Sunday, May 25, 2025
Blog Page 624

JCR Presidents brand University’s mental health provisions “completely unsustainable”

Joanna Lonergan
-
0
JCR Presidents brand University’s mental health provisions “completely unsustainable”

30 JCR Presidents have signed a letter condemning Oxford University’s current mental health provisions.

Signatories of the letter include the JCR Presidents from Merton, Jesus, LMH, Oriel, Magdalen, Balliol, and St John’s. 

The letter, seen exclusively by Cherwell, reads: “The collegiate system tends toward ad-hoc welfare structures. While at some colleges the welfare team can give much needed emotional support, or referrals to the counselling service or NHS, elsewhere, suitable procedures might be completely lacking.

“This leaves students as the main point of contact for those struggling with mental health problems: the SU found that 85% of JCR welfare reps are called out to crisis situations. This very [sic] troubling, and completely unsustainable.”

Oxford University spends more on mental health services annually per student than any other university in the country, with £1,000,100 spent in 2016/17 according to statistics obtained by Cherwell last year.

Yet there is serious discrepancy between colleges. Only ten out of the 38 Oxford colleges and six PPHs offer an on-site counsellor. Colleges without an on-site counsellor rely on the University’s counselling service, which, according to their website, sees between 11% and 12% of the student population each academic year. 

The University is in the process of developing a ‘Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy’ in order to address the problems surrounding the existing provisions, however there has been recent criticism over the way this has been managed.

In their letter, the Presidents claimed: “There has been a severe lack of public leadership on this issue from the University governance, the sort of leadership that has been demonstrated elsewhere’, referencing the proactive role of Graham Virgo, Cambridge University’s Pro-Vice Chancellor for Education.

They went on to say: “The students we represent have seen no comparable public statements from key University figures, and no recognition of mental health as an institutional priority.

“Furthermore, the lack of student consultation in the creation of this strategy is highly irresponsible at best, and deeply negligent at worst. Common room welfare teams cannot be on the frontlines of the battle, yet remain as peripheries to this conversation.”

All undergraduate colleges appoint Junior Deans, JCR Welfare Representatives, and trained Peer Supporters. In addition, all colleges have chaplains, who are often involved in pastoral care, especially as Welfare Co-ordinators. 

In the letter, the 30 JCR Presidents set out their demands, which included: “The senior leadership of the University, including the Vice Chancellor or Pro-Vice Chancellors, should declare their concern about student mental health. This should ensure that any efforts are transparent, so we can hold them accountable to these promises.”

Addressing their concern over the lack of student involvement in the development of any new mental health strategy, the Presidents called for: “extensive student consultation sessions regarding the implementation of the Mental Health and Wellbeing strategy”

They also requested: “The Vice Chancellor should release a written statement responding directly to the requests made by this letter, which outlines the actions that the University leadership will be undertaking.”

The end of their letter expressed concern for the impact the inadequacies of the current mental health provisions were having on other areas of student support.

“We must recognise that we are indebted to Student Welfare Services, including the Disability Advisory Service and the Counselling Service. We do not want their work to be eroded by overstretched budgets, and overdue by cases unsuited to their expertise.” 

Speaking to Cherwell, Mansfield’s JCR President Saba Shakil said: “The vast disparity in wealth between colleges means that whether or not students receive effective mental health support is a matter of pure chance.”

Shakil added: “The University is beginning to discuss the issue of wealth inequality on a meaningful level, but the impending mental health crisis will not wait for funds to gradually trickle into individual college welfare budgets. 

“What is needed is commitment from the central University to a comprehensive and universal approach to mental health provision across all colleges, ensuring that students who need help can get help, regardless of which college they happened to end up at.”

In a collective statement given to Cherwell, the signatories said: “This letter expresses the frustration of the entire student body about the lack of central university leadership on the issue of mental health. 

“We are committed to supporting the SU’s efforts to lobby the university to make mental health an institutional priority and have a constructive conversation with the Vice-Chancellor and Pro Vice-Chancellors.

“The student voice is an essential part of the dialogue, and together with the SU’s open letter, we hope that the university understands the gravity of the issue.”

Indian and Pakistani students unite for anti-war protest

Ben van der Merwe
-
0
Indian and Pakistani students unite for anti-war protest

An anti-war protest organised jointly by Indian and Pakistani students attracted more than 70 demonstrators on Saturday.

The protest was organised as a response to rising tensions between India and Pakistan, which saw both nations conduct aerial bombing missions.

One of the organisers, Rhodes Scholar Zehra Naqvi, told Cherwell: “It was powerful to experience the strong sense of community that exists amongst Indians and Pakistanis.

“I feel immensely grateful that we could reach across heart-breaking divides and come together like this in all our diversity and beautiful similarities.”

Staff, students and locals gathered outside the Radcliffe Camera to read out a joint statement signed by 81 Indian and Pakistani students and the Oxford University South Asian Society.

The statement read: “As students in a land that is foreign to our homes – India and Pakistan – we’ve always marvelled at how we seamlessly gravitate towards each other, and how we are able to come together in community in ways we can’t back home.

“We often talk about the similarities we share in our food, culture, histories and the challenges we face. The Indo-Pak community has emerged as a place of refuge and comfort for us.

“However, when we imagine visiting each other’s homes we realise all the ways in which visas and politics restrict us. As we sit together now, watching the increasingly violent direction the current discourse is taking, we are frightened.”

India and Pakistan both claim full sovereignty over the Himalayan region of Kashmir, though each control only a part of it. The heightened tensions began with a suicide bombing in Kashmir last month which claimed the lives of 44 Indian soldiers.

The joint statement strongly condemned the attack while warning that war would be in the interests of neither country, stating: “War only benefits a handful of influential profiteering interests who feed on hatred and fear.

“It is the people who never wish for war that face its repercussions. It is a luxury to be able to debate the possibility of war when the death, grief, and loss that accompany it are not part of your everyday.

“For some people, especially the already dispossessed, the human cost of war is no cliché. It is lived reality.

“We urge our fellow Pakistanis and Indians both within and outside the subcontinent to stand together in unity, focus on our commonalities, and reject divisive narratives.

“We call upon the leaders of our countries to develop de-escalation protocols, organise constructive peace talks and dialogue for the resolution of all bilateral issues, especially for Jammu and Kashmir. It has historically borne the brunt of power struggles between the two states. We call for an end to the violence being perpetuated on Kashmiris.

“War and warmongering are always unequivocally deplorable. At a time when India and Pakistan are lurching from crisis to crisis, we condemn the irresponsible rhetoric flooding the media in both countries in the strongest possible terms.

“We dare to imagine a future that is free of divisions and violence, and unshadowed by the politics of war. We refuse to succumb to this environment of fear and suspicion. We refuse to see our friends as enemies. We refuse to hate those we hold dear. This is not our war.”

Students recited poetry in Urdu, Punjabi, Bengali and English in what organisers described as “a bid to drive home the horrendous consequences of war and to help foster a sense of solidarity in the Indo-Pak community”. The demonstration concluded with the crowd singing ‘Hum Dekhenge’, a revolutionary poem by Pakistani intellectual Faiz Ahmed Faiz

Review: I punched a Nazi (((and i liked it))) – ‘Brechtian to the absolute T’

Robyn Allen
-
0
Review: I punched a Nazi (((and i liked it))) – ‘Brechtian to the absolute T’

Long walks down the beach, nights at the movies, punching Nazis – these are the things that really butter my biscuit. When I heard that there was a play running about punching Nazis, I simply could not have been more excited! Then I found out I wasn’t going to be allowed to punch a Nazi. I was distraught! What happened to good old-fashioned Brechtian audience interaction? Instead, all I was offered was the potential opportunity to blitz a goldfish in a blender, and a long story about Siamese twins by a woman in a fancy-dress rabbi hat. Somewhat less cathartic and satisfying than ramming one’s fist into the cheek of a bigot.

This was, however, exactly what was successful about mielspiel’s production. The level of grit required to get through the more philosophically complex sections could have paved Route 66. But, this managed to stop what would have made the production a failure; being conducive to the audience feeling morally superior and purified. Allowing the audience to feel good ‘cos they’ve gone to a play wot bashes Nazism.

The idea of an event inspiring personal release as opposed to inspiring change is something of particular relevance today when one looks at the manner in which the protests against Steve Bannon and Marion le Pen took place and is a phenomenon that is increasingly common. However, in this production it was clear the director had taken the words of Brecht to heart and did not intend I punched a Nazi to simply ‘satisfy the habits of its audience’. No main message was clearly presented to be accepted. The play was, in fact, unbelievably frustrating in the extent it forced you to engage. Brecht’s alienation effect was used to an absolute T, everything that was happening on stage was clearly presented as theatre and artifice, the smugness and passivity of the watching audience was banished.  

The play was also compelling in the way it subverted the expectations it had built for itself. It wasn’t really about Nazis, in particular, nor was it, in fact, a love story (despite the idea that it was both those things being conveyed to the audience at various intervals). Frankly, I would say it came closer to a lecture series than it did The Notebook.  This continual concept subversion did lead to a large amount of audience confusion, which was what truly made the production. Initial qualms such as why their representation of Brecht was played by a woman in white clout goggles and whether it was really okay to be taking about fatal surgery on infants using a toy baby with an Adolf Hitler moustache led to a querying mindset. With this audience mindset induced, deeper questioning was inspired through subtly posing ideas about whether violence is ever the correct response, and to what degree any action can be considered a response rather than an opening act. After seeing it one continually thought about the questions of the foggy lines between right and wrong which it raised.  By inspiring this questioning mindset, I punched a Nazi did exactly what it needed to do.

Fantastic Cities: unveiling the complex realities, and fantasies, of urban life

Franklin Nelson
-
0
Fantastic Cities: unveiling the complex realities, and fantasies, of urban life

“Peaceful change happens when we break out of the bubbles we inhabit, wake up, and connect with other realities.” observes the artist Penny Woolcock, whose first major solo exhibition is showing at Modern Art Oxford on Pembroke Street. Arranged across a number of rooms and comprising film and mixed media installations, the exhibition charts the course of Woolcock’s career, as she moved from Argentina to Spain and then to the UK, helping to establish the Oxford Printmakers Collective in 1976.

The exhibition opens with Utopia, a seven-minute film made in 2015 at The Roundhouse in London, which sees eight people read aloud extracts from Thomas More’s 1516 book of the same. Despite being half a millennium old, More’s considered and eloquent critique of society’s structures – he discusses capitalism, private property, and social relations – chimes with contemporary discussions about the 1%, ‘Generation Rent’ and what seem to be increasingly fractured social groupings: old and young, rich and poor, Remainers and Leavers.

Next is When the Same Road is a Different Road, made last year, which the gallery describes as ‘a dynamic new film installation presenting the startlingly different responses of two individual narratives […] on a short walk through the same city streets’. Those two individuals are a young gang member and the artist, and their thoughts and preoccupations go some way to underlining just how different it can feel to navigate London’s streets. Whilst the artist reflects on the similarities between a playground and the work of the artist Phyllida Barlow, the young man is busy watching out for rival gang members brandishing knives; both are, and are not, members of the same community. This is followed up by the intense, if more intimate, When I First Saw a Gun, where we see a separate group of eight recount their encounters with a gun. ‘The first time I saw a gun was’ and ‘that was the first time I saw a gun’, how they all begin and end their testimonies, despite the diversity of their individual stories, draws them together to emphasise that weapons do not discriminate according to race, gender or class.

Fantastic Cities, the last sound and film installation, is the highlight. Also made last year, it consists of two films which examine experiences of Oxford and Los Angeles from radically different perspectives. In Oxford, we see three white students dressed in sub-fusc strolling through the Bodleian against an unmistakably religious soundtrack, only for that image to be replaced by two rap artists critiquing the town/gown divide and Oxford’s appalling record on student diversity, the camera observing them as though in a music video. La La Land presents us with a Los Angeles where the number of tents on sidewalks outstrips the number of stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, its title throwing into relief the city’s crazily polarized nature (and a nod to the very apolitical 2016 Oscar winner). Woolcock calls it a ‘shitty, shitty, shitty city’, one where people go hungry whilst others can buy a beanie for $155. What makes these films is that their artistic aspects do not suffer for their political takes.  

Whilst the layout of the exhibition means that voices from individual sound and film installations occasionally clash, Modern Art Oxford is to be commended for this timely and engaging exhibition about community and multicultural cohesion, which is all the better for its exploration of the importance of Oxford to Woolcock’s artistic trajectory. Whilst pointing to the vibrant and diverse possibilities that the city has to offer, their fantastic nature, evoked in the exhibition’s title, signals also how remote from reality spaces and people in a city can be.

Hollywood’s lesser known gender gap

Cecilia Wang
-
0
Hollywood’s lesser known gender gap

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a male actor in Hollywood in the ripe stages of mid-life, is paid significantly better than his female colleagues.

This was vividly illustrated by the Wahlberg/Williams controversy last year. The entire cast of All The Money In The World had to participate in a reshoot following the urgent need to replace Kevin Spacey. Michelle Williams was paid $1000, whilst Mark Wahlberg was receiving an extra $1.5 million, a fact unknown to Williams. The backlash ensuing from the expose forced Wahlberg to donate his extra earnings but failed to get Williams better pay.

The story is only one example of the gender pay gap in Hollywood. Spectators tried to attribute many reasons to the mind-blowing disparity. Although both actors were represented by the same agency, they had different agents. Wahlberg’s agents were well-known for being tough negotiators that pushed for higher pay, whereas Williams’ agent seemed to have taken a much softer approach in anticipation of an awards show nomination.

There are wider trends that permeate the entire industry. Between 2016 and 2017, Wahlberg was the highest paid actor in the world, with earnings of $68 million. Whereas the top female earner, Emma Stone, only made less than half of that, $26 million. Nineteen male stars earned $15 million or more whereas only five women managed to do so. The pay gap can be attributed to the dominance of blockbusters and paucity of opportunities for older women. Wahlberg topped the list thanks to soaring fees for films including Daddy’s Home 2 and Transformers: The Last Knight, according to Forbes. Natalie Robehmed, Forbes associate editor, said: “This pay disparity comes down to roles: in release schedules dominated by superhero movies and brawny blockbusters, there are simply fewer parts for women that pay the sizeable backend profits that result in leading men’s large paydays, or the franchise sequels that permit aggressive negotiation for favourable deals”.

According to a 2016 study, women comprise just 28.7% of all speaking roles in movies and only a quarter of roles for characters are over the age of 40 – an example of ageism and lack of opportunity that Hollywood’s leading men simply do not face. “Until there are an equal number of high-paying roles, there will continue to be an inequality in the pay checks of Tinseltown’s very richest.”

A study by Time magazine revealed that earlier in their careers, women receive more roles than men. That trend reverses sharply after age 30 as men continue to receive an increasing number of roles while women receive fewer and fewer. It seems that women are rather like exotic sports cars which depreciate the moment they are first sold; whereas men are more like vintage cars whose value appreciates as time goes by.

However the situation is not so bleak. The push for gender pay equality gained momentum following the aforementioned Wahlberg/Williams scandal, and industry leaders are making increased efforts to treat actors fairly.

Most relevant to this article, there are an increased amount of complex roles available for older women as evident in recent films. The acclaimed film, The Favourite, which took home several BAFTAs, featured three women in its leading roles, two of them over 40, Rachel Weisz and Olivia Colman. Colman has just won Best Actress at the Oscars. She is an example of someone beating this trend as her career has only been on an upward trajectory since she entered her 30s. Glenn Close and Meryl Streep are further examples of female actors continuing to deliver stunning performances for very complex roles. However, the abundance of offers for roles has not necessarily translated into higher pay. This is mostly due to the fact these films often have mid-level budgets.

It is in the nature of blockbusters to have strong male leads. This in turn, means that these blockbusters are the same films that can afford to pay actors millions. The two issues are intertwined at their very foundations.

However, within these confines, female actors can still negotiate for more screen time and equal pay with their male colleagues. A push for transparency can also greatly aid this process as Hollywood is notorious for backdoor negotiations and actresses tend to find out about the scale of inequalities from the paper rather than from their producers.

Pushing for more dominant roles for women and roles in blockbuster franchises is vital if we seek to close the gender pay gap. It is only when women dominate the screen that they can tilt the balance of power.

On the Basis of Sex: battling through a man’s world

Jules Pars
-
0
On the Basis of Sex: battling through a man’s world

With the recent releases of The Favourite and Mary Queen of Scots, Hollywood appears to be taking an ever-increasing interest in the stories of strong female figures plucked from history. On the Basis of Sex arrives as part of this welcome influx of female-led films, its heroine the legal and gender parity icon, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (Felicity Jones). The film is a biopic which begins with her first day at Harvard Law School and rushes to its the dramatic core: the landmark tax appeal for unmarried male carer Charles Moritz in 1970. This case saw the beginning of her role in overturning U.S. laws based on sex discrimination.

While the film takes its title from Bader Ginsburg’s work on legal gender bias, the theme of sex discrimination pervades its entire two-hour running time. This preoccupation is established in its beautiful opening frame: the bright blue of Bader Ginsburg’s dress as she walks up the Harvard stairs induces a stark colour contrast with the darkly-suited mass of men with her, highlighting the gender imbalance of a 1950s law school intake. Merely a few scenes later, Bader Ginsburg and her female peers will be asked by the dean why they have “taken a man’s place” at Harvard.

The education-based chapter of the film highlights Bader Ginsburg’s personal struggle against institutional discrimination (such as being almost farcically ignored in class), before jumping to law firms rejecting her for being female, then abruptly fast-forwarding to her stint as a law professor at Rutgers University in 1970. These time jumps preclude a more in-depth exploration of Bader Ginsburg’s struggles with sexism in her early career and the transition from the 1950s to the 1970s – an otherwise fascinating period for women’s rights. The few scenes in which these issues are expressed are evocative and effective vignettes, but the lack of more intense exploration renders this beginning somewhat superficial.

While director Mimi Leder does a good job in steering scenes fecund for schmaltz away from the saccharine, the implied relationship between Bader Ginsburg’s motivation and the opinions of her teenage daughter, Jane (played with passionate teenage aplomb by Cailee Spaeny), is overdone. It comes across as both oversentimental and patronising to Bader Ginsburg. Yet Leder cleverly suggests that the cresting of second-wave feminism catalysed Bader Ginsburg’s motivation to fight against sex-based discrimination.

Once the film reaches its primary storyline of the Moritz case, the pace slows down. It is a testament to Leder that despite knowing the outcome of the case, the dramatic tension as to its result remains. While the film retains its historical integrity in not over-dramatising or elongating the courtroom scene, it is an inspirational and thought-provoking twenty minutes that it is worth seeing this film for alone.

While perhaps not an obvious choice to play Bader Ginsburg, Felicity Jones deftly evokes her calm determination and intellectual ferocity. Although Bader-Ginsburg is clearly the protagonist of her own biopic, the film must also be applauded for its skilful handling of the relationship between Bader Ginsburg and her husband (Armie Hammer). Leder manages the difficult balance of presenting a mutually loving and respectful relationship in a prominent way, without making it a distracting element of the narrative. Ultimately, this film is a thoughtful tribute to Ruth Bader Ginsburg which deserves a careful viewing.

Lord Adonis: I “can’t wait” to debate Nigel Farage at the Oxford Union

Christopher Sinnott
-
0
Lord Adonis: I “can’t wait” to debate Nigel Farage at the Oxford Union

Cherwell can reveal that Nigel Farage is expected to speak at the Oxford Union on Thursday’s eighth week debate on Brexit.

The announcement of Farage’s appearance had not yet been made by the Oxford Union, but instead was pre-empted by Labour peer and People’s Vote supporter Andrew Adonis, who this morning tweeted: “I’m debating Nigel Farage at the Oxford Union on Friday. Can’t wait”. Given that Oxford Union debates are, under normal circumstances, held every Thursday of term, and that the Union’s term card places the Brexit debate on Thursday 7th March, it is not known whether the date announced by Lord Adonis is correct.

The specific motion that will be debated at the upcoming Brexit debate and which speakers would be attending has been kept a secret from the Union’s members throughout the term. The Oxford Union’s website has for weeks read “speakers to be announced”.

Cherwell has contacted representatives of Nigel Farage, Andrew Adonis, and the Oxford Union for comment.

It is not yet known which other speakers from the student body or elsewhere have been confirmed to speak at the event.

Along with the Union debate, Adonis also announced on Twitter he would be speaking at Leeds, Eddisbury, Oxford, Llanelli, Swansea, and Wrexham in the upcoming week.

The Oxford Union organised a now-famous debate on Britain’s membership of a European community in 1975, two days before the referendum which saw Britain’s voters consent to membership of the EEC. Speakers in proposition included Edward Heath and Jeremy Thorpe, while Barbara Castle and Peter Shaw spoke in opposition.

More on this story is expected to follow.

David Bowie: The art of getting on a bit

Kavya Deshpande
-
0
David Bowie: The art of getting on a bit

During his 1995 tour of tiny club venues across England, David Bowie opened all his shows the same way. Newly-goateed and newly-toothed – American dentistry had overhauled what used to be a physical manifestation of the warning on a cigarette packet – he’d lean into the microphone and grin.

“D’you want to hear the hits?” 


The crowd would explode.

“Bad fucking luck, I’m playing my new stuff.”

It was cheeky, not hostile; this wasn’t a latter-day Bob Dylan concert, where he treats the audience like an irate teacher being held back to supervise detention. Nor was it the Rolling Stones’ school of geriatric performance, which is essentially an extended exercise routine to keep Keith Richards alive.

Decades after Ziggy had been buried, the Duke deposed and Berlin evacuated, the only character that remained for a middle-aged David Jones to play was that of a middle-aged David Bowie. He was trickier than all the space-messiahs and occult-idols that had come before. He was also infinitely more sublime.


Bowie built his legacy on what is widely considered to be a near-perfect thirteen-album run. His conquest began with the 1969 record that gave us ‘Space Oddity’ and culminated in 1980 with the one that tossed out ‘Ashes to Ashes’. By this point, he was thirty-three and tired. He was feeding the press a prodigal-son narrative about leaving behind his hedonistic past while still secretly struggling with cocaine. After signing an 18-million-dollar contract with EMI, he threw together a couple of hollow singles and was wheeled out to play them to stadium audiences. He felt, in his own words, “like Phil Collins” (unfortunately for those who’ve had a spiritual experience to In the Air Tonight, he didn’t mean this in a good way).

It’s the hero-worship of the young, flawless, Dionysian genius that makes the older, clumsier, “Uncle Dave” – as he started jokingly calling himself – more fascinating. It’s also not without reason that the latter is often known for his glorious fever dream of a midlife crisis.

He crash-landed in 1988 as a member of the short-lived garage band Tin Machine, a project for which one music journalist told him to “go home, man; you’re an embarrassment” in a review that purportedly made him cry. He soundtracked his own wedding to Somali model Iman and released it on CD in 1993. In 1997 arrived a drum ‘n’ bass album to coincide with his 50th birthday and new hairstyle (remembered lovingly as the ‘Bohawk’ – look it up, or don’t). Some of this was tiresome. A lot of it was wince-inducing. All of it, however, is worth listening to; not just for its occasional moments of beauty, but because there is something to be learnt from a man who refused to do the decent thing and keel over at 27 with an unspoiled legacy.He always found it exhilarating, personally fulfilling and a little bit funny to keep flinging his new stuff at confused crowds who’d only come to hear ‘Let’s Dance’. (‘Let’s Dance’ was eventually incorporated into his live set; a flamenco-infused version with a two-minute-long intro played on classical guitar).

And then, just like that, the mania fell away into silence. After suffering a heart attack onstage in 2003, David Bowie went back to being David Jones for a little while. He retreated to his penthouse in New York, rummaged about in bookshops, strolled the streets in a cap and sunglasses with his middle finger surreptitiously extended towards the rare errant paparazzo he noticed. In the 2010s, he gave everybody a lovely shock by releasing two more albums whilst maintaining his self-imposed exile. And then he died.

There exists a theory that his vanishing act was an imitation of Marcel Duchamp’s withdrawal from the art world in 1942. Another suggests he’d finally had enough, that he desperately desired a total and decisive break from his past. Listening to the final two records, however, this is difficult to believe. They are ridiculously transcendent as always, yelped rockers on the penultimate, followed by a swan-song spun from space jazz. But now and again, there are winks and nods to those who remember the old stuff and care enough to stick around. A drumbeat from the Ziggy opus ‘Five Years’ is grafted onto a track on 2013’s The Next Day. On the last ever song of the last ever album, a harmonica line from 1977’s Low is exhumed. It is the sound of a boy from Bromley who will later remark that by all the laws of reality, he should have ended up an accountant. It is the feeling of being punched in the stomach.

David Bowie was never more interesting than when long after most people had ceased paying attention. He shrugged off his legacy and ran, returning only to make things that he didn’t expect would satisfy anybody but himself. Most of the time. In 2007, the voice of Lord Royal Highness in the 92nd episode of SpongeBob SquarePants did sound vaguely familiar to many viewers.

Sometimes an artist growing old will continue working because they still have something left to say. And sometimes it’s just because they want to make their seven-year-old daughter laugh.

Death and the maiden

Sophie Jordan
-
0
Death and the maiden

A naïve ear listening to Verdi’s Requiem might wonder which part of the score was really designed to accompany the deceased into their final rest, or any kind of rest for that matter. From the hushed opening notes in which the violins’ languishing tirade softly underlines the soprano’s opening phrases; the basses, alone for a handful of measures, lead on to the crescendo until the ensemble reaches an already booming mezzo forte. By the fifth minute, the strings, the orchestra and all of the doubled chorus have struck the audience’s ears with their passion and power, leaving only the four soloists to be introduced successively within the next section.

Blame it on the Romantic epoch, on Italy ’s much parodied love for fiery, from-the-heart music or even on the composer himself: Requiems as a sub-category methodically play with extremes, regardless of the period or place they were written in. Mozart’s own beast of a piece follows a similar pattern, drawing the audience into the work’s dizzying dynamics after a few counterpoint measures, with the chorus’ layered murmurs rapidly gaining momentum. By definition, the Requiem mass evokes the vertiginous prospect of eternity and the finality of death in turns, displaying the widest range of spiritual attitudes to the end of life on Earth whilst showcasing the composer’s own capacity to transcribe these superlatives into music. Although its early transposition from the initial context of the funeral mass to the concert-hall demonstrates the Requiem’s particular propension for Romantic expression beyond strictly religious settings, the short time-span which saw the first performances of Brahms, Verdi, Dvořák and Fauré‘s pieces in the last decades of the 19th century only stresses the text’s flexible offering. Here, turn to Fauré for all the blown-up beauty of troubled lentos and near-mystic adoration, with a little boost from the organ.

Perhaps more than most genres, the Requiem appeals to individual conceptions of the human being’s short existence. Ironically, setting Biblical verse to music and presenting it in a concert turns the pious dialogue of the original Catholic mass for the Dead into a very public event. Beyond the tragic accents in the exclamations sung by Verdi’s soprano, the liturgical structure framing the work in lieu of a narrative renders the Requiem into a paroxysmal expression of emotion. Yet precisely this stripped form may seem an obstacle against catharsis: a Latin text, the meaning of which we might have gathered through its thematic repetition, remains a Latin text, and its subdivision into the various postures of the mourning soul heightens the abstraction.

Brahms’ answer to this tradition was to compose a Requiem in his mother-tongue. Using lines from Luther’s Bible translation, the German composer premiered his Deutsches Requiem just over 150 years ago, on 18th February 1869. Without necessarily delving into the historical matter of nationalist sentiment on the eve of Wilhelmine Germany, this re-appropriation evidently intensifies the sense that public discourse and the inherently private are interwoven in the genre. In choosing the most comforting lines from Luther’s text, Brahms positioned his Requiem at the more soothing end of the scale, addressing the mourner’s perspective first. From Mozart’s galvanised memento mori and Verdi’s triumphant ode, to Britten’s fragmented work on atmospheric effects, the Requiem mass has been set to a wide range of styles and plied to many different emotions. These swansongs cry to spiritual glory, simultaneously being implicitly deemed the most authentic examples of their composer’s voice. To any enraptured audience, the energy in Mozart’s work overwrites the unfinished state of the original score, to class it somewhere very near the top of the list of his greatest works.

More paradoxically still, this same audience will likely hear the Austrian master’s mass more than once. Who wouldn’t, when a piece which condenses so much into a comfortable short hour’s worth of music, is programmed at least every other year in all ambitious concert-halls? This swansong, like the other composers’ Requiems, is played year after year as part of the standard repertoire, and it isn’t far from there to saying the Requiem immortalises its author’s voice as a meta-consequence of the content’s universal dimensions. Words hardly get any bigger than ‘immortality and ‘the universe’, and this is exactly what Britten’s timpani cries out for in its rather overstated pairing with a less than timid glockenspiel: the king is dead, long live the king!

Wilberforce Academy set to return

Libby Cherry and Joanna Lonergan
-
0
Wilberforce Academy set to return

The Wilberforce Academy, a residential course affiliated with the evangelical Christian group Christian Concern, is set to return to Oxford this September.

It is not yet known if a college will host the academy, however in the past Trinity, Exeter, Jesus, and most recently Lady Margaret Hall, have received criticism for considering hosting the group.

Rt Revd Michael Nazir-Ali, Honorary Fellow at St Edmund’s Hall, is listed among the ‘Faculty’ who will be teaching participants on the course.

Christian Concern describe themselves as “passionate to see the United Kingdom return to the Christian faith” and express their concern that “in the last few decades, the nation has largely turned her back on Jesus and embraced alternative ideas such as secular liberal humanism, moral relativism and sexual licence. The fruit of this can be seen in widespread family breakdown, immorality and social disintegration.”

Nazir-Ali is listed as a Director at the Oxford Centre for Training, Research, Advocacy and Dialogue, a centre which aims to “prepare Christians for ministry in situations where the Church is under pressure and in danger of persecution.”

Nazir-Ali had also previously commented on a complaint made by a master’s student at Oxford University in 2017, which was reported on Christian Concern’s website.

The student, Shahriar Ashrafkhorasani, claimed that the lecturer had forbidden him from asking critical questions about Islam. Nazir-Ali said at the time that a “politically correct” atmosphere was “very widespread in the university as a whole”.

Also on the faculty are Paul Diamond, Andrea Williams and Sam Solomon, all of whom have participated in rallies in association with the Tennessee Freedom Coalition (TFC) in America, which itself has strong links with the English Defence League (EDL), headed by Tommy Robinson.

On their website, the TFC have expressed their support for Robinson, describing him as a “brave man” and defending his “right to bring truth to light regarding the spread of radical Islam both in the United Kingdom and around the world.”

In 2011, Solomon spoke at one of these TFC rallies with Dutch politician Geert Wilders, a man Theresa May, the then Home Secretary, believed would “pose a genuine, present and significantly serious threat to one of the fundamental interests of society…[his] statements about Muslims and their beliefs…would threaten community harmony and therefore public safety.”

Also in 2011, Diamond spoke at another TFC rally alongside John Guandolo – a disgraced former FBI agent (who believes the US to be at war with Islam and excused the June 2017 Finsbury Park Mosque attack on the grounds that, with a ‘Jihadi mayor’ in London, it was akin to an act of self-defence) and two activists, Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller, both banned from entering the UK for their anti-Islamic campaigning.

Diamond also spoke at at “Nashville-area megachurch”, where he expressed the hope that Christians in the US and the UK should stand “shoulder to shoulder” to battle dual enemies of Islam and anti-Christian sentiment, warning that “What’s happening in Europe could be coming to your state.”

In 2013, Williams attended a conference in the Caribbean, following the country’s repealing of its ‘buggery laws’. According to Buzzfeed, in her speech Williams said: “It is not compassionate and kind to have laws that lead people [to engage] in their sins [that] lead to the obliteration of life, the obliteration of culture, and the obliteration of family.”

Williams is also reported to have encouraged Jamaica to resist the “man-boy movement” in Europe, saying: “Might it be that Jamaica says to the United States of America, says to Europe, ‘Enough! You cannot come in and attack our families. We will not accept aid or promotion tied to an agenda that is against God and destroys our families.”

In a response to Williams’ comments, Martin Warner, the Bishop of Chichester – where Williams is one of the elected representatives to the General Synod – said: “The comments by Andrea Minichiello Williams about the decriminalisation of same sex intercourse in Jamaica have no sanction in the Church of England or the diocese of Chichester. Insofar as such comments incite homophobia, they should be rejected as offensive and unacceptable.”

Diamond and Williams are both part of the Christian Legal Centre, an organisation established in 2007 to provide legal representation to Christians who believe they have been discriminated against on the basis of their faith.

The Centre told the Observer in 2011 that they were “receiving up to five calls a day” from Christians seeking legal aid, with Diamond in particular representing clients in many cases.

However, in 2011 a Judge described more than one of his arguments as “couched in extravagant rhetoric” and a “travesty of the reality”.

In his response to Cherwell, Mr Diamond said: “Fake News [sic]. I rarely respond to persons lacking integrity, but you should be able to gain employment with CNN. As a former Labour Councillor, I remain concerned at the reports of widespread anti-Semitism associated with the Oxford University Labour Party.”

In 2012, students at Exeter College petitioned the Rector, Bursar and Chaplain to donate any profits made through hosting the Academy.

The students also alleged that members of Christian Concern had made homophobic remarks about one homosexual student, comparing his sexuality to that of a paedophile and labelling him “immoral”.

The following year, the then President of Trinity College, Sir Ivor Roberts, released a statement of apology after a backlash from students.

Roberts said: “Trinity regrets that any current or old members were upset by the fact that we gave houseroom unwittingly to Christian Concern. Any profits from the conference will be given to an appropriate charity.”

Last year, Jesus College JCR accused the college of “subsequently covering up” their hosting of the Academy. Jesus College denied any “intentional” cover up.

The Academy applied to Lady Margaret Hall for their 2019 course, however after JCR opposition, concerns for student welfare and a reconsideration on the part of the SCR, the application was rejected.

In a press statement released on their website, Christian Concern referred to Lady Margaret Hall as being “afraid of its own community” and “unable to maintain peaceful protest, bringing into question their own college values of ‘fairness, openness and equality’”.

The statement went on to say: “It is disappointing that the college and its students would appear to feel so threatened by an event promoting the same Christian values as Oxford University has so clearly been shaped by.”

Teddy Hall, Nazir-Ali, Andrea Williams and Sam Soloman have been contacted for comment.

1...623624625...2,500Page 624 of 2,500

Support Student Journalism

Cherwell is Oxford’s oldest independent newspaper, established in 1920. We are entirely student-run. By supporting us, you will contribute to keeping our paper in print and online. Every donation makes a difference.

Donate

Explore

Follow us

More

Oxford Student Publications Limited © 2025 - All Rights Reserved | Privacy Policy

Website by James Ashley