Archive

Cheap As Chips! Critic’s Summer Goodies

Posted 4:10pm Monday 13th October 2025 by Critic Staff

Every summer, students travel far and wide across the motu for the break. Critic Te Ārohi staff members reached out to local secrets from their own hometowns to score student discounts*. Your mission: explore your backyard this summer and enjoy these discounts on us. Record your journey in the Read more...

Skulls, Sea-Shanties & a Full Cream Speight’s: A Farewell Tour of Ōtepoti

Posted 2:29pm Monday 13th October 2025 by Adam Stitely

It dawned on me this semester that these months would be my last in Dunedin. There was so much I still hadn't done. What more of the weird, wacky, and wonderful was yet to be seen? As the stress of the end of semester hit, the ominous cloud of exams loomed, and decisions about the future needed Read more...

Who Said That?

Posted 2:20pm Monday 13th October 2025 by Stella Weston, Tilly Rumball Smith & Molly Smith-Soppet

After a long hard year here at Critic Te Ārohi, we decided to bring you a little game for the end of the semester. On the left page you’ll find illustrated portraits of a handful of campus characters – the high strung BSc, the alternative postgrad, the over-eager American exchange Read more...

Sins & Virtues of Flatting

Posted 9:05am Monday 6th October 2025 by Molly Smith-Soppet

Seven Sins  Pride Pride is the over-inflated sense of superiority. The prideful flat is one that considers themselves above the simple tasks that hold flats and the shared Otago experience together. But such pride is, as always, a curse. Pride is selling tickets to a flat party. Pride is Read more...

Penetrating the Perfect Pussy Problem

Posted 10:53pm Saturday 4th October 2025 by Esme Hall

Content warning: Racism I can’t remember how it started. There was no inciting incident that compelled me to question my labia. Perhaps because I was raised by lesbian parents with a strong hippie persuasion, and (radical) feminist ideology being passed around the dining table as if it were Read more...

Asking for a Friend

Posted 9:51pm Saturday 4th October 2025 by Campus Support Services

Student life isn’t always easy. For Mental Health and Wellbeing Week, campus-based support services – Student Health and OUSA Student Support – answer your questions with advice on everything from how to manage your workload through burnout or grief, to dealing with flatcest or Read more...

Where the Fuck the Function?!

Posted 10:49pm Sunday 28th September 2025 by Lily Jane

There is no feeling more rewarding than waking up at 11:45am, with no thoughts in your dusty brain other than “ouch, my head hurts,” followed by: “Did we just host the party of the century?”. Hosting isn't just about shoving every person you know into a room with a JBL Read more...

Stock Your Flat For Free

Posted 10:46pm Sunday 28th September 2025 by Molly Smith-Soppet

Disclaimer (because someone will ask): This is satire but also probably some good advice. Use your critical thinking skills to determine which is which.   So, you’ve blown your last $20 on a hungover Hunger Buster. Fear not, Dunedin is a magical place filled with many Read more...

Everything I know About Hate

Posted 7:50pm Sunday 28th September 2025 by Tristan Shand

It was my first year at university when I read Dolly Alderton’s book Everything I Know About Love. Going into it, I wanted to understand what love meant. For Dolly, it was platonic friendships with women where she finally understood what that pesky little word signified. For me it was a little Read more...

New Zealand Young Writers Fest: A Review

Posted 6:30pm Sunday 21st September 2025 by Stella Weston

Disclaimer: I’m really super biased — this was one of the coolest things I’ve ever had the privilege of being a part of.  The New Zealand Young Writers Festival celebrated its eleventh year in 2025. Beyond promoting the voices of young writers aged 15-35 over the weekend of Read more...

The Road to Te Huinga Tauira

Posted 6:06pm Sunday 21st September 2025 by Heeni Koero Te Rerenoa (Sky)

Porourangi Templeton-Reedy – Ngāti Porou, Ngāi Tūhoe, Tainui Jacqueline Te Kani-Nankivell – Te Aitanga-a-Māhaki, Ngāti Porou, Ngāti Maniapoto, Ngāpuhi Every year, tauira Māori (students) from across the motu (country) gather under one roof Read more...

The 24th Annual Critic Fish & Chip Review

Posted 5:44pm Sunday 21st September 2025 by Hugh Askerud

In many ways, fish and chips embody the ideal student: well-cooked, sopping with grease, and wrapped in paper. Well…maybe we’re not directly comparable, but there is something studenty about fish and chips, trust. More importantly, fish and chips are one of the few ways students have a Read more...

Flaunt Your Fashion

Posted 1:50pm Monday 15th September 2025 by Gemella Reynolds-Hatem (Ngāi Tahu: Ngāi Tūāhuriri, Ngāti Waewae, Ngāti Hāteatea)

Open my whakapapa and you won’t find a tidy capsule collection, but a wardrobe crowded with pieces that refuse a singular aesthetic. Among the Jordans, arab silks sit beside pounamu pieces; between the stacks of NFL jerseys, a hijab folds next to Māori-made designer. It’s messy and Read more...

From Ūawa to the Unknown: Six Weeks Across Taiwan

Posted 1:45pm Monday 15th September 2025 by Tenaya Brown (Te Aitanga a Hauiti ki Ūawa)

My journey started back home in Ūawa, with my whānau helping me gear up for my first-ever trip abroad – beyond Aussie, at least. From Christchurch, across to Hong Kong and finally over to Taiwan, it took five months of prep before we were even ready to step on that plane. Leaving Read more...

Champion One Day, Crumbling the Next

Posted 1:40pm Monday 15th September 2025 by Jessie-Jade Witeri (Ngāti Whakāue, Te Whakatōhea, Ngāti Ranginui, Ngāti Whanaunga)

You probably know the entire menu at Burger N Beast off by heart, but couldn’t explain where your degree comes from without citing another white guy. Brutal? Maybe. True? Definitely. And before you clutch your pearls, name one Māori scholar without opening Google. Thought so. Let’s Read more...

Microwave Meals for the Maniacal Masses

Posted 9:10am Monday 8th September 2025 by Via Hooks

Need to prep for an all-day study sesh? Want to eat a hot meal on campus instead of in your cold flat? Keen to push the edges of culinary possibility and ethics? I (might) have the solution for you. A few weeks ago – armed with several microwave-safe containers, a lack of sleep, and one Read more...

Material Māori Gewl

Posted 5:50pm Sunday 7th September 2025 by Heeni Koero Te Rerenoa (Sky)

Apparently, 2016 is trending, and it’s an aesthetic. But my 2016 wasn’t all Tumblr edits, Musical.lys, or Kylie Lip Kits. While the internet’s version of that year was selling girls a pastel-filtered summer of promise, mine was very different. I’d been dragged back up to my Read more...

Why You Should Give A Shit About Local Body Elections

Posted 10:33am Sunday 7th September 2025 by Molly Smith-Soppet

If you're into trawling local Facebook groups then you've probably seen the words “Dunedin City Council” floating around somewhere. But what even is the DCC, and why should you, an ordinary student just trying to survive the dog-eat-dog world of academia, care? While it is Read more...

Campus Cryptids

Posted 10:06am Monday 25th August 2025 by Via Hooks

Cryptozoology is part of a long line of various pseudosciences, promising to reveal hidden worlds that traditional sciences fail to properly comprehend. You may have heard of many ‘cryptids’, like mothman, bigfoot and the chupacabra. We at Critic Te Ārohi believe that Dunedin is Read more...

I Fucking LOVE Mosgiel

Posted 3:17pm Sunday 24th August 2025 by Gryffin Blockley

Powering over the steep hill of the Southern Motorway, your eyes are blessed by scenery so beautiful it may force you to pull over. As the sun beams on the broad expanses of the Taieri Plains, a magical town sits in your eyeline. With just under 15,000 residents, the quaint town is not too busy like Read more...

“Waste of Money": Sexy Garfield vs the world

Posted 11:53pm Sunday 17th August 2025 by Jonathan McCabe

Sexy, erotic, and throbbing. That is the best way to describe Emily Davidson's 2017 magnum opus entitled Lasagnerie. Exhibited in the OUSA reception for all to see, entrenched within a gilded frame, is the portrait depicting a seductive cartoon of Garfield dressed in lingerie, stockings, and Read more...

The Great Ōtepoti Flag Referendum

Posted 11:03pm Sunday 17th August 2025 by Molly Smith-Soppet

Flags are a way for communities to display their collective pride and patriotism. Currently, Dunedin does not have a cohesive identity. As the story goes with university towns, every three years there is a whole new batch of students, and therefore a whole new identity. A flag would give students Read more...

Diary of a Tortured Artist

Posted 10:53pm Sunday 17th August 2025 by Ellie Bennett

7am  My alarm goes off at 7, like it does every morning (except for Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays, and Tuesdays, which are my designated days of rest). I let it ring for a while, contemplating staying in bed. Artists are an amalgamation of feelings. I feel Read more...

Get the look — lecturer edition

Posted 10:08pm Sunday 10th August 2025 by Stella Weston

Disclaimer: I mean no offence, please don’t fail me. Nothing but respect for academics <3 Law Starting strong, law lecturers have known who they are from a young age. Law school was such a war for them that they have harboured that pain within them – determined to take it out on Read more...

Romanticising Getting Dressed

Posted 9:00pm Sunday 10th August 2025 by Grace Hards

Every morning I look at myself in the mirror and ask the world’s most terrifying question: Who do I want to be today? It’s not just about putting on pants one leg at a time. It’s a full-blown existential crisis, performed in front of a bathroom mirror, under fluorescent Read more...

Popping Cherries: Virginity Horror Stories

Posted 7:58pm Sunday 3rd August 2025 by Stella Weston

Over the last three months I’ve been asking my friends, friends of friends, distant associates, and girls I’d met ten minutes ago in the bathroom how they lost their virginity. I was surprised at how many women were open about it and happy to yap – some with nice wholesome Read more...

The Flatmate Erotica: Within Or Without You

Posted 7:55pm Sunday 3rd August 2025 by Lady Jane Grey

There’s something uniquely unholy about a student flat – a place where personal growth, emotional regression, and sexual chaos all happen in the same 10-square-metre living room. You move in thinking you're just renting a room but, really, you’re signing up for a year-long Read more...

A Lesbian, Bisexual & Straight Woman Walk into a Bar

Posted 7:46pm Sunday 3rd August 2025 by Nina Brown

I change seating positions at least three times before Leah* and Beth* arrive for the interview. Settling into our armchairs, the three of us epitomise our stereotypes. The straight woman who has rarely cum with a man is dressed in jeans and a white t-shirt, long hair in a bun. The masc lesbian who Read more...

Online Anonymous: A support group for the chronically online

Posted 5:25pm Saturday 26th July 2025 by Zoe Eckhoff

This is an intervention. For everyone who panics about early-onset dementia every time you forget what you ate for breakfast and especially with the seasonal flip of an exam paper as the clock starts ticking. Are we remembering less and less? Is it sleep loss? TikTok? Those AI breatha reels Read more...

Choose Your Own Adventure: OUSA President Edition

Posted 5:20pm Saturday 26th July 2025 by Molly Smith-Soppet

1.  You wake up, wrapped up in a duck-down comforter with that gorgeous OUSA green burned into your eyelids. It's time to take on your busy day. You leap out of bed and go down to your kitchen to pour yourself a big bowl of Weet-Bix. What do you do while you eat your meal? Open your Read more...

A Slice of Our Opinions: Pizza Reviewed

Posted 5:22pm Saturday 19th July 2025 by Adam Stitely

Takeaway pizzas are a cornerstone of the “I can’t be fucked cooking” catalogue: when your parents couldn’t be fucked trying to satisfy your picky childhood palate with homecooked meals; when your boss couldn’t be fucked giving you a bonus so you got a pizza party; or Read more...

Flatmageddon: Best ways to resolve flat conflicts

Posted 4:26pm Saturday 19th July 2025 by Hunter Jolly

Conflict is inevitable when you live in close quarters with other people, especially when you may have conflicting ideas about what cleanliness looks like and what acceptable sleeping patterns are. Whether tension manifests in passive-aggressive remarks about your innovative pot-soaking method, or Read more...

30 Years Strong: Te Rōpū Māori Marks a Milestone

Posted 1:05pm Monday 14th July 2025 by Heeni Koero Te Rerenoa (Sky)

Kiritea Smith, Chair of the 30th Committee – Ngāi Te Rangi, Ngāti Ranginui, Ngāti Pūkenga Porourangi Templeton-Reedy, Co-President of Te Rōpū Māori – Ngāti Porou, Ngāi Tūhoe, Tainui Honouring the Past, Celebrating the Present, and Read more...

I can tell you what you study based off your census answers

Posted 11:21am Monday 14th July 2025 by Nina Brown

I spent the semester break trawling through census data and am confident I can accurately guess what you study based on how you answer the following questions. If I get it wrong, it says more about whether you’re in the right degree than my powers of generalisation. 1. How’s your Read more...

You are here: An investigation into the tangled web of the queer Dunedin dating scene

Posted 5:56pm Sunday 25th May 2025 by Via Hooks

Having been in ostensibly queer friend groups basically since arriving in Dunedin, I’ve observed that all of my friends (myself included) are, indeed, dating each other. But can I back this up with data?  Yes. My proposed hypothesis is the “Queer event horizon” - that Read more...

The Jorts and Jafas of Bisexuality

Posted 5:39pm Sunday 25th May 2025 by Stella Weston

Jokes about Doc-wearing, threesome-having bisexual femmes are as low hanging as ragging on breathas for the mullet-moustache combo. While the copy and paste breatha look at festivals means some stereotypes often have a basis in truth, stereotypes can also be exaggerated or distorted in ways that can Read more...

criticHow To Be An Ally

Posted 4:59pm Sunday 25th May 2025 by Zoe Eckhoff

There are many ways in which we can become better people in this society. Dunedin is an ever-expanding, diverse, and lively city full of all colours of the rainbow. Maybe you don’t think you’re one of those guys. Maybe when you're at a flat party and see a queer couple you only stare Read more...

Queer Mess?

Posted 4:55pm Sunday 25th May 2025 by Madeline O’Leary

It's a bit of a running joke within my circle that my sexuality announces itself before I do. My friends often tease about how they can hear me coming before they see me. The jangle of keys on my carabiner is like a rumble of dyke thunder before lightning strikes. Pair this with my eyebrow Read more...

OUSA President Liam White Caught With His Pants Down?

Posted 11:04pm Sunday 18th May 2025 by Molly Smith-Soppet

There are some things we have come to expect from our OUSA presidents. Campaining on the promise of a student bar, not delivering a student bar. That's about it honestly. What we did not expect however... was this.  Sources (one suspicious email with a portfolio of equally suspicious Read more...

Red Flag Roundup

Posted 10:57pm Sunday 18th May 2025 by Critic Staff

I once had a guy ask me – completely deadpan – if the reason I didn’t want to date him anymore was because my parents didn’t love me enough as a child. No joke. That was his closer. And to be fair, it did close things. Safe to say, the almost-relationship ended right there, Read more...

Overheard Ōtepoti

Posted 10:12pm Sunday 18th May 2025 by Critic Staff

Amnesty Youth members in a Law lecture AYO member 1: “Do you think $20 for a joint is reasonable?” AYO member 2: “Yeah, I mean it sounds reasonable. It depends how big the joint is – they can get you really fucked up.” AYO member 1: “Yeah, I’ve never Read more...

We Made A Fanpage for Daniel Leamy

Posted 10:04pm Sunday 18th May 2025 by Molly Smith-Soppet

With the Tabloid Issue approaching and pitches running somewhat dry, two of Critic Te Ārohi’s most chaotic staff (us) turned to what we do best: shit-stirring. One of us writes horoscopes and the other wrote the love story of the century (Critic Bachelor). Between us, we knew exactly how Read more...

The Legacy of Martin Phillipps

Posted 3:50pm Sunday 11th May 2025 by Jordan Irvine

.column { float: left; width: 33.33%; } /* Clear floats after the columns */ .row:after { content: ""; display: table; clear: both; } “The Dunedin Sound is the sound of honesty” - Martin Phillipps It’s hard not to write about the Dunedin Sound without Read more...

Sound and Vision: Capturing Dunedin’s Music Scene

Posted 3:17pm Sunday 11th May 2025 by Ellie Bennett

Sweaty, a bit drunk, and surrounded by people who look about twice my height and half my age, I’ve got a headache and my ears are buzzing. My shoes squeak every time I try to unstick them from the floor. I can just about make out the features of the lead singer but the drummer blends into the Read more...

An Inside Look at the Six60 Scholarship: Is it sick-60?

Posted 2:35pm Sunday 11th May 2025 by Zoe Eckhoff

6 and 60. Perhaps not everyone's two favourite set of numbers, but nevertheless, undeniably iconic to anyone from Aotearoa who didn’t forget their roots. It’s generally known that this band name came from the flat on Castle Street that the four members started off in (you’ll Read more...

Ranking what native New Zealand birds I could beat in a fight if I were also a bird?

Posted 10:05pm Sunday 4th May 2025 by Jordan Irvine

Evolution has not been kind to the native birds of Aotearoa. Some are small, some flightless, and all pretty vulnerable to introduced pests. To put it lightly, they don’t stand a chance against predators. You know that, I know that. My question is, do they stand a chance against me, Read more...

Critic Wuz Here: There’s a phone number inscribed on your desk and I called it.

Posted 9:44pm Sunday 4th May 2025 by Jordan Irvine

One of God’s greatest gifts is the cell phone because doing this gimmick in a time of payphones would have set me back a lot in coins (where the fuck do you even get coins from now?). As a child I did not focus in class and paid more attention to the writings forever engraved onto the desks at Read more...

Fuck it: Rice Ball Sports

Posted 9:17pm Sunday 4th May 2025 by Connor Moffat

Rice balls have always been a lunch staple on campus, and they’re just as versatile as they are iconic. Whether it’s a cheap sit down meal, a snack between lectures, or a surprise dinner after leaving one in your bag all day, rice balls can do it all. Or can they? In a never-before-seen Read more...

The True Cost of Ethical Consumption: A Trial R

Posted 10:17pm Sunday 27th April 2025 by Adam Stitely

Inspired by a rewatch of Food, Inc. (2009), the god-given right to shit on Nestlé, and an attempt to offset years of Fatty Lane-sponsored staff meals, Critic Te Ārohi spent five days living as an Ethical Consumer – cutting out anything even vaguely unethically sourced. Despite our Read more...

Locally Produced David Attenboroughs: A Guide

Posted 10:06pm Sunday 27th April 2025 by Jodie Evans

Looking for your next Attenborough fix but want something local? Check out the babies of Otago Science Communication grads and alumni. With a cheeky behind-the-scenes “brought to you by” to let you in on the highs and lows of bringing science to the people. If Nina’s editorial is a Read more...