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‘Barbie’ was great at representing the patriarchy, but awful on feminism.
The 2023 Barbie Movie was a wonderful overview of how a patriarchy works, something (as Pop Culture Detective brilliantly shows) is vanishingly rare in Hollywood. This refreshing take is why the film received such glowing reviews: However, Barbie is not a feminist masterpiece. On that front it’s awful. So here—finally—is commentary from a middle aged…
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Things I’ve learned from the 5-4 Podcast about how the Supreme Court has ruined democracy
If you prefer this article in pdf format, you can download it here. Introduction 5-4’s tagline is “a podcast about how much the Supreme Court sucks”. The hosts cover a wide variety of cases, but in this essay I’ve focused on election law, because a lot of people have been worrying about the future of…
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Berlin Nonfiction Circle
The Berlin Nonfiction Circle is a twice-a-month meet up of authors, journalists, essayists and hobbyists working on articles, books or any other nonfiction works (and sometimes fiction too). We meet every second Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. at Hasenheide 74 to discuss each others’ work. The rules are explained below, but the general format for the…
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The Cliffs of Moher: Making life bad for buskers since 2007
“In some ways it had become an easy way to make money. You go up there in the middle of August with a tin whistle and whether you can play or not, probably some people will throw you some money in the hope you might go away and stop playing.” — Gerard Dollard, Clare County Council…
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Research: Trashing Westminster City Council’s Busking Policy
In 2023, Westminster City Council in London passed one of the most insane busking licenses I’ve ever seen, made even more nuts because the enforcement area included Covent Garden, perhaps the world’s most famous and popular busking pitch, and jewel of Westminster’s public entertainment. I did a two month investigation into their proposed busking policy,…
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The benefits that busking provides cities
If you apply for grant funding, you usually have to choose who the beneficiaries are of your activities. The Busking Project CIC tend to pick ‘artists’ in our grant applications. We also say we work in the world of ‘arts and entertainment’. And, of course, we apply exclusively for ‘arts grants’. But, that’s a woeful…
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Why busking is an “at risk” part of human culture
Covid has obviously accelerated cashless payments. But it has also created a surge in initiatives transforming city centres, either through legislation, pop-up markets, outdoor seating and other endeavours trying to bring people back to town. Add inflation and the cost of living crisis—both of which are eating away at the value of a $1 tip—and…
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How busking epitomises the ideals of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion
Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (acronyms: EDI or DEI) is a good idea in theory. ‘Equity’ stands for treating everyone fairly. ‘Diversity’ refers to classifications such as age, race and gender. And ‘Inclusion’ refers to how welcome everyone feels (slightly different to diversity, which focuses more on numbers). Taken together, these represent ‘values’ that organisations try to…
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From Rags to Revolution: remembering Josh White, America’s forgotten legendary street performer
Content warning: there’s a graphic description of violence, torture and murder in the grey box below. You can skip it, if that’s not something you feel like reading today. Josh White’s story arch, as detailed in Elijah Wald’s biography, Josh White: Society Blues, is proof that busking’s proximity to deprivation and adversity is one of the art form’s biggest strengths.…
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The Busking Project (book)
With images selected from over 45,000 photos taken from a round-the-world trip interviewing street performers, this book gives a unique, beautiful look at the world of busking, split into four main sections: Part 1: Malls Without Walls, exploring the impact of changing cities on the art of street performance, including the rise of pseudo-public spaces…