Category: Culture

I’ve made this a survey question. This is a purely subjective opinion, as all such questions are. It is informed by Nick Nicholas’ answer to Do you think Australian singer Delta Goodrem is pretty?: Individual: Not really into blondes, man. As opposed to Season 3 Australian Bachelor Richie Strahan, who was only into blondes, man, […]

I had a slightly different take on the final scene, and I’m a little surprised that nobody else had the same take. Must be just me then. Yes, Andrew starts playing out of spite, because he’ll show Fletcher what he’s made of, and he’s happy to disrupt Fletcher’s show while doing it. But as Andrew […]

They are indeed real people, who interview for the privilege, rather than professional actors. The whole point, after all, is that “real people” are cheaper. That doesn’t necessarily mean they are media innocents, of course, and I’m quite happy when I find they are not. There are people who have done repeat appearances in various […]

Something more complicated has happened than that. We have left behind a world where there was a well-regulated Canon of literature, and where the masses paid attention to scholars who would identify that Canon. We live now instead in a world where taste have become democratized, and more subject to market forces than to elite […]

You come to me highly recommended, Melinda Gwin, by the Magister, with a very ticklish question. You ask me a question that the Magister has already answered exhaustively, and morally, and Stageritically. What then may I say? Τί σοι προσοίσω, δέσποινα;—What shall I offer thee, lady? (Though you may not be that familiar with Comnenan […]

… Do we, Kat? I mean, pear-shaped we do say, yes, and the body shape is old (1815); the “things went wrong” meaning is much later, and may (may) be unrelated: Pear-shaped. But banana-shaped? I haven’t heard that. I have heard “flat as a pancake” instead, and pancakes aren’t fruit. Apple shaped? I haven’t heard […]

Originally Answered: Why do people like to watch The Bachelor? I’m sure I’ve seen this question somewhere else already, but I’m on my phone, so I won’t go hunting to merge. The Bachelor draws on a potent combination of factors, although the proportion of factors seems to differ by country. The Australian Bachelor and Bachelorette […]

Prison Notebooks – Wikipedia I like using the word hegemony. I like it a lot. I even made reference here recently to the hegemony of meat pies in Australia. So I’m chatting to Janna today. Janna is not on this forum. And Janna says, “If you want to know about hegemony, you’ve just got to […]