Epigram #283

Epigram 09.02.2015

4

VC against fee reduction

• Letter: main issue is living costs • Union: ‘Strange’ that VC ‘suddenly concerned’ having slashed bursaries

Bristol University’s Vice-Chancellor has signed an open letter to The Times warning against possible Labour plans to reduce tuition fees. Professor Sir Eric Thomas added his name to a letter from Universities UK (UUK), which he was President of from 2011 to 2013, criticising Labour’s intention to lower fees.

Although Labour have not yet fully revealed their tuition fees policy, Ed Miliband has said publicly that he wants to reduce the fee cap from £9,000 to £6,000. Speaking to Bristol students, Chuka Umunna, Shadow Business Secretary, refused to fully spell out plans but said Labour want to move to a ‘more progressive system of funding’ and emphasised current tuition fee policy is ‘unsustainable’: ‘I don’t like the current system, I don’t like the fact that you are spending around £9,000 a year on tuition fees. Personally, I would rather have a graduate tax, but this would take time to develop.’

However, UUK, a board of 24 Vice Chancellors, has suggested that any move to cut fees is ‘implausible’, and could cause ‘colossal damage’ to universities as they think that at least £10 billion of additional public funding would be needed.

The group argued that the proposals ‘would damage the economy, affect the quality of students’ education, and set back work on widening access to higher education.’

“ ‘To simply dismiss all questions to a national body is ridiculous when I pay money to this university’

‘We are very disappointed to see that our Vice-Chancellor has signed a letter by Universities UK against reducing the current £9000 tuition fees. We don’t believe that £6000 fees are a progressive solution, as we think education should be publicly funded.

‘However we find the assertion by UUK that the government wouldn’t be able to find the money to plug the gap highly improbable. We also find it worrying that UUK have issued a statement opposing plans to reduce fees but have not taken a stance regarding uncapping fees altogether.’

In defence of keeping fees at £9,000, UUK argued that funding should be directed into raising maintenance support. The letter suggested that ‘A better way of supporting students, especially those from poorer backgrounds, would be for

Professor Stephen Sparks, School of Earth Sciences

Bristol Professor wins prestigious Earth Sciences prize Amie Marshall News Reporter

A Bristol Professor credited with modernising the study of volcanology is to be awarded the 2015 Vetlesen Prize. Professor Stephen Sparks, a Professorial Research Fellow of Bristol’s School of Earth Sciences, is to receive the award in recognition of his pioneering exploratory work into the science behind volcanoes and the development of methods to help predict them.

His research has provided a greater insight into the ways in which volcanic activity can be monitored, helping to increase scientist’s ability to predict eruptions

Nick Riddle

Protests in Bristol before Christmas and rising student-staff ratios have demonstrated the extent to which students feel they are no longer getting value for money.

Despite student frustration, the VC’s office refused to respond in detail about his decision to sign UUK’s letter.

Instead, it told Epigram that: ‘How universities are funded is a national issue and hence you may wish to redirect your questions to UUK or a similar organisation.’

John Murray, a final year Politics and French student, told Epigram, ‘As a Bristol student, whilst I’m disappointed with what the VC had to say, I’m not surprised. We aren’t sure where our money’s going. That’s been exhibited over series of protests and general dissatisfaction expressed in National Student Surveys.

I want my Bristol University representative to be demonstrating to me where my money’s going, what fees are being spent on. To simply

“ ‘It’s good VCs are suddenly becoming concerned about living costs, but they didn’t seem so when replacing bursaries [with fee waivers]’

the government to provide greater financial support for living costs.’

However, in the past, Thomas had advocated getting rid of bursaries to help students from poorer backgrounds, supporting substituting them with fee waivers.

In 2011, Epigram exposed plans to remove bursaries, which would have made Bristol the only Russell Group university to lack some form of meanstested cash bursary. The University eventually conducted a partial u-turn following a campaign led by UBU. Phillips and Vieru added, ‘It’s good that VCs are suddenly becoming concerned about living costs, but it’s strange, because they didn’t seem so concerned in the past.

The reason why they now are is because it’s become politically salient.

‘They’re framing it as a zero-sum game. They’re saying you can either have lower fees and nothing to live on, or higher fees and more maintenance costs. Where has that come from? Why can’t we have both?’

It is not just students from low income backgrounds who feel the squeeze.

Frankie Hastings, a second year Biochemistry student, said, ‘I think that low maintenance loan funding impacts the middle most.

Parents who neither earn very large salaries, nor qualify for grants are squeezed; they can only support us to a point. Bristol is also one of the more expensive places to go to University, so it would seem sensible that the maintenance support should be adjusted to fit with the costs of the city students study in.’

It is perhaps unsurprising that the NUS have said that financial difficulty is the main reason students drop out of University.

The letter signed by Sir Eric Thomas calls reducing tuition fees ‘implausible’

Photo: courtesy of Professor Stephen Sparks

Zaki Dogliani Editor

dismiss all questions to a national body is ridiculous when I pay money to this university.

‘I feel the VC’s comments are the latest in a string of poor attempts by the University to explain to us where our money is being spent. They have been very slow to address our concerns.

Sorana Vieru, UBU Postgraduate Education Officer, and Alice Philips, Equality, Liberation and Access Officer, expressed their frustration to Epigram.

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Sarah Newey News Editor

Professor Sparks joined the University of Bristol in 1989, after being chosen to lead the new Geology department, helping to set up a centre for volcanology and earth sciences of global importance. His pioneering application of the principles of maths and physics to the study of volcanology is often praised for its role in modernising the subject.

His research has provided a greater insight into the ways in which

volcanic activity can be monitored, helping to increase scientist’s ability to predict eruptions. During the 1995 eruption of the Soufrière Hills volcano in Montserrat, Professor Sparks led a team of researchers who monitored the eruption, advising Montserrat’s government on strategies for evacuation and rebuilding to prevent the high numbers of fatalities characteristic of past eruptions. More recently, he has worked for the United Nations, conducting an assessment of global volcanic risk, as well as being involved in the evaluation of old volcanic rocks as a means of safely storing radioactive waste.

Dean Connor, President of the Bristol University Geology and Geoscience Society (BUGGS), told Epigram: ‘Steve Sparks’ research into volcanic forecasting and hazard assessment has potentially saved countless lives.

The award is fully deserved and shows what great potential there is coming out of Bristol University in this field’.

The Vetlesen Prize is considered to be the equivalent of the Nobel Prize within the field of Geology and is awarded for outstanding achievement in the Earth Sciences, recognising discoveries that have helped develop our understanding of the Earth. Set up in 1959, the prize is awarded collaboratively by Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and the G. Unger Vetlesen Foundation. Professor Sparks will receive his award in June in a ceremony held in New York, along with a medal and $250,000.

Professor Sparks has already received much acclaim for his work, including the Geological Society of London’s Wollaston Medal in 2011, the European Geosciences Union’s Arthur Holmes Medal in 2004 and the Geological Society of America’s Arthur Day Medal in 2000. He was accepted into the Royal Society at the age of 38.

Epigram

09.02.2015

5

Have you registered to vote in in May? has been replicated at Universities across the country.’

Indeed, during the second week of term the Union launched a voter registration drive across campus, coinciding with National Register to Vote Day on the 5th February.

Volunteers were out in force all week publicising the change in law all week by the Hawthorns, and spoke to over 2000 students.

Zaki Dogliani

Matt Field

Epigram spoke to Chuka Umanna after his Q and A session with students (see the full interview online) and attended a Norman Lamb event on Thursday

Sarah Newey News Editor

“

Joanna Woods, Union Affairs Officer, told Epigram: ‘Most students have never voted in a general election before, and we want to make sure they have the chance. Once students are registered

turnout levels amongst students.’

She told Epigram that the University has been involved in a local project with Bristol City Council, South Gloucestershire Council, UWE, and the Students’ Union to encourage students to register, and suggested it was having a positive impact.

However, as much as the Union and University can encourage students to register, if you have not done so before April 20th you will not be able to vote in the general election.

Stephen Williams, the current Bristol West Liberal Democrat MP, said: ‘Both the government and Bristol City Council have publicised the changes very widely, as have lots of other bodies including the NUS. I believe that people who are motivated to vote will surely be the same people who are motivated to register to vote.’

As only 44% of 18-24 year olds voted in 2010, the figure of student registration will not be high. The University and Students’ Union are doing everything they can to prevent this.

Philip Brulard

According to a recent Epigram survey, 30% of Bristol students do not know that they need to register to vote in order to participate in the general election in May. Previously Universities had been able to register students automatically, which ensured nearly 100% registration. This was because the ‘head of the household’ was responsible for registering voters; for students this was interpreted as the University.

But in June last year, Individual Electoral Registration was implemented. This has been widely heralded as positive; it is a move away from an antiquated Victorian process and will help reduce electoral fraud.

However, only 87% of voters have been automatically re-registered, and students have been particularly hard hit by the changes. This is because existing voter details were compared to government records, and only those that still matched were automatically transferred to the new system. As most students move

regularly, details are no longer the same. In Oxford, for example, wards with a high percentage of students saw overall registration drop by 60%.

In Bristol, the student vote could have a huge impact on the next election; in Bristol West 24% of the electorate are students, while students make up 10% of voters in Bristol North West.

However, according to a recent MyBristol survey, only 49% of students have registered so far.

Matty Bacon and Lucy Simmons, Co-Chairs of Bristol Labour students, told Epigram that while the ‘head of the household’ principle is outdated, ‘it is worrying that a large number of people have dropped off the register.’

‘We are concerned as we think that this has disproportionately affected the young and the poor, both of which we believe are unlikely to vote to support this government.’

Charlie Brandon, Bristol Students Conservative Association, agreed that the system needed to be changed, and commented that: ‘The University and the Union, for all its faults, have been working pretty hard to make people aware of this change, something I would imagine

Only 49% of students have registered so far, and 30% did not realise that they needed to register

there will still be a lot of work to do to increase voting education - ensuring students do not accidentally ruin their ballot papers, for instance.’

Joanna also praised the move to internet registration: ‘The age of the internet is good for democracy. Yes, it is open to abuse, but think of all the positives that can be achieved. It is exciting.’

On Thursday, Norman Lamb, Liberal Democrat Minister of State for Care and Support and Chuka Umunna, Labour Shadow Business Secretary both visited the University.

Umunna spoke to students in a Question and Answer session, in which he highlighted the importance of voting: ‘When you vote you give yourself a voice, if you don’t turn up then you won’t be empowering yourself.

Frankly if you don’t vote for Labour but you vote for somebody else, I’d prefer that than not voting at all.’

Judith Squires, Pro-Vice Chancellor for Education, said that the University are ‘keen to ensure that the changes to the electoral registration process do not impact negatively on voter

Jo Woods, Union Affairs Officer, encouraged students to vote during the second week of term

UOB library seeks student help Hribhu Mendiratta News Reporter

University of Bristol Library Special Collections/

UOB want to add material to their election archives

The University of Bristol Library Special Collections is seeking the help of students in adding to their archive of election publicity material during the build up to May’s General Election.

The archive consists of over 30,000 election addresses, as well as other campaign material, from across the country and dating back to 1892. The archive acts as an aide in the research of not only students and staff of the university, but is also used by academics from other institutions, journalists, and politicians themselves.

This extensive resource can allow one to read such things as the election addresses of future prime ministers with their fresh-faced charm (and perhaps innocence) still intact.

Hannah Lowery, Archivist at Special Collections, highlights the insight to be gleaned from the collection by pointing to the changing nature of election addresses in the last century.

‘Early ones are less about the party line, maybe they were thinking more

”

about policies’, she says ‘there was less awareness of marketing than there is now’.

The archive consists of over 30,000 election addresses from across the cournty dating from 1982, and has been used be acedemics, journalists and politicians

Special Collections has asked students to save what comes through their doors for the first time to make the collection process more efficient and also because changes in the nature of campaigning have made it pertinent. The collection of material has thus far involved

sending letters with a return envelope to every candidate standing in the election, which according to Hannah Lowery, ‘is very time consuming and has to be done in the three week span of the Election Campaign’, whilst also being expensive given the increasing cost of sending letters.

An appeal to students is now particularly beneficial because the upcoming election is the first since the 2011 Fixed-term Parliaments Act, which effectively allows politicians to conduct their campaign over a longer period of time as they can be sure that there will be a General Election in May and also allows a more gradual collection of publicity material. Whilst compiling material from Bristol is relatively straightforward for the collection, there is now an opportunity to use the huge network of students from across the country to make the process cheaper and easier.

Whilst the promises made in the garishly colored leaflets coming through your door may not be genuine, their academic value certainly is. Election addresses and other publicity material can be posted to Special Collections at the ASSL.

Epigram

09.02.2015

37

Shocking new first-time buyer stats

” People in their twenties are being locked out of ownership until their forties

Abode, a letting agency in Bristol, claimed that they have been appalled in recent years by the radical increase in house prices as well as the drastic increase in renting rates, commenting that they were becoming ‘extortionate’ and ‘out of hand’.

Indeed, Adobe were quick to

comment on the increased struggle young adults, and most commonly fresh graduates, are having in finding potential rentable properties, let alone buying from the property ladder, as many rents with Abode are off the market within 24 hours of being released.

Whilst the revelation of the statistics is alarming and poses worries to current students and graduates, Bristol is not alone in the housing struggle.

Places like Birmingham and Bath present similar, if not worse statistics, with Birmingham’s average age for a couple in their twenties saving to get on the property ladder being 35. However, Bristol does have one of the highest percentages of students remaining in the city after graduation, averaging around 22 per cent, double the amount of York and Plymouth University, thus suggesting Bristol needs to step up its increase in affordable housing and achieve its aim of 2,500 affordable homes in 2018 so as to combat this crisis.

Graduate job opportunities increasing Charlotte Lewis News Reporter A new survey reveals that students can be more optimistic for their postuniversity prospects. The survey, carried out by the Association of Graduate Recruiters states that graduate jobs are expected to increase 11.9 per cent this year, the biggest increase since 2007. This is not due to employers giving higher value to degrees, but because of greater confidence in the economy. The trend can similarly be seen in the rise in jobs offered to school leavers. Yet Stephen Isherwood, the AGR’s Chief Executive, assures that ‘graduates are still more likely to be employed than non-graduates’.

Some sectors are set to rise more than others, the highest being IT and telecommunications, predicting a 26.9 per cent rise, while public sector

will rise 23 per cent, construction 22.1 per cent and engineering 19.7 per cent. This change has already been noted by some in Bristol, including Julian Chajecki, President of the University of Bristol Engineering Society (TUBES), who found there to be more graduate job opportunities than he expected.

Chajecki stated that he had received emails ‘from companies ranging from consultancies to all forms of engineering, asking me whether I could promote their grad schemes and internships to TUBES members’, suggesting that employers are seeking out students now more than over the last few years.

The University’s Careers Service also confirmed AGR’s findings. The prediction is in line with trends of an increasing number of vacancies being posted on their website. According to Stuart Johnson, the Director of Careers Service, ‘last year over 5600 vacancies

were posted, more than double the number advertised 2 years ago.’

Increasing opportunities are giving graduates more choice over what position they accept post-university.

AGR’s survey shows that one in seven graduate positions being declined.

According to Johnson, this is in part due to a wider range of opportunities ‘not just across sectors, but also with small and medium sized employers’.

Tanya de Grunwald, author of How to Get a Graduate Job in a Recession and founder of Graduate Fog also states that graduates are applying to numerous schemes and increasingly ‘playing a “numbers game”, seeing what offers they get…and deciding on a winner.’ This suggests that we are now witnessing a decline in graduates simply accepting any job they can get. Students, therefore, can be more optimistic towards the level of control they will have over their graduate employment.

PwC sponsored the competition, which Claire Machin won

Steph Rihon

Research completed by homelessness charity Shelter, alongside Liverpool Economics, calculated that young adults across the country are going to have to wait for increasingly longer periods to get on to the property ladder, with statistics showing young adults living in Bristol having to wait more than a decade to place a deposit down on a property. With over a fifth of Bristol University students’ remaining in the city after graduation, largely due to the city’s promising graduate prospects, this presents a challenging outcome for the future of the city and its young adult population.

The research carried out by Shelter took into account current and projected house prices, incomes, essential costs (food, utilities, transport costs) and rent by household type across the country.

The analysis assesses the length of time households currently in their twenties

can expect to save for a deposit for their first home. Shocking statistics show that people in their twenties living in central Bristol and saving for their first home will be potentially locked out of ownership until their forties. Those saving as a couple fair slightly better, with the average predicted age being 31, still staggeringly high.

Freshers’ Fair competition winner finally announced Issy May Bull Deputy News Editor

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Alison Ralph News Reporter

The lucky winner of Epigram’s freshers giveaway was final year Psychology student, Claire Machin.

The competition involved taking a ‘Selfie with Ellie’, Epigram’s furry mascot, and posting it to the newspaper’s Facebook page. The photos were taken at the Freshers’ Fair on Friday 26 September when 10,000 students descended upon the Harbourside to see what societies Bristol University had to offer. The winner was later drawn at random.

Contributing to a publication like Epigram is just one of the many ways students can improve their employability

The Kindle Fire was provided

by Epigram sponsors PwC, the multinational professional services firm. Alex Spaven, PwC’s West and Wales Student Recruitment Manager said that ‘this is the second year that we have sponsored Epigram’s

Freshers Fair Competition and it’s been great to see the level of interest it generated’.

‘Working with Epigram continues to give PwC a unique opportunity to stay involved with the University of Bristol’ he told the paper.

‘Contributing to a publication like Epigram is just one of the many ways students can improve their employability by developing skills outside of their academic studies’ that Spaven believes is ‘crucial’ at a time when demand for graduate jobs and internships is at ‘an all time high’.

Managing Director of Epigram, Stephanie Rihon said that ‘it’s been a pleasure to work with PwC and we were delighted that they sponsored our Kindle competition. It has been a great way of promoting Epigram among the student body, which is shown through our increased readership and the enthusiastic participation within Epigram’.

Rihon added her congratulations to Claire and insisted that ‘we will definitely be looking to run more competitions like this in the near future’. Keep an eye on the Epigram Facebook page for your chance to win prizes and #getinvolved. There will also be the chance to win a large selection of giveaways at the highly anticipated raffle at the Media Ball on March 6.

Bristol students support the city’s homeless via new app Ivana Scatola Deputy News Editor

British Council Russia

StreetLink was used more in Bristol than anywhere else

Students were among the many users of Bristol City Council’s StreetLink service, set up last October, helping to make Bristol the most responsive city to the service, in the whole country.

StreetLink is a nationwide service set up last October, and the first enabling the public to alert local authorities about rough sleepers in their area. It is funded by the Government, as part of its commitment to lower the figures of rough sleepers.

It offers the public an alternative mode of acting when they see rough sleepers, to provide local help and support. Once an alert is received by StreetLink in Bristol, a member of the St.Mungo’s Broadway outreach team – also commissioned

by Bristol City council - visits the rough sleeper and assesses their situation, connecting them to more specific, local services which they might not be aware of. 69 per cent of reports made through StreetLink in Bristol ended with the rough sleeper quickly connected to a service of help.

St.Mungo’s Broadway is a charity set up to help the homeless rebuild their lives. It provides a bed and support to over 2,500 people a night across the South of England. Its base in Bristol is at The Compass Centre, Stokes Croft.

StreetLink is easy to use.

You can alert the service by visiting their website: www. streelink.org.uk, by phoning Freephone 0300 500 0914, or by simply downloading the app onto your smart phone.

Tackling homelessness is an issue which mayor George Ferguson has outlined as a priority for the city.

He praised the service and Bristol’s responsiveness to it, and encouraged even more future engagement with Street Link: ‘It only takes a few minutes to take out your phone and make the call, but in doing so, you could really help change someone’s life. The number of people at risk of homelessness is on the rise, and we all need to work together to

help those less fortunate than ourselves.

‘This year I have dedicated my Mayor’s charitable Fund to homelessness, and aim to raise at least £50,000 by April 2015, and I would like to encourage everyone to help me support those without a home.’

Gillian Douglas, service manager for Housing Options of Bristol City Council added, ‘The StreetLink app allows people to take action and helps them not to feel so helpless.’

‘A lot of rough sleepers are not aware of the resources available to them, and it is important that we get them on our radar so that we can try and help them.’

Students are also doing their bit in helping the homeless in the city in other ways. Perran Byles, 3rd year politics student is taking part in a ‘sleep out’ to raise money for One25, a Bristol-based charity working in supporting women involved in street sex work. The sleep out is being organised by Crisis Centre Ministries, a Christian, Bristol-based charity helping the homeless, and will take place from 10pm on Friday 27 February 2015 to 7 am on Saturday 28th February, outside Pip ‘n’ Jay Church, Tower Hill.

Epigram 09.02.2015

10

Does our cyclical politics prevent change?

Welcome to the new government - same as the old government, right?

Westminster politics, the establishment, that collection of jeering men in a chamber on TV on a Wednesday… Every five years we can change the faces, but how much difference does it actually make to our lives?

As Harold Wilson infamously said, ‘a week is a long time in politics’, but conversely it is somewhat difficult to achieve much in terms of real change in a decade, and it would be normal to have at least two governments in this time. It can seem like our politics is petty, distant and irrelevant, with too short a time for each government to make a difference and too little difference between the main parties. Westminster politics looks, to the outsider, like a series of squabbles that make very little difference.

Where is the policy of real change? It looks like it is lost.

We had Tony Blair’s ‘New’ Labour and now we have David Cameron’s supposedly green and compassionate Conservatism allied with the Liberal Democrats. All of the parties, clustered in the centre ground, creating very little change. It looks like it doesn’t matter if we vote, and it seems like young people are ignored; policy will still come out of Westminster whether it is relevant to us or not.

Hannah McGovern Features Writer The responses of Bristol students when asked about the Bristol Pound ranged from complete bewilderment, to a mere ‘Is it that blue pound logo I’ve seen on the buses to Cabot?’.

In reality, since its inception in September 2012, the Bristol Pound has grown to be the largest alternative currency to sterling in the UK, with benefits for local residents, university students, and businesses alike.

First things first, though: what exactly is the Bristol Pound? In short, it is the UK’s first city wide local currency, a not-for-profit social enterprise and completely free to use.

Thousands of users across the city are spending Bristol Pounds via mobile, cash and online.

Simply sign up, put sterling in your account with a conversion rate of £1 to £B1, and spend in participating businesses.

Businesses involved in the scheme include popular places on the Triangle such as Flavalanche and Goldbrick House. Participating businesses on Whiteladies Road include

But it is not irrelevant.

Parliament makes the law, and (it is a cliché, but nevertheless true to say) people died so that we could vote and choose who makes up that parliament.

From that parliament has come legislation that has made a real difference to the lives of everyone in this country, for good or bad.

The National Health Service, votes for women, the ban on foxhunting, gay marriage, free education up to the age of 18, the Human Rights Act… all of these pieces of legislation marked a change for Britain.

“ young people feel like little policy is relevant is because there is little policy aimed at us

I would argue that they were all positive - you may disagree. Such is the beauty of democracy. We form our views, we cast our votes, and we see change. Politicians and their parties rely on the support of voters, so they are incentivised to form policy that appeals to us, the voters.

If we don’t want to be ignored, we have to participate in our democracy, and this election is particularly important. We must be voters.

The 2015 election may well turn out to be one of the turning points of British Politics. The traditional dominance of Tory

and Labour is being called into question. While one of these parties will undoubtedly be the main power at parliament in May, whether alone or as part of a coalition, other small parties could be vital.

Don’t vote, don’t get. The reason why we, as young people, feel like little policy is relevant to or has an effect on us, is because there is little policy aimed at us. We don’t, as a group, tend to vote and thus we don’t, as a group, get the policy we want. We are overlooked, because we do not go to the ballot box.

There is a solution to this.

Do you want funding for your postgraduate degree, or to someday own your own home?

Do you want to keep your rights, and to be listened to by those who represent us? Then you must vote. Young people, students, must take part in choosing their democratic representatives. This election is a great opportunity. If you are bored of two-party politics, Tory or Labour, there are other, smaller parties who have a real chance of holding the balance of power at Westminster or being elected here in Bristol. Or for the main parties to start making policy for young people, then a large enough group of us must vote relative to other age groups.

For many students, this is the first chance to put a cross on a ballot paper. To secure the future we want, young people must vote.

Your vote matters. Go to gov.uk/register-to-vote.

Sound as a Bristol Pound

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Ceri Fowler Features Writer

Bristol Does a Sterling Job With Its Own Currency

Be.In Bristol, Burger Joint, and many more. The Bristol Pound is a great way for students to get

The Bristol Pound has grown to be the largest alternative currency to sterling in the UK

involved in the sense of local pride that comes with the local currency, and to feel part of a great cause for Bristol. Some participating businesses even add further discounts for Bristol Pound users, which could be a massive bonus for students.

Full details can be found on the Bristol Pound website.

Bristol as a city benefits from its local currency in

that, in a time of austerity, both tourists and employers are attracted to the city due to the media coverage and advertising of our vibrant and entrepreneurial community.

It also encourages people to shop locally, supporting local businesses and consequently increasing spending power and retaining money within Bristol.

The future for local currencies looks bright, with councils in the UK and further afield recognising the benefits of keeping money circulating within their cities.

Local communities such as the Cotswold town of Stroud and the London borough of Lambeth have launched their own currencies already. It must be said that there are some drawbacks to local currencies in that if the scheme fails, there may not be a way to claim back any sterling pounds you have invested into the scheme.

However, with the successes

so far of the Bristol Pound this seems unlikely, and due to the extensive benefits of local money schemes, there are discussions in place in twenty other UK authorities

to follow suit and create their version of the Bristol Pound.

To stay up to date with the latest news on the Bristol Pound, follow them on twitter @BristolPound or open an

account online today (www. bristolpound.org /signup) and support Bristol’s independent businesses!

Epigram

09.02.2015

9 11

In Interview: The One Show’s Anita Rani Holly Jones Features Editor

they’re onscreen? Does that hinder how seriously you’re taken?

AR: A-ha, so you noticed my outfit the other day!

HJ: Yeah, especially the shoes!

Loved ‘em. Is that all you or do you have someone managing your look?

AR: Well, no-one tells me what to wear. I actually used to be a complete tomboy in the 90s, baggy trousers at clubs, the whole lot. I tried on a pair of Doc Martins from then the other day and was so pleased to find that they still fitted! But really, I didn’t even own a lipstick until I started presenting, but that’s because I wanted to make an effort, not to look ‘sexy’.

HJ: You’ve worked on Escape to the Continent, do you think that there’s a bit of hypocrisy in the way Brits moving abroad don’t consider themselves immigrants in the same way as people who move over here do?

AR: It’s not spoken about as much over here but people who move abroad are definitely aware of it – there are Little Britains all over the place; I talked to a man who has lived in Spain for five years and doesn’t speak more than conversational Spanish. It should be all about integration rather than assimilation.

HJ: Speaking of which, do you ever feel a bit sort of torn between your Indian heritage and being in Britain now?

AR: No, I’ve never felt torn – it’s really quite a privilege when you think about it that I’m bilingual and have an innate understanding of two cultures; I mean I’m fluent in Punjabi.

The great thing about living

was with my cousin from India and his favourite thing about London was the Tube, because he’d never seen such a diverse collection of people in the same place before.

HJ: Given that you travel so much for your documentaries, has there ever been a point in your career which has felt very challenging or dangerous – when you were going across Russia or India?

AR: It was a real dream gig – I like cars, I like travelling, so going around in a great big SUV around three completely different cultures was brilliant.

“ ‘be cheeky - send emails to journalists and be open to everything’

Driving in India was a risk, full stop, but there was never a point at which I felt like I wasn’t safe. There was an incident in Russia where we were filming somewhere we weren’t supposed to and had to be kept at the immigration office until 2am, but we were pretty protected by the producers.

HJ: Do you have any advice for up-and-coming journalists– given that you are expected to talk about such a wide variety of subjects, what sort of tips would you give when researching very niche topics?

AR: Just go for it! Just start.

It’s so much easier now – write a blog, write for a student publication, just get yourself

“”

‘I didn’t even own a lipstick until I started presenting, but that’s because I wanted to make an effort, not to look ‘sexy’’ twice as good!

HJ: That’s interesting – but do you think there’s a kind of pressure for female journalists to sort of ‘sex up’ a bit when

in London is that it’s a little country of its own so speaking another language doesn’t feel out of place, no-one gives a shit what you’re wearing, it’s great! I

Photo: @itsanitarani

Anita Rani has worked on a diverse number of investigative programs, familiar to most as a regular contributor to the BBC’s The One Show. Her ‘On Four Wheels’ documentaries took her across China, Russia and India, three of the most vast and remarkable countries in the world. I had the opportunity to talk to her about her varied career and what advice she would offer to aspiring journalists.

Holly Jones: Hi Anita, thanks for taking the time out to speak to me. Firstly, I wanted to ask what you think of lifestyle journalism – is it something of a ‘safe’ and uncontroversial brand of journalism?

Anita Rani: Hi, no problem.

You mean like The One Show?

It can be quite cuddly but recently I’ve been looking at quite controversial stuff like homeless war veterans, which definitely doesn’t make for comfortable viewing. The documentaries I’ve worked on have been quite gritty too – I wouldn’t say what I did was really ‘lifestyle’. I think of myself as more of a factual journalist.

HJ: Yeah, that’s a good way of putting it. So what kind of hurdles do you face becoming a factual journalist as a woman, if any? Do you think there’s sexism in the industry?

AR: Sure, there are plenty of hurdles, but if there are any relating to my being a woman, a brown woman, I haven’t felt it. You’ve just got to not think about it and get on with the job.

It’s not something you can let yourself get hung up on when you’re at work – I like to think that if you’ve had to work twice as hard at something, you’ll be

From On Four Wheels to Escape to the Continent, Anita offers insight to her varied career

out there. Be cheeky – send emails to journalists and be open to everything.

Anita has recently talked couriers and homeless veterans on The One Show, and has travelled across Russia, China and India as part of the BBC’s On Four Wheels series.

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Epigram 09.02.2015

Inherent Vice

flickr/ Ma_Co2013

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Film & TV Writer Ben Hickey on why you should take in this feel-good hit of the 1970s

It may be a lot of fun, but this is not to say that Anderson has taken half measures here. Inherent Vice does not shy away from its dense and convoluted source material, choosing instead to revel in its peculiarity. It is the story of Larry ‘Doc’ Sportello, a private

Flickr/Chris Elt

Against all the odds, Joaquin Phoenix is actually pulling that look off.

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guiding the action, however skewed they may be by his stultifying drug habit. Phoenix puts a look in Doc’s eye which says that, while the facts never seem to be in order for him, his understanding of the characters’ sadness is far sharper than his outward appearance

Anderson takes Pynchon’s wry social commentary and gives it heart flickr/ Ma_Co2013

I can’t be the only one who thinks this is weirdly sexy.

would suggest. Adding to this melancholic undercurrent is the pitch-perfect narration by Joanna Newsom, whose cracked and fragile voice of sweetness and light epitomises the film’s tone. Within the fog of reefer smoke is

American Sniper Film & TV Editor Matthew Floyd on why this war biopic is epically unoriginal and a Republican’s wet dream

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loving garbage that was Spread and Paranoia, and who here continues this theme with the benefit of a leg-up from Kyle’s status as a national hero.

it’s far from the best and it sure as hell won’t be the last Iraq War film American Sniper picks up with the discontented cliché of a Texan Kyle, whose hobbies include rodeo and big belt buckles, being inspired to join the military on the back of a single news story he half-watches. American Sniper reveals that in the Iraq War US troops fought under the Metallica banner.

flickr/ Canburak

American Western movie icon Clint Eastwood has a chequered record in the director’s chair. Out of his 37 credits, for every Million Dollar Baby or Unforgiven there’s a J. Edgar or a Hereafter, and for the past few years he’s been missing more swings than he’s been hitting. At 84 years old though, one thing you can’t criticise the man for is slacking, with his latest effort coming only seven months on from his big screen adaptation of hit Broadway and West End musical Jersey Boys, which was received like a morose dish of gruel being served at an Eton banquet. American Sniper, however, is more classically Eastwood-y territory, following as it does a lone American gunman fighting for freedom, justice and above all the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms.

A beefy Bradley Cooper stars in this biopic as Chris Kyle, who whilst serving four tours in the Iraq War earned the title of most lethal sniper in U.S. military history. Jason Hall is responsible for adapting his bestselling autobiography for film, a man who has only otherwise brought us the American Dream-

a very tangible sense of misguided goodness and loss.

And then there’s what Inherent Vice looks like. Using lenses from old Pathè cameras Anderson makes sun-baked Los Angeles look like a work of art. Anderson has stated in interviews that his purpose was to make the film feel ‘like a faded postcard…like a movie from 1970’. Shots of evening sunlight pouring through Doc’s window and resting on his hair are beautiful, intensely evocative of that same sense of ‘pastness’ and painful nostalgia which appear to follow Doc wherever he goes. It is not just a film about a certain time and place but a picture rooted within that time and place. Many critics have been quick to criticise Inherent Vice for its cold, knowing detachment but it is not filmed that way. Anderson takes Pynchon’s wry social commentary and gives it heart.

Inherent Vice is both a sharp critique of a deliciously weird and dark time in America’s history and also a bemused, foggy love letter to that same period. It is big, brash and unashamedly chaotic, but it may be Paul Thomas Anderson’s most sincere film to date.

flickr/ canburak

“

Inherent Vice revels in the peculiarity of its source material

investigator tasked with tracking down a missing real estate giant who may or may not have been captured by an international drug-smuggling consortium. This is only the first component of the case, however; bound up in Doc’s quest are a plethora of decidedly dicey and damaged characters, each with their own agenda. As the superb supporting cast, including Jena Malone, Reese Witherspoon and Josh Brolin as the hilariously acerbic and hippy-hating Detective ‘Bigfoot’ Bjornsen, stacks up, you find yourself chasing your own tail in an attempt to work out who’s working for who.

This, I think, is Anderson’s intention: to create an atmosphere of suspicion and paranoia which Pynchon felt typified America’s post60s hangover. When Coy Harlingen, a police informant played by Owen Wilson, asks Doc, ‘And your question is, whose side am I on?’, the query seems somehow pertinent to our own viewing experience.

Guiding us through this minefield is Joaquin Phoenix’s Doc, a performance in stark contrast to his full-throttle turn in The Master. His role is not one of the most immediately engaging aspects of Inherent Vice, but it is quietly captivating in its understatement. For much of the film, Doc is us, chasing leads only to have them elude him just as the complete picture seems ready to reveal itself. However, while scorn is continually heaped upon him for being a no-good dope fiend, Phoenix elevates Doc’s character beyond this stereotype. There is an unmistakable sense of Doc’s moral principles

flickr/ canburak

Based on Thomas Pynchon’s 2009 novel, Inherent Vice is a bewildering, heady look at the drug-addled stupor in which America found itself at the dawn of the 1970s. By staying faithful to Pynchon’s predilection for the zany and the bizarre, Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest film sees him steering away from the weightiness of The Master and There Will Be Blood towards a more rambunctious, screwball-indebted mode of storytelling while also, paradoxically, managing to make possibly the most honest film of his career.

Epigram 09.02.2015

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Over the course of the film we see how his time as a Navy SEAL sniper changes him and those around him, both on the battlefield and at home.

American Sniper is is a perfectly competent contemporary war film, put together with such bland proficiency that the end result is wholly un-extraordinary. The Hurt Locker is arguably so far the pinnacle of Iraq War films, which intimately depicted a bomb disposal unit and won six awards include Best Picture and Director for Katherine Bigelow at the 2010 Oscars. In an uninspired feat of publicity, American Sniper has been dubbed ‘The Hurt Locker with snipers’ and has similarly been nominated for six Oscars which by God I hope it doesn’t win, except maybe for sound.

Whilst The Hurt Locker was tense, gripping and engrossing, American Sniper is dull, repetitive and politically distasteful. For anyone unclear going into the cinema where Eastwood puts his cross on the ballot paper - even after his notorious ‘chair speech’ - this film will leave you feeling like you’ve been This is not the first cinematic effort to straddled for 132 minutes by Sarah Palin handle the Iraq War, it’s also far from the best dressed as Rambo. and it sure as hell won’t be the last. What

American Sniper is put together with such bland proficiency that the end result is wholly un-extraordinary

Wild Film & TV Writer Ronan Davis is out in the wilderness with only a spoon Amidst the traditional glut of high quality January releases, Wild seems like one of those that are quietly relegated to the B-list in favour of the Birdmans and Whiplashes of the moment. Its two main awards nominations, both for acting, may suggest that it’s primarily a dramatic showcase, with decent views. Yet here is a strong film that is absolutely forthright in its convictions, defying the awards-bait smear thanks to an authentic and intense atmosphere.

Based on an autobiographical bestseller, Reese Witherspoon plays Cheryl Strayed, a young woman who has seen her life overhauled by getting orphaned, divorced and addicted to heroin, seemingly with nothing noteworthy in between. Whilst never spelt out through exposition, we gradually realise that Cheryl responds naturally to hardship by occupying her mind with physical action. Hence the film’s central premise: a gruelling hike up the USA’s west coast - alone, with too little prior experience and too much stuff slung into her mammoth backpack.

Any thoughts of a charming little flick with landscapes and an uplifting score are quickly wiped away by a desolate and winceinducing pre-credits sequence. Cheryl timidly removes a shattered toenail, only to simultaneously knock her boot down into the gorge below. The tone is set for an at times gruelling experience that, in a similar spirit to 127 Hours, forces us to undergo the struggle alongside her.

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here is a strong film that is absolutely forthright in its convictions flickr/ Ma_Co2013

Flickr/screen relish

‘If I don’t wear any make up, I’m guaranteed an Oscar nomination...’

Flickr/canburak

What distinguishes this film, however, is its seamless interweaving of such tough physical moments with a moving narrative that explores how Cheryl reached this point.

Rather than a chronological approach, scenes ranging from her childhood to the desperate last few months arise

“

spontaneously and unpredictably, memories triggered in her mind by details of the present. This is a daring and well-executed approach that avoids frustration, and instead enables us to feel as equally immersed in her spiritual journey of rediscovery as in her long trek.

Wild seamlessly interweaves tough physical moments with a moving narrative And the ‘her’ is crucial, since Wild takes particular note in telling a woman’s story.

Cheryl, who self-identifies as a feminist, intermittently meets charming guys, boisterous guys, creepy guys who turn out nice and creepy guys who turn out creepy but the point is conveyed that every single one treats her differently for being a lone woman walking the trail. This theme is rarely dragged to the foreground, though Cheryl’s jubilation when she finally meets another lady (“Oh my God! You’re a woman!”) provides a heart-warming insight into our protagonist’s personality.

Such personal touches are always right at the film’s core, perhaps linking to the fact that this character study is based on a real person.

Authenticity shines through the plot, which bears few marks of a familiar, overarching formula at work. With certain memories repeated emphatically, unexpected wry humour at the most challenging moments, and even a somewhat abrupt ending, we are thoroughly exposed to a complex, unpredictable reality that feels extreme yet totally believable.

And so, if, like me, you were a bit intrigued upon hearing of Wild before getting preoccupied with the awards bigwigs, then do watch it when the chance comes along.

There’s a soul to this film that needs no tick on an awards card in order to be acknowledged.

Editors’ Picks

Our personal choices of what to watch over the next two weeks Matthew Editor

Hannah Deputy Editor

Manvir Online Editor

The Interview Friday 6 February 2015

Fifty Shades of Grey Friday 16 January 2015

The Gambler In Cinemas Now

flickr/ Ma_Co2013

Okay, so we know it’s not going to be Seth Rogen and James Franco’s stoner comedy about a plot to kill Kim Jong-un Oscar worthy, but come on, it’s a must see. Everyone who’s read the books is is finally getting a UK release, with the added bonus of not catalysing a nuclear dying to see what is and isn’t going to be put up on the big screen, myself holocaust. Check out my review on the included. And of course whether or not Epigram website if you want, I’m not Jamie Dornan is going to live up to the the boss of you.

Christian Grey on paper. Either way it’s set to cause quite the stir...

The Walking Dead - Season 5 part 2 From Monday 9 February 9pm FOX UK The Casual Vacancy Thursdays 9pm Channel 4 We all love seeing beloved characters graphically disemboweled by the Though it’s based on JK Rowling’s undead or, alternatively, hipster novel, don’t be expecting any wizards. cannibals. Aren’t we lucky then that The mini-series focuses on a seemingly TWD is back, ending the intolerable quiet town, and its inhabitants’ cruelty of splitting the season into parts separated by an interlude of more than interlinking story lines - I’m hoping for a Love Actually-style TV drama. two months. Damn you, TV schedulers.

Mark Wahlberg and William Monahan team up for the first time since the brilliant The Departed in this remake of the 1974 original starring James Caan. Originally designed to be another DiCaprio-Scorsese film, this adrenalinefuelled film is the perfect tonic to the sloppiness of Valentine’s Day. Catastrophe Mondays 10pm Channel 4 It is so rare for a new comedy to be a runaway success but Catastrophe has pulled it off. The sitcom follows Sharon Morris and Rob Norris who get together after Sharon falls pregnant after their brief fling. Their chemistry and a sharp script will have you laughing out loud.

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SILLY SAM...

STUPID SAM...

Sam Smith seems to be coming under quite a bit of fire recently.

Maybe it’s because the ‘Latch’ star has been catapulted quite so suddenly and so emphatically to the levels of superstardom he is now at, but the softly spoken crooner seems to be getting more and more flack with each passing day. The new out of court settlement Tom Petty has just got from him, then, will delight Smith detractors, as Smith’s now-trademark single ‘Stay With Me’ has been deemed to be similar enough to Petty’s track ‘I Won’t Back Down’ to warrant Petty being credited as a co-writer of Smith’s track. Plagiarism suits seem to be becoming quite a regular occurrence in the music world as of late – rock band Spirit’s claim that Led Zeppelin stole the riff for ‘Stairway to Heaven’ from their track, ‘Taurus,’ comes to mind as a recent example.

Is Petty’s claim here fair, or one of the more dubious ones?

Personally, I think this example veers a lot more towards the ‘speculative’ side. Whilst the two tracks admittedly have a very similar (ok, the same) melody for their titular refrains, the melody is used in such a different context within each song that it becomes pretty clear that Smith was not plagiarising anyone when he penned his hit. Petty’s track has a distinct chugging, classic rock atmosphere and his delivery of the line in question is halted and defiant. ‘Stay With Me,’ on the other hand, is more richly produced and sprawling in its instrumentation, with a loose, ringing piano banging out the main chords, later being fleshed out by lush strings. The two songs are going for such completely different atmospheres musically – even down to how the two lines of such purported similarity are delivered – that it seems ridiculous for Petty to have any writing credits for Smith’s track.

Don’t believe me? Fortunately, if we want to get technical about it, if we have a look at the chords underlying the section in question of each track, it actually has a different chord progression to Petty’s classic. Smith’s song is in C Major and follows a vi – IV - I (A Minor, F, C) progression, whereas Petty’s chorus follows a vi – V – I (in this case the song is in G Major, so that’s E Minor, D, G) pattern. The key difference here is between the second chord, and with such a simple progression repeated so many times, as is the case with both tracks, this one disparity has a massive effect. So not only are the songs different as it is on a superficial level, when we actually have a boring, more technical look at it like the above one, we can see that the finer details are surely different enough to dispel Petty’s claims to any authorship of Smith’s song, too.

Apparently, though, the powers that be did not see things this way, as Petty has, after all, ended up with the all-important writing credit and out-of-court settlement. Should Smith’s song go on to win yet more awards – which does seem pretty likely based on its current success – Petty will receive them, too. This doesn’t seem fair to me. The tracks are different enough both in their actual chord progressions and also in their atmosphere and whole ambiance that Petty getting a writing credit for the modern tune just seems ridiculous to me; they’re two completely different songs, and even the oh-so-controversial titular lines are different enough in each that it just seems bizarre that Petty has even filed his suit, let alone won it. But hey, maybe it’s just cool to not like Sam Smith now.

A few months ago, Sam Smith came to an arrangement with Jeff Lynne and Tom Petty, having copied the melody and underlying chord sequence of Petty’s 1989 hit, ‘I Won’t Back Down’ in Smith’s own song, ‘Stay With Me’. It was only this week that the details came to light - Petty and Lynne received co-authorship credit and 12.5 per cent of the royalties to ‘Stay With Me’. Many had noticed it at the time of the single’s release, so this news came as little surprise.

It’s not the most egregious example from recent years (that would be One Direction copy-pasting the backing track to ‘Baba O’Riley’ for ‘Best Song Ever’. Seriously, they may as well have broken into the Decca vaults and nicked the original tape for all the difference between the two songs), but there’s no denying it. That said, all the talk of direct plagiarism belies the point that none of his songs are particularly original; Smith’s discography is a seemingly unending series of bland melodies on top of clichéd chord progressions, songs that a proper musician could write in their sleep. The only thing different about ‘Stay With Me’ is that it’s ripping off one song rather than thousands.

Anyone who has ever written a song will tell you how easy it is to hear a catchy melody and accidentally integrate it into something you’ve written. Paul McCartney was so convinced that he was stealing the melody to ‘Yesterday’ from someone else that he spent months asking anyone he could in the music industry whether they had heard it before. Only once he was fully convinced that it was his own creation did he record it. If we take Smith’s word that it was all a massive coincidence, surely someone must have pointed out the similarities at some stage before it was released to the public. He should have either rewritten it or simply not released it, the latter of which would have at least saved us having to hear yet another Sam Smith song.

Smith’s popularity also speaks to a larger point, a more worrying trend in the music presented to us. It’s a damning indictment on today’s charts that all it takes for someone like Smith to be heralded as a brilliant singer-songwriter is the ability to play four chords on the piano and a voice that would just about pass for ‘soulful’ on The X Factor. This isn’t just Sam Smith - acts like Adele and Ed Sheeran have benefited from being an average talent at best in a Top 40 filled with auto-tuned crap. It’s all equally formulaic, but it’s got to be better if there’s a piano or guitar, right?

Maybe I’m being too harsh on Smith. Like I said, it’s easy to accidentally rip people off. I cribbed that Paul McCartney anecdote from Craig Cross’s book The Beatles: Day-by-Day, Song-by-Song, Record-by-Record, and just about rephrased it enough. Perhaps we’re both just hacks, but I’m citing my sources in a student newspaper and he’s claiming ignorance on a quadruple-platinum album.

Ultimately, this isn’t going to damage Smith’s career. His fans will remain, his detractors likewise. The gigs will sell out and the albums will fly off the shelves. Well, for a couple of years, at any rate. Few acts pass the test of time, and so far Smith hasn’t offered up anything worthy of surviving the selective filtering that we’ll apply in 50 years when complaining that music was better in our day. Jeff Lynne and Tom Petty are assured their place in musical history, but Sam Smith will be forgotten as quickly as he arrived.

Tom Gellatly, 3rd year, English

Sam Healer, 3rd year, Computer Science

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THE NEW ORLEANS OF THE UK? BRISTOL’S LEADING JAZZ/ BLUES CULTURE Gunseli Yalcinkaya gets some valuable life lessons in In the first of our new series, looking at the Bristol music scene, Matt Townsend gives us his own personal experience with the Jazz/ Blues genres...

who played the sax solo in James Brown’s ‘I Feel Good’ even got up and played.

For me though, the high point of the festival was the Saturday night, when Bristol’s newly appointed ‘Music Ambassador’, James Morton, and his group The Rawness hit the stage. As soon as they broke into their first song, it was as if a high voltage current swept through the crowd with euphoric consequences.

I simply could not get enough of this group who, as luck would have it, played every Saturday down on Corn Street.

After going on about this to nearly everyone I knew, it turned out my friend’s favourite guitarist was The Rawness’ own Alex Hutchings! So, we obviously made it down to their next gig. Getting to see him meet Alex and even have a go playing his guitar was pretty darn moving.

relationships, feminism and internet trolls

‘‘It was as if a high voltage current swept through the crowd with euphoric consequences.’

Anyway, getting to be in such close proximity to world class musicians in a typically relaxed, Bristolian atmosphere is one of the main reasons to love the scene here! This place hasn’t just lived up to expectations, it has far exceeded them!

Matt Townsend, Second year, History

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flickr: Roving Eye 365

If you are anything like me, Bristol’s music scene was a large part of your decision to spend your undergraduate years here. So has it lived up to expectations?

Bristol is known worldwide for its role in the emergence of Trip Hop, Drum and Bass, and Dub Step. However, I can’t pretend to have even the slightest idea about those genres. What I know and love is Jazz and Blues music, and here the city does not disappoint! Sometimes referred to as the ‘New Orleans of the UK’, Bristol ‘s vibrant atmosphere and festival vibes put it at the forefront of the Jazz/Blues genres.

The musical community in Bristol is very tight-knit; in fact, owing to the small size of the city, most musicians tend to know each other, and often collaborate to produce innovative new sounds. Don’t be fooled either into thinking that just because this place is smaller than say, London, the musicians are any less talented. This city is in fact home to some of the world’s premier Jazz musicians, such as saxophonist Andy Shepherd.

In terms of my personal experiences with the music scene here, two have stood out in particular: volunteering at the Bristol Jazz and Blues Festival, and discovering James Morton’s residency at Copper Jack’s. The atmosphere at the Festival was exhilarating as jazz and blues fans from Bristol and beyond descended on Colston Hall. The late night jams were, unsurprisingly, of supreme quality. Pee Wee Ellis, the guy

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Groundbreaking research in Antarctica

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Epigram Science reports on Bristol’s part in the first group of researchers sampling the ground zone in Antarctica Matt Davis Science Writer The extreme conditions that he would face on the southernmost continent; hazardous mountainous terrain, crevasses and average temperatures of below -57C; did not put off Professor Martyn Tranter to become part of the first ever group of researchers to sample the grounding zone in Antarctica.

“ it will cause sea levels to change

possibly cause it to collapse into the Ross Sea

The drilling took placed on the Ross Ice Shelf, which is the largest ice sheet floating at this moment in time: it is roughly the same as three UKs. This is one of the most remote places on Earth, 850km from the edge of the Antarctic ice sheet. Some theories suggest that warmer water might enter the grounding zones as a result of climate change, causing partial melting of the base of the ice sheet.

This might increase the instability of the ice sheet and possibly cause it to collapse into the Ross Sea, causing the sea level to rise globally. Even small ice sheets contain enough stored water to cause significant increases in sea levels.

“ the best we can do is monitor the situation

This research will help scientists understand the future consequences of the warm water intrusion into the ground zone and also the ability of various animals to survive in harsh conditions. How the ice sheets in Antarctica will respond to climate change is out of our control, the best we can do is monitor the situation, and try to predict future events from what is, relative to Antarctica, a very small borehole.

Flickr: : JasonJThomas

The grounding zone is where the sea, sheet ice and Antarctic ground land mass all meet. The hope was that an investigation of this area may provide clues and insight into climate change by learning more about the stability of the sheet ice in Western Antarctica and how fast it will cause sea levels to change. Suffice to say this was not an easy task, and involved cutting through almost half a mile of solid ice (740m) using a hot water drill. Antarctica’s ice is layered, with each layer containing evidence about what the world was like when that layer was formed. By drilling deep holes researchers can read a narrative, not just about Antarctica, but also about the world in general.

Antarctic drilling has revealed much about what an earlier earth’s climate, atmosphere and sea-level was like.

After the borehole was drilled it was a race against time to collect as much data as possible before it closed again, this involved over 40 researchers working around the clock. A remotely operated vehicle was deployed to search the marine area at the bottom of the borehole. Unexpectedly, the vehicle came across fish, invertebrates and other animals surviving in the highly challenging, very cold and

permanently dark environment. This was the most surprising discovery of the expedition, as this is the closest any marine animals have been found to the South Pole. It was thought that the constant darkness and freezing temperature would be unsuitable to support life.

Robots co-operate in performing tasks Mike Sampson Science Writer

Flickr: : PVBroadz

Fans of films such as I-Robot may start to see, what once felt like farfetched fiction, seep into reality as robotics took another huge leap forward in 2014. Although robots have been known to work together with humans to varying degrees, last year it was found for the first time that some of these machines can work together without human supervision.

The public need not fear however, as although it is thought work in robotics is creeping ever closer to achieving artificial intelligence equivalent to that of humans, there is still a long way to go. It may therefore seem that

it is premature for researchers to be getting robots to work together; especially as many roboticists are still working to improve robots ability to sense their surroundings and respond to unfamiliar situations.

Yet, researchers have managed to create new software which makes robots capable of co-operating on rudimentary tasks.

The activities the robots cooperated in range from building simple structures to radioing their locations to one another in order to move in formations. However, they are still running on relatively crude information and are very limited in their abilities to detect one another and achieve complex tasks.

Many doubt whether it will ever be possible for robots to completely catch up with human minds. However, neuroscience seems to be ever more certain that the mind is computational, thus we cannot continue to assume human superiority will persist.

The research into robotics is bound to be an area which will shape the next few decades, especially as sci-fi films based on future robotics seem more and more like the reality we live in at present. So, whilst there is no need to panic that there will be an uprising of machines, it is undoubtable that as technology catches up with us, robots will continue to chip away at the assumed superiority of humans as a species.

Sport

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The ski’s the limit

Marcus Price Sport Features Writer

is unprecedented and must in part be attributed to the 140m push-start track located at the University of Bath, where athletes are able to practice the crucial start to the skeleton event.

Elsewhere, Kelly Gallagher and her guide, Charlotte Evans, won Great Britain’s first-ever gold medal at the Winter Paralympics with victory in the visually-impaired Super-G. They were joined on the podium by Jade Etherington who, having already won silver in the downhill competition, secured a further bronze medal. Further records were enshrined with Jenny Jones, who won Great Britain’s first ever medal on snow in Winter Olympic history, taking bronze in the snowboard slopestyle, and by Elise Christie, who became the European Short Track Speed Skating champion.

While many of these names may have escaped the public radar, the success of athletes such as Lizzy Yarnold, (pictured, l.) Kelly Gallagher and Charlotte Evans and their subsequent nominations for Sport’s Personality of the Year has been vital for increasing the popularity of Winter sports and, indeed, securing funding for the future. Owing to the achievements of Sochi and other such competitions, funding for various Winter sports has more than doubled for the next four years, with notable improvements in skeleton, going from £3,447,600 in 2010-2014 to £6,549,617 in 2014-2018 and in para alpine skiing, going from £405,400 to £2,749,000.

The dramatic increase in funding is a statement that this success is merely a benchmark for British Winter sports and that we can expect to see a few more gold medallists in the near future. And so, as I make the transfer across the border to Valmorel, I shall fall asleep to dreams of tearing the slope up at Pyeongchang 2018.

Maybe I’d better stick to Ski Sunday.

Flickr: Roy, Sport Relief 2014

Whether it’s a half-term excursion to Val-d’Isère with mummy and daddy or a lads’ trip to Bulgaria, the chances are that the middle-class students of Bristol (yes, that’s you) will have undergone the Instagram-inspiring, arse-numbing experience of skiing. And for those who feel I’m being prejudiced or even hypocritical, I’m not. In fact, I am writing this in Gatwick’s North Terminal on my way to Geneva. Am I middle-class? Yes. Will I Instagram this? Probably. Do I care? Not a chance.

While it is indubitable that skiing provides we British with everything we love, namely an opportunity to dump the kids for the entire day, use our legs for something other than our lightweight, carbon-fibre, 216-gear racing bikes and have a jolly good moan at the French population’s inability to queue, we have traditionally left the competitive element of the sport to the Europeans, the Scandinavians and our cousins across the pond. However, in more recent years it has emerged that our tiny, mountainless island has managed to gain serious footholds in the world of winter sports.

Long gone are the days of British ski jumper Eddie ‘The Eagle’ Edwards, who, described by one Italian journalist as a ‘ski dropper’, came last in both the 70m and 90m competitions at the Calgary Winter Olympics in 1988. Hailed as an embodiment of the plucky underdog spirit of Great Britain, he was resented by all those who dearly loved the sport; his inclusion led to a changing of the qualifying regulations, requiring all competitors to meet specific standards. Oddly enough, Eddie ‘The Eagle’ never quite made the cut after that.

While the next few decades brought little in terms of British achievement in Winter

sports, success made its way back into the public eye in the form of Amy Williams, who won gold in the skeleton at the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Games. Since then, skeleton has significantly grown in popularity and, as such, has brought with it considerably more British success. Williams’ victory was followed four years later in Sochi by Lizzy Yarnold, whose performance ensured the Olympic title remained in British hands. Mention must also go to Laura Deas, who has finished on the podium on more than one occasion during the course of the skeleton World Cup season and to Dom Parsons, who made an Olympic debut in Sochi. Such success in a country usually stopped in its tracks by the merest glimpse of snow

BUCS back with a bang in 2015 Edward Henderson-Howat Online Sport Editor

The women’s badminton 1st team beat the University of Gloucestershire 8-0 at home on the 4th February but the boys were on the receiving end of a whitewash as they went down 0-8 to Bath Spa. In basketball, the women’s team won a tightly fought game 74-71 against Winchester (see page 54).

Women’s football are fighting a mid-table battle. They drew 11 with UWE on January 28th and enjoyed a crucial 3-0 victory over Exeter on the 4th. However, the men’s team continued their struggle losing 2-1 to Hartpury College.

Men’s hockey scored a huge 3-2 victory over Exeter 1s while the ladies drew 0-0 on the 4th.

The girls’ lacrosse team put up a brilliant fight against Exeter to come back from 7-3 down at half-time to draw 10-10.

Unfortunately, the men couldn’t repeat this performance as they lost 10-4 to the same opposition.

Bath came up trumps in netball, beating Bristol 51-46 while in rugby league, the men lost two in a row as they were downed 22-0

by Exeter and blown away 52-16 by UWE. Women’s rugby, one of Bristol’s best performing teams this year, smashed Plymouth 75-0 on the 28th and gave it their all in a 17-17 draw with Cardiff a week later. Meanwhile, the men’s XV survived relegation as they beat Swansea (see back page).

On the squash court, Bristol’s men triumphed over Exeter and Cardiff Met. The men’s tennis team also enjoyed success as they beat Cardiff Met on the 28th. The women lost against Bath on the 28th and drew with Exeter on the 4th.

We now move towards quarter finals and varsity. Keep a look out for our special feature on the UoB-UWE rivalry in next fortnight’s paper and as ever, check out our website for all the latest news and match reports.

1st Team Fixtures WEDNESDAY 11th FEBRUARY HOME Women’s Football v Uni of South Wales Women’s Netball v Southampton Men’s Rugby v Hartpury College AWAY Men’s Volleyball v Exeter WEDNESDAY 18th FEB HOME Women’s Badminton v Oxford Men’s Football v Uni of Glos.

Women’s Football v Oxford Women’s Football v East London Women’s Rugby v Sussex AWAY Women’ s Basketball v Birmingham Men’s Rugby League v Cambridge Men’s Volleyball v Aberystwyth

Epigram

09.02.2015

54

Clubs playing the patriot game?

Conor Gogarty Sport Features Writer

that African footballers have started to regard representing their countries as a chore. One need only cast their mind back to last summer’s World Cup, in which the campaigns of Cameroon,

would routinely ask to be withdrawn from international duty. This is not something that is limited to a continent; it is not even limited to players. The media, fans and players alike have begun to move on from international football.

Once upon a time, the World Cup was considered to be the highest level of professional football. Such was its power that Brazil’s Pele became a global legend on the back of just 14, admittedly magical World Cup games.

The residence of Pele atop “greatest players of the twentieth century” polls tends to be challenged only by Maradona, also best known for performances in the World Cup. In recent years, however, the club game has stolen the thunder of its international counterpart. Nowhere is this more in evidence than in the 2014 Ballon d’Or ceremony, where Cristiano Ronaldo received the World Flickr: menosultra

A young winger by the name of Jeffrey Schlupp scored the decisive goal for Leicester in their recent FA Cup fourth-round victory over Tottenham. The pacey Ghanaian was a constant threat down the left flank, and capped a fine display with an unorthodox flicked winner that Michel Vorm should probably have saved.

Schlupp’s big moment against Tottenham has, however, been overshadowed by controversy. The goal occurred at a time when, over 3500 miles away in Equatorial Guinea, Ghana were preparing to face South Africa in their final Africa Cup of Nations group game. Leicester had withdrawn Schlupp from the Ghana squad a week before the tournament started, citing a knee injury. It is no surprise, then, that the player’s appearance at White Hart Lane has led to uproar in his homeland. Though Leicester have washed their hands of any wrongdoing, the Telegraph has reported Ghana head coach Avram Grant to be “infuriated” by the situation.

The impressive nature of Schlupp’s performance only served to rub salt in Ghanaian wounds. His play, exuberant and dynamic, was that of an athlete in prime condition. Schlupp’s transgression is the footballing equivalent of phoning in sick to work, before uploading pictures to Instagram of a lunch with the boss of a rival firm.

A similar hullabaloo has arisen

over West Ham forward Diafra Sakho’s absence from the Senegal squad. Days before he was due to join up, West Ham announced that the striker had suffered a back injury which would prevent him from flying for six weeks, and thereby from playing in the same tournament. The Senegalese Football Federation greeted this claim with a scepticism that proved to be wellfounded; Sakho was back playing for his club within three weeks. The day after Schlupp scored the late winner in a cup tie, Sakho did the same with an extra-time header against Bristol City.

West Ham manager Sam Allardyce was given the unenviable task of explaining how a player could be unfit to fly, but perfectly capable of scoring in the advanced stages of the FA Cup. Allardyce stressed that Sakho was still in such a delicate condition that he had required a limousine to transport him to the Bristol City stadium.

Given that the player had emerged unscathed from an encounter with a horde of lower-league journeymen hungry for Premier League blood, though, this defence convinced few Senegalese and amused many neutrals.

It is difficult to determine exactly who was responsible for the absence of Schlupp and Sakho from the Africa Cup of Nations. One suspects, however, that if they had really wanted to be with their international teammates in Equatorial Guinea, they would have been.

Do these controversies show that players are losing their appetite for international football? There is no shortage of evidence for the claim

Nigeria and Ghana were soured by rows over bonuses and allegations of match fixing.

Yet, it becomes evident upon close inspection that the issue is much broader. Harry Redknapp has revealed that, while manager of Tottenham, the English contingent of his squad

Player of the Year award. Although Ronaldo’s achievements in 2014 were undoubtedly remarkable, his World Cup performances were indifferent.

The German side that won the World Cup, and did so in outstandingly impressive fashion, was largely ignored at the ceremony. It had only three representatives in the Team of the Year and a token nomination for World Player of the Year.

Another, slightly more obscure indication of our attitude towards international football relates to one of Schlupp’s Ghana teammates.

Asamoah Gyan is often the object of ridicule because of his decision to leave top-level club football at the prime of his career for a payday in the United Arab Emirates. Unlike Schlupp, however, Gyan’s priorities have always been with his country. He is the captain of Ghana and their highestever goalscorer, having netted for them in eight major tournaments.

The day before Schlupp’s controversial goal, Ghana had a crucial group stage tie against Algeria.

In the ninetieth minute, Gyan, who had played the entire match despite suffering from a mild bout of malaria, burst through to score the winner and keep alive his country’s hopes of qualification. As he had done on countless previous occasions, Gyan showed himself to be a true national hero. Perhaps, if he had been born twenty years earlier, he would have the respect of the wider footballing world too.

Women’s Basketball bounce back Tom McCarthy Sports Reporter

University of Bristol Women’s Basketball prevailed over their high-flying Winchester University rivals recently in the sports hall in a memorably end-to-end basketball match. Bristol began desperately needing a win, residing bottom of the Western 1A Table (1-5), while Winchester were coming off a twogame winning streak, cementing their position in third (3-4).

In the first quarter, Bristol won the tip off and came out firing. Team captain Naz Saghafian impressed early, dominating the first quarter offensively (16 pts. 2stl). The hosts opted for a zonal defence that began shakily, but proved effective against a Winchester team that lacked the perimeter shooters to take advantage.

Early on, it was clear that it would be a very physical game and every loose ball would be a fight. Bristol played with more heart and were rewarded for it, the quarter ended with them ahead 21-20.

Bristol employed some incredibly effective counter-attacking basketball in the second quarter. On the break, the hosts were lethal, leaving Winchester looking like their feet were set in concrete. However, when the guests were able to slow the pace

of the game down, they took control, going on a 13-2 run and dominating the offensive glass. Bristol held in on with a strong defensive performance, and were able to reduce the gap towards the end of the first half. A great performance from Adrienne Lee saw her sink three straight buckets and take a heavy charge in the offensive key, winning possession at a vital point of the game. At the end of the half, Bristol were behind 35-40.

a 17-2 run for the away side who were 37-54 up when Bristol called a much needed time-out with 4 minutes 30 seconds left on the clock. Winchester’s bench were in great spirits while the home side received a well-deserved earful from their coach. Back on court, Bristol failed to trouble the scorers again, only for the visitors to counter and sink a three-pointer, increasing their lead to 20 points (the highest of the game). Fortunately, the home

Whatever the coach said to Winchester at the half-time break paid dividends, as they came out all guns blazing. Well-paced play, thoughtful passing and solid defence resulted in

side’s shooting slump was broken by Maria Marshelli, who sunk a welltimed jumper from just outside the key. Thanks to this change in fortunes, Bristol gained confidence and were

able to reduce the gap to 13 points. At the end of third quarter, Bristol were behind 45-58.

In the final quarter, the mighty maroons displayed some great team basketball. They collaborated well by controlling their zones under the defensive glass and were once again lethal coast-to-coast on the fast break. The quarter opened with the home side going on a 7-0 run, forcing Winchester into a time-out. The break did little to cool the shooting streak however, as Bristol extended their run to 16-2, forcing a second time-out to be called by the away side, in a desperate attempt to stem the tide.

Winchester had given up trying to keep up with the counter attack at this point, but instead attempted to remain offensively effective. With 2 minutes 30 seconds left on the clock, Bristol were only three points behind with the score at 68-71.

After the break, Winchester lost their third-quarter control. Poor passing, wild air balls, and even a five-second violation on an inbound pass under the offensive glass which gave Bristol possession, and an opportunity to narrow the lead to one point. They missed this chance, with Winchester blocking the ball defiantly and taking it to the other end, only for their shot to be blocked. Immediately afterwards, Bristol scored on the counter attack to make it 70-71.

To hold onto their lead, Winchester really needed the next bucket, but missed and were forced to foul, taking Bristol’s captain Saghafian to the free-throw line with a chance to take the lead.

The pressure was on, but her efforts in sinking both ensured Bristol took the lead for the first time since the first quarter, 72-71. Winchester looked shell-shocked, and called a time-out to bring the ball to half-court. Their resultant inbound pass was stolen by the Bristol captain, forcing another foul and taking Saghafian back to the free throw line. She sank both without breaking a sweat, making it 74-71 to Bristol. Winchester, looking fatigued both physically and mentally but spurned a chance to take the game into overtime with a three-point play.

Winchester dragged the ball to the offensive half, but it was stolen again by Saghafian who was fouled and brought back to the free-throw line. She only needed to score one for the game to be out of reach for Winchester, and despite missing the first, she made the second, only for it to be disallowed as with a foot over the foul line. Winchester desperately tried to find three points in the little time they had left, but failed. The home side had throughout played with more heart and it paid off with a 74-71 success and 30 points for Saghafian.

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