Coffee all over the world
An instructive essay on etymology need not always be devoted to a word going back to the hoariest antiquity. It can also deal with an “exotic” borrowing like coffee, for example.
A duty of care? Archaeologists, wicked problems, and the future
Archaeology needs to stay relevant. To do so, it will need to change, but that won’t be simple given how much needs to change, and how many of the things that need changing are systemic, firmly embedded both within disciplinary traditions and practice and within society.
Bringing decolonisation to law teaching: fulfilling the promise of legal pedagogy
I, like many others, came to the law school because I heard justice and freedom and peace in its name. For many, like me, the sojourn into the study of law is triggered by some event or situation. For me it was the Rwandan genocide of 1994.
Six books to understand international affairs [reading list]
The world we live in is complex and ever-changing. This year India, Iran, the UK, and the US, to name a few countries, are facing pivotal elections, and many diplomatic relationships—in Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and beyond—are at a turning point. Check out these titles to better understand the state of geopolitics and the movement of power in the world.
Overconfidence about sentience is everywhere—and it’s dangerous
Years before I wrote about the edge of sentience, I remember looking at a crayfish in an aquarium and wondering: Does it feel like anything to be you? Do you have a subjective point of view on the world, as I do? Can you feel the joy of being alive? Can you suffer? Or are you more like a robot, a computer, a car, whirring with activity but with no feeling behind that activity? I am still not sure. None of us is in a position to be sure. There is no magic trick that will solve the problem of other minds.
On querns and millstones
Have you ever seen a quern? If you have not, Wikipedia has an informative page about this apparatus. Yet there is a hitch about the definition of quern. For instance, Wikipedia discusses various quern-stones, and indeed, pictures of all kinds of stones appear in the article. But stones don’t do anything without being set in motion.
Cooperation and the history of life: is natural selection a team sport?
Cooperation is in our nature, for good and ill, but there is still a nagging doubt that something biological in us compels us to be selfish: our genes. This is the paradox: genes are inexorably driven by self-replication, and yet cooperation continually rears its head. Not only are humans fundamentally team players, but all of nature has been teaming up since the dawn of life four billion years ago.
Effective ways to communicate research in a journal article
In this blog post, editors of OUP journals delve into the vital aspect of clear communication in a journal article. Anne Foster (Editor of Diplomatic History), Eduardo Franco (Editor-in-Chief of JNCI: Journal of the National Cancer institute and JNCI Monographs), Howard Broman (Editor-in-Chief of ICES Journal of Marine Science), and Michael Schnoor (Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Leukocyte Biology) provide editorial recommendations on achieving clarity, avoiding common mistakes, and creating an effective structure
Latin American voices of international affairs
In the field of International Relations (IR), voices from Latin America have long been underrepresented—overshadowed by dominant Western perspectives, particularly those from the United States and Britain. This blog post aims to spotlight some of the contributions of Latin American thinkers to IR, showcasing how these perspectives challenge established norms and offer unique insights into both regional and global dynamics.
How to edit your writing: tips to perfect your journal article
Editing plays a significant role in improving the quality of your journal article and builds the bridge between the first draft and a submission-ready manuscript. You might picture grammatical corrections when you think of editing, but this process also improves the clarity, coherence, and accuracy of your writing.
How race shapes American Christian solidarities in Palestine [long read]
Since the October 7 2023 Hamas-led attacks on Israel and Israel’s subsequent war on Gaza, race and religion have loomed large in debates over appropriate solidarities linking the United States with Israel and Palestine, with the breakdown and reorientation of durable Black-Jewish U.S. civil rights alliances, mounting pressure coming from African American Christian clergy for a ceasefire in Gaza, and even organized Black clergy denunciations of U.S. military aid for the State of Israel as enabling “mass genocide.”
How the body reshapes our understanding of biblical prophecy
In common parlance, a “prophecy” is a special kind of utterance. Perhaps an oracle about the future, words of approval or condemnation, critique or consolation. Scholars often define prophecy as a kind of message, issued from a deity to their people and mediated through an individual called a prophet.
Love your friend as yourself
Perhaps the most popular command in the Bible is to “love your friend”—or “neighbor,” as it’s commonly translated— “as yourself” (Lev 19:18). Less popular today are the preceding verses, which command friends to rebuke each other if one has sinned. In ancient Judaism, a good rebuke was a mark of friendship, although it had to be done the right way.
Why are lips called lips?
A reader asked me to explain how I choose words for my essays. It is a long story, but I will try to make it short. When more than thirty years ago I began working on a new etymological dictionary of English, I compiled a list of words about which dictionaries say “origin unknown” and came up with about a thousand items. My other list contains “words of uncertain origin.”
Charles Darwin the geologist
Who was Charles Darwin the geologist? Was he a nephew, or maybe a cousin, of the illustrious naturalist, who first published the theory of evolution by natural selection? I know they had big families… But no, this is the one and the same. It is often forgotten that, early in his career, Charles Darwin was a ‘card-carrying’ geologist.
The real existential threat of AI
How does Artificial Intelligence (AI) affect climate change? This is one of the unprecedented questions AI raises for societies, challenging traditional perspectives of fairness, trust, safety, and environmental protection.