Welcome back to Honi Soit.
The theme for this week’s edition is Paralysis. It’s a familiar feeling this time of year; the sun is setting earlier and the mid-semester break is creeping slowly towards us. I hope flicking through these pages will release you from uni-stupor. Creating this edition has freed me from the catatonia of autumn.
In these pages: Purny and I report on the Doctors’ Union strikes; Sofija Filipovic brings home her experiences during the student protests in Serbia; Dalisha Cristina and Ramla Khalid analyse our social and dating lives in a technological panopticon; Lara Martins Fonseca explores the kafkaesque nature of our university.
In the feature article on page six, my wonderful reporter Madison Burland deep dives into the reactionary narratives subtly hidden in the everyday digital content we consume.
On page 14, in the perspective section, I ruminate on paralysis and growing pains in my teenagehood.
Thank you to my lovely and dear friend Ava for the gorgeous cover art. This editorial is dedicated to everyone who has un-paralysed me; you know who you are.
Love always, Mehnaaz <3
Companion Piece, Ava Broinowski
Ink & gouache on cold-pressed paper
‘What is keeping you here?’
Wherever you are, the square is. You can’t see the square. You cannot see normality until you see abnormality. The square and you made each other. Outside of the square is the world, so glorious and flowing. Unreeling, unyielding, always about to begin. But the square is of the world, too. We like to square off our ways of knowing to understand the flux. Which distinctions have you drawn, and what are they serving? Between self and world, artifice and nature, work and life, mind and body. Perhaps these are useful lines. In any case, there you are. In your little square. Why can’t you move? What is keeping you here?
Ava is starting her honours year in philosophy in semester 2, 2025. She paints and writes poetry and essays, about epistemology, the idea of nature, imagination, and scepticism.
