Despite protestations to the contrary, the structural imbalance of the Welsh public sphere can easily lead to situations where even a simple misunderstanding can reinforce some of the worst tropes latent in our collective culture. People of colour considered to have too much righteous energy for their own good and consequently having to qualify theirContinue reading “White Wales and Black Lives Matter”
Author Archives: Gareth Leaman
Wales beyond borders: nationalism and the climate crisis
(This article was originally published in translation by O’r Pedwar Gwynt in June 2019) In recent months we have witnessed two distinct-but-overlapping protest movements mobilising throughout Wales and converging on our capital city. First, the Welsh branch of the international Extinction Rebellion movement took to the streets during March and April, in which activists and,Continue reading “Wales beyond borders: nationalism and the climate crisis”
The British Virus
When the full scale of the Coronavirus crisis first became apparent in the UK, one could have been forgiven for presuming that it signalled an existential blow to the global economic order as we know it. As the country began to comprehend the struggles we were about to face, surely the scales would fall from people’sContinue reading “The British Virus”
Rethinking Wales
The crisis caused by coronavirus has triggered an unprecedented moment of introspection. Amid a growing consensus that we can never return to what we once thought of as normal, we asked some of Wales’ leading thinkers to suggest a single idea we need to consider, address or implement once lockdown is lifted. (Preview from IssueContinue reading “Rethinking Wales”
The reification of Welsh rugby
A shiver down the collective spine of the Welsh nation: international rugby (or, one presumes, that which is presented in the English language) may soon disappear from free-to-air television. This has obviously created a degree of collective consternation about the implication for Welsh mass culture, and rugby’s apparently totemic place within it. This mass panicContinue reading “The reification of Welsh rugby”
Solving problems the Welsh way
So, after a year of chaos and misery for workers in Gwent, there is some suggestion that perhaps removing the tolls from the Severn Bridges was a terrible idea after all. All of the fears of commuters have come to pass: traffic has increased dramatically, pollution is reaching ever-more toxic levels, communities have been turnedContinue reading “Solving problems the Welsh way”
The Election That Never Took Place
When assessing the media coverage of December’s general election, it would be reasonable to conclude that the politics of Wales barely featured at all. It is well documented that there is little space in ‘mainstream’ British media forms to develop and articulate a complex, coherent discourse that is recognisably Welsh and speaks specifically to andContinue reading “The Election That Never Took Place”
Unserious ideas for serious times
It’s a familiar melancholy, seeing Jeremy Corbyn, like Leanne Wood before him, becoming a more radical yet more marginalised voice within his party, post-leadership. Both Corbyn and Wood were deemed to have failed electorally by their internal detractors, but achieved far more than they’ll ever be given credit for by changing the conversation around whatContinue reading “Unserious ideas for serious times”
New Solidarities in Wales
There are numerous conflicting prognoses of Wales’ future, but in the present moment we know this much to be true: almost a third of children in Wales live in poverty; the rollout of the UK government’s latest punitive welfare regime will affect a third of Welsh households; a post-industrial plague of scarce, low-quality employment isContinue reading “New Solidarities in Wales”
Chartists in the Newport Afterlife
To live and grow up in Newport is to be irrevocably intertwined with the historical forces that built this city. Symbols of the past are etched into the landscape: what we might call our ‘industrial heritage’ is all around us. But these totems are not fossilised relics, and they’re not engaged with passively: they’re theContinue reading “Chartists in the Newport Afterlife”
