Climate change has been on the world’s political agenda for at least fifty years—ever since scientist Gordon Dobson first began to measure carbon emissions back in 1956. If one disregards various alarmist exaggerations, the situation has been more or less clear from the start and the solution has been self-evident. However, the message has been remarkably slow in coming across.
This slowness manifests itself in many ways: despite overwhelming scientific consensus, the world continues to act as if climate awareness is just another trend—here today, gone tomorrow. Factories continue to spew out pollutions, politicians continue to discredit scientists and research projects on climate change, and ordinary people continue to turn a blind eye while consumer frenzy continues to spin out of control. Books, CDs, DVDs, MP3 players, iPods, clothes, shoes, accessories, cars, stereo decks, boats, houses, vacations… The list is endless. In the end, our desire to keep up with the Joneses might well be the end of the very lifestyle we seek to perpetuate.
In the meantime, who is to blame for this late awakening? Some travellers interviewed at an airport a few months ago said that they ‘booked this flight a year ago—long before the climate started changing’. This level of ignorance, whether self-imposed or otherwise, is perhaps not surprising. But where does it come from? Your third blog assignment is to try to explain why you think this realisation has been so slow in coming.
The deadline for this assignment is Sunday, 03 May.
Monday 27 April 2009
Tuesday 14 April 2009
Blog Assignment #2: The Fascination of a TV series
Ever since TV made its way into people’s homes in the 1950s, it has become an increasingly dominant part of our lives—especially American TV series. Many people have a favourite series that they follow and a majority of those series, like it or not, are American, and their impact on Sweden and Swedish popular culture has been monumental.
One such TV phenomenon was Dallas. In the 80’s and early 90’s, this was one of the most talked-about TV series in Sweden and even people who didn’t follow it knew who the scheming J.R. was. This was the series that had it all: money and power, intrigue and whiskey, love and revenge, cowboy-hats and outrageous outfits… You name it—Dallas had it. Perhaps its appeal was partly due to the relative novelty and scarcity of American light-weight entertainment in Sweden. With only two channels to choose from, both of them public-service, frivolous TV series were fairly thin on the ground.
Today, however, the flood of American soaps, sitcoms and reality shows in Sweden is endless, and very few reach that almost universal appeal that Dallas had. Perhaps that is because, instead of having merely two state-owned TV channels, many people have several commercial channels as well and no longer have to wait a whole week for their next fix of American light-weight entertainment. More often than not, the supply far outweighs the demand. Viewers today can choose between Prison Break, 24, Grey’s Anatomy, CSI New York, Desperate Housewives, The Simpsons, Big Brother, E.R., America’s Next Top Model... plus all the re-runs, of course.
Personally, I am a die-hard fan of 24, that action-packed, heart-stopping, never-ending cliff-hanger in which CTU agent Jack Bauer chases bad guys across LA. I have always loved action films just as much as I have loved high-brow BBC historical dramas and Astrid Lindgren-style children’s series, and I think I always will. There is something quite alluring about losing yourself in a full-speed action thriller which does not require as much mental processing as, say, a dramatisation of Dickens’s Bleak House. But what about you? For your second blog assignment, I would like you to tell me what it is about your favourite TV series that makes you love it—or perhaps why you shun TV altogether.
The deadline for this assignment is Sunday, 26 April.
One such TV phenomenon was Dallas. In the 80’s and early 90’s, this was one of the most talked-about TV series in Sweden and even people who didn’t follow it knew who the scheming J.R. was. This was the series that had it all: money and power, intrigue and whiskey, love and revenge, cowboy-hats and outrageous outfits… You name it—Dallas had it. Perhaps its appeal was partly due to the relative novelty and scarcity of American light-weight entertainment in Sweden. With only two channels to choose from, both of them public-service, frivolous TV series were fairly thin on the ground.
Today, however, the flood of American soaps, sitcoms and reality shows in Sweden is endless, and very few reach that almost universal appeal that Dallas had. Perhaps that is because, instead of having merely two state-owned TV channels, many people have several commercial channels as well and no longer have to wait a whole week for their next fix of American light-weight entertainment. More often than not, the supply far outweighs the demand. Viewers today can choose between Prison Break, 24, Grey’s Anatomy, CSI New York, Desperate Housewives, The Simpsons, Big Brother, E.R., America’s Next Top Model... plus all the re-runs, of course.
Personally, I am a die-hard fan of 24, that action-packed, heart-stopping, never-ending cliff-hanger in which CTU agent Jack Bauer chases bad guys across LA. I have always loved action films just as much as I have loved high-brow BBC historical dramas and Astrid Lindgren-style children’s series, and I think I always will. There is something quite alluring about losing yourself in a full-speed action thriller which does not require as much mental processing as, say, a dramatisation of Dickens’s Bleak House. But what about you? For your second blog assignment, I would like you to tell me what it is about your favourite TV series that makes you love it—or perhaps why you shun TV altogether.
The deadline for this assignment is Sunday, 26 April.
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