Finding small joys in lockdown Lifestyle 16
Sports Commitee on their mental health video that’s attracted thousands of views
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Forge Press ISSUE 149 | MONDAY 30 NOVEMBER 2020
THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD’S INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER
Sheffield Hallam MP backs student petition to house asylum seekers in vacant University accommodation
Campaigners for Sheffield STAR outside the Home Office. Credit: Juliette Barriac
Jack Mattless Olivia Blake, the Labour MP for Sheffield Hallam, has offered her support to a joint petition by Sheffield Student Action for Refugees (STAR) and ASSIST Sheffield, calling for asylum seekers to be housed in unused accommodation owned by the University. She told Forge Press: “Asylum seekers risk homelessness and
destitution this winter. Campaigns like ASSIST do fantastic work in providing housing to asylum seekers but they’re battling against a clear shortage of suitable accommodation. “I 100 per cent oppose the ‘hostile environment’ and no recourse to public funds rules. The government should provide more support to people who have fled violent and dangerous situations, and it should stop all evictions – I
applaud attempts to find suitable accommodation for asylum seekers.” The petition, which has amassed nearly 700 signatures, was started by STAR after the Home Office resumed evicting asylum seekers from emergency accommodation earlier this month. Under current UK law, asylum seekers without a residential address are expected to leave the country within 21 days. Continued on page 4 >>
FORGETODAY.COM
Students divided on University adopting IHRA antisemitism definition Pippa Coleshill Sheffield SU’s Palestine Society are seeking support to challenge the University’s proposed adoption of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism on the grounds that it could infringe on other minorities’ rights to freedom of expression. In a statement, the Palestine Society criticised the University for “rushing” through the adoption of the IHRA definition and shortening the consultation period that was promised to the Jewish community and other stakeholders. The University of Sheffield Students’ Union already adopted the definition in 2018. Now, Jewish students are looking for the natural progression of events to be the University’s adoption. The Palestine Society statement reads: “We strongly believe that the document makes a poor contribution towards tackling antisemitism; it generates further marginalisation and discrimination rather than tackling it; and is a threat to freedom of speech and of scholarly inquiry. “While some of the IHRA’s ‘illustrations’ of antisemitism are easy to understand and unambiguous, others, which relate to Israel and Zionism, refer to highly contested historical and political issues.
“We believe that these illustrative examples, if adopted by our University, will lead to serious implications for, as previously stated, freedom of speech, academic study, as well as the ability for Palestinian students to express their identity, understand their historical heritage, and campaign for their political and national rights. “We do not deny the benefits of adopting a definition of antisemitism, nor do we deny that anyone should want the possible protection that a definition could provide, we believe that it is the right of minority groups to be able to define the nature of the oppression they face. However, this should not be achieved in a way that silences the ongoing struggle for liberation of another minority group, in this case, the Palestinian people. “We believe in the intersectionality of struggle for freedom, and value of all oppressed groups working together to address unfairness, prejudice and discrimination in all societies.” The society insists that at the very least, there should be a reasonable time frame for consultation on the definition as was first agreed upon by the University. The statement continues: “By adopting this definition, the University would be silencing Continued on page 6>>
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Forge Press
Letter from the Editor FORGE PRESS EDITORIAL TEAM Editor-in-Chief
Kate Procter
Deputy Editor
Emily Evans
Deputy Editor
Taylor Ogle
Managing Editor Becky Sliwa Webb Head of Design George Tuli Head of Photography Rebekah Lowri Head of Online Rahul Warrier Head of Marketing Harry Daniels Inclusions & Welfare Officer Bethan Davis Production Assistant Sraddha Sabu Production Assistant Kirsty Hamilton-Emery Head of News Jack Mattless News Editor Sophie Henderson News Editor Hannah Ahmed News Editor Pippa Coleshill Features Editor Anastasia Koutsounia Features Editor Dana Raer Opinion Editor Ella Craig Opinion Editor Bernadette Hsaio Science & Tech Editor Louise Elliott Science & Tech Editor Sarah Laptain Lifestyle Editor Claire Gelhaus Lifestyle Editor Eve Thomas Break Editor John Gilding Break Editor Emily Stainforth Arts & Theatre Editor Jack Redfern Arts & Theatre Editor Betty Wilson Music Editor Thomas Hirst Screen Editor Annabel Goldsmith Screen Editor Kerry Violet Games Editor Catherine Lewis Games Editor Joe Warner Head of Sport Harry Harrison Sport Editor Patrick Burke Sport Editor Tom Coates
Get involved Do you want to get involved with Forge Press for the 2020/21 academic year? We’d love to hear from you! Check out the ‘Forge Press Contributors’ group on Facebook to find out more. Contact editor@forgetoday.com or message us on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.
“Keep your chin up”
U
nder normal circumstances, November can be a difficult month at university. The workload is piling up and deadlines are closing in. Normally, this pressure can be balanced with pub nights and gatherings with friends and coursemates - maybe even a late-night study session in the library. However, this semester has been a blur of tricky tier restrictions, socially distanced teaching, and too many video calls to count without the usual outlets for fun. Next week England parts ways with its second national lockdown, but Sheffield will be left in the new Tier 3 category. These restrictions mean pub nights are still a thing of the past, and while the libraries are beginning to extend their hours, large course gatherings are still not back on the timetable. As December is fast approaching many students are having to make tough decisions about the holiday season. The government has announced a student travel window for those wishing to return home for the winter break, and the university is offering free Covid-19 testing for asymptomatic students. Despite these measures, many students are making tough decisions about travel over the break. As an international student, I am one of the many people making tough phone calls with disappointed family members. While sizing up the health risks for yourself and your family isn’t what anybody wants to do in place of baking cookies and decorating, many are making extra efforts to protect the ones they love. Contrary to all this, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. In the past week, exciting new vaccine advancements have been announced (p.19). Matt Hancock is
asking the NHS to prepare for the roll out of the vaccine imminently. New mass testing regimes are being implemented. We’re still in the woods, but the trees are beginning to part for a bright winter sun. While this semester isn’t what anyone expected, our resilience as a student body serves to highlight the strength of our will to keep going and keep learning in unprecedented times. Keep your chin up,
Taylor Ogle Deputy Editor
Monday 30 November 2020
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NEWS Students campaign against gendered violence Page 7 ▶
OPINION Why friendship doesn’t mean having the same political views Page 11 ▶
ARTS & THEATRE Theatre Review: Emilia Page 28 ▶
Credit: George Tuli
The big picture Head of Design, George Tuli, reflects on the changing of Autumn to Winter, and taking advantage of early walks, a unique opportunity to absorb nature, even in the City.
I’ve lived overlooking Rivelin Valley for one and a half years, so I’ve seen it change through all the seasons. From becoming steadily greener during the Spring as buds open and new leaves emerge, via glowing with warm, rich hues in the Autumn, to senescing in the Winter into a monotonous grey-brown. At this time of year, the hours of daylight are noticably shorter. We wake up and go to bed in the dark. And sometimes the Sheffield sky is so thick with clouds and mist the Sun barely breaks through. In this photo - my favourite I’ve taken of the valley - the mist from a recent rainfall and smoke from people’s chimneys coalesce into a blanket covering the valley. As Winter progresses and the air becomes colder, there are many more misty mornings to look
forward to. I’ve made a new goal to go for a walk while the Sun is rising each day to make the most of the few daylight hours we have in the Winter, and to take full advantage of the emptiness of the park early in the morning. So far, these walks have shown me just how much nature there is right on my doorstep. I’ve seen more species of bird than I normally would. Flocks of long-tailed tits and goldfinches, a goldcrest (the UK’s smallest bird), robins, blackbirds, and a jay. Further into the valley, by the river Rivelin, I even saw my first kingfisher, a flash of bright blue and orange as it flew by. If you’re able, I suggest taking an early morning walk, and taking a moment to absorb the nature around you. Even in a city, there’s more than first meets the eye.
MUSIC Interivew: APRE on lockdown creativity Page 30 ▶
GAMES Why Nintentogs was my gaming ‘wow’ moment Page 36 ▶
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News
It’s understood the University of Sheffield told ASSIST that all accommodation was occupied for the duration of the autumn semester, with a meeting planned next month to work out a strategy for the remainder of the academic year. But Juliette Barriac, a STAR volunteer and History and French student, said the University’s initial response had been “terrible”. “When [Vice Chancellor] Koen Lamberts was appointed he said that Sheffield was a civic university and
would work with the community to improve the lives of everyone living here. “To deny fifteen individuals the chance of having a safe and warm place to sleep considering the suffering they’ve already been put through is just the opposite of what he said when he took office. “It’s a confusing and scary time for everyone at the moment. The Home Office evictions are dangerous and we need to be there for those in need.” A spokesperson from the University of Sheffield said: “We recognise this is a really important
students to still return home for Christmas even if they test positive in this period. Universities are expected to make plans for the staggered return of students, working with local public health officials and transport operators. More details are to be shared with students this week.
However, the University and College Union’s General Secretary, Jo Grady, said the Government plans are “riddled with holes”. She told the PA news agency: “Allowing just a week for around one million students to travel across the country leaves little room for error. “If the Government instead told
>>continued from Page 1
Sheffield students start petition for unused accomodation to house refugees
Left: Olivia Blake MP, Credit: Chelsea Burrell. Above: STAR campaigners, Credit: Juliette Barriac
issue and are keen to do anything we can to help. “Our University accommodation is currently under contract to students but we’ve been discussing this issue with ASSIST Sheffield and are raising its request with city partners to explore how we could support.”
Rapid Covid-19 testing centre set to open in the Octagon Pippa Coleshill The University of Sheffield’s rapid Covid-19 testing centre is set to open in the Octagon from Monday 30 November. The centre will allow asymptomatic students to get a Covid-19 test before returning home for Christmas. The opening of the rapid test centre comes after the government set out their official guidelines detailing the student travel window. From 3 December to 9 December, students will be allowed to travel home on staggered departure dates set by universities. The guidelines also advised all face-to-face learning will be moved online by 9 December so students
can continue their education while also having the option to return home to study from there. University Minister, Michelle Donelan, said: “We know this Christmas will feel different, and following this incredibly difficult year we are delivering on our commitment to get students back to their loved ones as safely as possible for the holidays. ” The Lateral Flow Test delivers results in just 30 minutes without the need for a laboratory. The University has said they hope to have the capacity to test up to 16,000 students per week should there be the demand. If a student tests positive in this window, they must remain at university and self-isolate for 10 days. Testing early will allow
The Octagon. Credit: Jack Mattless
universities to move online now it would provide much more time to stagger the movement of students and better protect the health of staff, students and their wider communities.”
Monday 30 November 2020
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News
University extends library opening hours as students report difficulty finding study spaces
Sophie Henderson
Jack Mattless The University of Sheffield has confirmed that Western Bank Library and the Information Commons will be open for longer periods from Satursday 28 November. Pre-booked study will be avaliable between 9.30am and 9.30pm from Monday to Friday, alongside re-opening between 9.30am and 4.30pm on weekends. The move aims to ease pressure on library services, which have become increasingly busy in recent weeks with students battling for space to complete mid-term assignments amidst national lockdown restrictions. However it’s understood the Diamond will remain closed for independent study and that students remaining in Sheffield for the Christmas break will have limited access to facilities from 18 December, with Western Bank Library due to close and the IC only open on weekdays between 9.30am and 4.:30pm until 3 January at the earliest. Emily Evans, a third year English Language and Literature student, told Forge Press it is“simply not possible to find a library slot available for the following day” with the current provisions. She said: “It’s got to be 48 hours prior, and knowing whether you need to go to the library that far in advance is next level planning. “I can’t bear to think what it’s going to be like during exam season.” Other students have suggested simply extending opening hours in a limited fashion won’t necessarily fix the problem. Fred Baker, a Politics and International Relations student said he was pleased to see the SU maintaining some great study
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The zombie library system we currently have has taken something fundamental away from the university experience - James Turrell
Student opinion split over move to online teaching
spaces but that he was “pretty spontaneous” with his work so that “booking slots at the library feels strange”. He also added that the rules around taking out books hadn’t been clear to him and many of his classmates for the duration of the semester. Physical library shelves are currently inaccessible and, according to the University website, book borrowing is currently reserved for students with “research needs”. For James Turrell, an MA Librarianship student, the loss of physicality has proved a substantial problem. He told Forge Press: “At its heart the library is about things; books, DVDS, journals, newspapers and even sheet music. Under the current rules, there can be no borrowing of physical resources or even browsing of the shelves. “Studying on paper and studying on screen are vastly different experiences. He added: “For me, the biggest loss from these Covid measures is the loss of serendipity. The feeling of browsing the shelves looking for nothing particular and coming across the perfect book for your essay or finding a film you’ve always meant to watch but never got around to. “The zombie library system we currently have has taken something fundamental away from the
Image: Hannah Ahmed
university experience, one which may take us a long time to get back.” A spokesperson for the University said: “The health and safety of our students and staff is always our number one priority, so throughout the pandemic we have focused on providing a high-quality library experience online. This way, students are able to access content and resources 24 hours a day and we are able to support the largest number of students at any one time. “We realise students having access to study spaces is really important however, so the library has been working hard to safely increase staff numbers.” “As well as the Information Commons and Western Bank library facilities, students are able to book study space at a wide range of locations around campus, including various campus buildings such as the Hadfield building and Bartolome House, Inox Dine, within the Students’ Union and study/social spaces for residents at multiple student accommodation locations. To help keep students safe, we ask them to book a study slot to access spaces before arriving at their chosen location. “We will continue to review study space availability in light of student demand, while doing all we can to keep our students and staff as safe as possible.”
The University of Sheffield is moving all teaching online by 9 December to allow students to go home for the Christmas vacation period within the ‘student travel window’, but not all students are happy with this change. In a series of polls conducted by Forge Press, 56% of students said they were not happy with the move to online learning. A further 62% said the University was right to continue with face-toface teaching this semester. Alec Turner, a third-year English Literature student, said the move to online teaching will reduce important social contact. Turner said: “I find it such a shame to miss out on the interaction with course mates as those small encounters with acquaintances can really brighten your day in a world becoming more isolated. “It also helps to talk to peers about the course content, careers, and assessments as you can help each other, gauge if you are all struggling and honestly I am way more open about these aspects with peers instead of tutors. “Additionally, it’s just nice to get out of the house with a purpose. I know we can go on walks, which I do everyday, however, it’s not the same as having to be somewhere.” The University is following guidance from the Government, who have said this is to minimise the risk of transmitting Covid-19 to friends and family at home. Matt Kilborn, a Chemical and Biological Engineering MEng student, said that although there is a need to reduce the risk of transmission, asking students to go home earlier than usual was not a
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I find it such a shame to miss out on the interaction with course mates as those small encounters with acquaintances can really brighten your day - Alec Turner
solution to this problem. He said: “It seems to have been overlooked that being in the university environment is crucial for me and a lot of others as student accommodation tends to be set up well for home working and also means you are surrounded by people with similar lifestyles. “This all helps with being able to focus properly when deadlines are closing in fast. I know I wouldn't be able to focus enough if I were to go home early especially with the added stress that the end of term brings.” However, 44% of students surveyed said they were happy about the move to online learning and a further 38% thought face-toface teaching should not have been happening at all this semester. Turner said the high risk of Covid-19 in universities has meant students have often been “demonised” and feel “neglected”. “It would have been smarter to do this [move online] a while ago. At the very least, I think it should have been a University wide option to have what the French department do: in-person seminars with the option to be online on the computer with the tutor leading the sessions.” They added: “Universities have a lot of money including disaster funds, resources, staff, leading technology and so on. This should have been put to use a long while ago. If we are having in-person teaching use the resources available to make it safe.” A University spokesperson said: “Delivering an excellent student education while doing all we can to ensure the safety of our students and staff has remained our top priority throughout the pandemic and we have been assured by our local public health teams and academic experts that there is a low risk of transmission within teaching spaces.This view is supported by our own data. “We know that it is incredibly important to many of our students that they are able to go home for the Christmas break and are working within government guidelines to do this safely. We also know that other students intend to stay in Sheffield over this period and we are committed to supporting all our students, regardless of their decision, whilst still allowing them to continue with their education.”
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Palestine Society criticise University for “rushing” through adoption of IHRA definition Pippa Coleshill >> continued from Page 1 academics and marginalising students who seek to hold Israel accountable and advocate for the rights of Palestinians, and would be impacting the freedom of speech of many minorities on campus - a vital component of any respected university.” Last year, Sheffield city recognised Palestine as a state, making it the first city in the UK to do so. The Palestine Society therefore believes that if the definition was adopted this would contradict the city’s longstanding show of support for Palestine by “silencing any legitimate criticism against the state of Israel.” Zaid, a 21-year-old International Law and Global Justice student, said: “As a third-generational Palestinian refugee, I believe that societies such as ours, around the UK, are an integral voice to Palestinians all over the world. “Palestinians in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza do not have their issues given any attention in the respective territories. “Taking away the voices of activists here in the UK, by implementing the vague IHRA definition, will manage to silence Palestinians even further. “We believe we must retain our right to criticize Israel’s military actions, as we could criticize any nation that is complicit in human rights violations and that the IHRA definition would make it difficult to do so.” Caroline, a 24-year-old Politics and Philosophy student said: “My main concern is regarding the conflation of critique of the state of Israel and the human rights violations they commit, to antisemitic behaviour. “As someone involved in political campaigning for justice for Palestinians I could have my right to freedom of expression limited. “Therefore, what I have experienced as an observer in Palestine will not be accepted as legitimate critique of state policies but made into hate speech. That frightens me deeply.” The Arab, Islamic, British Asian and Student Labour Society have all
signed the statement in support of Palestine Society. A spokesperson for Islamic Circle Society said: “We have always supported the University's policies of battling all forms of discrimination. However, prioritising the IHRA definition would mean that the University has breached its own policies as it would marginalise minorities and certain religious groups. Hence, we strongly support the Palestine society's decision.” But Jewish students are divided on the issue. Ben Southern-Thomas, a Jewish student studying Politics and International Relations, told Forge Press: “I take antisemitism incredibly seriously and it is for this reason that I vehemently oppose the University’s proposed adoption of the IHRA definition. “No one seriously believes that the British Government, which presided over Windrush and Grenfell, has any commitment to anti-racism, so the attempt to force universities to adopt the IHRA definition must therefore have a political motive, that motive is to silence legitimate criticism of Israel and Zionism. “The cynical deployment of 'antiracism' as a shield to advance specific political ends, undermines the real fight against antisemitism, something I know all too well from constantly having to explain the realities of antisemitism to my peers. “You can't fix a lack of understanding by muddying the waters further and that's exactly what the IHRA definition does. “The University is responding to political pressure brought by the Tory government and as such, make it clear that they care more about kowtowing to Boris Johnson than genuinely fighting antisemitism.” However The Jewish society, in a statement supported by the Union of Jewish Students, told Forge Press: “The IHRA definition provides a legal definition of antisemitism as it was adopted in 2016 by the Government of the United Kingdom, all major political parties and was further adopted by 26 other authorities and 35 UK universities. “It does not infringe on freedom of speech, only protects the Jewish community from being victims of
hate speech and racism. “Both the European Convention on Human Rights and the UK Human Rights Act 1998 state that freedom of expression may be subject to restrictions in the interest of public safety and the protection of rights of others. “As Jews, we should be able to define antisemitism the same way any other minority defines their oppression and we support all other minority groups in combatting discrimination and racism on campus. “Universities are a place of debate and discussion, but also students have the right to feel safe on campus and the IHRA definition allows for both.”
A spokesperson from the University of Sheffield, said: “The University has been consulting widely on the adoption of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism ahead of a December deadline set by the Universities Minister. “During this consultation, feedback has been received from all the faculties via the respective Faculty Directors of the University’s Equality Diversity and Inclusion
Committee (EDIC), the University Race Equality Steering Group, the University Chaplaincy, the Student Jewish Society, the Student Palestine Society, the Students’ Union, UCU and staff involved in research and teaching on the middle east, including on Israel and Palestine. “Alongside this, a working group set up by EDIC has started a listening process on equality, diversity, inclusion and religion and belief identities with our community, including our Jewish staff and student groups, which will continue into March 2021. Important findings from this group will be used to inform the development of a University strategy and action plan in relation to religion and belief. “The University of Sheffield is committed to tackling anti-semitism and all forms of discrimination. When developing new policies, processes and structures, Sheffield takes an approach that fully engages our student and staff communities to foster an inclusive environment where new policies can be fully implemented while still preserving freedom of expression.”
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November in response. The security guards involved have since been suspended, and University ViceChancellor Nancy Rothwell issued an apology after falsely claiming in a BBC Newsnight interview that she had written to Adan personally. Student action group ‘UoM Rent
Strike’ are occupying Owen’s tower on the Fallowfield campus at the university. One of the occupiers, Lucy Nichols told Forge Press that the decision to occupy was “a last resort” after seeing fences put up around accommodation blocks. “After months of protesting against the University’s treatment of its students; the poor quality accommodation, a lack of mental health support, and the extortionate tuition fees, it felt like nothing was going anywhere,” she said. “The fences showed an astonishing neglect of the University’s duty of care, but also demonstrated just how angry students were. ” The group, who have been occupying the building for over a week, are demanding that the University meet with them, commit to no more staff redundancies until the end of the pandemic and to agree that no students participating in the occupation or rent strike will face penalties. The group is also part of the ‘9k 4 WHAT? MCR’ campaign, who are demanding a 40% reduction in rent, partial reimbursement of tuition
fees, better mental health care for students, and better living standards in university accommodation. Nichols described the response from the University so far as “frustrating to say the least.” While university management have met with student representatives and the Students’ Union, occupiers are disappointed that the Vice-Chancellor has not agreed to a meeting yet. Although the University has agreed to a 5% reduction in accommodation fees for two weeks, ‘UoM Rent Strike’ are optimistic that they’ll achieve their main demand of a 40% reduction in rent fees due to widespread support for the campaign. Nichols said: “It’s been so fantastic hearing from people all over the country who are supporting us. It’s also been great to have so much support from students here in Fallowfield, who have been dropping off food, waving at us through windows “I think one of the main reasons we’ve been able to keep doing what we’re doing is because of the ridiculous amount of support we’ve had from people literally all over the country.” Students have received letters of solidarity from University of Manchester alumni and staff. Zarah Sultana, MP for Coventry South, tweeted her support of the occupation and students “standing up to unfair rents and the behaviour of management”, and Afzal Khan, MP for Manchester Gorton, has met virtually with the occupiers to listen to their concerns. The University of Manchester has been contacted for comment.
rally proved that Covid-19 cannot, and will not, stop our fight to live in a world free of violence.” Opening the event, Grimshaw said the Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted “the sheer number of women” who suffer violence in their own homes, citing the United Nations’ term “shadow pandemic” and the rise in calls to domestic abuse helplines. Students read poetry and literature from feminist authors, and delivered speeches on topics including low-level street harassment such as cat-calling, the issue of sexual violence at University, and male and masculine allyship. This year’s event was supported by the Feminist Society and the ‘Our Bodies, Our Streets’ campaign which aims to empower people to exercise outdoors without fear of street harrassment.
As part of the campaign, Grimshaw has also launched a socially-distanced protest called ‘Reclaim the Space’ in which she is encouraging protestors to “take ownership” of the public areas in Sheffield where students have reported feeling unsafe. She has created a map of these
areas for household groups to visit in daylight to show solidarity with victims of gender-based violence, and will be compiling photos of these protests into an online collection. The protest is taking place in the three weeks leading up to 8 December.
Credit: UoM Rent Strike
“An astonishing neglect of the University's duty of care”: Students occupy University of Manchester building in protest Hannah Ahmed Students at the University of Manchester have continued to protest against the university’s handling of the coronavirus crisis on campus. Their action follows the
University’s decision to erect fences around accomodation blocks without notice, and the recent alleged racial profiling and harassment of student, Zac Adan by University security guards. Hundreds of students turned out for a peaceful protest on 16
Students campaign against gendered violence at virtual Reclaim the Night rally Sophie Henderson Reclaim the Night, an annual campaign against sexual assault and gender-based violence, returned on Saturday 21 November. In previous years, women marched through Sheffield city centre. However due to Covid-19 restrictions, protestors took to Zoom to reclaim their right to use public spaces without fear. Students’ Union Women’s Officer Lily Grimshaw, who hosted the online event alongside the SU
Women's Committee, said she found it “incredibly moving”. “The event reaffirmed to all that attended the collective strength that is needed to tackle gendered violence, and the importance of supporting all women, both victims and non-victims,” she said. “I feel so grateful to be working alongside such amazing individuals who have worked tirelessly to maintain the continuation of our safe spaces and feminist campaigns throughout lockdown. “The success of Saturday night’s
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“Left alone to cope with the barriers I face”: Students with disabilities report mixed online teaching support Hannah Ahmed
disabilities. “There are [deadline] extensions and I feel tutors do what they can but the University offers little help. There are some appointments but they are really hard to get and [the Academic Skills Service] 301's sessions are slightly too simplistic.” Olivia Blake, MP for Sheffield Hallam and Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Special Educational Needs and Disabilities, is currently leading an inquiry into the impact of Covid-19 on provision for disabled people at all levels of education. She said to Forge Press: “Before Covid-19, there were already problems with Disabled Students Allowance and accessing support – the support is often badly advertised, the application process is demanding, and often there are problems and delays with accessing appropriate equipment. “During the pandemic, the Government has failed to show leadership on offering guidance to universities on the transition to online forms of teaching and how this might affect disabled students, or on resourcing those transitions. “I’ll be pushing the Government hard to deliver for disabled students and fix the problems in the system.” A spokesperson from the University of Sheffield said:“DDSS has provided a full service online during the pandemic, including appointments, exam arrangements, Learning Support Plans and providing support workers. “The pandemic circumstances
have provided DDSS with an opportunity to develop a more flexible offering which has often worked well for students and which will also be offered in the future to suit users’ needs. “In any instances where support has been delayed or disrupted, we would always encourage students to contact DDSS so staff can look to resolve the issue as quickly as possible. “Feedback from our students is very important in making sure we're meeting their needs and expectations and will always be welcomed.” DDSS also ran its annual survey in June and saw a 92% approval rating. All respondents were asked to rank how likely they would be to recommend DDSS to a friend and the average score on this question was nine out of ten. In a community consultation ‘The Big Conversation’ held by Paul Blomfield, MP for Sheffield Central, students from the University of Sheffield and Sheffield Hallam gave feedback on changes to teaching. Blomfield’s office said it was clear in these meetings that disabled students have been calling for access to online learning for much longer than the start of the Covid-19 crisis, however the current support available falls short of what many require. They also found that some autistic students and students with ADHD have had to defer a year due to the shift to online learning. Some disabled students are in the at-risk
category, making it harder for oneto-one support to be carried out as usual. Some students also found that subtitles during online lectures aren’t always accurate. But others are more optimistic about the current situation. Luke Nash, Co-Chair of the Disabled and Dyslexic Students Committee (DDS) said to Forge Press: “I think the University is one of the best in the country, their policies and even actions show this but there are a few niggles in implementation in practice... with Learning Support Plans and
accessing DDSS/SAMHS (Disability and Dyslexia Support Service, Student Access to Mental Health Support). “These are quite long standing issues really and there's a difference between what is said and what happens in practice.” Nash said that it is unclear whether these issues are solely down to the University; limited government support, and structural inequalities are also contributing factors.
No plans for free drug testing kits at Sheffield after provision introduced at Britsol University
accidental overdose in the process. Their introduction in Bristol coincided with a number of high profile drug deaths at Newcastle and Northumbria universities, which nightlife researchers believe testing kits and harm reduction policies could have helped stop. While Sheffield Students’ Union launched its own harm reduction policy in collaboration with the University after Hallam University student Joana Burns, died of an MDMA overdose at The Foundry in 2017, testing kits were not part of the provision.
Holly Ellis, Sheffield SU Welfare Officer, said: "At the SU we're committed to the important role of harm reduction, we're also required to comply with the conditions of our license by operating a zerotolerance approach. “The SU’s’ Drug Harm Reduction’ policy supports our role in fully complying with the law regarding controlled drugs and the conditions of our licensed premises, whilst also prioritising student welfare in our approach to drugs, and lobby and educate local government to move away from zero tolerance and
towards harm reduction. “We've explored various resources and initiatives to promote harm reduction, including staff training. Although we have no current plans to supply drug testing kits, if we were we'd be looking for advice and guidance from experts such as DACT [Sheffield Drugs and Alcohol Coordination Team].” A spokesperson from the University declined to comment directly but emphasised the institution’s zero tolerance policy on drug misuse and the importance of staying safe around substances
The move to online or ‘blended’ learning has been a major adjustment for students with disabilities, with divided opinions on whether the change has been positive or negative for their learning experience. Alec Turner, a third year English Literature student, told Forge Press that he had mixed feelings about changes to teaching this year. Turner has dyslexia and dyspraxia which means it takes him longer than typical students to read and understand information. He said: “While my brain can physically read words, absorbing meaning from them takes longer which means slow reading or re-reading. When having things explained to me, they need to be explained in a very particular way for me to understand the instructions.” With the shift to online teaching, Turner appreciates the fact that he can now pause or rewind lectures to catch up on typing notes. However, he feels that he is losing out on the more interactive side of face-to-face teaching. Turner has been provided with a laptop which has software that supports him by reading the words onscreen out loud and checking his work. He said: “This is great! However, once I received the laptop, I have been left alone to cope with the barriers I face. “I don't feel very supported by the University in general for my
Jack Mattless The University of Sheffield and Sheffield Students’ Union have confirmed they will not be providing students with substance testing kits
following their introduction at the University of Bristol last month. The kits would allow students to test harmful substances to determine their narcotic content, aiming to avoid deaths from
Above: Alex Turner, a third year English Literature student with dyslexia dn dyspraxia
Monday 30 November 2020
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Opinion
Student mental health is the epidemic being ignored Indie Labbe-Jones shares her thoughts on how online learning has affected her and other student’s mental health
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niversity is often challenging enough without the inevitability of catching a debilitating virus, having to do lectures in the discomfort of your student house that has very poor Wi-Fi and constantly worrying about whether you’ll even get a job once you’ve finished struggling over this online degree that you’ve paid 9.5k for. We might as well be doing an online degree at the Open University, right? But I digress. The University Student Mental Health Survey in 2018 found that among 37,500 students from around 140 UK universities, one in five have a current mental health diagnosis whilst 33% of students said they often or always felt lonely. And that was without a global pandemic. In an ideal world, everyone would have amazing Wi-Fi and a completely quiet environment to work in. Online learning would run so smoothly that we wouldn’t even notice we’re not on campus! However, this is obviously not the case as we’re far from an ideal world right now and our online learning experience is taking a negative toll on student mental health. University can sometimes be an incredibly lonely place. I found that in my second semester of first year I really welcomed being able to go into campus with my coursemates as an escape from my extremely dirty Endcliffe kitchen and tiny room that was identical to everyone else’s. This year, that kind of escape is not so accessible. The turn to online learning was the exception for our much anticipated return to university after a long (and for some, very painful for their mental health) six months in our family homes. Yet, it is online learning that is turning out to be so detrimental to student mental health. Spending all day in our rooms in front of a computer screen and with very
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1 in 5 students have a current mental health diagnosis whilst 33% of students said they often or always felt lonely
Above: Indie, 2nd year English Literature student limited access to campus study spaces is just not working. It’s university, but without the fun bits and it’s not what any of us signed up for. Online learning perpetuates isolation. Isolation from friends, support systems and the general sense of community and belonging that is felt at university. Online learning creates distance, not only between peers, but between students and lecturers. Blackboard Collaborates black screens and muted mics definitely don’t help us to make friends or feel comfortable in online sessions. As a second year student who had the end of my first year cut short due to March’s lockdown, I haven’t met many of the tutors in my department and, for some of my online tutorials, I’ve never even met the lecturers in person. It’s very clear that students are finding this online connection to be very disconnected. From confusion over how the academic year would run to a two
week suspension of the minimal face-to-face teaching we had scheduled and then another lockdown, it’s just as much the uncertainty surrounding online learning as it is the actual thing that is causing a decline in student mental health. Students are not stupid, despite what the government and much of the general public may think. We understand that a certain virus is making things very tricky for everyone at the moment, but I also think that in a time when students are being targeted more than ever, there should be more support. According to mental health charity Mind, 74% of 18-24 year olds reported that their mental health had gotten worse in lockdown. This was when we were at home with families, not cooped up in student houses or accommodation. 74% is already way too high, but how much higher will it climb? At the start of the year when everything still seemed relatively normal, SAMHS (the first port of call
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According to MIND, 74% of 18-24 year olds reported that their mental health had gotten worse in lockdown
regarding counsel for the University) had a two week wait for just an initial assessment. Many students have chosen the option to move home permanently in order to solve this epidemic of loneliness. But not everyone is able to do this. Going to our family homes does not instantly cure mental illness. As university students we are part of a community that I hoped would have had more support during this incredibly confusing, de-motivating and depressing time. This isn’t to say suspend all online learning immediately because I understand that this is not a situation in which everything can go back to normal straight-away. However, online learning is not sustainable in the long run either and students are struggling with their mental health more than ever. There needs to be an intervention in the way of support for students in these unprecedented times, or otherwise Covid-19 won’t be the only pandemic we face.
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Forge Press
Opinion
Care home residents should be allowed to reunite with family and loved ones
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Emily Staniforth n 5 November a woman was arrested after taking her 97-year-old mother out of a care home to look after her during the second lockdown. She was de-arrested shortly after, but her mother, who suffers from dementia, was returned to the home. The daughter said her motive was the thought of not being able to see her mother again. During the first lockdown this year, the reputation of care homes for keeping their residents safe went drastically downhill. The Government’s decision to move untested Covid-19 patients from hospitals to care homes resulted in the virus ripping through residential populations. Once the virus got into the homes, it was inevitable that thousands of elderly and vulnerable people would die. Loved ones could only wait with baited breath and hope that their relatives would come out of lockdown unscathed. Despite all the preventative measures put in place by government guidelines and care
homes, this was not the case for so many. Many people passed away without their loved ones by their sides. Residents with life-limiting illnesses, like dementia, were denied access to the people who could help to keep their lives enriched. People were living a helpless existence in terror that they may not see those who are the most important to them ever again. Some care homes have come up with a variety of ingenious ideas to get around the ban on households mixing indoors in this second lockdown. A care home in Featherstone, West Yorkshire is one of the homes across the country that have installed a visiting booth. The booth was created by using Perspex to separate the inside of the home from a small porch where visitors can sit with the doors open and talk to their loved ones whilst still being separated by a partition. However, this is less than practical as the days get colder and shorter and is no substitute for prolonged and physical contact. It would make sense during this second lockdown to allow family
Trump’s presidency was a warning to the UK
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Jack Redfern reathe in. Breathe in. Breathe out. Donald Trump lost the election. Joe Biden’s win gives many a ray of hope at the end of this dark and gloomy 2020 tunnel. Though there’s a lot to say about Biden and his validity as the Democratic candidate, this defeat of Trump offers some reassurance that the US is returning to some political normalcy. But as is so often the case with being on the progressive side of politics, basking in victory can only last for a short while. This time the election was concerningly close; even though Trump lost, the sheer number of votes cast for him is staggering and concerning. Biden and Trump received more votes than any other political candidates in history. Biden won 79 million and Trump won 73 million. Those 79 million contributed to
a political change, a break away from the Trump era, but those 73 million wanted a continuation, an extension of the past four years and what Trump stands for. A far clearer political pitch than what we saw in 2016. When up against Hillary Clinton, Trump was a new figure: his difference and lack of respect for political traditions and conventions masterfully working in his favour. The comparison of him next to Clinton was clear. To millions, she was yet another bland establishment Democrat, while Trump was fresh and different, despite his extremely problematic nature. But that nature was overlooked, ignored even, because Trump gave variety to a broken system. His vague lack of policy was overlooked and his novelty allowed him to not need a comprehensive plan for governance. This time however, Trump wasn’t this new, bald as brass figure who represented a break away from establishment politics.
members to remove residents from homes and take care of them themselves. Of course, every case is different and for some people it may not be a suitable idea. However, if someone’s family is prepared and willing to look after their vulnerable relatives, then provisions should be made by individual care homes to allow them to do so. It is unfair to ask people to trust that their relatives will be kept safe and well given the disastrous outcome of the last lockdown. It also allows residents of care homes to maintain their dignity.
It is disgraceful that people who do not trust the Government to ensure the protection of the elderly and vulnerable are made to feel like criminals
Each person in a care home is someone’s family member or friend and it is unfair to essentially lock them away without any say in the matter. When the University of Manchester appeared to lock students in their accommodation by erecting large fences there was uproar. In care homes the same principles should apply. No, it wouldn’t be easy to arrange but people deserve to feel safe and to know that their loved ones are safe. It is disgraceful that people who do not trust the Government
to ensure the protection of the elderly and vulnerable are made to feel like criminals for simply trying to do what they think is right. If the Government is serious about protecting the health of the nation this winter, they should have considered the devastating long term physical and mental health issues that will be caused by separating vulnerable people from their nearest and dearest again, and given care home residents a choice in where they spend this lockdown period.
He had just spent four years being the President, the highest position in the land. With his last eight months of it being a disastrous period, tackling the Covid-19 pandemic poorly. Also, the aspects of Clinton’s campaign - from the emails, Russian interference, and the ‘basket of deplorables’ remark - were no longer there. The 73 million who cast their red votes knew exactly what they were signing up for. There was no sense of ‘let’s give him a chance’; a vote for him was a vote for four more years of his ideologies and policies. Those being nationalism, anti-globalism, closed borders, anti-immigrant sentiment and an ambiguous America-first approach. This closeness tells us that his 2016 win wasn’t a fluke, it wasn’t this erratic political anomaly that came out of nowhere. He and what he represents had and still has support. Those feelings are there, angry with loss (many denying the loss altogether), ready to be lit up by anyone who knows what gets people angry and how best to win a campaign by tapping into division and hate. As we often look at America as a means of reflecting on our own
country, this is a warning to the UK. Those aspects of nationalism, antiglobalism, political scapegoating of immigrants and the use of simple, vague solutions to difficult problems have bubbled up in both countries. It’s very easy to think that the political technique of inciting division and casting out any need for unity and democratic respect for one another, as used by Trump, can’t happen over here in the calm liberal UK with our (sort of) variety of parties and parliamentary democracy. But it’s becoming increasingly evident that these political sentiments which took over America four years ago have absolutely creeped their way into the political discourse of our own country. In terms of vague terminology used in campaigns as policy, the similarities are unnerving: ‘Make America Great Again’ and ‘Get Brexit Done’; ‘Build The Wall’ and ‘Take Back Control’; ‘Four More Years’ and’ Oven Ready Deal’. Looking at our Prime Minister’s trajectory - Johnson became leader, chucked out the Tory MP’s who scrutinised him, tried to prorogue Parliament, called an early election and then won it on a handful of
unclear political promises. And with his unshakeable position as PM with a big 74 majority, we’ve got Priti Patel who has overseen plans that immigrants entering the UK to have to speak English. Who’s also now trying to store incoming asylum seekers in offshore centres on Ascension Island. Furthermore, Jacob Rees-Mog now is Leader of the House, a position such a rightwing Conservative, like him, hasn’t filled for years. The comparisons are becoming more and more equally weighed up. Those of us who support progressive, democratic politics in the UK should look at America not as a sigh of relief, but as an example, to learn from their mistakes. Divisive, anti-democratic, nationalistic and consciously unclear policies are there for the taking and any politician determined to take power can grab them whenever they want to. Ready to tap into fears and insecurities that the public hold for all sorts of reasons. We must never think that such an event as Trump’s election and mass support for those ideas can’t happen over here. Take it as a warning, for Boris Johnson is a step too close towards it.
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Monday 30 November 2020
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Opinion
Friendship doesn’t mean agreeing on same political views
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Ed Brown n the summer of 1987, a man met a woman at a barbeque hosted by the local Young Conservative Club. Soon enough, the pair fell in love, got married, and 28 years later, found themselves reacting to their teenage son’s news that he might be voting Labour with the same ferocity you would direct at someone who’d swaggered 10 minutes late into an AA meeting slurping a mimosa through a curly plastic straw. That teenage son, as may be obvious, was me. And no, I’m not exaggerating. My defection – for that is how it was seen – was a shock, and a big breach of family tradition. “Cut me”, said my granddad on the subject of politics “and I bleed blue”. My parents used to discuss Tony Blair with such seething vitriol that as a child I genuinely believed he was somebody they knew personally. My aunt would whisper “vote Conservative” into my sleeping cousin’s ear as a baby (yes, really). Conservatism was stamped onto my family’s DNA. For the eldest child to buck the trend was borderline scandalous. These days, it’s easy to curate your friend groups to avoid the sideline views you find unappealing. For me, this wasn’t an option. From morning till evening, I was completely surrounded by Tories. Tories made me lunch. Tories dropped me off at school. Tories sang me happy birthday, and Tories tucked me in at bedtime. My political disagreement with them was, and is, profound. But there was no way we were ever going to have a serious falling out about it. This was my family, not a Tinder match I could boot after I realised they hadn’t read the ‘no tories thanks x’ in my bio. Yes, there’s plenty my family have managed to get dazzlingly wrong. But they’re also attentive, kind and supportive, and these are qualities we just won’t notice if we define someone entirely by their political persuasion the moment it clashes with ours. Acknowledge the person behind the opinion, and you might find your Thatcherite parents doing the unthinkable and ditching the Conservative party just before the 2019 election. Stranger things have
happened. The fact is that calling someone ‘Tory scum’ will probably not win them over. It’s far more likely they’ll just stop talking to you about politics. But their convictions will not disappear. Instead, they’ll hold them tighter – but this time in secret. Lack of dialogue means we’ll never understand what attracts people to views that repel us, and before we know it, we’re looking at another five years of starving schoolkids so Richard Branson can buy a new yacht. Echo-chambers do not help anyone. Never directly engage with an adversarial concept, and you risk constructing your own politics around a hypothetical; what you believe the opponent thinks, not what they actually do. This makes for impressive rants at your Marxist book group. But it means you will run into huge difficulties when
Ed and his mum at his graduation, him reading The Communist Manifesto. Credit: Ed Brown
trying to affect real-world change – which, after all, is what politics should really be about. So, problem solved? Well, not quite. It’s easy to forget just how extreme mainstream politics has become in the past five years alone. In 2013, UKIP MEP Godfrey Bloom was hounded out of his party after referring to Africa as “bongo bongo land”. Fast forward 6 years, and the public’s reaction to
Boris Johnson comparing Muslims to violent criminals was to whisk him into Downing Street by way of a landslide majority. As recently as 2015, declaring victory in an election you had manifestly lost was the behaviour of treacherous despots. But it’s exactly what we’ve just seen Trump do. As more politicians espouse extreme views, more ordinary people will end up adopting them. But something being normalised is not the same as it
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My political disagreement with them was, and is, profound. But there was no way we were ever going to have a serious falling out about it
being right. Throughout history, brave women and men have given their lives for that which we now take for granted; democracy, civil liberties, and human rights. These are the essential building blocks of any free society, and the atrocities which inevitably and historically follow their absence means that any discourse questioning whether some groups are more deserving of them than others is simply reprehensible. So, yes – America’s Muslim travel ban was instituted by the President. But that doesn’t make it any less of a human rights abuse. The morals of engaging publicly with supporters of this ban is one thing, but whether you should invite them into your social group seems an open-and-shut case. Overall, friendship is precious and let’s not waste it on authoritarians.
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Forge Press
Features
isa*, a Modern Languages student, contacted the Student Access to Mental Health Support (SAMHS) in January 2019 through the Dyslexic and Disabled Students Services (DDSS). At the time, she was just looking for some mental health support with academia in an effort to rediscover her passion for her degree and feel less depressed. Once she got an appointment with SAMHS, Lisa felt the therapist kept asking questions about previous issues that had no relation to her current mental state. Lisa felt pressured: “I nearly burst into tears in the appointment by talking about my previous issues, to which she kept pressing and pressing.” The psychologist’s next words stunned her. “You’re too far gone, we can’t help you.” SAMHS is a service designed to give mental health support to students at the University. Appointments include 30 minute discussions between an expert and each individual. According to their website, the waiting time for an appointment varies between five days to 14 days after registering. Even so, Lisa waited for over a month before her first appointment with the therapist. After the appointment, Lisa received an email with a series of numbers to mental health institutions, but with no direction or knowledge of how to access them. She did not contact them. “I felt like, if they can’t help me, who can?” she said. “It actually made my mental health worse going to see them and I know for a fact that I wasn’t the only person who was turned away and told that they were unhelpable. “It massively wrecked my confidence in SAMHS - it was really demotivating and I ended up struggling a lot that year.” Unfamiliar at the time with any other mental health service providers such as Nightline or NHS 111, it felt like the support from the University was all she had. Feeling lost, she reached out to academics in her Modern Languages department for help. However, she admitted to not feeling comfortable sharing her experiences with them and, in the end, nothing was solved - her depression started getting worse. After two years of not getting the help needed, and now on her year abroad, Lisa found herself once again in a difficult position: stuck in a foreign country during the outbreak of a worldwide pandemic. She was forced to move back in April 2020 - an abrupt change that
“I felt like, if they can’t help me, who can?” Students on feeling let down by SAMHS during the pandemic Written by Dana Raer she admitted caused her to suffer bad depression, anxiety, and mental breakdowns. In June, she had a “massive” breakdown over fears of changes in her assessments due to Covid-19; those fears were later confirmed as the expectations of structure and communication she desperately valued were not fully met by her department and her submissions completely changed. She found herself contacting the Student Wellbeing Services in tears. “I said, I don’t know what’s going on, I feel really bad. And he talked me through some wellbeing exercises.” The Student Wellbeing Service is preventative support offered by the University to help manage student’s wellbeing when dealing with mild difficulties and challenges at university. It does not include counseling, mental health support, therapy or treatment; to get those, their website recommends SAMHS. Lisa was finally given some assistance in the form of six weeks of free therapy and a referral to SAMHS. “I actually found the Wellbeing Services were pretty instant. I definitely recommend the faculty Wellbeing Services because I managed to get an appointment that day with someone in my faculty.” That was how she learned she might have Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD). Her next step was to go again to SAMHS - the request for an appointment was placed in early October and finally came to fruition mid-November. “I went in there and said: ‘Look, my therapist says I probably have OCD, what can you do about it?’ And they knew what to do from there. But it would have been a different story if I went in there and said I’m feeling depressed and I don’t know what to do.There’s no doubt that SAMHS are quite notorious for not
seeing students quickly and I think that will put students off because it takes a lot of courage to recognise that you need help. “But there was always the worry that I couldn’t open up to SAMHS fully, especially since the last appointment I’ve been [to]” she added, “I’m very fortunate I now have quite good communication with them, but that’s because I’ve been trying for a couple of years.” This delay in support can be detrimental for anyone in a delicate mental state. Even more so during lockdown, when socialising with other households is banned and social distancing measures are in place. Nightline, the student listening service, has recorded a 92% increase in their number of Instant Messenger texts since last year, with 57% of them being related to Covid-19. However, by contrast,
SAMHS experienced a surprising decrease in students accessing their services, down 46.6% during the first lockdown compared to the previous year. Dale Kitchen, the University Counselling Service Manager at
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It massively wrecked my confidence in SAMHS - it was really demotivating and I ended up struggling a lot that year. - Lisa* (Name has been changed)
SAMHS said: “At the beginning of the pandemic we made a major shift from offering exclusively face to face appointments to offering appointments remotely via telephone and video call. This remote service was put in place within a couple of days but refined and developed over the following months. “We always aim to offer an appointment within 15 working days, although we have in the past exceeded this at our busiest times.” For other students, accessing the University’s mental health services can be a confusing system with the registrations, initial calls, and then waiting times for appointments. Yaroslav Matveev, 19, a Journalism student, contacted SAMHS for an emergency appointment at the end of February this year after suffering from depression and self-harm.
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Features
Left: Yaroslav Matveev, Right: Bárbara Pinho, both international students who struggled to get helpful mental health support from SAMHS. By the time SAMHS scheduled an appointment for him at the end of March, the pandemic had struck the UK - counseling services went online and all previous appointments were cancelled. “It was really tough because I needed help,” he said. “At that exact moment, it was an emergency.” SAMHS, however, is not a service for mental health crises and emergencies. They state this on their website and instead direct students to alternative services that can help in those instances. The pandemic put the mental health services in a tough position; SAMHS had no choice but to cancel
every single appointment and offer phone or email alternatives. This decision, combined with an already long waiting time, left students astray during turbulent times. Yaroslav had to register with them again. The University had also created a VPN service to make registering safe for students but, for Yaroslav, this made student mental health services even more inaccessible. Finding the adjustment to online services unsettling and difficult, he decided to have online, private consultations back in his home country, Russia, which helped him cope during the lockdown months. But when he started his second year in September, the uncertainty surrounding his degree was overwhelming, and the anxiety
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SAMHS had no choice but to cancel every single appointment and offer phone or email alternatives. This decision, combined with an already long waiting time, left students astray during turbulent times.
that came with it pushed him into another period of depression. This time he asked for help from his Journalism department. The department referred him to SAMHS where he managed to get an early appointment because of a student cancellation, only to be sent to a GP to receive medication. “What I really needed the most during that time was a simple chat to discuss why I am feeling this way,” he said. “Nobody really tried to talk to me or support me in any way. “I am just very confused and this shouldn’t be happening, especially when we’re talking about mental health. It’s so cool to have the NHS 111, SAMHS and GPs for students, but I think it can be really good if the University could make a mental health section designed specifically for international students’ needs. It can take pressure off the NHS or from GPs and the entire process can be less confusing for those who have just moved here.” Another international student, Bárbara Pinho, 23, a science writer and former MA student, had to fly back to her home country, Portugal, at the beginning of the pandemic and quarantine for two weeks in a room. “It was really difficult to just go back to my parents place, and we kind of live in the middle of nowhere,” she said. “I’m looking at the window and I see sheep. So it’s like, really, really isolated. I feel very limited here.” Being at home with her parents after living independently for so long, and while facing the same uncertainty as Yaroslav with her degree, soon brought her to the point of experiencing anxiety attacks every day. She would work and then, out of the blue, have tough crying attacks. “I would just go to the sofa and let myself cry.” She contacted SAMHS in April and did not mind the two-week waiting time. “The therapist was amazing and we had an entire session and talked about all the things that were going on, and why I feel so overwhelmed and bad with all of the things that were happening to me. And then it felt like we were going somewhere”. However, after the initial discussion, Bárbara did not hear back for weeks, until she decided to email them herself. SAMHS specified that students from the University of Sheffield who do not live in the UK cannot access the counselling service offered by the University as it is against their guidelines. But Bárbara had to move back to her home country out of circumstances, not out of choice. “The representative from SAMHS
was completely apologetic, so it was really nice. And he said he knew I could benefit from therapy with them, but it was just like a bureaucracy kind of thing. “I’m seeing a private therapist here, which is, again, a privilege because it’s expensive. I started in August or September, which is quite a delay. Mental health is still a stigma in Portugal though.” Holly Ellis, the Welfare Officer at Sheffield Students’ Union said: “Everybody who had an appointment booked [with SAMHS] should have been offered an alternative. They should have been offered to have a phone call or a video call. “We’ve got lots of mental health support services at our university. The welfare of our students is our priority, especially during this pandemic. We’ve got SAMHS, and we’re offering a fast track service to students who are self isolating, so they should be seen within two days after going through that service. “The Wellbeing Faculty service was launched in June with the aim of helping to reduce those long waiting times, and so students can book an appointment with the wellbeing service themselves; they can self-refer, which makes things a lot easier.” During the second lockdown, the waiting times for appointments did not change even though there was also a decrease in the number of people accessing the mental health services at the University. However, Ellis explains that the long waiting times now are connected to the new system they provided students with. “It’s because of the fast track system that we’ve had for the self isolating students,” she said. “We’re prioritising the self-isolating students and making sure that they can have a call within two days. With the number of self-isolating students coming down now, we’re confident that we’ll be able to reduce the waiting times for all students accessing SAMHS. “We really want our students to know that we are here for you, and we will do all that we can to support you. You’re not alone.” Kitchen added: “Discussions with IAPT Sheffield resulted in an offer of a four week online course called “It’s Okay Not To Be Okay- Coping With Covid” to improve well-being for students during the Covid-19 pandemic and this additional resource, specifically for students, is due to start on the 17 November. “Further resources available to students are our archive of workshop recordings, free 24/7 access to mental health support from Togetherall and Student Space.”
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Forge Press
Features
The English Cultural Divide: The South vs the North
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Ryan Smith t is no secret that the North/South divide plays an integral part in English culture. Assumptions and biases regarding the North specifically often have a thorny undercurrent, as proven by comments recently made by a Tory MP. During a debate about the level of Covid-19 economic support to be given to Northern towns and cities, former Northern Powerhouse minister Jake Berry said, “For many who live in London and the South of England, things like the opera house and the ballet will be the heart of their culture, but in the North...it is our local football club.” The MP’s comments place a bias upon the North, as Dr David Forrest, Senior Lecturer in Film Studies at The University of Sheffield, explains: “The comments are an example of the lazy assumptions about regional identity designed to contain people within their fixed narrative of place. There is a tendency to think of the North as a genre, with its stock characters, conventions, and thematic preoccupations [which] gives a marginalised space a narrative of identity. But there is a very real danger that individuals, communities, and artists that don’t fit this paradigm are excluded.” The MP’s reference to football, a sport primarily known for its masculine associations and that originates from the working class, is cause for concern. As footballers are often young, working class and very well paid, they become perfect scapegoats for perceived evils; such as back in April when the UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock suggested Premier League players should take a pay cut and play their part in aiding the pandemic response. These biases are not isolated; it is wider culture that feels the effects. “When it comes to Northern bias I think accent is the apex of the issue,” says Lisa Leak, a Northern English Literature MA student. “I have witnessed quite a bit of ‘banter’, usually surrounding the notion of intellect. It seems the more regional your accent, the less intelligence you are allowed to acquire. “This goes hand in hand with the ideas of class and ‘The North’.”
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There is a tendency to think of the North as a genre, with its stock characters, conventions, and thematic preoccupations... But there is a very real danger that individuals, communities, and artists that don’t fit this paradigm are excluded - Dr David Forrest
The recent scandal at Durham University regarding the bullying of northern students intensifies this idea that ‘banter’ is not always light-hearted. It has insidious effects, alongside mockery and dismissal of intellect. The idea of culture in the North thus becomes muted, even harder to break away from or be attracted to, given the
Images from left to right: Dr David Forrest, Lisa Leak, Dr Madeline Callaghan, and Jardel Rodrigues.
class dynamics of such comments. However, Leak did have cause for optimism. ‘Things do look like they’re starting to change. In Waterstones’ November books of the month, both fiction books featured were set in Yorkshire and Lancashire and both authors are local to these areas.’ Berry’s comments also speak to a supposedly higher and lower culture, portrayed by the South and North in England. “I don’t believe Northern students are less interested in poetry than anyone else,” said Dr Madeleine Callaghan, senior lecturer in Romantic Literature at the University of Sheffield, regarding her poetry students. “We tend to have less experience of learning about [poetry] at school, and kids from a working class background don’t have, in my experience, a shelf full of poetry books. Less exposure to something means less confidence
and less interest in it – not less ability.” This conflict of confidence and intellect finds its roots in ‘high art’. Art, such as opera and ballet, is assumed to need intellect and nuance to enjoy - despite art’s lifeblood being the need for collective understanding. ‘Low art’ is often associated with sports such as football, sitcoms, or soap operas. Something for the masses, in other words. This breeds the ingrained belief that the North needs educating. As a Blackpool native, Dr Callaghan’s roots to the North are strong. “The idea of the North needing an education is insulting and offensive. We are not stupid or ignorant. Some of the most important writers, filmmakers, and musicians are from the North. The North should get libraries rather than constant threats of closures and access to top museums and collections.
“Don’t give the best art to Kensington and sling the leftovers to the provinces.” The austerity implemented since the 2010 coalition government has also widely decimated Northern artistic services and illusions quickly became cemented that the North simply is not worthy of such investment. Dr Callaghan echoed this disdain: “The arts funding has been slashed, as has public confidence in studying the arts and humanities. Certain arts seem off limits to normal people. This has to stop, but it will only come from the highest level of government and the people who hold the purse strings. It is not good enough to pretend that the North or working class people in general don’t like books or museums. We deserve the same chances.” The MP’s comments assume the South is automatically the heart of the English arts scene. I spoke to Manchester poet Jardel Rodrigues,
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Features
recent winner of UNESCO Slam-O-Vision 2020, about working as a Northern artist. “There is this notion that, as an artist, there’s nothing outside of London,” he said. “Of course that’s not true, but when all of the top funded art institutions such as theatres, drama schools and even events are down there, it’s easy
to see how people get this mindset.” Rodrigues has been a poet for a number of years now, capturing audiences at events such as the Young Identity’s One Mic Stand at Manchester’s Contact Theatre. However, he expressed a concern for upcoming fellow Northern artists. “A lot of artists are almost in states of
desperation to be ‘noticed’ by London based companies, to get work generated by them is seen as a ‘step up’. “Sometimes at poetry events, a lot of big Southern publishers definitely have an air of looking down at you after hearing your voice or even seeing what you’re wearing,” Rodrigues continued. “The danger here is that [these assumptions] put young northerners off the arts entirely. Yes, you can read classic poetry in a thick Yorkshire accent, yes you can be a scouse Romeo!’ It is a progressive thought. While things may be changing slowly, the overwhelming majority of voices in English media are still in Received Pronunciation. In contrast, the common acceptance or understanding of Northern regional accents in the same regard are only allowed to be comical, foolish or aggressive. “I do feel that both poetry and music are two of the places in which Northern culture is very much alive,” said Rodrigues. “Especially when it is unmistakably Northern in its identity. There’s always been space for a John Cooper Clarke, a Shifty, a Bugzy Malone -
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people whose sounds are straight products of the North.” Among all the interviewees, there was a strong belief that these comments made them more resilient to changing perceptions for the better, none more so than Jardel himself: ‘I’ve seen the way that
Manchester’s poetry scene has grown, and the absolute powerhouse of a scene that [the North] is heading to be. “Manchester is integral to who I am and why I write. I’m Manc, and so is my art. I’m here to stay.”
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SheffieldSU.com
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Forge Press
Science & Tech
Milestone Covid-19 vaccines offer new hope of a return to normality Kirsty Hamilton-Emery Just as the UK passes the grim 50,000 death milestone, the news of a vaccine offering 94% of people protection from Covid-19 comes with great hope as we now know the virus is vaccine-preventable. The vaccine, developed by Pfizer and BioNTech, has performed well in preliminary analyses and the government has already secured doses for 20 million people. Not long after this announcement, US firm Moderna announced their even more effective vaccine. The vaccine, shown to be 94.5% effective, has been developed quickly using similar methods to the first vaccine. Health Secretary Matt Hancock has promised the NHS will begin rolling out doses on 1 December, despite the safety of the vaccine not yet being established. Conventional vaccines, such as the MMR vaccine, work by injecting a dead or weakened form of the pathogen that builds immunity by helping the body recognise and respond to the disease. These vaccines take between 10-15 years to fully develop. This is where
the vaccines being developed for Covid-19 are different. Several companies, including Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna, are creating an RNA vaccine. This involves a synthetic version of the mRNA (the molecule which tells cells what to build) that a virus uses to build its infectious proteins. This is injected into the body, where the cells read it as instructions to build that viral protein and therefore create some of the virus’s molecules themselves, however these
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The government hopes to get the vaccine ‘to more than 50 percent’ of the UK population, but all of these promises and hopes are still no quick fix in ending the pandemic
Vials and needle for vaccination, Credit: Pixabay
proteins do not assemble to form a virus. The immune system detects these cells and begins a defensive response to them, therefore building immunity. If one of these vaccines are approved, it will be the first of its kind. On BBC’s Question Time, Mr Hancock answered questions about the vaccine, including the list of who will get the vaccination first. In the UK, care home residents and staff are top of the vaccination priority list, followed by health and social workers, over 80s, then continues
to people down the age bands. Hancock stated it will then go to those particularly vulnerable across all age groups. The government hopes to get the vaccine ‘to more than 50 percent’ of the UK population, but all of these promises and hopes are still no quick fix in ending the pandemic. The transportation and storage of the 40 million doses vaccines is an issue in question, which Hancock described as a ‘mammoth logistical operation’, especially given that the vaccine is being developed in Belgium and can only be removed
from its storage temperature of minus 70C four times. With most other vaccines not requiring such low storage temperatures, most GPs only have refrigeration facilities and regular freezers set at temperatures between minus 2 and minus 8 degrees celsius. In response to this, Hancock said: “Is this going to be an enormous challenge? Of course. This will be one of the biggest civilian operations in history… but I think that the NHS can rise to [this challenge]. “I’m confident that we can make it happen.”
Deafness in infancy affects more than just verbal communication Sarah Laptain Infants learn communication skills through early interactions with their parents. But psychologists at the University of Sheffield have found that deafness in infants can affect their non-verbal communication as well as their verbal communication. Looking at communication indicators that predict language development, the researchers found that deaf infants engaged less in communication behaviours than their peers. Published in the journal Pediatrics, the study showed that deaf infants experienced fewer learning opportunities, later affecting language development. Dr Danielle Matthews, from the University of Sheffield said: “On average deaf infants produced five
fewer communicative behaviours in 25 minutes of play than their peers. While this may not seem like a big difference, each communicative act is a chance to learn something further and these chances add up over the weeks and months as a child develops. So it’s important to find ways to support interaction.” For parents of infants with varying levels of infancy, an early question may be how their child will communicate - through spoken language, sign language, or both. Following their research, the team at the University of Sheffield produced supportive and informative videos for parents and caregivers about how to support their child. These videos explain how infants communicate, how deafness impacts this, and how to support
children with any level of hearing loss. They explain that responding to children’s communication is important to show they can communicate through babbles and gestures before moving onto using words and sound. However, children with hearing loss may find it more difficult to recognise responses to their communication attempts. In the videos, Dr Ciara Kelly highlights the need to ‘tune-in’ on what a baby is focusing on and watch out for chances to respond, encouraging them to communicate more with you. For deaf infants it’s important to encourage them to look at you when you are responding to them so they can easily access your spoken or signed response. The videos also talk about checking hearing devices
are working and optimising the listening environment for a child. Dr Kelly said: “Videos with parents in real interactions, demonstrating communication strategies, can really help to make information and advice tangible. This is something parents and practitioners have raised the need for. So we aimed to create videos that can be used by parents and by professionals as a tool in their practice.”
Mother and child playing with toy Credit: University of Sheffield
Monday 30 November 2020
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Science & Tech
Hicks Builing, University of Sheffield Credit: Forge Press
University of Sheffield introduces new sustainable plans to help tackle the climate crisis Sam Gilder A new plan from the University of Sheffield states ‘‘we will not force all students to become climate scientists” but hopes to invigorate sustainability across campus and beyond. The strategy, which was released earlier in the month, sets forward action for our institution to become a leader in tackling the effects of climate change. Vice Chancellor, Professor Koen Lamberts, said: “We don’t take this commitment on lightly and we don’t currently have all the answers”, but “we will never lose sight of the urgent need to cut emissions, restore habitats and secure our Credit: University of Sheffield
planet for the future. “We must grasp the opportunity for a green recovery and take full responsibility of the changes to behaviours and practices that have become embedded in these unprecedented times.” The University of Sheffield wants to build on its track record when it comes to sustainability. Between 2005 and 2019, the University cut its carbon emissions by 35%, and in May this year the institution switched to 100% renewable electricity. As the climate crisis becomes ever more serious, this new plan intends to take action much further. The strategy sets out a path created by student campaigners and senior researchers. It aims to
place education for sustainable development on taught courses and use the facilities available at the University to help implement positive change locally. Under the wide umbrella of sustainability, the plan covers several points: to reduce carbon emissions, to research, to educate and to make wholesale changes on campus. One of the institution’s primary aims is to become carbon neutral on campus by 2030, and become carbon neutral in all of its activities by 2038. In terms of research, the University claims it is “contributing to an evidence base that informs regional policy decisions and is building regional partnerships
that will catalyse new innovation in sustainability that can be communicated globally, achieving both local and global impact.” It is clear this is a policy which endeavours to make change locally and nationally. The University also wants to embed education for sustainable development into all of its courses. It accepts this “can be a challenge for subjects that are not traditionally seen as sustainability related” but that there are skills and approaches that all subjects can link to these challenges. The changes planned on campus are particularly promising. They include eradicating single-use plastics, removing carbon-intensive beef and lamb options, and transforming the University’s vehicle fleet into an all-electric one. It is important to remember that students are at the centre of this work. The report states “we want our students to be involved in major decisions relating to sustainability on campus.” As a result, the work being done by the Students’ Union in order to challenge the cards that the University has thrown on the table is vital. SU Development Officer, Jordan Weir, said: “Our students have been at the forefront of this work for the last six years and have been the key to getting this strategy over the line. Students and young people up and down the country know the importance of climate change and
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Students and young people up and down the country know the importance of climate change and how we must act now to instigate changes that aid in the battles against it how we must act now to instigate changes that will aid in the battles against it.” As vaccines are being worked on and it looks as though a recovery from Covid-19 is on its way, we should be excited about the timing of the new measures. Weir said: “The strategy being released now is so pertinent and gives the University and ourselves at the Students’ Union [the chance] to build back better and greener from Covid-19. The pandemic has highlighted that now more than ever we must ensure that all of our endeavours are strongly focused on forging a sustainable future. “I am firmly convinced that any form of recovery from Covid-19 must be a green one and therefore my focus will be to ensure that the University is taken to task on this, as well as ensuring that our Students’ Union is doing the same.”
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Science & Tech
Can low dose radiation therapy treat Covid-19 related pneumonia? Lucas Mentken As the Coronavirus pandemic continues to affect millions worldwide, scientists have been racing to find treatments to alleviate symptoms in the worst affected patients. Low dose radiation therapy (LDRT), which is commonly used as a cancer treatment, is the latest option being considered. The concept is not new and has already been used to treat pneumonia in the early 20th century, but its use comes with its own risks and complications. How does Covid-19 cause pneumonia? While the virus only causes mild symptoms in most cases, in a small number of patients it can overstimulate the body’s immune response. Since Covid-19 is a respiratory disease, it reaches far into the respiratory tract, including the lungs. When the virus comes into contact with mucous membranes in the nose, mouth, and eyes, it multiplies and infects nearby cells. It then travels down the airway, irritating the inner linings. This causes the lungs to swell as they build up with fluid and debris, causing a condition called pneumonia. In some cases, the body can overreact to an infection in the lungs, causing so-called “cytokine storms”. Cytokines are small proteins released in the body but having large amounts of them released into the blood can cause further inflammation in the lungs, causing or worsening the pneumonia. Scientists are now looking at whether low dose radiation therapy can help abate such cytokine storms and therefore treat the pneumonia with its antiinflammatory properties. What is low dose radiation therapy and how can it treat pneumonia? Radiation is widely used in medicine to diagnose and treat certain conditions. Radiation therapy is the use of ionizing radiation to control or kill malignant cells. As such, it is
one of the main ways to treat cancer today. The radiation works by damaging the DNA of cancerous tissue leading to cellular death. Of course, ionizing radiation can also be dangerous and lead to cancer by causing mutation in nearby healthy cells. Targeted low dose radiation therapy mitigates this risk by reducing the amount of damaging ionizing radiation to surrounding cells. The concept of using LDRT in the treatment of pneumonia actually isn’t all that new, with initial trials dating back to 1905 at The University of Pennsylvania. It was also used to treat viral pneumonia after the 1918 influenza pandemic. Most reports were written from 1930 to 1946 in a time when advanced intensive care including the use of respirators was not possible. Although these studies produced good results, the use of radiation to treat pneumonia dropped after 1946 due to the emergence of other ways to treat bacterial infections such as antibiotics like penicillin. There have been no further studies into the use of low radiation therapy to treat pneumonia after 1946. This area of research has only recently
been revived by our desperate search for a cure during the Covid-19 pandemic, 74 years later. What have the studies found? In June of this year, the results from the first trial in humans showed promising results. The small scale pilot study, which was later published in the American Cancer Society Journal, found that “low-dose whole-lung radiation led to rapid improvements” in five oxygendependent elderly patients with Covid-19 pneumonia. It also concluded that LDRT appears to be safe and should be studied further. Another clinical trial conducted in Iran and published in the International Journal of Radiation Oncology also found “encouraging results”. The research concluded LDRT had a response rate of 80% and “starts to demonstrate efficacy from the first day of irradiation”. There are further ongoing trials researching the effectiveness of LDRT in Covid-19 patients, including the VENTED and PREVENT studies at the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Top: Woman wearing face mask, Credit: Pixabay Middle left: Lung with CAP pretreatment, Credit: Wiki Commons Bottom: Painkillers, Credit: Pixabay
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The small scale pilot study, which was later published in the American Cancer Society Journal, found that “low-dose wholelung radiation led to rapid improvements”
What are the concerns? The main concern regarding the use of LDRT are the unknown long-term effects on the body. While LDRT can sterilize inflammatory lung tissue, it could damage other healthy cells in the lungs. Another practical problem of treating Covid-19 patients in radiotherapy clinics is the potential infection risk to cancer patients, who are extremely vulnerable to the virus. This had led some scientists to argue that the potential risk of exposing patients to radiation in clinical trials outweigh the potential benefits. Nevertheless, we will need to wait for more studies on the effectiveness of LDRT before it becomes a real treatment option for hospitalised Covid-19 patients today.
Monday 30 November 2020
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Lifestyle
Wellbeing column
Dismantling the ableist notion that audiobooks are ‘not reading’
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Amber Coates egardless of whether you are by nature a ‘reader’ or not, completing any degree requires a substantial amount of reading. Living during the Covid-19 pandemic, with changes across our lives stretching to academics, paid work and our socialising, it has been crucial, too, to diversify how we complete our studies. I am still unsure exactly why, but back in March when teaching moved online and our movement was restricted, I began to find it almost impossible to read in a traditional way- on paper, or on screen. Having been someone who loved the process of diving into material, it became somewhat exhausting to move my eyes across a page. During the pandemic, things that were once pleasurable and commonplace have taken on a far more exhausting feeling. When ‘are audiobooks…’ is typed into Google, the first suggested question is ‘are audiobooks as good as reading?’. Popular reading site
Goodreads has an article from 2018 on the subject: a compiled list of ten responses to the question, which has over 400 comments. Clearly, this is a question which gives rise to opposing responses. Within this article, I would like to posit that audiobooks are, absolutely, reading. Crucially as a starting point, the belief that reading is reserved only for those who have the circumstances to sit down and read a book by eye, excludes those with visual impairments. According to PBS, “Audiobooks first emerged in 1932, with the establishment of a recording studio by The American Foundation for the Blind, which created recordings of books on vinyl records”. So it is clear that the beginnings of audiobooks were about making reading less exclusionary and ableist, and more accessible. The belief that everyone should be able to enjoy literature, regardless of whether they are non-disabled or not, is a central tenet of the foundational concept of audiobooks. Secondly, the idea that audiobooks are not reading excludes those who turn to audiobooks because of their
mental health. Some may not be in a mental space where the energy which is required to read, that repetitive eye movement that sends even many voracious readers to sleep, is possible. However, they may feel able to go for a walk, shake out some anxiety, and listen to a chunk of an audiobook instead. Or, it may feel right for them to sit on a bench, and listen to an audiobook there. In a moment, one can be transported into a different experience, narrated by someone else, but still appreciate the moment in front of them. They can, instead of remaining glued to the writing on a page, appreciate what is around them, the sights, sounds or smells of nature, all whilst reading. The life-affirming qualities of reading are reflected in the lifeaffirming experience of being in nature. I would like to make the suggestion that listening to an audiobook is simply a matter of personal preference, but in terms of whether it should be considered reading, it is very much the same. Granted, there are things that a reader can do with a written piece of material which cannot be done
with an audiobook. For example, written texts can be annotated freely, and the reader can see how words are set out and structured on the page through punctuation, emboldened text and italics. However, audiobooks have their pluses over written texts, too. The narrator can often provide insight for the reader into intonation, as well as into how accents change how written words are pronounced, and subsequently how they can have multiple meanings. Additionally, listening to a text quite literally brings it to life; the characters gain depth when their voices can actually be heard. Lastly, to put it simply, it is far better to listen to one’s body and mind in terms of how best to read, than to adhere to an exclusionary and ableist argument. Just like finding your own personal working
Credit: Illustration by Robin Ireland hours and patterns is important, and your specific working style, finding the best and most accessible ways for you to take in study materials is also crucial. As with anything, society is often very quick to define what something is not, without postulating what it is. I hope that this can be an academic term of allowing yourself to think outside the box, of ways that you can make your studies firstly doable, and subsequently enjoyable. You know how to manage your reading best and if audiobooks can help, then they may become, as they have for me, one of your most vital study resources.
The most brew-tiful alternatives to coffee shops cakes. The cake in the photo is a blueberry muffin with an elderflower and pistachio icing - take note of that one, it’s great!
Emily Evans The rich elixir that we all know as coffee has become a necessity for many uni-students’ routines. Yet with the recent closure of our beloved coffee shops and eateries, getting that sought after caffeinefix has become a little problematic, but that’s not to say that it’s impossible. While we can’t currently sit in, countless establishments are offering customers the chance to take away their fresh brews and bakes – but where to find them? Here I present you with four Covidsecure ways to boost your energy whether at home or out.
Takeaway choices Steam Yard For those who don’t already know, Steam Yard is a true Sheffield favourite. Situated in the middle of Division Street, it’s one to take a note of for visiting - even though it is a shame that we currently can’t enjoy the bustling environment that they usually offer. A personal
Recommended by the author: Coffika’s blueberry muffin with an elderflower and pistachio icing. Photo by Emily Evans
Coffee Revs, SU A more affordable alternative that can be picked up on the way to a library session, or a wander around Western Bank Park is Coffee Revs. With an array of flavoursome, sweet syrups to jazz up any drink to your own taste, it’s one that is definitely worth visiting as the winter nights roll in.
recommendation would be their sticky, cinnamon rolls; a favourite of mine when paired with a flat white. Coffika Why not start off a crisp, autumnal stroll through Sheffield’s Botanical Gardens with a pit stop at Coffika? Found half-way down Ecclesall Road, Coffika are currently offering a takeaway service to customers consisting of rich brews with ornate coffee art, alongside several humble
Homemade frappé. Photo courtesy of Emily Evans
Frappuccino who? Starbucks are renowned for their designer, 30-ingredient, polysyllabic drinks, and the Frappuccino is one of them (and an expensive one too!). A homemade rendition, however, has become somewhat of a household favourite. Ingredients: 2 tablespoons of instant coffee 2 tablespoons of sugar 2 tablespoons of boiling water 100-120ml of milk (depending on how milky you prefer) 3 ice cubes Method: 1 – In a mixing bowl, use a hand held blender (a whisk will work too but will take a little longer), and mix the coffee, sugar and boiling water together until a fluffy texture starts to emerge. The sugar is the active agent that forms the fluffiness, so, if you’re on a health kick, reduce the sugar by half but whisk for longer. 2 – In a glass, add your ice cubes and milk, followed by adding your
thick coffee mixture slowly to get that perfect coffee-shop aesthetic. 3 - Stir well before drinking, and enjoy! Coffee shop, copycat / A third and final alternative When I bought my cafetière a year ago, I expected that it would only ever come out once in a blue moon for I thought it was quite an expensive luxury to maintain… when really, it’s quite the contrary. The cafetière itself was only £5 from John Lewis, and when paired with Aldi’s own-brand, French ground coffee blend, it works out as quite the student-friendly alternative to coffee shop brews. To make, simply add a scoop of your ground coffee into your cafetière, pour boiling water to the brim and let sit for 3-minutes. Pour into your favourite winter mug and enjoy!
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Forge Press
Lifestyle
Finding small joys in lockdown Lockdown has brought a multitude of challenges for all of us, and perhaps the most significant one is all the extra time stuck in the house. Whilst it’s easy to become overwhelmed and frustrated, many of us have found outlets in new hobbies, or in the revisiting of old ones. The small joys of everyday life have become more important than ever before. Experiencing ‘The Outdoor City’ I’ve found that despite the lack of travel and social interaction lockdown brings with it, a small pleasure I have been able to indulge in is walking. Walking outside and into the fresh air allows me to become much more in tune with myself, as well as giving me the opportunity to take a step back from work and anything that might be stressful. Throughout lockdown it has beenis incredibly easy to allow yourself to stay inside (or even to stay in bed) all day without experiencing how beautiful the crisp autumn air is. I recently visited Greno Wood, an ancient wood within Sheffield that is full of Pine and Oak trees and after being inside all day, the walk really invigorated and inspired me. Getting outside and into nNature has helped me to keep optimistic and motivated, saving me from an overwhelming slump. For a while, the chilly breeze and warm colours easily provide a distraction from any anxieties cropping up throughout this second lockdown. Some places I definitely recommend are: the Botanical Gardens, for somewhere with a huge variety of fauna and flora; Greno Woods, if you like to walk through ancient woodland; and Ecclesall Woods, for somewhere that feels like you are in the middle of nowhere. Getting out and into nature has improved my quality of life over lockdown and I hope this inspires you to get out in Sheffield, ‘The Outdoor City.’’ By Jessica
Forsyth
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Having a hobby doesnt have to be about being an expert, but it should always be something that makes you happy - Liv Taylor
Baking the best of a bad situation
My dad has often told me the story of how, when my mum was in hospital having given birth to my sister a few days prior, he sat me on the kitchen counter and I taught him how to make a Victoria Sponge cake, from memory, at just four4 years old. Granted, I think I had just memorised the phrase “Six of everything and three eggs!” which isn’t exactly complicated, but nonetheless the story tells me one thing for sure: – I have always loved to bake. I haven’t eaten gluten for a few years now, so going out to eat often means settling for yet another dry gluten-free brownie, while everyone else chooses from an array of creative and exciting treats. Frustrated with the constant food-envy, I took it upon myself to figure out how to make gluten-free alternatives to the usual classics – in essence, I turned to baking out of jealousy more than anything else. However, through lockdown it became something of a lifesaver, as well asand it was an outlet in which I could channel both boredom and anxiety. A huge slice of Bailey’s tart really took the edge off of Boris Johnson’s daily Covid updates. So, once a week, with my parents at work and my sister shut away in the living room watching New Girl, I took advantage of the empty kitchen and baked to my heart’s content, experimenting with new flavours, techniques and styles. Did every bake go to plan every time? Absolutely not. Did I find joy in it anyway? Every time! Having a hobby doesn’t have to be about being an expert, but it should always be something that makes you happy. In the last year or so, life has been full of utter chaos and it’s important to
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Having a hobby doesn’t have to be about being an expert, but it should always be something that makes you happy.
find relief in something you love, be it writing, running, drawing, cycling or, indeed, baking. By Liv Taylor
An opportunity to listen back The internet has furthered a musical
obsession with the here and now. Via instant news and instant trends, we are always on the lookout for that new band, album or single. Yet alongside this is a huge archive of musical history, accessible on demand for free. During lockdown, I’ve been putting it to use, re-listening to
music that I used to be unable to get out of my head. Indie was a force to be reckoned with in the late 2000s and early 2010s. For many teenage fans, it was an important part of adolescent identityshaping. Listening to the frustrated yelps of Bloc Party or the endearingly awkward dance-rock mix of Does It Offend You, Yeah? awoke memories of walking hurriedly down school corridors with other uniformed kids, wondering how to set myself apart. Seeing the irony that this made most indie-kids identical now puts a smile on my face. Bombay Bicycle Club remain dear to me, because their first four releases span the rough period between the forming of my first proper musical opinions and my first attendance at Reading Festival.
Monday 30 November 2020
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Lifestyle for Christmas. Thin sound quality and background crackle haunt their Spotify counterparts. Music’s relationship with memory is strong enough to treat amnesia, according to researchers from the University of Newcastle in Australia. It can become part of your identity. This makes it a good way to reflect on how your identity has changed. The prevalence of nostalgia has increased in popular culture and in many ways lockdowns are the climax of this trend. Whereas previously we were nostalgic for lost decades, now we are nostalgic for lost months. By Charlie Ridler
Making the lockdown blues ‘jog on’ 2020 will be regarded as one of the most momentous years in the
There, a 16-year-old me was bombarded with sets from, among others, Queens of the Stone Age, Disclosure, Jungle and Metronomy. Then I went back to music I inherited from my parents. I can recall being driven around, home-made CDs blaring through car speakers. The White Stripes, Norah Jones and Billy Bragg tracks were ripped from vinyl records, converted to digital format on a USB turntable we got had been bought
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Previously we were nostlagic for lost decades, now we are nostlagic for lost months - Charlie Ridler
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I cannot recommend anything else that will change you for the better, and keep you focused and clear-headed, even when the world around you turns upside down - Matthew Barnes
history of humanity. How are you keeping sane during these crazy times, I hear you ask? My answer is very simple. At the start of the first lockdown back in March, I decided to start running - something which I hoped would keep my mind and body occupied. I was initially sceptical about how long I could sustain the new-found hobby; it seemed like a monumental challenge as a beginner. However, after eight enjoyable months of running, I’m still at it, and I’m still loving it. Since moving to Sheffield to study at the university, I have carried on with regular running, usually getting myself out every couple of days. Luckily for me, there are so many spectacular running routes all around Sheffield, from the picturesque Botanical Gardens to the delightful Weston Park. My personal favourite is Endcliffe Park, but perhaps I’m a little biased due to living just up the road from it. I cannot recommend anything else that will change you for the better, and keep you focused and clear-headed, even when the world around you turns upside down, and becomes overwhelming. Running was the answer for me, and it might just be for you too. If you’re considering starting, then my best advice is just to get
out and give it a go. You can start simply by easing yourself in with a combination of walks and runs. Once you feel ready, try gradually increasing your distance and time at a comfortable rate; the key is not to put too much pressure on yourself. I started this way, and although it was tough at times, the endless and joyful benefits that can be gained from the activity kept me going. The power of regular running is incredible - it has genuinely given me a new lease of life. With all this time at home, there really hasn’t been a better time to start running. All you have to do is try it, and trust me - you won’t regret it for one minute. By Matthew Barnes
Bottom far left: Liv’s homemade lemon and blueberry cheesecake; Top far left and below: Greno Woods, Credit: Jessica Forsyth; Left: Trainers, Credit: Matthew Barnes
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Forge Press
Break
Lockdown 2's Good News Update Ed Brown
Sir David Attenborough joins Instagram
Coronavirus vaccine found to be 90% effective It can be hard to imagine a time when the coronavirus wasn’t having a profound effect on our lives. Fortunately, we shouldn’t need to imagine for too much longer. Pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and BioNTech have reported 90% efficacy in their phase 3 trials for a vaccine, and the World Health Organisation thinks it could be completed by early next year. BioNTech’s Professor Ugur Sahin says there’s every chance life will be right back to normal by next winter. So, everyone was right when they said it would be over by Christmas! (They just meant Christmas 2021.) Two new marsupials discovered in Australia Until recently, the greater glider was thought to be just one species. It turns out it’s three distinct ones. They all use membranes between their legs to glide between trees (a bit like the Washington Monument scene in Spider-Man: Homecoming). This is excellent news for Australian biodiversity, and helpful for scientists aiming to conserve species under threat. Plus – they’re very, very cute. There are officially two more cute species on the planet than there were before, and that, scientifically, is a good thing.
I do not believe there is a single person in Britain who has anything bad to say about David Attenborough, and nor should there be. What’s not to love about this National Treasure taking to Instagram? Letting more Attenborough into our lives can only ever be a good thing, and will help to raise awareness about climate change – which is the veteran broadcaster’s motivation for making the jump into social media. First new reef discovered in the Great Barrier Reef in 120 years
Virgin Hyperloop completes its first manned journey The Virgin Hyperloop is a stunning new piece of technology. It takes a small capsule, levitates it with magnets, then propels it through a vacuum at incredible speeds – and, as of 10 November, has now done so with people inside of it. The Virgin Hyperloop could revolutionise travel; with a potential top speed of 600mph, it would make HS2 look like a Fiat Panda, and could undercut domestic flights, providing a new service at a fraction of the cost and environmental impact. Welcome to the future. Here, we take a rollercoaster to work.
NASA teaches indigenous people the benefits of satellite technology NASA has begun courses for Native Americans where they are being taught remote sensing – that is, the science of monitoring the conditions of a physical area via satellite – to help them with natural resource management within their traditional tribal lands. After engaging in talks with indigenous leaders, NASA has tailored its courses to the specific needs of each tribal community. The indigenous people’s need to take care of their land is spiritual as well as practical, and with these programmes, NASA aims to help Native Americans overcome new threats presented by climate change.
For years, Australia’s Great Barrier Reef has been considered particularly vulnerable due to changes brought about by climate change. As the oceans grow warmer, the corals become stressed; they jettison their algae into the water in a process known as ‘coral bleaching’, named for the colour-draining effect it has on the wildlife. But recently, a new reef has been discovered, proving that the Great Barrier
Reef still has plenty of fight in it yet. Not only is it enormous – that is, taller-than-the-Empire-StateBuilding enormous at a whopping 1,640 feet – but it contains all the signs of a flourishing ecosystem. Scientists theorise that reefs such as this one could serve as a safe haven for species unable to survive in hotter waters, until such a time as the climate is brought back under control, and the damaged reefs once again become capable of supporting life. Success for Marcus Rashford’s campaign to feed schoolchildren over the winter The whole of the UK seemed to rally behind Manchester United and England player Marcus Rashford this month in an impassioned moment of national unity. Rashford’s tireless campaigning, inspired by his own personal experience of childhood food poverty, has secured financial support from the government to the tune of £170 million to put school meals in the bellies of hungry children this winter. “Time we worked together,” Rashford said in a powerful statement put out on Twitter. “This is not politics, this is humanity.” Since then, spurred on by the success of his campaign he has also started a children’s book club in the hope of providing kids from all socio-economic backgrounds with the escapism of reading. What a guy.
A Letter: From Mr C. Ovid to Forge Press
Written by Ryan Smith Dear Forge, Well, here it is. Another lockdown for the whole country. I feel like that chap from Forrest Gump writing this, but we’re now all back inside, again. Being told to only go to work if we need to, again. Being told it’s for the good of the country, again. The only change this time is that the weather is becoming more miserable by the
day, and who doesn’t love going for a walk in the cold November rain? Still, it’s comforting to know this is a proper lockdown. For real. No ifs or buts. Super-duper lockdown. None of that namby-pamby half in, half out lockdown. Lockdown Two: This Time, It’s Personal. Nonsense, more like. Shutting the whole country down won’t solve a thing. I mean, really. Do they shut down rugby matches if one fan gets kicked out? Come off it, there’d be a riot. At least this time they extended that furlough business until the end of March, meaning thousands, if not millions, have lost their job for no reason whatsoever. Call me suspicious, but telling people to go to work then essentially cancelling their jobs almost seems like they
didn’t want furlough to cost as much this time. But hey, that’s just me. Business as usual for me though, with people still going out. And that’s not a jab at those who do stand up for their inherent British values
(exploring places previously offlimits, doing what we want without a care for others, breaking rules and claiming it was always our duty to do so); it’s our natural course of order to stand up to them telling us to stay
inside! Like the students at the University of Manchester. God bless every one of them, sticking it to The Man, standing up for themselves, showing they’re not to be cowed by anything. Not only was it chuffing crackers to quite literally cage in students to the confines of their own apartments,
Images (Clockwise from top left): David Attenborough in 2015, filming a documentary on the Great Barrier Reef, Credit: Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade via Wikimedia Commons; A mural of Marcus Rashford in Manchester; The Student's Union , remarkably still open in a national lockdown. Credit: Forge Press
Monday 30 November 2020
23
Break
Moments of the Month Bruno Cooke
world’s longest game of hide and seek. After more than a century going unseen by human eyes, the rare Voeltzkow’s chameleon has been discovered in an overgrown hotel garden. The hidee declined to comment, but he does like to move it move it.
1
Bentley catches drift, casts off shackles, and goes electric
You may have heard – or maybe you haven’t, because electric cars are really quiet. Bentley has thought the unthinkable, and announced the thought that they thought is actually going to be made real life, in five years’ time. After a century of making cars, Bentley’s journey has, at last, begun. The luxury car manufacturer and national treasure is foregoing internal combustion entirely. No more cylinders, no more petrol. Just a faint whirr and a whoosh as the aristocracy is moved around the country. I know what you’re thinking. A British stalwart changing tack? Shock! Tradition is being flouted! What next? Frankie Boyle stops swearing (what the f***?), Judi Dench announces her new role on Hollyoaks (almost unthinkable, but you just thought it, and it wasn’t pretty) and Attenborough pours tea down the drain, favouring a frappuccino (just weird). This is the kind of madness honest British gentlefolk shouldn’t have to be dealing with, especially before breakfast.
Dear Forge, Well, here it is. Another lockdown for the whole country. I feel like that chap from Forrest Gump writing this, but we’re now all back inside, again. Being told to only go to work if we need to, again. Being told it’s for the good of the country, again. The only change this time is that the weather is becoming more miserable by the day, and who doesn’t love going for a walk in the cold November rain? Still, it’s comforting to know this is a proper lockdown. For real. No ifs or buts. Super-duper lockdown. None of that namby-pamby half in, half out lockdown. Lockdown Two: This Time, It’s Personal.
2
15 million Danish mink ordered to be culled amid fears of coronavirus mutation
The minks are sick. New research from the State Serum Institute suggested that a version of the virus circulating between mink and humans might have mutated sufficiently to render future vaccines ineffective. As a result, the mink must go. Who will kill them? Danes, I imagine. Great ones – by which I mean the large hound, or Apollo of Dogs – in huge numbers. Granted, they’d be huge in small numbers, too. Great huge Danes. To recap: Danish officials have announced that Danish mink farmers are going to have to kill all their mink – that’s somewhere between 15 and 17 million mink, and a
Nonsense, more like. Shutting the whole country down won’t solve a thing. I mean, really. Do they shut down rugby matches if one fan gets kicked out? Come off it, there’d be a riot. At least this time they extended that furlough business until the end of March, meaning thousands, if not millions, have lost their job for no reason whatsoever. Call me suspicious, but telling people to go to work then essentially cancelling their jobs almost seems like they didn’t want furlough to cost as much this time. But hey, that’s just me. Business as usual for me though, with people still going out. And that’s not a jab at those who do stand up for their inherent British values
significant proportion of Denmark’s GDP flushed down the drain (or thrown into large mink ditches). Spare a thought for them over the next few months. But perhaps even more curious is the seemingly benign phrase, “circulating between mink and humans”. Now, let it be known. I’m as openminded as the next animal lover. Whatever floats your goat. And minks are soft, that’s literally the point of them. But none of that puts the brakes on my gross and curiously sprinting imagination. What were you minking, I mean thinking, farmer Jensen?
3
Chameleon wins at hide and seek, breaks record
Donning their brightest torches and most luminescent headgear, a group of researchers in Madagascar have rumbled the
(exploring places previously offlimits, doing what we want without a care for others, breaking rules and claiming it was always our duty to do so); it’s our natural course of order to stand up to them telling us to stay inside! Like the students at the University of Manchester. God bless every one of them, sticking it to The Man, standing up for themselves, showing they’re not to be cowed by anything. Not only was it chuffing crackers to quite literally cage in students to the confines of their own apartments, they weren’t even consulted about it beforehand. Not that any sane person would actually agree to cutting yourself off from the outside
4
An actual politician prepared to re-enter the White House
Over the course of their campaign, Team Biden has won the hearts and minds of the West’s liberal media. The Guardian declared ‘A new start’ with a ‘Free 16-page Joe Biden souvenir supplement inside’ its weekend edition, so all those who love a warmonger can snuggle up nice and close, and remember 2020 for all the change it wrought. Do you love a warmonger? Gosh, I love a warmonger. The Independent declared something similar when Blair came into power, leaving the Conservative Party, the hopes of leftists, and the lives of millions of Afghans and Iraqis in his wake. So, a Biden souvenir then. Next, perhaps, we can expect a line of Bush Beanie Babies, alongside a run of Kissinger Ken dolls and a
world and paying for the privilege. Let the students roam free, into the city of Manchester to live their lives. Otherwise, what’s the point of going to live in a university city at all? Rebellion should be at the heart of every good student. Take Uni of Sheffield as an example. Yes, the library is open. Yes, the Union is open. But at what cost? As stated in my previous letters, either open it, or don’t. These bosses think they know it all – take it from me kids, they know the square root of sod all when it comesfrom to people. Images (Clockwise top left): European Mink atabout Osnabrück Zoo, All they’re bothered is money credit: zoofanatic via Flickr; Joe – my last boss, that Trump fella, he Biden at a pre-election march in didn’t care for anybody. That new Iowa, credit: Gage Skidmore; Bentley one, Biden, he’sGT, badcredit: news for me.Cars He Continental More via Flickr actually has plans to help his people.
Mickey Mouse in the shape of Milton Friedman.
5
Walkers confirmed: it’s a claw.
Is it a claw? Is it a foot? Is it the whole monster? Well, now the eternal debate has been emphatically silenced. Walkers themselves have backed the claw clan, and now anyone who thought that Monster Munch crisps came in the shape of an actual alienoid monster has resigned to the superior authority on the matter. So worry not, confused people of the crisp packet, who never really got how anyone could see anything other than a claw. All is not lies. At least, when it comes to things you thought about oversized and abrasive pickled onion-flavoured corn snacks.
Lockdown creation of the month
We're all pretty bored in lockdown, but this group of masters students took it to the next level. Over a few weekends, they designed and painted their own Monopoly board to create a brilliant custom Uni of Sheffield set. It well features a Hallam jail, apeople, full It’s all and good helping of chance and SU chest cards,at butset what is it that keeps you warm and the all-important Mayfair night? That’s right, pound coins and square towhat. Firth Court. £20 notes,goes that’s The Sheffield Emma Dorricott, of thefellow students ought to lookone at their students who made the board, Mancunians. If they had any sense, said:organise "The ideaa was they’d rent ultimately strike and let of where boredom aspriorities we theborn uni out know their started it when Sheffield was ought to lie. gradually going into Atleast students can lockdown now go home again. over Christmas. They get six days to alsostuff felt like pack"It their and agogreat back home achievement as none of us for are with families. Huge potential the work most for experienced artists." more me, of course, but They were inspired by a Harry good luck to them. Nobody deserves monopoly board on to Potter be alone for Christmas. TikTok, have already started But thenand again, don’t listen to me. their I’ve just next beenSheffield-inspired rinsed too much by board game, Cluedo those who don’tacare a jotset! for those like me. I just get by any way I can –
24
Forge Press
Looking Ahead
Our cultural calendar highlights
Television
Theatre
Film
Pop
Film
The Flying Lovers of Vitebsk
Black Beauty
Shawn Mendes
County Lines
23 November
3 December
27 November
4 December
4 December
Set in the 1930’s, Black Narcissus follows the life of Sister Clodagh as she comes to terms with the challenges of living in the hostile environment of an ancient Himalayan palace. Available on BBC One.
A production centred around young love through the Russain Revolution, The Flying Lovers of Vitebsk makes for an emotional performance enhanced through dance and physical movement. Live streamed directly from Bristol Old Vic from December 3-5.
Based on Anna Sewell’s 1877 novel, Black Beauty is an upcoming dramafilm staring Mackenzie Foy and Kate Winslet. It explores the unbreakable bond between a wild horse and teenage girl, Jo Green. Avaliable on Disney+.
Following the release of his track Wonder at the start of October, Mendes teased fans with what is now the release of a whole new album.. The release is accompanied by his Netflix documentary titled Shawn Mendes: In Wonder, released on November 23.
Based on true events, County Lines is a coming-of-age drama that follows the life of Simon (Harris Dickinson), a 14-year-old boy who is groomed and forced to survive in the toxic world of a drug-selling enterprise. Released in cinemas and digitally on BFI Player and Curzon Home Cinema.
Black Narcissus
Film A Christmas Carol 4 December
Theatre
Death of England: Delroy
Film
Hillbilly Elergy
27 November
24 November
This National Theatre production explores the life of Delroy, a Black working class man tackling his delicate relationship with Great Britain. The Daily Telegraph are calling the production “a blazing powerhouse”. Available from 7pm for 24 hours via the National Theatre YouTube channel.
Starring Amy Adams and Haley Bennett, Hillbilly Elegy follows the life of a Yale law student who moves back to his Appalachian family home to discover their mother’s damaging heroin addiction. Avaliable on Netflix.
Theatre Rent
Until 20 December
Exciting news folks - A Christmas Carol has yet another adaptation. This time the Dickens novel will see the merging of the dark and the fantastical in an immersive Victorian world where the screen becomes theatre. The Jacqui Morris adaptation starring Carey Mulligan and Martin Freeman will come to our screens on December 4
Rent depicts the lives of aspiring artists in bustling Manhattan through the medium of rock and roll, while simultaneously incorporating more hard-hitting topics of impoverishment and life with HIV/AIDS. Running dates are from 27 November - 20 December 20, with tickets starting from £25 at hopemilltheatre.co.uk.
Pop
Indie
Miley Cyrus
Liam Gallagher
27 November
5 December
Miley Cyrus’s seventh album, Plastic Hearts, is coming out just in time for the festive season. Cyrus opened up on Instagram that the upcoming album has been two years in the making, hinting that the California wildfires and her divorce from Liam Hemsworth has delayed it’s production. Get the tissues ready people, I think it’s fair to say that it’s going to be an emotional one.
Liam Gallagher is back with an exclusive, one-off live performance for fans to stream. He plans on performing his top tracks from his own albums, as well as “some stone cold Oasis classics”. Tickets are available via Gallagher’s website, liamgallagher.com.
Monday 30 November 2020
25
E C A P S e h Reclaim t We want to get out and protest in different areas around Sheffield! Send in your pictures and images, we will create an online collection to show both our solidarity with victims, and our strength against the violence.
Find out more at sheffieldsu.com/16days Please do not attend these spaces alone and we encourage you to go in the daytime. Women’s Officer
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Forge Press
Arts & Theatre
Feature
University in fiction: How well does it match reality?
Article author Madison Burgess. Credit: Herself
Madison Burgess
Starter for Ten David Nicholls
“University will be the best time of your life!” I can guarantee that if you are a student, you have heard this at least once. I know I definitely have. Throughout fiction, university is portrayed as a life-changing experience where you meet amazing friends and truly find yourself. But how does real life compare to this? I delved into the best fiction books set at university to see how well they paint the picture.
Hodder Paperbacks [£8.99]
Starter for Ten by David Nicholls follows the first-person narrative of Brian Jackson in his first year at Bristol University in 1985 as he deals with education, love and identity. It is really relatable to the university experience, including the first awkward conversations with flatmates, struggling with work, and of course there is a classic love triangle thrown in there. Brian believes knowledge is
“
University is a huge, and sometimes messy, learning curve about finding out what is important to you and who you really are, a message that is central to Starter For Ten
power and has a remarkable range of general knowledge. This leads him to audition for a place on the University Challenge Team, a dream he has had since childhood. However, all of Brian’s morals seem to go out of the window within his first week. At the University Challenge trials he gives away his answers to fellow student, Alice Harbinson, leaving him without a place on the team. Although this is early on in the book, this seems out of character for Brian. He values knowledge above all and this was both his and his late father’s dream, yet he throws it away to win the affection of a beautiful girl. The book is comedic and makes light of all the situations Brian throws himself into, which is really refreshing and fun. University is often portrayed as a really happy time, and it can be. But what I like about this book is that it shows that you will make mistakes and get things wrong. University is a huge, and sometimes messy, learning curve about finding out what is important to you and who you really are, a message that is central to Starter For Ten. Brian also struggles a lot with his identity throughout the book, which is comparable to real life. He feels like a different person at his home in Southend than he is at University, and finds that when he returns home for Christmas, he doesn’t get on with his friends as well. Before he leaves, Brian’s friend Tone says says “You’re not going to turn into a wanker, are you?”, followed by his friend Spencer with “He means you’re not going to get all studenty on us”. This may be relatable for some people as moving away from home and meeting new people can be difficult. You live in accommodation with people from all over the country, from all different backgrounds. Life is different from your hometown, and you may grow into a completely different person.
Fangirl Rainbow Rowell MacMillan Chidren’s Books [£7.99]
Switching to American university fiction, otherwise known as college, I read Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell. The book follows the lives of twins Wren and Cath, who are polar opposites. Wren is outgoing and
popular whilst Cath is timid due to suffering with social anxiety, and therefore struggles when they become Freshmen at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. This book is a must-read for anyone who is going through a tough time at university or is an introvert. It tells the story of Cath’s growth as a person, whilst highlighting struggles such as making friends, family problems at home, and the transition from a teenager to a young adult. One of my favourite quotes from the book is “In new situations, all the trickiest rules are the ones nobody bothers to explain to you. (And the ones you can’t Google.)” This really encapsulates life at university. Similar to Starter for Ten, Fangirl presents university life as far from perfect, whilst still including all of the amazing highs such as Cath’s adoration for her writing class and her romance with fellow student Levi.
Normal People Sally Rooney Faber & Faber [£8.99]
Finally, I have to talk about Normal People by Sally Rooney. It is such a deep and intense piece of fiction, following the complex relationship between Connell Waldron and Marianne Sheridan, as they attend the same secondary school, and later reconnect at university (Trinity College Dublin). Rooney provides a raw and intense view of university life and how it can differ for everyone. Marianne excels in her classes and becomes a social butterfly, unlike at school where she was lonely and bullied. It’s the opposite scenario for Connell. He is used to being the popular boy at school, ashamed to admit his relationship with Marianne. At university he struggles with social anxiety and depression, leading him down a dark path that Rooney executes perfectly. The book tackles mental health at university in a way I have never seen before and could be relatable for so many people. Overall, I would recommend all three of these books to anyone studying at university. They highlight the highs and lows of the experience, whilst keeping you entertained throughout.
Monday 30 November 2020
27
Arts & Theatre
Fresh books
Lockdown in Love Chloe James
These Violent Delights Toshikazu Kawaguchi
Ready Player Two Ernest Cline
James’s novel highlights the struggles of
Set in an old Tokyo coffee shop that uniquely
This highly anticipated sequel takes readers
isolating alongside the joys of the smallest
allows its customers to travel in time, this
on a new quest with high stakes, unexpected
connections.
moving story ponders past, present and future.
twists and enchanting possibilities.
Prefection performing last year. Credit: UoS Drag Soc
How UoS’s Drag Soc is maintaining the glamour through the pandemic Credit: Amazon
Opinion Amazon Xmas 2020 Ad: A fitting tribute or the commercialisation of a stuggling industry Grace Dodson There’s no question that the Coronavirus pandemic has impacted almost every aspect of people’s lives, but the decision by Amazon to focus their 2020 Christmas advert around a young dancer living through the pandemic, raises many questions about its commercialisation of the ongoing struggles within the arts. The advert starts the same way many of us started 2020 - with hope and excitement of the new year and new opportunities. However, much like 2020, the advert suddenly develops into a tale of woe, depicting the immediate changes to living and working that was faced globally at the beginning of the first lockdown. All of this is illustrated through a ballet dancer struggling with the adaptation to lockdown life. Amazon’s decision to include a dancer as their advert’s central character might be a subtle reference to the now infamous UK government advert which faced worldwide backlash after suggesting people in creative careers should retrain for employment in more ‘safe’ careers, such as cyber security. The advert gives a nod to many familiar parts of the first national
lockdown, with video calls and online classes shown to make up a large proportion of the dancer’s day and the rearranging of furniture to suit working from home. It also shows her family’s changed priorities, going from watching her rehearse in their home to dodging her practicing in front of the television whilst they try to focus on an important news bulletin. Bound within the four walls of her own home, we see her hope and positivity slowly dwindle away; something many people will relate to. However, the climax of her loss of hope is something that
“
Amazon has more than enough power and finance to make immense contributions to struggling organisations and people
not everybody watching will have been familiar with: a cancelled performance. Whilst most (if not all) of the advert’s audience will empathise with adapting to changes in daily life, those who resonate with the specific experiences of the character, namely people working in the arts whose livelihood relies on in-person events, will undoubtedly view the advert’s message differently. Amazon’s decision to focus on this sector specifically could be said to show how badly the arts industry was hit as a result of Covid-19, but there is also something a little less sympathetic occuring in the advert that makes me question this idea. It’s commercialisation of the experiences of the dancer becomes more clear as the advert progresses. The neighbour’s spotlight (which he is shown to have purchased from Amazon) is used to illuminate the dancer, who’s holding a substitute performance on the rooftop of her apartment. The neighbour shines his spotlight on her dancing, attracting the attention of other neighbours, and while possibly symbolising the together-ness and sense of community that was discovered for many through the first lockdown.
The autumn semester was inevitably going to be a tough one for all societies, particularly those which
those looking to join the society this semester and, hopefully, they will be able to put on a virtual show later in the year that would allow for its members to perform again, albeit in a very different setting. Like many societies this move to online events and socials has made it much harder for new members, especially freshers, to join, but
are based around in-person events such as drag shows. The current restrictions imposed by the lockdown mean that no live drag performances are currently able to go ahead, nor are any face-to-face social events. Sadly, this means no glitter fuelled Grapefruit shows or in-person workshops full of glitz, glamour and creativity, and for a society that relies on performance not only for fun and community but also for promotion, this is an obvious blow. But drag is an art form that can’t be shut down, as Sheffield’s Drag Society is proving. Despite not being able to meet new and returning members in person, the society is committed to maintaining the essential community spirit and support of the group through regular online sessions including Get Ready With Me videos, makeup tutorials and Instagram lives. Drag Society Vice President and Secretary, Ruben a.k.a Perfection said: “We hold weekly online meetings every Wednesday where we discuss all things drag related and also put together ideas for potential performances. We have
Drag Society has a simple message: come once to an online social and you’ll definitely want to come back for another! This spirit, alongside the passion of the committee and members for their art, is the driving force behind the society and their community ethos. “Drag Soc is a place for people of all identities to feel valid, accepted and safe,” added Ruben. “We welcome everyone who shares a love for drag and we encourage all drag artists regardless of their gender or sexuality to join us and grow with us.” Whether you fit the glamourous RuPaul’s Drag Race portrayal of drag queens, you’re an AFAB queen, you’re a drag king, or if you still want to figure out your drag, there is space for everyone. It is in times like these where we need artistic communities more than ever. Societies like Drag Soc allow you to escape the many stresses of 2020 by building a new persona, making new friends and having fun - something that we can all admit has been lacking this year. Whether you are missing the buzz of performing live or the thrill
something very exciting planned for the end of this semester and we would love for you to be a part of it!” Alongside this, they are planning to run Give It A Go events aimed at
that comes with doing a full face of makeup in a backstage room with your mates, Drag Society will try to fill that void and provide a bit of glamour and fun to this semester.
Arts & Theatre Editor Betty Wilson spoke to the Drag Society about their plans for the semester, despite the challenges of the pandemic.
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Forge Press
Arts & Theatre Theatre Review
Emotional and inspiring play about a woman who should’ve shone long ago
Emilia Madison Burgess With their ferocious passion, wit and emotion, Saffron Coomber, Claire Perkins and Adelle Leonce bring Emilia roaring to life on the stage of the Vauderville Theatre alongside an all-female cast. This Olivier Award winning play is based on true events and follows the life of Emilia Lanier, the ‘dark lady’ of Shakespeare’s sonnets but more importantly a poet and feminist who was erased from history. Its clever reevaluation of the past places Emilia at the centre of her story, allowing her voice to finally be heard. The audience follows Emilia through the stages of her life, with each portrayed by a different actress. Saffron Coomber as the youngest who we watch grieve
her parents and discover her love for poetry in the royal court. She is followed by Adelle Leonce as an older Emilia, struggling to make her voice heard as she becomes Shakespeare’s muse. Finally, Claire Perkins brings the play to a dramatic climax as she fights for women’s voices, recruiting a team of women alongside her. A unique aspect of this play is that all three of the Emilia’s are often on stage together, but oblivious to each other. For example, both of the older Emilia’s watch and narrate young Emilia’s life directly to the audience. This feature was so effective and gripping; it really emphasised unity amongst women, which is what the play is all about. In an emotional scene, Emilia is giving birth whilst holding hands with her older selves as a group of women all breathe
and scream in time with her. The all-female cast and creative team was exactly what this play needed to make it a breath of fresh air. It has a perfect balance of heartwrenching moments followed by comedic relief. The extravagant portrayal of the male characters is almost mocking, like an inside joke between the audience and cast that the male characters are there to be laughed at. However, the dynamic between each of the Emilia’s and Charity Wakefield as William Shakespeare was nothing short of
electric. When Shakespeare - or ‘Will’ as he’s referred to throughout the play - recites Sonnet 130 to Emilia, you could hear a pin drop in the audience. The intense and emotional ending scene that brings the play to a close leaves the audience feeling inspired. Perkins’ Emilia is reunited with Shakespeare who breaks the fourth wall and addresses the audience directly, telling Emilia that she deserves all of this right now, pointing at the audience. Emila then delivers a passionate monologue as
she tells the audience: “Listen now when I say to you to take the fire as your own”. The all-female cast then joins her onstage to end with a joyful and comedic dance, lifting the spirits of all women and men alike. In short, Emilia is a play everyone should watch. Although it’s set in the 1600’s, the narrative is relevant to a modern audience and it will leave you both laughing and crying, giving the stage to a woman who should have had it a long time ago. Available to watch at emilialive. com until 2nd December 2020.
Student Food Drive Donate food and money to help with food poverty in Sheffield. You can physically donate food to the designated drop off point in the SU Plaza and donate money to our fundraising page bit.ly/3ei2JR1
Tell us about your semester, and guide our priorities.
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Forge Press
Music
Interview APRE chat about lockdown creativity, their influences, and the pressures of social media
F
Tom Coates or Kent’s alt-pop prodigies APRE, 2020 has proven to be productive. Multi-instrumentalists Charlie Brown and Jules Konieczny met at a chess club, so getting to work away from the limelight and in a quiet space was not completely alien to them. When the duo sat down for a virtual chat with Forge Press, it became abundantly clear how the band provide such a polished pop sound, they are deep thinkers and music obsessives, who produce their own songs and mirror society’s ills in their work. “Generally, we have quite an upbeat sound but the lyrics themselves can often be really negative,” Brown explained. “In the mini album we’ve just released, the lyrical content is pretty dark in places.” The often-sobering lyrics provide a juxtaposition favoured by Jules Konieczny, who is self-admittedly not fond of social media and the pressures it brings. “It’s my whole thing of putting the negatives in a positive light, like you would, for
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Filtered life, showing off, people trying to make themselves look like they're winning, I don't think it's very good for mental health. - Jules Konieczny
example, on social media, which I struggle with massively,” he said. “Filtered life, showing off, people trying to make themselves look like they’re winning, I don’t think it’s very good for mental health.” He did, however, concede that the mirroring of social media’s pitfalls in APRE’s tracks was not intentional. “Having a negative frame of mind but taking a picture of it and covering it in a filter, jazzing it up, making it out to be this amazing thing which it isn’t, that wasn’t something that was done intentionally,” Konieczny clarified. “That was an accident, but when I think about it, I really like it because it’s real. Life is like that. People are going through shit and there’s lots going on in everyone’s heads, especially now. “It’s been a really terrible time for millions of people, so I like the idea of how audibly, we can dress it up, even though it is still kind of showing it in a negative light.” APRE’s mini album, ‘Always In My Head’, was released earlier this month. Consisting of eight tracks, it will act as a forerunner for the band’s actual debut album, which they hope to release in 2021 if it is possible for them to tour it. Although the songs were written before the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, it was finalised when the virus had taken a firm grip of the UK. Lockdown allowed the duo to focus on their music, and
Credit: Chuffmedia
both have tried to see the benefits of something so difficult. Brown elaborated: “From a creative point of view, it’s been really great. We’ve had so much time to write music and get those songs together without ever having to jet off to different countries and play live. “That’s been annoying, of course, because we love playing live, but it’s been really good. It’s meant we can focus without knowing we have to leave in a weeks’ time.” Konieczny added: “From a very negative situation we’re in, if you’re creative, it’s quite a positive place to be because the outside world is closed off. “You don’t have any other choice than to sit down and be creative and try to express how you feel. All in all, it turned out to be really good because it gave us that time and that freedom to be creative.” Although their debut record is yet to be completed, the duo still offered an insight into the mood and sound of the LP. “It’s definitely still going to sound like APRE, but the main album sounds rawer, a bit more indie,” said Brown. Konieczny added: “It’s hard to tell because the songs are finished but it’s not in the final mix yet. I’m not entirely sure, sonically, how they will sound. They sit in a similar realm with the mini album being about escaping, being free and moving to another place, and kind of leaving all that negative energy behind. “The actual album is definitely following a similar light, in terms of what we stand for as people. We are all about being anything we want to be. There’s that idea of when you come to a gig, everyone being in the same place and believing in the same thing.” The Sunday Times described APRE’s sound as something that melds Tears for Fears
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I really like it because it's real. Life is like that. People are going through shit and there's lots going on in everyones head, especially now. - Jules Konieczny
and Foals – an assessment the duo agrees with. “I think those bands are quite accurate,” Brown said. “I think what’s been really nice is that we’ve never set out to sound like anyone, we’ve never said we want to make a song that sounds like Foals, or that we want to make a song that sounds like Coldplay, or anything like that. Our influences subconsciously sneak into our music, but we never set out to make music that sounds like Tears For Fears or Foals, it just happens.” The pair’s passion for their craft is evident throughout the interview, and their influences range from Bon Iver to Beethoven. Brown explained: ““If you took our brains and laid them out, if you
went in and looked at all of the influences and all of the music we’ve liked, it’s so vast. “I like rap, I like poppy stuff, I like chart stuff. He likes Peter Gabriel, he likes Tears for Fears, he likes some Beethoven. We like Bon Iver, we like Foals, we like Ben Howard. Basically, what I’m saying is that there’s so much stuff, that there will be something we make that sounds a bit like those influences.” Underneath their passion and enthusiasm, however, is understandable worry. Like many, they share concern for the future of the live music industry. For APRE, touring is vital as they want live gigs to accompany the release of their eagerly anticipated debut record. “I really don’t know which way it’s going to go,” Brown said. “If people haven’t got much money, are they going to buy gig tickets? But on the other hand, people are going to be desperate for gigs. It could go either way.” APRE’s mini album, ‘Always In My Head’, is out now.
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Music Yesterday Loyle Carner Londons rap connoisseur is back with a production heavy, kanye-esque track; marking an interesting turn for the MC. .
Fresh tracks
Therefore I Am Billie Eilish An existential critique of haters where Billie delves deep philosophically, and also provides a banger of a chorus.
Album Reviews
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Confetti is fierce, bold, and the post record label album we should've had in 2018
Little Mix Confetti
If you’ve ever admitted that you secretly love Little Mix’s catchy pop hits, their latest album, Confetti, will make you think twice about calling them your guilty pleasure and embrace your knowledge of every word to hits ‘Touch’ and ‘Shout Out to My Ex’. The girl group's 2018 album, LM5, received mixed reviews after their separation from label Syco, which led to a track list filled with a messy combination of genres and influences. However, the follow up, Confetti is a fierce, bold and the post-record label album we should have had in 2018. ‘Not a Pop Song’ has a sly nod to Simon Cowell, who was their mentor on The X Factor nine years ago. The lyrics “We don’t do what Simon says”, over the upbeat, bouncy track, show that the girls are happy with their new-found independence from his label’s power, and expose what the music industry is really like for pop artists with the line, “Like a hamster on a wheel”. A common theme throughout the album is self-love and acceptance, with similar messages to Ariana Grande’s 2019 post-break-up album, Thank U Next. ‘Happiness’ preaches finding contentment in yourself, rather than needing a partner, and is reminiscent of Grande’s ‘7 Rings’. The backing vocals even make an attempt at the vocal gymnastics Grande is known for. Although this shows the band’s immaculate vocal ability, it seems unnecessary and doesn't conform to their usual style. However, it wouldn’t be a LM album without a slow ballad track such as ‘Secret Love Song’ from 2015’s Glory Days. So, of course, Confetti continues this fashion, with ‘My Love Won’t Let You Down’,
bringing emotional lyrics over slow piano keys. The 13 track album also boasts a number of empowering, pop tracks that the group have made their forte; ‘Holiday’, ‘Gloves Up’ and ‘Break Up Song’ being prime examples of that classic Little Mix sound. However, it’s obvious that the girls have taken inspiration from early 2000’s R&B groups as the highlight track ‘Rendezvous’, with its silky lyrics and electronic beat, could easily have been pulled from a Destiny’s Child album. As well as this, on ‘Not A Break Up Song’ the girls attempt a Cardi B style prechorus with snappy and sassy lyrics. It’s clear that the girls are still finding their feet after the record label split. Yet, Confetti is a pick and mix of their inspirations, flawlessly infused with their glam pop sound; a sound that we have listened to and loved (whether openly or as a guilty pleasure) for the past nine years. Ella Craig
AC/DC
POWER UP
AC/DC’s newest record sounds like it could have come from almost any point in the band’s long history. Unfortunately, this is less due to a sense of timelessness and more a case of seriously arrested development. The album is just utterly devoid of surprise. If you fed AC/DC’s entire discography into a bot, and
told it to make an algorithm for the most statistically average AC/ DC album possible, it couldn’t conceivably do better than POWER UP. This is because POWER UP is basically a rehash of AC/DC’s earlier effort Black Ice (2008), itself a doover of Stiff Upper Lip (2000), which is a copy of The Razors Edge (1990), a reimagining of Back in Black (1980), which was a retooling of Highway to Hell (1979), which was essentially just riffing on Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap (1976). These guys have made the same album year after year, decade after decade, with the same jagged, angular riffs grooving over that faithful kick-snare-kick-snare drumbeat, treating the continuing progress of musical history with truly magnificent indifference. It’s the only thing that makes sense from a man who’s spent his entire career dressed as a schoolboy. Nirvana was just something that happened to other people. Of course, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. AC/DC have built their legacy on these 3-chord bolts of hard-rock machismo, and if you expected change now, then more fool you. Age has not dented the band’s exuberance, and a few songs – ‘Demon Fire’, ‘Rejection’, ‘Through The Mists Of Time’ – will get you moving just because they’re too damn triumphant not too. But the fact is that most of the album is pretty middling and kind of forgettable. It’s not exactly bad. It’s just incredibly samey. And herein lies the real problem. AC/DC’s image is one of loud, boisterous rebellion, and maybe in the early stages of their career this worked. But music that shocked in
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These guys have made the same album year after year, decade after decade, with the same jagged, angular riffs over that faithful kick-snarekick-snare drumbeat
1980 is the status-quo today, and even the band’s most devoted fans must be starting to wonder quite what it is that AC/DC actually have left to bring to the table. Instrumentally, thematically and lyrically, these songs are just the same as they always have been. “Speeding up the road, tearing up the highway code/ Ain’t gonna slow me down”, croons Brian Johnson on the record’s outro, ‘Code Red’. Now, where have we heard that before? Ed Brown
Giggs
Now or Never
The godfather of the UK rap scene has returned. Since the release of Walk in Da Park in August 2008, Giggs has paved the way for a generation of artists obsessed with unfiltered and unapologetic rap. The Peckham rapper’s new mixtape Now or Never dropped seemingly out of nowhere at the start of November, and provided a difficult year for UK rap with a much-needed silver lining. Giggs’ overt arrogance is on display from the outset in Now or Never, and rightly so. It is the arrogance of a man who knows his legacy is untouchable, a man who no longer needs to prove himself, a man whose influence on grime transcends the music he produces. Giggs takes a backseat role in much of this mixtape, letting the featured artists take centre stage with Dave, Jorja Smith, and A Boogie wit da Hoodie being three of the heaviest hitters on the star-studded project. The 16-track mixtape begins with the title track ‘Now or Never’. You’d be forgiven for thinking Giggs might take it easy in his solo songs due to the high-end features they’re surrounded by. ‘Now or
Shady Alfie Templeman The latest from the 17 year old prodigy is a groovy and refreshing slice of indie pop that piles onto the hype train.
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It really is the epitome of the unsullied rap scene Giggs has helped mould into what it is today Never’ immediately dismisses these misconceptions and showcases vintage Giggs. Not just a pioneer but an evergreen entertainer. ‘Debonair’ is the standout solo song on the project, combining the typical nonchalant Giggs flow with an atypical jazz club beat. Whichever way you look at it, there’s no escaping the features that give this mixtape its selling point. ‘Changed Me’ with A Boogie is the first of the huge collabs on the track list, but also one of the least impressive. Both artists on the song are excellent in their own right but this contrast in styles feels forced and doesn’t run smoothly. Normal service is resumed in ‘I’m Workin’ with Jorja Smith, a feature that was impossible to fail. Jorja Smith often compliments rappers with her delicate soprano and Giggs’ ragged deep-tone works so well in tandem. ‘Straight Murder’ with Dave is indisputably the best song on the mixtape. Giggs and Dave have produced genius in the past with ‘Peligro’ which is held amongst Giggs’ greatest tunes, and simply put ‘Straight Murder’ outdoes it. It really is the epitome of the unsullied rap scene Giggs has helped mould into what it is today. Now or Never is by no means Giggs’ greatest work. However, the true intent behind this mixtape feels deeper than just the music. Giggs knows his name is cemented in UK rap history. He can afford to take a back seat and let the next generation take the baton from here. Nat Williams
Credit: RCA Records, Chuffmedia, Island Records
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Music
Feature Are hopes for live musics reintroducion misplaced?
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Charlie Ridler n 9 November 2020, the first Coronavirus vaccine was found by Pfizer and BioNTech to be safe and
effective. Not least in sectors most affected by the pandemic, this was big news. Shortly after entertainment ticket company, Live Nation, saw a 22% jump in share price, a second vaccine was announced. Dozens more are set to be ready by January. Live Nation’s trajectory mirrors other event and ticket companies like CTS Eventim and DEAG, as well as non-musical entities like airlines. They are confident that live music will bounce back; an August report by the company found that 86% of customers have kept their tickets and CEO Michael Rapino “expects shows at scale” to be back by summer. Meanwhile, Ticketmaster, one
of Live Nation’s many subsidiaries, are planning a system which would require fans to verify that they had received either a vaccine or a negative test before attending their events. Not only are companies predicting a brighter future, but they are preparing for one. Given that the pandemic is far from over, this optimism might seem misplaced. Faisal Majeed, an independent investor from Milton Keynes, says he is not currently planning on making any long-term investments, despite “vaccine euphoria” providing temptation to do so. “It will be difficult for markets to go a lot higher from here without going down first. They’ve gone up too fast over the past month and need to build a stable base lower and then move up above current levels,” he said. “Price will come majorly down one more time and that’s when it will be wise to start buying.”
Opinion
Is the album in decline? James Turrell
Credit: "Old Vinyl" by fensterbme is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0
Live Nation Share Price. Source: Reuters A fear that the economy is still too unpredictable is shared by larger investors. George Travell of S&P Global, a company in whose index Live Nation debuted last year, suggests that, while some investors clearly believe Live Nation will do well in the long run, current trend is not an accurate indicator of recovery. He said: “Broadly speaking, you can look at the S&P 500 and the state of the US economy during Covid. There is almost no similarity. “There are plenty of examples of companies being overvalued; that is, bubbles which highlight how the market isn't a true reflection of a company's worth.” This, as well reports by the
H
ow do you diagnose a dead artistic medium? The novelist and semi-professional walker, Will Self, in one of his many proclamations has described the novel as dead. People take that as meaning at some point there will come a time that there will be no more novels. But what he is really articulating is that the novel has lost its ability to define a cultural period – it can no longer occupy a ‘watercooler’ moment. People compose symphonies, write poetry or paint portraits but beyond a conclave of obsessives nobody really cares. Has the album reached this point? The idea of somebody queuing up outside of a record shop to buy somebody’s latest release is long gone, and describing such behaviour feels like an alien past. The album certainly seems to be swimming against the virtual tides of history as the music industry pivots towards algorithmic music distribution. Tides change of course, with the ‘vinyl revival’ offering proof that listening habits are not solely defined by new technologies. The imperial rise of streaming is clearly a major factor in the
Financial Times that, while the world economy tumbles, billionaires’ wealth has increased by 27% since March, points to a disconnect between the market and reality. Those working at ground level may yet find it difficult to be cheerful. “Live Nation are making loads of money off live streamed gigs, but the grassroots industry is not in a position to charge for a livestream,” said Amy Kinsella, Senior Promoter at HOT VOX in London. “But then on the flipside of that, if it all comes back, we might miss out on the first big boom of gigs. There is very much a mindset that February, March, April will be full on back to normal gigging.” Ms Kinsella also said that London
grassroots entities are seeing precious little of any government stimuli. Consequently, the live industry is being forced into a position where they must be wilfully ignorant to survive. Both regionals and nationals are using live streaming as a means of staying afloat, but larger companies are better equipped to play the waiting game. The real danger of collapse is to Britain’s small venues, promoters and musicians, on whom the sector is reliant but rarely thankful for. The moment we believe that live music is dead is the moment we lose it. But while we should remember that optimism is never misplaced, we should accept that neither is patience.
changing cultural perceptions of the album as a medium. Spotify has 286 million active users who spend an average 25 hours each month listening online. Users also spend on average a third of their time listening to the hugely influential Spotify playlists and another on user generated playlists. The average user spends 16 out of their 25 hours of Spotify listening time listening to music chosen for them by the Spotify algorithm or the musical whims of a random user. A ‘listen’ on Spotify is defined as the user listening to the first 30 seconds of the song This, combined with the focus on playlists, is inevitably creating changes in the composition of music. Despite remaining the best-selling physical format, CD sales have plummeted faster than the critical acclaim for IDLES. In 2019, approximately 22 million CDs were sold in the UK compared to over 100 million sold in 2008, whereas there were 114 billion streams across all platforms. If a musician gets paid as long as the first 30 seconds of their song is listened to, and the likelihood is that this song will have been put on playlist by somebody other than them, it is going to do two things. Firstly, it will create a dynamic that
means the first 30 seconds need to be disproportionately captivating because, ultimately, it’s all too simple for people to skip a song. Secondly, if you are creating music that people will be listening to on playlists increasingly compiled around moods and times of day, we will find that music is created to fit a very narrow market. I still believe the album is the pinnacle for which the majority of artists strive. An album can still define a cultural moment – that very brief period where a piece of art seems to vibrate throughout society, becoming the third person in every conversation. It is becoming progressively rare though; Beyoncé’s Lemonade is a recent example, and from this year, Fiona Apple’s Fetch the Bolt Cutters captured an excitement that resembled, in a very small way, the pre-digital hysteria a new album could generate. The album is not dead yet, but neither is its demise without question; musicians still cling to the notion that a classic record is the path to artistic greatness. But the day they think the pinnacle of success is getting a song in the Spotify Top 100 is when the album will be confined to the same lonely cultural corner as the sonnet.
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Small Axe. Credit TheMovieDB
TV Review
Small Axe: Mangrove
Shaye Mistry
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teve McQueen’s Mangrove is the first of a five-part series called Small Axe, an anthology exploring London’s West Indian community through the late 1960s to mid1980s. Its purpose is simple, to make viewers more aware of the struggles faced by immigrants, especially those in a post-Windrush era, in obtaining equality. These are delicate histories, national histories, and histories that need to be portrayed in the right way for this is one we were never taught at school nor would be at the fore of a majority of the British population. So, for the next few weeks, be prepared to be taken on a journey. Mangrove follows the story of the Mangrove Nine’s landmark Old Bailey trial. The story, for those who aren’t familiar, is as follows: in 1968, Frank Crichlow (Shaun Parkes) opened a Caribbean restaurant in Notting Hill called The Mangrove. Crichlow’s place soon became a hub for the immigrant community that had grown up in West London since the Windrush era, and was also where the young Darcus Howe (Malachi Kirby) and the British Black Panther leader Altheia Jones-LeCointe (Letitia Wright) went to write pamphlets
and hold meetings. The restaurant, as a result, became subject to racial harassment by the Metropolitan police where 12 raids took place between 1969-1970. This inspired a reaction on 9th August 1970, where 150 people marched in solidarity, which resulted in the arrest of the Nine for riot and affray. Mangrove’s cast animates their characters with vivid humanity, reminding us of the story’s reallife origin. In Parkes’ performance, we not only see a man wrestling with frustration, apathy and desire for justice as his business is threatened, we feel his turmoil too.
When police violently barge into his establishment on multiple occasions and scare customers away, he swings between outrage and hopelessness as his complaints to his MP and the embassy go unanswered. Crichlow’s fight for justice is eerily reminiscent of author Toni Morrison’s words about racism, and how its function is to distract: “It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining, over and over again, your reason for being.” The film’s attention to detail makes Mangrove a visceral experience. The set design, costumes, and music transport the audience back to 1960s West London with ease. We are treated to
scenes of a young Notting Hill carnival celebration, complete with melodious steel drums and dancing in the street against the grey backdrop of London’s skies. Even in its time warp, the cultural shorthand of Mangrove is still familiar. McQueen (12 Years a Slave) also strikes the post-colonial tone, unequivocally portraying Britain as a nation still adjusting to a Commonwealth. Wright (Black Panther) and Kirby (Black Mirror) are stand out performers. Wright, who deals with the intersectional context of being a Black woman, demonstrates to audiences her ability to deal with the complex layers of her character. Kirby’s performance is seamless in demonstrating his unwavering commitment to racial justice -
especially in his closing statement in the trial where he devotes the case of the Mangrove Nine as one that will change public perception of social injustice. Mangrove is a story about big and small triumphs. It’s about small signs leading to significant changes, a tiny community making an unforgettable impact and little moments with overwhelming meaning. By reenacting these unexamined parts of British history, Mangrove revives the story for a broader audience who can undoubtedly draw parallels between 1968 and today’s racial injustice. It shows us times have changed, but not everything has changed with it. The signs still exist today, but the timeliness of Mangrove’s release suggests we’ve still got more looking to do.
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TV Review
The Crown: Series 4
Lucy Lillystone
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he much-anticipated fourth series of Netflix’s royal drama The Crown has finally arrived, and it does not disappoint. Covering the late 1970’s and 1980’s, this is the season we have all been waiting for as the rise and fall of Margaret Thatcher, and the blossoming relationship between Prince Charles and Princess Diana, takes centre stage. For anyone who has not been
The Crown. Credit: TheMovieDB privy to the excellence that is Netflix’s The Crown, the show is based on the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, played by the extravagant Olivia Colman, following the Queen from her coronation to the present day. It has been possibly one of the most entertaining series on Netflix due to great writing, excellent performances, and extravagant cinematography. Season four is nothing short of spectacular, being, in my opinion, the best season yet. Episode one is ominous; opening
TV Review
The Undoing
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Annabel Goldsmith BO’s new limited adaptational series, to fill the Big Little Lies shaped hole in our hearts, is also about murderous, rich, American people starring Nicole Kidman and written by David E. Kelley. The Undoing is familiar yet widely original due to incredible performances and direction. The Undoing follows the unravelling of therapist Grace Fraser’s (Nicole Kidman), and oncologist Jonathan Sachs’ (Hugh Grant) ideal life upon the murder of Elena Alves, a mother whose child goes to the same school as Grace’s son. Upon Jonathan’s unusual absence, we see Grace’s perfect life unravel, questioning the entire image she created of her family and her husband. It is the tension of too much perfection that leads the audience
to question the image created of the American Dream nuclear family; living in a tastefully decorated New York townhouse and participating in the school’s parents committee. as it is revealed by a detective that his employment at the Price Norbury Memorial Hospital was terminated three months prior, due to inappropriate contact with a patient’s mother, Elena Alves. This tension breaks with Jonathan’s absence for a medical conference in Cleveland, as it becomes revealed that this conference never happened. The audience see the lies and deceit that permeate this family, breaking free upon the murder of Elena Alves. This is the fashion for which information is given out in The Undoing; detectives and friends to the Fraser family reveal secrets about Jonathan that Nicole Kidman’s superb performance gives the veil of presumed ignorance. Her
the new series with a scene of violence and turmoil with real-life footage of the troubles in Ireland, foreshadowing and setting the tone for the political troubles and disorder yet to come. The civil unrest in Ireland and the relationship of Charles and Diana juxtapose the frivolous humour of the Windsors, making every episode of the new series an emotional rollercoaster. If you are not laughing at the wicked humour of Elizabeth II, then you are bound to be crying at the devastation caused
steadfast nature to keep seeing her husband causes the audience to reflect on the advice she gives in her therapy to her clients; Grace keeps seeing “a particular type of person” that she wants to be with and is “a little too quick to see that person in the men that you meet instead of seeing what’s actually there”, this perfect image of a child oncologist, the perfect image of a husband distracting from the nature of him lying about attending work and having an affair with a patient’s mother. Moreover, her confusion to the events leading and following Elena’s murder maintains the audience’s interest as to whether she is innocent or not. Hugh Grant’ssimilarly excellent performance entices questions and playful arguments to be had with your friends (watching together virtually, of course) on whether his charisma is a ploy to hide his true vindictive nature, or if he is truly innocent in regard to Elena’s murder. As the series episodes turn to the court case, we can expect further secrets to be unravelled leading to shock for both the characters and the audience. At the helm of direction, the notorious filmmaker Suzanne
by Thatcher’s rule. This season is capable of bringing the viewer to tears by the first episode. ‘Balmoral Test’ stands out in particular amongst the ten episodes as it provides an intimate insight into the royals’ unrelenting superficial politeness and mockery of society, establishing a balance of both loving the royal family and resenting them at the same time. What really made this season stand out though are the newcomers and the sheer power of their performances. Emma Corrin’s embodiment of the young princess Diana is enchanting, capturing the charismatic, silly persona of the young girl and her eagerness for attention. She’s fun, energetic and full of warmth and the show really homes in on the fairy-tale romance between herself and Prince Charles. We can never really know for sure how Diana was in person, but the writers of the show make sure to depict her with an empathy and care that makes it difficult for the audience to not fall in love with her. Then there’s Gillian Anderson,
who is an absolute joy in the role of Thatcher, portraying the rivalry with the queen perfectly as they puzzle about one another, poking at their prejudices. She’s remarkable both in appearance and performance, holding the Thatcher grimace so well that for a moment, you forget that this is an actor playing Thatcher and not actually the woman herself. Together, Corrin and Anderson give The Crown a powerful energy that’s unprecedented compared to the last three seasons. Indeed the queen, her sister and the Duke of Edinburgh may not be as influential in this new series, however the newcomers more than make up for it, bringing a feminist authenticity that we can all root for. Season four of The Crown drives home that the royals’ failures can more often than not be selfinflicted; it is simultaneously heartbreaking, humorous and absolutely beautiful to watch. Bringing to life Britain under Thatcherism, the new series does not disappoint with excellent scripts, direction, and performances across all ten episodes, making it a perfect binge for Lockdown 2.0.
The Undoing. Credit: TheMovieDB Bier’s (Open Hearts, The Night Manager) style of filming draws the viewer into Grace’s vision. The blurred close-ups all display Grace’s fractured mindset upon hearing of Elena’s death and this subjective style of filmmaking is superb in making the viewer question the validity of Grace’s innocent naivety.. Aimlessly wandering around the streets of New York, the viewers’ aligned perspective with Grace incites questioning on Grace’s
relationship with Elena and how much Grace is hiding between the blurred images presented. The Undoing keeps you enthralled with every morsel of information, unravelling in tantalisingly small amounts; you remain entranced waiting for the next episode to drop, questioning the innocence of every character. The Undoing keeps you consistently on your toes, leaving viewers eager to find out: who did kill Elena Alves?
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Fresh Episodes
The Undoing Sky Atlantic The tension in the Fraser family heats up as we head towards the penultimate episodes of the acclaimed limited series.
The Great British Bake Off Channel 4 The Great British Bake Off finale sees Dave, Laura and Peter competing to be this year’s winner..
Panorama – Is TikTok safe? BBC iPlayer Panorama investigates whether Tiktok, the newest social media sensation, is safe for young users or not. .
Opinion
‘An homage to a murderer’ - BBCs The Trials of Oscar Pistorious
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Thomas Hirst n February 14 2013, Reeva Steenkamp was killed by her boyfriend in his home. Shot four times through a locked bathroom door, she died alone, afraid, and much before her time. She was 29, a model, a paralegal planning on taking the bar, the face of an anti-bullying campaign, and an ardent activist against domestic violence. Yet, on Valentine’s Day in 2013, this future was snatched away by a boyfriend who’s alleged erratic temper, controlling disposition, and history of abuse had made past partners fear for their lives, and cost Steenkamp hers. The boyfriend in question? Paralympian Oscar Pistorius. The story, one of heartbreaking loss and the ever-present issue of domestic violence. Well, this was the story to everyone except our national broadcaster. The BBC’s new four part documentary, The Trials of Oscar Pistorius, is one that’s decided that the aforementioned isn’t what’s important. Instead, it’s about the man currently serving 13 years for murder. A man who a court of law proved guilty. A man who the BBC call “an international hero who inspired millions,” that “suddenly found himself at the centre of a murder investigation.” Clocking in at a sobering five and a half hours, the four part documentary is one where Pistorius’s life is mapped out meticulously, and one where we are repeatedly invited to show sympathy and pity for the man. We see his childhood and how he resiliently overcame his disabilities, we see how he made history being the first amputee to compete in the
able-bodied Olympics, we hear his nicknames of “the Blade Runner” and “the fastest man on no legs”, and we are shown how much of a national icon and hero he was to South Africans. Whilst all of this may have been true, and should command some sort of respect, he lost the right to be revered in such a way when he shot his girlfriend four times. It’s sickening the amount of times we are shown him on a podium, winning races, or speaking to dignitaries. It’s undoubtedly more than Steenkamp’s life is celebrated. Context is needed, obviously, but this much? In a series about a murder? Such an exclusion of Steenkamp’s life and achievements should’ve been a bleak expectation from viewers, given that the original trailer for the series didn’t even mention her name. It led to Steenkamp’s mother writing an article for the telegraph in protest, a twitter campaign hash tagged #sayhername, and even caused waves within the BBC itself, with a host of their own journalists complaining to management about how it minimised violence against women. It seems the message the BBC are trying to portray is that, despite being a convicted murderer, Pistorius is still deserving of celebration and that his sporting legacy should be able to coexist and be seen as separate to what he did. The series does this through intertwining the investigation into Steenkamp’s murder with accounts of Pistorius’s achievements. This creates a morbid paradox where the real tragedy was not Reeva’s loss of life, but Pistorius’s loss of career. We do get some accounts of Steenkamp’s life, told through archive footage and interviews
Image credit: Top: The Trials of Oscar Pistorius. Credit to BBC, Bottom: The MovieDB
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It seems the message the BBC are trying to portray is that, despite being a convicted murderer, Pistorious is still deserving of celebration with family and friends, but such accounts are still drowned out by Pistorius’s achievements. Statements from his family, friends and fellow athletes both question his guilt and console his mental state following the incident, and this persistent padding of pro-Oscar advocates eventually feels gnarled and uncomfortable. How the BBC would not expect this from a director (Daniel Gordon) that has openly stated his “flipflopping” over Pistorius’s guilt, is foolish. The statement does
explain a lot, with the documentary frequently feeling like an amateur public retrial. But even then, if his purpose was to debate Pistorius’s guilt (to this day the Paralympian says it was an accident, claiming he thought she was a robber), it fails. Whilst he does display Pistorius as someone of remarkable dedication and character who overcame countless odds to get to where he was, it also displays him as petulant and brattish, and as someone overly obsessed with guns who wanted to live life in the fast lane. Even if we forget the muddy moral compass and look at it objectively as a piece of television, The Trials of Oscar Pistorius is poorly made. It relies on true crime cliches with a cacophony of news reports and trivial interviews, frequently trudging through narrative rabbit holes that add little to the story other than to, again, look into Pistorius’s life. It means the series is one that has no scope, nothing to actually say. It instead unfolds as propaganda for a convict, ultimately undermining
the experience of every victim of domestic abuse. The series plays into the nauseous narrative oft-seen when men murder their partners. Where these ‘honourable’ men have been provoked by their partners, and, in a moment of madness, have lost control and hurt them. Thereby painting them as victims, and how they promise that they really are good people, really. It could have been powerful, it could have explored the harrowing details of these toxic relationships and how they come to be, it could’ve told of how dangerous a place South Africa can be for women, it could’ve criticised the media response and dissected the myriad ways in which it was reported. Instead, this documentary is a plea of forgiveness for a man in prison, playing into genre tropes to try and whet the grim fascination of the true crime brigade, and it should be one that is avoided at all costs. Don’t watch it. Instead, remember the one name that matters in this whole story, Reeva Steenkamp.
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Gaming’s best ‘wow’ moments: stuff that had us on the edge of our seats Some games just ooze that feeling of wonder and awe no matter how many times you play them, but nothing beats the very first time you experience what they have to offer. Callum Brown tells his story of when he first discovered one of his favourite games; Shadow of the Colossus. Back when I was six or seven years old, I was looking through my Dad’s PS2 games for something new to play when suddenly, I discovered a small cardboard sleeve with a Demo Disc inside from a copy of PlayStation Magazine. The disc came with two games loaded on it - the first one was Ico which I never got around to playing. Instead, my child brain was enticed by the second game on the disc, the now legendary Shadow of the Colossus. I chose Shadow of the Colossus over Ico because my young mind saw a monster on the cover and decided that it was cooler than Ico’s windmill cover (and can you blame me?) It took me just a few seconds to start riding my horse across the huge empty fields, and I probably spent about 40 minutes just exploring the world before figuring
out what I was supposed to be doing. Despite it being empty, it was the very first time I had experienced an open world game and so the scale of the world astounded me. However, this wasn’t the moment that had me absolutely stunned. Eventually, I figured out that holding my sword in the air would shine a light in the direction the game wanted me to go, and I was led to a cliff face. The controls are a little unconventional, and so I struggled to climb the cliff, falling all the way to the bottom several times. I began to feel defeated and was ready to give up, but I decided to try climbing it one last time, and it was probably one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. I slowly scaled the cliff, taking my time to line up each jump, desperate to reach the top. I made the final
Not all ‘wow moments’ have to be dramatic, action packed, or spoiler heavy. In fact, they might just be pretty adorable. Catherine Lewis recalls her first time playing Nintendogs on Christmas Day fourteen years ago.
leap from one ledge to another, and after a long struggle (as well as some ‘heated gamer’ moments) I was finally there. The sense of accomplishment was truly amazing, but even this was nothing compared to what would happen next. After I composed myself following my amazing achievement, I picked up my controller, walked a few steps forward to discover what I was to do next, and that’s when it happened. A cutscene started playing and suddenly a single giant foot the size of about two houses stepped into frame, leaving a huge crater in the ground. Another giant foot appeared, and then the camera slowly panned up, revealing the first Colossus. It was easily the biggest enemy I had ever seen in a video game by far, and I just stopped playing to stare at it in awe. I couldn’t believe something so huge could be in a video game, and I was even more surprised that the game just let me exist in the same area as it instead of it being in the background. It was at this moment that I knew I was playing what would become one of my favourite games of all time, and I’m forever
grateful my dad decided to buy a copy of PlayStation Magazine on
that fateful day.
When you think of “wow moments” in games, your brain probably ventures somewhere along the lines of huge plot twists and the spiciest of spoilers from 100 hour RPGs. I know mine certainly does - it was incredibly difficult holding myself back from babbling about my favourite Xenoblade Chronicles moment, but that’s something you should experience for yourself. Anyway, I digress. One of my all time favourite wow moments is the first time I booted up Nintendogs on Christmas Day, 2006. I had been begging for a Nintendo DS for what must have been all year (and a real dog for even longer) and at long last, my dreams came true, and I was greeted with an Ice White DS Lite (because pink is gross and for girly girls) and the Dalmatian edition of Nintendogs. Commence screaming. Loading up the game for the very first time and instantly falling in love with my very own Lucky the Dalmatian was like magic. At the time, I very much believed this was the pinnacle of realistic graphics, and that these virtual dogs were near enough photo-realistic. I was
blown away; as that one NPC in Pokémon always says, ‘technology is incredible!’ I think I’d have passed out if I knew what games would end up looking like 14 years later. The magic began to wear off slightly when I couldn’t get past the required section at the beginning of the game where you have to make your dog learn its name by saying it into the microphone. The visuals of the DS may have been incredible (I thought) but the microphone… perhaps not so much. In reality, my seven-year-old brain just didn’t understand that you had to say the name with the same intonation each time, but after having my mum step in to figure that out for me, I was off once again, and straight back to intensely rubbing the touch screen to pet my beloved spotty dog. After that, I didn’t put the game down all day; I was so in awe of how realistically the dog behaved (“it sneezes when you touch its nose!”) and how cute she was; it really was like I’d gotten both the DS I wanted and a real dog for Christmas all at once. That Christmas marked my
first steps into the world of gaming, and away from the Baby Annabell phase of Christmases past (much to my Grandma’s dismay), but perhaps most importantly, prepared me for seven years later when I’d finally have my real puppy dream come true in the form of my very own tiny white fluff ball. I may not visit my Nintendogs anymore, but I have a real one who honestly looks like he was plucked straight from the game, and I wouldn’t swap him for the world.
Top: Shadow of the Colossus, Credit: Bluepoint Games Left: Nintendog, Credit: Nintendo Above: Sonny the dog, Credit: Catherine Lewis
Monday 30 November 2020
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Games
Fresh games
Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity Switch Discover what happened in Hyrule 100 years before Breath of the Wild in this fast paced hack-and-slash.
Bugsnax PS4, PS5, PC, Mac Explore the mysterious Snaktooth Island, and capture adorable half-bug half-snack creatures in this whimsical adventure.
Football Manager 2021 PC, Mac, Mobile. Later: XBO, Xbox Series S/X Develop your managerial skills and command success like never before.
Xbox Series S: what you need to know before buying your latest console With all the latest generation consoles releasing seemingly all at once, you might be wondering which one will be worth picking up. To help you with your decision, Yaroslav Matveev has detailed what you need to know about the new Xbox Series S, and how it compares to its more expensive counterpart, the Xbox Series X.
I
t has been almost a week since I got my hands on the Xbox Series S, and there are a few things worth talking about when it comes to its positives and negatives that you may not have considered. Hopefully, this will make you feel more confident in choosing your gaming companion for the next few years. First of all, arguably the most important feature of this device is its cheapness. The ‘weaker’ version of latest generation Xbox consoles is around £200 cheaper than its more high-end counterpart, but make no mistake, it’s incredible value for money and it’s still very powerful. The loading times between the two new systems are almost identical, and are both much faster than the previous generation. A vivid example is GTA 5 which took ages to load on the older consoles, but now takes only 10-20 seconds. The price point discussion is relevant not only to the device itself, but also to the content you
use it for. Microsoft’s Game Pass is a killer feature and is essentially the Netflix of gaming. The best available subscription, Game Pass Ultimate, costs £10.99 per month and gives you access to a wide range of titles, from the recent Gears 5 to Forza, Sea of Thieves, and Sniper Elite 4. In addition, the Game Pass includes EA Play, which gives you access to many popular titles such as Fifa, Battlefield, Star Wars: Battlefront, and many others. If the number of games already available isn’t enough, the Game Pass also gives you a 10% discount on all EA titles as well as various discounts for other products - some of the games are even free. Another feature, which is a huge boon of the Xbox, is its backwards compatibility with games from previous generations. You can play Alan Wake from Xbox 360, then move to Marvel’s Avengers on Xbox One and finish with Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla. On top of this, the fact that both the Xbox Series S
and Series X automatically improve upon past-gen games to make them look more modern gives yet another great reason to consider this device. The only distinct differences between the Series S and Series X are that the Series S has no disc drive, meaning you can only download games, and that the Series S cannot natively run games at higher graphical resolutions, such as 4K and 8K. Instead, the Series S renders games at 2K (1440p) and upscales them to 4K, so they’ll still look better on 4K televisions, even though the console isn’t actually ‘processing’ the games in 4K. Even though ultra high resolution gaming became a reality in the previous generation, it was never used to the extent that it was considered to be essential for gaming. In addition, most gamers still don’t have 4K displays, and although they’re rising in popularity, they are still quite expensive. Continuing with graphics, casual gaming is still prevailing, so the higher frames per second (how smooth movement in a game looks) and raytracing (complex reflections) which Xbox Series S can still deal with in lower scales also should not be a problem. Games don’t always need these technical attributes to be cool, engaging and attractive to consumers, especially those who just want to have access to the newest generation of games. For now, there is only one significant downside of Xbox Series S, and that is the amount of storage space it has available. Even though it supposedly has 512GB on the disk, the actual capacity is only 364GB due to all of the system apps and settings. Modern games often take around 50-70 GB of space, sometimes even more, so at that rate you’ll only be able to download around five (!) games before your disk becomes full (ridiculous). However, it’s not the end of the world. You can buy a new Xbox 1TB expansion drive (for a rather pricey £219, although it will almost certainly become cheaper after a while) and save both new and old games there. Of course, there is a cheaper alternative – standard
expansion drives are much cheaper, but because of the new system requirements that ‘next gen’ games have for speedier storage, they will only be able to store games from previous generations. Overall, the Xbox Series S is almost a perfect console. Although it may lack some cosmetic gaming features (and of course, a disc drive),
it is still an incredibly powerful, compact (around the height of three toilet rolls) and easy to use gaming device, which is perfectly suitable for both veteran gamers and those who have only just begun exploring the gaming universe.
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It’s an incredibly powerful, compact, and easy to use gaming device, which is perfectly suitable for both veteran gamers and those who have only just begun exploring the gaming universe.
Credit: tTop (in order): Nintendo, Young Horses, Sports Interactive Xbox Series S - Microsoft
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Sport
Sport thoughts New Boss Tony Pulis offers substance over style for SWFC
Sport thoughts UK Cycling has promising future as new decade begins
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He’s part of a new generation that gives Britain reason to be cheerful into the 2020s Adam Dickinson Two days after Joe Biden’s election victory brought a relentless and cut-throat year of campaigning across the pond to a close, the curtain came down on a cycling season that was just as dramatic and entertaining. As we started a new decade of racing, the sport set itself to move on from the Team Sky stranglehold from the 2010s (and the drug-fuelled rampage of the previous era). Tadej Pogačar won the Tour de France as the most attacking rider, while Primož Roglič and Team Jumbo-Visma rode a very defensive race to the point where he didn’t attack even when his rivals were on the ropes. The shackles were off for Roglič at the Vuelta a España though and he delivered in style, with four stage wins and the red jersey. Meanwhile, Tao Geogaghan Hart became Britain’s latest grand tour champion by winning the Giro
Hugh Carthy. Credit: Geof Sheppard, Wikimedia Commons d’Italia with an attacking flair, which Dave Brailsford proclaimed as his team’s new philosophy. He’s part of a new generation that gives Britain reason to be cheerful in the 2020s, alongside Hugh Carthy who finished third in his breakthrough Vuelta, and Yorkshire’s Tom Pidcock, who won the Baby Giro this year and has now signed to Ineos Grenadiers. This comes at a perfect time for the UK’s cycling scene as the original British Cycling trailblazers find their careers fading out. Geraint Thomas may have had his last opportunity to lead Ineos when he crashed out of this year’s Giro, while Bradley Wiggins is now a fullyfledged pundit. Chris Froome continues his recovery from injury last year and will lead Israel Start-Up Nation next year, but looks as if his best years are behind him. The same could be said for Mark Cavendish,
who has question marks over his participation next season and last won a race in February 2018. Cavendish will leave a hole in the hearts of British fans when he does finally move on, the rider who introduced a generation of fans to the Tour and who showed Britain really could top the cycling world. While there’s no British sprinter in line, there could be an Andy Murray effect on Irishman Sam Bennett, the first rider to wrestle the green jersey from Peter Sagan over a full Tour and who should be a contender in that competition for years to come. He will face stiff competition with the rest of the new generation, as will Pogačar against the most exciting crop of GC racers we’ve seen for a while. Nothing is certain heading into the next four years of professional cycling but, unlike the presidential election, that’s a really good thing.
February restart planned for Uni of Sheffield Campus Leagues Patrick Burke Campus Leagues for 2020/21 have a new scheduled starting date of Monday 8 February 2021, according to an email sent to teams who had registered an interest in taking part. Original plans to restart Campus Leagues on Monday 16 November 2020 were put on hold after a suspension of all grassroots sport during the national lockdown, but the Government’s this week
announced that outdoor grassroots sport would be allowed to resume when England returns to a regional ‘tier-based’ system of restrictions on Wednesday 2 December 2020. This is expected to apply in all tiers, despite plans to toughen restrictions in other areas compared to the tier system in place before lockdown. The prospect of a return to football and netball for semester two will no doubt be a huge boost
for the student community. Campus Leagues allow teams representing Students’ Union-affiliated societies or ‘house teams’ formed independently by students to face off in a league format, followed by a knockout competition at the end of the year. Fixtures have not taken place since 17 March 2020, so their return in February will prove something of a landmark event.
Credit: Ronnie MacDonald, Flickr
George Litchfield Tony Pulis may be ‘sick of being known as an escape artist’, but his move to Sheffield Wednesday, who are currently 23rd in the Championship, will do him no favours in the eyes of some people. Pulis doesn’t simply see the job as a matter of escaping relegation, however, instead aiming to ‘turn the club around’ and make the Steel City Derby a Premier League fixture by leading the Owls to promotion. While probably out of reach this season, this ambition may not be an impossibility. Wednesday were in the play-off places just before the start of 2020 last season, before rapidly dropping off and finishing 17th. But if Pulis can galvanise the squad, it is certainly possible for them to compete strongly in the upper reaches of the table again. He certainly has the CV to suggest he can do it, which is something he himself likes to point out. The now Wednesday manager has been promoted out of all three divisions in the EFL, and took his robust Stoke City side to an FA Cup Final and the round of 32 in the Europa League. At his last club Middlesbrough, Pulis was sacked for having missed out on the play-offs by a point, the season after managing to guide them to fifth place despite only taking over in December. This becomes more impressive when we see that the same side finished 17th last season after Pulis left, having to be saved by the vastly experienced
Neil Warnock. Perhaps Pulis will be hoping somewhat ironically to have a similar impact on Wednesday to that Warnock has had on his former club, who currently sit seventh in the Championship - four points off top with the least goals conceded in the division. While it is very possible that Pulis will get Wednesday into a good position, what ultimately could be the deciding factor in whether he is a long-term appointment is how fans and the chairman take to his style of play. His style at Stoke has been described as ‘Hoof-ball. Hammer throwing. Antifootball’, and it was clear with the appointment of Jonathan Woodgate and the talk of developing a ‘new identity’ that style had also become a problem at Middlesbrough. Make no mistake, Pulis has some good footballers at his disposal, the likes of Izzy Brown and Barry Bannan to name a couple, but I’d expect we are more likely to see Callum Patterson launching long throws into the box in a Rory Delapesque manner than any radical overhaul in the new manager’s style, although he himself claims that people have ‘pigeonholed’ his tactics. For short-term improvement then, Wednesday have arguably a great man for the job. Whether he can succeed long-term perhaps rests more on whether people can accept his style in exchange for his results.
Monday 30 November 2020
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Sport
Government give green light for sports fans to return
Credit: Adam Bates
Credit: djedj, Needpix.com
Tom Coates
In tier 3 areas, the ban on fans will remain in place.
The government has confirmed that supporters will be able to return to stadia and sports venues in a landmark announcement. When the country leaves national lockdown on 2 December, plans for the safe return of fans to sport venues will be put into practice, although the extent to which restrictions are lifted will depend on each area’s tier. Oliver Dowden, the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, has confirmed that up to 4,000 fans or half of the venue’s capacity, depending on which is lowest, will be allowed to return in tier 1 regions. For tier 2, a limit of 2,000 spectators for outdoor events and 1,000 for indoor events will be set, or 50 per cent capacity.
Bramall Lane, home of Sheffield United, and Hillsborough Stadium, home of Sheffield Wednesday, have not welcomed football fans through the turnstiles since March. The Blades have played in front of empty stands since their win over Norwich City on 7 March, and the Owls haven’t been welcomed to the pitch by fans since their FA Cup defeat to Manchester City on 4 March. Whether the Steel City’s two professional football clubs will be able to welcome fans or not will be dependent on what tier the city is put in, but the announcement provides an exciting possibility for the two well-supported institutions. The news could also provide a boost for semi-professional outfits such as Hallam and Sheffield FC, who saw their 2020/21 campaigns placed on hold when the country entered a second lockdown. Clubs that represent Sheffield in other sports, such as rugby league’s Sheffield Eagles and basketball’s Sheffield Sharks, could also be able to welcome supporters if the city can avoid tier 3 restrictions. Grassroots sport has also received a boost, as it will be allowed to return regardless of tier. The same can be said for gyms and leisure centres, which will both reopen across all tiers in December.
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Whether the Steel City’s two professional football clubs will be able to welcome back fans or not will be dependant on what tier the city is put in
Interview: Sharks’ Captain Mike Tuck on BBL Basketball Bubble Life With the British Basketball League Cup underway for the B. Braun Sheffield Sharks, basketball is officially back in the Steel City. In the wake of their 70-61 win over the mighty London Lions two weeks ago, Head of Sport Harry Harrison sat down with Captain Mike Tuck to talk all things Sharks. The team’s great result over the Lions on 6 November was the stage for American import Antwon Lillard to show out. The great team chemistry all the new Sharks have bought into is thanks to the extended off-season due to Covid-19. Tuck said: “This is the longest break I’ve ever had as a Shark. “The beautiful thing is that when the season didn’t start when it was supposed to, we got a lot of time together to grow.” All the new arrivals to Sheffield have been working hard in practice and the pre-season games. Tuck had plenty of praise for his new
teammates. He pointed out his new “tough” defensive American teammates, Lillard and Kipper Nichols, and lauded the team’s new Point-Guard from Manchester. “Callum Jones,” he started, “You couldn’t ask for a more experienced guard in the league.” Ex-junior Shark, Oscar Baldwin, has worked his socks off since joining the senior squad. The former Sheffield Hallam British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS) player has really impressed his captain: “He’s doing great. He’s got a bright future ahead of him.” This season wouldn’t be able to go ahead without the team bubbles that all BBL teams are required to enter.
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The beautiful thing is that when the season didn’t start when it was supposed to, we got a lot of time together to grow - Mike Tuck
It’s been a strange new experience for Tuck, who said that all players have been told they can’t see friends outside of the team. Every Sharks team member is tested for Covid-19 regularly, especially when entering practice and game facilities. “Everybody is temperature checked. If anyone shows symptoms they need to self-isolate and stay away from the team,” Tuck said. It must be a very daunting and frustrating prospect to be forced to stay away from your team in the midst of a competitive campaign. Though Tuck understands, if it happens, it’s for the best to allow basketball to continue. He said: “When the first lockdown came in and we had basketball taken away, it was heartbreaking.” Tuck and the whole Sheffield Sharks team are optimistic of what they can achieve this season. Though Tuck knows the season is only just beginning. “It’s early doors but the goal is always silverware.” The fixture list for the Sharks currently only contains cup games, and winning the cup is the team’s first goal. Tuck and the squad next play on the 29 November, in their second game against the Newcastle Eagles this month.
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Sports Committee open up about filming touching mental health video that has been viewed by thousands Harry Harrison The release of an emotional mental health awareness video by the University of Sheffield Sports Committee has touched the many students and staff who have watched it. Yet the committee members who took part found the experience challenging as they have always been seen as confident and happy people by those around them. Sports Committee Charity and Volunteering Officer, Alice Buxton told Forge Press: “I wouldn’t really want to reach out to people. In my head, I would think ‘no it’s just weakness’ as people always said I was a bright and bubbly person.” Miss Buxton, who is a keen rower, revealed how in the lead up to making the video, she didn’t believe her own experiences were bad enough to warrant her appearing on the film and had never identified them as mental health issues before. It wasn’t until she spoke with campaign chair, Katie Littlewood, about what she went through that she began her journey of accepting what she had been through. She said: “For me, it was just so much confronting and reflecting. “[Making the video] was terrifying, but on the other side, I definitely feel really empowered. I’m really proud of myself.” For Miss Littlewood, the biggest challenge was telling people what she’d felt. She said: “A lot of the things I said were things I have never said out loud before.” The video was also the first time that Miss Littlewood’s mother had ever heard of her daughter’s struggles. Her mother had cried when watching the film. This was hard for Miss Littlewood. She said: “Your parents are the one thing you want to keep it all away from.” Every committee member who
bravely spoke to the students about their personal struggles found it scary to do, but it was important for the committee to get this campaign out now. Sarah Laptain, the Sports Committee secretary, said: “We wanted to spread awareness for mental health, but to use real people with real problems.” With the ongoing pandemic and numerous lockdowns, many people of all ages have struggled with their mental health. The constant isolation to ensure others safety has meant that many have spiralled down difficult paths. As advice for those struggling, Miss Laptain said: “My first step would be to just talk to someone.” She also encouraged people to look out for their loved ones too by checking in with them to make sure they’re okay. The film can still be found on the
Images (clockwise): Matt Graves, Alice Burton, Katie Littlewood, and Sarah Laptain
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Every committee member who bravely spoke to the students about their personal struggles found it scary to do, but it was impotant for the committee to get this campaign out now
Sheffield SU and Sport Committee Facebook pages and has garnered over 6.4 thousand views since it’s release on the 12 November. If you, or anyone you know, are struggling during these unprecedented times. It is always good to speak to someone. You can contact Sheffield Access to Mental Health Services (SAMHS) by email or calling 0114 222 4134. You can also contact Sheffield Nightline if you need someone to talk to at 2228787.