Well, the start of this week felt like I crashed and burned in the space of five minutes. My presentation didn’t go as smoothly as I had hoped, my years out of academia showing like a blaring neon sign saying I’m out of my depth.

Thankfully, I have some terrific tutors. Lee recommended to me that I needn’t worry and just keep reading so that’s what I’m going to do.

The question, ‘What is Culture?’ is very much at the heart of this week’s work, and I feel like it’s going to take some time to unpack this. Reading Stuart Hall, Raymond Williams and Sara Salem, I found Salem’s writing to be a fascinating piece on Transnational Feminism with her take on Angela Davis’s work with Egyptian feminist activists in the 1970’s. I have since moved up Angela Davis’ book Women, Race and Class up my ‘to read’ list.

Closer to home Raymond William’s piece entitled ‘Culture is Ordinary’ from 1958; gave his interpretation of culture while mixing in a storytelling narrative of living in Wales, while he leans on the teachings of Marx and F.R. Leavis to guide his definition.

Finally, Stuart Hall, looks at culture in terms of the word heritage, he acknowledges that colonisation and slavery are connected to the ordinary life of the British population, despite there being a selective memory loss on the impact of the ‘Empire’.

Now it’s Friday night and I am looking at the next chunk of reading to do. It’s getting interesting and I am determined not to be intimidated by it.

Adiós!

Franki