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The Patron
Get PDFDetective Gilbert Hayden fumbled with the cigar. Trapped between the vice-like grip of his leather clad fingers, it could not escape no matter how much the carriage bounced. In his lefthand Hayden held an old bronze lighter, battered by time and use. Idly he thumbed the lid of the lighter, letting it flick open. With a bored and apathetic motion, he flicked the lighter to life. Hayden waved the flame below his cigar, watching as the orange flame touched the corners of his cigar, igniting the tobacco into the smallest plume of smoke
Unearthing the Complexities of Sex Testing Elite Female Athletes
Get PDFSport is prone to debates of biological difference because it is a social space that relies on biology-based criteria for determining gender (McClearen 2015). This essay will explore the sexism, cissexism and racism facing female athletes as a result of sex testing testosterone levels in women. This essay defines sexism as discrimination based on the belief that a certain gender is inferior to another, in terms of skill, intelligence or ability. Mostly, sexism operates on the basis that women are the inferior gender to their male counterparts. Moreover, cissexism is defined as discrimination against those whose gender identity does not fit the binary social model, or discrimination based on someone not appearing to fit the binary social model based on their gender performance. Firstly, the essay will analyse the fundamental flaws of sex testing in determining biological difference and how this practice is sexist. Secondly, it will discuss the impact of said sex testing and gender questioning on elite female athletes. Thirdly, it will analyse the racism apparent within sex testing. Lastly, it will consider the media’s role in perpetuating the evident sexism, cissexism and racism in sex testing, and the general over-sexualisation and criticism of female athletes
Frank
Get PDFHe stood at the railing, peering over the frosted caps of the parting seas, the morning bursting over the cold waters. The scent of sea spray flourished in his nostrils before dying away on the wind. He hadn’t slept the night before. The image of the shimmering moon danced in his mind long into the night, swaying back and forth like waves that carried his ship, glinting and spinning end on end; a beacon of his arrival. He often imagined the moon as a woman from some exotic land even he had not ventured to, a wild and mysterious mistress swaying to the rhythm of the earth. Such women he had met before, green of eye and soft of tongue, often singing long into the nights with whispering tones and gliding melodies, their silken dresses blowing and wavering under the stars of some distant land. Oh, he scoffed, how naïve he was to believe the Dublin he’d heard of could ever be anything but a trace of the world beyond its walls
These roots run deep: How Australia’s British colonial history has shaped modern land use
No full textContemporary laws and norms regarding how land is managed in Australia are rooted in colonial legacy. The inheritance of English social, legal and agricultural systems, the marginalisation and displacement of Indigenous Australians, and a fundamental ignorance of Australian ecosystems profoundly shaped land management in Australia’s settlement period. English feudal society equated land ownership with power, and as such gave landowners absolute dominion over their property; a norm that has lasted into the present day. The eighteenth-century legal decision of declaring Australia as terra nullius, and the subsequent disruption of Indigenous land management practices, has similarly had ramifications into the twenty-first century. Early settlement farming practices on the continent replicated traditional European farming, despite this being not well suited to the Australian environment; another norm that remains firmly in place today, despite the environmental consequences and poor agricultural yield. Though the country’s cultural and social landscapes have changed in the intervening centuries, our land management systems remain inextricably linked to their colonial origins. In order to understand our present land management systems and practices, it is vital we understand how they grew from the legal, social and environmental contexts of settlement
\u27A fight which you cannot lose’: The effect of economic reform during the Hawke era (1983-1991)
No full textThis paper aims to analyse and evaluate the effects of the drastic economics reforms undertaken in Australia by the government of Bob Hawke between 1983 and 1991. The seismic nature of the Hawke Government policies have ensured that this era is of considerable interest to Australian economic historians. This paper aims to offer a sweeping, comprehensive assessment of the manner in which the Hawke Government transformed the progression of Australia’s economy. Reflecting the significance of this era in Australian history, a variety of perspectives have emerged in within the economic history literature. Particular scrutiny has been applied to the role of trade unions in Hawke-era reforms, and the increasing acceptance of ‘neoliberal’ policies within the Australian labour movement. After surveying the nature of Hawke’s economics reforms, I conclude that such policies laid the foundations for a prolonged period of economic growth. However, these achievements were qualified by the dismantling of institutions which protected vulnerable elements within the Australian economy. Finally, I employ a comparative approach to assess Australia’s economic progression in the 1980s with that of the US and the UK. Ultimately, Hawke Government reforms avoided the substantial growth in inequality experienced in these two countries. This outcome was a testament to the collaborative approach undertaken by the Hawke Government, which preserved a substantive role for trade unions in formulating economic policy
The impact of Brexit: A neofunctionalist perspective
Get PDFThis paper examines the impact of the recent Brexit crisis in Europe and the extent to which the neofunctionalist perspective can be used to understand the continued integration of the European Union (EU). It identifies key issues surrounding the exit of the United Kingdom from the EU, analysing the extent to which this crisis has affected the EU overall. By examining the historical progression of public opinion and national referendum discussions, this paper explores how the possibility of Brexit has united the member states of the EU, instead of dividing them as predicted. It addresses how the future of the EU can be explained through the concept of neofunctional integration as a crisis spillover effect, and explores the relevance of Ernst B Haas’s work on continued European integration 50 years after its publication in 1968. This paper also discusses criticisms of Haas’s work, but maintains that Haas’s theoretical perspective remains relevant to our understanding of modern regional integration, despite longstanding criticisms. Finally, I conclude by considering the future impacts of Brexit for the EU, and the ways in which this institution can utilise future external struggles to strengthen its unity from within
Introduction to AURJ volume 10
No full textThe fifteen essays contained in this volume—originally submitted as assessment tasks, for which all received High Distinctions, and subsequently refined and honed by their authors—are outstanding examples of the undergraduate research being undertaken at the Australian National University. Whether original research undertakings or exemplary responses to prescribed questions, the authors have crafted exceptional essays, and anyone who chooses to read this volume cover to cover will embark on a stimulating multidisciplinary journey, from law to literature to archaeology to psychology to history to science to politics and beyond. This section introduces the volume, authors, editors, and cover artist and acknowledges other valued contributors to this volume
Everything Was Beautiful
Get PDFThere are times when I wake so early that it’s still dark outside. Mum’s always asleep when that happens, rolled over on her stomach with her arms out either side like she’s flying. I go in to pull the covers over her, and watch the air in her chest give in and out like a balloon
More than a children’s book: A surface reading of Anna Sewell’s Black Beauty
Get PDFThis article employs Margaret Cohen’s notion of the ‘generic horizon’ to explore the production and reception of Anna Sewell’s 1877 novel Black Beauty. It uses a ‘surface reading’ methodology, focusing on the novel’s contemporary generic context and on how the book was received and marketed. This allows the article to interrogate critical commonplaces about the novel’s genre. While Black Beauty is typically considered a children’s book, the novel in fact had a considerable adult audience, especially among working-class men. This article sheds new light on Black Beauty’s genre through its contextual reading of moralistic, animal-centric children’s literature, and didactic tracts on horse management. It contends that the novel is a sophisticated exploration of the suffering and indignities faced by both horses and their working-class handlers in Victorian England. Reading the novel alongside contemporary horse care manuals brings into focus Sewell’s serious didactic purpose, in both teaching the correct means of tending horses and in presenting them as feeling, sympathetic beings in their own right. This article argues that Sewell’s novel deserves to be read as a significant contribution to nineteenth-century debates about animal welfare
‘Equal Pay for Equal Work’: Changing the Japanese Employment Paradigm
Get PDFAgainst a backdrop of domestic demographic and economic challenges, Japanese employers have started to increasingly grapple with the risks associated with hiring full-time workers without fixed-term contracts. Japan’s previous ‘three jewels of the Japanese employment system’ – lifetime employment (shushin koyo), seniority-based wages (nenko joretsu) and specific enterprise unions (kigyo-nai kumiai) – are becoming perilous in a nation shouldering the burdens of a declining birthrate and a rapidly ageing population (Kingston 2001; Lincoln & Nakata 1997). Whilst this model played an important role in Japan’s period of rapid economic growth, often regarded as a major social driver of Japan’s postwar growth (see Abegglen 1958), prolonged economic stagnation as Japan enters its second so-called ‘lost decade’ has caused many economists to question to what extent this model is sustainable in the shadow of Japan’s future.