Monthly Archives: December 2007

Carnival of Feminists

The Carnival of Feminists: an academic view

Over on the lively peer-reviewed journal Third Space, you’ll find an article about the carnival of feminists.

Thanks Georgia, you’ve quoted me a lot more accurately than a journalist with whom I recently dealt (who shall remain nameless).

And this also seems a useful point to note that I’m bringing the carnival here to Philobiblon for the next edition (I missed the second anniversary due to being ridiculously busy, so this one makes up for that). It will be here on January 10. Nominations can be emailed to natalieben AT gmail DOT com, or you can use the submission form.

Blogging/IT History

Britblog landmark

Britblog Edition No 150 is now up over on Redemption Blues, and as ever, Chameleon has done a lovely job. There’s a great collection of posts and chemistry on the great new policy of the Brown government, “give guns to all three-year-old males”, and much more.

And through it I indirectly found this great site: Old photos of the UK – taken from postcards and, I gather, copyright free.
london-hyde-park-dogs-cemetery.jpg

Miscellaneous

A new way of organising our information feast

On the advice of Investigations of a Dog I’ve just downloaded what looks like a very good way of storing Net records – everything from Jstor articles to Flickr photos! I’ve been thinking for some time that someone really needed to sort out the vast amounts of information that we’re all handling, and Zotero looks like a promising way to do it.

Cycling

Boo, hiss, hiss

The boo is for whatever body is responsible for staffing the lifts on the Greenwich and Woolwich foot tunnels, which it was my misfortune to use today (the latter because the Wollwich ferry wasn’t running). It was Boxing Day, so particularly the former was thronging with people – of course nice stroll by the river is, quite predictably, what a lot of Londoners and tourists are going to do.

But were the lifts operating? Of course not. So I was one of many cyclists wrestling their bicycles up and down the 100-plus stairs each way. Normally it is a minor inconvenience, but when you are trying to do it through a non-stop stream of tottering grannies and small children running down looking at their feet and not where they are going, it is a positive hazard.

The hiss is for the fact that the lovely old traditional pie and mash shop in Greenwich is now a “Gourmet burger” place.

And the second hiss for me is a reminder that I really must get out and do some more miles on the bicycle more often. I did a nice loop through the City, Limehouse, and Greenwich, past the Dome (waving to Tutenkhamen), then along the Greenway and the canal home. But the last few miles were done in a very low gear – if you saw a cyclist in Bloomsbury about 5pm going very slowly that was probably me- and the lactic acid will drain from the thighs eventually, I’m sure.

Politics

A flow in reverse

Over on My Paris Your Paris I’ve finally found time to write up my visit to the new immigration museum. It often tries too hard, is exceedingly awkwardly housed in a “colonial” building, but it has some very powerful things to say – particularly the maps that introduce the exhibits are a reminder that the immigration flows into Europe now are simply a reverse of what was happening a century going – getting back what you sent out, you might say.

Environmental politics

Climate change: you’re convinced

Proving only, really, that you, the readers of my blog, are a pretty exceptional lot, 62% of you (and 502 people voted) answered “completely convinced” to this question which was in my sidebar:
If we don’t set in train a process of drastic reduction of CO2 within the next 10 years, do we face thermal runaway and climate disaster.

A further 17% are either “largely persuaded” or “think it is plausible”. Only 10% said they were “completely unpersuaded and 5% “think it is doubtful”.