Humanities desk
< October 17	<< Sep \| Oct \| Nov >>	October 19 >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Humanities Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

October 18[edit]

Purpose of books on table in House of Reps[edit]

In the Australian House of Reps there's a bunch of books on the centre table.

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/may-abbott-continue-says-gillard-20121016-27pm7.html

Do those books serve an actual purpose or are they there to make the place look more authoritative? Surely the clerks would have those records on a laptop?

101.169.85.83 (talk) 00:48, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

[1] - the best I can find - suggest that in the UK they'reHansard and books of parliamentary rules, such as, presumably, Erskine May. There is a cite, but to a defunct PDF location. I think we can take it that they're mainly decorative. Oz mirrors the UK, and as it turns out, visa versa ... the UK dispatch boxes came from down-under. --Tagishsimon (talk) 01:00, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Tagishsimon. 101.169.85.83 (talk) 01:05, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Here's the answer from the horse's mouth. As a long time observer of our Parliament in practice, I can't remember seeing anyone actually consulting those books. That's not to say they don't, though. Sometimes it is still easier and quicker to consult a familiar book than hunt through various computer links and breadcrumbs to get what you want. For example, if I wanted to check out some clause in the Constitution, I'd go straight to the book in my personal library rather than to any online copy thereof. -- Jack of Oz ^[Talk] 01:38, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Red republicans?[edit]

Do US Americans find it strange that red is the official color of republicans? 83.52.248.109 (talk) 14:05, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Not an answer, but see Red states and blue states for a (sort of) explanation. Ghmyrtle (talk) 14:18, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know that it's the "official color of Republicans" but rather the media-imposed shorthand for Republicans since 2000 (before 2000, the only real association between Republicans and red was the preferred color of Nancy Reagan's dresses). The thing is, that Red and Blue are the only two active colors available in the patriotic American palette of red, white, and blue, and if Red were assigned to the Democratic party, then this would give rise to all kinds of snickering and innuendo, so it has to be the other way around (even if this is opposite to UK political color symbolism).AnonMoos (talk) 14:25, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

But the republicans would have a vested interest in being identified with blue - to make the democrats look more communist/socialist/threatening. It's like saying that Obama is Muslim/Arab/threatening. 83.52.248.109 (talk) 14:38, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

And that's probably part of why the journalists ultimately settled on Republicans=Red, Democrats=Blue. If the Republicans wanted to reserve blue as their own particular color, then they should have done so before 2000 (but they didn't). AnonMoos (talk) 15:01, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It's just coincidence. The various networks assigned arbitrary colors to the parties prior to each election and used the colors to make electoral college predictions and on election night for the results. Democrats had been assigned red in the past, and republicans blue, entirely snickerfree. I remember a green versus yellow scheme during the Reagan era. There is certainly nothing "official" going on--as if this were a decision by the BBC--and parties were not offered a choice--the decisions were made arbitrarily in news rooms. In 2000 there was a coincidental confluence of colors. This was noticed by the media and a convenient meme arose. See Fixation (population genetics). μηδείς (talk) 16:50, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

As I remember, in the 1992 and 1996 elections (the last two for which I was living in the States and actually watching the news coverage), which color was used for which candidate on the maps on the Election Night TV news coverage varied from network to network. I remember being very startled one Election Night when I changed channels from ABC to NBC and suddenly it looked like the other candidate was winning! Then I realized that NBC's use of red and blue were reversed from ABC's use of them. Angr (talk) 21:14, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Medeis -- the Democrats could be assigned red in some ephemeral television graphic without much problem, but if there's going to be a long-term stable metaphorical assignment of Red vs. Blue, then assigning red to Democrats would bring in all sorts of unfortunate connotations, while assigning blue to Democrats causes much fewer problems (and Nancy Reagan can have her favorite dress color)... AnonMoos (talk) 21:46, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I really don't think Americans associate red with communism much, anymore. Maybe older Americans, who lived through the various red scares. --Trovatore (talk) 21:54, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It hasn't been very actively used over the last 20 years of U.S. politics, but I think that it's more prominent and ready to be reactivated (particularly among politically-involved types), when a suitable opportunity arises, than you may realize... AnonMoos (talk) 22:14, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

As a politically active free-marketeer since the 1980 US election--before I was old enough to legally vote--I can assure you, AnonMoos, that fewer than 95% of Americans my age have any actual awareness of any association of red with the left. I say this as someone who (1) has worn red symbolically as striking union member, and (2) who has no cognitive dissonance in seeing it as "representing" the GOp since the 2000 election. Were people as historically aware as one might wish them to be, perhaps it would be otherwise. But they aren't, so it isn't. μηδείς (talk) 22:55, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Funny thing how 1980 is about the time that the "Reds" film was released, to great critical acclaim and reasonable box office. The red=communist connection is in the past, but it's in the living past, not the remote dead past, so that someone like Rush Limbaugh could get a great amount of mileage out of riffing on such a theme -- and a journalist might think twice about doing something that would provide the likes of Rush Limbaugh a source of cheap insults... AnonMoos (talk) 02:57, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I can't prove it didn't happen. But I like Medeis's "coincidence" explanation better, in the absence of evidence to the contrary.--Trovatore (talk) 04:14, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm presuming people here read the article linked above as the first reply? It suggests albeit without a source that in 2000 initially there was less unification but this changed because of the long period of uncertainty meaning there was continual coverage and so the media began to conform on one colouring pattern. This doesn't rule out there being a greater confluence in 2000 then in previous years which may have aided the process but does suggest if 2000 had had a clear cut and undisputed on election day the confluence may not have taken hold. Nil Einne (talk) 05:55, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Trovatore -- I'm sure that chance played a role in various transitory and ephemeral color schemes for TV graphics, but if at some point it had seemed like a possibility that a lasting Blue=Republicans / Red=Democrats scheme could be established, then probably someone would have asked "Do we really want to label Democrats as ‘Reds’"? -- while if it seemed possible that a lasting Blue=Democrats / Red=Republicans scheme would be established, then there would be no similar question to be asked... AnonMoos (talk) 07:42, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I think you're speculating. It's not clear to me that anyone would have thought that important enough to bring up.--Trovatore (talk) 08:26, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

As an Australian, I'm perfectly happy to solve the problem by loaning the American parties our national colours of green and gold. (Although green might be unacceptable to those who hate environmentalists.) HiLo48 (talk) 22:45, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

HiLo48, other parties have already taken those colors. The Libertarian Party uses yellow (close to gold) as the primary color in its logo, and the Green Party obviously uses green. → Michael J Ⓣ Ⓒ Ⓜ 00:35, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I clearly remember Professor Sibley wearing red ties the way others wave flags. He wasn't a Communist, but according tothis wore red to "to remind himself and others of his solidarity with the working class and the socialist movement." Zoonoses (talk) 05:00, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Died the year The Berlin Wall fell. Poetic justice? Heartbreak? ...Could it be...Satan? μηδείς (talk) 02:37, 21 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Neckties in presidential debate[edit]

Following from the question above, the first thing I noticed in the debate was that Obama was wearing a red necktie and Romney a blue one -- the reverse from the first debate. That surely wasn't a coincidence. Has anybody seen any discussion of why they decided to do that?Looie496 (talk) 15:20, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

One place it isn't is the Debate MoU, in which they seemingly nail down every single other possible question. I'm envisioning their staff members meeting in a neutral hallway and flipping a coin, but there's no reason it couldn't have been done by an earlier informal phone call either. A simple Google.com search for obama romney necktie color yields plenty of pages making the same observation and an excellent unrelated first result, but none I've clicked on so far actually has any reasons why they would have done so. ☯.Zen Swashbuckler.☠ 16:58, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

ThisSlate article discusses the question, and says that it is simply coincidence -- but I don't believe it. Looie496 (talk) 17:14, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It would have been hilarious if Romney had come out in white tie. Then at least 47% of the voters would have been seeing red, and the Republicans would have been blue. Clarityfiend (talk) 00:02, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Relegion ,[edit]

In which roman catholic semenarys would roman catholic priests have been trained for work in plymouth between the years 1850 to 1900 — Preceding unsigned comment added by86.160.170.17 (talk) 15:16, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Do you mean Plymouth or some other place called Plymouth? If you meant the city in Devonshire, then a quick look through Wikipedia shows that Catholic priests in the south of England would have trained at St. Edmund's College, Ware until 1869, when a new seminary was founded at St Thomas's in Hammersmith in London. Thereafter, each diocese began to establish their own colleges; a scheme to have a central seminary at Oscott College in Birmingham seems to been abandoned in the early 1900s.[2]. St. John's Seminary (Wonersh) opened in 1891, serving the Archdiocese of Southwark. The Diocese of Plymouth falls within the Ecclesiastical province of Southwark, so maybe there's a connection there, perrhaps someone with a better understanding of the RC hierarchy in England could comment. Alansplodge Alansplodge (talk) 17:30, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The IP geolocates to Launceston, Cornwall, so Plymouth, Devonshire, does seem most likely. Angr (talk) 21:09, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

By that time, there was a fair amount of mobility for clergy in the UK, for both Roman Catholics and Anglicans. So you might very well expect to find a priest working in Plymouth who had been trained in France, Italy, or elsewhere. If you're interested in a specific priest, or the priest(s) at a specific institution, you'd be well advised to find the relevant Catholic Directory for the time. Had you been interested in Anglican priests, you'd find things nicely centralised in Crockford's Clerical Directory, of which larger reference libraries in UK will have an archive (Crockford has a mini-bio of the career of each incumbent Anglican priest and official). Things RC don't seem to be quite as well ordered - there certainly was a publication for Scotland, Catholic Directory for the Clergy and Laity in Scotland, but I can't find an equivalent that would cover Plymouth. It might be worth a trip (or maybe a phone call) to the County Reference Library in Truro to see if they have the appropriate Directory. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 22:31, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

What happened in these 3 years of king Yeongjo reign?[edit]

1729년: 기유처분
1740년: 경신처분
1741년: 신유대훈

I couldn't understand it, and I didn't find any information in Yeongjo article. — Precedingunsigned comment added by Sayom (talk • contribs) 16:23, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

unidentified London building/castle[edit]

Hi, does anyone familiar with London know what building this is part of? I took the picture a couple of years ago, and I was (judging by shots taken before and after) either near Tower of London or the Globe Theatre. Obviously Tower of London would seem like a good option, but I haven't been able to find on the web a portion of it that looks like this. Julia\^talk 21:38, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It's the Curfew Tower of Windsor Castle. Mikenorton (talk) 21:54, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Ooh, okay, interesting. Apparently I did quite a lot of travelling that day that I don't remember! Thank you so much! Julia\^talk 22:02, 18 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]