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The art of concentration

10/24/2017

Lifestyle
Francesca Di Donato

We have all been there, trying to study hard for finals or get stuck into that essay or equation, when some attractive individual strolls nonchalantly past, catching our fancy. Perhaps a library announcement sounds, taking your focus off task. Maybe even something so trivial as a group WhatsApp feed buzzing away with notifications. Our writer this week offers some insights gathered from their years in higher education balancing two degrees. Writing from her year abroad in St Petersburg, she offers an insight in how to perform and maintain that ever so crucial work life balance.

We have all been there: coming back from summer break, studying seems like an alien and intolerable activity. Settling back into the old routines is exhausting and when the first assignments start coming, concentrating is not something that comes naturally. Sound familiar? Then you may find this article useful.

As someone who is currently pursuing two Bachelor degrees while still being able to lead a ‘normal’ life, I have developed my personal plan to achieving everything I set my mind on and not tear all my hair out (it does a fine job by itself!)

Firstly, it is important to remind yourself of the reasons why you do what you do. This may be having the possibility of moving to a country you are fascinated by, working toward a humanitarian passion to solve world hunger or inspiring new generations through teaching, it doesn’t matter. What’s important is keeping that goal in mind throughout.

Setting a list of tasks to accomplish, breaking down the end vision into a series of baby steps is going to be the difference between getting up at the crack of dawn versus enjoying that long afternoon lie in.

Having a vision, great or small, lends perseverance for when times get tough. This vision should be unique to ourselves and so not applicable as a metric for gauging our self-worth and progress against those around us.

Being a compulsive list-maker, the longer-term plans end up appealing to myself - even if these are but pipeline fantasies. Reach for the stars and you’ll at least make the top of the tree. Lists keep you grounded and help you rationalise tasks that look daunting and impossible at first. Virtually any problem or assignment, if broken down into more manageable chunks, becomes achievable and far more enjoyable. The world was built and moulded by people no greater than you or me – just hard work, perseverance and the luck that comes with trial and error. The satisfaction of crossing out each completed task is a rewarding process, making the day feel productive and worthwhile, even if it is but simply mental trickery.

This slight alteration of mindfulness is a kind way of reminding myself that there is something waiting beyond the mind-numbing assignment I may be working on.

Others may draw inspiration from pin boards with stimulating pictures and quotes, some may opt for the daily journal. To each their own. In short, think grand, aim high and look at the bigger picture.

Without turning this into an outright self-help guide, being able to relax and recharge your batteries is essential for that work life balance and long-term wellbeing.

Dedicating a few hours a week to a hobby unrelated to your field of study may go further than taking your mind off things. It could inspire you in ways you may not have otherwise imagined.

Naturally, exam periods or a looming deadline makes finding the time to cultivate your hobbies unwise, it may be the best time. Depressurising for a few hours when under the cosh may leave you refreshed and relaxed.

Study breaks are advisable, as research emphasises 30 to 60 minute breaks as optimal for increasing concentration and consolidating that already learnt – counter intuitively enabling you to retain more than uninterrupted study. Professor J. P. Trougakos describes the brain like a muscle, capable of fatigue after prolonged usage, necessitating recharging. Don’t underestimate the importance of fetching a snack or a stroll to the corner shop or fetching a coffee with a friend during those long study sessions. It could make all the difference.

Finally, don’t worry, or at least try not to. University is known to be hard, as it should be. After all, it is higher education that we are pursuing, so it is only fair that the workload and expectations increase. But it is far from impossible given the appropriate time management. Generations before us have successfully obtained their degrees and we shall too. And hopefully this article will be the nudge that makes the entire process that little less frightening and a whole lot more attainable. TMM

Francesca Di Donata is studying German and Russian at The University of Manchester, she is currently on a year abroad in St Petersburg, Russia, (She also studies her second bachelors in politics and international relations with the University of London's international programme).

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the Sino-Russian connection

10/24/2017

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Politics
Riccardo Scroppo

We are currently witnessing an expansion of the Sino-Russian cooperative axis, notably within their mutual economic cooperation. Indeed, both countries have recently confirmed their willingness to further the already existing partnership in the energy field. Over the past month Gazprom CEO and Chinese Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli have been cosying up over a deal to establish a new gas pipeline and reinforce bilateral cooperation in oil-gas operations. Other major companies on both sides have followed suit.

Emerging estimations point to the fact that trade between the two countries has grown new roots in 2017. Moscow and Beijing have extended collaboration in nuclear energy, space and civil aviation, aircraft construction, arctic exploration, digital economy cooperation and agriculture. Chinese Commerce Ministry spokesman Shen Danyang predicted in May of this year that breakneck trade will eclipse $80 Billion before the year is out – a rise from $69.5Bn in 2016. Russian exports to China rose 33 per cent in January-April, while the reverse up 22 per cent.

The precedent has been set as additional efforts are afforded to see bilateral trade reach $200 Billion within the coming 3-7 years, according to Russian Prime Minister Dimitry Medvedev. Preferential trade ruling will enable the yuan renminbi and rouble to be used in settlements, so reducing transaction costs.

This comes as Russia accepted Beijing’s formal invitation to take part in the One Belt, One Road initiative (OBOR).

The purpose behind the $900 Billion project is to integrate the Asiatic countries in a regional bloc market structure that, in turn, aspires to closely resemble that of the European Union.

In the wake of Donald Trump following up on his announcement to withdraw this January in signing a presidential memorandum formally withdrawing the US from the Trans Pacific Partnership Deal (TPP); China and South-East Asia had to look elsewhere.

This elsewhere led to the reenacted interest in reviving the ancient Silk Road – a cross-continental route. While the remaining 11 signatories pursue TPP without American assistance, China casts her eyes westwards.

The OBOR project may offer effective and temporary relief to Russian-European tensions, reviving a country plagued by sanctions.

Sino-Russian divergence
There are, however, inflection points between the two super states.

On such point of divergence is their personal relationship with the West, wherein future confluence seems highly unlikely. China entertains a more proactive and favourable liaison with its modicum of liberal free market interactions.

Russia, meanwhile, appears supportive of the conservative versus liberal tensions endemic to current US and European politics.

Such divergences appear to leave unchanged Sino-Russian relations. Just this week, payment versus payment (PVP) was established. A system that promises to aid facilitation of rouble-yuan transactions by easing business affairs and remove the collateralised economic risk of doing business is non- transparent regions.

Russia would be the first country to see the realised benefits of China’s master-plan OBOR coming into fruition. Despite leaving the door open to further inclusion of new members in future, PVP was created with the sole intention of undermining the greenback’s defacto status as the world’s reserve currency.

A relaxation of economic sanctions may bring Russia more into the fold of US shores and prevent a financial and trade takeover. Furthermore, such a move could facilitate North Korea talks and allow the matter of Kim Jong-Un’s nuclear arsenal to be brought to bear.

However, this state of affairs is not on the table for Capitol Hill at present. To pardon the Kremlin for the annexation of the Crimean peninsula in 2014 would mean that Russia can do whatever it feels like on the international stage. And that would bring chaos to the European continent, sparking fears amongst several nations. TMM

Riccardo Scroppo is a Third year Politics and International Relations Student at The University of Manchester.

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The politics of Rick and Morty

10/23/2017

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Politics
Lioui Benhamou

Rick and Morty is arguably one of the best adult cartoon shows on air right now. Each episode blends the philosophical depth of Black Mirror, the futuristic themes of Futurama and the comments about the real world of South Park.

For those who don't know and haven't watch it (yet, you should), Rick and Morty is the story of the mad scientist Rick Sanchez and his grandson Morty Smith, – best defined as a slow learner. Thanks to an inter-dimensional portal gun, the pair live crazy adventures, often accompanied by some more reluctant, members of the Sanchez family.

This article is intended to look at Rick and Morty’s political leanings and the ideas that are explored throughout the show. After all, the show’s popularity is partly due to the underling commentary the show has to give on our current political situation.

[spoiler alert]

Rick and Morty Season 1 episode 2, Lawnmower Dog:
Rick, in a moment of clairvoyant brilliance (and to get Jerry off his back) decided to make the family dog Snuffles smarter. Unintentionally, Snuffles was capable of powering the device to become more cognizant than Rick intended.

Snuffles is initially treated in an equivalent fashion to the average owner exercising their rights to dictate their pet’s actions. Once the tables have turned, however, Snuffles becomes conscious of this state of affairs and questions the status quo. This train of thought leads him to consider why he shouldn't treat humans as they had been treating him. For those who are in any way partial to CGI monkeys, you could quite easily draw parallel between Snuffles’ episode of self-awareness and the Planet of Apes’s Ceasar during his insurrection against the humans.

As more ethicists come around to the ethically problematic stance of keeping pets, this episode seems to address the moral hazard of exerting such explicit dominance over one’s own pets with light comedic relief.

Snuffles’ self-awareness is piqued as he ponders the location of his missing testicles, resorting to question Morty’s sister on their whereabouts.

The episode is befitting of political attention for asking the question whether we are suitably poised to define the divide between consideration of animals as persons or as objects.
The episode of compos mentis leads Snuffles to declare himself ‘Snowball’ – rather than the name bestowed to him by his slave-owners resonates as more human in action than we would feel comfortable admitting. This raises the further dilemma of whether intellect alone determines personhood or possession hood. Were all animals capable of expressing their desires by the lingua franca English, would we all turn vegan overnight?

Rick and Morty Season 2 episode 5 Get Schwifty :
A giant alien head visits earth and demands the humans to "show [me] what you got". The magnitude of the alien’s head, naturally, disrupts gravity on Earth and ushers in an apocalypse. Known only to Rick, Morty, and the US government, the giant head is, in fact, expecting humans to show him their best musical talent.

Rick and Morty swiftly proceed to write a song, and the giant head proceeds to enrol Earth into an inter-planetary song competition. With the chaos of the interplanetary X-factor going unnoticed by the majority of Earth’s population, a religious cult forms around the head and gains traction on earth.as the movement goes as far as forming its own rudimentary judicial processing, consisting of tying misbehaving individuals to balloons and releasing them up to the mercy of the floating head – ‘Up!’ style.

The religious cult is based on the humans’ interpretations of the Head’s actions and emotions. When the head was displeased by the musical performance, the cult mistakes causation for correlation that the head is displeased because of their own actions. What appears to be a simple mistaken causation/correlation, is instead a deeper criticism of religious belief structures and formation in US society today.

The first reflex of many people after the head visits Earth is to go to church to pray. Beth, Morty's mother, questions those praying on their reasons for going to church, with the Morty's math teacher sniping back: "Ma’am, a giant head in the sky is controlling the weather. Did you wanna play checkers? Let’s be rational! I’ll see you at God’s house! "

It seems to some people that because an event has occurred that is beyond their comprehension, the only "rational" thing to do is to pray. And this is a metaphor for the "raison d'être" of religions – the giving of a simple answer and meaning to complex ideas or events, such as apparitions, works of God or the meaning of life.

Cults offer the answer to this ingrained human need, and in turn are offered authority for their wisdoms. Large cult following believe in creationism, "rationalise" scientific progression to suit their Christian-creationist perspective. Defence of these views, then, presents difficulties to overcome. However, but the overall development of their defence makes sense. As soon as one can accept the premises that everything on earth was created that way already by God only 6000 years ago, we are able to “rationally” deny any other information that may be given to us.

While the holding of extreme religious belief may not intrinsically be bad, religious views are not a reasonable view to hold when governing a large number of people. How Do we account for science and belief in the political system of a society when people could have conflicted views over the most rational and truthful world-view to hold? Take multicultural English society, with significantly higher proportions of Islam and Sikhs within the population. To enforce one doctrine through the medium of political economy needs little further elaboration.

Rick and Morty do not shy away from incorporating such societally pressing dilemmas in its scripts.

Journalist: The view here is the same as yours, Jim. A giant head has entered Earth’s gravity, triggering climate change and natural disasters we thought were impossible for at least another eight years.

Anchor Man: (in news studio) Let’s not make this political, Terry. Do we know what this giant head wants?

Given the context in the USA, it is easy to compare this phenomenon to most debates, the most recent of which is the conversation surrounding gun control. By not wanting to talk about climate change, the anchor man shows that he doesn't believe in it. Not because he is irrational, but because his world view assumes that climate change is either not real or simply not pressing enough to be paid lip-service at present.

Climate change is scientifically proven and should not be a political matter. It only becomes so because of the disparities between world views. Debates exist mostly because humans are fundamentally individually constituted from their nature, which is then compounded in their nurture by means of upbringing, education and exposure to lines of thought, reasoning and argumentation – or lack of therein. Not everyone starts from the same foundation to reach the optimally inclined solution to the problem at hand.

Oftentimes, the rational outcome is problematic for those deontologists among us, yet highly desirable for the consequentialist audience. A moral dilemma that harkens up instances of pushing an obese individual into the path of an oncoming train to derail it before it hits a group of 5 others. As Nietzsche would phrased it: "It's not the doubt that makes people crazy, it's the certitude."

Rick and Morty Season 3 episode 7, The Ricklantis Mixup:
This episode broaches the question of time travel, warping the space time continuum by fracturing the single universal strand into many smaller offshoots. Although not exclusively political by nature, we may observe the inequalities that arise with different political agendas these multi-dimensional realities allow. We are exposed to The Citadel that houses all the many nuanced versions of Rick and Morty. This presents us with the Butterfly Effect, wherein a butterfly flaps its wings and causes a typhoon on the other side of the world. The ramifications from our actions have the capacity to fundamentally alter the fabric of time. Tinkering with it even slightly, and no matter how good the intentions, may ultimately splinter into worse outcomes than non-intervention may have eventually become.

A version of Rick we follow has adopted a more simplistic life baking "Simple Rick's" cookies. The catch for this Rick means he is attached to a virtual reality technology that forces him to relive his best memories. The chemicals of serotonin, dopamine and oxytocin were produced which is siphoned into the cookies to enhance the flavour.

The protagonist Factory Rick, unable to cope with the guilt of subjecting simple Rick to such imprisonment, rebels against the system, killing the boss and Simple Rick. Our Rick becomes alienated in rebelling. Despite dissenting against the authority of the status quo in decisive fashion, he ultimately still takes part in the system he wishes to oppose by remaining in work. The company management finally lobotomises him, and places him in the old role of Simple Rick so the consumers may sample the delights of ‘Freedom Rick’s’ cookies. An irony of being subject to the very role he tried to relieve another from.

Parallels may be drawn with Black Mirror S1E03, wherein the protagonists attempted escape from the system reinforces the environment around him.

This phenomenon is known as co-optation. Co-optation is when the system absorbs what once was outside of it. A simple example is the anti-slavery activist Harriet Tubman’s replacement of Jackson on the $20 bill. Even if she opposed capitalism and fought the system, she is now a symbol that serves the system and makes it more inclusive. Conclusively, in absorbing its outliers and anomalous elements, the political encompassment and manipulation of the system tightens, making it harder for anybody to see past the cloak and daggers, let alone escape from its clutches.

The commentary indicates that total revolution is all but impossible. What may seem like an escape from the old system is a reinforcement of it, absorbed in closing those loopholes that allowed it to be undermined originally.

The original power structures and authorities remain in power or ascend up the ladder – often hardliners that were unable to make it centre stage before because of their extremist agendas. An analogy of this predicament on the smaller scale is buying vegan in order to feel good. This action leaves the impression you have participated actively in changing the social paradigm, whilst you are still, in fact, participating in global capitalist exchange, aiding the system, rather than opposing it outright by growing vegetables and becoming a self-sufficient individual.

The Arab Spring revolution is a further analogy of this phenomenon. What started as a revolution that could bring change to the whole region was rapidly co-opted by the international system in to containment.

Radical change of the regime failed to precipitate because of an international oversight that demanded swift and smooth transition to democratic rule. This is akin to teaching a puppy to pee outdoors without offering guidance and training. A society of people ruled under totalitarian authority, never left to their own devices, are suddenly made the ‘masters of their own destinies’. For them to decide their countries’ futures was never going to end well given the human precedent for greed, ambition and the co-optation of incumbent regime cronies.

Understanding subliminal messages embedded in the sub-context of many easy-watch shows may nurture an entirely different outlook toward comprehending the world. The political sphere, it seems, extends even to Rick and Morty.

Lioui Benhamou is a third-year Politics and International Relations student at the University of Manchester

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Trouble In The Trade

10/13/2017

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CULTURE
RICHARD BOLTON
RICCARDO SCROPPO

Crafts and trades having been fading into the rear-view mirror for decades. Following the recent closure of Britain’s oldest and most renown postcard maker, we ask whether the days of specialist trades are numbered.

Postcard Pandemonium
The oldest and most renowned British postcard manufacturer, J. Salmon, has formally announced that the company shall close-up shop. The official statement noted shorter holiday trends negating the postcard culture, alongside the lack of heirs to take over the management and ownership. Nevertheless, the advancing footfall of social media, and of emails that preceded it, is acknowledged to carry much of the blame. With Instagram’s pre-eminence in the market of filtered photo frame reality, against a backdrop of ‘selfie mania’ among younger generations, there is a dying art of bread and butter letter-writing in the age of instant communication. However one looks at traditions like writing, an amalgamation of factors appear to have put the nail in the coffin to tangible tokens of affection to loved ones and friends.

End of an era?
With heavy heart, Charles and Henry Salmon have announced closure to their lifetime enterprise in December this year, after it served British households and foreign visitors for 140 long years. For granting us the possibility to shock, thrill, awe and move our loved ones the world over, we are duly grateful.

A Sign of the Times
Still, it is all too easy to lament technological progress as the destructive winds that have reduced modern society to a mere fleeting gratification of an instant message; a society in which clarification can be sought out instantly and words lose their meaning with careless irreverence for the recipient. Written expressions of fondness and affection have been our reflection in their absence for centuries. Careful refction with each pen stroke that carried with it the gravity of hope and promise in their wake. From sonnets that gave rise to eros, ludos or philia, to the fluttering sensation that someone, somewhere is thinking of us out there in the big wide world.

Instant communication at the expense of solicitude and meaning.

We are by default understanding more connected than ever today, yet never have we quite felt so isolated. Connectivity has shortened communication time and expediency, yet has done so at the expense of meaning and solicitude. A mania for and to let the person know we have taken the time and effort to find the paper, pen and stamps and then take it to a post office or box and wait patiently in a world that is racing past us at breakneck speed.

Traditional arts: condemned to the dust of history?
Is the decline of postcards a decline of long-standing traditions? Perhaps consumer preferences and advertising of modern expediency are to blame. Disruption has been around for centuries. Gutenberg was criticised in 1440 when launching the first printing press by staunch Conservatives, antagonistic to any form of change, who believed it would simply kill off writing and creativity.

Books for artists is one such instantiation of a niche trade in 2017. Books that are bound with love and attention by hand with glues and pastes, pigments and paper. Often adorned with gold leaf along the paper’s crest. Sometimes, skilled craftsmen and librarians will engrave or etch a drawing or message across the page edges as they are flicked through.

So long as we have rare and collectible books in our libraries, and we do not succumb to the book burnings of Germany under the Third Reich, trades will have a place in society. That is, unless censorship returns with the same vehemence as 1643 England, which drove John Milton, one of the greatest poets of our time to respond with, “He who destroys a good book, kills reason itself.”

Milton would turn in his grave were he to see requests for banned books in American libraries in recent years. From sexism to uses of the "N-word", a common complaint lodged against Mark Twain’s classic novel Huckleberry Finn, keyboard warriors are out in force to push their views onto others. All in an skewed attempt to demand conformity to their outlook on society and the world around them.

Britain is a nation of DIY addicts, spending billions on home improvements and projects. One would therefore be swift to assume the young are queuing up to take the mantle. Yet, this is not the case. Instead, trades and ancient skills passed down the generations are dying out. It were not so long ago we were blessed with specialists in every trade and craft under the sun. Formalised guilds of stonemasons, carpenters and glass strainers were commonplace.

Ironically, this DIY and heritage preservation fixation is ingrained in the public mindset as indicative of our culture and identity. Recent years, especially the transition into the baby boomers generation appears to have divorced the father to son, generation to generation passing down of skills through families. The baby boomers were quick to don suits and ties and head to offices for their new 9 to 5 culture.

Salvaging a dying breed
It bears smacking of television advert appeals to donate and save an endangered species of Siberian tiger or Ibis; however, the task of keeping old traditions alive holds proof in the pudding. Put straight, young people need convincing that crafts and apprenticeships are worth cementing a future in. And either government, private heritage and preservation companies may well benefit from sponsoring these in this modern austerity bound era.

Munroe the clock maker - by the sweat of a man's brow // Ph: Neil Moralee / Flickr

Masons of Old // Ph: Stonemasons / Flickr

Generations divorced - Grandpa's empty workshop // Ph: Chris Frewen / Flickr

1920's Carpentry guild - Every Tom, Dick & Harry // wistechcolleges / Flickr

For many crafts, the path they have taken and continue to head will likely be by machine and specialisation. Other trades, such as woodworking, still retain a considerable population who work with wood and can create incredible pieces of furniture and artisanal design. But even here, last century would have held that every family needed at least one person who could make a bookcase or box, while now it may be one family in 30. The individuals in these cases would be as a hobby, for the love of making.

Making things is important for the soul of mankind. It will never go away entirely, despite a capitalist production agenda, wherein mechanisms worship coercive inter-capitalist competition, impelling technological advancement and organisational improvements at whatever cost. The blinkered worldview of self-valorisation of value we pursue leads us to become bound in by cognitive commodity fetishism. As the Cubans tossed their gold into the sea in a vain attempt to deter the Spanish Conquistadors as a prime instantiation of fantastical materialism. Albeit a case prior to the Anglo-Dutch Protestant Capitalist roots of 300 years ago. Traditional methods will have a place, however, niche writing a letter or postcard, to crafting wood in a workshop, may become in future.

However, traditional crafts are up against it with their divorced status from daily life, meaning fewer people encounter them in a way they would learn them and integrate these skills as hobbies or paid work. The practitioners and artisans are ever fading, yet there will be a time when much of society does not know of their presence among us.

Madeleine L’Engle has been attributed with a memorable contemplation, “The great thing about getting older is that you don't lose all the other ages you've been.” Although the artisans and specialists of old are long gone, their trades and skills remain, albeit as though a socially recounted familiarity and consolation, framed in faint , yet foggy nostalgia for a bygone era. When man's metal was cast in iron and steel, his worth judged by the sweat of his brow, and hard work meant more than an indivisible, sedentary office job.

Traditional arts and crafts reflects this melancholy inertia for a time when change may have come slower and more predictably. Yet, the skills and trades we once all knew and practised are not lost, but have evolved to exist and adapt in the shadows of modern capitalism.

Photos may capture a snapshot in time. Perhaps a mirror reflection of a far-off land before it became industrialised, or developed into a beach resort, or well-trodden tourist trail. Yet, the dis-consolation of J. Salmon recently announced fragmentation lies in a great loss to English society.

The time, consideration and purposefulness of writing a letter or postcard has the innate and perhaps unique ability to capture and captivate, if only fleetingly, the heart and soul of the writer. And that same joy is beholden by the reader. A unique insight into a holiday, an experience that moved us or perhaps something so simple as a shared glimpse into their life journey. However small this insight, writing is a passage into this amazing and ephemeral land we call our own. One can only hope it evolves and adapts alongside other crafts in the shadow of our whittling immoderations. TMM

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Beware of the accidental accent

10/11/2017

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LIFESTYLE
Jake Robinson

How much will University change the way you talk, or how much will you let it do so?

University brings a wide range of change for people. Change of location, lifestyle, maybe your turn up jeans might get that little bit further up past your ankle. Another change that might go slightly more unnoticed is your accent. The very nature of University brings hundreds, if not thousands, of different pronunciations and dialects together in a big linguistic cocktail. But how likely is this new environment to change the way you say bath? Or determine whether that round piece of bread is a roll, muffin, cob, bap or barm? For future reference, it's barm; you’re in Manchester now.

According to the director of the Centre for Mind, Brain, and Learning at the University of Washington, Patricia Kuhl, our accents are engrained into our brains as early as 6 months suggesting it may be difficult if you want to shrug of those features of your accent which you think need to go.

However being surrounded by a collection of accents is surely bound to have some effect on different people. Making new friends from all over the country and the world develops many students’ social groups into what is known in sociolinguistics as an "open network"; a situation where an individual has contacts and friends in many areas. This is the opposite of a closed network, where all the individual's contacts are in one closer area, geographically and socially. These different scenarios translate into varying influences upon the individual's accent.

The expansion of a social network is particularly more significant for those from working class families or areas. I never heard any Cambridge accents in Rochdale, for example. Some students might be apprehensive to speak up in their thick brummie or scouse accents, instead adopting a more neutral accent. Accent has long been linked with class and education, where in the past, and sadly still today for some, a more upper class or neutral accent is thought to make you sound more professional and well informed. Meanwhile, a scouse accent might make people pad their pockets for fear their effects may be missing. Attitudes do seem to be shifting however, with the perceived posher "Received Pronunciation" accent now being viewed as many as cold and lacking in empathy towards others.

Change in someone’s speech isn’t a one way street. Students don't always become more spiffing. There is many a Rupert or Maximilian, who, having found themselves in new surroundings, have started smoking Amber Leaf roll ups. Not to forget their penchant for developing a love of grime. Perhaps, if you are lucky, you may catch the 'aged' shoes and shirts from the Urban Outfitters retro renewal section. You know the type. And of course along with that comes their newly adopted edgy slang! This trait, in the magical world of linguistics, is termed "covert prestige". The desire to pull off the minimalist effort avant-garde - "I woke up and found these rags laying around".

Will they maintain their poise? Or between semesters will they revert back to tweed and James Blunt? A question as old as time.

You can’t really blame them. We all do things to fit in from time to time, half of which may not even be intentional. It's just one of those things. Be proud of where you’re from and don’t be too scared to change either... just don’t be a nob about it.

Jake Robinson is a first-year Law with Politics undergraduate studying at The University of Manchester

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The art of concentration

the Sino-Russian connection

The politics of Rick and Morty

Trouble In The Trade

Beware of the accidental accent

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