Hi, I’m Salient
Being a student magazine is tough these days. Being criticised from all sides. Threats of budget cuts. Luring students into the office to fill my pages with sweet sweet content. Competing with online publications and mainstream media for students attention. At the same time having to deal with international economic crises, the whims of student associations, the Editor (who I like to think of as my caretaker), contributors, advertisers and national governments.
>
Me and my sibling publications Critic, Craccum, Canta and Chaff constitute five of the oldest surviving publications in New Zealand. For well over seventy years we have been a breeding ground for future journalists, writers, academics, politicians and at least one Prime Minister. We have become an alternate source of news for student populations countrywide and have catered to the needs of students where other publications have little penetration.
>
For those of you who don’t know me, Salient is the publication of the Victoria University of Wellington Student Association. I was founded in 1938 with the intent of providing a place for students to debate about issues which faced us as not only students at Vic, but as residents of Wellington and citizens of the world. Originally a newspaper, I have changed my appearance many times. Some say I’m still looking quite young for my age.
>
Somewhere along the tangled web of history I became associated with VUWSA. Looking back on things this infatuation was short lived. Maybe we should’ve thought about things a bit before jumping into bed with them. But we both saw that it was important to have a publication that could act as a conduit. Engaging students and challenging them to think about issues, providing feed back and a playpen for ideas to be thrown around. Securing a publication that was run by students, for students and funded by students.
>
I’m now governed by the Salient Charter, which is part of the VUWSA Constitution. The Charter affords Salient many freedoms, which have in the past caused conflict with the Executive, but over all have safeguarded Salient’s duty to act as a watchdog on the Executive.
>
We have “complete freedom from political interference”. We’re entitled to “remain in the [Exec] meeting if it moves into committee.” It provides that we are “entitled to adequate accommodation, furnishings and equipment… equivalent to the current standard” which if you’ve ever been into the Salient office is a pretty sweet deal.
>
But the most important piece of the Salient Charter is point sixteen: “Because of its role in all goals of the Association, Salient is entitled to adequate funding by the association.” As I wrote earlier this year: “we’re pretty much joined at the hip.” Where the VUWSA stallion bolts surely Salient’s donkey will be tethered behind jotting down notes about the journey.
>
Printing costs money: roughly $5000 a week for 6000 copies that we distribute around Victoria. We run twenty-four issues a year. We have to have paid staff. Someone to be the editor, a designer to put the whole shebang together, a news writer to go out and find things happening on campus, distributors to get the final product to you, a advertising guy to solicit my pages for cash.
>
Currently we meet half our costs with advertising. But world events are starting to draw tight on businesses ability to advertise with us. This means a likely down turn in my earnings for next year.
>
But the thing that really makes me salient (Oh I do enjoy a good play on words) is you. I’m a bit of a free spirit. I’ve generally been a lefty. But at times radical, commie, conservative and existential. But that is shaped by the students who come in and contribute.
>
Approximately $8 of your student levy comes to me. For that tiny weeny amount of money you get twenty-four issues of the finest student journalism New Zealand has to offer. Or at least a handy way to start fires during the windy Wellington winters. You have the right to submit content to the magazine. You have the right to come hang in the office talk smack about philosophy, play chess, and drink scotch. It gives you a letters page on which you can bitch and moan about VUWSA, VUW, your flat mate, the editor. Shit! anything you want to bitch and moan about.
>
For many of you I am the only VUWSA service that you’ll ever use. The 2008 Student Union Survey reckons that for about 67% of students, Salient was the top VUWSA service. The diary and wall planner, that I have a hand in making, we important too (about 45% of you use them.) Our pick up rate on campus is about 95% and we get well over 40,000 hits on this very website every month. Copies of the magazine are sent to the Prime Ministers office, all the political parties media teams, notable public figures and even to people internationally. We have broken stories that MSM have plagiarized. I constantly sit on the shoulder of the executive, report their mupperty and make sure they’re accountable to you.
>
We aren’t running on much. The term oily rag comes to mind. We don’t spend thousands of dollars on vans, psychic hot lines, painting over graffiti or offering unoriginal rewards for the capture of visiting dignitaries. In fact because the Editor has a committee that he or she has to report to, we’re probably the best managed arm of VUWSA.
>
Simply put: a cut in the amount of funding that I get from VUWSA means a cut in quality of the magazine.
>
VUWSA needs to be building an association that seeks to grow and gather more services rather than less. I hope to be an integral part of that over the coming years. Without adequate funding Salient will become less salient. Students need to know what is happening with their money. They need something tangible in their hands. We need a place to discuss ideas, proposals and a place to showcase the talent and massive potential that the study body has. And I, well to be quite frank, I won’t be able to do that without the current level of funding. I am a student magazine. That means I’m there for you. I’m not a business; although I would like to make money, that has never been one of my aims. I am not a Advertisers magazine or a sponsors magazine. I’m yours.
Author info
Salient
Salient is a magazine. Salient is a website. Salient is an institution founded in 1938 to cater to the whim and fancy of students of Victoria University. We are partly funded by VUWSA and partly by gold bullion that was discovered under a pile of old Salients from the 40's. Salient welcomes your participation in debate on all the issues that we present to you, and if you're a student of Victoria University then you're more than welcome to drop in and have tea and scones with the contributors of this little rag in our little hideaway that overlooks Wellington.
Other articles by Salient
115 Comments
23 Dec, 2008 at 8:40 am
Dahling, it’s all about the accessories.
23 Dec, 2008 at 8:43 am
Oh man. I was hoping that Joel would be the editor, because then my content would get wider coverage in the pages of Sparklient.
23 Dec, 2008 at 12:14 pm
You’re all wrong! Everyone is lying!
23 Dec, 2008 at 7:43 pm
*pisses and shits everywhere*
24 Dec, 2008 at 7:41 am
Not a Maori in sight, eh?
They don’t even come up in conversation. Salient ever had a Maori editor or is it just another racist white publication like the Dom post?
The silence is worse than the actions taken everyday to get Maori out of work and out fo sight. I lost my job at Takaka public library because of Racist whites. We should refuse to take part, brothers and sisters.
24 Dec, 2008 at 8:41 am
Ummmm… Maria Salient has traditionally been very supportive of Maori causes. If you’d taken the time to actually go back and read through my catalogue, my writers have taken an active role and given Maori a voice in the media which was way ahead of my main stream family.
I’m not too sure if any of the editors have been Maori, race really doesn’t matter to me too much, but we definitely have had many many Maori contributors over the years and for at least the past 10 years there has always been a Te Reo issue.
In fact VUWSA and Salient value Maori input into the magazine so much that Ngai Tauira has a seat on the selection panel for the new editor and the publications committee which governs the magazine.
Salient is not, has never been and will hopefully continue well into the future to not be a “racist white publication like the Dom post”
I suggest you get your facts straight before commenting on my website and, regardless of race, making yourself look like a fool.
24 Dec, 2008 at 8:52 am
It’s unfortunate when comments like Maria’s are made. All they do is goad others into an unintelligible mish-mash of a “debate”.
The fact of the matter is that Salient is not a “racist white publication” (whatever the hell that means) and has made tangible efforts to cater to a wide range of Maori issues. The incoming editor himself has indicated that there will be an upswing in the amount of Maori content in addition to Ngai Tauira’s current level of contribution.
24 Dec, 2008 at 9:14 am
Oh come on Maria, for years Ngai Tauira were offered weekly pages in Salient but after the first couple of issues the content dried up. For years the news editors had been trying to cover Ngai Tauria meetings but were turned away because they weren’t Maori. Now that’s what I call racism.
28 Dec, 2008 at 2:39 pm
Been away. How’s everone doing?
25 per-fucking-cent? Damn personified Salient, that’s one Hell of a crappy amputation. Particularly when Salient is really the only thing I approve of my VUWSA money going towards; well, that and the VUWSA Tramping Club since I did attend a meeting of it once. I have to say that there’s a fuck-load else we could shave a few bucks off in order to get the full 100% that Salient enjoyed and deserved in 2008.
Gotta be that damn recession.
Anyway, sice I’ve thoroughly enjoyed flaunting my ego in the pages of Salient during 2008 and fully plan to enjoy the same next year if there’s anything I can do, including handing over the loose change in my wallet, (which I’m afraid to say consists of twenty cents and two guitar picks,) or giving you my Subway rewards money I will be more than happy to.
29 Dec, 2008 at 1:07 am
Salutations fellow gentlemen,
It seems to me that the previous troll infestation has mildly subsided, which can only mean one thing of course it must be that darn recession.
Ms Williams, I found your statements empowering and somewhat heroic. What a voice, what an avatar of hope, acts that require prestige. The acts in which I refer to are of course the two amazing feats that follow; A, Setting feminism back twenty years and B, Solidifying the stereotype of the “whining maori”. I could not have done better in my lifetime, perhaps we could have a spot of tea one eve?
Salient, my old friend, oh how the mighty have fallen. We once basked beneath a mid summers rays, enjoying ourselves. Do you remember that time we eloped too the meadows of Motueka? It was beautiful Salient, beautiful.
I remember you as an accepting androgynous beast, how wrong I was.
Though Ms Williams is obviously ignorant to the “door” that you have open to her minority group and has obviously formed an attempt at targeting an issue that targets said groups advocacy in a manner that screams “fail” from the first line to the end, in a way that can only be described as a banshee committing atrocious forms of sexual abuse upon a poor lost Gentleman.
Perhaps she was trying to highlight the fact that a minority class of a minority group are obviously failing to advocate for and of course voice to the wider population that they represent. Her wail holds merit.
Why back when I was but a young squire, I recall taking a stroll up Kelburn parade with a chap who went by the name of Franklin. Not much of a man yet he had a keen eye for game and had flawless aim. Not to mention of course that he also hailed from the prestigious Motueka, the land of rolling plains and the true home of the Gentleman.
( Bel air )
We were approached by a group of indigenous fellows, apparently we came across as young men looking lost within a new land. It also seemed that I held a familiar posture and they seemed to feel that my dashing appearance coupled by my olive skin made me their kin, who am I to argue with the natives of this land.
I quickly left poor Franklin behind and attended the banquet they had prepared for those just like me, they named it a ‘hangy’. I was asked a few questions like, ‘What is your ee wee?” and “Cay tear, pear for your queer?”. I quickly told them that I didn’t understand, and attempted to shrug off their jungle mind trickery. I found their goading incredibly elitist at first and not at all the way one would treat another gentlemen, what tipped the iceberg was when they led my ignorant soul towards a pit, and I put two and two together. Was this to be my grave?
To my suprise they had actually used this hole as an underground oven, what ingenuity! The feast was fantastic. We conversed over our food, which led to a lengthly debate regarding the structure of our nation. It seemed that no matter what angle I attempted to attack the words of their president he would make a sub par attempt at belittling my argument which would be followed by the heckling guffaws of his tribe, it was not only offensive but plain rude.
This was my first experience with their way and frankly, I must say I was not impressed.
I have since met many, a number that far out weighs the group that had in my eyes represented a culture. I will at once admit fault in my prior conclusion and humble myself by apologising.
My thoughts for you Ms Williams are as follows,
Do you feel that you are being advocated well?
Are you willing to become the peoples champion?
Do you know Dwayne The rock Johnson?
Are you attractive?
If yes, would you mind a spot of tea?
but in all seriousness, Do you think a group of pretentious students from middle class families actually care about what you say?
inb4 bitches don’t know about ma lazar~raaaar
29 Dec, 2008 at 1:17 am
I lol’d
22 Jan, 2009 at 10:29 am
“Matt”ls suggestion:
slander the exec (think: accusations of pedophilia) then print a retraction the following week, citing a lack of sub-eds as the reason such filth got through in the first place. Repeat the following week.
= Bloody brilliant!
Geez though, 25%? Is this decision coming from the people we elected to represent our views? Woo for demo-fucking-ocracy…
24 Jan, 2009 at 11:58 am
^^^^^
= defamation lawsuit = salient more broke than ever
24 Jan, 2009 at 3:00 pm
I don’t think it’s in anyone’s interests to divulge any details surrounding the budget, but you can rest assured there will be 24 64-page issues of Salient with all your favourite shenanigans (and some new bits and bobs) coming out in 2009.
We’re all excited about bringing a more open and student-orientated Salient to the student masses this year without skimping on quality… well, for the first few issues anyway… but some of us might get bored and just start copy-pasting “lol cats” in instead of, you know, “words”, but we’ll do our best for the most part.
And, of course, if you want to contribute, or you know somebody who’s got a knack for writing/drawing/reviewing – maybe even a first year, god forbid – then flick an e-mail in the direction of jackson@salient.org.nz (subject = volunteer).We’re eager to bring as many new faces into the world of student media this year as we can because, after all, this is the student magazine, written for the windswept masses of Victoria University. We’re here to write for you, and that’s all.
There’s a place for everyone at the Salient pool table this year, so bring your ideas, your creative genius and a desire to entertain and inform your classmates, and the rest will take care of itself.
Don’t be shy – we may look like a bunch of busy douchebags (and, well, we are), but it’s our wish that every volunteer and every new face feels welcome and that their energy and efforts will be appreciated. You may even grow to like us (except for Dr. Peter Manglethwaite, who is barely able to maintain a conversation with a stranger without blurting out some racial/gender/anti-animal jibe with little or no prompt).
It’s been great to see that so many people care about the livelihood of this tasty piece of student media real estate. I can only hope we’ll be able to repay that interest by producing a magazine worth kicking a fuss up about. God knows we’re gonna try.
Thanks again, everybody.
- Michael (News Ed, 2009)
24 Jan, 2009 at 3:36 pm
correction i know your father: defamation lawsuit = VUWSA suing itself = VUWSA more broke than ever.