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Doug Benson
Sean O'Neal
To most people, comedian Doug Benson is one of the many talking heads panning the never-ending shit creek of celebrity scandal for comedy gold on VH1's Best Week Ever. But to a certain bleary-eyed cult, he's best known for The Marijuana-Logues, the hit Off-Broadway show (later collected in a book and CD of the same name) he created with partners Arj Barker and Tony Camin. High Times liked it so much that they christened Benson "Stoner Of The Year" in 2006, prompting Benson to keep the buzz going with the new Super High Me, a Morgan Spurlock-aping documentary that Benson matter-of-factly describes as "like Super Size Me with weed instead of McDonald's." Just before the film's première at the SXSW Film Festival, The A.V. Club spoke with Benson about what it's like being one of America's most visible stoners, why talking dogs make poor drug counselors, and whether there's anything funny left to say about getting stoned.
The A.V. Club: Were you always into doing stoner comedy?
Doug Benson: No, it just sort of happened. I tried smoking pot in high school, but similar to Willie Nelson's life story, I didn't think much of it because I didn't inhale properly. I never ran with the kind of crowd that smoked pot until I started doing stand-up on the road. One time I was working in San Francisco and the other acts were Brian Posehn and Greg Proops—who are both huge pot smokers—and they turned me on to it. I've been smoking ever since. And since my act is a goofy reflection of what's going on in my life, I started doing pot jokes, and I noticed that audiences invariably love pot jokes. Even people who don't smoke pot think it's a funny subject. So when I started getting laughs, I started doing more material about it. Then we came up with The Marijuana-Logues, so we had to generate a lot of material about pot, so it's sort of evolved over time. When people come to see my shows, there are a lot of stoners in the audience, but there are also a lot of people who just like me from Best Week Ever or Last Comic Standing, where pot rarely comes into it. So I try to give a healthy mix, where people aren't going "There are too many jokes about pot!" or "There's not enough jokes about pot!"
AVC: Do you think that there are still new pot jokes to be told?
DB: That's the tricky part. I either have to talk about my own personal experiences with marijuana, or things that are happening in the world of weed—legalization, the occasional pot movie. But you're right, there's really only so much you can do about pot: "Memory loss. Munchies. Thanks for coming!" [Laughs.]
AVC: Do you ever worry that by being such a visible pot smoker, you'll get red-flagged by the DEA?
DB: If the DEA's going to bust down the door to get their hands on me holding an eighth or less of marijuana… [Laughs.] I'm not Tommy Chong. I'm not selling any pot-related products, other than things that contain spoken words about marijuana. People say, "Don't you worry you're going to end up on some list, or audited by the IRS?" I don't smoke enough pot to get that paranoid about it. People always say, "Don't you worry that when this movie comes out, you're going to get arrested?" If somebody really wants to arrest me for smoking marijuana—not selling it to anyone, barely giving it anyone—I guess they could come after me, but it seems ridiculous. And it would certainly bring some attention to how ridiculous the drug war is.
AVC: You're a card-carrying medical-marijuana patient. Did you get that specifically for the film?
DB: Yeah. I had always gone through the regular route of calling up my dealer and he'd come to my home—and he wouldn't stay to chat, so it was a pretty good deal. Over the years, I'd had people talk up medical marijuana to me, but it sounded like such a hassle. You know, going to a doctor and whatever. It seemed like the system was already working for me. But when we made Super High Me, we figured we'd show that whole part of the process and make it legal for the movie. We actually film in a couple of dispensaries, so you get to see me buying pot after I get my license. We went to a couple of different doctors. There are doctors who, all they do is hand out medical-marijuana evaluations—it's kind of a scam—so they weren't too crazy about being on camera. But we did find a couple of stores who let us in and showed us how everything works. We also got a donated Volcano Vaporizer, which I used quite a bit. I go to see a doctor—a regular one, not a medical-marijuana guy—and get check-ups throughout the movie, and of course his recommendation is that you shouldn't smoke anything. He said it was a good idea to use a vaporizer, and the perk was, I got to keep it.
AVC: Do you worry that by showing how medical marijuana is "kind of a scam," you're giving critics fodder to question it?
DB: I'm giving them fodder for questioning it, but I'm also hopefully increasing the number of people who will go out and cast their vote for medical marijuana by getting a card. Pot advocates actually try to convince people who don't need or want medical marijuana to go get a card, because as those numbers go up, it's like voting for an initiative. It's saying "There are this many people who want to use this who are not getting in trouble, who are not turning around and selling it or giving it to minors." No matter what they have—cancer, HIV, depression—anybody who says they feel better after smoking marijuana, I feel they should be able to do so, especially if it's in the privacy of their own home while watching a Project Runway marathon. While conservatives can say that medical marijuana has its flaws, it at least legitimizes the pot trade.
AVC: Do you consider Super High Me a political film?
DB: The movie is political just by its existence, but I'm the comical center. You see me doing stand-up and making jokes—it's a funny movie. But we also got footage of some of these dispensaries getting busted, and people standing around watching DEA agents unload all of the money and weed, and it's sad. It's so much manpower being put into stopping something that may not be absolutely harmless, but it's considerably less harmless than alcohol, or every abused prescription drug. But that's as political as I get. I'm a comedian. Just talking about it is my way of effecting change.
AVC: What do you think of the way marijuana smoking is portrayed in popular culture? Are you a fan of the Cheech And Chong school of pot comedy?
DB: I liked Cheech and Chong when I was kid, just because they used silly voices and talked about things that seemed taboo. Looking back on most of their work, I don't particularly appreciate it. But it's hard for something about pot to slip through the system. It'll be interesting to see that Judd Apatow/Seth Rogen movie Pineapple Express, because it might be a real, full-blown pot movie. Even Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle, I don't think a lot of stoners even saw that in the theaters, because just saying that two guys are going to White Castle is not enough to sell the notion that it's because they're high. [Laughs.] Plenty of people eat junk food without smoking marijuana first. I think the reaction to The Marijuana-Logues and hopefully Super High Me has been so positive because there's so little decent pot humor out there for stoners to smoke a bowl and watch. I mean, any comedic entertainment is better when you get high. People probably get high and watch The Daily Show or The Office. But like The Marijuana-Logues, I imagine people will say, "Thank you for doing [Super High Me], because it's not a topic that's spoken of that freely in this country."
AVC: Why do you think we don't, especially considering that nearly everyone has at least tried marijuana?
DB: It's just how it's been for so long. The View is on my TV right now, and all those old broads—even Whoopi Goldberg—will sit there and say, "Marijuana is bad, and you shouldn't do it because it's illegal." It permeates the entire society, this notion that because something's illegal, it's bad and will always be bad, like there are no gray areas that need to be investigated. It's an old-fashioned notion that won't go away. That's one thing I talk about quite a bit in my act, the ridiculousness of anti-pot ads. Now, I like these commercials that show kids who get into their parents' medicine cabinet. That's very practical to me. Parents should be aware that there are some awesome drugs for their kids to try right there in their house, and that's a good place to start in keeping your kids off drugs. But the commercials where the dog talks to the little girl about how she's changed because she smokes pot… A talking dog is not the answer. [Laughs.] That's not a way to convince people not to smoke pot. If animals started talking to me, I would up my pot consumption just to make that happen.
AVC: Do you think the general lameness of "pot culture" has hurt its chances of becoming as widely accepted as alcohol?
DB: [Laughs.] Yeah, because beer commercials are so cool. But that's certainly an area that I have fun with in all of my pot projects, that there is a great deal of silliness behind the pot movement. Smoking pot makes people talk for long periods of time, for instance, so people who advocate pot won't shut the hell up about it. On the other hand, no one really needs to defend drinking. That's something that frustrates me as a comic: I have to play clubs where selling booze runs the business, so crowds get drunk and yell out a bunch of stupid stuff at me. Pot doesn't cause people to do that. I did a show in Amsterdam a few months ago, and people weren't yelling stuff out at all. They also weren't laughing very much, but I think they were still having a good time. [Laughs.] The whole pot-to-alcohol thing is a huge issue with me, because I've grown to hate drunks so much, and like potheads. But some potheads are, like you suggested, just ridiculous. So with The Marijuana-Logues and Super High Me, I've tried to be your Average Joe pot-smoker. Someone who doesn't have an agenda beyond just wanting to be able to smoke it.
AVC: Given the stigma associated with stoner culture, was it difficult to convince your comedian friends to "out" themselves in your movie?
DB: Fortunately, most of my friends in comedy that smoke pot are almost as open about it as I am, and in some cases more so. But most that appear, it's more about friendship with me than making some statement about pot. I'm sure those of my friends who are onscreen smoking might have a little regret, but there's not too much of it. And two of my friends in the movie—Paul F. Tompkins and Graham Elwood—don't smoke pot at all, so there's certainly that angle: showing that even with people who don't smoke it, we can still all hang out together. It's not like there are battle lines drawn. Brian Posehn and Sarah Silverman are both seen smoking in the movie; I appreciated that they were willing to do that. It's certainly putting themselves out there in a way that, if they had thought about it a little harder, they might have decided not to. Or if some stranger had filmed them smoking pot, they might have said, "Please don't ever use that footage." But in my case, they were willing to let me exploit them.
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AVC: For half the film, you smoke pot for 30 days, and for the other half, you stop smoking for 30 days. Which was harder?
DB: Going into it, I thought smoking for 30 days would be harder. It turns out it was much easier. Not smoking for 30 days wasn't hard, in the sense that I didn't experience much withdrawal. I missed smoking pot, but I didn't mind it. Having the cameras there helped me to not think about it that much, because it was sort of my job to not smoke. That month where I was smoking constantly, I thought it would be like when you catch a little kid smoking cigarettes, and you make him smoke a whole pack. I wake-and-bake on occasion, and I smoke almost every evening, but smoking day in and day out for 30 days, I thought by the end, I was going to be sick of it and that would be it. I'd either smoke pot rarely, or not at all. But Day 31, partway through the day, I lit up a joint. [Laughs.] You know, I never had to drive a car, because my crew drove me everywhere. So we tried not to break any laws, but at the same time, that was a strong enabling system I had. There was a camera filming me, and I had to smoke, and I didn't have to drive, and all I had to do was do stand-up comedy and hang out. It was pretty darn easy to be high for 30 days.
AVC: As for all the supposed risks of marijuana—loss of short-term memory, lung problems—what did you find out?
DB: The long-term effects, I obviously won't be able to determine for some time, but short-term memory… I'm getting old enough now where I forget stuff all the time anyway. My friends forget stuff too. They do a memory test on me and Graham Elwood in the movie, and he does worse than I do. In terms of my lungs, pot smoking is not like cigarette smoking. It doesn't affect the lungs as quickly, or as much over time. If I stopped pot smoking today, my lungs could heal probably 100 percent in a few years. According to the doctor in the movie, right now I have 90 percent lung capacity, which is pretty good for my age and how much pot I've smoked over the years. And wanting to eat all the time—in the movie, I gain about eight pounds, so that's obviously a problem for some people. But in terms of short-term effects, I haven't experienced anything worth worrying about.
AVC: Do you think Super High Me will change anyone's mind about marijuana?
DB: I know The Marijuana-Logues changed a couple of minds. I had people tell me they tried smoking pot again afterward—like they hadn't done it since college, and then they got back into it. [Laughs.] Which I'm not necessarily proud of. I'm not trying to recruit anyone. I think minds can be changed, but I also think they don't have to be changed. If someone doesn't want to smoke pot and doesn't think it should be legal, then that's fine, but the numbers that do are going to continue to grow to the point where change will eventually occur. How soon it will occur, I don't know, but I'm perfectly happy with the current system. I renew my doctor's note once a year, and go to a neighborhood dispensary where I buy an eighth at a time. It lasts me a week or two, and I mostly just smoke it at home. I don't really need to change minds with this movie. I'm just preaching to the choir.
AVC: Let's talk about some of your projects not related to marijuana. How did your show The Benson Interruption come about?
DB: One night at the M Bar in L.A., a friend of mine, Suli McCullough, was playing a character who would talk to comics while they were onstage. He asked me if it would be okay if he interrupted me with stupid shit, and I said, "I'd love it." That night, it dawned on me that it would make a great format for a show: Somebody would be doing their act, and I would be interfering—hopefully in a humorous way—to make it funnier. Two comics working at once, rather than one comic trying to tear down another one. Audiences liked it, and when we moved it over to the UCB Theater, it got even better. We do it the last Thursday of every month in Los Angeles, and it sells out every time. That was way too long an answer. The short version is, I like talking shit while comedians are on stage, so why not do it into a microphone?
AVC: It seems like we've become a culture of commentators—that there's no wall between performer and audience anymore. Is The Benson Interruption your way of commenting on the commentators?
DB: [Laughs.] Well, it's certainly my way of getting my two cents in there. In my case, the comics mostly like it. Every now and then, I'll say something that steps over the line or that's too insulting, or they'll say something mean to me. Obviously, you take that risk any time you do something where comedians interact with each other. Like a roast, somebody's always going to cross over the line. As far as the public goes, I like feedback, I like to hear laughter, and I like the occasional pointed heckle, but it's true: Everybody thinks that they need to express their opinion now. There's been this sea change—specifically with the Internet and MySpace—where people are constantly writing to me directly about stuff, where in the past you'd never hear about it, because nobody would go to the trouble of writing you a letter or trying to find you to make one of their stupid comments.
On my MySpace blog, I had to disable the comments, because I just want to say my joke and move on. People can read it and enjoy it or not, that's up to them. But when you leave the comments open, then there's this flood of stupid remarks from people who don't add anything. They'll start getting into debates with each other about stuff. The thing is—because I'm a total narcissist—of course I'm going to read every word of it, and then I'm just sitting there all day reading this shit. Society has definitely gotten to the point where everybody has to comment on anything, and if you want to stay sane as a performer, you're better off not reading that stuff.
AVC: Of course, you do a lot of commenting of your own on Best Week Ever.
DB: [Laughs.] Well, in the case of Best Week Ever, I know there's a lot of nasty humor directed at celebrities, but my feeling is, in most cases, they deserve it. The cases where they don't, it's just too good of a joke to walk away from. If someone wants to make a joke about me smoking too much pot, I'm not going to get mad at them, because I've put it out there that that's what I do. If I'm on Best Week Ever making a joke about Snoop Dogg being high, I can only hope that Snoop Dogg isn't going to turn around and say, "What did that bitch say about me?" But I've yet to run into a famous person that cares about what I've said about them. Most of them don't watch, and the ones that do must have a sense of humor, otherwise they wouldn't be watching.
AVC: With that show, do you always have, like, a store of Britney Spears riffs ready to go?
DB: Basically, they fill you in on that particular week's events with regard to Britney, Lindsay, Paris, whoever. Like, they'll say, "This week, a video of Tom Cruise talking about how awesome Scientology is made it to the Internet." Then they'll show us that clip and tell us to do whatever jokes we want. I don't have to keep up, because the show itself does most of the heavy lifting. And if you don't have a joke, you can always say "Pass," and move on to something else. Like, within weeks of Anna Nicole Smith dying, I didn't personally think that was the most hilarious topic. Most of the commentary was about how crazy the coverage surrounding her death was, so it was mostly making fun of the press, but I still thought, "She just died! Can't we not treat her like a piece of shit for just a little while?" Or when Dave Chappelle went to Africa because he supposedly went crazy. I was like, "I don't have anything to say about that. I like Dave Chappelle, and he went to Africa. So what?" Sometimes those comments actually make it on the show. They just let us be ourselves, and then they edit it severely.
I know that Best Week Ever gets kind of a bad rap—like, for instance, whenever I travel to a city that has The Onion, there's always a blurb about me saying I'm in town, and it usually says that Best Week Ever is the most horrible thing to happen to television, "but Doug Benson is funny." Like, "He's funny in person because he's not doing four-second jokes about Dancing With The Stars." I don't know how I can get people to come back to Best Week Ever, but I think the show right now is considerably better than it was a few years ago. With some people, it's got a reputation for being too many comedians that don't have anything clever to say, which brought it down in the minds of some hipsters. But how can you not watch that show just to see Paul F. Tompkins? Or [John] Mulaney? I mean, it is what it is. It's certainly slapped-together. You're going to have some substandard comedy jammed in there, just because it's such a giant jigsaw puzzle that has to be put together every week. I feel the same way about The Soup, even though it's just one guy. I think Joel McHale is hilarious, but the show lives or dies by each joke. That's my favorite thing I see on the Internet, by the way. People saying, "They covered the same topics on The Soup that they did on Best Week Ever!" Yeah, no shit! They're two shows that talk about what happened in entertainment in the last week! What else are they going to talk about?
AVC: Do you ever feel worn down by the constant stream of tabloid scandals and bad reality TV, to the point where it stops being funny?
DB: You have moments where you go, "I'm tired of talking about this." That's the beauty of it: You can just walk away from something. One time they used a clip of me saying—I think it was about Hilary Duff's sister Haylie—"Haylie Duff? Now you're just making shit up." You can comment on how ridiculous it's getting. About a year or two ago, Patton Oswalt quit the show because he was getting angry having to talk about Paris Hilton every week. He just doesn't feel like that's his sensibility, having to come up with material about this one worthless celebrity. But I will continue to be on it as long as it's on the air and as long as I have the time in my schedule. I'm probably never going to get my own talk show, but on Best Week Ever, I get to say my own monologue jokes every week. I get to do jokes about stuff that's happening right now, and it's on TV right away. That to me is one of the biggest appeals of having your own show, and as long as I have the forum to do it, I will.


Hi! My name is Elena Nathani Badrutt and this is my work, a unique blend of art and science: architecture design, photography and editorial design.
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The Black Abstract shares "Fisher Boy" feat EwW, "Work Hard" and "iLLegal" [Video]
Posted on December 6, 2021 by Irfan Akhtar
Buffalo NY emcee The Black Abstract comes through with three solid joints from his stash this week and its pure flames from start to finish.
The first cut "Fisher Boy" sees him collaborating with EwW over an anthemic backdrop. Both emcees proceed to wreak havoc on the beat with unique and vivid bars. The visual is engaging too and captures both emcees doing their thing.
Get "Fisher Boy" on Spotify
The second cut "Work Hard" is a pure display of lyrical prowess and it's birthed from a competition he took part in and won. Backed by a crunchy drum break and cinematic texture, The Black Abstract showcase why he is one to watch with his evocative lyrics and knack for crafting memorable. "Work hard" is the first single off of The Black Abstracts Debut project Injured Reserve dropping in January.
Get "Work Hard" on Spotify
The final cut "iLLegal" is a reflective track that dives into the everyday activities young men in urban neighborhoods go through. Backed by a somber and soulful backdrop, he takes us deep into the dark alleys where things could go haywire in a split second.
Get "iLLegal" on SoundCloud
THE BLACK ABSTRACT is a rapper hailing from Buffalo, New York. The artist, whose style is best described as aggressive soul, draws inspiration from some of the most monumental names in R&B and Hip-Hop, including Anita Baker, Mary J. Blige, Nas, Biggie, DMX, and Drake to create uplifting and powerful songs that push listeners to stay focused and grind hard. With his melodic hooks and soulful trap beats, THE BLACK ABSTRACT incorporates old-school elements with relevant themes to pay homage to the culture of Hip-Hop while appeasing to rap lovers of all ages. In doing so, THE BLACK ABSTRACT strives to make music for others to relate to, so that no matter how lonely they may be feeling, they can find comradery in his lyricism.
Keep up with The Black Abstract | Facebook : Twitter: Instagram
L.A.'s Quaesar Drops New Video "Strangle Things"
Crusif shares reflective track titled "Help Me"

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


"Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake.
and will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.


Sandy: Once In A Generation?
Superstorm Sandy, as of this revision, is three months past. Yet the effects will continue to reverberate for a long time--just as the effects of Hurricane Katrina continue to do.
Sandy, some have suggested, helped President Obama to his decisive electoral win. That may or may not be so, but it is certainly true that Sandy led Mayor Bloomberg to endorse the President--albeit in a state Mr. Obama was set to win anyway.
More importantly, Sandy significantly altered the discourse around the topic of climate change. Clearly, for Governor Andrew Cuomo at least, and probably for considerable numbers of people, the fact of climate change (if not always its cause) has become incontrovertible.
The scenes of devastation and wreckage that Hurricanes Sandy (2012) and Katrina (2005) left behind were tragically similar. But the storms differed in important ways, too. Here's a summary.
Get the latest weather news from weather.com. Here are the latest tallies from Sandy, the second most expensive storm in U.S. history.
In New York and New Jersey a total of 651,000 'housing units' are reported to have been destroyed, and 455,000 businesses affected. Insurance giant Munich RE reports $50 billion in total losses; the states put that figure at $62 billion. Congress has approved two aid packages totaling $60.2 billion, roughly what President Obama had requested.
At least 3,500 families in New York and New Jersey are still living in hotels and motels on the dime of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. As winter has settled in, people who still have homes but no means to heat them have taken refuge in tents set up by aid workers.
Some people are still living in mold-infested homes. Others are trying to persuade the city to tear theirs down. Small businesses are shutting down in neighborhoods where nobody seems to shop anymore.
Redrawn federal maps indicating flood-prone areas may force many property owners, especially in New York or New Jersey, to pay exorbitantly for flood insurance, raise their homes or move away altogether. In New Jersey, flood insurance premiums could cost as much as $31,000 a year.
In New York, a commission formed to examine ways to guard against future storms has called for flood walls in subways, water pumps at airports and sea barriers along the coast. It's unclear whether enough money can be found for all the expensive recommendations.
As property values drop, mayors and school boards must decide between cutting services or programs, raising taxes or seeking additional revenue from other sources if they want to keep the status quo.
As spring comes to the Northeast, the process of recovery continues.
Coming to the fore is a financial question: for some localities, up to a third of their tax base was wiped away with the destruction of beachfront properties. Matoloking, NJ, was particularly hard hit, for instance, losing nearly a third of the value of its existing tax base.
Local officials there and elsewhere must decide how to respond: cut services, raise taxes or borrow--even as, ironically, their government's credit ratings may be at risk of downgrade.
Of course, state and Federal assistance is helping. But with those budgets tight, too, it's not clear just how this will all play out.
What is clear is that the economic blow Sandy dealt will have effects that last for a long time to come.
As dawn broke over Manhatten on the last day of October, 2012, it was already clear that Sandy, the hurricane-turned-post-tropical-cyclone, had dealt the city a devastating blow: the storm surge had muscled its way over seawalls from the Battery on up, submerging vehicles, filling subway tunnels, and shorting out elements of the power grid. One woman, awakening, thought she smelt the old fish market, gone for years; in reality, it was the sea brine and wrack outside her front door.
Amateur videographers had captured transformers exploding in bunches, like Fourth of July fireworks, before the power went down altogether, leaving an estimated six million people in the dark. By noon, the estimate had risen to eight million, and Consolidated Edison refused to estimate how long restoration would take. Fire broke out in Breezy Point, Queens; fire-fighters had to use boats to rescue 25 people trapped in upstairs apartments. 80 homes are reported destroyed.
"We have not seen damage like this in a generation," said New York governor Andrew Cuomo.
The Bounty foundering, as the USCG rescues crew members. Image courtesy USCG & Wikimedia Commons.
Nor was the Big Apple the only area affected. Sandy had earlier killed a reported 68 people in the Caribbean, mostly in Haiti. But by the morning of the 30th, flooding and power loss were extensive throughout New Jersey. Delaware was reportedly 'at a standstill,' with a complete driving ban in effect. The Mid-Atlantic coast had been pummeled hard already, with piers broken in half and coastal areas flooded.
Off the North Carolina coast, the tall ship Bounty--built in Nova Scotia for the Marlon Brando movie "Mutiny On The Bounty"--had to be abandoned as she foundered in heavy seas off Cape Hatteras. One crew member died and the captain is still missing.
Sandy's precipitation has been falling as heavy snow in West Virginia and Tennessee, where blizzard warnings were posted. Accumulations of three feet were predicted, and one woman had been killed in a snow-related traffic accident. And on the western fringes of the storm, over 50,000 people in the Toronto area were without power. One Toronto woman died when she was struck by flying debris.
Early estimates of the economic cost vary widely: Monday saw estimates of $5-10 billion in insured losses, and $10-20 billion in economic damages. The highest estimate reached $100 billion.
The New York Times called the hurricane a "once in a generation" event, inspired, perhaps, by Governor Cuomo.
Sandy's damage on 101st Street. Image courtesy MrChoppers and Wikimedia Commons.
Three recent scientific papers suggest that it may not prove to be. None, of course, addressed Sandy specifically; superstorms, like other weather, are not predictable months in advance. Yet the implications suggest that this disaster may be less of a fluke than might at first appear.
Most clearly pertinent is Francis and Vavrus (2012), which appeared earlier this year in Geophysical Research Letters, under the title Evidence linking Arctic amplification to extreme weather in mid-latitudes. The abstract--a summary customarily preceding the main body of a scientific paper--explains.
Arctic amplification (AA) – the observed enhanced warming in high northern latitudes relative to the northern hemisphere – is evident in lower-tropospheric temperatures… Daily [data] over N. America and the N. Atlantic [is used] to assesses changes in north-south (Rossby) wave characteristics… Two effects are identified that each contribute to a slower eastward progression of Rossby waves in the upper-level flow: 1) weakened zonal winds, and 2) increased wave amplitude. These effects are particularly evident in autumn and winter consistent with sea-ice loss, but are also apparent in summer, possibly related to earlier snow melt on high-latitude land. Slower progression of upper-level waves would cause associated weather patterns in mid-latitudes to be more persistent, which may lead to an increased probability of extreme weather events that result from prolonged conditions, such as drought, flooding, cold spells, and heat waves.
The other papers are Jaiser et al (2012), in Tellus, and Liu et al (2012), in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences; both papers linked declining Arctic sea ice to blocking events, which can lead to outbreaks of severe wintery weather in the mid-latitudes.
So what might this have to do with Sandy?
The 2011 meteorological autumn was unusual in that both a hurricane and an October snowstorm hit the north-east. They occurred two months apart, and the idea that either one would happen again in the near-term was not something high up on the probability scale. But if there is one thing more unpredictable than politics, it's the weather.
The kicker here is that the jet stream, which carries weather systems across the country, is coming along at the perfect time and will block the eastward movement of Sandy.
The jet will force the storm to head due north. The jet should then pick up the storm and bring it back towards to the coast. The result is a five day projection of Sandy as a tropical storm (ie winds of 39-74mph) into New York City by Tuesday midday.
Not too shabby for a 5-day projection. As it turned out, Sandy sped up, hitting New York just about high tide on Monday. And she had changed character, morphing into a "post-tropical cyclone." But the track was about right, and the winds recorded were consistent with the projection, too.
Sandy's track. Map courtesy Wikipedia.
Hurricane Sandy barrels towards the US – will it really be the end of days? | World news | guardian.
Harry J Enten: Forecasters are predicting an unusual degree of severe weather, but it's much too early for the hurricane hysteria to kick in.
Moreover, for most of the way, Sandy's path led over waters that were anomalously warm--up to 5 degrees Celcius, which is quite a lot. Warm waters feed energy into hurricanes.
So if a slowed and more meandering jet stream ("weakened zonal winds" and "increased [Rossby] wave amplitude")--caused, perhaps, by the unusually low Arctic sea ice--steered Sandy; and if warmer-than-usual sea surface temperatures in the Western Atlantic--clearly related to the warming climate--strengthened her; then both shaped the ongoing disaster. To ask the question in an over-simplified way, was Sandy 'caused' by human-induced global warming?
The short answer would be "No, but AGW may have contributed." Or, as Dr. Andrew Weaver of the University of Victoria more colorfully put it, "The ingredients of this storm seem a little bit cooked by climate change, but the overall storm is difficult to attribute to global warming."
In other words, Sandy very possibly would have existed without AGW. But she likely would not have gone where she went, nor become as strong as she did.
East coast sea surface temperatures compared to normal; October 25, 2012. Image courtesy ESRL, crop by author.
Putting the "Frankenstorm" called Sandy in broader climate context.
This year, Americans saw a strangely warm winter, a ridiculously hot summer and extreme drought conditions. As Hurricane Sandy advances on the East Coast, folks may be wondering if climate change has come to pass. Let's see what science can tell us.
Climate scientist Michael Oppenheimer stood along the Hudson River and watched his research come to life as Hurricane Sandy blew through New York.
An even-handed description of the ways in which climate change may have 'juiced' Sandy, written before landfall.
Something analogous has been happening during this strange day of October 30, 2012. This morning the numbers were crisp and stark: 6.8 million people were without power. 18 had died. Tonight, the picture is hazier: NBC says that 46 people were killed by Sandy; CBS says "at least 50." NBC reports that 6.6 million "individual structures" are without power; the number of actual people would be higher, but by how much is unknown. CBS says 8.2 million "households," adding later in the report that the Breezy Point fire "destroyed as many as 100 houses." NBC claimed that destruction claimed "at least 110," and that 20 more were damaged. Morning's seeming certainties are tonight's confusion.
But clarity will come. The missing will be accounted for; power will be restored to the last customer; and eventually, the last entry will be written in the computerized ledger tallying all the costs. Sandy will be history.
Similarly, the meteorological and climatological contributing factors will be sorted out. We'll know, at some point, just how much the sea ice did, or did not, shape the meanders of this October's jet stream--or, if not that, then at least how much it does so in general. We'll know more precisely how those warm waters powered Sandy up into the most widespread cyclone observed in the Atlantic, and we'll know in more detail just how unusual the temperatures were in context.
But it's already clear that Sandy has been a huge blow to the Northeast--big enough to affect US GDP numbers for the last quarter of 2012. And it's clear that whether Sandy was 'caused' or 'influenced' or 'cooked' or 'steered' by AGW or not, we are experiencing a very different meteorological world. It's not just Sandy in 2012, after all; it's the massive drought, the record low sea ice, and, in the US, the warmest year on record.
We're not in Kansas anymore. We can't count on old certainties. Sandy's exact relationship to AGW may not be clear, but it is clear that asking whether global warming caused this disaster is not a fool's question. Rather the reverse: it is foolish, and criminally irresponsible, not to consider whether we are setting ourselves up for grave harms; not to ask what the cost of those harms might be; and not to prepare to deal with them.
If ordinary weather is a roll of the dice, then climate change can load them--load them to come up "drought, flooding, cold spells, and heat waves," as Francis and Vavrus put it.
And if they are loaded enough, another Sandy could come down the pike a lot sooner than Governor Cuomo might think.
Hurricane and Tropical Storm news from The Weather Channel. Sandy produced major coastal flooding, winds in excess of 80 mph and knocked out power to millions.
Superstorm Sandy slowly weakened over land Tuesday, but not before leaving behind a devastating trail of destruction across the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic.
As morning dawns on the Feast of All Saints, reports speak of the Northeast taking the first steps back to normalcy. In many of the jurisdictions affected more peripherally by the storm, power is largely restored, though millions are still without it in New York.
Transportation is coming to life again, slowly--ports are reopening, and even sections of the New York subway are now operating, though commutes are stitched together clumsily with shuttle bus links. By way of compensation, rides are free for the time being.
More somberly, the death toll continues to rise as rescue and recovery efforts continue. 74 people are now known to have been killed in the storm, from a variety of causes. The casualty numbers will likely continue to rise for some time.
As much as 2-3' of snow fell in the mountains of Maryland and West Virginia, with lighter snows in Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Ohio.
"By sunrise Wednesday, 16 different locations in three states had reported at least two feet of snow," reports weather.com meteorologist Nick Wiltgen.
Of great concern is the situation of residents trapped in homes without heat. In West Virginia, the governor says that it may be days before power is completely restored. The National Guard is rescuing people and distributing meals--up to a planned 7 million, by the time the crisis passes.
Details on the lives lost as a result of Superstorm Sandy in late October 2012.
The massive storm that started out as Hurricane Sandy slammed into the East Coast and morphed into a huge and problematic system, killing at least 92 people in the United States. Power outages now stand at more than 3.8 million homes and businesses.
Discussion of changing climate norms and risk from CN.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo told reporters when inspecting the World Trade Center the state needs to rebuild for a "new reality" due to "extreme weather events."
Reaction to Sandy's global warming connection and dealing with risk.
The morning of All Soul's day, November 2nd, sees National Public Radio reporting that the US death toll from the storm has now exceeded 90--CNN says, more precisely, that "at least 92" deaths are now confirmed. 48 people died in New York. That brings the hemispheric death toll from this storm to 161.
Power outages remain widespread, though down by about half from their peak. Huffington Post puts the numbers at "more than 3.8 million homes and businesses, down from a peak of 8.5 million."
"The time has come. The city is finally going to have to face this," said oceanography professor Malcolm J. Bowman at Long Island's Stony Brook University. He has warned for years of the potential for a catastrophic storm surge in New York and has advocated for a barrier.
As outlined in the Associated Press story from which this quote is pulled, such a barrier would entail a multi-billion dollar price tag and a prolonged development process. Similar measures are in place in various places, from Providence, Rhode Island, to Saint Petersburg, Russia.
I'm hopeful that not only will we rebuild this city and metropolitan area but use this as an opportunity to build it back smarter. There have been a series of extreme weather events. That is not a political statement; that is a factual statement," Cuomo told the reporters. "Anyone who says there is not a change in weather patterns is denying reality. We have a new reality when it comes to these weather patterns; we have an old infrastructure, we have old systems. That is not a good combination and that is one of the lessons I will take from this, personally.
Bloomberg business week (re-reported in Climate Progress) certainly takes a clear position.
This Bloomberg Business Week cover certainly says it all.
As of 11 PM on November 2nd, the US death toll had risen to 106, according to CNN.
Disaster modeling company Eqecat estimated Sandy caused up to $20 billion in insured losses and $50 billion in economic losses, double its previous forecast. New York Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli estimated economic losses of $15 billion to $18 billion in New York state alone.
Tempers were starting to fray in some areas, as the strain of waiting for improvements started to tell; police had to respond to gas line disputes, as lines snaked around blocks. "They forgot about us," said one Staten Island resident.
As of 7 AM Eastern Time, Sunday, November 4, the death toll had not increased further.
...the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported no gas in 67% of metropolitan New York stations on Friday, the federal agency estimated that figure plummeted to 38% on Saturday.
Some of this is due to direct corporate or government action. The Federal government has brought in 12 million gallons of fuel, and Hess was approvingly cited by Mayor Bloomberg for supplying gasoline to other companies' stations. But much is also due to the restoration of electricity to stations which may have had fuel in their tanks, but needed power to pump it.
Restoration of power is still far from complete, however--the linked CNN report says that "More than 835,000 customers were [still] in the dark statewide by mid-afternoon [Saturday]." Over the entire region affected by Sandy, the number is reported to be 2.4 million.
Several residents in the Rockaways, in Queens, vented their frustrations at New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg as he toured the area Saturday. One woman yelled, "When are we going to get some help!" while a man talked about "old ladies in my building who have got nothing."
To that mixture of emotions, one should add fear. While the temperatures had remained relatively high following Sandy's strike, that appears to be changing. Sunday's overnight low is predicted to be below freezing in Manhatten, and highs throughout much of the region will struggle to reach the 50s.
Worse, forecast models predict the possibility of a Nor'easter developing by Wednesday. "I can't believe it," exclaimed New Jersey governor Chris Christie.
A current summary, with links, to online NBC News Sandy stories.
In the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy which devastated the Northeast, the U.S. death toll has risen over 110 with more than 1 million still without power.
In the morning, CNN reported a US death toll of 110 people. But later in the day, other media updated that number to 117.
Most New Yorkers are going back to work as the new week begins. Some tunnels under the East River are back in service, but service will not reach normal levels. Some routes remain down, and fewer trains than usual are running. The commute is expected to be "challenging."
Mayor Michael Bloomberg told reporters he expected to take the subway to work on Monday. He will be joined by many of the students returning to class in the nation's largest school system. About 90 percent of the 1,700 schools will reopen for the first time since Sandy hit last Monday, the mayor said.
"Though this storm will not have near the magnitude of the impact Sandy had, the combination of rain, wind and snow will add insult to injury for the recovery process along the East Coast," The Weather Channel's Chris Dolce reported.
Before and after photos of the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy.
A new computer animation reveals the explosive and erratic development of superstorm Sandy.
The focus is shifting toward the housing problem--something like 200,000 people need places to live in the greater New York area. FEMA and local officials are attempting to facilitate placements in apartments, hotels and other spaces, but it is not an area with high vacancy rates.
Some photos illustrating was has happened have been made available; see the CBC story linked in the sidebar. And a Delaware researcher has made a stunning animation of Sandy's development.
We spell out the four primary impacts of Athena and outline who will be affected the most and where.
The predicted misery of another storm--dubbed winter storm Athena--is materializing this hour, as rain and snow move into the areas affected by Sandy. Many residents still don't have power--and if tree limbs become laden with snow, we may well see additional outages.
Accurate death toll figures are becoming increasingly difficult to find as Sandy fades from the news cycle. But NPR news gave a figure of 124 on November 8, and at least one published report cited 121 deaths.
Meanwhile, the Nor'easter which struck Wednesday dumped up to a foot of snow, causing hundreds of thousands of new power outages. Some who had power restored lost it once more; others have been without power for 11 days.
"Look how fast you can shut down the region, just by shutting town the pumps," he said, adding that officials must examine what, where and how to rebuild infrastructure so the region is not hampered in the future.
As with Katrina, for many Sandy is rapidly receding into memory, but for the victims the reality has not changed very much. Recovery is painfully slow.
Among the biggest jobs is the total restoration of the relatively new South Ferry terminal, which is expected to cost $600 million.
"South Ferry was destroyed. It wasn't hurt. It wasn't wrecked. It was destroyed – from top to bottom," Lhota said last month.
For thousands of private citizens, progress is just as painfully slow. Since private insurance is expected to be the first avenue for funding each individual's or family's recovery, FEMA checks typically amount to perhaps 10% of losses--welcome, helpful, but a bare start. And documenting losses while financially strapped and living in temporary housing is not quick nor easy.
Democrats on Capitol Hill said President Barack Obama plans to ask Congress for about $50 billion in additional emergency aid for states hit by the storm.
Superstorm Sandy victims had their sights Saturday on Washington, D.C., hoping to avoid political gridlock as they work to get the money needed to recover from the storm.
The price tag for Sandy seems to be rising, as well. Governor Christy of New Jersey, asked for a reported $83 billion from President Obama, to be divided among the three states most affected. President Obama, in turn, asked Congress for $60, to be apportioned among all 11 affected states. It is unclear what an austerity-minded House will agree to, with the 'fiscal cliff' looming.
Either way, these amounts would be intended for reconstruction, and should presumably be counted as 'replacement costs' for actual losses. Economic losses will add billions to the price tag, but it will take time to understand these with any clarity. Already, reports of the effects on employment are contradictory.
Elsewhere, the numbers have been noted with--indignation, perhaps? Kumi Naidoo of Greenpeace international took note of the inadequacy of the proposals under consideration at the Congress of Parties Conference 18 in Doha, Qatar, pointedly contrasting the $60 billion figure President Obama requested with the $100 billion fund proposed to channel funds from developed to developing economies to cope with the effects of climate change.
How is it, he asks, that if a single storm can cost $60 billion in one region of the US, $100 billion can for one moment be considered adequate recompense from the entire developed world to the entire developing world?
Image courtesy MTA and Wikimedia Commons.
The economy, foreign policy, justice--all weighty issues touched upon in the Presidential and Vice-Presidential debates of 2012. But the issue that will shape more lives for good or ill for longer was conspicuous by its absence.
Can Mr. Romney Deliver A Prosperous Economy?
Mr. Romney promises a prosperous America as a result of his 'pro-growth' policies. What are the chances that he can deliver?
Thanks for your first-hand comment, Rnj. Speaking of loading the weather (climate) dice, meteorologist Jeff Masters just posted that October broke a string of warmer-than-usual months for the lower 48 stretching back to the summer of 2011. But 2012 is still on track to be the warmest calendar year ever observed for the contiguous US.
Sandy was definitely an unusual storm. I was worried that if a hurricane made it up to the New York area this year that the impact would be bad because the ocean temperatures were so warm this summer and fall, which is due in part to the warm winter last winter, which may be due to the changing jet stream patterns caused by global warming and the arctic ice melting. I thought hurricane season passed us by, but then along came Sandy. Historically, the New York Area has experienced a major hurricane (at least Cat 3) every 70 to 90 years, so storms even stronger than Sandy have a history of affecting the New York Area. However, like the last one (the 1938 CaT 3 Long Island Express), they usually take the coastal route and stay well east of New York City. It appears that the chances of major hurricanes and superstorms like Sandy impacting coastal areas like New York are increasing as the ocean warms and the jet stream's steering currents change. As you have said in the past regarding increasing heat waves, global warming has loaded the dice in favor of these extreme weather events.
Hi Y'all - There's a book called "The Control of Nature" by John McPhee that does an excellent job of explaining the Mississippi vs Atchafalaya situation. From it, I got the idea of writing a hub comparing two watersheds - that one and the one where I live near the San Gabriel Mountains (SoCal), also covered in the book. The hub has a link to the book and other sites I researched, including the State of Louisiana's current coastal restoration plan.
Great questions. The answer to your last seems to be, no, we are not ready for a national conversation about this, because too many of us can't yet look at reality honestly.
Personally, I think we're overdue for such a conversation.
I also have to wonder, Doc, whether the insurance industry will be able to induce the kinds of changes in public policy needed to preserve the viability of their industry. On a small scale, requirements levied by insurance carriers can cause people to improve the safety of their homes -- we were told to reroof or lose coverage. On an industrial scale, rates were tied to safety equipment being built into cars. But here, like in New Orleans, we're talking about the wisdom of rebuilding in natural hazard zones. Can the credit rating of cities be tied to whether they discourage building in areas that are becoming hazardous due to the increasing severity of storms? Could city governments offer attractive inducements for locating in safer areas, and could they refuse building permits for repairing damaged structures where it is clear they will be destroyed repeatedly? These questions may start with climate and weather, but they extend way past that. Can we even have a national discussion about this?
Thanks for great comments. Iscribble, I suspect you are correct; in today's update I quoted Governor Cuomo, whose mind appears to be made up on the issue. I also reposted the Bloomberg Business cover, which is worth a look, and certainly is more than definite.
Orin, thanks for expanding on that thought. It's interesting in this connection to observe that the nuclear industry has enjoyed special Federal insurance through the Price-Anderson Act; the second tier runs to $12.6 per incident. The idea was to protect the industry against disasters that might be 'too big to cover,' if I have the history straight.
Yet Sandy will cost much more than that. Even under the status quo, how much of the tab will be picked up by the various levels of government? And what will the future hold as sea levels rise, warming continues (as it assuredly will), and weather keeps getting wackier?
"...the government ends up playing Emergency Room to uninsured patients," quite possibly indeed.
I'm not in the Insurance industry, so I might just be blowing smoke here, but it seems to me that the industry would attempt to hedge their bets on their expected payoffs by adjusting premiums and exclusions. At the same time, their customers (both people and businesses) are also making judgements about what they can afford, and an increasing number of these customers would be squeezed to the point of making a bet that they might not need as much coverage, so that they can pay their other costs, much like people who opt to not take collision on their cars if they're not forced to by their lender.
But people don't have the benefit of the statistical analyses used by their insurers, and they'll open themselves to devastating losses in the interests of short-term fiscal viability. An awful lot of people think that because they haven't totaled their car yet, they must therefore be safe drivers. This faulty logic will be applied to other risks as well.
So then, when a widespread disaster like this strikes, an enormous number of people will be instantly destitute. They'll have no way to recover from the loss. Affordable insurance will be revealed to be inadequate insurance. And yet, because the insurance industry depends on having enough income from premiums to cover their payouts, their existence depends on a predictable customer base. So when that predictability weakens, their own risks increase. More insurers will likely fold, leaving customers in the lurch, and the government ends up playing Emergency Room to uninsured patients.
Another very informative article, DS. I'm pretty confident that once the dust and debris have settled, climatologists will conclude that global warming had a significant role in how Sandy played out. 350.org suggested that dubbing the storm Hurricane Chevron or Hurricane Exxon would be poetic justice. I agree, and I hope the label catches on, like "Obamacare" and "Romnesia". I think this would likely do more to sway public opinion than all the detailed scientific explanations in the world. What do you think?
Orin, the question would presumably be whether (and when) a 'new normal' can be established that would enable the kinds of adjustments (no pun intended) you describe to let the insurance industry operate successfully. And that might depend upon the mitigation efforts--that being the jargon for 'reducing or eliminating CO2 and other GHG emissions--and adaptation efforts society as a whole makes.
But I'm not so clear about the 'bubble' you mention. Feel free to expand on the thought, if you'd like: would the bubble belong to the larger economy, or do you mean that rising premiums and payouts would create an 'insurance bubble?' And what do you see the 'effects' being? You've piqued my curiosity!
watergeek, that sounds like a huge shift. (I don't mean that in a skeptical way; I've canoed enough rivers to know that rivers do shift their courses, and sheer scale doesn't change that.) What would the results be, in geographic and human terms? Can you point me (and any readers here who may be interested) to some sources for further reading? You, too, piqued my interest!
I'm waiting for the Mississippi River to finally jump its banks and switch over to the Atchafalaya, drowning Baton Rouge and New Orleans in the process. Hurricane Katrina didn't do it, although it came close. But like you said, events are occurring more quickly and are stronger these days.
Insurance is a business model founded on a narrative that says because we can state the probability of events, we can make profitable bets on how much they'll have to pay out against how much they get from premium payments. That narrative has been broken by AGW, so the insurance industry must scramble to adjust their model. I would expect premiums to rise and exclusions to grow in the short term. But the entire insurance enterprise could crumble as a bubble in the economy. The effects of this bubble, however, will be unlike what has come before.
That's an insightful comment, Orin.
Coincidentally, I was just reading a comment at RealClimate earlier about how increasingly unstable and unpredictable weather is a challenge for insurers, whose whole business model of course depends on risks being statistically predicable. Many of them--especially Munich Re--are quite concerned about the climate change issue.
Along with getting people to accept the science of AGW and how it affects so many things, we also need to address some of the narratives that we use to talk about events such as Sandy. People often call such events the 'storm of the century', or a 'once-in-a-lifetime' event, but these narratives assume an essentially static climatic environment, and that assumption is no longer true. Planning for 50-year storms was a way for cities to gauge how extreme their preparations had to be, in the form of a compromise between prudence and safety. But what had been a 50-year storm in the middle of the last century is likely to be more of a 10-year storm now. Infrastructure is designed to withstand predicted stresses during its expected lifetime, but when those stresses are repeatedly beyond those predictions, the designs will fail. In NYC, the subways were not expected to have to withstand being flooded as they just were. The corrosive effects of seawater may not be immediately evident, but the expected lifetime of such infrastructure is shortened, and it will fail sooner than it might otherwise. We ignore the cost of repairing and rebuilding our infrastructure by hiding in narratives that no longer serve us well.
Yeah, I like that sidebar thing, too. I'd say you're welcome to use it, but I'm sure I'm not the first!
That was great Doc! Informative, well laid out, factual rather than sensational. (I also like the way you put your link in sidebars. I'm going to adopt that technique.) ;) Voted up and shared.
And, of course, disasters do happen anyway. But there's good reason to think, as you do, that our abuse of the environment is having consequences. And Sandy reminds us that the cost of inaction can be very, very high.
We should heighten our efforts to not only preserve but improve our environment. I really believe that superstroms and other horrifying natural disasters are directly related to our continuous abuse so we should change our ways before it's too late.


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Crafting Research
December 11, 2017 jennymacknessLeave a comment
This seminar that I attended last week on crafting research was very interesting. It was organised by the Department of Organisation, Work and Technology at Lancaster University, UK, and delivered by Professor Hugh Willmott from City University London. Hugh Willmott has been working with Professor Emma Bell from the Open University. His talk was based on a paper they are working on, in which they are exploring the significance of crafting research in business and management, although having heard this talk the ideas presented seem relevant to social sciences research in general.
The essence of the work lies in an interest in how to produce well-crafted research and avoid Baer and Shaw's (see reference list) criticism:
As editors, we are often surprised by the lack of "pride and perfection" in submitted work, even when there is a kernel of a good idea somewhere in the manuscript. Submitted manuscripts that report results from research designs in which many shortcuts have been taken are rather commonplace. In addition, many papers seem to have been hastily prepared and submitted, with obvious rough edges in terms of grammar and writing style.
In their article Baer and Shaw quote C.W. Mills as follows:
Scholarship is a choice of how to live as well as a choice of career; whether he knows it or not, the intellectual workman forms his own self as he works toward perfection of his craft; to realize his potentialities, and any opportunities that come his way, he constructs a character which has at its core the qualities of the good workman. —C. W. Mills, 1959
The seminar started with a look at the online etymology dictionary where we can see that the meaning of the word craft has, over time, shifted in meaning from 'power, physical strength, might' to 'skill, dexterity'.
The thrust of the argument made was that researchers should shift towards being craftsmen who are dedicated to the community, have a social conscience and are aware of and acknowledge the ethical and political dimensions of their research. Such an approach would also openly acknowledge uncertainty and bias in research and the role of embodiment and imagination.
The image that ran through this presentation was Simon Starling's art work 'Shedboatshed'.
Starling was the winner of the Turner Prize in 2005. For this work he dismantled a shed and turned it into a boat; loaded with the remains of the shed, the boat was paddled down the Rhine to a museum in Basel, dismantled and re-made into a shed. See: http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-britain/exhibition/turner-prize-2005/turner-prize-2005-artists-simon-starling for further information.
I'm not sure that I fully understand the significance of using Starling's work in relation to crafting research unless it's that his work has been described as research-based and clearly involves research and craft. Maybe it's simply that Starling deconstructs familiar things to recreate them in different forms?
Interestingly, in the questions that followed the seminar, the thorny issue of having to write in a prescriptive way to be accepted in high ranking journals was discussed. Some members of the audience seemed to accept this as a given constraint which cannot be surmounted, i.e. we need to write and present research in a way which will not only be accepted by the given journal, but also will meet the requirements of the University's REF. For some of the seminar participants there seemed to be no room for embodied, imaginative research which embraces uncertainty. My suggestion that we should perhaps look for alternative publishing outlets, blogs being one example, was met with an outcry of protest from one or two in the audience. 'No one reads blogs' they said, and besides 'Blogging is cowardly'. I neither understood this nor agreed. The conversation seemed to endorse these sentences from Baer and Shaw's paper:
Our goal was to reaffirm the notion that scholarly pursuit in the management sciences is a form of craftsmanship—we are craftsmen! Some may dismiss our arguments as idealistic or romantic. The realities of life as an academic, the pressures we are under—to publish in order not to perish—offer an all-to-convenient excuse to dismiss our ideas.
What a sorry state of affairs, but I do know from experience that many journals are not prepared to take a chance on non-conventional styles of presentation; Introduction, Literature Review, Method, Results, Conclusion remains the format most likely to get accepted and to suggest that the research endeavour might have failed or that there is a degree of uncertainty around the results is unlikely to lead to a favourable response. It seems there's a long way to go before the idea of crafting research in the terms presented by Hugh Willmott is widely accepted.
A wide range of Literature was referred to in this seminar, which will be interesting to follow up on. See the references below.
Adamson, G. (2013). The Invention of Craft. Bloomsbury Academic.
Alley, M. (2018 4th edition). The Craft of Scientific Writing. Springer
Baer, M. & Shaw, J.D. (2017). Falling in love again with what we do: Academic Craftsmanship in the Management Sciences. Academy of Management Journal. 80(4), 1213-1217.
Bell, E., Kothiyal, N. & Willmott, H. (2017). Methodology-as-Technique and the Meaning of Rigour in Globalized Management Research. British Journal of Management, 28(3), 534–550.
Burrell, G. & Morgan, G. (1979). Sociological paradigms and organisational analysis: elements of the sociology of corporate life. Heinemann
Cunliffe, A. (2010). Crafting Qualitative Research: Morgan and S Smircich 30 Years On. Organizational Research Methods OnlineFirst.
Delamont, S. & Atkinson, P.A. (2001). Doctoring uncertainty: mastering craft knowledge. Social Studies of Science, 31(1), 87-107.
Frayling, C. (2017, reprint edition). On Craftsmanship: Towards a New Bauhaus. Oberon Books
Kvale, S. & Brinkmann, S. (2008 2nd edition). Interviews: Learning the Craft of Qualitative Research. SAGE Publication.
Wright Mills, C. (2000). Sociological Imagination. Oxford University Press.
Higher Education, Researchacade, academic writing, crafting research, Research, scholarship
Academic writing: saying what you really mean
November 8, 2015 jennymacknessLeave a comment
Link to source of image
This morning I picked up this quote from a blog post Thirteen Ways of Looking at Ted Hughes by Anthony Wilson.
Teachers' words should not be 'How to write' but 'How to try to say what you really mean' – which is part of the search for self-knowledge and perhaps, in one form or another, grace.
Ted Hughes (2008). Poetry in the Making, p.12
The quote caught my attention because recently I have come across a number of academic articles where the author/s undoubtedly know the conventions of writing but don't seem to know how to say what they really mean. Although the peer review process is often criticised, in my experience it can help authors to become clearer in saying what they really mean. On a couple of occasions I, with my collaborators, have had to completely rewrite an article in response to reviewers comments, even to the point of changing the title, before the paper could be published. It is really nice to get a review which says 'no changes required', but this has only happened to me once!
Why can it be so difficult for intelligent academics to say what they really mean? Putting aside the possibility that the author has simply not spent enough time engaging with and reading around relevant and associated ideas, two possible reasons immediately come to mind.
Research is by its nature messy and emergent, so ideas are emerging and dynamic. They don't come fully formed, but grow and develop with the on-going process of the research. It is often difficult to know when to stop the research, stop the reading, stop the data collection, stop the analysis and discussion with colleagues and just get on with the writing. Perhaps there are times when we don't make the correct judgement about this time to stop and begin the writing.
We often end up wallowing in data and find we have far too much for the 6000 word paper (or less, but rarely much more) we want to submit. It may be that the data analysis suggests more than one line of argument and you've spent so long on the research process that it's hard to let go of some ideas, the result being a paper that loses focus; the author then can't or doesn't say what s/he really means.
Etienne Wenger has said that meaning occurs through an on-going process of negotiation, which does not necessarily involve language and that reification gives our meanings an independent existence and shapes our experience. (See Meaning is the driver of learning)
For authors of academic articles there is a tension between negotiation of meaning and reification. As Wenger says 'Reification as a constituent of meaning is always incomplete' – so perhaps it is not surprising that we find it difficult to say/write what we really mean, because meaning is always up for negotiation.
Researchacademic writing, meaning, poetry, Ted Hughes, writing
Inconsistent experiences of journal article publication
February 17, 2015 February 21, 2015 jennymacknessLeave a comment
So far this year, I have been fortunate to have two journal articles published. It is always exciting after months of work to finally see papers in print. The first paper to come out in January was
Williams, R., Gumtau, S. & Mackness, J. (2015). Synesthesia: from cross-modal to modality-free learning and knowledge. Leonardo Journal
The second came out this month
Mackness, J. & Bell, F. (2015). Rhizo14: A Rhizomatic Learning cMOOC in Sunlight and in Shade. Open Praxis. 7(1), p. 25-38
The history behind the publication of these two papers couldn't be more different. Read on and then decide which history you would prefer. The Leonardo paper which I worked on with Roy Williams and Simone Gumtau is published in Leonardo Journal. This was quite a coup for us; on the ranking of visual arts journals released by Google Scholar it came in fourth. If I worked for a University, like Simone does, this would be important not just for me, but also for the University's Research Excellence Framework's (REF) ranking . Looking back in my folders and files, this is the history I find:
Jan 2012 Started work on the Synesthesia article
March 2012 First draft of the paper was completed
End of July 2012 Submitted to Leonardo Journal
Nov 2012 Received comprehensive reviewers comments
Jan 2013 Resubmitted and paper accepted for publication in Jan 2014
Jan 2015 Paper published
Following acceptance it seemed to take for ever to get permission for the images we wanted to include and meet the image quality requirements of Leonardo Journal. Roy did a huge amount of work on this. Ultimately the paper was not published until Jan 2015. The quality of the publication in terms of the work of the publishers in preparing this paper is very high. It looks great Leonardo is a closed journal with very strict copyright regulations. We cannot share the paper (for example on Research Gate) for another 6 months. Despite this we have had quite a few requests for this paper.
Time from start to finish = 3 years
The Open Praxis paper was published on Feb 14th this month. The history of this paper is as follows:
Feb 2014 Frances Bell and I started discussing the ethical framework and possible approaches for the research
March to Sept 2014 Collection and analysis of data
July 2014 Presentation about research in progress to ALTMOOCSIG at UCL
Sept/Oct 2014 Literature review and writing
10th Nov 2014 Submitted
13th Jan 2015 Accepted with no required changes. Feedback from reviewers. Made some minor edits
14th Feb 2015 Published
The process was very smooth with great attention to detail by the Editor and a good looking publication as an outcome. All communication with the Editor was courteous and helpful. In addition Open Praxis is an open journal and there were no issues with our coloured Table. We have been able to blog and tweet about this publication and are already receiving positive feedback.
Total time from start to finish = 1 year
Update: Just as I finish writing this post, Open Praxis tweets a brief report on Open Praxis figures and data (2013-2014) which is very interesting and reports an increasing impact as a journal.
Research, Rhizo14#rhizo14, academic writing, Research, rhizomatic learning, synaesthesia
Academic Writing as a 'Desire to Relate'
February 5, 2015 jennymackness8 Comments
A couple of days ago, Nancy White posted this video on Facebook (thank you for sharing it Nancy)
David Gregson : A Desire To Relate from Creative Matters on Vimeo.
The video, of the western Australian artist, David Gregson, tries to capture how he uses his art to communicate and his desire to relate. Quoting from the text under the video:
In the year 2000, the late Western Australian artist, David Gregson (1934 – 2002) allowed students from Curtin University of Technology (Perth, Australia) to access his Kellerberrin studio to film him as he worked. David, still recovering from recent surgery, completed the painting 'Provence Window' over a period of four days.
A highly prodigious visual artist, whose career spanned over 50 years, David Gregson is one of Western Australia's most highly regarded figurative painters. His dedication to opening our eyes to the communicative power of art, and his virtuosic talent with a paintbrush, strongly informed his art and continues to influence many an aspiring and established artist.
At the same time as being introduced to this video and David Gregson's work, I have been following Pat Thomson's blog in which she is sharing how she is running her 8-day writing course in Iceland . Patter is a wonderful blog and I always look forward to Pat's posts. I like the initial questions that Pat posed:
What is the contribution your paper will make?
What will connect your readers with this topic?
How will you create the niche for your work?
These are questions that I have been asking myself in some recent writing I have been doing, although they have been implicit concerns rather than articulated. Pat's next post was all about the writing the Introduction for a paper – and again, all very good advice. Since then she has written about the Literature and Methods sections of a thesis or paper.
How does all this relate to the David Gregson video? Well, when I watched the David Gregson video I immediately recognised the way of working, whereas when reading Pat's posts, I had to admit to myself that that is not the way I work. For example, in the most recent writing I have been doing, the introduction was the last section I wrote, I only had a very vague idea of where I was going at the start and I was waiting for ideas to emerge, for 'Ah Ha' moments.
On watching the video some of the things that David Gregson said resonated very strongly with me. On starting his painting he says:
'You may think that I am dithering. I am not really. I am trying to get into character of what it is that I am going to paint'.
Gregson painted his picture 'Provence Window' over four days. The video doesn't tell us how long he 'dithered' for, but in my most recent writing that I have been doing with Frances Bell about the rhizome as a metaphor for teaching and learning, I dithered for weeks and weeks. It has taken almost a year to get to the final draft.
Gregson says that in your work you are the performer, but you have to remember that standing behind you, looking over your shoulder, is the past, the present, the critic and the director. In other words, the act of painting, or in my case writing, is a multi-faceted conversation and you have to prepare yourself in your daily work by first calming down. He talks of becoming re-familiar with your materials each day in this calming preparation phase, saying 'hello' again, cruising around the painting surface, becoming as one with it – 'there's a little courtship about it'.
This is not dithering. This is becoming immersed in the process. It is not following a plan. It is allowing the process to 'speak to you'. I find it comforting to think that what might be perceived as dithering is actually a necessary part of the process.
Gregson then talks of introducing the characters and says that it is worthwhile introducing some extremes initially so that you have an intuitive scale from which to work. 'If you kick off on a high key it will keep you there', but if you introduce a major dark area you get a tangible meaningful contrast to the light. That makes sense to me. As he says, you can always rub out 'the bum notes'. If you are immersed in the process, sensitive to the areas which need attention and let the process (writing or painting) speak to you, you will know what you've got to get rid of, although in my own case, I have to say that this can take months rather than days.
I agree with Gregson when he says that we need to sustain a mood and be open to 'happy accidents'. The beginning and the middle of the process can all be very suggestive and vague, but the sense, the meaning, slowly emerges. I can recognise this too. I have to consciously be 'open' and patient, because at times, it can all feel so extraordinarily messy.
Gregson's commentary on his painting relates closely to my recent thinking and reading around Deleuze and Guattari's concept of the rhizome and the nomad. Nomadic thought encourages an avoidance of boundaries and free wandering. Rhizomatic thought encourages taking lines of flight and breaking free of traditional, hierarchical thinking – a deterritorialisation of thought. Ultimately though, there is reterritorialisation such that in the case of David Gregson he finally produced his painting 'Provence Window'. That was a reified outcome, which satisfied the requirements of the art world. Similarly, academic writers ultimately reify their written communications in the format required to satisfy the requirements of the audience for which the writing is intended. Currently many journals, if not most, require authors to write in very traditional ways, almost to a template. This is difficult to escape, for academics who want to be published – but perhaps the process of writing, before the final drafts, can benefit from lines of flight and deterritorialisation – a bit of free wandering rather than following a plan. Does this lead to more creative, communicative academic writing that fulfils a desire to relate, or does it just lead to a messy incoherence?
Researchacademic writing, David Gregson, Deleuze and Guattari, nomad, Pat Thomson, Research, rhizome
Academic blogging
October 26, 2014 October 28, 2014 jennymackness4 Comments
George Veletsianos is running a four week open course about networked scholarship and the implications of academics' presence and visibility online for their work and careers.
The first week is already over and there has been plenty of interesting discussion and two interesting events.
On Wednesday Michael Barbour joined the course for a day to answer any questions that participants threw at him and he generously shared his strategies for working in the open.
On Thursday there was a webinar with Laura Czerniewicz who shared her work on open scholarly practice in relation to presence, visibility and branding, including her guide to curating open scholarly content:
An 8-step guide to curating open scholarly content
and with Sarah Goodier a Four Step Guide to online presence
Also shared in the course was this slideshare by Sydneyeve Matrix about academic branding –
How to Use Social Media for Academic Branding from Sidneyeve Matrix
There has been some discussion about whether academics should blog. Some have said that open scholarship means sharing all aspects of your life (I have blogged about this in the past ), but as Laura Czerniewicz said 'Some people are not comfortable blogging – some people have a blogging voice, others don't'.
For me it's not either/or. Sometimes I feel that I can't get the blog posts I want to make out fast enough. At other times I feel that I have nothing to say, nothing to add to the conversation that has not already been said, nothing that I think anyone would find interesting to read – but sometimes you just have to force yourself and start writing, because as others before me have pointed out, writing is a practice – use it or lose it.
Catherine Cronin has recently said (I can't remember where – sorry Catherine) that you can never tell whether something you write might be of use to someone, and you might never know.
Stephen Downes (a most prolific blogger) has written somewhere (or maybe it was said – again I don't remember – sorry Stephen) that if you can't find anything to write about, you must be a boring person, 'or words to that effect'. I think what he meant was that everyone has something to say – we just need the confidence, the belief that there is someone out there that might want to listen.
This echoes what the poet Bernadette Mayer said in a Modern and Contemporary American Poetry MOOC webinar this week – 'You can't have writer's block – as that would mean total lack of thought'. It's not lack of thought, it's lack of confidence. Various bloggers have written about this (see references at the end of this post).
Bernadette Mayer has provided loads of possible starting points for writers in a long document Bernadette Mayer's List of Journal Ideas. In the webinar her advice was to find something completely impossible to write about and write about it, such that the problem becomes the material and we use the constraints. Write against the reality that is presented to you – she says.
Bernadette's advice is for poets, but works equally well for academic bloggers. The advantage of blogging is that it can release you from the conventions of academic writing of the type done for journal articles. You can simply start and 'let it all hang out' and include images and multimedia. You can write a line or two or you can write at length. There are a whole host of genres you can experiment with.
I think it would be a shame to think about blogging only in terms of scholarship and academic branding. Blogging is much more than that, even for academics. It is about 'finding your voice' and building an identity. As Laura said: 'So much scholarship is embodied in a person.'
Some references that might be of interest, that I have come across or been reminded of this week are:
Downes, S (2009) Blogs in Education
Theresa MacPhail (2014) The Confidence Gap in Academic Writing
Also see this page on Scholarly Writing
Dr Inger Mewburn's Thesis Whisperer blog always has useful posts. See for example http://thesiswhisperer.com/2011/08/16/5-strategies-to-help-your-research-student-to-write/
As does Pat Thomson's Patter blog – See this post on writer's block
See also Martin Weller's book – The Digital Scholar
Uncategorized#modpo, #scholar14, academic branding, academic writing, Bernadette Mayer, blogging, georgeveletsianos, Laura Czerniewicz, Michael Barbour, stephen downes


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D'Silva is one of four researchers across the US whose research is being funded by 2017 SOAR grants.
WASHINGTON: An Indian-origin scientist in the US has been awarded a USD 8.1 million grant to support her research on lethal head and neck cancer, which could help improve the survival rates of patients.
Nisha D'Silva received the prestigious Sustaining Outstanding Achievement in Research award, or SOAR, for her continuing research into the molecular pathways that control the spread and recurrence of head and neck cancer.
The ultimate goal of the research by Dr D'Silva, clinician- scientist at the University of Michigan (U-M) in the US, is to improve the survival rates of patients with this particularly lethal form of cancer.
Her findings may enable clinicians to identify patients who will best respond to existing treatments, and might lead to new treatment strategies.
Dr D'Silva's grant from the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR) will be disbursed over eight years. "It is truly exciting news that a clinician and scientist as accomplished as Dr D'Silva will now have extended funding to allow her to focus on finding answers to some of the toughest cancer questions we have," said Laurie McCauley, dean of the School of Dentistry at U-M.
"The prestigious SOAR grant speaks volumes about how the NIDCR views Dr D'Silva's research track record and her potential moving forward," said McCauley.
Dr D'Silva noted that head and neck cancer is the sixth-most common cancer in the world with about 600,000 new cases per year.
Nearly half of all patients die within five years of diagnosis, she said. "The focus of our research programme is invasion because this is a defining feature of head and neck cancer," said Dr D'Silva, also a professor of pathology at the U-M Medical School.
"Invasion is important for spread of head and neck cancer, but unfortunately there are no strategies that effectively target invasion. This knowledge gap is due to limited progress in identifying and understanding the underlying mechanisms that control invasion," she said.
Dr D'Silva is one of four researchers across the US whose research is being funded by 2017 SOAR grants, according to information NIDCR.
SOAR provides long-term support for NIDCR-funded investigators who are in mid-career and have outstanding records of research productivity, mentorship and professional service to the research community. "This award provides a longer base of grant support, allowing investigators to have more freedom to perform high-risk, high-reward research that has the potential to break new ground or expand previous discoveries in new directions," according to NIDCR.


text:
Edward John Kerling (June 12, 1909 – August 8, 1942) was a spy and saboteur for Nazi Germany and leader of Operation Pastorius during World War II.

Early life
Born in Biebrich, Wiesbaden, Kerling was the son of Kasper and Walberoa Kerling. His father, Kasper, was a World War I Imperial German Army veteran. Kerling studied engineering at the University of Freiburg. He joined the Nazi Party in 1928. After leaving school, he went to the U.S. and over the next several years worked a myriad of jobs. He married Marie Sighard in 1931. Kerling and Sighard frequently travelled back to Germany throughout the years to visit their families. The couple was estranged by the time of Operation Pastorius, with both being in other relationships.

World War II
In the summer of 1940, Kerling once more returned to Germany to look for work. He received a position within the Wehrmacht translating English broadcasts into German. He was sent to France for the duration of the project and returned to Berlin after three months. Upon returning, Kerling was given a position with the Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda managing German theatres. He remained with the Propaganda Ministry for the next two years until Walter Kappe offered him the chance to return to the U.S. on a military mission. After a short time Kerling accepted the offer and spent the next several weeks training and becoming acquainted with other members of the mission. He spent a great deal of time with his parents during this period.

Operation Pastorius
Operation Pastorius consisted of 12 Germans who were fluent in English. They were trained as secret agents at the Brandenburg School of Sabotage. Upon graduation they were sent to the U.S. via U-boat in an attempt to damage infrastructure and industries vital to the American war effort. Kerling's group landed on Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida on June 17, 1942.

Kerling was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation on June 23, 1942. It was revealed that two members of the other group, George Dasch and Ernst Burger, betrayed the entire operation and alerted federal authorities of their intentions.

Trial and death
Kerling and the seven others involved were sent to Washington, D.C., where they were to face a military tribunal. All were convicted of being spies and, even though they had not yet carried out any sabotage, six — including Kerling — were sentenced to death. Dasch and Burger received long prison sentences which were eventually commuted to deportation after the war.

Kerling and the remaining five, Herbert Hans Haupt, Henry Harm Heinck, Hermann Otto Neubauer, Richard Quirin, and Werner Thiel were all executed on August 8, 1942, in the District of Columbia's electric chair. It was the largest mass execution via electrocution ever conducted at the jail. Kerling and the others were buried in the Potter's Field in Blue Plains. The graves were originally marked by boards with numbers until a German-American organization placed a small monument commemorating their lives.

Prior to his execution, Kerling wrote a final letter to his wife:"Marie, my wife—I am with you to the last minute! This will help me to take it as a German! Even the heaven out there is dark. It's raining. Our graves are far from home, but not forgotten. Marie, until we meet in a better world! May God be with you. My love to you, my heart to my country. Heil Hitler! Your Ed, always."

Other prosecutions
Four people were arrested for associating with Kerling in relation to the plot: His friend, Helmut Leiner, his girlfriend, Hedwig Engemann, his estranged wife, Marie Sighard, and Marie's boyfriend, Ernest Herman Kerkhof.

Leiner was charged with treason for agreeing to get change for two 50 dollar bills for Kerling. He was acquitted since he was not an American citizen, but was then immediately interned. In 1943, Leiner pleaded guilty to three counts of trading with the enemy and was sentenced to 18 years in prison. He was paroled in 1954. Engemann was also suspected of exchanging money for Kerling, but there was only enough evidence to charge her with misprision of treason. The charge was for having knowledge about Leiner's trading and not intervening. Engemann pleaded guilty and was sentenced to three years in prison. She was paroled in April 1945.

While they were both interned for the remainder of the war, neither Sighard nor Kerkhof were ever charged due to a lack of evidence. While both were members of the pro-Nazi German American Bund, there was no other evidence against Kerkhof, and the only evidence against Sighard was that Leiner had attempted to arrange a meeting between her and Kerling.

See also

 Capital punishment by the United States federal government
 List of people executed by the United States federal government

Citations

References used

 </ref>

1909 births
1942 deaths
German military personnel of World War II
German people executed abroad
Saboteurs
Nazi Party members
Nazi propagandists
Nazis executed by the United States military by electric chair
People executed for spying for Nazi Germany

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


For the final instalment of the Canary Wharf Screen, Art on the Underground collaborates with the BFI to screen a season of films showcasing previously unseen footage, rare and restored film, and newer experimental works by some of today's most renowned British moving image artists. The ticket hall of Canary Wharf tube station has been infiltrated by the BFI screen since December 2012 and will remain to entertain commuters until March 2013, all in celebration of the 150th anniversary of the London Underground on 10 January.
Lifted directly from the BFI National Archive the programme is made up of three parts. The first part was The Artists Year in Nature, which explored the contrast between images of nature and the man-made concrete environment of London where they were screened. The final third part of the project begins at the start of February and is entitled From the City to the Sea: A Century of Archive Film. The conclusion of the season is a double bill of feature length creative archive documentary films that simultaneously record the history of the last century and the story of film itself.
Part two of the programme, Tales from the Underground began yesterday and runs until 5 February. This series features works from several directors including, Underground by Anthony Asquith (1928), All That Mighty Heart by RK Neilson Baxter (1963), Cine Gazette No.14 – Do You Remember? by Tony Thompson (1955), Under Night Streets by Ralph Keene (1958) and AFC: Automatic Fare Collection and You, by Bob Privett (1969). Taking rare and restored archive footage, Tales from the Underground reflects upon London Underground throughout history. In conjunction with a theatrical release on 11 January at the BFI Southbank and at selected cinemas nationwide, Asquith's Underground revives the early silent era of feature filmmaking. Following a tale of love, treachery and murder on the underground, the newly restored piece is accompanied by an entirely new score written by Neil Brand and performed by the BBC Symphony Orchestra.
Part two also includes the instructional videos that were produced along with new ticketing and barrier technology in the 1960s and Keene's Under Night Streets, which follows the "fluffers" who cleaned and maintained the tube system 50 years ago. And in January Café OTO will perform an experimental musical score to accompany the films live in Canary Wharf ticket hall.
Canary Wharf Screen, until 5 March, Canary Wharf, London Borough of Tower Hamlets, London E14.
1. Underground, Anthony Asquith courtesy of Youtube.
Bob and Roberta Smith's Art Party is due to open on 21 August. The feature film, produced with director Tim Newton and Stuart Cameron of Crescent Arts will be accompanied by a UK-wide Art Party hosted by key venues.