Keywords: The Lost Art Of Sleep
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Barry Gittins
- 05 September 2022
2 Comments
Philosopher George Santayana sagely pronounced, ‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’ Yet that repetition is part of being human. We are creatures of habit and don’t necessarily notice or learn from our thoughts and deeds. Nor do we necessarily want to be made aware of that lack of learning.
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RELIGION
- Michael McGirr
- 11 January 2022
5 Comments
I must have time on my hands. I have been thinking about the difference between atheists and God cancellers. I love my atheist friends, of whom I am blessed with many. I relish the existential grist of our talks, the deep sense of substance and mutual respect. I also love the constant jokes. We keep each other honest. I enjoy a rich engagement with the history of thought and I believe we ennoble each other through the kind of trust that is prepared to talk about things that are off limits to others.
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Michael McGirr
- 20 September 2021
11 Comments
It’s not hard to understand why so many people are watching Ted Lasso (Apple TV), nor why it was nominated for twenty Emmy Awards and won seven. Believe it or not, it is twenty years since The Office first premiered on the BBC. Not since then has a comedy series cut so close to the bone of our cultural needs and anxieties.
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Michael McGirr
- 02 September 2021
15 Comments
There is a curious world called LinkedIn, a social media site for people trying to nurture their careers. The problem with it is that the participants are expected to take themselves more seriously than they might in what we used to call real life. LinkedIn has a culture of self-importance that cracks me up every time. There is nothing quite as funny as utter humourlessness.
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RELIGION
- Michael McGirr
- 10 August 2021
28 Comments
I must have time on my hands. I have been thinking about the difference between atheists and God cancellers. I love my atheist friends, of whom I am blessed with many. I relish the existential grist of our talks, the deep sense of substance and mutual respect. I also love the constant jokes. We keep each other honest. I enjoy a rich engagement with the history of thought and I believe we ennoble each other through the kind of trust that is prepared to talk about things that are off limits to others.
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AUSTRALIA
At the fringes of the legal system, there are areas of work you probably won’t read about in law school career guides. Many of these deal in trauma or poverty. They are substantial, but they aren’t celebrated or pursued by the mainstream of the profession. They generally attract neither money nor prestige, and in many cases the ‘market’ fails to provide paid jobs of any sort, irrespective of need.
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Georgia White
- 28 April 2020
5 Comments
I keep going back to a short story, by Carmen Maria Machado in her book Her Body and Other Parties, called ‘Inventory’. In its simplest terms, the story is a narrator’s list of her lovers loved: boyfriends, girlfriends, neighbours, strangers. From this inventory emerges, bit by bit, the story that has made the list necessary: an epidemic is ravaging the world’s population.
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AUSTRALIA
- Barry Gittins
- 19 July 2019
7 Comments
The regulations these guys have to abide by — the behavioural hoops they need to navigate — are designed to protect them, the volunteers and the property of the host churches. It is an ethical dilemma, the ceding of normally inviolate personal freedoms for the use of the facilities. I don't know how I would feel about it if I was in their shoes.
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Maureen O'Brien
- 20 March 2019
14 Comments
On the morning of your last day there are eight people, including me and my daughter, who is a music therapist and has played music for people as they die as part of her clinical practice. After discussions during the week, first with you and then with your neurologist, it was decided that she will sing for you and the people with you today.
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RELIGION
- Michael McGirr
- 31 October 2018
21 Comments
My year ten class studies Islam, one of the most formative influences in the world that my students will inhabit and hopefully improve. I have a profound respect for Islam. Westerners often fail to acknowledge the debt they owe to Islam, a tradition that had a huge role in bringing Europe through the Dark Ages and into the Renaissance.
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EDUCATION
I have the controversial opinion among my colleagues that teachers, on average, actually get paid pretty well. Averaging, however, is the crux of debate. Yes, if a teacher's job is averaged over the year, their pay is reasonable and their workload is manageable. Alas, teachers are mere mortals; they aren't Time Lords who can redistribute their work to a time of year when they are less busy.
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Jenny Blackford
- 22 January 2018
3 Comments
I ask the kids to pick a character and write a sentence or a paragraph to start the telling of those lives cut short. A tragedy so far away in space and time is made brand-new, but still as sad, by Aussie Muslim hands and shiny minds.
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