When students were asked to express their hopes and dreams for the future on canvas, they painted motorways. They wanted fast and effective escape routes. When the brushes were handed to children from the orphanage, they refused to use colour. All their painting was done in black These and many other illustrative responses from Sarajevo's […]
Did you count the magpies on your way to work this morning? Are you afraid of walking under a ladder? If the answer is yes some might say that you are superstitious. Although it is an assessment the experts are unlikely to agree with. Steve Roud, a folklorist who has written a book on the […]
“Part of it is to get out from under the idea that this is all mythical” says Professor Nancy Scheper-Hughes, speaking from the headquarters of Organs Watch, an organisation founded in 1999, operating out of the University of California, and with a research presence in over a dozen countries . Indeed, the myths surrounding organ […]
The Economic Models of Terrorism “I think there was a reluctance to accept a book like this because at that certain moment, after 9/11 what they wanted to push forward was the religious argument. That it was a bunch of religious fanatics, whereas this book is saying the opposite”. Loretta Napoleoni is talking about the […]
Depending on what side of the sesame seed bun you stand on, it's either the best or worst of times for the fast food industry. Sure, the fast food chains have been taking some big hits of late; not least from Morgan Spurlock's Supersize Me which has helped put burgers and fries firmly back on […]
It is somehow grimly appropriate that ten years after he shot himself through the heart, Guy Debord, an acute analyst of how the media can blandly neuter transgressive figures, has become a ‘celebrity’. Surrounded by calumnies and myths, the one-time leader of the Situationist International (SI) has become indelibly associated with the euphoria of the […]
In a telling episode at the start of his latest book Out of the ashes, Professor Marc H. Ellis tells of an encounter, in New Zealand during a speaking tour, when his arguments were dismissed by an Israeli member of the panel with the simple but caustic phrase “he doesn’t even speak our language”. And […]
The title is perhaps misleading, as obviously it's virtually (no pun intended) impossible to describe Islam on-line. Yet that is in a sense what Dr. Gary R.Bunt's research is attempting to do – to chronicle, record and describe the diverse manifestations of an Islamic presence online, that veers from religious scholars, to gay rights groups, […]
Just as the 60's generation erroneously thought they had discovered sex, the 90's generation could be forgiven for thinking that it discovered globalisation. The media have embraced the word, and it's vaguest of vague concepts, to the point that it's become a shorthand for almost anything and everything to do with international trade. At the […]
Much has been written about the rise to power of Umberto Bossi’s Lega Nord, but surprisingly little in the way of research has been done to examine the connection hinted at by the Lega with its medieval counterparts. Dr. Edward Coleman of University College Dublin however has examined the connections, from a Medievalist’s perspective. He […]
