Hip hop across the world by Angela Caldin
I look forward to Wednesdays because it’s the day I go and collect my 12 year old granddaughter from hip hop. I like to go a bit early so that I can watch her and her fellow dancers going through their latest routine. Last week they were practising a segment which involved very fast arm movements, flashing above and around their heads. It looked challenging and hard to keep in time with the music and each other. ‘It’s called waacking,’ said a mother standing next to me. ‘Why don’t you tell your… Read More
Tis the gift to be simple by Trevor Plumbly
The philosopher’s stoned Yesterday, I was relaxing in the armchair (the dreamspace), sipping rather a nice single malt, contemplating the vagaries of life and it occurred to me that there’s a degree of comfort about things when you’re approaching 80. Time was I used to think I knew it all, now I’m absolutely sure of it. Over the years I’ve read heaps of stuff by deep thinkers, academics, learned clergy and even educated drunks, but nothing tangible emerged from their musings and I’m now convinced I know a bloody sight more about… Read More
“You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone” (Joni Mitchell) by Trevor Plumbly
“There ain’t half been some clever bastards” (Ian Dury) I listened to a British talk show recently and, like NZ and Oz, they’ve got loads of folk waffling about the mundane things of life. The target for these media crusaders (let’s call them ‘progressives’) was language; this particular bunch decided, after some deliberation, that certain descriptive terms are no longer acceptable. They focussed on name-calling: describing someone as ‘skinny’, ‘tubby’ and the like is ‘body shaming’ and must now be considered emotionally damaging. I was shocked by the attack on British schoolboy… Read More
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