The University has confirmed that Room Cleaning is set to be cut by 50%.

After protracted negotiations between the SU and the University over a new Service Level Agreement, a decision has been reached to reduce room cleaning from once a week to once a fortnight, and kitchen cleaning to once a week, rather than every day.

Nan Flory spent a few weeks of the Easter break taking a bite out of the world’s biggest apple. New York is not only America’s cultural capital, but also arguably the cultural capital of the world. Can any similarities be found between the US city and its very English namesake?

Students are bombarded with posters and lectures warning against the dangers of excessive drinking, but are all these well meaning campaigns just out to spoil our fun? Flora Bradwell looks at the joys of alcohol and its place in university life

The scientific briefing with Luke Boulter

In July 1945 the US tested a bomb with an explosive impact equivalent to 200,000 tonnes of TNT: the bomb named Trinity was the first (not so small) step in nuclear technology. Now several hundred thousand tonnes of plutonium and enriched uranium are available, and 27,000 atomic bombs are stored away.

Intelligent design theory is now taught alongside evolution in science lessons. Bob Higson considers the implications of allowing religion into scientific theory

Evolution and Creationism have long been pitted against one another, crudely categorised as science battling against faith or simply ‘God vs Science’. The issue is a source of contention, particularly with regards to what should be taught in schools. Does Creationism belong in the religious studies classroom or in the science lab alongside the theory of evolution by natural selection?

Following their recent gig at Fibbers, Sara Sayeed talks to The Earlies about groupies, the Arctic Monkeys and the problem of making music over different sides of the Atlantic

The Earlies seem to have stumbled into something of an identity crisis. As it turns out, Transatlanticism is not just an affected title for a wistfully meditative Death Cab for Cutie album, but an uncomfortable predicament suffered by the band. Critics have wrestled with the bi-continental make-up of the band, reflecting on the line, “Take me home”, which punctuates the majority of their lyrics. Two Texans plus two Mancunians making music together seem to have caused more bafflement than the rapid spread of bird flu.

It’s been reported that French Connection has had a collapse in sales recently, blamed in part on their recent advertising campaign, which attracted a large number of complaints. I don’t know if you saw it, but I certainly found it quite off-putting: it showed two women beating each other before enjoying a kiss, while covered in oil.

When people used to talk to me about finals, I assumed they’d be like my A Levels: I’d be permanently exhausted, wandering from one exam to the next, and all I’d ever do was work.
I also thought that I’d get rather stressed – or, at the very least, panicked – and end up having arguments with everyone I knew. Thus far, that hasn’t happened. Mainly because I do English, so I’ve had a single exam (which I did worry about no end, but I can’t summon the energy to be concerned about it now it’s over); but also because the mood that appears to be characterising this final term at York is boredom.

A campus celebrity may seem like an oxymoron, but Lucy Peden discovers a fascinating subculture as she attempts to create her own legacy

Many aeons ago at the height of the Ancient Greek empire, the seeds for Big Brother, the latest instalment of which launched itself at us on Thursday last week, were sown. The immortal Pheme, daughter of Gaia, was the Goddess of fame and rumour and (according to the ever helpful Wikipedia) was usually depicted with wings – perhaps she was the inspiration behind that wonderful line: ‘Fame I want to live forever, I want to learn how to fly.’

Many people see those who choose not to eat meat as over-idealistic hippies. Dan Whitehead and Sam Noble explore their different reasons for shunning the red stuff.

William Bowry recounts the sweat, tears and other bodily fluids he encountered when he ran the 26th annual London Marathon

I loved sports day at school. In the balmy summer sun, as athletes stretched toned muscles and hurled javelins in fury, I would enjoy an afternoon of doing absolutely nothing.

Holly Williams considers the opportunities available for new writers in the theatre scene
In his recent appointment as artistic director for the Globe theatre, Dominic Dromgoole has made a commitment to emulate the original conditions of Shakespeare’s Globe, ‘the greatest new-writing theatre in the history of the world’, when the stage was filled with the recent […]

Rosanna Trigg and Holly Williams take a look at Man and God and Blasted - two controversial productions for this term, one playing on and one off campus

No man, and certainly no student at York University, can claim to know the answers to the questions posed by modern cynicism. However a valiant attempt at some humorous philosophising is always welcomed by the Drama Barn audience, and Chris Bush’s newest offering certainly proves more satisfying than the traditional drunken debate. Indeed, an answer to the question of whether a God flawed enough to have created an imperfect world would be accepted by its naturally sceptical inhabitants is attempted with wit and originality.

The Accidental, winner of the prestigous Whitbread award, is a quirky novel sewn together in a patchwork of exuberantly refreshing and vivid narratives. Set during a family holiday in Norfolk, Smith weaves in and out of the insular, funny, poignant interior worlds of the Smart family.

There is twelve year old Astrid, who like her name, burns with astronomical verve as she captures her eccentric childhood days on camera; seventeen year old Magnus who is tormented with the knowledge that he is partly responsible for a trick that led to a girl’s suicide.

Chroniclers of the Wind marks a departure from author Henning Mankell’s usual line of crime fiction, although it explores some similar thematic issues. The novel is full of little amusing but sad anecdotes about a street urchin in an unnamed African port town, Nelio, renowned throughout the city for living on his wits. It is also about Jose Antonio Maria Vaz, a baker who hears gunfire and finds Nelio on his roof.