Dragon and Kangaroo

Our region is in a state of dangerous flux, with territorial jostling in the South China Sea and temperatures rising on the Korean peninsula.

Renowned historian and author Robert Macklin identifies Australia’s conundrum, in these interesting times, as being how to strengthen ties with neighbouring powerhouse China without causing offence to security partner America.

“One of the extraordinary elements in this is the sudden appearance of an American President, in Trump, who has really diminished America’s standing in the world and potential influence in our region,” Macklin says.

“That is very, very significant, particularly at a time when China is evolving the One Belt One Road initiative, which is going to see the infrastructure of half the world altered irreparably.”

Dissecting the Sino-Australian relationship in Spanning early Chinese traders to the atrocities of the Gold Rush, from the White Australia policy to WWII and the Cold War, it puts in context our current political relationship.

“You don’t get over 90 years of being told that the yellow hordes are coming and that White Australia is somehow an appropriate way to conduct ourselves, quickly,” Macklin says.

“It does take a while for something like that to work its way out of the perception of a nation.”

The development, dating back to WWII, of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance between Australia, the US, Canada, UK and New Zealand plays into this ongoing distrust, Macklin suggests.

“That’s a very significant name, actually, because there are five countries involved… so you’ve got a one-eyed point of view, which is basically a racist viewpoint, because the five countries are all white fellas that derive from the British base,” Macklin says.

“Those ties are going to have to loosen a little so that our geography takes a greater role than our colonial history in the manner in which we operate in the world.”

The numbers game suggests that move we must, Macklin notes.

“We are, in so many ways, dependent upon the Chinese economy for the health of our own. That’s a good foundation to build upon in other elements right across the board, including the combined requirement we both have for defence against terrorism.”

Macklin isn’t convinced Turnbull will make great strides.

“On the one hand, he shares with [former] Prime Minister Kevin Rudd that one of his children is married to a Chinese person and the things he says in China when he’s there are very friendly and sensible. But he does seem to be influenced very considerably by the need to pander to his right wing, often contradicting himself, so you never know exactly where he stands.”

Would the Opposition leader fare any better?

“I think the same applies, probably, to someone like Bill Shorten, though the Labour party has a more collegiate approach to China within the caucus than you’ve got at the moment with the Liberals and the Nationals fighting each other.”

Raymond Williams– (1921–1988) and Plan X

Raymond Williams (1921–1988) is often cited as one of the founders of the interdisciplinary field of education and research known as cultural studies. To be more specific, he formulated an influential methodology that he named “cultural materialism,” which has an affinity with but is a distinctive perspective in its own right. 

Williams’s most celebrated book, Culture and Society 1780–1950 (1958), traced British Romanticism’s critical response to the Industrial Revolution and successive debates on social and cultural change. 

At the time of publication, Williams declared “culture” to be “ordinary,” thereby challenging the cultural elitism of literary study and opening up questions concerning mass-popular culture. However, Williams distanced himself from the populist study of communications and culture that became fashionable in the 1980s. 

His transition from literary criticism and history to sociological commentary and speculation on future prospects was signaled further by his 1961 sequel to Culture and Society, The Long Revolution.

Williams challenged the behaviorism of American-originated communication studies and drew upon European critical theories in his own work. His academic specialism was dramatic form, which he studied historically and related to theatrical and audiovisual trends in modern drama. His perspective of cultural materialism broke entirely with idealist approaches to the arts and communications media. 

However, he was firmly opposed to technologically determinist explanations of the emergence of new media and the dynamics of social change, On technical innovation, he emphasized the role of intentionality, the materiality of discourse, and the social conditions of cultural production and circulation. His key concepts include selective tradition, structure of feeling, and mobile privatization. 

Williams later coined the term “Plan X” to refer to the rise of military recklessness and unregulated “free-market” political economy and communications during the late 20th century. His final non-fiction book (he also wrote novels), Towards 2000 (1985), has been updated to take account of developments in culture, society, and the environment over the past 30 years.

John LE CARRE–Agent RUNNING IN THE FIELD

Le Carré delivers a tale for our times, replete with the classic seasoning of betrayal, secret state shenanigans and sad-eyed human frailty, all baked into an oven-hot contemporary thriller that’s partly inspired by the machinations of 21st-century Ukraine, today more than ever the fatal crossroads of great power politics.

Once again, le Carré’s sixth sense about the thrilling fulcrum of jeopardy has not deserted him. Agent Running is right on the money, in psychology as much as politics, a demonstration of the British spy thriller at its unputdownable best.

His devoted readers will note that agent-runner Nat in the Haven is a long way from Smiley and the Circus. We are among the broken statues of old empires. Karla and the iron curtain are long gone and Britain’s spies cling to the wreckage as best they can, while turning a blind eye to post credit-crunch corruption. 

At the same time, although le Carré locates much of his plot in a unified Germany, some things don’t change. In the end, it’s the threat of Moscow Centre that will motivate Nat towards his final, desperate and most audacious covert operation, closing with 15 perfect lines about Nat’s “exfiltration”. 

Shane O Mara–in Praise of Walking

Walking upright on two feet is a uniquely human skill. It defines us as a species.

It enabled us to walk out of Africa and to spread as far as Alaska and Australia. It freed our hands and freed our minds. We put one foot in front of the other without thinking - yet how many of us know how we do that, or appreciate the advantages it gives us? In this hymn to walking, neuroscientist Shane O'Mara invites us to marvel at the benefits it confers on our bodies and minds.

In Praise of Walking celebrates this miraculous ability. Incredibly, it is a skill that has its evolutionary origins millions of years ago, under the sea. And the latest research is only now revealing how the brain and nervous system performs the mechanical magic of balancing, navigating a crowded city, or running our inner GPS system. 

Walking is good for our muscles and posture; it helps to protect and repair organs, and can slow or turn back the ageing of our brains. With our minds in motion we think more creatively, our mood improves and stress levels fall. Walking together to achieve a shared purpose is also a social glue that has contributed to our survival as a species.

As our lives become increasingly sedentary, we risk all this. We must start walking again, whether it's up a mountain, down to the park, or simply to school and work. We, and our societies, will be better for it.

Neuroscientist Shane O’Mara celebrates the full sweep of human walking, from its origins deep in time, through to how the brain and nervous system performs the mechanical magic of walking, to understanding how it can set our thoughts free, all the way to its most social aspects, when we walk together to achieve something – whether it’s a four-ball in golf, a country ramble, or a march to try and change society.

Walking confers a great many benefits for the body and mind; walking helps protect and repair organs that have been subject to stresses and strains; it is good for the gut, helping the passage of food through the intestines. Regular walking also acts as a brake on the aging of our brains, and can, in an important sense, reverse the aging of our brains. Walking is also associated with improved creativity, improved mood, and the general sharpening of our thinking.

Percy Grainger–speaks and plays (1948)

If we think of the popular music of today and compare it with that of the turn of the century

we will seek for some strong influence in the direction of greater delicacy and subtelty and 

I think Cyril Scott and Debussy are two of the clues. 

The chords that are used in jazz and swing today are the chords that are generally used in Cyril Scott and Debussey. And if we want one single instrument that turned music away from the late 19th century from the delicacy of 20th century music I think it is to be sorght in Debussy's admiration for the Javanese Gong Orchestras that he heard in Paris in 1888 you can hear very beautiful examples of that music in a volume of records called Music of the orient edited by Doctor Von Hornbustle I think it is put out by Decca. 

In that album of course you will hear music it is conceived for Debussey's staff was difficult to translate to our own kinds of instruments. It is not and exact transcription of what of what he heard from these orchestras in 1888. Some of the passages in it are European chords with some Oriental instruments.

Percy Grainger 1882-1961 was a multi-talented universalist who wanted to embrace and
encompass all the arts... he was not only a musician, but also a folklorist, editor, musicologist, lecturer, writer, inventor etc etc.

Playing the piano was just one of his many interests though he had enough skills to impress
Busoniand Grieg with his playing, and he had original ideas about phrasing, making contrasts and pedaling.

Here at we can hear him play Claude Debussy's "Pagodes" (from "Estampes") during a recital at the University of Texas in 1948. Before he plays he briefly talks about the influence of Oriental music on Debussy, notably the Javanese gamelan orchestras that Debussy heard for the first time during the Paris Exposition Universelle in 1888 (or 1889).

German Peasant Revolt

Many rulers of Germany's various principalities functioned as autocratic rulers who recognized no other authority within their territories. Princes had the right to levy taxes and borrow money as they saw fit. 

The growing costs of administration and military upkeep impelled them to keep raising demands on their subjects.

The princes also worked to centralize power in the towns and estates.Accordingly, princes tended to gain economically from the ruination of the lesser nobility, by acquiring their estates. This ignited the Knights' Revolt that occurred from 1522 through 1523 in the Rhineland. The revolt was "suppressed by both Catholic and Lutheran princes who were satisfied to cooperate against a common danger.

Pearl Beach