Issue20

31st MAR 2014/ ISSUE 20 FREE

MANCHESTER’S STUDENT NEWSPAPER

Food & Drink: Cakes made with vegetables

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Lifestyle: Where to travel this summer

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Fashion & Beauty: Festival fashion

Students scammed in Parklife-ticket con Jonathan Breen Editor-in-chief Con-artists pretending to sell Parklife tickets have targeted Facebook groups used by University of Manchester students.

The fake touts comment on posts by people looking for tickets, telling them to “message me”. The buyer is then given bank account details to send the money to and told tickets will be sent to their address, after which all communication is stopped and no tickets arrive.

One University of Manchester student told The Mancunion how he was fooled by the scam.

“I messaged him saying are you selling any more tickets? He responded pretty much instantly”, said third-year Joseph Brunner. “At first I had some concerns about the legitimacy of it all – he swayed my concern by giving me his phone number so that I could speak to him.

“But when I told him I’d give him the money tomorrow or the next day he seemed hesitant, and asked me to put it in his bank account that evening.

Also, when I asked him if he had a PayPal account he made up some bogus excuse for not having one.”

The scam-artist who conned Brunner operated as “Philip Baron”, his Facebook profile also showed images of a man with what appeared to be

his daughter.

“I thought he looked quite trustworthy because his Facebook photos were of some man with their child,” said Brunner.

After the tickets didn’t arrive and repeated phone calls with no answer, Brunner reported the incident to the police.

“They took the details down and referred me to Action Fraud, who also took the details down”, he said. “Whilst I was doing that I noticed on Facebook that someone had commented on one of his ‘message me’ posts - I messaged that person and it turned out there was a whole group of us who had been mugged-off by this person.”

Jess White, another Facebook user looking for Parklife tickets, wrote on a post Baron had commented on saying “don’t message Philip Baron he takes your money and doesnt sent the ticket! [sic]”.

Oliver Quinn Elmes also wrote, “Philip Baron is scamming people”.

Action Fraud suggested Brunner get in contact with his bank and use a reference number they supplied to try and redeem the £95 he lost.

However, NatWest told him it would not be possible because he had willingly given the money, and so it did not count as fraud.

In a statement to The Mancunion, Parklife founder Sacha Lord-

Society make NSS threat after university rejects economics module Michael Williams News Editor

Students using Facebook to try and buy tickets to Parklife have been caught out by confidence men pretending to have tickets for the June festival.

Photo: of other days @Flickr Marchionne said, “We are currently in talks with the Manchester Police regarding illegal ticket sales and doing everything possible to reduce this fraudulent activity. This is a nationwide issue that the authorities are aware of and action is being taken, however we would strongly advise you not to buy a second hand ticket.

If you have already been a victim of fraudulent ticket sales then please contact

Action Fraud to take the matter further: http:// www.actionfraud.police. uk/report_fraud.

“We would always suggest buying Parklife tickets directly from our website rather than a second hand buyer, however if you decide to purchase a second hand ticket always ask the person selling it to change the name on it to your name. If the ticket seller is not willing to change

the name then it is likely that it is a fake/duplicated ticket and will not gain you entry to Parklife 2014.

Name changes are done via contacting the ticket agent directly.”

Tickets for the popular Parklife Weekender 2014 sold out in February this year, only weeks after they went on sale.

Greater manchester Police were not available to comment at the time of goign to print.

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The leader of the Postcrash Economics Society has urged members to give negative National Student Survey feedback after a module they requested was rejected within one week.

The lecturer of the module, Dr. Sakir Devrim Yilmaz, has also hit out on Facebook, calling the University’s handling of the situation “completely outrageous and unacceptable”.

The module at the centre of the row, “Bubbles, Panics and Crashes: An Introduction to Alternative Theories of Crises”, sought to give students “alternative perspectives” and teach the “mechanisms of economic bubbles and crises which are largely left unexamined in conventional courses.”

A University spokesperson told The Mancunion, “We have decided not to run the Bubbles, Panics and Crashes module next academic year, but

will launch other new economics-run modules to address broader areas of the economics curriculum.”

The module had been ran not for credit and outside office hours, but a petition to officially instate the module received 245 signatures – 1 in 5 students who study Economics – in just three weeks.

However, after a summit last Tuesday, the department refused to take up the module – leading the head of the Postcrash Economics Society (PCES), Joe Earle, to “urge [students] to mention [their] displeasure at this decision being taken in the NSS”.

University of Manchester Students’ Union Education Officer Rosie Dammers, said “The University pesters students to ‘use their voice’ by filling out the NSS. However, if they really cared about the student voice then they would listen to and respond to campaigns such as [PCES’s]...

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02 : NEWS

ISSUE 20 / 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Highlights

Arts & Culture:

Cultural revision breaks

The Students’ Union’s ‘Big Ask’ campaign ended last week, the top concerns noted by students who responded included crime, cycling safety, and street lighting.

Photo: The Mancunion

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Picture of the week

Books:

Manchester Central Library re-opens Page 21

Food & Drink:

The Sunday Roast Page 22

Continued from page one... ...rather than putting so much weight on a deeply flawed and destructive survey.”

The University cited “uncertainty regarding Dr. Yilmaz’s contract” in their decision, as the lecturer has only one year left on his contract with the University and his future is as yet undecided.

It is also alleged by Dr. Yilmaz that the module was not implemented due to action from the Economics teaching area group.

“I have been told that even if the uncertainty regarding my contract for next year is no longer present, this module will not run as an official ECON module because the associated teaching area group (TAG) is completely against such a module covering alternative approaches to macroeconomics,” he posted.

Grace Skelton, Students’ Union General Secretary, commented “The Society […] clearly feel there is still more to be done for economics students to really be gaining a full understanding of the various schools of economic thought”.

Joe Earle says the blame for the decision rests with a “few members” of the Macroeconomics group of lecturers.

“We understand the module was

blocked by lecturers in the macro group […] they have refused point blank to accept this module. However, we went to see five out of seven of the Macro group lecturers individually and they told us that they had no problem with the module,” Joe told The Mancunion.

“Cloak and daggers or what? The economics department is clearly broken when a few members of the department can hold everyone else to ransom.”

Dr. Yilmaz took to the PCES Facebook group to issue a statement to students.

“I have been notified by some of my students that before several third year Economics lectures, a presentation was given to the students in the class in order to convince them to give high scores in the NSS. In this presentation, my module was given as an example of how responsive the economics department has been to student demands,” he posted.

“I am writing to let the third year economics students know that this is a complete misrepresentation of what has been happening with this module in reality.

“While the department has done everything to prevent this module from running as an official university module in the last one year, it is now using it in order to convince students Deputy Editor: Harriet Hill-Payne Sub-Editors: George Bailey, Jennifer Grimshaw & Eleanor Muffitt

Film:

Summer 2014 Page 18

Visit Our Website www.mancunion.com Facebook: The Mancunion Twitter: @THEMANCUNION Editor in-chief: Jonathan Breen editor@mancunion.com Postal address: Univerity of Manchester Students’ Union, Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PR Phone (0161) 275 2933

News Editors: Michael Williams, Pippa AllenKinross & Aidan Gregory news@mancunion.com

that it has actually responded to their demands to learn different approaches to macroeconomics. This is completely outrageous and unacceptable,” he continued.

“I have delivered 20 hours of lectures out of office hours, spent over 100 hours of my personal time preparing lecture slides up to now, and I faced enormous resistance from the department in my attempts be able to deliver this module officially so I will not allow the department of Economics to use my effort as a ‘department initiative’ for high NSS scores, particularly after rejecting this module twice due to its contents.

“I apologize for posting this here, but I have to make this correction announcement myself because despite my requests in this direction, the department refused to correct this obvious distortion of the truth in those classes in which that presentation was given.”

The PCES is set to lobby Vice Chancellor Dame Nancy Rothwell at the ‘Dame Nancy Rothwell comes to the School of Social Sciences’ event this Monday.

A University of Manchester spokesperson said, “Our students have been leading a national debate on the way economics is taught in Higher BeautyEditor: Haylee Wells beauty@mancunion.com Food & Drink Editors: Ben Walker & Maddy Hubbard foodanddrink@mancunion.com Film Editors: Sophie James, Robbie Davidson & Angus Harrison

News Reporters: Inez Dawoodjee, Anna Philips, Charlie Spargo, Haider Saleem

film@mancunion.com

News Web Editor: Dan Harold

features@mancunion.com

Opinion Editors: Alice Rigby and Charlotte Green opinion@mancunion.com

Features Editor: Sam Dumitriu Games Editor: Alasdair Preston games@mancunion.com Lifestyle Editors: Moya Crockett, Isabelle Dann, Beth Currall & Lauren Arthur lifestyle@mancunion.com

Fashion Editors: Susie Coen & Marie Yates fashion@mancunion.com

Music Editors: Tom Ingham, Patrick Hinton &

Education, and the ensuing debate has been positive, useful and informative in terms of our extensive consultation with key stakeholders, including students.

“We have decided not to run the Bubbles, Panics and Crashes module next academic year, but will launch other new economics-run modules to address broader areas of the economics curriculum.

“These include: A new module on economics for public policy led by the renowned and newly appointed Professor Diane Coyle and a module on behavioural economics. Students will also now be able to take a second year module on the Financial Crisis offered

by MBS and two third year modules on global capitalism by Politics.

“Looking further ahead, Economics is exploring the possibility of running a module on alternative economic theories from 2015-16.

“We take the National Student Survey very seriously, as it is a key way for us identify those areas which we need to improve upon, so that we may fully meet the needs of our students now and in the future.

“We urge all students to complete the NSS in the allotted time.”

Phoebe Clarke music@mancunion.com Sport Editors: Andrew Georgeson, Thomas Dowler & Thomas Turner Sports Reporters: James Eatwell & Jonathan Roberts sport@mancunion.com Theatre Editor: Stephanie Scott theatre@mancunion.com Web Editor: Jennifer Ho webed@mancunion.com Photography Editor: Peter Chinnock photography@mancunion.com Photography team: Patrycja Marczewska, Joshua Brown & Cil Barnett-Neefs

ISSUE 20 / 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

NEWS : 03

Chinatown supermarket refuses discount to domestic students - Student refused discount reported ‘hate incident’ to police - ‘We may have to talk about discount for all students’, says supermarket Michael Williams News Editor A student has spoken out after she felt ‘rejected’ when refused a student discount in a supermarket in Chinatown – because she was from the UK. The supermarket, Wing Fat, does not deny withholding the student discount and said that the discount is a way to support overseas students who pay higher tuition fees.

“Since overseas students come to this country and they pay more study fees than the local students, that’s why we’re going to support them when they’re buying foodstuffs,” said a Wing Fat spokesperson.

“We’ve done that over the past ten years.”

The Human Resource Management Masters student, who wanted to stay anonymous, went shopping at the Wing Fat supermarket on Faulkner Street in Chinatown on March 10th.

She attempted to get a student discount on the “few groceries” she was buying after seeing a poster in the shop advertising student discount.

However, she was told by the a member of staff behind the checkout that the student discount was for “international students only”.

“I felt really hard done by, I felt like I was rejected from the Chinese quarter of town,” said the MMU student. “I felt like I wasn’t welcome there.”

The supermarket acknowledged that this rule may come across as abrasive.

“I know for local students it must sound not very nice,” said a Wing Fat spokesperson.

“We may have to talk about discount for all students, we haven’t decided yet.”

The incident has now been logged as a “hate incident” by the police after the student reported it.

“The crux of it is, I was treated differently because of my race.

And that is a hate incident.

It’s not a crime, and it’s not a criminal offence, but it is an indicent of hate. So that’s what it’s been reported as,” she said.

“A 28-year old student attempted to get a student discount after seeing a sign advertising one, she was told it was only for

The Wing Fat supermarket in Manchester has an international-student-only discount to help with the higher fees they pay, a spokesperson said. Photo: Wikimedia Commons international students,” said a Greater Manchester Police spokesperson.

“She perceived this to be racist due to her being a nonforeign student.

“No crime has been committed according to the officer she spoke to, because no racist or discriminatory language was used during the incident.”

Charlie Cook, Community Officer, said that such a rule

was “not only unfair but also in breach of Trading Standards and therefore illegal”.

“The students’ progression of this issue to the police, who can remind businesses of their legal duties, was the most constructive way forward,” she said.

“The Union would encourage equal and legal trading among all companies and this too is the case when those businesses choose to offer student

discount. It is not in line with the ethos of the National Union of Students or Manchester’s own policies to offer a double standard of service and we would urge all organisations to recognise their own inconsistencies and address prejudices.”

However, the student felt that the police did not treat her situation correctly.

“Every single person in the police I spoke to seemed to

have a different understanding, or a lack of understanding, over what it was,” she said.

“I think it’s because [Wing Fat] want to give discount to Chinese people, personally. If we had a British small store offering students from the UK only a discount, that would be completely discriminatory, and it wouldn’t be stood for. That would be front-line, headline news, wouldn’t it?”

Student homes from hell: damp University of Manchester knocked out in 7th University Challenge semi-final rat-infested and expensive

Haider Saleem News Reporter

A quarter of students’ homes are infested with rats, mice or slugs, while nearly a third are riddled with damp, condensation and mould, a study has revealed.

The research ‘Homes Fit for Study’ by the NUS looked at students’ experiences of housing on a national level and revealed that over three quarters of students have problems with their privately rented accommodation.

Seventy-five per cent of students had experienced at least one problem with the condition of their home, while nearly half said their accommodation was poorly insulated and/or draughty.

Living conditions were not the only problem students faced. The housing issues

were worsened by financial problems. Three quarters of students go into debt to cover the upfront costs of securing a student home, from deposits to letting agency fees.

Thirty-nine per cent reported that they struggled with energy bills. To cope with this, two thirds resorted to wearing an extra layer of clothing to bed, and 40 per cent chose to spend more time in university buildings to stay warm.

A fifth of students had experienced pressure to sign a contract and almost a quarter had been asked to pay a holding deposit without having seen a copy of the proposed contract.

More than half of respondents had paid £500 or more to secure their property, with 21 per cent paying £1,000 or more. Students are also receiving unfair treatment

when it comes to deposits.

Colum McGuire, NUS Vice President Welfare mentioned in the forward of the study that this was part of a wider problem, not just for students and called on the government to protect all tenants from exploitation.

He said, “With recent figures showing rapid increases in the size of the (private) sector, this is no longer just about students.

“It is time for decision-makers to stand up and take notice of the unacceptable practices that are making students and other tenants’ lives a misery; sky-high letting fees, spiralling rents and energy bills, health and safety hazards, and unresponsive landlords and letting agents.

Too often students and others feel like there is nowhere to turn and nothing in place to protect them.”

Anna Philips News Reporter

The University of Manchester was knocked out in the semifinals of the on-going University Challenge competition.

The Manchester team went head to head in the quarterfinals with University of Southampton, and comfortably won 200-80 to secure their position in the semi-finals of the BBC quiz show.

Manchester has held the title of University Challenge winners for the past two years, but the team were beaten by Trinity College, Cambridge in the semifinal aired on TV last week.

Despite losing the chance to win the compeition for a third consecutive year, Manchester have reached the semi-finals for the past seven years, and Team Captain Elizabeth Mitchell told The Mancunion she was “very

glad to have upheld that!”

She also said, “In terms of how happy I was with where we got, I was very happy. Obviously it would have been nice to reach the finals but we were beaten by a team who were better than us and I’m really proud of us for making it as far as the semis.”

She added, “I didn’t realise how close we were to winning it until I watched it back, it was really down to the wire until the last four minutes!”

Team member Joe Day also said it was an “amazing experience” and “I’ll admit, it was annoying not to be in the final, after being so close”.

He added, “I think it’s a great thing for the uni and society that previous teams have done so well on it by beating various Oxbridge and London colleges, but at least we kept up the record of semi’s”.

The Manchester team

consisted of PPE student Elizabeth Mitchell, Geography student Jonathan Collings, Physics with Astrophysics student Joe Day, and History student Edward Woudhuysen.

The team was picked after a tough selection day, including 100 sample questions put together by long-serving coach Stephen Pearson.

Captain Mitchell also said, “I’ve found the exposure bit very weird. It’s odd being recognised in public but it’s not too bad.

I’ve even had a poem written about me and someone drew a caricature of the team!”

Although the team did not manage to reach the finals when put against Trinity College, Mitchell said the team “went into the match treating it as a bit of fun and thoroughly enjoyed it.”

The last of the semi-finals is at 8pm on March 31st on BBC2.

ISSUE 20/ 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

04 : News Seven teens arrested after gang attack on student near University Seven teenagers have been arrested in connection with the violent attack on a student near the University of Manchester earlier this month.

The gang attacked the 20-yearold women – a student at the University – beneath the bridge near the University Place building.

They dragged her to the ground, hit her repeatedly in the face, and held her legs to stop her kicking out in defence. The assault only stopped when a passerby intervened.

The gang had been stalking the student from Fallowfield, according to Police.

Four girls, two aged 16 and two aged 13 and 14, along with two 14-year-old boys and a 19-yearold man were arrested in connection with the incident.

All have been interviewed and bailed pending further enquiries.

The suspects were identified following a review of CCTV cameras in the area, Police said.

“Following this incident I said we would identify those responsible, and true to my word, we have arrested seven people we believe were involved in one way or another in this vicious, premeditated and sustained attack on an innocent woman”,

Detective Sergeant John Robb, said.

He added, “Manchester has an excellent network of CCTV cameras and if someone is prepared to carry out violent crime on our streets with the expectation that they will get away with it, they can think again.

“These arrests should act as a strong warning to others that such mindless wanton crime will not go unpunished.

“We are continuing to compile evidence as part of our investigation into this incident and if anyone has any further information that can assist I would encourage them to get in touch.”

Police appeal to student community after man’s death Dan Harold News Reporter Police are trying to trace a group of four people, thought to be university students, who went to the aid of a man who collapsed on Oxford Road.

The 56-year-old man was found collapsed between 6pm and 7.30pm on Wednesday 26 February on Oxford Road and taken back to his house on Great Western Street.

His condition subsequently deteriorated and he was taken to hospital where he died the next

day. Police stress that there are no suspicious circumstances and has passed the details of the case to the coroner.

Police are now appealing to the three women and one man who went to his aid. They believe that the group could have information about the man that could be relevant to an inquest that has been set up to look into the death.

Police say that the man would have looked much older than 56 and probably looked like he was in his seventies. He had receding grey hair, stubble, and spoke

with a strong Mancunian accent.

He is also thought to have been intoxicated.

It is believed that when the incident occurred, the man was wearing a waterproof ski jacket with press studs, jeans and black trainers.

Police believe the four people who helped the man are likely to be university students and have appealed to the city’s student population for help.

Anyone with information are asked to contact the Police Coroner’s Office on 0161 856 4155 / 6069/ 1376.

Manchester girl kills police officer before committing suicide Dan Harold News Reporter A teenager from Manchester has shot dead a police officer before killing herself in an alleged suicide pact.

Alex Hollinghurst, 17, was found dead near the body of her American boyfriend Brandon Goode, in Florida, USA. The pair are alleged to have shot dead Orlando police officer Robert German, before turning the gun on themselves.

German is reported to have called for backup after stopping the couple in the early hours of Saturday morning. He was later found with a gunshot wound to the head, before being confirmed dead at hospital.

A statement put out by the local police department paid tribute to German, “The entire law enforcement community and the Town of Windermere are mourning the loss of Officer Robert German. Our hearts, thoughts, and prayers are with Officer German’s family during this difficult time.”

According to reports, Hollinghurst was originally from Oldham before emigrating to America six years ago. She was known to be a straight-A student, who completed high school a year early.

Florida police have released a series of suicide notes that

Hollinghurst left for family members. In a hate-filled note to her mother, Jane, she wrote, “I could write to you for days, but I know nothing would actually make a difference to you. You are much too ignorant and self concerned to even attempt to listen or understand.”

She went on, “When people compare us, I vomit on the inside…If I had stayed another minute I would have painted the walls and stained the carpets with my blood, so you could clean it up.

“You are a waste of space, ignorant, and a rotten c***. I wish I were never born.”

Her notes to her sister and father struck a more loving tone.

To her sister she wrote, “I need you to know that you’ve always been my favourite, my number one. You’re so much younger but you’re a better person than me, you always have been.

“I hope you never take a wrong turn like I did…I hope you realise that you are ever so beautiful. I love you.”

Hollinghurst wrote to her father apologising for disappointing him.

“I’m so sorry I’ve changed. I wish we could rewind. I love you to death, but I just couldn’t do it anymore. Every day became harder and harder.”

While police reports insist that Hollinghurst is likely to have killed herself her family

believe that she was killed by Goode. A family friend wrote on Facebook, “I have friends whose daughter was murdered this morning in Florida…they believe her boyfriend killed her.”

Goode had been arrested a few weeks earlier of marijuana possession and possessing alcohol while underage, and had been arrested in 2012 on a charge of assault.

Speaking to the Mirror, her grandmother, Joyce Johnson, said, “He had changed Alex.

She had everything to live for before she met him. Her mum is heartbroken.

“She self-harmed and put blood all over the walls. Jane was distraught. It was a constant worry…I think when he shot the police - because it’s serious, you can be executed for that in America - he might have thought, well I’ll just do it.”

Andrew Cartledge, the headmaster of her old school, spoke of Hollinghurst as an intelligent and friendly girl who was well-liked, “Alex was with us until she was 11 when she moved to America. She was an able pupil with lots of friends. She was very sociable with the other pupils because of her outgoing personality. Of course our thoughts are with her friends and family at this difficult time.”

MONDAYS

TUESDAYS A quizzical look at specialist subjects, current affairs and pop culture with a £50 bar tab to be won!

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ISSUE 20/ 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

NEWS : 05

Student loan write-off rate could mean huge loss for government

New figures show that the cost of writing off unpaid student loans could negate the profit made by the coalition government after tripling tuition fees in 2010 Charlie Spargo News Reporter

The coalition government is on track to lose more money than it gained by tripling tuition fees, after a report states that the proportion of students that will never repay their debt is reaching a tipping point.

New departmental forecasts have predicted that £90 billion of a total £200 billion in loans will remain unpaid by 2042.

David Willetts, the universities minister, responding to a question by Liam Byrne, revealed the extent of the issue.

He announced that the resource accounting and budgeting (RAB) charge - the cost of writing off all unpaid debt - is rapidly approaching the boundary figure of 48.6 per cent.

At this level the profit made by putting tuition fees up to a maximum of £9,000 per year will be negated by the cost of writing off loans.

Graduates whose salary does not exceed £21,000 a year do not have to repay their loan until a time when it rises above this figure, and a loan that remains partially or fully unpaid after thirty years will also be written

off.

New forecasts, however, have indicated that an excess of people with degrees, poor employment prospects and falling wages mean that many more graduates than previously estimated will never pay off their loan.

Even students on the median salary of £26,000 a year will end up defaulting on over £100,000 of debt, which will have to be made up by the government.

The coalition government in 2010, amidst protests over rising student fees, emphasised that the fee rise would save the public’s money and aid the deficit.

At the time it was estimated that 28 per cent of loans would remain unpaid, a figure that has been revised several times since 2010.

Now the prediction indicates that “the economic cost of the 2012-13 higher education reforms will exceed the 2010-11 system that it replaced,” according to policy and economices consultants London Economics.

This means that despite the government’s claims of saving public money, they will in fact be losing more than if tuition fees had remained at the previous level of £3,000 a year.

Many have called for urgent

Student protests against tuitionThe fee People’s rises in 2010.

Assembly In raising was formed fees thelast coalition year tocould fight lose against more the Coalition government’s austerity measures. than it made from write-off costs.

Photo: Photo: OccupyMCR lewishamdreamer @Flickr

action to be taken by the coalition to prevent any further negative consequences.

Chuka Umunna, shadow business secretary, described the situation as a “student loan time bomb,” that could prove devastating to the Liberal Democrats.

Vice-president of the National Union of Students, Rachel Wenstone, called tuition fees “an experiment that has well and truly failed.”

The consequence could be that the taxpayer is required to make up the shortfall, and more possible cuts in

universities’ budgets.

Speaking to The Mancunion, Grace Skelton, the Union’s 201314 General Secretary, said “the current model for funding higher education is not only unfair to

Researchers at the University of Manchester have found a new mechanism that can control the human body-clock.

The discovery has paved the way for a drug which would be taken to reset the body’s internal clock to help it adapt to changes caused by jet lag or working shifts.

The research means that the body-clock controlling mechanisms can also be used to help combat dangerous health conditions such as breast cancer and obesity, which are believed to be enhanced by chronic bodyclock disruption.

Internal biological body-clocks are found in almost every species,

and the team have discovered that an enzyme can control and adjust a body’s clockwork.

Therefore, by obstructing this enzyme, it may become easier for a species to adapt to a new light or dark environment.

These findings follow a recent discovery by scientists at the University of Manchester, revealing how disruption to body-clocks is linked to chronic lung disease. The Scientists suggest that taking certain drugs according to a person’s ‘lung clock time’ may enhance the effectiveness when treating cases of lung disease.

Dr David Bechtold, who led the University of Manchester’s research team, said, “We already know that modern society poses many challenges to our health

and wellbeing - things that are viewed as commonplace, such as shift-work, sleep deprivation, and jet lag disrupt our body’s clocks. It is now becoming clear that clock disruption is increasing the incidence and severity of diseases including obesity and diabetes.”

He added, “there is very clear evidence that disruption of our body clocks has real and negative consequences for our health.”

The findings are part of the University’s on-going research into the effects of chronic disruption to body-clocks, and their potential effects on conditions such as breast cancer, cardiovascular disease or mood disorder.

only be beneficial to students and Universities, but would be an investment in the future of this country and would save the Treasury a lot of pain and money in the long term.”

GRADUATE RECRUITMENT

University scientists discover a way to reset body-clocks Anna Philips News Reporter

students who are burdened with huge debt for the rest of their lives, but… is also economically unsustainable.

“Increased public investment in higher education would not

11 & 12 June 2014 10.30am–4.00pm

The Armitage Centre, Manchester Graduates from any subject, any university welcome More exhibitors than any other UK graduate jobs fair DIFFERENT EXHIBITORS EACH DAY – ATTEND BOTH DAYS

Hundreds of graduate jobs for 2014 and some postgraduate course places Over 170 exhibitors, local and national, from a wide variety of sectors Free entry and free fair guide Free coach to the fair from Piccadilly train station

Register at: www.manchester.ac.uk/graduatefair

2014GR_133x168.indd 1

20/03/2014 09:28:12

06 : News

ISSUE 20 / 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Leeds Student paper stopped from printing Budget mishandling and Union disagreements have left the future of the newspaper in doubt Pippa Allen-Kinross News Editor The future of award winning student newspaper Leeds Student is in jeopardy after budget mishandling.

The remaining issues of the paper this year will not be printed, and staff at the newspaper known as LS - are concerned that the problem will continue next year.

However, Leeds University Union (LUU) has released a statement insisting that ‘the rumours aren’t true’.

Activities Officer at LUU, Gregory Sturge, has blamed the “higher printing costs and financial burden” of the creation of the LSi supplement to the newspaper.

In a statement he said, “Both the Union and LS were aware of the potential risks of being short of money, as advertising income

can never be guaranteed. This is not a risk that has crept up on the LS and the Union – the risk was very clear from the start”.

LS have refuted this claim. On their website, they said, “while the LSi supplement has cost more, this cost was counterbalanced by a cut in its print run of 1,000 copies. In real terms, its inclusion in the newspaper required £200 more advertising to be brought in each week – the equivalent of one quarter page advert every other week”.

LS also say that their attempts to source more advertising themselves were rejected by the Union because “they do not fit in with LUU’s advertising policy, which prohibits adverts that LUU believes conflict with its existing establishments and services”.

The cost of running and printing LS and the LSi supplement is £40,000 a year. The Union provides £20,000 of this, with the

other £20,000 made up from advertising revenue. This year LUU has fallen short of this budget by £5,200.

Although an initial article in LS said they “will no longer be able to print, due to a lack of funding”, they later clarified that it was the remaining two issues of this year that would not go to print.

But, they have expressed concern that these issues will reoccur next year, leading to the possible cancellation of more issues.

Current Editor-in-Chief Rehema Figueiredo – a paid position at LS - told The Mancunion, “Going forwards it is important that changes are made to the relationship between LS and the Union to ensure that its future is secure”.

This was reiterated by Sturge, who said, “There have been issues in the working relationship between the Union and LS this year, and lessons have been learned on both sides”.

Leeds Student has won several awards throughout the years, and in 2012 was nominated for publication of the year and website of the year at the Guardian

DO YOU KNOW WHAT

ACADEMIC MALPRACTICE IS?

Advertising revenues have fallen short this year, leaving the Leeds Students’ Union struggling to fund the newspaper. Photo: Leo Garbutt Media Awards.

Famous journalists including Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre and BBC correspondent Nicholas Witchell worked on the paper while at the University.

An online petition to save the paper has already reached almost 1,300 signatures, and 42 societies have pledged their support.

LS have also reported that two editions of the paper have already been paid for out of their

society membership fees because of a lack of funding.

Despite this, Sturge said, “There is no threat to the future longterm existence of LS. There are two editions left that were originally planned for later in this academic year, and that there is now a financial concern over. However, the door is still open to help these editions secure advertising to cover their print costs.

“It was never going to be the case that LS would be shut down

due to this situation”.

However, the paper said, “LS is open to all proposals to ensure that the paper can not only survive, but to expand and improve so that it can remain at the forefront to student journalism.

“LS seeks a long term guarantee from LUU that it will continue to fully fund its student newspaper while supporting its independence as the University of Leeds’ only free weekly newspaper”.

You may be surprised to know the following behaviours could adversely affect your grades or even lead to you being expelled from your course: • Plagiarism (bad referencing could be considered plagiarism too) • Collusion in coursework (working with someone else on an individual assignment or borrowing their assignment) • Fabrication and/or falsification of results • Cheating in exams • Impersonation • Breaching anonymity requirements as prescribed by your course If the University suspects that you have committed academic malpractice you will be called to a meeting to present your case.

For further information visit: manchesterstudentsunion.com/adviceservice

ISSUE 20 / 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

NEWS : 07

Manchester histories festival hosts ‘Manchester heroes’ debate The debate asked the question, how should we remember Manchester’s heroes?

Aidan Gregory News Editor A panel of prominent local figures debated the question, “How should we remember Manchester’s heroes?” as a part of the Manchester histories festival, last week.

In his opening speech, Dr Jones explained that the topic is personally important to Dr Jones, because his historical research concerns charting the changing attitudes towards British heroes across the last two centuries.

Jones said there are three things which surround the concept of a hero, “places”, “possibilities” and “politics. The key question for Jones is “who we choose to celebrate.”

The panel, organised and chaired by Dr Max Jones, senior lecturer in modern history at the University of Manchester, comprised of TV historian and professor of public history Michael Wood, Tomb Bloxham MBE, Chancellor of the University of Manchester, former

NBA player John Amaechi OBE, author of Man in the Middle and radio and TV presenter Terry Christian, and Ruth Daniel, founder of Manchester based indie record label Fat Northerner Records and manager of the ‘In Place of War’ project at the University of Manchester.

Starting the debate, Amaechi argued that we must be careful in who we call a ‘hero’.

“Being a hero isn’t just about being talented. Heroes are important because they are protective interventionists. They act for the betterment of others.”

Tom Bloxham put forward Tony Wilson and Sir Alex Ferguson as his mancunian heroes.

Tony Wilson to Bloxham was a hero because “he was a half genius, half lunatic, who believed in the power of music.”

And Sir Alex Ferguson, “not because he was such a great manager, but because he had such a vision for the club.”

Terry Christian also spoke of Tony Wilson as a hero.

“I knew Tony Wilson and I knew what he was about...[he] made me feel excited about living in Manchester.”

Ruth Daniel in her speech discussed the suffragette movement’s Manchester origins, expressing her love for the fact that “Manchester has so many women heroes.”

Michael Wood talked about the legacy of the Chartists, the cooperative movement, and the music scene in the 80s and 90s.

The Mancunion asked the panellists whether Manchester is still “the belly and guts of the nation” as George Orwell once wrote of the city.

Terry Christian responded, “Orwell was talking about our industry. We’ve lost that now, but I still think we’re the belly and guts.

“Manchester to London needs to be the Barcelona to Spain’s Madrid.”

The Mancunion also asked whether Morrissey is one of the greatest examples of a Manchester dissident hero, as someone who fought the city’s cause, to which they all responded positively.

Terry Christian knew Morrissey and Johnny Marr growing up in Stretford. He told The Mancunion that in school Morrissey was

University of London Union sign pledge to tackle sexual harassment in nightclubs ULU and popular London nightclubs aim to challenge the culture that suggests sexual harassment in clubs is normal Anna Philips News Reporter The University of London’s students’ union ULU recently signed a pledge to deal with the normality of sexual harassment in clubs.

The pledge aims to stamp out sexist and offensive advertising used by nightclubs, and encourages a more empathetic outlook to harassment in clubs.

Popular London nightclubs such as Fabric and Ministry of Sound have also signed the pledge, agreeing to give extra training to staff members with regards to dealing with issues or complaints of sexual harassment.

Hollaback London, a movement which aims to end street harassment launched the campaign this month, which has since gained support from other movements, such as Everyday Sexism and the End Violence Against Women Campaign.

Zero-tolerance posters will be placed around these nightclubs,

using the slogan ‘Good Night Out’.

The posters read: “If something or someone makes you feel uncomfortable, no matter how minor it seems, you can report it to any member of our staff and they will work with you to make sure that it doesn’t ruin your night”.

Julia Gray, co-director of Hollaback London said, “Groping, bum-slapping, and sexually aggressive behaviour are all too common aspects of a night out in London. We started this campaign because so many women and LGTBQ people submit stories of harassment

and even assault in clubs and pubs to our website.”

She added, “These experiences are now so commonplace that they’re actually putting people off going out altogether.”

Arielle Melka, second year Portuguese and business management student at the University of Manchester said, “The pledge will make girls who have potentially experienced sexual harassment in the past feel safer, and more willing to go out if they know staff will take action if there is a problem”.

The campaign encourages constructive feedback via Twitter, in order to ensure it is yielding positive results and can gain more support throughout the country.

Former frontman of The Smiths Morrissey was one of Manchester’s heroes discussed by panelists that included TV historian and University of Manchester professor Michael Wood and former-NBA star John Amaechi. Photo: Man Alive! @flickr known as the “weirdo on the 251 bus.”

He added, “I knew his mates, Bowie fans, footballers, hard as nails. That’s why he never got bullied.”

Later that evening, a twitter war ensued between Christian, and Amaechi.

Amaechi wrote, “just finished a panel debate. I had to remind

[Terry Christian] that debate is not the art of formulating your next thought while others speak.”

Christian responded that “debate is the art of making your point in 30 seconds instead of five minutes and having some clue about the point being made.”

He also said, “I get where you

were coming from John - but you never justified a single statement i.e. an argument - could do better.

I had to remind you that brevity is the key to making a point - this isn’t the USA - know your subject first.”

Amaechi retorted, “You conflate factual ‘points’ with sound bites, more Farage than philosopher.”

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08 : Feature

ISSUE 20 / 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Interview: Raymond Tallis

Raymond Tallis chairs Healthcare Professionals for Assisted Dying Photo: BBC World Service

Polymath Raymond Tallis speaks to Features Editor Sam Dumitriu about consciousness, assisted dying and why science can’t do away with philosophy

D

octor, philosopher, poet, novelist, literary critic and campaigner – talking to Raymond Tallis makes you feel very unaccomplished. The breadth of his work in philosophy alone, dealing with consciousness, humanism and time, is staggering.

What makes it even more staggering is that philosophy for 37 years was but a side project.

“Medicine has always been the foremost, it filled my waking consciousness from 1970 to 2007, nearly all my waking consciousness is involved in medicine. Both in clinical medicine of course, but also in teaching, research, and getting involved with reorganising services nationally. So all the other things have been fitted in around the edges.”

Tallis stands out as a polymath in a world of highly specialised academics. The question you’re compelled to ask is how does he find the time?

“The question is finding those edges, and my edge was usually five o’clock to seven o’clock [in the morning], and then I’d go to the hospital. If you write for two hours a day, everyday. You can cover an awful lot of territory.

Nobody wants you at five o’clock anyway.”

On academia’s path towards increased specialisation Tallis is damning.

“I think it was George Bernard Shaw who said ‘A specialist is a kind of idiot.’ It seems to me to confine oneself to one’s own speciality is almost to betray the very nature of being an academic.

“An intellectual should be someone who has a 360 degree solid angle open awareness. You can’t be that all the time, but given that you only live once, isn’t it a good idea to be curious about this as well as that.”

Throughout all of his work, whether in medicine, in literary criticism, or in philosophy, there is one consistent theme: humanism. He comes to the topic when discussing his disdain

An intellectual should be someone who has a 360 degree solid angle open awareness. You can’t be that all the time, but given that you only live once, isn’t it a good idea to be curious about this as well as that. for post-structuralist approaches to literary theory.

“I’m a humanist and a humanist is somebody who feels that supernatural explanations of what we are simply have no future. On the other hand the opposite explanation is to say, as it were, we are nothing in ourselves, nothing unique.

“My criticism of a lot of so-called literary theory was that it denied the reality of the conscious human agent of either the writer, the reader or indeed the critic. At the centre of its criticism it said that ‘We don’t speak language, language speaks us’, that basically we’re in a sea of signs and that we’re hardly aware of it.”

But, literary theory’s anti-humanism was not the only thing to make Tallis cross.

“It was very bad philosophy. Its

philosophy of mind and language, was absolutely third rate. and to be honest a lot of what literary theorists said, they wouldn’t have got away with it if they spoke at philosophy conferences. But you can get away with pretty poor cricket if you’re moving amongst rugby players.”

Ironically, Tallis’ son Ben is a doctoral researcher in International Relations at the University of Manchester.

A department where you can’t swing a stick without hitting a poststructuralist. Heated dinnertime discussion perhaps?

“Although we disagree with certain names like Foucault, and certain aspects, I think there’s probably a profound level of agreement with us.

I often find that with other people, whom I disagree with politically. I don’t disagree with Ben politically, we’re probably the same left of centre or whatever you call it. But even people I disagree with politically, I often find there is a core with which you seriously and existentially agree almost.”

He repeatedly stressed that ‘I feel there is much more I’ve learned from him than he has from me, and as a result of him doing critical IR I generally have been more critical of my own views’.

Tallis has dedicated himself to two political causes, campaigning against the recent NHS reforms that increase the level of private sector involvement in the health service “the private sector is not interested in providing healthcare for a population. There responsibility is to deliver a particular product and make a profit”.

More controversial however, is his commitment to legalise assisted dying. Tallis chairs Healthcare Professionals for Assisted Dying.

What motivates him?

“From my experience as a doctor and my experience as a human being who has watched other people die and so on, there is a small number of people for whom palliative care cannot solve

all the problems. They go through absolute unbearable hell. Amongst those, there are some who ask for assisted dying. At the moment it is actually a criminal offence to assist someone to die.

“I feel that if you’re terminally ill and you’ve had good palliative care, you’re mentally competent and you have a settled wish for assisted dying, it is your right to have that assistance, it is not your right to have the doctor walk away from you at the time of your greatest need. I feel like I’ve had to do that with some of my patients, and I feel very bad about that, so I’m making reparation by campaigning to change that.”

In the field of philosophy, he has focused his attention upon those who believe that science has made philosophy obsolete.

“Just as I am opposed to supernatural accounts of humanity. I’m opposed to a naturalistic account of humanity.

That says we are simply the sum total of the things that can be investigated through biological science. I think there is more to us than that.

“There are many issues that are addressed by philosophy, that physics doesn’t touch… One example is the notion of free will. There is clearly, no space for agency in a physical account of the world. Of course not, Physics deals with causes, it can’t find agency. The fact it can’t find agency does not mean there isn’t difference between me falling down the stairs, and me walking down the stairs in order to see you. It means that there are things that escape the cognitive grasp of science.”

One particularly bad version of the position Tallis opposes, he calls ‘Darwinitis.’

“Darwinism is probably one of the greatest leaps of thought Humanity has ever had about itself. It has seen how it is possible to produce complex organisms such as ourselves by means of process that require no design or direction.

“What it doesn’t explain is the nature

of persons. Not the organism homo sapiens, but human people. There is a huge gap between a person and an organism. Darwinism, good. It says I can explain how the human organism came about. Darwinitis. Bad. because it pretends the human person is somehow identical with the human organism.”

One author particularly guilty of this charge is John Gray.

“He says that Darwin has now shown us that the human mind is not adapted to generate truths but for survival.

So that it is as it were undarwinian to think that we can access truth, that we can make progress beyond our animal state. To which I would say, what is the status of the truths you are invoking, such as Darwin’s theory. Surely it’s hardly a theory that is purely about survival? I mean you believe the theory is objectively true.

He is a supreme example of someone who the philosophers would say are victims to pragmatic self-refutation.“ Tallis was particularly interested when the subject shifted to consciousness. As the interview drew to a close, he made a plea to reject scientism in our understanding of consciousness and instead embrace philosophy.

“I don’t think we will have such a theory until we get out of our little heads, the notion we’ve got it all ready, namely the notion that consciousness is just a manifestation of neural activity. So long as we think we’ve solved a problem, we won’t get anywhere near solving it.

“By pretending that we solved the problem of consciousness and ignoring all the philosophical issues around a materialist account of consciousness, we are missing a most fantastic opportunity. The light’s pouring in, even in the form of uncertainty, I think we’ve got to make the most of this crack in our materialist world picture.”

ISSUE 20/ 31st March 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Features : 09

Interview: i Editor Oliver Duff Features Editor Sam Dumitriu speaks to i editor Oliver Duff on the future of journalism and how politicians can engage students Do you think print journalism is still relevant to young people?

Absolutely. We all have a huge choice about where we turn for information and opinion, and in a world where we’re overloaded with data, people who can aggregate and filter that - people who used to be known as journalists but who now wear a lot of different labels - are more important than ever. The specific medium our readers choose is less important to us than the fact they are choosing to engage with our journalism.

Three-and-a-half years ago the i paper didn’t exist; now we have a daily print circulation of 300,000 and our sister website independent. co.uk has 33 million unique users a month. A lot of people, especially young people, mix media - it’s not a binary choice - and a disproportionately large number of our readers are young. I think that’s because we try to offer intelligent, fair, concise journalism at a cheap price (30p), with fewer of the unhealthy additives found in some other titles.

We also try to make our paper really relevant to young people - the news, issues and politics we cover, the columnists as well as the arts, entertainment and sport. This is easy for us because a lot of our staff are young - I’m 30, and a lot of my colleagues are the same age or younger. This has always been a paper that believes in young people and invests in them, and we want to make sure issues that matter to them are given a platform in politics and society.

Do you think newspapers are giving enough space to younger voices?

Online maybe, but for a few of them not so much in print perhaps because they have struggled to attract young readers before - so

Change the voting age to 16, put a ballot box in every sixth form and student union, and let people vote on their mobiles.

Time to move on from our steam-powered democracy.

they focus exclusively on their older readers instead. We haven’t had the same issue because we’re such a young paper ourselves, only founded in October 2010, and a lot of our staff are young. So we make sure our pages reflect that!

What was the idea behind the iStudent debates?

We think young people are badly represented in Westminster politics despite having such a critical role in society, because relatively few young people vote. Just 44 per cent of 18 to 24-year-olds voted at the last general election (dropping to 39 per cent among young women), compared to 75 per cent of people aged 55 and over. That’s why Westminster politicians care much more about older people. I don’t think the answer to that is to hector people to vote - Westminster is guilty of disengaging from young people, rather than the other way round. Since so many of our readers are students or under-30 we thought we’d try to provide this platform for young people’s interests to be aired - and hopefully get a few more politicians to wake up to the millions of people out there who aren’t given much of a voice in Westminster politics.

We also want to champion the many ways people can get involved in politics and society away from Westminster.

What’s the main reason behind the i’s success having one of the highest circulations in the country? Is it the price or is there a demand for the more concise style?

The 30p price is an important factor, but our readers say that they choose i because they like its quality, the unbiased approach to news and politics, and the space we give to dialogue with readers. Our brevity is key: people don’t want to wade through 700 words for every story, and they dislike that “buyer’s remorse” of having to throw away tonnes of supplements unread. We also try to make a lively paper every day and to develop i based on our readers’ requests - a lot of improvements to i are first suggested by readers. In conclusion, I suppose in the newspaper market, i is unique: we digest Britain and the world for our readers, quickly, cheaply, fairly and trying to adhere to standards of journalistic excellence.

How can politicians engage with students?

It’s really simple: meet many more of them, away from party functions (so they’re not just preaching to the converted) and away from events stage-managed by the press office.

Everything else - understanding and caring about issues important to students, championing them, the dialogue, working together - follows from that. It’s not something that can be done through a focus group, and that dialogue isn’t something that can be faked. There’s this huge reservoir of talent and creativity that’s untapped, which could be used to benefit society and politics.

“I was a crap gossip columnist “ - i Editor Oliver Duff Photo: The Independent For example using social media to organise people locally or on a specific issue to come together to solve a problem. Or on the macro level crowd-sourcing best policy from experts, instead of fag packet announcements designed to curry easy headlines but which fall apart under close inspection.

Also: change the voting age to 16, put a ballot box in every sixth form and student union, and let people vote on their mobiles. Time to move on from our steam-powered democracy.

What advice would you give people wanting to get into journalism and what’s the worst piece of advice you’ve seen given?

There is no substitute for practical experience and experimenting.

Try work experience in as many different places as you can, student, local, regional, national, radio, telly, online and definitely print. Set up your own site or video channel. It’s fun, and showing a commitment to wanting to join the media helps you stand out from the crowd. Target your approach: the fewer resources a media organisation has, the more useful you can be. If you can’t afford to do weeks at a time, try to arrange the odd day here and there and build experience slowly that way. And write to a specific journalist asking for work experience, rather than sending generic emails to news desks. Offer to make the tea and water the plants, stay out from under their feet – and jump at every chance someone gives you. It’s that cliche about a foot in the door, and trying to create your own opportu-

nity. Also: read newspapers, in their print form, every day. Sounds obvious? You’d be surprised how many people who want to work in the media don’t do this. The print media still set much of the agenda for broadcast and even online.

Two more tips: go outside of your comfort zone, so you learn more, and always make stories about real people and their lives.

The worst piece of advice was from a senior reporter the day I started: that journalism was a sunset industry and I should give up before I got going. He was wrong. If I get fired tomorrow I’ll have been blessed with a decade of fun, mischief, surprises, freedom to pursue interesting ideas - and travel.

How did you get into journalism?

While I was a sixth-former, writing reports for a sympathetic news editor at the Leighton Buzzard Observer, Mick King, then throwing myself into the student paper when I went to uni. I did a little work experience for nationals but was fairly clueless and too terrified to speak to anyone. By the time I got to The Indy I’d pulled myself together a bit and got lucky when an admin vacancy arose just as I was sitting my finals - I’d proven my ability to make tea and photocopy without upsetting anyone. The reward was a seat next to the news editors. Hearing them tear through each edition was a great education.

You used to be a gossip columnist, how different is covering celebrity news to covering politics?

I was a crap gossip columnist,

certainly when I started. I didn’t recognise anyone - I failed to identify Kate Middleton when she pushed in front of me at Richard Branson’s buffet. Worse, I didn’t give a toss about celebrities. But it was great fun, I think of it as throwing planes from the back of the class. We covered a lot of politics and took pride in breaking some proper news stories too. Good gossip columnists - and there aren’t that many - have a steel that belies the flippant public image.

Politics profoundly affects people’s lives, and political journalism is rightly a serious business. I can think of four main similarities between covering politics and writing a gossip column: you need a nose for a story, an ability to spot new information in a throwaway sentence; you need to work damn hard and spend a lot of your time meeting people and building trusting relationships with contacts; you need to try to challenge the status quo and establishment; and to do either well you have to place real people at the heart of each story.

The best political journalism transcends Westminster and resonate in people’s homes.

You were fired from the position of bar critic after three weeks, what’s the story there?

Artistic differences. Also, I was rubbish. At the time they wanted reviews of the smartest new bars, whereas my preferred drinking holes had grumpy landlords, blackout curtains and mouldy carpet.

Sam Dumitriu

Opinion We need to talk about deadlines 10

Charlotte Green argues that prioritising logistics over student interests has negatively impacted final year Politics students

ISSUE 20/ 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

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Want to give your thoughts on University news, or comment about an article?

Tweet, and it could appear in this fortnightly column...

@MancunionOp

Photo: jdeeringdavis @flickr The University of Manchester has remained remarkably untouched by student protest over the last few years – mostly because it has avoided the kind of privatisation and outsourcing that has caused such uproar at Sussex and Birmingham. Throughout the years that I have studied here I have never felt cause to occupy a campus building, or protest outside the Vice Chancellors office.

I’m proud of the way that Manchester maintains its’ internal working community; Food on Campus in particular has been incredibly successful in its’ commitments to locally-sourced food, its’ Fairtrade status and sustainable food policy. Despite being one of the largest universities in the UK it has a local feel, and over two years I formed the impression that the University is committed to prioritising student welfare and achievement over profit and convenience.

Or at least I did, right up until my final year – the year of the dissertation. The dissertation is treated as a sacrament – the culmination of three years of work, knowledge building and preparation. The majority of us will only ever obtain an undergraduate degree, which makes the final year dissertation the only genuine contribution we will ever make to academic literature. Whilst not on the same level as G4S security contracts, the fact that the deadline for Politics dissertations was brought forward to the 31st of March in a startling break with precedent does seem to be part of a new trend in higher education to prioritise logistics over students’ interests.

According to course convenor Professor David Richards this early deadline was the result of the lateness of Easter and the “need to be able to dispatch material to the external examiners before entering the actual examination period”. The deadline had been stated from the beginning of the year – so we cannot fault the department for poor communication. However, the argument given for this earlier deadline, which is weeks before most other Humanities and Social Science department deadlines, does not withstand closer scrutiny.

The lateness of Easter, which falls on the 20th of April this year, is not a new occurrence. In 2011 Easter Sunday was even later – landing on the 24th. And yet that year the vagaries of the Christian calendar did

not seem to be so important; the deadline remained steadfastly in May consistent with previous years.

So what exactly is different about this year that makes even the moderate lateness of Easter such a fantastically huge issue? Head of Politics Andrew Russell pointed out that Politics has an extremely large number of dissertations to mark before they can be sent off to external examiners, more than either Sociology or Philosophy, both of which are disciplines that have retained deadlines in May. But this does not explain why the

We will have suffered in isolation, and for no valid reason History department has also not seen fit to bring forward their deadline to before Easter.

Politics has 195 final year dissertations; History has nearly 200. Additionally all their dissertations are 40 credits, rather than the mix of 20 and 40 credit dissertations that make up the Politics total. And yet somehow the History department are managing to balance their marking commitments within the established timeframe.

In response to my question about why there wasn’t a coherent approach to dissertations across the Humanities and Social Science disciplines Andrew Russell stated that “History is in a different School of course and have to be free to set own procedures”.

So the defence of the earlier Politics deadline appears to rest on a contradictory mix of appeals to faculty autonomy whilst at the same time, relinquishing all responsibility by blaming external factors.

Apart from merely being bad logic this approach hardly epitomises the principles of ‘best practice’ that the University prescribes.

The real problem is that the earlier deadline has had huge implications for students in terms of balancing their workload. Attending lectures and tutorials over the last few weeks has been of secondary importance to most Politics students, essential though those hours are they are not seen as imperative when compared with the importance of producing the best possible dissertation.

Additionally, although the deadline was communicated to students from September onwards, there seem to have been discrepancies in how this information was conveyed to course leaders, resulting in many module deadlines clustering around the same time as the dissertation deadline.

Another Politics student wanted to know “why they [the course convenors] didn’t check with other Politics courses that it wouldn’t fall at the exact same time as loads of their essays, which it did”. The lucky few, me included, have had essay deadlines delayed to alleviate the stress of balancing coursework commitments with completing an extensive dissertation.

But most students have not had this support and as such have been placed under undue pressure. When I made this point Andrew Russell responded that “as far as the coincidence of deadlines is something we have every year, so whether they be in February, March, April or May there are always likely to be clashes and the only thing we can say to students is that it’s about time management”. Ironically it is the Politics department’s own botched attempts at ‘time management’ that has produced this mess in the first place.

When electronic submission is fully rolled out in two years’ time, there will be greater flexibility around the days on which work can be submitted, which should go some way to streamlining the procedure of essay submission. The news of this innovation will bring little comfort to those students who have suffered this year’s break with precedent – nor, I suspect, will the knowledge that next year the traditional deadline will be restored. As far as me and my contemporaries are concerned; we will have suffered in isolation, and for no valid reason.

Opinion

ISSUE 20/ 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

11

The porn-filter is an affront to the idea of net neutrality The Internet is really great we can all agree - it’s great for talking to your friends, buying things, learning things and settling down after a hard day to watch the pounding conclusion to Sasha Grey’s pizza being delivered. David Cameron’s new opt-out ‘porn’ filters could make your private fantasies semi-public as you may have to pick up the phone to your ISP and explain to them you’re feeling a bit randy as you ask politely to have the porn turned back on. But it’s okay – because it’s all under the laughable pretext of protecting children.

Recently we have seen a slew of events indicating that freedom on the internet, just like physical freedom, must be fought for. The Twitter ban in Turkey, for example, has been combated by many scrawling on the walls, in the most haphazard ways, DNS references and instructions to circumvent the ban. People violently rioted on the streets in Egypt against the Facebook and Twitter ban and the consequential shut down of the countries internet.

We watch this happening in

other countries and make the assumption it could not happening in our own. But we are wrong.

The 2014 report of, “Enemies of the Internet” by Reporters Without Borders has, for the first time ever, listed the UK as an enemy of free speech online for its schizophrenic attitude that claims to respect fundamental freedom whilst knowingly perpetrating acts and implementing legislation contrary to this.

David Cameron’s porn ban is a perfect example of this schism. The ban is intended to be opt-out, meaning by default you consent to have it on, so anyone who forgets to uncheck that small unmarked box at the bottom of the 13th page of their new contract may find they have willingly allowed themselves to be blocked from not just porn but a slew of other categories such as the worryingly vague and bizarre “alcohol” and “smoking”.

Drinking and smoking is common and frequently done in public, maybe Cameron’s next step is to propose an opt-out lock on everyone’s front door.

Photo: Flickr@dprevite

The variety of the categories included in the “porn ban” is astounding – 10 in total. The categories range from “esoteric material”, which will presumably be the labour party website, “extremist and terrorist related content”, which is surely the sort of thing that you don’t opt out of unless you want to wake up with a bag on your head to “anorexia related websites” and “web forums”. As we can see this is becoming far more than just a ‘porn filter’. The categories are intentionally vague and have already shown themselves to be unfeasible, with educational

websites on sexual and psychological health being banned in addition to porn sites. Internet filters are notoriously clumsy, frequently blocking anything for merely having a few of the keywords on its front page, regardless of the content it seeks to communicate. One of the more worrying elements of this process is that you would not simply see “this website has been blocked” but in a scarily dystopian fashion that would make George Orwell claw his way out of his grave just to pop up and say “I told you so”, you wouldn’t even know that any

websites have been blocked – you simply wouldn’t see them.

Yet, beyond the subversive, but ultimately inefficient way of blocking all these sites that would likely result in the government needing to create an entirely new department just to deal with all the appeals, the “porn ban” presents a serious and important affront to our private freedom and the sovereignty of net neutrality itself. Net neutrality is the idea that a connection to the internet should be the same for everyone and should not be interfered with by the internet service provider or the government – it’s a general principle that partly states all data should be treated equally and that the user should have control over what content they view. It’s giving everyone an equal voice regardless of what they are saying and Cameron’s ‘porn’ filters are categorically in opposition of this. By Cameron even proposing a list of semimandatory filters that nobody has any real idea what is being filtered he is setting a dangerous precedent for free speech on the internet and sticking his

foot in the doorway of every house in Britain – forcing his brand of social conditioning onto every man, woman and child who will have to make the conscious choice to opt out of what he believes children shouldn’t see – assuming they realize they have even opted in.

Many suggest that the porn ban is a smoke screen and that Cameron cannot truly follow through on his proposals. In an interview with the BBC’s Jeremy Vine he even admitted, “I’m not saying we’ve thought of everything” yet the prospect of such large scale, obtrusive censorship is a scary one. This example is indicative of what could be and what should be fought against. People want to censor the internet; this is a benign start to an issue which will become one of the most important fights of our time, it is the duty of our generation to keep the Internet free and in the right hands - the hands of everyone. I implore you to opt out of this ban, not because downloading porn sucks, but because our rights shouldn’t come with an expiration date.

Morris Seifert

We’re all so charitable we ignore the need for charity These days, it’s rare that charity campaigns don’t come without controversy.

The motivations of those involved are often questioned and in the age of charity fun runs and sponsored baths, the link to the cause concerned is often tenuous at best. No campaign recently has more embodied 21st century ‘charity’ than the #nomakeupselfie trend that took hold of social media last week.

The idea of creating a campaign around women posting selfies without makeup actually came from Children in Need, who encouraged celebrities to go ‘Bear Faced’ as a mode of promoting the charity and its flagship night of entertainment. But while this campaign got some attention, the #nomakeupselfie campaign exemplified the elusive virality that marketeers can often only dream of creating. What is remarkable is that the charity endorsed by the campaign, Cancer Research UK, had nothing to do with its inception.

Women seemingly absorbed

the message of the campaign from one another, without formal prompt and the charity claims that over £2 million has been donated as a result.

A viral charitable campaign?

So far, so good. The idea that cancer awareness can be that quickly conveyed to so many people is appealing. Yet, there were many who noted strong objections to the campaign.

Despite its apparent ‘success’, the #nomakeupselfie campaign epitomises the hypocrisy of the digital era and is riddled with problems.

One of the most apparent objections noted by critics has been the evident narcissism that the campaign appeals to at its core. Many have suggested that participants post the pictures thanks to a blend of wanting to be involved with a trend and a desire to garner the kind of compliments that covered the comments sections of the images. ‘What a natural beauty’ became an archetypal response from friends and family alike. Actively seeking compliments has little to do

Photo: Wikimedia Commons with cancer awareness.

The picture gets bleaker if you add to this the message that the pictures explicitly conveyed. The whole campaign revolved around the idea that a woman not wearing makeup in public was in some way brave or unusual. Given that we apparently live post-feminist victory, this message is archaic and perpetuates the fears of girls and women who rely on makeup day after day. However, some women have leapt to their peers’ defence, noting that the

compliments received could be the first step in a woman or girl putting down the makeup and proudly displaying a bare face more often. While the campaign reeks of misogyny, on an individual level it could have been a liberating moment.

Narcissism isn’t a new thing in 2014, though. Lives lived on social media are obviously slightly self-obsessed so we’re all guilty of one of the evils of the campaign. What’s more frustrating is the campaign’s charity message. A number

of participants replaced their #nomakeupselfie with a diagram of cancer symptoms for specific forms of cancer.

What some of these pointed out is that we are all pretty aware of cancer. 1 in 3 of us will get some form of the disease which means that pretty much all of us will be touched by it. A generic ‘awareness’ campaign seems a bit outdated in light of those figures. Instead, being able to recognise cancer, in yourself or others, could help survival immensely. The viral spread of images describing cancer symptoms could be epic.

Most troubling of all, the campaign is a damning indictment of our charity culture. While the campaign did successfully raise money, its focus wasn’t the charity’s cause or giving. Anyone who uses social media, or works in an office, or reads a newspaper, or engages with the outside world at all for that matter will know how often we are asked for charity money today. That itself isn’t a problem.

But when someone is climbing

a mountain ‘for charity’ the cynicism begins to creep in. Our culture now is to do something for ourselves under the mask of being charitable. What gets lost in these supposedly good deeds is the issue at the heart of that charity. We are all aware of how to raise money but we are rarely conscious of what we are raising for. This allows us to ignore some of the most pressing issues within society today, considering our donation participation enough.

While running, cycling and shaving for charity we forget how to actually care.

Charitable campaigns shouldn’t die. Our giving culture provides a life raft for people in trouble around the world. What’s missing, though, is knowledge.

We need to know who we are giving to and why they need us.

Only then will we be properly motivated to solve, or at least attempt to solve, some of the tragic circumstances facing people today.

Alice Rigby

ISSUE 20/ 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Editors: Phoebe Clarke, Patrick Hinton, Tom Ingham Opinion

Interview

the MUSIC OPINION: Who’s afraid of the big bad internet?

It seems every week that some musician waxes lyrical about how the internet is “ruining music forever”. Of course, they’re concerned about dwindling pay checks and blank royalties. And as hard as they might try to preach change from their sinking ships, they’re ignoring the problem (and answers) right beneath their feet.

With the invention of music records, musicians were in uproar. In the 1940s musicians unionized and went on strike against ‘canned music’. If machines replaced live music they’d all be out of a job. But they were blind to the future of a new medium – we all know that for the next 60 years musicians made an absolute killing from selling records. The skill in music shifted from performing music to creating music. The Beatles set the standard in the 60s of a band both writing and performing their own songs.

Their late albums were written without the intention of ever being played live, which made an album like Revolver one of the first true conceptual albums.

I’m not here to praise the Beatles. Say what you like about them, but you can’t deny their influence – an influence which spread a simple idea: Recording was not a replacement for live music, but a completely different art form. With both the financial and critical success of the Beatles, no-one was on strike about being on record anymore.

Fast forward to today’s musicians, who are having to adapt to another new medium.

So far a few notable attempts have been made: Radiohead’s

In Rainbows was a nice token gesture, giving a fully realised album away practically for free. But the music wasn’t any different because of it. Kaiser Chiefs (remember them, of all people?) sold their fourth album The Future is Medieval so you could pick 10 out of 23 songs to make your own track listing. For every person who bought your track listing you made £1. Unlike Radiohead’s stunt, this actually changed the way you experienced the music.

Unfortunately for people with ears, you couldn’t change the fact this was a Kaiser Chiefs album.

Musicians don’t have to be limited to how music was made in the past. With mindblowing technology at their fingertips, I expect musicians to be making album-apps that play in various clever ways. Like having different songs set to play at the same time each hour, continuously mix and repeat without any first or last track like Pharrell’s 24 hour ‘Happy’ video. Or an electronic track that changes speed depending on your speed, starting off with slow dubstep for a leisurely walk, progressing through house into drum and bass as you speed up and break into a sprint. If I can come up with ideas like that in a few minutes I can’t wait to hear what some truly creative people will be making in the future. Music can become less about what it sounds like and more focused on how we listen to it. Anyone who says the internet is killing creative thinking clearly isn’t thinking creatively enough.

Lowell Clarke

the MUSIC INTERVIEW:

Eagulls

Alex Daniel talks with Rock five-piece Eagulls about battles with Music Press,

sexism and tattoos of Bill Murray.

Eagulls won an NME award for the music video to their song ‘Nerve Endings’, in which a pig’s brain slowly rots and is eaten by maggots. By the end, there is nothing left.

This says a fair bit about the NME for giving the award, but surely it says even more about Eagulls, the guys who made it. When asked about this, alongside the generally positive receipt of their eponymous debut album, singer George Mitchell mumbles “it’s nice to be accepted”. This implied anxiety appears to be at the very heart of Eagulls’ ethos, certainly within their music. George continues, “‘Nerve Endings’ is very much intertwined with the feeling of discomfort that I don’t know what’s around the corner.

Anxiety, yeah.”

Despite this, Eagulls are not an angst-y band. Their music is visceral and harsh- less pop, more Iggy Pop, whatever critics tell you about it being melodic. I broached the punk genre issue to George. “I guess it’s pretty punkish. I wouldn’t say we set out for any style in particular, it’s just what happens, it’s just the music, you know? I wouldn’t want to slap a label on us as a band and say ‘that’s the sort of music we make, and what we’re going to make’, but once it’s out there… Yeah, I guess it’s fair to say punk.”

“We’re not affected by what people think, I’d say I’m pretty impervious. It certainly doesn’t affect our musical style – if critics call us punk, that’s fine, but it doesn’t mean we’re going to start playing up to it.” It seems that Eagulls need little invitation to follow the genre anyway, however. Many of their songs, though hardly anti-establishment, take pot shots at areas of society. “In this day and age [by far George’s favourite phrase, I come to learn] there are so many things that are going on that just don’t seem right. Hollow Visions [from the album] is one about crushed dreams, dead end jobs, all that shit I suppose… And yeah, “Yellow Eyes” is about religion. It’s pointed towards the believers of this great architect and questions them why?

Some people are more bothered about bands because they’re girls - girls with guitars and all that - it’s all got so condescending’.

Why the world’s creator would let us suffer the way we do baffles me. I mean, in THIS day and age… really?! I’ll never find faith myself.”

I tell George this is good to know. He agrees.

It appears Eagulls, despite enjoying their “new found” feeling of acceptance with the music press (who have, in fact, always quite liked them anyway), aren’t afraid of saying a thing or two about what they think. They’re pretty opinionated actually. Last year, they took part in South by South West, about which they posted a picture of a hand written a letter to their blog. The letter attacked all manner of things, including ‘beach bands’: “without your 90’s hairstyles over your ugly faces you have nothing.” Another part addressed bands that incorporate Afro-beat in their music, and another even appeared to have a go at bands with females in, and where they stand in the industry.

The letter is no longer online- it’s been

replaced by a picture of a penis below a hairy arse with eyes drawn on, if anyone’s interested. However the ‘females’ attracted particular media attention. Unsurprising ‘in this day and age’, I venture. All of a sudden the Northern drawl gets angry and animated. “You’ve read that completely wrong there. We’re not sexist. Everyone thinks we’re sexist now, but we’re not. We were touring at the time with some really annoying people, and it was basically about the way the industry, the media, everything, perceives this stuff. Some people are more bothered about bands because they’re girls – girls with guitars and all that – it’s all just so condescending. A lot of people have given this note a lot of thought though. Far more than I did. Maybe it’s a North South thing, but some people just don’t get our dark humour.” Sorry George.

Trying to diffuse the situation somewhat, I ask about the band’s background, whether their Leeds roots have affected their music – they have a song called ‘Council Flat Blues’, after all. “Yeah, I think so. I mean, being brought up by your single mum in Leeds sort of affects your outlook. We’re all from there, so we can all relate. I think that solidarity has had more of an effect than the circumstance itself though.”

Finally, I bring up their recent performance on Letterman, where they played for guest star Bill Murray. “Yeah, that was good. Our bassist actually got a tattoo saying ‘Bill Murray’, he got a picture with him after and all.” What with all these breakthroughs, could 2014 be their year? “I don’t really want to make predictions, you never know.

It’s hard to say. We’ve had some good stuff recently though so it’s looking up I guess, yeah.” Regardless of the letter, it certainly seems that on the back of their album and THAT pig’s brain video, Eagulls are going places at the moment.

Alex Daniel

Top 5: by Jack Bittiner

TOP 5

SONGS:

for the Stages of Grief (University Work Edition)

1. Sugarbabes - Denial

2. Limp Bizkit – Break Stuff

3. The Who – Bargain

4. Adele - Someone Like You

5. The Beatles - Here Comes The Sun

Step-1. Denial. Bury your head in the sand. You’ve got loads of time to do all your work. Sugarbabes will make it all go away.

Step-2. Anger. You just discovered you have another assignment due in for next week. It’s time to take it out on your friends and personal belongings.

Step-3. Bargaining. You need more time! You promise yourself you won’t go out for the next month. You just need to get an extension first.

Step-4. Depression. What’s the point? You’ve left it too late. It’s time to settle for a third class degree and listen to Adele and cry.

Step-5. Acceptance. You got through it. Sure, you didn’t do well but now you’re free.

Go drown your sorrows with a nice cold beer.

ISSUE 19/ 16th MARCH 2015 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

: @MancunionMusic : / TheMancunionMusicSection

The Mancunion Festival Guide WIRELESS 3rd - 5th July Wireless is hosted in Finsbury Park again this year after its brief stint at the Olympic Park in 2013. 2015 sees the festival celebrate its 10th anniversary and once again does not disappoint in bringing the biggest names in urban and dance music to London this summer. Headline acts include Drake, Kendrick Lamar, Nicki Minaj, David Guetta and

SECRET GARDEN PARTY 23rd - 26th July

From the 23rd to the 26th July, acres of Cambridgeshire will be home once again to Secret Garden Party. This eclectic festivals boasts creativity like no other as a mix of people create shows, stalls, floats, art and more, in a beautiful setting of landscaped garden, river and lake. This year’s theme of Childish Things will encompass the

FARR FESTIVAL 16th - 18th July

Farr Festival returns for its 6th incarnation. As ever, boasting an all star line up of well established producers and DJs, alongside up and coming artists such as sampling genius Romare, who is just starting to be recognised for his copious talents.

Resisting the temptation to bump capacity, Farr remains one of the most exciting and intimate small

Avicii across the 3 days. After Drake previously pulled out due to illness, the anticipation of his performance this year is doubly exciting. Other acts performing across the weekend include Mary J Blige, Major Lazer, Joey Bada$$, Duke Dumont and Stormzy. Dinesh Mattu fields with a whole toy box of wonders and suprises.

What’s more, the fantasy land of a festival raises the bar with a line-up including Kate Tempest, Marika Hackman and Jungle. So get ready for jelly and ice cream and the annual Sunday paintfight!

Marina Garvey Birch festivals around.

Lacking the pretentious vibe of many boutique festivals, it instead focuses on booking an eclectic variety of quality-over-quantity artists. With a lineup featuring house favourites Roman Flugel and Prosumer, alongside disco pioneer Hunee, Farr packs a punch, especially considering its initial bargain basement £30 ticket prices.. Fraser Brooks

READING / LEEDS

in Thailand, this should be one to watch. Festival favourites Jamie T, Royal Blood and the Maccabees also play over the weekend, with a surprising amount of dance acts such as Hannah Wants, My Nu Leng and Jamie XX also featuring in the line up.

Matthew Staite

LATITUDE

all-round national treasure Noel Gallagher. Away from the music, the festival will also feature a wide range of theatre, art and cabaret for your viewing pleasure; the 10th Anniversary of Latitude is not to be missed! Dan Whiteley

6th - 9th August

GOTTWOOD 11th - 14th June

Don’t be fooled that a trek to Croatia is required to find a beautiful festival: only a considerably shorter trip across the border is needed. Nestled into the stunning surroundings of leafy North Wales and boasting a beach to rival the Adriatic coast is Gottwood. With support from a number of the UK’s best promoters – including Manchester’s own Dog

artistic. Workshops throughout the weekend include deer butchery and woodland foraging, with the promise of wild medicine walks and dips in the spring-fed lake. What’s more, queen of alternative living Björk will be trumping the musical line-up.

Cordelia Milward Eat Dog and Hit&Run they’ve put together a stellar line up featuring Ben UFO, Move D, Zip and many more. In their own words: “striking a delicate balance between rising stars and established veterans drawn from all corners of the scene”. Final release tickets are on sale now priced at £125 for the weekend. Patrick Hinton

BEACONS

13 th - 16th August A youthful festival in terms of age, Beacons is growing up fast, and already waving goodbye to its country home in the Yorkshire Dales to take up residence in three of the most exciting cities in the North. The move has apparently been motivated by the growing expense of traditional camping festivals, but for those fearing the loss of some of that ‘festival feel’, the new form of Beacons, Beacons Metro, promises

to deliver the same level of commitment to supplying the excellent Film, Music, Art and Food that they are well known for. The partners for 2015 include huge names such as Crack Magazine and Resident Advisor, as well as Vice Films and 2020Vision; all of this makes for an encouraging view of what they have to offer in 2015, something that I personally am very excited to see. Bradley West

END OF THE ROAD 4th - 6th September

Nestled in the tranquil grounds of North Dorset, End Of The Road Festival welcomes you with open arms into a haven of love and creativity. You’d be hard pressed to imagine a more fitting location for modern folk legend Sufjan Stevens’ first ever UK festival performance. Elsewhere on this year’s line-up, My Morning Jacket and Tame Impala bring the psych, Sleaford Mods and Ex Hex bring the punk, and Future Islands bring the righteous dance

SHAMBALA

The return of Shambala to an obscure location in Northamptonshire promises to unite the festival’s own guiding principles of creativity and openness with a unique and diverse range of artists spread across the four days. The late August bash boasts appearances from a kaleidoscope of musical talent, from Andy C to My NU Leng and Kate Tempest to

moves. But there’s also late-night cinema, live comedy, gourmet food washed down with Dorset’s finest ciders, and the occasional free-roaming peacock. Cramming all of that into one weekend will be harder than cramming your tent back into its bag when Monday morning comes around. Henry Scanlan Public Service Broadcasting.

Alongside the array of aural delights Shambala will seek to integrate its audience closely with interactive workshops and small art exhibitions, all of which will highlight their “people come first,” tenet. The all ages festival holds bucketloads of charm and intrigue. George Scrafton

DIMENSIONS

If the location – an abandoned fort on the coast of Croatia – wasn’t already enough to get your festival glands watering (or, more accurately, sweating) then the line-up for Dimensions festival will leave you a mushy mess of musical hype. From the opening live show with Four Tet, Little Dragon and Floating Points - who will be accompanied by a small

orchestra of classical musicians – to the stellar lineup which includes Moodyman, Mount Kimbie, Ben Ufo, Pearson Sound, Daniel Avery and many, many more… This is set to be the supersized whopper of festivals abroad this summer.

Lowell Clarke

SONAR

Born in Barcelona in the 90s, Sonar brings the city to life with a string of parties and has grown exponentially into Europe’s premiere electronic music festival.The deliberate mix of underground and mainstream makes Sonar special; exemplified by the Sonar by Day/Night setup. Sonar by Day showcases homegrown talent and keeps the underground roots of the festival alive ,while Sonar by

Night is a concert arena fit for impressive headliners.Highlights are the exceptional Mr Daniel Avery, The Chemical Brothers, Flying Lotus and Kindness.

Sonar is the unmissable start to festival season.

Rachel Connolly

GARDEN

1st - 8th July The festival that started it all. Croatia’s seminal and renowned The Garden Festival celebrates its tenth and final year from 1st – 8th July. Held in the earthly paradise of Tisno, you can bathe on the luxurious beaches by day and dance to some of the world’s finest electronic acts at night. The festival has gone all out for its last hurrah; DJ Harvey, Session Victim

and Jackmaster are amongst the names helping them say goodbye in style. Tickets for the week long party are on sale now for just £120.

6th - 7th June

17th - 19th July Bonobo, Nils Frahm, Clark and Zenker Brothers.

There is an alluring lake to be taken advantage of to cool off after some heavy duty dancing. Expect to be spoiled with the ominously beautiful setting, pyrotechnics and astonishing quality and quantity of music. Alyssa Vongapai

Field day returns to east London’s Victoria park on the weekend of the 6-7th June for its 9th iteration.

The line up spans an extensive range of genres; with legendary artist Patti Smith one of the main draws as well as headliners Ride, and Caribou. A slew of well-known acts including Mac DeMarco, Diiv, Django Django, FKA Twigs, and Gaz Coombes

are just a drop in the ocean of what’s on offer; with over 50 other artists featuring alongside DJs to round off the current, partial, line-up. Weekend tickets are priced at £83, making Field Day well worth your attention. Robin Davies

Y NOT

BESTIVAL

31st July - 2nd August

10th - 13th September It’s easy to shrug off Bestival’s name as marketing nonsense, but on the English festival circuit there’s definitely more than a shred of truth to it. Maybe it’s because its location is on the most tropical of British Isles, the Isle of Wight. It really is the only festival where people seem to care less about how many crates of beer they can carry back into the

http://www.parklife.uk.com/images/2015_logo.png display across the weekend. Tickets are on sale now priced at £89.50 for the weekend and £54.50 for the day. For further details see: www.parklife.uk.com Patrick Hinton

FIELD DAY

MELT!

Melt is an open-air cheerful and hip playground, with all the benefits of a huge festival. It takes place in quirky Ferropolis, an open museum of old huge industrial machines. It is very generous with its refreshing line up, with a spectrum of anticipated acts, ranging from global mainstream acts to underground. They will spoil you Kylie Minougue,

The Number One event in the summer calendar of Manchester students returns to Heaton Park on June 6th & 7th with a line up that asserts just why it’s the worthy holder of that title. The star studded DJ cast includes the likes of Dixon and MK, whilst there’s live performances come from acts such as Disclosure, Caribou and Nas – and that’s barely scratching the surface of the wealth of incredible music on

18th - 20th June

WILDERNESS As the two well-established festival teams Lovebox and Secret Garden Party fused creative ideas, an illegitimate lovechild was born, and Wilderness first came to life. Now in its fifth year, Wilderness praises itself for a harmonious combination of creativity, gastronomy and revelry. Located in the beautiful Cornbury Park in Oxfordshire, Wilderness invites the outdoors back into the arms of the

6th - 7th June

26th - 30st August

16th - 19th July Taking place just off the Suffolk coastline, Latitude has, in the decade since its inception, grown from being a small-time affair to become one of the highlights of the UK’s festival calendar. This year’s lineup is perhaps its most impressive yet, boasting appearances from artists as diverse as Jon Hopkins, Seasick Steve and Femi Kuti, as well as a closing mainstage set from Britpop legend and

13

Parklife

27th - 30th August

28th - 30th August

Love it or hate it, Reading and Leeds are two giants in the UK’s festival calendar (and are seemingly everyone’s first ever festival experience). This years headliners come in the form of previous Glasto headliners Mumford & Sons, and Metallica.

The Libertines, champions of Reading and Leeds past, also return to headline the event. With their return to form and a new album being recorded

Music

campsite more and more about how many quality acts they can see. With a line-up including The Chemical Brothers, Duran Duran, Tame Impala, Flying Lotus and Jamie XX, there’ll barely be a moments rest. Lowell Clarke

Y Not Festival is known for its smaller scale and more intimate nature than many of the other British summer festivals, without skimping on the quality of the acts on offer. The 2015 edition is set to be no different, with headline appearances from genre-defying indie rockers Primal Scream, electronic music stalwarts Basement Jaxx and hip hop

royalty Snoop Dogg already confirmed. Rae Morris, We Are the Ocean and Pulled Apart by Horses are also on this year’s bill, and with much more to be confirmed across ten stages, this summer is the perfect chance to check out one of the festival season’s hidden gems. Dan Whiteley

14

Music

ISSUE 20/ 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Mancunion Recommends

Now: Shakira- Shakira RCA Records Release Date - 25th March 2014

It’s easy to be cynical about Shakira.

She does, after all, have a chequered past of selfgratuitous arse-wiggling and dodgy euro-pop.

However, like all pop icons of the 21st Century, her success speaks for itself (her ‘hits don’t lie’…?!).

This record will surely be no different.

Firstly, it is encouraging to see that Shakira doesn’t leave the singer’s musical roots behind – the first thing to be heard on the album is a couple of blokes shouting “Hola! Hola”. Good stuff. It then launches into the Eurovision-worthy introduction to ‘Dare (La La La)’, which then swiftly evolves with some Lady Gaga-esque dancefloor synths emerging.

This juxtaposition in style is what sells records for Shakira (aside from her scantily clad album covers). It doesn’t exactly live up to the billing of the album as a more ‘mature and mellow’ Shakira, but makes a strong start here nonetheless.

Unfortunately, next up ‘Can’t Remember To Forget

Book now: 0161 832 1111

You’, the collaboration with Rihanna, lives up to its title. Definitely one to forget. It quickly becomes a bit too ‘Avril Lavigne’ and the supposedly clever wordplay of the title is just a bit unimaginative.

However, all is forgiven when the super-catchy chorus of the next, ‘Empire’, kicks in. It’s not “intimate but massive” as Shakira claims, but it’s memorable enough.

Further highlights include the reggae feel of ‘Cut Me Deep’, which is a good listen. The rest isn’t overwhelmingly good, but Shakira manages to largely avoid the sort of offensive bilge which so much of the big industry seems to think is acceptable for an album track. ‘Spotlight’ even throws up encouraging hints of The Cure in overall sound, before sadly going a bit Disney. The tracks in Spanish are fun too, and this throwback to Shakira’s pre-English-speaking-market days is a nice inclusion.

The one real bone to pick is that the supposedly ‘mellow’ numbers - the emotional ones - put the listener too much in mind of Leona Lewis for comfort, and none really catch the attention.

However, Shakira still does a fair bit of what the singer does best; infectious, Latin-American tinged dance numbers, which are more than suitable for the US mainstream. There is no ‘Hips Don’t Lie’ moment, but this is by no means a slump in standards for the Columbian hit-maker, and this will surely be reflected in record sales. .

For full listings visit:

6/10

Alex Daniel

manchesteracademy.net APRIL The Robert Glasper Experiment Wednesday 2nd Emblem3 Thursday 3rd Therapy? Troublegum 20th Anniversary Thursday 3rd Mentallica vs Megadeth UK Saturday 5th

CULMINATION – Marcel Woods/TV Noise/Harry Shotta Live/Sandy B Live/Paul Taylor/Original Sin/Whelan & Di Scala Sunday 25th The War On Drugs Wednesday 28th The Three Johns Wednesday 28th AWOLNATION Thursday 29th FutureProof Thursday 29th

Bipolar Sunshine Saturday 5th

Francis Dunnery Band Friday 30th

Deaf Havana Saturday 5th

The Enemy Saturday 31st

State Of Quo Saturday 5th

JUNE

Riverside Sunday 6th

Schoolboy Q Sunday 1st

Devildriver Wednesday 9th

The Polyphonic Spree Saturday 7th

The Wildhearts Thursday 10th

Pond Monday 9th

Hue & Cry Thursday 10th

George Ezra Thursday 12th

UB40 Saturday 12th

Andy Jordan Wednesday 18th

Penetration Saturday 12th ConnectedTour:JustinLo+TerenceSiufay Sunday 13th Gallon Drunk Tuesday 15th Augustines Wednesday 16th The Summer Set Thursday 17th Berlin Berlin Saturday 19th Kvelertak Monday 21st Brody Dalle Tuesday 22nd

Jurassic 5 Thursday 19th

Uncle Acid &The Deadbeats Thursday 24th

Gareth Gates Tuesday 24th

REST OF 2014 Extreme – Pornograffitti Live Tour Friday 4th July Ska Face Saturday 5th July In Hindsight Wednesday 9th July Converge Monday 4th August Anberlin Thursday 7th August The Magic Numbers Friday 12th September

Then: The Verve - Urban Hymns

Clutch Thursday 24th

Hut Records - September, 1997

Jace Everett with band Friday 25th

Axis Of Awesome Monday 22nd September

The Smiths Ltd Saturday 26th

Vance Joy Thursday 25th September

John Butler Trio Sunday 27th

The Fray Friday 26th September

Blood Red Shoes Monday 28th

Evile (Album Launch Show) Saturday 27th September

For every decade, it can be argued there are handful of records that have the ability to serve as a soundtrack of sorts; a set of songs that perfectly encompass a certain time and place. The Verve’s Urban Hymns is, undeniably, one such album.

Released in 1997 at the tail end of the Britpop era, the album marked The Verve’s transformation from psychedelic cult favourites to writers of huge, string-laden everyman anthems in the vein fellow Northern songsmiths Oasis. But whilst Oasis’s Be Here Now – by which this album was preceded by a month - was a bloated, overindulgent trainwreck of an album, Urban Hymns manages to tread the line between murky, rambling jams and pop sensibility perfectly, and by doing so still manages to sound fresh and exciting today.

Opening the album is the sweeping, majestic ‘Bittersweet Symphony’ – which has since achieved ubiquity thanks to football highlight reels the world over – in which frontman Richard Ashcroft ponders the bleakness of the human condition (“try to make ends meet/you’re a slave to money/then you die”) over thundering drums and an army of violins. In fact, one the album’s main strengths is Ashcroft’s ability to dissect huge themes over the span of a relatively brief pop song, most notably mortality, as in the mega-single ‘The Drugs Don’t Work’ and the eerily hazy ‘Weeping Willow’.

‘Lucky Man’ – one of the album’s few lighter tracks – is a rousing ode to self-acceptance and the most unabashedly Britpop moment here, with Ashcroft crooning “how many times do I have to learn/all the love I have is in my mind” over swirling guitar textures provided by the inimitable Nick McCabe who turns out, on more than one occasion, to be the

band’s secret weapon. Meanwhile, the criminally underrated ‘Velvet Morning’ starts out as a sleepy acoustic ballad, but builds into what may be the band’s biggest ever chorus, with Ashcroft reflecting on the depression that plagued much of his early life; “my feelings, they’ve been betrayed/I was born a little damaged/look what they made.” The whole thing would sound overblown and ridiculous if it weren’t for the conviction in the delivery – these are, after all, the words of the same man who once declared, without any trace of irony, that he could fly.

The only real disappointing thing about Urban Hymns is how the band decided to call it quits a mere eighteen months after its completion, and as such never had a legitimate chance to try and top it whilst still in their prime. As such, Urban Hymns stands as the high-water mark of both The Verve’s career, as well as a landmark in British guitar music as a whole.

Dan Whiteley

Patent Pending & People On Vacation Friday 25th

MAY

Azealia Banks Thursday 18th September Sleaford Mods Friday 19th September

De La Soul Friday 2nd Northside Saturday 3rd Neon Trees Monday 5th Janelle Monae Wednesday 7th

Miles & Erica Saturday 11th October

Martin Stephenson & The Daintees Thursday 8th Jagwar Ma Saturday 10th The Clone Roses Saturday 10th Action Bronson Monday 12th Courtney Love Tuesday 13th Michael Franti & Spearhead Tuesday 13th Lit Wednesday 14th CASH – The No.1 Johnny Cash Tribute Saturday 17th

Katy B Saturday 25th October

Capone-N-Noreaga&Onyx Saturday17th Fishbone Wednesday 21st Goldfinger/Zebrahead Thursday 22nd Swans Thursday 22nd The Hoosiers Thursday 22nd Ned’s Atomic Dustbin + The Wedding Present + CUD + The Sultans Of Ping + The Frank & Walters + Chameleons Vox

GIGANTIC – Classic Indie All Dayer Bank Holiday Saturday 24th

Anti-Nowhere League Thursday 16th October The Orb Saturday 18th October Asking Alexandria Friday 31st October Big Country Friday 31st October Y & T Tuesday 4th November Cockney Rejects Thursday 6th November Lindsey Stirling Friday 7th November Absolute Bowie Saturday 15th November Dan Baird & Homemade Sin Friday 21st November New Found Glory Friday 21st November Limehouse Lizzy Saturday 22nd November Tonight Alive Saturday 29th November Mostly Autumn Friday 5th December At The Gates Friday 5th December UK Foo Fighters Saturday 13th December

Games

ISSUE 20/ 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

15

Editor: Alasdair Preston Review

Review Respawn Entertainment • EA Games • RRP: £44.99 • Available on Xbox One, Xbox 360 & PC

Retro Corner

Titanfall

Is this the best shooter ever made? Alasdair Preston investigates

The first time I saw footage of Titanfall, back during E3 2013, was when I decided to buy an Xbox One. Before then, the console had been nothing but a pipe dream to me, an “I’ll get it eventually” purchase. So, as you might imagine, I had a lot to look forward to on March 14th. But, after the months of hype, would any finished product actually be able to justify my £400 spend?

Choosing my words very carefully and deliberately, I will say that Titanfall is, without doubt, the best shooter I’ve ever played. It demolishes competition from former favourites Modern Warfare 2, Gears of War, Halo Reach and even TimeSplitters.

Being even more careful, I say that Titanfall could be the best game I’ve ever played. I keep waiting for that notion to dissipate in my mind but, with every match I play, every Titan I destroy and every shot I fire, it becomes more and more solid.

For the uninitiated, Titanfall is Respawn Entertainment’s debut game that hopes to make waves in the multiplayer shooter genre by bringing in fresh ideas and executing them with precision and skill. The key mechanic at the heart of the game is the Titan, a massive machine of destruction that plummets from the heavens above at your call to aid the fighting. These beasts replace the idea of a “killstreak reward” that we might expect in Call of Duty. Instead of being dependent on your ability to rack up long killstreaks, or even point streaks, your Titan becomes available based on a timer.

Every kill you make and point you score just knocks precious seconds off. Once you’re inside, the timer counts down to charging your “core ability”, a chassis-specific option that provides a temporary boost in some way.

Classic modes Capture the Flag, Pilot Hunter (team deathmatch) and Hardpoint Domination are all present and enjoyable, although the Pilot Hunter mode seems somewhat redundant in the Titanfall setting.

Unique to this title are Attrition and Last Titan Standing. The latter is exactly as it

sounds, multiple rounds in which you spawn in a Titan and must destroy those of the enemy team. It plays out much like Gears of War’s Warzone and Execution modes, making you think carefully about each move and co-operate with whoever’s on your team to win. Attrition is a form of team deathmatch, but is substantially more fun than any team deathmatch could be. Instead of a kill total to aim for, there is a points score.

Players can earn points by killing opposition players, or alternatively by destroying Titans and fighting any of the enemy grunts that populate every map. Even if you’re not the best competitive shooter you can still run riot, killing everything in sight and benefit the team in the most enjoyable way possible.

The background grunts that flesh out the six-on-six matches do more than just provide fodder for you to crush beneath your enormous Titan boot. They actually make each map feel like a warzone. Your success affects them, as they look to the almost superhuman pilots to win this war for them. Occasionally, they even steal the show with amusing dialogue that you may not even notice unless you’re trying to hear it. It’s little details like this that show a level of polish in Titanfall that we’re really not used to anymore from our AAA titles.

There are many areas of Titanfall where you can observe lessons learned from West and Zampella’s former franchise, Call of Duty.

Parts of the series that perhaps hit a sour note are notably absent here, despite them become almost standard in most multiplayer shooters. A key example is the big cinematic campaign. Titanfall simply doesn’t have one.

The story is told by a series of multiplayer matches cut together with dialogue and scripted events that you’ll eventually see both sides of. It’s a unique concept, although getting all the details of the plot could take a few play-throughs. What’s hard to determine is how long this playlist will remain well populated, as players will surely opt for the far more open classic matches once the campaign is done and dusted.

Titanfall also does away with the messy complicated classes that Call of Duty has developed. There is a comparatively short list of available weapons, equipment and perks for your pilot and Titan loadouts that then avoids all the fiddly tweaking and unfair balancing issues that plague modern CoD games. For once, learning the minute differences between all the available assault rifles won’t determine who wins. It is immediately more accessible to almost all levels of gamer. Much to Respawn’s credit, Titanfall doesn’t skimp on available maps.

The game comes with 15 different arenas that each have their own character, and that’s all without word on any potential future DLC. It puts games such as Gears of War: Judgement to shame with it’s paltry four multiplayer maps at launch.

One of the key catchphrases we kept hearing during development was regarding the “asymmetric gameplay”. With pilots and Titans looking to compete in the same arena, it was always going to be difficult to achieve a balance. However, despite their aggressive force, an organised team of pilots can fell a Titan without much bother. The exciting anti-Titan weapons coupled with Mirror’s Edge-style parkour and rooftop-running give pilots a fighting chance.

I’m always reluctant to confirm if something is “the best ever”. It’s a powerful statement that you can’t take back, and it just feels too soon to say that Titanfall is the best game I’ve ever played. But it probably is.

Image: ToTheGame

Tom Bruce keeps the metal alive with Tim Schafer’s Brütal Legend Brütal Legend sees you take control of the almighty Eddie Riggs, a valiant and absurdly muscular roadie voiced by Jack Black. Cut down in the prime of his speaker-stacking career, Riggs re-awakens in the realm of Ormagöden , an obsidian netherworld carved from the essence of Heavy Metal. He strikes a chord with the subjugated locals, who champion him as the leader of their uprising. Riggs is then tasked with taming (read: melting the faces of ) the demonic beings of Ormagöden with the steely-sweet power-licks of his godly guitar. ‘It’s not just gonna blow your mind… it’s gonna blow your soul.’

EA did a great job combining several genres into one with Brütal Legend, and it transitions smoothly from decapitation-happy button masher to stylised racing game (you can even ride laserpanthers!) to RTS. These strategy set-pieces are the only downside to the game; controlling your backstage battalion is fiddly as hell and winning takes no skill, just a great deal of waiting.

Onto the music. A vast catalogue of 100+ head bangers are available from the seat of your unstoppable Deuce-mobile, mixing metal mainstays Motley Crue and Motorhead with the dark and more obscure - of course, with Jack Black in the central role, there’s a nice bit of Tenacious D too. Ample time can be spent raising ‘hidden metal’ to bolster the setlist with additional tracks, and by completing the varied side missions you can fill up your Titan tribute lighter to purchase axe, car and guitar upgrades from the guardian of metal himself, Ozzy Osbourne.

Brütal Legend’s art design and landscapes are full on stunning, moshing together a Viking Valhalla with Hades’ underworld and the album covers of Metallica and Iron Maiden. As Riggs says, some would call it ‘hellish, but I think it’s pretty bad ass’. The lore of the land is impressive too, stringing you along one metal myth at a time and reinvigorating your epic quest.

Jack Black in Brütal Legend is an example of an actor that becomes the game; you can practically sense his every eyebrow raise. He even made a hilarious Image: ToTheGame mockumentary in the Spinal Tap vein in which he struts around L.A. wearing a remarkably convincing prosthetic musclesuit with forearms the size of fire hydrants. Brütal Legend is a solid 10-15 hours of atmospheric (if slightly repetitive) fun, and you will definitely want to turn the volume up higher than 11.

Feature

Assassin’s Creed in retrospective I’ve been following the Assassin’s Creed franchise since it first came out way back in 2007, and with the recent announcement of the next game in the franchise, Unity, I started thinking; where are they going with this?

The first game was a spiritual sequel to the Prince of Persia games, notably bringing the fluid free-running from these games into an open-world setting. Set in the Holy Lands during the Third Crusade, the game focused on the Assassin Altaïr Ibn-La’Ahad and his quest to redeem himself.

He shamed his order, and now must hunt down members of the Knights Templar, the sworn enemies of the Assassins. The over-arching story follows Desmond Miles, a descendent of a number of prominent Assassins who relives his ancestor’s memories using a machine called the Animus.

Eventually, Desmond goes on a quest to save the world, but that takes the better part of four games to become a

major factor. Ubisoft definitely know how to keep people invested in a franchise.

After Altaïr came Ezio Auditore, an Italian noble during the renaissance who seeks revenge upon the Templars after his family is executed.

Ezio’s adventures were chronicled over the course of three games; AC II, AC: Brotherhood and AC: Revelations.

Each game was similar in its mechanics with only small iterations between releases, though I think Ezio’s story particularly in AC II is probably the most enjoyable to date.

The biggest addition AC: Brotherhood offered was a multiplayer mode, which gives each player a target that they must assassinate as discreetly as possible for maximum points. This mode has remained more or less unchanged from its inception to now.

AC III saw the arrival of the Kenway family in the American Revolutionary war with Haytham, an English Assassin-turned-Templar. Later, focus

shifted to Connor (also known as Ratohnhakéton, which I still cannot pronounce correctly), Haytham’s son by a Mohawk woman. Not only did this game bring a new protagonist and setting, but also a streamlined free-running system and revamped combat mechanics, designed to improve the fluidity of movement and handle the increased use of pistols and muskets during the 18th century. The core game, however, remained unchanged with the same sort of stealth and combat we were used to, as well as a very heavily scripted first act which restricts the player’s freedom for a good portion of the game.

Then last year, Ubisoft released AC IV: Black Flag. Set during the Golden Age of Piracy in the Caribbean,

the game has yet another new protagonist; the welsh-born pirate Edward Kenway, father of Haytham and grandfather of Connor. To me, Black Flag represents a step in the right direction for the series, away from the tired, well-trodden aspects of previous titles. A large focus of the game, even from early on, is exploring the high seas aboard Edward’s ship, attacking and boarding other vessels and visiting tropical islands. It makes for a far more refreshing experience, though the usual land-based runny, jumpy, stabby action is still there when Edward visits port. The stealth element itself feels a lot more consistent here too, without many moments of thinking ‘how did he see me from there?!’.

Another point worth noting is that while this game is Image: ToTheGame an Assassin’s Creed game, Edward is not an Assassin for the majority of it. He’s a pirate, through and through. He acquires his robes by killing an Assassin and stealing them in order to cash in on a delivery. Pirate or what? It mostly

tells the story of a pirate struggling to survive through the crackdown on piracy, with the Assassin-Templar feud as a backdrop not until later in the game. This offers a nice change of pace from the usual Assassin-huntingTemplars plot in every other game.

Now along comes AC: Unity, which has supposedly been under development for three years already.

Details are still scarce, but I’m concerned about how they’ll keep the game fresh and not revert back to old habits. Since the setting is the French Revolution, it is likely Paris will be the game’s main setting. We’re back to running around a big city like the earlier games. It’ll take either a big shift in narrative or a big mechanics overhaul to keep the game feeling fresh. I have to wonder if they are willing to shake up the formula enough to keep the freshness that Black Flag delivered so well on, or if they’ll go back to the same old routine and stagnate for another game. Black Flag shows they’re capable of innovation in the right setting, I’m just not convinced that the French Revolution is going to be the place to maintain it. Now it’s up to Ubisoft to prove me wrong.

Nick Jastrzebski

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Editors: Gráinne Morrison, Aimée Grant Cumberbatch, Nikki Patel

ISSUE 19/ 16th MARCH 2015 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Trends

SS15: Trend report

/mancunionfashionandbeauty

ISSUE 19/ 16th MARCH 2015 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

@MancunionFash

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Readers respond

Event

Not sure what to wear as the weather starts to warm up? Sarah Kilcourse is here to help

Fashion

Charity pop-up shop for We Teenage Cancer Trust Ask Did someone say sale? By Gráinne Morrison

You Answer Spring is just around the corner so last week we asked you “Does the warm weather spell dream or disaster for your style?”

Photo: Mia Champion

H&M, £19,99

New Look, £14,99

Topshop, £40 Asos, £32

Zara, £35,99

The ‘70s Perhaps the biggest and newest trend for the current season, it involves an influx of flares, platforms and boho dresses. The ‘70s is perfect for summer with light flowy fabrics, halter necks and sheers - this is a trend you can easily dip your toe into if you’re a bit unsure. On the high street, Topshop and Zara have a great offering of smock tops, button up skirts and platform heels that are sure to bring out your inner hippie.

The Midi Skirt It’s been lingering around for a couple of seasons and now it’s time to embrace the more elegant midi skirt. Fitted tube midi skirts are perfect with a pair of heels or wedges; they flatter everyone and give you that Jessica Rabbit wiggle. Admittedly in the heat you may prefer something looser and more floaty. With this style, heels are your best friend - they will lenghten your legs to inifinity. Wear with a crop top or a tucked-in vest.

The Bucket Bag Every season there is a defining accessory and for SS15 it is the bucket bag. They look fabulous worn across the body or in the crook of your arm, either way they are an easy way to update your look with one simple piece. And, let’s face it: you can never have enough bags!

Pair with these cat-eye sunnies for extra style points!

White Over the past couple of seasons white has been getting some major press in the fashion world and the theme is set to continue. No, it’s not the easiest colour to wear for obvious practical reasons but it does look fantastic on everyone.

An easy way in is white jeans or white shorts, or for the more adventurous, head to toe white is essential, especially when paired with a beautiful summer glow.

So it’s week 8, our loans seem like a distant memory and our

the 16th of March. The shop will be stocked with heavily

bank accounts are looking… well, let’s not even go there. And

discounted clothes from labels such as Mink Pink, French

our wardrobes have never been so neglected. On top of this

Connection ,Vera Moda, Blue Rinse and Black Score. Yes you

we’re faced with 20 deadlines all at once meaning that even if

read that correctly: Heavily discounted— this is not a drill. And

we had the finances, we wouldn’t have the time to go all the way

best of all, all profits will go towards the Teenage Cancer Trust,

into town and traipse around the shops. I mean just popping

an incredible charity that provides care for cancer patients aged

into Zara takes up an hour of one’s day (well, if you’re doing it

between 13 and 24. We couldn’t love this event more. Come

properly).

along between 11am and 4pm to Room 2 of the SU and shop,

This is why Mancunion Fashion and Beauty are all over this

shop, shop!

pop-up charity shop event in the Students’ Union on Monday

Agony Aunt

Ask Adrienne

Resident fashion guru Adrienne Galloway solves a spring style conundrum

Dear Adrienne, It’s now March and I refuse to let my coveted winter wardrobe go. Do you have any tips for adjusting my garms during this winter to spring transition?

The weather around this time of year is particularly unpredictable. Leaving the house without an umbrella, or wearing a skirt in gusty winds can prove fatal. Here are my four tips to help with that winter/spring transition:

Profile

What goes up...

1

Check the weather forecast. Having to lug around a heavy coat when the sun suddenly comes out is a pain in the arse. It’s time to stop envying those who have managed to be so well prepared with sunglasses and a light cardigan…whilst you haven’t. The answer is right at your fingertips (literally!). Checking the weather forecast in the morning can help avoid serious fashion mishaps. Nobody wants to be that girl wearing dusty pink ballerina flats in heavy rain.

Although it might not always be accurate, it’s a good tool to gauge what exactly you can get away with.

Contributor Kathryn Murray investigates the rise, fall and rebirth of John Galliano

John Galliano, the famous Gibraltar-born British fashion designer is not exactly a refined character.

From an early age his mother, a flamenco teacher, dressed him in his ‘smartest’ outfits even for trips to the shop. Apparently, this experience combined with his creative flare was what made him the designer who some people love, and some people love to hate.

Over the course of his career, he has been at the helm of Givenchy, Christian Dior and his own label

Asos, £28

John Galliano. He has also been decorated with the title of Designer of the Year (four times!), CBE and

2

RDI (Royal Designer of Industry). Fancy.

Unfortunately for Johnny boy, it all went Pete Tong in 2011 when he was arrested over an anti-

Lighten up. Enough about practicalities, let’s talk fashion. It’s time to replace your beloved woolly sweatshirts for a lighter option. Their comfort and warmth has guided you through the frostiness of Oxford Road but it’s time to move on now. Try layering a cami top with an oversized cardigan or cotton shirt to feel more summery. This bohemian and carefree flair is what spring is all about.

Semitic tirade in a Paris bar. Not only did this set Galliano back €6,000 worth of fines, but he also lost his job at Dior and the respect of many. But that is what happens when you supposedly declare your love for murderous dictators.

But if you think this was the end of his career, you are sadly mistaken. In an interview broadcasted

Galliano’s first collection for Maison Martin Margiela.

His debut was welcomed with open arms by fashion giants, bloggers and close friends (apparently he is best buds with Anna Wintour). His Margiela show was praised as a ‘pure triumph’. It seems that

Yumi, £28

Galliano has been well and truly welcomed back to the cut-throat fashion industry. Quite the feat.

Photo: privateinvesigations.blogspot.com

Photo: clotheshorse-diaryofaclotheshorse.blogspot.com

‘I live for our yearly week of summer, it’s my only chance to show off my floaty dresses and crochet crop tops.’

-Nuala Timoney

‘I hate the catcalls inevitably provoked by my shorts, I haven’t got my legs out for your satisfaction.’

-Anjana Selvanathan

‘I hate summer. Sweat patches, chafing thighs and heat rash are not my accessories of choice.’

-Nadia G

Brighten up. Colour is a significant factor in the seasonal transition. The “rainbow effect” (going too bright too quickly) can sometimes shock the system, better to simply add in a pop of colour. Floral patterns are always a good call. Start by swapping your dark, bulky parka with a bright boyfriend or cocoon jacket.

Pastels also work especially well this time of year.

the beginning of his comeback and after four years of disgraced absence, January 2015 saw John

‘Sun’s out, guns out.’

-Ben Murphy

Topshop, £58

3

an invitation from Oscar de la Renta for a temporary residency at his studio. This opportunity was

‘It’s fine for a day drinking Pimms in the park but dressing for a lecture in 28 degree heat is not chic.’

-Gráinne Morrison

New Look, £7.99

in the US, Galliano talked about his readiness to create, stating “I hope through my atonement I’ll be given a second chance.” And a second chance is what he has got. In early 2013, Galliano accepted

‘The heat doesn’t bother me because it’s a perfect excuse to prance around in my birthday suit.’

-Phillip Shuttleworth

Zara, £35.99

Though this is our last print edition for the academic year, you can stay up to date with the latest in student style, fashion news and opinion at mancunion.com.

See you there!

ISSUE 20/ 31st March 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Editors: Sophie James, Robbie Davidson and Angus Harrison Top 5

TOP

5

Classic movies which wouldn’t be released today Nikolas Mcnally gives us his picks for the movies Hollywood wouldn’t touch today 5. Life of Brian (1979) Despite originally attracting ire from Christian groups, including mistaken blasphemy accusations, the majority of its humour is merely silly by modern standards. However, the Israeli suicide squad sequence would be near-impossible to translate comically in a post-911 world, where fundamentalism is surrounded by an increasingly grave hysteria.

4. Dr Strangelove (1964) Kubrick’s manic black comedy about the heightened U.S paranoia of nuclear war and communism was a bold release amidst the heat of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Time may have tamed some of the jokes, but in light of The War on Terror and currently frosty international relations, the premise itself seems too distressing for today’s Hollywood to replicate.

Feature

the

FEATURE: Keeping the Faith

Film Editor Sophie James explores the mixed relationship between the Bible and film 2014 sees the release of not one but two biblical blockbusters. Darren Aronofsky’s Noah opened in cinemas last Friday, with Russell Crowe as the most famous boat builder of all time, and later this year, Christian (no pun intended) Bale is set to star as Moses in Ridley Scott’s Exodus.

Hyped up to the eyeballs it may be, but Noah has most recently been hitting headlines due to its controversial subject matter. Indeed, it’s been banned in several countries for its warts n’ all representation of the biblical events, marking something of a departure from the classic “two by two” Sunday school version.

This of course is not the first (or last) time film has “done” the Bible. What’s more, when it does, controversy is always the sub-text – the Bible is a touchy subject, and invariably films which trespass onto biblical territory get mixed and uneasy reactions. Films like Scorcese’s The Last Temptation of Christ and Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ or even Ron Howard’s The Da Vinci Code have all suffered from controversial backlash prior to their release. However, these films have also all then gone onto achieve great critical success, with all three films receiving Oscar and/or Golden Globe nominations. Given such controversy, however, the question arises – is there room for faith in film?

Film is a powerful medium, accessible and engaging, and for this

reason tailor-made for challenging audiences. But there is no reason why taking inspiration from the bible has to be controversial. That book is jampacked with ripping yarns and film has done a lot worse in the past and present than retelling a bible tale! A

stories, allowing us to re-engage with them in new and dynamic ways.

Cinema has a history of controversy, that’s what makes it so exciting. But what is just as exciting to witness is its power to move audiences and test the boundaries of what cinema can

filmmaker’s particular interpretation of a bible story need not engage with the whole “faith” thing, it can be taken simply as an artistic engagement with or interpretation of a good story.

Adaptation has a major role to play in cinema – fiction and non-fiction, old and new, religious or secular – and this is because film is the perfect medium to revive and enhance well-loved

do. There is room for faith in film, not as the butt of a lazy joke or a target for skepticism, but as the basis for audiences to reengage or encounter for the first time stories that may have had massive global impact throughout history. Ben Hur was perhaps the paradigm example, with its epic portrayal of one man’s life interwoven with that of Christ without the latter

ever being a direct part of the story.

In a completely different way, Franco Zeffirelli’s Jesus of Nazareth with Robert Powell engaged completely and directly with its subject without preaching at any level.

What these biblical remakes do teach us is that film is now the major artistic and cultural medium of our generation. It alone perhaps has the power to bring these monumental stories to the attention of an entire world. It puts a lot of responsibility onto a filmmaker’s shoulders. Film is of course entertainment, but nowadays it is much, much more too - a key cultural and academic activity, with the power and authority to educate and engage audiences across the globe. Noah was always pretty impressive, but now he’s going global everyone!

Whatever your religious views, go see these biblical blockbusters with an open mind. Take them at face value.

Enjoy them simply as stories so good they have lasted thousands of years.

If something deeper comes through, if the director manages to challenge or inspire you, then all the better. That should be enough to restore your faith in film. But at least, if nothing else, it’ll be worth the crack to go and see Russell Crowe attempt to manoeuver an army of CGI’d animals!

Sophie James Film Editor

Preview

3. Airplane! (1980) This joke-a-minute screwball comedy about a doomed flight finds time to poke fun at every potentially sensitive topic in under 90mins.

Though more often ridiculous than macabre, it’s hard to imagine a current mainstream equivalent able to play sore spots like post-war PTSD, terminally ill children and archaic ‘Jive speak’ for laughs.

2. Heathers (1989) With a scathingly sarcastic script, Heathers features Winona Ryder and Christian Slater as high-schoolers killing off the popular kids and framing the deaths as suicide, sparking a sensationalized wave of teen suicides. Despite the perception around its release that Heathers was as surreal as it is satirical, post-Columbine and Virginia Tech viewings give its premise a context too harrowing for today’s studios to produce.

1. Blazing Sadles (1974) After a power-hungry State Attorney appoints a new black sheriff to bait him to his death, what ensues is the savaging of every PC social value upheld today. This blood-thirsty Western spoof leaves no minority (or majority) group left unmutilated, to the guaranteed horror of film execs and Tumblr’s keyboard social justice warriors alike were it released now.

the

FEATURE: Summer 2014

The cinematic year can almost be neatly divided in two: one part of the year is populated by serious, though-provoking, issue-driven films, and the other is succession of broadly commercial, shamelessly bombastic, highly entertaining blockbusters. Now spring has sprung ,we are crossing that sacred barrier into the blockbuster season. Having sat though the harrowing 12 Years a Slave, you can reward yourself with a little harmless fun in the months ahead.

There was a time when a comic book movies were rarity not a constant. But now that Marvel Studios have established their ‘Cinematic Universe’, nerds everywhere are assured at least two new installments from the interconnected world, and the casual viewer is introduced to another superhero they’ve likely never heard of, but are inexplicably excited to visit on the big screen anyway. Captain America: The Winter Solider (26th March) was first out of the gate, and has turned out to be a surprisingly smart addition to the Marvel canon.

Guardians of the Galaxy (1st August) is their other 2014 release, and if the trailer is anything to go by, should be a vital mix of comedy and space opera.

Elsewhere, two of the more established comic book franchises are proving just how long you can milk a dead-horse (if you’ll excuse the idiomatic infusion).

X Men: Days of Future Past (22nd May) looks suitably ambitious in its attempt to draw together the cast of X Men: First Class with the original X-Men into one coherent story line- with Wolverine naturally leading the charge.

The Amazing Spiderman 2 (18th April) is the sequel, as you might have guessed, to The Amazing Spiderman, a film so underwhelming they’ve packed the sequel with enough villains to render any sort of plot superfluous.

Comic books aside, there’s a healthy dose of remakes, reboots and sequels to prequels of reboots to suit your every whim. Godzilla (16th May) actually looks like a genuinely smart, gritty reinvention of the classic Japanese monster. And it’s got Bryan Cranston in it.

Dawn of the Plant of the Apes (17th July) is the

sequel to Rise of the Planet of the Apes, another smart reinvention of a classic sci-fi story, and looks to explore the humans’ continued resistance against primate tyranny. And it’s got Gary Oldman in it.

And then there’s Transformers: Age of Extinction (10th July), the reboot/sequel I’d like to say nobody ever asked for, but the last film made over a billion dollars at the box office, so that’s patently not true.

Fans and haters alike will likely flock to see what Michael Bay- public speaker extraordinaire- can blow up next.

Comedy offerings are similarly sequel-centric.

22 Jump Street (6th June) and The Inbetweeners Movie 2 (6th August) both look to capitalise on the popularity of their original films, with the requisite amount of cock jokes.

Seth McFarlane’s A Million Ways to Die in the West (30th May) fills the long-empty space for a Westerncomedy, with an all-star cast game for McFarlane’s unique sense of humour.

Animation offerings haven’t escaped the sequel scourge either, with How to Train Your Dragon 2 (4th July) filling the notable gap left by the absence of a Pixar release this summer.

Mr Blockbuster himself, Tom Cruise, has a new film, Edge of Tomorrow (30th May) a high-concept time travel/sci-fi actioner which will once again test if the actor can still draw a crowd for a non-franchise movie.

The monumental failure of the Diana biopic last year may have given distributors cause for concern for film about another famous blonde, who became royalty, was hounded by the press before dying in a tragic car accident. But Grace of Monaco (6th June) is finally arriving this summer and may prove to be a welcome antidote to the summer’s barrage of superhero sequels and monster reboots.

Robbie Davidson Film Editor

/filmmancunion @mancunionfilm

Review

the REVIEW:

Film

19

TV Catch Up

Labor Day

Riddled with sub-plots, mixed messages and sexist undertones, Leo Mates found Jason Reitman’s drama simply laborious You all know the story: Boy meets girl. Boy kidnaps girl and her deadbehind-the-eyes son. Boy feeds girl chilli. Romance ensues. Frank ( Josh Brolin) is an escaped prisoner, who ends up hiding out in lonely single mother, Adele’s (Kate Winslet), house. Originally he manages to get her to cooperate by threatening her son, but eventually they fall in love because she’s been longing for a man, and he’s actually one of those nice convicted murderers who knows how to make pie. I wish I could say that the film has a better reason for the two of them to end up doing the horizontal fandango, but honestly, Adele seems to be won over purely by the fact that Frank’s a damn fine chef. Although, this does lead to a moment of completely unintentional hilarity when Adele eats a scone that Frank has made and looks at him like he’s the second coming of Christ, which was the highlight of the film for me, so I can’t complain too much.

This painfully contrived love story, along with a myriad of subplots that are introduced and then never mentioned again means that watching Labor Day is only slightly more entertaining than actually going into labour.

The film doesn’t really seem to be able to decide what it wants to be about, flicking aimlessly between being a story of star-crossed lovers,

a pensive look at the mental effects of infertility, and a coming of age story about Adele’s son going through puberty.

Sometimes the various plots don’t even let the previous one finish before leaping straight into their own.

Halfway through an early scene where Frank is just beginning his courtship/home invasion, there was suddenly a flashback to Adele and her son having a conversation about sex that definitely veered into Oedipal territory. The film

Director: Jason Reitman Starring: Kate Winslet, Josh Brolin, Gattlin Griffith Released: 21st March

then cuts straight back to the ongoing hostage situation as if nothing has happened. The audience looks baffled, and I check my watch before sighing because there’s still an hour and a half left of this s**t.

What annoyed me most about this film though, is that it’s just plain sexist. Throughout we get these constant references to how Adele has been unable to do anything with her life now that she doesn’t have a man around the house,

seeing as her previous husband left her for his secretary. She is portrayed as an absolute mess, relying on her son to do things like getting money from the bank and buying groceries. Fortunately, all that changes when Frank comes along and fixes everything. It seems like at this point we’re meant to realise that Adele actually just needed a man to look after her all this time, because lord knows this woman can’t possibly look after a house, maintain a social life, raise her son properly or feel in any way satisfied with her life if she hasn’t got a man to do all of that for her.

Even her issues with her infertility are only eventually dealt with because Frank reveals to her that it doesn’t bother him, teaching us that important life lesson that you should only be ok with your body if the person you love has said that it’s ok to be.

In the end, this film just plays out as a long, boring advert for both the nuclear family and Stockholm syndrome. If those two things happen to be just exactly what you want in a movie, you’ll probably enjoy this. If not, I’d give it a miss and save yourself a laborious two hours.

Leo Mates

tv CATCH UP Winter is coming once again, my friends! No, you’re not on the wrong page of your calendar – I am, of course, referring to the imminent arrival of Season Four of Game of Thrones. Even after the mighty blood bath that was Season Three, this season is promising to be the bloodiest and most epic outing the show has seen yet. Fans of the books will be well aware of what is going to happen – and who is going to die – in the upcoming ten episodes. I do not intend to spoil the fun for those who still remain blissfully ignorant, though I’m sure they can guess that the scale is going to be apocalyptic. The trailers that have surfaced so far have raised expectations for the new season sky high – the consistency of the show’s quality so far makes me confident that these expectations will be met. No doubt we’ll be seeing another infamous Episode Nine too. The show will be broadcast on HBO starting on April 6th. Anyone with the luxury of Sky TV will be able to watch the episodes as they come. The rest of us will be picking them up on Sky Player.

A much-anticipated new show due to hit the small screen sometime this spring is Fargo. Adapted from the 1996 Coen Brothers’ movie of the same name, the show has all the makings of a black comedy gem. A few short clips have been released online, all of which have revealed little and yet spoken so much – you can find them on Youtube if you want to see exactly what I’m talking about. The show has no UK airdate yet, but it premiers on April 15th in the US, so we should expect it over here before spring is over. Channel 4 is due to be its UK home.

James Moules

Contrary Corner

Cornerhouse Pick of the Week

‘Yves Saint Laurent’ Miffed with Smith Andriana Hambi reviews Jalil Lespert’s biopic of the French Fashionista and finds it full of style but lacking substance

Like all good wünderkind, the story of Yves Saint Laurent is a tumultuous one. Adapted and directed

by César winning actor Jalil Lespert, Yves Saint Laurent has come under criticism for lacking depth, and although it is enjoyable and informative, I’m inclined to agree. The first half being set to the backdrop of the Algerian war of independence, melancholy tones run throughout the movie.

Narrated by YSL’s life-long companion Pierre Bergé, the story is told like a letter to the deceased Yves, and recounts the major and minor points in his life.

The transformation from the golden boy of 50’s haute couture to a coked up genius is quietly portrayed by young French actor Pierre Niney, who, throughout the movie, maintains a level of innocence and ‘I didn’t ask for this’ in his interpretation of the pioneering designer. Perhaps the fault of the script, but throughout the entire movie the question lingered in my mind, why was he so sad? Other than being drafted (and dodging) the war, he had no real reason to be in a constant state of self-pity. The issue of mental health and treatment of his manic depression is briefly addressed, but not

explored. Rather, we see a man spiral into a state of childlike dependency and Peter Pan syndrome. The idea of innocence in the character of Yves is one of the few constants in this movie, as we see a young nervous prodigy become one of the most renowned designers in the world, but always maintains a sense of anxiousness and isolation.

The most intriguing character is by far the companion and husband/father figure Pierre Bergé, played by Guillaume Gallienne, who narrates and oversees the story. His presence in the scenes often serves as a calming adversary to Niney’s jitteriness.

What was most interesting to me about this movie was that it wasn’t searching for a villain, like so many biopics do. We all know that real life doesn’t have ‘good’ and ‘bad’ people, but Hollywood hasn’t seemed to have received this memo. It would be very easy to carve out a villain shaped hole for Pierre Bergé, but it was made very clear throughout the movie that he was not the cause or catalyst to YSL’s problems. This film has all the trappings of a traditional love story: infidelity, throwing marble busts, one massive slap.

The title could easily be changed for a fictional name and you’ve got your basic tale of ‘stand by your man – even if he’s a coked-up psycho’ and herein lies the problem. Other than the fact that this film is the tale of Yves Saint Laurent, there is little else to set it apart from any other smoke filled, double bass picking French love story.

This film, 40 minutes shorter, would serve its purpose very well as a TV movie. If you want a chronology of Yves Saint Laurent’s early life, enjoy Woody Allen’s movie soundtracks and the Instagram filter ‘Sutro’ this is the movie for you. But other than that, this film has little else to offer.

Andriana Hambi

George Bellamy reflects on Will Smith’s career and grieves the decline of a once-great actor This week, with the revelation that Will Smith is now older than the actor who played Uncle Phil was at the start of The Fresh Prince of BelAir, I finally reached a revelation that is truly heart breaking for any fan of an actor. I’ve given up on him. I don’t care any more. He is beyond redemption, and I’m beginning to wonder if he really had any major credentials in the first place.

It wouldn’t be enough for me to give up on an actor if their only crime was to have been in a slew of stinkers – Nicolas Cage’s flops over the past decade vastly outstrip his hits – but with Bad Lieutenant, Kick-Ass and the upcoming Joe, Cage still retains the appealing spark of insane vitality which attracts me to his best films. The best film Smith has made in the last ten years was Hitch – a guilty pleasure at best, though one which saw him coasting on his affable charm rather than adding anything to it. The big hits of his career – Independence Day, Men in Black and the Bad Boys films all demonstrated charisma as a leading man, but they appeared quite a while ago, and were very good at best, but never great.

The films he rejected - the leads for Django Unchained and The Matrix were fantastic, and he could have been great in them had he chosen to work in challenging waters; but Smith’s filmography has a consistence in that the stories he involves himself with have an interesting promise, performed with a terribly over-familiar execution. I, Robot, I Am Legend and Hancock all had premises which could have challenged minds and tastes, but each ended up resorting to familiar patterns of bloated conventions and contrived resolutions He has struggled in earnest to make more serious films such as The Pursuit of Happyness, Seven Pounds and After Earth, but the most his characters managed to achieve was to stoically struggle after a distant philosophical message which never existed beyond the ambition to be serious. The high point of his career, Ali, in which he successfully managed to evoke the intensity behind Muhammad Ali, strikes as an anomaly akin to Adam Sandler’s Punch Drunk Love, where both actors demonstrated a raw talent for uncovering the simmering emotions

beneath what their usual shtick indicates. But, like Sandler, Smith hasn’t ventured into the dangerous territory of a high quality film for far too long for me to care any more. I loved him for The Fresh Prince, and on that affection his career has coasted to this point of resignation. I’m now excited about Independence Day II only after Smith rejected the film, Smith bowing out could mean the film’s on the right tracks.

George Bellamy

What do you want from your feedback?

Written assessments? Presentations?

Lab reports? Placements? Exams?

We want to know what you think about the academic feedback you currently receive, so that we can suggest areas of improvement to the University. Rate your current feedback online at: www.manchesterstudentsunion.com/bigaskfeedback

ISSUE 20/ 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

/TheMancunion: Books

Editors: Esmé Clifford Astbury, Annie Muir

@MancunionBooks

Feature

Review

Central Library re-opened Elizabeth Linsley is inspired by the long-awaited re-opening of Manchester Central Library It’s a beautiful, sunny Monday morning and my double lecture has been cancelled.

I could crawl back to bed, watch reruns of Malcolm in the Middle with my flatmates or even do some work on my essay. Instead, I head straight to the recently re-opened Central Library, following a £50 million refurbishment.

The round pale-stoned library stands out against the more traditional Manchester red-brick of The Midland Hotel across the road. It is an imposing building; literature has arrived. I’m greeted by the friendliest G4S security staff, and who wouldn’t be cheerful, working in such a beautiful place.

The library houses everything you could ever possibly need or want: computers, information on local history, film booths, a lovely café, plenty of comfy chairs and practical desks, interactive archives, DVDs, CDs, sheet music, a piano, electric drums, meeting rooms, lots of handy plug sockets, and books

magazines, newspapers, six inch thick tomes detailing nineteenth century US patent laws, books in Arabic, Chinese, French and other languages, crime thrillers.

I’ve died and gone to library heaven.

I’m going to write my first novel. I’m finally going to read Dickens. I am never ever going to leave this library.

Manchester Central Library. Photo: Kamla Pillay

The library houses everything you could ever possibly need or want: so many computers, including enormous iMacs, information on local history, film booths, a lovely café, plenty of comfy chairs and practical desks, a wonderful Shakespeareinspired stained glass window,

interactive archives, DVDs, CDs, sheet music, a piano, electric drums, a cute ‘Secret Garden’ children’s area, meeting rooms, lots of handy plug sockets, a Race Relations Resource Centre and so many books. Oh, the books; travel guides, children’s books, the classics, sci-fi and fantasy,

The circular shape of the library draws you in and makes the already big library seem never-ending, an Alice in Wonderland type warren of twisting corridors with row upon row of bookshelves. I skirt around the magnificent Wolfson Reading Room on the first floor, peering through the glass doors. I force myself to visit all the other floors before I return to this reading sanctuary.

It’s a wonderful round room, with a high domed ceiling and a marvellously elaborate gold clock in its centre.

Bookshelves line the walls and long dark wooden desks encircle the golden clock.

I’ve died and gone to library heaven. I’m going to write my first novel. I’m finally going to read Dickens. I am never ever going to leave this library.

Review

Review: The Beggar Maid by Alice Munro Books editor Annie Muir encourages you to read the novel that Nobel Prize for Literature winner Alice Munro always wanted to write In December last year Alice Munro was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. The eighty-two year old published her first collection of short stories, The Dance of the Happy Shades, in 1968 and her most recent collection, Dear Life, came out in 2012.

Munro said in an interview with The Guardian that her first attempt at writing was to rewrite Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid with a happy ending. It is interesting, then, that her long career is made almost entirely of short stories, which don’t need to have happy endings because they don’t really have endings. Unlike novels which can seem to summarize the worlds they depict, short stories are snippets, and because of this denial to finalise they are more like reality which cannot easily be concluded (except for the obvious way).

Munro commented that short stories are ‘often

Books

21

Allen Lane, 1979

brushed off as something people do before they write a novel […]. I would like them to come to the fore without any strings attached.’ But she also says that she’s always wanted to write a novel.

I read The Beggar Maid:

Stories of Flo and Rose after reading this article. To me it seemed like a novel: the one she’s always wanted to write. The stories were first published separately in The New Yorker, but their ability to stand alone only attests to the brilliant writing, and adds to the interest of the book as a whole. The unexplained leaps in time make it fascinatingly filmic. Through the different episodes you see Rose’s personality change, so much that it is almost like a different character every story. But the important thing is that it is not.

The stories begin with little details about her childhood in Hanratty. During the later stories I found myself thinking back to her childhood stories, and remembering what she was like then. I found that I was drawn to these early stories, maybe because she herself is the most likable character as a child. Her older character is sometimes less attractive and

harder to sympathise with: she has affairs and sometimes seems to treat other people quite badly. But she is also the most real character I have ever read, partly because of the fact that I don’t always like her. If it wasn’t for being connected to all the rest of the parts of me and my life I might not like myself when I did certain things. In the same way if you didn’t keep thinking back to Rose’s childhood, and the lack of love she seemed to receive, you would probably like her less.

My favourite is the last story called ‘Who do you think you are?’ where Rose goes back to Hanratty to see her stepmother Flo. In this story you see her go back to the place she grew up and notice all the changes and developments being built, and you see her realise how interesting and vibrant it used to be, the way it is presented in the first stories, when all she wanted to do was escape.

In Defence of Martin Amis: Lionel Asbo reviewed Alister Pearson defends Martin Amis, and his most recent novel, against critics who call him elitist I have read three previous Martin Amis novels – all brilliant in their individual way. His debut, The Rachel Papers, tells the story of a diligent and arrogant youth and his quest to have sex with an older woman before he goes to Oxford University. It’s his books orientated around the Thatcher years that made me become a big Amis fan though. John Self in Money is an archetypal hedonist and slob cruising from London to New York as he looks to produce his first film whilst Keith Talent in London Fields is a sex-mad scumbag attempting to win at a darts competition.

‘Threnody’ is a caricature of the veridical glamour model and writer Katie Price – Amis had read her autobiography in preparation for the novel His latest novel entitled Lionel Asbo: State of England focuses on a seemingly more controversial theme: the world of the poor. Critics have slated Amis for choosing a subject who he knows nothing about and for being elitist.

The book is about the yobbish Lionel Asbo and his nephew Desmond who live in povertystricken Diston – a fictional borough in London where “everything hated everything else, and everything else, in return, hated everything back”. During one of his frequent stints in prison, for he is a subsistent criminal, Lionel wins £140 million in the lottery and is shot to superstardom. Lionel spends the dough dining out in expensive restaurants every night, taking up residence in various prestigious London hotels, often being kicked out for living up to his name and forming a relationship with the glamour model and poet ‘Threnody’. ‘Threnody’ is a caricature of the veridical glamour model and writer Katie Price – Amis had read her autobiography in preparation for the novel.

The outrage of the book most likely comes from the descriptions Amis gives of the ‘chav’ culture. Owen Jones comments “Lionel Asbo’s portrait reinforces a one-dimensional image” and this may be true but I don’t think Amis was attempting to illustrate that when writing.

Johnathon Cape, 2012

For me the book is a satire of English culture and the way newspapers report it.

This latter interpretation is important. Amis himself does not and would not describe it in quite the same amount of ridicule as he does when he is writing in the eyes of newspaper writers. Diston is such a far-fetched concept and should not be treated as Amis’ view of London’s poorer parts but rather a satire of how tabloid newspapers are written. Nowhere in England is the average life expectancy 60 unlike Diston. It is extremely rare for mothers to have eight children before they are 18 yet this is the norm in Diston. Even fifteen-yearold Desmond’s affair with his 39-year-old grandmother is based upon something Amis saw in an Agony Aunt column.

Diston is such a far-fetched concept and should not be treated as Amis’ view of London’s poorer parts but rather a satire of how tabloid newspapers are written Newspapers, particularly tabloids, attempt to portray parts of England like this and this is what I believe Amis is playing upon. Amis also touches upon the theme of celebrity culture lampooning it from how the newspapers report it. One should not criticise Amis for Lionel Asbo but instead turn that outrage on newspaper editors. Fiction writers are artists rather than social commentators.

Amis has written another gripping and entertaining novel that one should remember as just a satire of celebrity and chav cultured as portrayed by the media.

ISSUE 20/ 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Editors: Ben Walker, Maddy Hubbard

Photos: Flickr (Ludvajz)

Wine Column

Victor Croci

& Going out with a Bang

THE WINE LIST

Victor Croci, soon to depart Manchester for good, has left us with a guide to show us how to celebrate the coming end-of-year revelry in style. All you need is a flute, a magnum, and post-exam euphoria.

If this is to be the final issue of our unorthodox wine column with all its delightful little eccentricities – then we had better go out drinking, an opened bottle of Merlot in one hand and a 19th century vintage corkscrew in the other! Who am I kidding, as students a half carton of Tesco’s Basic Red Wine and some stale mild cheddar cheese will have to suffice.

Springtime is finally upon us and with it comes the promise of the 190th edition of the University of Manchester’s games (exams that is); a cruel ordeal where harsh and unforgiving professors strut through halls of malnourished exhausted students frantically scribbling away at an obscure algorithm, deep yet meaningless philosophy quote or worse, dreaded multiple choice question.

Friends! Do not fear because once the academic games are over and summer lethargy is here to stay – I have carefully pieced together with my Francophile posse of cork-teasers, a list of wines you may wish to consider for the occasion. It is bold, bombastic and yet somehow available on a meagre student budget.

full-bodied Pinot is a remarkably well priced for its bubbly feeling of elation. Genuinely, you could order a case of 6, get a 25% discount and still pull off the Wolf of Wall street’s pool party in whatever remains of your student house’s “garden”. Not to be consumer with moderation. £21.99

1. BOLLINGER SPECIAL CURVEE The classiest and most expensive item to be sold in Asda since David Beckham forgot his Rolex on the Levenshulme fruit counter. Prestige, glory and the aroma of inevitable Victory – the perfect drink to crown your University experience! Expensive, yes but the event justifies the means, dixit Machiavelli.

At first you’ll be afraid, you’ll be petrified, you’ll think you can never live with yourself again – but you are wrong! So wrong! Just be strong! This bottle’s nectar is the liquid equivalent to success, whether politely popped open in Cloud 23 or shaken furiously outside the Academy after your epic 4 hour exam… I suppose, against all the odds of University life – you’ve made it, therefore you’ve earned it. £40.99

5. TESCO CAVA BRUT In the arsenal of post-exam shenanigans and Formula One victory celebrations – this is a state of the art high pressure fire extinguisher. Corked and loaded somewhere off the Danube by Cava giant Cordoniu, this bottle always ends up falling into the wrong hands at a critical point of the party.

This is the ultimate weapon a student has to aim in the face of the cynical bearded examiners who yell “though shall not pass!” Failing that, you could probably just drink it. £5.25

counterpart in taste, appearance and price. A bench beside Platt Lake isn’t quite a deckchair off Lago di Garda, but at least you won’t be deafened by the sounds of ‘pimped’ Vespa bikes. £11.99

DE BRISMOND 4. PROSECCO ZARDETTO 3. COMPTE CHAMPAGNE BRUT

No post exam festivities are complete without a very fizzy bottle of spumante. Hailing from Italy, the country which gave us the Mario Brothers, Luciano Pavarotti as well as Papa John’s Pizza service…

This spumante is light years ahead of its ‘frizzante’

What better way to celebrate a final exam than sprawled out on the lawn of the Armitage centre sipping Lidl’s finest from gimmicky plastic glasses?

Keep it chilled, preferably in a plastic bag full of ice to maximize the fresh lemony nature of this decent bottle of champagne: incredibly good value and generally on offer throughout Lidl stores. £12.99

2. CHAMPAGNE BLANC DE NOIRS Because you’re a lazy student in need of celebration and Sainsbury’s is just around the corner. Idleness and post-exam sloth aside, this

My fellow readers, the list is hardly exhaustive – yet it captures the essence of what I’ve been trying to teach you since I first penned a wine column back in October 2013. There’s nothing wrong with a drink, as long as it’s in an actual glass and you convey a false air of sophistication with mixed appreciation. On that note, with watery tears running down my cabernet tinted red cheeks, I must scribble away a gentle goodbye and good luck to each and every one of you loyal readers.

Ladies and gentlemen, through the best of wines, through the worst of wines, the pleasure was entirely mine.

Arrivederci raggazi, Victor Croci

Feature

our RECIPES OF THE WEEK

Vegetable cakes are (pretty) healthy and yet surprisingly delicious - the perfect way to indulge in revision period comfort food

Sweet Potato Scones Parsnip Cake Beetroot & Chocolate Cake Ingredients: 250g of cooked and mashed sweet potato (about 2 small sweet potatoes) 60g of melted butter 60ml of milk 2 tbsp brown sugar 1 egg, lightly beaten 260g plain flour, plus extra for dusting 1 tbsp baking powder 1. Preheat oven to 230°C/210°C (fan assisted)/gas mark 7. Add the melted butter, milk, brown sugar and the beaten egg to the sweet potato in a medium bowl.

2. Sift together the flour, baking powder and cinnamon or nutmeg in a separate bowl.

3. Next, fold in the dry ingredients into the sweet potato mixture until evenly combined.

4. Gently tip the mixture out onto a very well-floured surface. Cover your hands in flour and gently pat the dough out to 2-3cm thickness – no need to use a rolling pin! If the mixture is looking really wet at this stage add extra flour to even out the consistency.

5. Cut into circles using a 6cm scone cutter; a mug is a good sub-

stitute if you haven’t got a cutter.

Don’t twist the cutter as you pull it up, as this can affect the rise of your scone.

6. Line a baking tray with greaseproof paper and place scones about 2.5cm apart. 7. Brush with milk and cook for 12 to 15 minutes until golden brown.

8. Leave to cool on a wire rack before serving, if you can wait that long!

Recipes and photos: Humaima Skripta, Sam Herridge & Holly Poynter

Ingredients: 2 large parsnips, peeled and grated, 250g Demerara sugar, 175g butter, 2 tbsp golden syrup, 3 eggs, 250g self-raising flour, 2 tsp baking powder, 1 tsp each of cinnamon & ground ginger, ½ teaspoon of nutmeg, 1 apple, peeled and grated, 1 orange, juiced and zested.

300g of cream cheese, 100g of caster sugar, 150g of butter, 1 orange.

1. Preheat oven to gas mark 4.

2. Melt the butter and the sugar in a pan with the golden syrup.

3. Let this cool for a few minutes but not so much that it solidifies.

4. Meanwhile, mix the flour, baking powder, ginger, nutmeg and cinnamon into a bowl.

5. Whisk the eggs into the cooled sugar mix and then stir in the flour mixture.

6. Add the remaining ingredients and whisk until smooth. Decant into a round baking tin.

7. Bake for 1 hour or until the top of the cake feels spongy. If it begins to brown quickly cover the cake

Ingredients: 200g of butter, plus extra for greasing 250g of cooked and peeled beetroot 200g of dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids) 4 tablespoons of hot espresso 135g of plain flour 1 heaped teaspoon of baking powder 3 tablespoons of cocoa powder 5 eggs, separated 190g of caster sugar crème fraiche or double

tin with foil for the remainder of the time.

8. Allow the cake to cool for an hour.

9. Beat the butter and caster sugar for 2-3 minutes 10. Whisk in the cream cheese until smooth.

11. Cut cake in half horizontally.

12. Spread half of the icing mixture evenly on top of the bottom half.

13. Place top half on top of the bottom half and ice the top of the cake.

14. Grate the zest of the orange evenly on top to finish.

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4. Grease a 20cm/8in cake tin with a little butter and line the bottom of the tin with a disc of baking parchment.

2. Blend the beetroot in a food processor to a rough purée, or grate finely by hand.

3. Melt the chocolate in a bowl suspended over a pan of hot water (do not allow the bottom of the bowl to touch the water), then pour in the hot coffee.

4. Stir in the butter in small pieces and leave to soften in the chocolate mixture.

Remove from the heat and allow to cool slightly.

5. Meanwhile, sift the flour, baking powder and cocoa

together in a bowl and set aside.

6. Separate the eggs. Whisk the yolks in a bowl until frothy. Then stir this into the chocolate and butter mixture, then fold in the beetroot 7. Whisk the egg whites until still peaks form when the whisk is removed. Fold in the sugar.

8. Fold the sugar and egg whites into the chocolate mixture, then fold in the flour and cocoa mixture.

9. Pour the batter into the prepared tin and bake for 40 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.

10. Serve with crème fraiche

/TheMancunion: Food & Drink @MaddyLaura

Food & Drink 23

Feature

Feature

The Sunday Roast Holly Poynter provides the ultimate student guide A roast dinner is arguably one of the greatest meals for feeding a hungry crowd of student, and in my experience it always goes down well. In the last four years I have prepared a roast chicken for friends of varying figures: the smallest was for four people and the biggest was fourteen! It only feels right that I should pass on everything I have learned about doing a welltimed, tasty roast dinner in a small kitchen with limited utensils as a soonto-be-graduating student.

Firstly, a word on shopping. Before you start cooking, write a list of absolutely EVERYTHING that you will need for your cooking. From remembering your chicken and stuffing, to goose fat to roast your potatoes in, herbs, and even a bottle of washing up liquid for during and after cooking, a shopping list will make sure you don’t have a nasty shock when your hands are covered in butter after prepping the chicken, and reach to cover your chicken in foil only to realise that you have forgotten it. This is also good if you are on a budget, as you can work out approximately how much you will be spending by looking online at prices and then won’t be too shocked when you get to the till.

Next, some notes on food choices here: for your chicken, I recommend simply stuffing it with a whole lemon, and then covering the skin in butter with some garlic, salt and pepper.

Potatoes: depending on how many people you are cooking for, make both roast potatoes and mash. The advantage of this is that mash doesn’t take up oven space, and once it is cooked and mashed you can pop a lid on the pan and reheat before serving. Investing in goose fat to roast your potatoes in takes your potatoes to a new level of tastiness, and you can always keep the goose fat for subsequent meals.

Regarding stuffing: I keep it simple, using classic sage and onion from a packet, and it always goes down well with guests. If you feel up for making your own then all power to you, but it is an added layer of preparation which doesn’t necessarily translate into better results. On the vegetable front, frozen peas are a cheap and simple way of adding something green into your

What kind of Eater are you?

Whether it’s your first or your final year, time is quickly running out and summer is on the horizon. By now you should have worked out your signature dish, discovered your favourite type of cereal, and attempted to get as much free food as possible from campus. But do you know what type of eater you are?

Faye Waterhouse can help.

1.

Photo: Wiki Commons roast, and then roast carrots and roasted parsnips are essential accompaniments for a roast chicken. For gravy, I keep a back-up pot of instant gravy granules so that if homemade gravy gets used up then no one will be left gravy-less. Optional extras, depending on the number of people you are making for include Yorkshire puddings, pigs in blankets, and other vegetables, such as steamed leeks or broccoli.

The next thing to do is check your utensils. I recommend a deep tray to cook your chicken in, so you don’t lose any of the precious juices that can be used to make your gravy later. In addition, be sure that you have adequate oven trays to cook your roast potatoes on, along with roasted carrots and parsnips, plus a dish for stuffing. It is also important to check how many pans you have, as you will need at least one pan to parboil your potatoes before roasting them. Last but not least, verify that you have enough plates and cutlery for everyone, as you may find yourself using from preparation and you don’t want to be left eating your dinner out of a pan!

Once you have all your equipment and ingredients, the next thing I would advise you to do is to make a list of timings. This planning is essential and will reduce your stress levels substantially, particularly during the last half an hour of cooking. Plan your timings around when you are aiming to serve

up, and use this as a basis to work out how long different things need to cook. Don’t forget to take into account preparation times as well. For example, factor in peeling and chopping potatoes before parboiling them, and then once they are parboiled leave the potatoes to cool for 5 minutes. The most important thing to remember here is that the chicken needs 30 minutes to rest after it has come out of the oven: at this point you can turn up the heat (the chicken will have been cooking at 160°C in a fan assisted oven, far too low to get your roast potatoes nice and crispy) and get the other components of your roast ready.

The most stressful part of the whole cooking will undoubtedly be the 10 minutes before serving. If possible, enlist a sous chef who can help with the last minute tasks, such as laying the table, cutting the chicken, and making sure that everyone has a drink. Good wines for this meal are a Chardonnay or Sauvignon Blanc, and on the nonalcoholic side I would recommend an elderflower cordial topped with still or sparkling water. When everything is finished, make sure that you all sit down and toast the efforts of everyone involved. Enjoy sharing the fruits of your labour with your friends, and bask in the satisfaction you will feel after completely this marathon task!

2.

Exams are looming again, and it’s that time of year when everybody starts hoarding chocolate, crisps and energy drinks to comfort themselves whilst huddled in a dark corner of the main library. It’s probably no surprise to hear that they probably aren’t the best things to be feasting on if you want to maximise your chances of learning a whole semester’s lectures in three days. So what should we be eating to boost our brain power?

Flavonols, which can be found in beans and cocoa, have been shown to boost brain power in scientific studies.

Don’t go panic buying dairy milk just yet though—saturated fats have the opposite effect. For a happy medium, try snacking on a small bar of dark chocolate which has a higher cocoa content equals more flavonols!

Omega-3 fatty acids have long been cited as ‘brain food’.

That’s fish and nuts to me and you. Your fellow library-goers may not appreciate you snacking on mackerel during your revision sessions, so nuts might be the way to go in this case—almonds are especially good.

Folic acid is recommended for pregnant ladies to help

babies’ brains develop, and there’s some evidence to show that it isn’t just babies who can benefit from its brainboosting properties. So get chugging the orange juice and scoffing on spinach—though do watch out for the sugar content of the orange juice.

Studies have shown that alpha-lipoic acid improves memory function, and it can be found in unpopular but delicious foods such as kidney, heart and liver. If they aren’t your thing (let’s face it, they’re probably not) you can also find alpha-lipoic acid in spinach and broccoli.

As well as giving your brain a much needed boost during exam time, in the long term these foods can help maintain your brain function as you get older, reducing your risk of dementia. Win-win! Exercise is also really important to maintain brain power, so switch off your brain every now and then, and get outside and burn off that spinach!

Finally, don’t forget to sleep. All-nighters are never worth it; give your brain a break and get a good eight hours in.

6.

You are suspicious your friends are only your friends for your cake-making abilities.

You go to the cinema to watch a long film and think you might get thirsty so take your own teabags and ask for hot water (Ashamed to say guilty as charged…but I did shell out for pick and mix!)

You were addicted to the Great British Bake Off and thought you would have a fair chance of impressing Mary Berry.

You sometimes wonder what happened to all your mixture then you realise you’ve helped yourself to most it whilst it was in the bowl. When deadlines are looming and work is getting on top of you baking is the perfect stress reliever.

THE FOODIE EATER

7.

You’ve tried the latest super foods and try to shop locally.

‘I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here!’ eating challenges would be a fun opportunity for you to show how daring you really are.

THE TAKEWAY QUEEN/KING You are on first name terms with your local takeaway.

8.

4.

THE CAN’T HAVE ANYTHING WITHOUT SAUCE EATER Barbecue, tomato, mayonnaise make every kind of food better.

You try your hardest not to distract everyone whilst you munch your way through your apple/carrots sticks, crisps or chocolate bar.

You’ve spent a small fortune on plastic cutlery because you forgot a knife and folk.

5.

9.

THE NOISY EATER

People stop what they’re doing to look at you, curious to know what you’re eating, this turns into a glare as they wish they were eating what you are.

THE SWEET TOOTH EATER You’re addicted to chocolate. You look at the desserts before the main on the menu. You know how it feels to have a sugar hangover. You often substitute dinner for cake.

They appear in your recent calls and know your order before you do.

You debate between one last drink and chips on a night out—chips always win!

THE ‘YOU ONLY LIVE ONCE’ EATER That yogurt has been in your fridge for a while now—what harm can it do! The idea of having a sandwich for your lunch most days sends you to sleep.

Your friends get worried when they suggest a place to eat as it might not be good enough for you.

3.

THE BAKER EATER

You love raiding the supermarket reduced section after 5pm most days.

You know all the best places to eat in town and turn your nose up at a Panini in the union.

Feature

For Thought you ASK Food Joanne Procter offers her expert advice on how to we ANSWER eat smart for the upcoming exam period

THE FRUGAL EATER

You know that Tesco stock 27 different kinds of ketchup (fact). You get annoyed when sauces come in a little dish because, one, there is never enough, and two, getting it out of the bottle is all part of the fun.

10.

THE SELFISH/GREEDY EATER We’ve all seen that episode from Friends—the one where “Joey, doesn’t share food!”

You’re Joey.

THE ENVIOUS EATER You get annoyed because you’ve been out ordered by your friend who is clearly enjoying their food more than yours.

You finish everyone else’s leftovers.

People think there’s something wrong with you if you don’t eat everything on your plate.

24

Arts & Culture

ISSUE 20/ 31st March 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Editors: Abbie Roberts, Matilda Roberts

Feature

youASK

we ANSWER

Cultural revision breaks

THE LOWRY Image: Flickr: Smabs Sputzer

(that you don’t have to feel guilty about)

WAR MUSEUM NORTH

PORTICO LIBRARY Jonathan Yeo - Portraits 15 March 2014 - 29 June 2014 Jonathan Yeo is one of Britain’s best portrait painters, especially well known for his paintings of performers, artists and politicians. From Kevin Spacey, acting as Richard III; Damien Hirst, dressed incongruously in chemical protection suit; to Helena Bonham Carter, Michael Parkinson, Grayson Perry and Idris Elba. Yeo is self-taught, taking up painting whilst recovering from Hodgkin’s disease in his early 20s.

Women and Industry in the First World War 18 January - 28 September 2014 Exploring how the First World War changed the society we live in today, this exhibition reveals images of women working in industry during the conflict.

From Street to Trench: A World War that Shaped a Region 05 April - 31 May 2014 IWM North launches it’s first major exhibition - revealing extraordinary stories from the North West never told publicly before.

The exhibition reveals more than 200 personal objects, films, sound recordings, photographs, artworks and letters, including many on public display for the first time.

MUSEUM OF SCIENCE & INDUSTRY

Northern Exposure 2014 04 March 2014 - 29 March 2014 The Portico Library’s popular annual photography exhibition is back! Northern Exposure showcases the skills of photographers based in the North of England and this year brings together the work of eight from the region. Each photographer carries their own distinctive style, interests and specialities and the show features an exciting blend of subjects including portraiture, fashion, art photography, music and travel.

MANCHESTER MUSEUM Image: Manchester Museum Website

CHINESE CENTRE

Wellcome Image Awards 2014 12 March - 07 September 2014 See the winning entries of the Wellcome Image Awards 2014 on display at the Museum of Science & Industry in Manchester. From an x-ray bat to a kidney stone, a head louse egg to a cross section of a flower bud, take a look at 18 stunning images which show some of the world’s wonders in minute detail.

From the War of Nature

Image: CFCCA Website

The Voice Currency

JOHN RYLANDS LIBRARY

11 April - 31 August 2014 Reveals that living things resolve conflict in many, often unexpected, ways and aims to challenge the perception that war an inevitable outcome of conflict. Drawing upon more recent scientific discoveries about the relationships between living things, the exhibition explores the place of war in nature, and the idea of a ‘struggle for existence’.

11 March 2014 - 01 June 2014 ‘The Voice Currency’ is an innovative exhibition with a focus on new engagement systems in contemporary art and design.

Working in collaboration with partners, associate curators, artists and design practitioners, CFCCA will open Gallery 1 to a sharing of ideas through a broad exploration of projects and people, with the aim of initiating on-going, trans-cultural dialogues.

TAncient Worlds showcases the best of the museums outstanding archaeology collections and reveals the people behind the objects: who made them, who used them, who lost and re-discovered them, who collected, classified and interpreted them.

MANCHESTER ART GALLERY

CORNERHOUSE

Ancient Worlds

Image: Flickr: Anosmia Image: Clifford Owens Website

Aftermath at The John Rylands Library 07 February - 29 June 2014 A thought provoking exhibition that brings together stories of people and places forever changed by conflict. Highlights include letters written from the battlefields of World War One, shown alongside new artworks created in response to these moving testaments.

Bus Stop Stories 20 February - 22 June 2014 John Shinnick, a Manchester photographer, sets out to document the people using a local, city centre bus stop; a quiet stop where people rarely alight. The people that he met allowed him to take their portraits and in those brief interactions they started to tell him their stories. This exhibition documents those portraits and stories.

Image: Joana V - Manchester Art Gallery

Joana Vasconcelos: Time Machine 15 February - 01 June 2014 Fresh from her success representing Portugal at the 55th Venice Biennale, Joana Vasconcelos brings her seductive, subversive large-scale sculptures to Manchester for her most ambitious UK exhibition to date.

Clifford Owens Better the Rebel You Know 10 May 2014 - 17 August 2014 In summer 2014 Cornerhouse in Manchester will host the first major European show by American conceptual artist Clifford Owens, across all three of their galleries. Owens’ work explores the intersection of photography, video, text and performance.

His practice has sought to challenge the boundaries of performance and the possibilities of interaction between artist and audience, interrogating the role of documentation by producing what he calls “discreet works of art”.

Theatre

ISSUE 20/ 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Editor: Stephanie Scott Review

What’s on

Sophie Willan: The Novice Detective

this WEEK This May Hurt A Bit

Jennifer Leung reviews Sophie Willan’s one-woman, interactive show, The Novice Detective, at the Contact Theatre, as part of Flying Solo Festival “I wonder if I’ll get asked onto stage”, I overheard a passer-by gleefully ask her friend. Her excitement was in anticipation of that night’s performance of ‘Sophie Willan: The Novice Detective’, which is, arguably, one of the funniest plays you will ever see. The thought wandered into my head like an unknown visitor and did a few dances and a back-flip before charging headfirst to my belly and releasing a cage of butterflies. “Will I be picked? Will tonight be my night?” shouts of excitement were passed from corner to corner.

Needless to say, the atmosphere of the theatre was positively elastic with a cocktail of emotions (add 1 part nerves to two parts excitement and shake well).

Certainly not for those with stage fright, ‘Sophie Willan: The Novice Detective’ is a one-woman play (written and performed by Willan herself ) with some serious bite. Mixing the detective tale with interactive storytelling and lashings of comedy, Willan’s masterpiece is a kooky and, at times, wacky rendition of classic film noir detective tales (think Humphrey Bogard).

At approximately 8:32 pm on a drizzly Manchester night (yes, I’m precise with my timings),

Review

2

25

MINUTE REVIEW

Sophie Willan’s father went missing leaving behind a trail of apparently unconnected clues: a photo, a phone call and a 90s pop album with revealing lyrics. Armed with my detective notebook in tow ( journalistic scribble pad), I was ready to witness the unravelling of a very curious mystery, along with a packed theatre audience and possibly the most northern lead detective you will ever encounter.

Set to the tunes of The Verve and The Pink Panther (YES!), Willan danced, pranced and joked across the stage making very creative use of props, lighting and interactive devices (every audience member received a pretty neat detective file). Her exuberance was contagious and within seconds, the audience felt like Willan’s very own best friend, enlisted in cracking the code and finding her father. Let’s just say, you won’t hesitate to feel a little pathos for Willan once the mystery is unravelled.

Certainly a very talented actress and comedian with first-rate one-liners and improvisational skills, I was thoroughly impressed with the fact that Willan didn’t have to resort to profanity or sexual innuendo for cheap

This show, directed by Out of Joint artistic director, Max StaffordClark, dramatises problems concerning the NHS and puts the service under the stethoscope.

A biting and political play, it’ll be well worth the trip to Bolton.

Photo: Joel Chester-Fildes laughs: her natural humour was enough. The play also started on time which is always good stuff in the theatre world. In all, ‘Sophie Willan: The Novice Detective’ was a short, snappy and sweet piece: a lovely treat for a Saturday night so contrasting to your student regular routine of drinking it up and hitting the town. If I had to describe it in three words, I’d say it was exciting, enigmatic and energetic. And, no, unfortunately I didn’t get picked to go onto the stage this time...

Kindertransport Carys Lapwood reviews Diane Samuel’s poignant and moving play at The Manchester Opera House

In the nine months leading to the outbreak of the Second World War, amid a climate of hostility escalating violence towards Jews, 10,000 Jewish children were permitted to leave Germany, Austria and Czechoslovakia as asylum seekers. They were transported to Britain and sent to live with foster families, taking only a suitcase of clothes (no toys, valuables or “sellable items” were permitted), and told by the authorities that if they cried, they would be sent back across the border. Many of them, of course, never saw their families again.

Diane Samuels’ play, Kindertransport, offers a poignant and profoundly unsettling look at the questions of trauma, memory and survivor-guilt in the wake of atrocity. The narrative is fragmented; the past overlaps with the present, fairy tales entwine with reality, and the everyday bickering of mother and daughter breaks under the weight of unspeakable grief.

Shadows and clouds, both literal and figurative, hang Ultimately, Kindertransport offers a compelling insight over even the most familiar of domestic scenes, and the into the question of suffering, and joins a rich body of set, a sparse, skeletal attic, is suitably claustrophobic. literary and cinematic work that deals with the theme of Unfortunately, in spite, or perhaps because of, such “working through” the Holocaust. rich and complex material, the acting itself sometimes fell a little flat. The fraught relationship between Evelyn ( Janet Dibley), her eighteen-year-old daughter, Faith (Rosie Holden), and their foster mother/grandmother, Lil (Maggie Steed), seemed to lack emotional credibility at several points. However, Evelyn’s imaginary conversations with her Jewish birth mother, Helga, and her internal battle with anxiety and guilt, was truly captivating and thoroughly chilling. Special mention should also go to the understudy, Alicia Ambrose-Bailey, who stepped into the role of nine-year-old Eva, sent to live in a foreign country among strangers. She was heartbreakingly charming, and did an admirable job with the cultivation of a German/Mancunian accent.

Photo: Diane Samuels UK tour

My Favourite Scene

my FAVOURITE SCENE

As well as being one of Shakespeare’s most wellknown, and well-loved, plays, Romeo and Juliet is often classed as a great love story. However, it also a story of teenage passion and lust, desparation and desire. In the following scene Juliet wishes time to move faster so that she can enjoy (i.e. consumate) her marriage to Romeo.

Was there ever a more eloquent display of hormonal sexual frustration?

SCENE II. Capulet’s orchard.

Enter JULIET JULIET: Gallop apace, you fiery-footed steeds, Towards Phoebus’ lodging: such a wagoner As Phaethon would whip you to the west, And bring in cloudy night immediately.

Spread thy close curtain, love-performing night,

Runs from the 25th March to the 5th April at The Bolton Octagon

Much Ado About Nothing Shakespeare’s classic love comedy comes to The Royal Exchange.

Directed by Maria Aberg, who has directed plays for King John and the RSC to critical acclaim, this classic is not one to be missed, The tale of two parallel love stories will have you giggling in your seat.

Runs from the 27th March to the 3rd May at The Royal Exchange

Ballet Central Any dance enthusiasts should get themselves down to The Lowry to catch this years Ballet Central dance show. Featuring ballet, jazz, contemporary and narrative dance, the show promises to showcase the talents of the best upcoming dancers.

2nd April at The Lowry

This week Theatre Editor, Stephanie Scott, discusses her favourite scene from William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet

That runaway’s eyes may wink and Romeo Leap to these arms, untalk’d of and unseen.

Lovers can see to do their amorous rites By their own beauties; or, if love be blind, It best agrees with night. Come, civil night, Thou sober-suited matron, all in black, And learn me how to lose a winning match, Play’d for a pair of stainless maidenhoods: Hood my unmann’d blood, bating in my cheeks, With thy black mantle; till strange love, grown bold, Think true love acted simple modesty.

Come, night; come, Romeo; come, thou day in night; For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night Whiter than new snow on a raven’s back.

Come, gentle night, come, loving, black-brow’d night, Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die,

Take him and cut him out in little stars, And he will make the face of heaven so fine That all the world will be in love with night And pay no worship to the garish sun.

O, I have bought the mansion of a love, But not possess’d it, and, though I am sold, Not yet enjoy’d: so tedious is this day As is the night before some festival To an impatient child that hath new robes And may not wear them. O, here comes my nurse, And she brings news; and every tongue that speaks But Romeo’s name speaks heavenly eloquence.

Enter Nurse, with cords Now, nurse, what news? What hast thou there? the cords That Romeo bid thee fetch?

JB Shorts 11 Six brand-new 15 minute plays, wirtten by top TV writers come to Joshua Brooks this April. A far cry from the hoards of drunk students who typically populate JB, these short plays offer comedy and a critical eye when contemplating modern society.

Runs Tuesday 1st - Saturday 12th April at Joshua Brooks

ISSUE 20/ 31st MARCH 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Editors: Lauren Arthur, Moya Crockett, Beth Currall Feature

Summer lovin’, happened so fast Holiday romances can be sweet, sordid, and downright stupid, but they always make for great stories. We share our favourite anecdotes “On my gap year I went travelling around Greece with my best friend. We made friends with a couple of French guys who we met in a hostel, and ended up travelling with them for quite a while. On our last night before coming home, Yves and I ended up 69’ing on the roof of a villa under the stars. I guess it might have been romantic, except I was so drunk that I wouldn’t stop talking, and he eventually asked me to shut up. Rude.”

Natalie, 20

“The best holiday fling I’ve ever had was with a guy called Chuck. We met in Zante, when we were both seventeen. We spent the whole week together but didn’t do anything except kiss. He was a virgin and asked me to be his first, but I said no. On our last night we watched the sunset on the beach and promised that we would stay in touch forever. When we got home, we texted each other every single day for ooh, about two weeks, and then it fizzled out. I still love that memory, though.” Kaya, 21

“When I was sixteen, my mates and I went to Newquay to celebrate the end of our GCSEs. There were six of us lads, and as luck would have it, there were six girls staying in the hostel room next door to ours. I immediately hit it off with one of them, and (being a sixteen-year-old boy) neglected to tell her that I had a girlfriend at home – who would be arriving in Cornwall within a matter of days. To this day, I’m genuinely not quite sure what I expected to happen, but of course things got messy. I’ll never forget walking into that 16-18’s club night and seeing my girlfriend and the girl I’d been getting with having an emosh heart-to-heart at the bar. In a weird twist, my holiday fling now goes to Manchester. We bump into one another occasionally, but we don’t really chat. I think it’s all still too raw.” Joel, 22

“Last year, I met this girl in a club in Chicago. I was on study abroad elsewhere in the States and was only in town for the weekend; she was from Leeds, and was in Chicago visiting family. We really hit it off and spent the whole night in the smoking area, talking and talking. When she had to leave she gave me her English number. I only had a month or so left in the States and was genuinely planning on getting in touch when I got back to the UK. A few days later, though, I lost my phone. I didn’t have her number written down and I’ve never been able to find her on Facebook. It still haunts me to this day.” Ollie, 22 “When I was nineteen, my friends and I went to Rome for a few days. I met a guy called Fabio (seriously) in a bar who was the definition of an Italian stallion. Not my usual type by any stretch of the imagination, but I got swept away in the excitement of it all. He took me on a moonlit drive around the city and I ended up giving him head in a very conspicuous location near the Coliseum. Very romantic, I know. Things all went a bit tits-up when we went back to ‘his place.’ He was staying in what I can only describe as a hostel run by nuns, which I was not aware was even a thing. I just remember tiptoeing up the marble steps to his room while he whispered, ‘We must be quiet! We can’t wake up the sisters!’ He then proceeded to explain that he couldn’t possibly wear a condom, in fact didn’t even have any, because ‘Italian men don’t use condoms.’ I don’t know, maybe it was a Catholic thing. Suffice to say, I got out of there sharpish.” Maeve, 21

“My most memorable holiday romance was when I was fifteen, on holiday in Italy with my parents. I met this German guy who claimed he had once been a Nazi, but had since seen the error of his ways. Being young, naïve and a total idiot, I interpreted this as him being a reformed bad boy and fell fast and hard. One night we were on the beach together, engaging in some prime Year 10 top-off heavy petting, when I heard my dad’s voice calling my name. He’d come down from the villa to look for me. Friedrich grabbed for his clothes, I grabbed for mine, and we sprinted off in opposite directions. I never saw him again. Probably just as well, bearing in mind the whole Nazi thing.” Rachel, 20 “I was in Barcelona last summer at Primavera festival and met this Australian girl who was, no joke, a ten out of ten. Bizarrely, she liked me too.

We spent pretty much the whole festival together, which really annoyed both our sets of friends, and I remember thinking that I might actually have met my dream girl. The only problem was, she was flying back to Melbourne when the festival ended. I was genuinely a bit heartbroken for a while there, but maybe it was for the best. I guess I never had to find out if she had any annoying habits or anything like that. I was still secretly gutted a few months later when I saw her change her Facebook status to ‘In a Relationship’, though.” Greg, 22

“I met Tom at Benicassim. I had drunk half a bottle of Jaeger, was wearing a very questionable outfit (leopard ears, some strange plastic hat and a top with Lil Wayne smoking a spliff on it) and decided to shout out to this hot guy walking past that I could help him put up his tent. When he came over with his friends, it quickly became apparent that there would only be room for one of their tents near ours, but I managed to persuade them to stay.

The three of them spent their first night squeezed into a one man tent. It was worth it, though – me and Tom have now been together for two and a half years.” Holly, 21 Photo: renee_mcgurk (Flickr)

Travel

Where to travel in summer 2014

Farr Festival, Hertfordshire Farr is a self-described “boutique” festival, a description that might make your skin prickle with irritation. However, get rid of the pretension, and that translates as a friendly, intimate festival set in woodland less than an hour from London. The eclectic line-up includes Hercules & Love Affair (arty disco-infused pop), Mount Kimbie (English electronica), The Skints (East London reggae/ska/dub four-piece), George Fitzgerald (typical Manchester house), and Only Girl (brilliant, spectral R&B).

Dates: 18-20 July Advance weekender ticket: £99

Photo: Moyan Brenn (Flickr)

Photo: Julian King (Flickr)

Green Man Festival, Wales Held in Glanusk Park, a beautiful 400acre estate in the Brecon Beacons, this festival’s line-up will tempt those whose music taste leans towards indie, folk and electronica: Beirut, Caribou, Poliça, Daughter and Mac DeMarco are all appearing. Line-up aside, Green Man’s biggest draw is its blissful atmosphere. It’s as happy as Bestival, just without the snapbacks, ketamine and Disclosure.

Dates: 14-17 August

Photo: Emmanuel Demuren

Budapest, Hungary Often described as the “Paris of Middle Europe” (according to, erm, the Hungary tourist board), Budapest is a pastel-toned, gracefully ageing gem of a city that makes perfect sense as the setting for a Wes Anderson movie. Take a dip in the Király thermal baths, float down the blue Danube on a river cruise, or visit the House of Terror, a bizarre museum dedicated to those killed during Nazi and communist rule. For nightlife, Szimpra comes highly recommended.

Beacons Festival, Skipton, Yorkshire Taking place in the Yorkshire Dales, Beacons is (to paraphrase M&S) more than just a music festival. There are theatre tents, creative workshops and yoga classes; art installations, film and documentary screenings; cocktail bars, street food, and Q&As with all kinds of interesting people.

The music doesn’t take a back seat, however: this year’s line-up includes Darkside, Jon Hopkins, The Fall, Jackmaster and East India Youth. It all sounds terribly terribly middle class − but also really quite nice, no?

Dates: 7-10 August Adult weekend ticket: £99.50 + booking fee

Garden Festival, Croatia The explosion of Croation festivals is akin to Ibiza in the 90s: sunshine, beautiful scenery, sunburned British kids, house music, MDMA, weary locals. Axel Boman, Bicep and Krankbrother are among the DJs playing, so if you like the idea of dancing to the music you’d normally hear in the basement at a Fallowfield party, but on the Mediterranean coast, this is a solid choice.

Dates: 2-9 July Week ticket: £120

Photo: Xiquino Silva (Flickr)

Istanbul, Turkey Half European, half Asian (the Bosphorus River divides the city into two continents), and with a distinctly ancient-meets-modern flavour, Istanbul feels like another world. Sip Turkish mint tea or black coffee in the sun, spend hours lost in the Grand Bazaar, and make sure to visit Topkapi palace, the Ottoman Sultans’ royal residence for 400 years.

There’s great nightlife, too: Kadife Street (“Bar Street”) in Kadikoy, on the Asian side, has loads to choose from.

Photo: Farr Festival

Photo: Costa Slincu (Flickr)

If you don’t have a huge budget for travelling in the summer, never fear. A trip to one of these great cities or fantastic festivals won’t break the bank

Prague, Czech Republic Prague is famous for its great beer and relatively cheap cost of living (or visiting), and so has gained something of a reputation as a hot spot for stag do’s and lads’ weekends. However, it’s also stunningly beautiful − a jumble of baroque towers, imposing squares and medieval churches and cathedrals, plus one castle – with a fascinating Communist history.

Great for a weekend away.

Dublin, Ireland Edinburgh, Scotland You’re pretty much guaranteed a good There’s something almost surreal about weekend in the Guinness capital of the Edinburgh’s dramatic landscape. Cobworld. The neighbourhood of Temple bled streets, grand Georgian buildings, Bar is Dublin’s cultural quarter: pop into lurching hills and Gothic churches the Irish Film Institute or the Gallery straight out of Harry Potter make for a of Photography. If you’re after live Irish fantastic city to explore by foot. Climb country, folk and bluegrass music The Arthur’s Seat, the huge extinct volcano Cobblestones (77 North King Street) is sitting right in the city centre (yes, re- a great pub. Finally, make sure you take ally), visit Edinburgh Castle and the a stroll around the grounds of Trinity National Museum of Scotland. When College, which put our own bedragnight falls, head to Cabaret Voltaire. If gled campus to shame. You can get a theatre and comedy’s your thing, visit return ferry to Dublin from Liverpool in August during the Fringe: accommo- for around sixty quid in the summer - it dation is more expensive, but it’s a real almost seems rude not to. experience.

/TheMancunion: Lifestyle @MancunionLife

Horoscopes Finance

Lifestyle

27

Debate

The big YOUR HOROSCOPES FOR tattoo taboo

APRIL

PISCES (20 FEBRUARY - 20 MARCH) You will most certainly be a lucky fish this summer, Pisces: I see a fabulous holiday on the cards, and perhaps a romance thrown in! Just make sure to come down from the clouds at some point to make a head start on your work.

VIRGO (23 AUGUST - 23 SEPTEMBER) This will be a summer of selfdiscovery for you, Virgo. New friendships will allow a side of you that no one has ever seen before to be unleashed- but be warned, some old friends may not like the changes. Decide carefully who’s worth keeping in your life.

ARIES (21 MARCH - 20 APRIL) Don’t let work pressures get to you over the next few months, Aries. This a time to enjoy yourself, so make sure you let your hair down and spend that hard-earned cash you’ve been slaving away for.

LIBRA (24 SEPTEMBER - 23 OCTOBER) After exams, you’ll still be feeling pretty stressed out, as you always do. Make sure you give yourself some time to unwind afterwards, before even thinking about starting a new job or studying again.

You always throw yourself into the deep end Libra, but does this always make you happy?

TAURUS (21 APRIL - 21 MAY) The stars are aligned for you Taurus, and during these next few months you will discover a sense of liberation that you have never felt before.

Perhaps you will travel alone, or even move away from the family home for a while- either way, you’ll be returning in September a new person.

SCORPIO (24 OCTOBER - 22 NOVEMBER) This is a summer of spontaneity for you, Scorpio. You’re not the best at making plans in advance anyway, but this will all work out for you over the next couple of months. Just be sure to watch your money- the remainders of that student loan will not last forever, you know.

GEMINI (22 MAY - 21 JUNE) As a summer baby, you always enjoy success and happiness in this time. However, be sure to not let your twin personalities collide over the course of the next few months: you need motivation and ambition, not laziness and complacency.

SAGITTARIUS (23 NOVEMBER 21 DECEMBER) Now is the time to rebuild relationships with family and friends back home, who you feel like you have neglected this year.

Don’t worry, they understand that it has been a busy time for you, and will welcome you back with open arms. There’s also a possibility that you will be opening your arms to a new love- you meet around a waterside.

CANCER (22 JUNE - 22 JULY) This is the summer of love for you, Cancer- make the most of it! It promises to be a passionate and fulfilling relationship, but this may die down along with the sunny days if you’re not careful. Communication is key to sustaining a happy union.

CAPRICORN (22 DECEMBER 20 JANUARY) Capricorn, you’ll be using your summer as an opportunity to make a shed load of money as per usual. This year, job opportunities could lead to doors being opened for the future, so make sure you make a great impression on your employers.

And don’t shag any of your colleagues.

LEO (23 JULY - 22 AUGUST) Let your creativity run wild over the next couple of months: start a project you haven’t had chance to do all year because of academic commitments, or visit places that you’ve always wished to see- at home or away. Allow your mind to wander, because you need to be on the straight and narrow come September.

AQUARIUS (21 JANUARY - 19 FEBRUARY) You’re always the quiet one of the group, Aquarius, and that needs to stop! Allow yourself to take centre-stage this summer; put forward plans that you would like to action, instead of just going along with everyone else. This will lead to both financial and romantic benefits- you lucky soul.

Tattoos are becoming increasingly common in Western culture yet will their reputation ever really change?

Photo: Instagram

Miley’s most recent ‘shocking’ stunt was to post a photo on Instagram of her newest tattoo: a yellow and black ‘sad kitty’ Emoji… on her the inside of her lower lip.

Ignoring the ongoing Miley debate for second and simply considering the tattoo led me to question when it started being okay to ink literally every part of our bodies? Studies show that roughly 1 in 5 adults have a tattoo and 1 in 3 regret getting one. So what is the seemingly addictive appeal of going under the needle and what does it say about our society?

Being brought up to believe that tattoos were horrible, I never had any interest in them. The only people I knew to have them were a couple of my friend’s mums at primary school. They were a distant form of rebellion to my ten year old self who still wasn’t allowed to get her ears pierced. Even at secondary school, it would be shocking news if someone had got a tattoo. Word would spread like wildfire around our bitchy girls’ school common room and we’d flock to the source of gossip to catch a glance, return to our base and comment on how lovely it looked (bitch).

Coming to Manchester has made me realise that I’ve lived in a bit of a tattoo-free bubble. Everyone seems to have them: my best friend, course friends, colleagues - they’re everywhere. Why is it that more and more people are choosing to ink themselves? Once a demonstration of defiance or ticket into a motorbike gang, tattoos are now fully integrated into our culture. But should we really be treating our bodies like a blank canvas to be decorated? Our generation seems to think so.

I do not have a tattoo. I’m boring, a huge wimp who cried on every injection day and a clinger-onner to the romantic vision of traditionalist ideas. I also promised my mum I’d never get one. However, the problem with being constantly surrounded by something your life is void of is that curiosity worms its way into your head.

It creeps up on you unexpectedly until suddenly you’re sat daydreaming about tiny Russian dolls and intricately designed birdcages.

“I got my second tattoo in Maga”, says Lizzy, a second year English Literature student. “It’s a small heart on my bum cheek that seemed like a brilliant idea when I was drunk and loving post A-level life. I really regret it though, it doesn’t mean anything to me, serving merely as a memory of a funny week I had when I was 18.

My mum says that no one will want to marry me with it.”

A search for ‘shattoo’ on any social media platform will flood your screen with images of train wreck tattoos. From grammatically incorrect declarations of past loves to the well-known ‘My daddy will kill you’ on girls’ bikini area, it would seem that a worrying number of people are waking up one day and deciding to brand their body.

Admittedly, they’re not all bad. I’ve seen quite a few tasteful ones; they can actually look like art when done by a skilled professional. For some people they’re also meaningful, names of lost loved ones or symbolic illustrations are common choices. Whilst I personally would not opt to have either, I can see why people would want a permanent memory that they’re never apart from.

It is often said that employers see tattoos in an undesirable light. A study by St Andrews University concluded that they still hold negative connotations thus hindering chances of getting a job. The stigma of tattoos being related to thug-like stereotypes is clearly still prominent. Regardless of the company’s own views on the matter, many worry about how tattoos affect their image. Your finished sleeve might look cool as you wander around Withington but in five years’ time the dear old lady looking to open a bank account may not feel quite the same.

Despite this, some companies are changing their attitudes slightly. A spokeswoman from Bank of America said that when it comes to inked corporate employees, “we have no formal policy about tattoos because we value our differences and recognize that diversity and inclusion are good for our business and make our company stronger.” As the number of people with tattoos grows, people argue that society will have to accept tattoos as if they are merely an overstated necklace or a lairy tie.

Have one or not, like them or not, tattoos are everywhere so it’s usually best to keep your opinion to yourself. Whether an expression of individuality or a spontaneous dare, in a world where nothing seems to last longer than 30 seconds perhaps this is our way of clinging onto something permanent. One thing’s for sure, pretty soon people will start making an awful lot of money from laser removal.

Lauren Arthur

ISSUE 20/ 1st April 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

SPORT Over the weekend, the Manchester University Shotokan Karate Club travelled to Prestatyn to compete in the Kyu Grades Championships.

The small, but very strong squad, consisting of 5 members, hauled a total of 4 medals: 1 gold, 1 silver and 2 bronze medals.

Victoria Ogunseitan was the outstanding competitor from Manchester, reaching the finals for all the events entered. She delivered strong performances in Kata, placing 3rd. She cruised through the Kumite eliminations dominating her opponents. In the final, she successfully defended her title and remained the reigning champion for 2 years running.

Alexandra Petrea displayed good performances during Kata eliminations and placed 2nd in the event, losing only to a member of the Welsh Squad.

Josh Croft also had an excellent

day. He took part in 3 events, performing at a very high standard overall. He reached the finals in the Kata event and placed 3rd.

Vanessa Macintyre reached the semi finals in the Individual Senior Ladies Kata event, losing to this year’s champion. Charlotte Lindsley, at her first KUGB competition, fought against a brown belt in the first round and won. Unfortunately, she was eliminated just before the semi finals by this year’s bronze medallist.

Club Captain Cristina Finta said: “Once again I am extremely proud of the team. Everyone did their absolute best and I couldn’t have asked for more. I would also like to thank to everyone that came to support the team. I would also like to thank our Sensei for his guidance, patience, continuous efforts and invaluable input. Most of the things we achieved during this year would not be possible without you.

/TheMancunion @Mancunion_Sport

Sports Editors: Andrew Georgeson, Tom Dowler and Thomas Turner

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Contact: sport@mancunion.com

Mancunion Sports Warrior of the year Despite major successes from the UoM martial arts clubs this year, one person stood out for me. That person is Laura Wylde from Man Uni Kickboxing. In one academic year alone, Laura has achieved her black belt, won the world championships and been nominated by Martial Arts illustrated magazine as ‘Fighter of the Year’. Of course the most important of these achievements is being selected as Way of the Warrior Manunion Sport’s Fighter of the Year (#WOTWMSFOTY).

From having watched a number of Laura’s fights, let me tell you, this is not someone you want to mess with. I was able to get Laura to agree to an interview and then I realised this could be quite intimidating. My imagination got the better of me and for a split second I must have looked like Danny Dyer on one of his outlandish documentaries on Dave. Thankfully Laura was really pleasant and I was available to avoid a sparring challenge! Let the questions commence...

When did you start kickboxing and why?

I started kickboxing four and half years ago. I wanted to train in a martial art and it’s also a great way to keep fit especially with the lazy student lifestyle!

What has kept you so enthusiastic over the years?

At the university club and across the rest of NWCKB we have some fantastic instructors who do a great job keeping the lessons varied and interesting. It’s hard not to stay enthusiastic!

Would you describe anyone as a personal mentor?

Ha that’s an easy one! Like most people at the university club, Lee Waters was one of my first instructors. When I said I wanted to fight he supported me all the way.

He’s given me hours of his spare time improving my fitness and building up my skills. Like a true coach he is always there to keep me on track when I’m struggling or if I reach for a slice of pizza!

Describe what the different achievements for you this year have been like? Which was the most important to you?

Winning the world championships was unbelievable. It had been a tough year training through injuries and I was over the moon when I

won! The MAI award is a complete honour. I’ve had a relatively short fighting career so far compared to many on the circuit. But to be recognised by my chief instructor and MAI is fantastic and makes me even more dedicated to my upcoming tournaments.

However neither of these match getting my black belt. For me it wasn’t just about getting the belt but proving that I was a true martial artist. The sporting aspect is just one part of what we do - in the black belt grading you are tested for fitness, strength, technique and most of all your mental determination to keep going when you have nothing left. I still have a massive grin every time I put it on at the start of class!

What do your achievements mean to the Man Uni Kickboxing club, particularly for prospective members?

You would have to ask them! I hope others at the club can share my experiences. It was great bringing home my world medals to the club and I hope it can inspire fellow students to work hard at training, whatever their goals. We were all there at the beginning where we couldn’t manage our sit ups or press ups. I hope I can show that success isn’t all about natural ability - it’s about hard graft!

By Seamus Soal

Students’ Union Awards 2014 Nominations are now open for the 2014 Students’ Union Awards. We’ll be awarding all of the awesome work done by our students over the past year, so nominate your favourite group, society, project or student by visiting the Students’ Union website.

Nominations close at midday on 11 April.

www.manchesterstudentsunion.com/unionawards

SPORT : 30

ISSUE 20/ 1st April 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM

Salford steamroll to varsity win Manchester out-muscled 27-10 by local rivals Tom Dowler Sports Editor

The University of Manchester took on the University of Salford at the AJ Bell stadium in Salford in the highlyanticipated Rugby League varsity match last Monday. Having beaten their rivals in the regular league season 24-18, hopes were high of an away victory which would have stopped Salford claiming their fourth Rugby League varsity victory in succession. However, Manchester were overpowered 27-10 on a bitterly cold evening in front of a crowd of just under 500.

Right from the off, Salford piled the pressure on the visitors, with early trips into Manchester’s territory looking dangerous as they powered their big ball carriers down the middle channel. The early exchanges saw some ferocious collisions, with both sides initially struggling to hold on to the ball in contact. After working some excellent phases together, the Salford dummy-half put a cross kick out wide, however, the Salford winger was hauled into touch by scrambling defence.

It was then Manchester’s turn to turn the screw after an excellent kick to the corner. However, a 40-metre break immediately set Salford back on track. They looked in for a clear try on the left hand side, but excellent last-ditch defence brought them down short and they flung an offload infield to no avail.

Manchester looked to respond immediately, with a huge break of their own, but another desperate tackle just edged a Manchester speedster into touch.

Salford opened the scoring after their gargantuan forward Samir Tahraoui crashed over from short range after taking a penalty quickly. His quick-thinking caught the Manchester defence napping and the sucker-punch score was a shocking start for the visitors. The conversion from the right hand touchline fell wide, but Salford held the early 4-0 lead.

Missed tackles began to cost Manchester dearly as another massive surge up field from the hosts caused Chris Bates’ sides real problems. After a few well-executed phases, Chris Higgins barged his way over to double the reigning varsity champions’ score. The place kicker dragged his second conversion attempt horribly wide,

UMRLFC Captain Chris Bates’ thoughts

Manchester defended with heart, but Salford powered to a 27-10 varsity victory.

Photo: Richard Meftah.

but Salford held a promising 8-0 lead.

Manchester needed a quick response after leaking two weak tries in succession. However, a clever peel off from the back of the scrum by the Salford half back

saw Alex Davidson scramble his way over for his side’s third score.

The try scorer added the simple conversion from just outside the right hand upright to extend Salford’s Lead to 14-0.

With Manchester in the wilderness

A second half comeback couldn’t keep Salford at bay.

Photo: Richard Meftah.

“I was really proud of the lads for putting their bodies on the line, the difference in the two sides is that they have players who are paid to play rugby league at super league and championship level coming off the bench, we have players who are playing their 10th game of rugby league ever. We’ve some pretty broken bodies in the squad

and yet to get a grip on the game, halfback Davidson spotted an opportunity to slot an easy drop goal to add one point for his side and to keep the pressure on the visitors. At this stage, Salford were cruising at 15-0, with the BUCS League champions a shadow of their former selves.

At times like these, you need a captain’s performance and it was the skipper, Chris Bates, who managed to power his way over from short range to open the Manchester account. Matt Macintosh added the conversion from under the posts and the half time whistle blew with Salford in the lead 15-6. This was a crucial score for Manchester, and it gave the away side a foothold back in the game. For much of the first half Manchester had looked vulnerable to Salford’s bulldozing loose forwards.

The second half started with Manchester needing a big 40 minutes and they got off to a perfect start. They seemed to knock the ball on, which made the Salford defence switch off. However, Olly Thomas stormed down the left hand wing to score the visitors’ second try, with the referee judging that the ball had gone backwards to the dismay of the Salford faithful. Macintosh drilled the conversion effort low

now and that speaks volumes for the effort we put in.”

“The first half was horrendous, we had no ball, and zero field position, our game management was awful, and that was a position we put ourselves in.”

“Getting a score before half time was probably more than we deserved, but we

and hard into the wind, but it fell just short. Despite this, his side had closed the gap to just five points: Salford 15 Manchester 10.

Soon Salford began to tear the visitors apart, and they looked to be in for an easy try with a three-onone, but they blew the opportunity and a last ditch Manchester tackle stopped a simple scoring chance.

From the next phase, Salford were held up on the line. On this occasion, brave defence kept the dynamic Salford charge at bay.

This gave Manchester an opportunity to work their way up field however, they failed to release quickly enough and were penalised, giving Davidson, who was having an off day with the boot a chance to increase the hosts’ lead. He split the uprights with ease from 30-metres out to take Salford’s lead to 7 points.

Salford led 17-10 with 12 minutes left.

Shortly afterwards, Salford scored a sucker punch try to dampen hopes of a Manchester comeback.

Will Evans scored for Salford after Tahrauoi (the Zlatan Ibrahimovic lookalike) made a scything 20-metre break, he looked to have spoilt the scoring opportunity, but he bounced off a tackle and offloaded to Evans close out the game. The conversion attempt was struck poorly and drifted wide, however, Salford led Manchester by 21-10.

It wasn’t an easy day for the Manchester defence, and while the tackling was not up to normal standards, the whole team put in an excellent effort. Bodies were cramping all over the pitch, but Salford had too much left in the tank, while Manchester were running on empty. Salford put the final nail in the coffin with a powerful run through the heart of the Manchester defence and the easy conversion ended proceedings, giving the hosts a convincing 27-10 victory. It was their fourth varsity victory in a row, with the result never really in doubt after a phenomenal first half performance, in which several opportunities were left out on the field.

Manchester were simply out powered and outclassed on the evening. The league victory is perhaps some consolation, however, the visitors will feel bitterly disappointed to have lost to their biggest rivals.

found a way to drag ourselves back into it.”

“I thought we kicked on in the second half and made it a contest.”

“It’s been a fantastic season, I wouldn’t swap our league win for a win on Monday, it’s a shame we didn’t do ourselves justice, but UMRLFC is in a strong position for next year, and we’ll kick on.”

SPORT : 31

ISSUE 20/ 1st April 2014 WWW.MANCUNION.COM/

Congratulations to our Cue Sports UMPSC were comprehensive winners in the Cue Sports competition, held at the Northern Snooker Centre. Competing in the disciplines of both 8-ball and 9-ball pool, Manchester overcame early leaders Liverpool to emerge victorious. In doing so, Manchester maintained their impressive unbeaten record in Christie competition.

The final results were Manchester 61, Liverpool 51 and Leeds 25. Despite a strong performance all round, Dong Ming Lau and Jacob Roberts were especially prolific on the day, winning 11 and 10 of their 12 games respectively. Fans’ favourite Stephen Patterson was a close third, with Craig Timmis, Navid Ahmed, Daniel Simons and Dan Slane Tan also performing strongly on the day.

Badminton

Manchester’s badminton team tasted victory in the Christie cup after an afternoon of excellent displays from both the men’s and women’s teams in the Edge sports centre. Led by club captain James Kee the men’s first and second teams managed to secure first place overall to help in the push for superiority on Wednesday afternoon.

Excellent performances from Ben Dolman, Andrew Hawkes and the captain himself in their matches provided the perfect base for the teams to cruise to victory. Not to be completely undone, the woman played their part, placing second in the standings and making sure it would be Manchester bringing home the badminton bragging rights for 2014.

Table Tennis

Swimming Gala The University of Manchester’s swimming team mirrored last year’s impressive performance by securing an early win for Manchester’s Christie Cup 2014 campaign.

Manchester ruled the waves in the swimming gala, winning the majority of races on their way to glory.

Leading the charge were the 1st team men.

Consisting of Ben Rust, James Gayland, Matt Watkinson, Daniel Mills and Laurence Gummerson.

In 12 races, they won eight and finished in 2nd place four times to round off a completely dominant display.

However, Manchester women did even better, winning 11 out of 12 races. The 1st team women included Ella Abelehkoob, Orla McCarthy, Jess Powell, Becky Whaling and Yasmin Bithrey.

Abelehkoob notably swam a personal best in the 100m backstroke to cap an overall fantastic team result.

Indoor Cricket

Not many of Manchester’s victorious Christie cup teams could boast as impressive a victory as the Men’s Cricket club.

Led by 1st team captain Tom Atkinson, the team ran out winners in both their matches, played at Headingley indoor cricket centre. In the first game the match was clinched in the final over against the hosts, with Adam Rodgers leading a fierce Manchester bowling attack. The second match was a more convincing victory against Liverpool, helped along by two reaction catches from Dave Phillips and a commendable batting performance from Joe Button, the cricket team returned to Manchester after enjoying a successful day out in Yorkshire.

Team: Atkinson, Phillips, Rogers, Button, Wells, Lewis.

Manchester Christie Champions

The men’s table tennis team were also winners at Leeds’ Cromer.

After a very comprehensive 15-2 victory over Leeds in their first game, the team were given a far sterner test in their second game against Liverpool.

In a thrilling encounter, Manchester eventually took the match 9-8 to secure Christie victory.

Each match consisted of 16 singles matches and one game of doubles. Each of the four players played every member of the opposition in singles, in a best of three sets match. The Manchester team was made up of Adam Choi, German Chaparro, Noah Tang and Robert Shrimpton.

Rowing Before the excitement of the main Christie cup day on Wednesday a few sports had their results tied up in the weeks beforehand. One of these was rowing, with both the men and women’s quadruple scull teams results being taken from a time trial rowing event taking place at Runcorn head two weeks ago.

The women’s quad came out of the event with a respectful second place just being pipped to the post in the time trial competition. The men’s team went one better and successfully fended off the Leeds and Liverpool crews to do their bit to helping Manchester retain the trophy for a second year.

winners!

Sailing

Sailing were another Manchester club to dominate in Leeds.

Despite Liverpool failing to turn up for the event, the competition went ahead as expected with 11 races being contested at Leeds’ West Riding Sailing Club.

Six competitors took to the water for Manchester, with two racing in each boat. Of the eleven races contested, the visitors emerged victorious in 10, with the home side claiming victory only once, ensuring that Manchester claimed victory with consummate ease. In the Manchester team were captain Lucy Storey, Mike Moruzzi, Chris Mclaughlin, Ruth Berkley, Mabel Lim and Iona Deacon.

Trampolining Manchester’s Trampolining club smashed their Christie cup rivals a week before the competition took places taking 8 out of the 18 available medal places. Manchester took two gold medals in the competition, starting in the Uber category with Captain Ruth Shevelen comfortably overcoming her competition. Katy Phips also took first place in the Novice category.

Manchester took four silvers on the day as well with Chris Lunt taking second place in the Uber category, Jemma Cammish in Novice, Tilly Hall in intermediate and Nick Weise in the advanced. Matty Bradley took a bronze in Uber and Sam Humphrey also finished third in his respective category.

Congratulations also to Badminton men’s 2nds, Football women’s 2nds, Hockey women’s 1sts, Rugby Union men’s 2nds, Rugby Union women’s 1sts, Ultimate Frisbee men’s 1sts, Volleyball men’s 1sts and Golf, who also won their respective events!

SPORT

1st April 2014/ ISSUE 20 FREE

MANCHESTER’S STUDENT NEWSPAPER

Way of the Warrior

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Rugby League Varsity

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: @Mancunion_Sport : /TheMancunion

Christie round-up

WWW.MANCUNION.COM

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Christie Cupset

Hosts Leeds end Manchester’s two year Christie reign

Manchester narrowly lost out to Leeds in the 2014 Christie cup.

Source: Tyron Louw

Thomas Turner Sport Editor The University of Leeds narrowly edged out Christie cup holders Manchester in the competition’s 128th year - regaining the title for the first time since 2011.

Despite a valiant effort from Manchester, they agonisingly fell just 10.5 points short of the hosts, on a day where 39 teams from 17 sports vied for glory in Yorkshire.

Regardless of the overall loss it was still a proud day for those in purple, as just short of 20 teams emerged victorious in their respective disciplines.

Several events had already taken place prior to the main event on Wednesday, with wins already recorded for both the Sailing and Trampolining clubs. The victory for trampolining capped an impressive few months, after another fantastic performance at the BUCS

championships in February.

Manchester too got off to a bright start on Wednesday, performing superbly to take first place in the swimming gala at The Edge.

While victories were roughly split between Manchester and Leeds throughout the day, Manchester failed to take first place in many of the sports which they have excelled in throughout the year.

In truth, Manchester’s failure to retain the trophy may well have

been due in part to the success of so many of their teams elsewhere.

Teams including Netball, Rugby League and women’s table tennis all fielded weakened teams due to commitments elsewhere.

Netball first team were competing in the BUCS final at Surrey sports park, women’s table tennis had too competed elsewhere this week, and the men’s Rugby League had competed in their varsity just two days prior to the event.

Nonetheless, there were upteen reasons to be purple and proud - not least for Cue Sports who maintained their unbeaten record in Christie competition.

Despite the disappointment on the day, Manchester will undoubtedly be eager to regain the trophy next year in Liverpool.

And given the success of so many of our sports teams over the course of this year, few will bet against them.