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No. 820 Friday 20th January 2017 varsity.co.uk Championing independent student journalism in Cambridge for 70 years

From plodge to politics Former Clare porter makes Blues football bid for Cambridge mayoral role INTERVIEW  caught in venue drama

● Squads split over  rst Varsity double-header

Speaking exclusively to Varsity, the Sophie Penney and Paul Hyland women’s captain, Gerda Bachrati said: “We felt that playing at Barnet would be e football teams of Oxford and Cam- riding on the coattails of the men.” bridge Universities have sparked con- “We felt it would be really important troversy ater a disagreement over the to take that opportunity to play at a big venue for this year’s women’s Varsity stadium [Cambridge United] for the match.  rst time, get people interested in the Both the men’s and women’s Varsity women’s game.” football matches are set to take place CUWAFC recognises that a double- on the same day this year at Barnet FC’s header will bring more media attention, Hive Stadium, in the  rst ever Varsity but saw a game on a separate occasion double-header, but the decision has let on a big stage as an essential precursor the Cambridge women’s side feeling to a double-header: “Once you start mak- short changed. ing people realise that women’s football However, contrary to reports that the is actually good, people are more likely match was under threat, on Wednesday to be interested in a double-header in Cantabs march against Trump this week it was announced to the public the future.” that the double-header is going ahead on e location of the matches is the 19th March at e Hive Stadium. most important concern for the Cam- e men’s and women’s teams of the bridge Women’s team as Bachrati ar- When asked about their reasons for In a press release, Zeichner said: “As Cambridge University Association Foot- gued that Cambridge United’s Abbey Charlotte Gi ord protesting Trump’s inauguration, their Donald Trump is sworn in as president of ball Club (CUAFC) and Oxford University Stadium would be more accessible to Senior News Correspondent co-ordinator Richard Rose told Varsity of the United States on the back of a cam- Association Football Club (OUAFC), all students, meaning more spectators and Protesters are set to rally in cities across his concerns about the negligence that paign which fractured the country and seem to have had the objective of greater attention. the world today, as Donald Trump is anti-racists had shown recently, and too oten descended into the politics of equality for the women’s Varsity match, “If Cambridge United had said okay sworn in as 45th president of the United spoke of the necessity of speaking out hate, I am proud to join this campaign in but the teams disagreed on how this for a double-header it would have been a States of America. against Trump. saying that Cambridge welcomes multi- could best be achieved. completely di erent situation, I think for Cambridge is among over 20 UK cit- “One of the reasons racism in Cam- culturalism and diversity. Oxford’s view was that a double- Oxford too, as both universities would ies where protest marches have been bridge may be lower than in surrounding “Sadly, following the EU referendum, header would give the women’s match have been more sure and secure of the spurred on by Trump’s inauguration. areas is because anti-racists have been we have seen a rise in hate crime in Brit- a share of the great attention that the fan base.” e marches are a response to the Pres- constantly vigilant, not letting any ex- ain and it is important that Cambridge men’s match draws. Cambridge felt that is year it was Oxford’s turn to or- ident-elect’s history of xenophobic and ample of racism go unchallenged,” Rose stands together as one, united behind hosting the women’s match separately ganise the men’s match and Cambridge’s misogynistic remarks, which many fear explained. “ at’s why we need to make the common values that make our city at the Cambridge United stadium would turn to organise the women’s. will translate into policy once he takes a fuss about Trump here and in London. so great: tolerance, diversity and interna- be the best option. At the start of Michaelmas 2016, Cam- o ce. Anti-racists have been on the back foot tionalism. We should be building bridges May Martin, Women’s President of bridge United approached CUWAFC to A rally to celebrate a diverse and for a few months now – it’s time for us not walls.” OUWAFC told Varsity, “OUWAFC thought invite them to play their Varsity match multicultural Cambridge and stand up to go back on the o ensive: we are the More than  ty Democrats, includ- that a double header would be the best at their stadium, an o er the Cambridge against racism will be held by Cam- vast majority!” ing civil rights campaigner John Lewis, way to achieve the joint aim that we women accepted. bridge’s branch of the campaign group e Cambridge rally will be attended will be boycotting the inauguration at share with Cambridge, which was to Stand Up to Racism in Market Square on by the MP for Cambridge, Daniel Zeich- promote equality in the sport.” Continued on page 5 ▶ Saturday at midday. ner. Continued on page 4 ▶ 2 Friday 20th January 2017 EDITORIAL News Not impressed

n this, Varsity’s 70th anniversary year, we Trump victory are looking back. In our new, weekly From the Archives feature, for example, we are delving back through the paper’s archives. IIt’s not always pretty: this week’s selection thwarts King’s (p. 8) seems funny, until you remember its out-and-out misogyny is just that – no irony. But we are also looking to the future. We may be passionate about what we’re doing now – more video content than ever before, a weekly email choir Mexico show newsletter launching today, a brand-new blog, Violet, coming soon – but with 70 years now under our belt, we are also keen to ensure that Varsity can ● he inal stop of the choir’s annual tour was to continue to lourish over the next 70 years, once we have moved on. be Mexico City, but will now be Midland in Texas And this is why I ind the Section 40 press reforms – the provision made after the Leveson Inquiry for libel claimants to have their legal costs covered by the papers, whether or not they win – so diicult. Merlyn homas Senior News Correspondent As a student paper, giving a voice to the underdog is a big part of what we do. Our core readership may be privileged in many ways, but it is also, on he annual international tour of the King’s College Choir was set to end in the whole, young, which is not always easy. Yukiko Mexico City, but has been relocated Lui discusses this theme in more depth on p. 14, in to inish in Midland, Texas due to the the irst of her new column, Pale, Stale, Male. Young economic diiculties caused by Donald people are new to salaries and budgeting; new to Trump’s victory in the recent US elec- adult relationships and living alone; new to democ- tions. racy. What Varsity does – and has been doing for he Mexican promoter has “with- the last 70 years – is allow these nascent adults to drawn the invitation in light of the eco- have their say. nomic climate in the country following Similarly, allowing those with fewer resources the US election result”, according to the to take on big media organisations when they have email sent out to the choristers. been wronged is, in theory, something to get on he e-mail announcing the change to board with. the tour, which is scheduled to leave on But the reality for small papers like us is that we Wednesday, 22nd March and return on Monday, 3rd April, gave no further details simply could not aford what Section 40 proposes. to the members of the Choir. A law which allows people to sue indiscriminately, he world-renowned choir was set to with no inancial repercussions if their suit is un- perform concerts in Berkeley, Vancouver, successful, would be crushing. Would we have pub- Seattle, Logan (Utah), and Salt Lake City, lished last term’s important intermissions investiga- inally ending the tour in Mexico City. tion, for example – which prompted discussion and Coincidentally, the move to replace the changed attitudes within the University community Mexico City concert with one in Midland, – had Section 40 been in force? Maybe not. Texas, signiicantly reduces the amount Print journalism may never be the same if and of travel. when these reforms are introduced, but certainly it Intermusica, the company that organ- were blamed on the very low value of ▲ King’s College would be crushing for smaller papers like Varsity – a ises the Choir’s tours, conirmed to Var- the Mexican currency, due to falling oil Choir choristers sad, sad prospect indeed. sity, “he concert by the Choir of King’s prices and a stronger dollar. walk in front College, Cambridge on 1 April at Festival Intermusica, the company that is run- of their iconic del Centro Histórico, Mexico City, has ning the Choir’s tour, has been responsi- chapel editor Millie Brierley [email protected] been cancelled, due to a change in the ble for organising tours for the group in (LUCAS CHEBIB) deputy editor Anna Menin [email protected] magazine editor Daniel Gayne [email protected] Festival’s funding circumstances.” the past. In summer 2016 they organised deputy magazine editor Patrick Wernham [email protected] he Mexican cultural celebration Fes- a return tour to China after their debut online editor Harry Curtis [email protected] tival del Centro Histórico, which takes in the country in October 2010 and in editor-at-large Louis Ashworth [email protected] business manager Mark Curtis [email protected] place every year to bring together art- the same year they also set up concerts news editors Sam Harrison & Sophie Penney (Senior); ists and shows from all over the world, in Sweden in recognition of the 80th an- Matt Gutteridge, Aoife Hogan & Caitlin Smith (Deputy) [email protected] has already seen inancial diiculties in niversary of their irst ever international senior news correspondents Ankur Desai, Charlie Fraser, Charlotte recent years. tour to Stockholm in 1936. Giford & Merlyn homas In 2015 more than 5 million pesos (ap- he last time the King’s College Choir investigations editors Tom Richardson (Senior) & Monty Fynn (Deputy) [email protected] proximately £185,000) was cut from the toured the US was in 2015, when they comment editors Peter Chappell (Senior); Noah Froud, Matt Green, Emily festival’s budget, resulting in cancella- visited New York City, Washington, St Robb & Sarah Wilson (Deputy) [email protected] tions. At the time, inancial diiculties Paul, Chicago and Dallas. interviews editors Keir Baker, Anna Fitzpatrick & Joel Nelson [email protected] science editor James Alvey [email protected] features editors Anna Hollingsworth & Anna Jennings [email protected] sciEncE in sociEty tHE nEXt stEP For stasH GoinG For Gold culture editor Ellie Howcroft [email protected] fashion editors Elizabeth Huang & Flora Walsh [email protected] theatre editor Molly Stacey [email protected] Relationships, St John’s signet How Team GB music editor Ben Haigh [email protected] film & tv editor Pany Heliotis [email protected] sport editor Paul Hyland [email protected] politics and life rings – stash dominated sport reporters Devarshi Lodhia (Senior); Andrew Derrett & Imran Marashli (Deputy) sub-editors Jay Vinayak Ojha (Chief); Hannah Jones, Imran Marashli & outside the lab gone wrong Olympic cycling Sara Rasul [email protected] photography editor Lucas Chebib [email protected] James Alvey and Polly Evans look at he St John’s signet ring is the latest Team GB raised plenty of eyebrows at video editor Charlie horpe [email protected] arts editor Jade Cuttle [email protected] the role of science in our cultural and stash trend to hit Cambridge but Anna last year’s Rio Olympic Games, winning blog editor Danny Wittenberg [email protected] political interactions. In an era of imme- Jennings isn’t convinced. She argues twelve cycling medials between them. radio editor Nick Jones [email protected] diacy, the way we collectively approach that they represent a step backwards Paul Hyland speaks to one of the people varsity board Dr Michael Franklin (Chairman), Prof. Peter Robinson, Dr Tim Harris, Michael Derringer, Talia Zybutz, Callum Hale-homson (VarSoc decisions and tasks can shape the world. in the continuous battle against elitist who helped to make it happen: Profes- President), Louis Ashworth, Richard Berg Rust (he Mays), Millie Brierley Science’s role discerning fact from ic- stereotypes, questioning where the de- sor Tony Purnell. he Trinity Hall fellow

©Varsity Publications ltd, 2017. all rights reserved. no part of this publication may be tion and educating non-specialists can mand for them has come from. Jennings and chief engineer of Team GB Cycling reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical photocopying, recording or otherwise without prior permission of the publisher. clash with its utility in technology which confesses what many Cambridge stu- spills the beans on just how big a part Varsity, 16 Mill lane, cambridge cb2 1rX. telephone 01223 337575. promulgates ‘fake news’ in a post-truth dents are bound to be thinking but never technology has had to play in a dominant Varsity is published by Varsity Publications ltd. Varsity Publications also publishes he Mays. society. say: that stash is actually quite weird. few years for his team. Printed at ilife Print cambridge – Winship road, Milton, cambridge cb24 6PP on 42.5gsm newsprint. registered as a newspaper at the Post oice. issn 1758-4442. Page 10 & 11 ▶ Page 15 ▶ Page 34 & 35 ▶ Cambridge International Academy Ltd

CamIntAc specialises in developing educational programmes with China and seeks:

- Part-time subject tutors for our summer and winter programmes in Cambridge - Full-time teachers for our ‘English public speaking and debating skills’ courses in China (A generous expatriate package is available for our teaching positions in China)

Are you a Cambridge graduate or undergraduate? Are you looking for interesting opportunities in Cambridge and / or overseas?

Then visit us at www.camintac.co.uk , write to [email protected] or phone 01223 881943 for further details before February 28th, 2017.

4 F  20 J  2017 News Trump march in city centre today

Students and residents join protests in London and Cambridge as Donald Trump is sworn in

tions committed to equality, diversity, ▶ When Trump ▸ Continued from front page and inclusion” have been encouraged won the election to join them “in representing the rights in November, the White House. Meanwhile, here in and voices of progressive people around students hung the UK, more than 50 public gures, in- the world.” ‘messages of cluding shadow cabinet members Diane Although the marches will unite indi- hope’ from trees Abbott and Clive Lewis, have signed a viduals against Trump across the world, on the Sidgwick statement encouraging Trump’s “grow- there has been some division amongst Site LUCAS CHEBIB ing opposition” to protest against him. the marchers.  e March on Washing- Perhaps the most proli c strain of ton released a “statement of inclusiv- the marches taking place this Saturday ity” in which they acknowledged that are the Women’s Marches. Hundreds of some women did not feel “adequately these have sparked up in cities across represented” by their march.  ey said the world, including the Women’s March to these individuals, “we want to state on London. to you clearly: we see you, we hear you, Organisers of the London strand are and we understand.” adamant that “the politics of fear and However Sebatindira, CUSU Wom- division have no place in 2017”, and have en’s O cer, was clear that the Women’s gathered support from such groups as Marches encompassed many di erent Amnesty International, the Women’s issues: “we’re certainly hoping that is- Equality Party, and Greenpeace. sues concerning racism and other forms  e CUSU Women’s Campaign will be of marginalisation won’t be ignored by sending a contingent to join the Wom- the marchers and organisers.” en’s March on London. Similarly,  e Women’s March on “Engaging in protests like these can Washington has been eager to reiterate #LoveTrumpsHate Trump and the world be cathartic as well as e ective,” Audrey the overriding purpose of the marches. Sebatindira, CUSU Women’s O cer told “ e work of this march is not only to Ahead of Trump’s inauguration today, Declan Amphlett, a third-year Varsity. “Marching in solidarity with stand together in sisterhood and soli- Cantabs around the world spoke to Varsi- MML student in Paris, was worried others who are equally as angry as you darity for the protection of our rights, ty about the propsect of his presidency. about the rise of right-wing populism, about the state of the world – refusing our safety, our families and our environ- Some were worried about the po- sayingthat a lot of people fear “what to let that anger be silenced – is an im- ment,” they announced, “but it is also to litical consequences. Anya Draycott, may happen if Marine Le Pen wins, portant part of liberation and sends a build relationships and mend the divides a third-year AMES student in Jordan, so he is most de nitely in the French message to others that we won’t allow between our communities.” o ered a sense of the fear many are public consciousness.” our interests to be threatened without In November 2016, Cambridge stu- experiencing: “One teacher said she Others expressed their horror at a ght.” dents hung dozens of brightly coloured was happy because America would ▲Donald his comments about women. Me-  e organisers of the rst march, in tags, carrying messages of hope and destroy itself instead of the Mid- Trump is the redith Ford, a third-year MML stu- Washington, had clearly intended others solidarity, outside the Alison Richard dle East,” she told us. “At the same least popular dent, spoke of a palpable sense of to follow their lead, calling for a global Building at the Sidgwick Site in a stand time my homestay mum said she President-Elect in fear in Alicante, Spain. She told us: response: “individuals and organisa- against hate and xenophobia. was scared and had a friend whose modern history “I think the marches are a great show daughter lives in the US who is ab- MICHAEL VADON of protest and woman-to-woman solutely terri ed.” solidarity.”

‘Uber for bikes’ scheme coming to Cambridge Looking for work Aoife Hogan this summer? Deputy News Editor Chinese company ‘Ofo’ have announced 4 July – 19 August 2017 plans to launch its bike-sharing scheme The University of Cambridge International Summer in Cambridge this March, allowing us- ers to hire bikes through an Uber-style Programmes is ofering challenging paid work for smartphone app.  e self-standing yel- Cambridge undergraduate and graduate students. low bikes can be dropped o and picked up from publicly accessible locations, As one of a team of ten Cambridge Student with each trip estimated to cost under Assistants you’ll need customer-care and £1. Cambridgeshire County Council trans- administrative skills, initiative and tact. port o cer Hilary Holden expressed the Council’s eagerness to “continue to de- velop a leading transport network for the ▲ Previous bike-sharing schemes have struggled MICHAEL VADON For full details and an application form, future” in partnership with Ofo. Speak- call network: 60850 or 01223 760850 ing to Cambridge News, she asserted that Founded in 2014, Ofo currently have and Stanford University, California in “the City Deal will continue to work with 10 million registered users in China, 2017. or email: [email protected] partners in the community, higher edu- and claim to be the rst company in the A similar scheme, the Green Bike pick- Closing date for applications: 20 March 2017. cation, and business to ensure that our world to operate a ‘non-docking’ bike up-drop-o , was introduced in Cam- transport system is t-for-purpose and rental system online. Ofo is available in bridge in 1993. However, it was aban- uses opportunities from new and emerg- 24 cities and 200 universities in China, doned ater six months as most of the ing technology.” with plans to also expand to Singapore bikes went missing ater the launch. F  20 J  2017 5 News

Controversy University sends out  rst o ers over Varsity under new assessments football

Caitlin Smith ▸ Continued from front page Deputy News Editor In September 2016, the Oxford men’s Cambridge University has sent out its football team applied to Barnet FC to  rst o ers to have been made following see if they would host the men’s Varsity pre-interview entrance exams in thirty match, which they agreed to do. years. e idea of a double-header has been Following the introduction of admis- raised before but it has previously not sion assessments for the majority of been followed through. Laurence Wroe, degree courses, many of the applicants captain of the Oxford Men’s Blues team who received their o ers on Saturday explained to Varsity that “both OUAFC had had to sit a test as well as the tradi- and OUWAFC have viewed the double tional interview. header as the future of the football Var- Until they fell out of favour in the sity for the past couple of years, but this 1980s, entrance exams used to be man- is easier said than done due to di culties datory for all Cambridge applicants in- in getting a prestigious ground to host vited to interview. two  xtures on the same day.” e change was announced in a letter Given this long-term aim, the Oxford sent out to UK schools and colleges last committees contacted Barnet to ask if year by Dr Sam Lucy, the University’s there was a possibility of a double-head- Director of Admissions. In the letter, er, which Barnet FC also agreed to. she explained that the change was a re- e Cambridge women’s committee sponse to “teacher and student feedback, one practice paper so it was really dif- ▲ e students but I didn’t work through anything with did not attend the meetings discussing a desire to harmonise and simplify our  cult to revise for.” ey added that an who received teachers in school.” with Barnet FC the opportunity of a dou- existing use of written assessments and applicant’s performance “depended on o er letters this Mature applicants are not required to ble-header at e Hive Stadium. Bachrati a need to develop new ways to main- how self-motivated he/she was because week had an take the admission tests, in part due to explained that this was because they tain the e ectiveness and fairness of there wasn’t any teacher help and it re- extra hurdle to concerns raised by Professor Sir Richard were so “ rmly” settled with Cambridge our admissions system during ongoing lied a lot on extracurricular reading.” overcome Evans, president of Wolfson College. He United at that point, and stressed that quali cation reform.” Sara Williams, a pupil at a compre- SAM GUTTERIDGE stressed that mature applicants may be they did not discourage the men from Speaking to Varsity this week, Dr Lucy hensive school who applied to study En- less accustomed to taking exams than these talks as they had every right to said that the University was not yet in a gineering, said: “I struggled a lot more their younger counterparts, as they are hold them. Once Barnet had con rmed position to comment on the outcomes of on the engineering section of the test likely to have spent an extended period that a double-header was possible, CU- the assessments, but “initial indications as the questions were written in a style of time out of formal education. WAFC tried to convince OUWAFC to were positive.” which I had not come across before, stick to the original plan of playing at However, it has been suggested that and it involved an application of maths How hard can it be? Cambridge United. privately-educated students are likely and physics which I haven’t learned in Some sample questions from the assessments were However, Cambridge United then to perform better than applicants from such detail yet.” Preparation, she said, released last year, including: backed out of their agreement with CU- state schools, thanks to more intensive had been di cult: “We worked through ● Must all revolutions fail? WAFC, saying that a double-header at coaching from their teachers. the specimen paper on the Cambridge ● Discuss whether the recent European migrant their stadium is impossible and instead An applicant currently attending an website and some of the PAT papers crisis has challenged or reinforced racism. encouraged CUWAFC to take up the o er independent school told Varsity that “no [the Physics Aptitude Test used by Ox- ● ‘ ere are some ideas so wrong that only a very of the double-header at Barnet FC. one knew anything about what the test ford University]. My Director of Sixth intelligent person could believe them.’ Discuss. Speaking to Varsity, Wroe explained would be like because there was only Form gave me some resources as well the  nancial background to Cambridge United’s decision: “ e women’s deal was that Cambridge United would host the women’s Varsity for free. Cambridge United reversed their decision to host the Higher Education Bill battles through Lords game when they heard that OUAFC and OUWAFC had found a  nancial alterna- tive to a double-header.” With the option of playing at Cam- ❝ Cambridge’s view that links fees with will experience what is going on on a bridge United no longer available, it was Harry Curtis teaching quality was “bound to a ect course. at is the level at which they agreed on by all committees that Varsity Online Editor A ranking student decision-making adversely and need data. ” would be hosted as a double-header at in particular it may deter students from e TEF has drawn widespread criti- Barnet. e government’s plans to link the fees system for low-income families from applying to cism for the way in which it proposes to CUWAFC confessed to being not that universities can charge with teach- turkeys the best universities”, saying that he re- measure teaching quality, with student fully content with this  nal decision, ing quality came under attack in the mained “unconvinced” of the govern- satisfaction determined by the National “We are still upset that there’s still that House of Lords this week, as the Higher ❞ ment’s commitment to improving social Student Survey (NSS) likely to be an inte- loss - potentially a situation where fewer Education Bill continues its turbulent mobility. gral metric. is has led to calls from the people come to watch our game at Bar- passage through Parliament. e theme of social mobility was National Union of Students for students net. at’s still very di cult for us to e Teaching Excellence Framework picked up by Baroness Deech, the former to boycott the NSS. digest and consider.” (TEF) allows participating universities Principal of St Anne’s College, Oxford, However, Lord Willetts defended the Both committees have agreed to make to raise fees in line with in ation, and who said that allowing the top-rated proposed metrics, saying: “ ese are not a concerted e ort to address this key will also see institutions being awarded universities – in her estimation, likely perfect measures. We are on a journey, concern. CUAFC men and women are gold, silver and bronze ratings which to be Oxbridge and other Russell Group and I look forward to these metrics being keen to provide transport to Cambridge will dictate the fee limit a university is institutions – to charge higher fees would revised and replaced by superior metrics in fans. allowed to charge. create a “reinforcing division” between the future. ey are not as bad as we have Despite her disappointment, Bachrati On Wednesday, Lord Watson of In- them and other universities. heard in some of the caricatures of them, did stress that this was a mutual deci- vergowrie, the Labour Party’s education e proposals for a gold, silver and and in my experience, if we wait until we sion: “Towards the end it was a deci- spokesman in the House of Lords, spoke bronze rating system also drew criticism have a perfect indicator and then start us- sion between us and the Oxford women’s against the parts of the Higher Education from the government’s benches, Lord ing it, we will have a very long wait.” team. It’s Cambridge’s turn to host, but Bill that enable the implementation of Lucas, who has previously called it “a On 9th January, the government was it’s important to develop a meaningful the TEF, saying it was “a clear example ranking system for turkeys”. defeated on reforms that would have relationship with them to make women’s of the Government’s view that the Bill “If someone is choosing a university,” granted for-pro t colleges the right to Breaking news, football bigger.” is as much a question of consumerism he said, “they will look at what is going award degrees. e Lords will continue around the Wroe con rmed this: “ e issue has as it is about education.” on on a course. ey will not experience to debate the Higher Education Bill on clock now been resolved amicably between He went on to cite the University of the university quality of teaching; they Monday. varsity.co.uk all the clubs involved.” 6 Friday 20th January 2017 News Student actors to sleep on the street for charity Sleepout will submerge the actors in the world of their play’s protagonist

sometimes sleeping rough – others live reminded that what we value as mid- Ankur Desai in hostels and attend day centres – and dle class students is so often hollow and Senior News Correspondent we wanted to experience, even if incred- comes with gross levels of privilege.” ibly briely, a number of diferent places Jimmy’s is named in memory of Jim he cast and crew of the forthcoming in which people live in the city. Dilley, a man who died of lung cancer play Stuart: A Life Backwards are to stage “I am hoping that the whole cast in 1995 after spending much of his life a ‘sponsored sleepout’ this weekend in and crew will learn just how incredibly sleeping rough in the Cambridge re- order to raise awareness of homelessness scary and cold sleeping rough really is gion. in Cambridge. and wake up empowered and angry to It ofers emergency accommodation he group will sleep rough near Mill help change a system which creates and as well as a range of other services, in- Lane lecture theatre from Saturday night scapegoats so many homeless people.” cluding a controlled drinking project on through to Sunday morning. In preparation for the play, the cast Newmarket Road, supported housing, hey will also be raising money for met with guests at Jimmy’s, seeking and budgeting advice for those at risk or Jimmy’s Night Shelter, an emergency their guidance on characterisation and renewed risk of homelessness. shelter in Cambridge, and are working publicity for the show. Bevan said: “We Cambridge City Council has recently with Wintercomfort, a support centre really wanted to involve local homeless stepped up eforts to tackle rough sleep- for the homeless and those at risk of people right from the beginning of the ing, but has been criticised for stigmatis- homelessness. he team is hoping to project – designing our publicity images ing the homeless by publicising advice raise £1,000 through donations. and meeting our cast and crew – to the not to give money to beggars. he play is an adaptation of a book very end when we will perform the show Between 2015 and 2016, it was es- by Alexander Masters, an alumnus of St at Jimmy’s Hostel and invite staf and timated that the number of people in Edmund’s College. It tells the life story guests along to the post-show talk on Cambridge sleeping rough was 152. he of his friend Stuart Shorter, a “chaotic opening night!” number of households without perma- homeless” man who lived in Cambridge. He added: “Meeting people at the hos- nent accommodation was estimated to he adaptation itself was penned by tels has had a huge efect on how we be 418, which represented almost a tri- Pembroke graduate Jack horne. as a cast and crew have thought about pling of the number from 2011-12. Speaking to Varsity, producer of the homelessness. he complicated, frus- Stuart: A Life Backwards will run at the show Tom Bevan said: “We wanted to trating, sad, inspiring, traumatic stories Corpus Playroom from the 31st of Janu- do something that would raise a load of behind every person who we lazily label ary to the 4th of February at 7 p.m. At- awareness and money for Jimmy’s and as ‘homeless’ are remarkable... Like Al- tendees will be able to donate to Jimmy’s we are all incredibly excited.” exander in the play, we have had our and Wintercomfort at the door, which “One aspect of being homeless is preconceptions smashed and have been ▲ The number of people sleeping rough in Cambridge is growing (LuCAS CHEBIB) the cast encourage them to do.

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Tonbridge School is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, and applicants must be willing to undergo child protection screening appropriate to the post, including checks with past employers and the Disclosure & Barring Service. 17/GA/TPB Friday 20th January 2017 7 News

LETTUCE EAT LETTUCE TATE WADHAM Clare Lettuce Club to Rejection letter made Nominations open in launch this week into art

on Monday, Clare College Cellars will NUS delegate by-election host the irst Annual General Meeting As thousands of students receive the of the ‘Clare Lettuce Club’. he meeting, result of their oxbridge application this which has been advertised on university week, one unsuccessful applicant took ticket website Agora, will see students the news in an unusual way. Claudia ▼ Roberta delegates has been reached, this by- attempt to eat an entire head of lettuce Vulliamy, who had applied to Wadham Charlie Fraser Huldisch (top) election is only open to candidates that in an hour. College, oxford, converted her rejection Senior News Correspondent and Eireann At- identify as female, though it can also Whoever inishes their lettuce the fast- letter into a piece of abstract art. Vul- tridge (below), be illed by an individual identifying as est will assume the presidency of the liamy told the BBC she made the work, Nominations have opened for the elec- the non-male non-binary. unique society, and be responsibile for which has been re-Tweeted over 50,000 tion of the inal Cambridge delegate to CUSU delegates he position is open because CUSU organising the following year’s meeting. times, because “it’s not often that you get the National Union of Students (NUS) chosen last term initially only received enough applica- Speaking to Varsity, inaugural Clare Let- a letter dedicated to you from oxford. It’s National Conference in April. (LoUIS ASHWoRTH) tions to ill two of the three female/non- tuce Club President David Wesby said, very meaningful, so I thought it would be he election, which will run for two binary places. “it’s gonna be littuce fuck”. funny if I made it into something.” weeks from midnight on hursday 19th he conference will debate a variety of January, will be the inal stage in the issues under ive key policy categories: process to select the ive delegates who, Further Education, Higher Education, WHO WOOD’A THOUGHT IT “URINAL WAITING TO HAPPEN” along with the CUSU President Amatey Society and Citizenship, Welfare, and New progress towards New statue honours Doku, will attend the conference in Union Development. It will also elect the late April. organisation’s new leadership. building a wooden creation of oicial Elections for the four existing del- CUSU’s delegation will be among over skyscraper football rules egates, Jonty Leibowitz, Josh Jack- 600 sent from the student unions of uni- son, Roberta Huldisch and Eireann versities all over the country. Attridge, took place last term. While his annual conference is particularly A Cambridge professor has made a break- Planning permission has been granted Leibowitz and Jackson are new to the signiicant after a dramatic year for the through that could lead to the construc- for the construction of a sculpture com- NUS, Huldisch and Attridge are both cur- organisation. In May, individual student tion of wooden skyscrapers. Professor memorating the irst game of Association rently members of the CUSU Sabbatical unions began a wave of referendums Paul Dupree, of the university’s Biochem- Football. he work will be inscribed with Team. Huldisch was also a delegate at to disailiate from the NUS, after the istry Department, has discovered how the original eleven ‘Cambridge Rules’ last year’s conference. newly-elected president of the NUS, cellulose and xylan, the two most com- drawn up at Trinity College in 1848, and In 2014 the NUS passed a new rule Malia Bouattia, was accused of making mon naturally occurring polymers, bind go on display on Parker’s Piece, where which states that at least 50 per cent of anti-Semitic statements. together in plant walls. It is hoped that the irst game of football was played. any delegation at the conference must More recently, the NUS was shaken by Professor Dupree’s research will aid the of the original rules, which contain a be self-deining women. his ‘Fair Rep- a sting operation which recorded NUS development of super-strong timber to primitive ofside rule, only two are no resentation on NUS Conference’ policy Vice-President Richard Brooks calling replace steel and concrete in buildings. longer in the game. However, one critic means that, as the total delegation size Bouattia a “racist” and discussing the Plans have already been drawn up for a of the sculpture called it a “urinal wait- is six and the maximum of three male internal opposition to her leadership. wooden skyscraper in the Barbican. ing to happen”.

Independent variables welcome.

www.deshaw.com 8 Friday 20th January 2017 Interview Kevin Price

❝ It should be about more than just existing ❞

● Anna Fitzpatrick speaks to the Clare porter who wants to become mayor of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough

rised, undermining what he describes with the city… hey're coming here and Anna FitzPatrick as the desire to feel that “Although I’m getting involved. When I got re-elected Interviews Editor not a multi-millionaire, I have my life, I in 2011, I was astonished at the numbers live my life – I do alright”. It interests me of students who would come out on a When I told people I was going to study that he feels as though people compare Saturday or Sunday and come canvass- at Cambridge, they were usually quick themselves to ‘multi-millionaires’. I ask ing in the ward”. to comment on ‘how posh’ it would be. him if he thinks there is a social divi- “It’s important that people don’t I was invited to imagine that everyone sion as stark as the ‘town versus gown’ just have enough money to pay their would wear tuxedos instead of pyjamas phrase suggests. rent- that’s what the living wage was and eat gold leaf for breakfast. his too, he highlights, is a misconcep- all about. It should be about more than When I recall this to Kevin Price – Cam- tion. “You know, not every student is just existing” bridge City Council’s Executive Coun- from a very wealthy background and has In his bid to be elected a mayoral can- cillor for Housing and representing the a butler at home”, he points out, musing didate for a devolved Cambridgeshire Labour Party in the upcoming mayoral that “stereotypes work in a great many and Peterborough authority, Price is contest for Cambridgeshire and Peter- ways.” He recalls his time as a porter: continuing his ight for a seemingly un- borough – he laughs. I persist in telling “When I irst got the job I thought – this acknowledged poverty to be part of the him, though, that I think Cambridge is is not gonna be for me – posh people discussion. He says that he wants to “put ‘posh’. He laughs again and echoes me coming in and looking down their noses social justice at the heart of the devolu- – “It is!” at me. But it’s just not like that, it really tion deal”. I ask him what this means. As But having grown up in Cambridge, isn’t. hat’s a worry for a lot of students well as “improving transport and local worked at Clare College as a porter for coming. It’s not just a lot of posh people democracy” one of his key priorities is ten years and devoted himself to repre- in bow ties – it’s a lot of young people, to ensure that people are not forced into senting local people, it is clear that Price having a good time, socialising and get- homelessness through the provision of all”, he conirms. ”Not everybody has understands that this is not the whole ting dressed up for it. here’s nothing afordable housing, “by setting rent lev- that opportunity, certainly in a place like story. “he perception of Cambridge be- wrong with that”. I ask him if this was els at what they call a ‘local housing al- Cambridge, where 40% of the population ing very posh and very wealthy”, he tells the case in the past. “I don’t hear of many lowance rate’, [meaning] anyone renting earn £22,000 per year or less. he aver- me, “is, of course, a gross misconcep- incidents of what they used to call ‘grad those homes, if they were on beneits, age price of a house is approaching half tion.” bashing’ in the sixties and seventies for instance, their beneits would cover a million. It’s not do-able.” He is right. Although tweed-wearing where students would be picked on… the rent. If people are in employment It makes sense, then, that he would boins tend to be the public ‘face’ of never say never, but that’s not as ap- it means that they still have money to recall that a major concern of people in Cambridge in art or the media, research parent to me as it was then. It’s partly actually live with, because it’s impor- his ward is that of council housing. “he shows that 90 per cent of the people who because there are more working class tant that people don’t just have enough private sector has never built enough go to Jimmy’s Night Shelter are locals. people coming to Cambridge University, ❝ money to pay their rent – that’s what the housing. he only times when enough “Parts of it are very wealthy” he con- so there is an understanding of what real living wage was all about. It should be housing was being built was when lo- tinues, “but I represent a ward [King’s life is like. I think that helps.” I think the about more than just existing.” cal authorities and housing associations Hedges] in the north of the city that is He further elaborates that many stu- people of he recent words of heresa May – were building alongside developers”, he the [city’s] most deprived. And I hate dents can and do try to pierce the im- that ‘if you’re young, you’ll ind it harder continues, highlighting the £70 million using that term, because, you know, I’ve age of an academic ‘bubble’. “We have Cambridge than ever to own your own home’ – echo ring-fenced for building council housing talked to people who say ‘I don’t like be- local councillors that were and are still are unique in my mind. I ask Price if he feels that in Cambridge city as part of the devolu- ing that term’”. He explains to me that graduate students. hey’ve crossed that her emphasis on home ownership is tion deal. people feel like they are being catego- ‘divide’, if you like, and they’ve joined in ❞ helpful. “No it’s not – it’s not helpful at “Now, these are people that are al-

never try to establish a man-to-man re- to show of… the seductively drooping ❝ Every woman has a natural power he art of lationship with a man. his can only lead gown, the of-the-shoulder blouse and of attraction, compounded of youth, to misunderstanding. the risqué story are out of place in the Time the possibility of seduction and femi- here are other ways to subdue him! lecture room. You must learn to con- ninity. It is dangerous to overestimate love As wild beasts are tamed by the warmth quer without appearing to lose your spent in this power but it is equally foolish of human regard and the promise of modesty. to ignore it. 30th January 1954 ∙ Dr Kay capturing food… so men are conquered and kept Let them think you are there to listen Time spent in capturing a man in happy captivity by the radiance in a to the lecture! But it is quite permissi- a man is is time well spent! It is exciting to en don’t like clever women… so woman’s eyes. ble to use the subtle language of smiles time well ight your own way in the world… but Myou need to be very charming Don’t give way to the temptation which can drive a man to desperation, why bother when there are so many and immodest to be forgiven. the trembling hesitation as to where you spent! men willing to cherish you and carry If possible you must contrive (even in will sit, the warm scent of perfume in ❞ you into the upper income brackets! From the From archives... examinations) to appear just that little your wake… Remember that woman is made for varsity at bit more stupid than they are. Do not believe people who say that love… Found by Ted Mackey A free and easy attitude towards men a little kiss is of no importance. A care- can lead to too much friendship and not less caress can create complications! he After better advice? Try our resident 70 enough love… or the reverse! Be femi- way to captivate a man is not to allow Agony Aunt. Every Monday at nine, not feminist, and above all, never, yourself to be captivated. varsity.co.uk/violet F  20 J  2017 9 Interview

❝ bottom instead of making major compa- had to live alongside this perception nies, major organisations pay their fair of wealth and privilege.”In reference to ere share of tax.” that very perception, Price reminds me Finally, I ask Price what Cambridge to broaden my focus to beyond the city are more means to him. “Well,  rst and foremost, of Cambridge to wider Cambridgeshire working Cambridge is home: it’s my hometown. and Peterborough. I was born here, a lot longer ago than As a self-absorbed student, it's easy class people I’d like to admit”, he laughs, “and it’s to forget that this is an area which exists coming to important to me. I like the people of outside of the Union's debating cham- Cambridge, I think the people of Cam- ber. Chatting to Kevin reminded me of Cambridge bridge are unique because they have that. ❞ e new Mayoralty of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Everything you need to know

Why is Cambridgeshire and tion, pitting Cambridge against Peterborough going to have a Peterborough. For the Conserva- Mayor? tives, the choice is between leader  e new position is part of the of Cambridge County Council government’s devolution drive. Steve Count, leader of East Cam- Initially it wanted to create an bridgeshire District Council James East Anglia Combined Authority to Palmer, and Roger Harrison, who encompass 22 local authorities, but has a place on the executive of this was vetoed by local councillors Huntingdonshire District Council. across the region, and so the plans  e Liberal Democrats have already were changed. Cambridgeshire chosen their nominee: Rod Cantrill, and Peterborough will combine who is currently councillor for just 8 local authorities in a much Newnham Ward on Cambridge City smaller area. To sweeten the deal, Council. the government also o ered the new combined authority £600 What powers will they have? million over 30 years to support  e position will be able to allocate economic growth, and £170 million a lot of funding: £170 million for for housing. housing projects, and £20 million per year to boost economic growth. Who will it be?  ey will also work with the gov- It’s too early to say. Each politi- ernment to produce a new National cal party intending to run in the Work and Health programme, election will hold a vote amongst which will focus on those with a ready housed, well housed, but their swers” to the question of how to ease the its local members to nominate a health condition or disability, and concern is about the next generation, pain of social oppression.Price, though, candidate. Kevin Price and County on the long-term unemployed. other people not having anywhere or a tells me he believes that there are an- Councillor Fiona Onasanya are  ese powers might well be ex- decent home,” he says of his ward. swers. “Well, there are easy answers” he competing for the Labour nomina- panded in future. With this in mind, I probe Price to resolves. “One is in the realms of housing look to the future, asking him what his and how you make that genuinely a ord- prediction for the British political climate able for people. One is about pay levels. might be. He thinks for a while, before People’s pay has stagnated over the past settling that “It’s not easy to predict."  ve or six years but everything else has Eventually, he re ects that “when people seemed to increase in value. Corporate are hurting, when people feel that the tax not being paid.  e government will government is doing everything it can ▲▼ Kevin Price spend a lot of money investigating what to make life harder for them, you know – in Clare College they see as ‘bene t fraud’ and very little when they can’t get into their hospitals, and with Labour looking at tax evasion, when tax eva- they can’t get to see their doctors – the leader Jeremy sion takes far more money out of the natural direction is the Labour party.” Corbyn ANNA economy than bene t fraud.  at’s in In the same speech, the Prime Min- FITZPATRICK; KEVIN no way saying that bene t fraud is okay, ister stated that there are “no easy an- PRICE but they concentrate on the people at the Apomorph Consultants – Cambridge

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www.apomorph.co.uk 10 F  20 J  2017 Science Science in Society Relationships,

◀ Sam Gregson, son encourages the audience to “get real CERN researcher data from CERN using an app, and then as well as stand- learn to analyse, model, and conclude Dr Sam Gregson up comedian SAM based on the observations”.But this is GREGSON just a drop in the ocean; the real chal- lenge lies on a much wider scale. He recalls the view that prevailed during his PhD that “when you work in sci- ence, no time or credit is given to go and speak to the public. In fact, it’s actually negatively viewed by supervisors.” e ❝ People don’t accept that being example of Brian Cox springs to mind, whose lectures usually sell out in Man- chester, a rarity in the  eld. And yet, his wrong isn’t necessarily a bad thing ❞ contribution to science is still somewhat questioned. is brings us full circle back to the role of the scientist in educating laymen and potential students about scienti c method. If communicators are viewed as up format. I decided to do one of these a versity, to a way of life and a thought- being unapproachable and unenthused, James Alvey couple of years ago, and Ministry of Sense process that genuinely shapes how I then can we expect the students to gen- Science Editor sprung o the back of that.” It is a show make decisions and carry out tasks. e erate their own enthusiasm? Gregson aiming to develop the audience’s intui- scienti c method, then, does not only suggests the answer is no, and that we ere is a great deal of stigma attached tions, with Gregson noting that while feature in the context of a laboratory have to remove this so-called “ivory to scienti c teaching. People oten have “you get a bit of science from it… more but far beyond. tower”. particularly strong views on the subject. importantly, it asks why science mat- Gregson’s perspective is di erent, a Within the current system, the path Science is far more than school labora- ters”. combination of nuance and pure logic. towards this understanding is admit- tory benches and battered textbooks.It Gregson takes this further, though: To him, science is “the best framework so tedly not an easy one. Gregson spoke is certainly not memorising the colours “you have to present the scientists far that we’ve devised to determine fact at the TEDx Conference two years ago of various solutions simply to write themselves in a good light”, he suggests, from  ction. If I want to know whether about the role of science in society, ac- them down in an exam or building the noting this is something which is oten something is more likely to be true than knowledging that this way of thinking same electrical circuit in physics year neglected. In this case, the vehicle is false, the best framework to apply that is “isn’t taught at school, and it takes a big ater year. If those are your preconcep- stand-up, in a similar vein to Bright Club. the scienti c method. I want to believe jump to get over that knowledge gap. tions of the muddied scienti c waters, Unlike Bright Club, however, Ministry of as many true things as I can in my life. People have a very tough time thinking the perspective of Dr Sam Gregson can Sense focusses on the scienti c method, If you ask me whether I am 100 per cent against their natural bias.” be refreshing. something that Gregson feels is “far more certain of something, the answer is no, ❝ Bringing the discussion to a close, I’m His show – which is entitled Minis- applicable to a complete range of back- however, you have to operate on a day- reminded of a quote by Albert Einstein: try of Sense: Hunting the Higgs and set to grounds and experiences”. to-day basis as if this uncertainty doesn’t One of the “education is what remains ater one hit the Cambridge Junction on the 25th e premise behind the show brings exist. You have to keep reapplying the has forgotten what one has learned in January – has it origins at CERN: “I was up an interesting point – it asks what is method as this goes along.” best things school.” It certainly applies here, prompt- doing a PhD at the Large Hadron Col- the scienti c method really for and in- What comes out of this, then, is not a scientist ing thought about what we prioritise in lider three years ago and an email went vites audiences to question what exactly simply a laboratory practice, but a life- our life. around the lab about a science comedy science means to them. style choice – something that moulds can do For Gregson, science and its meth- evening called Bright Club with the task For me, science is everything from political, ethical, and emotional deci- is have odology provide the platform and in- being to explain your research in a stand- a day-to-day activity at home and uni- sions. spiration to “tune out what is wrong or Indeed, Gregson notes that “one of something ine cient, gradually re ning my view”. the best things a scientist can do is For me, the real question is this: what have something they truly believe in be they truly really matters, learning what to think, proved false. Indeed, the problem we’ve believe in or learning how to think about it? seen this year with Brexit etc. is that peo- For more like ple don’t accept that being wrong isn’t be proved ● Dr Sam Gregson will be performing his this, visit necessarily a bad thing.” false show, Ministry of Sense: Hunting the varsity.co.uk/ So how does one go about teaching Higgs, at 8pm on Wednesday 25th January science the scienti c method? In his show, Greg- ❞ 2017 at e Cambridge Junction.

WWI, Fleming worked as a medic and Managing the saw many soldiers die from infected wounds. Back then, the only way to  ght Gourmet roast meats, fresh artisan infections was to use antiseptics such as outbreak of ethanol, iodine, and hydrogen peroxide bread, poutine, sides, craft beers which can worsen wounds when used ‘super-bugs’ in excess. When he returned home, he and excellent coffee. concentrated all e orts on  nding an an- tibiotic to address this. Ater many years All to eat in, take away, or Zi Ran Shen of successful research but little progress Sta Science Writer on the antibiotic front, Fleming woke up delivered via Deliveroo. to an agar plate unfortunately contami- Recently, a woman was killed by su- nated with fungus. He noted, however, Vegetarian, intolerances and perbugs which resisted every available that no bacteria were growing next to antibiotic, even colistin. We are living the fungus, and the further away the bac- allergies all catered for. in an era that no longer has a failsafe teria were the healthier they looked. He antibiotic. e emergence of antibiotic extracted the contaminating fungus and Open every day from 11.30am. resistant bacteria was always a threat, puri ed the substance he called “mould but now it’s  nally arrived. juice”, now known as penicillin. Student night from 5pm Wednesdays e story of antibiotics began with a is awakened a new era in medicine. boy in a shipping o ce. Alexander Flem- Countless people were now prescribed Bread & Meat, 4 Bene't St, Cambridge CB2 3QN ing was all but resigned to such a job for a cheap and easy drug for what used to www.breadandmeat.co.uk the foreseeable future. He did not have be a deadly problem. Got an in amma- to stay ater receiving enough inherit- tion? Have some antibiotics! Have a viral ▲ Alexander Fleming discovered ance from his uncle, however. During cold? Have some antibiotics! Alongside penicillin in 1928 F  20 J  2017 11 Science politics and life outside the lab

veri ed facts – recently I emailed ▼ Mark Zucker- uni ed by one hashtag – BlackLivesMat- as being politically active, then we my mum a picture that some of you berg’s Facebook ter to name one. It’s also never been might have cause for optimistism. might be familiar with. It portrayed is a key platform easier to record and live stream events Leo Mirani vehemently supports this. a younger Donald Trump with the for one-click across the world – everybody is a wit- In one article he argues: “if activism quote: “If I were to run, I’d run as news TECH ness. Does this bring us closer to an era extends to changing the minds of a Republican.  ey are the dumb- CRUNCH of truth than ever before? people, to making populations aware est group of voters in the country. Of course, footage can be manipulated of what their governments are doing  ey believe anything on Fox News. and quotes taken out of context, and en- in their name, to in uencing opinion I could lie and they’d still eat it up. gaging in one-click political discourse across the world, then the revolution I bet my numbers would be terrif- doesn’t necessarily relate to practical will be indeed be tweeted.” ic.” My mum sent it to her friends, engagement.  is is one of the main criti- I’m not convinced by the embar- and one of them replied saying that cisms levelled at what has been dubbed rassing ‘smart phones, dumb peo- Polly Evans Trump had never actually said this. ‘slacktivism’ – how many of us ever ac- ple’ mantra, oten bandied around I immediately felt embarrassed to tually check whether the motion we in response to these questions – of have shared something false. Yet it’s signed up for went to parliament? course we are smart, but how do we Clickbait culture also unrealistic to expect everybody  ere have been studies which stay ‘woke’? Do we train ourselves to to fact check all the information we contest this notion that Facebook become immune to obvious click bait come across, so whom do we hold merely engenders political laziness. news and untrustworthy sources? Do changing politics responsible for regulating the infor- One of these, published in Nature, we register which media platforms mation we share? supposedly proves that around we can trust? Or should we rely on ew technologies have en- Olivia Solon recently wrote a bril- 340,000 extra people turned the regulation of media platforms Ntered every aspect of our liant article in e Guardian exploring out to vote in the 2010 US like Facebook? It feels like it’s getting lives, from our dating habits how the proliferation of fake news congressional elections harder to know exactly what we can to what we eat, promising to make a ected the American general elec- because of a single re- trust, but I’ve learnt the embarrassing everything quicker, easier and more tion. In it she notes how Facebook minder. We might also way that Facebook memes probably e cient. In 2016, we’ve witnessed shirks responsibility by labelling it- think about what ‘ac- aren’t the best source. And to be hon- the political repercussions of making self a ‘neutral technology platform’, tivism’ means – if help- est, neither is this article, but I’ll leave information bite-sized, manifesting not a media company. It seems that ing to build a global you to make up your own mind. If itself through Britain’s divisive Brexit Facebook has not yet reconciled its consciousness counts you do, send me a tweet. campaign and Trump’s victory. Both public perception as a legitimate me- of these relied on juicy giblets of truth dia source with its inability to regu- being shared before they were ever late information. Part of the problem properly cross-checked. Oten these with using Facebook as a source of were propagated in the form of witty information is that your newsfeed memes, 140 character responses and becomes simply the like-minded sensationalist Facebook posts. opinions of those around you. In this e Oxford English Dictionary didn’t sense, there is little space for opposi- name 2016’s word of the year ‘post- tion.  is results in a simpli ed and truth’ for nothing; these campaigns increasingly polarised type of politics are both testament to the notion that ❝ which is insular and divisive. facts are no longer relevant unless I can’t help but wonder whether they are compressed into an easily A there is something democratising accessible package. According to in- simpli ed about the way new technologies cir- formation gathered in a 2015 study culate news. For the  rst time, thanks by the Reuters Institute for the Study and in- to platforms like Twitter, everyone of Journalism, 18-24 year olds are the can be a journalist, regardless of their most likely age group to gather news creasingly background. Behind a screen, race from ‘any online source’, supporting polarised and physical location cease to be bar- the assertion of this clickbait culture. riers and there’s a political platform But what are the long-term conse- type of as long as you have an iPhone. quences of this, and how can we pre- politics  ere is something incredibly vent ourselves being complicit? powerful in the idea of a group of I’ve been guilty of sharing un- ❞ people from disparate communities

the mass over-prescription of penicillin, ance should not cause panic. Even rare many other antibiotics were discovered. cases of multi-drug resistant superbugs And with the wealth of alternatives, hu- can be treated.  at is not to say that mans for the  rst time felt invincible. But preventative measures can’t be taken. this safety did not last.  e  rst case of  ere are some things that anyone can penicillin resistance was reported in the do to limit the spread of antibiotic resist- early 50s, only 10 years ater its intro- ance including taking the antibiotics to duction, with others following. In 2007, term as per the prescription. Also, un- we no longer had any resistance-free necessary overloading of your system antibiotic. with antibiotics only bene ts the resist- Bacteria who have picked up the abil- ant bacteria, which only enhances their ity to metabolise antibiotics can trans- proliferation and spread. fer such information to other bacteria Antibiotic abuse is the leading cause through many means. Unlike higher of the alarmingly rapid onset of resist- order organisms, bacteria can absorb ance.  ere are no more failsafe anti- other bacterial genetic material from its biotics on the market. New research is surroundings. Bacteria can easily latch constantly trying to  nd the answer to onto travelling vessels and move to a this di cult problem. Leading scientists new location to proliferate and amplify around the world are discovering possi- the gene of interest. Two living bacteria ble compounds as we speak, and we may can also exchange genetic material via soon  nd a new solution. However, let the donor bacterium building a bridge to us not forget the path that took us here the reipient bacterium and transferring and use antibiotics with care. IMPERIAL WAR genetic material. MUSEUM Although daunting, antibiotic resist- ● Read the full version at varsity.co.uk/science 12 F  20 J  2017 Comment Talking about millennials’ love a air with technology Flora de Falbe Sarah Wilson is tired of Union lineup pointless millennial bashing and wants to have a proper disappoints t’s been over a year since Cambridge debate about social media students were in the national news Ifor campaigning to ‘no-platform’ a f 2016 was the year of political Union speaker. For a while it was upheaval and social unrest, it was a trendy topic, but journalists soon re- Ialso the year of ‘Wise Men On e turned to mocking safe spaces and trig- Internet’. You’ll have seen at least ger warnings, claiming that ‘snow ake’ one. ese men love nothing more than students can’t handle ‘free speech’. to stand in front of a camera, gesturing e Cambridge Union have just re- wildly, and giving their Very Clever hot leased their Lent 2017 term card, and takes on the world and its various prob- I am disappointed. Not because I’m a Sarah Wilson lems. You probably only have to head member (I can think of better ways to is Deputy over to your mum’s Facebook to  nd pri- spend £200), but because they’re a li- Comment Editor mary o ender Jonathan Pie, who appar- ated with my university and have once and studies ently stopped the UK in its tracks with again failed at maintaining a gender bal- English at the big ‘the Tories might actually be bad’ ance. e line-up is 68 per cent male, and King’s College reveal . Pie’s favourite activity involves ing that it becomes impossible to have a ❝ and attention on social media, release only two of the 15 individual speakers are rebelliously  outing the orders of his reasoned debate about technology’s im- dopamine in the same way that smoking women. In a university working to dispel imaginary producer, Tim, because fuck pact on a generation. It is a fundamental, If I had a or having an alcoholic drink does. But its reputation for lack of diversity, this your rules, Tim, I’ve got to tell these guys perhaps even wilful, misunderstanding pound for doing these things infrequently does not makes the Union painfully regressive. that the news is actually a huge conspiracy of the way that social media networks make one an addict. Nothing made this In the ‘no-platforming’ debate, this of lies. Pie, however, is like an enthusias- and technology actually function. It every time clearer to me than a period of having no matters. Refusing to listen to a viewpoint tic A-level student ater his  rst politics seems that he and other grumbling smartphone for two months last term, doesn’t make it go away, but we need to lesson. He is largely benign, if a little ir- baby-boomers have got the impression I have read as I found neither the total spiritual re- think carefully about which viewpoints ritating. No, the very worst of his type that when millennials scroll through ‘post-truth birth nor the total agony of separation are being privileged over others. e de- are those that have turned their attention their Facebook, Instagram and Twitter that much commentary had told me I bate has never been about free speech: away from political issues to blame the feeds, they are engaged in an activity of politics’ would experience. I was more produc- that would involve government censor- world’s woes on everyone’s favourite mindless self-absorption. I hate to be ❞ tive, but I missed meetings because of ship. e student body has a right to feel punching bag: the millennials. e big the one to point out the obvious, but the incapacity to check my email. My angry when the views with which they kids so addicted to their phones that it these networks exist for interacting with anxiety subsided a little, but I missed are presented come overwhelmingly is now, apparently, literally impossible other people. Sinek claims that a ‘friend’ being able to take photographs with from the same, privileged groups. for them to make any meaningful con- on Facebook carries the same semantic ease. What this period did make me do In the last two years, 61 per cent of nections with other human beings. At meaning as ‘friend’ in the real-world was evaluate my own personal habits of speakers have been male, with this least, according to Simon Sinek, whose sense. But we millennials have always use, and this was the really important term’s line-up the least balanced. is faux-scienti c rant on ‘exactly what is perceived a very obvious di erence. In part. I concluded that social media was is more disappointing when you con- wrong with this generation’ went viral fact I’ve never met a person my age who a distraction, but fun to use sometimes, sider that the percentage of women is around the end of December. His over- would sincerely proclaim that they had and that having a smartphone was vital boosted by female-dominated debates arching theory is that millennials are ‘500 friends’; this world view has been for keeping up with the world, but that on ‘women’s issues’: on non-gendered sel sh, unful lled, and unsociable, and entirely fabricated by people like Sinek I didn’t always want to. It is lazy and topics the gap is much greater. Particu- it is technology, that is to blame. and projected onto our generation. He hyperbolic to imply that access to the larly concerning is the upcoming debate What really irritated me about this suggests that millennials can no longer internet has demolished our generation’s on prostitution, in which  ve of the eight video going viral was the veracity that forge meaningful relationships because capacity to socialise properly, but we speakers are men. We should not only viewers and sharers so readily awarded their friendships exist solely online, can’t suggest it has had no e ect. blame the Union: ater all, most of those to the claims Sinek was making. Fre- without pausing to consider that net- What is clear is that technology and in high-powered jobs are male. But this quently during the video, he makes plain works like Facebook are now the main social media are here to stay, and indeed will not improve if organisations like the statements about millennials without platform for organising events and meet- are oten prerequisites of working life Union don’t make more of an e ort. any substantial evidence to back himself ups in real life. One form of socialising for our generation. But instead of mak- is term, the President, Vice Presi- up, and at one point  ippantly states doesn’t replace another, but augments ing mass, un-nuanced generalisations dent and Speakers O cer are all female, ‘their words, not mine’. Whose words? it. is wincingly patronising man in about technology and its younger users, while in Lent 2016 – where the balance e man clearly thinks that one conver- a hat goes as far to suggest that social Facebook’s favourite ‘thinkers’ would was almost equal at 52/48 – all three were sation with a 25-year-old he once had media has made all millennials literally do well to encourage users to evaluate male. Privilege is complex and intersec- can be claimed as the voice of an entire want to be their idols, unable to tell the their usage for themselves, to open up tional, and maybe the women at the Un- generation. di erence between reality and a  ltered more productive conversations about ion don’t feel that sexism a ects them One of the main hurdles he really Instagram post. the pros and cons of switching on and personally. But living in a comparatively stumbles at, however, is one that comes ere is one basic, universal rule o . Ater all, let’s be realistic: I’m sure progressive environment doesn’t mean up time and time again in discussions of being a human being: everything in ▲ YOUTUBE Sinek de nitely checked his own likes that we should stop noticing inequality,

Sarah Wilson Sarah and viral videos such as these, mean- moderation. Sinek points out that likes, JONATHAN PIE at least once. and, importantly, trying to change it. F  20 J  2017 13 Comment

Cartoon by Ben Brown

Opinionated? Sign up at varsity.co.uk/ get-involved Your conspiracy theory is anti-Semitic Miikka Jaarte 28 per cent fear of conspiracy-lore. But digging deeper ❝ politicians and a whole new genre into the Illuminati-narrative, Protocols of memes describing the murder of “Hillary Clinton meets in secret with in the global control of the Illuminati almost always comes up. Following the Jewish myself and my family doesn’t exactly international banks to plot the destruc- are anti-Semites. e fact that the anti- trail of conspiracy articles disturbingly  ll me with hope. tion of U.S sovereignty in order to enrich Semitic content is hidden deep into the oten leads to the conclusion that our people are e motive for releasing the Proto- her donors” conspiracy’s mythos is one of the real sinister rulers are at least disproportion- built from cols in the  rst place was to divert at- – Donald Trump (2016) dangers of such propaganda. ately Jewish. tention away from the ruling classes. e most famous and in uential Even when it is not explicitly refer- 28 per cent ere is of course no reason to believe “ e nations of the West are being case of such anti-Semitic propaganda enced, its in uence shows itself pas- fear this is happening in any coordinated brought under international control is a ‘document’ called e Protocols of sively. e most sinister of all bankers way now – but their original func- at political, military and economic the Elders of Zion, released in 1903. It is always tends to be George Soros, and ❞ tion still holds. Blaming ‘ e Jews’ levels.” supposedly the recorded minutes of a the primary Illuminati-owned media- is attractive to many because of the – Protocols of the Elders of Zion (1903) secret society of elite Jews, who gathered outlets are e New York Times and e sheer simplicity of assigning blame together to non-speci cally discuss how Washington Post, both founded by Jew- for the evil in the world to a small secretive group of people they control the media, the banks and ish families. group of people, but also because it controls the banks, the the world (you’d think such a mission On the other hand, the defenders of leaves everything as it is. Amedia and the economy. was fairly complicated, but it mostly the common people, those who refuse As awkward as it may seem, we ey’re the Illuminati, the involves sinister laughing and robes). to be cogs in the Illuminati wheel, tend should call out conspiracy theories Freemasons or blood-drinking lizard- Its goal, some historians have argued, to be people and groups who aren’t too like this them as what they are – thin- people from the Alpha Draconis star was to turn the attention of the emerg- friendly with Jews – Vladimir Putin and ly veiled anti-Semitic propaganda. system, if you’re feeling adventurous. ing revolutionary movement away from conservative ‘news’ sources like Infowars While your distant cousin Jeb call- e main point is this: they control the actual Russian ruling classes and and the Ku Klux Klan. is is hardly an ing you a sheep and linking you a the world, subvert democracies, and towards the Jews.Despite it promptly accident. documentary about e Truth ey possibly want to turn the world gay being shown to be plagiarised from a Though I suppose it is flatter- Don’t Want You to Know About 9/11 by putting chemicals in the water. satirical novel from 1864, the Nazis used ing that ‘international Jews’ (I have and the Rothschild Family might I hopefully don’t have to tell you it as a central piece of propaganda. lived in more than one country and be uncomfortable, this stu is im- that this is all horseshit. But I might at the Nazis were uncritically anti- go to the synagogue once a year, so portant. An old Yiddish proverb have to tell you that these conspiracy Semitic might not be news to anyone, I think I qualify) are thought to be states that the Jewish people are theories, while not always explic- but millions of people still believe Pro- smart enough to control the global built from 28 per cent fear, 2 per itly anti-Semitic, tend to be deeply tocols to be a genuine document. Due economy by being both communists cent sugar and 70 per cent au- rooted in Nazi propaganda. I’m not to its obvious anti-Semitic content, it and ruthless neoliberals, seeing the dacity. I’d love to believe that the saying that all people who believe isn’t presented as an entry-level piece harassment of Jewish reporters and fear is no longer necessary. 14 F  20 J  2017 Comment BuzzFeed has played Trump’s game – and lost A former stalwart against fake news has lost its way and who pass o unsubstantiated allegations crat outlets such as CNN resorting to this fueled Trump’s media narrative as ‘news’ and then passing o this very rhetoric of victimhood. Ater one of Alec behaviour as ‘news’ has been observed Baldwin’s hilarious sketches of Trump in his week’s allegations from Buz-  e worst thing about BuzzFeed’s ❝ throughout pro-Democrat media outlets Saturday Night Live, Trump tweeted the zFeed of Trump’s ties with Rus- poorly disguised engagement in ‘fake in the few months following Trump’s next morning: “totally one-sided, biased Tsia represent yet another case news’ is the hypocrisy behind it. Only BuzzFeed election. show – nothing funny at all. Equal time of a growing tendency within two months ago, BuzzFeed was part of a  e most notorious example was the for us?” liberal media: a concerted attempt to trend within established media outlets is su ering Washington Post article on Russia’s cyber-  ere is thus a very serious conse- smear Trump using the same tactics as that reported on the connection between from con r- hacking of the American election that quence in the contagious spread of alle- the man himself. ‘fake news’ and Trump’s election victory. spread like wild re, as CNN and other gation-based reporting within the liberal Reacting to the election of someone BuzzFeed published articles on ‘hyper- mation bias pro-Democrat news outlets jumped on media.  e rhetoric of victimhood has Eduardo Baptista as divisive as Trump can be di cult.  e partisan’ Facebook pages, Macedonian these allegations to publish their own become a self-ful lling prophecy – one studies History at sombre mood in the Union on election fake news websites and an article on ❞ material against Trump. that Trump has all too gladly accepted. Jesus College night was indicative of the shock and the overtly “pro-Donald Trump” nature A consequence of these high-on-sen- Trump’s  rst press conference since dismay felt by many students. However, of fake election stories. sation, low-on-fact controversies was his election on Wednesday proves this. it is important that Cambridge and other Ben Smith, BuzzFeed’s Editor-in-chief, that they spawned the creation of other His response to a CNN reporter’s attempt let-of-centre hubs around the US and followed up the publication of the dossier articles based on unveri ed allegations. to ask a question, “You are fake news”, the UK leave aside the knee-jerk moral with a statement that defended the pub-  e Post article was used as a source for was followed up by a tweet: “We had a outrage of election night, and rationally lication as an act of journalistic transpar- other articles of an anti-Russia slant great News conference at Trump Tower assess what happened.A panel discus- ency in a hyper-partisan era. However, which in turn created more stories, all today. A couple of FAKE NEWS organisa- sion organised by former MP Julian this goes against BuzzFeed’s previous, sensationalist and all insinuating the tions were there but the people truly get Huppert on Trump’s Inauguration Day, and more ethical, tendency of simply credibility of their allegations by citing what’s going on.” entitled ‘How did we get here and what highlighting the lack of fact-based re- previous allegations. BuzzFeed’s actions Notice how Fox News’ Sean Hannity does it mean?’ signals Cambridge’s  rst porting in certain areas of the Internet. ▼ Soon-to-be therefore have a clear precedent. reinforced the populism in Trump’s step in this direction. Furthermore, in spite of Smith’s moral inaugurated Granted, BuzzFeed does not pass o tweet by describing the press confer- Unfortunately, liberal media outlets justi cations, there is a clear trend that President-elect the allegations as truths, distinguishing ence as “the single greatest beat down of such as BuzzFeed seem to be moving in BuzzFeed’s actions fall within. Trump GAGE it from oten pro-Trump websites claim- the alt-let, abusively biased mainstream the opposite direction. Reading the in- Shiting between criticising those SKIDAMORE ing that Bill Clinton is a child rapist. media in the history of our country.” Ir- famous article, their attempts to dress Circulating allegations about Trump respective of CNN’s intentions, it is clear up their dissemination of fake news as only feeds into the rhetoric that al- their involvement with BuzzFeed has only a noble venture to allow Americans to lowed him to win in the  rst place. By added fuel to the  re of Trump’s populist “make up their own minds” seem laugh- instigating the belief amongst millions appeal. able at best. of Americans that the political system By responding to post-truth politics A note in the article, asking read- was ‘rigged’ in favour of the Democrats, with post-truth journalism, liberal media ers to send tips on these allegations to Trump was able to portray himself as outlets such as BuzzFeed are not only con- [email protected], suggests an outsider, a victim, and thus all the tributing to the corrosion of journalistic BuzzFeed is su ering from ‘con rmation more righteous in his campaign to responsibility, they are legitimizing the bias’, a need for evidence that supports ‘Make America Great Again’. ‘Trump tirade’ on how the whole world their pro-Democrat, anti-Trump stance. With the help of pro-Trump outlets is against him. An argument that aug- As the title of the email address suggests, such as Fox News, he was able to react to ments Trump’s messianic appeal as a

Eduardo Baptista they want stories, not facts. any negative coverage from pro-Demo- champion of the excluded in America. Age is more important to identity than ever Yukiko Lui Pale, Stale, Male compulsion to lump large swathes of the ▼ LIZZY O’BRIEN to warn our politicians against fall- s there something inherently and partisan. population into Generations X, Y, and Z ing into the trap of forgetting their di erent about being young, as  is divide is not completely new, is also evidence of this.  ere is undoubt- responsibilities to the only true silent Iopposed to being let-wing, or however. We’ve used age to delineate edly a tangible di erence in outlook and majority that exists: the electorates BME, or trans, or any other label borders in art and culture for a long perspective as you move up and down and populations of the future. Some- we use to categorise ourselves? time. the age scale. times, compromise in politics must Looking back at the car crash that In the 1960s, when rock and roll was If age is a legitimate factor in assess- involve deferring to the judgement some would call 2016, it would seem just appearing on record players around ing art and culture, then it’s no stretch to of those in the future whose shoul- so. the world, some conservative older folks say that it might also a ect the political ders will actually be supporting the Last June, young people voted in decried the booming, hip-swinging beats leanings of di erent generations. weight of our decisions. favour of remaining in the European as the devil’s work.Similarly, though the In the wake of last year’s surprise  is view of the world necessarily Union, and the breakdown of voted occasional EDM-loving dad bursts with election outcomes, disparities in age presumes a narrative of di erence cast in the US Presidential election unprecedented success onto the meme were quickly pointed out as instrumen- rather than unity. Barring the discov- have shown the younger masses vot- scene, you’d probably be hard-pressed tal to understanding the confusion and ery of a fountain of youth, it says that ing for Hillary Clinton. to locate a large contingent of middle- frustration voiced by younger people there will always be an irreconcilable It seems that we aged ravers. all over the world. It was pointed out di erence between the young and are, more than ever,  is raises other questions, especially ater the EU referendum, for instance, the old. Coming to terms with the living in a world regarding the quality and artistic or cul- that if the 16-17 age group could have inescapability of large scale social divided – not only tural weight we attach to art made by voted, the outcome would have swung divergence, quite honestly, makes along the famil- and for young people – some say mod- the other way. me nervous. iar lines of gen- ern pop music is vulgar, arrhythmic, a Does this mean that we should lower  e inevitable nature of the dispar- der, race, class, real cultural dumpster  re. Tellingly, it’s ❝ the voting age to include younger peo- ity makes it scarier than the existence or sexuality, mostly older people who recycle these ple? Or that we should enforce an upper of other ideological di erences. But but also refrains, generation ater generation. We like age limit on voting for those who won’t as the steady march of time is una- by age. We like to see our identities as con- to see our be around to bear the full brunt of their voidable, so is the fact that we live It is an stant and resilient things, able to outlast decisions? in a society which is as potentially identity the  ckle parts of us. But I think we’ve identities Regardless of what the ‘right’ answer fractious as harmonious. factorf a c t o r fed ourselves a small untruth. to the referendum was, we’re still faced But if we recognise that age is a le- we can When we look properly, it becomes as constant with the problem of an ostensible demo- gitimate and signi cant contributing no longer clear that there is something inherently and cratic de cit and a lack of representa- factor in diversity of opinion, maybe ignorei g n o r e di erent about the identities of young tion. I hesitate to advocate for any drastic we can better understand the roots when con- people compared to those of middle- resilient measures, but the recognition of the cru- of our disagreements, and do better sidering our aged or older people, whether it was things cial factor age plays in political identity at coming up with better solutions politics, both an embarrassing pop punk phase, or a means we de nitely need to reconsider which more faithfully represent the personalp e r s o n a l tween obsession with K-pop bands.  e ❞ how we conceptualise politicsWe need adults of tomorrow. F  20 J  2017 15 Comment SOAS students are right to favour Eastern philosophy teaching Western philosophers frequently spoke ❝ Europe. It shows us that di erent expe- In a globalising world, wanting to study non-European of a ‘civilised’ West, and ‘primitive’ East, riences produce di erent philosophical and almost exclusively theorised about Excellence and political models, broadening our un- thinkers isn’t just political correctness men. A challenging education should derstanding of the world and strength- demand critical engagement with these does not ening our capacity for critique. isinformed educational the reasoning behind our curriculum, issues, and the opportunity to consider warrant ‘To understand the world as it was’ conservatism has hijacked and do universities have a responsibility them in contrast to philosophies else- must surely be to demand more from Mthe free speech argument to justify it? where. Instead, free speech is being used worship higher education that just the narra- to shut down a discussion  ere is little doubt that philosophers as an excuse to defend a narrow and ob- which tives of white Western men in colonial we absolutely need to be having: why like Kant and Plato have made invaluable structive philosophical education. Europe.  eir lived experiences are not we study who we study. e Telegraph contributions to the canon of Western Sir Anthony Seldon showed us this in permits us unimportant, but they are limited. not only misinformed its readership that political thought. Having been lucky his response to the SOAS Students’ Un- It is not only more interesting to place SOAS’s student union had “demanded” enough to come across other enlighten- ion’s motion. He claims that “there is a to overlook the thought of enlightenment thinkers Esther Ra ell the removal of philosophers from its ment thinkers like Hobbes and Rousseau real danger of political correctness getting racism at odds with non-Western philosophers studies HSPS at St. curriculum “simply because they are as an HSPS student, I would never sug- out of control, we need to understand the like Gandhi or Confucius, but necessary Catharine’s College white” but also asserted that the idea gest their names be wiped from the map. world as it was and not to rewrite history ❞ to a well-rounded education. of questioning a predominantly white  ey have provided ground-breaking, as some might like it to have been.” It’s SOAS’s student body places a large curriculum might be “political correct- foundational ideas about sociability, de- almost as if he was worried that, were we focus on post-colonial studies, which ness getting out of control.” mocracy, and the nature of the state. to shit our focus from Western philoso- would be natural given its regional fo- Naturally, rather than considering the  at being said, given the explicit phy, we would  nd nothing but blank, cal points. It matters that while white possibility that the School of Oriental racism and sexism in their writing, empty space.  is is exactly the problem Western philosophy predominates, there and African Studies might actually want I’ve found the lack of substantial post- that SOAS wants to address. is a student body challenging its intel- to prioritise the study of African and Ori- colonial and feminist criticism on my  e student union’s website states lectual authority, and calling for a greater ental philosophers, it looks like the right- reading lists frustrating.  ere is a sense that deconstruction of the “myth of the diversity of thought.  at, ater all, is wing press is looking for another excuse that since the prejudices of these authors universal truth” in Western philosophy ▼ Philosophers what free speech is all about. to bash students for challenging and cri- were so ingrained and widespread, to is at the heart of its campaign for decolo- like Confucius  ere is an alternative, additional dis- tiquing the status quo. Not only are the highlight them would be to detract from nisation. Prioritising the exploration of are ignored by course within academia, and the voices ‘special snow ake’ assertions tired and the goal of gaining a basic understand- non-Western philosophy is a challenge ciriculums KEVIN of the SOAS’s student union should be boring, they’re utterly unfounded. ing and analyses of some very complex to the conceptual dominance of Western SMITHNYC welcomed in contributing to it.  e unthinking rush to defend the ideas.  ere is probably some truth to likes of Kant and Plato, whilst constantly this, and SOAS Students’ Union’s discus- attacking students for hypersensitivity sion should remind other universities and censorship, is plain and simple hy- that there is a balance to be sought in pocrisy.  e Daily Mail and e Telegraph our critical approaches. couldn’t be more o ended. Vilifying and Philosophical excellence does not war- exaggerating SOAS’s calls to decolonise rant a kind of hero worship which per- its curriculum is the British establish- mits us to overlook racism, sexism and ment getting defensive. Feeling like a host of other prejudices.  eir writing Western values are being placed under should be understood within its context, critical light, their response is to simplify but also rigorously critiqued by exposure the debate into one about skin colour to contemporary perspectives. It is insuf- and miss the point completely.  cient to simply excuse these thinkers Ironically, our so-called free speech based on their time of writing. Mill, who warriors are attempting to neutralise wrote less than a hundred years ater the a genuinely interesting and important enlightenment period, made a case for discussion. English philosophers like the perfect equality of men and women John Stuart Mill, who championed open long before gender equality became a debate for both societal freedom and mainstream Western value. personal growth, would not be pleased. Our time on a three-year undergradu-  is is not only a debate about black or ate degree is limited, but there is a dis- white, colonial or post-colonial  it’s cussion to be had about the philosophers

Esther Ra ell Esther Ra also about education. What might be and perspectives we prioritise. White John’s signet rings are a symbol of elitism ’m going to begin this article with buy anything they can get their hands signet rings in particular. Wikipedia tells forms for the rings “must be authorised a confession. I  nd college stash on which asserts their college identity, me that signet rings date back to Ancient by the Domestic Bursar”.  e signet rings Iweird. Really weird. Perhaps it’s be- or because colleges are always on the Egypt as personal seals – a way to attest can only be bought by college members, cause I come from a bog-standard lookout for more ways to capitalise on an individual’s identity. In today’s Euro- and John’s, it seems, are taking this seri- comprehensive, the name of which no their students? In other words, does the pean tradition, signet rings are generally ously.  ey wouldn’t – God forbid – want one would want on their back to parade market fuel demand, or vice versa?  e associated with old families and their someone to pretend to be a Johnian. At around in. It’s a strange phenomenon relationship seems symbiotic, with each coats of arms. Can your college – a place £65 a pop, it would be quite an expensive that one can’t buy the ‘Cambridge Uni- comfortable to feed the other’s desire. where you spend three years – really be hoax. Quite why someone would want to Anna Jennings versity’ sweatshirts because in some ❝  ere is a further use of college stash: equated to this kind of individual or fa- pretend to go to John’s is another ques- studies English at unwritten rules these are deemed tour- presents. I think a lot of us are guilty of milial identity? tion altogether. Clare College isty, but college stash is wholly accept- Can your giving a mother/ uncle/ grandmother/ General consensus would be that it I was really con icted in writing this able because it is speci c. It confounds godfather (delete as appropriate) a col- can’t. And that is why there is a di erent article. Irresponsible journalism on this me as to why so many people delight college lege-themed git – and yes, chapel choir word for rings that are worn by students theme which capitalises on sensational- in buying branded sweatshirts, teddy identity recording CDs do count. When you sit and alumni to commemorate their uni- ist headlines and lazy stereotypes does bears, and even bottles of port in order down to think about it properly, this is versity.  ey are called class rings. While little but perpetuate and give a platform to broadcast their college identity to the really be quite odd. It’s an attempt to give a loved this seems to be a broadly American tra- to the nasty, elitist underbelly of college outside world. one something personal, something to dition, the conscious choice of John’s identity: it literally is advertising. Signet rings emblazoned with the equated to make them think of you. But a really to instead market their ring as a signet But ignoring the issue won’t make it charming St John’s College crest are the individual well-considered git, or giving them ring ties it to a masculine tradition of go away. As Cambridge students, I be- just the latest addition to a long line of something you genuinely love (a favour- elitism rather than becoming part of an lieve we have a moral duty to speak up increasingly ridiculous stash. Part of or familial ite book, for example), is a much better established educational custom. against the persistent ugly facets of this the question, I suppose, is the age-old identity? way to do this than a bottle of wine with  e other facet of this whole John’s institution if we are to combat the elit- chicken and the egg. Does college stash a sticker of your college on it. ring malarkey that really got to me is ism which year upon year leads talented

Anna Jennings exist because students are desperate to ❞ Let’s think a bit more carefully about a detail at the end of the email: order students to turn elsewhere. Week

Poetry in Motion As the ADC’s biggest dance show of the ADC eatre year, ‘Poetry in Motion’ should appeal to ballet and  amenco fans alike 24th–28th January, 1 7:45pm

T2 screening Irvine Welsh and the original + discussion cast return for more drug- fuelled fun (maybe) in the se- Picturehouse quel to the iconic 90s  lm 2 31st January, 6:30pm

is UL exhibition reveals Curious Objects ‘London Road’ ex- some of the more bizarre University plores the impact on objects in its collection, all the residents ater starting with a mummy gited Library one of its inhabit- 3 to the University in 1743 Finishes 21st ants is convicted of March murder

Charity Fashion Show Corn Exchange 4 15th February, 6:30pm

Cambridge Shorts Ater its success last ADC eatre term, Joe Shalom returns to present a selection of 21st February, 11pm Cambridge students’ best 5 short  lms in collabora- tion with Cambridge Film Association What’s on this term Vulture’s guide to the best events, helping you keeping it cultural this Lent Vulture

Footlights Presents Some of Cambridge’s nest comedians Illustrations Corpus Playroom present a brand new sketch show to kick o the term by Lizzy 25–28th January O’Brien 11pm

In a one-woman production, Foot- Doppelgangers light Luisa Callander delivers an Corpus Playroom hour of comedy ‘starring some char- acters who all look just a smidgen 30th January, like her’ 9:30pm

London Road ADC eatre 7th February–11th February, 7:45pm

 ere might have been controversy, but this year the organisers are promising the biggest and most immersive show yet

Macbeth Directed by Saskia Ross and with an TBC entirely BME cast, this production takes place in a sprawling urban landsacape 21st February– and looks set to be an entirely original 25th February, take on the Scottish play 7pm

Postmodern Jukebox  ey’ve got nearly 500 million views and Corn Exchange over 70 di erent cast members, and now the cover-making collective come to Cam- 28th February bridge 6

e Zero Hour Musical A wholly improvised musical, the crea- ADC eatre tors are promising that every show will be shaped by the audience that night 8th–11th March, 11pm 7

In their biggest headline show to date, the Oxford in- Glass Animals die band are touring their acclaimed 2016 album ‘How e Junction to Be a Human Being’ 13th March 8 18 Vulture    

Soulless Sellouts says Peter Chappell Success Stories says Felix Peckham

Navigating the corporate careers divide

he path to nding a career is like ing of where your skills lie, what makes you ▲ Di erent are spent by banks and consultancy rms the path to nding someone you happy, and what lifestyle you want to lead in jobs, to convince us of their de nition of success. love. It involves acceptance, and 40 years’ time.  e cold truth is most people di erent Don’t be fooled. It is not just direct job adver- Like in love, Trejection; hope, and loss. It re- don’t have a true understanding of who they dress codes tisement they spend money on. You should choosing a quires perseverance and knowing are, and that’s why most people end up in (Lucas understand that this goes a lot further than when to let things go. Strange career passions jobs they hate. Chebib) that; banks will fund dinners, societies, events, career can appear in your early or mid teens. You fall Paradoxically, job-choosing is hugely per- lectures, student ambassadors.  ey do eve- for the clichéd options; you want to be a sonal and yet hugely impersonal at the same rything they can to love-bomb us. Crucially, be a matter footballer, a dancer, a pop star. Around the time; only you can make this decision, and never undersell yourself. You are worth a lot, same time, you might fall for that girl or boy know what is right for you. However, this has and you have the world at your feet. Consider of instinct, in school with all the friends or the hair that to be balanced with the impersonal practical your options wisely. and this falls in exactly the right way. considerations of salary, location and expe- If you happen to choose a corporate career, As you move on, your tastes start to re ne. rience. A similar paradox exists in how we know that you may have the opportunity to shouldn’t You realise that actually you really do hate choose our lovers. lead a happy and ful lled life. Such careers chemistry, and history just isn’t for you. You Like in love, choosing a career can be a can be hugely creative, rewarding, and intel- be ignored fall into a group of friends based on what you matter of instinct, and this shouldn’t be ig- lectually stimulating. But let’s be clear: if you have in common, and you form an identity. nored. Many factors cloud our judgement; one are doing it “until I pay o my debts” then Around the same time, you may lose your vir- look at the CamCareers internships page will very soon aterwards you will be using the ginity, and realise that it’s really not all that it’s make anyone who doesn’t want do banking same excuse til “I pay o my mortgage”. It will ❠ cracked up to be. Once again, your priorities or marketing balk. On my last check, there become, “I just want to make enough not to change and you get that there is more to love were 149 opportunities for “Accounting and worry any more”. When you have kids it will than  irty texts and glances down the corri- Finance”, and 245 for “IT”.  ere were 39 for be “I’m doing it for my family”. In your cyni- dor. You understand that being with someone “Media” and 17 for “Publishing”. Is everyone cal 40s and 50s you will echo your parents; is just as much about what you want from going into IT? No, and even if they were, that “What, that? Just a student fantasy.” them as what they want from you. wouldn’t matter.  is is where imaginative It sounds old-fashioned and naive to ques- You are accepted into university and fall in and varied work experience and internships love with a whole new group of friends.  e are vital for exploring what is and isn’t for you. things you were taught in school are swept See it as the job equivalent of experimenting away by a torrent of exciting new ideas. Simi- sexually. areer plans for our generation are going larly, you start to fancy people from places far I think there is a dismal failure of imagina-  inking Cto be very di erent from ever before: from where you grew up, or from backgrounds tion on the part of our generation. We’re still we’re going to have to factor in whether very di erent to yours. Your view of what you living in the careers equivalent of the pre- forwards: the job we want will actually exist in a few like – what your tastes are, what makes you Sexual Revolution; people years’ time.  inking of selling your soul to happy – changes again. think they sign up for a corporate job or a bank for “only ve years And then, abruptly, it comes to choosing a job and that’s them does it until I make enough to retire at 27”? a career. Like choosing a partner, choosing a sorted, forever. It is Well, you might not have to worry about job is a colossal test of self-knowledge. It is unsurprising be- matter getting trapped in that world for much longer a moment when you are called upon cause millions because chances are you’ll be replaced by a to have a profound understand- of pounds anyway? machine pretty soon anyway. Okay, so maybe we’re not that close to replacing the corporate bureaucratic world with computers, but it’s no longer a question of it maybe happening because it de nitely will. Perhaps many of us at Cambridge won’t be a ected by this technological revolution. Most of us will aim quite high and graduate with quali cations good enough to get us into jobs that won’t be facing computerised ◀ Do we replacement any time soon. But many people unfairly who will end up in the lower end of corporate demonise jobs, jobs that are routine, repetitious and the world bureaucratic, will nd that those positions of corporate simply won’t exist in the near future. careers?     Vulture 19

o be quite honest with you, I am per-  e executives that emerge from glass-clad plexed by the swathes of young and skyscrapers the world over have politicians on Tidealistic graduates from universities e world speed dials and are responsible for employ- across the country who embark upon the of big ing thousands of people. Being accessory to journey to work for the giants of corporate that, and indeed potentially being the puller and nancial skulduggery: Goldman Sachs, business of said strings, is tempting.  ese corporate Price Waterhouse Coopers, British Petroleum, titans really are in high demand: the next US Credit Suisse, and so on. is an Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, is the former  ese are companies that play a central CEO of ExxonMobil. Status and power are role in some of society’s prevalent social and electrifying irresistible. economic ills – the repercussions of the 2008 place to No analysis of the merits of a corporate nancial crisis are still alive in households job would be complete without a mention of across the UK, and yet executives at these work money. It goes without saying that a career in corporate hegemons remain unrepresentative, the corporate and banking sectors can yield unaccountable, and grossly overpaid. vast riches for eager graduates. In 2015, in- Despite this, four per cent of Goldman vestment banks o ered the highest average Sachs’s analyst class of 2016 were educated ❠ starting salary for graduates at a substantial at Cambridge. Can corporate jobs really be the £45,000 per annum.Needless to say, the ceil- paragons of soulless work, or is there more ing on potential earnings across a career is to them than strenuous hours spent as an rather higher.  e CEO of Goldman Sachs, underling to faceless multinational rms? Lloyd Blankfein, earned a healthy $23 million  e working conditions at big banks and in 2015. Money talks, and, when compared corporate businesses oten receive a lot of against the charity sector for example, where negative attention: exceedingly long hours the median salary for CEOs in 2014/ 2015 was have led to mental health conditions and, in £55,500 per annum, it becomes a persuasive some cases, suicide. However, while many factor. For graduates saddled with student jobs will be strenuous, challenging, and at debts and a habit of counting every penny, times unsustainable, such an environment is the prospect of a vast salary is a powerful not alien to many students who have spent incentive. years working hard, long hours to get to uni- Finally, the question of mundane repetition, tion whether a job is worthwhile or moral versity, and then to graduate with the best lack of ful lment, and sheer boredom has to anymore. Take a moment to consider how degree possible. be addressed.  is is sometimes used as a much the taxpayer has invested in your life. Such an atmosphere of pressure and expec- criticism of the corporate world: can anyone Your hospital, your school, your safety. Ask tation is known to most millennials, and many really enjoy being a banker or consultant? what you can do to repay that profound debt have learnt to thrive o of it. Perpetuating this Investment banking clearly involves skill and to society. in the workplace may well be an incentive for intelligence; ater all, the bonuses o ered in I sometimes think competitive Times Top some, who believe that their greatest work the industry are presumably distributed on 100 grad schemes are like those achingly and output is achieved under these circum- merit.  e application of expertise in any in- beautiful people in high school that everyone stances. Indeed, they may even nd a less dustry or career will inevitably be ful lling wants. Soon you may realise that there’s no pressured environment to be stagnant and and rewarding in its own particular way. substance to them, or maybe when you nally insu ciently stimulating. Equally, consultancy is about problem meet face-to-face you just don’t click. It isn’t  e world of big business is an electrifying solving and creating solutions to the needs surprising that we pursue our job search like place to work. I suspect working in White- of companies and individuals. Most jobs fun- we do our search for romance. hall, or Parliament, had once the same atmos- damentally concern the application of prob- We even use the same language; the ‘dream phere to it – the sense of action and power lem solving, whether it be understanding how job’ is like ‘the One’; job sites oten have all being palpable. Now, in the corporate and Glaxo Smith Kline can better target the UK the judgmental awkwardness of a Tinder en- nancial bubble, men in tailored suits hold consumer market, or Oxfam attempting to counter; we  aunt our internships right above great power and responsibility. Working for a solve world hunger, the fundamental deploy- our relationship status on Facebook. Would vast and sprawling organisation with o ces ment of brain power is the same – ethical you marry someone you weren’t absolutely around the world is exciting in a way that di erences aside. sure about? No. It sounds obvious, but isn’t. careers such as the Foreign O ce aren’t any Ultimately, job satisfaction and enjoyment Don’t do a corporate job if it isn’t right for longer. Increasingly these corporations and will come down to an individual; for an econo- you; have the unfashionable qualities of faith, individuals pull the strings of governmental mist, investment banking is undoubtedly a imagination and the individual resolve to be policy and have immense leverage over the fascinating practical application of years of yourself ● Peter Chappell political sphere. studying, and the designing of complex nan- cial models will be simultaneously interesting and rewarding. While this may not appeal to English literature graduates, it doesn’t neces- And it isn’t primarily corporate and nan- humans who work like robots every day. be a rise in the number of people working sarily mean that it is not a worthwhile and cial careers either – jobs in the legal sector,  is isn’t quite like the Industrial Revolu- in the technology industry in order to keep genuinely ful lling career choice. even the medical sector, might be a ected. tion either, where skilled labour was replaced up with the machines we’re putting  at said, attempting to make the case for  ere are already programmes that can write by steam engines and new factory machin- out there. pursuing a corporate job is something of a editorial copy and then pull it into a publica- ery.  en there was a loss in hand-made What is so hard about this, as I Boris Johnson moment to me. Just as Boris tion, removing any demand for human copy manufacturing, in human skill.  is guess was hard during the indus- deployed arguments, slogans and statistics editors. new technological rise will see the trial revolution, is how to know that he is alleged to have questionable be- Consider the future of self-driving cars: re- loss of a bureaucratic world that has what happens next.  e hope is lief in, and commitment to, I similarly have moving the risk drivers represent means a di- run its course anyway. that the bureaucratic jobs that are pitched an argument which I cannot truly minishing motor insurance industry. Without It’s possible that we’ll see anoth- no longer useful will be eradi- believe in. the kinds of problems humans can encounter er ‘Luddite’ revolution: workers cated, but any damage caused While I do feel that some of the criticism while driving such as poor sight, distraction, threatened with unemployment by subsequent unemployment directed towards the corporate sector, and drunkenness, sudden illness and tiredness, rising against the machine.  is is is minimised. those who pursue careers in it, are hyperbolic, there will inevitably be less accidents. Fewer obviously understandable, natural As a generation we en- if not unfounded, my overwhelming sense accidents mean fewer police monitoring mo- even. To prevent this, we need a bet- ter the workplace amid a is that graduates are motivated by nancial torways, and less pressure on hospitals to deal ter understanding of the technology revolution. So far it’s a reward – e ectively greed – and not because with car-related injuries.  e future of tech- that’s coming in. quiet one, it creeps up on they have some innate calling to become a nology does not just replace jobs, it renders What is going to happen to all the us one new machine, one consultant. them obsolete. workers who will be out of a job most new programme, one new Graduates from all walks of life should But none of this has to be a bad thing.  e likely won’t be answered until the jobs algorithm at a time. But it’s think carefully about how to deploy their 30 future of technology does not signal the end are actually replaced. Hopefully we’ll there and it’s happening. We or 40 years of working life that they have to of the world if we accept it. Jobs that will no see a growth in creativity and in science. just have to work out what to do o er, whether that be in the corporate sec- longer exist will create new ones instead. If More jobs will open up that don’t require with it once we get there ● tor or somewhere providing a sense of moral there are jobs that can be replaced by ma- robotic repetition, so perhaps there will be a satisfaction as well ● Felix Peckham chines, surely there is some bene t to the rise in collaboration, in innovation.  ere must Mollie Semple Illustrations by Matthew Seccombe 20 Vulture    

Important tip – eat! Breakfast! I was in- structed to put together a skeleton submis- From pencil skirts to sion, meanwhile, the barrister had donned headphones to get in the zone to write legal advice.  e atmosphere was terse and pro- ductive, the room enveloped in the sound of our keyboards clattering and the clock proper breakfast ticking. Right then, out of nowhere, our silence was broken by the deafening roar of my gut. Not a hollow growl Lizzy Brown on how to survive your internship to convey its emptiness, rather, it emitted a moist, insipid sort Illustrations by Oliver Baldock of squelch, as the acids in my breakfast-deprived stomach s I write this, I’m almost at the and plonking myself down con dently onto tossed and churned on each end of a two-week mini-pupil- a low chair somehow undid the clasp.  e pin other in the absence of morsels lage at a law  rm. Despite the rammed itself into the back of my thigh and to digest.  e barrister removed Afact that this is my second in- I leapt up like I was being exorcised. What to his headphones slowly and ternship to date and that intern- take away from this experience? Dress for the turned quizzically towards me. ing is something that one is meant to improve job you want. But don’t injure yourself doing “Do you need to excuse yourself, at with time and experience, I still don’t think it, for God’s sake. Cordelia?” he asked curtly. Never I’ve  gured out how to do it properly. At least During my stint, I would o ten feel like more again. I’ve managed to pick some golden nuggets of of a nuisance than a helpful presence in the You hear stories of interns mak- knowledge (read: charred lumps of coal) up o ce. For me, this was con rmed when the ing themselves so indispensable from my unpaid glory days. barrister I shadowed tripped over my back- to the company that they’re hired First – what to wear? As I pored over my pack and spilled the contents of his co ee straight o the job, and it’s hard wardrobe on a Monday morning, my mind mug onto the wall. I tried to counteract my to see yourself in that narrative was burdened singularly by a terrifying fac- obviously super uous role in the machine when you’re wedged between the toid from the Daily Mail: apparently, employ- by looking super busy and engaged. Some- walls of a toilet cubicle to steal a ers take six and a half minutes to decide if times, I found myself simply waiting around quick nap before your 12:30 lunch they’ll hire you. Hence, I came in on my  rst for a new task. My advice? Slack o , but be break. Capitalise on the fact that, day dressed to the nines, my white blouse smart about it. I don’t need to remind you as an intern, you’re not supposed tucked tightly into my pencil skirt and my to keep a legitimate task open in a readily ❝ to have all the answers, but you kitten heels primed to clack loudly against the accessible window, to mute your Facebook can try to  nd them. Tra c in parquet  oors. I was a powerhouse corporate chat sounds, to use an FT article on oil prices Slack off, people’s low expectations of you. vision, plucked straight from the set of Mad as a failsafe. Ultimately, if you are fortunate Be a freeloader, and accept your Men. A ter sharing a Firm and Professional enough to take on real responsibilities as an but be boss’s o er to pay for your lunch Handshake with the barrister I’d be shadow- intern, complete the task to the best of your smart and transport. Ultimately, your job ing, I sat down in a corner of the o ce, ready ability. But in the instances where everyone is is to learn, and to make your impact to get my hands dirty. What I’d forgotten was too busy to micromanage you, amuse yourself about it. on the company as close to positive that I’d safety pinned the back of my skirt, but cover your tracks. ❞ as possible. No pressure ●

experience in our daily lives) and life evalu- linear scale, making it seem like happiness Is it true that ation (what we think about our life when stops increasing at a certain point, when we sit down and think about it). What they in fact this was simply because the larger found was that income and education are your salary is, the larger an increase in sal- money can more closely related to life evaluation, while ary you need to make any considerable other factors such as health and loneliness are difference to your life. buy happiness? stronger predictors of emotional well-being. What Kahneman and Deaton found is Citing this study and others of its kind, that your life evaluation improves as your journalists often quote $75,000 (£61,500) as household income increases, and contin- rowing up, I o ten repeated the naïve the cut-off point: up to this level of household ues to improve no matter how large your Gmaxim “I’m not going to care how income, more money does make you happier; household income gets. They also found much I earn as long as I’m doing a but as soon as you’re earning over $75,000, an that the more you earn, the better your job I love.” Looking back, I realise I was increase in salary won’t make you happier. emotional well-being, but only up to able to say this only from a very privileged This simplistic interpretation of the study $75,000 – a fairly middle-class income standpoint: my family never had to worry misses a few key details: firstly, Kahneman level. about putting food on the table or paying and Deaton used a logarithmic scale for house- These strike me as findings that Stephen the rent – in fact, growing up abroad my Pollan, author of Die Broke, would approve sister and I attended private international ❝ of. In his popular personal finance book, schools and travelled widely. I didn’t care Pollan argues that we should treat our jobs about money because I didn’t have to, and My childhood plan of becoming merely as money-making methods. We if I ever have children, I want the same a writer takes backseat as I shouldn’t use our jobs to find enjoyment for them. or fulfilment, he argues. Instead, our jobs So my childhood plan of becoming a begin to think more realistically should provide the money we need to find writer takes backseat as I begin to think about my future career those things elsewhere: in our family life, more realistically about my future career. ❞ or hobbies, or nice holidays abroad. But beyond earning enough to live com- However, Pollan’s book is now a few dec- fortably, does it really matter how much hold income. This is due to something called ades out of date. Professionals nowadays I earn? Weber’s law, or in other words, due to the fact seem to spend an increasing number of An oft-cited 2010 study by Daniel Kah- that the effective stimulus for the perception hours in the office – and even when they neman and Angus Deaton seems to prove of change is the percentage change, not the come home they are expected to check so. Kahneman and Deaton plotted house- absolute change. their emails and catch up on reading. If hold earnings against well-being. Unlike In layman’s terms: a salary increase of we are spending more time at work, and previous studies on this topic, they distin- $1,000 will mean a lot more to someone earn- ▲ How important is money when have less free time in which to spend our guished between two types of well-being: ing $20,000 than someone earning $100,000. it comes to choosing a job? (Louis hard-earned money, surely it’s important emotional well-being (the emotions we Previous studies made the mistake of using a Ashworth) that we enjoy the way in which we’re earn-     Vulture 21

Smith nished writing White Teeth during her COLUMN nal year of studying English at Cambridge – a degree she received a First in. My goal for the end of this year is just to leave Cambridge with my sanity vaguely intact. And where do I go ater this place?  e current plan is a Master’s course – partially because I am not sure if I can function out- side of academia but also because I do love my subject. I am idealistically hopeful that I will naturally gravitate towards my dream career through postgraduate study. Taking into consideration that I am the sort of person On whether who cannot even pick the sandwich I want in a meal deal, I do not think it is sensible turning for me to rush things and apply for a gradu- 21 really ate scheme. It’s hard to assess the situation rationally when it feels like there is an ex- means pectation that we are all meant to subscribe ▲ By the time of graduating Zadie Smith to a similar idea of success and thus follow had written a novel (David Shankbone) adulting a similar path. When you ignore what Adele and Bill Gates were doing at this age, 21 is still seeing. I’d love to travel more and have a go at super young and there is a juicy 44 years of properly learning a language or two.  ere’ll be am 21 years old and about to embark on work ahead of us.  at accommodates time time to take more baths, go on long walks, or Imy penultimate term in my nal year at for failure, change, and diversions. to write and draw for fun. I’ll actually be able Cambridge. I am pretty certain this should Most of all, I’ve been in a competitive ed- to devote proper time for friends away from feel like some sort of a landmark point in my ucational environment for pretty much my all the stress and essay deadlines. I’ll learn life where big things happen and grand deci- whole life, and I need the time away from it to the best way to respond to people when they sions are made. But nothing has happened shake o bad habits and take things at a slow- say something that upsets me and when it’s since turning 21 that has transformed me er pace. When I graduate from Cambridge, I better for my health to ignore them.  ere’s into an adult. I’m not considering adopting a will nally have some time to work on myself time for learning to enjoy my own company. child or driving a lorry any time soon. Despite holistically rather than academically. I want If our twenties are about nding our feet in being allowed to drive since age 17, I’ve still to spend some time learning about self-care, the world, then they are just as much about not passed my test.  e age limit on drink- establishing a foolproof skincare routine, and working on our happiness levels as they are ing hardly stopped anyone sneakily drinking watching those TV shows I never got round to about nding a job that pays £50k a year ● Glen’s vodka years before they were 18. Nor did turning 16 inspire me to get married. And so nothing is di erent but, to recon gure the philosophical musings of the modern prophet, Kylie Jenner: 21 for me has more been the age of realising things than it has been about becoming an adult. Or it’s the year of realis- ing that becoming an adult does not actually change anything about you at all. And I’m ing money. OK with that. Another factor to consider as well as In short, I was probably a better adult when salary is career progression. This is due I was 11; I only knew of about seven jobs in to the adaptation phenomenon: while a the world, which made picking a career much raise may seem fantastic at first, we soon easier, and I hadn’t yet been led astray by the get used to having more money, and need power of wine.  e Holy Grail of a ‘healthy another raise to get that boost of happi- sleeping pattern’ will probably still mystify ness again. me for decades to come. I hate Tinder and It seems then that our potential to earn yet I still cannot bring myself to delete the more is as important as our starting sala- app from my phone, largely due to a sadistic ries. Lots of graduate jobs out there offer part of myself (one that I am ashamed of) that this: for example, the Civil Service Fast enjoys rejecting men for the thrill of it. Ater Stream offers a starting salary of £28,000 a few weeks of brilliant budgeting I reward which could go up to £55,000 after four myself with a shopping trip that sends me years. flying close to my overdrat. I leave it till the So, after all my research, what am I look- last possible moment to do my laundry, and I ing for in a career? A good life-balance (for rarely wash out my co ee mug under the false my emotional well-being), a salary which pretense that it cleans itself because ‘black would allow me to live a comfortable mid- co ee is basically just murky water.’ But even dle-class life (for my life evaluation), a job if continually messing up and picking myself with good opportunities for promotions back up again like a human Flappy Bird is the and salary boosts (to deal with that pesky face of adulthood in my twenties, then I don’t adaptation phenomenon) and a job that I really mind too much. enjoy (as I’ll be committing many hours a But it does feel like there is a rush to ensure week to it). a smooth transition from university into the While I have an immense amount of re- adult world, especially when you remember spect and admiration for those who choose that, at age 20, Bill Gates had dropped out of to pursue riskier, creative careers, I’ve de- Harvard and co-founded Microsot. Adele had cided that life path is not for me. While I’m already released 19 and had just begun writing not going to go after a career in banking or 21 when she was my age. Stevie Wonder was consultancy just to bring in the big bucks, signed by Motown when he was just 11, while I have decided to consider my potential Mozart’s operas were already being performed earnings when making career choices, a professionally when he was 14. At 16 years decision which would truly shock 13-year- old, Malala Yousafzai received a Nobel Peace old me ● Katherine Ridley Prize nomination. In stark contrast, when l was 16, I was awarded my Silver DofE. Zadie 22 Vulture     Culture Josie Long ❠ ‘Women comedians are like the canary in the mine for sexism’ Rhiannon Melliar-Smith chats politics, progress and positivity with the award-winning comedian ahead of her performance at the Cambridge Junction in February

he events of the last two years are she is, in my experience, the perfect cross- enough to make most on the le t section of these two styles of comedy. of the political spectrum want to Long has certainly established a crowd who Tcrawl under a rock and stay there. keep coming back for more, leaving it easy to Not Josie Long. She is setting o on think she is one of a number of political co- a 2-month tour of the UK with her new show, medians simply preaching to the choir rather Something Better, in an attempt to spread her than changing the world. Yet, for her, “political infectious optimism. Her philosophy? “Basi- comedy isn’t changing minds and winning cally people have an obligation to, you know, elections. Or, at least, it hasn’t changed enough not be a twat”. minds, from what last year showed”. It feels wrong to begin an interview with She recognises that her crowd know what someone so positive by asking them about the they’re in for – “most of the time,” she adds likes of Trump and Brexit, but Long has been with a laugh – but prefers to think of her com- able to take the turbulent political climate edy as having a consoling, healing e ect for and turn it into something equally hilarious those who feel alone in a world which, too and comforting. Noting the activist nature of o ten, feels riddled with hatred and worry. her stand-up, I ask whether she thinks that “If my stand-up can help people keep going comedians have a duty to talk about politics, to do better things… that’s the best thing in or if she has simply found that her personal the world,” she says. interests marry well with her creative out- It feels an apt time to mention that, let. Long admits that, for her, comedy is a having seen her stand-up in 2012, a “companion” which becomes a way to in- card she handed out at the end of terpret and understand the world around the show about not feeling limited her – whether it is the struggle to be a by class had been pinned over my functioning adult or the rise of the far- desk for 4 years and had served right in Europe. as inspiration to work hard and Having always admired her for how achieve goals. she has used her platform to promote Seeming genuinely touched by kindness and equality, it surprises me this, she re ects on her time at Ox- when Long talks about her struggle to ford University: in 2010, she told be as good a person as possible. Not- e Independent her biggest regret ing her despair at the 2015 General was not ‘having done better’ in her Election result, she mentions how degree, and I ask her if this feeling she felt “intensely and desper- has changed with age. It is surpris- ately urgent” to talk about poli- ing, and a little disheartening, to tics, for fear of “letting everyone hear someone so interesting and down”, including her children who successful talk about the stresses of – she adds – do not even exist. She used to feeling academically inadequate, but be angry when she saw other comedians Long admits that the “attainment men- comedy, and ask her whether she thinks wom- ◀▲ Josie ignoring the real world in their work, but tality” promoted by Oxbridge, and many ❝ en comedians can come out of 2016 stronger Long got now, it does not bother her: a ter all, secondary schools, is “intense” and di cult to People than ever. Long talks passionately about the involved in she admits, “we need every  avour get over, even for people in their 30s. pride she feels as her contemporaries, such comedy as of ice-cream in the pack”. Nonetheless, Long is still able to put a posi- have as Bridget Christie and Isy Suttie, continue a student Long’s attitude is refreshing for tive spin on a feeling all too familiar to Ox- an ob- to break the glass ceiling. “ e thing is,” she at Oxford a comedian just coming to terms bridge students, noting she went to Oxford says, “women comedians are like the canary (Above: with 2016. “ e only obligation is with a plan to  nd her “crowd”, engage with ligation in the mine for sexism”. Giles Smith/ to be real,” she says of the role her subject and learn to read critically – and to, you Comedy, according to her, re ects society as Le t: Phil of the comedian, pointing out managed to do just that. She is comfortingly a whole; there are a few at the top who make Chambers) ) that it is great that some people frank, explaining how she “had an amazing know, millions, there is a small wedge who can get use their platform to talk about time” but cannot help the negative feel- not be a by, and there’s the majority at the bottom of important issues, “but we also ings which come from the academic side the pile, struggling. And there is sexism. “ ey need someone who will empty of things. twat don’t like your voice, the attention you get yoghurt over their head”. And I turn the conversation towards women in ❞ or the opinions you have. But stand-up isn’t     Vulture 23

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tension, which means they don’t give the ap- COLUMN pearance of having a lm, and look a lot more shimmery. One theory suggests that this shim- mering was once considered ghostly, meaning that the appearance of the liquid itself was what led to the name ‘spirits’ linking these alcohols to the paranormal.  e widely accepted explanation, however, derives from not what spirits look like, but how they’re made.  e crucial thing about spirits is that they’re all forms of distilled alcohol, made by heating a liquid and then collecting and condensing the vapour created.  is process is actually very similar to the Georgie method Middle Eastern alchemists once used orpe while attempting to create medical elixirs, and in which the vapour given o would be looks called the spirit of the material being heated. at the  e similarity of the processes meant that the alcoholic results of distillation took on origin of the name of ‘spirits’, too, and it stuck.  e word ‘alcohol’ actually derives in almost the ‘spirits’ same way from an Arabic term for kohl and other powders that could be created through the process of sublimation (turning some- his year, I spent New Year’s Eve on a ▲ A vital part of any student’s term thing directly from a solid to a gas, missing freezing beach in Cornwall with my par- (Wikicommons: Angie Garrett) out the liquid stage); ‘al-kuhl’, meaning ‘the Tents. It wasn’t exactly a night of wild kohl’, came to refer to any distilled alcohol festivities, and the craziest thing that hap- enough to be the reason behind the name. sometime in the 1600s. pened was nding a sh washed halfway up At the other end of the scale is a theory It’s not as exciting as ghostly possession or the shore. Others, however, weren’t quite so which combines ghosts with a bit of science. paranormal drinks, but at least you can head tame, and I’m sure plenty of people enjoyed A liquid like water has very high surface ten- into Refreshers’ Week knowing that you’re a few drinks that evening. Depending on your sion, which gives the appearance of a skin (sort of) engaging in alchemy. And, if it comes alcohol of choice, you might have had some forming on the top of the water. Spirits, on to it, that cringeworthy drunken text? Blame spirits. the other hand, have a much lower surface it on the ghosts ●  ose of you drinking spirits were prob- ably too busy celebrating the end of 2016 to be thinking about etymology, but ater my parents went to bed early and I was let alone with a dead sh and a drunken man mak- ing sand angels, I found myself with plenty of time to contemplate such things. It’s not di cult to hazard a few guesses as to where the name ‘spirits’ comes from, and my rst assumption was to do with the fact that drink- ing spirits tends to cause intoxication, or ‘high spirits’.  at doesn’t hold up, though, with things like methylated spirits, which contain methanol to make them un t for drinking. So, where does the term originate? Other forms of alcohol have more obvious etymologies; ‘liquor’ comes from the Latin ‘liquere’, meaning ‘to be  uid’. ‘Booze’ comes from a Middle Dutch word, ‘būsen’, meaning to drink excessively. Both of these terms refer solely to alcoholic drinks, and it makes sense that their etymologies would derive so directly from this. If you look at the origins of ‘spirits’ outside of the context of alcohol, it comes from the Latin ‘spirare’, meaning to breathe, and giving rise to the notion of ghosts.  e paranormal appears to be far removed from vodka shots, but according to some, the two are more connected than you might think. Ever done something while under the in u- the exception”, she notes, highlighting the ence that you regret horribly the next morn- problems for women in STEM and the music ing? Don’t worry – if you subscribe to this industry too. “Change is slow and incremen- explanation for the origins of ‘spirits’, then it’s tal”, she points out, “but it’s happening”. not you, but some malevolent ghosts to blame Long’s optimistic view of the future is the for your actions. If we follow this logic, which perfect remedy for anyone hoping to leave is still popular among some believers in the 2016 in the past. Her show promises to inspire, paranormal today, drinking distilled alcohol educate, and maybe, just maybe, put another lowers your body’s natural barriers against crack in that glass ceiling. possession, allowing any nearby spirits to take control of your body and cause the state identi ed as drunkenness.  is, in turn, is said Josie Long will be performing her new stand-up to have led to the drinks responsible being show, Something Better, at 8pm on Wednesday referred to as ‘spirits’. Ghosts may be a handy 8th February at the Cambridge Junction. Student excuse for any questionable behaviour, but it’s tickets cost £13.50. also a niche belief, and certainly not popular 24 Vulture    

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Early modern England saw a detailed stipula- even once paired them with Superga train- tion matching certain colours, materials and ers!). A-listers and the high street have also places of manufacture to their formed an unlikely coalition: Gigi ‘appropriate’ social standing: ❝ Hadid has sported H&M; Hailey even exemption from an Eliza- Baldwin and Kendall Jenner are bethan Act of Parliament requir- e polarisation happy to switch Louboutins for ing all men over the age of six to of the nation’s Kurt Geiger, and Olivia Palermo wear a woollen cap on Sundays even wore Topshop to London and holidays was dependent on wardrobes was Fashion Week in February 2016. being a member of the clergy or absolute By proving style is far more about holding a university degree. how you wear an out t than how However, using clothing to ❞ much it cost, they earn extra negotiate status was certainly fashion kudos from fans, too. most prevalent in the wealthiest classes of Switching luxury labels for a ordable attire society: peasants could not even consider can be done far more discretely today than in protesting about what they were allowed to the nineteenth century. Since the invention wear when they struggled to put food on the of the sewing machine and synthetic dyes table. At Mary I’s coronation, her half-sister in the 1860s, it’s a lot harder to tell who can Rags to Elizabeth was dressed to emphasise her infe- a ord to spend thousands on one coat, and rior position, and Charles II’s restoration saw who has just bought a whole new wardrobe a plethora of sumptuous garments, from the sales: a good cut and quality fabric lest anyone needed reminding can be found on the high street, making it a riches that he was the rightful mon- lot easier to dress well and impress arch.  e monarchy included others on a budget. clothing in the salaries of their  e only unbreakable bond oday, a he ty price tag is likely to be the ▲ ▶ Elizabeth I reserved servants, and gave away pieces between status and class is the only barrier standing between us and the colour purple for from their personal collection power of the designer logo: a re- Tour sartorial dreams, but for most of royalty (George Gower), as favours.  e aristocracy cent study has shown that history, sumptuary laws prevented all but an but Kate Middleton has meanwhile would also make wearing a visibly branded elite handful from the ability to even consider changed the rules on provisions in their wills for item of clothing can make buying exclusive garments. Purple was rre- power dressing their most valuable garments. you appear wealthier, more served for the upper strata of society, whether (Reveal.co.uk)  e polarisation of the nation’s trustworthy, and more professional this was the nobility (as in Ancient Rome), wardrobes was absolute: the than others. A tiny embroidered or royalty alone (as in Elizabethan England). average early modern labourer logo adds nothing to the prac- would have had one out t made ticality of a garment, yet be- of sheepskin or wool, yet James I stows status on the wearer. frequently spent at least £4 million Perhaps this explains why a year on his wardrobe to maintain Polo Ralph Lauren can charge his stately image. up to £145 for a shirt. Class percep- Fast forward to today, and the as- tion through clothing has, of course, sociation between class and cloth- come a long way since the reign of ing has been diluted considerably: it Elizabeth I, yet our perceptions of would have been unthinkable for roy- class, power and status remain, if a alty to wear skinny jeans even 20 years little more subtly,  rmly attached to ago, yet the Duchess of Cambridge is super cial sartorial cues ● o ten spotted wearing a pair (and Ellie Mullett

Trendspotter LFW Men’s AW 17

London Fashion Week Men’s (LFWM) e highlights: Autumn/Winter wraps up for another Christopher Shannon, Liverpudlian year, having showcased the best of British designer-of-the-moment: bold colours, menswear over the course of four patchwork stitching and retro vibes. His whirlwind, days. Many LFWM use of torn EU and British  ags was a nod designers re ected on the polit- in the direction of post-Brexit despair. ical turmoil that pervaded 2016, and incorporated this tur- Liam Hodges, ‘Dystopian Lives’ collec- bulence into their work. tion: hard wearing outer layers, cam- Despite the sombre ou age prints, and biohazard suit-like undertones, LFWM also trousers. Hodges’ work was inspired showcased optimism, by spoken-word artist Hector Apony- promise and unprec- sus’ quote: “Looking for a vocation in edented energy. With the decline of civilisation”. His mod- emerging talents Phoebe els looked like they were dressed for English, Edward Crutch- survival. ley, Grace Wales Bonner and Craig Green, Britain Charles Je rey Loverboy: monstrous is rea rming its posi- papier-mâché creations were dark tion as a forerunner in symbols of sinful psychological un- the fashion industry. dercurrents. His controversial collec- tion highlighted fashion’s ability to be an expressive, emotional outlet despite ▶ Liam Hodges’ collection dividing the opinions of critics ● presented an image of resilience (FOXES Magazine) Olivia Darby     Vulture 25

eatre More reviews are available online at: varsity.co.uk/theatre

knows what is expected of them, arranging have met. FEATURE various meetings to discuss the production. As well as the relatively short-term ben- en I step back and let these talented indi- e ts of friendship and fun, producing also Opening viduals do their thing... until I have to remind helps you tackle the employability monster someone of a deadline, or respond to a request that constantly threatens to overshadow our in Week 1 for more budget in one area, or make sure the university experience. Producing really does production designer and director agree on cover all the bases – need to show teamwork? Monday 23rd what the set is going to look like. is term I As a producer, you manage a large team of Pity Laughs am producing Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons people working on a speci c project. Need Corpus Playroom Lemons, Sam Steiner’s fantastic debut play. to prove you can use excel spreadsheets and 9:30pm (one night only) As it is a Week One show this has involved manage money? As a producer you could man- lots of emailing, Facebook messaging, Doo- age budgets of up to several thousand pounds. Tuesday 24th A beginners guide dle polling, and spreadsheet-making over the Need to show organisation? Communication Lemons Lemons Lemons holidays. skills? Initiative? Producing’s got your Lemons Lemons to producing Having this overall responsibil- back. Corpus Playroom ity for a show and being able to If you love theatre, enjoy doing 7pm (‘til 28th Jan) interfere with everyone else’s job,” an- ▲ ▶ watch it grow from an idea in a admin, and want to meet new swered Cameron Mackintosh (of Cats, Producing: director’s head to a fully  edged people there’s no reason why you Poetry In Motion “ILes Misérables and Miss Saigon fame) theatre production that people will actu- shouldn’t take up producing this ADC when asked in a recent interview what his fun that ally pay to see is extremely re- term. You can start by applying to 7:45pm (‘til 28th Jan) job as a producer actually involves. Although won’t leave warding. e sense of solidarity assistant produce a show to learn at risk of implying that my producing prow- a bitter created between everyone involved the ropes, then move up to produc- Wednesday 25th ess is equal to that of Cameron Mackintosh, aftertaste. in a show is irreplaceable – and while ing yourself. Maybe you’re already Footlights Presents: I agree. Producers are in overall control of a (Tian Chan) it is oten stressful and time-pressured involved in student theatre, as an actor Bread show: from applying for a venue, rights, and and frantic, this only enhances the ecstatic or stage manager? at’s no problem – lots ADC funding, to running an eye-catching public- mixture of relief and pride and adrenaline of people start producing shows ater being 11pm (‘til 28th Jan) ity campaign and balancing the budget. Ulti- you are rewarded with when a show goes involved in student theatre in some other kind mately, producers don’t really do much of the well. Furthermore, getting involved in any of role. So what are you waiting for? Follow Friday 27th show-creating themselves – but we recruit a aspect of student theatre is a great way to in the footsteps of the great Cameron Mack- Simone’s Speaking team, enable communication between team get to know people at other colleges and in intosh and start interfering ● Service members, and make sure a strict timetable di erent years from you. While college-based Katherine Ridley is producing Lemons ADC and budget are kept to. friendship groups are certainly invaluable, it Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons, 9:30pm (‘til 28th Jan) Usually I start by making sure each person, can be nice to burst the college bubble and which runs Tue 24th January - Sat 28th from the director to the publicity designer, get to know people I would never otherwise January, 7pm at the Corpus Playroom.

NOTES FROM THE STAGE DOOR Is Leiden University the “Who on earth would want to do lighting?” (Flickr: Shehal) ‘Let there be lights!’ next step for you? arkness had fallen, yet just enough Or some residual negative energy might be light spilt in from the next room to il- let, reverberating through my veins, from Dluminate the white plug socket. ree that time I electrocuted myself with a string of of the six holes were covered by a safety guard: fairy lights. Oh, eight-year-old me, you should Close to home, yet on the doorstep of Europe, this was something o -limits, forbidden. have run from the light. more than 200 English-taught master’s Was it the danger that drew my hand to the But truly, from the day we arrive on the switch? Or the promise of the light which lay planet, we, blinking, step into the sun. ere programme specialisations are on off er at one dormant inside the bulbous night lamp, just is more to see than can ever be seen… and of the world’s leading universities. If you dream waiting to be invited into the empty space, so many productions to make you feel well to  ll each corner of the room with incan- and truly done with the lack of recognition of continuing your studies abroad, apply now, or descent glow? a orded to lighting techies. I reached out into the darkness for the Yes, any person and several high function- visit us in person/online to learn more. switch, and something clicked. ing primates could do our job. But we need is was the moment that I  rst knew I to open our eyes and recognise the potential en.mastersinleiden.nl wanted to turn on lights, sometimes. energy of the humble lighting techie. Flash forward (by way of a haphazardly Instead of encouraging children to switch timed blackout to cover the boring, unim- o lights and think for themselves, we should portant bits) to a world of excited chatter and be teaching them to waste energy and remain invented Camdram credits; to blown fuses, completely silent for hours at a time in dimly unsaved lighting sotware and forgetting to lit corners, following cues set by others! turn on the mains switch in the  rst place; Yes, catch them while they’re young – to collective dinners, day-long tech rehears- before they realise that there is de nitely a als, kinetic warm-ups; and to me, sitting in a fully automated computer program which corner, more concerned with running out the could replace this already rare breed, invisible door than running through any of the light- save when an actor gestures vaguely in their ing cues. direction as the applause dies: the elusive, To quote myself (because no one else will) strangely self-important, lighting designer. on any opening night, “why on earth do I want Without whom, we would all be let in the to do lighting?” In some ways, it’s in my blood. dark... at least, until someone else decides to I’m pretty sure that for the last three genera- switch on the lights ● Discover the world at Leiden University tions my family have been switching on lights. Claire Sosienski Smith 26 Vulture     Music

REVIEW Vulture ‘Tell me this time TUNES you’ve changed’

with Alice French e xx have returned triumphantly from their four year hiatus, writes More suited for mellow aternoons in the library than it is to pres, Alice French’s Fionn Connoly playlist ranges from the sexy, empower- ing and upliting ‘Get to Know Ya’ by Nao to  e Japanese House’s dremy ‘Clean’. Special mention goes to Prides, whose electro-ballad ‘Messiah’ never fails to lit the mood of a long revision session.

Clean Fire y ▲  e xx e Japanese House Mura Masa (t. Nao) I See You on intimacy”.  eir sound still has the power e xx will be to envelop us, their lyrics still draw us in.But embarking Get To Know Ya Station Young Turks, 13 January the record’s most poignant moment is yet to on their UK NAO Lapsley ★★★★☆ come.  e closing track ‘Test Me’ starts with tour on the odd-sounding parallel fourths in the piano, 4th March California Indecision but the chorus ditches the weirdness in favour he xx’s eponymous debut album (NRK P3) of smooth bass and subtle horns, alongside Childish Gambino Shura Tand sophomore e ort Coexist were the stunning lyrics “Just take it out on me / both met with critical and popular it’s easier than saying what you mean / test Messiah Pressure acclaim, with their minimalist indie pop and me, see if I break / tell me this time you’ve Prides e 1975 emotive lyrics creating a hypnotic sense of changed”.  e lyrics are intensely vulnerable, catharsis that cemented the band’s place in sound beautiful, and give the whole album a Fuck With Myself Iron Sky both the charts and the hearts of their fns. feeling of closure. Banks Paolo Nutini Songs like ‘Intro’, ‘Crystalised’ and ‘Angels’ I See You is not perfect by any means. Songs quickly became iconic. But while these re- like ‘Dangerous’ jar with the imprecision of leases largely showed continuity in terms combining di erent timbres, while tracks of sound, much has changed on their third such as ‘A Violent Noise’ fade slightly into album I See You. From the very beginning, forgetfulness. But the singles ‘On Hold’ and Jamie xx’s presence is far more ▼ ‘I See ‘Say Something Loving’ are strong, ‘Perform- ❝ prominent. Although the usual You’ marks ance’ and ‘Brave for You’ are subtly charm- husky vocals in octaves are still something ing, and ‘Lips’ and ‘Test Me’ are so stunning eir sound present on ‘Dangerous’, the  rst of a change that they largely redeem the album’s small still has the song on the album, Jamie’s drum of sound for discrepancies. I See You provides a welcome tracks and horns mark a depar- the band relief to the xx-shaped hole in the charts and power to ture from their previously guitar- (Young the understated beauty of this new record is envelop us, based sound.  is is in no small Turks) unlikely to disappoint fans ● part down to Jamie’s solo suc- their lyrics still cess, with his work on his debut draw us in album In Colour (which reached no.3 in the UK charts in 2015) hav- ❞ ing clearly a ected his approach to the band’s sound.  is is par- Pick of the Week: ticularly evident on the single ‘Say Something Loving’, which begins with a sampled intro Banks - Fuck With and o eat guitar reminiscent of tracks on In Myself Colour. Once the vocals come in, the synco- pated guitar begins to make rhythmic sense, If I could ll this playlist with tracks by just one and we are hurled straight into the new sound artist, it would be Banks. of  e xx.  e haunting vocals and  e track ‘Lips’ marks the strongest union clever lyrics of ‘Fuck With of the band’s traditional vocals and guitar Myself ’ make it a particular and the drum-oriented in uence of Jamie favourite of mine. xx. A choir-like harmony introduces the song and returns throughout, as the guitars and drums build to a magical peak around the three-minute mark. As Romy Crot sings “My Got your own Spotify playlist? name on your lips / you’re wearing my lungs Email it to [email protected] / drowning in oxygen”, the band’s sombre na- ture takes a sexy turn, and we too feel “high     Vulture 27

To listen to Alice French’s playlist, nd our account: musicvarsity

en, My Love! is a sprawling funk soundscape as the duo’s desire to make serious political FEATURE which spawned the ubiquitous single ‘Red- points saps their humour and wit. Fortunately, e week While bone’, while  e Stones’ Blue and Lonesome the album ends with a blistering verse from is a crunchy set of covers that exhibits Mick Rage Against the Machine frontman Zack de in music Jagger’s skills as a blues crooner. la Rocha, closing a braggadocious record from you J. Cole’s 4 Your Eyez Only spun a personal two of rap’s elder statesmen. story of the life of the rapper’s childhood  e releases continued ater Christmas, Saturday 21st were friend James McMillian Jr and featured the with Brian Eno’s twenty-sixth studio album standout tracks ‘Immortal’ and ‘Deja Vu’, but Re ection appearing on new year’s day. A sin- Mahler Symphony no.3 was littered with forgetable songs and unnec- gle track running to almost an hour in length, King’s College Chapel away essary moments of spoken narrative. By con- Re ection is a peaceful, meditative experience 8PM trast, Stillness in Wonderland, a Lewis Carroll in the style of Eno’s iconic Ambient series. Lon- themed album by UK rapper Little Simz, was don Grammar’s new track ‘Rooting for You’  e Music of John a far more compelling piece. Simz, who’s been is a similarly tranquil a air, made exquisite Williams, by  e tipped for success by Kendrick Lamar, came by Hannah Reid’s gorgeous vocals. Royal Philharmonic through with a moody, atmospheric album Released on what would have been David Orchestra lled with standouts such as the swaggering Bowie’s 70th birthday, the brief EP No Plan Corn Exchange ′Shotgun’. Singer-songwriter Mahalia also re- featured some of the last songs he ever re- 7.30 PM leased Diary of Me, a cheery album perfect for corded.  e title track is the best of the three mellow Sunday aternoons. new songs (‘Lazarus’ is also included); more Wednesday 25th Perhaps the most anticipated release of the than a year ater his death, Bowie’s vocals vacation period was RTJ3, the third album are poignant and moving, as is the haunting Two Door Cinema Club by US hip-hop duo Run the Jewels, which saxophone solo which plays as the song fades Corn Exchange dropped two weeks early on Christmas day. away.  e heavier, Station to Station-style ‘Kill- 7PM Backed by thumping beats, Killer Mike and ing a Little Time’ could also have made a great eemingly una ected by Varsity hav- ▲ Little El-P spend the album’s rst teen minutes addition to Bowie’s nal album, Blackstar. ursday 26th ing been out of print since the end Simz relentlessly proclaiming their superiority to Tipped for a Glastonbury headline slot, Ed Sof Michaelmas term, a host of artists released the rest of the rap scene. Lyrics suggesting Sheeran announced his upcoming album ÷ Britten’s  e Rape of dropped new releases over the Christmas ‘Stillness that they’re a better pairing than peanut but- with two new singles. Elsewhere, shoegaze Lucretia break. Two enormous acts put out albums in Wonder- ter and jelly may approach self-parody, but legends Slowdive released their rst new song Palmerston Room, St on the same day in early December: Child- land’ in the songs are so loud and powerful that this in 22 years; ‘Star Roving’ is a frenetic guitar John’s College ish Gambino and e Rolling Stones. While December rarely matters. In fact, the album’s only real attack which will leave fans hoping for a new 8PM (‘til 28 Jan) their styles could not be more divergent, both (Olly problems appear when Mike and El-P take album in 2017 ● records proved excellent. Gambino’s Awak- Stabler) themselves too seriously: the midsection lags Ben Haigh

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and I’m struck by some- FILM thing: its ordinariness. Both leads’ voices are strained like small birds. But this has a de- liberate function, the songs Finding Love in are merely bursts of harmony within discord, snatches of fantasy in a painful reality.  e dancing is similarly hu- ‘La La Land’ man, the characters lacking the grace of Kelly but moving with a neurotic tentativeness that’s just as beguiling. Cha- Can romance survive zelle’s point is clear: falling in love is magic but still sub- amid the toxic ambition of ject to the laws of humanity, with all the discomfort that Hollywood? Pany Heliotis, entails. However, his mes- sage is almost jeopardised nds out by Gosling’s perma-smirk and Stone’s smug surprise, the pair staring at the dancing extras with ironic curiosity and killing the conceit that their collective imagination has somehow elided with their surroundings. Instead, darker canvas. ▲▼ Stone it looks as though they think they are being Dir. Damein Chazelle Gosling and Stone deliver as artists fooled and Gosling danced for rather than with. In cinemas now by the facade. Stone, wide-eyed and with- falling in Chazelle’s camera moves like a ballet danc- ★★★★☆ ered, captures the bristling desperation of love in er, pirouetting in and out of the action in a the invisible actress clambering over the City dizzying fashion. Hypnotic fades and percus- ginger clones to be seen. Gosling, com- of Angels sive cross cuts allow the director to show his uthenticity and arti ce, romance and ing o e Nice Guys, continues his (Lionsgate) hand, building on the language he developed Aheartbreak, musical and drama: La La quest for clown status. His jazz pianist in his sophomore e ort, Whiplash. Land is a  lm concerned with duality, gesticulates with the coiled intensity But he is also the  lm’s hindrance, the tussle between the disparate, the merging of a self-elected masochist, wilfully the dialogue at times driting of the oppositional. And what better concerns su ering for his art. But their fragile ex- into the trite and mawkish. to have when telling a love story? You’ll hear teriors mask steely ambition and this But this is small criticism for a a lot about La La Land’s retro-stylings this is when their entanglement gets,  lm with such complex ambi- awards season, but what makes this musical ❝ well, entangled.  e charac- tions which, for the most truly sing (sorry) is the neurotic romance at Both ters are forced into bitter part, it achieves. its heart. compromise and frustra- Imagine Alvy Singer’s adventures in Hol- leads tion. Like 80’s Woody Al- An ode to the dif- lywood and you’ll come close to the masked voices are len, separation anxiety, culties of mixing scepticism and contentious courtship in Dam- self-loathing and crea- ambition and re- ien Chazelle’s third picture, his protagonists strained tive ennui  lls the air lationships. La trying to balance love and ambition amid like small like a melancholy La Land is a fresh LA’s toxic splendour. Gaudy colours abound, soundtrack. spin on the frac- primary and pastels, Chazelle tipping his birds Speaking of, as tured romance head to your West Side Story-s and Singin’ in ❞ I write, it plays in – neurosis with the Rain-s. But they’re used to paint over a the background melody ● Television of the grotesque in Steven Knight’s

reminder that life in the past was both vastly evocative of the lives of people in 1814 than Taboo TV ROUND-UP di erent and yet not so di erent at all. any history textbook. Steven Knight’s latest, Taboo, is no excep- Jonathan Pryce stands out in the  rst two Writ. Steven Knight, Tom Hardy, Chips Hardy tion. Along with Tom Hardy and his father, episodes as the detestable Sir Stuart Strange, BBC 1, Saturdays, 21:15 the late Edward ‘Chips’ Hardy, he has con- a representative for the dark dealings and Episodes 1 & 2 structed a rich tale portraying grimy Georgian colonial injustices of the East India Company, London, the war with America, and the East which he chairs. Alternating from formality to India Company.  e return of the presumed- rage, Pryce is truly frightening to watch, and dead adventurer James Delaney is a major convincingly demonstrates the corruption of he arrival of Downtown Abbey and Steven game-changer in both the lives of his family the EIC. Tom Hardy was equally enjoyable as TKnight’s Peaky Blinders demonstrates and Britain’s political situation. antihero James Delaney, particularly in the how period dramas have taken on new Visually, Taboo is exceptional.  e smoky  rst episode, where his brooding character shape in recent years. While once an escape cinematography and attention to historical sets up a suitable air of mystery. Nonetheless, for those with little interest in the  ashy su- detail re ect the harshness of eighteenth-cen- ▶ Tom by the end of the second episode, Delaney per ciality of reality TV, British period drama tury London: the sharp  ashes of  esh being Hardy started to seem simply moody rather than has begun to entice the nation with a world cut and organs being pulled out; the bustle of broods with mysterious and his lack of disclosure bordered of darkness, lust and deceit.  ey have suc- a brothel; and the far-from-glamorous charac- aplomb but on frustrating. However, provided next week’s ceeded in capturing our imaginations with ters who are dirtied and worn.  is is how a where's the installment moves a little faster, he should the graphic use of blood and gore, explicit period drama succeeds: by generating a the- mystery? remain an intriguing  gure. sexual references and raw human emotion; a atrically grotesque atmosphere that is more (BBC) What is unclear is whether the issue of race     Vulture 29

To read more about lm & TV, go to: varsity.co.uk/ lm-and-tv

emotive and exciting – and, because lots of Tarantino’s lms are shot through with in u- ▼  e people all over the world partake in them, they ences from Hong Kong cinema. Wong Kar- VISCOURSE Lumière have potential to represent and possibly even wai’s Hong Kong movies owe a debt to the brothers are change people’s political views. I concluded French New Wave. Japanese director Akira credited my introspection with this: culture is hugely Kurosawa was in uenced by American cin- with signi cant, but I must not participate in it ema, and in turned in uenced much American inventing unthinkingly. Culture should be engaged pro- cinema ater him. He was also a great admirer Whose motion gressively and not complacently. Easy, com- of his Indian contemporary Satyajit Ray.  is picture culture fortable assumptions must be challenged. Be- plurality may be because the nature of the ing ‘neutral’ supports a speci c status quo. medium itself is especially  exible and open. Pluralistic, democratic aspects of culture, the  ere must be movement, but the rest – mu- is it things that can unite us, must be promoted. sic, sound, dialogue, choreography – are all Film is the ideal medium in which to il- in nitely malleable. Film is a vessel that can anyway? lustrate this way of engagement, being so even carry other discrete art forms within it. easily accessible and globally widespread as Narrow assertions of ownership are unhelp- an art form. But there are atti- ful when referring to a  exible medium that tudes towards lm and cultural ❝ develops so rapidly in form. Ater all, the very ownership that I consider to word ‘ lm’ has begun to refer to an object that be damaging, and want to con- Easy, comfortable is archaic and now redundant in the creation front. A few months ago on BBC assumptions of movies. radio a woman referred to cin- If this is the case, why is it that lm culture ema as “Western Culture”.  is must be challenged. is misconceived as something ‘Western’? It’s assertion begs the question: Being 'neutral' probable that much of this is down to the na- what does “Western Culture” ture of lm as a commercial and not a merely mean? Can a person or group supports a specific artistic medium, and that most lms people in ‘own’ culture when culture is staus quo the UK watch are Hollywood lms. It is easy inherently something cumula- ❞ to hear of American movies being exported tive and  uid? How does lm all over the world, and people in distant coun- t into all this? tries learning action-movie catchphrases, and Experiments with lm began in the 1890s, consequently view lm as something ‘we’ by pioneering gures like the French Lumière export to ‘them’. Such notions are inaccurate brothers, with their famous work from 1895, and exacerbate partisan notions which are n the latter half of this year, my pastimes Train Pulling into a Station, which legend tells so easy to hold in such a visibly divided and began to trouble me. It may be a cliché to us frightened the audience with its unprec- tribal world. In this series, I will examine Iview 2016 as a year of unprecedented hor- edented scale and realism. From the 1890s aspects of the world of lm by consider- ror, but it feels like the winds are shiting in a Japan was producing its own lms with tech- ing lms from all over the world, and di erent and dangerous direction, all around nology that was learnt from cameramen that from throughout the ages. Unlike the the world. As a result, political complacency had worked with the brothers and built on shelves of your local DVD shop, I in words and in actions has started to feel like an existing Japanese visual culture. Since the will include American and British a morally untenable position. Complacency birth of lm, techniques and ideas were de- cinema in the category of ‘World feels like complicity. So, when examining my veloped all over the world, so it cannot be the Cinema,’ because to separate own preoccupations, culture being a central invention of a particular camera type alone the Anglophone community one, I started to wonder if it was a particu- that makes a medium ‘Western’. Invention is from the rest of the world is larly self-indulgent substitute for action or not ownership. Culture is not a commodity to the opposite of the approach activism. be given or lent from one people to another. I want to take. Matthew Arnold justi ed an exploration of ▲Satyajayit Anyone who seriously engages with it can be Film is a fusion that can culture as the search for “the best which has Ray, an said to own it. belong to anyone; we must been thought and said in the world” which in uence Film was born in a boom time for rapid challenge ideas about cul- cannot but be valuable, and may help us nd on director travel. In uences from all over the globe are tural ownership that seek insights into a time that feels like the dark Akira programmed into its DNA. One can track the to further divide us into ‘the ghosts of the twentieth century are rising Kurosawa work of important lmmakers and their in u- West’ and ‘the rest’ ● again. Furthermore, the arts are enjoyable, (Dinu Alam) ences on other lmmakers across the world. Lydia Sabatini newest period drama is weekend online Manchester by the Sea is intended to be eye-opening or whether the Review and Response exoticisation of people of colour is simply o ensive. Delaney’s  ashbacks of his time in Africa show a nightmarish world of witch- crat, tribes and ‘savages’. Is this is an unfor- tunate and clumsy reinforcement of archaic stereotypes? Or perhaps Hardy and Knight are using these references as an insight into the ADVERTISE discrimination that existed in this period, no matter how uncomfortable it may be to watch. If this is the case, Taboo will act to show that the only real ‘savages’ were the EIC. WITH US. Knight has succeeded in creating a period drama that entertains while stimulating our To advertise in any of our print publications or intellect.If the race issue is dealt with ap- online, please contact our Business Manager: propriately and characterisation developed, Taboo has the potential to become one of the greats of BBC drama. tel : 01223 33 75 75 But who knows? I wait with bated breath email: [email protected] web: varsitypublications.co.uk ● Anna Ellis-Rees 30 F  20 J  2017 Sport ❝ It’s stone-bonking obvious that

● Sport Editor Paul Hyland speaks to the chief engineer of Team GB Cycling on the role of technology in the sport

Despite all evidence to the contrary, Pro- – a team of engineers who help their rid- fessor Tony Purnell would like to make ers to make the marginal gains that, all one thing perfectly clear. together, give them a serious head start “I’m not an academic!” he insists. A on the track. visiting fellow at Trinity Hall, with En- “You can be cynical about it and say gineering degrees from Cambridge and MIT (“like having an unbelievable credit card to open doors”, in his words), Pur- Seconds shaved nell is rather more a businessman whose o team pursuit career has never strayed very far from 1 vs mile run the world of sport. Scarcely having n- 13 world record in ished a PhD on the dynamics of Formula the last 30 years One cars, he was inventing revolutionary new ways to collect data on drivers’ per- formances, which led to the setting up of that the Brits win because they spend his own business: Pi Research. more money – well, correct!” “We became the Microsot of motor  e mere mention of cycling sparks racing”, he says. “All of the electronics in the fondest of memories. “Working with the cars came from Pi.” Twelve years in, the Olympic team at Rio was phenom- Ford liked it so much they bought the enal. I took a sel e the last second we company, making Purnell the head of the were in the velodrome. It was a bit mel- Jaguar Formula One team in 2002. “Ex- ❝ ancholy because I thought, ‘I’m never cept it coincided with Ford going into going to have a week like this again.’ As freefall as a business,” he explains. “In You can a student I loved May Week. I thought it 2005 I sold the business to Red Bull. We be cynical was fantastic – you work so hard coming didn’t get on with Red Bull at all. At the up to May Week, then suddenly there’s time they were a marketing company, and say the no work. Rio was a bit like that. It was they didn’t have the rst clue how to Brits win by such hard work, it was like the stu of run a Formula One team.” nervous breakdowns. Everything went Purnell was removed from his posi- spending wrong, but we just got everything done tion within months, a decision Red Bull in time.  en they [the cyclists] got to lived to regret when the quality of the more Rio and they just smashed it. So the mis- car he and his team had created became money ery made it even better. If it had been obvious. A stint working alongside Max smooth I don’t think it would have been Mosley at the International Automobile - well, as good.” Federation (FIA) was followed in 2013 by correct! So why was it such a good Olympics an invitation to become head of British for Team GB? “ e bottom line is that Cycling’s famous ‘Secret Squirrel Club’ ❞ it’s funding,” he admits. But that’s no Cambridge Panthers mauled at home

league leaders was evident. A series of Cambridge 20 avoidable defensive errors ultimately consigned the Light Blues to defeat and cost them the opportunity to end their bitter rivals’ undefeated league run: the Oxford 35 Dark Blues are yet to lose a match since a 4433 defeat away to Birmingham 1sts last March. Defeat for the away side could have seen them knocked o the Devarshi Lodhia top spot on goal di erence. As it hap- Chief Sport Reporter pened, the Dark Blues took a three-point lead ahead of second-placed De Montfort ● BUCS Midlands 3B League, Univer- University. Well sity Sports Centre  e opening minutes were cagier than connected... anticipated with neither team able to A fourth quarter comeback was not properly dominate proceedings. OUWBC Printers for the University enough as the Cambridge University Twos made the stronger start courtesy of Cambridge, Cambridge Science Park, Cambridge Women’s Basketball 2nds (Panthers) fell of two quick- re scores and, helped by Rugby Club, The Royal British to a 3520 loss against the Oxford Uni- a number of unnecessary fouls by the Legion, and many other versity Women’s Basketball Club 2nds Light Blues, established an early lead. Posters Lealets

Cambridge based companies Booklets (OUWBC Twos) in the BUCS Midlands  e Panthers managed to peg their Postcards Brochures Stationery Magazines

and organisations. Handbooks 3B League on Wednesday night at the opponents back towards the end of the University Sports Centre. quarter with some ne shooting cour- Having not played a competitive tesy of St Catharine’s Eunice Wong who ▶ Cambridge match since their 4322 victory against scored all six of Cambridge’s rst quarter were defeated Nottingham Trent on 30th November, points. However, a lapse in concentration convincingly by 01223 870266 and having won only one of four com- in the nal seconds of the quarter from their Oxonian [email protected] Lithographic & Digital Production www.langhampress.co.uk petitive league matches this season, the the Panthers allowed the Dark Blues in rivals DEVARSHI Panthers’ lack of cohesion against the for a buzzer-beater to extend their lead, LODHIA Friday 20th January 2017 31 Sport technology has a major part to play ❞

◀ Professor Tony bad thing. the decision to give everybody the same ❝ “It could be that we have unbelievable Purnell is a visit- “Do you remember the Tour de France car, and it was all a level playing ield. coaches. It could be that not enough peo- ing fellow at Trin- in Cambridge?” he asks, rhetorically. “he he public interest since that decision In my eyes, ple were doing it, so we weren’t getting ity Hall and head number of people who turned up was has sagged and sagged and sagged. But as many ‘genetics freaks’ that make up of Team GB’s amazing. It creates aspiration. I think in saying that, there’s kind of a duty to it’s a no the Olympic squad. Or it could be that ‘Secret Squirrel the psychologists would tell you that make sure that everything is accessible brainer. technology has come in. In my eyes, it’s Club’ (YOUTUBe/ what motivates people more than any- and that the more advanced nations help a no-brainer. It’s the technology. It’s the TOmORROW’S enGI- thing is aspiration. And fairly ordinary along the weaker nations.” It’s the bikes, the skin suits, the whole package, neeRS) people going to the Olympics and com- Technology’s relationship with sport technology the position the riders put themselves in, ing back with medals has a big efect on isn’t uncontroversial. But Purnell exalts and a little bit of sports science. So this youngsters.” its potential to change the game. He pulls ❞ graph tells me that it’s stone-bonking It could hardly have been a better out an iPad with a graph on the screen. obvious that technology has a major Olympics for increasing aspirations. What it shows, he explains, are two dif- part to play.” Team GB brought home six gold med- ferent lines representing the amount of But these sorts of innovations aren’t als in cycling – three times as many as time that’s been shaved of the world always intuitive. “Once I didn’t think their nearest competitors. But cycling is record in two diferent events over the there was any chance of improving roll one of UK Sport’s most heavily invested last 30 years: the mile run, and the men’s resistance in the tyres,” he remembers. events. Twelve medals at the London cycling pursuit. he line for the mile run “hen a company came along with some Olympics lifted British Cycling’s funding scarcely moves downward. But the one tyres and said ‘try these.’ And surpris- from £26 million to £30.2 million for Rio. for the cycling pursuit plummets to- ingly they really were a lot better – not he correlation between investment and wards the bottom right hand corner of a little bit better – a lot better than what return is quite stark. the screen. we had.” “You can be cynical about it and say “What this little graph tells me,” he “And what that made me think is that that the Brits win because they spend says, in full supervision mode, “is that you’ve got to be very careful about intui- more money – well, correct!” I wasn’t in running the coaching has reached tion. So you think there’s no chance of expecting him to be quite this candid. a plateau, and that the pool of people getting any progress out of something, “It works. We have 1,300 professional doing running has maxed out as well. then somebody comes up with an idea athletes paid for by the government. If Okay, it gets a little bit better probably and you think ‘Ok, that might work!’ And you say to a promising youngster, ‘we’ll because more people do it. In cycling, an nine times out of 10 those won’t go any- give you a salary, we’ll give you coaches, event that lasts about the same amount where. But one in 10 can be spectacular. we’ll give you physiotherapy all so you of time has taken 13 seconds of world And you have to risk working on those can pursue your sport,’ and you pit them record pace. things.” against the French who turn up at the weekends, who’s going to do better?” But is it right that the Brits have the chance to do better? “he truth of it is that it’s not ‘fair’”, he begins, signing inverted commas in the air with his ingers. “he fact that our athletes get paid to train for four years – how can that be fair? But I’m afraid life isn’t fair. If you stagnate it by putting everyone on identical equipment, it al- ienates the public.” He reaches for an example from his other area of exper- tise: “In the Indianapolis 500, they made by ruthless Oxford Twos

leaving the home side with a 14-6 deicit display. at the end of the irst period. he Panthers’ attacking perseverance Cambridge started the second quarter paid of in the fourth quarter though as with much greater intensity and were Kate Burrell scored Cambridge’s irst duly rewarded for their attacking in- points of the half. Cambridge soon, al- tent, with michelle Lim scoring in the beit belatedly, got fully into their attack- opening seconds after a lightning-quick ing stride as Aicha massrali scored after passing move that cut through the Ox- some tenacious work from the tireless ford defence. Both sides traded scores as Alisha Kasam forced an error from the the quarter proceeded with Wong once Oxford team. A late lourish courtesy of again providing the Light Blues’ main michelle Lim and a buzzer-beater from attacking threat, scoring twice more. Ba- Lucia Bura ensured that Cambridge in- sic defensive errors once again proved ished the game stronger. Cambridge’s undoing, as despite domi- Speaking to Varsity after the match, nating the quarter, the Panthers went the Panthers coach, Kent Griith praised into half-time 20-12 down. his team’s persistence, stating “the game he third quarter unequivocally be- should’ve been closer than it was” and longed to OUWBC Twos as they scored 10 that the Light Blues’ performance in the unanswered points to extend their lead fourth quarter encouraged him greatly. to 30-12. Cambridge’s defensive weak- he Panthers won’t have to wait nesses were once again exposed and long to attempt to exact their revenge Oxford exploited the Panthers’ inability as they face OUWBC Twos again on the to efectively deal with their defensive 25th January, in what will no doubt be rebounds. Ofensively, the Panthers’ a much closer afair. movement and passing intensity war- ranted much more than they got but luck ● Cambridge Team: N. Pratanwanich (Cap- simply wasn’t on Cambridge’s side in tain), E. Wong, K. Burrell, N. Jessen, A. Segal, the third period, as they hit the rim no E. Ferreira-Bruco, L. Bura, L. Ellis, A. Mass- fewer than seven times in a frustrating rali, E. Widjaja, M. Lim, A. Kasam 32 F  20 J  2017

Devarshi Lodhia Basketball: Cambridge Sport Panthers defeated by Sport Oxford Twos Page 30-31 CUHC scrap to share the spoils against unfortunate Oxford side

Cambridge 1

Oxford 1

Imran Marashli Sport Reporter

● BUCS Premier A South, Wilberforce Road Hockey Ground

Cambridge University Hockey Club (CUHC) women’s Blues dug out a hard- fought 1–1 draw in their opening BUCS Premier A South league game of 2017 against the Oxford University Hockey Club (OUHC) at Wilberforce Road on Wednesday evening .  e hotly-contest- ed encounter provided an entertaining prelude to March’s Varsity clash, al- though it was Oxford who were more disappointed to have come away with only a share of the spoils. Having defeated the Oxonians 2–1 in the away  xture earlier this season, the Light Blues came into the game with a con dence visible from the start. Early Cambridge pressure produced a short corner that was expertly swept into the corner by Molly Buxton. Buoyed, Cam- bridge exploited the wide channels, with a swashbuckling run from Lucia Corry down the right  ank encapsulating the Light Blues’ rigorous interrogation of a somewhat rattled Oxford out t. Gradually the Dark Blues weathered the same vein. Oxford con dently ma- ▲ Cambridge goal lead looked ever more precarious,  nally got our new coach, Craig, and it the early Cambridge storm.  e away noeuvred the ball and used the wide couldn’t hold and the breakthrough Oxford had been was his  rst day, so putting into practice side began to retain possession and spaces effectively to prowl around on to snatch a seeking duly arrived. A ball through the things with the new coach has been bril- worked the ball across the pitch well, the Cambridge D, yet they struggled narrow victory middle escaped the Cambridge defence, liant. Now we’ve got 53 days until we with captain Naomi Kelly orchestrating to convert their territorial upper hand IMRAN MARASHLI allowing Sophie Shakespeare to race play them again and a lot to work on, the tune from the middle. Bearing down into goals. A succession of short corners through and calmly slot past Briscoe but I’m generally positive.” more on the Cambridge D, an o -target came and went without the Dark Blues for a merited equaliser. She added: “I think Oxford should be tomahawk from Shona McNab indicated managing to  nd the backboard, despite Oxford scented blood, and were a worried because we’re going to go out the inroads Oxford were creating. the brains trust of McNab, Sophie Spink, whisker away from snatching a victory there even harder, and our  tness should But in spite of the mounting pressure, Annie Koehli and Maddie Burnell trying in the game’s dying moments. Ater yet be immaculate by Varsity.” Looking for- it was Cambridge who had the next clear a number of tactical variations to unlock another spurned Oxford short corner, ward, she said: “We’d like to get the ball opportunity. Emily  orpe’s blistering the defence. a moment of panic in the Cambridge in the net a bit more. We had really good counter-attack burst through the heart  e Light Blues remained resolute, of- defence gited Imogen Brown the ball chances, but we just need to work on our of the Oxford team to set up Hatty Dar- ten channelling Dark Blue pressure into in the middle of the D, but her e ort on  nal product in the D.” ling, whose e ort was well smothered by congested central areas where Oxford’s goal was shut down by the Light Blue Rachel Dellar in the Oxford goal. attacking waves broke up against the backline. ● CUHC: Briscoe, Bradley, Darling, Kidd Oxford continued to hunt for an equal- Light Blues’ defensive barriers. Skipper In the match’s  nal play, Oxford (c), Moore, orpe, Corry, Buxton, Marsh, iser that, for all their industry, looked like Faye Kidd led by example, commenting pierced through Cambridge’s right wing Brown, Burrows, Padt, Bevan, Shears, it would never come. Despite winning ater the match that “we’re a very tight- only for Alexa Copeland’s e ort to trickle Cox a series of short corners, a combination knit group, and we put our bodies on the across the goal without anyone at the Goal scorer: Buxton of inspired goalkeeping from Freddie line for each other on the pitch.” ▶  e Light Blues far post to convert, leaving Cambridge OUHC: Dellar, Kelly (c), Spink, Hughes, Briscoe and dogged Cambridge defend- It was clear as the second half wore struck  rst blood hearts in mouths. Donovan, McNab, Stewart, Brown, Koehli, ing ensured the two teams were level on that Oxford had the upper hand, and against the run Speaking to Varsity ater the game, Burnell, Whitaker, Bailey-Williams, Shake- at half time. Cambridge were restricted to more spo- of play captain Faye Kidd re ected: “Our per- speare, Copeland, Harrison  e second half continued much in radic periods of o ensive play.  e one- IMRAN MARASHLI formance wasn’t as good this time. We Goal scorer: Shakespeare