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INKYTEXT 334
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BAYONNE RAILWAY STATION EDITION
Issue No 334 Thursday 17th February 2000
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Editorial correspondence should be sent to InkyText@lancaster.ac.uk
Subscription requests to Inkytext-distribution-request@lists.lancs.ac.uk
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AGENDA
Minutes and Matters Arising
1. News: Charity Film Show
2. Interim Editorial Diary
3. Readers' Letters: Business, Paris, Death Row Plea
4. Small Ads: Bucolic accommodation wanted; House for sale, etc.
1. NEWS
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SPECIAL CHARITY FILMSHOW: THE THEORY OF FLIGHT,
Saturday 19th February at 7.30 p.m. at the Dukes Playhouse.
On Saturday 19th February at 7.30 p.m. there will be a special charity
film performance of The Theory of Flight starring Helena Bonham-Carter
and Kenneth Branagh. The performance is being put on by the Dukes
Cinema in collaboration with the local branch of the Motor Neurone
Disease Association. It features Bonham Carter as a young woman with
Motor Neurone Disease - a severely disabling terminal illness - who has
one burning ambition. She knows she is going to die but, before she
does, she is determined to lose her virginity. She enlists the aid of
Branagh, an unwilling accomplice, who, unable to perform the deed
himself, agrees to help her find someone who will "oblige". He,
meanwhile is determined to achieve his own lifelong ambition - to build
and fly his own aeroplane. Having one of its main characters a person
with a terminal illness does not seem an ideal formula for a comedy but
this indeed is what it is. The interplay between the two main
characters is a perfect setting for some of the funniest episodes in
British screen comedy since Four Weddings and a Funeral and anyone who
enjoyed that should make a point of catching this one. Since this is
the only planned showing in this area it may be your only chance. Don't
miss it! Tickets are 4.00 with 3.00 concessions and are available
from the Dukes box office.
2. EDITORIAL DIARY
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MONDAY 14th: Departmental Reading Week. Also writing week, and marking
week. Also St Valentine's Day but all of mine must have gone missing in
the post. Rain. Phone Dick Geary to congratulate Laetitia on getting
her PhD and to wish her well in Brazil, where she is returning to teach
in Rio.
TUESDAY: Up at 6.00 and drive to Stansted. Alone alas: The Blonde
isn't on mid-term till next week and doesn't like flying anyway.
Worried about a slowly deflating rear tyre. Roadworks slow progress on
the M-way. Pity commmuters like Mr McG. Manchester commuters slow me
at 8.00 and Leeds ones at 9.00. Arrive Stansted at 1.15 after a leisurely
lunch at Sawley. Had been going to try the Three Horshoes at Madingley
but would take too long.
The Ryanair 5 pound tickets do exist: I have one (5 pounds return plus
23.55 airport taxes). My 28.55 is taking me to Biarritz. Never been
there before but know it was the haunt of the Napoleon III, the
Romanoffs and Edward VIII.
TUESDAY EVENING: Cloudy but balmy. Take cheap chain hotel near airport.
Walk to downtown Biarritz. Very posh. Also boring and empty. The three
adjacent communes of Biarritz, Anglet and Bayonne call themselves
collectively BAB and have an excellent bus system.
WEDNESDAY: Raining on and off all day. Bayonne. Visit Musee Bonnat,
one of the few major provincial galleries in France I don't know.
Wonderful. Food excellent and very cheap. Rains all evening too.
THURSDAY: Still raining. Gusty wind too. Off to Bordeaux in an hour.
More anon.
3. READERS' LETTERS
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You note "No responses at all from the Management School to our
Millennium editorial denouncing branding and capitalist profiteering.
Can this mean they agree with it?". OK, here's a response.
What you wrote was not particularly outrageous and I for one agree
with almost every word. I would however take issue with the following
paragraph:
"People are paying extra for brands that have been established by the
very advertising which they are paying the extra for. The desirability
of this is taught in our business schools instead of being banned by
law or classed as insanity."
Any business school that taught the desirability of this rather than
encouraging a substantial discussion of opposing views would not be
worthy of belonging to an academic establishment, since it would be
simply acting as an advertising agency itself.
You (and others) appear to believe that the management school is full
of right-wing capitalists who are automatically in favour of whatever
business/management does. This is no more true than to suppose that,
for example, all academics in the department of religious studies
automatically approve of everything said or done by priests or mullahs,
or that you personally believe that everything that happens in France
is automatically superior to everything that happens anywhere else. For
example, probably a majority of us regard the current government as
unbearably right-wing.
We're not a different species. We're like the rest of you. Honest.
Mike Wright
Management Science
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The following is a response from the Students' Union to your request
for information concerning LUSU and Liquid etc:
The Students' Union has agreed to accept and support advertising from
Liquid night club for their Monday evening student night. The Students'
Union decided to work with Luminar Leisure plc to ensure that a
positive relationship could be created between the two organisations
and most importantly to provide student input into a significant
student night in the locality. It is also obviously sensible for two
club operators sited literally in each others back yard to co-operate
and coexist harmoniously.
The previous arrangements with the Carleton remain unchanged and the
Students' Union remains entirely committed to the highly successful
Wednesday night at the Carleton night club.
In addition, any agreement made for sponsorship or large scale
advertising by the Students' Union is subject the approval of the
Students' Union Finance and General Purposes Committee and ratification
by the Union Council. Students' Union Financial Regulations expressly
forbids the acceptance of gifts, money or other blandishments in the
making of any deals.
Jo Hardman
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The Lancaster Alumni Association (LUA) has also been strongly protesting the
proposal to eliminate its two representatives on University Council. The
Alumni Association is the public face of the University into the large (over
30,000) and increasingly influential Alumni population and acts as a conduit
for information flows to and from that population. We believe that it is
essential that the Alumni Association is seen to have representation at the
highest level possible if the University is to demonstrate an ongoing interest
in its Alumni population - particularly important in these days of lifelong
learning, development campaigns, and subject reviews.
Removing LUA representation from the Council will pass negative messages into
the current undergraduate and Alumni groups about their relevance to the
University once they have left.
We seek support in asking the University to recognise the importance of LUA,
and the Alumni it represents, by maintaining the two LUA positions on the
University Council.
Emily Fay
Alumni Officer
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As a footnote to the Rileys' nostalgia-inducing itinerary, I cannot
let pass the reference to the rue de la Huchette without recalling the
delicate essa ys of Eliot Paul, published in Penguin as "A Narrow
Street". Following serge antry in the US Army during the first World
War, he remained in Paris as corresp ondent for the Chicago Herald
Tribune, assimilating perfectly into the intimat e ambience of the
village-like life in the quarter round St Severin. H is off-duty essays
give sympathetic portraits (well, mostly - make an exception for "le
Navet", a self-important local official of fascist outlook) of the
street's inhabitants and activities - the taxidermist, the bistro,
Madame's esta blishment - and its cosmopolitan character. The clouds
gathering in the 1930s ov ershadow the later essays, and a postscript
section adds details, mostly tragic, of the war years and the fates of
the characters whom by then the reader has come to know like friends.
The narrow street that is La Huchette to-day disappoints, with its
garish cafE9s and travel agencies, contrasting with the quieter world
described by Eliot Paul. But you can still cast an enquiring glance do
wn that intriguing tiny sidestreet, "la rue du Chat qui peche" - I
hope Inkytext can manage those accents.
Mark Cantley
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As an alumnus of Lancaster and a member of the National Union of
Journalists, I want to ask readers of InkyText all over the world for
whatever help they feel able to give in a campaign to avert the
judicial murder of an honorary member of the NUJ, Mumia Abu Jamal.
The following article appeared in the February issue of 'Report', the
bulletin of NUJ London Magazine Branch.
'Mumia Abu Jamal has been on death row in the US for more than 17 years.
Framed for the death of a policeman in 1981, he is demanding a retrial.
This is the last chance to save his life. A vigorous campaign in 1995
won him a reprieve, but only international protests will stop him being
executed early in April.
'The judge who presided over Mumia's trial was Albert Sabo, a life-long
member of the Fraternal Order of Police and a man who sentenced 32
people to death during his career - twice as many as any other US judge.
Sabo refused to allow Mumia to appear in court during his own trial
because his said that Mumia's dreadlocks made the jurors 'nervous'.
'As a prominent radio journalist in the 1970s, Mumia was called 'the
voice of the voiceless' for standing up to racism and injustice. He was
a founder member of the Black Panthers in Philadelphia and has had an
FBI file ever since.
'Mumia is one of 3,549 people on death row in the US; more than half are
from ethnic minorities. Nearly 100 were killed in 1999.
Write to demand a retrial to:
Judge William H Yohn Jr,
c/o Leonard Weinglass, 6 West 20th Street,
Suite 10a, New York 10011, USA'
The NUJ campaign can be contacted on 0207 538 5821 and there is a
demonstration in London on Saturday 4 March, 1pm @ Embankment Tube,
marching to Trafalgar Square.
Anyone who feels able to write to the judge will be a big help, as will
anyone passing this on to others. Now that capital punishment is once
more on the agenda in the US we have a real chance of averting a
terrible crime. Please help.
Nick Bardsley
Secretary, NUJ Book Branch
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Cher Monsieur Proust du nouveau siecle, merci beaucoup! We are
thrilled and overwhelmed by your special itinerary for our trip to
Paris. Your love and knowledge of that beautiful city (first
encountered by me in 1959) and the Marais is amazing and we now have
a very strong sense of the ambience and the delights which await us.
Due to your inside information we will confidently assume Parisian
guise and your Guide will be the first thing we pack. Because of
interest shown by other friends in Lancaster in your Guide we expect
to meet some familiar faces in the streets and cafes. Hold the Front
Page!
We will be sending you reports somehow and feel sure this will be a
trip to remember.
With grateful thanks, Joan Riley.
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The local branch of the Motor Neurone Disease (MND) Association are
currently running a quiz to raise funds to support research into the
causes of MND and to support local people affected by the illness. The
quiz consists of seventy or so crossword-type clues all of which lead
to words describing "something that can be worn". The cost of a quiz
sheet is 1.00. There are prizes of 25.00, 15.00 and 10.00 to be
drawn from all correct entries received by the closing date, April 1st
2000. (Not as much as the lottery but better odds of winning!) Copies
of the quiz have been placed in most of the bars on campus. It's a bit
of fun and it's supporting a good cause! More information or requests
for copies of the quiz to Peter Silvester
(mailto:p.silvester@lancaster.ac.uk . If you do email me please give me
a phone number so I can arrange to see you to deliver the quiz sheet
and take a pound off you!
Peter Silvester
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4. SMALL ADS
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BUCOLIC ACCOMMODATION WANTED: Visiting academic seeks quiet
flat/cottage within (preferably easy!) commuting range of Lancaster
to rent for 6 months from April 2000. She would prefer to live in the
country, and will have her own transport. Suggestions please, either
to Aneta Stefanovska (aneta@osc.fe.uni-lj.si) directly, or to her
local agent Peter McClintock (p.v.e.mcclintock@lancaster.ac.uk) in
the Physics Department, Lancaster University, tel. (01524)-593073.
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PROFESSOR DAVID DENVER will deliver his inaugural lecture entitled
Fifty Years of Elections and Election Studies in the Faraday Lecture
Theatre at 6.00 pm on Wednesday 1 March 2000. The University extends a
cordial invitation to all members of staff, students and to members of
the general public to be present at this lecture.
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FOR SALE: DETACHED FAMILY HOUSE SCOTFORTH, Lancaster
* 4 double bedrooms, large hobby/utility room, enclosed gardens
* Gas c.h., UPVC double glazing, integral garage and storeroom, fitted
kitchen
* Ideally located in quiet side road close to shops and schools (and with
magnificent views!)
* Excellent order throughout; viewing essential OIRO 185,000
For further details, ring Halifax Property Services (01524 843043)
OFF TO CATCH THE BORDEAUX TRAIN