frontpage – Page 11 of 20

9Jan

By Holly FeenyNo Comments

Lifestyle

Please, Just Use a Condom

Fertility app Natural Cycles is described on its website as “an effective, natural method of contraception.” It is essentially a smartphone app, for which users pay £5.99 monthly or £39.99 annually to access, along with their own oral basal thermometer. The user takes their temperature every morning and inputs the reading into the app. Along with information about the individual’s menstrual cycle, it decrees whether that day is ‘green’ (i.e. you are presumed not to be fertile, and are safe to have unprotected sex) or ‘red’ (i.e. you are presumed to be fertile, and should either abstain from sex or use additional protection). It is marketed both to help those who want to get pregnant soon, and those who wish to prevent pregnancy. The main issue with this app’s method is its reliance on tem...

Academic Twitter: the Good, the Bad and the Unwarranted Twitter Review

8Jan

By Maliha RezaNo Comments

Opinion

Academic Twitter: the Good, the Bad and the Unwarranted Twitter Review

A simple tweet with the right hashtags will result in students and academics providing answers to the most obscure of questions. For the most part, academic Twitter serves its purpose of connecting people with similar research interests. It has, in many instances, resulted in collaborations between academic Tweeters on articles and books. Nonetheless, disseminating research through the medium of Twitter has its downfalls, namely due to the culture of destructive criticism and satire. People on Twitter have the incessant ability to dissect and ridicule work, revealing the darker side of academic social media: unwarranted criticism. Reviewer two tends to be considered the harsher critic during peer reviews of academic articles, journals and books; however, in recent times, the Twitter re...

18Dec

By Mollie CarlyleNo Comments

Features

In Conversation With: Charlie Higson

Hello Charlie. First of all, thank you very much for taking the time out of your busy schedule to speak to us. Christ! If I’d known there were so many questions I wouldn’t have agreed. Being a Norfolk girl myself, I was very happy to read that you went to the University of East Anglia, which became a very unlikely hotspot for up and coming comedians (with connections to Jim Moir, Harry Enfield, Paul Whitehouse, Dave Cummings etc.). What was university life like on the seventies Norwich scene? I started there in 1977 – which seems about a hundred years ago. So much has changed since then it’s hard to get across to people how different things were in the 70s. Norwich was quite isolated – although the university connected it to a wider world. There was a professional ENTS officer at...

17Dec

By Rachel HainsNo Comments

Opinion

Student Safety On Campus

On the 13th of December, at 4:30 am, Surrey Police were called to campus, here at Royal Holloway, to attend to what has now been revealed as a stabbing. The incident occurred outside the SU shop, and whilst the victim is not in a life-threatening condition, nor a student here, it is enough to make some students question the safety of our campus. Is there more that the university could be doing to prevent incidents like this one? Shortly after the incident was reported, the staff at the university issued a statement claiming we are “still one of the safest universities in the UK”. However, currently, the Times Higher Education survey 2018 has placed Royal Holloway as only joint 49th for being ranked as the ‘safest’ university in the UK. Clearly, students do not agree. Having spoken to nu...

13Dec

By Shloka RamachandranNo Comments

Creative Writing

Lunar Cycles

i. i was born in the capital of the country and grew used to gazes ii. madras found me shoving my hands in the pockets of my too-short shorts or so the aunties and teachers and friends’ mothers thought got pulled aside one sunny afternoon (but then most afternoons were sunny) when i was sitting by the library (the safest spot on the campus) my physics teacher asked my why i wasn’t wearing shorts under my uniformed regulation skirt and wasn’t i sending the boys the wrong idea, somehow? madras found me laughing in the face of my modern-day medusa asking her whether she thought boys staring up my skirt might already have completely the wrong idea through no encouragement of my own through no intention of mine medusa and i called an uneasy truce after that but i could feel her s...

13Dec

By Becca BashfordNo Comments

News

Stabbing Reported Outside SU Shop

Surrey Police cordoned off the Student Union shop and the surrounding area in the early hours of this morning between 2.30am and 4:30am. A spokesman for South East Coast Ambulance Service confirmed that they responded to reports of an assault. Surrey Police have confirmed that the man was not a student at Royal Holloway. They believe he knew his attackers, but it is unclear why he was on the university campus. There is speculation that the stabbing occurred on campus but this has not yet been confirmed. The SU shop is now open as normal. Surrey Police have released the following statement: “In the early hours of this morning (13 December) Surrey police were called to disorder at Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham. We responded quickly and, working in partnership with the univ...

13Dec

By Insiyah AdamjeeNo Comments

Culture & Literature, Theatre & Performance

When The Clock Strikes 00:00

Engaging, thought-provoking and transparent are some of the adjectives that come to mind thinking back on the brilliant performance at The Packhorse, ‘00:00’, a play put on from the 7th to the 9th of December by ‘from (a)basement theatre collective’. The plot involves an exploration into the lives of employees of the Network Rail and is a conversation starter for tough and heavy topics such as mental health, suicide and social conventions. The small cast of four manage to tackle these serious and controversial topics in an empathetic yet frank way, unapologetically showing the audience the truth of the lives and struggles of those who run the behind-the-scenes of England’s Rail system. The cast are not given names, but instead letters of the alphabet, which further reiterates how unreco...

5Dec

By Michele TheilNo Comments

Features

RHUL Donate and Reuse

Donate and Reuse is one of many volunteering programmes offered at Royal Holloway. The project is currently in need of new volunteers to help run the programme and promote the reuse and recycling of clothing. Taking part is a great way to meet new people whilst also gaining experience as an individual. What is the Donate and Reuse volunteering project about? This is a campus project associated with the British Heart Foundation. It encourages students to donate their unwanted clothing, therefore promoting the reuse and recycling of these items. What kind of tasks are volunteers given? Through working as a volunteer, students would be promoting end of term collections, helping with the coordination of these collections, and distributing them to the Egham branch of the British...

A Midsummer Nightmare: A Dream of a Performance

5Dec

By Abel FenwickNo Comments

Culture & Literature, Theatre & Performance

A Midsummer Nightmare: A Dream of a Performance

Comedy. Tragedy. Star crossed lovers. Deceptions, donkeys and a play within a play. All of the above sound tremendously Shakespearian until I mention the Post-it notes, don’t they? Like any adaptation of the Bard worth its salt, the RHUL Shakespeare society’s original production ‘A Midsummer Nightmare’ contained all of the above and more, with the audience invited to peer behind the scenes of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ and watch Tarquin-Ann Richardson the Third and troupe attempt to make it to opening night without unlearnt lines, gargantuan egos and a four-person Swedish pop band destroying all of their hard work. With choreographed dance numbers, acting tips and actual passages of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ performed throughout, on paper the play seems in danger of feeling a litt...

Through The Lens of a Camera: Comedy Virgins

30Nov

By Lina PavlovaNo Comments

Culture & Literature, Theatre & Performance

Through The Lens of a Camera: Comedy Virgins

On Thursday November 15, Royal Holloway’s very own Comedy Society had their first show of the year, and what a blast it was! Going to a comedy show is always exciting, and a great night full of fun and laughter is almost always guaranteed. But what happens when you’re not just there as an audience member? I attended as a videographer to film the event, and while you might assume the excitement would be pretty much non-existent due to the mere fact that I was there to do my job and be ‘professional’, this was not the case! Just seeing the enthusiastic faces of the people performing on the stage, even if only from behind my camera, was enough to make me happy for days and days to follow. From the name of the performance itself - ‘The Comedy Virgin Show’ - which immediately stirs up cur...