Oxford University Press's
Academic Insights for the Thinking World
Bob Chilcott, as conductor, and John Rutter, as producer and engineer, join forces with some talented freelance professional singers in a church in Highgate, London every February. For three days these singers become The Oxford Choir, formed to record Oxford University Press’s latest choral publications so that choral directors worldwide can discover new repertoire.
In 2014, the Chinese corporation Alibaba Group famously released the world’s biggest US-listed IPO. IPO stands for ‘initial public offering’ and represents the first sale of stock by a company to the public. There have been many instances of record-breaking IPOs from around the world – and as far back in history as 1602 – that also deserve our attention. Click on our interactive map below to find out about the biggest IPOs from across the globe.
Is Christian feminism an oxymoron? For the past century or so, it’s often seemed that way. But it wasn’t all that long ago that many women not only considered Christianity and feminism compatible, but in fact believed each essential to the other. Perhaps no figure makes this case more powerfully than Katharine Bushnell. An internationally-known anti-trafficking activist in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries, Bushnell repeatedly encountered Christian men who had perpetrated acts of appalling cruelty against women, often without remorse or consequence.
The effective treatment of schizophrenia has long presented a challenge to clinicians and scientists. Common misunderstandings around symptoms and behaviors, and inadequate approaches to diagnosis and physiology, have hindered significant progress for patients and professionals.
In 1980, Walter Alvarez and his group at the University of California, Berkeley, discovered a thin layer of clay in the geologic record, which contained an anomalous amount of the rare element iridium. They proposed that the iridium-rich layer was evidence of a massive comet hitting the Earth 66 million years ago, at the time of the extinction of the dinosaurs. The Alvarez group suggested that the global iridium-rich layer formed as fallout from an intense dust cloud raised by the impact event.
May 29th marks the International Day of United Nations Peacekeepers, during which the world pays tribute to those who are serving, those who have served, and those who have lost their lives in the service of peace. Although peacekeeping was not envisaged in the UN Charter, it has become the flagship activity of the Organisation and perhaps the most innovative evolution within the UN collective security system.
Commemoration of the birthday of Sakyamuni Buddha forms an important but relatively small part of a remarkable emphasis on wide-ranging types of memorials that continue to be observed in modern Japan. However, celebrations in remembrance of death, including for all deceased ancestors who are regarded as Buddhas (hotoke) at the time of their passing marked by ritual burial, generally hold far greater significance than birth anniversaries. Buddha’s birthday is celebrated in Japan every year on 8 April.
This May, we’re featuring Søren Kierkegaard as our philosopher of the month. Born in Copenhagen, Denmark, Kierkegaard made his name as one of the first existentialist philosophers of his time. Centuries later, scholars continue to comb through his works, which were produced in such abundance that it is difficult, even now, to come away with a cohesive portrait of the Danish scholar; not to mention the fact that many details of Kierkegaard’s personal life remain unknown.
These transnational feminist movements are rich and diverse. Their origins and struggles are located in anti-imperialist, anti-colonial, civil rights, anti-war, pro-democracy, indigenous peoples, workers, peasants, youth, disability, and LGBT movements, among others. They seek to transform patriarchal institutions in all their manifestations — from violations of intimate relations to the discriminatory and unequal gender norms of political, economic, social, and cultural institutions.
The filming and recent airing of the HBO film Bessie, which stars Queen Latifah as Bessie Smith, serves as a perfect excuse to look back at the music and life of the woman who was accurately billed as the Empress Of The Blues. When Bessie Smith made her recording debut in 1923, she was not the first blues singer to record.
Functional disorders are one of the most common reasons for attendance at the neurology clinic. These disorders — at other times and in other places called psychogenic, non-organic, conversion or hysterical — encompass symptoms such as paralysis, tremor and other abnormal movements, gait disorders and seizures.
Huckleberry Finn, when faced with the opportunity to turn in the slave Jim, is tortured about what to do. At first he leans in favor of turning him in, because Jim is someone else’s property. And as he was taught in Sunday school, acting as he had been toward Jim was what got people sent to hell. But he can’t stop thinking about Jim’s companionship on the river, and how Jim had been nothing but kind to him all along, a real source of comfort and friendship. So Huck, with trembling hands, finally declares, “All right, then, I’ll GO to hell,” and decides not to turn Jim in.
As the television show Mad Men recently reached its conclusion, we thought it might be fun to reflect on the contributions to language during the turbulent decade of the 1960s. This legacy is not surprising, given the huge shifts in culture that took place during this point in time, including the Civil Rights movement, the apex of the space race, the environmental movement, the sexual revolution, and—obviously—the rise of advertising and media. With this in mind, we picked 16 words from the 1960s that illuminate this historical moment.
“East is East and West is West, and ne’er the twain shall meet.” Well, no. Kipling got it wrong. The East and the West have been meeting for a long time. For most of the last few hundred years, the traffic has been mainly one way. The West has had a major impact on the East. India felt the full force of British imperialism with the British East India Company and the British Raj.
Hop (Humulus lupulus L.) is an essential ingredient for brewing beer, and contributes a characteristic bitterness, aroma, and fullness. However, during the Middle-Ages, various other herbs including Rhodomyrtus tomentosa and Salix subfragilis, had also been used for brewing beer in Europe.
It was a simple request: “Try and put the fun back into microbiology”. I was about to write a new practical course for first year students, and apparently there had been complaints that microbiology is just another form of cookbook chemistry. Discussions showed that they liked the idea of doing their own experiments without a pre-determined outcome. Of course, with living microorganisms, safety must be a major concern, and some control was needed to prevent hazardous surprises, but “fun” and safety are not mutually exclusive.