Het eerste examen is achter de rug. Ik heb het er niet supergoed vanaf gebracht, maar al wat ik nu nog kan doen is afwachten hé. En om met een positieve noot te eindigen deel ik met jullie nog enkele citaten van de prof die we hadden voor het gedeelte “UK today”. ‘t Is een Schotse met gevoel voor humor — vooral het stukje over de religious minorities is de moeite, en medestudenten in de Therminal zich maar afvragen waarom ik zat te gniffelen boven mijn cursus.
Uit het hoofdstuk “media”:
Radio 1: I grew up listening to this addictively, it was the only way out from a Scottish city a long way from anywhere else. John Peel was my hero. It used to have cutting edge music and everyday mainstream music, and still does, but the music has changed for me. Daytime programmes have more stupid chat, evening programmes can be obsessively dance tracks or techno, but can also be great wall to wall music. The accents of the presents are much more regional than they used to be, you might find them incomprehensible, but give it a try.
Radio 2: used to be the last word in cheesy, boring, old-fashioned die-of-boredom music, the station your parents listen to. Because of that reputation I find it very hard to listen to, even though the music and presenters have changed and it can be quite good. Its image of being where old Radio 1 presenters go to die has been radically changed by ‘adult’ DJs like Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross.
(…)
Talksport: says it all, really. If you want to hear endless, tedious pub-talk by boring men about sports teams you’ve never heard of, this is the station for you.
Uit het hoofdstuk “religion”:
From the 2001 national census for England & Wales:
Christian – 37,000,000 (72%)
‘no religion’ – 7,700,000
no answer given – 4,000,000
Muslim – 1,547,000 (3%)
Hindu – 552,000
Sikh – 329,000
Jewish – 260,000
Buddhist – 151,816
Jedi – 390,000 (0.7%)So, why did nearly 400,000 people fill in the ‘religion’ box on their census forms with ‘Jedi’? (Eight of these were police officers from Strathclyde Police.) Why was the ‘UK Church of the Jedi’ founded last year?
The most obvious reason is that in 2001 there was an internet campaign to get 10,000 signatures, in the belief that this would give Jedi-ism the status of a religion in Britain. (The census statisticians did not recognise it as a religion, and filed those answers under ‘atheism’.) So there were a lot of people who were willing to give it a try, because the British have got a sense of humour, laughing at the idea of installing an invented belief system from a film in the pantheon.
There’s also a quirky enjoyment of bringing fantasy into real life, especially when it doesn’t offend or harm anyone.
There’s the idea of messing up the system, of rocking the boat, of not treating an official enquiry with the respect it normally gets. So far, all very British.
(…)
Ook nog uit het hoofdstuk “religion”, maar dan uit mijn eigen lesnotities:
Religious minorities:
Mormonism: crazy people (sic) but useful: genealogy (specialized in software & databases)
Christian Science: also slightly bonkers (sic); no such thing as illness: read the bible, think positive thoughts, and you’ll be okay.
Paganism: loopy but interesting people (sic)
Scientology: utterly dishonest and dangerous people (sic); a scam based on science fiction, not even a belief system in its own right.
Uit het hoofdstuk “music”, het eerste bij de onderverdeling “national anthems” en het tweede onder “protest songs”:
Flower of Scotland: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWfRQDIEXxc
There are a LOT of Flower of Scotland links out there, but I’ve picked this one because not only do you get a sight of a grand old Scottish man of folk music in the full kilt and dress jacket, he’s leading the singing of the anthem at Hampden (or is it Ibrox?), where Scotland are about to play Ukraine in a game of footie, and it is very very important that they win, and so you can hear the passion in the crowd’s singing. Notice that they all know the words by heart, and that some of the players are so overcome with emotion, or fear, that they can’t get the words out.The Jam – Down in the Tube Station at midnight: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGsyL6DhgPU
Ah, nostalgia. I watched The Jam play this track on Top of the Pops in 1978 and was utterly hooked. Didn’t actually know what ‘the Tube’ was at that point in my life, but never mind. Those suits, those haircuts, very radical at the time, and the brilliant lyrics, that energy, I could go on …
Ik geef toe, er zijn ergere dingen om te leren. Ook nog nooit eerder een cursus moeten studeren waarin we onderricht werden over The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Fawlty Towers, Monty Python en Little Britain (hoofdstuk “humour”).
