Murray Head [Lab] (muzza@omen.net.au)
2 Jun 1998 10:47:00 0800
Okay all, hyper-efficient Murray (the same one who owes you all an FAQ
and a demog list post) has managed to get the file of that student mag
article for y'all today. I know there used to be a certain Kb-age over
which the list server would refuse to send out attachments, so if this
doesn't go through, I will cut and paste the article into a post this
evening (ie in about 8 hours).
Thanks are due to Simon Collins, the editor of Curtin uni's "Grok"
magazine, for getting back to me so soon.
Fingers crossed this works,
Murray,
still cool calm and collected despite having only done the title page
and stolen a few of his old slides for a talk he's giving tomorrow (god
that guy has problems :) )
___________________________________________________________________
Murray Head <muzza@omen.net.au> http://www.omen.net.au/~muzza/
Also at mhead@anhb.uwa.edu.au (Anatomy & Human Biology, UWA)
Australasian Society for Human Biology http://anhb.uwa.edu.au/ASHB/
"I invented calm - I only have a pulse on weekends"
-Steven Moffat (from the TV series Press Gang)
------
_7 # .o 6æ -o 4 M 4 M 4M 4M 4M 4[ J 4¥ 4¥ 4¥ 4¥ 4_ 41 41 5U x 4¥ 6Q 6q 6_ * 6º 4M 6_ 6% 6_ 6_ 6º , 6_ 6_ 6_ 6_ 6_ 6_ It is a proven fact that television can make you believe that the impossible is possible. But when it makes out that high school is a great place to be filled with action, adventure, romance, abortions, drug addictions (and thatOs only in year nine) I get mad, I get angry and I say show me the proof that this happens in reality.
Ladies and Gentlemen, television brought me up to believe that the world was a happy place and I accepted that. That is, until I entered High School, upon which it turned around and spat me in the face with the grim reality that High School was a battlefield.
A recent survey (well, actually it was just me asking a few friends), revealed that the majority of the population were also deluded when they started High School. They couldnOt figure out why there were no full length lockers (you know the kind that you could hide in), there werenOt any free periods and there certainly werenOt any initiation rites. Mind you, with the prospect of getting your head shoved down a toilet whilst Year 12Os filled your underwear with shaving cream as you yodelled the DivinylOs "I touch myselfO, I think IOm kind of glad I missed out.
Okay, sure I might be taking this a bit far, we all know that television is a fictional place where good always prevails and everyone is good at sport, surely it doesnOt matter if it bends the truth occasionally?
Of course it matters! Look people, weOre not just talking a few irrelevant errors every now and then. WeOre talking full-scale, big-time deception, with the five most popular misconceptions including:
* Student Councillors actually have a say in the running of the school.
* The school magazine is a widely read publication
* Enemies can become friends in five days
* Canteen food is edible
* There is no such thing as school uniform (N/A for Grange Hill)
And thatOs without even mentioning those great 80Os high school flicks. The Breakfast Club, Ferris BuellerOs Day Off, Revenge of the Nerds Ñ oh for the days when a geek could submerge his face in two ginormous breasts whilst his computer watch wrecks havoc on a JockOs alarm clock causing him to be late for the football grand final causing them to lose and destroying the moral of the sports team and cheerleading squad.
And can I just ask what exactly is the deal with the high school prom? Why is it that in every single series there comes a time when halfway through the dance the school nerd starts busting a move on the dance floor that incorporates both the macarena and the box step. All of sudden the cool kids go OwowO, and start imitating him. I donOt know about you, but every time I try something like that I receive dodgy looks from all directions followed by my friends trying to ditch me.
But nevertheless I still dreamed of the perfect school. I imagined a school in which even an unfit girl with a big fringe (IOm talking king-sized proportions) could excel and become School President, Homecoming Queen and golly gosh, just an all round great girl. No I didnOt, not really. I wanted to see some interesting characters go to school. Who else would like to see the arrival of the Devil Worshipper who made the religious education teacher cry? What about the psychic student who can accurately predict exam questions and sells them to fellow classmates? And then of course you have your witches, hypnotists, necrophiliacs Ñ thatOd certainly make for an interesting episode.
Yet despite all my whinging, IOm a secret High School drama addict. I tell you, if anyone taped over my Press Gang tape IOm afraid I would turn into an extraordinarily introverted individual, wandering the streets of Perth with a knife in my pocket. IOd be the type of person who reads the White Pages and ...thinks about things. IOd be the type of person who (stop it, youOll have them thinking youOre the Claremont Serial Killer soon).
So join me if you will on a trip back in time to visit your adolescence. Walk the hallways with me as we enter the classroom of youth to be taught lessons on life and remember Ñ there is a moral at the end of every episode.
DEGRASSI JUNIOR AND SENIOR HIGH
Yes sirree, Degrassi is officially the greatest high school program ever made. This was the only show in w