2024-04-23 09:30
Is it democratic to disqualify a popular candidate from the ballot?
That a popular candidate could be disqualified from running and removed from the ballot might, at first glance, seem at o… Read More
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Oupblog | Oxford University Press’s Academic Ins Blog
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The talented authors, staff, and friends of Oxford University Press provide daily commentary on a variety of subjects on its official blog since 2005
2024-04-22 09:30
A Sand County Almanac at 75: the evolution of the land ethic" rel="nofollow">A Sand County Almanac at 75: the evolution of the land ethic
A lot changes in 75 years. In 1949, when Oxford… Read More
2024-04-19 09:30
How do you solve a problem like gender inequality?
For most women’s rights advocates, the answer is obvious: adopt a human rights framework. At the global level this means using the C… Read More
2024-04-18 12:30
The US South: A deadly front during World War II
The US Army recently gave a full military funeral to Albert King, a Black private stationed at Georgia’s Fort Benning who was killed b… Read More
2024-04-18 09:30
The Alexander Mosaic: Greek history and Roman memories
Perhaps the finest representation of battle to survive from antiquity, the Alexander Mosaic conveys all the confusion and violence of… Read More
2024-04-17 12:30
Oxford English Dictionary" rel="nofollow">Walter W. Skeat and the Oxford English Dictionary
For many years, I have been trying to talk an old friend of mine into writing a popular boo… Read More
2024-04-16 09:30
Forgotten books and postwar Jewish identity
In recent years, Americans have reckoned with a rise in antisemitism. Since the 2016 presidential election, antisemitism exploded online and ente… Read More
2024-04-15 12:30
The rising power paradigm and India’s 2024 general elections
India, the world’s largest democracy, is holding its national elections over a six-week period starting 19 April. Th… Read More
2024-04-15 09:30
How well do you know Shakespeare’s plays? [quiz]
This month, we’re starting to release new editions of The New Oxford Shakespeare series. Combining cutting-edge scholarship from… Read More
2024-04-12 14:30
Do American family names make sense?
Do names really mean anything, even when they seem to? Individuals in present day America called Smith, Jackson, Washington, or Redhead are not usually… Read More
2024-04-10 12:30
From “frog” to “toad”
I did not intend to write an essay about toad, because a detailed entry on this word can be found in An Analytical Dictionary of English Etymol… Read More
2024-04-09 12:30
Understanding the EU’s Law Enforcement Directive
If you ask an average European if they may request Google or Facebook to delete their data, they are likely to refer to the EU General… Read More
2024-04-09 09:30
Remembering John Hope Franklin, OAH’s first Black president
The 2024 OAH Conference on American History begins in New Orleans on 11 April, almost exactly fifteen years after the death… Read More
2024-04-08 14:30
Society was to blame for the letters, not twisted psychologies
In complex ways, social inequalities create the conditions for people to feel that writing anonymously might be useful for the… Read More
2024-04-05 09:30
Jonah and genre [long read]
Reading a piece of writing—from instruction manual, to sports page, to Op-Ed piece—according to its genre is something we do so naturally that it see… Read More
2024-04-04 12:30
Philosophers don’t often write about the heart
The Heart and Its Attitudes illuminates interpersonal phenomena that are, one the one hand, as local and commonplace as heartfelt connec… Read More
2024-04-04 09:30
Pay attention to your children
You’ve probably been ignoring your children. This isn’t simply you not paying attention to them because you’re distracted or need to do some… Read More
2024-04-03 12:30
An etymological plague of frogs
Last week, I discussed a few suggestions about the origin of the English word frog. Unfortunately, I made two mistakes in the Greek name of this animal. My n… Read More
2024-04-02 09:30
Is humanity a passing phase in evolution of intelligence and civilisation?
“The History of every major Galactic Civilization tends to pass through three distinct and recognizable phas… Read More
2024-04-01 09:30
The hidden toll of war
During war, the news media often focus on civilian injuries and deaths due to explosive weapons. But the indirect health impacts of war among civilians occur more fre… Read More
2024-03-29 09:30
England and Egypt in the early middle ages: the papal connection
When the Venerable Bede (d. 735) looked out from his Tyneside monastery across the North Sea, over the harbour at Jarrow Sla… Read More
2024-03-28 09:30
Thinking disobediently?
A person who “thinks disobediently” can be invigorating, maddening, or both. The life and writings of Henry David Thoreau have provoked just such mixed r… Read More
2024-03-27 12:30
A jumping frog and other creatures of etymological interest
Our readers probably expect this post to deal with Mark Twain’s first famous story. Alas, no. My frog tale is, though mildl… Read More
2024-03-27 09:30
Why decolonization and inclusion matter in linguistics?
As sociolinguists, we have centered social justice in our research, teaching, and administrative work for many years. But as with man… Read More
2024-03-26 09:30
American Exchanges: Third Reich’s Elite Schools
In the summer of 1935, an exchange programme between leading American academies and German schools, set up by the International Schoolb… Read More
2024-03-25 12:30
Conversations with Dostoevsky
The first time I visited St Petersburg, nearly thirty years ago, I stayed not far from the area in which Dostoevsky set the action of Crime and Punishment. The… Read More
2024-03-25 09:30
Does doctrine have a future in Christianity?
Why did Christianity develop doctrines in the first four centuries of its existence? After all, no other religion or worldview of late classical… Read More
2024-03-22 12:30
How well do you know your ancient Greek literature? [Quiz]
From Homer to Euripides, ancient Greek literature has an abundance in poetry, prose and plays—but how well do you think you… Read More
2024-03-22 09:30
The origins of the war in Ukraine [timeline]
The fall of the Soviet Union meant independence for Ukraine, and radically altered the shape and power structures of Eastern Europe. Russia&rsqu&hell…Read More
2024-03-21 12:30
Awkward? We’d better own it
We live in a golden age of awkwardness. Or so we’re told, by everyone from The Washington Post to Modern Dog Magazine. But we always have. A 1929 Lif… Read More
2024-03-20 12:30
A Retrospective on “Origin Uncertain”
In early March, the mail brought me the expected complimentary copies of my recent book Origin Uncertain: Unraveling the Mysteries of Etymo… Read More
2024-03-20 09:30
Who do you think you are? Genetics and identity
Ethnicity and ethnic identity have been recently brought to the fore in the Western world. One important reason is that immigration and globa… Read More
2024-03-19 12:30
Music Publishing: Looking to the Future
Music publishing is an exciting and fast-paced industry touching all our lives, whether as performers, composers, or music lovers listening in the ca… Read More
2024-03-19 09:30
Alice Mustian’s scandalous backyard performance
The year 1614 was an eventful one for the London theatre world. Shakespeare’s Globe playhouse, rebuilt after having burned to the… Read More
2024-03-18 09:30
Explore the history of Asia in ten stops [interactive map]
Embark on a captivating journey through pieces of the rich tapestry of Asian history with this interactive map of reading suggesti… Read More
2024-03-15 14:00
Beyond God and atheism
What are we doing here? What’s the point of existence?
Traditionally, the West has been dominated by two very different answers to these big questions. On th… Read More
2024-03-13 12:30
Chewing the cud and ruminating on word origins
The history of cud may be more exciting than it seems at first sight. Initially (long ago!), I was intrigued when I read the statement by Henr… Read More
2024-03-11 09:30
Unheard voices: overcoming barriers in women’s music composition
Until recently, women were regularly dismissed as unable to compose music. In 1894, the French physician Havelock Elli… Read More
2024-03-10 09:30
How well do you know fantasy literature?
Do you know your orcs from your elves, and your witches from your warlocks? Are you a J. R. R. Tolkien or C. S. Lewis aficionado? Have you read ever… Read More
2024-03-08 10:30
Homer’s Penelope and the myth of the ‘model military wife’
Ostensibly a tale of the adventures of a soldier, Homer’s ancient Greek epic Odyssey also has at its heart… Read More
2024-03-06 13:30
“Smother,” “smooth,” and the Slavic name of sour cream, with an obscure idiom for dessert
The word smother “dense or stifling smoke” (often with smoke!)… Read More
2024-03-04 10:30
Written in the stars: Prince Hal’s almanac
Prince Hal addresses Poins in the Boar’s Head Tavern in William Shakespeare’s 2 Henry IV, exclaiming “Saturn and Venus thi… Read More
2024-03-03 10:30
Rhetorical “um”
“Uh” and “um” don’t get much respect. What even are they? Toastmasters International calls them “crutch words.” Speech… Read More
2024-03-01 10:30
Policy meets politics on the frontiers of world urbanization
At a time when funding for urban infrastructure and the promotion of an overarching global goal—the hard-won SDG 11—… Read More
2024-02-29 13:30
African American religions and the voodoo label
In 1932, an African American man named Robert Harris killed his tenant on a makeshift altar in the back of his home in Detroit, Michigan. Har… Read More
2024-02-29 10:30
The musician’s journey: preparing our students as entrepreneurs
Today, our college and university music students are facing a rapidly changing global marketplace. There are new techno… Read More
2024-02-28 13:30
Late winter etymology gleanings and a few little-known idioms
Questions and answers
Sheeny
Ms. Melissa Mizel found my post for July 29, 2009, on the ethnic slur Sheeny “Jew&rdqu&hell…Read More
2024-02-28 10:30
Faith in God, themselves, and the people: Black religious activist-educators
I started my first seminar on Radical Pedagogy, reflecting with students on a provocative blog entitled “1… Read More
2024-02-26 10:30
The first women’s shelter in Europe? Radegund’s Holy Cross
‘With the passion of a focused mind, I considered how to advance other women so that—the Lord willing&mdas&hell…Read More
2024-02-24 10:30
Analysis of the Nuclear Risk Reduction Agenda
Nuclear risk analysis will not save us
In a context of intensifying great power competition and deep divergences of view between nuclear and… Read More
2024-02-22 13:30
Of language, brain health, and global inequities
One of the greatest public health challenges of our century lies in the growth of neurodegenerative disorders. Conditions such as Alzheimer… Read More
2024-02-21 13:30
A four-forked etymology: curfew
I remember that I promised to answer a few questions, and several of my answers are indeed overdue. But so is the post on the word curfew, which has been smo… Read More
2024-02-21 10:30
The need for expertise in quality improvement at every stage of a healthcare workers career
The quality improvement in healthcare movement has been around for the past 25 years with variabl… Read More
2024-02-20 10:30
Cosmopolitan, cad, or closeted Catholic?
Having just arrived via ferry to the Dutch town of Sluis in mid-May 1611, William Cecil, Lord Roos (1591-1618), promptly exposed his “privy me… Read More
2024-02-19 10:30
Brighter than a trillion suns: an intense X-rated drama
You may be unaware of the celestial wonder known as OJ 287 but, as you will see, it is one of the most outlandish objects in the cosm… Read More
2024-02-16 10:30
The third sister: beauty, and why the aesthetic matters
In the current critical/political atmosphere, the “aesthetic” has come to be regarded as the province of dandies and thei… Read More
2024-02-14 13:30
“Indian summer” and other curious idioms
Part 1: Indian summer
The Internet is full of information about the origin of the phrase Indian summer. Everything said there about t… Read More
2024-02-12 10:30
Aleph-AI: an organizing force or creative destruction in the artificial era?
The Aleph is a blazing space of about an inch diameter containing the cosmos, Jorge Luis Borges told us in 1945… Read More
2024-02-07 13:30
Intractable words
In my correspondence with the journalist who was curious about the origin of caucus, I wrote that we might never discover where that word came from (see the posts for Janu… Read More
2024-02-07 10:30
Exploring different facets of love in eight history books [reading list]
As Valentine’s Day approaches, we’ve curated a special reading list that considers the complexities of l… Read More
2024-02-06 10:30
Electronic Enlightenment" rel="nofollow">Françoise de Graffigny and Electronic Enlightenment
‘Ah mon Dieu, tu n’es plus ici. Voila les pleurs qui reccomensent.&rs&hell…Read More
2024-02-05 10:30
Election plays and the culture of elections and electioneering in the days of Dunny-on-the-Wold
England’s pre-Reform elections are memorably satirized in the historical sitcom, Blacka… Read More
2024-02-04 10:30
How synonymy rolls
If you look up the synonym of big, you are likely to find words like large, huge, immense, colossal, enormous, and ginormous, among others. Some of these will cause you t… Read More
2024-02-02 10:30
Scientific writing as a research skill
Scientific papers are often hard to read, even for specialists that work in the area. This matters because potential readers will often give up and do… Read More
2024-01-31 13:30
The origin of the word caucus: conclusion
Last week, I mentioned three etymologies of caucus: from caucus, Latin for “cup”; from an Algonquin phrase, and from calker’s or… Read More
2024-01-31 10:30
Holes in the Tower of Babel
The Tower of Babel story (Genesis 11:1–9) is among the most famous in the Bible. It might even be considered an iconic text—famous beyond its actual… Read More
2024-01-30 10:30
Less-than-universal basic income
Ten years ago, almost no one in the United States had heard of Universal Basic Income (UBI). Today, chances are that the average college graduate has not on… Read More
2024-01-29 10:30
Cello and the human voice: A natural pairing
I’ve heard the phrase “It’s the instrument most like the human voice and that’s why it’s so expressive” coun… Read More
2024-01-25 10:30
Could lonely and isolated older adults be prescribed a cat by their doctor?
Many older adults struggle with isolation and loneliness. Could cats be the solution? At the same time, many huma… Read More
2024-01-24 14:30
The intractable word caucus
At the moment, the word caucus is in everybody’s mouth. This too shall pass, but for now, the same question is being asked again and again, namely: “… Read More
2024-01-24 10:30
A librarian’s reflections on 2023
What did 2023 hold for academic libraries? What progress have we seen in the library sector? What challenges have academic libraries faced?
At OUP… Read More
2024-01-22 10:30
A Q & A on English and all its varieties [interactive map]
With the rise of English as the world’s lingua franca, countries have adopted English in their own unique and fascinatin… Read More
2024-01-17 14:30
Etymologicon and other books on etymology" rel="nofollow">Etymologicon and other books on etymology
In the previous post, I answered the first question from our correspondents (idioms wi… Read More
2024-01-17 10:30
Living Black in Lakewood: rewriting the history and future of an iconic suburb [Long Read]
In the annals of American suburban history, Lakewood stands as an icon of the postwar suburb, alon… Read More
2024-01-15 10:30
Your 2024 travel guide [reading list]
Now is the time for crafting your resolutions and setting the stage for a remarkable new year.
For those ready to become frequent flyers in the upco… Read More
2024-01-12 10:30
Which imaginary book should you read?
Are you looking to broaden your book list? Why not try a book that doesn’t exist? Literature is full of fictional books – books which exist… Read More
2024-01-11 10:30
How can business leaders add value with intuition in the age of AI? [Long Read]
In a speech to the Economic Club of Washington in 2018, Jeff Bezos described how Amazon made sense of the cha… Read More
2024-01-10 13:30
Back to work: body and etymology
While the blog was dormant, two questions came my way, and I decided to answer them at once, rather than putting them on a back burner. Today, I’ll de… Read More
2024-01-10 10:30
From Abbas Ibn Firnas to Assassin’s Creed: The legacy of Medieval intellectualism
The dream of flying has a long premodern history. Think of the myth of Daedalus, the ancient Greek in… Read More
2024-01-08 10:30
Albrecht Dürer and the commercialization of art
The Nuremberg artist Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528) is often thought of as one of the Renaissance´s greatest self-promoters. He m… Read More
2024-01-07 10:30
Janus words
January gets its name from Janus, the Roman god of doors and gates, and (more metaphorically) the god of transitions and transformations. What better time to talk about so… Read More
2023-12-20 13:30
English spelling, rhyme, rime, and reason
Alexander Pope, not a friend of hackneyed rhymes. Jonathan Richardson, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
The story of rhyme has been told mor… Read More
2023-12-15 10:30
Five ways the British magnetic enterprise changed the concept of global science
The concept of global science was not new in the nineteenth century. Nor was that of government-sponsored sci… Read More
2023-12-14 10:30
7 ways to deal with the rejection of your manuscript submission
Publication in peer-reviewed journals is an integral part of academic life, but however successful you are in your research c… Read More
2023-12-13 13:30
Going on an endless etymological spree
I have more than once remarked that though I despise punning titles, the temptation to use them is too strong. Sure enough, this post is about spree… Read More
2023-12-12 10:30
Genomic insights into the past and future of the black rhinoceros
The iconic African black rhinoceros (Diceros bicornis) faces an uncertain future after intense poaching caused a 98% declin… Read More
2023-12-11 10:30
Chick Webb meets Chick Webb: Fact and fiction in James McBride’s new novel
Chick Webb’s drumbeats resonate through much of James McBride’s fast-paced new novel The Heaven… Read More
2023-12-06 13:30
More gleanings: cob, shark, cowan, and the rest
After a long dearth of queries, I may report a tiny drizzle and will now answer some of the questions I received in November.
Cob
An ic… Read More
2023-12-05 10:30
10 things direct reports must do to get the most out of their 1:1 meetings
1:1s are crucial in promoting positive outcomes such as increased employee engagement, higher retention rates, mor… Read More
2023-12-04 10:30
“Happy Birthday” to the Linguistic Society of America
This January, the Linguistic Society of America will celebrate its 100th anniversary. The effort to create a Linguisti… Read More
2023-12-01 19:08
Remembering the legacy of Henry Kissinger [reading list]
As a key architect of US foreign policy during the Nixon and Ford administrations, Henry Kissinger left an indelible mark on interna… Read More
2023-11-28 10:30
A spotlight on Native American language and religion [podcast]
The October release of Martin Scorsese’s latest film Killers of the Flower Moon has thrust the sordid history of America… Read More
2023-11-24 13:30
Falling dice and falling ministers: explaining an artwork in the Royal Collection
Royal Collection Trust / © His Majesty King Charles III 2023
This curious drawing in the Royal… Read More
2023-11-24 10:30
Flow of time: reality or illusion?
Real time of space-time is one of the dimensions on which we comprehend and describe reality. Time neither flows, nor flies, or drags on; it doesn’t… Read More
2023-11-23 10:30
The man behind the legend: Martin Niemöller, Hitler’s Personal Prisoner
Martin Niemöller, Lutheran pastor in the Dahlem parish at the outskirts of Berlin, stood at the centr… Read More
2023-11-22 10:30
Napoleon’s cinematic empire: a fascination with film
People around the nineteenth-century Atlantic world were fascinated by Napoleon Bonaparte. One way to measure this enthusiasm is t… Read More
2023-11-22 10:28
Highfalutin, cowan, and all, all, all… Gleanings at last!
Highfalutin
The OUPblog editor, who has been taking care of this blog for over three years, is leaving the Press, and I w… Read More
2023-11-20 10:30
Catch-22: exploring the escape routes for Gazans
Almost as numerous as the missiles and rockets currently flying between Israel and Gaza are the accusations of war crimes, i.e. serious viol… Read More
2023-11-17 10:30
The art of philosophy
The “philosophy of art” in Anglo-American analytical philosophy has had barely any influence on the main epistemological, ethical, and metaphysical concern… Read More
2023-11-15 13:30
Five unexpected things about medical debt
Debt is a subject that so many of us dread. It is a drain not only on our wallets but also on our minds, leaving us with the sense that our lives a… Read More
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