Sunday 8th June 2025
Blog Page 819

The freshers’ ‘slave auction’ wasn’t just ill-judged banter. It goes deeper

Brian Wong
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The freshers’ ‘slave auction’ wasn’t just ill-judged banter. It goes deeper

Students organising freshers’ week at Loughborough have been criticised for deciding to host a “slave auction” and “slave night”. At first glance, the slave auction appears to be another clichéd relic of banter that is expectedly divisive – some may find it funny, others may find it in bad taste. The decision to prohibit or condemn it is likely to be characterised as one made out of the intent of preventing offence. Of course, I highly doubt that the freshers’ committee is actively racist and does, in fact, condone slavery.

Yet a belief that the backlash against the event is due to the ‘offence’ it causes, neglects the fact that such “humour has repercussive harms for people of colour (PoC) that extend far beyond mere offense. The auction adds to an ongoing trend of appropriating historical injustices under the title of “banter” and “edginess”. It makes campus unwelcome to a core demographic group amongst the freshers that the very committee – ironically – is trying to welcome.

First, the would-be (now cancelled) auction trivialises the abhorrence of slavery. It portrays the dynamic of slavery as a vehicle for entertainment, as a source of comic relief. In particular, scheduling the event during black appreciation month allows for the auction to be read in conjunction with the subjugation of African Americans under the slave trade.

Of course, this is not to say that the joke slave auction is in any way equivalent to genuine slavery. Yet the harms brought about by trivialisation precisely do not derive from the imitation of the full harms of the historical slave trade, but the contrast of horrific images of slavery against the in-jokes and “banter” gained from the process.

The event is disrespectful because it exploits the images and discourses of suffering and places them within a comic context. This argument stands regardless of the demographics of the participants, and the extent to which the par- ticipating parties consent – the harm originates not from how it plays out in actuality, but the very symbolism of slavery being coopted and ‘modified’ for the sake of entertainment.

What’s more, the auction – alongside the “slave night”, “cowboys and Indians”, and various other events lined up for the week – exemplifies an ongoing trend of reappropriation of historical injustices. To laugh, to mock, to pay, to dominate, and to subjugate as a part of the slave auction is to posit that the denigration and dehumanisation of individuals can be funny.

To say dissenting voices “can’t take a joke” suggests that slavery can be a joke. Whilst this may be true for students whose history and current social statuses have suffered little at the hands of the transatlantic slave trade, the same could not be said for PoC who are continually reminded, by pathetic attempts to whitewash public memories that the suffering of there ancestors is up for debate, and can be obfuscated.

The purpose of a freshers’ committee is to make the incoming students feel safe. The experiences of incoming students are supposed to matter – particularly when the entertainment brings along with it little to no constructive value beyond deriving mirth from the wounds and pains of victims of the slave trade in the past.

Finally, such auctions or “banter” make the campus deeply unwelcoming for students of colour. Notice that the very same historical events could be experienced and interpreted differently by individuals from different racial or socioeconomic backgrounds. A white individual may conceptualise slavery as an egregious error, as a relic of the past, and as a historical atrocity that is apparently not in any way equivalent to the parody put on by the freshers’ committee at Loughborough University.

For many students, slavery is an event of the past. Yet for many PoC living in an actively racist society filled with oppressive incarceration complexes, discriminatory employers and police forces, and bigots emboldened by recent events such as Brexit and Trump’s presidency, the power dynamics of white subjugation and dominance are still very much present and active.

For many PoC – particularly freshers who are unlikely to have had extensive opportunities to build up supportive networks of friends at the university prior to arrival – the so-called ‘joke’ auc- tion sends out the signal that the campus may not take their experiences of racism seriously, or that the students they interact with may nd their present subjugation a potential subject of humour.

The “anti-PC” movement brands students who object to racist, sexist, or bigoted speech (in gen- eral) as ‘snow flakes’. It’s easy to accuse others of being snow akes when one is blinded by one’s own privilege. It’s also very easy to nd others’ suffering and historical injustice hilarious “banter” when it’s not you whose historical and present experiences are bound up with the oppression of the past. The liberal consensus is that campus environments are overwhelmingly safe for minorities and oppressed groups. Incidents like those at Loughborough suggest that there is a long way to go prior to that idea becoming the reality.

Andrew Graham-Dixon: Bridging the gap between high culture and mass media

Altair Brandon-Salmon
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Andrew Graham-Dixon: Bridging the gap between high culture and mass media

Andrew Graham-Dixon is one of the most famous art historians working today. Thanks to his television series for BBC Four, he has brought to the general public probing accounts of the art of France, Australia, America, and a host of other cultures. Graham-Dixon sees his mission, he explains to me, “[as] doing Civilisation again.” Instead of tackling world art in one concentrated bout, like Kenneth Clarke did in his 1969 series, Graham-Dixon has been surveying the globe’s cultures over a period of three decades.

It is the paucity of art history on television since the nineteen-sixties that motivates Graham-Dixon. Apart from the brief highlights of John Berger’s Ways of Seeing (1972) and Robert Hughes’ The Shock of the New (1980), the area has been largely ignored by public service broadcasting.

“The range of subjects was so small in the past—even compared to Clarke—there was no mention of the art of Spain [in Civilisation]. Try finding out about Spanish art in English, or even in Spanish.” His programs are proudly didactic, not in a condescending, top-down way, but driven by the desire to educate an enthused audience starved of high quality television.

Educated at Westminster, he went to Christ Church, reading English Literature before graduating in 1981 and moving onto the Courtauld Institute, the art history research institution par excellence, where he gained an MA. On his Oxford days, Graham-Dixon recalls that he was not involved in student newspapers or magazines like Cherwell or The Isis, saying ruefully that “I just sat in a dark room and read fourteen books a week.” Indeed, he relates, “when I finished, they wouldn’t serve me in [Christ Church’s] Buttery as they said I wasn’t a student there!” Instead, he travelled frequently to Bristol University to visit his then girlfriend, and watch Two-Tone bands like The Specials.

After university, Graham-Dixon entered journalism, writing for Vogue and the recently-founded Independent, describing his drive as borne out of his twin pleasures: “All I knew was that I was going to be a writer. I was always interested in art, so one thing lead to another really.”

Becoming The Independent‘s Chief Art Critic in 1986, he looks back fondly at a moment in the late eighties when The Independent seemed to challenge the Fleet Street status quo. “At the Indy, before I came, it was a quarter of a page for an art review. We started doing two whole pages, three thousand words on Rembrandt. Lots of papers at the time never even had regular art critics. They had reviewers for theatre and classical concerts, but not for art. All of that has really changed. Now The Sunday Times has double page spreads on exhibitions.”

He considers that “All of that has made a big difference. It has changed things. That’s good, I wanted to change it.” Here, I begin to see beneath the even, urbane manner of Graham-Dixon, to the steely determination which has propelled his desire to bring art down from the pedestal.

Graham-Dixon was on the Turner Prize panel in 1991, the year Anish Kapoor won, and just as the Young British Artists were emerging into the public consciousness.
“Norman Rosenthal and I were on the Turner Prize committee. We wanted Michael Landy, but he wasn’t even on the shortlist. But Nicholas Serota was on the committee and his was the deciding vote, and he had bought a large collection of Anish Kapoor, so I said this looks like he’d won it from the start. As a sop to us, they changed the age rule, so that only artists under 40 could win.”

“When the Turner Prize began there was a massive prejudice against contemporary art in the media—this false outrage over art being shit, was alleviated by the Turner, it became such an annual bore for the press to attack the Turner that they became sick of their own outrage. So it worked, in a way.”

Yet he sees this as part of a wider issue within contemporary art. “The problem is saying art must be avant garde, which is bullshit—if art is only powerful if it shocks you.”

“[Karlheinz] Stockhausen called 9/11 the ultimate visual spectacle, committed on TV [‘the biggest work of art there has ever been’]. Isis speak the language of shock, the language of the avant garde. How can an artist compete? Art has lost the power the provoke.”

When I ask him about the state of contemporary British art, he points to Gillian Wearing.

“The problem now is knowing who the good ones are. What’s astonishing is how every museum collection is so uniform—if one gets an Anish Kapoor, everyone has to have one. In the past, such works went to the basement quicker, but who wants to put £200m in the basement? Who would be brave enough to do that?”

In a way, it is not surprising that Graham-Dixon has spent the last decade focusing instead on the art of the past. It seems certain that his television work will be his lasting contribution to art history, despite his impressive 2010 book Caravaggio—A Life Sacred and Profane (and he is working on a biography of Vermeer). Keeping to a similar format with each of his BBC4 documentaries, Graham-Dixon’s The Art of… has notched up eleven distinct series, each tackling a different nation.

“The objective over twenty years,” he explains, “has been to choose as many different cultures as possible over three episodes.” From Germany to China and back to Scandinavia, he has always refused to tell the easy stories about humanity’s artistic past.

Indeed, when it came to making this year’s The Art of France, he laments that “it was delayed because BBC4 thought it would be too familiar.”

Graham-Dixon is certainly unsparing when it comes to the national broadcaster’s failings. “The BBC is rich as hell,” stressing “it’s not about funding cuts but funding choices. One episode of Match of the Day has the same budget as ten of my series.” He admits to finding the BBC having “lost its way”, too dedicated to spending on large-budget costume dramas than educating and informing the British public.

Graham-Dixon is keen to point out that it is hardly a problem with audiences –“The Art of Spain was on BBC World and sixty-eight million people watched it!” he says with justifiable pride – but with the BBC’s priorities. “At the moment for the BBC it is about the big audiences, which I don’t think is what public service broadcasting should be about.”

Yet this pessimism has not infected his work – he is keen to tackle the art of India and Latin America next, bringing fresh art historical narratives to the screen. Graham-Dixon ruminates that “part of the subtext of my programmes is that nationality is a powerful fiction,” pointing to the crossover in European cultures shown by his programmes on Britain, France, Germany, Italy, and the Low Countries. “Nations have been constructed. By doing the whole world, the overall message is anti-nationalistic despite paradoxically being a history of nations,” threading an internationalist undertone to his work, leaving it there for an audience to find.

I ask him how he closes the gap between art and an audience wary of museums and galleries. “I don’t know, [I try] bridging the gap between art history and museum, to tell people it’s alright to be interested in art. I don’t want to sound condescending, but I’m trying to set an example about it being okay to like art, to be enthusiastic about art.” With that deceptively humble mission, Andrew Graham-Dixon hurtles towards another corner of the world, to bring it to us.

‘Random’ preview – “Convincing and jarring”

Izzy Smith
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‘Random’ preview – “Convincing and jarring”

Francesca Amewudah-Rivers’ ability to completely transport me into the world of Random, even without the magical context of a theatre, speaks to her impressive talent as an actress. At a hurriedly arranged preview of the play’s first act at the Okinaga Room of Wadham College, I saw her embody multiple characters with consummate skill. Her accents, tones of voice and facial expressions shift masterfully, with each character clearly recognisable, even as their emotional states shift dramatically. What is perhaps most convincing is her use of physicality, her bearing and stature morphing impressively, truly embodying the characters, from the hunched careworn mother to the confidently upright father, and the son’s careless, loose-limbed ceaseless movement.

Speaking after her performance, Amewudah-Rivers tells me how her and director John Livesey had discussed in detail the importance of “spotlighting each of these characters, showing how they all link but are all individuals.” This focus certainly came through in the performance, with the closeness of the family permeating throughout, palpable even in the tensions between them. The mother resents how her children take her for granted, feeling like “their keeper” as she clears away their breakfast plates, but then softens as she states that actually she is doing this “like their mother.” Amewudah-Rivers also discusses how being, as a black woman, the only actor on stage, “centralises the themes of gender and race,” with Livesey agreeing that it enhances this ongoing examination of “the role of the woman within the family,” and the burdens placed upon her.

The intimacy of this family of developed characters, built through, as Amewudah-Rivers says, “Finding the truth and the honesty behind all of them,” and who all come together within this one actress, makes the later intrusion of the police into their home deeply jarring. Present within the play only in the family’s reactions, they are a sinister gap in the dialogue, and Amewudah-Rivers, as each family member, moves around their imagined figures with caution. The family’s fear and distrust for them is striking and infectious, and I as the only audience member recoil from writer Debbie Tucker Green’s very physical descriptions of them traipsing uninvited over the mother’s best carpet in their “outside shoes.”

As Amewudah-Rivers comments, “There’s a lot of emphasis on ‘them’ versus ‘us’,” and Livesey adds that “what we hope to capture with our staging is this sense that the police, who we should feel protected by, feel like this intrusion,” and “so often institutions can feel they are at a disjunct from communities and families, especially from ethno-religious communities.” Amewudah-Rivers’ deft shifting of intensity, and portrayal of true fear, resentment and anger, really drive home the emotional implications of this, making the most of the musicality of the script through angry crescendos and poignant, frightened moments of quiet.

This poetic or music quality is a particular focus of Livesey’s, and he reflects on how, “finding the different rhythms, the different beats, the different energies for the characters, finding their music, and then letting Fran sing it, was a great process for me.” The play is also poetic in how short phrases can be laden with meaning, and Amewudah-Rivers gives these lines space to work on the audience. She allows a significant lull in the mother’s hectic industry as she notes wistfully, and with an odd nostalgia: “still I catch a shiver of a shadow of a shadow of a day.” She delivers with slow sickening force a line observing how the police take out a “clear plastic bag of a conversation stopper.”

Throughout the play we see repetitions of phrases or moments from different perspectives, like a form of refrain, but each time radically altered by the context and tone. Both the mother and daughter comment on the father’s quietness in similar terms, but the daughter seems affectionately impressed, the mother somewhat defeated. This repetition is at work even in what seem at first more quotidian moments of the play. Characters repeatedly state the time of day, the significant of which becomes painfully clear as it culminates in the police stating the time of the play’s central incident. Amewudah-Rivers is able to use these poetic qualities of repetition and rhythm to enhance the emotional impact of her performance, where with a lesser actor they may damage the play’s believability.

Both Amewudah-Rivers and Livesey hope to see their production of Random have an ongoing impact after the performance. Livesey tells me, “we’re really hoping this play doesn’t just rest on its laurels, we are really trying to raise awareness.” The production team will be collecting and raising awareness for the Damilola Taylor Trust, which Livesey tells me “is about trying to create more aspirational opportunities for kids.” As Amewudah-Rivers points out, Oxford “experiences these same kinds of problems, these same kinds of disjuncts” as we are shown in the lack of understanding between the family and police. She hopes that, “by seeing this play, whether they’re current students or prospective students, people can see that they’re represented by a stage in Oxford.” In pursuing this goal of greater representation, she has also set up the BAME Drama Society, which she describes as “a safe space for any BME students to just share and explore and create, and voice our own stories and our own narratives through theatre.”

They both hope that, rather than feeling comfortably virtuous for attending the play, audiences – and, as Livesey notes, “particularly white audiences” – will recognise that “you could still be doing more, you should still be thinking about these questions for you.” As Amewudah-Rivers adds, “everyone has implicit bias, and everyone needs to check themselves.” Whether they leave with this sense of responsibility will be up to audiences of the whole play to decide, but I certainly believe that Amewudah-Rivers’ subtle and convincing performance makes empathy for the characters and their struggles unavoidable.

Random runs at the Oxford Playhouse from 31 October-4 November. Tickets are available here.

Five minutes with Markus Beeken, Light Entertainment Society’s Community Officer

Cherwell Stage
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Five minutes with Markus Beeken, Light Entertainment Society’s Community Officer

Can you tell us a bit about OULES and your role there?
OULES is the Oxford University Light Entertainment Society. We’re basically the more casual approach to drama, everyone who auditions gets a part and we write all our own shows. I’m the Homes and Schools Officer, which basically means I deal with promoting OULES in the community, organising taking shows to Care Homes and local schools to raise money for charity.

How did you get involved with drama at Oxford?
I started by assistant producing a garden play during my College’s arts week in first year, having never got involved in any drama back home. From there it was just a case of saying yes to anything that came my way and trying my hand at new things.

What is your favourite play?
That’s a big question! I’m writing on theatre for my dissertation and the play that’s interesting me the most at the moment is Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee. It’s so claustrophobic and threatening, it’s hard not to get sucked in.

How would you want to stage it at Oxford?
As I said, it’s a very narrow and suffocating play, so I feel like put- ting it on with minimal staging in something like the Burton Taylor Studio would highlight that sense of entrapment. It wouldn’t be a comfortable performance but it would be effective.

What is your happiest memory of Oxford drama?
Probably the feeling I got when I decided to pursue my long-time dream of directing The Winter’s Tale. It’s always been a passion project of mine and seeing it all coming together has been an honour. More than this though, the outpouring of support from my friends has been kind of overwhelming.

Have you ever had a production go really wrong?
My first experience as a stage manager I forgot to put an integral prop on the stage and only realised about ten seconds before it was needed. I’ve never seen a group of people running so fast in my life!

What advice would you give for freshers who wanna do the dramz?
Firstly never, ever call it ‘dramz’ but I think it’s a case of remember- ing that whatever you want to do, there’s probably other people out there who would be willing to do it with you so go for it. I’ve always treated drama as a social exercise, not something to be taken too seriously. So join the Light Entertainment Society, make some friends and then keep trying out new things.

Have you got any exciting projects that you’re working on at the minute?
I’m currently directing a hyper-modern production of Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale at the Maths Institute which will be on in November. It’s a really exciting project, especially pulling such a strange play into the modern era. The event is floating around Facebook, look us up! It’s going to be great.

The toughest job in college football

The Secret College Footballer
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The toughest job in college football

Football is a game consisting of two teams of eleven, but there is one person on the pitch that this description does not account for. The man in the middle, the thin black line between order and chaos, the most influential figure on the pitch – the referee. In the lightning-paced world of college football, where captains can forget to pay refs’ fees and refs themselves can forget to turn up, sometimes the responsibility lands in your lap, and you’d better be ready when it does.

Although squad rotation means that they’re not likely to ref more than a half per game, taking the black can present certain challenges for college footballers. Brought up on a diet of blood, sweat and tears, needing to adopt an unpassionate approach to a match is an extremely big ask for players, especially if they are asked to ref straight after being subbed off. Even the most mentally flexible players struggle to rise above the situation at the flick of a switch. While no respectable ambassador of the sport would officiate with deliberate bias, it is not easy to stifle the celebrations when their would-be teammates score, nor to forget that they’re no longer marking a particular opponent and clear them out in a 50/50. Critics might accuse these players of indiscipline, but it is important to remember that being a referee is temporary; being a custodian of college pride is a lifetime responsibility. You can never blow the final whistle on your college.

This is a fact that many of the refs’ would-be teammates tend to forget. When college footballers think with their hearts as well as their heads, as they are wont to do, their teammate-cum-ref is lost to them. Where once they saw a comrade in arms they now see only a malevolent watch and whistle. Flashes of vitriol may be directed the ref’s way, especially if the match if finely poised, or worse, turning against their would-be team. However, their true nature as a fellow player affords the ref patience in these situations, and all is forgotten once the prodigal son returns to the fold at the end of the half. Alternatively, other players might always see the refas a teammate, to the point where they sometimes attempt to pass to them. To avoid such situations, some kind of distinctive clothing is advised. Past options have included but are not limited to a bib, a coat, and a scholar’s gown.

Of course, challenges from former teammates are not the only ones that a hastily appointed referee has to face in a game. There is also the physical challenge. Imagine spending 70 minutes marauding up and down the left flank, running yourself into the ground for your team. Then, when you are eventually subbed off for a well-deserved rest, you find that you never even make it to the touchline. Instead, you’re made to swap shirts with the previous ref and keep up with the game for another 20 minutes. It’s a thankless task, but someone has to do it, you might well tell yourself as you struggle to mask your exhaustion. But why, you may add, does that someone have to be you?

Forget sensationalism, Lammy should focus on social inequality

Arya Tandon
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Forget sensationalism, Lammy should focus on social inequality

Last week I was approached by a BBC journalist. He wanted to know if I’d be willing to answer some questions about diversity at Oxford. At first I was tempted by the prospect of a brief touch of fame. But I eventually decided against it, made my excuses, and walked away.

It wasn’t because I needed to return to college (though this was what I told them), or that I had freshers’ flu, and would like to save my 15 minutes of fame for when I could both walk and breathe at the same time. It was because I didn’t want to be the token BME student in their report.

That’s not to say that the voices of students from minority backgrounds at the University aren’t an important part of the conversation. Their first-hand experience of life within an elite institution is vital if we are to have a productive conversation on inequality and admissions. However, it must be noted that much of the ‘conversation’ splashed across recent headlines has not sought to thoroughly analyse the reasons for a lack of diversity at Oxford, but instead focus on reinforcing stereotypes about the admissions process as elitist and discriminatory.

In his article for The Guardian, David Lammy, the Labour MP who has recently criticised Oxford’s “social apartheid”, raised the problems of below-par schools and a lack of support for applicants only to briefly dismiss them as “excuses”.

Herein lies the real cause for outrage. As a British Asian from a state (albeit grammar) school in the north, it seems as if I’ve become a pawn on the chessboard of identity politics. Painting a picture of a racist, classist university makes for a great story. But it’s not necessarily a truthful one. Meanwhile, the immense underlying problems in our society, ranging from huge divides in educational opportunities to severe regional inequality, continue to go largely ignored.

When the University points to these issues, we can react in one of two ways. In disclosing that it receives a reduced proportion of minority and disadvantaged applicants in the first place, we can recognise that Oxford raises a profound issue.

Or we can choose to subscribe to a conspiracy theory of tutors throughout the colleges meeting up in the dead of night to decide how many black applicants to disqualify, or that, after having a discussion, they don’t want to put up with anyone with a Geordie accent.

Joking aside, it’s understandable why when the statistics are taken at face value without informed context, some people jump to the conclusion of active discrimination in the admissions process. The figures are shocking, and rightfully so. Oxford still has a disproportionate percentage of students from private school backgrounds compared to the general population. Admissions statistics consistently show lower acceptance rates for those from ethnic minority backgrounds, and the fact that a third of Oxford colleges failed to admit any black A-level students in 2015 is objectionable.

But the same admissions statistics also highlight alternative reasoning: higher proportions of ethnic minority applicants consistently going for the most oversubscribed courses. More widely, private schools educate 7% of all students, yet account for a third of all those who get AAA or better in their A-levels.

So, although there are implicit ‘biases’ within the admissions system – for example, a ‘bias’ towards private school students because more of them achieve the highest grades – many of the fundamental causes lie in pre-existing social conditions.

The effects of wider social issues on admissions are serious enough without unfounded claims of discrimination. Of course, Oxford can do more to widen access where it can influence these societal problems. Focusing on expanding outreach, particularly to those regions of the country with fewer current applicants, would help to improve the availability of information for those who could most benefit from it.

Lammy’s proposal for the University to write to all those who achieve 3 As in their A-levels might be impractical but reflects good intentions. Teachers across the state sector should not only receive training in supporting struggling pupils, but also in how to support particularly high- achieving students in reaching their full potential.

In contrast to this vital discussion on improving equality of opportunity, Lammy refers to many colleges as “fiefdoms of privilege” with “interviews overseen by academics recruiting in their own image”. This extreme portrayal is unhelpful, especially since strong claims require strong evidence and he provides none.

At a previous symposium on admissions held at Oxford, he contended that the burden of proof lies on the University to demonstrate that there is no unconscious bias in its interviews.

In reality, the burden of proof lies on Lammy to show that, considering the thorough training on such bias for interviewers, any unconscious bias that does exist actually affects the selection process at elite universities.

Not only does the current media spin ignore the underlying problems, it could even risk putting off some students from applying to Oxford. When I was applying for university, I remember reading about the private/state school student divide, and chatting to friends about how Oxford apparently takes in a lower percentage of BME applicants. For those who have might have less access to the side of the story other than “Oxford is racist/classist”, this could make all the difference in choosing whether or not to apply.

Serious problems require serious solutions. Jumping to caricature and sensationalism, rather than properly trying to consider how we can tackle the fundamental causal inequalities in our society, not only ignores the problem but has the tragic potential to make it worse.

David Lammy: “You cannot describe Oxford as an inclusive environment”

Will Dry
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David Lammy: “You cannot describe Oxford as an inclusive environment”

David Lammy is a lighthouse in British politics: he seeks out rocky outcrops of injustice, where he sees the elite failing the people, and brings them into the light of public scrutiny. He labelled the Grenfell fire a “monstrous crime” and “corporate manslaughter” in the days after the tragedy. The most recent injustice at which he has directed his fire is the “systemic institutional issues” at the heart of our own university’s admissions policy.

“You cannot describe Oxford in any sense as an inclusive environment that reflects our country,” he tells me. “It’s more exclusive than the House of Commons in terms of social background and diversity, or the room for criminal barristers at the Old Bailey.”

He is speaking to Cherwell shortly after a series of freedom of information requests he submitted revealed the extent of elitism in Oxford’s application process. Namely: that in the years 2010-15, 82% of Oxford’s students came from the top two social classes, that Oxford makes more offers to five of the home counties than it does to the entirety of the North of England, and that 13 Oxford colleges did not make a single offer to a black A-level applicant.

Many of those defending the university in the media since these revelations surfaced have argued that diversity would come at the cost of lower standards.

But Lammy is not entertaining this possibility. “Let’s not even have a debate about lowering standards. There are young people who are able to go to Oxford on the grades that they have.”

For now, he believes the debate should centre on how Oxford is reaching those young people. He believes Oxford should be “actively writing to the students who are getting outstanding A*s in GCSEs: ‘Please come to us, please apply, you can come for free.’”

Lammy, who attended Harvard, highlights how the majority of this year’s intake at the prestigious American institution will be non-white. This makes him “conscious of what is possible… the truth is in America the schools are considerably worse than they are in the UK. And yet, Harvard and Yale reflect America to a much greater extent than Oxford and Cambridge.”

To drive the point home, he brings up the issue that one suspects will remain closest to his heart for the rest of his life. “A child who is on the twenty-second floor of Grenfell Tower, who is, despite all the disadvantages of school, the disadvantages of parenthood, the disadvantages of space to revise, who gets one A* and two As, is probably brighter than the child who gets three A*s at Eton.”

His simple message – that children who have the talent should be given the opportunity – has resonated across the political spectrum. Even Michael Gove tweeted that he “<3 David Lammy”, and agreed that blame shifting should be sidelined to end this inequality.

In some of Lammy’s fiercest remarks, he told me that Oxford “should be leading the debate about access and social mobility, not hiding under the bushes, reluctant to hand out data, reluctant to be transparent and instinctively blaming schools and educational inequality for the problem that they have.”

Regardless of your interpretation of the facts, it is indisputable that Oxford should regularly publish their data. Behind the worrying figures is the less headline-grabbing but equally sinister story of Oxford administrators attempting to block Lammy’s investigation at every opportunity.

Lammy described the university as “aggressively resistant” to giving him the data, and when it finally did agree to, after being informed that The Guardian was planning on publishing a story on it, they presented it in such an unintelligible fashion it took plenty of hard work to interpret the results.

Students, he believes, can “play a really, really important role” in fixing the issue. The exceptional colleges that buck the trend – Mansfield and Somerville, among a few others – do so because they have “student officers really obsessed with the issue of getting access to these young people.”

One could infer that Lammy believes students at Oriel and Teddy Hall – where just one and two black British A-level students respectively have been admitted in the last six years – could become a little more “obsessed.”

But in the grand scheme of things, these social justice warriors face insurmountable barriers. Lammy believes the basic problem lies within the college system. “A college-based admission system will always mitigate against progress in this area. Centralised faculties have to recruit so that you do not get the disparity across colleges.”

Within the Oxford bubble, transferring the responsibility of recruitment from colleges to faculty is an almost unthinkable revolution.

Just last week, Louise Richardson was hounded by various college academics for  suggesting that the processing of taxi receipts, among other back office functions, could be centralised to save money.

To erode what many believe to be the lifeblood of a college’s autonomy, its ability to recruit who it wants, is bound to create a fierce backlash from some of Oxford’s more trenchant dons.

On Brexit, Lammy is similarly scathing of the Tory government which he believes is attempting to “hijack our democracy.”

“The people were sold Brexit on the basis that we would be taking back control. We are now seeing an attempt to hide the impact assessments that the government has done and not reveal them to the general public, and to thwart the democratic sovereignty of our parliament by not giving parliament a proper meaningful vote before the deal.”

This, and the government’s refusal to publish its Brexit impact assessments, amounts to what Lammy believes are “dictatorial attempts to thwart democracy, which will only split this country apart even further”.

“It’s clear that nothing that is now coming out of the government suggests that this is in the national interest of our country. We’ve moved a long way from the sunlit uplands of this is going to be easy, the EU is going to be begging us for a trade deal, the world is going to be begging us for a trade deal.”

Lammy believes that students can play a pivotal role in resist such ‘dictatorial’ attempts. They must “resist, resist resist. Protest, campaign, write – make it clear that you will not vote for parties that are intent on Brexit.”

Two days after the referendum, Lammy did his own resisting on Twitter, stating that parliament should ignore the referendum result – out of step with the front bench of his party.

He does, however, optimistically note that “the Labour Party is travelling on the issue of Brexit… Labour is an internationalist party, and it’s working people who will suffer as a consequence of leaving the European Union. I would hope that our front bench position continues to evolve.”

The bulk of backbenchers, on both sides of the aisle, who believe in their heart of hearts that this policy goes against the country’s national interest, are very slowly creeping towards the position Lammy reached just two days after the referendum.

His message to those MPs is: “Put our country first. Put our country first. Be brave and courageous about what is in the national interest of our country.

For a man who has pitted himself against those responsible for the Grenfell tragedy, against what he sees as outdated admissions practices at the country’s finest university, and against a government – and potentially even electorate – insistent upon us leaving the EU whatever the cost, Lammy clearly does not check the odds before picking his battles.

His source of inspiration and hope in these fights is the millennials – “a fantastic generation”. He is less affectionate towards baby boomers “who basically heated up the world and gave us climate change, spent too much money and gave us the 2008 crash, and now seem to be giving us a populism.”

It remains to be seen whether our generation will resist the “bumpy decade” of “reactionism” and “xenophobia” that Lammy believes the UK is in for.

Lammy’s optimism for the UK, and his own career, is grounded in the gamble that us millennials will give him a helping hand in the fights ahead. A proactive group of Oxford students might not be a bad bunch to start with.

Imagining the Divine review – engrossing and important

Elizabeth Diggins
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Imagining the Divine review – engrossing and important

The Buddha. Vishnu. A bearded Jesus. A Parochet. A guilded Hajj certificate. The Ashmolean’s engrossing and important new exhibition begins by addressing the assumptions most of us hold about the ‘big five’ religions. Yet it sets these up only to slowly dismantle and shatter them.

While these may be representative of religion in the early modern period which these artefacts hail from, the exhibition takes the viewer back 1000 years to investigate the more ideologically porous time in which the images of these religions, both literal and figurative, were formed. The exhibition as a whole is a rare chance to see the impact of research work, laid out in a visual and almost tactile way.

The exhibition is a culmination of the ‘Empires of Faith’ project based at the British Museum and Oxford University, which is evident throughout with the focus on clear explanations and intellectual exploration. Next, the exhibition takes the viewer through early Christianity, some of the remarkable objects synthesized in the room including the Hinton St-Mary mosaic with the Chi-Rho symbol behind it. In this instance, possible ambiguities are not quite emphasised enough: it is labelled as a figure of Christ, whereas there are convincing arguments that it is in fact a depiction of Constantine. This would have been an interesting debate for the exhibition to untangle and delve into, especially in the context of the room as a whole, which investigated a crossover between temporal and divine rule.

What is perhaps most remarkable about this room is the small cabinet of curiosities in which the figurines and coins sometimes cannot be identified, due in fact to the extent to which the cultures and symbolism intertwined and intermingled. The section on Judaism, while small, powerfully challenges understandings of early Judaism. Indeed, the figurative illustrations of a God, alongside Romanesque and Islamic techniques and styles, demonstrate the transformation Judaism has undergone between then and now. Turning the corner into the main room of the exhibition, a reverential silence seems to fall. The cavernous hall befits the exhibition’s focus on the divine, and seems almost a shrine dedicated to the art that fills it.

Indeed, the works and relics in this room are worthy of respect, intricate both in artistic terms and in the analysis that accompanies them. One relic in particular demonstrates the close relationship between image and understandings of the divine, the sculpture of a goddess left unidentifiable due to her powerful attributes having been chipped off. The final section takes the visitor through rich Islamic texts, and then the British Isles. Yet here it feels like the exhibition slightly loses its focus and clarity. This is not to say it is not interesting or beautiful.

Indeed, the placement of three standing stones against a backdrop of a rugged vista is visually stunning. Here too, there are early medieval English illuminated manuscripts, gilded and intricate, as well as a fascinating example of a monk practising such illumination. However, while an interesting case study, it slightly feels as if the exhibition just trails off, rather than finishing with a visual bang.

The exhibition is cleverly coloured, with each of the religions it explores assigned a hue in order for the viewer to more clearly follow the complex ideas about religious assimilation that are distilled in the exhibition. Yet given that the exhibition’s focus is on the relationships and similarities between religions, this can be more unhelpful and confusing than elucidating. Indeed, the division of the exhibition into more discrete religious sections means that a copy of the Qu’ran, and a codex Torah to which it was remarkably similar, are situated at different ends of the exhibition.

Similarly, a blue Qu’ran and an Anglo-Saxon codex that was a clear imitation are placed in separate sections. While this is a result of the multiplicity of connections that the researchers discovered, it is disappointing for the viewer and makes the links on which the exhibition is based far harder to make. This is a strong and powerful message from academia about what unites us, and the religions that many follow.

Indeed, at a time when deep divisions are forming along sectarian and religious lines, this is a timely reminder that they were not, and are not, so distinct after all. While the exhibition in many respects throws up more questions than it answers, it has begun a pertinent and long-needed discussion on religion, and what it can demonstrate about the power of unity and assimilation. Indeed, as the Co-Curator Professor Jaś Elsner says, “This discussion has been begun at a time when cultural exchange, migration and globalisation are of critical importance.”

Is there a way out of this crisis for the Catalan people?

Jorge Lopez Llorente
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Is there a way out of this crisis for the Catalan people?

There is a ‘crisis’ in Catalonia. Yet it remains hazy, probably even more so from the outside, as it gurgles with manipulation, fake news and indecision. Catalans now live in a broken mirror of bitter division that sometimes slips into absurd comedy, like the minute-long declaration of independence by Carles Puigdemont, President of the regional government, who then backed down.

You may have believed the international coverage, which was mostly dreadful: nationalist lies were taken at face value, as in the Washington Post’s article signed by Puigdemont. Voices shout over each other, but dialogue fades. We must step back and realise that nationalists of both kinds, with Catalan esteladas or Spanish flags tied to their necks, are equally problematic. Their only ‘dialogue’ is to ram their heads against each other. It’s Spain at its most factious – but their fanaticisms must leave the centre-stage to real talk.

“Aren’t the Catalan people supporting nationalism just for freedom, legitimately, fairly?” Secessionism has been organised from above, from the powerful, so drop that populist idea of ‘the people’ first. Legitimately and fairly? That’s questionable. The Catalan regional government has been contaminating educational curricula with nationalist ideology for years: there are many cases in which Spanish is neglected, whilst Catalan is reinforced at schools, for example.

They have manipulated the regional television channel, TV3, as a propaganda platform without respect for the numerous Catalan anti-separatists who support it through taxes. “But the referendum they suggested is democratic, right?” Perhaps on paper. The latest poll on 1 October, organised by Puigdemont without consent and illegally defying the Constitutional Tribunal, was a joke, not a referendum, including Tupperware ballot boxes and people voting twice or more. Participation was below 50%.

“What if nationalist are a majority anyway?” I don’t know, but I doubt it. Most, if not all, secessionist supporters voted in that poll and they didn’t make it beyond 50%. In the 2015 regional elections (a de facto referendum), the secessionist parties didn’t gain the majority of votes, even if in a messy coalition featuring the radical left-wing CUP they reached a majority of seats. A reasonably reliable poll by CEO (July 2017) indicates that 49% of Catalans reject independence, although a majority want a referendum. Uncertainties remain, but that speaks for itself: their high-ground is shaky.

“Then what? Do you claim that Rajoy has acted correctly?” Far from it. All these years, the useless mannequin performing as Spanish PM Mariano Rajoy has been incapable of acting on anything other than defending his inaction. Crisis exploded and (unsurprisingly) he was unready. Then he worsened the situation, swinging to the other extreme: he lashed out with unnecessary police brutality on referendum day, which should have been snubbed. All states act repressively, but open violence stings even more. It wasn’t even an effective strategy: now separatists can play ‘the only victim’.

Furthermore, Jordi Cuixart and Jordi Sánchez were sent to jail, in an anti-democratic reaction. The judge spoke politically. “Some say they deserve it for breaking police cars – is that an excuse?” Legal action may be necessary, but these activists could have been fined.

It seems that Catalonia will break away. Instability has taken hold. An independent Catalonia cannot emerge though. Rajoy’s government, alongside a parliamentary majority, won’t allow it. “What if Puigdemont had his way?” Alright, devil’s advocate, if that (magically) happened, cold numbers would destroy his rhetoric: as you read this, companies are fleeing from Catalonia to other regions like CaixaBank. Also, an independent Catalonia would economically self-destruct, out of the EU and without Spain’s support to pay debt and pensions, despite Puigdemont’s decision that Spaniards would still pay Catalans’ pensions whatever the situation.

“Still, Rajoy just activated article 155 of the Constitution, which won’t help… It means that Puigdemont will be sacked, Rajoy’s cabinet will govern Catalonia…” So that there can be regional elections in some months. Inés Arrimadas, a levelheaded politician, suggested holding regional elections and that’s reasonable. “It’s a democratic option.” Exactly, but it’s only possible through article 155 or, ideally, convincing Puigdemont to call elections. Puigdemont won’t budge and Rajoy rejects referenda, so there are almost no other scenarios.

So what happens now? Who knows. Hopefully, the debate can progress from populist nationalism to actual problems too, like corruption or unemployment. Flags have covered the muck of corruption from Rajoy’s Popular Party and ‘the 3% scandal’ from Convergència i Unió (the former label of Puigdemont’s party) “Yes, while both leaders disgracefully mishandled other issues, especially public healthcare.” Indeed. Economic accountability on all sides would temper secessionism’s fantasies and direct taxes to better purposes than police violence or nationalist propaganda. Not only just the Spanish, but surely everyone, could do with less shouting, less deception and less hatred, don’t you think?

Smokers need freedom, not permission

Ethan Croft
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Smokers need freedom, not permission

I was unsurprised when the high-minded administrators of Exeter College decided to play mother this week, and propose a smoking ban for the alleged good of their students. And I was disappointed at the slightly damp rejoinders offered by the college’s tobacco-loving students.

Smoking was described by opponents of the ban as “symptomatic of the working class”, another one of those crass but fashionable statements which assume everybody in an economic group thinks and acts the same. But whether these arguments hold up to scrutiny or not is beside the point. Individual smokers have their own motivations, which shouldn’t require justification to the authorities of their university.

I didn’t start smoking because I grew up without much money, but because I like tobacco. I like the rush of nicotine to the blood. I like the peace of sitting in the quad, undisturbed, without the need for a social excuse. I like the opportunity to retreat from the boredom of an office, or a library, or an argument in the kitchen. And I like smokers. It’s a young person’s hobby, and a particular type of young person at that. Cigarettes might not be good for you, but they’re definitely good to you. Smoking is the proclivity of someone who, exceptionally at this University, isn’t planning to settle down in a Surrey semi-detached with a wife and two kids. It’s the pastime of someone who doesn’t actually believe they’re so brilliant that they should live forever.

If there’s one thing that really puts us off quitting, it’s the insufferable piety of the smoke-free. I’m sure all smokers reading this have heard it: “smoking kills, you know!” Yes, of course we know, it says it on the front of the packet. These encounters aren’t even the worst. It’s the melodramatic coughers, and splutterers who really grate on me. Their spiteful idea, that we should be stripped of our ciggies because they don’t like the smell, was also the motivation of Exeter’s proposed ban. The exact phrasing was “inconsiderate behaviour”. But smokers are, in my experience, considerate. We have moved out of restaurants, bars, and pubs, and onto the street. And smokers, seeing a child or an elderly person coming their way, turn their cigarettes away to spare discomfort.

But this is not enough for the deans of Exeter College and Oxford University at large, who continue to believe that we need them to enforce good politesse. They are mistaken. All we need is for them to leave us alone.

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