Culture

  • How do you protest without creating disturbance? Vic artists take on anti-protest laws

    The Art of Silent Protest September 17-30 11am-4pm (opening night 6pm) The Snug 447 High St, Northcote. Free entry The Art of Silent Protest is a new exhibition as part of the Melbourne Fringe Festival. In view of new laws, a collective of Australian creative people have responded to this question. They use the form of the placard to “explore notions of change and the visual impact of the art of activism”.

  • Brisbane musos take a stand for asylum seekers

    A diverse range of musical acts from Brisbane and the Gold Coast are uniting in support of asylum seekers at the “Freedom Seeker: Roots, rock, reggae for refugees” concert at the New Globe on September 14 starting at 3pm. Lending their songs and voices to the call for the Australian government to abide by it obligations to refugees, the concert is raising money for refugee advocacy and assistance through the Refugee Action Collective (RAC) and the Refugee and Immigration Legal Service (RAILS). The lineup includes Big Iron, Rivermouth, The Phil Monsour Band, The Molotov and Andy Dub.

  • Call to help indigenous hip hop get produced

    I am the founder of “Reality Records” and a 24-year-old indigenous Australian with a strong cultural background. I am asking your assistance in helping indigenous artists ― not only from Australia but around the world ― have their music recorded and produced. I see a shortage of indigenous music around the world, particularly in Australia, and I believe this provides a unique opportunity. My record label aims to help address this shortage by: • Bringing people together in a positive and creative environment; • Teaching people new skills and self confidence;

  • Author suggests imperialism in new phase

    Global Imperialism & the Great Crisis: the Uncertain Future of Capitalism Ernesto Screpanti Monthly Review Press, 2014 New York, 256 pages The goal of Ernesto Screpanti’s new book is to theoretically elaborate a model of a new phase of imperialism. Screpanti’s argument is that the kind of imperialism written about by the likes of Russian revolutionary V.I. Lenin belongs more and more to the past. Although the work of people like Lenin retain relevance, Screpanti argues a new kind of imperialism has been taking shape over the past two decades.

  • 18 questions for radical rapper Intikana

    Bronx-based rapper, producer, film-maker and youth worker Intikana hits out at indigenous injustice, cultural colonisation and international imperialism, among many other topics. Green Left Weekly's Mat Ward put 18 questions to him.

  • Palestinians farewell poet Samih al-Qasim

    The summer sun beat down on August 21 as thousands of Palestinians set out on a silent march in al-Rama, a Palestinian town in the northern Galilee region of present-day Israel, honouring the recently deceased poet and activist Samih al-Qasim. The 76-year-old al-Qasim, who battled cancer for three years, died late on August 19. Placards bearing verses of al-Qasim’s poetry and Palestinian flags bobbed above the marching crowd, which eventually arrived at the town’s main amphitheater. Al-Qasim’s relatives, prominent religious figures and politicians all spoke.

  • Books delve into Labor's climate failures

    Power Failure: The Inside Story of Climate Politics Under Rudd a& Gillard Philip Chubb Black Inc., 2014 302 pages, $29.99 (pb) In 2007 in Australia, “climate policy was a reform full of promise and excitement,” writes Monash University journalism academic Philip Chubb in Power Failure.

  • A left-wing, but flawed, vision for an independent Scotland

    In Place of Fear II: A Socialist Programme for an Independent Scotland By Jim Sillars Vagabond Voices Publishing, 2014 www.inplaceoffear.com Jim Sillars is a well-known and well-respected figure on the Scottish political scene. Elected a Labour Party MP for South Ayrshire in 1970, he shifted away from mainstream Labour Party politics due to his commitment to setting up a Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh.

  • Dealer joins dots between climate and Aboriginal art

    Adrian Newstead was one of the first people to study climate change in Australia. "I went to a place called the Barren Grounds, which were down the New South Wales south coast down near Kangaroo Valley," the 66-year-old tells Green Left Weekly.

  • How China has moved into Africa

    China’s Second Continent: How a million migrants are building a new Empire in Africa Howard W French Knopf Published May 20, 2014 304 pages www.howardwfrench.com In his 2009 film Rethink Afghanistan, director Robert Greenwald suggested that the US should not try to control the world through military means, but by building schools and hospitals in the countries it wishes to invade. Journalist Howard French's book China's Second Continent shows how such a model can work in practice.

  • Wall Street machinations laid bare in Flashboys

    Flashboys By Michael Lewis W. W. Norton, 2014 288 pp, $39.99 Michael Lewis's Flashboys has had a dramatic welcome in the United States. It swept to the top of the best seller list and was only knocked from its perch by Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the 21st Century. It is revealing of the contemporary US mindset that Flashboys, which turns the machinations of Wall Street into a classic US-style morality play, should alternate with Piketty’s history of capitalist inequality. In reality, Lewis has not produced new information.