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By Tania Sawicki Mead | 6 Oct, 2008
Inappropriate and lewd lecturer-student relationships! Academic ineptitude! Blatant bias! Marxist crackpots! Wild-eyed megalomaniacs! … Douchebags!
If this sounds familiar, then the best of Salient’s sound and objective reportage over your years of readership has done its job. Long have we maintained an occasionally querulous interest in the performance and role of academic staff here at Victoria University. Critiquing arseholes and hermits alike, Salient has trained its keen eye on the various achievements and failures of the student-staff relationship. More
By Jenna Powell | 29 Sep, 2008
Stethoscope: $200, Gloves: $200, Surgical equipment: $100,000. A patient not noticing you left a rag in their newly sewn up stomach… priceless. Wellington Hospital is becoming renowned for what Dr Liz Hesketh described as “unsafe clinical practice.” Several news media publications have followed what seems to be an increasing number of errors and staff resignations. More
By Sarah Robson | 22 Sep, 2008
Earlier this year, Salient reported on progress being made by Victoria University in implementing the Campus Development Framework (CDF). So far, there’s an almost finished hall of residence perched above Boyd Wilson Field, and there’s a gaping hole between Cotton and Laby where something used to be. But what’s next for the Kelburn campus’ extreme makeover?
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By Haimona Peretini Gray | 15 Sep, 2008
Salient’s drunken rambler Annoy Mouse AKA Film Editor Haimona Peretini Gray sheds his pseudonym and talks frankly about monogamy, relationships and the new sexual revolution.
The case for monogamy - like the hetero-normative state - is seen as commonsense by many within our society, but it really shouldn’t be. It is an imposed form of morality that we have been indoctrinated with from birth. More
By Jenna Powell | 8 Sep, 2008
Housework is a repetitive and generally thankless task that is usually taken up by the woman of the household. Just like the burden of housework the difficult mix of children and academia should not be underestimated. Many women have their tertiary education truncated due the arrival of a newborn baby. Women with children are increasingly focusing on attaining a higher education. More
By Jenna Powell | 1 Sep, 2008
Every year hundreds of parents breathe a sigh of relief as their 18 year olds embark on the beginning of their future in the supposed safety of University Accommodation. Victoria University’s student accommodation has been renowned for dodgy foundations, mould, mushrooms, religious fanatics and several outbreaks of scabies. More
By Haimona Peretini Gray and Tony Barnao | 11 Aug, 2008
Olympic Tyranny
The Olympics have long been the destroyer of nations, the crusher of souls and the taker of lives.
The early Olympiads were merely hilarious prolonged brutal orgies, in which naked men would grapple and attack each other in a wacky sexually violent bloodbath. More
By Conrad Reyners | 4 Aug, 2008
The partial defence of provocation is still a powerful defence in New Zealand’s criminal law. The defence has come under heavy criticism for its use as an excuse for homophobia, hetero-normativism and hate crimes. Conrad Reyners investigates these allegations, and asks the question - is the existence of provocation still justified?
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By Tania Mead and Haimona Peretini Gray | 28 Jul, 2008
Pritzker Prize Winner 2007 Richard Rogers: “My view of sustainable architecture is essentially the humanizing of the built environment”.
The phrase sounds like a tag-team of contemporary buzzwords, and it’s not a surprise that for many of us, ‘sustainable urban design’ seems like a corporate-speak utopia. More
By Ngai Tauira | 21 Jul, 2008
Ripiripīa, Haehaea
Ripiripīa, Haehaea
Tuakina! Paranitia te upoko o te ngārara
Kai tangata hue ha!
He aha te tohu o te ringaringa?
He kawakawa
Tuku ki raro kia hope ra
He korokio
Ko te whakatau o te mate
Hue ha!, hue ha! More
By Jenna Powell | 14 Jul, 2008
A decrease in funding and morality has caused the university experience of the average student to become ruled by the establishment’s business imperatives rather than the pursuit of knowledge. Hence the attempts to reduce gender studies and film from proper subjects to leisure pursuits. Campus spirit and student activism has been replaced by sleazy student politicians and scenester bullshit. More
By Matthew Proctor | 7 Jul, 2008
The war in Iraq has never left world headlines since the pre-invasion debate of 2003. Yet since the bombing of the UN Headquarters in Baghdad in 2004, and the consequent withdrawal of the New Zealand contribution to reconstruction, there has been very little debate as to what New Zealand policy towards Iraq should be. Salient Sub-Editor Matthew Proctor investigates. More
By Jackson Wood, Tania Mead, Tristan Egarr and Matthew Proctor | 26 May, 2008
In 2003, China, India, Brazil and South Africa led a walkout of developing nations from the WTO’s Cancun talks, in protest at the developed world’s trade-distorting agricultural subsidies. Pissed off at having the global economy dictated to them by the West, the Rest finally decided they don’t want to take our shit lying down anymore. Is this a sign of the new world order raising its head and finally escaping the rule of the west? More
By Jenna Powell | 19 May, 2008
It does not take an exceedingly sober individual to spot the different folks that stride down Cuba Street once night falls. The cute emo kids, the barefoot ferals, the bums – it all adds to the exciting atmosphere that is Cuba Street. Drinking a ridiculous amount of Kristov did not impair my ability to be slightly embarrassed when my tragically hip indie friends spotted me stumbling around Courtney Place singing Britney Spears’ ‘You Wanna Piece of Me’ at the top of my lungs. More
By Jenna Powell | 12 May, 2008
Men’s social movement groups are interest groups that believe there is not enough support for men and men’s issues due to gender discrimination. The movement in New Zealand is anything but homogenous, with different groups promoting different agendas. More
By Tania Sawicki Mead | 5 May, 2008
“The pentagon war planners, with cold blooded lucidity, say the “feral, failed cities” of the Third World – especially their slum outskirts – will be the distinctive battlespace of the twenty-first century. Night after night, hornet like helicopter gunships stalk enigmatic enemies in the narrow streets of the slum districts, pouring hellfire into shanties and fleeing cars. More
By Tristan Egarr | 21 Apr, 2008
Between the 10th and 12th of April, Wellington experienced three notable protest actions: a $10 billion student debt day march on the Thursday, a pro-cannabis smokeup on parliament lawn on the Friday, and anti-Labour party protests outside the town hall on Saturday. More
By Jenna Powell | 7 Apr, 2008
Should you be at university?
Out of Victoria’s 21,000 students only a small percentage will graduate and an even smaller number will move on to do postgraduate studies. Only 15 per cent of students who enrol in a New Zealand university come out with a qualification. It is a safe bet that most students do not want to be professional academics. University elitism is again rearing its ugly head as Auckland University becomes the first to place all of its courses under the ‘limited entry’ category. More
By Tania Sawicki Mead | 24 Mar, 2008
He’s no swashbuckling Romeo, but I could hardly fault John Campbell’s burning desire to propose marriage to Joseph Stiglitz during his brief talk last Friday. Erudite, controlled and surprisingly entertaining, the Nobel Prize winning economist amused large portions of the audience with his pithy observations on the disparities of global wealth distribution. Stiglitz was one of many authors to attend the 2007 International Festival Readers and Writers week, but the only deemed so compelling as to be given a prime-time slot and the grandeur of the Michael Fowler Centre to expound on his theories.
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By Jackson Wood | 17 Mar, 2008
The original space race kicked off in 1957 when the USSR fired Sputnik off into orbit. Tit for tat the USSR and USA fired off various metal objects and life forms up into space culminating in 1969 with Neil Armstrong stepping out onto the Moon’s surface. In the late 60’s China came along and fired a couple of rockets up into orbit then didn’t do much else.
In the 70’s, Skylab, the first “space station”, was put into orbit by NASA, and in ’86 construction of Mir space station began. From here the world’s interest in space seemed to dwindle and slip into the background of other global events. More
