The Venice Film Festival is adding a prize to its annual lineup which will recognize the best in gay/lesbian cinema. “The Queer Lion award, a take on the festival’s main Golden Lion prize, will go to the best full-length film featuring a gay theme or character. [It took] four years of negotiations to introduce the award.”
Tag: 08.01.07
Why Do We Speak? (And When Did We Start?)
“In the middle of the 19th century, the main professional bodies governing linguistic research formally banned any investigation into the origins of language, regarding it as pointless. The topic remained disreputable for more than a century, but in the last decade or so, language evolution has eased toward the front burner, attracting the attention of linguists, neuroscientists, psychologists and geneticists.” Now, a new book offers a view into what is regarded as one of the most complicated scientific questions facing humanity today.
Radio Listenership Dropping In Canada
“Canadians are spending less time listening to radio, but the number of stations across the country is rising… Average weekly listening time – which includes mornings, at work and while driving, the three points of the day when most people tune in – has fallen substantially from eight years ago.”
Words & Music
A musical about a pair of rare book collectors? Really? Yes, but these aren’t your garden-variety book collectors. These are the collectors turned literary detectives who exposed the secret life of Louisa May Alcott, and one friend saw something stageworthy in their life and work.
Choking Off All Interest In Cultural Literacy
Is the UK’s populace suffering because of an abandonment of cultural education and enrichment? “Most people, especially when younger, have precious little access to or encouragement in the creative and civilising processes. In schools, music is a Cinderella subject. Teachers who might want to encourage an interest outside the curriculum in books, or poetry, or the past often meet with blind resistance from the parents whose role it would be to assist the enterprise in the long hours and days outside the classroom… It is no wonder there is a lack of cultural ambition among our people, because any squeak of interest is in effect suffocated at birth.”