Artículos de revistas sobre el tema "Estate of David Crossman"

In this short article, housing campaigner David Utley-Williams looks at the class dynamics that underpin estate demolition. Drawing on his own personal experience and looking at the broader sociopolitical context, he examines how estate demolition is a policy failure that inflicts huge damage on London’s working-class communities.

This article is a tribute to Professor David McLauchlan on the occasion of his 40th teaching anniversary. The first part is a personal recollection from each of the two authors. The second part is a joint case note. It poses the question: how could a real estate firm who knew the vendor did not intend to appoint the firm as agent nevertheless have a legal right to withhold commission? In the decision of Nightingale v Barfoot Ltd, Venning J confirmed that the firm had such a right. This article challenges the accuracy of that conclusion, suggesting that as there was no evidence to support the formation of an agency agreement, the real estate firm did not have the right to deduct commission. It analyses critically a number of the legal arguments raised in the case and those that should have been raised, including those concerning contract formation, the objective principle, promissory estoppel, and the effect of s 62 of the Real Estate Agents Act 1976 and the Contracts Privity Act 1982. Much responsibility for the outcome of the case must be pinned on counsel for the vendor, who failed to stop and ask himself "But Where’s The Contract"?

Review of Mekim Nius: South Pacific media, politics and education, by David RobieAt its core, Mekim Nius argues a clear position university level education is central to the health of South Pacific journalism and its democracies. To do this Robie is ambitious with the book's scope, declaring three broad aims: a study of the critical influence of teritary education on Pacific journalists and their profession; an analysis of the political, economic and legal frameworks in which Fiji and PNG journalists have operated since; and outline of the development of journalism education in the South Pacific.

This was David Drew's last published article. Completed in December 2008, it appeared in May 2009 as a contribution to “… dass alles auch hätte anders kommen können”. Beiträge zur Musik des 20. Jahrhunderts edited by Susanne Schaal-Gotthardt, Luitgard Schader and Heinz-Jürgen Winkler, published as Band XII of Frankfurter Studien, a publication of the Hindemith-Institut (Frankfurt am Main: Schott ED 20571, 2009).David Drew had discussed with the present editor a projected followup article for Tempo, to deal specifically with Walter Leigh's music for A Midsummer Night's Dream and the ideological and critical misunderstandings which he felt were beginning to envelop it as a result of its citation in Fred K. Prieberg's Musik im NS-Staat. This was presumably one of the ‘several research-projects’ ongoing to which he alludes in footnote 37. Sadly, little if any of that projected article was written down. But since the publication of ‘North Sea Crossings’ in an otherwise German-language source must inevitably have found it few English readers so far, it seemed a fitting tribute to its author to reprint it here, with profound thanks for co-operation to Schott Music GmbH & Co. KG, Mainz, to Sally Groves in particular, and the estate of David Drew.

This text discusses and explains the relation between the urban crisis today and the antivalue in respect to the conceptual framework by David Harvey, a well-known British geographer. He approaches this theme in many of his books, including ‘Marx, capital and the madness of economic reason’, published in Brazil, in 2018. This text uses this book as a starting point for the discussion of how the contemporary world, which is increasingly urban, is dominated by the Empire of antivalue, especially in the form of a growing debt. The antivalue, in the form of capital holder of interest, plays a crucial role in the accumulation of capital, articulating production, circulation and realization of commodities, promoting and facilitating the geographical movement of capital and the transfer of capital between economic circuits and cycles of production. However, debt is the favorite form of antivalue under capitalism today. In addition to being supported and granted by the State in a variety of ways, including through public debt, debt imprisons all economic agents in perpetual servitude. Debt follows the tendency of continuous production of value and surplus value under capitalism, a movement that Harvey calls bad infinity. Antivalue in its form of debt is also called fetishism of capital, which defines the contradictory situation in which money alone seems to have the magic powers to create more money. The consequences of growing debt to the urban crisis go beyond the necessity of solving fiscal problems of the State. The need to produce value and surplus value, in addition to the service of the debt generates urban spaces marked by gentrification and segregation. In sum, the text discusses the urban crisis today in the context of the domination by the financial-real estate complex, basing the discussion on Marx’s theory of value and the concept of antivalue, as presented by David Harvey.

ABSTRACT This article revisits and affirms Derek Pearsall’s reading of Chaucer’s Merchant’s Tale, elaborating it with reference to the medieval theory of satire, ecclesiastical literature relating to the sacrament of marriage, analogues of the pear tree escapade from the novella tradition, and David Lawton’s research on “voice.” The idea of a single, all-encompassing narrative voice is challenged. Pearsall’s assertion that we do not need the Merchant to understand the tale, because its voice is “fully established from within,” gives rise to the question of whether there is any need to assign it to a singular voice. The contemptuous references to “secular estate” by a teller who is supposedly a merchant drives the speculation that Chaucer may originally have intended the story for a member of some religious order—a friar or monk perhaps. However, the risk of a cacophony of different voices is averted by the ultimate dominance of mercantile discourse. Whatever the poet’s original intention may have been (the Canterbury Tales being a work in progress), it has convincingly grown into a merchant’s tale, wherein supposedly noble characters speak and act in ways inappropriate to their high estate, and the values of commerce gain priority.

In this paper, a ‘weak’ test of the capital-switching argument developed by David Harvey is offered. With data on construction investment activity for the USA and on various alternative investments, a temporal analysis was used to assess whether evidence exists for the movement of capital from the primary to the secondary circuit. The investigation is focused specifically on the building boom of the 1980s, as that expansion has been the focus of recent theoretical and empirical work centered on the relation between urbanization and the restructuring of capital. Little support was found for the claim that capital switching has occurred, but the data do point to a delinking of real-estate investment from nonspeculative investment criteria and use-value considerations.

The Sunnyhill Health & Racquet Club (SHRC) is a very small, private, volunteer-run, not-for-profit club located on a swath of prime real estate in the heart of a wealthy community in Sunnyhill Township. At the behest of the club’s board, SHRC President David Wilson has been tasked with developing financing strategies to address the current (perceived) shortcomings of the club. Like he did for decades working in Post Office Square, in Boston’s Financial District, Wilson knew he had to (1) understand the current financial capacity of SHRC, (2) discern the members’ desire for financial contribution, and (3) develop financing options. Here, strategies to finance improvements to the club include debt utilization (and the necessary servicing of any debt commitments), one-time capital injections through the disposition of club property, and/or enhanced revenue generation. Developing strategies in an environment of disparate stakeholder goals provides additional challenges for Wilson.

The libri delle case are inventories of buildings that were produced by the pious institutions of Rome—convents, confraternities, hospitals—beginning in the second half of the sixteenth century. They are based on images—first plans, later elevations and even sections—and for that reason are different from all earlier inventories. In Visual Documents, Property Archives, and the Map of the City of Rome: 1563–1712, David Friedman discusses how the introduction of images transformed both the organization and the content of the archives. Introduced at a moment of dramatic change in the real estate market, they are the means by which the documentary record focused for the first time on the physical qualities of property. The plans document a fundamental change in the way the city itself was understood. First recorded as isolated objects, the houses of the later libri are set in increasingly wide physical contexts, reflecting a vision of the city as a continuous spatial field.

After over a century of relative neglect, the activities of David Steuart Erskine, the eleventh Earl of Buchan, on his Dryburgh estate between 1785 and 1829 have come under increasing academic scrutiny. The Earl’s retirement to Dryburgh has been seen less as a retreat from his high public profile as the founder of the Society of Antiquaries and more as a continuation both of his antiquarian and political interests. Indeed, landscape features such as the Temple of the Muses to the poet James Thomson and especially the giant statue to William Wallace have been viewed recently as part of a highly political nationalist-historic romantic landscape. While confirming the essentially political nature of these monuments, this article will explore an alternative whig and unionist reading of them. At the same time, although highlighting the continuity of Buchan’s antiquarian agenda, it will attempt to show how this gradually merged with a wide range of the Earl’s more personal enthusiasms such as Horace Walpole’s Strawberry Hill, classical antiquity and the beaux arts of London’s Royal Academy to form a distinctive second summer to his career.

In late 1996 a heraldic parcel-gilt badge (fig 1) was found during a metal detecting rally by Mr Martin Hay of Horley, Surrey, in a field just to the north of Chelsham Court Farm, near Chelsham, Surrey (National Grid Ref: TQ 388 586). The badge was subsequently brought by Mr David Williams of Reigate, Surrey, to the Department of Medieval and Later Antiquities at the British Museum for identification. It was established that the find had been made on land belonging to Earl Compton of Castle Ashby, Northamptonshire. The Chelsham estate was acquired by the Sixth Marquess of Northampton in 1943 and passed on via family Trustees to The Earl Compton in 1994. As this single find was made before the Treasure Act came into force on 24 September 1997, it does not qualify as Treasure under the terms of the new legislation. As a casual loss under the old regulations of Treasure Trove, ownership of the object was claimed by the landowner who has generously agreed to lend it to the British Museum for display purposes.

As one of the Islamic sources of law, hadith is always confronted with two challenges: reinterpretation and origination. Either of these two will appear any time the teaching it contents considered fail adjusting to social need and change. This holds true, for instance, in the matter of bequest to an heir. As is well-known, Islamic law of inheritance prescribes two restrictions upon bequest: first, a bequest may not exceed one-third of the estate and second, a bequest may not be made in favour of an heir. However, modern Muslim personal law, like in Egypt and Sudan, shows the contrary especially to the second restriction. Muslims of these two countries may legally make a bequest to whom he will, whether heirs or non-heirs. This directly runs counter to the hadith: "la waṣiyyah li-wārith" (no bequest to an heir). But the reforrners argue that the hadith is poorly attested. David S. Powers even suggest that the hadith is a false one. The hadith scientific approach Proposed in this article to the hadiths, as shown in al-kutub at-tis'ah, proved to corroborates the argument, albeit differs slightly with Powers' suggestion.

Abstract Triple negative breast cancer (TNBC) is characterized by the absence of estrogen, progesterone, and HER2 receptors. It exhibits a higher level of aggressiveness compared to other types of breast cancer, with a greater likelihood of recurrence following standard treatments such as surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation. Despite limited FDA-approved targeted therapies for TNBC, there is an ongoing need for additional molecular targeting agents.Our investigation focused on the role of the receptor tyrosine kinase MerTK and its impact on proliferation and invasion/metastatic potential. Immunohistochemistry analysis revealed that approximately 86% (128/148) expressed varying levels of MerTK in human TNBC samples, whereas approximately 50% (23/47) of TNBC patient-derived xenografts (PDX) expressed MerTK. Additionally, three established TNBC cell lines (BT549, MDAMB231, and MDAMB436) exhibited elevated MerTK expression levels.To further explore the role of MerTK in TNBC, we stably overexpressed MerTK in human TNBC cell lines SUM102 and SUM159, which naturally have low MerTK levels. The results demonstrated that MerTK overexpression led to increases in proliferative potential, robust in vivo tumor growth, heightened migration/invasion potential, and increased lung metastasis. NanoString nCounter analysis of MerTK-overexpressing SUM102 cells (SUM102-MerTK) revealed upregulation of several signaling pathways, including PI3k-Akt, PDGF, and Myc, ultimately driving cell cycle progression, reducing apoptosis, and enhancing cell survival in TNBC.Further investigation using a cytokine array showed increased endoglin production in SUM102-MerTK cells compared to vector control cells. This suggested that MerTK might be creating a conducive environment for increased proliferative and metastatic activity via elevated endoglin expression in TNBC. To ascertain the role of endoglin in increase proliferation and/or invasion potential, we knocked out endoglin in SUM102-MerTK cells. While endoglin knockout SUM102-MerTK cells exhibited similar growth to SUM102-MerTK cells, the number of lung metastases was significantly impacted, indicating that MerTK regulates invasion and metastasis through endoglin in TNBC. Collectively, our data suggests that MerTK regulates a unique proliferative signature allowing for robust tumor growth and increased metastatic potential through endoglin regulation. This suggests that targeting MerTK and endoglin simultaneously may be a viable approach for TNBC patients. Citation Format: Christine Glitchev, Mari Iida, Bridget E. Crossman, Kourtney L. Kostecki, Carlene A. Kranjac, Jillian M. Adams, Peng Liu, Irene Ong, David T. Yang, Irene Kang, Ravi Salgia, Deric L. Wheeler. MerTK drives proliferation and metastasis activity in triple negative breast cancer [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2024; Part 1 (Regular Abstracts); 2024 Apr 5-10; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2024;84(6_Suppl):Abstract nr 6994.

David Steuart Erskine, 11th Earl of Buchan (1742–1829), is best known for founding the Society of the Antiquaries of Scotland in 1780. In 1786 he reacquired the family’s Dryburgh estate, on which stood the ruins of Dryburgh’s medieval abbey, which he thereby protected from stone-robbing, enabling it to be enjoyed today. This paper focuses elsewhere, namely on Buchan’s architectural interventions in the abbey’s landscape, on what motivated him, what he sought to achieve and on what people both at the time and afterwards have made of him and these interventions. It is argued that while Scotland’s elites were striving to downplay the independent nation’s accomplishments, Buchan instead exploited Scottish history and accomplishment to create a political landscape at Dryburgh, centred on his statue of Sir William Wallace, Guardian of Scotland during the Wars of Independence and executed in 1305. It is argued, too, that the nature of Buchan’s politics, as one of the privileged elite who had broken rank from the ruling class, resulted in his reputation being maligned and his creation being generally undervalued by posterity, and in particular by the Scots themselves, the very people to whom he wanted to reach out, to inspire, and to highlight.

Abstract This article aims at presenting ISIS expansion in North Africa in the first quarter of 2016, with its subsequent implication in the wider framework of Jihadist proliferation worldwide. It can be argued that, while losing real estate in the Middle East, ISIS has started a permanent search for extra-cellular matrices or an ongoing process of de- and reterritorialization. The allegiance and support pledged by other African-based terrorist groups or organizations such as Boko Haram, al-I’tisam of the Koran and Sunnah in Sudan, al-Huda Battalion in Maghreb of Islam, The Soldiers of the Caliphate, al-Ghurabaa, Djamaat Houmat ad-Da’wa as-Salafiya and al-Ansar Battalion in Algeria, Islamic Youth Shura Council, Islamic State Libya (Darnah), in Libya, Jamaat Ansar Bait al-Maqdis, Jund al-Khilafah and Mujahideen Shura Council in the Environs of Jerusalem in Egypt, Okba Ibn Nafaa Battalion, Mujahideen of Tunisia of Kairouan and Jund al-Khilafah in Tunisia and al-Shabaab Jubba Region Cell Bashir Abu Numan in Somalia is an alarming hypothesis of Jihadism reaching “the threshold of inevitability”- syntagm existent in the network theories of David Singh Grewal- turning a whole region, continent of even world into what Nassim Nicholas Taleb would call Extremistan.

“There is, indeed, little doubt,” the formidable scholar James Orchard Halliwell-Phillipps confidently explained to the Victorian readers of hisOutlines of the Life of Shakespeare,“that the Birth-place did not become one of the incentives for pilgrimage until public attention had been specially directed to it at the time of the Jubilee.” That's broadly true. The earliest reference to the three-gabled, half-timbered house (two houses, originally) on Henley Street in Stratford-upon-Avon as the birthplace of William Shakespeare dates only from the late 1750s, when it was so named in Samuel Winter's town map. During the Stratford Jubilee, which David Garrick organized in 1769, the “small old house,” as the actor's first biographer called it, was fully recognized and promoted as the place where Shakespeare was born. Even so, Halliwell-Phillipps's observation conceals more than it reveals, because there is also little doubt that the dwelling that tradition calls Shakespeare's birthplace did not suddenly acquire that status during the first week of September 1769. The process by which the unremarkable piece of real estate that John Shakespeare purchased sometime in the late sixteenth century was transformed into what Barbara Hodgdon has rightly called the “controlling ideological center” of Shakespeare biography was long, slow, and far from inevitable. That process is the subject of this essay.

Professor Preston was born in Leeds on 21 July, 1908. His father, Walter Cluderoy Preston, was a self–employed builder who read Nature each week, but at that time the journal had a more general character than it has today. He was particularly knowledgeable in geography. He had some skill as a monumental mason and sculptor mainly of cemetery memorials. He had taught his son to read and ensured that he was well read; the child had read Robinson Crusoe at the age of five years and was reading Paradise lost at the age of four. His grandfather's brother made a living rolling pills in the cellar of his house and this was developed into a successful chemical business. Preston's great uncle Walter was married to Ethel and when she died he built over her grave in Lawnswood cemetery a statue (called ‘Ethel at the gate’) of her waiting, looking for his return as she had done during her lifetime. The memorial was featured in local postcards for many years. Preston's paternal grandfather, John Roger Gilpin Preston, was a prominent builder in Leeds, who became bankrupt and died of pneumoconiosis at the age of 45 years. His grandmother, Ann Cluderoy, was expert at cleaning ostrich feathers, fashionable ornaments at that time. They had three sons, of whom Preston's father was the eldest, and two daughters. Roger Preston had built Mount Pisgah Chapel in Tong Road, New Wortley, in Leeds, and later, during the Boer War, he built a residential estate. Preston's father rescued some furniture, crockery and some silver, and a piano with a movable keyboard on which Preston practised. His mother was Eliza Dawson, a seamstress whose mother, Rebecca White, had come from Ilkeston in Derbyshire; Preston's mother insisted that her son go to university. In April 1935 Preston married Sara Jane Pollard, by whom he had a son, David Roger, and two daughters, Maureen Anne, a physiotherapist, and Judith Margaret, a dental nurse. His wife died in 1962, as did David, who had become an organic chemist employed by Glaxo at Greenham and then by Imperial Chemical Industries and by Professor Lipson at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology. In October 1963, in Leeds, Preston married Eva Frei (DrScNat), a Swiss scientist who had come to work with him.

Abstract Loss of NF1 plays a major role as an oncogenic driver in up to 33% of all breast cancers (BC). Loss of NF1 is also a prognostic indicator for increased cancer risk at an earlier age, poorer outcomes, and therapeutic resistance. NF1 has recently been shown to bind the estrogen receptor alpha (ER) and act as a transcriptional corepressor. This helps explain findings in ER+ BC. Changes to NF1 that abrogate ER signaling thereby lead to Ras driven tumor resistance to endocrine therapy as cells are able to grow in low levels of E2 (and tamoxifen). Hence, NF1-mutant tumors represent a distinct molecular class in need of new therapeutics targeting both Ras and ER pathways. We have generated preclinical mammalian models of NF1 loss and BC that can be used to evaluate the role of NF1/ER transcriptional signaling in BC, the role of immune cells in BC, and therapeutics. Our models include a pathogenic patient missense allele c.3827G>A, p.R1276Q (knockin or KI) as well as a 14 base pair deletion c.3661_3674del, p.P1220fs*1223 (knockout or KO) model. Heterozygous (het) Nf1 female rats develop mammary gland adenocarcinoma spontaneously, but het KO rats develop multiple tumors with earlier onset. Tumors are generally Grade 2 and do not differ by genotype. By 16 weeks, 70% of KO females have developed at least one tumor whereas only 20% of KI rats and 2% of WT rats have developed tumors. This impacts survival as 76% of KI and 58% of KO females survive to one year. By 2 years, both alleles have 54% survival. The divergence in phenotype between KI and KO alleles may be due to residual function of R1276Q missense NF1 protein. A more in-depth analysis indicates that mammary tumor formation likely begins relatively early, as we find evidence of aberrant morphology and hyperplasia prior to the formation of palpable tumors. Interestingly, we find histological evidence of lung metastases and expression of breast markers GCDFP15, MGA, and CEA in the lung. Again, we see allele-specific effects in that KO rats develop lung tumors earlier than KI rats. Using single nuclei RNASeq to characterize the transcriptional profile of the mammary tumors, we find allele-specific effects beyond repression of Ras activity that drive aggressive tumor development. We identified different tumor cell populations (2 epithelial cell populations, Myeloid cells, B cells, T cells, Basal mammary cells, and WT specific cells) and identified different pathways altered due to the loss of Nf1 including Ephrin B signaling, Cyclin and Cell Cycle signaling, and Glycolysis signaling. Our overall goal is to characterize the phenotype of these rat models in terms of histopathology, Ras signaling, hormone signaling, immune components, and targeted drug response; which can then be compared with what is known regarding patients with somatic or germline inactivation of NF1 and breast cancer. Ultimately, this will provide better prognostic predictions for patients and better therapeutic options. Citation Format: Deeann Wallis, Christian Fay, Kelley Bradley, Erik Westin, William Bradley, Hui Liu, David Crossman, Jeremy B. Foote, Robert Kesterson. Loss of NF1 drives hormone dependent mammary carcinogenesis in a rat model with intact immune system [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2023; Part 1 (Regular and Invited Abstracts); 2023 Apr 14-19; Orlando, FL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2023;83(7_Suppl):Abstract nr 1726.

Abstract Loss of NF1 plays a major role as an oncogenic driver in many cancer types and can be found in up to 33% of all breast cancers (BC). Loss of NF1 is also a prognostic indicator for increased cancer risk at an earlier age, poorer outcomes, and therapeutic resistance. In addition, certain NF1 genotypes may increase cancer risks, while others do not. NF1 is largely perceived as a classic Ras-opathy syndrome due to inactivating mutations in neurofibromin affecting RAS-MAPK signaling. However, recently it has been shown that NF1 binds estrogen receptor alpha (ER) and acts as a transcriptional corepressor. This helps explain some BC findings specifically in ER+ BC. In this model, specific changes to NF1 that abrogate ER signaling lead to Ras driven tumor resistance to endocrine therapy as cells are able to grow in low levels of E2 (and tamoxifen). Hence, NF1-mutant tumors represent a distinct molecular class in need of new therapeutics. A preclinical mammalian model of NF1 loss and BC would be helpful in both evaluating the role of NF1/ER transcriptional signaling in BC, evaluating the role of immune cells in BC, and testing therapeutics. Novel Nf1 rat models have a very robust ER+ BC phenotype, therefore more closely recapitulating clinical tumors compared to other preclinical models. Our models include a pathogenic patient missense allele c.3827G>A, p.R1276Q (knockin or KI), associated in humans with familial spinal NF1 and malignancy, as well as a 14 base pair deletion c.3661_3674del, p.P1220fs*1223 (knockout or KO) model. Heterozygous (het) Nf1 females develop mammary gland adenocarcinoma spontaneously, but het KO rats develop multiple tumors with earlier onset while het KI rats tend to develop fewer tumors with later onset. Tumors are generally Grade 2 and do not differ by genotype. By 16 weeks, 70% of KO females have developed at least one tumor whereas only 20% of KI rats and 2% of WT rats have developed tumors. This impacts survival as by 1 year 76% of KI females survive yet only 58% of KO females survive. However, by 2 years, both alleles have 54% survival. The divergence in phenotype between patient and null alleles may be due to residual function of R1276Q missense NF1 protein. A more in-depth analysis indicates that mammary tumor formation likely begins relatively early, as we find evidence of aberrant morphology and hyperplasia prior to the formation of palpable tumors. Interestingly, we find histological evidence of lung metastases and expression of breast markers GCDFP15, MGA, and CEA in the lung. Again, we see allele-specific effects in that KO rats develop lung tumors earlier than KI rats. While het male rats also develop mammary tumors at low rates, they experience longer survival times (76% of KO males survive 1 year and 98% of KI males survive 1 year) and males also develop tumors in other locations. Using single nuclei RNASeq to characterize the transcriptional profile of the mammary tumors, we find allele-specific effects beyond repression of Ras activity that drive aggressive tumor development. We identified different tumor cell populations (2 epithelial cell populations, Myeloid cells, B cells, T cells, Basal mammary cells, and WT specific cells) and identified different pathways altered due to the loss of Nf1 including Ephrin B signaling, Cyclin and Cell Cycle signaling, and Glycolysis signaling. Our overall goal is to characterize the phenotype of these rat models in terms of histopathology, Ras signaling, hormone signaling, immune components, and targeted drug response and compare/contrast them with what is known regarding patients with somatic or germline inactivation of NF1 and breast cancer. Ultimately, this will provide better prognostic predictions for patients and better therapeutic options for treatment. Citation Format: Deeann Wallis, Christian Fay, Kelley Bradley, Erik Westin, William Bradley, Hui Liu, Laura Lambert, David Crossman, Jeremy Foote, Robert Kesterson. Loss of NF1 drives hormone dependent mammary carcinogenesis in a rat model with intact immune system [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 2022 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium; 2022 Dec 6-10; San Antonio, TX. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2023;83(5 Suppl):Abstract nr P3-08-01.

CHASING METHUSELAH: Theology, the Body, and Slowing Human Aging by Todd T. W. Daly. Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2021. 307 pages, index. Paperback; $38.00. ISBN: 9781532698002. *Chasing Methuselah brings "a Christological anthropology to bear on the scientific quest to attenuate aging by manipulating the body" (p. xi). Todd T. W. Daly, who teaches at Urbana Theological Seminary, argues that faith-based lenses are integrally important for interpreting historically diverse, and mostly failed, efforts to slow human aging--an elusive goal typically pursued by biomedical professionals, technocrats, and quacks. "The idea of a significantly prolonged healthy life has captured the public's imagination," Daly states in his Introduction, but "to date, the ethics of aging attenuation contains assumptions that often go unchallenged, leaving fundamental questions unasked" (p. 11). *With bold originality and astounding erudition Chasing Methuselah fills a major gap in critical gerontology by highlighting ethical foundations and existential dilemmas that scientists and commentators have generally ignored while attempting to alter bodily homeostasis and manipulate basic processes. Blazing a terra incognita full of unfamiliar names and references, Chasing Methuselah poses questions that reframe a fundamental debate: Should healthful longevity be extended by trying to cure age-related diseases or by slowing the rate of aging? In his critique of this "two endings [that] speak of two disparate paths of old age" framework, Daly pushes gerontology's limits beyond what most researchers, teachers, and practitioners (regardless of their specialization) regard as its transdisciplinary, cross-professional domain. *Chasing Methuselah has five richly nuanced, assiduously researched chapters. Chapter 1 alone is 58 pages long with 284 footnotes. It traces "the quest for longevity [that] has moved from legend to laboratory," thereby engendering "new hope that human aging might be brought under human control" (p. 76). Daly's second chapter chronicles how certain Christian texts and doctrines have bolstered two conflicting perspectives--specifically, a secular contention that "prolonging life is unequivocally good" and an "unequivocal foreclos[ing of] all attempts to secure a longer life by slowing aging" (p. 112). *Chapter 3 examines the legacy of Francis Bacon (1561-1626). Its title, "Relief of Man's Estate: Francis Bacon and the Theological Origins of the Modern Quest to Slow Aging," pivots the book to a contrapuntal, interpretive turn wherein technological and theological pathways toward greater longevity have complemented, paralleled, or contradicted themselves for centuries. On the one hand, Daly affirms that Bacon birthed biomedical science as an indispensable approach to practical knowledge about old age and aging. On the other hand, Daly quotes Bacon's objections to the project: "Natural philosophy [the study of nature] should not be invaded by revealed theology in the Bible," declared Bacon, "but rather be bounded by it" (p. 148). *The last two chapters of Chasing Methuselah's narrative invite laboratory scientists, policy analysts, and healthcare professionals to grapple with theodicy and eschatology--subjects usually taught in seminaries, not showcased in conferences on aging. Chapter 4, entitled "Adam Again," reveals the typically unacknowledged importance of theology in reflecting and refracting scientific views on slowing bodily aging. Ascetics tried to attenuate aging to reframe Adam's Fall in Genesis. For the Desert Fathers, "Bodily practices such as fasting were viewed as the primary means by which the Christian might regain a measure of what was lost by Adam's sin, namely, a heightened degree of bodily incorruptibility allowing for the possibility of longer life" (p. 199). *Chapter 5, "The Last Adam and Slowing Aging," builds upon the connection between asceticism, fasting, and prolongation of life espoused by Saints Anthony, Athanasius, and other Desert Fathers. This chapter also considers the work of the Swiss theologian Karl Barth in particular, employing Barth's "dynamic anthropology" or "dialectical-dialogical anthropology" for framing "christologically informed discussions on the relationship between one's body and soul as it relates to slowing aging" (p. 206). By taking on "finite humanity as embodied soul and ensouled body" (p. 253), the incarnation affects our perspective on lengthening life: "In light of the real man Jesus, any use of biotechnology ... is not without risk, as it may threaten our pursuit of the proper order to body and soul" (pp. 253-54). *Reading Chasing Methuselah can be daunting. I had to Google many references, and readers without theological training may well find the discussion of Barth difficult to comprehend. I associated Daly's modus operandi with "thick description"--Clifford Geertz's method of doing cultural anthropology. This approach gathers biographical details, historical milieus, and societal belief systems to contextualize actors' symbols, legends, and rituals, thereby explicating individual worldviews and collective behaviors. Geertz (omitted in the 34-page bibliography) used reams of data to synthesize and interpret what he observed being enacted ethnographically. *Daly, in contrast, offers a "conclusion" to each chapter, but rejects narrative foreclosure. To wit: The last sentence of Chasing Methuselah's four-page Conclusion, which begins "Perhaps the best question is whether the use of such biotechnology will help or hinder our pursuit of Jesus" (p. 258), requires readers to formulate their own answer to what Daly implicitly articulates. This tack leaves loose ends unresolved--perhaps frustrating for scientists accustomed to explicit, straightforward conclusions. That Daly chose not to bridge two specific cultures (humanities and science) diminishes his argument's impact. Reviewing this as an historian of aging, a religious/spiritual believer, and a critical gerontologist, I opt for more transparency. *I commend Daly for invoking Tom Cole and Gerald Gruman, whose histories of science, theology, and myth orchestrated early parts of Chasing Methuselah. I am dismayed, however, that the book does not sufficiently acknowledge two fierce competitions raging for decades: (1) turf wars over intramural status and extramural authority within the Gerontological Society of America (GSA); and (2) ideological and methodological rivalries that have pitted GSA advocates against experts in the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine (4AM). *For example, the pro-longevity claims made by David Sinclair and Valter Longo, 4AM stalwarts whom Daly frequently cites, are important and pertinent. Nonetheless, their research does not enclose the vast array of theories advanced and debunked by specialists and emerging professionals within GSA. That strand of historical gerontology was evident in the early twentieth-century pathological model of aging (articulated by Elie Metchnikoff) and its physiological counterpart (presented by I. L. Nascher, the father of US cross-disciplinary geriatrics). Similarly, Daly's historiography could have paid more attention to Clive McCay's caloric-reduction experiments (replicated persistently for 90 years) and to Roy Walford's fasting regimen in Biosphere 2. *This Episcopalian wanted more exegesis in Chasing Methuselah. How do women's opinions about slowing human aging compare with those of male theologians and mystics? Doesn't Daniel Callahan merit more than a footnote citing his claim that "'national necessity' [is] another way of saying 'research imperative'" (p. 12)? Might assessments of non-Christian or agnostic ethicists have sharpened Daly's focus on a faith-based lens? *As a critical gerontologist, I was frustrated at the outset by the phrase, "slowing human aging." What does Daly intend this wording to encompass and exclude? Is it the equivalent of "the scientific quest to attenuate aging by manipulating the body" (p. 15)? Is "limiting caloric intake [which] reduces oxidative stress, allowing DNA to repair damage suffered by cells" (p. 54) a modern-day version of "holy anorexia" practiced by prayerful nuns during the Middle Ages? *This critique of flaws hardly lessens my admiration and respect for what Daly contributes. Rarely, in fifty years of evaluating multidisciplinary books on old age and longevity, have I so willingly engaged dialogically with an author. Addressing questions raised in Chasing Methuselah prompted rethinking the dialectical symbiosis of religion and science. Many of my colleagues in age studies will dismiss this book as an outlier, I suspect, because Daly's Christological anthropology turns them off. That is a pity, if so: The debate and search for meanings embodied in Chasing Methuselah advances what truly matters in anchoring the aging enterprise. *Reviewed by W. Andrew Achenbaum, Professor Emeritus of History and Gerontology, Texas Medical Center, Houston, TX 77054.

Ben Brooks of the Becker Friedman Institute reviews “Game-Changer: Game Theory and the Art of Transforming Strategic Situations”, by David McAdams. The Econlit abstract of this book begins: “Introduces the reader to a game-theory approach to life, including business, and presents six ways to change games that people are confronted with. Discusses commitment; inviting regulation; merging or ""colluding"; enabling retaliation; building trust; leveraging relationships; how to escape the prisoners' dilemma; price comparison sites; the Newfoundland cod collapse; the real estate agency; addicts in the emergency department; eBay reputation; and antibiotic resistance. McAdams is Professor in the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University.”

An outpouring of critical sub/urban scholarship in recent years has explored the historical and ongoing linkages between race, real estate, and space in the United States. Much of this literature has positioned residential segregation as crucial for structuring the geographies of capital accumulation, highlighting how segregation delimits places for extraction and dispossession. In this essay, I build from the foundations this literature lays by bringing together Charles Abrams’ concept of “the racist theory of value” (RTV) and David Harvey’s notion of “anti-value” to illuminate the centrality of racialized devaluation in the accumulation process in the US. Specifically, I contend that the RTV, in its role in entrenching residential segregation and collapsing race and value together in space, has helped to demarcate and contain the devaluation that capitalism requires in Black residential spaces. As a key innovation for real estate capital to manage the geographies of (anti-)value, the RTV ensures that the economic losses generated in the accumulation process are felt most acutely in Black communities. In this way, the RTV constitutes a form of planned spatial obsolescence wherein the restricted movement of Black people is converted into the controlled movement of devaluation.

American Century Cycle This note relates to the Journal's terminology involving the cycle of ten plays that August Wilson wrote commonly known as the "Pittsburgh Cycle" or the "Century Cycle." At the 2018 August Wilson Society Colloquium held at the August Wilson Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Constanza Romero, August's widow and coordinator of the August Wilson Estate, said to the group that her preference, going forward, is that the phrase "August Wilson's American Century Cycle" be used to refer to those ten plays. Being Pittsburghers, David and I you both love the term, "Pittsburgh Cycle," but we also understand that it is not entirely accurate as Ma Rainey's Black Bottom is set in Chicago. Therefore, all references to Wilson's cycle in the August Wilson Journal will be standardized as the "August Wilson American Century Cycle," "August Wilson's American Century Cycle," or shortened to "American Century Cycle."

The housing question is back on the agenda in Germany. House rents in urban areas in particular, where the vast majority of habitants are renters, are on the rise since the outbreak of the global financial and economic crisis in 2007/08. The first part of the article articles discusses David Harvey’s notion of the secondary circuit of capital in order to provide a politico-economic theory for a better understanding of the economic base of these processes. Harvey’s central argument is that the flow of money capital in search of investment opportunities is “switched” into the sphere of real estate in times of overaccumulation. The second part of the article provides empirical data on construction activities, buying and selling of built environment and the development of land prices, including speculation, in Germany that all point in the same direction: the secondary circuit is gaining in importance in the past ten years. Further, the data shows the geographical unevenness of these processes, as most activities are located in major cities.

John Baldwin Buckstone took over the management at the Theatre Royal Haymarket in 1853, assuming control from Benjamin Webster who had been manager since 1837. They had both served in the company of David Edward Morris, the proprietor who had overseen the building of the new Haymarket Theatre in 1821. When Morris died, his estate passed into a trust on behalf of his widow, Maria Sarah. A lease dating from 1871 (now in the Library at the Garrick Club) describes the agreement between Buckstone and Maria Sarah. Not only does the lease detail the arrangement between the two parties, it also includes an extensive 214-page room-by-room inventory of the Haymarket Theatre, revealing hundreds of items accumulated throughout half a century of constant use. This article outlines the peculiarities of the lease and pays special attention to the music and dance holdings which feature prominently in the inventory. The lease is remarkable not only for the diversity, breadth, and specificity of its contents, but also because it serves as a rare document of theatre business and tells us more about the day-to-day life of one of London's most important theatres in the mid-nineteenth century.

At the heart of a global crisis over news media credibility and trust is Britain’s so-called Hackgate scandal involving the widespread allegations of phone-hacking and corruption against the now defunct Rupert Murdoch tabloid newspaper News Of The World. Major inquiries on media ethics, professionalism and accountability have been examining the state of the press in New Zealand, Britain and Australia. The Murdoch media empire has stretched into the South Pacific with the sale of one major title being forced by political pressure. The role of news media in global South nations and the declining credibility of some sectors of the developed world’s Fourth Estate also pose challenges for the future of democracy. Truth, censorship, ethics and corporate integrity are increasingly critical media issues in the digital age for a region faced with coups, conflicts and human rights violations, such as in Fiji and West Papua. In this monograph, Professor David Robie reflects on the challenges in the context of the political economy of the media and journalism education in the Asia-Pacific region. He also engages with emerging disciplines such as deliberative journalism, peace journalism, human rights journalism, and revisits notions of critical development journalism and citizen journalism.

В статье анализируется эпизод из истории взаимоотношений Киевской духовной консистории и Слуцкой архимандрии – одного из важнейших православных центров Великого княжества Литовского. К середине XVIII века консистория практически полностью взяла в свои руки вопрос назначения слуцкого архимадрита. Это вызвало недовольства патрона православной церкви в Слуцком княжестве – Иеронима Флориана Радзивилла, который сумел получить обширные владения пресекшейся биржанской ветви рода. Поддержку католическому патрону оказало слуцкое Преображенское православное братство, также недовольное утратой рычагов влияния на процедуру назначения архимандрита. После смерти архимандрита Михаила Козачинского, братчики получили разрешение Радзивилла на составление описей движимого и недвижимого имущества Слуцкой архимандрии, а также право на отправление посольства в Киев для сопровождения нового кандидата на архимандричью должность. Объединение православных братчиков и католического патрона в борьбе против власти киевской консистории в отношении Слуцкой архимандрии стало одним из признаков недовольства православных сообществ ВКЛ процессом бюрократизации и централизации управления заграничными приходами Русской православной церкви на территории Белоруссии. The article analyzes an episode in the history of the relationship between the Kiev Spiritual Consistory and the Slutzk Archimandrite District – one of the leading Orthodox Christian centers in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. In the middle of the 18th century the Kiev Consistory effectively controlled the nomination of the Archimandrites of Slutzk. This clearly dissatisfied the patron of the Orthodox Church in the Principality of Slutzk— Jeronime Florian Radzivill, who managed to receive vast lands of the extinct Birzhansk family line. The Catholic patron was supported by the Slutzk Transfiguration Brotherhood, which was also dissatisfied with the loss of their ability to influence the nomination of the local Archimandrite. After the death of Mikhail Kozachinsky, members of the Brotherhood received Radzivill’s permission to create a registry of all moveable and real estate property of the Slutzk Archimandrite District, as well as the right to send an embassy to Kiev, to escort the new candidate for the post of Archimandrite. The union of an Orthodox brotherhood and their Catholic patron in the struggle against the authority of the Kiev Consistory (with regards to the Slutzk Archimandrite District) was amongst the pivotal signs of the dissatisfaction felt by the Orthodox in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania towards the bureaucratization of the administration of the Russian Orthodox Church’s parishes in Belarus.

Is Food The New Sex? Mary Eberstadt Hoover Institution Policy Review | no. 153 | Feb-Mar 2009 | also: www.hoover.org:80/publications/policyreview/38245724 Globesity. A Planet Out of Control? Francis Delpeuch et al Earthspan | 2009 | 180pp| £17.99 The Vital Ingredient Royal Society of Chemistry | 2009 | 88pp | www.rsc.org Fighting the Banana Wars and Other Fairtrade Battles Harriet Lamb Rider | 2008 | 246pp | £8.99 The Dining Nobility. From the Burgundian Dukes to the Belgian Royalty P. Janssens and S. Zeischka, eds Brussels University Press | 2008 | 266pp. | 39.95 euros Bite Me. Food in Popular Culture Fabio Parasecoli Berg | 2008 | 168p | £55.00/£16.99 Eating India Chitrita Banerji Bloomsbury | 2008 | 266p | £8.99 Eat Love Marije Vogelzang BIS Publishers Amsterdam | 2008 | 160pp | £32.50 Let Them Eat Junk Robert Albritton Pluto Press | 2009 | 259p | £17.99 The Spaghetti Tree Alasdair Scott Sutherland Primavera | 2009 | 255p | £14.99 Sushi and Beyond: What the Japanese Know about Cooking Michael Booth Cape | 2009 | 329pp | £12.99 Feeding the Whole World Louise Fresco TED broadcast http://www.ted.com ‘Go Ahead. Spoil My Appetite’ Geoff Nicolson NY Times Sunday Book Review | 3 May 2009 | p.23 | also online Agriculture in Urban Planning Edited by Mark Redwood Earthscan | 2009 | 248pp | £65 Why the Chinese Don’t Count Calories Lorraine Clissold Constable | 2008 | 223pp | £8.99 The Wild Life: A Year of Living on Wild Food John Lewis-Stempel Doubleday | 2009 | 293pp | £16.99 Food: The Key Concepts Warren Belasco Berg | 2008 | 158pp | £14.99 Waste: Uncovering the Global Food Scandal Tristram Stuart Penguin | 2009 | 451pp | £9.99 Street Food www.youtube.com 2008-2009 | free Bad Science Ben Goldacre Harpers | 2008 | 370pp | £8.99 Shoot the Cook David Pritchard Fourth Estate | 2009 | 266pp | £16.99 TvTropes www.tvtropes.org Scientific and Gastronomic Lexicon Harold McGee, introduction Alicia Foundation, Alicante | 2009 | www.worldsofflavorspain.com/food-and-technology ‘Spider Plant’ at Try African Food www.try-african-food.com

There has been a fundamental shift in how we work and real estate strategies require adaptation. Accelerated moves to effective distributed work and team models offer opportunities to create value for organisations willing to embrace change. Successful strategies work by connecting in ways to help employees stay engaged, productive and effective, thereby improving talent recruitment and retention. But the most effective strategies go a step further by connecting people to an organisational culture through shared mindsets and behaviours. Taking that extra step begins with organisations identifying the specific mindsets and behaviours they will need to achieve their core business purpose (‘why we do what we do’), which is then supported by three people-centric elements: culture (‘how work gets done’), place (‘where work gets done’) and tools (‘what enables work’). In the age of hybrid work, this framework involves aligning strategies for talent systems and the work ecosystem to drive business outcomes through a people-centric lens. To foster a winning culture, business leaders must first understand employee incentives and motivation. The human behavioural aspect of the workplace should not be underestimated. When it comes to workplace interactions, psychology research makes it clear that leaders can maximise engagement and drive lasting performance when they help their team members meet one another’s needs. So, which needs should leaders focus on? At Jacobs, we looked to research from the NeuroLeadership Institute, in which co-founder and CEO David Rock’s team identified five domains in human social experience that drive behaviour. They include status, certainty, autonomy, relatedness and fairness. Collectively, these domains make up what is known as the SCARF® Model. Each domain can be a powerful motivator. In organisations where the work ecosystem is built around satisfying these SCARF domains, employees are more likely to stay engaged, remain loyal and contribute at peak performance. This paper illustrates human drivers and how they can be leveraged to develop a strategic path forward.

In one of the earliest films about a whistleblower, On the Waterfront (1954), the dock worker Terry Malloy (Marlon Brando), who also works for the union boss and mobster Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb), decides to testify in court against him and uncover corruption and murder. By doing so he will not only suffer retribution from Friendly but also be seen as a “stool pigeon” by his co-workers, friends, and neighbours who will shun him, and he will be “marked” forever by his deed. Nonetheless, he decides to do the right thing. Already it is clear that in most cases the whistleblowers are not simply the ones who reveal things, but they themselves are also revealed.My aim in this article is to explore the depiction of Edward Snowden and Julian Assange in fiction film and its connection to what I would like to call, with Slavoj Žižek, “Hollywood ideology”; the heroisation of the “ordinary guy” against a big institution or a corrupt individual, as it is the case in Snowden (2016) on the one hand, and at the same time the impossibility of true systemic critique when the one who is criticising is “outside of the system”, as Assange in The Fifth Estate (2013). Both films also rely on the notion of individualism and convey conflicting messages in regard to understanding the perception of whistleblowers today. Snowden and AssangeAlthough there are many so called “whistleblower films” since On the Waterfront, like Serpico (1973), All the President’s Men (1976), or Silkwood (1983), to name but a few (for a comprehensive list see https://ew.com/movies/20-whistleblower-movies-to-watch/?), in this article I will focus on the most recent films that deal with Edward Snowden and Julian Assange. These are the most prominent cases of whistleblowing in the last decade put to film. They are relevant today also regarding their subject matter—privacy. Revealing secrets that concern privacy in this day and age is of importance and is pertinent even to the current Coronavirus crisis, where the question of privacy again arises in form of possible tracking apps, in the age of ever expanding “surveillance capitalism” (Zuboff).Even if Assange is not strictly speaking a whistleblower, an engagement with his work in this context is indispensable since his outsider status, up to a point, resembles those of Snowden or Manning. They are not only important because they can be considered as “authentic heroe[s] of our time” (Žižek, Pandemic, 7), but also because of their depiction which differs in a very crucial way: while Snowden is depicted as a “classic” whistleblower (an American patriot who did his duty, someone from the “inside”), Assange’s action are coming from the outside of the established system and are interpreted as a selfish act, as it is stated in the film: “It was always about him.”Whistleblowers In his Whistleblower’s Handbook, Kohn writes: “who are these whistleblowers? Sometimes they are people you read about with admiration in the newspaper. Other times they are your co-workers or neighbours. However, most whistleblowers are regular workers performing their jobs” (Kohn, xi). A whistleblower, as the employee or a “regular worker”, can be regarded as someone who is a “nobody” at first, an invisible “cog in the wheel” of a certain institution, a supposedly devoted and loyal worker, who, through an act of “betrayal”, becomes a “somebody”. They do something truly significant, and by doing so becomes a hero to some and a traitor to others. Their persona suddenly becomes important.The wrongdoings that are uncovered by the whistleblower are for the most part not simply isolated missteps, but of a systemic nature, like the mass surveillance by the National Security Agency (NSA) uncovered by Snowden. The problem with narratives that deal with whistleblowing is that the focus inevitably shifts from the systemic problem (surveillance, war crimes, etc.) to the whistleblower as an individual. Moretti states that the interest of the media regarding whistleblowing, if one compares the reactions to the leaking of the “Pentagon Papers” regarding the Vietnam War in the 1970s by Daniel Ellsberg and to Snowden’s discoveries, shifted from the deed itself to the individual. In the case of Ellsberg, Moretti writes:the legitimate questions were not about him and what motivated him, but rather inquiry on (among other items) the relationship between government and media; whether the U.S. would be damaged militarily or diplomatically because of the release of the papers; the extent to which the media were acting as watchdogs; and why Americans needed to know about these items. (8)This shift of public interest goes along, according to Moretti, with the corporate ownership of media (7), where profit is the primary goal and therefore sensationalism is the order of the day, which is inextricably linked to the focus on the “scandalous” individual. The selfless and almost self-effacing act of whistleblowing becomes a narrative that constructs the opposite: yet another determined individual that through their sheer willpower achieves their goal, a notion that conforms to neoliberal ideology.Hollywood IdeologyThe endings of All the President’s Men and The Harder They Fall (1956), another early whistleblower film, twenty years apart, are very similar: they show the journalist eagerly typing away on his typewriter a story that will, in the case of the former, bring down the president of the United States and in the latter, bring an end to arranged fights in the boxing sport. This depiction of the free press vanquishing the evil doers, as Žižek states it, is exactly the point where “Hollywood ideology” becomes visible, which is:the ideology of such Hollywood blockbusters as All the President’s Men and The Pelican Brief, in which a couple of ordinary guys discover a scandal which reaches up to the president, forcing him to step down. Corruption is shown to reach the very top, yet the ideology of such works resides in their upbeat final message: what a great country ours must be, when a couple of ordinary guys like you and me can bring down the president, the mightiest man on Earth! (“Good Manners”)This message is of course part of Hollywood’s happy-ending convention that can be found even in films that deal with “serious” subject matters. The point of the happy end in this case is that before it is finally reached, the film can show corruption (Serpico), wrongdoings of big companies (The Insider, 1999), or sexual harassment (North Country, 2005). It is important that in the end all is—more or less—good. The happy ending need not necessarily be even truly “happy”—this depends on the general notion the film wants to convey (see for instance the ending of Silkwood, where the whistleblower is presumed to have been killed in the end). What is important in the whistleblower film is that the truth is out, justice has been served in one way or the other, the status quo has been re-established, and most importantly, there is someone out there who cares.These films, even when they appear to be critical of “the system”, are there to actually reassure their audiences in the workings of said system, which is (liberal) democracy supported by neoliberal capitalism (Frazer). Capitalism, on the other hand, is supported by the ideology of individualism which functions as a connecting tissue between the notions of democracy, capitalism, and film industry, since we are admiring exceptional individuals in performing acts of great importance. This, in turn, is encapsulated by the neoliberal mantra—“anyone can make it, only if they try heard enough”. As Bauman puts it more concretely, the risks and contradictions in a society are produced socially but are supposed to be solved individually (46).Individualism, as a part of the neoliberal capitalist ideology, is described already by Milton Friedman, who sees the individual as the “ultimate entity in the society” and the freedom of the individual as the “ultimate goal” within this society (12). What makes this an ideology is the fact that, in reality, the individual, or in the context of the market, the entrepreneur, is always-already tethered to and supported by the state, as Varoufakis has successfully proven (“Varoufakis/Chomsky discussion”). Therefore individualism is touted as an ideal to strive for, while for neoliberalism in order to function, the state is indispensable, which is often summed up in the formula “socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor” (Polychroniou). The heroic Hollywood individual, as shown in the whistleblower film, regardless of real-life events, is the perfect embodiment of individualist ideology of neoliberal capitalism—we are not seeing a stylised version of it, a cowboy or a masked vigilante, but a “real” person. It is paradoxically precisely the realism that we see in such films that makes them ideological: the “based on a true story” preamble and all the historical details that are there in order to create a fulfilling cinematic experience. All of this supports its ideology because, as Žižek writes, “the function of ideology is not to offer us a point of escape from our reality but to offer us the social reality itself as an escape from some traumatic, real kernel” (Sublime Object 45). All the while Snowden mostly adheres to Hollywood ideology, The Fifth Estate also focuses on individualism, but goes in a different direction, and is more problematic – in the former we see the “ordinary guy” as the American hero, in the latter a disgruntled individual who reveals secrets of others for strictly personal reasons.SnowdenThere is an aspect of the whistleblower film that rings true and that is connected to Michel Foucault’s notion of power (“Truth and Power”). Snowden, through his employment at the NSA, is within a power relations network of an immensely powerful organisation. He uses “his” power, to expose the mass surveillance by the NSA. It is only through his involvement with this power network that he could get insight into and finally reveal what NSA is doing. Foucault writes that these resistances to power from the inside are “effective because they are formed right at the point where relations of power are exercised; resistance to power does not have to come from elsewhere to be real … It exists all the more by being in the same place as power” (Oushakine 206). In the case of whistleblowing, the resistance to power must come exactly from the inside in order to be effective since whistleblowers occupy the “same place as power” that they are up against and that is what in turn makes them “powerful”.Fig. 1: The Heroic Individual: Edward Snowden in SnowdenBut there is an underside to this. His “relationship” to the power structure he is confronting greatly affects his depiction as a whistleblower within the film—precisely because Snowden, unlike Assange, is someone from inside the system. He can still be seen as a patriot and a “disillusioned idealist” (Scott). In the film this is shown right at the beginning as Snowden, in his hotel room in Hong Kong, tells the documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras (Melissa Leo) and journalist Glenn Greenwald (Zachary Quinto) his name and who he is. The music swells and the film cuts to Snowden in uniform alongside other soldiers during a drill, when he was enlisted in the army before work for the NSA.Snowden resembles many of Stone’s typical characters, the all-American patriot being disillusioned by certain historical events, as in Born on the 4th of July (1989) and JFK (1991), which makes him question the government and its actions. It is generally of importance for a mainstream Hollywood film that the protagonist is relatable in order for the audiences to sympathise with them (Bordwell and Thompson 82). This is important not only regarding personal traits but, I would argue, also political views of the character. There needs to be no doubt in the mind of American audiences when it comes to films that deal with politics, that the protagonists are patriots.Stone’s film profits from this ambivalence in Snowden’s own political stance: at first he is more of a right winger who is a declared fan of Ayn Rand’s conservative-individualist manifesto Atlas Shrugged, then, after meeting his future partner Lindsey Mills, he turns slightly to the left, as he at one point states his support for President Obama. This also underlines the films ambiguity, as Oliver Stone openly stated about his Vietnam War film Platoon (1986) that “it could be embraced by … the right and the left. Essentially, most movies make their money in the middle” (Banff Centre). As Snowden takes the lie detector test as a part of the process of becoming a CIA agent, he confirms, quite sincerely it seems, that he thinks that the United States is the “greatest country in the world” and that the most important day in his life was 9/11. This again confirms his patriotic stance.Snowden is depicted as the exceptional individual, and at the same time the “ordinary guy”, who, through his act of courage, defied the all-powerful USA. During the aforementioned job interview scene, Snowden’s superior, Corbin O’Brian (Rhys Ifans), quotes Ayn Rand to him: “one man can stop the motor of the world”. Snowden states that he also believes that. The quote could serve as the film’s tagline, as a “universal truth” that seems to be at the core of American values and that also coincides with and reaffirms neoliberal ideology. Although it is undeniable that individuals can accomplish extraordinary feats, but when there is no systemic change, those can remain only solitary achievements that are only there to support the neoliberal “cult of the individual”.Snowden stands in total contrast to Assange in regard to his character and private life. There is nothing truly “problematic” about him, he seems to be an almost impeccable person, a “straight arrow”. This should make him a poster boy for American democracy and freedom of speech, and Stone tries to depict him in this way.Still, we are dealing with someone who cannot simply be redeemed as a patriot who did his duty. He cannot be unequivocally hailed as an all-American hero since betraying state secrets (and betrayal in general) is seen as a villainous act. For many Americans, and for the government, he will forever be remembered as a traitor. Greenwald writes that most of the people in the US, according to some surveys, still want to see Snowden in prison, even if they find that the surveillance by the NSA was wrong (365).Snowden remains an outcast and although the ending is not quite happy, since he must live in Russian exile, there is still a sense of an “upbeat final message” that ideologically colours the film’s ending.The Fifth EstateThe Fifth Estate is another example of the ideological view of the individual, but in this case with a twist. The film tries to be “objective” at first, showing the importance and impact of the newly established online platform WikiLeaks. However, towards the end of the film, it proceeds to dismantle Julian Assange (Benedict Cumberbatch) with the “everyone has secrets” platitude, which effectively means that none of us should ever try to reveal any secrets of those in power, since all of us must have our own secrets we do not want revealed. The film is shown from the perspective of Assange’s former disgruntled associate Daniel Domscheit-Berg (Daniel Brühl), who wrote a book about his time at WikiLeaks on which the film is partly based on (Inside WikiLeaks). We see Assange through his eyes and delve into personal moments that are supposed to reveal the “truth” about the individual behind the project. In a cynical twist, it is Daniel who is the actual whistleblower, who reveals the secrets of WikiLeaks and its founder.Assange, as it is said in the film, is denounced as a “messiah” or a “prophet”, almost a cult leader who only wants to satisfy his perverse need for other people’s secrets, except that he is literally alone and has no followers and, unlike real cult leaders, needs no followers. The point of whistleblowing is exactly in the fact that it is a radical move, it is a big step forward in ending a wrongdoing. To denounce the radical stance of WikiLeaks is to misunderstand and undermine the whole notion of whistleblowing as a part of true changes in a society.The cult aspects are often referred to in the film when Assange’s childhood is mentioned. His mother was supposed to be in a cult, called “The Family”, and we should regard this as an important (and bad) influence on his character. This notion of the “childhood trauma” seems to be a crutch that is supposed to serve as a characterisation, something the scriptwriting-guru Robert McKee criticises as a screenwriting cliché: “do not reduce characters to case studies (an episode of child abuse is the cliché in vogue at the moment), for in truth there are no definitive explanations for anyone’s behaviour” (376).Although the film does not exaggerate the childhood aspect, it is still a motive that is supposed to shed some light into the “mystery” that is Assange. And it also ties into the question of the colour of his hair as a way of dismantling his lies. In a flashback that resembles a twist ending of an M. Night Shyamalan thriller, it turns out that Assange actually dyes his hair white, witnessed in secret by Daniel, instead of it turning naturally white, as Assange explains on few occasions but stating different reasons for it. Here he seems like a true movie villain and resembles the character of the Joker from The Dark Knight (2008), who also tells different stories about the origin of his facial scars. This mystery surrounding his origin makes the villain even more dangerous and, what is most important, unpredictable.Žižek also draws a parallel between Assange and Joker of the same film, whom he sees as the “figure of truth”, as Batman and the police are using lies in order to “protect” the citizens: “the film’s take-home message is that lying is necessary to sustain public morale: only a lie can redeem us” (“Good Manners”). Rather than interpreting Assange’s role in a positive way, as Žižek does, the film truly establishes him as a villain.Fig. 2: The Problematic Individual: Julian Assange in The Fifth EstateThe Fifth Estate ends with another cheap psychologisation of Assange on Daniel’s part as he describes the “true purpose” of WikiLeaks: “only someone so obsessed with his own secrets could’ve come up with a way to reveal everyone else’s”. This faux-psychological argument paints the whole WikiLeaks endeavour as Assange’s ego-trip and makes of him an egomaniac whose secret perverted pleasure is to reveal the secrets of others.Why is this so? Why are Woodward and Bernstein in All the President’s Men depicted as heroes and Assange is not? The true underlying conflict here is between classic journalism; where journalists can publish their pieces and get the acclaim for publishing the “new Pentagon Papers”, once again ensuring the freedom of the press and “inter-systemic” critique. This way of working of the press, as the films show, always pays off. All the while, in reality, very little changes since, as Žižek writes, the “formal functioning of power” stays in place. He further states about WikiLeaks:The true targets here weren’t the dirty details and the individuals responsible for them; not those in power, in other words, so much as power itself, its structure. We shouldn’t forget that power comprises not only institutions and their rules, but also legitimate (‘normal’) ways of challenging it (an independent press, NGOs, etc.). (“Good Manners”)In the very end, the “real” journalism is being reinforced as the sole vehicle of criticism, while everything else is “extremism” and, again, can only stem from a frustrated, even “evil”, individual. If neoliberal individualism is the order of the day, then the thinking must also revolve around that notion and cannot transcend that horizon.ConclusionŽižek expresses the problem of revealing the truth in our day and age by referring to the famous fable “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, where a child is the only one who is naive and brave enough to state that the emperor is in fact naked. But for Žižek today,in our cynical era, such strategy no longer works, it has lost its disturbing power, since everyone now proclaims that the emperor is naked (that Western democracies are torturing terrorist suspects, that wars are fought for profit, etc., etc.), and yet nothing happens, nobody seems to mind, the system just goes on functioning as if the emperor were fully dressed. (Less than Nothing 92)The problem with the “Collateral Murder”, a video of the killing of Iraqi civilians by the US Army, leaked by Wikileaks and Chelsea Manning, that was presented to the public, for instance, was according to accounts in Inside Wikileaks and Inside Julian Assange’s War on Secrecy, that it did not have the desired impact. The public seems, in the end, to be indifferent to such reveals since it effectively cannot do anything about it. The return to the status quo after these reveals supports this stance, as Greenwald writes that after Snowden’s leaks there was no substantial change within the system; during the Obama administration, there was even an increase of criminal investigations of whistleblowers with an emergence of a “climate of fear” (Greenwald 368). Many whistleblower films assure us that in the end the system works; the good guys always win, the antagonists are punished, and laws have been passed. This is not to be accepted simply as a Hollywood convention, something that we also “already know”, but as an ideological stance, since these films are taken more seriously than films with similar messages but within other mainstream genres. Snowden shows that only individualism has the power to challenge the system, while The Fifth Estate draws the line that should not be crossed when it comes to privacy as a “universal” good because, again, “everyone has secrets”. Such representations of whistleblowing and disruption only further cement the notion that in our societies no real change is possible because it seems unnecessary. Whistleblowing as an act of revelation needs therefore to be understood as only one small step made by the individual that in the end depends on how society and the government decide to act upon it.References All the President’s Men. Dir. Alan J. Pakula. Wildwood Enterprises. 1976.Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. “Oliver Stone- Satire and Controversy.” 23 Mar. 2013. 30 Juy 2020 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7s2gBKApxyk>.Bauman, Zygmunt. Flüchtige Moderne. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 2003.Bordwell, David, and Kristin Thomson. Film Art: An Introduction. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010.Born on the 4th of July. Dir. Oliver Stone. Ixtian, 1989.The Dark Knight. Dir. Christopher Nolan. Warner Brothers, Legendary Entertainment. 2008.Domscheit-Berg, Daniel. Inside WikiLeaks: My Time with Julian Assange at the World’s Most Dangerous Website. London: Jonathan Cape, 2011.The Fifth Estate. Dir. Bill Condon. Dreamworks, Anonymous Content (a.o.). 2013.Foucault, Michel. “Truth and Power.” Power: Essential Works of Foucault 1954-1984. Vol. 3. Ed. James D. Faubion. Penguin Books, 2000. 111-33.Frazer, Nancy. “From Progressive Neoliberalism to Trump – and Beyond.” American Affairs 1.4 (2017). 19 May. 2020 <https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2017/11/progressive-neoliberalism-trump-beyond/>.Friedman, Milton. Capitalism and Freedom. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1982.“Full Transcript of the Yanis Varoufakis/Noam Chomsky NYPL Discussion.” Yanisvaroufakis.eu, 28 June 2016. 15 Mar. 2020 <https://www.yanisvaroufakis.eu/2016/06/28/full-transcript-of-the-yanis-varoufakis-noam-chomsky-nypl-discussion/>.Greenwald, Glenn. Die globale Überwachung: Der Fall Snowden, die amerikanischen Geheimdienste und die Folgen. München: Knaur, 2015.The Harder They Fall. Dir. Mark Robson. Columbia Pictures. 1956.The Insider. Dir. Michael Mann. Touchstone Pictures, Mann/Roth Productions (a.o.). 1999.JFK. Dir. Oliver Stone. Warner Bros., 1991.Kohn, Stephen Martin. The Whistleblower’s Handbook: A Step-by-Step Guide to Doing What’s Right and Protecting Yourself. Guilford, Lyons P, 2011.Leigh, David, and Luke Harding. WikiLeaks: Inside Julian Assange’s War on Secrecy. London: Guardian Books, 2011.McKee, Robert. Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principles of Screenwriting. New York: Harper-Collins, 1997.Moretti, Anthony. “Whistleblower or Traitor: Edward Snowden, Daniel Ellsberg and the Power of Media Celebrity.” Moscow Readings Conference, 14-15 Nov. 2013, Moscow, Russia.North Country. Dir. Niki Caro. Warner Bros., Industry Entertainment (a.o.). 2005.On the Waterfront. Dir. Elia Kazan. Horizon Pictures. 1954.Oushakine, Sergei A. “The Terrifying Mimicry of Samizdat.” Public Culture 13.2 (2001): 191-214.Platoon. Dir. Oliver Stone. Hemdake, Cinema ‘84. 1986.Polychroniou, C.J. “Socialism for the Rich, Capitalism for the Poor: An Interview with Noam Chomsky.” Truthout, 11 Dec. 2016. 25 May 2020 <https://truthout.org/articles/socialism-for-the-rich-capitalism-for-the-poor-an-interview-with-noam-chomsky/>.Scott, A.O. “Review: ‘Snowden,’ Oliver Stone’s Restrained Portrait of a Whistle-Blower.” The New York Times, 15 Sep. 2016. 5 May 2020 <https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/16/movies/snowden-review-oliver-stone-joseph-gordon-levitt.html>. Serpico. Dir. Sidney Lumet. Artists Entertainment Complex, Produzioni De Laurentiis. 1973. Silkwood. Dir. Mike Nichols. ABC Motion Pictures. 1983.Snowden. Dir. Oliver Stone. Krautpack Entertainment, Wild Bunch (a.o.). 2016.Žižek, Slavoj. “Good Manners in the Age of WikiLeaks.” Los Angeles Review of Books 33.2 (2011). 15 May 2020 <https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v33/n02/slavoj-zizek/good-manners-in-the-age-of-wikileaks>.———. Less than Nothing: Hegel and the Shadow of Dialectical Materialism. Verso, 2013.———. Pandemic! COVID-19 Shakes the World. New York: Polity, 2020.———. The Sublime Object of Ideology. Verso, 2008.Zuboff, Shoshana. The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future and the New Frontier of Power. New York: Public Affairs, 2020.

This is a report on archaeological work in two of Scotland's less well-known medieval burghs of Kelso and Peebles. The excavations at Wester Kelso/Floors Castle established that the original medieval burgh of Kelso or Wester Kelso was much further west than previously believed, being situated well inside the present Castle policies. That early settlement at Wester Kelso appears to have been abandoned in the 14th or 15th centuries, at the same time that the royal burgh of Roxburgh was deserted, probably as a result of the English occupation of Roxburgh Castle. The other settlement of Easter Kelso, near the abbey, survived and expanded northwards from the abbey along Roxburgh Street. The finding of a possible building terrace in Phase 1 at 13-19 Roxburgh Street indicates that settlement along the southern end of that street could date to as early as the 13th or 14th centuries. Combining the archaeological, cartographic and documentary evidence, it seems clear that 'Easter' Kelso, now Kelso, had expanded from the market area around tThis is a report on archaeological work in two of Scotland's less well-known medieval burghs of Kelso and Peebles. The excavations at Wester Kelso/Floors Castle established that the original medieval burgh of Kelso or Wester Kelso was much further west than previously believed, being situated well inside the present Castle policies. That early settlement at Wester Kelso appears to have been abandoned in the 14th or 15th centuries, at the same time that the royal burgh of Roxburgh was deserted, probably as a result of the English occupation of Roxburgh Castle. The other settlement of Easter Kelso, near the abbey, survived and expanded northwards from the abbey along Roxburgh Street. The finding of a possible building terrace in Phase 1 at 13-19 Roxburgh Street indicates that settlement along the southern end of that street could date to as early as the 13th or 14th centuries. Combining the archaeological, cartographic and documentary evidence, it seems clear that 'Easter' Kelso, now Kelso, had expanded from the market area around the abbey northwards towards the Floors estate by the early 18th century.The excavations in Peebles have provided important information on the origins of the settlement of the peninsular ridge between the Tweed and Eddleston Water. The results obtained from the excavations at the two sites in Peebles indicate that settlement of the ridge began in the 12th century, soon after the establishment of the royal castle and burgh by David I (1124-53). At both sites, after initial dumping of rubbish, possibly to raise the ground level to counter flooding, occupation, in the form of stone structures, can be dated to the 14th century at the latest, with probable earlier dumping of domestic refuse in the 12th and 13th centuries. The street of Bridgegate was apparently laid out in the 13th or 14th centuries when the excavated site was divided into three properties aligned on that street, two of which had stone buildings erected on them. Alternatively, Bridgegate may have been the initial focus of settlement on the east side of the Eddleston, providing the access route from the east into Old Town, where a pilgrimage centre had been established at the Cross Kirk in 1261, and the location of the tolbooth (Bridgegate Building 4) in it suggests that this street was originally more important than High Street. It is noteworthy that all eight medieval buildings excavated at the two Peebles sites were of stone construction. Peebles tolbooth, the civic centre of the burgh, is the only medieval tolbooth site in Scotland to have been excavated.

IntroductionWe five friends clinked glasses in our favourite wine and cocktail bar, and considered our next collaborative writing project. We had seen M/C Journal’s call for articles for a special issue on ‘regional’ and when one of us mentioned the television program, Escape from the City, we began our critique:“They haven’t featured Armidale yet, but wouldn’t it be great if they did?”“Really? I mean, some say any publicity is good publicity but the few early episodes I’ve viewed seem to give little or no screen time to the sorts of lifestyle features I most value in our town.”“Well, seeing as we all moved here from the city ages ago, let’s talk about what made us stay?”We had found our next project.A currently popular lifestyle television show (Escape from the City) on Australia’s national public service broadcaster, the ABC, highlights the limitations of popular cultural representations of life in a regional centre. The program is targeted at viewers interested in relocating to regional Australia. As Raymond Boyle and Lisa Kelly note, popular television is an important entry point into the construction of public knowledge as well as a launching point for viewers as they seek additional information (65). In their capacity to construct popular perceptions of ‘reality’, televisual texts offer a significant insight into our understandings and expectations of what is going on around us. Similar to the concerns raised by Esther Peeren and Irina Souch in their analysis of the popular TV show Farmer Wants a Wife (a version set in the Netherlands from 2004–present), we worry that these shows “prevent important aspects of contemporary rural life from being seen and understood” (37) by the viewers, and do a disservice to regional communities.For the purposes of this article, we interrogate the episodes of Escape from the City screened to date in terms of the impact they may have on promoting regional Australia and speculate on how satisfied (or otherwise) we would be should the producers direct their lens onto our regional community—Armidale, in northern NSW. We start with a brief précis of Escape from the City and then, applying an autoethnographic approach (Butz and Besio) focusing on our subjective experiences, we share our reflections on living in Armidale. We blend our academic knowledge and knowledge of everyday life (Klevan et al.) to argue there is greater cultural diversity, complexity, and value in being in the natural landscape in regional areas than is portrayed in these representations of country life that largely focus on cheaper real estate and a five-minute commute.We employ an autoethnographic approach because it emphasises the socially and politically constituted nature of knowledge claims and allows us to focus on our own lives as a way of understanding larger social phenomena. We recognise there is a vast literature on lifestyle programs and there are many different approaches scholars can take to these. Some focus on the intention of the program, for example “the promotion of neoliberal citizenship through home investment” (White 578), while others focus on the supposed effect on audiences (Tsay-Vogel and Krakowiak). Here we only assert the effects on ourselves. We have chosen to blend our voices (Gilmore et al.) in developing our arguments, highlighting our single voices where our individual experiences are drawn on, as we argue for an alternative representation of regional life than currently portrayed in the regional ‘escapes’ of this mainstream lifestyle television program.Lifestyle TelevisionEscape from the City is one of the ‘lifestyle’ series listed on the ABC iview website under the category of ‘Regional Australia’. Promotional details describe Escape from the City as a lifestyle series of 56-minute episodes in which home seekers are guided through “the trials and tribulations of their life-changing decision to escape the city” (iview).Escape from the City is an example of format television, a term used to describe programs that retain the structure and style of those produced in another country but change the circumstances to suit the new cultural context. The original BBC format is entitled Escape to the Country and has been running since 2002. The reach of lifestyle television is extensive, with the number of programs growing rapidly since 2000, not just in the United Kingdom, but internationally (Hill; Collins). In Australia, they have completed, but not yet screened, 60 episodes of Escape from the City. However, with such popularity comes great potential to influence audiences and we argue this program warrants critical attention.Like House Hunters, the United States lifestyle television show (running since 1997), Escape from the City follows “a strict formula” (Loof 168). Each episode uses the same narrative format, beginning with an introduction to the team of experts, then introducing the prospective house buyers, briefly characterising their reasons for leaving the city and what they are looking for in their new life. After this, we are shown a map of the region and the program follows the ‘escapees’ as they view four pre-selected houses. As we leave each property, the cost and features are reiterated in the written template on the screen. We, the audience, wait in anticipation for their final decision.The focus of Escape from the City is the buying of the house: the program’s team of experts is there to help the potential ‘escapees’ find the real estate gem. Real estate value for money emerges as the primary concern, while the promise of finding a ‘life less ordinary’ as highlighted in the opening credits of the program each week, seems to fall by the wayside. Indeed, the representation of regional centres is not nuanced but limited by the emphasis placed on economics over the social and cultural.The intended move of the ‘escapees’ is invariably portrayed as motivated by disenchantment with city life. Clearly a bigger house and a smaller mortgage also has its hedonistic side. In her study of Western society represented in lifestyle shows, Lyn Thomas lists some of the negative aspects of city life as “high speed, work-dominated, consumerist” (680), along with pollution and other associated health risks. While these are mentioned in Escape from the City, Thomas’s list of the pleasures afforded by a simpler country life including space for human connection and spirituality, is not explored to any satisfying extent. Further, as a launching point for viewers in the city (Boyle and Kelly), we fear the singular focus on the price of real estate reinforces a sense of the rural as devoid of creative arts and cultural diversity with a focus on the productive, rather than the natural, landscape. Such a focus does not encourage a desire to find out more and undersells the richness of our (regional) lives.As Australian regional centres strive to circumvent or halt the negative impacts of the drift in population to the cities (Chan), lifestyle programs are important ‘make or break’ narratives, shaping the appeal and bolstering—or not—a decision to relocate. With their focus on cheaper real estate prices and the freeing up of the assets of the ‘escapees’ that a move to the country may entail, the representation is so focused on the economics that it is almost placeless. While the format includes a map of the regional location, there is little sense of being in the place. Such a limited representation does not do justice to the richness of regional lives as we have experienced them.Our TownLike so many regional centres, Armidale has much to offer and is seeking to grow (Armidale Regional Council). The challenges regional communities face in sustaining their communities is well captured in Gabriele Chan’s account of the city-country divide (Chan) and Armidale, with its population of about 25,000, is no exception. Escape from the City fails to emphasise cultural diversity and richness, yet this is what characterises our experience of our regional city. As long-term and satisfied residents of Armidale, who are keenly aware of the persuasive power of popular cultural representations (O’Sullivan and Sheridan; Sheridan and O’Sullivan), we are concerned about the trivialising or reductive manner in which regional Australia is portrayed.While we acknowledge there has not been an episode of Escape from the City featuring Armidale, if the characterisation of another, although larger, regional centre, Toowoomba, is anything to go by, our worst fears may be realised if our town is to feature in the future. Toowoomba is depicted as rural landscapes, ‘elegant’ buildings, a garden festival (the “Carnival of the Flowers”) and the town’s history as home of the Southern Cross windmill and the iconic lamington sponge. The episode features an old shearing shed and a stock whip demonstration, but makes no mention of the arts, or of the University that has been there since 1967. Summing up Toowoomba, the voiceover describes it as “an understated and peaceful place to live,” and provides “an attractive alternative” to city life, substantiated by a favourable comparison of median real estate prices.Below we share our individual responses to the question raised in our opening conversation about the limitations of Escape from the City: What have we come to value about our own town since escaping from city life?Jane: The aspects of life in Armidale I most enjoy are, at least in part, associated with or influenced by the fact that this is a centre for education and a ‘university town’. As such, there is access to an academic library and an excellent town library. The presence of the University of New England, along with independent and public schools, and TAFE, makes education a major employer, attracting a significant student population, and is a major factor in Armidale being one of the first towns in the roll-out of the NBN/high-speed broadband. University staff and students may also account for the thriving cafe culture, along with designer breweries/bars, art house cinema screenings, and a lively classical and popular music scene. Surely the presence of a university and associated spin-offs would deserve coverage in a prospective episode about Armidale.Alison: Having grown up in the city, and now having lived more than half my life in an inner-regional country town, I don’t feel I am missing out ‘culturally’ from this decision. Within our town, there is a vibrant arts community, with the regional gallery and two local galleries holding regular art exhibitions, theatre at a range of venues, and book launches at our lively local book store. And when my children were younger, there was no shortage of sporting events they could be involved with. Encountering friends and familiar faces regularly at these events adds to my sense of belonging to my community. The richness of this life does not make it to the television screen in episodes of Escape from the City.Kerry: I greatly value the Armidale community’s strong social conscience. There are many examples of successful programs to support diverse groups. Armidale Sanctuary and Humanitarian Settlement sponsored South Sudanese refugees for many years and is currently assisting Ezidi refugees. In addition to the core Sanctuary committee, many in the local community help families with developing English skills, negotiating daily life, such as reading and responding to school notes and medical questionnaires. The Backtrack program assists troubled Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal youth. The program helps kids “to navigate their relationships, deal with personal trauma, take responsibility […] gain skills […] so they can eventually create a sustainable future for themselves.” The documentary film Backtrack Boys shows what can be achieved by individuals with the support of the community. Missing from Escape from the City is recognition of the indigenous experience and history in regional communities, unlike the BBC’s ‘original’ program in which medieval history and Vikings often get a ‘guernsey’. The 1838 Myall Creek massacre of 28 Wirrayaraay people, led to the first prosecution and conviction of a European for killing Aboriginals. Members of the Indigenous and non-Indigenous community in Armidale are now active in acknowledging the past wrongs and beginning the process of reconciliation.Josie: About 10am on a recent Saturday morning I was walking from the car park to the shopping complex. Coming down the escalator and in the vestibule, there were about thirty people and it occurred to me that there were at least six nationalities represented, with some of the people wearing traditional dress. It also struck me that this is not unusual—we are a diverse community as a result of our history and being a ‘university city’. The Armidale Aboriginal Cultural Centre and Keeping Place was established in 1988 and is being extended in 2019. Diversity is apparent in cultural activities such as an international film festival held annually and many of the regular musical events and stalls at the farmers’ market increasingly reflect the cultural mix of our town. As a long-term resident, I appreciate the lifestyle here.Wendy: It is early morning and I am walking in a forest of tall trees, with just the sounds of cattle and black cockatoos. I travel along winding pathways with mossy boulders and creeks dry with drought. My dog barks at rabbits and ‘roos, and noses through the nooks and crannies of the hillside. In this public park on the outskirts of town, I can walk for two hours without seeing another person, or I can be part of a dog-walking pack. The light is grey and misty now, the ranges blue and dark green, but I feel peaceful and content. I came here from the city 30 years ago and hated it at first! But now I relish the way I can be at home in 10 minutes after starting the day in the midst of nature and feeling part of the landscape, not just a tourist—never a possibility in the city. I can watch the seasons and the animals as they come and go and be part of a community which is part of the landscape too. For me, the first verse of South of My Days, written by a ‘local’ describing our New England environment, captures this well:South of my days’ circle, part of my blood’s country,rises that tableland, high delicate outlineof bony slopes wincing under the winter,low trees, blue-leaved and olive, outcropping granite-clean, lean, hungry country. The creek’s leaf-silenced,willow choked, the slope a tangle of medlar and crabapplebranching over and under, blotched with a green lichen;and the old cottage lurches in for shelter. (Wright 20)Whilst our autoethnographic reflections may not reach the heady heights of Judith Wright, they nevertheless reflect the experience of living in, not just escaping to the country. We are disappointed that the breadth of cultural activities and the sense of diversity and community that our stories evoke are absent from the representations of regional communities in Escape from the City.Kate Oakley and Jonathon Ward argue that ‘visions of the good life’, in particular cultural life in the regions, need to be supported by policy which encourages a sustainable prosperity characterised by both economic and cultural development. Escape from the City, however, dwells on the material aspects of consumption—good house prices and the possibility of a private enterprise—almost to the exclusion of any coverage of the creative cultural features.We recognise that the lifestyle genre requires simplification for viewers to digest. What we are challenging is the sense that emerges from the repetitive format week after week whereby differences between places are lost (White 580). Instead what is conveyed in Escape from the City is that regions are homogenous and monocultural. We would like to see more screen time devoted to the social and cultural aspects of the individual locations.ConclusionWe believe coverage of a far richer and more complex nature of rural life would provide a more ‘realistic’ preview of what could be ahead for the ‘escapees’ and perhaps swing the decision to relocate. Certainly, there is some evidence that viewers gain information from lifestyle programs (Hill 106). We are concerned that a lifestyle television program that purports to provide expert advice on the benefits and possible pitfalls of a possible move to the country should be as accurate and all-encompassing as possible within the constraints of the length of the program and the genre.So, returning to what may appear to have been a light-hearted exchange between us at our local bar, and given the above discussion, we argue that television is a powerful medium. We conclude that a popular lifestyle television program such as Escape from the City has an impact on a large viewing audience. For those city-based viewers watching, the message is that moving to the country is an economic ‘no brainer’, whereas the social and cultural dimensions of regional communities, which we posit have sustained our lives, are overlooked. Such texts influence viewers’ perceptions and expectations of what escaping to the country may entail. Escape from the City exploits regional towns as subject matter for a lifestyle program but does not significantly challenge stereotypical representations of country life or does not fully flesh out what escaping to the country may achieve.ReferencesArmidale Regional Council. Community Strategic Plan 2017–2027. Armidale: Armidale Regional Council, 2017.“Backtrack Boys.” Dir. Catherine Scott. Sydney: Umbrella Entertainment, 2018.Boyle, Raymond, and Lisa W. 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Maja Krakowiak. “Exploring Viewers’ Responses to Nine Reality TV Subgenres.” Psychology of Popular Media Culture 6.4 (2017): 348–60.White, Mimi. “‘A House Divided’.” European Journal of Cultural Studies 20.5 (2017): 575–91.Wright, Judith. Collected Poems: 1942–1985. Sydney: Angus & Robertson, 1994.