Jeevan Farthing

Editor-in-Chief of The Glasgow Guardian. Law and Politics (LLB) student at the University of Glasgow.

The Glasgow Guardian •

Notes on Booker Prize 2023 winner Prophet Song

Paul Lynch, winner of The Booker Prize 2023, told the awards ceremony that he risked “dooming his career” by writing Prophet Song. His dystopian novel follows an ordinary, middle-class family, The Stacks, whose lives deteriorate in tandem with the city where they live, Dublin. Written poetically – with no paragraph breaks or speech marks – its tragedy lies in the helplessness of its characters: its floundering mother, Eilish, and her bed-wetting, school-skipping children. Prophet Song is formida
The Glasgow Guardian •

Glasgow deserved better from COP26

Two years since COP26. Two years since Prince Charles turned up at the Kelvingrove Art Gallery, Joe Biden was chauffeur driven past my halls of residence to a VIP-dinner, and John Kerry was spotted outside The Dirty Duchess in Finnieston. Two years since 100,000 of us took the streets and crammed around George Square for hours, craning our necks to catch a glimpse of Greta Thunberg (who, despite many rumours, unfortunately failed to turn up to Polo Wednesday the following week).
The Glasgow Guardian •

Review: Baek Sehee’s i want to die but i want to eat tteokbokki

i want to die but i want to eat tteokbokki is marketed as “part memoir, part self-help book.” Its format is unusual: recorded conversations between the author and her psychiatrist constitute the bulk of the text, before an epilogue serves as a personal reflection. In this epilogue, Baek Sehee discusses her experience of finding books which are like medicine for her. It is implied that these are self-help books.

As instances of mental ill-health skyrocket among young people, substituting the adv
The Glasgow Guardian •

University spends £93 million on student accommodation with 87.8% occupancy rate

Data seen by The Glasgow Guardian suggests there to be over 500 empty rooms in University-owned accommodation.

A Freedom of Information (FOI) request obtained by The Glasgow Guardian has revealed substantial decreases in the overall occupancy rates of student accommodation available to University of Glasgow (UofG) students compared with the previous academic year.

The occupancy rate of beds within student accommodation owned by the University of Glasgow stands, as of 12 October 2023, at 85.35%
The Glasgow Guardian •

Experimental dance and chronic pain: In conversation with Sarah Hopfinger

Living with invisible pain can be debilitating, but artist and Royal Conservatoire researcher, Sarah Hopfinger, endeavours to turn her pain into art through her autobiographical show, Pain and I, performed at Tramway on November 8 and 9.

Sarah Hopfinger has lived with chronic back pain since she was 14. In the script for her immersive autobiographical performance, Pain and I, she admits feeling “embarrassed” by her pain, and wishing it would “disappear for good”. Because she “can’t always sit f
The Glasgow Guardian •

Instagram and me; Instagram is me

By adopting the perspective of the Instagram version of himself, can our Editor-in-Chief better understand his toxic relationship with social media?

Sometimes I think about the Instagram version of myself, as if they were sentient, like me. As I watch them grow and develop, I feel like I’ve created and nurtured them, like a parent does with their child. What would they perceive of the things they do, the places they go, the people they interact with? Would they be satisfied with the existence t
The Glasgow Guardian •

The definite Real Housewives of Cheshire ranking

Glitz, glam and deceit: these ladies are all showstoppers in one way or another

Dorothy was right: there’s no place like home. This adage from The Wizard of Oz surely extends to Real Housewives franchises, too, and while there will always be purists asserting the supremacy and authenticity of Bravo – the network which launched the show – I am convinced that ITVBe have done a fine job with their UK spin-off series (or, at least, this one). After 175 episodes of quintessentially British drama, th
The Glasgow Guardian •

Editorial: We support trans rights

The Glasgow Guardian stands with UofG’s trans community amongst increasingly vitriolic public discourse

In the past week, headlines have been dominated by successive government representatives making increasingly provocative and aggressive overtures about trans people. From Rishi Sunak declaring base level transphobia as “common sense” at Conservative party conference, to Steve Barclay announcing government policy designed to exclude trans women from female hospital wards, it has been a particu
The Glasgow Guardian •

Petition opens for UofG graduate Lovisa Arnesson-Cronhamre killed in car accident

The Arnesson-Cronhamre family are encouraging people to sign a a petition in advance of an upcoming court case.

25-year-old Lovisa Arnesson-Cronharme, who graduated from the University of Glasgow earlier this year, died on Tuesday 12 September after a hit-and-run incident in the US state of Pennsylvania. Ahmed M. Alqubaisi, 20, has – according to police – been charged with vehicular homicide, involuntary manslaughter, reckless endangerment, careless driving, and speeding, and is currently in cu
The Glasgow Guardian •

Inside the Print: Exclusive interview with Nicola Sturgeon and more

Listen to this episode from Inside the Print on Spotify. Join Deputy Editor-in-Chief Jan Jasinski for an in-depth look at the Glasgow Guardian's latest print edition. Rory Mullen speaks about his exclusive first interview with former First Minister Nicola Sturgeon since her arrest in June News Editor Odhran Gallagher on his interview with a UofG student running for Parliament Editors-in-Chief Jeevan Farthing and Niamh Flanagan on the state of the University and what to look out for in the y
The Glasgow Guardian •

Editorial: Higher education is in crisis, the University must act

The decisions of administration this academic year will be fundamental to the student experience.

Freshers’ week is once more upon us at the University of Glasgow, and with it comes for many of you a fresh start – perhaps you’re a fresher leaving your hometown to embark upon your university journey, or a returning student moving into the next phase of your academic career. Unfortunately, as we embrace the new beginnings that September offers, students and staff alike are unable to leave behind
The Glasgow Guardian •

My next job is beach (I just don't know it yet)

Building universities in seaside towns could help revive them.

It’s the end of July, and I’m soaking up the fragments of sunshine interjecting a surprisingly chilly afternoon. Behind me is the mound of sand – laden with crumbs and footprints – and beneath me are the pebbles, granular and crunchy. Right front of me is the soothing lull of the tide, crashing aggressively inwards, foaming, while further ahead are small specks of people exploring rough-and-ready ridges. What are they up to? A few d
The Glasgow Guardian •

Room 223, Cairncross House

Don’t obsess over making your halls a home away from home: embrace its eccentricites.

Someone else is in my room. A few days ago they hauled bags past reception, up two flights of stairs, through a door, left turn, right turn, zig zag, zig zag again. No time to get a first impression when they finally arrive because there’s six more boxes of stuff waiting outside on the pavement and what if someone steals the one with their collection of houseplants which will probably die anyway because they w
The Glasgow Guardian •

Glasgow students face second highest cost-of-living in UK

A survey of students in the UK has placed Glasgow as one of the most expensive places for students in the country.

New data from the NatWest Student Living Index 2023, collected in May and June of this year, has named Glasgow as the city with the second highest living costs for students in the UK, behind only Edinburgh. The survey – which covered 3,052 students across 63 university towns and cities – determined student living costs by dividing their average monthly living and accommodation cost
The Glasgow Guardian •

Glasgow zine library gets bigger and better

The Glasgow Guardian visits and speaks with their staff about the creative value of zinemaking, and why exponential growth isn’t always a good thing

It’s Friday afternoon, and I’m reading a zine called Old Ladies Swearing. Doreen, hunching slightly, says “Shithouse”. Gladys has a perm, and she says “Cunt”. While I flip its plain white, A5 pages, a woman wearing a Scottish autism jumper gets up and leaves the building. She’s been quietly working on a zine for the last few hours. “The last time I
The Glasgow Guardian •

Tinderbox Orchestra Review: Ordinary people doing extraordinary things

As one component part of the registered charity Tinderbox Collective, the orchestra returns to the Edinburgh Fringe for a dazzling showcase of fusion music.

Two rows of numbered PCs, a dozen red office chairs and a photocopier are already incongruous additions to Edinburgh Central Library’s grandiose, wood-panelled reference room. A modest stage, a smattering of instruments laid out on the floor and a multitude of criss-crossing wires only add to what looks like, at first glance, a messy bricol
The Glasgow Guardian •

Ten Years since Sheryl Sandberg told women to Lean In

Since Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In topped bestseller lists, we have entered the fourth wave of feminism. This has been, in part, defined by the #metoo movement which challenged sexual harassment in the workplace, as well as a renewed focus on intersectionality. Neither of these two issues are addressed by Lean In, and Sandberg’s supposedly feminist manifesto has largely failed on its own terms - the number of female tech leaders has fallen. Sandberg herself called it quits in June last year, taking
The Glasgow Guardian •

Glasgow Film Festival 2023: Rye Lane

Naming a rom-com after a bustling street running through the heart of Peckham (South London) emphasises the special importance of setting to Rye Lane. The plethora of spaces which Dom (David Jonsson) and Yaz (Vivian Oparah) navigate are unmistakably and proudly in Zone 2, whether that be chicken shop Morley’s, under the arches of the London Overground, or Brixton Market. In a Q&A, director Raine Allen Miller mentioned filming in the latter location as especially important, because South London i
The Glasgow Guardian •

Glasgow Film Festival 2023: What Sex Am I?

Were it not for their gender, most of the people interviewed in What Sex Am I? would make pretty boring subjects. A former PE teacher and a computer mechanics worker are just some of the subjects of Lee Grant’s hour-long documentary, which dissects the lives of ordinary people whose relationships with sex and gender American society deems complex (both in the 1980s, when the film is set, and maybe even more so today).

Grant’s style is forthright, and sometimes a little too prying, but effective
The Glasgow Guardian •

Glasgow Film Festival 2023: How To Blow Up a Pipeline

Why To Blow Up a Pipeline is perhaps a more appropriate title for the book this climate crisis thriller is based on. Yet Andreas Malm’s theoretical and intellectual justification of direct action, sabotage and property destruction in tackling the climate emergency is almost less philosophical than Daniel Goldhaber’s screen adaptation, which provides a nuanced account of a group of environmental activists as they attempt to destroy an oil refinery.

One of several programmes chosen by Glasgow Fil
The Glasgow Guardian •

The Weekly Roundup Podcast 28/02/23

Listen to this episode from The Glasgow Guardian on Spotify. Join Digital Media Editor Jan Jasinski and Digital Content Creator Sydney Martin for an overview of The Glasgow Guardian's February print edition, including news on an investigation of the University's expenses scheme, and what's coming up on Glasgow's cultural scene. Joined by Editors-in-Chief Luke Chafer & Kim Mannion, Culture Editor Jeevan Farthing, and Deputy Editor-in-Chief Fraser McFarlane.
The Glasgow Guardian •

New report shows surge in student housing prices

The report found that the average PBSA rent has increased by 34% since 2018. 26% of students they sampled reported being unable to pay their rent in full on one or more occasion, with this rising to 46% among widening access groups. Students also detailed poor living conditions, including being unable to access fresh water for up to 96 hours, and faulty fire alarms that would go off every night.

Concerns were also raised by the report that international students are disproportionately affected
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