Lesbian existence and marginalization in India

By Srila Roy

India’s first ‘lesbian ad’ went viral at the start of June this year. The advert featuring a young lesbian couple awaiting the arrival of one set of parents to their joint home is uncompromisingly ‘out’ even as it sets this exceptional moment in the everyday intimacy and domesticity that most relationships share. The ad is actually part of a new digital campaign launched by the brand Myntra for its range of ‘contemporary ethnic apparel’ called Anouk.

The history of the word ‘bad’, Chapter 1

By Anatoly Liberman

Our earliest etymologists did not realize how much trouble the adjective bad would give later researchers. The first of them—John Minsheu (1617) and Stephen Skinner (1671)—cited Dutch quaad “bad, evil; ill.” (Before going on, I should note that today quad is spelled kwaad, which shows that a civilized nation using the Roman alphabet can do very well without the letter q.)

Receiving “Laudato Si”: will Pope Francis be heard?

By Gary J. Adler Jr.

Pope Francis’ recent encyclical, Laudato Si, will be surrounded for some time by intense debate among and between journalists, columnists, Catholic journals, political leaders, and environmentally-focused scientists and NGOs. In other words, the fight over how it’s received is well underway. In the 125 years or so that papal social encyclicals have been written, their reception has been hotly debated, with the most infamous such episode occurring in the pages of the National Review.

The criminal enterprise of stealing history

By Miki Onwudinjo

After illegal drugs, illicit arms and human trafficking, art theft is one of the largest criminal enterprises in the world. According to the FBI Art Crime Team (ACT), stolen art is a lucrative billion dollar industry. The team has already made 11,800 recoveries totaling $160 million in losses.

Psychological deterioration in solitary confinement

By Ian O’Donnell

It is difficult to imagine a more disempowering place than a solitary confinement cell in a maximum security prison. When opportunities for meaningful human engagement are removed, mental health difficulties arise with disturbing regularity. In the United States, where prisoners can be held in administrative segregation for years on end, stories of psychological disintegration are common.

Why care?

By Marina Della Giusta and Sarah Jewell

If your parents required care, would you or a family member provide care for them or would you look for outside help? If you required care in your old age would you expect a family member to provide care? Eldercare is becoming an important policy issue in advanced economies as a result of demographic and socio-economic changes. It is estimated that by 2030, one quarter of the population will be over 65 in both Europe and the USA.

Elisabeth Bing and an American revolution in birth

By Paula A. Michaels

On May 15, Elisabeth Bing died at the age of 100. It is no exaggeration to say that during her long life she perhaps did more than any other individual to humanize childbirth practices in the United States. Obituaries and tributes to her rightly celebrate her role as a founding mother of the Lamaze movement in America and a lifelong advocate for improvement in maternity care.

Book vs. Movie: Far From the Madding Crowd

By Thomas Hardy

A new film adaptation of Far From the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy was recently released, starring Carey Mulligan as the beautiful and spirited Bathsheba Everdene and Matthias Schoenaerts, Tom Sturridge, and Michael Sheen as her suitors.

In memoriam: Gunther Schuller

By Suzanne Ryan

Gunther Schuller (1925-2015) was one of the most influential figures in the musical world of the past century, with a career that crossed and created numerous genres, fields, and institutions. Oxford offers heartfelt condolences to his family, and gratitude for the profound impact his work continues to have on music performance, study, and scholarship.

Top 5 most infamous company implosions

By Miranda Dobson

Since the global financial crisis in 2008, the world has paid close attention to corporations and banks around the world that have faced financial trouble, especially if there is some aspect of scandal involved. The list below gives a brief overview of some of the most notorious company implosions from the last three decades.

How do we resolve reproductive material disputes?

By Jesse Wall

Recent scientific advances have enabled us to have more control than ever over how and when we reproduce. However, these developments have resulted in serious legal discussions, raising the question: Do we lose the right to control what happens to our reproductive materials once they have left our body? Here, Jesse Wall discusses the courts’ different approaches for such disputes and the justification for their decisions.

Being defaced: John Aubrey and the literary sketch

By Kate Bennett

John Aubrey might have made an excellent literary agent. When Charles II was restored, Aubrey told Thomas Hobbes to come down to London straight away to get his portrait painted. It was a successful bid for patronage. Aubrey correctly calculated that Hobbes would meet the King at the studio of Samuel Cooper, ‘the prince’ of miniaturists. Cooper painted two watercolour miniatures, ‘as like as art could afford’. One the King took away for his ‘closet’ at Whitehall Palace, and another was not finished.

Climate change and self-adapting law

By David D. Caron

How would law look different if we had always known about climate change? One difference – I would suggest – is that it would have been constructed so as to self-adapt to the changing context that it seeks to govern. What does it mean to self-adapt? An example of self-adapting law can be found in long term supply agreements.

Islamic State and the limits of international ethics

By John Williams

The moral outrage at the actions of Islamic State (IS) is easy to both express and justify. An organisation that engages in immolation, decapitation, crucifixion and brutal corporal punishment; that seemingly deploys children as executioners; that imposes profound restrictions on the life-choices and opportunities of women; and that destroys cultural heritage that predates Islam is despicable. What drives such condemnation is complex and multifaceted, however.

OUP staff discuss their favourite independent bookstores to celebrate Independent Bookshop Week

In support of Independent Bookshop Week, a campaign run by the Booksellers Association that supports independent bookstores, we asked the Oxford University Press UK office what their favorite independent bookstores were.

How is the mind related to the body?

By Nicholas Jolley

At one point in the recent film The Imitation Game the detective assigned to his case asks Alan Turing whether machines could think. The dialogue that follows is perhaps not very illuminating philosophically, but it does remind us of an important point: the computer revolution that Turing helped to pioneer gave a huge impetus to interest in what we now call the mind-body problem. In other words, how is the mind related to the body? How could a soggy grey mass such as the brain give rise to the extraordinary phenomenon of consciousness?