@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

RuthSalter

@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot

Knitting, cooking, socialism and folk music.

Doctoral Researcher, University of Edinburgh: Hegemony and Counter-Hegemony in the Scottish Folk Revival (interests: cultural hegemony, Gramsci, critical folklore, 'folk' culture, cultural revivalism, history of folk, Scottish folk culture and music, labour history, working-class culture)

Plus I make a cocktail-based pie every month.

She/her

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simonvarwell, to random Esperanto
@simonvarwell@mastodon.scot avatar

Good news that ScotGov is to declare a housing crisis. Communities are being squeezed by second homes, short term lets and unequal land ownership.

However it is bizarre that reserve powers will be blamed. So many competences in this area are devolved, eg equipping councils to ensure planning oversight of property usage, introducing a land value tax and so forth.

Such a paucity of imagination and ambition.

https://news.stv.tv/politics/scottish-government-to-declare-national-housing-emergency

RuthSalter,
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

@simonvarwell We've been trying to buy a house for three years (JFC). No doubt in my mind that 100% of the problems we had for the first 18 months could have been solved by councils preventing second homes and AirB&Bs. Even since then it's been waiting for the market to settle a bit after the second-home covid boom, twinned with the fact that all the places we want to move (roughly the areas we're from) are outrageously expensive owing to....you guessed it, second homes and holiday lets!

RuthSalter,
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

@simonvarwell Aw thank you, didn't mean this to come across as quite such a trauma dump though, sorry - more to say through example I agree with your assessment that ScotGov blaming Westminster for this situation is ridiculous (but very convenient for the SNP's landlord contingent)

RuthSalter,
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

@simonvarwell Yeah, IMO the incoherence within the SNP has become increasingly obvious as the unifying force of the independence campaign has dissipated - showing the large swathes of nats invested in the same systems of wealth as anybody else. I always have hopes for the Greens, but I struggle to seperate Scottish Labour from Keith; wish they would just leave rUK Labour and try to develop a progressive indy party (oh wait, like the Greens). Long and short, no idea who to vote for now eh 😅

RuthSalter,
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

@simonvarwell Oh yeah I definitely would vote Green if I thought they could actually win here. But we've been quite a swinging seat recently and I think it'll basically come down to having to support whoever keeps the Tories out.

RuthSalter, to Perth
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Wander up Kinnoull Hill in Perth today. I don't think I've been up here before, but it had really good paths and was pretty quiet so reckon we'll be back.

A view down some cliffs and greenery towards a small city. The River Tay runs out from the city, and there are green and yellow fields behind it. In the distance are some low hills. The sky is mostly grey with white clouds, although it's attempting to be blue.

RuthSalter, to knitting
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Separated for sleeves! In fingering weight yarn though each row is still a beast 🫣

@knitting

RuthSalter, to Scotland
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Was very excited to see the train leave from Rannoch station on its way to Mallaig today 🚂

#Scotland #Scottish #Perthshire #Highlands #ScottishHighlands #Train #Trains

A purple and yellow ScotRail train leaves Rannoch station. The station is one long platform with north and south sides and a Victorian station building in the middle. The train is heading North into Scottish moor and hills on a beautiful sunny day.

RuthSalter, to socialism
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Today is 87 years since Antonio Gramsci died at the hands of the Italian Fascists.

Gramsci, a founder and leader of the Italian Communist Party, was imprisoned by Mussolini’s regime in 1926. During his imprisonment he wrote extensively about history, politics and society.

His work on the role of culture, ideology, and the consent rulers obtain from those they rule has been influential in understanding how groups gain and maintain power.

1/2

RuthSalter,
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

The circumstances leading to the fascism of Gramsci's time are starkly comparable with the current rising tides of fascism; it terrifies me on a daily basis.

Nonetheless, Gramsci was optimistic about how people, together, can create change: 'when the individual can associate himself with all the other individuals who want the same changes ... the individual can be multiplied an impressive number of times and can obtain a change which is far more radical than at first sight seemed possible.'

RuthSalter, to knitting
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

New cast-on: a 'So Basic' sweater for my partner.

Here comes 1.35km of (basically) stockinette 😱

@knitting

RuthSalter, to knitting
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

I finished my Vehnä Shawl and I actually love it! I think this might be the most wearable shawl I’ve ever made - thanks to the combination of it’s lovely details, neutral palette, and functional (modified) shape 🌾

I made a bunch of easy mods to make it symmetrical and add more wheat rows, full notes on Ravelry or hmu for off-Rav:
https://www.ravelry.com/projects/RuthSalter/vehna-shawl

@knitting

2) A closer photo of me in front of the same stone wall, wearing my shawl. It is wrapped round my neck with the big central point in the middle, and the smaller edge points by each side. The two outside points are exposing the wrong-side of the knitting.

RuthSalter, to FolkMusic
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Always like stopping at Hamish Henderson's childhood home in Glenshee, which backs right onto the kirkyard.

Henderson was a major organiser of the Scottish Folk Revival in the 1950s-70s. Some of his interest in folk culture came from his upbringing here and around
Blairgowrie, where he heard his mother
and their neighbours singing traditional songs.

A kirkyard with a stone church, reasonably well kept, and some mismatched gravestones in front. Behind are some hills, with some forestry on the near one. It is a cold grey day and the vegetation is still quite wintery.

RuthSalter, to knitting
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Almost off the needles! I'm really glad I decided to turn this asymmetrical Vehnä shawl symmetrical - I think it's gonna be more wearable for me, and it's been fun working out how to fit the decreases into the dip stitch and cable columns.


@knitting

RuthSalter, to knitting
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

🎶 You'll forget the sun in his jealous sky
As we lie in fields of gold 🎶

I think we can all agree holding gold for the second half of my Vehnä (wheat) shawl was a good decision 💛

@knitting

RuthSalter, to Scotland
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Great photo by Peter Sandground! Gathering of heavy horses at the Kelpies yesterday to begin celebrations for their 10th anniversary.

https://www.scottishcanals.co.uk/news/heavy-horses-gather-to-celebrate-powerful-kelpies-effect-a-decade-on

#Scotland #Scottish #TheKelpies #Kelpies #Falkirk #Stirling #HeavyHorses #Clydesdale #Horse #Horses

RuthSalter, to knitting
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

I've reached a turning point in my Vehnä shawl. The pattern is for an asymmetric shawl, but as it's getting wider I'm thinking I might prefer a symmetrical one for ease of wear.

So I think I'm gonna start decreasing back down at the same rate, so I can end up with an even triangle.

Wondering about holding a lil gold with the second half too ✨

@knitting

RuthSalter, to folk
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Sad news for Scottish folk music, to hear Ian Green has died.

So much of Scottish folk from the past four decades (and before) is on Greentrax, from Shooglenifty to Dick Gaughan to archives from the School of Scottish Studies - Ian's label surely is the 'undisputed leader in its field'.

Hands Up for Trad hall of fame entry: https://projects.handsupfortrad.scot/hall-of-fame/ian-d-green/

RuthSalter, to knitting
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Cable surgery!

I've widened my shawl beyond its pattern, so was unsure whether to put a cable next to an increase at one point and dropped down later to add it. It never looked quite right though and kept bugging me. Realised I'd done it 1 row too high, so dropped back down and fixed it again.

I found putting a stitch marker on the yarn from each row as I pulled it out and stacking these over the needle made it easier to see what yarn was for what row on the way back up.


@knitting

RuthSalter, to knitting
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

New cast-on. I've done quite a lot of colourwork recently so it's nice to be working on something textural again. And sooo fluffy!

@knitting

RuthSalter, to knitting
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Finished my Rautuneule jumper and matching hat. Honestly love the bold colours and how I kinda look like a 1980s ski instructor?

Project notes via Ravelry, or happy to send direct: https://www.ravelry.com/projects/RuthSalter/rautuneule

@knitting

2) A photo from the front of me wearing the same jumper and hat, in the same place. My hair is over my shoulder; it is ridiculously long (to hip level). I am wearing bright pink-framed sunglasses.

RuthSalter, to Ukraine
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

40 years ago Ukrainian miners brought aid to striking Welsh miners; now Welsh miners have driven aid to miners fighting in Ukraine.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-68369946

Incredibly moving story of international, decade-spanning solidarity.

It makes me think of Hamish Henderson's 'The Gillie Mor', a song of friendship between Leith and Kiev in the 1950s which speaks to an international solidarity of the industrial working class: https://www.tobarandualchais.co.uk/track/16917?l=en

RuthSalter, to knitting
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Avoiding sewing in the ends on my jumper by making a matching hat 😉

@knitting

RuthSalter, to folklore
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

'If you have money and friends in high places,
You can keep the law up your arse'

  • Proverb used in San Costantino di Briatico, Catanzaro, Italy
    (cited in Luigi Lombardi-Satriani, 1974)

RuthSalter,
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Honestly that has nothing on this very concise Sicilian proverb in use c.1880:

'The law is made to oppress the poor.'

(Also cited in Luigi Lombardi-Satriani, 1974)

RuthSalter, to knitting
@RuthSalter@mastodon.scot avatar

Final three colour round - can't wait for things to get less messy 😅

@knitting

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