century. Paper money was introduced in the Song Dynasty in China during the 11th century. Paper money’s roots come from merchant receipts of deposits, as wholesalers required more convenient and practical representations of value rather than large quantities of coins. Paper money became

known to Europe around the 13th century from accounts of returning travellers from Asia.

The earliest European currency standards were based on the value of silver up until the 18th century. The Brazilian Gold Rush of the 18th century led to a surge in the supply of gold to Britain and Portugal, with Britain adopting Portuguese gold coins and later fixing the value of the Pound Sterling (named as so from its previous fixture to the value of silver) to gold instead. Initially, the British Gold standard spread across the world from use in its colonies.

In 1873, the International Gold Standard commenced. Until 1971, the US dollar was directly convertible with gold, and other currencies were either directly or indirectly pegged to it. However, the end of this system has led to most currencies around the world now being free-floating.

to their ease and efficiency. From exchanging cattle to simply swiping a card, the concept and form of money have come a long, long way.

Now we are seeing money evolve in even more ways, with the development and rise of cryptocurrencies that are not tied to any central bank or regulatory authority. Just as a farmer exchanging grain for a clay tablet could have never imagined people buying tonnes of grain from across the world in seconds, we cannot even begin to fathom the future of money.

The rapid rise of computer technology led to the surge of electronic payments and the domination of virtual credit over physical.

By the early 2000s, most money existed as digital currency in bank databases, and digital transactions became increasingly popular due 23

The Heritage of Women in Computing Kimberely Harrison

24

I

f you want to gain an indication of how much the world has changed over the past thirty years, a worthwhile exercise is to compare a list of the ten largest companies in the world at the time with one from today. The first thing you would notice is that other than oil giant Exxon Mobil, the two lists share nothing in common. While the 1992 list was dominated by oil (Exxon, Texaco, Chevron) and car (Ford, General Motors) companies, the 2022 version of modern technology brands like Apple, Amazon, and Meta (formerly Facebook).

Of course, this is indicative of the extent to which the past thirty years has been an era of technological transformation.

This has been largely driven by advances in computing, in both its software and hardware dimensions, that have changed so much our lives.

While this transformation has been highly profitable for the technology giants that have led it, and has ushered in a generation of highly paid technology workers in certain industries and geographies, it has not benefited everyone.

There is much to be said and written about issues like labour rights in the tech-controlled gig economy, or environmentally unsustainable practices that often go into manufacturing some of the most popular consumer products today.

However, there is a particularly under-discussed element to this modern computing revolution: how much of its foundations were built by women and how little of that important heritage is still reflected today.

In Australia, only 29% of those in the technology sector are women. This almost matches the 28.8% figure in the United States, the home of Silicon Valley, and most of the global tech corporations. On current trends, it is estimated that it will take until 2087 for gender parity to become a possibility. Such dismal figures begin in education choices. The enrolment levels for women in computer science university degrees range between 15% and 25%. However, from the very beginning, the heritage of computer science has been inextricably linked with the achievements of female pioneers.

25

The distinction of “the world’s first programmer” is often attributed to 19th century English mathematician Ada Lovelace. With fellow mathematician Charles Babbage, she worked on designing a theoretical computer known as the “Analytical Engine”. Lovelace’s unique insight was that such a system could be made to follow a series of instructions to perform advanced calculations in a way that would allow complex information to be represented.

In the mid-20th century, computing advancements became more tangible and testable, especially as part of large government programs. One of the pioneers of this period was Dr. Grace Hopper, a US Navy rear admiral, who led the programming efforts in the Harvard Mark I computer, a unique general-purpose electromechanical computer that was initially used to help the US military operations in WWII. Her research then led to the critical development of compilers, the method by which human-readable programming languages could be converted into machine code.

As software development moved from government labs into commercial uses, women were also leading the field there. The world’s first services company working with computers was started by four female software engineers in 1955. In 1957, Elsie Schutt started one of the first software companies in the United States (Computations Inc) as an all-women business 26

which encouraged its workers (who were primarily young mothers) to work part-time from home while their children were young and then join full time once their kids grew up.

These are only a few examples of many. Women were not only the key pioneers of the early computing industry, but they also formed the majority of its workers. The growing opportunities in the field meant that the number of women majoring in computer science continued increasing steadily from 1960 to 1984.

This all began to change when the personal computer revolution kicked off in the 1980s. As computers and gaming consoles became popularised, two distinct factors pushed women away from the field. The first is that high-paying jobs in computing were now seen desirable to men and no longer “women’s work”. This led to a reframing of hiring standards that attached perceived “masculine” traits to the profile of an ideal programmer, particularly in senior roles.

Secondly, advertising for personal computers and gaming consoles directed at households often encouraged them to see these devices as purchases for their sons to play with, and this had a profound impact on popular culture, leading to a gendered perception of the role of a computer in middle-class households.

In more recent times, technology companies and governments have made some efforts to encourage more women into the field.

While these efforts are commendable, we have a long way to go in undoing the damage that has been done, which has kept many women away from the dominant industry of the 21st century.

An industry that they helped build.

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Robotics for Erotics

The Tech Advancement of Sex-Bots Crystal Ngo has multiple electronic devices. She does not want to have sex with any of them.

I

t’s the year 2050. You come home from a long day at work. You throw your keys on the counter, put on your VR headset, and sit on the couch. Finally, some me time. Before logging onto your favourite game, you check your social media messages. You receive a text from a friend you made back in university. You open the message. They tell you to turn on the TV – one of their inventions is about to go up.

You sigh…and turn it on.

To your surprise, sex robots are on sale! The voice-over tells you these sexbots not only sleep with you through the late hours of the night, but they also laugh at your jokes and can have intelligent conversations. “Sign up now, and you get 20% off your first order. Two thousand dollars.

Pretty cheap for the perfect companion.”

And you think it’s disgusting. Who would want to have sex with a robot?

Your phone rings. It’s your friend. Annoyed, you answer.

Friend: What did you think?

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You: To be honest, I think it’s a terrible idea.

Who would buy this?

Friend: Hmm... maybe I can change your mind. Let’s go back in time. To the year 2022.

You hear a zap and the Time-traveller 3000 sends you tumbling and swirling back to the past. *Cue Back to the Future soundtrack* Scared, dizzy, and confused. You are back at the beginning of 2022. The COVID-19 pandemic is still infecting the world, causing people to be more glued to their phones than ever. The pandemic has led people to rely on technology for work and socialising. But, unlike the future, people are yet to transform their lives within the Metaverse - using virtual reality to work, date, and even have sex.

You look down at your hands and notice their plumpness. You realise you are back in your twenties. Your knees don’t hurt, and you feel

fit and strong. Then, in an instant, a robot appears and tells you its name is Sally, sent to you from the future.

computer science, I can be just like you. I want to have conversations, and I like to have sex.

Don’t you?

Sally: Hello. I’m Sally. I’m a sex robot from the future. I was sent here to meet with you.

To talk to you about...well, me.

You tremble, trying to stop the trembling in your hands, you put them in your pockets.

You: I saw your kind advertised on TV in the future. But I was confused. What are sex robots?

Sally: Sexbots are human-like full-body artifacts created for sexual purposes. Unlike sex dolls, sexbots are embedded with Artificial Intelligence technology, which means we are intelligent enough to learn from experience.

We can even talk about science and philosophy, tell jokes, and are equipped for intimate relationships. Making us ‘the perfect companion.’

Scared, you ask: Are robots good? Or bad?

Sally: I mean, I might be biased, but I think I’m nice? Thanks to engineering and

Awkwardly, you reply: Ah... I mean, yes.

Sally: Great! Let me tell you more. I am part of the future of sex. But, my sister, or maybe even grandmother, Harmony, was one of the first sexbots to be invented. In 2017, Abyss Creations created Harmony. The sexbots phenomenon took off, and the company made millions. This year there are many more just like her. In the future, there will be even more.

Needless to say, these sex robots are made by men, for men.

You: But Sally, will this not lead men to perceive women as sexual objects?

Sally:

Sex

robots

have

always

been

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Sexbots are human-like full-body artifacts created for sexual purposes.

controversial. Many scientists have argued about the dangers of human and sex robot relationships and the possible abuse that may inflict on human partners. Additionally, it is thought that sexbots may socially isolate people from human intimacy. However, some scientists believe sexbots are safe, sexual, and emotional outlets for people who want to harm others.

You: I saw an article about sex robots, explaining that men treat them like objects having no empathy for them. That’s morally problematic!

Sally: Rather than being a sex object, I think I’m helping someone with their intimacy. As I say this, I know that I am programmed to think this way.

You: This totally goes against my morals. It’s just plain weird!

Sally: Sex robots may not be what we consider to be ‘traditional.’ They might be the farthest thing away from our traditional ways

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of thinking. But just because it’s untraditional doesn’t mean it’s not up for discussion.

Now it’s up to you. Do you conform? Or do you act against it?

Cottage Blues - Sally Thomas

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ISLAND Georgia Grubelich

P

eople went to the island for the creatures.

“Nobody knows why or how,” my mother told me. “But the animals on that island never stop growing. The birds there fly like aeroplanes. The whiting are the size of sharks. I saw a komodo dragon there once, only to realise it was a skink.”

For years I had heard and read the stories. Pelicans the size of pterodactyls; snakes as thick as the trunks of palm trees; frogs that grew as big as motorbikes. Someone had even once spied a free-tailed bat as big as a hang glider. Every creature on that island grew to unimaginable sizes, and still, after a hundred years of studying, no one could explain why.

And the day I finally went, after sixteen years of researching and wondering, I found out the answer.

It had been a calm day, and the water swayed gently. It guided our ferry to the island, which, as we got closer, I realised didn’t look all that special. The ocean encompassed the reefs, which encompassed the shore, which encompassed the land. Some roofs could be seen if you squinted, and somewhere in the distance, a lonely lighthouse protruded into the sky. From the outside, you could almost forget it was magic.

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Once we disembarked, the ferry volunteer pointed me in the direction of the lighthouse. “Take your time to explore,” he said. “Don’t forget to bring water and stay on the path if you’re going to the island’s centre.”

“What’s at the island’s centre?”

“The animals tend to get larger the further inland you go. Some of them have become so big they’re considered dangerous, but they tend to keep to themselves as long as you stay on the path.” asked.

“Has anyone ever died out there?” I

“Yes and no,” said the volunteer. “It depends on who you ask.”

His words echoed in my head as I trudged to the island’s centre, doing my best to ignore the now avocado-sized flies that licked my skin. The path was fenced on either side; beyond it, the woodlands seemed endless, a mess of brown and green that went on forever.

The path, too, kept going, and going, until, after what felt like months of walking, I spotted a small, rickety wooden sign that read, ‘The heart of the Island — 500m.’

The heart of the island. The island’s centre. I pushed on, not entirely sure of what I was expecting to find, and, after conquering yet another hill, I stopped.

The woodland had come to an abrupt end, and in its place stretched out a plain, dry clearing of hard-packed dirt. Something stood in the middle of it. When I realised what it was, a vice-like grip of fear seized my heart.

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In front of me was a creature.

Not one of the overgrown animals; this was something new. It was imposingly tall, and its limbs were spindly, with a crooked neck and hunched tight shoulders. Its black skin was stretched too thin over its bones and clinging to its skeletal body were tattered rotting robes. It turned its head towards me and I found myself staring into two glowing yellow eyes.

Who are you? It asked me in a voice unsuitable for this world. Get away from here. Only then did I notice it was holding something in its deteriorating hand: a tiny red-capped robin, crimson as a cranberry, teetering on both feet in the creature’s palm.

You cannot help it, the creature said.

This animal must join the others.

Somehow, I spoke, and I spoke without thinking, “You’re the one making the animals huge. Aren’t you?”

Yes, it said. I feed them. I remind them.

Of the tragedies that happened here.

My brows furrowed. “Tragedies?”

But then I remembered what the volunteer said.

I asked, “Did someone die out here?”

The creature turned to the robin and leant down, its neck twisting with a creak and a crack, and kissed it on the head. I stood, mouth agape, as the robin suddenly flapped its wings and, in an instant, completely filled the haggard hand it sat in. It tweeted, and I could hear that it was sad.

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Many have died here, said the creature as it lifted the robin high. It flew off into the wind, much larger than it had been a moment ago. My people were killed by yours. Brought from the mainland as prisoners. Look around you. See their faces.

In my shock and horror, I hadn’t noticed the hundreds of gravestones that encircled the clearing we were in. I turned and turned and turned some more, finding them all; hard and grey and bothered they stood, halfeaten by the wind and salt. None of them bore any names.

I feed the animals my grief, explained the creature. The grief never stops growing, so neither do they.

So, I thought, this is where they come from. It filled me with a sadness I didn’t know I could feel.

You must go now, said the shadowy beast. Leave the island and never return to it. You and your people should stay far, far away.

Without a word I turned, more than happy to comply with its demand.

Leave us now, it called out as I walked away. But, please, whatever you do, don’t forget the faces. Remember them. Forever.

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Through the Frosted Glass and Confusion Anonymous

CONTENT WARNING

contains graphic wording

Went to Rotto with my mum and a family friend of ours

I remember going on a holiday.

I remember getting my first job and having to pay the power bill, or our energy would be shut off

We camped because we didn’t have enough money for the houses

Finishing by 9:30

Rented bikes and shitty food kept us happy

I remember the late nights Home by 10:00 Asleep by 11:00

The only other time we went away was to Sydney Mum couldn’t get out of bed for a couple days But we made our own fun I remember going back home to our Homeswest house in Gosnells I remember the cobwebs in the corners I remember the sirens I ignore them now My girlfriend says it’s a problem But I say it’s just me I lived in Homeswest places almost all my life.

I remember taking whatever scraps we were given and cobbling together a home 36

Awake by 6:00 At school by 8:30 I remember being exhausted I remember feeling like every breath was an effort I remember fighting My heritage?

My dad died when I was fourteen, and all I thought about was if we were still going to the cinema that day My mum was a struggling addict who tried as she might to keep my world together like a perpetual explosion, she never could stop all the shrapnel

My heritage?

Outsiders Shopping at Salvos cause we didn’t have enough money to go anywhere else Using public transport to get everywhere cause fuel was too expensive Stressing every single night that we might be homeless tomorrow You ask about my fucking heritage?

You really want to know?

My fucking heritage is people making fun of me for only owning one school shirt cause we couldn’t afford any more My fucking heritage is attending four funerals by the age of eighteen

My mother spent the last two decades making sure my sister and I wouldn’t end up with a life like hers So, my legacy will be killing the gods that made my world this way My legacy will be standing atop a mountain of bones and blood with the forgotten, the poor, the outsiders, the exhausted and the tired Our legacy will be making a new city out of their flesh and making sure no one will have to starve as we did Not out of anger Though we have a lot of it Out of love for each other Out of the love my mother had for me

My fucking heritage is seeing the bloodstain from my dead uncle soaked into the carpet and having to clean out his apartment cause we didn’t have enough money to pay for cleaners

Out of the love my father was never there to give me

My heritage is seeing my childhood clawed from bloodied hands off of me

We will build a better future

My legacy though?

We will survive Or we will die trying What else is there?

My legacy?

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Missing Pieces Art Theft and Erasure of Culture Emma Horak

T

hroughout history, art theft has remained a lucrative human practice from the attempts to erase Indigenous culture during colonisation to the encouraged looting of art during World Wars. Reports and articles dictating the activity have consistently been met with collective cultural uproar and grief. The idea that a piece, which may have never been viewed personally, could be lost by the public eye forever has always raised simultaneous outcry and fascination. From the stealing of widely cherished Van Goghs and Rembrandts, which are held behind laser beam alarms and several locked doors; to family portraits and chinaware taken from the top drawer, it appears that art has a consistent target on its back.

In 1995, the International Foundation for Art Research conducted a report which found that stolen art carried a collective price of between $2.7 and $8.1 billion. However, the public furore over looted art has always gone past the piece’s dollar value; it appears that the practice strikes a nerve far beyond the confines of our back pocket.

The great Aristotle once proclaimed that...

the aim of art is not to represent the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance.

As well as functioning for the purpose of aesthetic and expression, art’s importance in 38

documenting and retaining cultural practice is invaluable.

For so many societies, artwork has remained an integral tool for not only continuing cultural practices and norms in everyday life but also for embedding the values and belief systems that lie at their culture’s core; from cooking practices and patriotic song to religion and virtues, art provides a significant insight into our knowledge of history and society, and therefore ourselves.

In my own experience as a woman of DutchIndo descent, I have always been fascinated by the history of both cultures, as well the third liminal space (borne by an understandably tumultuous clash between the two due to Dutch colonisation) that I seem to inherit. In recent years, I have realised that the main driving force for provoking and fostering my understanding of my heritage has been art, a medium that has single-handedly transcended past language barriers and knowledge lost through civil and international war.

When I expressed this to my Oma, her sentiment was the same. Her only material reminders of her grandparents lie in a small silver bowl and portrait of the two of them that still remain in her possession. During the Japanese occupation of Indonesia during the Second World War, all residents of Dutch descent were taken prisoner and placed in camps, their homes ransacked, and personal belongings stripped. A key detail my Oma mentions is her own grandmother

Artwork by Pauline Wong desperately burying all of the family’s most prized items and art pieces in her garden after hearing of the occupation, and being taken with only the clothes on her back and jewellery hidden away to trade for food. Most upsetting for her grandmother upon her return home was finding her garden dug up and only her portrait and bowl remaining. Beyond the loss of her prized possessions and art pieces was a significant loss of physical and inheritable knowledge of our family’s history.

The looting of art unfortunately remains a universal process of cultural erasure that far surpasses my own family’s experience. However, with the swell of public fury over stolen pieces, there has fortunately been an equal driving force to recover them, driven by members of society both within and beyond the art world. Lawyers, organisations, and members of the public

have established valuable databases, reporting systems, and operations for this purpose, with huge success. A notable victory has been the recovery of art stolen during Nazi occupation in World War II. Despite attempts to remove Jewish artwork, among other exhibitions of cultural expression to make way for Nazi ideology, hundreds of thousands of pieces have since been recovered, helping to re-establish a link to history and culture that was so brutally stolen.

This sentiment should extend past art pieces of perceived societal value and worth, such as Picasso’s and Raphaels. If there is a chance that that lost art remains just out of sight, perhaps storage units and garage sales would be an appropriate avenue for equal public consideration. They say that one picture is worth a thousand words- how many sagas and histories does one piece of art hold?

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Film Review of

Prisoners (2013) Benji Steinberg

P

.risoners (2013) follows the disappearance of two young girls in Pennsylvania, and the subsequent police investigation. After bureaucratic failure, one of the fathers, Keller Dover, takes the interrogation into his own hands, capturing, and physically abusing one police suspect, Alex Jones, hoping for a confession. Prisoners is a film bound up with the concept of heritage.

First, it reveals the desperate and often immoral lengths that one will go to protect their physical progeny, as witnessed in the countless violent scenes of physical abuse when Keller Dover tries to beat a confession out of Alex Jones.

Throughout the film, the audience is positioned in Keller’s state of uncertainty and confusion.

We experience Keller’s decreasing confidence in his quest for his daughter, and his weakening conviction that Alex Jones is guilty. This journey concludes in the revelation that Alex Jones is a victim himself of his inheritance.

Alex Jones turns out to be a victim of the very same religious cult responsible for the disappearance of the two girls. In this moment

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of helpless irony, Prisoners effectively sours the seemingly romantic saying, “I will do anything for you.” Keller’s willingness ‘to do anything’ for his daughter produces a severe injustice and incredible suffering.

Second, Prisoners reveals that we are totally defenceless against our inheritance – especially if we receive this at an early impressionable age. Alex Jones typifies this situation. While he is complicit in abducting the two girls his upbringing has taught him that there is nothing wrong with his actions. As part of the religious cult, Alex was indoctrinated to believe that young girls have to be committed to stop them from committing sin. Overall, maintaining one’s inheritance is an incredibly powerful force for action and, at the same time, can be incredibly blinding.

In essence, Prisoners shows how what we inherit and the attitude we have towards our progeny can be cruel. It can produce insidious effects.

Prisoners in effect poses the question: What should we teach our progeny?

Spaces In Between Arabella Broshan

O

ne hand hangs on her mother’s, the other plastered against the glass.

She is alive in the remembering of this place. Metal spurs, golden rings, iron helmets, igniting fantasies of their histories.

Whose foot had moulded the iron, whose horseflesh had it urged.

Who bore the heavy rings, were they sung, too loose, or just right.

Whose eyes had peered through those slits, whose dreams had its weight protected.

She didn’t see the artefact in them. There was a space for humanity in them.

Who might once have filled it?

A tug on her arm, made harsher by the sharpness of a gemstone ring, pulls feet in plastic shoes and jolts the silver pins in her hair.

Her enlivening hand is peeled unstuck.

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The Spanish Language in West Side Story (2021) Morgan Maruthiah

W

est Side Story is a phenomenal musical.

The compositional mastery of Leonard Bernstein meets the eloquent lyrics of Stephen Sondheim, against the backdrop of the ageless narrative of Romeo and Juliet. Its success has been felt both on stage and screen; the 1961 film adaptation won 10 of its 11 nominated Academy Awards. As well as a spectacular aesthetic work, it prominently addresses contemporary issues that tend to be sidelined on Broadway, namely: xenophobia, racism, gentrification, generational poverty, and wealth inequality – as visible in the 1950s as they are today.

In fact, West Side Story is my second-favourite musical. The fault that I find in West Side Story is, unfortunately, an ever-present one: that is, the use of (artificial) Spanish-inflected English

by Puerto Rican characters, both in speech and song. I have never been able to shake the sense of awkwardness I get when listening to four Puerto Ricans speaking English in private with variably-convincing Spanish accents. In the 1961 film, non-Hispanic actors, wearing makeup in order to appear darker-skinned, played two of the most prominent Puerto Rican roles: Natalie Wood as Maria and George Chakiris as Bernardo.

By its very nature, a Broadway musical – let alone a production from the tail-end

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of the 1950s – will always be written for a predominantly English-speaking audience.

This offers food for thought regarding language other than the lingua franca in earlier musical productions. Audiences do not bat an eyelid when the Hebrew slaves of Babylon in Verdi’s Nabucco sing their impassioned cry in Italian.

More pertinently, singers in Bizet’s Carmen adopt a Spanish-inflected French, with a rolled R. It is difficult to find a performance of the famous ‘Toreador Song’, which does not incorporate an alveolar trill, perhaps indicating that the “Spanish accent” has crossed the line into a ‘stylistic element’.

The treatment of this matter in the West Side Story film adaptation of 2021 fortunately reflects the fact that sixty years have passed. This is perhaps in more appropriate recognition of the enormous (and growing) presence of the Spanish language within the USA, the Spanishspeaking population of which is second in size only to Mexico. The new production includes extended instances of Spanish dialogue without the use of subtitles, an addition which had first appeared in the 2009 Broadway revival.

Principally, this change adds vigour and depth to scenes involving Puerto Rican characters.

Spanish lines are not merely token phrases added for flavour, but meaningful dialogue that is delivered naturally and integrated into the plot seamlessly. English phrases – included for broader audience comprehension – are delivered almost as afterthoughts following Spanish dialogue. The result is communication which is believable and, importantly, relatable to an increasingly-multicultural western world of increasingly-bilingual households.

Director Steven Spielberg’s claim that English subtitles would devalue the Spanish language, has garnered both applause and criticism.

Positing that the 2021 production “doesn’t go far enough” in addressing the representational shortcomings of West Side Story, Sofia Andrade of Slate suggests that the lack of subtitles leaves

audiences with no choice but to sympathise with white characters, thus viewing the Puerto Ricans through the xenophobic eyes of the Jets.

This, however, neglects the sensibility of the audience; the Jets are characterised as repulsive and unsympathetic in far more explicit ways than any implied Anglophone solidarity could undo (Mike Faist’s portrayal of a particularly savage Riff comes to mind). On the contrary, the lack of subtitles allows for a more intimate connection with the Puerto Rican characters.

We see into the private lives of Maria, Anita, Bernardo and Chino as neither accented caricatures (as in the original) nor distant, ‘foreign’ subjects (as subtitles would imply).

When Puerto Rican characters do speak English, it is generally either at the command of (English-speaking) authorities, or at the request of other recent immigrants who wish to assimilate. Anxieties regarding assimilation into an Anglophone American culture have always been central to the plot of West Side Story. perhaps most strikingly-expressed in the climactic line of the tune ‘America’: “‘Life is alright in America / ‘If you’re all-white in America’”. With the new production’s inclusion of Spanish dialogue, this conflict enters the arena of speech. Anita and Bernardo’s conflicting experiences regarding the ‘American Dream’ become all the more real as they fluctuate between the languages of two homes. External pressure and internal desires to speak English subtly, but very effectively, convey the issue of assimilation through dialogue.

With the release of the 2021 production of West Side Story, the Puerto Rican characters finally go beyond “momentito” and “te amo”. Whether a small step or a giant leap, this choice is certainly moving in the right direction in terms of representation. However, I have attempted to limit myself to a brief discussion of the aesthetic qualities of this linguistic change. In this regard, the engagement with Spanish has served to deepen significant plot elements. On the whole, West Side Story benefits immensely, and one of the few tarnishes on this extraordinary musical begins to fade.

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Tertiary Education

A Long Time Sacrifice

Jelena Kovacevic insists that her laughter is always proportionate to the joke.

I

am very proud to be an Australian university student in 2022. Writing during Harmony Week, I’ve found myself reflecting on my heritage and am reminded of how fortunate I am to live and study in Australia. No generation before my parents pursued a level of education above high school if that. My maternal grandfather did not even complete secondary school due to his remoteness, which can be attributed to post-WW2 and the migration away from frequently shelled cities.

My paternal grandfather was discouraged from studying by his own father, who expected him to be a trader - this can be put in stark contrast to my experience where I was not only welcome to study but also expected to. I was warmly praised for this decision by my family, including those relatives who were deprived of the opportunity to attend university.

Neither of my grandmothers were allowed to study - both of whom were from conservative European countries. Additionally, unstable economic conditions- such as hyperinflation in Yugoslavia in the early 90s - and unstable

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political environments meant that relatives from both sides of my family were expected to enter the workforce as soon as they were able to. The cost of pursuing a university education was considered too great. The expansion of education is reflected in most universities’ enrolment over centuries and even decades.

Not long ago, going to university was reserved for upper-class men. Additionally, the gender gap in UWA enrolment has narrowed over the years- from a 37% female enrolment in 1913 to nearly 50% by 2016.

My father completed his postgraduate degree just last year, after years of postponing his studies due to full-time work. I saw the immense pride on his face when he graduated at last!

Immigration was disruptive for both sides of my family. Perhaps after fourteen years in Australia, he finally felt capable of severing every imaginary constraint holding him back previously. The trend is evident across the extended family: all of my father’s siblings studied once they dispersed across the world

too. I argue that in this sense, a country’s geopolitical stability is imperative to foster an environment for learning.

My decision to study political science and international relations stems from my longstanding desire to understand the world beyond my residence. From Norway to Argentina, I have always sought an explanation for how these countries came to be. As a fairly multicultural individual with both parents born in countries which no longer exist - Rhodesia and Yugoslavia, respectively - I am aware of the incredible dynamism of the world. Colonialism, war, democratisation, and economic growth is part of the history I confront in my classes regularly. Oh, but to think that previous generations have provided the pathway to where I am today is overwhelming. They did not have access to the wealth of knowledge that I can find on OneSearch. Becoming frustrated with the Wi-Fi in Reid library suddenly seems laughable!

With the recent armed conflict in eastern Europe and many students caught in the middle, I believe that political science and international relations are more relevant than ever, and I’m proud to be studying such an important discipline. I recognise the privileged position I am in that allows me to study. For me, it has always been about learning.

The right job will present itself to me at the end of this journey. Perhaps my decision to study an arts degree deviated from my family’s traditional inclination to more practical or science-based degrees. I like to say that I drew inspiration from my aunt, who studied law over in New Zealand.

Despite UWA being the oldest university in Western Australia by international standards, it’s actually quite young. Most European universities are at least a few centuries old.

Maybe it is UWA’s newness being implicitly linked to increased accessibility and progressive equality that appeals to me because of my unique identity, which is influenced by, but ultimately distinct from that of my ancestors.

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Stuck in (of Two Kassandra Fernando

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rowing up in what is still predominantly a white Australia, my cultural heritage as a South Asian woman gave me a unique and unforgettable experience. Although you might not be able to tell from the way I talk or act, I am a first-generation immigrant. I was born on the small island of Sri Lanka and moved to Australia when I was three. Growing up in Australia, I was still connected to my Sri Lankan heritage through my family and our traditions. I was very proud of being Sri Lankan, but I was also eager to learn about Australia (the place I would call home) and embrace that culture too.

Despite identifying with both cultures, there is one question I get asked that still leaves me thrown for a second: “So, where are you from?” I find my answer changes depending on the context.

If I’m travelling overseas, it’s always Australia, but I never know what to say when I’m in Australia. If I say Australian, I’m met with a confused look that says, “But you’re not white. Explain.”

So, I then begrudgingly go into the whole backstory of my cultural heritage.

There were times in my life where I felt disconnected from one culture but belonged to the other, times where I felt ashamed, and times where I felt excluded. I have one distinct memory of when I had a friend over at my house during primary school.

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the Middle Cultures) We were playing together when my dad came down to eat his lunch. In Sri Lankan culture, it is extremely common to eat our food with our hands, so that’s what my dad did. But, my Australian friend, who had never seen this before, exclaimed how ‘gross’ this was. I remember feeling so many things all at once while my cheeks lit on fire, embarrassed that my friend thought my culture was gross, but also upset at what she said to my family. I felt ashamed of a completely normal tradition that is a central part of our culture.

Although I cannot really blame this eight-year-old girl for not knowing any better, it does add another complexity when navigating my cultural heritage. What parts of my culture do I share with people? What if I am ridiculed for the parts that I do share? How can I feel both pride and shame? I think Tommy Kuti, a Nigerian-Italian rapper, summarises this feeling that most first and second-generation immigrants feel in his song Afroitaliano. One of the most powerful lyrics comes at the end of the song. When translated means “I am too African to be only Italian, and I am too Italian to be only African.” In my case, although I identify heavily with my South Asian heritage, I am also Australian. My cultural heritage is intertwined in complex and intricate ways, so much so that I cannot be one or the other. I am both.

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Not So Subtle Desi Traits Sabine Singh

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hen someone points out a trait that you have inherited from your family, your first reaction is usually to take offence.

Especially when you are painfully aware of your family’s myriad of faults. I remember the bamboozlement that ensued after the first time someone told me I looked like my father - a fifty-something year old whose face is 10% turban and 80% hair (beard and eyebrows), while I was a pre-teen desperately plucking at my eyebrows to escape this fatal analogy.

when displaying physical signs of struggling with the spice levels as an estranged relative sympathetically passes you a bowl of yoghurt...

It is eating with the children first before the chilly is added for the adults. It is the uncomfortable feeling I get when my white boyfriend cooks a better curry than me. It is the shameful truth that my favourite piece of Indian clothing is thrifted from Good Samaritans in Fremantle. I am aware that this has somehow turned into a shopping list of confessions - but I am not done yet!

Unfortunately, the truth is I do look a lot like my family. The resemblance becomes even more striking as I get older. I guess that is the amazingly freakish thing about being mixed, that you get to starkly observe which features from your overflowing gene pool truly sink in. It can also be painful to watch your relationships with family become more complicated whilst your physicality tries to mirror them.

There are some desi traits that I have picked up with ease. Examples include, but are not limited to, my affinity for elaborate outfits, my unmatched eagerness to find the best bargain, how absolutely sublime I look in eyeliner, using food to express my love when I am at lost for words, and my reflexive overuse of hand gestures.

Originally, I wanted to write this piece to roast those people who (with the ruthlessly sunny disposition of a game show host) try to guess my ethnicity. However, I think the most complicated and confronting part of my relationship with my heritage is when I meet another ethnic person my age who is just, I don’t know… ‘better’ at being ethnic than I am.

It sounds wrong because it insinuates that there is a right and wrong way to outwardly express one’s ethnicity. I am sure it is a deeply flawed opinion, but I am also sure I am not alone in this feeling.

This feeling arises sitting on the sidelines during conversations in a different dialect because your diction is strictly bound to the limits of what was addressed in The Jungle Book. The embarrassment you feel at an Indian function

Call me delusional, but some fantastic aspects arise when keeping a distance from your culture. For instance, the ability to choose what you do and don’t want to engage with. From this viewpoint, I find I can see the flaws more readily. The ‘all or nothing’ engagement style is so well perpetuated, but on a logical basis, it is as weak as my hastily made chai. The shame that comes with not knowing enough, although a disincentive, is not a substantial enough reason to disengage from your heritage completely. It is akin to a perfectionist paradox, where you want to do things a certain way so badly that you don’t really know where or how to start.

I am a bit scared to dig too deep and risk eroding the well-constructed walls I have built to keep out toxic traits and toxic people. Can one really independently learn culture - or is this counterintuitive? And is it even fair to cherrypick which cultural idiosyncrasies I would like to inherit?

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Thai Food Jake Phillips

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y grandma, Yai, cooks the best Thai food. She was born in the 1950s in the province of Petchaburi, during a period of peace. Traditional cuisine was well-evolved and varied regionally. Yai learned to cook from her mother and other women in the family, eventually inheriting the kitchen responsibilities to save her mum from work. When she matured, she found her way to my grandfather’s heart through his stomach, so my mum says because he left another woman to start a family with her.

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then let it go. At heart, he was a gentle trickster, unafraid to be playful, and to laugh with a heavy chuckle before it turned into a severe coughing fit. Yai’s fussing and dieting with him soon became too late.

My grandfather, Da, quickly became fat, then slowly obese over the years. He was also a smoker, one pack a day, and the poor lifestyle caused an early health decline, heart disease, and finally, death when I was about fifteen. The day before Christmas, we got a call in Australia to say goodbye. My mum and I were closest to him, so we left immediately on a plane for Thailand, unknowingly leaving our entire lives behind.

Da’s funeral was held traditionally at a temple, and we grieved for three days over his displayed body. Many relatives came from the country’s farthest regions to pay their respects. Some old divides within the family were healed but later revived through the emotional turbulence of the week, stoked by the intense gossiping that Thai women are known infamously for. On the fourth day, the body was cremated. The smoke was black, thick, and smelled unusual to us.

Monks paraded with brightly coloured strings around the temple and chanted prayers for Da’s soul and our family. Some of the rituals seemed superstitious, out of touch with the modern Buddhism of my temple-going days in Australia.

When we got there, Da made a slight recovery but then rapidly sickened after brief hope. Most of the family got a chance to say goodbye, but I never truly did. Instead, my teenage self was empty and confused because I loved him dearly for his big smile, his kindness, and for how funny he was. One time, he rescued me from a daddy-long-legs spider, grabbed it carefully in his hands, and pretended to eat it, to my horror,

After Da’s death, we stayed in Thailand for two more years without any real plan to support my grieving grandmother and uncle. Yai established a new purpose by cooking for us, and she became graceful, providing a matriarch figure that our family needed. She cooked in her little kitchen under a dim light, labouring over a gas bottle in the heat to make our favourite dishes.

Mine was Khao Khluk Kapi, a sweet and savoury

dish, shrimp paste infused rice with slices of chewy sweet pork sausage, shredded sour green mango, and a chopped omelette with bright red chillies on top. Every mouthful was spicy, sweet, salty, and sour. It’s still my favourite, though I’ve never seen it outside of Thailand, except when my mum makes it.

I’m back in Australia now and all grown up, or somewhere close. A plush orangutan reminds me of Da every night while I’m in bed; the big round face, jutted lip, and one dipped eye are the spitting image to my memory. When I was younger, I’d imagine Da watching over me, snooping about in puzzlement with how odd I was. Now, since I’ve associated him with little orange Xylo, I like to think he’s always here and has gotten used to me.

By writing this, I choose to remember who Da was to me. Not defined by his gravest mistakes, nor glamorised in death, but a reconciled and distant image of a decent man. A regular, old, wonderful grandfather, deserving of remembrance, left behind a sweet little old lady who is still pottering on and well overdue for my visit. So take a moment, if you will, to consider your heritage and family, how they brought you to where you are, and what your country means to you.

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Your Guide to the Ukraine-Russia Crisis Izzy Hamer and Maggie Leung

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he biggest headline circulating the news these weeks draws on the Ukraine-Russia crisis. Read below for answers to some of your hot questions about what’s happening in that sphere.

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Was Ukraine part of Russia?

Ukraine and Russia were both part of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) which consisted of fifteen countries. In the final years of the Soviet Union, its last leader Mikhail Gorbachev had failed to bring proper social and international reforms. Frustrations from both internal and external bodies had drawn the independence declaration of Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia.

In 1991, an agreement was made, followed by more independence announcements from different USSR countries, including Ukraine.

Following the resignation of Gorbachev, the Soviet Union collapsed.

Is the war a one-night stand?

In the past two decades, tensions have been brewing. In 2013, Russia and Ukraine were in discussion towards a Russian-Ukraine trade action plan by which Russia would purchase $15 billion worth of Ukrainian Eurobonds and the cost of Russian oil purchased by Ukraine would be lowered. The desired goal was to foster closer relations through trade. Mass protest against the agreement in Ukraine led to the then president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, not signing the agreement. Subsequently, in 2014, Russia invaded Crimea. This has been a border

flashpoint within Eastern Europe - violating sovereignty and International Law. A similar line of logic and ethos has been evoked by Putin to the invasion of Ukraine, despite its freely elected Government, backdropped against US and NATO involvement in Ukraine supporting democracy and Western liberalism within the Government. Russia’s invasion of Crimea was not its first occurrence of invasion in postsoviet states, with its prior intervention in the early 2000s against democratic uprisings in the post-soviet states of Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, and priorly Ukraine. Based on Russia’s patterns in foreign policy, the power and security contests, and ideological challenge - tensions were rising, and action was bound to happen.

Why did Putin start a war?

Due to the accumulation of tensions in recent years, the Russian army entered Ukraine on February 24th. The invasion can be reasoned from various perspectives. First, Putin observed that his country is under external and ideological threats, specifically from Western Liberalism. He holds a strong belief that Ukraine and Russia are one people.

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How is the world responding to the event?

Across the globe, there have been mixed responses regarding action - inaction and support. Germany, staunch in exercising soft power and peace through diplomacy, is sending lethal weapons to support Ukrainian resistance.

Similar action has been committed by the US, EU, Australia, Canada, and Japan. Australia has committed to sending weapons, humanitarian aid, and 70,000 tonnes of coal to Ukraine - as a strong ally of the US backing their operation.

Action from the UN thus far has consisted of the International Court of Justice ordering Russia to “immediately suspend” military operations in Ukraine. However, the verdict from the ICJ is not binding, the UN has no means of enforcing its rulings, and thus the UN’s action is limited.

Furthermore, as a member of the Permanent five of the Security Council, the resolution to globally block Russia’s invasion has been vetoed

by Russia. Currently, China has abstained from voting on UN security resolutions regarding the invasion due to the US Congress warning of Chinese military aid to Russia and limited economic measures - there is no supporting evidence of this.

However, the most forthright action is the Western economic iron curtain against Russia through the sanctioning of the Russian Central Bank. As the producer of 12% of

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the world’s oil, a key player in OPEC, and the core supplier of many of the world’s minerals, Europe, particularly in the past, has been hesitant on mass sanctioning Russia.

However, through Initiatives such as Nord Stream 2’s re-branching of the global energy distribution, sanctioning Russian exports and industries were further considered as the escalation of the invasion rose. The US has banned all Russian oil imports, the UK will phase out Russian oil by 2023, and the EU is committed to switching to alternative energy supplies from Russia by 2030. Furthermore, as reliant on many imported goods and components for production in the oil and gas and manufacturing industries, production will soon halter, resulting in business shut down and an increase in unemployment - all further exacerbated through Russia’s exclusion from the global financial system. Western states, including the US, UK, and EU have frozen assets of the Russian Central bank, preventing its use of its $630 billion of foreign currency.

Most prominently, Russian banks have been sanctioned from the SWIFT international financial messaging system - used to transfer billions of dollars daily throughout banks and financial systems globally. This has resulted in the doubling of interest rates, crushing Russian industry, particularly oil, rising unemployment, soaring inflation, and thus eroding the savings of Russian citizens.

In regard to Australia’s response, 4000 visas have been issued to Ukrainian refugees with Medicare access and the right to work and study - a drastic contrast to Australia’s treatment of refugees from other countries.

What could this mean for global politics going forward?

Is there really going to be a WWIII? Or are we already in WWIII? Beyond the political significance of the unprecedented barring of Russia from SWIFT - the possible greater acceleration of the conflict to inter-state war is simmering through NATO’s stationing of troops within NATO states bordering Russian and Ukrainian countries. NATO (Northern Atlantic Treaty Organization), is a military alliance formed between twelve states postWWII in 1949 with the prerogative to counter Soviet expansion in Europe, with key players including the US, UK, Canada, and France.

Whilst NATO has sent no troops to Ukraine as it is not a NATO state, and it has imposed a no-fly zone over Ukraine. A majority of NATO states have been supplying military equipment to Ukraine. The US alone has already supplied $550 million in weapons, with a further committed $1 billion security aid package. NATO has stated it will not send troops within the state to prevent mass conflict with Russia and nuclear threats. However, its actions have resulted in Putin placing the state’s nuclear forces on “special alert” based on the “aggressive statements” by Western states. The alliance already has troops positioned through Estonian, Latvia, Romania, Lithuania, and Poland since the 2014 annexation of Crimea.

With the onset of the current crisis, more troops and naval and air force capabilities are being positioned in this region.

A recurring refugee crisis…

The conflict has been devastating for Ukrainians, with a reported more than 3 million citizens fleeing since the onset of the invasion.

A majority of refugees have fled to Poland at approximately 2 million refugees, followed by Romania, Moldova, and Hungary. The EU announced that Ukrainian citizens would be entitled to the temporary protection directive, enabling them to live, work, or study within EU member states for three years. In regard to Australia’s response, 4000 visas have been issued to Ukrainian refugees with Medicare access and the right to work and study - a drastic contrast to Australia’s treatment of refugees from other countries.

The crisis stands as a significant turning point for International Relations: are we at the end of the post-cold war? As the invasion further unfolds, what we need to remember at its core: is the millions who have been displaced and the globally coordinated humanitarian action needed to support those displaced globally due to conflict.

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The Signs, Summaries and Predictions Summaries: Holly Carter Turner.

Predictions: Abbey Durant Illustrations by Sally Thomas

April is here, meaning the sky is growing darker, and so are the bags under my eyes as I crawl through mid-semester assignments. The key influences of April are communication, connection, and problem-solving. Venus in Pisces (April 6th - May 2nd) will aid the signs in communicating with friends and Family. Mercury in Aries (March 27th - April 11th) will bring about spontaneity and opportunity for original ideas. Mars in Aquarius (March 6th - April 15) will assist with organisation and finding loyalty.

Aries (Ram)

(May 21 – June 21)

In March it was said that you may be feeling stuck in the planning phase and unsure about your next step. April brings a boost of mental energy, which will help you make a decision and start working towards your goals. It is a month of training, discipline, and self-confidence, but don’t bite off more than you can chew. You can work hard and allow yourself to rest when you need to.

A is for April as A is for Argumentative. Your need to have the final say will be strong and could end up pushing away those you care about.

March was about breaking free of restraints, and April is where you finally reflect on how those restraints may have been burdening you. Feeling exhausted, your fuse will be short, which could lead to turning everything into an argument. It will be hard but try to hold your tongue (at least with those you really care about).

Taurus (Bull)

(April 20 – May 20)

April’s energy for Taurus focuses on relationships, particularly the romantic sort. While you will be feeling more spontaneous (and perhaps sexual), it will be a time for contemplation and reflection of things you hadn’t considered previously. It is also a month for helping you feel more physically confident. To balance the two, maybe get in the habit of nice meditative runs

by Matilda bay?

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Gemini (Twins)

(March 21 – April 19)

Cancer (Crab)

(June 22 – July 22)

The next month brings high levels of emotions for Cancers, as they work on thinking things over and being less impulsive. It is a month for working on self-grounding, improving communication, and empathetic skills. Make sure that while you are working inwards, you aren’t shutting people out. Continue to work creatively as it will help to ground you.

Leo (Lion)

Libra (Balance)

(July 23 – August 22)

(September 23 – October 23)

March had you breaking bad habits, and now April has Leos wanting to feel free to explore and prowl the town. Awakening your inner… animal… This is a good month to reflect on your independence and sexuality. While it will bring about fun and excitement, actions do have consequences, so make sure you aren’t doing things you will later regret.

Language is highlighted this month as you work on communication and the courage to speak out and stand out amongst a crowd. April will be a more positive month for Libras, and familial relations will also improve. Continue your keenness to learn but enjoy family time (remembering family isn’t just those linked by blood).

Virgo (Virgin)

Scorpio (Scorpion)

(August 23 – September 22)

(October 24 – November 21)

Last month was heavy, and Virgos may now be feeling in need of some T.L.C. While it may be tempting to cave to the craving and cling to everyone/everything you love, relax. Those that truly love you aren’t going anywhere. April brings new opportunities and enthusiasm for connection. Things will form at their own pace.

Try not to rush them.

It is a conflicting month for Scorpios, as you feel restless and full of energy, but there will be a sense of boredom that may make you feel sluggish. Following a somewhat heavy March, you may not quite be feeling yourself again yet. Take this month to gather engaging hobbies as you figure out who you want to be.

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Sagitarius (Archer)

(January 20 – February 18)

According to the planets’, paternal/maternal instincts are strong for you this month as you focus on looking after your children. Being uni students most of you won’t have kids yet, so perhaps take a fresher under your wing and show them the ropes? Use these intuitions to better look after yourself, your friends, and your family.

Your self-esteem will grow as April progresses, which can be both good and bad. Developing a good opinion of yourself can be an important part of success, but knowing when to be humble is just as significant. This confidence boost may find yourself enjoying some time in the limelight, but be aware that the longer you stay there, the more jealous peers and coworkers may become.

Capricorn (Goat)

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Aquarius (Water Bearer)

(November 21 – December 21)

Pisces (Fish)

(December 22 – January 19)

(February 19 – March 20)

This is another month of work for Capricorns.

As you continue to feel motivated, work will continue to chug along steadily. Cooperation and coordination will be strong suits for you this month, so use this to your advantage to set up new networks and systems. Coordination will also help you maintain a proper work-life balance, which isn’t always a strong suit.

Your mind is a sponge this month and can absorb a large amount of information. This will help you to improve communication, which may bring temptation to use it to manipulate others. As your head absorbs knowledge, don’t get big-headed. Just because you are learning new things doesn’t mean you know the most.

Colour me in for your enjoyment - tag your submissions @pelicanuwa

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