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7 ​January, 2015: “POWERFUL, PROFOUND, POLITICAL AND PHILOSOPHICAL”. Production House Theatre NW1 presents Athena Ashton’s Topical New Play “THE MISSIONARY POSITION!!” The play will be screened in theatres in Indian cities from April 2015 onwards with the first screening in Mumbai on 5^th April 2015.

The play is directed by the young British Director Samantha Rowe and has a great cast including: Christopher Pemberton as Father Joseph; beautiful Caroline Egerton as the ravaged nun Sister Abigail;  talented Indian actress Shyamala Shankaran as murdered nun Abhaya;  accompanied by a large, brilliant British, Indian and African cast. Sets designed by Rosemary Shackleton include a tribal area in North East Area and Andhra Pradesh where villages penetrated by missionaries are brilliantly and authentically created.

Athena Ashton the writer who has studied Sanskrit and Yoga under a great Indian Scholar was appalled by the destruction of Indian heritage by missionary activity which not only negated all that was beautiful and rich about Indian Philosophy and Mythology buy usurped part of it as their own but ” belonging to Christianity”. She also saw how christian missionary activity was primarily directed at Hindus in India but used propaganda against Muslims and Hindus to divide them. In Africa it was used for political power and natural resource exploitation through conversion. The play has been highly praised for an original and illuminating exposure from a European point of view into the activities of missionaries in India, China and other Asian countries as part of Gospel 2000 following mass conversions of indigenous peoples in Africa and Latin America.

RAVE INTERNATIONAL REVIEWS:

“A powerful expose of the cancer of Christian missionaries and their conversion and sexual predatory activities that has decimated most African and Latin American cultures and is now threatening the Chinese state after contaminating India.” – Theatre Review

“The young English playwright Athena Ashton who has investigated the phenomenon of fake Christian conversions across three continents has written a deep and profound play with huge political and cultural implications for several indigenous cultures that are now vanishing under the onslaught of a religion now almost defunct in Europe”- Buddhist World

“A hilarious yet shocking, powerful and tragic exploration of the ” Missionary’s Position in the third world and of the financial muscle of a highly questionable and historically dubious faith still at the root of post -colonial exploitation for natural resources and cultural destruction of ancient civilizations ” -London Stage.

ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT

Athena Ashton comes from an old aristocratic and historic English family whose great grandfather was from the family of the Earls of East Anglia.  She studied drama in the United States and travelled and lived extensively with her parents in Africa and Asia as her father was an officer in the United Nations.  After the tragic death of her husband at the age of 29 in a motor accident, she now lives with her son in a remote part of Spain close to Andalusia where she runs a yoga retreat. This is where she writes and performs her plays and poetry non commercially only to friends and her students.

The principal cast includes:

Christopher Pemberton as Father Joseph

Caroline Egerton as Sister Abigail

Anurag Sinha as Reverend Stepen Rajamanikkam

Shyamala Shankaran as Sister Abhaya

Charlotte Morrison as the investigative Journalist Samantha Morgan

Large cast of British, Indian and African extras

Orchestral and Choir Music by Penelope Richardson

Set Design by Rosemary Shackleton

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Nuremberg/Vienna, 26 June 2014 –Twitter has become an increasingly relevant platform for journalists, politicians, activists and newly empowered citizens to disseminate news and discuss current affairs. GfK in association with the University of Vienna have released their timely study, using new techniques and methodology, into leading contributors and their followers. The result maps the structure of individual countries’ Twitterspheres and how each coalesces to form a European universe, bringing to light divisions that underpin the political landscape within nationalities and in Europe as whole.

The debate on the European Parliamentary elections was used as the basis for defining relevant accounts. This delivered a universe of approximately 450,000 Twitter accounts, which were then reduced to a core of approximately 12,000.

Twitter accounts gather into clusters depending on political and national bias. Opposition groups, such as Spain’s 15M movement, create discordant alternative clusters. A strong European central core is noticeable, composed of accounts that have a Europe-wide following – those directly related to EU politics and the British international news media.

The European universe is dominated by Western Europe – the Eastern European countries are largely absent. Twitter has not yet become a key channel through which political news flows across the countries of Eastern Europe

Twitter’s users reach beyond the politicians and their parties.

Whilst mainstream news media and high-profile politicians, whether from the left, right, or center are dominant, one will also find bloggers, cartoonists and extra-parliamentary political groups commanding a significant following, although their roles tend to be confined to their own national communication networks.

For a free copy of the study, please go to www.gfk.com/twitter

More information:

About GfK

GfK is the trusted source of relevant market and consumer information that enables its clients to make smarter decisions. More than 13,000 market research experts combine their passion with GfK’s 80 years of data science experience. This allows GfK to deliver vital global insights matched with local market intelligence from more than 100 countries. By using innovative technologies and data sciences, GfK turns big data into smart data, enabling its clients to improve their competitive edge and enrich consumers’ experiences and choices.

For more information, please visit www.GfK.com or follow GfK on Twitter: https://twitter.com/GfK_en

About The Department of Communication at the University of Vienna

The Department of Communication at the University of Vienna is one of the world’s largest departments for communication science. Main research areas include political communication, journalism, advertising, public relations, critical technology and media analysis, media change, social media, the developments of communication science methods and communication history.

For more information, please visit http://publizistik.univie.ac.at or go to
http://axelmaireder.net

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