Category Archives: Politics

Feminism

Femmes on the Thames

February 13, 2007 – 9:18 am

Sounds good – “a night of fun and empowerment” for women on a barge on the Thames – Rebecca’s review is now up over on My London Your London.

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Politics

The big French issue – housing

February 12, 2007 – 8:48 am

In the square here on Saturday was a protest against the housing problem in France. It reminded me that when I first came to France some 17 years ago of protests in Paris outside the Sacre Couer about the fate of those “sans papiers”. It seems the issue has now moved on – and I suspect that it is broadly the same group of people – the immigrants and asylum-seekers – who are suffering.

The leaflet that I got points to this website, and says that the life expectancy of someone without permanent lodgement in France is 43 years, and there are 400,000 in that position.

It is noticeable too that – perhaps like any big city – Avignon has a very obvious group of rough sleepers/beggars – hard to tell if they concentrate in this tourist area for pickings, but it obviously has significant social problems, although none of these whom I’ve seen have been visibly from an ethnic minority.

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Cycling Environmental politics

A limp response

February 9, 2007 – 7:26 pm

I recently pointed to a petition urging the UK government to do more to allow cycles on trains. Here’s No 10’s limp response – basically, “well we have asked nicely”.

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Politics

One train, three “countries”

February 6, 2007 – 10:41 pm

Over on Comment is Free I’ve a piece recording thoughts on the train from Kings Cross to Inverness – it really does feel like you go through three “countries” – the South-East, the North-East and then Scotland (which of course might soon be an entirely independent country). It left me musing about the nature of citizenship. (And got some remarkably civilised, intelligent conversation.)

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Feminism History

From the Inbox

February 6, 2007 – 1:26 am

* Join a course on Feminist Theory and the Joy of Science – no fees, no exams, you can just read along and join the discussion.

* Or you could take a short course in Byzantine history through 12 Rulers, by podcast … well there is one woman in there, Irene.

* A new online collection of Medieval and Early Modern legal documents – how’s your medieval Latin?

* With debates running hot about nationalism and identity on these isles, it is interesting to revisit the 16th-century version of these controversies among William Caxton, Polydore Vergil and John Leland.

* A little more anecdotal evidence of the medieval household as a joint economic enterprise: Yves and Marion, a bookselling couple in Paris in the 14th-century (French).

(Here’s Google’s attempt at translation, which might not leave you much the wiser… but the pictures on this site are always worth looking at.)

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Feminism

Fleeing Christianity for Islam

February 6, 2007 – 1:14 am

Interesting example of the way the problem is with all religions, not just one of them: according to a piece on Women’s eNews, Coptic women in Egypt are fleeing to Islam, in the embrace of which they can find more freedom than in Christianity:

“A key reason for the so-called ‘kidnappings’ is that Coptic women have no right to divorce,” said Nahed Abul Komsan, head of the Cairo-based Egyptian Center for Women’s Rights, which is the leading women’s rights group in the country.
“This means that if their parents tell them they are going to marry their cousin, they have to submit to this and have no choice . . . So they turn to Islam, not because of a spiritual belief in the religion but because it gives them more of an opportunity to choose their life’s path,” she said.

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