Benchmarking 2015 writing and blog performance

I used to monitor my web stats quite closely, then found that I was spending just too much time navel gazing without productive results so gave up. However, this year it seemed sensible to do a stocktake to provide a benchmark for 2016.

Over 2015, I posted 346 times across my blogs compared to 344 in 2014. The decline was relatively greater on the New England blogs. In 2015 there were also 42 History Revisited columns compared to 45 the year before. 

Because I republish the columns on my history blog, the post stats include the History Revisited columns. This means that you cannot simple add them to get a total output figure, although re-posting actually takes a fair bit of time in part because I have to re-source the supporting images. 

In addition to the column and post, I also tweet and maintain three Facebook pages, one private and two public. This takes time too, and I'm not sure of value, although FB and twitter do feed into blog traffic. I have been experimenting with all this to try to get the best mix. 

Audience reach across the various platforms is difficult to measure precisely. Reflecting lower posting as well as variations in Google tracking and search algorithms, 2015 traffic was down. However, for benchmarking purposes:

• Total page views as recorded by Google on the three main blogs in 2015 was 252,332 broken up as follows 158,681 Personal Reflections, 64,486 New England Australia, 29,166 New England History
• The claimed circulation for the weekly Armidale Express Extra in which the column appears is 12,588. I have no idea how many people actually read it, although feedback from the paper or direct to me suggests a fair number especially in the older and more strongly local demographic.
• Then there are the public FB pages (419 members/likes) and Twitter (209 followers)

There are other ways of looking at or presenting the data. Here I am conscious of other patterns. But this basic analysis is sufficient for my purposes. 

I sometimes wonder if all this activity makes me a busy fool. Obviously I enjoy the writing and the interaction that follows, but it also makes progress on some of my main writing targets slower. The lags here are considerable. For example, the two chapters in Came to New England that formed my main print output in 2014 were completed in 2013, over twelve months before publication. There was no equivalent output in 2015, although I did have a 120,000 word working draft of Belshaw's World completed by year end.This should come out in 2016 to be followed (hopefully) by New England Travels in 2017 and the main history of New England the following year. 

One feature of the last eighteen months has been the increasing number of people interested in the use of the blogs as platforms for their own purposes. This is important to me, for my various platforms are central to my objective of generating sufficient income from writing/publishing to make that my primary income source. We will see how I go in 2016!   .    

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Turning finally to this blog, as stated earlier, the Google stats show 158, 681 page views over 2015. There are some issues with Google counts, but difficulties with my other counters now make them the most reliable information that I have. I still use the other sites for checking certain patterns.  

Looking just at 2015 posts, over the last twelve months twelve 2015 posts recorded more than 300 page views. This does not include those who visit the site on a regular basis and therefore come straight to the front page. Ranked by order they were:   

• Monday Forum - the future of Australia's universities 1558
• Monday Forum - China's one child policy, Turkish elections, Labor's isolation 1350
• Mixed income/rental models in social housing 981
• Saturday Morning Musings - The Turnbull Ascendancy? 789
• Monday Forum - terrorism and civil protection, the emerging digital dark age 361
• Monday Forum - What is your least favourite vegetable and why? 358
• Ethnicity, the European migrant case and the Australian model - Musings on the European experience 2 351
• Monday Forum - the historians  351
• Saturday Morning Musings - lessons from the Paris terrorist attacks, 344
• Science, Innovation and all that jazz 338
• Monday Forum – Mr Abbott’s jail before bail, tripe and the need for change 336
• Saturday Morning Musings - reflections on Malcolm Turnbull 305

The number of Monday Forum posts included is interesting and has to be linked primarily to the titles. Hopefully visitors actually read the comments sections. That's where the greatest value lies!  

Saturday Morning Musings - reviewing Looking for Grace: interesting but flawed

Running over January and February, the St George Open Air Cinema has become something of a Sydney institution. The reasons aren't hard to find.

The Cinema's location in the Domain overlooking the city is a beautiful venue. Gates open at 6.30, but the film cannot be shown until dark, so people eat and drink in the meantime, taking advantage of the view to turn it into a real night out.

Construction of the Cinema is a major undertaking in its own right. The huge screen is mounted on pylons in the harbour along with all the mechanicals required to raise it as darkness sets. The tiered open air auditorium seating 2,000 has to be built, as do all the food and bar areas. Then, at the end of the season, it all has to be dismantled and the site returned to its original condition. The whole process is large scale and expensive. You can see why ticket prices have to be high!

I hadn't been to the Cinema in some time, but last night a ticket became available. By chance, it turned out to be the opening night of the 2016 season and also the Sydney premiere of the new Australian film Looking for Grace. I had noticed the cordoned area with its red carpet at the waterside, but hadn't thought about it until there was a rush of people to take photographs. Needless to say, I joined the throng.

 
 Looking for Grace takes the form of a series of interconnected stories.

The starting story, Grace’s story, introduces Grace (Odessa Young)  and her friend (Kenya Pearson) who have, it appears, run away from home to go to a rock concert. However, there is more to it than that.

In her introduction to the film just before screening, Director Sue Brooks told the audience that we should work through this scene. I can see why she did this and will explain why later.  However, it was an error. She would have been far better off briefly explaining the structure of the film, helping us to understand.

The film then switches to the respective stories of Grace's parents,  Denise (Rahda Mitchell) and Dan (Richard Roxburgh). The next shot shows them both at the premiere.See what I mean by the beauty of the location?

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Both Mitchell and Roxburgh are considerable talents with substantial cinema records. Mitchell is also very sexy (am I allowed to say that today?), more so than you would think from her portrayal in this role where the setting required her to focus on the domestic.

I think that Mtchell's performance was better than Roxburgh's. This is not a criticism of his acting ability, rather that Sue Brooks as both writer and director miscalculated and especially in the potential adultery scene where Roxburgh's portrayal did not quite ring true. Indeed, there were several places in the movie where the detail in the plot lines just didn't come off. A director has to be very focused and disciplined. That's hard where the director is also the writer. How do you as director say to you as writer this isn't quite working? Or vice verca?

There were two more sub stories, one involving Terry Norris as the private detective, a second and short one involving Bruce (Myles Pollard), a truck driver. The second was necessary for the plot, but I'm not sure about the first. Before giving a summing up, here is another cast photo.

Writing in Variety, Guy Lodge was critical of aspects of the film while also recognising some of the strengths. He focused on the ennui of down-under life.There are elements here that I need to think about before responding properly, elements best summarised (and this is a very Australian comment) by the distant sounds of a crow's caw on a quiet morning with its remoteness and loneliness. There are also elements that I just thought were too stretched, that brought me out of that suspension of disbelief necessary for full enjoyment. This wasn't helped by the fact that the narrow gaps between the rows were making my legs and especially my knees hurt.

Given this, should you see the film if you get a choices? Yes, you should. I think that it might become a minor Australian classic as much for its weaknesses as its strengths.  It's an interesting film. .  

That Australian Life - regional variations in Australian English

Interesting piece in The Conversation, Togs or swimmers? Why Australians use different words to describe the same things, regional variations in Australian English. The piece draws from The Linguistics Road Show's Mapping Words around Australia.

Australia's regional language differences are relatively small, if greater than many realise (here, here). The European history of the country is relatively short, while there was considerable internal migration during the colonial period, far more than in recent years. This limited the creation of distinct regional dialects of the type found in, say, the US.

The main variation picked up the Mapping Words piece reflects state variations. This is partly due to the settlement patterns from the state capital, partly to the way that economic activity (and advertising) up to the 1950s was state based. In the marchland areas between states such as the River Murray or the far North Coast of New South Wales where state influences contest, there is some overlapping of words.

While state variations appear important, there are other influences as well. One classic example is the relative distribution of the terms Koori and Murri to describe Aboriginal people in Eastern Australia. A second is the concentration of immigrants from particular areas in Australian localities such as Germans in the Barossa valley. The linguistic effects here have declined with time as those populations became assimilated into the broader community. There are also socio-economic effects reflecting a combination of particular economic activities such as mining with the home location of migrants attracted to those activities.

It's interesting, however, that regional dialects are far more pronounced in New Zealand than in Australia. I wonder why?

The 2016 Australian outlook

In the three days since I wrote Saturday Morning Musings - the 2016 global outlook, the execution of the Saudi cleric Nimr al-Nimr and the subsequent breakdown of diplomatic relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran has further complicated the position in the Middle East. At the same time, the European migration crisis has led Denmark to impose temporary border controls on travelers from Germany. This followed the imposition by Sweden of temporary border controls between Sweden and Denmark, a move that directly affected (among other things) commuter traffic in the greater Copenhagen area. This extends into Sweden. Finally, release of the latest  Caixin/Markit China Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) suggests that Chinese manufacturing output is continuing to slow.

I am not sure that any of this affects the conclusions I reached in my outlook piece, but they are useful reminders of the dynamics affecting the 2016 global outlook.

Turning now to the Australian outlook for 2016, there will be elections this year in the Northern Territory (27 August), the Australian Capital Territory (15 October 2016) and, most importantly, at national level. 

The timing and form of the Federal election is still uncertain. The Prime Minister previously indicated October as the most likely date, but political events may lead him to call an earlier poll. This piece by the ABC's Antony Green outlines the choices open to Mr Turnbull. 

I will talk further about elections and election issues in a moment. Within all those prospective issues there is one central issue, the economy. That will finally determine just what happens over 2016. I say that partly because the differences between Labor and Coalition are differences at the margin, partly because economic events will determine what the Australian Government can finally do.

The graph shows movements in commodity prices on which the value of Australian exports is so dependent. The mining investment boom that flowed from the price rises has ended. The mining export boom flowing from the additional investment is underway in volume terms, but its value has been constrained by declining commodity prices, a decline partly offset in domestic terms by a fall in the value of the Australian dollar that has increased returns in Australian dollar terms.

The fall in the value of the Australian dollar has eased the adjustment process flowing from the decline and then end of the mining investment boom. This was a most unusual boom by Australian standards, for it was not followed by a recession as conventionally measured. However, it was followed by an income recession with real incomes falling. This aided adjustment and the maintenance of employment, but also adversely affected Australian Government revenues, increasing the deficit. 

The global economic outlook is clouded, with economic growth slowing. Middle East turmoil does not help this. Slower growth in Asia in general and China in particular reduces demand for Australian products. Aided by the low dollar, Australian manufacturing is finally expanding if from a low base.However, growth in the services sector that had supported adjustment appears to have stalled. The most likely scenario for 2016 is slow growth with continuing declines in Australian real incomes.

The income outlook severely constrains the Commonwealth Government's freedom to move, constraints accentuated by the way it has set stated budget parameters. The Opposition has a little more freedom, but it too is locked into specific budget constraints. Because neither side has much room to move, policy debate will focus on those  areas at the margin where there is some apparent room to do things or, alternatively, not. This makes industrial relations, tax and micro-economic reform key battle areas. 

Three weeks ago I would have said that Mr Shorten's position was terminal. I expected him to be replaced closer to the election by someone who might minimise losses. Just as Mr Abbott's greatest advantage as Opposition Leader was Labor dysfunction, so Mr Shorten's was Liberal dysfunction. Mr Turnbull turned that around,.but then the wheels came off. 

I don't have time this morning to trace either the Mal Brough or Jamie Brigg's matters including Minister Dutton's SMS in a way that would make sense to a person outside Australia. Prime Minister Turnbull has finally been forced to intervene. The whole thing bears a striking resemblance to the way in which first Mr Rudd then Ms Gillard, then Mr Rudd and then Mr Abbott were brought down by an accumulating series of previous political errors. 

From a purely personal viewpoint, I found both the Jamie Briggs and later Dutton matters quite distasteful. Just focusing on Mr Dutton, you don't have to get into the question of what is or is not sexist to find the language and attitude displayed distressing. It was, or so it seemed to me, both rude and nasty. It left me with the thought that I don't want that man making decisions that affect me or the people I care about. I just don't trust his judgement or his fairness. That is, I think, the real issue, for I don't think that I'm alone in my feelings.

Monday Forum - Brilliant Creatures, Blood and Thunder and the culture that formed us

I am not sure how many people are around at the moment. Still, it wouldn't be a Monday without a Monday Forum.

Over Christmas, I watched "Blood and Thunder: The Sound of Alberts". It tells the story of Ted Albert and his promotion of Australian contemporary music from the 1960s. It was very good. This promo provides a very good feel

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During that same period, I also watched 'Brilliant Creatures: Germaine, Clive, Barry and Bob". In this two parter, Booker Prize winner Howard Jacobson traces the footsteps of Germaine Greer, Barry Humphries, Clive James and Robert Hughes arguing these Australian giants didn't just join the cultural revolution in the 60s, they led it. Again the promo.


I am considerably younger than Jacobson's Brilliant Creatures: Barry Humphries was born in 1934, Robert Hughes in 1938, Clive James and Germaine Greer in 1939. However, the academic world in which I grew up, while having its own specific features, was still very similar to that in which they flowered initially. I did not feel the need to leave the country, I had neither their brilliance nor needs, but could understand the drivers that led to that mass departure of so many Australian intellectuals in the late fifties and sixties.

If I am old enough to understand the drivers that led the intellectuals to depart, I am young enough to sing along with Blood and Thunder. While that is true, I had not understood Ted Albert's quite remarkable role, including his final move into film with Strictly Ballroom, a movie equally loved by I and my daughters.

Looking at his career, I couldn't help wondering what might have been if Albert's life had not been so tragically cut short by heart attack.

One unifying theme in these two apparently very different stories lies in a certain brashness in the Australian character and culture, a dislike of cant, that led those involved to push the boundaries.

This brings me to my questions for this forum. We are all formed by our own experiences. What, to you, is that music or film for that matter that brings back your younger years? Are there distinct features in the Australian cultural experience?  As always, feel free to go in whatever direction you want.

 

Saturday Morning Musings - the 2016 global outlook

The first post for 2016. I wish you all a happy new year.

Over at his place, Winton Bates applies his economist's eye to the question of new year resolutions. I am going to avoid the trade-offs involved with making new year resolutions by not making any, or at least keeping them private! However, I do hope to continue to pursue my various interests including Australian art. There is just so much to learn.

Regular readers will know that I like to record my prognostications because they provide a framework for my thinking and writing. Sometimes its damn embarrassing when I get things totally wrong, but then I can ask why I got them wrong! So this post looks at some of the things I will be watching in 2016.

2015 saw the European Union face a series of rolling crises, culminating in the migration/refugee crisis at the end of the year. The scale here is hard to visualise properly. It's not the largest refugee crisis in human history. I think that sad record is held by the partition of British India where some 14 million were displaced. However, from a European perspective, its the largest moment of people since the Second World War.

The crisis poses an enormous almost existential challenge to the EU. Its resolution will affect the form and structure of the EU as an operating entity including the Schengen Agreement. 2016 will also see the UK referendum on membership of the EU, probably during the European summer. This is probably more important to the UK than to Europe itself. The EU can survive without the UK. It's less clear that the UK can survive without Europe. A UK withdrawal from the EU might well act as a further trigger to the internal forces that have threatened to tear the exiting entity apart because both Northern Ireland and Scotland would be adversely affected.

Doubts about the future of the EU has been a common theme in the reporting and commentary on the various European crises of 2015, with sometimes gleeful predictions of a break-up of the EU. I would be very surprised if that happened. As I have explained in previous posts, the model that I have used to understand some EU dynamics is the Federal model for the EU is an evolving Federation; the term Union is a misnomer. Applying this model, I expect Europe to muddle through through with some strengthening of central power.

2015 was the year of ISIS and terrorism. In my writing, I have tried to emphasise the need for perspective, in part to avoid further erosion of the principles of freedom central to liberal democracy in the name of keeping us safe, in part to avoid the distortion in thinking and policy making that comes with extreme rhetoric. I think that that battle has already been lost to some degree, although I do not expect the more extreme responses that we see in some of the more extreme European radical right wing parties, the Australian far right or indeed in Donald Trump in the US to triumph. The probability, certainty, is that there will be more terrorist attacks in 2016. How individual countries and the world responds will be something to watch.

The position in the Middle East can best be described as chaotic, creating strange bed fellows. While I have some reservations about this piece by Seymour Hersh, it does bring out some of the shifting complexities involved. I do not pretend to be an expert on international relations, but what can we say if we apply some best guess judgments?

It seems fairly clear, I think, that ISIS will cease to exist in a territorial sense. It's just going to be ground away. Beyond that? This is where the position gets very confused in my mind. My best guess would be that we will see the maintenance of existing state boundaries, if with accommodations to placate minority groups as well as other vested interests. The Assad Government will survive for the present, but there will be some transition of power in either 2016 or 2017. The relative power and influence of both Israel and Saudi Arabia will continue to weaken, if for different reasons. Iran's position will depend upon the actions and reactions of its governing systems. Played carefully, its influence will be at least consolidated and may increase.

At this point, I need to diverge into economics. From an Australian perspective, prices for natural gas, iron ore and coal are very important. Most projections suggest some weakening in the global economy over 2016. That plus increased production means that oil and natural gas prices are likely to stay low for the immediate present. This means reduced returns from the Australian LNG plants now coming on stream. It also places pressure on oil dependent exporters including Russia, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States.

Saudi Arabia is already experiencing growing budget deficits at just the time when general spend and especially defence costs including the Yemen excursion are rising. The country needs to restructure and has begun to do so, although the strategic challenges facing the ruling family are substantial. I may be wrong, but I think that these challenges are one of the key drivers of current international policy, including the attempt to create a global anti-terror alliance. Saudi Arabia has considerable financial reserves, oil prices will rise, but the challenge is there.

Russia is a second country affected by oil prices. Commentators debate the extent to which Mr Putin is affected by strategic as opposed to tactical considerations. I think that Mr Putin's Ukraine adventure was to some degree a strategic error, while Russia's involvement in Syria has been a considerable strategic success.

In the Ukraine, Russia gained Crimea, but the Eastern Ukraine intervention has bogged down with Mr Putin apparently not wanting to take matters further. To the degree that his strategic objective was to assert Russian influence, to divide Europe, he has succeeded, but at considerable economic cost. The involvement in Syria seems far more strategically important, reestablishing Russia's position after Ukraine. Again, there is a question of money. The Russian economy is now in considerable trouble. I just don't think that it can provide the resources to support President Putin's apparent objectives.Mind you, that won't stop him trying.

The contretemps between Turkey and Russia strikes me as a significant strategic error because of the costs to Russia. At the same time, Turkey has emerged as a strange wild card in the whole equation, one that must be watched in 2016. I am not sure of President Tayyip Erdoğan's  objectives beyond the newspaper reporting. Erdogan's period as Prime Minister strikes me as a considerable success. However, as president he has set Turkey on a path which does not have a clear outcome, where the risks to the country seem to be rising all the time.

Returning to the global economy, iron ore and coal are down as well as oil, again both important to Australia. Iron ore will likely stay down. Some production is dropping out, but existing lower cost mines are ramping up. Coal is a different issue because there are so many existing high cost producers in the market.

Coal production can be broadly divided into metallurgical and thermal coal. Demand for the first depends upon steel making which is down. Demand for the second depends on the use of coal in power generation. Yes, the second is affected by the responses to global warming, but for the present it is (I think) less cyclical It takes time for coal fired generators to be replaced by other energy sources, so I expect thermal coal prices to bounce before metallurgical coal as higher cost producers phase out.  Perhaps Nathan Tinkler is not so wrong in trying to pick up distressed thermal coal assets.

For both types of coal, Chinese economic growth is critical. as it is for the global strategic balance. In economic terms. I expect Chinese growth to continue to slow because of the continuing imbalances in the Chinese economy. This will affect both commodity demand and China's global reach. I don't think that the second will matter in 2016. China will continue to pursue its global strategic objectives along two dimensions.

Domestically, the aim remains state stability. This has international effects in areas such as the fight against terrorism. China will join with efforts that defend existing borders and which contain separatist threats such as that posed by the Uyghur minority. Internationally, China will continue to extend its influence and to assert its right to be heard in areas that it perceives to be important such as the South China sea.

The Great Silk Road initiative, something that I have written about, actually combines domestic and international objectives. It aims to protect Chinese domestic stability, while also extending China's international economic reach. This is an area where China and Russia's strategic objectives coincide at this point, so it's an area to watch in 2016.

Africa was once called the dark continent because of  Europe's lack of knowledge of the continent. It remains the dark continent so far as Western news coverage is concerned. Coverage is better in North or Saharan Africa because of its closer proximity. Here the two countries to watch are Egypt and Libya, Egypt because of the growing difficulties of the military regime, Libya because the collapse of the Libyan state is one of the proximate causes of the European migrant crisis as well as creating a terrorist breeding ground. Attempts to rebuild the Libyan state now underway will become more important as 2016 proceeds.

Western reporting of Sub-Saharan Africa is presently dominated by terrorism issues. This ignores two important developments. One is the evolution of the African Union, the second and more important one in the shorter term is economic development within Sub-Saharan Africa. This seems to be proceeding apace, something I expect to continue over 2016.

What about Australia? What can I say?

I think because of time I will leave this to a separate post, setting the domestic economic and political environment within the context set by this post.

Postscript

Just recording two stories for later reference:

• A smuggler's haven in the Sahara
• Image compares Saudi Arabia with Islamic State as execution protests grow

A life worth living - reflections on the sudden death of Will Owen

On 2 December, our fellow blogger Will Owen died unexpectedly in his sleep at his Chapel Hill North Carolina home. He was just 63. We had never met in person, but I felt that I knew him.

Will and I first interacted back in June 2007 when he commented on a post I had written on the Howard-Brough Aboriginal intervention in the Northern Territory, I hadn’t seen his blog, Aboriginal Art and Culture: an American eye, although by then it had been established for over two years. I looked, and it became one of my regular reads.

Later I nominated some of his posts for consideration by Club Troppo/On-line Opinion for the best independent Australian blog posts of 2008. There was some doubt as to his eligibility, but I thought that Will’s focus should make him eligible. I was pleased, and so was he, when his Basedow's photographs made the list. Later still, and rightly, the blog was selected for permanent retention as part of the National Library’s Pandora Archive.

While I knew of Will through his work on Aboriginal art, his main professional role was as a librarian. He began work at the University of North Carolina (UNC) Library in 1976 as a student assistant in the collection development department. At the time of his death, he was Associate University Librarian for Technical Services and Systems, a position he had held since 2011. He had also served since July as the Library’s interim Director of Human Resources.

In a tribute, Sarah Michalak, University Librarian and Associate Provost for University Libraries (UNC is a networked multi-campus institution) said that with Will’s passing, the Library and the field hade lost “one of the greats of librarianship and a leader whose accomplishments embody the best of the profession”.

Will believed that libraries should provide the broadest possible access to scholarly information. At a time when many questioned the value of the library catalog, he empowered his team instead to develop it as a sophisticated tool that would facilitate customized searching and would lead researchers directly to primary source material from the library collections.

At the time that Will became one of the Library’s first computer administrators in 1985, there were just a few computers in campus libraries, said David Romani, UNC Library’s lead systems administrator. “It was the two of us doing all of the technology,” he recalled, even to the point of removing ceiling panels and running cable for the first system of networked computers in Davis Library.

As technology became an increasingly prominent part of library work, Will became UNC’s first systems librarian and then head of the systems department. His guiding principle was always that the technology—and the technology department—should be a solid and reliable support that makes it possible for colleagues to focus on their primary mission of carrying out the work of the library.

It is clear from the many tributes that Will not only applied this principle in practice but was also an effective guide and mentor. “People valued his mentoring,” said Michalak, “because of the clear way he expressed himself. You knew that he really cared and that everything came from a grounding of integrity.”

Outside his professional work, Will was a man many of many interests. He already had an abiding interest in contemporary American art before seeing the “Dreamings The Art of Aboriginal Australia.” exhibition at the Asia Society in New York City in 1988.

The paintings, with their arrays of small dots, elaborate patterns in startling colors and puzzling iconography, took the lifelong art lover by surprise. “This is the first we knew it existed. I had no idea Australia’s Aboriginal people made art, much less crazy, beautiful art like this,” he said.

In 1990 Will and his long standing partner Professor Harvey Wagner (they had been together for 34 years at the time of Will’s death) visited Australia almost by accident.

Will had intended to use frequent flier miles for a European Christmas vacation with his partner. But by the time they made reservations at Thanksgiving, every seat was long since booked. Frustrated, they asked what was left. “I can get you on a plane to Sydney,” the agent offered. The surprise destination led the pair directly to a passion for Aboriginal art that has drawn them back again and again to Australia.

It was a day trip to the country west of Alice Springs that brought everything together. Piled into a Land Cruiser with five other passengers, Will listened, captivated, as their guide described Aboriginal culture and the complicated relationship at its heart between the people and the land. “It was so alien, so unlike anything that I’d encountered before,” he said. “I wanted to try to solve the puzzle, to understand these minds that saw the world in such a different way.”

He and Harvey began purchasing art, ultimately building one of the world’s largest private collections of Aboriginal art. This painting is by Kenny Brown, Tiwi Islands, Jilamara (Good Design), 2001. The image derives from ceremonial designs that mourners paint on their bodies.

Insatiably curious, Will began to read up on anthropology, history and art, seeking to understand. Eventually, he came to see his research and writing as a continuation of the efforts of the Aboriginal people themselves to explain their lives and their world.

“For more than 200 years, these people in Australia have been held up as the exemplar of the most primitive people on Earth,” he said. “In fact, their art – which is extremely popular, which the government has appropriated as a symbol of Australia – is the way in which these people have reached out across the racial divide, against bigotry, condescension and hatred to share what is theirs with the rest of us.

“Living in extreme conditions means that you have to share or else you die. Their art is the way they’ve chosen to share their culture with us.”

“Aboriginal people don’t own the land,” he explained. “The land owns them.” Each individual is tied to a particular piece of land – known as one’s country – by virtue of being born there, having family or family history there, or having ancestors buried there.

For Aboriginal people, the country is a living, sentient being. When they are away from it, “they worry for the country and the country worries for them,” he said. The paintings that had so intrigued Will were, in fact, the outpouring of a great deal of worry.

Will began blogging in 2005 as a way of keeping track of all he was learning. The posts covered not just art, but also history and culture. In addition to blogging, Will used various mechanisms to promote Aboriginal art, artists and culture speaking at events and providing expert advice.

He was among the contributors to Beyond Sacred: recent paintings from Australia's remote Aboriginal communities, edited by Colin and Elizabeth Laverty (Hardie Grant Books, 2008). Then in 2009 and 2011, Will and Harvey gave their entire collection to the Hood Museum of Art at Dartmouth College. This made the Museum a centre for the study of Australian Aboriginal art in the US and provided a base for a major exhibition in 2012.

Truly, Will’s life was one worth living with multiple contributions across fields My commiserations to Harvey Wagner and Will's many friends.

Sources:

In Memoriam: Will Owen 

Librarian, long-time art lover finds new passion in Aboriginal art
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Season's Greetings to all

This year I'm putting all my various publishing platforms on holidays until the 30th of December. It's actually the first time I have done this, I usually maintain some form of minimal posting, but I need the thought break.

I wish all my readers and blogging friends a very happy Christmas and a truly great New Year. For those to whom Christmas is not relevant, may the peace and joy that is meant to mark Christmas be with you in your lives.

Nanny NSW increases cycling penalties

One of my first impressions on visiting Copenhagen were the bikes. They were everywhere. I suggested that part of the reason for this was flat terrain, part better infrastructure, part integration of cycling into the road rules. However, I also suggested that a significant contributor was a less legalistic more cyclist friendly approach than that applied in Australia, citing bike helmets as an example.

Now the NSW Government has announced new rules:and penalties:

• Adult cyclists will be required to carry photo identification. From March 2017, failure to do so will attract a penalty of $106, the same as drivers caught without a licence.
• Drivers will be required to leave a one-metre buffer when overtaking cyclists, and at least 1.5 metres when travelling faster than 60km/h. Penalty two demerit points and a $319 fine
•  Penalties for cyclists breaking road rules will be greatly increased. While most offences currently attract a $71 fine, cyclists caught riding without a helmet will now be fined $319, running a red light will incur a $425 fine, riding dangerously a $425 fine, holding onto a moving vehicle a fine of $319 and not stopping at a pedestrian crossing a fine of $425.

Fairfax journalist Michael O'Reilly correctly described the new laws as a mixture of good (the one metre buffer),  bad (increased penalties for not wearing a helmet) to downright bewildering (the ID requirement).

According to the New South Wales Director of the Centre for Road Safety Transport Bernard Carlton, the requirement to carry ID was considered an important safety measure. "There's been a big change in cycling and we've got a lot more cyclists on the road who are commuting and cycling for recreation and health," he said. "In New South Wales we have on average around 11 cyclist fatalities every year and 1,500 cyclists are admitted to hospital every year with serious injuries.".

Its all very NSW. I can't see how those casualty figures will be affected by the ID requirement, nor indeed by the increased fines for not wearing a helmet. The increased distance requirement has been welcomed by cycling bodies, although as a driver who is already careful about cyclists my main concern is the risk of breaching it inadvertently if, for example, a cyclist comes within a metre of me or I am trying to pass a cycling pack. The one thing I am reasonably certain of is that the changes are going to further discourage cycling as an activity while adding to police loads.

Postscript

kvd wondered: "But of more importance, why are there no fines for "lycra'd whilst pudgy" and "cycling with hubris"?" The phrases made me laugh! I especially liked cycling with hubris!

Monday Forum - on history and historians

Today's Monday Forum is loosely linked to the question of history and historians.

Yesterday's train reading post, Train Reading - introducing Richard Hakluyt's Voyage and Discoveries 1, introduced the writings of this Elizabethan geographer. In reading the book, I found my knowledge of current historiography and political attitudes actually interfering with my reading. Of course, the way we approach the past in terms of the questions we ask is always strongly influenced by the present. In this case the process was quite annoying, standing as a barrier that I found was twisting my interpretation.

Hakyurt was a man of his time recording documents of that time. The writers of the documents were recording current events within the frame set by their times and their purpose in writing. The views expressed are neither right nor wrong, they just were.

This leads me to my opening questions for this forum:

• How do we avoid being biased by current perceptions? Can we? Is it important? Obviously I think it is.
• Can you really interpret the past if you have no idea of the context? More broadly, can you interpret the past if you have no personal experience relevant to that context? For example, people writing about politics and political or administrative structures who have had no experience in or real understanding of the type of dynamics involved.
• I agree that history does have lessons for policy. However, much of the policy related history that I have read attempt to integrate the history and the policy. This strikes me as quite dangerous. Do you think history can or should be used to inform policy?

As always, feel free to go in whatever direction you want. 

Train Reading - introducing Richard Hakluyt's Voyage and Discoveries 1

My present train reading is Richard Hakluyt's Voyages and Discoveries: The Principal Navigations, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation edited, abridged and introduced by Jack Beeching (Penguin 1972). The illustration, from the Wikepedia article on Hakluyt, is the stained glass window in Bristol Cathedral celebrating Hakluyt's life.

First published in 1589 with the final and greatly enlarged version appearing between 1598 and 1600, the book is a compendium of every voyage and commercial report that Hakluyt could get his hands on. The first two reports in the edition that I have date to 890, with the majority falling to the period 1553 to 1596.

Hakluyt's intent in collecting and publishing material was practical. Practical in the sense that he wanted to make the information available for use by others. Practical in the sense that he was promoting and presenting the English commercial interest. Practical also because the work undertaken by Hakluyt allowed him to amass a considerable fortune.

Today Voyages and Discoveries is interesting in part as travel yarns, in part because it presents eye witness accounts of events and commercial activities at a critical time in English and European history. This period saw the beginning of the colonial period with the early growth of the first overseas European empires; it saw England begin the challenge to the interests of Portugal and especially Spain (think Drake and the Spanish Armada) that would lay the basis for a wholesale land grab and the establishment of its own Empire; it also saw Europe's commercial and trade focus final shift from the traditional land routes towards the sea.  

Richard Hakluyt was born at Eyton in Herefordshire in 1553, the second of four sons. His father, also Richard, was a member of the Worshipful Company of Skinners whose members dealt in skins and furs. Richard Snr died in 1557, Richard's mother soon after. A cousin, yet another Richard Hackluyt, became his guardian. Cousin Richard  was a barrister and a member of the Middle Temple'

Hakluyt was educated at Westminster School and then at Christ Church Oxford. awarded his MA in 1577. He was ordained as an Anglican minister in the following year.

Hakluyt decided to dedicate himself to what we would now call geography while still a schoolboy at Westminster. Visiting his guardian whose conversation was illustrated by "certain bookes of cosmographie, an universall mappe, and the Bible", the boy resolved to "prosecute that knowledge, and kind of literature". At Oxford, he set out to read all the printed or written voyages and discoveries that he could find and began to give public lectures on geography following his graduation. 

In 1582 his first publication, Divers Voyages Touching the Discoverie of America and the Ilands Adjacent unto the Same, Made First of all by our Englishmen and Afterwards by the Frenchmen and Britons,  appeared , establishing his reputation. The following year, he was appointed chaplain and secretary to Sir Edward Stafford, English ambassador to the French court, a position he held until 1588, where he investigated sources as well as collecting intelligence on Spanish and French activities. 

Following his return, Hakluyt held important positions at Bristol Cathedral and Westminster Abbey and was personal chaplain to Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, principal Secretary of State to Elizabeth I and James I. He was the chief promoter of a petition to James I for letters patent to colonize Virginia, which were granted to the London Company and Plymouth Company (referred to collectively as the Virginia Company) in 1606.

The combination of his publications, his church roles, his commercial activities and inheritances from two of his brothers had made him a wealthy man by the time he died in 1616. He had married twice, but there seems to have been only one son who squandered his wealth following his death. 

Today Hakluyt is principally remembered for his writings and his efforts in promoting and supporting the settlement of North America by the English through those writings. His works were a fertile source of material for Shakespeare and other writers. He also encouraged the writing of historical and geographic works by others. In 1846, the Hakluyt Society was founded to printing rare and unpublished accounts of voyages and travels. A house at his old school carries his name. 

In my next train reading post I will look in more detail at the book and its context.

Saturday Morning Musings -tropes, happiness with a dash of coal

As a kid, having my own flying car was quite high on my list of  things I would like to have. It was and indeed still is a common visual trope in movies etc.

First announced back in 2013, Terrafugia's TF-X flying car has got to its next milestone - approval from the - the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) run in-air tests with an autonomous drone version of the car.

Staying with tropes, last night I watched the latest Star Wars movie, Star Wars: The Force Awakens. It was quite fun, although they went a bit overboard on reprise. But then everybody  is joining in. Count the Star Wars puns in this British weather forecast.  .


Changing directions, our blogging friend Rod Holland has been made a member of the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service Regional Advisory Committee for the Northern Rivers. He has also done his first ever interview on ABC North Coast Radio on the strange behaviour of the Clarence River. You can listen to the interview here - ABC Radio Interview - The river that flows the wrong way!

Over at his place, Winton Bates muses on Why wish everyone a Merry Christmas? Down in Victoria, the treatment of Christmas in state schools is again a matter of controversy with Christmas carols with a religious theme apparently banned (here, here). The change appears to have been triggered by new Victorian Government guidelines on special religious instruction in schools.

Fairness in Religions in School spokeswoman Lara Wood said the new policy would make schools more inclusive. I haven't read the new guidelines, but on the reports I am struggling to see how.the policy makes schools more inclusive. If anything, it's likely to confirm already existing prejudices among substantial groups of parents, many of whom have already voted with their feet, so to speak, by sending kids elsewhere. It all gets very difficult.

Staying with Winton for the moment, his two most recent posts connected with happiness (Was J S Mill correct in his observation that happiness cannot be obtained by seeking it?, How can we avoid the happiness trap?) deal with linked themes, can happiness be obtained through pursuit?

Despite the wording in the US Declaration of Independence (We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness), my own view is that happiness is a transitory state, a by-product of other things and consequently cannot be pursued  Here, I think, my views are somewhat similar to Winton's.

AC is another in a reflective mood, looking back at the year in My 2015. I was unpacking boxes at the time I read the post. Sitting there surrounded by wrapping paper looking at an extremely nice cut glass decanter with accompanying glasses, I thought that in one area at least, 2016 would definitely be a year of elegance compared to 2015!

During the week there was continued discussion on this blog on economic consequences of climate change and the future of coal. Yesterday, 18 December, Bloomberg's Thomas Biesheuvel recorded the closure that day of the UK's last underground coal pit. It's not quite the end of coal production in the UK, there are some open cut mines producing around 8 million tons per annum, but it is the end of an era. The Belshaws were a coal mining family, so it seems appropriate to record the event. My thanks to our Canadian blogging colleague Randy McDonald for the tip.

The graph shows the decline in UK underground coal production from its peak production of 292 million tons in 1913. Just to put that number in perspective, Australia presently both mines and exports more coal than the UK did at its peak year in 1913.

Some of the material that I have been reading on the end of coal is starting to seriously annoy me because it seems so unbalanced. I have started trying to establish the parameter facts for my own satisfaction.

Postscript

Youngest's video review of the latest Star Wars film