Culture

  • The Keening

    The Keening We are the women and childrenOf the men that mined for goldHeavy are we with sorrowHeavy as heart can holdGalled are we with injusticeSick to the soul of loss — Husbands and sons and brothersSlain for the yellow dross! We are the

  • Recreating a history of struggle

    ROSEBERY — A $10,000 Arts Council grant has been awarded to the "Rosebery Miners and Axemen's Bush and Blarney Festival" for a community theatre project based on Marie E.J. Pitt's poem "The Keening". Pitt, who lived in Rosebery

  • Women's theatre company plans NSW tour

    Somebody's Daughter Theatre is hoping to tour NSW in 1999. SDT is a unique Australian ensemble made up of women who have a history of imprisonment or are still in the prison system. Their productions are acclaimed for their balance of passion, guts

  • Behind the 'gumboot dance'

    Behind the 'gumboot dance' Rishile Gumboot Dancers of SowetoRishile Gumboot Dancers of SowetoLarrikin/Festival Review by Norm Dixon Within hours of touching down at Johannesburg airport, tourists on package tours to South Africa find themselves

  • Castro: the making of a Marxist

    Castro: the making of a Marxist Review by Neville Spencer The Making of a Revolutionary. My Early YearsBy Fidel Castro — Edited by Deborah Shnookal and Pedro Álvaro TabíoOcean Press, 1998141 pp., $19.95 (pb) In the capitalist

  • An inspiring tale from Australia's radical past

    An inspiring tale from Australia's radical past Green Bans, Red Union: Environmental Activism and the NSW Builders Labourers' FederationBy Meredith Burgmann and Verity BurgmannUNSW Press, 1998. 352 pp. $29.95 (pb) Review by Phil Shannon When the

  • Good fun and home truths

    Good fun and home truths Only Heaven KnowsBy Alex HardingDirected by Peter NettellNew Theatre, NewtownFriday-Sunday until December 19Bookings 9873-3575 Review by Helen Jarvis Sydney forms the setting and the subject of this musical play. Not just

  • Saving Uncle Sam

    Saving Private RyanDirected by Steven SpielbergWith Tom Hanks and Matt DamonScreening everywhere Review by Graham Matthews Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan is an extremely impressive film. It's meant to be. From the very first frames, you get

  • Still an inspiration

    Life on the PicketVideo released by CFMEU, Vickery Lodge6 McAndrew St, Gunnedah 2380Phone (02) 6742 0821 to order Review by Alex Bainbridge Vickery was a small coalmine near Gunnedah in NSW. It employed only around 50 workers, but it was on and

  • Aboriginal programming at radio 3CR

    Aboriginal programming at radio 3CR There has been over a decade of Koori programming at Melbourne's community radio 3CR, with Not Another Koori Show (Mondays, 2-4pm) and the Koori Survival Show (Tuesdays, 9-11am). Lisa Bellear, Destiny Deacon,

  • Like a common loaf of bread, they rise

    Uncommon People: Resistance, Rebellion and JazzBy Eric HobsbawmWeidenfeld & Nicolson, 1998360 pp., $49.95 (hb) Review by Phil Shannon "Common" people, "ordinary" people, the "average" man and woman — these labels are not just neutral