Term 2, Issue 4

www.badgeronline.co.uk Scan to find us online

BADGER

THE OFFICIAL NEWSPAPER OF THE STUDENTS’ UNION

THE

@TheBadgerNews /thebadger.ussu

Features

Comment

Lunar New Year 2015: Year of the sheep

learning to drive, and what happens if you eventually pass Page 11

Page 8

PRINTED ON RECYCLED PAPER

FREE

23 February, Week 6

NEWS Science

Arts

Sports

De-extinction: A recipe SICK! Festival review for resurrection

An interview with Grime blogger The Levels Are Very High Page Page14 3

We interview England U20 rugby captain James Chisholm Page 20

13 Page 12

Fossil Fuel petition handed to University Students and campaigners gather at University for ‘Global Divestment Day’

Caroline Lucas says: “Sussex can be at the forefront of a global movement” Daniel Green News Sub-Editor Over 50 students braved treacherous conditions to protest against the University of Sussex’s investment in fossil fuels. The event, organised by the ‘Fossil Free Sussex’ campaign, coincided with protests across the world as part of ‘Global Divestment Day’.

The campaign, which has attracted almost 850 signatures in an online petition, aims to force the University to divest from the fossil fuel industry and reinvest in renewable energy sources. Fossil Free Sussex claim that the University of Sussex may have as much as £400,000 invested in the coal, oil and gas industry.

The event, which took place on Friday 13th, consisted of a ‘critical mass’ of bikes cycling around campus, followed by a series of talks, culminating

in a handover of the petition to the University’s Registrar John Duffy.

Brighton Pavilion MP Caroline Lucas, an active supporter of the divestment campaign since its inception, attended the demonstrations, saying: “I am so proud and happy that Sussex University are taking such a key and leading role in the campaign that says we need to divest our pension funds and endowment funds from the fossil fuel companies. If we are serious about tackling climate change, then we know we need to leave the majority of fossil fuels in the ground.

She added that: “Sussex can be at the forefront of a global movement. It is an amazing opportunity for the authorities at Sussex to recognise that one of the best reasons to attract people to such a great university would be to demonstrate that they put their beliefs into action, and what better way

to do that than to divest funds from fossil fuels today.”

Earlier this month, Ms Lucas tabled an Early Day motion in Parliament, calling for the Government to divest pension funds from fossil fuels.

Jack Miller, campaign co-ordinator of Fossil Free Sussex, said: “What began this time last year as four or five students meeting once a month or so has become a widely-known campaign across campus, with students, faculty and alumni supporting us.”

He added: “The event went much better than expected! We were dreading the worst when the heavens opened just an hour prior, but more and more cyclists kept turning up to Library Square, and we were pleasantly surprised by how many came on foot too. It just goes to show how many people actually think that this is important.”

Peter Newell, a professor in International Relations, expressed his support for the campaign, saying: “Sussex University invests in several endowment funds, which in turn invest on the University’s behalf in a whole range of different industries and sectors, some of which are fossil fuels. Our starting point is that Sussex has a reputation for being a green university, for hosting lots of world class research on sustainability issues, and yet there is this hypocrisy at the heart of this where they are continuing to invest in fossil fuels, which are driving climate change.”

In a statement, a University spokesperson said: “Our investments are managed on behalf of our governing body (Council) through our Finance and Investments Committee.

Our committees are required to have regard to charity law in the manage-

ment of our investments.”

The protest comes after the University of Sussex scored 0 for ethical investment in an annual survey by People and Planet into the ethical and environmental policies of universities.

Daniel Greenberg, Students’ Union Operations Officer, said: “‘I was really impressed with the amount of students who came to get involved in Divestment Day. Fossil Free Sussex did an incredible job organising, and I hope this demonstrates to university management how important this issue is, and how strongly students feel about it.’

The Fossil Free movement was launched in 2012 in the United States, with hundreds of divestment schemes taking place at universities, cities and religious institutions across the Western world.

European Universities to be introduced to UCAS admissions

Charlie Thompson

Daniel Green

Universities from across the European Union will be now be able to apply to join UCAS’s admissions system, meaning thousands of UK students can apply to study in continental universities through the application management service.

UCAS confirmed last week that it had changed its rules so that students can make applications to any university that successfully applies to join the admission service.

Previous to the change, students interested in studying at European higher education institutions had to apply to each institution directly.

European universities will have to “demonstrate that they meet equivalent standards to those in the UK” in order for their application to join the

admissions service to be successful, according to the UCAS spokesperson.

The spokesperson added: “The inclusion of a wider range of higher education providers in the UCAS system offers students more choice about where and what to study,” said the spokesman for the admissions service.”

It is understood that each European institution must pay a joining for of approximately £25,000 UCAS did not disclose which universities have so far applied to be part of their system but Maastricht University in the Netherlands has previously made statements that it would be interested in joining the UCAS system if the opportunity arose.

Approximately 30,000 UK students are year travel abroad to pursue an undergraduate degree.

the badger

23 february 2015

in pictures • 2

IN PICTURES From dusk to dawn around Brighton

Marina Costin

Daniel Hadley

Kirsty Chan

Editor-in-Chief Deborah Batchelor badger@sussexstudent.com

Sports Editor Joe Cummins josephcummins.sportseditor@ gmail.com

News Editor Jack Williams Comment Editor Victoria Farley Tech/Science/Features Editor Jordan Ellis Arts Editor Tom Powell Head of Publicity Lili Pammer-Zagroczky

News Sub Editors Daniel Green, Zoe Halse, Alex Ferguson, Rosie Dodds,Jess Pitocchi badger-news@ussu.sussex.ac.uk Comment Sub Editors Miriam Steiner, Alice Nettleship badger-opinion@ussu.sussex. ac.uk

Darren Baskill

Letters Sub Editor

Arts Sub Editors

Publicity Coordinator

Louis Patel badger-letters@ussu.sussex.ac.uk

Victoria O’Donnell, Ioana Matei, Raymond Jennings, Lily Cooper, Lottie Brazier badger-arts@ussu.sussex.ac.uk

Lenart Celar badger-publicity@ussu.sussex.ac.uk

Tech Sub Editor

Online Editors Steve Barker, Pete Humphreys

Connor Cochrane badger-tech@ussu.sussex.ac.uk

Sports Sub Editor

Features Sub Editor

Vladislav Hristov Grozev

Ryan Bourne

badger-sports@ussu.sussex.ac.uk

badger-features@ussu.sussex. ac.uk

Photo Editors

Science Sub Editor

Nelly Tookey, Sophie Jones

Jade Groves badger-science@ussu.sussex.ac.uk

thebadgerphotography@gmail.com

badger-online@ussu.sussex.ac.uk Media Development Officer Paul Millar mediadevelopment@sussexstudent. com Communications Officer Michael Segalov communications@sussexstudent.com

the badger

23 February 2015

NEWS • 3

Concerns raised over Union poll question Pete Humphreys Digital Sub-Editor An online poll on whether the Students’ Union should invite smaller political parties to their QuestionTime style election debates has been criticised for being “too confusing”.

Following a Union executive meeting on Friday 13 February, it was announced that they would initiate a non-binding poll on whether to uphold the 5 percent threshold of the popular vote gained by parties at the last general election, which would mean that the invitation to participate in the Question-Time event would not be extended to parties such as UKIP. However, some students have raised concerns that the poll’s question isn’t properly worded.

A third year History and Politics student said: “This impromptu and grammatically incorrect survey is just another way of the Students’ Union trying to confuse students and get their way on this issue.”

The question asked ‘Should the Students’ Union uphold the current threshold of 5% of the popular vote from the 2010 General Election in the Brighton Pavilion Constituency to be invited to the Candidates Question Time Event in March 2015?’

One student, who wanted smaller parties to be represented, contacted The Badger to say that he accidentally voted ‘yes’ due to the poorly phrased question.

Another student told The Badger: “The question is simply too confus-

Jack Williams ing; it just doesn’t make sense.

“People should vote no to let freedom of speech win the day and let the Union see what you want.”

The poll was a response to complaints from some students that the debates were unfair as, uninvited UKIP candidate, Nigel Carter, is expected to perform better at the election than Lib-Dem Chris Bowers (according Lord Ashcroft’s December 2014 opinion poll).

Most of the debate has centred

around the inclusion of UKIP, however the online poll asked students to choose between upholding the status quo or inviting all candidates standing. The was no option of a fiveway event, involving: Conservative, Green, Labour, Lib-Dem and UKIP candidates.

Michael Segalov, Students’ Union Communications Officer, said: “This opinion poll was drafted at short notice to ensure that students had an opportunity to have their say on the

format for the question time event.

This was done through the correct democratic process and in conjunction with the Politics Society.

“We always encourage students to be part of our democratic channels.

Policies can be made by students submitting petitions on our new website and if any students wish to do this, they are free to come and speak to me at any time. We hope to have the results of this poll by today (Monday) and will do all we can to ensure that

the results are communicated successfully and broadly to the student body in time for the question time event in March.”

In a statement on their website, the Students’ Union said: “We would encourage all students to vote on this matter, as [the] Executive Committee would hope that at least 450 students will take part”.

The vote closed on Thursday 19 January. Check badgeronline.co.uk for the results.

Chartwells contract tribunal result expected in March Phoebe Day The verdict of a court case over the University’s refusal to release the unredacted version of its contract with Chartwells is to be announced in March.

The University of Sussex were called to the tribunal following its failure to release the full Chartwells contract following a freedom of information request by a former Sussex student.

The request filed by former Politics and International Relations student

Gabriel Webber, called for the release of the contract of Chartwells, an outside company the University employs to provide catering.

The request was sent in September 2013. After several rejected requests the University finally released sections of the contract in February 2014, however, many sections were missing.

The University claimed this was because the information under those sections were commercially sensitive, offering data that could aid rivals of the company.

A Tribunal panel was assembled for

the University and Webber to assert their reasons for releasing or detaining the contract, and has been in progress since January 2015.

Gabriel Webber commented on the tribunal’s progress: “some of the University’s arguments were clearly against FOI case law (previous Tribunal decisions) and I suspect they were hoping that I, as a poor non-legallytrained student, wouldn’t notice an wouldn’t be able to mount a counter argument.”

“I think it’s also worth noting the enormous amount of money being

spent by the University on lawyers at the moment: they’re appealing this, the planning decision about the Masterplan, they fought the OIA report into the Sussex Five discipline.

There’s a lot of very speculative and very dubious spending on legal advice and one wonders whether there is really nothing better they could do with the money.”

The University wished not to comment as “the commercial aspects of this contract are the subject of an ongoing Freedom of Information request and it would not be appropriate for us

to comment while this request is still under consideration.”

The University works with many outside contractors, and asserts it has “a long tradition of engaging with business and the community.”

Chartwells as a company is based in Surrey, and only expanded to east Sussex in 2013 following a £28m contract with east Sussex county council.

Chartwells has only provided catering to the University since 2013, a decision met with some objection over “associations with corruption in defrauding UN peacekeeping operations.”

University defends Farthing taking seat at NUCB Pete Humphreys Digital Sub-Editor University of Sussex Vice Chancellor, Professor Michael Farthing, has joined campus contractors Balfour Beatty and Compass Group on the Leadership Council of the ‘National Centre for Universities and Business’ (NUCB). He took up his seat in December 2014.

The Leadership Council is formed of 52 Vice-Chancellors and over 40 senior business leaders. It describes itself as “a powerful networking body”.

Michael Farthing will receive invitations to ‘Chatham House style meet-

ings’, as a member of the group. The Chatham House Rule says that Participants are free to use information discussed during a meeting but nothing should be done to identify who said what.

The NCUB Leadership council includes representatives from Balfour Beatty and The Compass Group.

Balfour Beatty are the preferred bidder for the £120 million redevelopment of the East Slope Residences and the only construction group represented on the NUCB Leadership Council. The 2000 bedroom accommodation project will also include a new Students’ Union building. Both

buildings will be managed by Balfour Beatty for the next 50 years.

The Compass Group have been running campus catering and conference facilities since being awarded the £43 million contract in August 2013 and will be running these services for at least ten years. They are the only catering firm represented on the NUCB Leadership Council.

According to the NUCB website: “The Leadership Council establishes the priorities for university-business collaboration. By bringing together expertise from every single part of the UK and a range of economic sectors the Leadership Council can iden-

tify the challenges at the interface between universities and business and how to work together on them.

Sussex student, ‘Free Education’ campaign member and NUS delegate candidate Max Odonnell-savage said: “This clearly shows the ever increasing marketisation of our education system, the same marketisation that says students should pay fees and the same marketisation that says staff should be outsourced and their working conditions worsened in the pursuit of creating more profit at any cost.

“It is quite fitting as university managers are not part of the university community. They are, in fact, disliked

by it. They have far more in common with ultra wealthy exploitative business leaders than with students or staff at a university.”

A University of Sussex spokesperson said: “Sussex’s membership of the NCUB is about the University engaging with the outside world to the benefit of our students, in particular with regard to their future employability.

“Member organisations such as the NCUB allow us to talk with businesses and other organisations in order to establish and strengthen our links and partnerships.”

the badger

23 February 2015

NEWS • 4

Israeli Apartheid week 2015 Jess Sankey From the 23rd to 27th of February, Sussex Friends of Palestine are hosting Israeli Apartheid week. There will be a series of talks, a film and a planning meeting that all aim to spread awareness of the situation in Palestine, a land and people oppressed by apartheid.

Since its creation in 1948, the Israeli state has implemented brutal policies of apartheid against the people of Palestine. Last Summer’s Operation Protective Edge is a tragic example of this.

More than 2,100 Palestinians were murdered during Israel’s ruthless bombing campaign, 86% of those were civilians.

There are around 6.5 million Palestinian refugees today. They are forbidden the right of return. Since 1967 there has been an estimated 27,000 demolitions of Palestinian structures, usually under the pretext of Israeli national security.

These demolitions are illegal under international law and carried out with no support for the families evicted. This creates a climate of fear that Palestinians live in constantly. That they may lose their homes, their livelihoods and their lives, all because of their ethnicity.

The Israeli army, government and media push the false justification that their policies are security against Palestinian terrorism. This is not so. By demonizing Palestinians, Israel can subject Palestin-

ians to daily violence and humiliation without being held accountable internationally. This process of ethnic cleansing is apartheid.

If you are anti-racist, pro justice and peace and want to understand more about the history and current situation in Israel and Palestine, come along to the events (as listed below) happening next week.

Monday, Fulton A at 6pm – Neoliberalism and Israeli Apartheid Toufic Haddad, a Palestinian American writer, is giving a talk on the .impact neoliberalism has on state-building in the Occupied Palestinian territories. He argues that Israeli apartheid has been consolidated through the creation of a Palestinian capitalist class with interests tied to those of Israeli and national capital.

Tuesday, Fulton A at 6.30pm – Gaza Under Seige Malaka Mohammad, a Palestinian Activist from Gaza, is giving a talk about the siege on Gaza, with focus on the massacre there this summer. She will also show a personal perspective of how apartheid affects education, discussing the difficulties she faced getting the UK to study.

Wednesday, Fulton 203 at 3pm – 5 Broken Cameras Film screening of 5 broken cameras, filmed almost entirely by Palestinian farmer Emad Burnat. This award win-

www.palestinecampaign.org ning documentary is a first hand account of protests in Bil’in, a Palestinian village suffering the effects of Israel’s apartheid, where the bulldozing of the village’s olive groves cut off 60% of their farmland to make way for a separation wall.

Thursday, Arts A103 at 6pm – Peace and Pacification Peace and pacification - Dr Abdel Razzaq Takriti is a Palestinian lecturer in International History at the University of Sheffield who argues that the alluring

rhetoric of ‘peace’ is used by the privileged and powerful to demand that the oppressed and marginalised give up their rights, in particular in the case of Palestine.

After Abed’s talk Michael Deas - the European coordinator with the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) National Committee, the Palestinian civil society coalition that acts as the Palestinian reference of the BDS movement, will launch the Friends of Pales-

tine Society’s new BDS campaign.

Friday, Falmer House Meeting room 1, at 11am – Planning meeting for future action If Israeli Apartheid Week has inspired you to take action in solidarity with the Palestinians, come to a meeting to discuss and organise effective actions that we can take locally as part of the BDS (boycott, divestment and Sanctions) movement, both on campus and in Brighton.

Final decision on year abroad marks due Jack Williams and Rosie Dodds News Editor and News Sub-Editor

The University are expected to confirm this week that they will no longer penalise students returning from a year abroad by reducing their marks.

The Students’ Union Education Officer, Bethan Hunt has previously lobbied for the University to end the practise of deducing marks for some students that have returned from a year abroad.

The Students’ Union announced on their website two weeks ago that the reductions will no longer take place.

Bethan Hunt, Students’ Union Education Officer: “This is a really positive change. Many students expressed their concern that this would have negative impacts on their final degree classification, I am glad that this worry has been removed.

“I also hope that the change encourages more students to experience the fantastic opportunity of study abroad”.

Bethan Hunt is due to meet Pro Vice-Chancellor Clare Mackie today to discuss the move.

Maths students had contacted the Students’ Union with the issue that the results they had achieved whist studying abroad had been reduced by 10 marks upon returning to the University of Sussex.

The deductions were made due to apparent differences between the difficulty of study at the University of Sussex and institutions abroad.

The University has said that they intended to move away from nonlinear reductions.

A University spokesperson has said: “The University Teaching and Learning Committee (UTLC) has been advised that the method to convert marks is under review; a workshop is being held this month and the academic leads on study abroad from each school have been invited to take part, together with the USSU Education Officer.

“We cannot remove marks conversion but are considering a proposal to remove non-linear scaling- that is taking 5% off an 80% result and 10% off a 50% result in an attempt to recalibrate the mark prior to classifying degrees.

“Any decision taken on the conversion charts will be applied at no detriment to individual students, so that no student will lose out when planned changes are introduced.

“We cannot state that marks will never be reduced in future, as some conventions give students a B and 80% mark, which we need to calibrate to Sussex marking. However, we hope to be able to remove non-linear scaling.”

Ella Gordon, a second year American studies student has commented: “I hope that they move passes as I am taking a year abroad next year. I don’t want to be worrying that my marks may change on the basis that the university I have chosen isn’t good enough for Sussex’s standards.”

Abraham Baldry President As temporary residents of the UK, why should international students care about or engage with UK politics? Students, and young people in general, are often cast as apathetic and disengaged with the political process. Fortunately, if my experience of being president of the Students’ Union at the Sussex is anything to go by, the idea that international students don’t care about democracy is wholly misplaced.

We find that where international students are able to engage with the democratic process, they do so. Students from over 90 countries voted in the Sussex Student Union elections, 45% of whom were from countries other than the UK, reflecting the University’s international profile.

Interestingly, students from China were the second most prolific voters, after those from the UK, suggesting that coming from a country without a tradition of voting is not a barrier to getting involved with democracy.

Not only do international students vote, but they also stand for election, such as Shikhar Shrivastava, the elected Community Engagement officer at the Students’ Union. Shikhar, an Indian national, works to foster

good relations between students and the local community, and is also a member of the executive committee, which steers the organisation which represents the interests of the 14,000 who study at the University of Sussex.

While international students are great with engaging with democracy at a students union level, many are unaware that they are able to participate in UK elections as well.

Students from the Commonwealth, the Republic of Ireland, Cyprus, and Malta have the right to vote in everything that UK citizens can, and students from any country can vote in the local elections. Ree Haggarty, from Bite The Ballot, a not-for-profit which seeks to empower young voters describes the system of who can and can’t vote as ‘really confusing’, and says that most international students ‘aren’t aware of their voting rights’.

At the same time, changes in voter registration law have made it harder for them to do so. Students living in university halls are no longer automatically added to the electoral roll as they used to be, and those who move house frequently are also often caught out. Not having a National Insurance number creates further difficulties.

Despite the many barriers facing international students to participating, they do intend to turn out to vote. Goke Adeboye, a third year law student at the University of Sussex who intends to vote in May was prompted to action by the recent rise in anti-immigration rhetoric, which he describes as ‘destructive and short sighted’.

Shreya Paudel, the NUS’s International Students Officer, echoes this sentiment, describing commonwealth students’ ability to vote in the general election as ‘a golden opportunity to be heard and bring international students’ concerns into mainstream UK politics.’

He continues “International students are being made to pay for healthcare, something unprecedented in the history of the NHS.” Paudel implores Commonwealth students and those from the Republic of Ireland ‘to use the power of voting to encourage those in the election who are pro-immigration and prointernational students.’

I’m leading the Students’ Union’s campaign to register students ahead of the general election, so that students are not ignored by politicians. If you haven’t already registered to vote you can do so at https://www.gov.uk/register-to-vote.

the badger

23 February 2015

NEWS • 5

Students now eligible Cost of the new Royal Sussex County for more than one grant Hospital increases by £65million Zoë Halse News Sub-Editor University policy has changed meaning that students from September 2015 will be able to claim both the First Generation Scholar grant and the Sussex excellence scholarship.

Previously students have been forced to choose between the grant schemes, only being allowed to claim one in spite of potentially being eligible for both.

The Sussex Excellence Scholarship is awarded on a merit basis. The scholarship is designed to recognise and reward those undergraduates who achieve at the highest levels in they’re entry qualifications, be it an A level, BTEC or International Baccalaureate.

The award is worth £3,000 in your first year as an undergraduate. The amount can be split into a £1,000 cash award and £2,000 rent reduction- if you are living in university managed accommodation. Alternatively, if you are not living in university managed accommodation it can take the form of a £1000 cash award and a £2,000 tuition fee waiver.

The First Generation Scholar bursary is specifically for students paying £9,000 tuition fees. The financial component of the scheme consists of a £2000 fee waiver or a £2000 University accommodation rent waiver, plus an additional £1000 bursary paid directly to the student’s bank account.

Provided that students continue to meet the eligibility criteria, the £1,000 bursary will also be paid out each subsequent year.

Welfare Officer, Rianna Gargiulo commented: “I am extremely pleased that the University has agreed to allow students to get financial aid from both of these schemes simultaneously. This means that students from disadvantaged backgrounds will have even more of a reason to come to university, and will have even more financial aid whilst here, alleviating money worries and allowing them to focus on their studies.

A University of Sussex spokesperson commented: “the University has a clear and robust approach to scholarships in that students can only hold one at any time- this allows us to maximise the impact of scholarships.

“However, due to a change in government policy, which has removed the cap on student numbers, we have been able to respond to a suggestion from the Students’ Union that the Sussex Excellence Scholarship should be an exception.

“To make an exception for excellence is an argument that Students’ Union have convinced us is the right thing to do. This means that students should be allowed to hold the Sussex Excellence Scholarship together with one other scholarship. So students entering Sussex in 2015 will benefit from this change.”

Rosie Dodds News Sub-Editor It has been revealed that the cost of the redevelopment of the Royal Sussex County Hospital has increased by 15 percent in the last six years.

Originally, the cost of the redevelopment was set at £420m, but owing to a price rise in the building industry, the current figure has now mounted closer to £486m.

Full and final approval from the Treasury and the Department of Health for the project is yet to be given.

Building work is expected to start later this year, once approval for government funding is granted, however it is anticipated that the scheme could be delayed if an announcement is not made until after the general election in May. It is feared that costs could rise even higher if building work is delayed further.

The Royal Sussex County Hospital is already preparing for the redevelopment by temporarily relocating some services, patients, and staff.

The redevelopment will involve the demolition of the 19th century Barry and Jubilee buildings, replacing them with a new 12-storey building, an expanded cancer and neurosciences centre, an underground car park, and a new front entrance.

A helicopter pad will also be added

The Argus to the Kemp Tower to allow for quick treatment for critically ill patients.

The redevelopment will be carried out in three phases, creating hundreds of new jobs during and after the construction process.

A Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust spokesman has stated: “The original budget of £420m was first set in late 2009 and we had been able to maintain that level for a considerable period of time.

“The improvement in the general economic climate, which is reflected in the construction industry, has

meant that our reassessment of the capital cost is £486m.

“This reassessment is set out in the full business case submitted in October 2014.

“There has been no sudden change to the cost and no changes to the scope of the project since it received full planning consent in 2012.”

The final, multi-million budget for the redevelopment will be agreed when the full business case is approved by the Treasury.

Once approved, the redevelopment completion date has been aimed for winter 2023.

Lord Attenborough centre to be opened in September Jessica Pitocchi News Sub-Editor The revamped campus arts centre renamed in honour of former University of Sussex Chancellor Lord Richard Attenborough will open for the start of the 2014/15 academic year.

The former Gardner Arts Centre, situated next to the Library, has been closed since 2007 and is un-

dergoing the final stages of a multimillion pound refurbishment.

The Attenborough Centre for the Creative Arts (ACCA) will open to students in September 2015.

The University of Sussex said the aim for the “contemporary, interdisciplinary arts centre” is to become “an integral part of campus life.”

University of Sussex Vice-Chancellor Professor Michael Farthing said: “Our ambition is to see the

News in Brief Zoella moves to Brighton YouTube vlogger Zoella has splashed out on a £1 million mansion in Brighton.

The five-bedroom home boasts five ensuites, solid oak floors, a designer kitchen and a log cabin.

The viral teen sensation, who shot to fame after posting a series of fashion and beauty videos on YouTube from her bedroom, will share the house with boyfriend Alfie Deyes.

The pair have coined their property the ‘Zalfie Pad.’ She tweeted to her fans: “It has been a secret and this is the first time Alfie and I have lived together. ‘Moving house is stressful and time consuming. We have rooms full of boxes.”

Zoe Sugg, her real name, started vlogging on YouTube in 2007 and now has over 7 million subscribers.

Jessica Pitocchi

ACCA become a dynamic cultural focus for the University campus and wider community, providing a home for the creative arts and creativity in its widest sense and serving as a catalyst for innovation and learning.”

The ACCA will host conferences, workshops, exhibitions and screenings. It will also stage performances “using both traditional and cuttingedge new media.”

The University is currently looking to hire a creative director who would be responsible for developing the ACCA and building relationships between the University and the city of Brighton and Hove, as well as with wider national and international arts communities.

Lord Attenborough passed away last year and was the Chancellor of the University from March 1998 until he stood down following the

summer graduation ceremonies in July 2008. The renaming will also honour his daughter Jane, a Sussex alumnus, who died in the Boxing Day tsunami in 2004.

The building, which is Grade II* listed, has experienced expensive repairs over the past seven years.

The former name was honoured to local businessman Dr Lyddon Gardner who donated £175,000 to the centre when it opened in 1969.

of a place to study here at the University of St Andrews!”

But half an hour later, the University sent round a follow-up email apologising for the mix up.

The email read: “We’re very sorry that we wrongly sent an email to some of our Scottish applicants which may have given the impression that we had made a decision on their applications.”

mistaken students are. They believe the findings, which are published in the Journal of Neuroscience, provide a significant insight that will eventually assist teachers in the guidance they give their students’ learning by how confused they are.

The experiment involved tasking volunteers with playing the role of a teacher watching another volunteer play and react to a computer game.

The volunteer playing the role of the teacher would then observe whether the other volunteer’s decisions during the game were correct or not, while laying in an MRI scanner The lead author of the study, Matthew Apps, said: “This is a signal in the brain that tells us ‘That person is wrong about something.”

“For teachers, understanding what your students believe is a vital part of the teaching process, allowing meaningful and useful feedback to be provided.”

Shadow minister says he would love education to be free

Jessica Pitocchi

St Andrews sorry for ‘brutal’ false offer emails St Andrews University have apologised for their “brutal” technical error in which emails were sent to hundreds of students wrongly informing them they had been offered a place to study.

The offer email was intended for just a few students but was instead sent to 760 applicants.

It read: “Congratulations on your offer

Your seminar tutor can tell you’re confused Teachers use a part of the brain to detect when their students do not understand what is being taught to them, according to scientists.

Researchers from the Royal Holloway and the University of London have identified a region of the brain called the anterior cingulate cortex which picks up how

Jessica Pitocchi

Labour’s shadow universities minister, Liam Byrne, has said that he would love higher education to be free but has shied away from making any promises that were “not deliverable”.

His remarks, made to a group of Labour students a Kings College London, look to confirm that the Labour Party will not go further than pledging to reduce tuition fees to £6,000 in their manifesto for the upcoming general election.

Byrne, who served as Chief Secretary to the Treasury in Gordon Brown’s government from 2009 to 2010, said at the meeting: “Obviously I would love free education, but I’m not going to make a promise that is not deliverable.”

Jack Williams

Thursday Evenings from 5pm in Room 76.

(Falmer Back Bar).

Sit : Down Listen : to live music Talk : to your friends Drink : Craft beer, Coffee, Cocktails

NEW

Relax.

the badger

23 February 2015

FEATURE • 8

FEATURE

IQRemix via Flickr

MrT HK via Flickr

Lunar New Year 2015: the year of the sheep

Chloe Allibon provides a brief history of Lunar New Year, describing Chinese, Tibetan and Vietnamese traditions and celebrations.

Chloe Allibon On Thursday 19th February, Lunar New Year celebrations will begin, as we move from the year of the horse to the year of the sheep or goat.

Despite often being referred to as Chinese New Year, Lunar New Year is also (although not exhaustively) celebrated in Tibet, Nepal, Bhutan, Vietnam, Korea and Mongolia.

New Year celebrations are packed with legend and tradition and last for around fifteen days, starting each year on a new moon and lasting until the moon shines at its brightest.

According to legend, the Jade Emperor (or in some versions Buddha) asked all the animals to meet him on New Year’s Eve and only twelve showed up.

He therefore named a year after each one and proclaimed that people would share some characteristics with the animal of the year of their birth.

There are many stories regarding how they came to arrive in that order.

The animals are said to appear on the calendar in the same order they appeared to Buddha. Other stories often feature a race or the crossing of a river.

In these stories the rat’s place as the first animal is usually explained by the rat riding on the ox’s back, and then sneaking in front of it when they arrived to the Emperor/Buddha. The rat is also usually blamed for the absence of the cat, either through promising to wake the cat up and forgetting or through pushing the cat from the back of the ox into the river, causing it to arrive too late.

The tradition of lighting fireworks

for Lunar New Year is based upon a story about a monster travelling from village to village looking for food until it reached a village which had just lit a fire of bamboo. The fire scared away the monster, so people began lighting bamboo sticks to celebrate the New Year, moving on to fireworks over time.

The colour red is commonly worn during the celebrations to symbolise fire, and so to frighten away evil spirits and drive away bad luck.

People also celebrate by decorating with poems written on red paper and parents give children money in red envelopes which is believed to be lucky.

The fifteenth and final day of the New Year’s celebrations is the lantern festival. This involves people carrying lanterns, which are painted with pictures of animals, flowers, zodiac signs and scenes from legend/history in a parade under the full moon.

Lanterns are also hung in temples and around the house. A highlight of the lantern parade is the dragon dance, where a dragon made of silk, paper and bamboo is carried in the parade.

The Tibetan New Year festival is known as Losar and is celebrated in Nepal and Bhutan along with Tibet.

The main celebrations for Losar take place in the first three of the fifteen days.

On the first day, an alcoholic drink called ‘changkol’ is made from ‘chhaang’, a Tibetan drink similar to beer.

The second day is known as ‘gyalpo losar’, meaning King’s Losar. Losar

predates the lunisolar calendar and was originally celebrated at the winter solstice. However, the festival was moved to coincide with the Lunar New Year when the Chinese calendar was adopted in Tibet.

The Vietnamese New Year festival is known as ‘Tet’, short for ‘Tet Nguyen Dan’, which means ‘feast of the first morning of the first day’. It is usually celebrated on the same day as Chinese New Year, however some years it may differ slightly due to a one hour time difference resulting in the new moon being calculated differently.

The celebrations are seen to mark the beginning of Spring and it is traditional to visit paternal relatives on the first day, maternal relatives on the second and teachers on the third.

After this people visit other relatives, friends and neighbours and before the celebrations are over they burn offerings to their ancestors.

Lunar New Year is based on the Chinese lunisolar calendar which, unlike the Gregorian calendar, is based on the cycle of the moon as well as the earth’s cycle around the sun.

The Lunar New Year begins on the second new moon after the winter solstice. The lunisolar calendar is made up by twelve months of 29 or 30 days, and is adjusted to fit with the solar year through the addition of an extra month during Gregorian leap years.

Along with one of the twelve animals, each year is also assigned one of these five elements; metal, wood, water, fire and earth.

The five elements represent Venus, Jupiter, Mercury, Mars and Saturn

respectively. The combinations resulting from the twelve animals and the five elements result in a total of sixty combinations, so the lunisolar calendar operates on a sixty year cycle.

While the animal changes every year, the element changes every two years. According to Chinese zodiac beliefs, this cycle can be combined with yin and yang, a person’s date and time of birth, and the positions of the sun and moon to tell their future.

This Lunar New Year marks the beginning of Chinese year 4712: the year of the wooden sheep, and is predicted to be one of prosperity, luck and opportunity. Happy new year all!

What does your birthday say about you?

The Rat (Birthdays in 1912, 1924, 1936, 1948, 1960, 1972, 1984, 1996, 2008): Rats are intelligent, charming, social and forthright, but they can be selfish and somewhat ruthless.

The Ox (Birthdays in 1913, 1925, 1937, 1949, 1961, 1973, 1985, 1997, 2009): Oxen are sturdy, hardworking and dependable with a logical approach to problems, but they can by stubborn and inflexible at times.

The Tiger (Birthdays in 1914, 1926, 1938, 1950, 1962, 1974, 1986, 1998, 2010): Tigers are powerful, passionate, and good at making decisions on impulse, but they can sometimes be reckless and foolish.

The Rabbit (Birthdays in 1915, 1927, 1939, 1951, 1963, 1975, 1987, 1999, 2011): Rabbits are friendly, compassionate and artistic, but can be lazy and self-indulgent at times.

The Dragon (Birthdays in 1916, 1928, 1940, 1952, 1964, 1976, 1988, 2000, 2012): Dragons are generous and loyal and make good leaders, but can be demanding and arrogant.

The Snake (Birthdays in 1917, 1929, 1941, 1953, 1965, 1977, 1989, 2001, 2013): Snakes are wise, cautious and strong, but can be prone to self-doubt and loneliness.

The Horse (Birthdays in 1918, 1930, 1942, 1954, 1966, 1978, 1990, 2002, 2014): Horses are witty, perceptive and cheerful, but can also be gullible and anxious.

The Sheep/Goat (Birthdays in 1919, 1931, 1943, 1955, 1967, 1979, 1991, 2003, 2015): Sheep are sincere and determined and are the most creative animal. However, they can be prone to worrying and indecisiveness.

The Monkey (Birthdays in 1920, 1932, 1944, 1956, 1968, 1980, 1992, 2004, 2016): Monkeys are social, intellectual and self-assured, but can be manipulative and prone to jealousy.

The Rooster (Birthdays in 1921, 1933, 1945, 1957, 1969, 1981, 1993, 2005, 2017): Roosters are decisive, practical and organised, but can be abrasive and egotistical.

The Dog (Birthdays in 1922, 1934, 1946, 1958, 1970, 1982, 1994, 2006, 2018): Dogs are loyal, moralistic and affectionate, but can be judgemental and fretful.

The Pig (birthdays in 1923, 1935, 1947, 1959, 1971, 1983, 1995, 2007, 2019): Pigs are thoughtful, patient and intelligent, but can also be naïve and materialistic.

STUDENT TAXI 01273

20 40 60 205 205 www.brightoncitycabs.co.uk

Student fare deals apply and 10% discount on metered fares with student ID

GOOGLE PLAY

Simply scan the QR code for Brighton Taxis App

APPLE APP

the badger

23 FEBRUARY 2015

Comment • 10

COMMENT

Beck vs Beyoncé: Who really should have won that Grammy?

Jemada Cicely Okay, so the monumental question this week is, who should have won the Grammy for best album 2014 Beck or Beyoncé?

How do I begin to answer? Well, let’s see, how about I start and finish by saying, Beck. Yes, that’s sounds pretty fine to me.

You know, I watched a report the other month by Russia Today which highlighted, shall we call it, the dumbing down of music.

Russia Today revealed or, rather yet, reminded us that pop artists today lip sync and auto tune, preposterous right? Not exactly.

According to the report, the likes of Britney Spears, Justin Bieber, Celine Dion and Madonna have all been caught not performing live.

And yes, even the beloved bootylicuous Beyoncé is no exception.

In 2013 it was reported by numerous news outlets that the former Destiny’s Child member was indeed lip syncing the national anthem at President Obama’s inauguration.

I wonder why then, according to the Guardian article, she posted a photo of herself on Instagram several days earlier in the studio ‘rehearsing’ for the performance?

Now I am not saying we should burn her alive on a stake for her treachery, but we should take her off her pedestal once in a while; no one, not even the wondrous Elvis deserves to sit on such a high horse.

The reality is lip syncing and auto tune are becoming a norm for pop stars who either a) have no raw talent or b) are getting caught up with the ease of perfection.

Neither option is a plausible excuse.

Imperfections, especially in music, are necessary. They let us know it’s genuine. Bob Dylan is a clear cut example of this.

Unless your voice sounds like a bag of screeching cats, I don’t care if you don’t sound like a robotic angel.

But sadly, the strive for perfection is

transforming definitively the authenticity of the music industry today into an illusion.

Now really I don’t want to go all ‘dude, where’s the music gone to bra?’ on you, but this formulated, contrived commercial music is boring me to oblivion.

I believe the only time I will accept my ears to bear such music is when I am trapped at work in a confined shop or when I am in a club too intoxicated to care.

Most of this music is repetitive, meaningless, cringey and to be utterly emotive, soul destroying.

After the Grammy craze, Buzzfeed made a post comparing Beck’s lyrics with Beyoncé’s to illustrate why Beck might have been merited best album after all.

I think doing the same thing here might be useful. So Beck’s lyrics go a little something like this: ‘Waking light, it grew from the shadow, brace yourself to the morning low, night is gone, long way turning, you've waited long enough to know’, whilst Beyoncé’s lyrical composition goes: ‘ I get filthy when that liquor get into me, I’ve been thinking, why can’t I keep my fingers off it, baby? I want you…Na Na.’ Now it all comes down to personal preference of course, but it may be safe to conclude Beck might be slightly more gifted when it comes to the poetic word.

Also Beck, apart from writing all his songs, composes his songs, produces them and is a multi-instrumentalist artist.

Like him or not the man has some talent and that should get some recognition.

You don’t have to be a fan of Beck’s psychedelic alternative rock and you don’t necessarily have to loath Beyoncé’s R&B/ Hip hop to take Beck’s defence.

But in all honesty who really gives a damn?

How many of us actually watched the Grammys anyway?

Beyonce.com

Tinder? I’d rather enter in the Hunger Games Victoria Farley Comment Editor

Yasunobu Ikeda (via Creative Commons)

I’ve never really understood Tinder.

It’s a phone app for online dating, sure.

It lets you anonymously and ruthlessly judge strangers, sure.

Maybe one day a swipe right will save you from the crushing loneliness of life, sure.

But when it did suddenly become weird to not want to use it?

The amount of time I’ve personally spent on Tinder can be counted on one hand, and even that short of a time immediately put me straight off it.

When Tinder was first released, everyone treated it like a joke, and actually going on a ‘Tinder date’ was something to be mocked, though let’s be fair, the examples that came before Tinder didn’t give it exactly a ‘good start’.

OKCupid, eHarmony (c’mon, not even the creator of eHarmony uses eHarmony), Match.com, these are all the bastions of online dating. Bastions that are mocked and ridiculed almost every day on the internet.

Don’t even get me started on the ‘niche’ sites. VeggieDate, anyone?

My point is that Tinder slowly changed, from something people made fun of, to something people actually

used. Like, for its intended purpose.

Even if you don’t use Tinder the way InterActiveCorp intended, you still use it, but as a ‘joke’.

It’s gotten to the point where not having Tinder is weirder than just not using it.

I told a friend that it had been around three months since my last date, and their response was just complete bewilderment.

I didn’t want to go out and meet strangers, drinking a £4 vodka and coke while we made endless small talk?

Somehow, I’ve missed the appeal.

Dinner for one, please!

the badger

23 FEBRUARY 2015

COMMENT • 11

COMMENT

The Students’ Union needs to step up and stop selling tobacco Daniel Green News Sub-Editor

The power of large tobacco companies has been heavily restricted over the last few decades in the UK; including a ban on the advertisement of tobacco, a nationwide smoking ban in enclosed spaces and talk of introducing plain packaging on tobacco products.

However, it would be incredibly naive to suggest that 'big tobacco' companies have been made impotent by these measures.

Just because big tobacco is restricted through our legislation doesn't mean that they are no longer a threat.

Companies such as British American Tobacco and Philip Morris International continue to exploit and damage the environment, whilst shifting their focus to vulnerable developing nations, crippling them with increased healthcare costs and infertile soil.

For decades, big tobacco has polluted the environment in every stage of the production of their products.

The devastation tobacco production causes ranges from deforestation (with over 600 million trees cut down annually), the use of banned toxic pesticides on tobacco plants and large quantities of chemical waste, making soil unsuitable for food production.

This is not to mention the billions of kilograms of carbon dioxide and methane released into the atmosphere through cigarette smoke, and the pol-

lution of lakes, rivers and oceans with toxic chemicals through abandoned cigarette butts.

Big tobacco has not only caused damage to the environment; it has also used its vast wealth to manipulate developing nations by threatening legal action if they want to regulate the industry.

Recently, Togo, one of the poorest nations in the world, attempted to put health warnings on packs of cigarettes.

Despite being a measure that has been widely adopted by western nations, Philip Morris International, the company that sells Marlboro, threatened Togo with "an incalculable amount of international trade litigation" if they implemented these plans.

Togo was forced to back down, allowing the power of big tobacco to overrule the health of their citizens.

A company which sells such a harmful product should not be able to exert such influence on a sovereign state.

In addition, within its dark history, tobacco corporations have used advertising in unregulated markets to target teenagers and children, through glamorising cigarettes and use of brands such as the Marlboro cowboy, a figure long since banned in the UK and the United States.

Moreover, as recently as the 1990s, R J Reynolds, was caught out marketing to LGBTQ and homeless communities under a campaign known as Project

SCUM. This explicit contempt for the people they were trying to market products to was widely condemned, with the director of the Maunter Project for Lesbians with Cancer, saying: "This is a hate crime, plain and simple. What else do you call it when a group thinks of gays and lesbians as 'scum', and then targets us with something that kills?"

Once looking at the insurmountable evidence of tobacco companies' destructive and manipulating behaviour, one can only come to the conclusion that such corporations should not be allowed to sell their products at a place which prides itself on its ethical policy and its tolerance of all people.

WWF

It is for these reasons why the Students' Union should take a public stance against these conglomerates and stop selling tobacco in its outlets.

It is my strongly held view that companies that sell a product which kills half of its consumers should have no place on Union shelves.

Such a move would only be restricted to SU outlets, primarily the Union shop, and would not affect students who want to purchase tobacco, as they would still be able to buy cigarettes and other products from the Co-op.

Some people may argue that such an attitude could also be taken towards alcohol and unhealthy foods; however, there is a clear distinction between tobacco and these products.

Whilst the majority of drinkers can exert control over how much they consume, tobacco is inherently addictive.

As one Canadian tobacco executive admitted: "Smoking is not like drinking. It is rather like being an alcoholic".

Our Students' Union has already, through similar campaigns, banned the sale of Coca-Cola and Nestle products in its outlets on similar grounds.

If our Union is going to take such a stance on these companies, the same attitude should also be taken to big tobacco.

This is a debate that as a Union, we need to have and I would encourage people to sign the petition online to make this debate happen.

Learning to drive, and what happens if you eventually pass Louis Patel Letters Sub-Editor Can you drive? Well done. Seriously, it took me four times to get my license; by the fourth time my instructor basically said: ‘well, you’ve got nothing to lose’.

Easy for her to say, I'd had so many lessons I was bank rolling her kids’ piano lessons.

But in my defence, I had my reasons for failing.

For anyone who recently failed their first test, take comfort in this tale of driving horror.

Test 1: I was pretty calm and collected, but on the last leg of the test (and I mean literally turning into the test centre road) I pulled out in front of a van.

Under her breath, I heard the examiner say: ‘so close’.

Oh, I also stopped to let a pigeon flap to the safety of the pavement, but I don’t think they can fail you for being a pigeon sympathiser. Fail.

Second time round, I had Mr Todd, who was the Malcolm Tucker equivalent of an examiner, who shouted at me for hesitating to overtake a bus.

It kind of throws you when a fat man in a high vis jacket is yelling at you to GET YOUR A*SE IN GEAR. Fail.

Third time round, I was like a boxer ready to go into the ring; the mirrors were perfectly positioned; I knew my show me tell me’s like the lyrics to sh*te pop song; and upon my friends advice, I ‘dressed like a nerd’ so as not to look like a boy racer (see me in person and you'd know that could never be a problem).

But who should examine me but Mr Todd himself. I won’t bother going into the full extent of that one, only to say it was like a GTA driving test, with a lot of yelling and pedestrian drive by’s.

On the fourth time, my dad gave me some advice, which I shall share with you: ‘when you meet the examiner, don’t be intimidated, just remember that they were sat on the bog like you this morning.’

Feeling slightly disgusted with that image I made for the centre.

Now I don’t know if that strategy necessarily helped, but hey, I can drive now.

That and it was so busy I never got out of third gear. But after all that, is it worth it?

Kinda. I share a car with my siblings, which none of us can afford to run, so it sits sad and alone back home.

And in terms of the opportunity cost of having insurance, or, like, food.

I think I’ll take the food. Having a

car back home might be worth it, if you live in north Wales.

But Christ knows why anyone would want a car at university.

Firstly, you aren’t that important that you need a vehicle to transport you and your ASDA shopping in.

Secondly, adding all the costs together (including those ridiculous ‘My other car is a Porsche' sticker crap) the average motorist spends four grand a year on running their car.

Then there's actually buying the car; perhaps old aunt Alice accidentally left

you five grand in her will, and perhaps you think spending that on your ride is a good investment.

But I can think of other ways to spend that money, rather than on a hunk of metal that you’ll probably back into a lamppost anyway.

Cory Disbrow (via Creative Commons)

the badger

23 February 2015

SCIENCE • 12

SCIENCE De-Extinction: A Recipe for Resurrection

Jade Groves Science Sub-Editor

De-extinction; the term given to the notion of bringing vanished species back to life. The concept has been hovering between reality and science fiction for more then two decades since the release of Michael Crichton’s famous novel unleashing the dinosaurs from Jurassic Park on the world.

For most of this time, the reality has lagged greatly behind the fantasy and with many more species on the brink of extinction, a small group of researchers believe that cloning could be the answer and reverse that trend.

So what is the recipe for resurrection? We all learnt about Dolly the Sheep back in secondary school, but in case you have forgotten, Dolly was the first mammal to be cloned from an adult somatic cell, using the process of nuclear transfer back in 1996.

She had three mothers (one provided the egg, another the DNA and a third carried the cloned embryo to term). In this process, an adult cell’s nucleus is transferred into an unfertilised oocyte that has had its nucleus removed. This hybrid cell is then stimulated to divide via electric shock.

When it develops into a blastocyst it can be implanted into a surrogate mother.

Since then, cloning has undergone vast amounts of research, eventually leading up to Fernandez-Arias’s clone - the closest anyone has gotten to true de-extinction. This research involved reviving the wild goat, known as a bucardo, a species originating in the Pyrenees- a mountain range that divides France from Spain.

Cells from the last living female bucardo were preserved in labs in Zaragoza and Madrid. Nuclei from these cells were implanted into emptied goat eggs then implanted into surrogate mothers. From the 57 implantations, only 1 survived until birth; which eventually died a mere 10 minutes after birth due to a severe lung defect.

What is next for de-extinction? The next thing to be in the spot light for de-extinction is the red breasted passenger pigeon, hunted to extinction over a century ago, is suggest to have the potential for revival from just a museum specimen.

Geneticist George Church at Harvard University suggested that by transferring key genes into the nearest living relative, the common rock pigeon, this can be achieved.

Firstly, the process requires the assembly of a passenger pigeon genome from DNA fragments in a museum specimen, with that of the rock pigeon, its living street-wise cousin.

This process involved identifying and synthesising mutations that distinguish the passenger pigeon- that give it a red breast, a longer tail, and other key traits. By swapping those bits of DNA for the corresponding bits in rock pigeon stem cells, scientists essentially create passenger pigeon stem cells. These stem cells are then converted into sperm cells - future eggs and sperm - and are then inserted into rock pigeon eggs.

What hatches will be rock pigeons bearing passenger pigeon sperm and eggs. These can then be bred and reintroduced to the wild.

However, this raises the question, just because it looks like a passenger pigeon, is it really a passenger pigeon?

In recent years, humans were the ones who wiped these extinct creatures out, by hunting them, destroying their habitats, or spreading diseases; thus suggesting another reason for bringing them back.

If we drove a species to extinction, we surely have an obligation to try and bring them back. Some other scientists who favour de-extinction suggests that by resurrecting the extinct, it will promote new biological diversity, benefit ecosystems, and the development of drugs that are derived from natural compounds have been found in wild plant species which are vulnerable to extinction.

Thinking back to Jurassic Park, the dinosaurs are resurrected for their en-

tertainment value - to create a theme park. The disastrous consequences that follow have cast a shadow over the notion of de-extinction, at least in popular culture. But people tend to forget that Jurassic Park is pure fantasy.

Concluding to the idea held by some who protest, suggesting that reviving an extinct species amounts to playing god.

In reality, the only species we can hope to revive now are those that died within the past few 10,000 years and left behind remains that contain intact cells or, at the very least, enough ancient DNA to reconstruct genomes.

This leaves us to question: If it can be done, should it be done?

Jesse Means Via Flickr

Science factoid

Research suggests RNA molecules are life’s engineers

Jade Groves Science Sub-Editor

Maximilien Rothier Bautzer

Scientists are to scan the Amazon forest in Brazil to look for evidence of occupation by ancient civilisations.

This UK led project seeks to determine what degree populations living in the late pre-Columbian period (the last 3,000 years before the Europeans arrived in the 1490s) altered the landscape and to begin to understand the scale and activities of there population.

To do this, a drone will be sent up with a laser instrument to look through the canopy for earthworks and geoglyphs, which are large geometric patterns left in the ground. It is suggested that these could represent ceremonial centres.

Findings should reveal how many more geoglyphs remain hidden beneath still-canopied regions of Amazonia and inform policies on sustainable forest use today.

A scientist involved in the project added, ”we want to see what is the human footprint in the forest […] it may be the case that the very biodiversity that we want to preserve is the result of the past historical manipulation of this forest”.

At the very foundation of modern biology lies the idea that the majority of genes encoded in DNA are transcribed into smaller RNA molecules which are then translated into proteins.

DNA is often said to be the blueprint of life, and proteins are described as its building blocks. RNA is seen as a simple messenger between those

of the week

two functions.

However recent research suggests that it might be more accurate to compare RNA to an engineer. A vast part of DNA does not code for proteins, but instead produces a plethora of small RNA molecules which seem to regulate the genome through a variety of mechanisms.

By modulating the levels of messenger RNA in the cell (the RNA that actually gets translated into proteins), those small RNA molecules

are able to dramatically alter the ways in which it operates. Like an engineer, they allow the cell to interpret its plans, modifying it where necessary.

There is a large variety of noncoding RNA molecules which work toward repressing the expression of target mRNAs, such as Piwi-interacting RNA (piRNA) or small interfering RNA (siRNAs).

One of the most recent regulatory RNA discovered is called micro RNA

Kennysarmy via Flickr

(miRNA). miRNAs are single-stranded small RNA molecules (about 23 nucleotide long) which regulate gene expression by silencing the mRNA already present in the cell. They bind complimentarily to the single stranded mRNA molecule at the 3’ UTR (untranslated regions) sites.

The miRNA sequence does not need to match its target 3’ UTR perfectly in order to have an effect, but a better match will lead to a more potent effect.

Their mechanism of action is still being debated, but current models favour the idea that they can work along with other proteins to degrade their target mRNA. Shedding light on the mechanism of miRNA action is crucial for understanding the vastly complex problem of gene regulation.

For example, the Alonso lab at the University of Sussex tries to understand the ways in which miRNAs can control the development of complex tissues such as the nervous system in the fruit fly.

The lab was recently awarded a “Welcome Trust Investigator Award” in order to fund this research.

It was once said that sequencing an organism’s DNA only gave us the characters of a play, the hard work is actually writing the story. We are only starting to glimpse at how complex life’s story really is.

the badger

23 February 2015 ARTS • 14

ARTS

Interview: The Levels Are Very High Recently, Arts editor Tom Powell had a chat with Sussex Art History MA-cum-Grime blogger Stephen Weller (aka The Levels Are Very High), they covered the online music underground on social media, what it’s like to make friends on Twitter and just how frustrating Windows Movie Maker can be. Read on for more.

Sitting in a grimy kitchen surrounded by the accretions of a post-work evening The Levels Are Very High, in his traditional attire of five-panel and sweatshirt, begins to open up about how he initially got into blogging and how over the year since his first posts and Youtube rips he’s carved out something of a name for himself.

Before the serious business however, I ask where his long and referential name comes from.

‘Well it was just a phrase that was around when I was younger, if something was ‘levels’, it was really good.’

Then, apparently, when he heard a 2006 Rinse FM show on Youtube a while back and heard Wiley getting rushed off the mic by the (now defunct) Wolf Pack crew and to the shout ‘the levels are very high!’, his childhood slang became the perfect moniker for his online music persona.

With Grime going ‘weird ways’ since 2006’s pirate radio days and becoming a fully fledged form of club music in the last few years, the blog work of Stephen and others has become an important part of the music’s dissemination in the UK scene, both locally and nationally.

The shifts undergone since the dawn of social and musical media have seen Grime catapulted to a mainstream dance music, and with this modest success comes one for Levels.

‘I had no idea how much to ask for’, he says, describing his first paid job, a video he’s making for an artist that’ll be released later this month; opting instead for streaming royalties, possibly meagre change, Levels concedes that while the last twelve months have been a great success, he’s still a little way from quitting his day job.

MA student by day, call centre worker by evening, blogger by night, his schedule is pretty hectic week on week.

He copes, pulling late nights making videos for up and coming Grime artists, organising guest mixes for his Soundcloud and even recording the odd mix of his own for other channels too.

Since he started, he tells me his output has changed significantly.

To begin with it was just a way of feeding his voracious appetite for club music, but it soon evolved when he realised that there were enough Grime mixes coming out every week for him to scavenge for rare, new and exclusive tunes.

What he did was to painstakingly rip dubs that he liked from mixes with Audacity and upload them to Youtube so he and others could easily listen to them (sometimes to the malcontent of the producer trying to keep them exclusive).

However, all this began to change through a little networking.

He tells me that although it ‘sounds stupid’, he’s making his name thanks to social media.

His initial presence on Youtube and Twitter got him noticed in the UK scene and an invite to the not-so-secret group for electronic music artists, label heads and journalists named Classical Trax.

With around 800 members, the Facebook group is apparently ‘a proving ground for young producers’, and in Levels’ case, this seems to hold true.

While the main focus is to get feedback on artists’ unreleased dubs and promote radio mixes, the group also release compilations with semi-regularity,

for which Levels will be making the videos from now on.

The leap from the wide world of Twitter and Soundcloud to Classical Trax’s more focussed Facebook mode means that conversations between artists and journalists actually occur, colleagues are made and careers begin to bud.

All this, Levels says, without ever having face to face contact.

In fact, he tells me that he can approach certain DJs or promoters in clubs and they already know who he is.

Spooky.

These include Brighton’s own Mute events team or Mumdance for example, who he interviewed after Mute’s last event at the Loft last month.

This just goes to show you what you can do in a year on Twitter without trolling and with a little hard graft.

This elevated status has moved Stephen from being a relative rogue to a relative hero in the industry.

Gone are the days when he used to nab tunes painstakingly on Audacity, now he spends his weekday evenings weaving together clips from old movies and stock footage on Windows Movie Maker (and they’re pretty good, follow the links at the end of the article for more).

Okay, so the levels are higher now,

he’s getting a strong supply of exclusive tracks and mixes that makes his connoiseur’s mouth water, but Weller continues to bemoan the fact that the software he’s using is clunky, inefficient, and crashes; ‘the bane of his life’.

To be fair to him though, he’s not complaining, and why would you be when you’ve gone from avid fan to well reputed industry insider in a matter of months?

Maybe industry insider is a bit of a jump, but when asked if the industry can get in on underground music’s fun he replies that he doesn’t think so.

While Soundcloud is falling to a raft of pro-users to rake in plays and publicity, Facebook forums like Classical Trax perpetuate the underground conversation, and most important sharing those dubs that aren’t getting played out in the clubs or on internet radio.

Levels demonstrates that ultimately, the music industry doesn’t have to be a closed loop, and that one’s ascendancy to renown is less about business and more about community.

So where next? He’s gonna be releasing about two mixes a month from now on, but with no concrete dates set because, well, ‘it’s pretty hard to chase people up on the internet’.

He seems pretty content with his re-

leases on this casual basis.

He’s also got an interview upcoming on his Tumblr with Kimi Mute after he DJs with L-Vis 1990 and Jam City in Audio this Friday, an event that you probably shouldn’t miss if you’re into club music and based in Brighton.

Otherwise he’s just looking to pop up and keeping working in the local Brighton scene, which he’s been enjoying over the last four years.

On top of this, he’s just glad to be doing what he’s doing, because his ripping days had made listening to music weird: ‘I was listening to music specifically for rips’ he tells me.

So I suppose for a while his hobby became an all consuming task of keeping up with the newest and best tunes, a frustrating task sitting somewhere between business and pleasure.

A task that luckily he’s now traversed through voracity, renown and enjoyment.

If you like what you’ve read, have a look at Levels’ work via the links below: Youtube.com/user/thelevelsareveryhigh Twitter: @lvlsrvryhi Soundcloud: /thelevelsareveryhigh

THE LEVELS ARE VERY HIGH’S TOP GRIME TRACKS TO GET YOU LISTENING Sudanim ‘Seydou’ (Sound Pellegrino) (2015)

Mr Mitch ‘Dru (Peace Edit)’ (Gobstopper) (2015)

Kieran Loftus ‘All Black Outfit (In the Club)’ (Paradise Rhythm) (2014)

Levels’ Top Rip: JT the Goon ‘Still Steppin’’ (2014)

Sudanim - Seylon Shrichia - Snowy Island Breaks Major Grave- Looking Forward

the badger

23 february 2015 ARTS • 15

Kate Tempest at Concorde 2 Laura McIntyre reviews the rapper/poet’s Concorde 2 performance from earlier this month. (If one thing was gained from this excursion, it was that Tempest was a more ideal candidate for PM than the bickering Cameron and Miliband.)

If Kate Tempest runs for Prime Minister somewhere down the line, I would a) be unsurprised and b) be sure she would do a stellar job.

Witnessing her performance last week confirmed her outstanding capabilities as an orator, in addition to her technical sophistication as a composer.

Charisma and sincerity were the standout qualities in her performance at Concorde 2 last week, which successfully held together an extraordinarily attentive and considerate crowd.

Each musical number, deriving from her latest album Everybody Down, was followed by an interlude of spoken word performance.

The profundity of these interludes stemmed from the naturalness of Kate’s voice; she has a natural ability to give spoken word a musical sensibility in her rhythm and playful diction.

I enjoyed these moments the most, when her lyrics stood alone without a

Dedicated to You But You Weren’t Listening: Who the Hell is Robert Wyatt?

Lottie Brazier does what it says on the proverbial tin, and looks into the extensive back-catalogue of this prolific songwriter.

Robert Wyatt is one of those ‘heritage’ artists that you are supposed to know about in order to have some kind of smug cultural one-upmanship over everyone else, which suspiciously seems to arise if you’re under thirty and own a turntable.

However, in the case of Robert Wyatt, it really is worth getting to know his musical contributions.

This will hopefully give you a brief summary, one by no means conclusive.

There’s a very good biography about him at the moment, which you should read if you want something more in depth than a 500-word article.

Wyatt started off as a ‘Canterbury Scene’ musician – he played in the 70s experimental rock band Soft Machine.

They usually get conflated with prog, and so lots of stuff, which is quite bloated musically and ironically, shallow, but Soft Machine –were- interesting.

They had a self-awareness that stopped them from getting too ridiculous, with song titles like ‘Moon in June’ as being subtle plays on jazz song title tropes.

Wyatt only stuck around briefly for their first incarnation, from the late sixties to the early seventies, but left when the rest of the band members decided

backing track, vulnerable to the ears of her audience.

Her ability to seamlessly execute the poems from memory, without hesitation, is commendable.

The language is, at times, hilarious.

Tempest gloriously cuts between the borders of high and low; she can allude to canonical works in one line, and transition to amusing observations of mundane day-to-day existence in the next.

However, the greatest message I took from Tempest was one of empathy.

The humorous everyday witticisms towards suddenly turned to a moving speech on the overarching darkness we live in and ultimately neglect.

She spoke openly about the today’s climate: the alienating and un-empathetic political state of affairs.

Whilst this momentarily broke the illusion of the performance space she inhabited, it didn’t prohibit my enjoyment of the event overall. Tem-

that they were Syd Barrett (only Syd Barrett is Syd Barrett, even if he doesn’t know that).

It was only until his covers of ‘Shipbuilding’ a song that Elvis Costello cowrite, and ‘I’m A Believer’ charted that he received any sort of mainstream interest.

This level of fame wasn’t really his bag, so Wyatt quickly made his way out of the limelight and back into his comfort zone of relative obscurity.

A particular noteworthy album that should be taken back from this obscurity is the 1997 release Schleep, which was co-produced by Brian Eno and Alfreda Benge, Wyatt’s wife.

It is worthy of an aside to mention how everything that producer Eno works on becomes imbued with his vibrancy.

For instance, Talking Heads’ Remain in Light and Fear of Music, his collaboration with David Byrne on My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, on David Bowie’s Low – one could go on.

The same spell is cast on Schleep, with Wyatt’s off-kilter sense of song structure easily complying with Eno’s signature warm-yet-alien synth pads.

Understandably, song titles like ‘Heaps of Sheep’ aren’t going to draw in the masses, but underneath this these are really accessible and interesting tracks (the balance of which being no easy task).

Despite the cuddly album aesthetic however, Schleep has an unshakeable darkness in its backdrop.

Wyatt continues to record with other artists, but due to his overwhelming bashfulness rarely ascribes himself any credit for this.

This is characteristic of Wyatt’s demeanour, who miraculously still bears no trace of cynicism.

pest forced me to step back and think about the world in a non-anthropocentric way, encouraging everyone to drop an ego-driven perspective and be more hospitable to others.

This is important now more than ever, she argues, at a time when certain parties encourage social alienation through shame and guilt.

There was something democratic about the whole thing. It didn’t feel grossly self-indulgent nor was it overly politicized.

This was facilitated by her selfawareness as a public speaker.

Tempest is uniquely explicit about the nature of her job and essentially deconstructed the position of power

Cat

Battersea Arts Centre Tempest, looking much more comfortable at the pub than Nigel Farage.

Robert Wyatt Special at The Catalyst Club: A Secretive Life Under Scrutiny At The Catalyst Club’s Robert Wyatt themed evening, Em Chittock finds herself enthralled and occasionally amused by this month’s discussion of the life of musician Robert Wyatt.

The Catalyst Club bills itself as a ‘unique monthly Brighton event that pays tribute to the old traditions of French Salon, debating societies and Gentleman’s Clubs’, the premise being that a guest speaker is given fifteen minutes to impart their topical enthusiasm to the audience.

Held every couple of weeks in a basement bar somewhere in Brighton, the club usually invites three speakers to each meeting; but last week saw Catalyst founder David Bramwell in conversation with Marcus O’Dair (‘writer, lecturer, musician, broadcaster’), the life and times of musician Robert Wyatt their chosen topic.

Before the evening, my knowledge of Robert Wyatt was limited – I like a couple of Soft Machine tracks

and Robert’s album Shleep, produced

by Brian Eno – but O’Dair’s account of working on Different Every Time, his authorised biography of Wyatt, made me want to rush home and listen to his life’s work while simultaneously reading the biography and learning the laws of pataphysics (mentioned often in reference to the Canterbury Scene).

O’Dair spoke warmly about Wyatt without proselytizing, sometimes

one has when given a microphone and willing audience.

By openly discussing the speakeraudience dynamics, Tempest made me feel at ease as a spectator and listener.

She encouraged a critical engagement whilst the uplifting electronic beats and overwhelming use of strobe lights allowed people to enjoy the show in ease.

This was one of those instances where it felt like there was a genuine creative connection between the performer and their audience.

In the end, Tempest’s humility and passion dominated the music.

Whilst the poetry can speak for itself, sometimes hearing it from the mind it bore from beats the letters on a page.

stopping to play a song clip or show a picture.

It was like watching a really low tech presentation in class that, if done by someone you didn’t like, would seem a bit sh*t; but O’Dair’s comfortable delivery and visible pleasure in Wyatt’s work made it an enjoyable evening.

Even if you’re not very interested in something, I think if someone is able to convey their enthusiasm and emotional investment in that topic it’s a pleasure to listen to (unless they’re keen on something like bear baiting or aggressive fascism). Those, like me, attending out of curiosity will, I’m sure, have left as fans of Robert Wyatt.

The Catalyst Club has also started releasing fortnightly podcasts at odditorium.com.

If you’re interested in knowing some things about stuff, it’s worth your time.

Cuneiform Records

the badger

23 february 2015 ARTS • 16

LIFESTYLE

What thinking about life as a game teaches us Daisy Tompkins I don’t understand other people’s inability to plan.

I obsess over the future consequences of every decision I make.

The other evening a friend of mine said he felt like “everyone else is playing this game” which he wasn’t invited to.

After consoling him (red wine) I got to thinking.

The game metaphor is useful.

Its use in politics and business allows you to contextualise power, and it can help your personal life too.

Consider, what games are you playing? What are the rules?

Take university, the first game, the most obvious one.

Who is marking your essay?

If it’s your tutor, meet them with your essay outline, if it’s your lecturer meet them.

I recently messed up on this one.

I didn’t know my seminar tutor was the marker and had I just asked him one little question I would have changed my grade entirely.

Sad but true that information is not shared in a fair way.

Now the second game: your career.

Possibly controversial, but I view university as an educational platform to get a job.

Putting it bluntly, my family do not have enough money for me to be educated just to “better” myself.

Therefore, I don’t understand the

Scott Caruthers shock element many people seem to face when they realise that their degree does not directly lead onto a career path or may (frankly) be unpopular with recruiters.

When looking for my degree I looked at what it could be used for, the jobs available and their linked salaries – sometimes I wonder if I’m the only person who did this…

Now look at the third game, your friends.

Are you the one everyone flocks to in the group or the one people sometimes forget to invite?

And why is that?

I have always been fascinated by power dynamics within friendship groups.

Usually you make friends with those who are relatively similar to you – age, intelligence, interests, humour- and yet these power dynamics still exist.

I think it comes down to planning.

Who decides what the group do?

Several of my friends I think I would never see if my other friends and I didn’t invite them out, just because they never plan things.

I think being the one who plans the events or hosts is the most powerful as they decide what the group does.

However, equally it can sometimes be the person who never plans anything and is the quietest member of the group who has the most power.

Tricky.

And finally, the fourth game, relationships.

A cruel game.

And a sick joke.

Yep, still feeling post-valentine’s day distress.

I really didn’t understand the complex maze of dating until I came to university.

Seriously, why are there all these rules about texting?

In the summer I kissed one of my friend’s friends at the pub and he got my number and then called me so I had his, which someone subsequently suggested was a bad sign because it means that “he doesn’t want the power of him being able to text you but you not being able to text him”.

And therefore it gets rid of the first-text rule and might be a bit “friend-zoney”.

SERIOUSLY. What even is that as a kind of analysis after one kiss?!

I don’t understand these rules at all.

So if it all boils down to a game, then I have no idea how to win.

Television and the unrealistic depiction of love Jessica Middleton In the fictional and framed universe of television, love is idealised and held up on a pedestal that makes all eyes dewy.

If it’s not the whirlwind romance that teaches hapless what’s-his-name how to enjoy life, it’s the overwhelming narrative of that single sad bastard whose life sucks because no sane human wants to settle down with them.

The dominant storyline for the majority of female characters centres around their failed or dysfunctional relationships and few are allowed other ambitions, whilst for male protagonists they are lumped with whining two-dimensional wives-and-girlfriends – equally as preoccupied with their husbands as they are with looking flawless and infantile.

Television’s presentation of love is desperate, warped and disturbing.

Intensity and passion are more watchable than healthy respect for space and individuality.

Perhaps these restrictive narratives are catering to a collective belief in the superior power of love, yet in doing so creating a false idea of it that alienates most human beings.

In television programs like ‘Friends’, a group of twenty-thirty-somethings end up falling for each other at some

point or the other (save for Phoebe) and doing the dirty, manifesting in a creepy insular clique.

This cliquehood exacerbates the worst qualities in each character until everyone is unlikable, looks exhausted and bored with their only friends.

With a contemporary sit-com like Mindy Kaling’s ‘The Mindy Project’ we see her circle of friends wither to her colleagues, one of which she ends up in a serious romantic relationship a couple of times, and the series of quirky and creepy guys she dates serially (the significant mates tend to work in the same building).

Mindy’s layers of make-up and snappy dialogue hides the hideousness of that same desperation that motivates both protagonists from each show.

Love is seen as necessary, the love that is doesn’t mind and will last the long, long distance of our ever-growing life spans.

But we are reminded of all the sexist rubbish of the family sit-coms where nagging Mrs Blah Blah must put up with ugly and ungrateful Mr

Blah Blah and denies him sex as a means of discipline.

Mr Blah Blah hasn’t had sex in so long and vaguely remembers some sort of love he felt for his attractive wife – a fact that seems overlooked although most producers wouldn’t hire an actress as unattractive as whichever comedian is playing Mr Blah Blah.

Set in suburbia, lives are mundane and exaggerated and each episode blends in with the other, the laughing track ominously guiding our enjoyment, the message was – BE WITH SOMEONE, EVEN IF YOU HATE THEM. Aimed at the pessimistic and depressed middle age folks, radicalism and free will sucked away by decades of mindless and pointless work in a meaningless society that tells you love is best expressed through consumption of material goods.

Goods that have flown greater distances than the average human, and produced part by part on the back of exploitation and hypocrisy.

But the power of love is limited to that elite few, the beautiful young cou-

“Love becomes a selfish and immature preoccupation, and whomever we love, an object to consume.”

ples in heat, fuelled by lust and enthusiasm and youth and stupidity.

Stalking each other; dropping all obligations and ties for the object of their affection.

After all, to love someone the way TV wants you to love is to objectify them and to make them into something you can buy, trick, and abuse.

Television struggles to represent anything remotely accurate or interesting.

Documentaries, reality television or scripted fictional series, anything you view has been crafted in an unrealistic and unreliable way.

But I guess the fact is that love is boring in real life, only interesting to those involved, so no wonder everyone in TV shows end up sleeping with their brother’s best friend, and the guy upstairs and the guy downstairs and falls in love with the-guy-fromthe-flower-shop’s brother – Ken. Ken and what’s-her-name are much more interesting together than apart.

Through this sensationalising of love we separate it from its humanity.

Love becomes a selfish and immature preoccupation, and whomever we love, an object to consume.

Through this sensationalising of love we separate it from its humanity.

Recipe of the week Raymond Jennings’

Chicken and Chorizo Jambalaya Ingredients For four people: 1 Onion, diced 2 Red and/or green peppers, diced ½ Stick of celery, diced 2 Garlic cloves, crushed and finely chopped 1 Red chili (optional) 4 Skinless and boneless chicken thighs, cut into strips 1 Chorizo sausage ring, diced 400g Can of tinned tomatoes 300g Long grain rice 400ml Chicken stock 4 tsp Paprika 4 tsp Turmeric Salt, pepper, and hot sauce to taste Method I had intended to share with you all a recipe for pancakes. You know how to make pancakes, though, don’t you?

Everyone does. Even if you don’t, with the help of Google you can learn how to make the delicious discs of fried batter in about 30 seconds. They really couldn’t be easier. So I’m not going to do that anymore. I hope you enjoyed Pancake Day but it’s time we moved on to bigger, but probably not better, things. Like jambalaya. What’s jambalaya, I assume some of you might be asking? I have no idea, I just saw someone cook it on This Morning once, but Wikipedia tells me it is a Louisiana Creole recipe with French and Spanish influences. It’s basically a bit like a risotto, only way easier to cook and not half as fancy. It is absolutely delicious, though, and still quite a bit more impressive than that Shin Cup you were eyeing up at the SU shop.

On a medium heat, fry off the onion, peppers and celery in some oil, until all the vegetables are soft and the onion is translucent.

Add the diced chorizo to the mix, fry and stir for about 3-4 minutes, then add the chicken. Cook until chicken is just browning.

Add the garlic, chili (if using), can of tomatoes and the spices. Stir through and let the tomatoes cook just a little bit.

Add the rice, stock, and hot sauce (if using), and gently stir through.

Simmer for around 30-40 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the rice has fully absorbed all the liquid. If the rice has absorbed all the liquid but is still not cooked, just add a touch more stock to the mix until it is ready.

Serve with whatever you want. Goes well with beer.

the badger

23 february 2015 Arts •18

Arts

Editor’s Picks

Arts Editor Ioana Matei shares her tips on the week ahead in culture

Visual Art Mutator 1 + 2: Evolutionary Art by William Latham Phoenix Gallery, Brighton Digital Festival Wednesdays-Sundays 11am-5pm (until 13th Oct)

Fuck Buttons

Duke of York’s

PINS Press

GIGS The Jesus and Mary Chain Brighton Dome Monday 23rd February, 7pm £27 Celebrating the 30th anniversary of Psychocandy, The Jesus and Mary Chain have embarked on another tour after the one that had started in November completely sold out. Tickets are going fast, so hopefully you’ve already got one!

GIGs PINS The Hope Wednesday 25th February 8pm £7 The four girls of Manchester-based band PINS have been making waves with their garage shoegaze pop since their formation in 2013.

If you enjoyed their album Girls Like Us, be sure to catch their show in Brighton this week!

Film Sussex Film Appreciation Society: Bande à part ARTS A Monday 23rd of February, 6:30pm FREE

As part of its new series “Young, Beautiful & Criminal”, the Sussex Film Appreciation Society is screening Jean Luc Godard’s adaptation of Dolores Hitchens’ crime novel Fool’s Gold (1958).

A worthy exponent of the French New Wave, Bande à part (1964) has been described by the director himself as “Alice in Wonderland meets Frank Kafka”.

An unmissable event for fans of the genre as well as for those cinematically curious by nature!

Film Swandown Towner Gallery, Eastbourne Friday 27th February, 7.30pm £5 A ‘playfully absurd’ travelogue, this film sees two men travel from Eastbourne to the Hackney marshes in a Swan shaped pedal boat, meeting Alan Moore, Stewart Lee, and others on the way.

Weird and hopefully wonderful.

Stateland: Detail from Windows, Luciano Piazza

watch, write, review

SCIENCE Brighton Science Festival Big Science Weekend Sallis Benney Theatre Saturday, 28th February - Sunday, 1st March, 9.30am - 5.30pm £10/£7 for a day pass or £17 / £13 for the weekend

bee?

Why does it feel so good to be bad?

You might have not pegged us for science enthusiasts, but us Arts people need to sometimes take a break from brooding silently in empty rooms and What are the origins of if you’re as interested as us human behaviour? in the answers to the quesHow do you stay upright tions above, make sure to on a bicycle? What’s it like get your tickets for the festo see through the eyes of a tival’s final weekend!

FILM Appropriate Behaviour + Q&A Desiree Akhavan Duke of York’s Picturehouse Saturday 28th February, 6.30pm Student: £9/Adult: £10 A screening of the film that offers a comedic look at the struggles of bisexual Shirin of Iranian upbringing in cosmopolitan New York, followed by a Q&A session with the director herself!

Get involved in the Arts team by joining us at our writers meetings or searching on Facebook for

Badger Writers

THE Jean Luc Godard Cinema

BADGER

the badger

23 february 2015

Societies - 21

SOCIETIES SPOTLIGHT ADVERTISE YOUR SOCIETY

ested in journalism, editorial work, magazine design, styling or photography!

On this page you can find out about what our societies have been up to and what their plans are for the coming weeks! You can view and join all of our 150 + societies online at www.sussexstudent.com/societies. If you’d like to advertise your society on this page, send your articles to societies@sussexstudent.com by 12pm on Wednesdays.

The Ukulele society are on fire this term. We held our third social of the year, based around a set of 10 challenges through the night to win a ukulele, signed by everyone out that night.

Our socials are very inclusive, we welcome not just members, but all students from all backgrounds. We also aim to hold more alcohol-free socials, to make sure we include all of our members equally. Our society has been going to significant lengths to ensure all members feel safe, welcome and happy.

Our first step was to appoint an inclusivity officer.

We aim for our society to be a safe space for our members, where they can feel comfortable, a place where they can leave any worries behind and find help in the group.

We also published a safe space and zero tolerance policy on our website, they will reinforce the message that we as a society do not condone discrimination, intimidation or bullying of any kind and will not tolerate these behaviours in our society.

This and next term, we are available to be booked for any balls, dances etc. Ukesoc are not new to these events, we performed at the geography ball last year and will do so again this year and we always enjoy them (mostly because we get to dress up)!

We are very inexpensive, so if you were interested in hiring us, please send us an email at ukulele@ussu.sussex.ac.uk.

SOCIETY REWARD SCHEME Congratulations to Sussex Style who have obtained the bronze Development award in the Society Leaves Reward Scheme.

Sussex Style have been recognised by the Students’ Union for their commitment to developing themselves as a society and offering new exciting opportunities for Sussex students.

Sussex Style aims to embrace the diversity of student style through providing a fresh and exciting platform for members to express their interests in all things fashion, as well as beauty, lifestyle, travel and local goingson in Brighton!

The society even have their very own unisex fashion magazine, PROMENADE which can be viewed online.

PROMENADE allows Sussex Style members to write, photograph and design, providing a creative outlet outside of their degree and great experience for a future career in the industry.

They are always looking for creative individuals to contribute to Promenade, so do not hesitate to get in touch with them if you’re inter-

UKULELE

we’re slowly getting bigger and better!

We’ve been on a number of trips to design and craft fairs, sketch events and also two subsidised trips to London (to visit the Science, V&A and Design museums)!

We have also had a successful social last term and are looking to host a pub crawl towards the end of February so look out for that too!

We are however looking for more members to join up to our wristband membership and also to our Facebook group- everyone on any course at Sussex is welcome!

The society is also supporting and fundraising for the Degree Design Show that the final years on the Product Design course hold every year, and they are looking to spread the awareness of the event and their media streams.

If you have a spare minute it would be great if you could have a look at the website and blog; designshow2015. wordpress.com, like the Facebook page; www.facebook. com/designshow2015, and follow the instagram; instagram.com/designshow2015.

members can connect with students across the UK and enrich CVs by joining competitions and charity events.

So far our members have joined the Model Lego competition, LSE Forum and much more! We hope to see you in the coming events!

Check out details on our Facebook page by searching “Sussex Hong Kong Public Affairs and Social Services Society”.

USPASS

As term is now in full swing, make sure you get involved with the paper as much as possible!

By searching ‘Badger Writers’ and ‘Badger Photography’ on Facebook, you can find groups where we request writers and photographers each week.

Our writers meetings run from 1-2pm on Fridays in the Media Office, which can be found in Falmer House above the Common Room.

Writers meetings are open to everyone. It doesn’t matter if you have an article idea or you just want to come along to meet the team. You can also get in contact with us by emailing at badger@sussexstudent.com.

Do political issues often puzzle you? Feeling eager to enrich your CV? Hope to know friends across the UK? Here’s a chance!

The Sussex Hong Kong Public Affairs and Social Services Society (USPASS) is a society of the HKPASS. It is a student-initiated society based in more than 15 universities in the UK. We aim to enrich youngsters’ knowledge of public issues of local and global concern and to contribute to the public by engaging in social services.

The Sussex Product Design Through events co-organSociety is one of the newer ized with other universities societies on campus and and charity organizations,

PRODUCT DESIGN

FRIENDS OF PALESTINE

From Monday 23rd February to Friday 27th February, Sussex Friends of Palestine society will be holding a week of events to educate and inform people about Israeli apartheid.

Come join us for a week of interesting and thought provoking discussions, talks and seminars.

The full list of events can be found on the Students’ Union website as well as on our Facebook page ‘Sussex Friends of Palestine Society’.

THE BADGER

THE WEEK AHEAD: Monday 23rd February • European Law Students’ Association (ELSA) Cheese & wine information evening. ELSA will be discussing their upcoming National Council Meeting to Leicester, our next International Council Meeting in Cluj Napoca, and much more! Fulton 203, 6pm • Waves Cheerleaders The Brighton and Sussex Waves Cheerleaders and Brighton Tsunami American football team are coming together to host Brighton’s biggest frat party at Revolution, West St.! Expect red cups, bunting, games and more! £5 per ticket on the door.

Revolution, 10pm Tuesday 24th February • Christian Union Come and taste some delicious desserts whilst hearing a talk led by Vince Vitale, a tutor of theology and religion at the University of Oxford on ‘Can there be more in life?’ FREE event and ALL welcome!

Meeting House, 6pm

Wednesday 25th February • Innocence Project The University of Sussex Innocence Project is holding its inaugural event titled ‘Let’s Talk About Innocence’.

The event is a panel discussion with Q & A with four remarkable guests. Tickets cost £2 and can be purchased from the Students’ Union website.

Fulton A, 5pm • LGBTQ For the finale of LGBTQ History Month 2015, the LGBTQ society are holding a LGBTQ History pub quiz!

Entry is free and there will be prizes for the winning team.

Falmer back bar, 6.30pm.