Cultural osmosis For many decades, visits, homestays and courses abroad in the country of the ‘target language’ have been considered essential to the study of a foreign language, both for UK young people going abroad and for young EU nationals coming to the UK. Indeed, this is nothing new: human beings have always travelled, mixed […]
During the Covid-19 lockdown, online exercise and dance classes became a staple part of many people’s lives. As well as keeping us physically fit and healthy, they helped provide social interaction which supported mental wellbeing. Unable to offer face-to-face classes, exercise and dance instructors had needed to embrace online platforms such as Zoom or MS […]
I wake up to yet another ‘dead cat’ announcement from the hapless Education Secretary, Gavin Williamson: “Let them learn Latin” he declares in a £4m Latin Excellence pilot scheme to teach the language in 40 schools. It is not unreasonable for all those concerned in the difficult task of creating and maintaining an education system […]
The news is almost universally grim right now, so we need a few diversions to give our batteries time to recharge. Here are a few ideas to explore, all of them my personal selections and free from the influence of their creators! Sounds: If, like me, you find it hard to get to sleep at […]
Towards the end of my first year as an undergraduate in 1979 I desperately wanted to switch to my subsidiary subject, art history. I had no idea that this even existed as a degree course when I applied to university, but it proved to be a mind-blowing, intellectually rigorous course of study that ignited a […]
In their first response to complaints submitted, the Information Commission Office (ICO) has ruled that Dartington Hall Trust violated data protection laws in their creation of a list of campaigners. Nearly a year ago now, the BBC and then the Times reported on a ‘Black List’ that Dartington Hall Trust (DHT) had created of people […]
The celebrated Erasmus Plus programme started as a large-scale exchange programme for university students across the EU. It also provides grants for a wide range of activities, including the opportunity for students to undertake work placements abroad and for teachers and education staff to attend training courses. In 2018, the European Commission adopted an ambitious […]
“Am I gonna sit here and say that Brexit is perfect, and your generation is gonna reap the benefits? No, I’m not, because you’re not, frankly, at the minute, and I can see that. We’ve got work to do…” So said Andrew Bowie, Conservative MP for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine, addressing an audience of under-30-year-old […]
Actor, producer, distributor and director David Nicholas Wilkinson is a regular fixture at the London Screenwriters’ Festival, generously sharing his experience with eager new writers and filmmakers. This year was no exception, although the format was different, of course, with everything online in one format or another. David chose to do his slot by Zoom, […]
The Hypatia Trust is a charity based in Penzance, Cornwall, which strives to support women’s education and achievements. Named after the remarkable hellenistic neoplatonist mathematician, astronomer and philosopher, the trust was founded 25 years ago by Melissa Hardie . She initially set up the charity with the primary aim to protect, maintain, and develop the […]
Amongst the very many losses and deprivations, the ending of UK citizens’ freedom to travel, work, study, love, live and retire in any of the EU’s 27 member states is, perhaps, the most devastating. It is a loss gleefully celebrated by Patel, that enemy of rights and freedoms, and repeated with every ‘let’s rub you […]
In February the London Screenwriters’ Festival ran an inspiring online event that gave screenwriters and filmmakers a much-needed boost. The early part of the year is traditionally a low-point. This year, in the midst of lockdown number three and after the hardest-ever year for the arts (despite the clamour for content), the mood was particularly […]
For those who missed the West Country Voices event on 11 Feb 2021, the director Robert Golden has produced an audio record of the proceedings. As it was a recording of a zoom event, the sound can be erratic so please make allowances. The event was a special Q&A session following the release of Robert […]
During the nineteenth century the fortunes of Swanage were dictated by a trio known as the Three Gentlemen of Swanage. Two of them, John Mowlem and George Burt developed the Purbeck stone trade, contributing to the fabric of the town as their business prospered and grew. It was the third, philanthropist William Morton Pitt, who […]
“This one year changed my life, my values and my appreciation of those of others”. As an undergraduate studying Spanish and French in 1969, I really didn’t want to spend a year abroad, and it wasn’t compulsory to do so in those days. My arm was twisted by my tutor, and I spent a year […]
Here’s something I would sincerely like to know from anybody who thinks today that Brexit was a good idea: what did my UK soundman and UK mandolin player gain from Brexit? I want somebody to tell me, because I keep hearing about “Global Britain” and “all the new opportunities”!!! I don’t want to argue. I’m […]
The export of live music, which earns the UK billions and is the only source of income for countless musicians, support crew and suppliers, has been stopped in its tracks – and not only by Covid-19. Visas take months. UK trucks are not permitted to drive between gigs. Customs documentation is needed in volumes not […]
One of the things that makes life worthwhile is the opportunity to keep learning something new. The first week of the London Screenwriters’ Festival online has been what I’d call a ‘chocolate mousse’ learning experience – intense, exquisite and deliciously inspirational. Every session has been brilliant, and some have been a revelation, like Tales of […]
“You may buy from us in English … but you must sell to us in my language!” This much-quoted maxim highlights the importance of language skills to international trade. What German Chancellor Willy Brandt actually said in the early 1970s was: “If I’m selling to you, I speak your language. If I’m buying, dann müssen […]
In case you missed them, here’s a collection of articles from Cornish writers or on Cornish (or Isles of Scilly) subjects. Please share! You are our distribution network! If you have a story to tell, please get in touch: cornwall@westcountryvoices.co.uk; devon@westcountryvoices.co.uk; dorset@westcountryvoices.co.uk and somerset@westcountryvoices.co.uk Look out for box sets from Devon, Somerset and Dorset!
Doro Williamson is 11, and lives with her parents on the southern edge of Dartmoor, Devon, UK. This poem was written while schooling at home, as part of her English work, assigned by her year 6 teacher after looking at alliteration and juxtaposition. Between Two Worlds The liminal lockdown kept us at homeFraying our tempers […]
If you’re not on Twitter, you may have heard terrible things about it. Indeed, it can be a very toxic place, especially UK ‘political’ Twitter, which is a maelstrom of Johnson’s Trumpist pronouncements, amplification by his forgiving fans and robust rebuttals from lovers of truth. Except every now and then something wonderful happens. I remember […]
In the final canto of the Paradiso, Dante is given a moment of perfetto veder, “perfect sight” – of union with the divine, when the seer and the seen become one. As his poem builds to this sublime climax, its creator loses his battle with language, yet captures that loss with words of such surpassing […]
West Country Voices is delighted to invite you to a special Q&A event following the release of Robert Golden’s powerful and elegiac film – This Good Earth. The film’s director, Robert Golden will be joined by Professor Timothy Lang, Professor of Food Policy, Centre for Food Policy, City, University of London and Simon Holland, farmer […]
There’s no original sin in Dante’s account of human spirituality. The soul is born of joy and seeks to return to a state of joy. In my first three tasting notes I’m going to skip about, dipping once only into each canticle – Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso. Then, if you’d like more, you can come […]
Catrina Davies discovered her true self in Europe. In September she left Cornwall for Portugal, from where she reflects on severance, belonging and betrayal. When I was ten my parents took me and my sisters to France for a week. We drove onto the ferry at Plymouth, all squashed into our Citroen AX, disembarked in […]
Dante is at once the most influential and the most neglected of Europe’s poets. Since the early 14th century, when he wrote, he has inspired countless other writers in almost every European language, yet today he has few readers outside academia and Italy. In this series of commentaries written to mark the 700th anniversary of […]
Most dogged defenders of our food & farming standards: Devon MPs Ben Bradshaw, Luke Pollard and Dorset MP Simon Hoare stand amongst those who braved the government to demand standards be enshrined in law and not on the table in any future trade deals. (Devon MP Neil Parish almost made it into this select group, […]
As an American living in England for over 50 years, being neither a Brit nor a European, I’ve kept my views about the EU and the Brexit debate to myself… until now. Despite the last-minute ‘agreement’, I still find it incredibly sad to watch the British government and Brexit supporters turning their backs on the […]
