Author Archives: Natalie Bennett

A site to explore

October 18, 2006 – 11:32 pm

… Bluestocking Women Writers in the 18th century.

Great content, and in interesting exploration of hyperlink structure.

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Orange – the Internet NON-service provider

October 18, 2006 – 7:56 am

Yet again, I’ve been without internet at home for 36 hours due to Orange’s inability to maintain the absolute basic – a broadband connection. They told Linksys last night that they’d fixed it after 12 hours or so (so I wasted half an hour or so checking my router), but they hadn’t. For practical reasons I can’t leave them yet, but should you be thinking about joining a UK ISP my advice would be NOT Orange.

Apologies to anyone who has been expecting me to do something, including respond to an email. I’ll have to leave for work shortly, so it will be 12 hours or so before I get to anything but the most urgent.

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History Carnival – with lots of women’s history

October 15, 2006 – 10:58 pm

Now up on Clioweb History Carnival No XLI. A great collection, and plenty of women’s history – some of it even positive history about women’s successes (plus the odd infanticide case…)

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Powerful women of the Pacific

October 14, 2006 – 11:04 pm

One of the new exhibitions at the British Museum, Power & Taboo: Sacred Objects from the Pacific, has some lovely images of powerful women.

There is a reproduction of a drawing of Paetini, who was “thought to be the granddaughter of Keatonui, the chief who met Russian expedition of 1804 in the Marquesas”. Important women such as her had up to three chief husbands, and “a number of secondary husbands (pekio) often drawn from the servant class”. They often carried out domestic work. All children were considered to be “fathered” by the most important husbands.

One of the pekios drawn in 1804 doesn’t look very domestic. Mufau, it is said, was greatly admired for his physique, tatooing and warrior prowess. Expedition artist drew and measured every aspecg of his body for comparison with Greek statues. Must have really upset the visiting European men, one suspects…

I’ve written more about the exhibition on My London Your London. Why the fearsome gods? is the question I’m asking.

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Forget the giga – this is the age of the peta

October 14, 2006 – 7:33 pm

The prefix peta refers to numbers of the magnitude 10 to the 15th power, a million billion, and that’s what they’re talking about in the computer world these days.

Yes, it is doing my head in too – and I’m marginally well hooked into this stuff. But if you want to understand what’s happening, I’d reckon you should read this article. I’ve read it three times and think I’ve almost got a handle on it.

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Pay the dinner ladies like the labourers

October 14, 2006 – 10:01 am

It could multiply their pay five times. As a result of a deal with the unions 15 years ago, dinner ladies are earning as little as 20 per cent of what men doing similar unskilled/semi-skilled jobs receive.

One of those cases where you have to ask just what unions and managers thought they were doing…

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