From Our Blog
Posted on March 27, 2020
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Posted on September 20, 2017
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Since the 30th April, I go almost daily to the hospitals,' Margaret Fuller told her friend Ralph Waldo Emerson in a 10 June 1849 letter. 'Though I have suffered,--for I had no idea before how terrible gun-shot wounds and wound-fever are, I have taken pleasure, and great pleasure, in being with the men; there is scarcely one who is not moved by a noble spirit.'
Posted on August 21, 2017
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For the better part of half a century, John Barth was synonymous with what was the last self-conscious attempt at constructing a universal aesthetic movement speaking for all of humanity but recognizing only its bourgeois, white constituent. Much like Virginia Woolf once could claim that 'on or about December, 1910, human character changed,' Barth would argue that literary modernism was over.
Posted on August 14, 2017
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Louis Leakey remains one of the most recognized names in paleoanthropology and of twentieth century science. Leakey was a prolific writer, a popular lecturer, and a skillful organizer who did a great deal to bring the latest discoveries about human evolution to a broader public and whose legacy continues to shape research into the origins of mankind. Louis and Mary's work garnered wide public attention for several reasons.
Posted on August 7, 2017
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In times of populism, soundbites, and policy-by-twitter such as we live in today, the first victims to suffer the slings and arrows of the demagogues are intellectuals. These people have been demonised for prioritising the very thing that defines them: the intellect, or finely reasoned and sound argument. As we celebrate the 161st birthday of Bernard Shaw, one of the most gifted, influential, and well-known intellectuals to have lived, we might use the occasion to reassess the value of intellectuals to a healthy society and why those in power see them as such threats.
Posted on July 26, 2017
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With various commemorations of the birthday of Gustav Mahler (1860'1911) in July, the attention to this composer reinforces his continuing significance for modern audiences. Literary scholars have made cases for the ways in which Shakespeare's works retain their relevance for modern audiences in such different works as Jan Kott's Shakespeare Our Contemporary (1960) and Marjorie Garber's Shakespeare and Modern Culture (2009).
Posted on August 29, 2017
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When the description "Victorian" is brought up, the image of corseted and bustled women in flouncing petticoats comes to mind. Familiarized through film culture and popular imagination, many representations of the era are preserved through the literature of that period. Countless remakes and references to Victorian novels have been made throughout the centuries, making their authors household names.
Posted on December 15, 2016
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The Anglo-Zulu War of 1879 is undoubtedly the most widely familiar of the Victorian campaigns of colonial conquest, those so-called 'small wars' in which British regulars were pitted against foes inferior in armaments, operational sophistication and logistics. It is also by far the most written about, some would say to the point of exhaustion.
Posted on January 11, 2017
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Posted on August 12, 2016
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Despite the biographical clues that historical fact and fiction may afford in excavating Joshua's life, the investigation itself rests on a set of assumptions that implicate literary studies of slavery and, in particular, the social and intellectual historiography by which we delineate the agency of slaves themselves. The attractive notion that we can access the life of Joshua by way of the literature of Paul betrays the complexity of that actual investigation.
Posted on May 16, 2016
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With the most widely-celebrated winter holidays quickly approaching, test your knowledge of the cultural history and traditions that started these festivities. For example, what does Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer have to do with Father Christmas? What are the key principles honored by lighting Kwanzaa candles?
Posted on December 9, 2015
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The 2014 Men's World Cup finals pitted Germany against Argentina. Bets were made and various observations were cited about the teams. Who had the better defense? Would Germany and Argentina's star players step up to meet the challenge? And, surprisingly, why did Argentina lack black players? Across the globe blogs and articles found it ironic that Germany fielded a more diverse team while Argentina with a history of slavery did not have a solitary black player.
Posted on November 25, 2015
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In a recent Huffington Post piece entitled 'Police Shootings Are About Class as Well as Race,' Jesse Jackson argued that the issue of police violence specifically, and an unjust and excessive criminal justice system in general, are disproportionately experienced by the poor, irrespective of race.
Posted on September 14, 2015
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The librarians at Bates College became interested in Oxford Bibliographies a little over five years ago. We believed there was great promise for a new resource OUP was developing, in which scholars around the world would be contributing their expertise by selecting citations, commenting on them, and placing them in context for end users.
Posted on September 17, 2015
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Spanning the Atlantic from New York to Oxford, the Global Online Product Marketing team is a motley bunch with a love for all things digital. Custodians of a diverse portfolio of online offerings, they definitely know what's what on the web. Read on for some literary and digital favourites from the team, and a glimpse into the minds of our online gurus here at Oxford University Press.
Posted on August 15, 2015
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In May 2015, at a press conference in Nairobi, Kenya, a French-led international team announced the discovery of the oldest stone tools known yet. Dating back to more than 3.3 million years ago, these crude flakes, cores, and anvils represent the earliest steps in our evolution into a species reliant on, if not defined by, the use of tools and other manufactured objects. Coined the 'pre-Oldowan' or 'Lomekwian' after the site in West Turkana at which they were found, these tools are larger and cruder than the more recent Oldowan industry.
Posted on July 29, 2015
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Today, 6 May 2015 marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of George Orson Welles in Kenosha, Wisconsin, to concert pianist Beatrice Welles and inventor Richard Head Welles. Widely recognized as a child prodigy, Welles exhibited musical talent, a fascination with magic, and the ability to recite Shakespeare all before the age of ten. At age sixteen, he traveled to Ireland, where he seized the opportunity to appear on the professional stage in a production of Jew S¼ss at the Gate Theatre in Dublin.
Posted on May 6, 2015
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How do violent Muslim groups justify, at least to themselves, their violence against fellow Muslims? One answer comes from Nigeria's Boko Haram, which targets the state as well as both Muslim and Christian civilians. Boko Haram is infamous for holding two ideological stances: rejection of secular government and opposition to Western-style education.
Posted on April 14, 2015
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No time to plant a garden or ride your bike to work this Earth Day? Don't worry--you can still do your part to honor Mother Nature today by staying informed about our global environment. Test your knowledge of water, weather, air, sea, and soil with the Earth Day quiz below, featuring content from Oxford Bibliographies in Environmental Science.
Posted on April 22, 2015
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Today is Armistice Day, which commemorates the ceasefire between the Allies and Germany on the Western Front during the First World War. Though battle continued on other fronts after the armistice was signed 'on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month' of 1918, we remember 11 November as the official end of 'the war to end all wars.'
Posted on November 11, 2014
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By Andrew Rabin On a shelf by my desk rests a pale, cloth-bound octavo volume entitled Leges Anglo-Saxonum, 601-925, published in 1958 by the German philologist Karl August Eckhardt. Inside, the volume's dedication reads, "Dem andenken Felix Liebermanns" ("In memory of Felix Liebermann").
Posted on August 5, 2014
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By Ellen Wohl The 1960s are famous for many reasons: the civil rights movement, the first moon walk, the Cuban missile crisis, rock and roll. The 1960s were also a period when awareness of environmental degradation spread to society at large.
Posted on April 22, 2014
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What is a student to do with a list of citations? Are an author's sources merely proof or can they be something more? We often discuss the challenges of the research process with students, scholars, and librarians.
Posted on August 22, 2013
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