Oxford University Press's
Academic Insights for the Thinking World
Making the leap between school and university can be a stretch at the best of times, but for UK law students it can be a real struggle. As there is no requirement to study law at school before beginning an undergraduate programme, many new law students have a very limited knowledge of how the law works and what they can expect from their studies.
Over the last few weeks, historian Gordon Martel, author of The Month That Changed The World: July 1914, has been blogging regularly for us, giving a week-by-week and day-by-day account of the events leading up to the First World War. July 1914 was the month that changed the world, but who were the people that contributed to that change?
Polygamy is a major part of Mormon history, dating back to the 1800s when Mormon leaders first encouraged it. While it is now a taboo subject, it had an undeniable impact on Mormon life, as illustrated in this infographic.
In his study, sociologist David Yamane found an interesting correlation between the type of catechetical sessions used in the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults process (which an adult who wants to enter the Catholic Church undergoes) and the socioeconomic standing (SES).
In their National Study of Youth and Religion, Christian Smith, Kyle Longest, Jonathan Hill, and Kari Christoffersen studied a sample of young people for five years, starting when they were 13 to 17 years old and completing the study when they were 18 to 23, a stage called “emerging adulthood.”
The struggle for food, water, and shelter are problems commonly associated with the poor. Not as widely addressed is the violence that surrounds poor communities. Corrupt law enforcement, rape, and slavery (to name a few), separate families, destroys homes, ruins lives, and imprisons the poor in their current situations.
April 2014 sees Shakespeare mature to the ripe old age of 450, and to celebrate we have collected a multitude of quotes from the famous bard in the below graphic, crafting his features with his own words.
In celebration of Black History Month, Social Explorer has put together an interactive infographic with statistics from the most recent Census and American Community Survey. Dig into the data to find out about current African American household ownership, employment rates, per capita income, and more demographic information.
How many revolutions have there been in the world’s history? Are they all violent? As revolutions around the world continue to make front page news, we asked Jack Goldstone, author of Revolutions: A Very Short Introduction, to help us pull together a timeline of the revolutions that have shaped the world.
From politicians to psychiatrists, novelists to biologists, and actors to entrepreneurs, the January 2014 update of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography adds a further 219 biographies of men and women who’ve made their mark on British history.
For billions around the world, poverty translates not only into a struggle for food, shelter, health, and education. No, poverty exposes them to a vast spectrum of human rights abuses on a daily basis. Safety and freedom from fear do not exist for those living in underdeveloped areas. Ill-equipped judicial systems, under-trained and corrupt law enforcement agencies, and despotic housing complexes are just a few of the challenges the impoverished face.
The 17th century saw great, heroic voyages of discovery — voyages into the unknown, voyages potentially into the abyss. The 18th century saw a slow transformation in travel — if for no other reason than the incremental improvement and progress in the methods of travel.
By Richard S. Grossman
Britain operated under the gold standard for nearly 100 years before World War I forced Britain — and many other countries — to abandon it. During that century, Britain was the world’s military, financial, and industrial superpower.
December sees the annual update of Who’s Who, the essential directory of the noteworthy and influential in all walks of life, in the United Kingdom and worldwide. This year, over 1,000 new lives have been added to the resource. Who’s made it in in 2014? From actors to authors, and presenters to politicians, discover the entries of a vast selection of past and present influential figures, written by the individual themselves.
In a world of 9.1 billion people… where 61% of the world’s population lives in urban centers… primarily with coastal cities as magnets of growth… and the people within these cities becoming ever more connected… with mobile phones as tools for destruction…
Leonard Jason, Madison Sunnquist, Suzanna So, and Sarah Callahan have created an infographic regarding the sequestration and its impacts.