Queer is an umbrella term for minority sexual orientations and gender identities that are not heterosexual, heteronormative or gender-binary. In the context of Western identity politics the term also acts as a label setting queer-identifying people apart from discourse, ideologies, and lifestyles that typify mainstream LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transsexual) communities as being oppressive or assimilationist.

This term is controversial because it was reappropriated only two decades ago from its use as an anti-gay epithet. Furthermore, some LGBT people disapprove of using queer as a catch-all because they consider it offensive, derisive or self-deprecating given its continuous use as a form of hate speech.

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Background

Origin

Since its emergence in the English language in the 16th century (related to the German quer, meaning "across, at right angle, diagonally or transverse"), queer has generally meant "strange", "unusual", or "out of alignment". It might refer to something suspicious or "not quite right", or to a person with mild derangement or who exhibits socially inappropriate behaviour. The expression "in Queer Street" was used in the UK as of the 1811 edition of Francis Grose's A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue for someone in financial trouble.

Queer as Folk is a reference to the common expression unrelated to homosexuality "There's nowt so queer as folk".

In the 1904 Sherlock Holmes story "The Adventure of the Second Stain", the term is still used in a completely non-sexual context (Inspector Lestrade is threatening a misbehaving constable with "finding himself in Queer Street", i.e., in this context, being severely punished).

Semantic shift

By the time that story was published, however, the term was already starting to gain a connotation of sexual deviance (especially that of homosexual and/or effeminate males), which is already known in the late 19th century; an early recorded usage of the word in this sense was in a letter by John Sholto Douglas, 9th Marquess of Queensberry to his son Lord Alfred Douglas.

Subsequently, for most of the 20th century, "queer" was frequently used as a derogatory term for effeminate gay males who were believed to engage in receptive or passive anal/oral sex with men, and others exhibiting untraditional (i.e. trans ) gender behaviour. Furthermore, masculine males, who performed the role of the "penetrator" were considered "straights".

Linguistic reappropriation

One of the first attempts by the LGBT community to re-claim the term "queer" was through an organisation called Queer Nation, which was formed in March 1990; a few months later, an influential though anonymous flier was distributed at the New York Gay Pride Parade in June 1990 entitled "Queers Read This".

Because of the context in which it was reclaimed, queer has sociopolitical connotations, and is often preferred by those who are activists; by those who strongly reject traditional gender identities; by those who reject distinct sexual identities such as gay, lesbian, bisexual, and straight; and by those who see themselves as oppressed by the heteronormativity of the larger culture. In this usage it retains the historical connotation of "outside the bounds of normal society" and can be construed as "breaking the rules for sex and gender". It can be preferred because of its ambiguity, which allows "queer"-identifying people to avoid the sometimes strict boundaries that surround other labels. In this context, "queer" is not a synonym for LGBT as it creates a space for "queer" heterosexuals as well as "non-queer" homosexuals.

The term is sometimes capitalized when referring to an identity or community, rather than merely a sexual fact (cf. the capitalized use of Deaf).

Inclusivity and scope

The range of what "queer" includes varies. In addition to referring to LGBT-identifying people, it can also encompass: pansexual, pomosexual, intersexual, genderqueer, asexual and autosexual people, and even gender normative heterosexuals whose sexual orientations or activities place them outside the heterosexual-defined mainstream, e.g. BDSM practitioners, or polyamorous persons.

For some queer-identified people, part of the point of the term "queer" is that it simultaneously builds up and tears down boundaries of identity. For instance, among genderqueer people, who do not solidly identify with one particular gender, once solid gender roles have been torn down, it becomes difficult to situate sexual identity. For some people, the non-specificity of the term is liberating. Queerness becomes a way to simultaneously make a political move against heteronormativity while simultaneously refusing to engage in traditional essentialist identity politics.

Current examples

Academia

Arts, entertainment, and publishing

Some television shows that use "queer" in their titles include both the British and North American versions of Queer as Folk, Queer Eye, and the cartoon Queer Duck. This commonplace usage has, especially in the American colloquial culture, recently led to the more hip and iconic abbreviation "Q".

See also

Sexuality and gender identity-based cultures

Sexual minority

Queer nationalism

Homophobia

Heterosexism

Bisexual/Fluid/Pansexual

Gay shame

Queercore (formerly "homocore")

Queer Youth Alliance

References

Notes

Bibliography

Anon. "Queercore". i-D magazine No. 110; the sexuality issue. (1992).

Crimp, D. AIDS DemoGraphics. (1990).

Katlin, T. "Slant: Queer Nation". Artforum, November 1990. pp. 21–23.

Tucker, S. "Gender, Fucking & Utopia". Social text, Vol.9, No.1. (1992).

External links

The Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Historical Society

Category:Queer Queer culture Queer culture Category:Reclaimed words

Name	Richard Dawkins
Caption	Dawkins in 2010 at Cooper Union in New York City
Birth name	Clinton Richard Dawkins
Birth date	March 26, 1941
Birth place	Nairobi, Kenya Colony
Residence	Oxford, England
Nationality	British
Ethnicity	White British
Religion	None
Education	MA, DPhil (Oxon)
Alma mater	Balliol College, Oxford
Occupation	Ethologist
Years active	1967-present
Employer	University of California, BerkeleyUniversity of Oxford
Organization	Fellow of the Royal SocietyFellow of the Royal Society of Literature
Known for	Gene-centered view of evolution, concept of the meme, advocacy of atheism and rationalism
Notable works	The Selfish Gene (1976)The Extended Phenotype (1982)The Blind Watchmaker (1986)
Influences	Charles Darwin, Ronald Fisher, George C. Williams, W. D. Hamilton, Daniel Dennett, Nikolaas Tinbergen (doctoral adviser)
Spouse	Marian Stamp Dawkins (m. 1967-1984)Eve Barham (m. 1984-?)Lalla Ward (m. 1992-present)
Children	Juliet Emma Dawkins (born 1984)
Parents	Clinton John DawkinsJean Mary Vyvyan (née Ladner)
Awards	Faraday Award (1990)Kistler Prize (2001)
Website	The Richard Dawkins Foundation

Clinton Richard Dawkins, FRS, FRSL (born 26 March 1941) is a British ethologist and evolutionary biologist. He is an emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford, and was the University of Oxford's Professor for Public Understanding of Science from 1995 until 2008.

Dawkins came to prominence with his 1976 book The Selfish Gene, which popularised the gene-centered view of evolution and introduced the term meme. In 1982, he introduced into evolutionary biology an influential concept, presented in his book The Extended Phenotype, that the phenotypic effects of a gene are not necessarily limited to an organism's body, but can stretch far into the environment, including the bodies of other organisms.

Dawkins is an atheist and humanist, a Vice President of the British Humanist Association and supporter of the Brights movement. He is well-known for his criticism of creationism and intelligent design. In his 1986 book The Blind Watchmaker, he argued against the watchmaker analogy, an argument for the existence of a supernatural creator based upon the complexity of living organisms. Instead, he described evolutionary processes as analogous to a blind watchmaker. He has since written several popular science books, and makes regular television and radio appearances, predominantly discussing these topics. He has been referred to in the media as "Darwin's Rottweiler," a reference to English biologist T. H. Huxley, who was known as "Darwin's Bulldog" for his advocacy of Charles Darwin's evolutionary ideas. In his 2006 book The God Delusion, Dawkins contends that a supernatural creator almost certainly does not exist and that religious faith is a delusion—a fixed false belief. As of January 2010, the English-language version had sold more than two million copies and had been translated into 31 languages, making it his most popular book to date.

Biography

Dawkins was born in Nairobi, Kenya. His father, Clinton John Dawkins (1915-2010), returning to England in 1949, when Dawkins was eight. His father had inherited Over Norton Park, which he turned from a country estate into a commercial farm. Both his parents were interested in natural sciences; they answered Dawkins' questions in scientific terms.

Dawkins describes his childhood as "a normal Anglican upbringing." Though he began having doubts about the existence of God when he was about nine years old, he was persuaded by the argument from design, an argument for the existence of God or a creator based on perceived evidence of order, purpose, or design in nature, and embraced Christianity.

He attended Oundle, a Church of England school, Dawkins' research in this period concerned models of animal decision-making.

From 1967 to 1969, he was an assistant professor of zoology at the University of California, Berkeley. During this period, the students and faculty at UC Berkeley were largely opposed to the ongoing Vietnam War, and Dawkins became heavily involved in the anti-war demonstrations and activities. He returned to the University of Oxford in 1970 taking a position as a lecturer, and in 1990, as a reader in zoology. In 1995, he was appointed Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford, a position that had been endowed by Charles Simonyi with the express intention that the holder "be expected to make important contributions to the public understanding of some scientific field", and that its first holder should be Richard Dawkins.

Since 1970, he has been a fellow of New College. He has delivered a number of inaugural and other lectures, including the Henry Sidgwick Memorial Lecture (1989), first Erasmus Darwin Memorial Lecture (1990), Michael Faraday Lecture (1991), T.H. Huxley Memorial Lecture (1992), Irvine Memorial Lecture (1997), Sheldon Doyle Lecture (1999), Tinbergen Lecture (2004) and Tanner Lectures (2003).

He has sat on judging panels for awards as diverse as the Royal Society's Faraday Award and the British Academy Television Awards, and has been president of the Biological Sciences section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. In 2004, Balliol College, Oxford instituted the Dawkins Prize, awarded for "outstanding research into the ecology and behaviour of animals whose welfare and survival may be endangered by human activities". In September 2008, he retired from his professorship, announcing plans to "write a book aimed at youngsters in which he will warn them against believing in 'anti-scientific' fairytales."

Dawkins' parents were married from 1939 until his father's death in December 2010, aged 95.–28 February 1999) in Oxford. They had a daughter, Juliet Emma Dawkins (born 1984, Oxford). In 1992, he married actress Lalla Ward in Kensington and Chelsea, London. who had worked with her on the BBC's Doctor Who.

Work

Evolutionary biology

, Austin, March 2008]] In his scientific works, Dawkins is best known for his popularisation of the gene-centred view of evolution. This view is most clearly set out in his books The Selfish Gene (1976), where he notes that "all life evolves by the differential survival of replicating entities", and The Extended Phenotype (1982), in which he describes natural selection as "the process whereby replicators out-propagate each other". In his role as an ethologist, interested in animal behaviour and its relation to natural selection, he advocates the idea that the gene is the principal unit of selection in evolution.

Dawkins has consistently been sceptical about non-adaptive processes in evolution (such as spandrels, described by Gould and Lewontin) and about selection at levels "above" that of the gene. He is particularly sceptical about the practical possibility or importance of group selection as a basis for understanding altruism. This behaviour appears at first to be an evolutionary paradox, since helping others costs precious resources and decreases one's own fitness. Previously, many had interpreted this as an aspect of group selection: individuals were doing what was best for the survival of the population or species as a whole, and not specifically for themselves. British evolutionary biologist W. D. Hamilton had used the gene-centred view to explain altruism in terms of inclusive fitness and kin selection − that individuals behave altruistically toward their close relatives, who share many of their own genes. Similarly, Robert Trivers, thinking in terms of the gene-centred model, developed the theory of reciprocal altruism, whereby one organism provides a benefit to another in the expectation of future reciprocation. Dawkins popularised these ideas in The Selfish Gene, and developed them in his own work.

Critics of Dawkins' approach suggest that taking the gene as the unit of selection − of a single event in which an individual either succeeds or fails to reproduce − is misleading, but that the gene could be better described as a unit of evolution − of the long-term changes in allele frequencies in a population. In The Selfish Gene, Dawkins explains that he is using George C. Williams' definition of the gene as "that which segregates and recombines with appreciable frequency." Another common objection is that genes cannot survive alone, but must cooperate to build an individual, and therefore cannot be an independent "unit". In The Extended Phenotype, Dawkins suggests that because of genetic recombination and sexual reproduction, from an individual gene's viewpoint all other genes are part of the environment to which it is adapted.

Advocates for higher levels of selection such as Richard Lewontin, David Sloan Wilson, and Elliot Sober suggest that there are many phenomena (including altruism) that gene-based selection cannot satisfactorily explain. The philosopher Mary Midgley, with whom Dawkins clashed in print concerning The Selfish Gene, has criticised gene selection, memetics and sociobiology as being excessively reductionist.

In a set of controversies over the mechanisms and interpretation of evolution (the so-called 'Darwin Wars'), one faction was often named after Dawkins and its rival after the American paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould, reflecting the pre-eminence of each as a populariser of pertinent ideas. In particular, Dawkins and Gould have been prominent commentators in the controversy over sociobiology and evolutionary psychology, with Dawkins generally approving and Gould generally being critical. A typical example of Dawkins' position was his scathing review of Not in Our Genes by Steven Rose, Leon J. Kamin and Richard C. Lewontin. Two other thinkers on the subject often considered to be allied to Dawkins are Steven Pinker and Daniel Dennett; Dennett has promoted a gene-centred view of evolution and defended reductionism in biology. Despite their academic disagreements, Dawkins and Gould did not have a hostile personal relationship, and Dawkins dedicated a large portion of his 2003 book A Devil's Chaplain posthumously to Gould, who had died the previous year.

Dawkins' book expounds the evidence for biological evolution. It was released on 3 September 2009, published in the United Kingdom and Commonwealth nations by Transworld. In the United States it was released on 22 September 2009, where it was published by Free Press. All of his previous works dealing with evolution had assumed its truth, and not explicitly provided the evidence to this effect. Dawkins felt that this represented a gap in his oeuvre, and decided to write the book to coincide with Darwin's bicentennial year.

Meme

Dawkins coined the word meme (the behavioral equivalent of a gene) to describe how Darwinian principles might be extended to explain the spread of ideas and cultural phenomena. This has spawned the field of memetics. Dawkins' memes refer to any cultural entity that an observer might consider a replicator of a certain idea or a complex of ideas. He hypothesised that people could view many cultural entities as capable of such replication, generally through exposure to humans, who have evolved as efficient (although not perfect) copiers of information and behaviour. Memes are not always copied perfectly, and might indeed become refined, combined or otherwise modified with other ideas, resulting in new memes, which may themselves prove more, or less, efficient replicators than their predecessors, thus providing a framework for a hypothesis of cultural evolution, analogous to the theory of biological evolution based on genes. Since originally outlining the idea in his book The Selfish Gene, Dawkins has largely left the task of expanding upon it to other authors such as Susan Blackmore.

Although Dawkins invented the specific term meme independently, he has not claimed that the idea itself was entirely novel, and there have been other expressions for similar ideas in the past. For instance, John Laurent has suggested that the term may have derived from the work of the little-known German biologist Richard Semon. In 1904, Semon published Die Mneme (which appeared in English in 1924 as The Mneme). This book discussed the cultural transmission of experiences, with insights parallel to those of Dawkins. Laurent also found the term mneme used in Maurice Maeterlinck's The Life of the White Ant (1926), and has highlighted the similarities to Dawkins' concept. without recourse to evolution). He has described the Young Earth creationist view that the Earth is only a few thousand years old as "a preposterous, mind-shrinking falsehood," and his 1986 book, The Blind Watchmaker, contains a sustained critique of the argument from design, an important creationist argument. In the book, Dawkins argued against the watchmaker analogy made famous by the 18th-century English theologian William Paley in his book Natural Theology. Paley argued that, just as a watch is too complicated and too functional to have sprung into existence merely by accident, so too must all living things, with their far greater complexity, be purposefully designed. Dawkins shares the view generally held by scientists that natural selection is sufficient to explain the apparent functionality and non-random complexity of the biological world, and can be said to play the role of watchmaker in nature, albeit as an automatic, nonintelligent, blind watchmaker.

, 2008.]]In 1986, Dawkins participated in a Oxford Union debate, in which he and English biologist John Maynard Smith debated Young Earth creationist A. E. Wilder-Smith and Edgar Andrews, president of the Biblical Creation Society. In general, however, Dawkins has followed the advice of his late colleague Stephen Jay Gould and refused to participate in formal debates with creationists because "what they seek is the oxygen of respectability", and doing so would "give them this oxygen by the mere act of engaging with them at all." He suggests that creationists "don't mind being beaten in an argument. What matters is that we give them recognition by bothering to argue with them in public."

In a December 2004 interview with American journalist Bill Moyers, Dawkins said that "among the things that science does know, evolution is about as certain as anything we know". When Moyers questioned him on the use of the word theory, Dawkins stated that "evolution has been observed. It's just that it hasn't been observed while it's happening." He added that "it is rather like a detective coming on a murder after the scene... the detective hasn't actually seen the murder take place, of course. But what you do see is a massive clue... Huge quantities of circumstantial evidence. It might as well be spelled out in words of English."

Dawkins has ardently opposed the inclusion of intelligent design in science education, describing it as "not a scientific argument at all, but a religious one". He has been a strong critic of the British organisation Truth in Science, which promotes the teaching of creationism in state schools, and he plans—through the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science—to subsidise the delivering of books, DVDs and pamphlets to schools, in order to counteract what he has described as an "educational scandal".

Atheism and rationalism

, 24 June 2006.]] Dawkins is an outspoken atheist and a prominent critic of religion. He has been described as a vocal, militant rationalist, and as "the UK's Chief Atheist". In an interview with Thomas Bass for a book published in 1994 he described himself as a 'fairly militant atheist'. In 1996, when asked if he'd prefer to be known as a scientist or a militant atheist, he replied, "Bertrand Russell called himself the Passionate Sceptic. It's aiming high, but I'll shoot for that." He is an Honorary Associate of the National Secular Society, a vice-president of the British Humanist Association (since 1996), a member of the Secular Coalition for America advisory board, a Humanist Laureate of the International Academy of Humanism, and a fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. In 2003, he became a signatory of the humanist manifesto Humanism and Its Aspirations, published by the American Humanist Association.

Dawkins believes that his own atheism is the logical extension of his understanding of evolution and that religion is incompatible with science. In his 1986 book The Blind Watchmaker, Dawkins wrote:

In his 1991 essay "Viruses of the Mind" (from which the term faith-sufferer originated), he suggested that memetic theory might analyse and explain the phenomenon of religious belief and some of the common characteristics of religions, such as the belief that punishment awaits non-believers. According to Dawkins, faith − belief that is not based on evidence − is one of the world's great evils. He claims it to be analogous to the smallpox virus, though more difficult to eradicate. Dawkins is well-known for his contempt for religious extremism, from Islamist terrorism to Christian fundamentalism; but he has also argued with liberal believers and religious scientists, from biologists Kenneth Miller and Francis Collins to theologians Alister McGrath and Richard Harries. Dawkins has stated that his opposition to religion is twofold, claiming it to be both a source of conflict and a justification for belief without evidence. However, he describes himself as a "cultural Christian", and proposed the slogan "Atheists for Jesus".

Following the September 11, 2001 attacks, when asked how the world might have changed, Dawkins responded:

Dawkins has especially risen to prominence in contemporary public debates relating rationalism, science and religion since the publication of his 2006 book The God Delusion, which has achieved greater sales figures worldwide than any of his other works to date. Its success has been seen by many as indicative of a change in the contemporary cultural zeitgeist, central to a recent rise in the popularity of atheistic literature. The God Delusion was praised by among others the Nobel laureate chemist Sir Harold Kroto, psychologist Steven Pinker and the Nobel laureate biologist James D. Watson. In the book, Dawkins argued that atheists should be proud, not apologetic, because atheism is evidence of a healthy, independent mind. He sees education and consciousness-raising as the primary tools in opposing what he considers to be religious dogma and indoctrination. These tools include the fight against certain stereotypes, and he has adopted the term Bright as a way of associating positive public connotations with those who possess a naturalistic worldview. Critics have said that the programme gave too much time to marginal figures and extremists, and that Dawkins' confrontational style did not help his cause; Dawkins rejected these claims, citing the number of moderate religious broadcasts in everyday media as providing a suitable balance to the extremists in the programmes. He further remarked that someone who is deemed an "extremist" in a religiously moderate country may well be considered "mainstream" in a religiously conservative one. The unedited recordings of Dawkins' conversations with Alister McGrath and Richard Harries, including material unused in the broadcast version, have been made available online by the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science.

Oxford theologian Alister McGrath (author of The Dawkins Delusion and ) maintains that Dawkins is ignorant of Christian theology, and therefore unable to engage religion and faith intelligently. In reply, Dawkins asks "do you have to read up on leprechology before disbelieving in leprechauns?", and − in the paperback edition of The God Delusion − he refers to the American biologist PZ Myers, who has satirised this line of argument as "The Courtier's Reply". Dawkins had an extended debate with McGrath at the 2007 Sunday Times Literary Festival.

Another Christian philosopher Keith Ward explores similar themes in his 2006 book Is Religion Dangerous?, arguing against the view of Dawkins and others that religion is socially dangerous. Criticism of The God Delusion has come from philosophers such as Professor John Cottingham of the University of Reading. Other commentators, including ethicist Margaret Somerville, have suggested that Dawkins "overstates the case against religion", particularly its role in human conflict. Many of Dawkins' defenders claim that critics generally misunderstand his real point. During a debate on Radio 3 Hong Kong, David Nicholls, writer and president of the Atheist Foundation of Australia, reiterated Dawkins' sentiments that religion is an "unnecessary" aspect of global problems.

Dawkins argues that "the existence of God is a scientific hypothesis like any other". He disagrees with Stephen Jay Gould's principle of nonoverlapping magisteria (NOMA). In an interview with Time magazine, Dawkins said:

I think that Gould's separate compartments was a purely political ploy to win middle-of-the-road religious people to the science camp. But it's a very empty idea. There are plenty of places where religion does not keep off the scientific turf. Any belief in miracles is flat contradictory not just to the facts of science but to the spirit of science.

Astrophysicist Martin Rees has suggested that Dawkins' attack on mainstream religion is unhelpful. Regarding Rees' claim in his book Our Cosmic Habitat that "such questions lie beyond science", Dawkins asks "what expertise can theologians bring to deep cosmological questions that scientists cannot?" Elsewhere, Dawkins has written that "there's all the difference in the world between a belief that one is prepared to defend by quoting evidence and logic, and a belief that is supported by nothing more than tradition, authority or revelation." He has said that the publication of The God Delusion is "probably the culmination" of his campaign against religion.

In 2007, Dawkins founded the Out Campaign to encourage atheists worldwide to declare their stance publicly and proudly. Inspired by the gay rights movement, Dawkins hopes that atheists' identifying of themselves as such, and thereby increasing public awareness of how many people hold these views, will reduce the negative opinion of atheism among the religious majority.

In September 2008, following a complaint by Islamic creationist Adnan Oktar, a court in Turkey blocked access to Dawkins' website richarddawkins.net. The court decision was made due to "insult to personality". During the 2010 Global Atheist Convention in Melbourne, Australia Dawkins was criticised for his use of the phrase "Pope Nazi" in reference to wartime Pope Pius XII, whose actions during the Holocaust have been a matter of controversy.

at the Atheist Bus Campaign launch]] In October 2008, Dawkins officially supported the UK's first atheist advertising initiative, the Atheist Bus Campaign. Created by Guardian journalist Ariane Sherine and administered by the British Humanist Association the campaign aimed to raise funds to place atheist adverts on buses in the London area, and Dawkins pledged to match the amount raised by atheists, up to a maximum of £5,500. However, the campaign was an unprecedented success, raising over £100,000 in its first four days, and generating global press coverage. The campaign, started in January 2009, features adverts across the UK with the slogan: "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life." Dawkins said that "this campaign to put alternative slogans on London buses will make people think — and thinking is anathema to religion."

In 2010, Dawkins supported legal efforts to charge Pope Benedict XVI with crimes against humanity. Dawkins and fellow anti-religion campaigner Christopher Hitchens were believed to be exploring the option of having the Pope arrested under the same legal principle that saw Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet arrested during a visit to Britain in 1998. Dawkins has given support to the idea of an atheists' "free thinking" school, that would teach children to "ask for evidence, to be sceptical, critical, open-minded".

On 15 September 2010, Dawkins, along with 54 other public figures, signed an open letter published in The Guardian, stating their opposition to Pope Benedict XVI making a State visit to the United Kingdom.

Richard Dawkins Foundation

In 2006, Dawkins founded the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science (RDFRS), a non-profit organisation. The foundation is in developmental phase. It has been granted charitable status in the United Kingdom and the United States. RDFRS plans to finance research on the psychology of belief and religion, finance scientific education programs and materials, and publicise and support secular charitable organisations. The foundation also offers humanist, rationalist and scientific materials and information through its website.

Other fields

, Menlo Park, California, 29 October 2006.]] In his role as professor for public understanding of science, Dawkins has been a critic of pseudoscience and alternative medicine. His 1998 book Unweaving the Rainbow takes John Keats' accusation that, by explaining the rainbow, Isaac Newton had diminished its beauty, and argues for the opposite conclusion. He suggests that deep space, the billions of years of life's evolution, and the microscopic workings of biology and heredity contain more beauty and wonder than do "myths" and "pseudoscience". Dawkins wrote a foreword to John Diamond's posthumously published Snake Oil, a book devoted to debunking alternative medicine, in which he asserted that alternative medicine was harmful, if only because it distracted patients from more successful conventional treatments, and gave people false hopes. Dawkins states that "there is no alternative medicine. There is only medicine that works and medicine that doesn't work."

Dawkins has expressed concern about the growth of the planet's human population, and about the matter of overpopulation. In The Selfish Gene, he briefly mentions population growth, giving the example of Latin America, whose population, at the time the book was written, was doubling every 40 years. He is critical of Roman Catholic attitudes to family planning and population control, stating that leaders who forbid contraception and "express a preference for 'natural' methods of population limitation" will get just such a method in the form of starvation.

As a supporter of the Great Ape Project – a movement to extend certain moral and legal rights to all great apes – Dawkins contributed the article "Gaps in the Mind" to the Great Ape Project book edited by Paola Cavalieri and Peter Singer. In this essay, he criticises contemporary society's moral attitudes as being based on a "discontinuous, speciesist imperative".

Dawkins also regularly comments in newspapers and weblogs on contemporary political questions; his opinions include opposition to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the British nuclear deterrent and the actions of U.S. President George W. Bush. Several such articles were included in A Devil's Chaplain, an anthology of writings about science, religion and politics. He is also a supporter of the Republic campaign to replace the British monarchy with a democratically elected president. Dawkins has described himself as a Labour voter in the 1970s and voter for the Liberal Democrats since the party's creation. In 2009, he spoke at the party's conference in opposition to blasphemy laws. In the UK general election of 2010, Dawkins officially endorsed the Liberal Democrats, in support of their campaign for electoral reform and for their "refusal to pander to 'faith'."

In the 2007 TV documentary The Enemies of Reason, Dawkins discusses what he sees as the dangers of abandoning critical thought and rationale based upon scientific evidence. He specifically cites astrology, spiritualism, dowsing, alternative faiths, alternative medicine and homeopathy. He also discusses how the Internet can be used to spread religious hatred and conspiracy theories with scant attention to evidence-based reasoning.

Continuing a long-standing partnership with Channel 4, Dawkins participated in a five-part television series The Genius of Britain, along with fellow scientists Stephen Hawking, James Dyson, Paul Nurse, and Jim Al-Khalili. The five-episode series was broadcast in June 2010. The series focussed on major British scientific achievements throughout history.

Dawkins presented a More4 documentary entitled 'Faith School Menace' in which he argued for "us to reconsider the consequences of faith education, which... bamboozles parents and indoctrinates and divides children."

Dawkins wrote a positive review on the book Intellectual Impostures, written by Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont.

Awards and recognition

, 12 October 2007, from Karlheinz Deschner.]] Dawkins was awarded a Doctor of Science by the University of Oxford in 1989. He holds honorary doctorates in science from the University of Huddersfield, University of Westminster, Durham University, the University of Hull, and the University of Antwerp, and honorary doctorates from the University of Aberdeen, Open University, the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, He also holds honorary doctorates of letters from the University of St Andrews and the Australian National University (HonLittD, 1996), and was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1997 and the Royal Society in 2001.

Dawkins topped Prospect magazine's 2004 list of the top 100 public British intellectuals, as decided by the readers, receiving twice as many votes as the runner-up. He has been short-listed as a candidate in their 2008 follow-up poll. In 2005, the Hamburg-based Alfred Toepfer Foundation awarded him its Shakespeare Prize in recognition of his "concise and accessible presentation of scientific knowledge". He won the Lewis Thomas Prize for Writing about Science for 2006 and the Galaxy British Book Awards Author of the Year Award for 2007. In the same year, he was listed by Time magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2007, and he was ranked 20th in The Daily Telegraph's 2007 list of 100 greatest living geniuses. He was awarded the Deschner Award, named after German anti-clerical author Karlheinz Deschner.

Since 2003, the Atheist Alliance International has awarded a prize during its annual conference, honouring an outstanding atheist whose work has done most to raise public awareness of atheism during that year. It is known as the Richard Dawkins Award, in honour of Dawkins' own work.

Media

Selected publications

Documentary films

Nice Guys Finish First (1987)

The Blind Watchmaker (1987)

Growing Up in the Universe (1991)

Break the Science Barrier (1996)

The Root of All Evil? (2006)

The Enemies of Reason (2007)

The Genius of Charles Darwin (2008)

Faith School Menace (2010)

Criticism of Dawkins

A number of writers have taken issue with the views expressed by Richard Dawkins. Examples include:

Darwin's Angel by John Cornwell

and The Dawkins Delusion? by Alastair McGrath

The Selfish Genius by Fern Elson-Baker

The Solitary Self: Darwin and the Selfish Gene by Mary Midgley

The Music of Life by Denis Noble

Why There Almost Certainly Is a God: Doubting Dawkins by Keith Ward

God's Undertaker: Has Science Buried God? by John Lennox

Reason, Faith, and Revolution: Reflections on the God Debate by Terry Eagleton

"Neo-Darwinism, the Modern Synthesis, and Selfish Genes: are they of use in physiology?" by Denis Noble Journal of Pysiology preprint here

Notes

b. The debate ended with the motion "That the doctrine of creation is more valid than the theory of evolution" being defeated by 198 votes to 115.

References

External links

General

Official website

Richard Dawkins' page on Academia.edu

The Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science

Video

National Geographic Interviews – A series of video interviews with National Geographic Channel with Richard Dawkins on Darwin, Evolution and God.

TED Talks: Richard Dawkins on militant atheism at TED in 2002

TED Talks: Richard Dawkins on our "queer" universe at TED Global in 2005

Video interview with Riz Khan for Al Jazeera English

Video interview at Big Think

Selected writings

Viruses of the Mind (1993) – Religion as a mental virus.

The Real Romance in the Stars (1995) – A critical view of astrology.

The Emptiness of Theology (1998) – A critical view of theology. (Alternative link at RDFRS.)

Snake Oil and Holy Water (1999) – Suggests that there is no convergence occurring between science and theism.

What Use is Religion? (2004) – Suggests that religion may have no survival value other than to itself.

Race and Creation (2004) – On race, its usage and a theory of how it evolved.

The giant tortoise's tale, The turtle's tale and The lava lizard's tale (2005) – A series of three articles written after a visit to the Galápagos Islands.

Dawkins' Huffington Post articles

Audio

Richard Dawkins on RadioLIVE's Weekend Variety Wireless – Richard Dawkins appears live on New Zealand's RadioLIVE, taking calls from the audience.

Category:1941 births Category:Living people Category:20th-century biologists Category:20th-century non-fiction writers Category:21st-century biologists Category:21st-century non-fiction writers Category:Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford Category:Atheism activists Category:British republicans Category:Criticism of religion Category:English atheists Category:English biologists Category:English humanists Category:English sceptics Category:English science writers Category:Ethologists Category:Evolutionary biologists Category:Fellows of New College, Oxford Category:Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature Category:Fellows of the Royal Society Category:Gifford Lecturers Category:Old Oundelians Category:People from Nairobi Category:Presenters of the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures Category:Recipients of the Medal of the Presidency of the Italian Republic Category:Statutory Professors of the University of Oxford Category:University of California, Berkeley faculty

Josie Cotton (born Kathleen Josey in 1956) is an American singer/songwriter, best known for her minor hits "Johnny Are You Queer" and "He Could Be the One" from 1982. "Johnny Are You Queer" has been featured on the soundtracks to the movies Jackass Number Two and Valley Girl.

Career

Born Kathleen Josey in Dallas, Texas, Cotton sang with Dallas area bands before moving to Los Angeles, California. Josie Cotton recorded her hit single "Johnny Are You Queer" under Bomp Records in 1981. The performance of the single attracted the attention of Elektra Records, which re-released both the single and a full album in 1982. The Convertible Music LP featured music reminiscent of the 1960s girl group tradition. Cotton made an appearance in the 1983 film Valley Girl, singing "Johnny Are You Queer?", "He Could Be the One" and "School Is In" during the film's prom scene. In 1984, Elektra issued Josie's follow-up album, From the Hip, which returned a minor hit with the cover of Looking Glass' "Jimmy Loves Maryann" (featuring guitar work by Lindsey Buckingham of Fleetwood Mac). In 1986, Cotton appeared in a minor film role as the character Silver Ring in the John McTiernan horror film Nomads opposite Adam Ant and Pierce Brosnan. "Johnny Are You Queer" was later featured in during the "Anaconda Ballpit" stunt and in the compilation album "A Date With John Waters". The punk band Screeching Weasel covered the song on their 1994 album How To Make Enemies And Irritate People.

Cotton recorded Frightened by Nightingales (as Josey Cotton) in 1993. The collection of songs by songwriter/violinist Bill Rhea was released on the French label Silences. Continuing to work behind the scenes, Cotton co-founded B-Girl Records, which issued recordings by Goldenboy and Alaska! A new album of her own music, The Influence of Fear on Salesmen, was planned for release in 2002 on B-Girl but failed to materialize under that title. Cotton released Movie Disaster Music in 2006, followed by Invasion of the B-Girls, composed of B-movie theme song covers, also produced in part by Bill Rhea, in 2007.

In 2009, "Johnny Are You Queer" ranked at #81 on VH1's "Top 100 Greatest One Hit Wonders Of The 80's" list.

Discography

Studio albums

Convertible Music - 1982, Elektra Records (#147, US)

From the Hip - 1984, Elektra

Frightened by Nightingales - 1995, Roxco Records

Movie Disaster Music - 2006, Scruffy

Invasion of the B-Girls - 2007, Scruffy

Compilations

Convertible Music/From the Hip (double album CD reissue) - 2002, Collectables Records

Singles

"Johnny Are You Queer" (Bomp) (1981)

"Johnny Are You Queer" (Elektra reissue) (1982) #38 Billboard Club Play Singles

"He Could Be the One" (1982) #34 Billboard Mainstream Rock, #74 Billboard Pop Singles

"Jimmy Loves Mary-Anne" (1984) #82 Billboard Pop Singles

"Johnny Are You Queer" A Date With John Waters (2007)

Filmography

Valley Girl (1983)

Nomads (1986)

Jackass Number Two

External links

Official website

Josie Cotton's Myspace Page

Category:Living people Category:American female singers Category:Female New Wave singers Category:People from Dallas, Texas Category:1956 births

Name	Joe McElderry
Background	solo_singer
Birth name	Joseph McElderry
Born	June 16, 1991South Shields, Tyne and Wear, England
Instrument	Vocals
Genre	Pop
Occupation	Singer
Years active	2009–present
Label	Sony Music, Syco Music (2009–Present)
Associated acts	The X Factor 2009 finalists, Cheryl Cole
Url

Joseph "Joe" McElderry (born 16 June 1991) is an English singer. He won the sixth series of the ITV show The X Factor in 2009. His first single "The Climb" reached number one on the UK and Irish Singles Charts. He is signed to Syco Music owned by Sony Music Entertainment.

McElderry has gained three number-one singles in both the United Kingdom and Ireland, two as a featured act; "Everybody Hurts" with Helping Haiti and "You Are Not Alone" with the X Factor 2009 Finalists, and one as a solo artist, "The Climb".

Early life

Born in South Shields, England, McElderry is the only child of Jim McElderry and Eileen Joyce. The couple separated when McElderry was a child. McElderry was raised in a small flat on Tyneside He took the role of 'Danny Zuko' in Grease performed at Harton Technology College.

X Factor

McElderry auditioned for The X Factor in 2007, but it wasn't shown because he felt he was too young compared to the other contestants and opted to walk away. He auditioned again in 2009 in Manchester and sang Luther Vandross's "Dance with My Father".

Mentored by Cheryl Cole, he made it through to the live finals and was announced the winner on 13 December 2009, beating runner up Olly Murs with his version of Miley Cyrus's "The Climb".

McElderry's prize, as winner, was a recording contract with Simon Cowell's Syco record label, whose parent company is Sony Music Entertainment. The contract has a stated value of £1 million, of which £150,000 is a cash advance and the remainder allocated to recording and marketing costs. The single "The Climb" was released as McElderry's debut single.

Along with The X Factor finalists, McElderry recorded vocal for featured on a charity single, a cover of Michael Jackson's hit "You Are Not Alone". It was released in aid of London's Great Ormond Street Hospital. The finalists premiered the song live on the 15 November edition of the programme; the single was available for digital download that day and a physical release followed the day after. The single reached number one in the UK Singles Chart.

Performances

McElderry performed the following songs during the contest:

Career after The X Factor

as part of the UK The X Factor series 6 tour.]] McElderry's debut single, "The Climb", was available to download at midnight on 14 December 2009 and was released physically on 16 December 2009. According to industry sources, approximately 100,000 copies of the single were sold on the day of its release. On 18 December 2009, it was announced that McElderry secured the top spot in the Irish Singles Chart for 11–17 December 2009.

"The Climb" was a contender for 2009's UK Christmas number one, competing against, and losing to, Rage Against the Machine's "Killing in the Name". McElderry's single sold 450,000 compared to Rage Against the Machine's 502,000 after a Facebook-based campaign was started in protest of The X Factors dominance of the Christmas number one title. This was the first time since 2004 that the X Factor winning single was denied the top spot for Christmas in the UK Singles Charts. Simon Cowell stated that he was "gutted for Joe because a number one single meant a lot to him. But I have to congratulate Jon and Tracy [Morter, who started the Facebook campaign]." McElderry's single stayed at number one on the Irish charts for a second week securing him the Irish Christmas number one (18–25 December 2009), and the song moved up to the top spot in the UK Singles Chart on 27 December. The single had the fifth highest sales of all UK singles released in 2009 staying one week at #1. It was also the top selling Irish single of 2009 where it remained at the top spot for four consecutive weeks. "The Climb" was nominated in the British Single category at the 2010 BRIT Awards but lost out to fellow X Factor contestants JLS. McElderry performed "Don't Stop Believin" and presented an award at the 15th National Television Awards in London on 20 January 2010.

In January 2010, he participated in the Helping Haiti charity single, a cover of "Everybody Hurts" arranged by Simon Cowell in order to raise money for victims of the 2010 Haiti earthquake. McElderry took part in the Great North Run half marathon 13.1 mile race on 19 September 2010 raising money for Teenage Cancer Trust.

at Radio 1's Big Weekend.]] McElderry and seven other finalists, Olly Murs, Stacey Solomon, Danyl Johnson, Lloyd Daniels, John & Edward, Jamie Archer and Lucie Jones, appeared in the X Factor Live tour which began on 15 February 2010 at the Echo Arena Liverpool and concluded on 4 April at the SECC. McElderry performed the songs "Don't Let the Sun Go Down on Me", "Love Story", "Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word", "She's Out of My Life", "Don't Stop Believin'" and his debut single "The Climb" on the tour. On 15 March, it was reported that McElderry had signed a modelling deal with Next Models. He performed on Radio 1's Big Weekend on 22 May 2010, singing an acoustic version of "Don't Stop Believin'" and "Telephone" in the Live Lounge tent and he also performed "Don't Stop Believin'" and his single, "The Climb" on The 5:19 Show.

Wide Awake 2010-present

Throughout 2010, McElderry recorded his debut album Wide Awake which was released on the 25 October 2010. Producers of the album include Dallas Austin and John Shanks. He will launch the album at G-A-Y along with appearances from X Factor runner up Olly Murs and X Factor 2008 winner Alexandra Burke. He filmed the music video for his second single, a cover of Norwegian band Donkeyboy's "Ambitions" in September. It was directed by Nigel Dick. The song premiered on 19 September and went on sale on 10 October. The song debuted at #6 on the UK Singles Chart and #4 on the Irish Chart. "Someone Wake Me Up" was the third single taken from the album. McElderry was approached by Twentieth Century Fox to record the specially written track, "There’s A Place For Us", written by American songstress Carrie Underwood, which features in . The song was nominated for a Golden Globe Award in 2011 for Best Original Song - Motion Picture 2011.

Charity

In January 2010, he participated in the Helping Haiti charity single, a cover of "Everybody Hurts" arranged by Simon Cowell in order to raise money for victims of the 2010 Haiti earthquake. He is also a stand in host for Metro Radio.

Personal life

In July 2010, McElderry's Twitter account was hacked and a message about his sexuality was posted, which made rumours circulate online about his homosexuality. The 19-year-old announced on his official website that he is gay, thanking his family and fans for their support. The gay charity Stonewall has listed McElderry as a gay role model.

Awards and nominations

|- | rowspan="2" style="text-align:center;"|2010 |"The Climb" |BRIT Award for Best British Single | |- |Joe McElderry |BT Digital Music Awards for Best Newcomer | |- | rowspan="1" style="text-align:center;"|2011 |"There’s A Place For Us" |Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song - Motion Picture 2011 !style="width:3em;font-size:85%;"|IRL |- |2010 |align="left"| Wide Awake

Released: 25 October 2010

Label: Syco Music

Formats: CD, digital download

|3 |5 |- |}

Singles

References

External links

Category:1991 births Category:Living people Category:2000s singers Category:2010s singers Category:English male singers Category:LGBT models Category:LGBT musicians from the United Kingdom Category:LGBT people from England Category:People from South Shields Category:Reality show winners Category:Sony BMG artists Category:The X Factor (UK) contestants Category:X Factor series winners

Name	Corinne Bailey Rae
Landscape	no
Background	solo_singer
Birth name	Corinne Jacqueline Bailey
Born	February 26, 1979Leeds, West Yorkshire, England
Instrument	Vocals, guitar
Genre	Soul, R&B;, jazz
Occupation	Singer-songwriter, guitarist
Years active	2005–present
Label	EMI, Capitol
Url
Notable instruments	Gibson Hummingbird

Corinne Bailey Rae (born Corinne Jacqueline Bailey on 26 February 1979) is a British singer-songwriter and guitarist from Leeds, who released her debut album Corinne Bailey Rae in February 2006. Bailey Rae was named the number-one predicted breakthrough act of 2006 in an annual BBC poll of music critics, Sound of 2006. She became the fourth female British act in history to have her first album debut at number one. Bailey Rae was nominated for Grammy Awards and BRIT Awards, and has won two MOBO Awards and an Album Of The Year Grammy and Best Contemporary Jazz Album for her work as a featured artist in Herbie Hancock's . Bailey Rae was married to fellow musician Jason Rae from 2001 until his death in 2008. Bailey Rae released her second album, The Sea on 26 January 2010, after a hiatus of nearly two years. Tracks on the new album have been produced by Steve Brown and also Steve Chrisanthou (who produced her debut album in 2006). She has sold 4 million albums, with her two albums combined, worldwide. Bailey Rae was nominated for the 2010 Mercury Prize for Album of the Year for The Sea.

Early years

Childhood

Bailey Rae was born in Leeds to a black Kittitian father and a white English mother as the oldest of three daughters, including Candice Bailey and actress Rhea Bailey.

Bailey Rae began her musical career at school where she studied classical violin before she turned her attention to singing: "I started off singing in church, I suppose, but people think it must have been a gospel church because of the whole, you know, black assumption," she says in reference to her multiracial background. "But it wasn't gospel at all, it was just your regular Brethren church, very middle-class, where we would sing these harmonies every Sunday. It was always my favourite part of the service, the singing."

Bailey Rae later transferred to a Baptist church, where the youth leader was coaching rock bands in the local high school. The church young people wrote their own worship songs and sang covers by the likes of Primal Scream. "We changed the words though," Bailey Rae states on her website. "We didn't want to offend the regular churchgoers, now did we?"

Performing in church broadened Bailey Rae's musical horizons, and her love for making music was solidified after the church youth leader offered to lend her the money for her first guitar. In her mid-teens, she was highly influenced by Lenny Kravitz, and through him she discovered rock legends Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin. "I loved that band during my teens; I wanted, somehow, to follow in their footsteps, and to create music of my own."

The group raised eyebrows on several fronts; in the white male-dominated world of indie music, they were a mainly female group, fronted by a mixed-race singer from Leeds. The moniker "Helen" also drew attention, albeit for not all the right reasons: "What can I say? We were 15 years old, and thought that Helen was a cheeky, indie kind of thing to do. It seemed clever at the time. Admittedly, it seems less so now". they got married in 2001 at age of twenty-two and Bailey changed her name to Bailey Rae. Jason Rae (born in 1976), a musician, played saxophone for the eight-piece group called Haggis Horns, and had recorded with Bailey Rae, The New Mastersounds and Martina Topley-Bird (Quixotic) albums. On 22 March 2008, Jason Rae was found dead in a flat in the Hyde Park area of Leeds. In December 2008, Leeds Coroner's Court gave a verdict of death by misadventure, and stated that Rae died of an accidental overdose of methadone and alcohol.

Music career

2004–2008: Career music development

In the three years after she got married, Bailey Rae began working on solo material—this time steering away from her indie past and embarking on a more "soulful" path. She collaborated with Leeds-based funk group The New Mastersounds on the track "Your Love Is Mine," featured on their 2003 album Be Yourself, released via One Note Records. The following year she again worked with another Leeds-based group, Homecut Directive, on the song "Come the Revolution", which was the first single from the group's debut album.

on 18 August 2007]] In 2004, Bailey Rae got a breakthrough when she was signed by Global Talent Publishing and then approached by Craig David's mentor Mark Hill, from the duo The Artful Dodger, to appear on his new album better luck next time under his new alias, The stiX. The resulting collaboration, "Young and Foolish", was released in April 2005 and brought Bailey Rae to the attention of the major record label bosses.

Bailey Rae released her debut single, "Like a Star", in November 2005 and her first album, Corinne Bailey Rae, in February 2006. It debuted at number one in the UK and entered the top ten of the U.S.Billboard 200, peaking at number four and spending 71 weeks in the chart from 2006 to 2008. According to Nielsen SoundScan, the album sold 1.9 million copies in the United States alone.

The lead single, "Like a Star" became a hit in the UK and U.S., and sold over 327,000 U.S. downloads. Follow-up single "Put Your Records On", her biggest hit to date, rose to number two in the UK, and sold over 945,000 U.S. downloads. "Trouble Sleeping" made the top forty, and "I'd Like To", the top seventy. In the middle of 2006, Bailey Rae embarked on her first international tour through Europe and North America with singer R&B;, John Legend, playing 55 shows including the festivals Rock in Rio Lisboa 2 and Live Earth. In early April 2006, Corinne Bailey Rae was certified 2x platinum by the BPI and platinum by the RIAA. In September 2006, Bailey Rae scooped two awards at the UK's MOBO Awards: "Best UK Newcomer" and "Best UK Female". Bailey Rae recorded a live session at Abbey Road Studios in July 2006 for Live from Abbey Road.

Bailey Rae was the musical guest in a 2006 episode of Saturday Night Live with the host being Jaime Pressly. She performed "Put Your Records On" and "Like a Star". She also appeared on Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip on the episode "B-12", which aired in November of 2006, with Howie Mandel. She performed "Like a Star" and "Trouble Sleeping". Also in 2006, Bailey Rae performed on Radio 1 Live Lounge with the songs "Like a Star", a cover version of Editors' "Munich", and a cover version of Justin Timberlake's "SexyBack".

Bailey Rae also received three nominations at the 2007 Grammy Awards: Record of the Year, Song of the Year (both for "Put Your Records On"), and Best New Artist. During the ceremony, she performed "Like a Star" and joined John Legend and John Mayer in a collaborative performance, providing accompanying vocals to Legend's "Coming Home" and Mayer's "Gravity".

Also in 2007, Bailey Rae accepted an invitation to participate (Vanguard Records), where she contributed her version of Domino's "One Night (of Sin)". She also recorded John Lennon's "I'm Losing You" for Make Some Noise, Amnesty International's music venture. The song was also released on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, "". In July of that year, Bailey Rae performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London.

In 2008, Like a Star was nominated for a Grammy for Song of the Year. Bailey Rae won in two categories for Album of the Year and Best Contemporary Jazz Album for her collaboration on . Also in 2008, she recorded a live session of "River" with Hancock at Abbey Road Studios in for Live from Abbey Road for Channel 4 which was broadcast on Series 2.

During the American and European tour, Bailey Rae recorded her first DVD with the title Live in London & New York. The DVD was filmed in London and the bonus CD was recorded in New York.

2009–present: The Sea

Corinne Bailey Rae released her new album titled The Sea on 26 January 2010. The album was released after a gap of two years following the death of her husband Jason Rae. Lead single I'd Do It All Again premiered on 25 November in 2009 on the Jools Holland program Later. Follow up single "Closer" was added to Smooth Jazz Radio on 25 January, Urban AC on 1 February and AC radio in late February. The album's second single "Paris Nights and New York Mornings" went to Triple A radio on 15 February. After the release of the second album, Corinne went on a national tour. Her London concert at Somerset House in the summer sold out, and she returned to London again in October to perform in Royal Festival Hall with Pete Lawrie as a supporting act.

In December 2009, Bailey Rae recorded a live performance in New York City that was broadcast in the summer of 2010 on the U.S. TV program Live From the Artists Den.

On June 2, 2010, Bailey Rae appeared with Herbie Hancock, singing "Blackbird" in a concert honoring (Sir) Paul McCartney in the East Room at the White House.

Bailey Rae made an appearance as a musical guest on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno on October 28, 2010, covering the Bob Marley song "Is This Love".

Soundtrack Inclusions

"Like a Star" is part of the soundtracks of several films, series and soap operas, such as Cashmere Mafia, 27 Dresses, Men in Trees, Nancy Drew, Perfect Stranger, Medium, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, Venus, Grey's Anatomy, and Sete Pecados.

In the film Venus, six songs from the debut album were included on the soundtrack of the film, which are "I'd Like To", "Another Rainy Day", "Choux Pastry Heart", "Put Your Records On", " Like a Star", " Breathless".

The song "I'd Like To", from Bailey Rae's debut album, was also featured in the soundtrack for the movie He's Just Not That Into You (2009).

Public Service

Bailey Rae is the Special Ambassador for the charity CORD. Bailey Rae is also the central ambassador for International water and Sanitation charity, Pump Aid.

Discography

;Studio albums

2006: Corinne Bailey Rae

2010: The Sea

;DVDs

2007: Live in London & New York

;Concert tours

2006/2007: World Tour

2010: The Sea Tour

Awards and nominations

Grammy Awards

The Grammy Awards are awarded annually by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. Bailey Rae has won two awards from four nominations, including Album of the Year; she featured artist, Best New Artist, Record of the Year, Song of the Year.

|- |rowspan="3"|2007 |Corinne Bailey Rae |Best New Artist | |- |rowspan="2"|"Put Your Records On" |Record of the Year | |- |Song of the Year | |- |rowspan="1"|2008 |"Like a Star" |Song of the Year |

Others Awards and nominations

{| border="2" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaa solid; border-collapse: collapse; font-size: 90%;" |- bgcolor="#B0C4DE" align="center" ! style="background-color: #BCBCBC"|Year ! style="background-color: #BCBCBC"|Result ! style="background-color: #BCBCBC"|Award ! style="background-color: #BCBCBC"|Category ! style="background-color: #BCBCBC"|Nominated Work |- |- |rowspan="10"| 2006 || || BET Awards || BET J Cool Like Dat Award || General |- | || MTV Europe Music Awards || Best UK & Ireland Act ||General |- | || MTV Woodie Awards || International Woodie (Favorite International Artist) || General |- | || UK Festival Music Awards || Best Urban Act || General |- | || Premios 40 Principales || Mejor Artista Nuevo Internacional || General |- | |rowspan="3"| MOBO Awards || Best Song || Put Your Records On |- | || Best UK Female || General |- | || Best UK Newcomer || General |- | || MOJO Awards || Best New Act || General |- | || Q Awards || Best New Act ||General |- |rowspan="21"| 2007 || |rowspan="2"| BET Awards || Best New Artist ||General |- | || Best Female R&B; Artist || General |- | |rowspan="3"| BRIT Award || Best British Single || Put Your Records On |- | || British Female Artist || General |- | ||British Breakthroug Act ||General |- | || Teen Choice Awards || Best Female Breakthrough Artist ||General |- | || ECHO Awards || International Newcomer of the Year|| General |- | || Ivor Novello Awards || PRS Most Performed Work ||General |- | || MOBO Awards ||Best UK Female|| General |- | |rowspan="3"| || Outstanding Album || Corinne Bailey Rae |- | || Outstanding Female Artist || General |- | || Outstanding New Artist ||General |- | || Music Week Awards || International Marketing Campaign of the Year || General |- | || European Border Breakers Awards || United Kingdom || General] |- | |rowspan="3"| Soul and Jazz Awards || Album of the Year |rowspan="2"| Corinne Bailey Rae |- | ||Best Album of Soul |- | || Best New Artist of the Year|| Corinne Bailey Rae |- | |rowspan="2"| Kickers Urban Music Award || Best Neo Soul Act || Corinne Bailey Rae |- | || Best Crossover Chart Act || General |- | || Urban Music Awards || Best Neo Soul Act || General |- | || BMI Pop Awards || Song of the Year || Put Your Records On |- |rowspan="10"| 2010 | |rowspan="4"| Soul and Jazz Awards || Album of the Year |rowspan="2"| The Sea |- | ||Best Album R&B; of the Year |- | || Artist of the Year |rowspan="2"| Corinne Bailey Rae |- | ||Best Artist of the Year Act Soul/R&B; |- | || Mercury Prize || Album of the Year || The Sea |- | || Q Awards || Best Female Act || Corinne Bailey Rae |- | || MOBO Awards || Best UK R&B; Soul Act Act || Corinne Bailey Rae |- | || American Smooth Jazz Awards || Best Female Act || Corinne Bailey Rae |- | || BET Awards || Best International Act || Corinne Bailey Rae |- | || Soul Train Music Awards || Centric Award || Corinne Bailey Rae |}

Notes

Closer can be heard in an episode of Hawaii Five-0.

"Put Your Records On" was featured on the Parenthood (television soundtrack) in August, 2010.

References

External links

Main reference sites

Corinne Bailey Rae — official website

Corinne Bailey Rae discography at Discogs

Corinne Bailey Rae discography at Musicbrainz

Interviews & others

Corinne Bailey Rae interview by Pete Lewis, 'Blues & Soul' February 2010

musicOMH.com interview

The Guardian interview 2005

The Guardian interview 2009

HiphopRnbSoul.com Audio Interview

aol.co.uk videos from AOL Sessions, live performances, official releases and interviews

theartsdesk.com interview 2010

Category:1979 births Category:2000s singers Category:2010s singers Category:Alumni of the University of Leeds Category:Black British musicians Category:British people of Saint Kitts and Nevis descent Category:Capitol Records artists Category:English Baptists Category:English female guitarists Category:English female singers Category:English rhythm and blues singers Category:English singer-songwriters Category:English soul singers Category:English-language singers Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Living people Category:Neo soul singers Category:People from Leeds Category:Rhythm and blues guitarists Category:Smooth jazz singers Category:Soul guitarists