Arts Scholars

Koi te hinengaro, koi te arero, koi te mahi!
Sharp of mind, tongue, and work!

Keep up with the latest discussions and thoughts from our Arts Scholars whānau

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Elephant Talk in the comments’ section

    "Comments, clichés, commentary, controversy… talk talk talk, it’s only talk!”     King Crimson’s classic Elephant Talk depicts perhaps the most accurate representation of any and all media relating to what’s gone in this truly incredible year....

So You Wanna Be a Global Citizen?

It’s not so hard- and you can do it from your couch!

The Wicked Witch of the West

After Jeremy Armstrong’s lecture, something that stuck with me was his initial description of Eastern vs. Western war during his recorded lecture. From what I understand, this initial 10 minutes of his talk was a presentation of the ‘stereotypes’ that these terms...

Change

Various revolutions across the past 200 years have caused changes in social structure, political control, and the movement of our everyday lives. Today I tried to write about the french revolution. It is intriguing to look back upon the past and in their perspective...

Catharsis and artistic expression: conflicts in context

“New needs need new techniques. And the modern artists have found new ways and new means of making their statements…the modern painter cannot express this age, the airplane, the atom bomb, the radio, in the old forms of the Renaissance or of any other past culture.” -...

Inequity In Research

One of the messages that resonates mostly strongly with me was Carisa Showden's reminder that the assumptions one brings to the research process need to be treated delicately. It is far to easy to let ill-founded assumptions taint your research process in a way that...

Truth is Uncomfortable

Research by Stephen Winter aimed to tell the stories of people who made claims of historic abuse in New Zealand state care and to investigate New Zealand’s monetary redress program.    I found this research intriguing as a psychology student, but rather than...

Rogue One: A Non-Skywalker Story

The first time I watched Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, it was as a casual moviegoer along for the ride. I sat there just soaking in the action and cast chemistry and left little space for thinking about theme or cinematography. Four years and one video essay later,...

The Conflict Between Ignorance and Knowledge

Art schol has expanded my perspective of my degree. It allows me to chew on the concepts introduced, and analyse them in a Sara-Esque, conflict-driven way. This is particularly true of my learnings in Maori History and Law.   ‘Conflict’ has multiple definitions,...

Politics Within Research

Many researchers may aim to keep a neutral political stance when conducting their investigations in order to prevent ‘bias’. Tracey McIntosh argues strongly against this goal. Within her research, McIntosh maintains that this is only another way in which unequal power...

Gender and War

When we talk about war, so often it is in terms of the male soldier or male head-of-state. When women are mentioned, it is often in the lumped phrase ‘women and children’. As we’ve progressed through this term, it has left me wondering: where are the women?  Simply,...

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Hated in our Nations

Hated in our Nations

Spoilers  for episode 6 of season 3 of Black Mirror below.  Civilian casualties are as common as they are condemned. Numbers remind us that governments, be it democratic or authoritarian, kill large numbers of civilians as a military strategy. In his lecture, Thomas...

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Labels and Positionality

Labels and Positionality

Of all the sessions we had this year, one of the most impactful for me was Dr. Madhavi Manchi's session on research positionality. She answered a lot of the questions that I didn't know had been at the back of my mind since I started my Arts degree, the core of these...

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