Sunday, May 4, 2025
Blog Page 573

Dube wins Union Presidency as “Unlock the Union” slate struggles

Christopher Sinnott
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Dube wins Union Presidency as “Unlock the Union” slate struggles

Sara Dube has been elected to serve as Oxford Union President in Hilary 2020 after a three way race that saw her claim 521 first preference votes over Charlie Coverman’s 355 and Amy Gregg’s 244.

Candidates representing Dube’s “RISE” slate also succeeded in securing the offices of Treasurer-elect (Beatrice Barr) and Secretary-elect (Lee Chin Wee).

In the race for Librarian-elect – for which “RISE” did not nominate a candidate due to an incident in which the expected candidate, Ayman D’Souza, was instead nominated in the Treasurer-elect race – Coverman’s “2020 Vision” slate successfully elected Spencer Cohen in a close race with Mo Iman, a member of Gregg’s “Unlock the Union” slate.

2020 Vision were also successful in nomination the candidates with the most first preference votes in the races for Standing Committee (Chengkai Xie), and Secretary’s Committee (Geneva Roy).

The night was disappointing for the Unlock the Union slate, who took 1 of the 7 places on Standing Committee and 2 of the 11 places on Secretary’s Committee. By contrast, RISE claimed 2 places on Standing Committee, while 2020 Vision won 3, and RISE saw 5 of its candidates elected to Secretary’s Committee to 2020 Vision’s 4.

Speaking to Cherwell about the results, Unlock the Union said: “We are, of course, disappointed with this morning’s results. But we are also so proud of every member of our team, they’ve all put in so much work – and we are really pleased for the members of our team who were successful.

“We wish both other campaigns the best and hope that the winning officers will push for the substantial change the Union needs.”

One independent candidate, Joseph Grehan-Bradley, was successfully elected to Standing Committee. Speaking to Cherwell, Grehan-Bradley said: “I’m absolutely delighted to have been elected, and to have finished third. I’m so grateful to all the people who took time out from their busy schedules yesterday to drop me a vote.

“I hope to affirm their confidence in me next term by acting as a voice for change in the union, and by delivering on my pledge to hold a referendum on the question of abolishing slates.”

The closely-fought three-way election was fought on a number of issues, with RISE pledging to spend less on committee and more on members, to negotiate a discounted Plush entry price for members, and to move the membership registration process online. 2020 Vision had pledged to offer £1 pints during happy hour at the Oxford Union bar, to organise movie screenings with actors and directors, and to invite more BME speakers. Unlock the Union’s offers included accrediting a living wage for all Union staff, filming YouTube debate tutorials, and tabling a referendum on banning slates.

Dube, Barr, and Cohen will serve their terms as President, Treasurer, and Librarian in Hilary term of 2020, while Lee will assume the role of Secretary in Michaelmas term of 2019.

Cherwell has contacted the RISE and 2020 Vision campaigns for comment.

Oxford MP calls for inquiry into voter suppression of EU citizens

Rachel Cordery
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Oxford MP calls for inquiry into voter suppression of EU citizens

The Oxford West and Abingdon MP, Layla Moran, has called for an urgent inquiry into claims that EU citizens were disenfranchised in the European Parliamentary elections last month.

EU citizens in the UK, including some in Oxfordshire, were reportedly denied a vote in May’s election despite being entitled to one under EU law. The mistake was linked to administrative errors made by local councils.

A number of EU nationals reported that they arrived at polling booths to find their names had been crossed out with officials confirming they were not entitled to vote. Others complained that the elections had been announced at short notice, giving them insufficient time to register to vote.

Problems were also encountered by UK voters living abroad, with reported cases of ballot papers being distributed a few hours before the poll.

A letter written by Moran was sent to the chair of the Electoral Commission and the Cabinet Secretary on Friday. Receiving cross-party support, the call gained the backing of 68 MPs from six parties. The letter outlined two issues: the UK government’s requirement that EU citizens must complete additional paperwork in order to vote, and the issues faced by UK voters who live abroad.

Moran wrote: “We find it deeply concerning that the Government appears to have taken no action to stop such serious disenfranchisement from occurring.

“Had the Government confirmed that we would be taking part in these elections sooner, rather than on the same day as the deadline for the return of the UC1 form, we could have largely avoided this situation.

“It is clear that the Government did not want to take part in these elections. However, the Government’s responsibility to every eligible voter, to enfranchise as many citizens as possible, must come above party political concerns.”

The letter comes five years after the Electoral Commission recommended reform following similar complications in 2014’s European election. Since the letter, a petition for an inquiry into the disenfranchisement of citizens has reached over 11,000 signatures, and an urgent question was raised in the House of Commons last week on the matter.

Moran, a Liberal Democrat who assumed office in June 2017, set out recommended lines of enquiry into the situation. These include the impact of the Government’s late confirmation of the election and an investigation into how many citizens were denied their vote on polling day, despite completing all procedures before the deadline.

Nicolas Hatton, founder of ‘the3million’, an advocacy group for EU citizens in the UK, and Jane Golding, founder of British in Europe, have between them raised over £40,000 for the ‘#DeniedMyVote is unlawful’ CrowdJustice fund. The fundraising constitutes part of a potential legal challenge to the #DeniedMyVote scandal, and they have called for people to come forward with examples of having been denied their vote, with the possibility of bringing forward legal action.

Hatton and Golding said: “Our team of expert public law practitioners and researchers will go through the testimonials and assess the best legal options to successfully challenge the Government.”

‘The3million’, whose name refers to the number of EU citizens living in the country, also wrote an open letter to all those standing for the Conservative Party leadership, outlining their hopes for the protection of rights.

They wrote: “British in Europe and ‘the3million’ represent over five million people who still have no guarantee that their futures are secure after nearly three years.

“You can make sure that there will never be a Windrush-style scandal for EU citizens by supporting our ‘registration, not application’ proposal for a new immigration status after Brexit. Not only is this the right thing to do, but it would also send a strong signal to EU27 countries as they consider the systems they put in place for UK citizens in their countries.”

Leaked examiners reports shed light on STEM’s gender woes

Liam OConnor
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Leaked examiners reports shed light on STEM’s gender woes

A trove of confidential examiner’s reports leaked to Cherwell show that Oxford’s female undergraduates are performing worse than their male classmates in several STEM subjects.

Chemistry and biochemistry

The 2017 chemistry examiner chairman wrote: “I was particularly troubled by the fact that there was an almost 10% difference between male and female attainment in the easier questions!” He stated that he had “no answers” to explain the difference but thought that “there is something clearly systematic.”

In a letter to the chemistry external examiner in 2017, the Head of Policy for taught courses noted: “There is a significant gender gap in favour of men in the proportions of candidates gaining A* in Chemistry A level, and that a number of other Russell group universities seem to have a similar (although less marked) gap.”

Two years later, she noted that the problem had persisted, suggesting that: “a gender deficit in ‘academic self-concept’” may cause an “imbalance” that is “correlated with examination performance.”

In another letter, she added: “Testing of our students at the start of the course shows a significant gender gap, which does not increase through the course, and there is a similar gap in the problem solving mark of the TSA test, which is taken at the application stage.

“It seems likely that this is a pre-existing problem rather than something created by the tutorial system.”

The department is also considering whether other confounding factors are falsely creating the appearance of a gender gap. Singaporean and eastern European students — who are usually male — tend to outperform British chemistry students. The greater proportion of men among international students accounts for half of the gender difference.

“There is no current plan to reduce the rigour of the examination process,” Gurm wrote, “the department considers it to be of [sic] the highest importance to preserve this.”

Cherwell understands that professors are collaborating with the head of Experimental Psychology on an unspecified project to improve academic self-concept.

In biochemistry, men have almost always had a greater chance of getting distinctions than women since 2010 (although women have been less likely to fail). Only 2015 did not see any difference between genders, which the examiner observed occurredw was in “the cohort with the highest proportion of males.”

Women comprised 35% of chemistry candidates and 52% of biochemistry candidates in 2017.

Computer science

Computer science’s external examiner wrote: “Of the three programs I examined there was not a single student was female [sic].” She urged the department and University to take “serious action to improve the situation.” Last week’s annual access report showed that only 9.8% of UK students admitted to computer science were women.

Physics

Men outnumbered women 4 to 1 in physics’ 2018 graduating class. The examiner noted that women were far more likely to switch out of the integrated master’s course to the BA course. Four in ten women transferred, compared to 14% of men.

“The Physics BA course is largely used as an exit route from the MPhys course,” the examiner said. “It appears that female students continue to perform noticeably worse on average than males at most levels.” Half of men received a first compared with 30% of women.

Maths

Maths had a similar gender balance to physics — 22% of candidates were women – but the results were more lopsided. The department’s examiners were “concerned to discover” that twice the proportion of male candidates received firsts compared to women, whilst women were two and a half times as likely to get a 2:2 or below.

This “very significant gender discrepancy” comes in the wake of the department’s 2017 decision to extend exam papers’ time limit from 90 minutes to 105 minutes in an attempt to help some female candidates who are “adversely affected by time pressure.”

The gap is about the same size in maths prelims. During 2016-2018, 37% of men earned distinction in contrast with 15 percent of women. Women were 35% more likely to receive a pass or lower. Graduate students in the MSc Statistical Science programme also experienced similar discrepancies. Between the same years, 54% of males earned distinctions versus 28% of females despite the gender balance being 58/42% respectively.

The examiner cautioned readers against making conclusions because “variables in addition to gender can play an important role.”

Other subjects

But a few MPLS subjects are achieving equal outcomes. Material Science’s “Confidential” report concluded: “the performance of male and female candidates was not significantly different.” Women tended to get the highest marks and men the lowest, which reflected individuals’ rankings overall.

Concern for gender disparities is not limited to MPLS either. “The better performance of male candidates is clear,” the History and Modern Languages examiner wrote. Over 2014-2018, 57% of males earned firsts compared with 36% of females. Men averaged fewer than a third of all candidates across those years. “The small number of males taking this joint school could perhaps suggest a greater degree of self-selection,” the examiner said.

There were also female attainment gaps in Music, Jurisprudence, Engineering Science, Classics, Modern Languages, Oriental Studies, Theology & Religion, and English Language and Literature. However, their examiner’s reports did not discuss their equality statistics or Cherwell was unable to acquire them.

The University and multiple women’s groups have been contacted for comment.

Tuition fee ‘cut’ to cost grads more in debt repayments

Simon Hunt
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Tuition fee ‘cut’ to cost grads more in debt repayments

Students could end up paying more after graduation under the government’s new tuition fee proposals, a Cherwell analysis can reveal.

The Government-commissioned Augar Review, published in May, has proposed a cut in tuition fees to £7,500 and a scrapping of interest rates during the period of study. However, the income threshold at which graduates begin to pay off their debt would be lowered from £25,716 to £23,000.

The effect of lowering the income threshold outweighs the effect of the fee and interest rate cut, Cherwell’s analysis shows. Graduates at Oxford, in virtue of having among the highest prospective incomes within the first five years of graduation, would be among the most severely affected by the proposed changes.

Research by Cherwell compared four undergraduate courses (Law, History/Philosophy, Engineering and English) taught at six different universities (Oxford, Cambridge, UCL, Durham, Coventry and Leeds Beckett) using median income data from the Department for Education.

Our analysis found that graduates from Oxford University, who already pay off among the highest levels student debt within five years of graduation, faced the biggest increases in debt repayments of the six universities under the proposed changes. The debt repayment for a Law graduate from Oxford five years after graduation is set to increase by around £1,200 on average. This is in comparison to the repayment for a Durham Law graduate, which will increase by around £960. The debt repayment for an Engineering graduate from Oxford five years after graduation would increase by around £1,200 on average, compared with repayments for a Coventry Engineering graduate, which would increase by around £1,080.

Our analysis also found that differences in debt repayments vary to a much greater extent between universities than between degree subjects, relating to respective differences in earnings. The median incomes of Law graduates five years after graduation at Oxford versus at Coventry are £61,400 and £21,400 respectively, a near threefold difference. Contrariwise, the median incomes of Coventry graduates studying Law versus English are £24,000 and £21,400 respectively, a difference of only 12%.

The median incomes of Philosophy graduates five years after graduation at Oxford versus at Leeds Beckett are £38,100 and £19,600 respectively, a difference of almost 200%. But Philosophy and Engineering graduates at Oxford will earn £38,100 and £42,800 respectively, a difference of only 12%.

Oxford hit by mumps outbreak

Angus Brown
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Oxford hit by mumps outbreak

Corpus Christi, Brasenose and LMH have all issued emails warning students of a mumps outbreak amongst the student population.

Cherwell also understands that cases of mumps have been reported at Univ, Oriel, Hertford, and Queen’s.

In an email addressed to “all students and tutors”, Corpus Christi’s Welfare Dean and College Nurse wrote that: “A number of students have been diagnosed with mumps so we thought it important to send out a message advising students what they need to look out for and what to do if they think they have mumps and advising tutors that mumps is circulating amongst the student body.”

LMH similarly warned students: “There has been reported cases of mumps in college. Mumps is a contagious viral illness which is troublesome to students particularly at exam time.”

Corpus Christi quoted the diagnosis of mumps from the NHS website as follows: “Mumps is a contagious viral infection. It is most recognisable by the painful swellings at the side of the face under the ears (the parotid glands), giving a person with mumps a distinctive “hamster face” appearance.

“Other symptoms of mumps include headaches, joint pain and a high temperature, which may develop a few days before the swelling of the parotid glands.”

The email further advises students to “See the College Doctor (but inform the receptionist that you think you have mumps so they are aware prior to your arrival at the surgery) or contact the College Nurse. “Rest, drink adequate fluids, and take paracetamol or ibuprofen for symptomatic relief.

“Apply warm or cold packs to the parotid gland as it may ease discomfort. Do not attend tutorials, lectures or interact with other students for 5 days after the initial development of parotitis (inflammation of a parotid gland). If you are able to go home it would be advisable to do so.”

Brasenose’s domestic Bursar Grahame Smith similarly told students: “Given the infectious nature of mumps we will be following the advice of the College nurse, and request that any infected student is placed in effective “quarantine”.

“We will make appropriate arrangements with the kitchen for food to be taken to such students’ accommodation rather than hall.”

The email from Corpus also reminded students that: “Mumps is usually a self-limiting condition. It will usually resolve over 1–2 weeks, with no long-term consequences and antibiotic treatment is not required.”

Oxford was previously affected by a mumps outbreak at University College in October 2018. In May 2017, an outbreak of mumps occurred in colleges across the University, causing disruption to exams and sports fixtures. At the time, Cherwell reported that as many as several dozen students were affected across the University, including major outbreaks at Exeter, Corpus Christi, and St Anne’s.

Mumps is an airborne virus transmitted through coughing or sneezing, and is easily spread through infected droplets of saliva that can be inhaled or picked up from surfaces, hence the need for students with the illness to be quarantined in their rooms or go home. In serious cases, it can cause deafness and meningitis.

Many students will already be vaccinated against mumps, since the MMR (measles, mumps and Rubella) vaccine is part of the routine NHS childhood vaccination schedule. After both doses of this are given, the vaccine provides 95% protection against mumps. Most people who have been infected by the mumps virus will develop a life-long immunity to further infection.

If you are worried that you might have contracted mumps contact your GP for advice.

Time to tilt the lens – why is the fashion industry ignoring disability?

Sophie Grapentin
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Time to tilt the lens – why is the fashion industry ignoring disability?

Part 1 of a two-part series

With crammed shops, an almost complete absence of disabled people on catwalks and a lack of inclusive products, the fashion industry is both a business which pervades the life of every single person and at the same time sports a complete lack of representation of and accessibility for people with disabilities. But what is the fashion industry actually lacking in the way it caters or doesn’t cater to a group which makes up twenty-two percent of the population in this country? Before getting into the topic I would like to point out that all the following statements, problems and solutions are based on conversations I had with different disabled women. They represent their lives and their personal experiences and opinions, nothing less but also nothing more. 

The first problem is the kind of products that are available. While Jo’s small size means she often shops in the kids section, she is always looking for certain items that are difficult to find. Or in her own words: “being restricted to children’s wear is great from a money perspective because I don’t have to pay VAT but from an underwear perspective not so great because I don’t fit the bras I need! And when I did finally find knickers that didn’t have cartoon characters printed on them, I bought them in bulk.” And it is not just the actual product, for many it’s even getting into the shop in the first place. The layout of the common high-street shop hardly makes clothes shopping a pleasant experience when navigating the space in a wheelchair. This can make shopping an annoying and unnerving experience for wheelchair users like Anne* (name changed by editorial staff). To maximise retail space the clothes racks stand so close to each other that it is often challenging for wheelchair users to move through them. Clothes are also hung up high. That makes it easy to browse when you are standing but unreachable when you’re sitting in a wheelchair. But the challenge doesn’t stop there. Wheelchairs do not move sideways but the curtains of a common changing room do. If you do manage to get in, you are facing forwards with not enough space to turn, but that curtain is still behind your back. And where is the joy in buying a beautiful new dress when not a single part of the store has been created with your needs in mind? 

Historically the relationship between fashion and disability representation has been difficult. It is not just that the group is shockingly underrepresented, the industry has also been accused of ableism and the fetishization of disability, especially disabled women, in the past. When Alexander McQueen created a pair of carved wooden prosthetic legs for the world-class Paralympic athlete Aimee Mullins in his 1999 collection ‘No.13’, he was accused of using her for shock value and treating her as part of a ‘freak-show’. The prosthetics have high sculpted heels with pointed toes and the calf is covered in flowers and vines trailing up the leg inspired by a Louis XIV-style table. While these connections between women’s legs and furniture does bring up associations of Carlo Mollino whose chairs balance on their very thin legs like the women in fetish heels in his private picture collection, McQueen’s catwalk was also a chance for Mullins to prove her talent which she clearly did when gracefully walking over the runway after only a few hours of practice with those legs. But photoshoots like the one accompanying Kylie Jenner’s 2015 Interview article have been rightfully criticised for their ableism. While Mullins is a woman who lives and thrives with her disability every day, Jenner as an able-bodied girl posed in a gold wheelchair wearing a shiny black bodysuit with black fetish heels. As a twitter user put it “when actual models can’t find work when in their chair but able bodied people can sit their ass in one and get paid, there’s a problem.” (Amelia, @amysgotmilk, December 1, 2015) Wheelchair models are still a rarity at fashion shows and when the model and disability advocate Samanta Bullock works at a show she is usually the only one there: “And when I was going down the runway, everyone was clapping and cheering on me and that was great, I mean who doesn’t love being cheered on but it shouldn’t have to be like that. I should be able to get onto the runway in my wheelchair and people should just think ‘oh, another model’.” 

Opening itself up to people of different abilities is not just a long overdue shift in the direction of social justice but also has the potential to make the fashion industry a better industry overall. In not catering towards people with disabilities it misses out on 13.9 million potential customers in the UK alone. But this is not just a matter of profits, the measuring stick of good design – ‘form follows function’ – also raises serious questions about the clothes that the industry currently offers. If mainstream fashion is unable to cater to disabled customers, are these pieces actually good products? 

Another big factor is the corporality of clothing. This is not to deny that fashion is an artform with its good right to create impractical, crazy creations but in its everyday use it is intimately connected to the body it covers. When fashion writer and activist Sinead Burke’s light turquoise Christopher Kane dress was supposed to be shown in the ‘Body Beautiful’ exhibition of the National Museum of Scotland, curators realised that there was no mannequin in the shape of a woman with achondroplasia. They had to create one based on Sinead’s own body using a mix of plaster casts and 3D-scanning. Samanta explained how fittings were at the heart of the process of creating the pieces of her upcoming inclusive clothing line. Every single item was tried on both her as a wheelchair user and on an able-bodied model. This allowed them to find the perfect balance between getting rid of excess fabric that bunches up unflatteringly when sitting but still having enough to cover the body comfortably when standing. In an industry where fast production and constant new designs are in demand, brands rarely take the time to try their clothes on fitting models during the design process. The result is ill-fitting clothes which were made without the human body in mind. The task of designing for body shapes that have not been given their due attention by fashion designers brings the human body back into focus. This will create clothes, which actually fit, for all of us. 

Luxury fashion in 2019- will it ever be ‘accessible’?

Sophie Grapentin
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Luxury fashion in 2019- will it ever be ‘accessible’?

Anna Wintour once said that one of the things she adored most about the fashion industry is its constant drive to evolve and its focus on the future. Karl Lagerfeld mused that fashion is a mirror of the zeitgeist and that nothing is more unsettled than the zeitgeist. Looking at the developments in the world of luxury fashion it sure seems to have changed a lot – a new focus on ethical consumerism has led to the invention of new materials such as vegan leathers, a growing second-hand market makes status symbols like a Hermès bag more readily available than ever and renting concepts like ‘Rent the runway’ make clothes as exchangeable as library books. On the other hand, some aspects that make high quality high price fashion so luxurious have remained surprisingly continuous. With all the developments that make luxury fashion more accessible and by necessity also less exclusive, it was only a matter of time until stars and actors had come up with a new and even more exclusive way to dress: vintage designer fashion. A general trend towards personalisation and customisation is also visible. Last year Louis Vuitton released a collection of colourful patches you could choose from to create a unique one-of-a-kind bag or purse. 

With the idea of ethical consumerism consumers now want fashion that does not just fit their personal aesthetic but also expresses their personal moral code. Stella McCartney’s designs for example do not use any animal products. She uses recycled polyester instead of calf leather and is supporting research into cruelty free silk thread created through replicating the way in which spiders spin their silky nets. Earlier this year the world’s first vegan fashion week was organised in Los Angeles.  

Owning a piece of high end fashion is always a status symbol and the industry has often used limited edition colourways and long waiting times to create a feeling of exclusivity. Even if you had the $10,000 that could buy you a Hermès Birkin bag, your name would only be put down on a waiting list. Second stores and resale websites for designer brands have made it much easier to access status symbols like the Birkin, even if you aren’t Victoria Beckham or one of the Kardashians. Another way in which more people can participate in the world of luxury fashion is renting. Different services offer different renting systems. A subscription style like ‘Rent the runway’ will let you adopt a piece for up to a month before you have to send it back. Others offer special occasion items, namely ball gowns, to borrow for a few days. And in many ways this concept makes a lot of sense. Ballgowns are among the dresses that rarely get worn twice. They take up a lot of space in your wardrobe and you don’t have the deal with the dry-cleaning . So there are many good reasons to outsource all these problems to a professional. 

Still, what is defined as luxury fashion is constantly changing and for every development that makes high quality and high end clothing available more widely, there is a shift to create a new unreachable standard only possible for very few people. The luxury dresses of choice for red carpet events have lately been surprisingly often vintage. Do you remember Cardi B’s vintage Thierry Mugler gown from the 2019 Grammy’s? Or Kim Kardashian showing up in a skin-tight sheer 90s Paul Gaultier look earlier last month? When it comes to vintage fashion it is not just the price that makes it so exclusive. Pieces like these are difficult to find and you will either need a lot of time spent looking through charity shops, eBay listings and estate sales or have very good personal relations to a vintage dealer to get them. 

While many changes in the industry have allowed more people than ever before to participate in the circus that is high end designer fashion, stylists and celebrities also keep finding new ways to ensure extreme exclusivity – mainly vintage and customisation. To be able to own or even just wear a dress like that you have to know the right people.  

But this personal connection that makes clothing so luxurious is not exclusive to high end designer pieces. While my own wardrobe does not sport any fancy designer pieces, there are a few things in there that to me embody true luxury. My favourite is a bright red evening dress. It is not only ethically produced by a woman I know and adore but also made exactly to my measurements. Because it is made from ethically sourced fabric I know that only five were ever sold. It fulfils all the requirements I could ask for in a glamorous dress: it is unique and rare, fits my ethical standards as well as my body and I feel emotionally connected to not only the piece itself but also the people who created it. It shows: the things that make the high end dresses described above so special and luxurious are not all related to a high price tag.  

Love, Lust and Angst

Josh Taylor
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Love, Lust and Angst

With ruthless contempt for form, clarity, elegance, wholeness, and realism, he paints with intuitive strength of talent the most subtle visions of the soul.” So Arne Eggum described Munch in 1984, and so do we have a description that still rings true some 35 years on for the expressionist master of angst. Perhaps the only thing missing from the list of Munch’s artistic disregard is that of sensual discretion: in his ‘soulscapes’, Munch explores an almost perverse fascination with sexuality and femininity. They are the focal points of much of his print works that provide a thematic foundation to his works almost on a part with his introspective talent. The British Museum exhibition exploring Munch’s sensual prints, entitled Love and Angst, may just have easily been titled Lust and Angst, a name perhaps better suited to describing frames filled with recurring phallic symbols and sperm cell borders. Inspired by the Bohemian-cum-anarchist Hans Jaeger, Munch (a good name for intellectual grand-standing, as it’s not pronounced how it’s spelt) came to treat art as an “attempt to explain life and its meaning to [him]self” .Much of the angst seen in his works is rooted in the difficult social transformation from Jaeger-esque Bohemianism to an industrialised, modern world. This same time period saw the hyper-sexual strands of Freudian thought emerge with great publicity, and it is likely that Freudian psycho-analysis branched into Munch’s own self-perception, resulting in the evocatively sensual style Munch has become recognisable for.

The exhibition wastes no time in establishing the influences of these two men: walking in you immediately find Munch’s infamously introspective self-portrait. Bland, indistinct features are overwhelmed by a sea of black, that deep black which is only possible on a lithograph. The eerie glare of such a normal face floating without a neck as if drowning, trying to keep his head above water, implies that the real monster, unspoken and unseen, lies within: it is the black of the deeper soul which provides the angst, not the outward appearance of man. Turning immediately round a corner, you encounter an enigmatic portrait of Hans Jaeger; the description next to it sufficiently Bohemian and complimentary of his influences on Munch. An elusively intriguing portrait, it is difficult to pin the man down as you find yourself drawn in, but rather unsure where to look. And so the scene is set: here we have a man of great artistic potential, with introspective expressionism that, only after the gentle nudging of an anarchist and in the emerging growth of psychology, truly came to life in its jealous, sensual, guilty, layered forms. Following a quasi-chronological development of Munch’s career the exhibition hits all the expected notes. The Frieze of Life, a lithograph print of The Scream, and The Sick Child, all rightly feature in this exhibition (and likely on many an Instagram story), and serve as good signposts for Munch’s progression as an artist.

To find the real intrigue and power of Munch though, one must look deeper into his ability to develop themes and prints, adding subtleties of colour and complexity that one can only appreciate fully when seeing versions side by side. These rows of prints, developed from one frame to the next, are where Munch really comes to life. Take Towards the Forest: three variations of one print, depicting an embracing couple standing at the edge of the forest, looking inwards. With each print, the forest gains detail; by the third variation, the forest is marked with twigs, tangled brush, and large tree branches, compared to mere outlines of shapes in the first print. The couple, in the same position but now different surroundings, take on a new character: sorrowful, overwhelmed, and contemplating something far more pessimistic than before. They become much more dependent on each other, the physical contact of their embrace now supportive, not solely loving. Munch adds a visceral tone to each print: he is not merely painting over a canvas, but carving notches and nooks into a physical manifestation of the soulscape he is trying to create. If visceral sensuality is only implied in Towards the Forest, it is the foundation stone for his exploration of women, habitually associating them with the femme fatale. Munch’s early experiences with women were dominated by tragedy: his mother and favourite sister died of consumption during his childhood, his younger sister developed schizophrenia (which Munch feared he had inherited too), and he never married. It is little wonder that these experiences led to a melancholic frustration with femininity, combined with a perceived fragility, to culminate in a repressed obsession with female sensuality. Vampire, Puberty, The Madonna, and The Kiss all revolve around the female nude. Displayed alongside each other in a row of women who resemble pre-Raphaelite muses (think Kate Bush in Wuthering Heights), each contains such deep-rooted sensual frustration that it is difficult to know where to begin. The nudity itself, especially of a young girl in Puberty; the disgruntled foetus floating in the corner of The Madonna; the voyeurism of nude kissing in front of a window in The Kiss; the billowing strands of red hair entangling an embracer in Vampire: the sensual elements are endless. There are even sperm cell borders on several works and recurring phallic symbols disguised as the sun’s reflection on a body of water. Confused frustration and hyper-sensuality penetrate each work, yet underlying them all is a feminine fragility Munch experienced all too well. Puberty shows a girl, staring directly at the viewer, frightened by her being observed, a young girl lost in a vast world. Vampire is an embrace, a woman resting on top of a man, a symbiotic dependency verging on parasitism. The Madonna has a perverse sense of peace, her eyes close to shut, looking slightly fatigued, resting calmly. The woman in The Kiss looks too weak to stand: without her partner holding her she may well fall through the window behind. Munch’s capacity for inner-exploration through development of prints and themes is why, in spite of his work’s continued capacity to make the viewer uncomfortable, his artistic appeal has endured. His angst at the emerging modern world and sensual frustration at women he could never seem to understand combine to create an impactful exhibition at the British Museum, where his art is allowed to flourish in its own brilliance, without forgetting the importance of the influences he received.

The Sensuality of Female Loneliness

Amber Sidney-Woollett
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The Sensuality of Female Loneliness

Erica Garza’s memoir, Getting Off, about her struggle with porn and sex addiction concludes with her looking back on a photograph on her as a young child wearing a bright orange T-shirt with ‘BOYS’ emblazoned upon it in thick black letters. “Look at me, BOYS,” Garza writes, summoning the voice of her child-self, “I’m a girl and I am sexual. I’m a girl and I have desires. I’m a girl and I am proud. Look at me looking at you.”

Though this might seem to gesture towards Garza’s self-confidence, this could not be further from the truth of how she actually feels throughout her adolescence and even into adulthood. The interplay of “I’m” and “I am” carefully illustrates Garza’s discomfort with herself, her uncertainty about her identity as ‘a girl’ being reflected through the linguistic contraction each time. Though she has always embraced her sexuality and desires, her relationship with her gender has been more problematic. Garza always sees herself as a ‘girl’ not a ‘woman’ until she has learned to overcome her addictions, memorialising herself as ‘the girl’ who is ‘waiting for someone to show her some interest so she can put the loneliness away for a few hours.’ In Getting Off, Garza’s loneliness has a personality and personhood of its own. It takes the form of many different things through the memoir, but most frequently, that of Garza’s own self-destructive and transgressive sexual addiction and desire. She fills herself with a penis only to feel empty again following the encounter. Even the concluding lines of her memoir indicate this: “look at me looking at you,” portends to this estrangement and the distance which has been created between herself and the “boys.”

The protagonist of Janet Fitch’s White Oleander, Astrid, ends up in foster-care after her mother is imprisoned for the murder of a formerlover, and also casts herself into metaphor: “I’m a fish swimming by Ray, catch me if you can.” The fluidity of this image and Astrid’s quickness at selecting it indicates that her sense of her own sensuality is as malleable and ever-changing. “My loneliness tasted like pennies,” Astrid complains after writing a letter to her mother who encourages her to nurture her feelings of isolation. “Loneliness is the human condition,” Ingrid declares. “Cultivate it. The way it tunnels into you allows your soul room to grow. Never expect to outgrow loneliness. Never hope to find people who will understand you, someone to fill that space.” This image of emptiness is a familiar motif of female writing where there is always a sense that they are waiting for something to come along and complete them.

In Anne Sexton’s poem ‘The Touch,’ the narrator describes her hunger for human contact and her ecstasy when she makes contact in the final stanza. “And all this is metaphor,” Sexton explains, “An ordinary hand – just lonely / for something to touch / that touches back. / The dog won’t do it.” The reference to her pet makes these lines almost bathetic whilst simultaneously exposing the very real effects of loneliness which can pervade through a persona completely. This disjoint between the real and the imagined is carried through by Garza who opens chapter five, ‘The Mean Girl,’ with the proclamation ‘We’re not making love […] We’re fucking.’ Anaïs Nin comments in her 1930 diaries that “Man can never know the loneliness a woman knows. Man lies in the woman’s womb only to gather strength, he nourishes himself from this fusion,’ whereas when women engage with their sensuality, they turn always to metaphor and speak in oxymoronic expressions. “I burn the way money burns,” Anne Sexton writes in her poem ‘The Breast’.

Sex and death are fundamental to the human experience and therefore the literary one. What is then most powerful and unusual about Sexton’s poetry is the fact she does not shy away from these taboo themes. She speaks openly of the female anatomy and sexual desire to the extent that her work might almost be deemed pornographic, her poems deliberately descend into allegory and metaphor in order to avoid such an indictment. The title: ‘The Ballard of the Lonely Masturbator’ already seems ironic, as if Sexton intends to exploit our own discomfort about such private acts. The ‘masturbator’ is by their very nature ‘lonely’ as if they were not ‘alone’ they would presumably be engaged in a sexual act of a slightly different nature. Similarly, Uterus is full of people, which bizarrely contradicts the sanctity of this physical ‘realm’ from which life comes forth, as the opening lines show: “Everyone in me is a bird./I am beating all my wings.” With this intense focus on the female anatomy, implied by the poem’s title, there comes a strange dislocation of the woman herself from her body as she morphs into some sort of visceral case to house birds, deriving her strength from these birds’ energy.

This can become a metaphor for looking at writing by women as the language they use is inherently a masculine one, according to Helen Cixious in The Laugh of the Medusa, a “[w]oman must write herself…must put herself into the text.” Yet what we see here is that there is no space left for the female voice to enter the poem, or her own body, as both have been overrun by “[e]veryone” else.


Aid should not be given selfishly

Becky Clark
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Aid should not be given selfishly

The Tory leadership election is heating up, and with it is the anti-aid rhetoric. Leadership hopeful Esther McVey has pledged to cut the UK’s foreign aid budget in half by £7bn to further fund schools and the police force. In a similar vein, Boris Johnson, the former Foreign Secretary and current frontrunner in the leadership contest, has previously called for the Department for International Development (DfID) to be shut down and instead subsumed by the Foreign Office. A notable exception is fellow contender and current International Development Secretary Rory Stewart, but his odds of becoming the next PM are looking rather thin.

This aid-sceptical sentiment is widely shared by politicians and the public alike. And when just this past month, poverty in Britain has been described as “systematic” and “tragic” by the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty, you might think it reasonable for the government to at the very least restructure foreign aid to promote the UK’s interests. Yet such a view overlooks the compassionate case for aid, which should supersede any self-interested motives.

In his seminal essay Famine, Affluence and Morality, the philosopher Peter Singer eloquently articulates an argument for giving aid, contending that “if it is within our power to prevent something bad from happening, without thereby sacrificing anything of comparable moral importance, we ought, morally, to do it.” According to Singer, it is immoral for rich individuals to spend money on luxuries rather than on reducing absolute poverty.

Even if you think that’s too demanding a requirement, there are many other reasons to think that Britain has a moral duty to give aid. For one thing, a person’s country of birth is a matter of luck rather than choice, and so there is no moral justification as to why one’s country of birth should be such a significant determinant of one’s life opportunities – giving aid is one way to compensate for this unjustified inequality. For another, the UK arguably owes reparations to many of the same low-income countries for past colonial injustices which the UK government previously committed and from which its citizens (including myself) have benefited.

Regardless of what argument you find to be most convincing, there certainly seems to be a strong ethical case for the UK giving aid to low-income countries in which people continue to live in extreme poverty. Of course, whether aid works at all is a separate matter; yet despite what the Daily Mail headlines might suggest, it cannot be denied that British aid has achieved a significant amount of good. To give just one example, DfID’s contributions to Gavi, the global vaccine alliance which immunises children against preventable diseases, have already gone a long way to reach its goal of saving the lives of 1.4 million children between 2016 and 2020 – this is a remarkable achievement which should not be diminished by aid sceptics.

Whilst it is true that aid can in certain instances harm its recipient countries, it is equally true that aid can have a hugely positive effect on them. The impact of foreign aid is far more nuanced than the media would have us believe, dependent on its specific nature and purpose. Take for instance the common criticism that aid is frequently siphoned off by corrupt officials, thus advantaging corrupt leaders in power at the expense of its intended recipients. We should, of course, be very concerned about this real possibility. However, the best response is not to cease to give aid altogether; instead, we should reduce instances of government-to-government aid to authoritarian regimes, require good governance conditions for any bilateral aid which does still occur, and promote bottom-up development initiatives which give more agency and show greater respect to citizens.

Ideally, foreign aid would simultaneously help the world’s poorest and advance the UK’s national interest. However, there are inevitably trade-offs involved in giving aid. The most efficient poverty-reducing interventions are often at odds with the type of aid which best promotes Britain’s strategic aims, such as combatting terrorism, fostering trade relations and creating new opportunities for UK businesses.

When Foreign Secretary, Boris Johnson argued that UK foreign aid should be reorientated towards supporting British interests in an opportunistic move to enjoy the best of both worlds: a situation whereby the UK still technically spends 0.7% of its Gross National Income on Overseas Development Aid, thus giving the UK soft power on the world stage, whilst the spending of that money is increasingly shifted towards the pursuit of national goals over the most charitable ones.

This proposal is part of a worrying trend whereby progressively less British aid is being spent on the world’s most needy countries. Whilst in 2013 only 12% of the UK’s aid budget was spent outside of DfID, this had more than doubled to 27% by 2017. These other government departments do not have the same levels of transparency as DfID, nor as strong a commitment to improving the welfare of developing countries.

Indeed, the Institute for Fiscal Studies noted in its 2017 report that whilst it is enshrined into UK law that the primary objective of UK Overseas Development Aid is to alleviate global poverty, it is highly questionable whether government departments outside of DfID have met this obligation when spending British aid. Moreover, the UK government continues to spend hundreds of millions of the aid budget in middle-income countries; it seems outrageous that this can be passed off as ‘aid’ when the money is clearly not being spent with the world’s poorest in mind.

To give but one example, I was shocked when the DfID Facebook page proudly shared an article in April with the headline ‘Nigerian women warned not to come to Britain in government campaign’. It turns out that the UK government is using aid money to back an advertising campaign urging Nigerian women not to immigrate since this may put them at risk of human trafficking. Rather than making the journey easier for such women, tackling the poor conditions which lead people to make the difficult decision to leave their home country in the first place, or combatting illegal traffickers directly, the UK government has decided to support this campaign in a barely-disguised self-serving attempt to appease anti-immigrant popular opinion.

It’s no surprise that Theresa May, who famously proclaimed at the 2016 Conservative Party conference that “if you believe you are a citizen of the world, you’re a citizen of nowhere”, has headed up a government which has chosen to put the national interest ahead of the alleviation of human suffering. Given the current frontrunners in the Conservative leadership election, the use of foreign aid as an easy scapegoat seems unlikely to change anytime soon. What the UK government has shamefully failed to recognise is that aid should be given altruistically, not selfishly.

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