It was my birthday last week. A belated gift arrived and it was this. Considering Tristram Hunt delivered the 2007 Engels Memorial Lecture at Urbis, I’m looking forward to reading it. Engels’ figure is an important one for Manchester, and we tour guides meet him every time we deliver our Radical City, Medieval Manchester and Suffragette City tours. Yes, even Suffragette City. It was the Burns sisters who gave the young Engels access to the slum districts of Manchester – areas that a well-to-do German businessman (or any outsider) would enter at their peril. During the years 1843-4, when Engels was writing the Condition of the Working Class in England, Mary Burns escorted Engels through the working districts of the city. This was the material fuel for his writing. Without this first-hand experience and insight into the horrific living conditions of the working class it is unlikely Engels’ writing and theory would carry the same weight. As Hunt writes, “Mary helped to provide Engels with the material reality for his communist theory”.
Yet, the Burns sisters are largely forgotten. There is little historic documentation relating to them and they are left uncredited by Engels despite their influence. Engels, of course, wanted to keep his “free union” with both Lizzie and Mary as low-key as possible. Our Suffragette City tour begins with the Burns sisters as examples of politically active and influential women in Manchester who have been historically neglected. A biography as extensive as Hunt’s on Engels, should shed some further light on them.
“Born in Kent in the summer of ‘79, Jehst spent his childhood in Sussex before moving to Huddersfield, West Yorkshire as a teenager. Fueled by the bleak reality of smack infested post-industrial North he re-located to London, making his vinyl debut in 1999 with the highly acclaimed “Premonitions” EP, launching the self-financed YNR Productions label from his University halls of residence. From this point on there was no turning back.”
Thanks to Jehst today for spending so long seriously helping out on the development of some of the main themes of Home Grown and immediately getting what we’re trying to do and why.
Big thanks to Disorda for meeting today with Urbis blogs and letting us know about the ups and downs of running a Homegrown business in the UK hip hop scene (which neatly ties in with long tail theory rather nicely for the trajectory of this blog at present).
Thanks to Suspect Packages expect to hear some of the earliest pure UK mixtapes, the rarest tracks and the most influential moments from the history of UK hip hop in Octobers exhibition.
If you just can’t wait or can’t make it to Urbis be sure to head over to the Suspect Packages online radio show now for true UK hip hop at its most upfront and best.
The online travel magazine Europe a la carte will be visiting Manchester later this month as part of their summer blogging tour of the UK. On 27 July they’ll be sampling some Urbis City Tours. They’ve kindly mentioned Urbis in their blog and it’s only right to return the favour. We look forward to reading the posts as the trip begins.
Good to see the BBC teaming up with Tim Berners-Lee on an open source documentary project about the Digital Revolution.
Not so good to see their lacklustre approach to capturing his keynote speech at their Web at 20 event, especially on the sound.
Nevertheless, the idea of the death of the channel and the implicit “structures of trust” (see 12.33-15.14 ) ring true with the future of the cultural institutions I’ve been considering here recently.
Enjoying Charlie Brooker’s take on the Fourth Plinth over a coffee this morning.
Summing up the One & Other project as “Big Brother: The Tate Modern Edition” Brooker hits on an important point facing all institutions wanting to open their doors to one and all; even if we have people wanting to create and comment on culture, sometimes they just aren’t good enough to fill an hour.
Surely it’s the job of established arts figures and institutions to encourage and develop their ideas and talents not to provide an open forum alone.
oh… there’s currently a woman having a teddybear’s picnic atop the plinth and asking their advice on what postcard she should send her mum…perhaps Gormley will cast one of them in lead.
Star Wars Uncut is an interesting concept for crowdsourcing from the fan remake community (I think one exists).
The entire film is split into 15 second clips. Each participant then acts, shoots and edits a remake of the sequence with the final 472 clips all patched together for a remake by 472 different people.
Can’t be any worse than some recent Hollywood remakes of old classics.
Good post from Nina Simon on Museum 2.0 about Museums collecting comments and info from visitors but not doing anything with it or making it into a usable form.
Seems a lot of institutions are liking the sound of open access and social networking but struggling to adjust to the new world of communicating ideas and acting on user focussed thinking.
