OxTalks will soon be transitioning to Oxford Events (full details are available on the Staff Gateway). A two-week publishing freeze is expected in early Hilary to allow all events to be migrated to the new platform. During this period, you will not be able to submit or edit events on OxTalks. The exact freeze dates will be confirmed as soon as possible.
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A LEGO-based game where each player is given a series of tasks related to the patient’s journey through the hospital – from admittance to diagnosis and treatment through to discharge. Through several rounds of the game, using reflection and facilitated improvement processes, the players are given a unique insight into interdisciplinary team-work and optimization of patient flow using game-based learning.
In this 60-minute online workshop you will be introduced to the methodologies and principles underpinning the conduct of literature searches for systematic reviews, scoping reviews and other evidence reviews. The session will cover: formulating a focused research question; preparing a protocol; developing a search strategy to address that research question; choosing appropriate databases and search engines; searching for grey literature and ongoing studies; managing your references in Covidence; and documenting and reporting your search. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
In this talk, I will present our lab’s latest research on generative AI models designed to simulate cellular and tissue-level perturbations with unprecedented resolution. These models enable us to ask fundamental questions such as: Which interventions can revert a disease phenotype back to a healthy tissue state? and What perturbations can reprogram cells from state A to state B? By learning causal structure from high-dimensional multi-omics and spatial data, our frameworks can propose actionable interventions, predict patient-specific responses to treatment, and identify the most promising therapeutic targets. I will highlight how these models support target discovery, guide experimental design, and accelerate the development of personalized and precision medicine. Overall, this work demonstrates how generative AI can transform our ability to understand, predict, and engineer complex biological systems.
Is it ethical to believe? Does believing necessarily entail ethically suspect metaphysical commitments? And if so, can one suspend all one’s beliefs? This talk explores these and related questions by reconstructing what is a hitherto largely unstudied yet highly original philosophical conception of how belief relates to ethical action. Substantively, it focuses on the foundationally important Sanlun 三論 or Three Treatises school of Chinese Buddhist philosophy. Sanlun is the Chinese development of Indian Madhyamaka ‒ the hugely influential school of Buddhist philosophy founded around the turn of the third century by Nāgārjuna (c. 150-250) ‒ and is most closely associated with two figures, Sengzhao 僧肇 (374-414) and Jizang 吉藏 (549-623). On the basis that Sanlun thinkers take belief formation, maintenance, and relinquishment as ethically consequential actions, Dr Stepien argues that the ethics of belief provides a generative means of perceiving ‒ and untangling ‒ the various interwoven strands of their thought. More broadly, this talk introduces ongoing research into Sanlun Buddhist philosophy. While research on Madhyamaka philosophy has recently been intense, work in this field has largely sought to elucidate the metaphysical, epistemological, and ethical positions of Nāgārjuna and his Mādhyamika heirs in India and Tibet, leaving the philosophical study of related Chinese Buddhist texts and ideas still relatively untouched. This talk outlines the ‘ChinBuddhPhil’ project, designed as this is to contribute to the historical and systematic study of Chinese Buddhist philosophy through specialist research on the Sanlun school in conversation with its Indian antecedents, later elaborations in Chinese Buddhism, and analogues in contemporary Western philosophy. Rafal K. Stepien is Principal Researcher at the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Buddhist Philosophy. He holds degrees from Oxford, Cambridge, Columbia, and the University of Western Australia, and has completed further studies at Harvard, Bologna, Damascus, Tehran, Esfehan, Peking, and Fo Guang Universities, among others. Rafal was the inaugural Cihui Foundation Faculty Fellow in Chinese Buddhism at Columbia, the inaugural Berggruen Research Fellow in Indian Philosophy at Oxford, a Humboldt Research Fellow in Buddhist Studies at Heidelberg, and the Soudavar Memorial Research Scholar in Persian Studies at Cambridge. His books include Buddhist Literature as Philosophy, Buddhist Philosophy as Literature (SUNY, 2020) and Buddhism Between Religion and Philosophy: Nāgārjuna and the Ethics of Emptiness (Oxford, 2024), winner of the American Academy of Religion’s 2025 Book Award for Excellence in the Study of Religion.
Researchers frequently want to have careers that impact school and classroom environments. There are many ways to impact those environments. One way is for researchers to use measurement tools that create information practitioners find trustworthy and useful. Another path toward impact is to use tools that produce high quality information about classroom practices in empirically rigorous research aimed at other researchers. These paths are not mutually exclusive, yet they do have tradeoffs. This talk will articulate some of the tradeoffs researchers face when selecting common tools for measuring teaching quality in K-12 classrooms. The talk draws on data from four studies of teaching quality that involve more than 8,000 teachers across continents. Dr. Bell will show how teaching quality’s definition, operationalization, and use by practitioners present significant tradeoffs. Researchers must be aware of and manage these tradeoffs if they are to make valid research claims and support the improvement of teaching. Speaker Bio: Prof Courtney Bell is a Professor of Learning Sciences in the Department of Educational Psychology at the University of Wisconsin—Madison. She recently served for more than five years as the Director of the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER). She was the center’s first female director in its 60-year history. During that time, she founded the SimLab at the WCER [simlab.wisc.edu] and fostered the successful launch of the Multilingual Learning Research Center. A former high school science teacher, Courtney earned her doctorate in Curriculum, Teaching and Educational Policy from Michigan State University and a B.A. in Chemistry from Dartmouth College. Courtney led the international development of two teacher observation systems and served as a principal investigator on the Global Teaching InSights study, the first of its kind to comprehensively measure teaching quality using observations, artifacts, questionnaires, and student outcomes in eight economies. She is currently engaged in both national and international studies of teaching, the measurement of teaching, teacher education, and teacher learning.
This presentation will provide an overview of the current situation of ISIS-affiliated families in Iraq. Based on extensive field visits and primary source interviews, it will discuss ongoing challenges for families returning from al-Hol camp in northeast Syria, as well as those in IDP camps in Iraq, and the similarities and distinctions between these two groups. It will consider the long-term implications of not addressing their needs, alongside the needs of victims of ISIS in the country, and highlight the importance of attention and support for both groups for long-term durable solutions in Iraq. Biography: Joana Cook is an Assistant Professor of Terrorism and Political Violence at the Institute of Security and Global Affairs (ISGA), Leiden University (Netherlands), and an Adjunct Lecturer at Johns Hopkins University (US). She was previously the Editor-in-Chief, and Senior Project Manager at the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT, Netherlands). Her research focuses primarily on terrorism and counterterrorism, with a specialisation in jihadism, children, women, non-state actor governance, and an increasing focus on AI. Please join either in person or online. For in-person attendees, the talk will be preceded by a light lunch at 12.15pm. Please email comms@sociology.ox.ac.uk with any questions.
During this talk I will focus on the epidemiology, ecology, and evolution of the diarrhoeal disease, shigellosis, in the United Kingdom. Using a large national genomic surveillance dataset of Shigella sonnei (n=3,475) sampled over nearly two decades I will illustrate how we connect pathogen evolution to public health outcomes by drawing on two major unpublished studies from the group. Firstly, a phylodynamic study showing the differential epidemiology (including geospatial spread) of shigellosis in and outside of sexual transmission networks, including how the acquisition and fitness benefits provided by antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is influenced by bystander resistance in different demographic groups. And secondly, how we have leveraged our deep understanding of this genomic epidemiological framework of multimodal transmission for novel fundamental biological discovery; using bacterial Genome Wide Association Study to identify novel precursors of AMR in this WHO priority pathogen. Professor Kate Baker University of Cambridge https://www.infectiousdisease.cam.ac.uk/staff/kate-baker
TItle: Unconventional lipid-antigen recognition by group 1 CD1 restricted T cells Brief description: Beyond peptides, lipid antigens are presented to T cells by the CD1 family of antigen-presenting molecules, providing a parallel system of immune surveillance that has been less explored than peptide-MHC recognition. While CD1d-restricted natural killer T (NKT) cells and their T cell receptor (TCR) recognition mechanisms are well characterised, far less is known about how the group 1 CD1 molecules (CD1a, CD1b, and CD1c) present lipids and engage diverse TCR repertoires, leaving lipid-reactive immunity incompletely understood. Early models of lipid antigen presentation assumed close analogy to peptide-MHC recognition, with antigens displayed in an upright, end-to-end orientation for TCR engagement. However, structural studies demonstrate that group 1 CD1 molecules use broader and more flexible antigen display strategies to accommodate a wide range of self- and foreign- lipid antigens. Notably, we identified a non-canonical CD1c mechanism in which bulky lipid antigens are displayed in a sideways orientation, challenging long-standing assumptions about antigen presentation and immune surveillance. Using X-ray crystallography, structural computation, and more recently cryo- electron microscopy, we have defined multiple modes of TCR engagement across CD1a, CD1b, and CD1c, including lipid co-recognition and lipid-independent docking, and uncovered public and gene-biased TCR docking mechanisms. Together, these findings revise classical models of lipid antigen presentation and raise fundamental questions about how distinct display modes shape T cell specificity and function in immunity. Short bio: Dr Adam Shahine is a mid-career researcher and currently an NHMRC Emerging Leadership Fellow within the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute (BDI), Melbourne, Australia. He obtained his PhD in Biochemistry in 2016 and has since undergone postdoctoral training both in Monash (Aus) and Cardiff University (UK). In 2023, he was appointed as a BDI group leader, where his group focuses on the molecular characterisation of lipid antigen presentation and processing by group 1 CD1 molecules to T cells. His research predominantly focuses on establishing the molecular determinants of lipid antigen presentation by each CD1 member, the models of unconventional lipid mediated T cell receptor recognition, and in the context of disease, the role of lipid presentation in M. tuberculosis infection and immune dysregulation in autoimmunity.
Bacterial genomes vary in sequence due to mutations but also vary in their gene content and order due to horizontal gene transfer. Whether the variation in gene content and order, known as the accessory genome, is typically neutral, nearly neutral or adaptive is still the subject of debate – different theoretical arguments support all three scenarios. The availability of large sample collections across many thousands of bacterial species offers the opportunity to bring data to bear on this question. I will first present methods being developed in my group to make it possible to analyse collections of millions of genomes. Using these approaches, I will then show how a mechanistic model of gene gain and loss can be fitted to different pathogen species to determine whether their accessory genome shows signals of adaptation. Finally, I will show how transformer-based AI architectures can learn gene content and ordering across even more species, giving another way to look at this problem.
We study the escape of academics of Jewish origin dismissed from their positions by the Mussolini government in 1938, when new Racial Laws were introduced, opening a new phase of increased persecution of Jews by restricting their rights and livelihoods. We use rich individual-level data on the universe of Jewish professors, revealing their family situation, their domestic and international academic recognition as well as their political orientation. Jewish academics with children, with Jewish spouses, those whose parents are deceased, as well as young, and internationally recognized scholars are more likely to emigrate. Jewish academics who are either openly fascist or anti-fascist are less likely to emigrate. While the former may feel ``safe enough'' given their loyalty to the regime, the latter may want to oppose and fight the regime, as evidenced by several of them joining the resistance.
A contention-resolution protocol is a randomised algorithm for sharing a communication channel. The most famous example is binary exponential backoff - which underlies the Ethernet. These algorithms are also used in other contexts, for example, for sharing cloud resources. The basic communication mechanism is a multiple-access channel, where users communicate by sending messages to the channel. If a single message sends during a time step, it is successful (so it leaves the system). However, if multiple messages send during a time step, they collide, and must be re-transmitted later. In this context, a contention-resolution protocol is a randomised algorithm that each user runs to decide whether to send a message during a given time step, or to wait. The most important question about a contention-resolution protocol is whether it is stable -- essentially, whether the population of waiting messages stays controlled, or whether it grows without bound. There has been lots of work on stability of contention-resolution protocols, which I will tell you about. My biggest focus will be on foundational questions about backoff protocols, where messages wait for random geometric intervals before re-sending. Backoff protocols are known to be stable for positive arrival rates in models with queues, but it is still unknown how high the arrival rate can be in order to enable stability. An even more fundamental question (posed by MacPhee) is whether there is any backoff protocol that is stable for any positive arrival rate in the model without queues (this model is more appropriate for shared-channel applications on the internet, where users come and go). In this model, a backoff protocol is given by a sequence p = p_0,p_1,p_2 … of reals in (0,1] and an arrival rate lambda in (0,1). On a given step, the number of messages that arrive is a Poisson random variable with mean lambda. Any message that has already collided k times sends with probability p_k. If exactly one message sends, it escapes. Otherwise, all sending messages collide. Aldous showed in 1987 that binary exponential backoff (with p_k = 2^{-k}) is unstable for any positive lambda, in the sense that the resulting process is not positive recurrent (so messages build up over time). He conjectured the same for all backoff protocols. I will tell you about progress on this conjecture, which John Lapinskas and I have finally proved.
Need a burst of focused time to get words flowing on the page? Join OCCT for our new series of Shut Up and Write (or Translate) sessions this term. These dedicated afternoons are a chance to step away from distractions, sit alongside fellow writers and translators, and make real progress on whatever project matters most to you. We’ll gather from 2–5pm on Mondays of Week 1, 3, 5, and 7 this term in a supportive, low-pressure environment designed to boost productivity and creativity alike. Bring along your laptop, notebooks, or translation drafts - anything you’d like to work on. After a quick check-in, we’ll dive into quiet writing or translating sprints, with breaks for coffee (which will be supplied) and conversation in between. Whether you’re polishing a chapter, drafting an article, working on a translation, or simply hoping to carve out space for your own work, these sessions are for you. Come for one, two, or all three afternoons, and leave with words on the page and renewed momentum for your projects.
Correlates of protection (CoP) are an important tool in vaccine development, approval, and deployment. Although many studies identify biomarkers predictive of protection, demonstrating the validity and generalisability of a CoP present a major challenge. In this talk Professor Davenport will discuss his team’s work establishing a mechanistic correlate of protection for COVID-19, and more recent application to mpox and HPV
Git & GitHub Fundamentals: Version Control for Beginners Monday, 2 February | 15:00 – 16:00 BDI/OxPop seminar room 1 Learn the essential skills to track your code, manage project history, and back up your work like a professional software developer. This beginner-friendly course introduces Git, the industry-standard version control system used by millions of developers worldwide. Starting from scratch, you'll learn how to initialise repositories, track changes, and create meaningful snapshots of your work through commits. We'll cover the fundamental Git workflow – staging, committing, and reviewing your project history – giving you the confidence to manage your code effectively. In the second half, we'll connect your local projects to GitHub, the world's leading platform for hosting and sharing code. You'll learn to push your work to the cloud, pull updates, and clone existing repositories, ensuring your projects are safely backed up and accessible from anywhere. By the end of this course, you'll have hands-on experience with: 1. Creating and managing Git repositories 2. Tracking changes and viewing project history 3. Writing clear commit messages 4. Connecting local projects to GitHub 5. Pushing and pulling code to the cloud 6. Cloning repositories Led by – Dr Mcebisi Ntleki, DPhil, Department of Biochemistry, University of Oxford This session will cover: 1. Introduction to Git & Initial Setup 2. Creating Your First Repository 3. The Core Git Workflow 4. Viewing and Managing Changes 5. Connecting to GitHub 6. Pushing, Pulling, and Cloning Learning Objectives: 1. Initialise Git repositories and track changes to project files 2. Stage and commit changes with clear, descriptive commit messages 3. View project history and inspect differences between file versions 4. Connect local repositories to remote GitHub repositories securely 5. Push local commits to GitHub and pull updates from remote repositories 6. Clone existing repositories from GitHub to their local machine Intended Audience: Undergraduates, graduates and early researchers; No prior experience required – just bring your laptops, curiosity and willingness to learn! To register here - https://forms.office.com/e/F0YGjvRWJR?origin=lprLink 40 minutes: A judicious mix of presentation and practical 15 minutes: Practical exercise 05 minutes: Questions & Answers Pre-Course Preparation - To make the most of this session, please complete the following tasks before attending: Install Git Download and install Git on your computer from git-scm.com.
Are you planning to present a poster at an upcoming conference, meeting or symposium? This introductory session will provide you with some top tips on how to create a poster presentation which will help you to communicate your research project and data effectively. There will be guidance on formatting, layout, content, use of text, references and images, as well as advice on printing and presenting your poster. This session will also provide help with locating resources such as templates, free-to-use images and poster guidelines. By the end of this classroom-based session you will be able to: evaluate the effectiveness of templates, formatting, text and images; and plan, prepare and present your poster. Intended audience: Medicine and NHS; Researcher and research student
In a recent paper in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, Buyalskaya, Gallo and Camerer (2021) make the bold claim that we are living though a ‘golden age in social science’ research. They argue that this golden age is a product of the availability of new digital data, the development of new analytic tools, and the proliferation of interdisciplinary research teams tackling big social problems. In this talk I will explore the role that social psychology (as a social science) can play in this new golden age. I will show how the availability of digital data streams – including digital visual data, naturally occurring text data, and mobile and wearable sensor data – have transformed our ability to record and analyse human activity. At the same time, it presents us with a series of moral, ethical and practical challenges to address. I will argue that while digital traces have allowed the study of behaviour to return centre stage in social psychology, we have been insufficiently curious about how these very technologies structure our social relations. More specifically, I will suggest that social psychology needs to embrace the study of digital technologies, not for what the technologies can do, but for who they do things to, and for who they do them for. A truly golden age for social psychology depends on our willingness to engage with the power relations of digital technologies in the same way we think about prejudice, discrimination, resistance and social change.
This paper begins the work of reconstructing the ideological foundations of India’s campaign for home rule during the First World War. It examines the ideas of Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Mohammad Ali Jinnah—and, to a lesser extent, Annie Besant—to uncover a shared argument for imperial federation that cut across their otherwise disparate social and political origins. These figures sought to preserve some of the most significant products of colonial rule—namely constitutional law, state authority, and the protective shell and universal promise of crown and empire. But they concurrently filled these old colonial containers with new content: representative democracy, racial justice, and economic freedom. Because racial hierarchy had so thoroughly diluted any imperial claim to universality, their decision to reimagine empire for a federation of equal (but internally hierarchical) nations amounted to an act of radical conservatism. It would have been simpler, at the theoretical though not practical level, to discard empire altogether, rather than recast its entrenched system of racial inequality into a global democracy governed by local elites. By refusing a complete political and intellectual rupture, these still anticolonial leaders theorised a politics of freedom for India’s subject population which nevertheless worked with the conceptual terms of their foreign masters. This active negotiation with modernity was beset by anxieties over the very mass democracy it tried to encourage. Tilak, Jinnah, and Besant sought to manage this other conservative paradox through elite trusteeship and gradual reform. The exceptional success of the Home Rulers lay in overcoming institutionalised religious divisions to locate political antagonism, not in the communal other, but in the colonial state itself. Therefore, however counterintuitive it may sound, the loyalist Home Rule Movement represented an uncommonly anticolonial moment in a freedom struggle vexed by internal difference. Biography Amar Sohal is an intellectual historian of modern India and Pakistan. He is Lecturer in the History of Political Thought at King’s College London and Koch History Centre Fellow, Oxford. His research focuses on anticolonial nationalism, religious politics, and the secular state. After completing his DPhil in History at Merton College, Oxford, Amar was elected Early-Career Research Fellow in Politics and International Studies at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. There he revised his DPhil dissertation for a monograph, The Muslim Secular: Parity and the Politics of India’s Partition(Oxford University Press, 2023), published in the Oxford Historical Monographs series. Amar’s academic articles and edited special issues on minorityhood and Kashmir have been published in leading journals: Global Intellectual History, Modern Intellectual History, and South Asia. His second research project explores the political thought of Hindu and Muslim conservatives across the twentieth century. Surmounting institutional divisions, these thinker-politicians collectively theorised ideas of state authority, freedom, (non)violence, and national culture.
For a long time, cities were conceived by authorities, urban planners, architects and scientists through the organicist metaphor of a living body. Inherited from nineteenth-century natural sciences, this framework deeply shaped urban policies by representing cities as metabolisms whose infrastructures functioned as vital organs. Today, this conceptualisation has been partly renewed through contemporary policies centred on the living and on urban nature. Yet the organic vision is not the only more-than-human approach to the city. It has long coexisted with other imaginaries, notably that of the mineral city or the city of stone (Richard Sennett). In this paper, I examine the stakes of metropolitan mineralisation as a counterpoint to dominant reflections on migration, mobility and floating populations, drawing on research in topography, mineralogy, geology and urban palaeontology. Architectural, engineering and geological reflections on the city’s foundations seek to stabilise the urban core by promoting an image of solidity and permanence, even though urban space remains fundamentally fluid and unfinished. This tension is expressed through metaphors of insularity—such as Manhattan imagined as a “granite island.” At the same time, the depth of the subsoil functions both as a marker of antiquity and as a vertical response to urban densification. Throughout the analysis, particular attention is given to New York and to the assertion of lithic power (Tim Edensor, Matthew Gandy), which frames urban expansion as the conquest and mastery of land. *Professor Stéphane van Damme* is author of a dozen monographs, his research contributes to the renewal of the history of science and knowledge and focuses on modern science and European culture from the 16th to the 19th century, examining the founding fathers (Bacon, Descartes, Linnaeus), scientific disciplines (philosophy, botany, chemistry, archaeology), and scientific institutions and capitals. His latest book, published in 2023 and entitled _Les Voyageurs du doute (Travellers of Doubt)_, focused on the critical epistemology of distant knowledge among libertine scholars in the 17th and 18th centuries.
The seminar will be followed by drinks.
The difficulties in making change happen are often attributed to different ‘blobs’. How can you build an eco-system for delivery in the modern era?
Registration required: In-person and virtual attendance options can use the booking link below. Overview: Join us for an incisive book talk with Andrew Badger, co-author of the #1 bestseller The Great Heist: China’s Epic Campaign to Steal America’s Secrets. Drawing on years of frontline experience, Badger will unpack how China has executed a coordinated, whole-of-society campaign to appropriate Western technology, data, and proprietary knowledge. From defense and aerospace to AI and agriculture, The Great Heist reveals how systematic intellectual-property theft has become a central instrument of strategic competition — with profound implications for economic resilience, innovation, and national security in the 21st century. Lauded as a “riveting and astounding story” by H.R. McMaster, former U.S. National Security Advisor, and a “must-read” by Neil R. Wiley, former Chair of the National Intelligence Council, The Great Heist offers an unflinching account of how state-sponsored theft, talent recruitment, and industrial espionage have been used to siphon Western innovation at scale. This talk offers a rare opportunity to engage directly with one of the authors behind one of the most consequential books of recent years. Speaker Bio: Andrew Badger is a former DIA case officer and graduate of CIA’s elite training program. He served on the front lines of human intelligence operations, including a 2014 deployment to Afghanistan in support of US military operations. In the private sector, Badger has advised global firms such as McKinsey & Company and Deutsche Bank on geopolitical risk. He holds a bachelor’s degree in government from Harvard and a master’s in diplomatic studies from the University of Oxford, where he is a research associate and lectures on state sponsored espionage.
Dr Ramirez will be talking about how she has made a career out of her passion for the past, searching for the overlooked, ignored or misrepresented voices from history.
Robert was a hidden child during WW2 in Holland, and his moving story is not only full of chance, but also speaks to compassion, solidarity, and unity across faiths.This is an incredible opportunity to hear first-hand from a Holocaust survivor, and we are fortunate to be able to host the talk in a large venue due to the kindness and generosity of the Vice Chancellor. Opportunities to hear from a survivor are dwindling, and most people have never attended an event like this before and may never have the opportunity to do so again.
The evening will begin with a 10-minute introduction and background to the film, followed by a 50-minute screening. We will then conclude with an open discussion led by members of the Oxford Iranian Society. Everyone is welcome! *Taraneh Alidoosti* is arguably Iran’s most acclaimed and popular actress of the past decade, best known for leading roles in landmark films and especially the iconic TV series _Shahrzad_. After the murder of Mahsa Amini ignited the “Woman, Life, Freedom” uprising, she threw her full weight behind the resistance and became one of its most powerful voices. In this astonishingly brave interview, Alidoosti appears without a headscarf. She speaks openly about persecution, her arrest in front of her young daughter, time in solitary confinement, and the women in nearby cells who sang protest anthems to her. She recounts memorising their names so she could tell their families they were alive. The film, directed by Pegah Ahangarani, ends with a breathtaking scene of Alidoosti swimming freely in a pool, lifting her head from the water and smiling, an echo of an earlier role where her body was always covered. Since the film aired, Persian social media has erupted in near-unanimous admiration. Alidoosti knows this interview likely ends her acting career in Iran and may lead to renewed arrest. Still, what appears on screen is a woman who is truly free: fearless, morally unbreakable, and extraordinary. If courage has a face, it is hers.
The Oxford Iranian Society and the OxMEND Society (Oxford for Middle Eastern Narratives and Discourse) are delighted to invite you to a movie night. Register here: https://forms.gle/zSzorm86tjeZ2mGp9 The recent documentary Taraneh has received millions of views. It follows Taraneh Alidoosti, one of Iran’s most acclaimed and influential actresses, whose career spans nearly three decades and includes leading roles in landmark films and the iconic television series Shahrzad. Following the murder of Mahsa Amini, which ignited the “Woman, Life, Freedom” uprising, Alidoosti publicly aligned herself with the protest movement, becoming one of its most prominent and outspoken voices.
For our next talk, in the BDI/CHG (gen)omics Seminar series, we will be hearing from Evan Irving-Pease, Group Leader, in Quantitative and Population Genetics, BDI and CHG, University of Oxford. We’re delighted to host Evan in what promises to be a great talk! Date: Tuesday 3 February Time: 9:30 am – 10:30 am Talk title: TBC Location: Big Data Institute, Seminar Room 1 Abstract Rapid increases in the size of large genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have provided new prospects for understanding the genetic evolution of complex traits and disease susceptibility in humans. In turn, genomes from ancient human archaeological remains are now easier than ever to obtain and provide a direct window into changes in frequencies of trait-associated alleles in the past. This has generated a new wave of studies aiming to analyse the genetic component of traits in historic and prehistoric times using ancient DNA, and to determine whether any such traits were subject to natural selection. In this talk I will review recent advances in the field, with specific reference to how ancient DNA is informing our understanding of the evolution of disease susceptibility and the genetic legacy of ancient populations to present-day disease risk. Short biography Evan is a Research Fellow and Group Leader at the Big Data Institute and the Centre for Human Genetics. Evan leads the Evolutionary Medicine group, funded by the Royal Society and the ERC, which uses computational and statistical approaches to understand how natural selection has shaped the genetic risk for common and infectious diseases. Evan’s undergraduate degrees were in Archaeology and Computer Science, before he undertook an MSc and DPhil in Palaeogenomics at the University of Oxford. During his postdoctoral work at the University of Copenhagen, he developed tools and methods to improve the modelling of complex trait evolution using ancient DNA. ———————————————————————————————————————— All members of the University are welcome to join, please let reception at BDI know you’re here for the seminar and sign-in. We hope you can join us! We also now have a mailing list – To be added, ping genomics_bdi_whg-subscribe@maillist.ox.ac.uk (with any message), you should get a bounce-back with three options to confirm your subscription. Follow any of those options, and with a bit of luck you should be signed up! As a reminder, the (gen)omics seminar series runs every other Tuesday morning and is intended to increase interaction between individuals working in genomics across Oxford. We encourage in-person attendance where possible. There is time for discussion over, tea, coffee and pastries after the talks. Hybrid Option: Please note that these meetings are closed meetings and only open to members of the University of Oxford to encourage sharing of new and unpublished data. Please respect our speakers and do not share the link with anyone outside of the university. Microsoft Teams meeting – Meeting ID: 336 160 339 598 86 Passcode: iJ3LM7sk ——————————————————————————————————— If you wish to know more or receive information related to trainings and events at BDI, please subscribe by emailing bdi-announce-subscribe@maillist.ox.ac.uk. You’ll then receive an email from SYMPA and once you reply you’ll be on the list!
For our next talk, in the BDI/CHG (gen)omics Seminar series, we will be hearing from Evan Irving-Pease, Group Leader, in Quantitative and Population Genetics, BDI and CHG, University of Oxford. We’re delighted to host Evan in what promises to be a great talk! Date: Tuesday 3 February Time: 9:30 am – 10:30 am Talk title: What can ancient DNA tell us about the evolution of disease susceptibility? Location: Big Data Institute, Seminar Room 1 Abstract Rapid increases in the size of large genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have provided new prospects for understanding the genetic evolution of complex traits and disease susceptibility in humans. In turn, genomes from ancient human archaeological remains are now easier than ever to obtain and provide a direct window into changes in frequencies of trait-associated alleles in the past. This has generated a new wave of studies aiming to analyse the genetic component of traits in historic and prehistoric times using ancient DNA, and to determine whether any such traits were subject to natural selection. In this talk I will review recent advances in the field, with specific reference to how ancient DNA is informing our understanding of the evolution of disease susceptibility and the genetic legacy of ancient populations to present-day disease risk. Short biography Evan is a Research Fellow and Group Leader at the Big Data Institute and the Centre for Human Genetics. Evan leads the Evolutionary Medicine group, funded by the Royal Society and the ERC, which uses computational and statistical approaches to understand how natural selection has shaped the genetic risk for common and infectious diseases. Evan’s undergraduate degrees were in Archaeology and Computer Science, before he undertook an MSc and DPhil in Palaeogenomics at the University of Oxford. During his postdoctoral work at the University of Copenhagen, he developed tools and methods to improve the modelling of complex trait evolution using ancient DNA. ———————————————————————————————————————— All members of the University are welcome to join, please let reception at BDI know you’re here for the seminar and sign-in. We hope you can join us! We also now have a mailing list – To be added, ping genomics_bdi_whg-subscribe@maillist.ox.ac.uk (with any message), you should get a bounce-back with three options to confirm your subscription. Follow any of those options, and with a bit of luck you should be signed up! As a reminder, the (gen)omics seminar series runs every other Tuesday morning and is intended to increase interaction between individuals working in genomics across Oxford. We encourage in-person attendance where possible. There is time for discussion over, tea, coffee and pastries after the talks. Hybrid Option: Please note that these meetings are closed meetings and only open to members of the University of Oxford to encourage sharing of new and unpublished data. Please respect our speakers and do not share the link with anyone outside of the university. Microsoft Teams meeting – Meeting ID: 336 160 339 598 86 Passcode: iJ3LM7sk ——————————————————————————————————— If you wish to know more or receive information related to trainings and events at BDI, please subscribe by emailing bdi-announce-subscribe@maillist.ox.ac.uk. You’ll then receive an email from SYMPA and once you reply you’ll be on the list!
Lifestyle interventions are increasingly central to treatment strategies for psychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders. This seminar will focus on ketogenic diet-based programs and GLP-1-supported lifestyle interventions, examining their metabolic and neurological rationale. I will discuss how AI-enabled digital platforms can support personalisation, adherence, and monitoring, while generating actionable data to inform both clinical care and research. The talk will highlight key evidence gaps and translational challenges, and will explore which lifestyle components, such as nutrition, physical activity, sleep, cognitive-behavioural strategies, and stress regulation, appear most critical for sustaining cognitive and psychiatric benefits. Opportunities and challenges for integrating AI-enables lifestyle platforms into clinical and research settings will be discussed. This seminar is hosted in person at the Department of Psychiatry Seminar Room. To join online, please use the below Zoom details: https://zoom.us/j/93311812405?pwd=9kbjSbEcO2fa7n7gFLZVqrChvr467B.1 Meeting ID: 933 1181 2405 Passcode: 169396
In this online interactive workshop, you will learn how to create an effective search query and have the opportunity to try out a range of tools that you can use to search for scholarly materials to support your research. You will: learn how to find books and other scholarly items in Oxford libraries using SOLO; search for journal articles using subject databases and scholarly search engines; and be signposted towards learning materials you can use if you are interested in searching for conference proceedings, theses and dissertations. Intended audience: Taught student; Researcher and research student
Postgraduate students, fellows, staff and faculty from any discipline are welcome. This group aims to foster frequent interdisciplinary critical dialogue across Oxford and beyond about the political impacts of emerging technologies. Please contact Callum Harvey (callum.harvey@oii.ox.ac.uk) in advance to participate or with any questions. Attendance is online only. You do not currently have to be affiliated with the University of Oxford to attend and participate in discussions.
Organelle membrane contact sites orchestrate inter-organelle communication that is essential for cellular homeostasis. However, aberrant crosstalk between lysosomes and mitochondria has been linked with neurodegenerative disease. The lysosomal storage disease Niemann-Pick disease type C (NPC) is caused by loss of function mutations in the (LE/Lys) lipid transport proteins NPC1 or NPC2. The resulting accumulation of lysosomal lipids in NPC has complex downstream consequences including mitochondrial dysfunction, which is thought to be a key driver of disease pathogenesis. How a defect in a lysosomal lipid transport protein causes mitochondrial dysfunction is not fully understood, but we identified expanded mitochondria:lysosome contact sites (MLCs) in NPC1-deficient cells. Membrane contact sites are regions where the membranes of neighbouring organelles are tethered in close proximity (typically 5-40nm apart) by protein and lipid complexes and are important sites of signaling and lipid and ion exchange. Our data suggest that MLCs are heavily influenced by the LE/Lys lipid environment, identifying a direct correlation between MLC extent and LE/Lys cholesterol levels. Expanded MLCs in NPC are associated with mitochondrial lipid accumulation, likely contributing to mitochondrial dysfunction, exacerbated by impaired removal of damaged mitochondria by mitophagy when MLCs are increased. The lab is also exploring ER contact sites with lysosomes and lysosome-related organelles and applying findings from NPC to other diseases including Age-related Macular Degeneration and Parkinson’s Disease.
In this talk, Jon Penney explores key themes from his new book Chilling Effects: Repression, Conformity, and Power in the Digital Age (Cambridge University Press, 2026), which examines the increasing weaponization of surveillance, censorship, and new technology to repress and control us. With corporations, governments, and extremists employing big data, artificial intelligence, FRT, cyber-mobs, and other technological threats to limit our rights and freedoms, concerns about chilling effects—or how these activities deter us from exercising our rights—have become urgent. Penney draws on law, privacy theory, and social science to present a new conformity theory that highlights the dangers of chilling effects and their potential to erode democracy and enable a more illiberal future. Following the book’s urgent and timely message, he sheds light on the repressive and conforming effects of technology, state, and corporate power and offers a roadmap of how to respond to their weaponization today and tomorrow. Jon Penney is a legal scholar and social scientist at Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, Toronto, where he is an Associate Professor and holds the York Research Chair in Artificial Intelligence, Data Governance, and the Law. He is also a Faculty Associate at Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society and Senior Research Fellow at the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab. His award-winning research on privacy, technology, and human rights has received national and international attention, including coverage in the Washington Post, the New York Times, Reuters International, The Guardian, and Le Monde, among others, and has been profiled in WIRED and Harvard Magazine.
Email oxchildpsych@psych.ox.ac.uk to request the Zoom link to attend online.
Join us for a bilingual (Mandarin Chinese, English) reading of Yen Ai-Lin's 顏艾琳 poetry collection Bone Skin Flesh 骨皮肉, newly published in a bilingual edition, followed by discussion between the poet, Dr Aoife Cantrill, Dr Bingbing Shi and Samir Ng Sum Leung. (Source: Balestier Press) First published in Chinese in 1997, Bone Skin Flesh now appears in a bilingual edition with its first English translation by Jenn Marie Nunes. A landmark in contemporary Taiwanese poetry, these poems revel in the feminine – its desires, violences, and contradictions – through language that is visceral, imagistic and unrelenting. Here the body is never just metaphor: truth is spit, the sky a leaking breast, the moon a tongue pressed to skyscrapers. Women recur – mother, lover, crone – mythic and ordinary, tender and grotesque. Infused with pink spirit and kin to the Gurlesque, Yen's work claims the feminine as a site of rebellion, pleasure, and creation. Urgent and intimate, Bone Skin Flesh is poetry that demands not only to be read, but lived with. Yen Ai-Lin 顏艾琳 is a Taiwanese poet whose work moves between modern poetry, lyrical prose, and cultural criticism. She was the first female poet in Taiwan to publish a sustained series of erotic poems—works that ignited wide discussions on gender and desire. Her writing, shaped by diverse influences, has been honored with the National Outstanding Young Poet Award, the Ministry of Culture’s Outstanding Award for New Poem Creation, the Genesis Poetry Magazine 35th Anniversary Poet Award, the inaugural Taipei Literature Award, the Wu Zhuoliu New Poetry Award, and more.
(co-authored with Mats Ahrenshop, Anthony Calacino and Hayley Pring) Abstract: The Global South faces existential impacts from anthopogenic climate change, yet most emerging economies are increasingly embedding themselves in climate-forcing fossil fuel production. How do communities exposed to both types of vulnerabilities relate to climate change? We argue that, in absence of strong fossil fuel stakeholders, exposure to extreme weather events can generate disruptions which, by consequence, raise the salience of climate change and the demand for climate response. However, this mobilisation is less likely when fossil fuel industries are strong, as economic dependencies here pacify local populations in the instance of climate shocks, consequently dampening climate politicization. We test our conjectures in two ways. First, we present cross-national fine-grained analyses of the Climate Vulnerability Database (2010-2023), which traces climate-relevant risks and concurrent public behavior at the municipality-monthly level in six emerging economies across three continents. Furthermore, we present text analyses of original focus group data from Brazil and Indonesia. Our empirical results reveal that climate shocks change public behavior and that, in the absence of fossil fuel production, this behavior reflects the politicization of the climate. However, these effects are systematically divergent in the presence of fossil fuels, which mute general mobilization and, consequently, the politicization of the climate. These findings highlight why the effects of climate change on political life in general, and public-driven mobilization on climate in particular, are inherently contingent on the political economy of the exposed communities.
Dr. Sana Tibi’s colloquium presentation explores the unique linguistic and cognitive dimensions of Arabic literacy development in the early grades. Over the past few decades, scientific research on reading has grown substantially. However, this body of work has been criticized for its “anglocentric” focus (Share, 2021), limiting its applicability to non-English languages and orthographies. Also, while several universal predictors of word reading such as letter knowledge, phonological awareness, morphological awareness, and rapid automatized naming have been identified, their relative contributions vary across languages due to differences in orthographic depth, grain size of phonological-orthographic units, and morphological complexity. Furthermore, despite the widespread use of Arabic orthography among Arabic speaking populations and across populations who speak other languages such as Persian, Pashto, and Urdu, Arabic remains underrepresented in cross-linguistic literacy research. Notably, large-scale comparative studies have yet to include Arabic. Arabic offers a compelling case for investigation due to its unique orthographic features (e.g., allographs, ligaturing, syllabic structure, consonantal script, and diacritics), rich morphological structure (linear and nonlinear), and diglossic nature (spoken dialects vs. formal standard). Drawing on multiple empirical studies, Dr. Tibi examines how cognitive and linguistic predictors contribute to Arabic reading outcomes (accuracy, fluency, and comprehension) in early elementary grades. She also addresses challenges in assessing Arabic literacy due to the lack of standardized tools and highlights some key findings from studies that focused on validation of some assessment tools (root awareness and letter knowledge). The presentation also explores differences between poor and proficient decoders in Arabic. Furthermore, the existing research on Arabic is largely cross-sectional, with few longitudinal studies. To address this gap, the presentation will report findings from a two-year longitudinal study following 142 Palestinian children from kindergarten through grade 2. The study examined the predictive roles of letter knowledge, phonological awareness, rapid automatized naming, morphological awareness, and working memory in second-grade Arabic word reading, controlling for biological sex and parental education. Structural equation modeling revealed the critical role of Arabic letter knowledge in reading development as well as the indirect role of working memory in Arabic word reading. These findings offer important implications for reading acquisition, instruction, and assessment in Arabic, and underscore the need for more inclusive and linguistically diverse literacy research. Studying underrepresented languages expands our understanding of the universal aspects of reading allowing nuanced insights into the world's linguistic landscapes. Teams link: https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/3825967966058?p=oaa4boDA3tu5ZnqMja
Bio Patrick (Paddy) Mark is Professor of Nephrology and Honorary Consultant Nephrologist at the Glasgow Renal and Transplant Unit based at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital Glasgow. He was appointed as Clinical Senior Lecturer in 2011 following clinical training in Medicine and Nephrology combined with a Clinical Lecturer post between 2006-2011. He was promoted to Reader in 2015 and to Professor in 2018. He leads the United Kingdom Cardio-Renal Clinical Study Group, as part of the United Kingdom Kidney Research Consortium. He is the Chief Scientist Office Scotland Clinical Lead for Renal Research. His PhD, awarded the Bellahouston Medal for outstanding thesis by medical graduate, was funded by a British Heart Foundation Junior Clinical Fellowship. He graduated in Medicine in 1999 as Brunton Medallist awarded to the highest achieving student that year.
Part of the Online Inclusivity Training for Health and Care Researchers series. Providing strategies to reduce barriers in health inequalities and understand challenges faced by disadvantaged communities. The session includes a case study and the NIHR INCLUDE Socio-economic Disadvantage Framework.
A conversation on Paula Cristina Roque’s book, Insurgent Nations: Rebel Rule in Angola and South Sudan, facilitated by Alpa Shah Over two separate twelve-year periods, two opposing ‘states’ governed in parallel in Angola (1979–1991) and Sudan (1990–2002), each with competing conceptions of society, history and national identity. Deeply dividing communities with their counter-nationalist programmes, rebel parties UNITA in Angola and the SPLM/A in Sudan, which had fought Africa’s longest and bloodiest civil wars, built political and military enterprises in opposition to the established governments. Insurgent Nations unpacks the complexities of these movements, exploring the charisma of their leaders, the ruthlessness of their military operations, their political manoeuvrings, and their multiple transformations in war and peace. Using first-hand, unpublished accounts from their leaders and cadres, Paula Cristina Roque provides unique insight into UNITA and the SPLM/A’s governing strategies. She details the ‘nations’, ‘states’ and ‘societies’ that were forged by the parties’ ideologies, sub-nationalist concerns and interactions with the population. While UNITA’s political project in the Free Lands of Angola was centrally controlled and totalitarian, the SPLM/A’s New Sudan was decentralised and minimalist, built from the bottom up. This is the first volume to compare the policies and perspectives of UNITA and the SPLM/A, offering a new understanding of territory-governing insurgencies. Ultimately, both rebel states were exercises in survival, resilience and adaptation. Paula Cristina Roque is an author, researcher, and security sector analyst with extensive expertise in human rights, security, and surveillance in Africa. She is the Executive Director of Intelwatch since 2024, an organisation that promotes democratic oversight of intelligence and surveillance, monitor and report on surveillance activities, raise awareness and provide education about the dangers of undemocratic intelligence and surveillance activities, and advocate for effective oversight of surveillance laws, policies, and practices. She has served as an advisor for the Crisis Management Initiative as well as a Senior Analyst for Southern Africa with the International Crisis Group. Previously, she worked with the South Sudan-Centre for Strategic and Policy Studies, the Institute for Security Studies, the South African Institute for International Affairs, and as a journalist in West Africa and the UK. Paula holds a Dphil in Development Studies from the University of Oxford, a MSc in Human Rights from the London School of Economics, and a BA in Social Anthropology from the Instituto Superior de Ciencias do Trabalho e da Empresa.
In an era characterized by complex mobility patterns, health crises, shifting geopolitical landscapes and personal and family’s views toward international education, it is imperative to recognize the concurrent (im)mobility challenges at a global scale. Despite a growing body of literature on international students, little attention has been given to prospective international students who defer their overseas education and remain in their home countries for various reasons. This cohort—having initiated pre-departure educational mobility but not commenced their studies—has been largely overlooked in international education research. This study addresses this critical gap by examining the “in-between” state of prospective Chinese international students, who exist in a liminal space between domestic and international identities. The study foregrounds the centrality of Third Space and liminality as analytical lenses to understand how students and their families negotiate uncertainty, construct hybrid identities, and reimagine educational pathways within fractured global contexts. The ‘in-betweenness’ in the study expands mobility frameworks to encompass temporal discontinuities, fragmentations, and non-linear trajectories of educational mobility that stir up challenges in this cohort’s wellbeing and family and social relationships. By advocating for the ongoing, processual nature of international education experiences, we call for universities and policymakers in both home and host countries to develop supportive infrastructures for these ‘in-betweeners’, ensuring they are not marginalized within international education systems.
Join us for this hybrid event with online speakers Ben Folit-Weinberg and Harriet Fertik (Ohio State University) to discuss The 'Metaphors of Reception, Reception as a Metaphor Project': An Overview. Harriet Fertik's is Assistant Professor at The Ohio State University. Her research focuses on literature and political thought in the early Roman empire and on classical reception. Ben Folit-Weinberg is Assistant Professor at The Ohio State University. His work on ancient Greek thought delves into poetry and drama, philosophy, and intellectual history. This event is free and open to all. Please go to the APGRD website for more details and to access the Zoom link to join us online.
https://www.cmcsoxford.org.uk/our-events
Large language models (LLMs) have taken the world by storm, enabling new applications, intensifying GPU shortages, and raising concerns about the accuracy of their outputs. In this talk, I will present several projects I have worked on to address these challenges. Specifically, I will focus on Ray, a distributed framework for scaling AI workloads, vLLM and SGLang, two high-throughput inference engines for LLMs, and LMArena, a platform for accurate LLM benchmarking. I will conclude with key lessons learned and outline directions for future research. Professor Ion Stoica is a Professor in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department at the University of California, Berkeley, and holds the Xu Bao Chancellor Chair. He is the Director of the Sky Computing Lab, and the Executive Chairman and Co-founder of Databricks, and Anyscale. Professor Stoica's current research focuses on AI systems and cloud computing. His work includes open-source projects vLLM, SGLang, Chatbot Arena, SkyPilot, Ray and Apache Spark. He is a Member of the National Academy of Engineering, an Honorary Member of the Romanian Academy, and an ACM Fellow.
In this session we will cover how to locate and interpret journal level metrics such as the Journal Impact Factor (JIF). We will examine the tools you can use to locate journal level metrics, such as Journal Citation Reports and Scopus Sources. We will also consider the uses, limitations and pitfalls inherent in these metrics and how they can be used responsibly. By the end of the session, you will be familiar with: the major journal metrics and how these are calculated; accessing journal citation data using Journal Citation Reports and Scopus Sources; using JIF, CiteScore and SJR journal metrics to rank journals; and the limitations of different metrics, including how journal metrics may be skewed or distorted. Intended audience: Taught student; Researcher & research student
In this online workshop you will be shown the functionality of Zotero, which is a free-to-use software programme used to manage references and create bibliographies. Zotero will be demonstrated on a Windows PC but users of MacOS or Linux computers will be able to follow the demonstration. The workshop will cover: understanding the main features and benefits of Zotero; setting up a Zotero account; importing references from different sources into Zotero; organising your references in Zotero; inserting citations into documents; and creating a bibliography/reference list. Intended audience: Medicine and NHS; Taught student; Researcher and research student
We estimate a model of intra-household allocation of time-intensive parental investments. To address the identification challenge of separating preferences, expectations, and bargaining power, we leverage a unique data combination. First, we derive the quantity and quality of maternal and paternal speech from day-long audio recording using a state-of-the-art neural network classifier. Second, we elicit expectations from each parent about the returns to speech. Third, we exploit hyper-local variation in female bargaining power arising from inheritance practices. Our model and estimation reveal how female bargaining power influences paternal investments: fathers provide more and higher-quality speech investments when women have greater bargaining power, but only when mothers expect investments to improve child language development. These results align with a collective model in which powerful women elicit paternal investment when they believe it is productive. Our results highlight the role of economic power as opposed to other forms of social status in driving these investments.
My doctoral research examines transnational bonds of solidarity between the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), the African National Congress (ANC), and the Irish Republican Army (IRA) during the 1969-1991 period of the Global Cold War. These case studies were chosen for the clear synergies between these three self-determination struggles, their convergent evolution from armed resistance to diplomatic engagement along remarkably parallel timelines, and the enduring salience of their solidarity in modern political discourse–South Africa’s December 2023 complaint against Israel at the ICJ and Ireland’s May 2024 recognition of the state of Palestine are two amongst many recent examples. The project builds on my MPhil research, which found that the ANC-PLO bond involved exchanges of paramilitary training and financial support, mutual diplomatic advocacy at international forums such as the United Nations, collaboration between civil society organisations in the post-Mandela period, and other modes of cooperation. My doctoral research incorporates the IRA's role in this transnational network, exploring whether these three movements constituted a trilateral alliance within the broader Third World, nonaligned, and anti-colonial revolutionary community. I am also interested in uncovering the role of state actors—particularly Muammar Qaddafi's Libyan Jamahiriya and Fidel Castro's Cuban regime—in fostering this revolutionary network.
President Franklin Roosevelt once said ‘no major war has ever been won or lost through lack of money.’ He was wrong. This paper explains why. It argues that as states struggled to finance the immense war efforts required by the two world wars, and to undermine their enemies, money became a crucial weapon. The UK and USA led the way in discovering new methods of using money to do both. In the process they invented forms of economic statecraft that remain relevant today, redefined the relationship between citizen and state as well as the meaning of money itself, and blurred the boundaries between war and peace. Using money as a lens through which to study the two world wars allows us to see them in a fresh light, as a case study of the blockade of Germany between 1914 and 1918 demonstrates. Jonathan Boff is Professor of Military History at the University of Birmingham, where he teaches courses covering topics from Homer to Helmand. His prize-winning books include Winning and Losing on the Western Front (Cambridge University Press, 2012) and Haig's Enemy (Oxford University Press, 2018). Oxford University Press will publish his history of economic statecraft and warfare, The Age of Mammon and Mars: Money and War in the Modern World, in 2026.
Even with stringent and rapid reductions in emission of greenhouse gases it is clear, and has been since the Paris agreement in 2015, that we will need to remove hundreds of billions of tonnes of CO2 from the atmosphere to keep warming below 2oC. More than 200 companies are now pursuing this CO2 removal (CDR -Carbon Dioxide Removal), using a wide range of approaches. More than $10bn has been invested in a voluntary CDR market which, by some projections, will grow to $100bn per year. Most approaches to CDR are novel, untested, and still at small scale. Whether they actually deliver the quantity of CDR claimed, and whether that removal is permanent and in addition to natural carbon uptake remain open questions. Accurate and robust measurement and verification of CDR also remains a significant challenge. And the consequences of CDR approaches to the wider environment are under-investigated. CDR presents both a challenge and a dilemma to environmental scientists and regulators. We urgently need to develop approaches to CDR at large scale if we want to prevent dangerous climate change, but the precautionary principle guides us to pursue such major interventions with care. This challenge becomes more acute as countries build CDR into their future emission commitments and as compliance markets develop, requiring regulation that both promotes CDR innovation and protects the environment. This lecture will ask: what do we need to do, as the demand for CDR credits grows, to ensure that credits have real climate value and are not causing unintended environmental harm? The lecture will be followed by a panel discussion with Dr Steve Smith and Dr Jessica Omukuti, chaired by Professor Rosalind Rickaby, and will conclude with a drinks reception.
Oxford Networks for the Environment (ONE) annual lecture followed by panel discussion and drinks reception - all welcome Speaker: Professor Gideon Henderson, Professor of Earth Sciences, and former Defra Chief Scientific Advisor Biography: Gideon is an environmental scientist and advisor with particular expertise as a geochemist researching surface-earth processes related to climate, the carbon cycle and the oceans. From 2019 to 2025 he was working 80% as the Chief Scientific Advisor and Director General for Science and Analysis at the UK Government Department, Defra (Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs). In addition to his work at Oxford, Gideon is Chair of the Met Office Science Advisory Committee, the Senior Independent Member of NERC Council, and a Member of the Advisory Board for the UN Decade of Ocean Science. Programme Welcome by Prof Heidi Johansen-Berg, Pro-Vice Chancellor for Strategic Initiatives Keynote by Prof Gideon Henderson Panel discussion: Dr Steve Smith, Arnell Associate Professor of Greenhouse Gas Removal Dr Jessica Omukuti, Research Fellow on the Politics of Net Zero in the Global South Chaired by Prof Rosalind Rickaby, Chair of Geology, Department of Earth Sciences Update on the Oxford Networks for the Environment by Prof Jim Hall, Professor of Climate and Environmental Risks, and Chair of ONE Network, Environmental Change Institute
_Homonoia_, usually translated as a “same-mindedness,” “unanimity,” or “consensus” in Plato, is said to underwrite political unity through an agreement across souls secured by the cultivation or implantation of true opinion in the many by those with epistemically superior knowledge. Exploring the repeated implication of homonoia with _harmonia_, harmony, in _Republic_ and other dialogs, this lecture retheorizes homonoia as a speaking together, _homolegein_, within and across souls, that secures agreement and unity, if it does at all, as a coming to terms that, like harmony, depends not on sameness but on plurality and difference.
Writing the volume on "the Ming" for a series entitled "Dynasties" provides the opportunity to reflect on what we mean when we use this English term in the context of China's past. Recent historiographical debates on the validity of the term have alternatively seen "dynasty" as a useful heuristic device enabling truly comparative global history, or a colonialist imposition designed to exoticize, even delegitimise, the "non-Western" polity. This talk will use the example of Great Ming to revisit this contentious issue, and think about what the Chinese case might contribute to the larger debate.
Heart failure affects millions of people around the world. Yet, many patients still have few effective treatment options, especially those whose hearts become stiff and struggle to relax between beats. In February's Balliol Online Lecture, Professor Zaccolo will describe her research group’s discovery of a small but powerful molecular ‘brake’ inside cells affected by heart disease, and the potential for it to be released with nanometer-level precision. Achieved through study of the signalling mechanisms associated with the heart’s response to stress - often called the ‘fight or flight’ response - in turn this could allow the heart to relax properly again, offering protection from the development of heart failure. If this discovery can be transformed successfully into a therapeutic treatment, it could represent a completely new way of helping patients beyond managing their symptoms, as current treatments do, by targeting a core mechanism of the heart that becomes altered in disease. Professor Manuela Zaccolo, graduated in medicine at the University of Torino, Italy, and subsequently went on to pursue a career in science by spending four years as a post-doctoral researcher at the LMB, MRC, Cambridge, UK, working on protein engineering and in vitro molecular evolution. She then moved back to Italy, at the University of Padova, to work on the generation of fluorescent sensors for real time imaging of intracellular second messengers in living cells. In Padova she established her independent research group in 2001 at the Venetian Institute of Molecular Medicine with a focus on intracellular signalling. In 2007 she moved to the University of Glasgow, where she initially held a position as a Reader and subsequently as Professor of Cell Biology. In 2012 she joined the Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics at Oxford University. She is also a Fellow in Pre-Clinical Medicine at Balliol College. Her research investigates intracellular signalling, particularly cyclic nucleotide pathways, signal compartmentalisation, and their roles in health and disease.
'Twelve Years Away from Constantinople' was an instant classic in its time. For well over a century, it has endured as a uniquely candid and entertaining account of Armenian émigré life during the reign of the authoritarian Ottoman sultan, Abdülhamid II. Best known for his trenchant satires, its extraordinarily cosmopolitan author, Yervant Odian, was and remains one of the most recognizable and active figures of his generation. His multifaceted international career as journalist and civil society leader embedded him deeply in Ottoman-Armenian intellectual and revolutionary circles both in Constantinople and well beyond. This remarkably unabashed memoir relates his observations as a well-loved and committed member of those inner circles. His twelve-year journey begins with the 1896 massacre of Armenians in the Ottoman capital, when Odian, like many of his contemporaries fled as a political refugee to safer shores. His migrations led him to Greece, Egypt, France, Austria, and England, where he witnessed and withstood the numerous hardships plaguing the Armenians of the ‘senior diaspora.’ https://gomidas.org/books/show/170
The question of space has been a crucial one in the development and maintenance of empires, particularly those that claimed and exercised sovereignty over overseas territories. A similar question shaped the experiences of women’s groups and organizations at the end of the empire, in an even more urgent way, as they sought to rebuild the ties between France and its colonies after World War II and the Vichy period. This seminar examines how women’s groups framed their activism across a plurality of spaces – national, imperial, and transnational – between 1945 and the late 1950s. By focusing on both pro-imperial and anticolonial groups, it explores political and social organization across space, as well as the nature of the different networks involved in developing contacts and cooperation between France and its West African territories. As women’s groups drew on existing networks (diplomatic, administrative, party-related, and organizational) while also creating new ones, they encountered both opportunities and constraints. The seminar will thus reflect on how the nature and form of these specific networks, as well as on their vertical, horizontal, and transversal interactions over time, influenced the expansion of French women’s groups in French overseas territories.
The seminars will take place on Tuesdays during term time, from 5:00 to 6:30 p.m. at Corpus Christi College in Merton Street. Please ask the porters for directions. No registration is required. For more details: https://tolkien50.web.ox.ac.uk/event/tolkien-seminars-ht-2026
Culture has always been targeted in the genocide of the Palestinian people. This talk approaches filmmaking as life-writing in conditions of genocide, where family photographs, film archives, and cultural institutions become sites of struggle over memory, survival, and the right to narrative. Drawing on histories of cultural loss and erasure in Palestine—from the theft of family photo archives in 1948, to the looting of the Palestinian film archive in 1982, to the targeting of cultural centres in 2024, such as Rashad Shawa in Gaza and the Jenin Freedom Theatre—filmmaker Saeed Taji Farouky asks: What does it mean to make creative work when the very materials of cultural memory are under threat? Key questions addressed in this lecture include: How can life-writing practices—including filmmaking—contribute to the resistance against occupation and to Palestinian liberation? How should we understand the value, limits, and responsibilities of such work in a state of emergency, such as the one currently ongoing in Gaza? How can we navigate the UK cultural landscape in which solidarity with Palestinians is suppressed or criminalised? Touching on life-writing, filmmaking, and cultural memory, this talk will be of interest to readers, writers, filmmakers, students, and scholars working across literature, film and media, visual culture, politics, and human rights. It will also appeal to those interested in archives and testimony, as well as the ethics of making and sharing creative work in times of genocide, occupation, and state violence. No prior specialist knowledge or preparation is required. Speaker Details: Saeed Taji Farouky is a Palestinian/Egyptian filmmaker who has been making films around themes of conflict, human rights, and colonialism since 2005. His latest feature documentary, A Thousand Fires, premiered as the opening film in Directors’ Fortnight at the Locarno Film Festival 2021, where it won the Marco Zucchi Award for most innovative documentary. His previous documentary, Tell Spring Not to Come This Year, premiered at the Berlinale 2015, where it won the Audience Choice Panorama Award and the Amnesty Human Rights Award, and was sold to Netflix. Farouky is also a radical film educator, regularly teaching, leading workshops, and lecturing about alternative forms of cinematic storytelling. He is the designer and lead tutor of the Radical Film School, a free film course based in London dedicated to political filmmakers from marginalised backgrounds. About OCLW’s Global Majority & Underrepresented Writers’ Programme: This event is part of OCLW’s flagship Global Majority and Underrepresented Writers’ Programme (GMUWP). The GMUWP supports talented yet historically excluded writers in developing their work, building confidence, and navigating the publishing industry by providing free lectures, workshops, and mentorship. The Programme aims to create a more inclusive writing community, ensuring that life-writing reflects the diverse range of voices that surround us. Find out more about the Programme here. Further Details and Contacts: After the event, please join us for a complimentary wine reception. This hybrid event is free and open to all. Delivering our lectures costs the Centre around £20 per attendee. If you are able, please consider making a voluntary donation of £5, £10, or £20 to help us cover these costs and keep our events accessible to all. No one will be turned away for lack of funds. Registration is strongly recommended for in-person attendance and required for hybrid attendance. Registration will close at 14:30 on 03/02/2026. The event will be recorded and made available on the OCLW website soon after. Registration is not required to access the recording. Queries regarding this event should be addressed to OCLW Events Manager, Dr Eleri Anona Watson.
Culture has always been targeted in the genocide of the Palestinian people. This talk approaches filmmaking as life-writing in conditions of genocide, where family photographs, film archives, and cultural institutions become sites of struggle over memory, survival, and the right to narrative. Drawing on histories of cultural loss and erasure in Palestine—from the theft of family photo archives in 1948, to the looting of the Palestinian film archive in 1982, to the targeting of cultural centres in 2024, such as Rashad Shawa in Gaza and the Jenin Freedom Theatre—filmmaker Saeed Taji Farouky asks: *What does it mean to make creative work when the very materials of cultural memory are under threat?* *Key questions addressed in this lecture include:* * How can life-writing practices—including filmmaking—contribute to the resistance against occupation and to Palestinian liberation? * How should we understand the value, limits, and responsibilities of such work in a state of emergency, such as the one currently ongoing in Gaza? * How can we navigate the UK cultural landscape in which solidarity with Palestinians is suppressed or criminalised? Touching on life-writing, filmmaking, and cultural memory, this talk will be of interest to readers, writers, filmmakers, students, and scholars working across literature, film and media, visual culture, politics, and human rights. It will also appeal to those interested in archives and testimony, as well as the ethics of making and sharing creative work in times of genocide, occupation, and state violence. No prior specialist knowledge or preparation is required. *Saeed Taji Farouky* is a Palestinian/Egyptian filmmaker who has been making films around themes of conflict, human rights, and colonialism since 2005. His latest feature documentary, _A Thousand Fires_, premiered as the opening film in Directors’ Fortnight at the Locarno Film Festival 2021, where it won the Marco Zucchi Award for most innovative documentary. His previous documentary, _Tell Spring Not to Come This Year_, premiered at the Berlinale 2015, where it won the Audience Choice Panorama Award and the Amnesty Human Rights Award, and was sold to Netflix. Farouky is also a radical film educator, regularly teaching, leading workshops, and lecturing about alternative forms of cinematic storytelling. He is the designer and lead tutor of the Radical Film School, a free film course based in London dedicated to political filmmakers from marginalised backgrounds.
You are warmly invited to the showing of a new documentary film, ‘The Hardest Bridge’, on a real example of post-conflict reconciliation in Britain and Northern Ireland, with discussion led by the film’s subjects Jo Berry and Pat Magee: 'The Hardest Bridge' Tuesday 3 February [Third Week] 7.30pm – 10.00 pm, in the Auditorium, St John’s College. As a Volunteer with the Irish Republican Army, Pat Magee planted a bomb in the Grand Hotel, Brighton, during the Conservative Party Annual Conference in 1984, aiming to kill PM Margaret Thatcher. The explosion killed five people including Sir Anthony Berry MP, father of Jo Berry. Magee was arrested in 1985 and imprisoned in 1986 but released under the Good Friday Agreement in 1999. Jo went to meet him. Ever since they have been on a transformative journey which has taken them to situations of tension and conflict in many countries. Can the wounds of war heal? Can enemies reconcile? ‘The Hardest Bridge’ (45 mins) focuses those questions through the insights of Pat Magee and Jo Berry. They will be present in person to speak and answer questions after the film. Also present will be the film’s director, Dr Imad Karam, an award-winning British-Palestinian film maker, and executive producer Howard Grace. Followed by a drinks reception. This event, jointly sponsored by OxPeace and the DPIR, is free and open to all. Registration is not required. Followed by a drinks reception.
COURSE DETAILS The key factors in developing successful proposals will be identified as will the requirements of specific research councils. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this session you will understand more about: The significance of winning research grants for your academic career The technical aspects of how to submit a research funding application. The key issues when writing a research proposal, and the pitfalls to avoid. What to look for when reviewing a research proposal.
Hospital Episode Statistics Admitted Patient Care (HESAPC) data are a comprehensive national dataset collected by NHS England that captures detailed information on all inpatient and day-case hospital activity across England. With around 16 million episodes of care recorded each year, HESAPC provides valuable insights into patient demographics, clinical diagnoses, and medical procedures, serving as a crucial resource for planning and research. Led by – Charlie Harper, Trial Data Scientist, Clinical Trial Service Unit & Epidemiological Studies Unit (CTSU), Oxford Population Health Raph Goldacre, Senior Health Data Scientist and Epidemiologist, Oxford Population Health This session will cover: 1. How HESAPC data are collected and the purpose behind this national effort 2. What information is included in the HESAPC data 3. How researchers can effectively use HESAPC data in their projects 4. The challenges and limitations of working with large-scale administrative data Intended Audience: Research staff and DPhil students interested in using healthcare systems data for research. Learning Objectives: By the end of the session, participants will: 1. Understand how and why HESAPC data are collected 2. Have a basic understanding of what information is recorded 3. Be able to interpret HESAPC data for their own projects and critically appraise its use in others’ research 4. Recognise the limitations and challenges of using HESAPC data in different research settings Register - https://forms.office.com/e/aMpZSNmLbA?origin=lprLink
Sensitivity to patterns is fundamental to sensory processing and lies at the heart of predictive coding and Bayesian theories of brain function, which conceptualise perception as inference based on internal models of the environment. The brain is hypothesised to maintain a hierarchy of predictive models that track the statistical structure of ongoing sensory input. A central challenge is to understand how such models are formed, stored in memory, and dynamically engaged, or interrupted, by changing sensory contexts. Owing to its inherently dynamic nature, audition provides a tractable and powerful test bed for addressing these questions. Over the past decade, my laboratory has investigated the neural mechanisms underlying auditory sequence processing. We use carefully designed rapid tone-pip sequences to model different types of environmental regularities, combining behavioural experiments, computational modelling, M/EEG, fMRI, and pupillometry to characterise how the brain automatically extracts, represents, and exploits regularities in sound. This work elucidates the underlying neural mechanisms and the statistical heuristics the brain employs, for example, how it arbitrates whether to maintain or interrupt existing models in the face of new evidence.
Digital and artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies are increasingly mediating our political and legal interactions. This is manifest, for example, in the ways in which judges and civil servants increasingly rely on algorithmic tools in their decision making, or in how political communications increasingly take place on, and are structured by, digital platforms. These technological developments have been the focal point of legal scholarship engaging with deep-seated puzzles about what is it that we gain and lose from the penetration of digital and AI technologies into political and legal spheres. In this discussion, I will share my insights on the implications of these transformations for the notion of the ‘public’ as a fundamental category and unit of analysis. The project examines the role that the notion of the ‘public’ plays in democratic politics and jurisprudence, and how this role is obstructed when humans and human functions are replaced by machines. It illuminates the evolving triadic interplay between the ‘public’, democracy, and technology, and considers the ways in which these understandings set novel priorities for law in the regulation of digital and AI technologies.
Female Genital Cutting (FGC) is a harmful traditional practice with severe consequences for women’s health, human capital accumulation, and psychological well-being. This paper evaluates two interventions designed to reduce the incidence of FGC among adolescent girls in Sierra Leone, where the practice is integral to an initiation ceremony - called “Bondo” - symbolizing a girl’s transition to womanhood. We randomly assigned 150 villages to one of three arms: (i) a control group; (ii) a Visual Information arm, which facilitated community discussions emphasizing the harmful consequences of female genital cutting; and (iii) a Norm-Replacement arm, aimed at substituting the traditional ritual with an alternative that does not involve cutting (“Bondo without Cutting”). Girls’ FGC was measured using maternal reports, as well as clinical examinations by healthcare professionals. Three years after the intervention, both treatments reduced the incidence of female genital cutting among girls aged 10-18 by 21%-27%. Mechanisms’ analysis reveals that the Visual Information arm improved awareness of health risks, while the Norm-Replacement arm enhanced support for alternative rituals. Both interventions modestly reduced perceived social pressure, as captured by second-order beliefs. These findings underscore the potential of culturally grounded, community-based strategies to shift deeply entrenched social norms. Written with Eliana La Ferrara
To observers across the political spectrum, American politics appears increasingly divided. Long-standing divisions of race, ethnicity, gender, class, and rural-urban remain powerful, but a more fundamental split may now be emerging between those who support the existing democratic order and those who do not. In this event, Robert Lieberman will analyse what today’s political cleavages mean for the future of American democracy, and place current conditions in a broader historical and comparative perspective. Robert C. Lieberman is Krieger-Eisenhower Professor of Political Science at Johns Hopkins University. He is the author and editor of numerous books and articles on American political development, race and politics, and American democracy, including most recently Four Threats: The Recurring Crises of American Democracy and Democratic Resilience: Can the United States Withstand Rising Polarization?
*Programme* 14:00-14:05 Welcome 14:05-14:45 *Michael Jaworzy* (CNRS-MFO, Oxford), Tschirnhaus and the Cartesians 14:45-15:30 *Mogens Lærke* (CNRS-IHRIM/MFO, Lyon/Oxford), Traveling with Tschirnhaus: Some Remarks on the First European Reception of Spinoza 15:30-16:00 Break 16:00-16:45 *Pablo Montosa Molinero* (Barcelona), Relational Post-Cartesian Physics: A Preliminary Study 16:45-17:00 Concluding remarks Contact: "$":mailto:mogens.laerke@cnrs.fr and/or "$":mailto:michael.jaworzyn@cnrs.fr
Join Neil Jefferies for an overview of how to analyse, annotate and collate images from different websites using the International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) technology. Discover how IIIF can be used in research processes and explore examples from the Digital Bodleian collection. This free, in-person event, is open to University of Oxford staff and students only. Registration is required.
Mode of attendance: in-person and Zoom (link TBC). If you would like to attend online, please notify the project manager: "$":mailto:amelie.berger-soraruff@mfo.ac.uk. Convened by Mogens Laerke and Michael Jaworzyn (CNRS, IHRIM/MFO) As part of the NOTCOM ERC Project Programme: 14:00. Welcome 14:00-14:45. Michael Jaworzyn (CNRS-MFO, Oxford), Tschirnhaus and the Cartesians 14:45-15:30. Mogens Lærke (CNRS-IHRIM/MFO, Lyon/Oxford), Traveling with Tschirnhaus: Some Remarks on the First European Reception of Spinoza 15:30-16:00. Break 16:00-16:45. Pablo Montosa Molinero (Barcelona), Relational Post-Cartesian Physics: A Preliminary Study 16:45-17:00. Concluding remarks Please get in touch with "$":mailto:mogens.laerke@cnrs.fr and/or "$":mailto:michael.jaworzyn@cnrs.fr if you would like more information.
AI is inescapable, from its mundane uses online to its increasingly consequential decision-making in courtrooms, job interviews, and wars. The ubiquity of AI is so great that it might produce public resignation—a sense that the technology is our shared fate. As economist Maximilian Kasy shows in The Means of Prediction, artificial intelligence, far from being an unstoppable force, is irrevocably shaped by human decisions—choices made to date by the ownership class that steers its development and deployment. Kasy shows that the technology of AI is ultimately not that complex. It is insidious, however, in its capacity to steer results to its owners’ wants and ends. Kasy clearly and accessibly explains the fundamental principles on which AI works, and, in doing so, reveals that the real conflict isn’t between humans and machines, but between those who control the machines and the rest of us. The Means of Prediction offers a powerful vision of the future of AI: a future not shaped by technology, but by the technology’s owners. Amid a deluge of debates about technical details, new possibilities, and social problems, Kasy cuts to the core issue: Who controls AI’s objectives, and how is this control maintained? The answer lies in what he calls “the means of prediction,” or the essential resources required for building AI systems: data, computing power, expertise, and energy. As Kasy shows, in a world already defined by inequality, one of humanity’s most consequential technologies has been and will be steered by those already in power. About the speaker: Maximilian Kasy is Professor of Economics at the University of Oxford. He received his PhD at UC Berkeley and joined Oxford after appointments at UCLA and Harvard University. His research interests focus on social foundations for statistics and machine learning, going beyond traditional single-agent decision theory. He also works on economic inequality, job guarantee programs, and basic income. He teaches a course on foundations of machine learning at the economics department at Oxford. In fall 2025, his book "The Means of Prediction: How AI Really Works (and Who Benefits)" was published by University of Chicago Press.
About the series: This series will feature master classes, seminars, workshops and talks with Laura Rival, research collaborators and colleagues, throughout academic year 2025-2026. Beginning in Michaelmas term 2025, the theme for the term, in answer to the series question, was 'In Latin America, by Greening the State at the Top and from Below'. In Hilary term, the theme is 'By Knowing Nature Differently'. In Trinity term, the theme will be 'By Imagining a New Civilization and Building the Next Political Economic Order'.
At COP30 in Belem, Brazil, governments reaffirmed global climate goals under the Paris Agreement but fell short of commitments capable of changing current emissions trajectories. This matters in a world that has already warmed to approximately 1.4°C above pre-industrial levels, with climate impacts intensifying unevenly across localities and regions, shaped by place-specific social, economic, and political contexts. The seminar uses the En-ROADS Climate Solutions Simulator to explore different mitigation policy options, showing how emissions respond in practice and opening discussion on what this means for climate policy and the choices we make in a warming world.
The Icelandic sagas have been used as a comparative literature for the narratives in the Old Testament ever since they became accessible in editions and translations towards the end of the nineteenth century. Scholars such as Hermann Gunkel, Gerhard von Rad, George Coats, Meir Sternberg and John Barton have all used the sagas to reflect on stories in the Hebrew Bible, ranging from single episodes like Jacob wrestling with an angel, to the entire span of the ‘saga’ of King David. Yet the sagas of Icelanders belong in a very different context: they were written down in the thirteenth century about Icelanders living in the tenth century and often survive in late medieval, or even early modern, manuscripts. If the characters in the sagas are sometimes pagans, the sagas themselves were written down by Christians, who may well have been familiar with the Old Testament, either in Latin or a vernacular translation. This lecture will consider the value of the Icelandic sagas for reading and understanding the Old Testament. It will look how the sagas have been used by scholars of the Hebrew Bible in the past and compare this with how the Old Testament has been used by scholars of the sagas. It will suggest not only that there is a genuine kinship between these storytelling traditions, but also that the saga authors themselves were aware of this.
Understanding how antidepressant drugs exert their effects in the human brain remains a major challenge in neuropsychopharmacology. In this talk, I will present our recent efforts to translate key findings from preclinical animal models into human neurocognitive paradigms of antidepressant drug action including behavioural and imaging approaches. I will discuss work spanning both established antidepressant medications and fast-acting, next-generation treatments, including ketamine. By integrating animal and human approaches, this work aims to bridge mechanistic insights across species and improve the way in which treatments for depression are understood and developed.
The New Yorker has described Adam Phillips as ‘Britain’s foremost psychoanalytic writer’, and John Banville has praised him as ‘one of the finest prose stylists at work in the language, an Emerson of our time.’ The Poet’s Essay seminars take place three times a year. Each seminar lasts around one and a half to two hours. The series is free and open to all who wish to attend. There are no sign-up lists or reserved places, although there will be a small amount of required reading in advance of each seminar. Seminars focus primarily on American poetry of the twentieth century. A few weeks before each seminar, a handout will be made available via a downloadable link on this page, and at the meeting Phillips will introduce the material and lead the discussion. The next seminar, on John Berryman, will take place on Wednesday 4th February at 4.30 pm, Pusey Room. Reading material will soon be available via pdf link below: https://www.keble.ox.ac.uk/teaching-research/poetry-at-keble/the-poets-essay/ Enquiries: please contact Matthew Bevis.
Join us for an evening of exploring one of the most exciting frontiers in innovation! Synthetic biology applies engineering principles to biology, aiming to design and build new biological parts, devices, and systems, or redesign existing living systems for useful purposes. Delivered in collaboration with the Oxford Synthetic Biology Society and the Oxford ZERO Institute, this event will demystify synthetic biology and reveal how it can drive transformative solutions on the path to Net Zero. From turning CO2 into insulin to decarbonising the aviation industry come and learn how biology can be engineered to work for the planet. This event will bring together four expert voices from academia, industry and policy to give you a holistic understanding of how synthetic biology aims to make an impact in climate tech in the next 10 years. Each speaker will deliver a concise 10–15 minute presentation, followed by an interactive 40-minute panel discussion. The evening will conclude with drinks and nibbles, an ideal opportunity to continue the conversation, network with innovators, and explore how synthetic biology can help build a sustainable future. Speakers: Dr Ting An Lee – Postdoctoral Research Associate and Founder Dr Stuart Reid – CTO of Cyanocapture Daniel Bloch – Director of Strategic Partnerships at Lanzajet
This screening programme explores a collection of Sinophone films whose genres sit in between an ethnographic film, documentary, essay film, and fiction. Through this screening journey, we will engage with various languages, narratives, perspectives, styles and textures of films that come across and reflect on the ever-changing realities of contemporary Chinese society – rich with nuances, obscurities, complexities, and uncertainties. The series will cover four themes, including COVID-19, Gender, Art and Society, and Rural-Urban, and will run from Feb to May 2026. The first session features Covid-19 and includes two films, The Memo 备忘录 Director: Badlands Film Group Release year: 2023 Run time: 30 mins Region: Mainland China Screening Talk by Badlands Film Group (online) Synopsis: This is a video diary of the surreal lockdown made by the filmmaker couple who were trapped in a small, rented apartment in Shanghai. In the face of endless madness, the camera gradually breaks free from the window and observes a vast social isolation unprecedented in the country's history. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TwB49yNgrE Bye Bye Barrier! 水马再见 Director: WAN Qing, ZHANG Hanlu Release year: 2022 Run time: 14 min Region: Mainland China Synopsis: One early morning in November 2022, Guangzhou announced the unblocking of the East and west corners of Haizhu District, and the middle blocked area was surrounded by water-filled barriers and tin walls overnight- which was called ‘One district, two Regulations’ by citizens. Hanlu, who lived in west Haizhu, asked her friends if they needed her supplies before she leaving Guangzhou, and Wan Qing, who lived in middle Haizhu, claimed some of the ingredients. The two made an appointment to meet at the water-filled barriers at the blocked border and filmedalong the way. After the editing of their own perspectives, they combined them to form this two-screen video.
Ever since the 2015 “migration crisis”, the EU has pursued a wide range of aggressive migration policies which can collectively be described as the continued construction of “Fortress Europe”. Much of the analysis and critique in law and philosophy to date has, understandably, focused on the immediate consequences this has for migrants and asylum seekers, often with deadly outcomes. More recently, there is an emergent debate that analyses how these policies undermine the EU’s constitutional values, such as the rule of law, democracy, and fundamental rights. In this talk, I want to push the conversation beyond the black letter of EU constitutional law and analyse the connection between these migration policies and the deeper level of the constitutional imaginary, the philosophical ideas and beliefs which underpin the project of European constitutionalisation. My hypothesis is that by shifting attention from the content of these migration policies and instead focusing on their place and method, by paying heed to the where and the how of Fortress Europe, two preliminary connections between migration policies and the EU’s liberal constitutional imaginary can be drawn. The first is that the informalisation of migration policies undermines the idea of European integration as a project of “integration through law”. Second, the territorial fragmentation that results from these migration policies undermines one of the deepest aspirations of European integration, namely, to unify Europe and overcome the ‘walls’ and ‘curtains’ that divided the continent in the 20th century. Thus, the talk traces the impact of Fortress Europe migration policies on the broader project of European integration. About the speaker Aristel is a legal and political theorist currently working as a postdoctoral researcher at Ghent University's Faculty of Law on postcolonial political theory and international migration law as part of the ERC-funded MIGJUST project. From January 2026, Aristel will be a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Cambridge’s Faculty of Law and a Senior Postdoctoral Researcher at Trinity College, Cambridge. There he will develop a theory on the impact of the EU’s migration policies on the constitutional imaginary of European integration. Aristel works at the intersection of constitutional theory, EU law, migration law, critical theory, and postcolonial theory. In 2024, he obtained a PhD in philosophy (summa cum laude) from the University of Leuven’s Institute of Philosophy where he held an individual fellowship from the Flemish Research Council (FWO). In his doctoral project, Aristel worked on a novel approach to EU law at the intersection of constitutional theory and a critique of legal reasoning. The project resulted in five publications, principal among which is “Ideology in the Adjudication of the ECJ”, published in Law and Philosophy in 2023. Aristel also holds an LLM in European and International Public Law (magna cum laude) form the University of Leuven’s Faculty of Law. Beyond academia, he is trained as a classical musician (Royal College of Music, London) and has so far called five countries home.
A look at the architecture of Algiers in the 1950s when the French tried to counter the calls for independence by erecting housing projects, often by excellent architects. The Algerians reacted to these top-down initiatives, often using buildings against the grain.
Join online via Microsoft Teams by clicking here: https://tinyurl.com/bdff6tpt
Smriti Verma (Wolfson): 'Restaging the Memoir: Fiction as Companion Piece in Rachel Cusk's Arlington Park (2006) & Archival Materials' Maya Hollander (Exeter): 'Chronotopes of the Post-Apocalyptic Prelapsarian in Contemporary Fiction'
To mark the centenary of Rilke’s death there will be a series of Oxford Centenary Readings held in the Queen’s College in HT 2025. These will be informal papers with plenty of discussion, about one poem or a handful of poems, that offer close readings and new insights. Papers will be in English and English translations will be provided for all poems and quotations (except for the session in week 4 with the visiting poets) making these sessions accessible to anyone with an interest in this remarkable poet and poetry in general.
Sharing a Mystery: The Science of Stories Chris Barkley’s debut novel, The Man on the Endless Stair was released in summer 2025 and was described in The Times as ‘An eerie, deeply atmospheric tale of hidden treasure and trauma.’ He was appointed Writer in Residence by the Edinburgh Book Festival in 2022 and has won the Oxford University Kellogg Writing Competition as well as the Bedford International Writing Prize. He achieved a distinction on the MSt in Creative Writing at the University of Oxford and has taught creative writing at Yale. Edinburgh is where he stays. The Creative Writing Seminar Series is convened by Dr Clare Morgan, Director of the Centre for Creative Writing at Kellogg College. The event begins with refreshments at 5pm, with the seminar taking place from 5.30-6.30pm. All are welcome, no bookings are necessary.
Join the Vice-Chancellor at the Sheldonian Theatre for a panel discussion on activism. The Sheldonian Series continues this term on Wednesday 4 February 2026 with a panel discussion on 'The Power of Activism'. From climate change to democracy to peace, has activism failed? Or has our world been shaped by activism in more ways than we recognise? What role should activism play in contemporary society? Contributors on the evening: Professor Federica Genovese - Professor of Political Science and International Relations, University of Oxford Dr Munira Mirza - Chief Executive, Civic Future Dominique Palmer - Climate Justice Activist, Youth Climate Justice Fund Shermar Pryce - President (Communities and Common Rooms), Student Union, University of Oxford With pre-recorded contributions from: Baroness Shami Chakrabarti CBE - Labour peer, House of Lords, and former director of human rights advocacy group Liberty The conversation will be moderated by Dr Julius Grower, Associate Professor of Law and Ann Smart Fellow in Law and Tutor at St Hugh’s College. This event is open to all and aims to promote freedom of speech and inclusive inquiry within the collegiate University, as part of the wider Sheldonian Series.
We are an interdisciplinary reading group which focuses on the social science, history, and theology of demons, the Devil, and supernatural evil as they relate to politics, identity formation, and social conflicts. Each week we will examine one academic paper or book chapter on these topics, gaining familiarity with subjects such as: the psychology of dehumanization, the conceptual development of the term “demon,” and contemporary political demonologies like QAnon. Hilary Term 2026, Thursdays from 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM Weeks 1,3,4,5,6,7,8: 21 St Giles (Kendrew Quad) Teaching Room G4 Week 2: 14 St Giles (next door to the Lamb & Flag) Seminar Room H Please contact Scott Maybell for the readings or for any questions: scott.maybell@sjc.ox.ac.uk
Join Chris Morrison (Copyright & Licensing Specialist) and Ami Pendergrass (Copyright Literacy Lead) to play Copyright the Card Game. This interactive, games-based session introduces you to the key concepts of copyright law and allows you to apply them in practice. No prior knowledge is required, and the session caters for all whatever their level of experience with copyright. At the end of the session participants will be able to: explore how copyright really works in practice; interpret the legislation and apply the relevant legal concepts to their own work; practice using the exceptions and licences in sector-specific examples; and discuss the role of risk management in making decisions about the ethical creation and use of copyright material. Intended audience: researcher and research student; staff
Puzzled by PICO? Daunted by databases? Baffled by Boolean? This one-hour introductory class will offer top tips and advice on how to find literature to answer a research question. No prior experience necessary! Together, we will break down a question into the PICO format, put together a structured search, and try it out in PubMed. By the end of this session, you will be able to: explain what structured searching is, and when to use it; break your research question down into searchable concepts; and make use of Boolean operators (ANDs/ORs) in your structured searches. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; taught student; researcher and research student
At first glance, it seems uncontroversial that the primacy of patient welfare must not be restricted by physicians’ profit motive. Yet, the many economic considerations the allocation and distribution of limited resources introduce into health care systems challenge this presumption and call for a more nuanced discussion. To exemplify: Certain cancer drugs can be administered on different routes: intravenous and subcutaneous. Administration route does not affect effects or increase side effects of the drug. However, intravenous administration takes longer than subcutaneous administration, meaning that patients’ welfare is restricted as they spend more time in the healthcare setting when receiving intravenous treatment. In German outpatient healthcare, physicians generate more profit if those drugs are administered intravenously. The German outpatient healthcare depends on registered private practices, therefore, it is important to generate profit. “Private” not referring to the patients’ insurance status, but to the practice being privately run and owned by one physician or more. Those physicians finance their registered outpatient practice and make their living with what they earn by treating patients while being the cornerstone of outpatient care. In this context, is it acceptable to restrict patient welfare for physicians’ profit? In my research, I analyse the notion of profit and distinguish between different kinds of profit motives. Based on that, I critically examine whether patient welfare may, under certain conditions, legitimately be restricted by profit motives within healthcare systems. This is a hybrid seminar. If you would like to register to join online, please complete the form below: https://forms.office.com/e/zxvjji4fgk
The Data Engineers meeting seeks to connect data wranglers and professionals in related data engineering roles across the University. This group aims to provide a platform for individuals to share their expertise and interests, fostering a sense of community and encouraging knowledge exchange across research teams. While primarily designed for those working at the intersection of data generation and analysis – covering areas such as data collection, wrangling, modeling, visualization, and communication – the group is inclusive and open to all members of the University. Please join us for the next Data Engineers meeting: Date – Thursday 5 February 2025 Time: 11:00 – 12:00 Venue: BDI/OxPop Seminar room 0 Agenda: 11:00 - Introduction 11:05 – 'Comparing various generative AI for extracting key information from long free texts and flag where conditions are met' Dr Yurika Sakai, IDDO Data Manager, Centre for Tropical Medicine and Global Health, University of Oxford 11:25 - Q&A 11:30 - 'Phenotypic and Genetic Data Analysis in Our Future Health' Vincent Straub, Doctoral researcher at the Leverhulme Centre for Demographic Science in Oxford Population Health, University of Oxford 11:50 - Q&A 12:00 - Refreshments and networking in the atrium Dr Yurika Sakai, Data Manager at the Infectious Diseases Data Observatory (IDDO), NDM As a Data Manager, Yurika’s main focus is on the management and transformation of clinical, epidemiological, molecular and pharmacology data sets to ensure completeness and accuracy of data in the IDDO data repository. She also experiments with various generative AI to evaluate its accuracy and time efficiency on data extraction from long free texts. Vincent Straub, Research Scholar for Our Future Health, DPhil Student in LCDS, NDPH Vincent is a Research Scholar for Our Future Health and MSCA DPhil student in the Leverhulme Centre for Demographic Science, working with director Professor Melinda Mills and Professor Augustine Kong. His research spans population health and technology governance, with a focus on health risk behaviours and the use of AI in public settings. To attend, please register: https://forms.office.com/e/SXub1krkBM?origin=lprLink
*Session Theme: Subjectivity* This workshop brings together historians of marginalised communities using magazines in their research to share our approaches to this particular source base, grappling with magazines’ unique methodological challenges as well as their tantalising opportunities. Each session is broadly organised around a different theme, and participants are invited to bring examples from their own research. Pastries and snacks will be provided. Please email "$":mailto:katie.burke@st-hildas.ox.ac.uk for more information.
If you are new to the University of Oxford and want to find out more about the University’s network of libraries or have been at the University a while and would like a refresher, join us for this online introduction to understanding and accessing the libraries, their services and resources. By the end of the session, you will: be familiar with the network of Oxford libraries and the differences between them; know the logins needed to access Bodleian Libraries services; be able to conduct a search in SOLO (the University’s resource discovery tool), filter results and access online and print resources; and know how to manage your library account including loans and requests. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student
The ‘environment’ emerged as a global crisis concept after WWII. Environmental history as a field has its roots in political movements of the late 1960s and 70s. Thus, both the term and the field have had, from their impetus, a strong political and global flavour. Environmental history is still driven by approaches that are akin to the field of political ecology, i.e. based on critical social theory. Early modern environmental history often finds its raison d'être in either attempting to take on a global perspective, or in pointing out power imbalances and the centralisation of state control over natural resources. Similar binary narratives of power used to define the historical study of state-building; however, already since the late 90s, the focus here has shifted onto ‘state-building from below’, which has not only questioned previous meta-narratives but also ascribed more agency to local actors lower down the social scale. Many of the sources used by these scholars (especially supplications/petitions) can also help us take on more locally embedded perspectives in understanding that environmental interests of governments and the governed were not always binary, and that ‘commoners’ had more power in shaping the land, or ‘environing’ (Sörlin and Wormbs) from below, than has been acknowledged.
Thursday February 5 (week 3) Rana Dasgupta (independent), After Nations: a discussion
*Readings:* Shannon Vallor, ‘Carebots and Caregivers: Sustaining the Ethical Idea of Care in the Twenty-First Century’ in Wendell Wallash and Peter Asaro (eds.), _Machine Ethics and Robot Ethics_ (Routledge, 2017)
Lesson of the week, clinical cases and research. All clinical and academic staff and students welcome. Coffee and Tea will be served.
Karuna Ganesh, MD, PhD, is a physician-scientist focused on investigating and treating metastatic gastrointestinal cancers at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, USA. She received her undergraduate and MD/PhD degrees from the University of Cambridge/MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, UK, where she studied mechanisms of antibody diversification with the late Professor Michael Neuberger. She trained in Internal Medicine at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center/Harvard Medical School and in Medical Oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, where she completed a postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. Joan Massagué. Dr. Ganesh leads a research laboratory in the Molecular Pharmacology Program, is an Attending Physician in the Gastrointestinal Oncology Service, and Director of Metastasis Research in the Center for Colorectal Cancer at Memorial Sloan Kettering. The Ganesh lab studies molecular mechanisms of phenotypic plasticity and tumor:host co-evolution using patient samples, patient-derived and mouse models of metastatic cancer. The goal of the Ganesh lab is to identify crucial signaling nodes required for plasticity that can be therapeutically targeted to improve outcomes for patients with advanced cancer.
Join Mélodie Doumy (British Library) and Luk Yu-ping (British Museum) for a lecture focusing on the digital discovery of manuscripts, paintings, prints, textiles and other objects discovered in Dunhuang and sites in northwest China, dating mainly from the 5th to 11th centuries, now held in the British Library and the British Museum. The Bodleian Libraries preserve the extensive manuscript notes, diaries and archaeological fieldnotes of Sir Marc Aurel Stein who collected this material in the early 20th century. By bringing together curatorial experts from separately held yet interconnected collections and archives, the lecture will offer an overview of the Stein Collection’s formation, its dispersal across different institutions, and the scope of the items involved. The Digital East Asia Lectures are co-hosted by the Centre for Digital Scholarship and the Asian and Middle Eastern Collections at the Bodleian Libraries. Registration is required.
Type 2 diabetes (T2D) arises from complex interactions between genetic predisposition and environmental influences. Although genome-wide association studies have identified hundreds of risk loci, these variants explain only a small fraction of disease heritability, pointing to additional regulatory mechanisms underlying disease progression. Increasing evidence highlights the epigenome as a critical integrator of environmental cues that shape chromatin accessibility and transcriptional programs, particularly in pancreatic islets. In this talk, I will present our work investigating chromatin remodeling as a key driver of β-cell dysfunction in T2D. Through integrated multi-omics analyses and functional genomic screening, we identify BAF60a, a regulatory subunit of the SWI/SNF chromatin remodeling complex, as a central regulator of islet chromatin dynamics. BAF60a orchestrates β-cell–specific transcriptional networks essential for glucose sensing and insulin secretion. In parallel, our recent studies reveal that BAF60c, another BAF60 family member, plays a critical role in shaping the islet immune microenvironment and maintaining β-cell function through β-cell–macrophage crosstalk. Together, these findings uncover a previously unrecognized epigenetic mechanism contributing to β-cell failure and highlight chromatin remodeling factors as promising targets for precision therapies in T2D.
'You’re the snake charmer, baby. And you’re also the snake.' So sings Laurie Anderson in “Closed Circuits” (1984). Music is often considered incorporeal – described in terms like “transcendent” and “ethereal” – yet it is produced by bodies and received by them. In this session, we will discuss the gendered associations of composition and performance, the performing bodies of artists such as Laurie Anderson and Yoko Ono, and the (im)possibilities of being both snake charmer and snake. *Readings:* Susan McClary’s sixth chapter 'This Is Not a Story My People Tell: Musical Time and Space According to Laurie Anderson' from _Feminine Endings: Music, Gender, and Sexuality_ (2002) Vera Mackie’s chapter 'Instructing, Constructing, Deconstructing: The Embodied and Disembodied Performances of Yoko Ono' from _Rethinking Japanese Modernism_ (2012).
We have recently observed that during inflammation there is hypoxic reprogramming of circulating, and tissue myeloid cells which is long-lasting and originates in the bone marrow. This work challenges the dogma that in chronic neutrophilic inflammation the lesion occurs at the inflamed site. I aim to present new data dissecting the mechanisms that regulate neutrophil reprogramming and the consequence for innate host defence responses.
Those who are ‘ideologically colour-blind’ do not express explicitly negative views of racial minorities but instead reject the argument that racial discrimination is a significant social problem (Bonilla-Silva 2003). In the UK, it has been shown that this ideology is as widespread among white voters as it is in the US, with previous research indicating that few racial minorities will subscribe to colour blindness. In this seminar, Maria Sobolewska, Professor of Political Science, will present the design and findings of a study demonstrating that both white voters and voters of ethnic minority backgrounds can hold colour-blind views, and that these views shape their political attitudes in similar ways. Maria will also examine how colour-blind attitudes correlate with political views and racial attitudes, and whether they predict discriminatory behaviour towards policies aimed at addressing racial inequality and political choice. Register to join on Zoom: https://zoom.us/meeting/register/pbFSmnaxQcq9n70pS2PBZA
Who bears the costs of decarbonization—and who is blamed for such costs—has become a central cleavage in contemporary party competition. Building on research on “green backlash” and the populist radical right (PRR), Zach argues that sharp and uneven household energy price shocks create fertile ground for PRR entrepreneurs to frame the transition to renewable sources of energy as unfairly costly. He examines the United Kingdom’s 2021–2023 energy price surge and shows two linked patterns. First, using a new text measure applied to party communications in press releases and in YouTube videos, Zach documents explicit blame attribution of higher energy bills to Net Zero and climate-related policies. Second, using pre-shock geographic energy price vulnerability measured using administrative data on over 27 million household energy efficiency inspections, he leverages difference-in-differences and triple-differences designs to find that individuals more vulnerable to higher energy prices become more likely to support PRR parties. Further evidence using survey panel data suggests that voters indeed blamed the government's environmental policies instead of the economy, implying that political support for a green transition hinges on insulating the most vulnerable households. ———————————————————————————————————————————— Speaker bio: Zach Dickson is a Fellow in Quantitative Methods in the Department of Methodology at the London School of Economics, where he is also affiliated with the Data Science Institute, the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, and the Public Opinion Analytics Lab. His research lies at the intersection of political behaviour and political communication, with a particular focus on right-wing populism and climate politics. Using quantitative and causal inference methods, his current projects examine the distributive consequences of climate policies and the political effects of public service decline. His work has been published in leading journals including Political Communication, Comparative Political Studies, and the American Political Science Review. His research has also been featured in outlets such as The Economist, The New Statesman, The Guardian, and Forbes, as well as in a range of research blogs. ———————————————————————————————————————————— Booking is required for people outside of the Department of Social Policy and Intervention (DSPI). DSPI Members do not need to register.
The seminar introduces a book Educating the Teacher Educators: Who, What, How and Why to be published by Bloomsbury in 2027. The book itself presents the voices of a very diverse group of practising teacher educators, working across a wide range of contexts and settings, as they learn and engage with practitioner research and inquiry to develop their professional thinking and practice on the Masters in Teacher Education and beyond. The seminar will explore the origins of the book, before the authors of four of the (13) chapters go on to present the theories, evidence, key arguments and insights from their particular research studies. It will end by looking at what the book contributes to the field of teacher education and to the education of teacher educators. Teams link: https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3a977e970b5670431f8f293fbaff57009a%40thread.tacv2/1769364974135?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%22cc95de1b-97f5-4f93-b4ba-fe68b852cf91%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%2220c48e67-b666-49ae-a9b1-d31d1be325ec%22%7d Speaker bio: Dr Ann Childs is Associate Professor of Science Education and former Course Director of the MSc in Teacher Education at the University of Oxford Education Department. Stuart Farmer is Learning and Skills Manager (Scotland) at the Institute of Physics. Professor (Emeritus) Trevor Mutton was Director for Graduate Studies at the University of Oxford Education Department.
Changing dietary behaviour and influencing consumer choice to bring about health benefits and increase consumption of sustainable products is slow and difficult. Fibre intake has been promoted by public health campaigns across Europe. Simultaneously, the food industry has implemented reformulation and innovation efforts to increase fibre or incorporate alternative plant-based proteins in products with varying degrees of success. Despite these efforts, fibre intakes have remained low in many European countries, including the UK, and remain below current recommendations. Plant-based products remain a fairly niche market. There are excellent examples of public health-industry partnerships which aim to increase fibre intake. For example, the Danish Wholegrain Partnership (DWP) aimed to make it easier for Danes to consumer wholegrains by increasing availability and making wholegrains a natural part of the daily diet. The DWP was successful in increasing products available carrying a wholegrain label, almost doubling the fibre intake of the population as a whole. Here we considering learnings from the DWP and how to apply this to the UK (and by implication other European countries) and to other foods. This presentation will consider barriers to changing diets, and the various strategies that can be employed, ranging from reformulation to exposure in anchor institutions such as schools (e.g. via school breakfast programmes) and the importance of consumer perception and understanding. Strategies to improve nutritional intake and reduce health inequalities need to take into account the agency of the target population and the resources required to achieve a healthy diet, which have been significantly reduced by the cost of living crisis. Health by stealth approaches which consider reformulation to increase fibre or alternative proteins in familiar foods/products could be one of the most effective methods but requires technical innovation in terms of taste, texture, acceptability, and affordability.
This seminar considers the extent to which English post-secondary education offered by further education and higher education institutions constitutes a tertiary education system. It examines higher education being offered by English further education colleges (HE in FE) and further education offered by higher education institutions (FE in HE). It observes that while much of this cross-sector provision seems to reflect specific opportunities or institutional strategies, some reflects an explicit regional or industrial strategy. These findings are located within an analysis of possible types of arrangements between vocational and higher education sectors, and an analysis of possible levels of association of vocational and higher education. The study found promising developments in the integration of vocational and higher education in England despite the fragmentation of tertiary education policy and programs, but considerable variations in arrangements because of the lack of an integrated tertiary education policy. Gavin is a SKOPE honorary research fellow. His first book From vocational to higher education: An international perspective (Open University Press, 2008) examined the relations between vocational and higher education in Scotland, Australia, and 3 USA states.
In this talk I will discuss a historically situated set of transatlantic relationships, chiefly but not exclusively centred on antislavery communities in Yorkshire, Newcastle and Pennsylvania. Focusing on quotidian and everyday antislavery and abolitionist work, as well as its more familiar public face, I bring together the Black abolitionists, Quakers and others who were part of what I call the dissenting Atlantic. Building on what my book calls the unquiet libraries that contain potential for locating overlooked voices and stories, I also argue for the transformational potential of the speakerly archive. Rather than figure archival absences as absence, loss or silence, a speakerly archival practice focuses on speculative figurations, further developing models of remediation pioneered by Saidiya Hartman and others. The Dissenting Atlantic has just been awarded the Shelley Fisher Fishkin prize by the American Studies Association.
As part of ‘French Sciences in Oxford: Cross-Channel Conversations’ Daniel Margulies (MFO) Chair: William James (Brasenose College, Oxford) Understanding how the cerebral cortex transforms distinct sources of information into cohesive experiences requires knowledge of how functional integration emerges from cortical structure. Building on work characterizing a principal axis of cortical organization, I will present a line of research that investigates the role of cortical geometry in enabling convergence across distinct modalities. By describing how the spatial layout of the cerebral cortex shapes its function, this line of research proposes a framework for understanding structural constraints that contribute to the integrated nature of cognition.
Join us for a wide-ranging discussion on the surprising resurgence of interest in Christianity within Silicon Valley and amongst developers of artificial intelligence. Our panel of experts will explore questions such as: What are the various factors driving the renewed curiosity? How might the ascribing of attributes to artificial intelligence that have typically been ascribed to a higher power (such as "omnipotence" and "omnipresence") both inform and distort our understandings of the potentials of AI? What role might religion play in challenging and guiding the development of artificial intelligence? What is both possible and desirable as it relates to aspirations for transcendence through technology, particularly in relation to the "merging" of the human brain with artificial intelligence? This is a Reuben College Values&Society theme event, also supported by the Oxford Medical Humanities Research Hub.
In this talk, I explore how Saudi legal thought is shaping the ways in which Islamic law is applied by Islamic courts beyond the Arabian Peninsula. Since the 1960s, Saudi Arabia has made significant efforts to promote a distinct Saudi understanding of Islam globally, mainly through international students at Saudi universities such as the Islamic University of Medina. I examine how this understanding of Islamic law has influenced Islamic courts in two contrasting contexts: The Gambia and Sri Lanka, two countries with a similar number of graduates from Saudi universities. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork and interviews with Islamic judges and scholars in both countries, the talk looks beyond simple depictions of “Salafisation” or “Wahhabisation”. It explores both the reasons for, and the consequences of, the differing receptions of Saudi ideas in court practice, and the implications this has for everyday Islamic adjudication in local settings.
Cristy will discuss her recently published book, Legal Geographies of Water, which begins with the recognition of a looming global water crisis in the 1970s and traces the next five decades of community and policy responses to this crisis, including the introduction of neoliberal logic through the liberalization, financializaton and privatization of water services; the legal recognition of a human right to water (and related water justice campaigns); and relational approaches to water governance. To illustrate the development and implementation of these water governance trends, the book uses a case study approach, drawing from twenty years of qualitative fieldwork in Chile, England, the Philippines (Manila), South Africa (Johannesburg), the United States (Detroit and Flint), Aotearoa, New Zealand (Whanganui), and Australia (Yarra-Birrarung, Melbourne and the Martuwarra-Fitzroy River, WA). A central concern of the book is that, despite the last five decades of global action and periods during which key reported measures of access to safe drinking water have improved, humanity appears to be facing its worst water crisis yet, fuelled by a toxic combination of climate change, growing inequality, geopolitical instability, and the ongoing impacts of extractivism. This raises the question of what our current predicament means for the legal regulation of water. In responding to this question, this book employs the insights of legal geography to explore how the law shapes human relationships with water and how these relationships, in turn, shape the law. This analysis also emphasizes the role of water itself in this co-constitutive process – through both its materiality and agency. In this talk, Cristy will particularly focus on the lessons that emerge from the book’s analysis, the stories of hope that it highlights, and the recommendations that it makes for the future of water governance. Speaker Dr Cristy Clark is an Associate Professor at the Canberra Law School, where she teaches Human Rights Law and Constitutional Law. Her research focuses on legal geography and the intersection of human rights and the environment (including relational rights and climate justice). Cristy is the co-director of the climate equality working group at the Berkeley Center on Comparative Equality and Anti-Discrimination Law. Her co-authored book (with John Page), The Lawful Forest: A Critical History of Property, Protest and Spatial Justice, was published by Edinburgh University Press in 2022 and won the 2023 Penny Pether Prize. Her most recent book, Legal Geographies of Water: the spaces, places and narratives of human-water relations was published by Routledge in June 2025. Other Information This event is part of the Oxford Water Network Hilary Term 2026 Seminar Series. Refreshments will be provided after the talk. Please email owncoordinator@water.ox.ac.uk if you have any specific requirements to be able to access this event. The Atmosphere Room is on the first floor of the School of Geography and the Environment in the Dyson Perrins Building - there is a ramp to enter the building and a lift to access the first floor.
Today, 1945 is widely recognized as a moment of global re-ordering. Through redrawn borders and population displacement, the immediate postwar declares itself as a watershed even while in practice political precedents and perceptions persisted. This talk looks at the relationship between language, power and identity in Taiwan during this period, exploring the syncretic bleed between pre- and post-1945 approaches to linguistic governance by the Japanese imperialist government and their Chinese Nationalist Party successors. In particular, it focuses on the control of the movement between languages – including Chinese, Japanese, Taiwanese and to some extent English – as essential to defining imperialization and post-imperialization in Taiwan’s public sphere. Rather than characterizing regime change as divergence, the imitation of linguistic policy, republication of texts and comparative commentary on both governments instead points to patterns of repetition and borrowing that stretched across the end of empire. Dr Aoife Cantrill is Laming Junior Research Fellow in Living Foreign Languages at The Queen’s College, University of Oxford. Previously, she has worked as a research fellow at National Taiwan Central Library, and as Lee Kai Hung postdoctoral research associate and lecturer in Chinese Studies at the University of Manchester. Her research looks at textual culture in Chinese-speaking territories of the Japanese Empire, with a particular focus on gender, material culture and translation.
All welcome, the event is free, and no registration is required. Convenors: Angeliki Kerasidou, Associate Professor in Bioethics, Reuben College Official Fellow; Andrew Moeller, Project Leader, Biotechnology and the Humanities, TORCH Join us for a wide-ranging discussion on the surprising resurgence of interest in Christianity within Silicon Valley and amongst developers of artificial intelligence. Our panel of experts will explore questions such as: What are the various factors driving the renewed curiosity? How might the ascribing of attributes to artificial intelligence that have typically been ascribed to a higher power (such as "omnipotence" and "omnipresence") both inform and distort our understandings of the potentials of AI? What role might religion play in challenging and guiding the development of artificial intelligence? What is both possible and desirable as it relates to aspirations for transcendence through technology, particularly in relation to the "merging" of the human brain with artificial intelligence? This is a Reuben College Values&Society theme event, also supported by the Oxford Medical Humanities Research Hub. Panellists: Andrew Davison, theologian (University of Oxford) Andrew began his academic journey at Oxford, reading Chemistry as an undergraduate, before completing a DPhil in Biochemistry. He subsequently studied theology at Cambridge. Following a curacy in Southeast London, he returned to Oxford to begin a career in theological teaching and research, first as Tutor in Christian Doctrine at St Stephen’s House and later in a similar role at Westcott House, Cambridge. During this period, he completed a Cambridge PhD on conceptions of finitude in Thomas Aquinas and John Duns Scotus. He went on to become the Starbridge Lecturer, later Professor, in Theology and Natural Sciences at the University of Cambridge (2014–24) and served as a visiting fellow at the Center of Theological Inquiry in Princeton, New Jersey (2022–24). In September 2024, he was appointed Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford, a post based at Christ Church, where he is also a residentiary canon of the cathedral. Louisa Clarence-Smith, journalist (The Times) Louisa is US business editor at The Times, covering companies across America and chasing after the characters who lead them. Previously, she served as chief business correspondent and in 2021 she was jointly named Young Journalist of the Year at the Wincott Awards for business, economic and financial journalism. She lives in New York. Bartek Papiez, artificial intelligence researcher (University of Oxford) Bartek leads multidisciplinary research at the intersection of artificial intelligence, biomedical imaging, and health data science. At Oxford’s Big Data Institute, he directs the Machine Learning & Biomedical Data Research Lab, where his team develops new algorithms for image analysis, data integration, and robust machine learning. A key focus of his work is combining medical images with other sources of information—such as genetic data, electronic health records, and natural language—to address pressing challenges in medicine and population health. His projects span disease monitoring, the discovery of new treatment targets, and advances in cancer imaging. By uniting cutting-edge AI with real-world biomedical data, Bartek’s research aims to deepen disease understanding, enable earlier diagnosis, and support more precise treatments.
In the first half of the 20th century, the ‘New Psychology’ – in which Freudian psychoanalysis played only a minor role – offered people a new vocabulary for understanding the self in modern conditions, in what has been called a transition ‘from character to personality’. Ideas about the unconscious, personality types, the developmental self, sex and intelligence reached unprecedentedly large audiences.
This seminar analyzes the idea of association as developed among anarchists in imperial Japan during the early twentieth century. In doing so, it proposes anarchist association as both subject and analytical lens to develop a critical approach in global history. It emphasizes viewing the modern world from peripheral positions as well as acknowledging the concept of association as both a socio-political practice and a methodological tool, thus using anarchist traditions to uncover and integrate overlooked actors, archives, and epistemologies. Ultimately, it argues that anarchist association offers a horizon of possibilities for a non-hierarchical, anti-authoritarian, and decentred history of the modern world.
Green hydrogen is discussed as an essential component of a climate-neutral energy system, particularly due to its potential for sector coupling and energy storage. At the same time, the hydrogen market faces numerous challenges, such as technological uncertainty, coordination issues and extensive infrastructure investments; implying that current developments are heavily influenced by political support and political framework conditions. In this talk, we provide an overview of developments in the hydrogen economy within the energy transition. We then present two ongoing research papers in which we explore local energy agencies as one variety of a local climate policy as well as political narratives from election manifestos and their relationship to the development of renewable energy technology.
To join online, please register in advance: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/WWqjr8SgT_WrzTodI65cdg
Erica Fudge, 'Farmyard Choreographies in Early Modern England' in _Renaissance Posthumanism_, Joseph Campana and Scott Maisano (eds) (New York, 2016), 145-66; Louise Hill Curth, 'The care of the brute beast: animals and the seventeenth-century medical marketplace', _Social History of Medicine_ 15/3 (2002), 375-92 *To attend online via Microsoft Teams, please email "$":mailto:ian.archer@history.ox.ac.uk*
Professor of Economics and Public Policy at the Blavatnik School, Sir Paul Collier is a leading British economist known for his research on development, poverty, and the political economy of low-income countries. Paul’s work focuses on why some nations remain trapped in conflict and poverty, and how policies, governance, and international action can support sustainable development. He is known for influential books such as The Bottom Billion and The Future of Capitalism, which combine economic analysis with practical policy insights, and his most recent book Left Behind: A New Economics for Neglected Places. He has advised governments and international organisations on development strategy, migration, and post-conflict recovery. This event brings together friends, colleagues and former students to reflect upon Paul’s body of work, and to explore the issues he has spent his career addressing.
Drawing on his experience as a youth justice practitioner and as Britain’s first and longest-serving Minister for Young People, Lord Boateng will reflect on contemporary challenges facing youth services and juvenile justice. His ministerial career included senior roles in the Department of Health, the Home Office, HM Treasury and Cabinet, including his time as Chief Secretary to the Treasury, overseeing the development of Every Child Matters. Refreshments will be served from 16:30 at the Gulbenkian foyer.
We are pleased to announce the upcoming Winter Lecture Series which will take place between January and March 2026. Across five thought-provoking lectures, special guests will discuss a range of subjects, with topics to be announced soon. Each lecture will be hosted at the University of Oxford Museum of Natural History. Join us on Thursday 5th February when TV producer and urban gardener Martha Swales will deliver her lecture.
Professor Alex Green studied medicine at University College London qualifying MB BS in 1997. He obtained a first class honours in Neurosciences (intercalated) in 1994. After house jobs and a basic surgical rotation in the West Midlands, he entered Neurusurgical training in London then Oxford from 2002-2009. He completed a MD degree in Oxford in the role of the periaqueductal grey area in autonomic control during this time. Professor Green became a consultant neurosurgeon in 2009. He is currently president of the British Society for Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery (BSSFN). The Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that attendance at the Surgical Grand Rounds can count toward internal CPD, with 1 point awarded per hour. Please note that in-person attendance is required, and you will need to sign the attendance register. All members of the University and NHS clinical staff are welcome. Please email Tarryn Ching (tarryn.ching@nds.ox.ac.uk) if you would like to attend online.
This ½ day course is run by Professor Helen Higham (Director of OxSTaR & a Consultant Anaesthetist at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford) and is suitable for clinical and non-clinical staff and aims to provide an introduction to the fundamentals of human factors in healthcare. The course introduces participants to basic human factors frameworks, including the Systems Engineering Initiative for Patient Safety (SEIPS), and focuses on practical applications in the workplace to improve understanding of systems in healthcare. This course will align with the new National Patient Safety Syllabus Learning Objectives Improve understanding of human factors principles Introduce and explore a human factors framework (SEIPS) Provide opportunities to practise applying SEIPS to real world examples Course content Definition and background of human factors Human factors applied to healthcare Importance of work place culture (including Just Culture tool) Explanation of SEIPS framework Exercises using SEIPS Plenty of opportunity for discussion and questions
The annual LGBT+ History Month Spotlight is running for the second year! Academic, professional staff and postgraduate students are invited to attend a day of talks and panels related to LGBTQIA+ research at the Education Department. What is involved? Presentations from researchers on their work, roundtable discussions on key questions in LGBTQ+ research and opportunities to network over free pizza at lunchtime.
This workshop explores the role of popular culture in Ukraine since the collapse of the USSR to the present day. It brings together leading academics and practitioners to examine music, sport, fashion, internet memes, and other forms of cultural expression as arenas for negotiating national identities, gender norms, emotional regimes, and economic practices. We focus on the role of popular culture in Ukraine’s cultural diplomacy and nation branding, especially in the face of Russia’s war. Speakers include: Laada Bilaniuk (academic, Department of Anthropology, University of Washington); Andy Brassell (writer, broadcaster, football journalist); Alexander Krassyuk (boxing promoter); Sonya Kvasha (creative director and producer); Iuliana Matasova (academic, New Europe College, Bucharest); Dmytro Shurov (pianist, composer, singer-songwriter) Schedule: 9:30am-10am: Coffee and tea (Hilda Besse foyer) 10am-12 midday: Popular Music 12 midday - 1pm: Lunch break (lunch will be provided for speakers; audience members may purchase their lunch at St Antony's dining hall) 1pm-3pm: Sport 3pm-3:30pm: Tea and coffee (Hilda Besse foyer) 3:30pm-5:30pm: Fashion and visual culture
Zotero is a reference management tool that helps you build libraries of references and add citations and bibliographies to word processed documents using your chosen citation style. This classroom-based session covers the main features of Zotero and comprises a 45-minute presentation followed by practical exercises at the computers. You can leave at any point once you have tried out the software, and do not have to stay until the end. The learning outcomes for this classroom-based session are to: create a Zotero library and add references to it; edit and organise references in your Zotero library; add in-text citations and/or footnotes to your word-processed document; create bibliographies; understand how to sync your Zotero library across multiple computers; and understand how to share your Zotero library of references. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student
Enhance your critical thinking and research skills in this practical workshop designed for undergraduate students. Learn to question assumptions, analyse sources critically, and develop information discovery and search strategies that will set you apart in your academic studies. By the end of this session, you will be able to: describe what critical thinking is; understand a critical thinking method; apply the method to your academic work; and explain the fundamentals of conducting research, including how to evaluate information sources in SOLO. Intended audience: Taught student
Scientific biography was once an excessively deferential genre that presented the scientist as a heroic individual. Today biographers take an approach that embraces broader cultural influences and impacts, notes flaws as well as achievements and highlights the social and collaborative practice of modern science. Obituary writing is a short form with its own conventions, and choices to be made about what to include or exclude. As a writer who has worked in both genres, *I will reflect on the particular challenges of writing obituaries of scientists who may not be household names but have materially changed our understanding of ourselves and the natural world.* *Georgina Ferry* is a science writer, author and broadcaster. She began as a staff editor and feature writer on New Scientist, and has presented science programmes on BBC Radio. Her biography of Britain's only female Nobel-prizewinning scientist, _Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin: Patterns, Proteins and Peace_, was reissued by Bloomsbury in 2019. She has published several further books on 20th and 21st-century science. She edits obituaries for _Nature_ and is a regular contributor of reviews, obituaries and features to _The Guardian_, _Nature_ and _The Lancet_. Registration is required and will close one week before the event (17:30 on 30 January). Confirmations of successful registration will be sent out one week before the event. Please note that this event is *exclusively open to current members of the University of Oxford*. Workshop places will be allocated on a first-come, first-served basis, with priority given to members of the English Faculty.
Certain models of collective dynamics exhibit deceptively simple patterns that are surprisingly difficult to explain. These patterns often arise from phase transitions within the underlying dynamics. However, these phase transitions can be explained only when one derives continuum equations from the corresponding individual-based models. In this talk, I will explore this subtle yet rich phenomenon and discuss advances and open problems.
Modern researchers need to have an up-to-date understanding of working with research data. This relates equally to the material they create themselves and that obtained from other sources. Academic institutions, funding bodies and even publishers are now expecting competence in these issues. This workshop will provide a grounding in the different ways quantitative and qualitative data is being made available to benefit researchers. By the end of the session you will also have some insight into how your own future work could add to the process and become part of the research discourse. The course aims to provide an overview of macro and micro data sources available at the University of Oxford, including national data archives, subscription services, business data, and offers some pointers for further searching. Topics to be covered include: overview of the landscape of data sources for health researchers, social scientists and most other researchers; how to obtain macro and micro data via specific sources; qualitative and quantitative data resources; additional data services such as the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR), Eurostat, Researchfish and the Oxford Poverty & Human Development Initiative's online interactive databank and global Multidimensional Poverty Index; plus specialist sources for business and economic data subscribed to by Oxford University; the value of resources for informing research design and methodological innovation; and the importance of data management and cybersecurity. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student; staff
The Earth's mantle has elevated Fe3+ contents relative to those of other telluric bodies, a property thought to reflect the disproportionation of ferrous iron into its metallic and ferric counterparts during core formation. However, how the oxidation and electronic state of iron change as a function of pressure in compositions relevant to that of Earth's mantle are not fully understood. In this study, we present in-situ energy domain synchrotron Mössbauer spectra of 57Fe-enriched peridotitic- and basaltic glasses at 298 K compressed from 1 bar to 174 GPa in a diamond anvil cell. Glasses were synthesised with different Fe3+/[Fe3+ + Fe2+] ratios, 0.02 ± 0.02 and 1.00 ± 0.02, respectively, as determined by colorimetry. At 1 bar, the spectrum of the Fe3+-basaltic glass is well fit by a single doublet. In contrast, the spectra of both Fe2+-rich peridotitic and basaltic glass are fit by two doublets, D1 (~92 %) and D2 (~8 %) at 1 bar. As pressure increases, the integral area of the D2 doublet increases at the expense of D1 to reach a D2/(D1 + D2) ratio of 0.65 by 172 GPa. Because this transition is reversible with pressure and no metallic iron is detected, the D2 feature is ascribed to Fe2+ in its low spin (LS) state, whereas D1 is consistent with Fe2+ high spin (HS). This assignment resolves a long-standing controversy on the interpretation of the Mössbauer spectra of basaltic glasses. As a consequence of the stabilisation of Fe2+ with pressure, terrestrial planets more massive than Earth likely do not host increasingly oxidising mantles.
In recent years, inequalities in residential environments have received much attention as an explanation for the appeal of anti-immigration parties across advanced democracies. This paper explores the long-term association between neighbourhood context in adolescence and attitudes towards immigration later in life, drawing on a UK-based cohort study matched with fine-grained census data on neighbourhood composition. Drawing on the premises of the impressionable years hypothesis and contact theory, we posit that as a space of socialisation, the local area that one experiences in adolescence is influential to the development of immigration attitudes. Our findings suggest that the share of immigrants in one’s neighbourhood during adolescence has a persistent association with political attitudes among the ethnic majority. Specifically, growing up in an immigrant-dense neighbourhood in Britain is associated with greater tolerance toward immigrants 18 years later, net of parental characteristics in adolescence and individual and residential characteristics in adulthood. These findings highlight the role of early-years socialization experiences in the formation of out-group attitudes; and the importance of diversity and inter-group contact for fostering tolerant societies.
Central nervous system (CNS) neurons govern every aspect of physiology, demanding an exceptionally tightly controlled environment. To preserve tissue homeostasis, the CNS has develop a unique rlationship with the immune system restrictsing conventional immune surveillance to CNS border compartments. How this CNS immune privilege is established, maintained, and dynamically regulated remains a fundamental question in neuroimmunology. We have proposed that the brain barriers divide the CNS into different compartments with different access for immune mediators and immune cells. To test this hypothesis we have developed novel reporter mouse models that enable direct visualization of the different brain barriers and borders in vivo. Leveraging these border reporter mice together with state-of-the-art intravital imaging, we found that different brain barriers precisely control immune mediator distributaion and immune cell migration in the CNS during immune surveillance and neuroinflammation. These findings shape our understanding of how brain barriers orchestrate CNS immune privilege and how failure of brain barrier function will contribute to neurological disorders. This knowledge will provide a foundation for targeted therapeutic strategies in neurological and neuroinflammatory diseases. SPEAKER BIOGRAPHY Since 2003 Britta Engelhardt is Professor for Immunobiology and Director of the Theodor Kocher Institute at the University of Bern in Switzerland. After studying Human Biology at the Philipps-University, Marburg in Germany she pursued her PhD thesis with Prof. Hartmut Wekerle at the Max-Planck Research Group for Multiple Sclerosis in Würzburg, Germany and the Max-Planck Institute für Psychiatry in Munich, Germany and obtained a PhD (Dr. rer. physiol.) in January 1991. After a post-doctoral fellowship in the laboratory of Eugene C. Butcher at Stanford University, California, she set up her own research group at the Max-Planck Institute for Physiological and Clinical Research, Bad Nauheim, Germany in the department of Werner Risau in 1993. In 1998 she obtained the Venia Legendi for Immunology and Cell Biology from the Medical Faculty of the Philipps University Marburg, Germany. From 1999 to 2003 she headed her independent research group at the same institute and the Max-Planck Institute for Vascular Cell Biology in Münster, Germany. Britta Engelhardt is a renowned expert in brain barriers research. Her work is dedicated to understanding the role of the brain barriers in maintaining central nervous system (CNS) immune privilege. Using advanced in vitro and in vivo live cell imaging approaches her laboratory has significantly contributed to the current understanding of the anatomical routes and molecular mechanisms used by immune cells to enter the CNS during immune surveillance and neuroinflammation. She has published over 300 manuscripts that are highly cited. She is an opinion leader in her field as shown by her regular presentations as invited and keynote speaker at international meetings. Britta Engelhardt has served the scientific community by coordinating several national (Sinergia UnmetMS, ProDoc Cell Migration) and international collaborative networks (JUSTBRAIN, BtRAIN) dedicated to brain barriers research and neuroinflammation. Together with Peter Vajkoczy she has received the Herman-Rein-Prize for their pioneering in vivo imaging of T cell migration across cervical spinal cord microvessels. She was elected Vice-Chair and Chair of the Gordon Research Conference Barriers of the CNS in 2016 and 2018, respectively. In 2023 she has obtained the Malpighi Award of the European Society for Microcirculation (ESM). In 2024 she was honored by the Keynote Lecture Award from the Journal of Comparative Pathology Education Trust ESVP/ECVP and the Camillo Golgi Lecture from the European Academy of Neurology and the nomination as member of AcademiaNet – The Portal to Excellent Women Academics. In 2025 besides receiving the Research Prize of the Swiss MS Society she has been awarded an prestigious ERC Advanced Grant by the European Research Council (ERC). She presently serves as president of the International Brain Barriers Society.
Charlie Hutchison (1918-1993) is the only known Black Briton to have fought in the Spanish Civil War. Having lied about his age to fight in Spain, Charlie survived a massacre that wiped out two-thirds of his company. Being one of the earliest British volunteers, and among the youngest and longest serving foreign volunteers, Charlie survived frostbite, shrapnel wounds, and was the victim of a smear campaign by the Daily Mail newspaper. During WW2 he served the British Army between 1940-1946 in Britain, India, the Middle East, and mainland Europe, and was once imprisoned for stealing clothes and giving them to refugees. Near the end of the war, Charlie served in a military unit that provided aid to the survivors of Nazi concentration camps. His existence was rediscovered in 2018 through the efforts of a curious historian and a class of London college students. Recently the Museum of Oxford has funded the research for a biography of Charlie Hutchison, the findings of which will be publicly shared in this lecture. Dan Poole is a history student who has recently authored a biography of Charlie Hutchison. His first book, Head Hunters in the Malayan Emergency (2023). His primary interests centre on the British Empire and anti-colonial movements in the 20th century.
We study agents playing a pure coordination game on a large social network. Agents are restricted to coordinate locally, without access to a global communication device, and so different regions of the network will converge to different actions, precluding perfect coordination. We show that the extent of this inefficiency depends on the network geometry: on some networks, near-perfect efficiency is achievable, while on others welfare is strictly bounded away from the optimum. We provide a geometric condition on the network structure that characterizes when near-efficiency is attainable. On networks in which it is unattainable, our results more generally preclude high correlations between outcomes in a large spectrum of dynamic games.
Integrated autoregressive conditional duration (ACD) models serve as natural counterparts to the well-known integrated GARCH models used for financial returns. However, despite their resemblance, asymptotic theory for ACD is challenging and also not complete, in particular for integrated ACD. Central challenges arise from the facts that (i) integrated ACD processes imply durations with infinite expectation, and (ii) even in the non-integrated case, conventional asymptotic approaches break down due to the randomness in the number of durations within a fixed observation period. Addressing these challenges, we provide here unified asymptotic theory for the (quasi-) maximum likelihood estimator for ACD models; a unified theory which includes integrated ACD models. Based on the new results, we also provide a novel framework for hypothesis testing in duration models, enabling inference on a key empirical question: whether durations possess a finite or infinite expectation. We apply our results to high-frequency cryptocurrency ETF trading data. Motivated by parameter estimates near the integrated ACD boundary, we assess whether durations between trades in these markets have finite expectation, an assumption often made implicitly in the literature on point process models. Our empirical findings indicate infinite-mean durations for all the five cryptocurrencies examined, with the integrated ACD hypothesis rejected -- against alternatives with tail index less than one -- for four out of the five cryptocurrencies considered.
A conversation with Dr. Sen Raj (Manchester) about his new book on the role of emotion in political & legal contestations about LGBT+ rights. Drawing from critical socio-legal theory, the book develops the concept of “emotional grammar” to examine how emotions guide efforts to reform anti-discrimination & gender recognition laws, bans on “conversion therapy,” and sex education in the US, UK, and Australia.
Week Three (6 February, Old Library) Primary: Marge Piercy, Woman on the Edge of Time, Chapters 7-9 Supplementary: Mirta Vidal, ‘Chicanas Speak Out, Women: New Voice of La Raza’ (1971)
Seminar followed by Q&A and drinks - attend in person or join online - all welcome Abstract: Landscapes are not static but changing. However, these changes may be on time-scales greater than that of the average research grant, of a researcher's life span, even of an institution's existence. We often need to put observations we make now into their longer-term perspective, if we are to understand their causes and hence, make projections into the future. Wytham Woods is famous for some of its long-term studies both of the animals and the plants. Keith will use examples from these studies to show why conclusions from what we see now may need to be re-thought when viewed over a longer period. Biography: Raised in rural Essex, I decided to be a forester; not really knowing what one was. My degree was in Agricultural and Forest Sciences (Oxford); becoming more interested in ecology than economics, a D.Phil studying brambles in Wytham Woods followed. My first permanent job in 1979 was as 'apprentice' to George Peterken,, the woodland conservation guru, in the Nature Conservancy Council (government conservation agency). With NCC, through to Natural England in 2012, I was involved with the development of the Ancient Woodland Inventory and1985 Broadleaves Policy, the woodland section of the Habitats Directive and Biodiversity Action Plans, various government reviews of forest policy, and the emergence of ‘rewilding’. plus a lot of individual site management advice. For the last 12 yrs I have returned to research on long-term vegetation change In Wytham Wood. I had 'inherited' the permanent plot records from my supervisor Colyear Dawkins in the 1980s and have tried to re-record them every 5-10 years. Throughout my career I have tried to break down perceptions of binary splits between foresters and environment, production vs conservation. We cannot afford them.
With author Khalid Lyamlahy (University of Chicago) and translator Ros Schwartz Chaired by: Jane Hiddleston (Exeter) On the 22nd of January 2017, Pateh Sabally, a twenty-two-year-old Gambian refugee living in Italy since 2015, arrives in Venice from Milan. He leaves his backpack near the Scalzi Bridge, puts his train ticket and residence permit in a plastic pouch, and then plunges into the cold waters of the Grand Canal, amidst the gaze of onlookers and tourists. As he drowns, some insult him, while others shout "Africa". Outraged by this tragic death, the novel’s narrator, a young writer based in Paris, follows Pateh’s trail aiming to piece together and understand the sequence of events leading up to his death. Venice Requiem tells the story of a Venice where literature grapples with the pressing dramas of our time. Throughout the novel, the narrator quotes authors who lived in or wrote about Venice: Goldoni, Thomas Mann, Ernest Hemingway, Lord Byron, Marcel Proust, and others. Through a dialogue with the writings and experiences of these authors, the novel explores the potential of literature to rescue humanity. Copies of the book will be available for purchase and signing at the event. With the support of the Institut Français du Royaume-Uni.
Join our next insaka on Friday 6th February, 2026 at 5:30pm UK time. The insaka will be live-streamed on YouTube and we encourage you send in your questions via the YouTube chat box. Speakers for this insaka are: • Professor June Bam: Global Herstoriography: an African perspective through the lens of plants • Dr. Theofrida J. Maginga: Predicting Soil Erosion Risk and Sustainable Land Use in Tanzania’s Uluguru Mountains Using AI and Climate Geospatial Data Global Herstoriography: an African perspective through the lens of plants How can the knowledge of plants held by indigenous communities help us to rethink the role of African women as knowledge producers? How can these forms of deep knowledge help us address crises such as climate change? An example of long-survived feminist indigenous knowledge is the Khoe ‘Ausi’ intergenerational ecological and medicinal knowledge around the wetlands on the Cape Flats in the Western Cape in South Africa. During the colonial period of the Cape of Good Hope, ‘Ausi’ knowledge holders were superficially described as the ‘kruidvrou’ (woman of herbs) in early European travelers’ accounts. The matrifocal globally interconnected and metaphorical ‘Ausi’ knowledge of environmental sustainability and medicinal practices is an illustration of Africa’s deep-time interconnectedness. In this presentation I examine how recent feminist and decolonial approaches to the study of Africa offer us an innovative opportunity to reclaim these marginalized forms of knowledge. To do this we must address the limitations of Eurocentric approaches to knowledge production and research methodologies about Africa’s deep pasts. Predicting Soil Erosion Risk and Sustainable Land Use in Tanzania’s Uluguru Mountains Using AI and Climate Geospatial Data AI has the potential ability to understanding environmental change by helping us analyse large datasets and detecting patterns. In this paper, I focus on how artificial intelligence, satellite imagery, and climate data can be combined to predict soil erosion in Tanzania’s Uluguru Mountains a vital region for smallholder spice farming. These landscapes are increasingly at risk due to deforestation, poor land use decisions, and climate stress. By using deep learning techniques like CNN and LSTM, the project aims to develop an interactive GIS tool to offer guidance for sustainbale land management.
Professor Fania Oz-Salzberger is a historian of ideas and political thought, and Professor Emerita of History at the University of Haifa. She was educated at Tel Aviv University and at Oxford, where she completed her doctorate in 1991, and her work has long focused on the European Enlightenment, the translation and migration of political ideas. Her books include Translating the Enlightenment: Scottish Civic Discourse in Eighteenth-Century Germany (Oxford, 1995), a pioneering study of how Enlightenment ideas cross linguistic and political borders, as well as Israelis in Berlin (2001) and Jews and Words (2012), co-authored with her late father, the writer Amos Oz. Alongside her home institution, she has held visiting professorships and fellowships at the Jerusalem Institute of Advanced Studis, the Wissenschaftskolleg in Berlin, Monah University, Princeton University and the LMU in Munich. Professor Oz-Salzberger has been awarded an honorary doctorate from Uppsala University, an Order of Merit from the German government, and the Grimm Prize for her contribution to European intellectual life and cultural dialogue. In recent years, alongside her historical scholarship, she has become an increasingly prominent public intellectual and civic voice, writing and speaking widely on democracy, nationalism, antisemitism, and the prospects of Israeli-Palestinian peace.
All welcome, and to join us for lunch afterwards.
*Readings* Primary source: ‘Memorial y relación a Su Magestad’ (1625), in Seville, Archivo General de Indias, _Patronato_, 223, R. 8, doc. 1 (available online here: https://pares.mcu.es/ParesBusquedas20/catalogo/show/126021?nm) Jorge Flores and Giuseppe Marcocci, ‘Killing Images: Iconoclasm and the Art of Political Insult in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century Portuguese India’, Itinerario 42, 3 (2018): 461-489 (available online here: https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/ao2p7t/cdi_proquest_journals_2787523748) Adrian Masters, _We, the King: Creating Royal Legislation in the Sixteenth Century Spanish New World_ (2023), 47-77 (Ch. 1: ‘Paper Ceremonies for a Global Empire’) (available online here: https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/ao2p7t/cdi_cambridge_corebooks_9781009315425_TPT_fnmp_1) J. H. Elliott, _The Revolt of the Catalans: A Study in the Decline of Spain_ (1598-1640) (1963), 273-304 (Ch. 10: ‘The Struggle with the City’)
Whether you want to improve a CV or draft one for the first time, Claire Chesworth from Oxford University Careers Service will explain how to craft a well-structured document that effectively showcases your skills and experience for industry. She will share practical advice on how to tailor your CV for maximum impact with each application and you will also gain insights into how to write a cover letter which will complement your CV. SPEAKER BIOGRAPHY Claire has substantial experience as a careers adviser, specialising in careers in pharma/biotech, healthcare, patents, conservation, psychology and social care, and she works with postgraduate and undergraduate students. Claire has a background in health, having worked as a dentist in several dental teaching hospitals as well as general practice.
The Colombian Civil War was marked by high levels of civilian victimisation, particularly inflicted by government-aligned paramilitaries against perceived guerrilla sympathisers in the name of counterinsurgency. It is in this landscape that the violent victimisation of LGBT populations produces a puzzle. LGBT populations were not affiliated with a specific ideology, nor were they inherently tied to any specific cleavage of the conflict. Yet many, if not all, paramilitary groups specifically targeted them in a brutal manner. The ubiquity of their targeting proved to be unique in the broader landscape of civilian victimisation by paramilitaries. Thus, while the form of this violence varied, its occurrence did not. In such a contested landscape, why would paramilitaries expend time, energy, and resources to target a social minority with no clear ties to the conflict? Why did this violence vary in its characteristics? And why did it utilise so much brutality? This paper presents a theory of wartime anti-LGBT violence through an exploration of Colombia paramilitary violence. To develop this theory, I conduct a comparative analysis of two paramilitary groups. In doing so, I explore the logics underlying wartime anti-LGBT violence and how they shape the repertoires through which this violence is enacted. Ultimately, I argue that variation in anti-LGBT violence resulted from divergent paramilitary social transformation efforts in the communities in which they embedded. In developing a theory of anti-LGBT violence during war, I contribute to existing efforts to document wartime social processes that exceed clear political objectives, reinforcing the importance of diverse perspectives in studies of contentious politics. Biography: Samuel Ritholtz is post-doctoral research fellow in politics at All Souls College. They are an associate researcher with the Department of Politics and International Relations as well as the Latin American Centre at the University of Oxford. They are co-author of The Way Out: Justice in the Queer Search for Refugee (University of California Press, 2026) and co-editor of Queer Conflict Research (Bristol University Press, 2024). Together with Jeffrey Checkel and Lisa Wedeen, they edit Qualitative and Multi-Method Research. Please join either in person or online. For in-person attendees, the talk will be preceded by a light lunch at 12.15pm. Please email comms@sociology.ox.ac.uk with any questions.
In the UK, voting patterns in elections are increasingly characterised by division along education lines rather than by other demographic or economic variables (bar age). But does this reflect a causal relationship between education and party support? In this paper we estimate the causal effect of education on political preferences exploiting a large expansion in the supply of higher education in the UK as a result of the Further and Higher Education Act (1992). We use this exogenous policy change to instrument years of schooling and find that an additional year of (higher) education decreases the likelihood of voting for the right-of-centre Conservative party by 8.4 percentage points, and decreased the probability of voting ‘Leave' in the 2016 Brexit referendum by 4.9pp. Teams link https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3ameeting_OWM3ODkyZGMtOTUzYS00OTQwLTkxY2YtNWI2NzdjNWZiMjA0%40thread.v2/0?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%22cc95de1b-97f5-4f93-b4ba-fe68b852cf91%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%224003529c-f252-47aa-8e83-ce1eff28df4a%22%7d
During his stay at Barnard Castle in the county Durham on 28 October 1799, Samuel Taylor Coleridge was obsessed with the image of what he called an ‘Eddy rose’. In his notebook, he records: ‘—River Greta near its fall into the Tees—Shootings of water thread down the slope of the huge green stone—The white Eddy-rose that blossom’d up against the stream in the scollop, by fits & starts, obstinate in resurrection—It is the life that we live’ (CN I, 495). I argue that Coleridge’s vivid description of the ‘Eddy-rose’ resonates profoundly with the Daoist yin-yang symbol. This talk forms part of my PhD thesis, which offers the first systematic study of the intersections between British Romanticism and Daoism, examining both their conceptual affinities and historical encounters between the 1790s––1820s. From a philosophical perspective, this study argues that British Romanticism and Daoism can be read as mutually illuminating intellectual frameworks, particularly when central Daoist concepts are brought into dialogue with the philosophical thought of Romantic writers such as S. T. Coleridge, William Wordsworth, and John Keats. In this talk, I begin by investigating hallucination as a creative mode in both traditions, focusing on its epistemological and aesthetic implications. I then turn to their shared contemplations of ‘the spherical’ as a fundamental form of nature, before concluding with an articulation of ‘Ideal Realism’ as a common philosophical pathway for decoding myth in both British Romanticism and Daoist cosmology. Serena Qihui Pei has recently completed her PhD at University College London. Her research explores the intersections between British Romanticism and Sinology, with a particular emphasis on Daoism. She is the recipient of the British Association for Romantic Studies Stephen Copley Research Award and the UK Turing Scheme Grant. Her work has appeared in the Journal of Comparative Literature and Aesthetics, The Coleridge Bulletin, and the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society.
Abstract: Human leucocyte antigens (HLAs) bind peptide fragments for recognition by T-cell receptors. An individual's HLA genotype determines which specific pathogen peptides their T cell responses are able to target. It is widely accepted that HLAs and various human pathogens must co-evolve, and that this accounts for the extraordinarily high HLA polymorphism seen across human populations. I use mathematical models and individual-based computational simulations to understand HLA/pathogen co-evolution. I will present general predictions about the population genetic signatures of pathogen selection we might expect to find among HLA loci, as well as discussing a model motivated specifically by Plasmodium falciparum malaria. Bio: Bridget Penman studies the genetics of infection. She uses mathematical and computational models to simulate interactions between pathogens and genetically diverse host species. Bridget is especially interested in malaria parasites and in how humans and other primates have adapted to malaria. Bridget studied her undergraduate degree and DPhil at Oxford and was also a postdoctoral fellow in the Zoology department and at Merton College. She then moved to the University of Warwick, where she worked in the School of Life Sciences and the Zeeman Institute. Bridget is now an Associate Professor Tutorial Fellow in the Biology Department and St Peter's College here in Oxford.
We study the communication strategies on Twitter-X of 367 political leaders in 21 countries, focusing on electoral competition between populists and non-populists. We measure polarization by the ease with which the leader can be classified as populist or not, conditional on his tweet. We find that political rhetoric becomes more polarized before and around elections dates. This happens because, in pre-electoral quarters, opposite leaders are more likely to: i) talk about different topics, and ii) frame differently the same issues. Our results are consistent with competing politicians targeting different voters, rather than appealing to the same swing voters.
Need a burst of focused time to get words flowing on the page? Join OCCT for our new series of Shut Up and Write (or Translate) sessions this term. These dedicated afternoons are a chance to step away from distractions, sit alongside fellow writers and translators, and make real progress on whatever project matters most to you. We’ll gather from 2–5pm on Mondays of Week 1, 3, 5, and 7 this term in a supportive, low-pressure environment designed to boost productivity and creativity alike. Bring along your laptop, notebooks, or translation drafts - anything you’d like to work on. After a quick check-in, we’ll dive into quiet writing or translating sprints, with breaks for coffee (which will be supplied) and conversation in between. Whether you’re polishing a chapter, drafting an article, working on a translation, or simply hoping to carve out space for your own work, these sessions are for you. Come for one, two, or all three afternoons, and leave with words on the page and renewed momentum for your projects.
Mahesh will present findings from a randomized controlled trial in Malawi that identifies the causal impact of a comprehensive intervention to improve access to family planning and reproductive health services. A sample of married women who were either pregnant or had recently given birth were randomly assigned to either an intervention arm or a control arm. Women who were assigned to the intervention arm received a package of services over a two-year period that included: 1) a family counseling; 2) free transportation to a high-quality family planning clinic; and 3) reimbursements for family planning services, including for the treatment of contraceptive-related side effects. Mahesh finds increases in postpartum contraceptive use (by 5.8 p.p.), which is marked by an increase in long-acting method use (by 5.5 p.p.) after two years of intervention exposure. Estimates from an intent-to-treat survival analyses indicate that women in the intervention group were 43.5 percent less likely to be pregnant within two years of their previous birth relative to the control group. In addition, the study finds that women who were assigned to the intervention arm were 5.3 p.p. more likely to be employed after two years of intervention exposure. This increase in employment is driven by a 4.5 percentage point increase in wage-earning labor. Finally, the study finds that children born to mothers assigned to the intervention arm were 0.34 SD taller for their age and were 12.0 p.p. less likely to be stunted within a year of exposure to the family planning intervention. Children born to mothers assigned to the intervention arm also scored 0.23 SD higher on a caregiver-reported measure of cognitive development after two years of intervention exposure. Taken together, these findings suggest that improved access to family planning may have positive downstream effects on health that extend beyond impacts on contraceptive use and fertility.
A practical 180-minute workshop where participants will work on searches for their review across multiple databases. Librarians from the Bodleian Health Care Libraries will be on hand to demonstrate online tools for facilitating the process and give practical advice on refining individual search strategies. By the end of this classroom-based session you will be able to: improve a search strategy that you are working on; adapt the search across multiple databases; use tools such as Yale MeSH Analyzer and Polyglot; describe alternative methods for identifying references, including citation chaser; use Covidence for your review; and report your search methods according to PRISMA-Search. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
The session will give you practical tools, frameworks, and real-world case studies to help you feel more confident acting as a first point of contact for media-related questions. The session is designed to be interactive, with group exercises, scenarios, and helpful take-away resources.
This paper quantifies the effect of water pollution due to oil spillage on local economic development outcomes in Nigeria. We assemble a geo-referenced panel of more than 13,000 oil spills occurrences recorded in the country between 2006 and 2019, and develop a hydrological model that traces contaminant transport over water networks, allowing spill exposure to extend beyond the point of discharge. We use arguably as good as random exposure within close range of spill sites to distinguish between directly treated locations, upstream locations, and downstream locations along watersheds and exploit this setup in a staggered difference-in-differences framework to estimate impacts on local socio-economic outcomes, including a novel proxy for extreme poverty obtained by combining high-resolution residential buildings data and nighttime lights. Relative to comparable cells, spill-exposed cells exhibit marked declines in nighttime lights, remotely-sensed extreme poverty, and the number of residents without electricity. Candidate mechanisms include environmental degradation, with annual declines in forest cover and vegetation health, and increased out-migration from affected locations. Dynamic event-study estimates show that these effects intensify from four to twelve years post-spill. We relate our remotely-sensed proxies to high-resolution survey data in order to estimate money-metric magnitudes of economic damages. Finally, we investigate the relationship between global oil price shocks and oil spillage intensity, in order to trace the complete causal chain from global commodity markets to local development outcomes.
Charmaine Lee will open her lecture with a live performance, situating sound as both method and inquiry. Through voice, electronics, and real-time processing, she explores listening as an embodied practice. The performance will be followed by a moderated discussion unpacking her tools, compositional process, and conceptual framework, addressing questions of presence, improvisation, and the relationship between technology and the human voice.
In the 1850s, the British government began closing urban churchyards on the premise that rotting bodies were dangerous to the public health. It did so mainly on the advice of a small but influential group of sanitary reformers, who considered miasma from overcrowded burial spaces to be a primary cause of contemporary epidemics. Their ‘burial reform’ legislation prescribed the permanent closure of large numbers of historic British churchyards, and burials were moved instead to purpose-built, closely-regulated cemeteries outside inhabited areas. The end result, according to historians, was that the British public were awakened to the health threat posed by the dead, and medical experts were, for the first time, invited to the fore of discussions about how death and burial should be managed in a modern society. This talk explores burial sanitation in Britain over the century preceding ‘burial reform’. It demonstrates that disease concerns had long been fundamental to corpse disposal practice, and explores how the dead were managed by urban localities as a population health problem. Overall, the talk reassesses the history of ‘burial reform’ and, with it, conventional accounts of ‘medicalisation’ in British death practice. *Eleanor Kerfoot* is a historian of death and medicine with a particular focus on early modern Britain. Her current research project focuses on medical understandings of post-mortem change in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Scholarship on Sikh–Muslim relations in eighteenth-century Mughal India has often centered on narratives of military conflict and political rivalry. This presentation suggests an alternative intellectual account by examining the ways in which Sikh scholars engaged Islamic and classical Sufi philosophy as objects of study, translation, circulation, and interpretation. Through these scholarly engagements, the Sikh tradition emerged as an active participant in a wider Persianate cosmopolis of mystical and ethical ideas. The Sikh community appears to have been the first in history to translate Rumi’s Masnavi-e Manavi (the spiritual couplets) and Imam Ghazali’s Kimiya-yi Sa'adat (the alchemy of happiness) into a ‘non-Muslim’ vernacular. Sikh scholarly engagements with Islamic and Sufi ideas unfolded over several centuries and took multiple forms. These include critical theological commentary within the Guru Granth Sahib (the central Sikh scripture), poetical ‘dialogue’ between leading intellectuals from each tradition, and arduous translations of ancient classics such as Rumi’s Masnavi-e Manavi and Imam Ghazali’s Kimiya-yi Sa'adat. Alongside elite textual production, popular retellings of the lives and teachings of prophets and Sufi mystics circulated widely through manuscript transmission and oral performance. Indeed, it can be argued that engagements with Sufi-, Quranic, and Biblical figures such as Maulana Rumi, Imam Al-Ghazali, Hafez Shirazi, Hallaj-al Mansour, Imam Ali, Rabia al-Basri, Junayd al-Baghdadi, Abdullah Ansari, Hassan al-Basri, Ibrahim Adham al-Balkhi, as well as Mithra, Adam, Moses, and Jesus appear to have been central to certain branches of the early Sikh intellectual tradition. Scholars such as Nand Lal Goya, Adhan Shah, Seva Ram, Garhu, and others appear at the center of this trajectory and redefine how we understand early Sikh intellectual history and its place in the Persianate world. Biography Satnam Singh is an intellectual historian and the author of The Road to Empire: The Political Education of Khalsa Sikhs in the Late 1600s (University of California Press, 2024). Satnam’s research explores early modern intellectual history and the construction of knowledge and authority within Sikh ranks. The research presented in this presentation forms part of his forthcoming monograph on precolonial Sikh intellectual traditions, scheduled for publication in 2028. More information on his publications can be found on www.satnam-singh.com
Goal-directed movements rely on both egocentric (target relative to the observer) and allocentric (target relative to landmarks) spatial representations. So far, it is widely unknown which factors determine the use of allocentric information when we localize objects in space. To probe allocentric coding, we established an object shift paradigm and asked participants to encode the location of multiple objects presented in naturalistic 2D scenes or 3D virtual environments. After a brief delay, a test scene reappeared with one of the objects missing (= target) and the other objects (= landmarks) systematically shifted in one direction. After the test scene vanished, participants had to indicate the remembered location of the target. By quantifying the positional error of the target relative to the physical shift of the landmarks we determined the contribution of allocentric target representations. In my talk, I will present a series of behavioral experiments in which we identified key factors influencing the use of allocentric spatial coding, such as spatial proximity, task relevance, scene coherence, and scene semantics. Overall, our results show that low-level as well as high-level factors influence how humans represent objects in naturalistic environments.
Viewed from one perspective, research funders run a “service factory”, a process that seeks to turns grant applications into research grants and rejection letters, with efficiency and fairness as prime goals. Viewed from another perspective, research funders are investors, seeking to identify the highest potential intangible investments, where the returns of different potential projects are highly heterogenous. Different proposals for reform of the research funding are predicated on different – usually unstated – assumptions about what research funders are actually doing. This talk offers a framework for how to think of what research funders do, together with observations on what this means for different reform proposals, informed by emerging findings from the UK Metascience Unit, the R&D Missions Accelerator Programme, and the wider field of metascience. About the speaker: Stian Westlake has a decade’s experience of leading research funding organisations. He is currently Executive Chair of the Economic and Social Research Council, part of UK Research & Innovation. Previously, he was Executive Director of Research and Policy at Nesta, the UK’s national foundation for innovation, and as adviser to three UK science and universities ministers. He is co-author of “Capitalism Without Capital” and “Restarting the Future”, two books about the economics and politics of intangible investment. Chair: Professor Rachel Brooks
The seminar will be followed by drinks.
Government projects for transformation that have been a success can seem rarer than hens’ teeth. There’s a growing sense that Government itself cannot achieve change but is that true or have there been examples that offer lessons that are overlooked and what does that tell us about how to deliver?
Jean-Paul Jean will present his book, which examines the role of judges under Vichy and during the Purge, drawing on previously unpublished archives to reassess their responsibilities, choices, and the enduring challenges facing justice and the rule of law. With Lise Jaulin (Liaison Judge, French Embassy in London) I Chair: Anne Simonin (EHESS-CESPRA) Please note that this talk will be given in French and in English FR Comment des juges, qui ont prêté serment de fidélité au maréchal Pétain et servi le régime de Vichy, ont-ils pu ensuite présider les tribunaux de l’Épuration ? Quel a été le rôle effectif de la justice dans l’application des lois sous l’Occupation, dans la persécution des Juifs et la répression des résistants ? La présentation de parcours de procureurs et de juges tout au long des années noires, attentistes, collaborateurs, résistants, ou vichysto-résistants, remet en contexte les situations concrètes auxquelles les magistrats ont été confrontés et les choix qu’ils ont effectués en conscience. Pourquoi Paul Didier a-t-il été le seul à refuser de prêter serment à Pétain ? Qu’ont réellement fait les magistrats résistants ? De quelle façon la magistrature a-t-elle contribué à l’exclusion des Juifs ? Quelle est la réalité du parcours controversé du vichysto-résistant André Mornet, procureur général qui a requis la peine de mort contre Pétain ? Comment ont été jugés après-guerre les magistrats des sections spéciales ? Pourquoi les procès de l’Épuration n’ont-ils pu s’appuyer que sur des éléments très partiels ? Nombre de documents inédits, provenant des archives publiques et privées, illustrent ces analyses. La remise en perspective de cette période sombre de l’histoire, qui s’éclaire aussi par les réformes de l’après-guerre, dont font partie l’accès à la magistrature des femmes et les prémices de la justice pénale internationale, ouvre au débat sur les enjeux contemporains de la justice, pilier de l’État de droit partout menacé par les dérives populistes et autoritaires. EN How could judges who had sworn an oath of loyalty to Marshal Pétain and served the Vichy regime later go on to preside over the courts of the Purge? What was the justice system’s actual role in enforcing the laws during the Occupation, in the persecution of Jews, and in the repression of members of the Resistance? By presenting the careers of prosecutors and judges throughout the dark years—ranging from wait-and-see attitudes to collaboration, resistance, or the ambiguous position of “Vichy-resisters”—this work places in context the concrete situations magistrates faced and the choices they made in conscience. Why was Paul Didier the only one to refuse to swear an oath to Pétain? What did resistance-minded magistrates actually do? How did the judiciary contribute to the exclusion of Jews? What is the reality behind the controversial career of André Mornet, the “Vichy-resister” and prosecutor general who called for the death penalty against Pétain? How were the judges of the special sections tried after the war? Why were the trials of the Purge able to rely only on very partial evidence? Drawing on numerous previously unpublished documents from public and private archives, the book sheds new light on this period. By placing this dark chapter of history in perspective—also illuminated by post-war reforms, including women’s access to the judiciary and the early foundations of international criminal justice—it opens a broader debate on the contemporary challenges facing justice, a cornerstone of the rule of law now widely threatened by populist and authoritarian drift. Les juges devant l’histoire. Savoir dire non, de Vichy à nos jours, Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2025
How many shuffles does it take to mix a deck of 52 playing cards? Behind this simple question lies a surprisingly deep mathematical theory. In this lecture, we explore what it means for a deck of cards to be ‘well mixed’, examine several classical shuffling methods, and see why certain methods require far more iterations to produce a random deck than others. We will view card shuffling through the lens of random walks, a mathematical framework used to model phenomena across physics, evolutionary biology and beyond. The presentation will be followed by discussion and drinks. The event is free. Registration required via the form below. This event will take place in accordance with the framework developed by a number of Oxford colleges, including Worcester College, to promote free speech at Oxford. Details of this framework and ‘tips’ for productive discussion of difficult topics are to be found at: www.worc.ox.ac.uk/fos. By attending this event, attendees agree to adhere to these guidelines and the terms and conditions of the event which uphold Worcester College’s commitment to freedom of speech: www.worc.ox.ac.uk/fos/massada
Sergey Radchenko is the Wilson E. Schmidt Distinguished Professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. He has written extensively on the Cold War, nuclear history, and on Russian and Chinese foreign and security policies. He has served as a Global Fellow and a Public Policy Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Centre and as the Zi Jiang Distinguished Professor at East China Normal University (Shanghai). Professor Radchenko’s books include To Run the World: the Kremlin’s Cold War Bid for Global Power (Cambridge UP, 2024), Two Suns in the Heavens: the Sino-Soviet Struggle for Supremacy (Wilson Center Press & Stanford UP, 2009), and Unwanted Visionaries: the Soviet Failure in Asia (Oxford UP, 2014). Professor Radchenko is a native of Sakhalin Island, Russia, was educated in the US, Hong Kong, and the UK, where he received his PhD in 2005 (LSE). Before he joined SAIS, Professor Radchenko worked and lived in Mongolia, China, and Wales.
This event is part of a series, “Kellogg and AI Learning Lectures”, which is organised by Kellogg College and the AI Competency Centre at Oxford. Open to all Oxford University staff and students, these sessions are designed to boost understanding of developments in AI and build confidence in using emerging technologies. This seminar will explore a range of generative AI tools, and demonstrate how they may be used to simplify and streamline a range of administrative and personal tasks. When people are first introduced to artificial intelligence, it’s often described as an easy-to-use, all-purpose tool – something that can write code, draft emails, design workflows, and act as a thought partner for almost any task. Then you open the interface, stare at the input bar, and wonder where to begin. Drawing on her experience in administration and communications, Ella Wicks explores the space between knowing what AI can do and learning how to use it well, wisely, and with confidence. This session focuses on developing a practical working relationship with AI – one that integrates seamlessly into daily routines without adding time pressure or reducing the satisfaction of meaningful work. Participants will learn how to use AI practically and analytically to simplify tasks, strengthen decision-making, and build confidence in applying these tools to their fullest potential. The session also builds critical awareness of what AI is, how it works, and how to use it effectively and appropriately. By the end, participants will have a clearer sense of how to use AI not just as a tool, but as a capable collaborator—one that supports clarity, creativity, and confidence in professional life. Tea and coffee will be served from 5pm. The event begins at 5.30pm. Speaker: Ella WicksElla Wicks is currently seconded to the role of Content Officer at the AI Competency Centre, where her work focuses on promoting the University’s approach to responsible AI adoption and helping colleagues build AI literacy. Previously, she worked as Office Manager at the Centre for Teaching and Learning, supporting their aim to enhance teaching and learning across the University. An early adopter of generative AI at Oxford, Ella is an AI Ambassador and been a part of University pilots of ChatGPT, Google Gemini, and Microsoft Copilot. Her background includes puppet and specialist costume making in film, as well as work in ceramics. She is particularly interested in how AI can support personal productivity and empower individuals to make AI work for them.
Join Joshua Richards, founder of OSINT Praxis and a leadership member of the UK OSINT Community, for an interactive session on the world of Open Source Intelligence (OSINT). Whether you are completely new to the concept or have experience in the field, this event will explore how publicly available information is found, analysed and used for both investigations and personal security. The session will cover: -Understanding the Landscape: We will look at the vast range of industries and use cases where OSINT is applied. Crucially, we will also discuss the current dangers we all face regarding our digital footprints and challenge common misconceptions about online safety. -Interactive Workshop: You will have the opportunity to put theory into practice with live challenges using the UK OSINT Community’s Capture the Flag scenarios. We will walk through solutions step-by-step so you can try out investigation techniques yourself. -Real-World Case Studies: Joshua will share insights from two distinct investigations: tracking a threat actor on the dark web to prevent intended harm, and identifying a sensitive individual from a simple video clip. These examples highlight the dual nature of OSINT as a powerful investigative tool and a critical reminder of our own vulnerabilities. -Protective Measures & Q&A: The session will conclude with actionable advice on how to better protect your own online presence, followed by an open Q&A to answer any questions you may have about open source intelligence. Speaker Bio: Joshua Richards is the founder of OSINT Praxis, where he specialises in digital footprint management, privacy consulting, and training. Dedicated to helping individuals and businesses understand their online exposure, Joshua focuses on identifying and fixing the vulnerabilities that most people don’t know exist. His approach combines technical precision with a passion for the human side of security. With experience spanning both the public and private sectors, Joshua brings a grounded and practical perspective to his work. In addition to his consulting, he is a member of the leadership team for the UK OSINT Community, helping to shape the future of the industry through education and collaboration.
Get ready to understand the stages of your literature review search process by using your own research questions to build a successful search and apply it to a range of library resources. By the end of the session you will be able to: build a successful search strategy; use a range of bibliographic databases and search tools in the social sciences; source highly cited papers relevant to your research; and set up alerts for newly-published papers on your topic. Intended audience: Taught student; Researcher and research student
COVID-19 is associated with increased neurological, mental and medical sequelae after severe illness. However, we have demonstrated that risk increases are comparable to those following other infections of similar severity. Mild infection shows no clinically meaningful long-term sequelae, and pandemic lockdowns were not associated with a substantial worsening of population-level mental health, aside form a modest increase in psychotropic medication use. This seminar is hosted in person, to join online, please use the Zoom details below: https://zoom.us/j/93311812405?pwd=9kbjSbEcO2fa7n7gFLZVqrChvr467B.1 Meeting ID: 933 1181 2405 Passcode: 169396"
In this 60-minute online workshop you will be introduced to the methodologies and principles underpinning the conduct of literature searches for systematic reviews, scoping reviews and other evidence reviews. The session will cover: formulating a focused research question; preparing a protocol; developing a search strategy to address that research question; choosing appropriate databases and search engines; searching for grey literature and ongoing studies; managing your references in Covidence; and documenting and reporting your search. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
Join us online on Tuesday 10 February at 10am for the opportunity to hear a brief introduction to the Sustainable Digital Scholarship (SDS) service. This session will provide the opportunity for Academic Researchers, IT and Research Support teams, and any other interested parties, to see first-hand how the SDS service uses the SDS Platform to provide a safe and secure home for digital research outputs. This online event is open to University of Oxford staff and students only. Registration is required.
Are you looking to learn about the ways in which to transmit scientific ideas and make your research accessible to a non-specialist audience through a variety of mediums? This session will serve as an introduction to science communication and how it can be successfully incorporated into our roles. By the end of this session you will be able to: define science communication and provide a list of examples; explain why science communication is important for both our CPD and the public; and list ways in which we can all get involved in science communication. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; taught student; researcher and research student
Join us for a digital scholarship coffee gathering - tea and coffee will be provided. These will be held in the Visiting Scholars Centre, so to attend you’ll need to bring your Bodleian Card and to leave your bags in the lockers - this event is only open to University staff and students. At this session we will have a talk from Miguel Arana-Catania, a Research Software Engineer at DiSc. Miguel will present the Digital Scholarship Open Source Initiative.
Postgraduate students, fellows, staff and faculty from any discipline are welcome. This group aims to foster frequent interdisciplinary critical dialogue across Oxford and beyond about the political impacts of emerging technologies. Please contact Callum Harvey (callum.harvey@oii.ox.ac.uk) in advance to participate or with any questions. Attendance is online only. You do not currently have to be affiliated with the University of Oxford to attend and participate in discussions.
On January 17, 1893, American businessmen Sanford Dole and Lorrin Thurston led a coup against the Hawaiian monarchy with the aid of the U.S. military and active involvement from members of President William Harrison’s cabinet. In light of federal backing, the group expected rapid passage of an annexation treaty. However, the treaty failed due to opposition from Southern Democrats, and further hurting the annexation cause, President Grover Cleveland, a staunch anti-imperialist, soon took office. For nearly six years, the newly established Hawaiian Republican remained in a state of limbo. Queen Liliʻuokalani lobbied for support in Hawaiʻi and abroad, while American oligarchs attempted to retain control and bolster Hawaiʻi's position for annexation. Despite sustained Native Hawaiian opposition, the U.S. government finalized annexation in 1898 and passed the Organic Act in 1900, formalizing Hawaiʻi as a U.S. territory and extending citizenship to its residents, including Native Hawaiians, though Native Americans on the continent remained excluded from citizenship at that time. This work uncovers the politics leading to the 1900 Organic Act and the crucial and distinctive role of citizenship in Hawaiʻi’s transition from republic to territory and then to state.
Working in vivo? Fancy a free lunch? Join us for an in vivo antibody masterclass exploring a PD-1 and PD-L1 cancer immunotherapy case study. We’ll cover tips and troubleshooting for the use of antibodies in your in vivo studies and wrap up with pizza and a networking session. Secure your spot today! Register here: https://www.bioscience.co.uk/bio-x-cell-seminar-cio-100226
This paper charts the frontier between strategy-proofness and collusion-proofness in efficient mechanism design, with applications to markets where pivotal firms act as hubs for collusive behavior. We model collusion via conference structures, which are collections of admissible collusive sets. A mechanism is conference-proof if no listed coalition can profitably misreport. We frame the design problem as a tension between two extremes: Groves' schemes, which satisfy dominant strategy incentive compatibility but are proof only to singleton deviations; and Safronov (2018), which achieves full collusion-proofness but only serial Bayesian IC. Interpreting ex post budget balance as resistance to the grand coalition, we show that the AGV mechanism is weakly dominated by Cremer and Riordan (1985), and we present two novel mechanisms that strictly dominate both. Furthermore, we bridge the gap to Safronov (2018) by relaxing individual IC constraints while expanding the conference structure. Finally, we introduce a projection method to trace this incentive boundary, demonstrating that the Safronov and AGV mechanisms emerge as geometric projections of Groves' schemes.
Labor reallocation across sectors has become a central mechanism of adjustment in response to asymmetric shocks such as the pandemic, trade and energy disruptions, climate events, and the rise of artificial intelligence. How does reallocation interact with sectoral heterogeneity in unemployment risk, consumption insurance, and production-network linkages, and to what extent is it shaped by countercyclical fiscal policy? In this paper, we first document the magnitude and cyclical behavior of reallocation and the systematic differences across sectors in risk and insurance. We then address these questions through a structural multi-sector New Keynesian model that integrates heterogeneous agents (HANK), search and matching frictions (SAM), and input–output linkages (IO), while allowing workers to endogenously choose the sector in which to search. Calibrated to US data, the model quantifies how labor reallocation amplifies or mitigates the transmission of sectoral shocks and how untargeted fiscal policies, such as unemployment insurance extensions, interact with heterogeneity to shape aggregate demand and unemployment dynamics.
Join us for an exciting workshop with David Shukman, BBC’s first Science Editor, about translating your research into clear, engaging stories for wider audiences. Expect practical tips, real examples, hands-on experience, and of course a free (nut-free) lunch. All SoGE ECRs welcome. Online (not required). In-person (required, for catering purposes)
This joint presentation examines how sovereignty is being reconfigured through encounters with Global China across Africa and South Asia. Moving beyond narratives of sovereign erosion or capture, we approach sovereignty as a set of practices that are actively produced, negotiated, and contested through legal, infrastructural, and institutional forms. Drawing on ethnographic research on Chinese litigation in Ethiopian courts and on the governance of the Belt and Road Initiative funded Colombo Port City project in Sri Lanka, we explore how sovereign authority is increasingly exercised through exception rather than rule. In Ethiopia, courts have become critical arenas where immunity is debated among those who fight, exact, grant, or weigh it, and where sovereignty is enacted through everyday legal practice . In Sri Lanka, sovereign exception is deliberately engineered through infrastructure-led development, as elite commissions design special zones that reconfigure territorial authority, legality, and economic governance. Taken together, these cases describe how postcolonial states strategically invite and manage sovereign compromise in pursuit of development and how authority is fragmented across state institutions. Most importantly it reveals how Global China serves less as an exceptional actor than as a catalyst that reveals and accelerates existing transformations. By placing law and infrastructure in dialogue, the talk highlights the multiple sites through which sovereignty is performed today and raises broader questions about accountability and governance under conditions of exception. Thiruni Kelegama (Oxford School of Global and Area Studies, University of Oxford, UK) examines how development projects reshape power, space, and identity in Sri Lanka. Her forthcoming book, Central Margins: Sri Lanka's Violent Frontier (Cambridge University Press 2026), analyses how postcolonial states pair narratives of benevolent development with territorial control. Miriam Driessen is an anthropologist and departmental lecturer in the School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography, University of Oxford. She is the author of Tales of Hope, Tastes of Bitterness: Chinese Road Builders in Ethiopia and the forthcoming book Immunity on Trial: Ethiopian Courts, Chinese Corporations, and Contestations over Sovereignty.
Dramatic attacks on universities took many by surprise at the beginning of Donald Trump’s second US presidency. Weaponized accusations of anti-Semitism became a pivotal focus in the context of protests over Gaza. But the lines of attack had been articulated in agendas from MAGA-linked think tanks, like the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025. The first part of this presentation will summarize key intellectual, as well as political roots of current rightwing challenges to academia. Focusing mostly on the US, it will also at least note the wider prominence of related challenges. As striking as the attacks themselves was weak response from academic leaders. Beyond individual failings or poor judgments of the political situation, these reflected fundamental tensions and even contradictions within universities. The second part of the presentation will focus on long-term institutional changes and how they undermined cohesion of universities and capacity to respond well to new challenges. Governments paid a declining part of academic costs; relying on student fees pushed expansion in numbers out of balance with educational quality. Exclusivity rather than intellectual or moral value-added became the basis for academic distinction. Making employability the metric for student success brought a regime of debt and displaced other educational values. Values themselves changed with secularization, emphasis on research performance, and dominance of liberal individualism, epistemic pluralism, and multiculturalism. Intense status competition drove up costs. Pursuit of gifts from the wealthy helped create governance structures in which outside donors exercised disproportionate and sometimes divisive influence. Concentrating growth in professional schools and job-oriented studies was at odds with liberal arts and disciplinary agendas. Semi-autonomous large-scale research and development enterprises added to the extent to which universities resembled conglomerate corporations and made them more dependent on grant income. Unequal grant dependence made it easier for attacks to drive wedges between branches of faculty.
Join us for a screening of Seeing Daylight: The Photography of Dorothy Bohm (2018), followed by a Q&A with Dorothy Bohm’s daughter, Monica Bohm-Duchen. This event will be introduced and moderated by Dr Aviva Dautch. Touching on life-writing, visual storytelling, and cultural history, this screening and Q&A will appeal to students and scholars of literature, film, and art history, as well as anyone interested in photography, documentary, and the relationship between images, memory, and lived experience. It will also be of interest to those curious about Jewish women’s histories, refugee and migration narratives, and the cultural legacies of displacement in twentieth-century Britain and Europe. No prior specialist knowledge or preparation is required. Seeing Daylight: The Photography of Dorothy Bohm Born Dorothea Israelit in 1924 into a Jewish family in Königsberg (then East Prussia), Bohm was sent to England in 1939 to escape Nazi persecution—leaving with little more than a suitcase and her father’s Leica camera. ‘[Bohm] knows her camera not only sees, it feels’—Roland Penrose Bohm trained in photography in wartime Manchester, began her career as a studio portraitist, and went on to establish herself as one of Britain’s finest humanist street photographers, earning recognition as a ‘doyenne of British photography’. Her work is known for its attentive, compassionate eye: candid street scenes and portraits that linger on fleeting gestures, everyday encounters, and the textures of ordinary life. Bohm declared of her art: ‘I’ve seen a lot. But I don’t show the ugliness of life; I try to show the good’. Bohm played a key role in London’s photographic culture: in 1971, she became Associate Director of The Photographers’ Gallery, London’s first gallery devoted solely to photography. There she nurtured emerging photographers, including Martin Parr and worked alongside pioneers in her field, such as Henri Cartier-Bresson. ‘Bohm has somehow been cheated of greater prominence [...]. In the documentary, she quotes from one of her own, early interviews: ‘How glad I am to have seen daylight.’ It’s about time Dorothy Bohm’s photographs see more daylight, too’—Shelley Klein, Frieze Seeing Daylight explores Bohm’s life through photographs, places, and personal testimony, with contributions from close family and friends. Directed by Richard Shaw, it is ‘as much a film about life as it is about art’. Throughout, Bohm’s own words frame photography as a way of holding on to what might otherwise vanish: ‘[photography] fulfils my deep need to stop things from disappearing. It makes transience less painful and retains some of the special magic, which I have looked for and found’ Speaker Details: Monica Bohm-Duchen is an independent art historian, writer, lecturer and curator, based in London. The institutions she has worked for include the Courtauld Institute of Art, Sotheby’s Institute of Art, Tate, the National Gallery, the Royal Academy of Arts and the University of London. She is the founding Director of Insiders/Outsiders, an ongoing celebration of the contribution of refugees from Nazi Europe to British culture and contributing editor of the companion volume, Insiders/Outsiders, Refugees from Nazi Europe and their Contribution to British Visual Culture. She is the contributing editor of the 2024 monograph Dorothy Bohm at 100: A Life in Photography. Monica has been the curator of her late mother Dorothy Bohm’s photographic archive since the late 1990s and, since the former’s death in March 2023, of the Dorothy Bohm Estate. Dr Aviva Dautch is the Executive Director of Jewish Renaissance, the UK's Jewish arts and culture quarterly. She lectures on modern Jewish literature at the London School of Jewish Studies and JW3 and contributes to programmes on BBC Radio 4. She is an award-winning poet whose residencies and commissions have included The British Museum, The National Gallery and Bradford and Hay Literature Festivals. Aviva is the Jewish Women’s Voices OCLW Visiting Scholar for 2025-6. About the Programme: Jewish Women's Voices is a collaborative initiative by Dr Kate Kennedy, Director of the ‘Oxford Centre for Life-Writing’, and Dr Vera Fine-Grodzinski, a scholar of Jewish social and cultural history. The Programme is the first of its kind at any UK academic institution. Launched in October 2023, the Programme celebrates the life-writing of Jewish women, who are often underrepresented in mainstream historical accounts. The Programme is a three-term seminar series dedicated to exploring the diverse experiences of Jewish women across centuries, countries, and cultures. Further information about the Programme can be found here. Further Details and Contacts: This hybrid event is free and open to all. Registration is recommended for in-person attendance and required for hybrid attendance. Registration will close at 10:30 on 10/02/2026. The seminar will be recorded and made available on the OCLW website soon after. Registration is not required to access the recording. Queries regarding this event should be addressed to OCLW Events Manager, Dr Eleri Anona Watson.
Speaker: Simon Kershenbaum (Department of Biology, Evolutionary Biology) Schistosomes infect around 250 million people around the world, with chronic infections leading to debilitating disease. The pathology is largely driven by the eggs laid by fully mature female worms, so understanding the mechanisms of sexual development in schistosomes may reveal novel targets to limit pathology. Beyond the public health implications, investigating the mechanisms of sexual development in schistosomes is of evolutionary interest since most flatworms are hermaphroditic while schistosomes are dioecious (have two separate sexes). However, to date, most research into the development of schistosomes relies either on using mammalian hosts, which is both ethically and financially costly, or in vitro cultures using foetal bovine serum which does not allow the parasites to reach a sexually dimorphic stage. We recently showed that parasites can be cultured from a sexually monomorphic stage to a sexually dimorphic stage using human serum instead of foetal bovine serum. This allows for the assessment of sexual development in vitro. Comparing single-cell RNAseq libraries from parasites cultured in different media shows that key stem cell populations are depleted in parasites cultured in foetal bovine serum, suggesting that despite its widespread use in both drug screening and research, important developmental pathways are perturbed. In light of these findings, we are currently shifting our in vitro experiments to human serum. We are now investigating the earliest developmental differences between male and female schistosomes, finding candidate transcription factors that may regulate sexual development in this human parasite.
https://www.cmcsoxford.org.uk/our-events
In this session we will examine article level metrics. We will discuss how citation counting can help identify influential papers in particular fields and how altmetrics provide a different perspective on research output. Using tools such as Web of Science, Google Scholar and Scopus you will learn how to locate different article metrics. The session will also allow you to appreciate the limitations of different metrics and the importance of their cautious interpretation. By the end of the session, you will be familiar with: using Web of Science, Scopus and Google Scholar to track and count citations to papers and individual researchers; measuring impact using altmetrics; understanding how to contextualise metrics against other, similar papers in a field; and the limitations of different metrics. Intended audience: Taught student; Researcher & research student
*2-day Conference: The Past and Future of Anglo-Catholic Socialism* *Tuesday 10 and Wednesday 11 February 2026* An impressive number of socialist priests and intellectuals were formed by the Anglo-Catholic tradition in the first half of the twentieth century, including Percy Dearmer, F.D. Maurice, R.H. Tawney, J. N. Figgis, Henry Scott Holland, Frank Weston, Conrad Noel, Albert Mansbridge, Charles Gore, Ken Leech, and John Hughes. The Centre for Theology, Law, and Culture at Pusey House will organise a colloquium to discuss what can be learnt from Anglo-Catholic socialism as a tradition that still bears relevance for our time. Please visit our website for full details and the conference programme: https://www.puseyhouse.org.uk/conferences/anglo-catholic-socialism The conference will be preceded by a public lecture by Dr Jon Cruddas, former MP for Dagenham and Rainham, and author of _The Dignity of Labour_ (Polity, 2021), at 16:00 on Tuesday 10 February. Title of his lecture: "Catholicism and the Labour Party".
Drawing on a collection of previously unexamined case files from St. Elizabeth’s Hospital, In the Shadow of Diagnosis explores the encounter between psychiatry and queer and gender-variant people in the mid-to late-twentieth-century United States. *Respondents:* Susanne Schmidt (University of Basle / WGQ) Grace Whorrall-Campbell (Oxford) Ella Castanier (Oxford)
Join us at Oxford Edge for a Humanities Beyond Academia Skill Workshop with *Dr Pegram Harrison*. This session will focus on "Skills for Competing", teaching you how to gain an edge over competitors. All welcome.
The lecture will seek to address a major omission in the history of the Labour Party: the lack of substantial work on the Roman Catholic contribution to it. Within the study of the origins of the Labour Party, this omission is often accounted for by factors such as the politics of Irish nationalism and home rule, prior to 1922 and the achievement of Irish self-government, the instruction of the clergy and traditional clerical suspicion of socialism, opposition to Labour Party policy over issues such as Catholic schooling prior to the 1918 Education Act, and the product of a restricted franchise and limited Roman Catholic participation at elections. Consequently, the Catholic contribution is a neglected area of study, often replaced either by a deterministic secularised Labour history, or one that emphasises the role of dissenting Protestant traditions in helping shape this history. This neglect also extends to the pre-history of Labour, the period the historian Stephen Yeo has described as the era of the ‘religion of socialism’ – the 1880s and 1890s. Yet this is when Catholic Social Teaching truly developed, particularly with the 1891 Encyclical of Pope Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum. There were also numerous Roman Catholic leaders within the late-nineteenth-century labour movement such as Pete Curran, Tom McCarthy and James Sexton. The lecture is part of a wider project to reinsert the Roman Catholic contribution within Labour’s history. It will examine debates over Catholic marginalisation, alongside theological developments within Catholic Social Teaching and its links to questions of ideological renewal throughout labour history, from the era of the ‘religion of socialism’ to the present day significance of the so-called ‘Blue Labour’ movement. It will acknowledge key Catholic figures within Labour history, such as its forgotten leader J.L Clynes; the great Red Clydeside leader and founder of the Catholic Socialist Society, John Wheatley; TUC General Secretary, George Woodcock; the former Education Secretary, Shirley Williams; and Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair. It will also address the role of Catholics and wider questions of public policy and social reform integral to the history of the British welfare state.
Dr Edward Howell is the Strategic Net Assessment Research Fellow with SST:CCW. His research concerns the politics, international relations, and security of the Korean Peninsula and East Asia, with particular interests in inter-Korean and DPRK-US relations, and the UK's relations with the Northeast Asia. His latest monograph, North Korea and the Global Nuclear Order: When Bad Behaviour Pays, was published by Oxford University Press in 2023, and his forthcoming monograph, A New Axis of Upheaval: North Korea, Russia, and China—and Why We Should Care is expected for publication in 2026. He is also the Korea Foundation Fellow at The Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House), London. Dr Rob Johnson is the Director of the Oxford Strategy, Statecraft, and Technology (Changing Character of War) Centre, Senior Research Fellow of Pembroke College, University of Oxford. He is an Adjunct Professor at the Norwegian Defence University Staff College and Adjunct Professor of Strategic Studies at Rennes School of Business in France. He is a historian, strategic studies and International Relations scholar combining academic analyses with ‘knowledge exchange’ policy impact. Dr Johnson was the first Director of the UK Office of Net Assessment and Challenge, working closely with the Secretary of State for Defence, Ministers, and Cabinet Office. He continues to advise and delivers direct support to government and armed forces in defence and security matters.
Hybrid. Email oxchildpsych@psych.ox.ac.uk to request the link to attend online.
This presentation theorizes Sinophone independent theatre in mainland China and Taiwan as a geo-literacy project that performatively resists Eurocentric, Sinocentric, and anthropocentric epistemologies. Situating selected texts and performances by independent theatre troupes within the Inter-Asian people’s theatre movement, Dr Jaguścik takes Rossella Ferrari’s (2020) formulation of 'transnational Chinese theatres' as a point of departure to examine whether – and how – contemporary Sinophone independent theatre moves beyond trauma-centered frameworks to rehearse future-oriented political imaginaries. The presentation draws primarily on unpublished performance scripts and personal exchanges with members of Assignment Theatre (差事劇團) and Against Again Troupe (再据劇團) in Taipei, as well as Fire Tent Theatre Troupe (北京流火帐篷剧社) in Beijing. Justyna Jaguścik is Senior Lecturer in Chinese Language, Culture and History at the University of Bern, Switzerland. She is the co-editor of Lyrical Experiments in Sinophone Verse: Time, Space, Bodies, and Things (2025) and Re-Thinking Literary China: Essays in Honor of Andrea Riemenschnitter (De Gruyter, 2025). Her main research interests include contemporary Sinophone poetry (particularly by women writers), transmediality in Sinophone poetry, and cultural activism.
Few countries have had as vexed a political history as Syria. Carved out of the Ottoman empire at the end of the First World War, Syria was then brutally ruled by France. This French ‘mandate’ carved out new borders with equally provisional neighbours in a process that pulled apart families, trade networks and political assumptions that had already been ravaged by the war. Syria's subsequent history has been a series of attempts to make sense of its borders, including a failed attempt in the late 1950s to unite with Egypt and several humiliations at the hands of Israel's armed forces. The civil war that broke out in 2011 plunged Syria into a nightmarish series of disasters, including the terrible years of Islamic State, ultimately resulting in the reimposition of Bashar al-Assad’s dictatorship, which came to an end in 2024. Daniel Neep’s remarkable book creates a gripping, intelligent narrative of how Syrians have lived through these events, never losing sight either of the fates of ordinary people or of Syria’s rich, complex and diverse society, unwillingly or willingly brought together in such a highly contested space. https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/213366/a-history-of-modern-syria-by-neep-daniel/9780241003299
As global politics shifts toward great-power competition and zero-sum thinking, the European Union faces a stark test of survival. Once built around multilateralism, rules, and win-win integration, the EU now confronts war on its borders, economic pressure from China, and an increasingly unreliable United States. This panel explores whether Europe can adapt to a more hostile world and defend its vital interests without abandoning its core identity and fundamental values.
_Kratos_ and _dunamis_ appear as “power” in Plato’s dialogs but they signify differently. Kratos is a practice of mastery, according to which “might makes right.” Dunamis is the individual and collective capacity to do or not to do, a capacity that makes exercises of power of any kind possible. This lecture explores in _Gorgias_ and other dialogs the ethical and political implications of the dialogs’ representations of kratos in terms of dunamis, including for democracy as _demokratia_.
A just energy transition is crucial in building the public backing needed to achieve climate goals. If citizens see that regulations cutting carbon emissions can reduce rather than increase inequalities they are more likely to support them. The EU’s two key regulatory policies for appliance energy efficiency—minimum energy performance standards and mandatory energy labels have achieved major energy and costs savings. This seminar will consider whether they cut carbon emissions in a way that also reduces inequality, looking at: · Whether decision-making processes enable broad participation (procedural justice) · Whether the allocation of costs and benefits reduces inequalities (distributional justice). and offering recommendations for improvement.
The tenth anniversary of the EU referendum is fast approaching and many will be focused on how Brexit has, or has not, changed the economic and political world. But what if the most important change was not to institutions, political parties and the economy, but to us? This lecture series explores how the referendum, and its aftermath, sparked a form of ‘tribal politics’ that reshaped how people saw themselves, each other and the wider world. This first lecture looks at how the referendum created two powerful and enduring political identities in Britain: Leavers and Remainers. Why did an issue of such little interest to so many people suddenly become the key way that people identified themselves and others?
This talk introduces the emerging research field of Futures-Oriented Science Education (FOSE), focussing on its potential to revalue physics teaching as a source of rich and important competences for navigating societies where acceleration and uncertainty are intensified by multiple, intersecting crises. Drawing on the history of Futures Studies, I will discuss how FOSE prompts us to reconsider the epistemic and axiological foundations of physics, and to draw on interdisciplinary approaches that bridge the natural sciences, social sciences and humanities to foster futures literacy. Examples from empirical studies and classroom implementations developed in the European project FEDORA will be used to illustrate two key findings. The first concerns the persistence—and the strong influence—of Modernity’s dominant conception of the future within contemporary schooling. The second shows that core ideas from complex systems science can strengthen secondary students’ futures literacy by opening them to alternative forms of temporality and by supporting more positive and imaginative engagements with possible futures.
The seminars will take place on Tuesdays during term time, from 5:00 to 6:30 p.m. at Corpus Christi College in Merton Street. Please ask the porters for directions. No registration is required. For more details: https://tolkien50.web.ox.ac.uk/event/tolkien-seminars-ht-2026
Thailand’s May 2023 election exposed a deepening ideological divide between supporters of the progressive Move Forward Party and voters aligned with parties linked to the former military junta. Although Move Forward won the most seats, it was blocked from forming a government, and the Constitutional Court later dissolved the party and banned its leaders from politics. A coalition headed by the second‑place Pheu Thai Party, associated with former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, formed instead. However, judicial rulings disqualified two successive Pheu Thai prime ministers in 2024 and 2025. These disruptions opened the way for a short‑lived minority government led by the Bhumjai Thai Party in September 2025. When that government faltered, parliament was dissolved in December, prompting new elections for February 2026. This talk will contextualize the election and its results and assess the implications for Thailand’s political trajectory.
It is well-established that phonological skills are critical for learning to read and that individuals with ‘dyslexia’ have phonological processing difficulties. However, as recognized by a recent Delphi study of dyslexia there is also growing evidence that poor reading is the outcome of multiple genes of small effect acting through the environment to produce individual differences in the manifestation of dyslexia/poor reading. I will draw on findings from a longitudinal study of children at high-risk of dyslexia, either because they have a parent with dyslexia or preschool language difficulties, to consider a range of risk factors that are associated with poor reading. The paper will begin by reviewing findings from longitudinal studies assessing the role of speech and language skills in reading development. There will follow a series of analyses examining dyslexia outcomes which are either specific or associated with comorbid developmental language disorder. We will touch on the role of ‘protective’ factors including the home literacy environment and implications for screening and intervention. Teams link: https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/3825967966058?p=oaa4boDA3tu5ZnqMja
This panel discussion will explore how biodiversity science can better inform decisions in business, finance, government and other bodies. The panel will examine: • What biodiversity science can currently say about state and trends, and which dimensions genuinely matter for decision-making across marine and terrestrial ecosystems. • How to navigate proliferating metrics and frameworks (TNFD, SBTN, national indicators, emerging biodiversity credits). • Where scientific frontiers lie: from genomics and AI-enabled monitoring to functional trait metrics, plural biodiversity knowledge and global synthetic indices. • How to ensure that scientific advances directly support nature-positive trajectories and do not inadvertently reinforce extractive forms of measurement or governance. The discussion will also consider how biodiversity metrics can be developed in ways that respect the rights, knowledge systems, and governance structures of Indigenous peoples (many of whom who are among the world’s most effective stewards of biodiversity).
10 Feb (Week 4) Rohit Ghosh (Pembroke) - Cobwebbed Thinking: Margaret Cavendish and the Poetics of the Spiderweb
What possibilities and pleasures might fantasy, the weird, the uncanny, and the queer offer life-writers and readers? For many, life-writing aims to authentically narrate the ‘real’, factual experiences of a life. Yet, as Professor Nicholas Royle (University of Sussex) contends, expressions of ‘the weird’ and ‘the uncanny’—often associated with fantasy and supernatural literature—increasingly seep into contemporary life-writing. After all, lived experience is not always straightforward or easily narrated: memory can blur and distort, coincidence can feel charged with meaning, and the everyday can suddenly seem strange or out of place. Royle calls this contemporary drift of strangeness into the ‘real’ the ‘New Fantastic’: a way of writing that narrates ordinary life while registering its weirdness—its slips, shocks, and uncanny moments. In turn, this lecture asks: What can these engagements with the weird and the uncanny tell us about life-writing today? ‘The uncanny’ names an unnerving moment when the familiar suddenly feels strange, while ‘the weird’ points to that which exceeds the usual rules of reality. They make the world feel odd, askew, out of joint—or, indeed, ‘queer’. Drawing upon the French philosopher Jacques Derrida’s provocation that ‘to be is to be queer’, Royle asks, What happens when life-writing refuses neat, ‘straight’ stories of the self, and instead stays with what feels unstable, difficult, or hard to explain? What's queer about contemporary life-writing? This talk will draw on classic supernatural fiction by the American writer H.P. Lovecraft and the English writer Algernon Blackwood, alongside experimental, reflective writing by the French writer and theorist Hélène Cixous and the British writer Lara Pawson. In so doing, Royle considers how the ‘New Fantastic’ can open up new challenges and pleasures for life-writers and their readers. Touching on life-writing, creative and critical writing, and literary theory, this lecture will appeal to writers, students, and scholars of literature, as well as anyone interested in memoir and contemporary experimental writing. It will also be of interest to those curious about queer approaches to culture, psychoanalysis, and the weird and uncanny in fiction and everyday life. No prior specialist knowledge or preparation is required. However, attendees may find it helpful to read Algernon Blackwood’s ‘The Man Whom the Trees Loved’ (1912). Speaker Details: Nicholas Royle is Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Sussex. He is the author of many critical works, including Telepathy and Literature (1991), E.M. Forster (1999), The Uncanny (2003), Jacques Derrida (2003), Veering: A Theory of Literature (2011), Hélène Cixous: Dreamer, Realist, Analyst, Writing (2020), as well as (with Andrew Bennett) Elizabeth Bowen and the Dissolution of the Novel (1995) and the Introduction to Literature, Criticism and Theory (sixth edition, 2023). He has also published the novels Quilt (2010) and An English Guide to Birdwatching (2017), along with Mother: A Memoir (2020) and David Bowie, Enid Blyton and the Sun Machine (2023). He is currently working on two projects: a book about Virginia Woolf and Palestine, and a study of The Weird, the Uncanny and the New Fantastic. Further Details and Contacts: After the event, please join us for a complimentary wine reception. This hybrid event is free and open to all. Delivering our lectures costs the Centre around £20 per attendee. If you are able, please consider making a voluntary donation of £5, £10, £20, or £50 to help us cover these costs and keep our events accessible to all. No one will be turned away for lack of funds. Registration is strongly recommended for in-person attendance and required for hybrid attendance. Registration will close at 14:30 on 10/02/2026. The event will be recorded and made available on the OCLW website soon after. Registration is not required to access the recording. Queries regarding this event should be addressed to OCLW Events Manager, Dr Eleri Anona Watson.
Adrian is the co-founder, President, and CEO of Genryo, a San Diego-based company specialising in the design and construction of synthetic genomes. He is the author of several critically acclaimed books, including Life Without Genes: The History and Future of Genomes (Harper Collins/Flamingo, 2000) and An Intelligent Person’s Guide to Genetics (Duckworth, 2006). His forthcoming book, On the Future of Species: Authoring Life by Means of Artificial Biological Intelligence, examines the science of genome writing — the ability to synthesise complete genomes, from humans to other species, entirely from scratch.
Boundaries of Humanity Discussion Group Series With the rapid development of AI and biotechnologies (including those relating to germline gene editing, brain-computer Interfaces, life extension, etc.) come vast powers to reshape ourselves and the natural world. As technological advances grant us new powers, so do they blur some boundaries between humans, animals, and machines, prodding us to ask the question: what does it mean to be human? Drawing upon readings in the humanities (including philosophy, theology, literature, etc.) and the sciences, this group will attempt to bridge the existential and empirical study of human identity - and within that context, ask if and how such reflections might help chart a path forward in relation to the right uses of new and potent technologies. We will focus in particular on questions of human purpose, place, and flourishing within the natural order. The reading group is open to students at all levels of study (including medical students), as well as faculty. We will meet for about 1 hour, twice per term. Under the umbrella of the medical humanities, this will be a casual reading and discussion group. The readings for each session will be introduced by a different participant - and the readings for each session will take a total of roughly 1 hour to complete.
Olly and Amelia are redefining what inclusive retail can look like, not just for customers, but for founders, teams, and communities. In this talk, they’ll share their journey building Neurohaus, the challenges and strengths of neurodivergent-led entrepreneurship, and how designing with neurodiversity in mind can unlock innovation, authenticity, and commercial success.
With the rapid development of AI and biotechnologies (including those relating to germline gene editing, brain-computer Interfaces, life extension, etc.) come vast powers to reshape ourselves and the natural world. As technological advances grant us new powers, so do they blur some boundaries between humans, animals, and machines, prodding us to ask the question: what does it mean to be human? Drawing upon readings in the humanities (including philosophy, theology, literature, etc.) and the sciences, this group will attempt to bridge the existential and empirical study of human identity - and within that context, ask if and how such reflections might help chart a path forward in relation to the right uses of new and potent technologies. We will focus in particular on questions of human purpose, place, and flourishing within the natural order. The reading group is open to students at all levels of study (including medical students), as well as faculty. We will meet for about 1 hour, twice per term. Under the umbrella of the medical humanities, this will be a casual reading and discussion group. The readings for each session will be introduced by a different participant - and the readings for each session will take a total of roughly 1 hour to complete.
This Weeks Focus: Defining Palestine, Defining Palestinians. Legal status, citizenship, and political (dis)belonging across international and local regimes. This reading group examines the political, geographic, economic, cultural, and linguistic fragmentations that have shaped Palestinian life over the past century, from the West Bank, Gaza, and the ’48 territories to the multiple Palestinian diasporas. By engaging with scholarship across history, political theory, and cultural studies, this reading group interrogates how these divisions have been produced, institutionalised, and normalised, and how they continue to shape Palestinian belongings, identities, and futures. Our aim is to consider both the unity that persists within fragmentation and the fragmentation that structures the very notion of Palestine. Central Question: How are ideas of Palestine and Palestinian collective identity shaped, challenged, and rearticulated under conditions of fragmentation? Structure: The group will convene biweekly throughout Hilary and Trinity Terms 2026, with each session lasting two hours Time: Tuesdays, 6:30–8:30 pm Location: To be announced Sign-Up Form: Reading Group: Palestine: Rethinking Politics of Fragmentations – Fill in form
*2-day Conference: The Past and Future of Anglo-Catholic Socialism* *Tuesday 10 and Wednesday 11 February 2026* An impressive number of socialist priests and intellectuals were formed by the Anglo-Catholic tradition in the first half of the twentieth century, including Percy Dearmer, F.D. Maurice, R.H. Tawney, J. N. Figgis, Henry Scott Holland, Frank Weston, Conrad Noel, Albert Mansbridge, Charles Gore, Ken Leech, and John Hughes. The Centre for Theology, Law, and Culture at Pusey House will organise a colloquium to discuss what can be learnt from Anglo-Catholic socialism as a tradition that still bears relevance for our time. Please visit our website for full details and the conference programme: https://www.puseyhouse.org.uk/conferences/anglo-catholic-socialism
COURSE DETAILS This session looks at the way in which we can have useful conversations in career development reviews. It examines the blockages to such conversations and how we can overcome them using active listening and coaching techniques. There will be an opportunity to discuss the policy and process surrounding CDRS. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this session you will have an understanding of: The Career context and support for CDRs. How coaching and active listening can enable positive CDR conversations. An opportunity to practice relevant skills.
Create content for your teaching or research with greater confidence by attending our session on Creative Commons (CC) licences. Learn how they work, how they interact with copyright and how to use them to best effect. The session will make special reference to images but is applicable to all media, including written works. The workshop is classroom-based. In this playful, interactive face-to-face session we will cover: what Creative Commons Licences are; where to find Creative Commons material; how to apply Creative Commons to your own work; and how to reuse Creative Commons materials. We’ll finish the session with a Creative Commons card game. Intended audience: Researcher and research student; Staff
This 90-minute session will cover some more advanced techniques for finding medical literature to answer a research question. We will recap some basics, then demonstrate searching in several medical databases, including using subject headings (MeSH) and the differences between platforms. By the end of this session, you will be able to: explain what subject headings are, and how to use them; search for words that appear near to other words; take a search from one database into another; and save a search and document it. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
*Please email "$":mailto:mori.reithmayr@history.ox.ac.uk to join the reading group mailing list.* *Session Theme: TBD*
Kate Watkins and her research group use brain imaging and brain stimulation to understand how the brain achieves the remarkable feat of communication using speech and language. One of the groups research areas focuses on stuttering (aka stammering), which affects 5-8% of children and at least 1% of adults. The research group has identified differences in brain structure and connectivity in people who stutter and differences in brain function during stuttered speech. The group also completed the first randomised controlled trial of brain stimulation alongside fluency training to enhance fluency in adults who stutter. Jonathan is a DPhil student at St. Anne's College currently pursuing a DPhil in the Philosophy of Psychiatry with a particular focus on stammering. As someone with lived experience of stammering disorder, his research has personal significance beyond his academic interest in mental health. Teams link: https://www.oxcin.ox.ac.uk/events/EDI-event
Mentzer Group Speaker(s): TBC Title(s): TBC Fowler Group Speaker(s): Luigi Celauro, Jack Williams & Sybille Marchese Title: Subcellular, spatial 'omics of tauopathies: which tau species to target and where?
Written with Bruno Crepon and Jules Gazeaud Prevailing methods for measuring sensitive outcomes confront researchers with an inherent bias-variance trade-off: direct questioning is prone to a sensitivity bias, while indirect methods such as list experiments are substantially less precise. We introduce the ballot-bag, a novel technique that relaxes this trade-off by mitigating bias in direct questioning while improving precision over indirect methods. In a field experiment in Egypt, where direct questions on irregular migration are biased, ballot-bag estimates closely align with those from a list experiment but exhibit significantly lower variance. Consequently, treatment effects are highly significant via the ballot-bag and not via the list experiment.
Hosted by the EMPTINESS project and co-organised by Stanford University Press, this series of masterclasses will demystify digital project development, publishing, and preservation. While the traditional print book has and will continue to advance scholarly communication, it is becoming increasingly more useful to present scholarly arguments in a multimodal framework. Digital publications allow authors to frame their arguments within and alongside the data, media, and multi-linear pathways that best represent and exemplify those arguments. The masterclasses will present insights into the various aspects of digital publishing, from making the decision to go digital and securing funding and partnerships, to working with a publisher and ensuring a project’s longevity. The event will be of particular interest to Social Sciences and Arts & Humanities researchers and publishers as well as digital technicians/research software engineers interested in digital preservation pathways and web archiving. 'Why Go Digital?' (1st of 4 masterclasses): In this conversational masterclass, authors who have published digital projects with Stanford and MIT University Presses will discuss why they chose to go digital rather than pursue traditional book publication pathways. They’ll cover topics ranging from multimodality and audience reach, to tenure/promotion and longevity. Q&A will follow. Attendance is free, but places are limited. We look forward to seeing you there!
The green digital transition is underway. But what does this transition look like when dictated by the energy and resource demands of monopoly tech? How has this situation come to be? And where is it being resisted? From the Bog to the Cloud uncovers the hidden intersections of land, resource extraction and climate policy in the transition to “greener” and “smarter” economies. Challenging eco-modern and techno-solutionist approaches, the book links narratives of sustainability with colonial histories and uneven development, arguing that tech-driven transitions replicate exploitative patterns of imperial capitalism. Using Ireland as a focal point, we show how the history and depth of the country’s postcolonial dependency on multinational investment, especially US technology companies, comes into friction with disparate land-based struggles. This talk will articulate these histories within their present expression in Ireland’s twin transition and AI industrial policy, offering a critique of dependent models of development and proposing an anti-imperialist approach to environmental politics. Patrick Brodie is an Assistant Professor and Ad Astra Fellow in the School of Information and Communication Studies at University College Dublin. His research focuses on the political ecology of digital media infrastructure. He is the co-author with Patrick Bresnihan of From the Bog to the Cloud: Dependency and Eco-Modernity in Ireland (with Patrick Bresnihan, Bristol UP, 2025), the co-editor of Media Rurality (with Darin Barney, Duke UP, 2026), and the author of Wild Tides: Media Infrastructure and Financial Crisis in Ireland (Duke UP, 2026).
*The TORCH Humour Network is hosting its official launch event!* Join us at our interdisciplinary roundtable to discuss the research and study of humour. Our speakers all research humour across three different academic disciplines. They ask different questions, approach their work from different angles, and look for humour in different places. But they all share a commitment to understanding how humour works, why it matters, and what it can tell us about culture, society, and the human experience. *Professor Matthew Bevis* is a Professor of English Literature at Keble College in Oxford. His book _Comedy: A Very Short Introduction_ explores comedy as a literary genre and as a range of non-literary impulses and events. His most recent book, _Wordsworth’s Fun_, argues that the poet owed his quixotic creativity to a profound feeling for comedy. It delves into William Wordsworth’s debts to the ludic and the ludicrous in classical tradition, his engagement with forms of English poetic humour, and his love of comic prose. *Dr Zoe Walker* is an Associate Lecturer in Philosophy at University College London, working on various philosophical issues surrounding humour, comedy, and joking. She is interested, for example, in the ethics of the sense of humour, in how engaging with comedy shapes attention, and in the concept of joking as a way of achieving plausible deniability on the cheap. Her work has been recognised with the 2022 British Society of Aesthetics Essay Prize and the 2024 American Society for Aesthetics Feminist Research Prize. *Nicolas Garraud* is a DPhil student in History at Exeter College in Oxford, a former Saul Kagan Fellow in Advanced Shoah Studies, and a former Fellow of the Fondations pour la Mémoire de la Shoah. His research explores the meaning and significance of humour and laughter in the everyday life of Jews living under Nazi occupation in the Warsaw Ghetto. His work questions idealised conceptions of humour as a weapon of cultural and spiritual resistance to instead consider humour as a language through which to understand a plural Jewish community. *_There will be tea and cake!_*
*Cherry Briggs* (Independent Researcher) *The Multiple Geographies of Sri Lanka’s Climate, 1805-1953* Since the early twentieth century, the division of Sri Lanka into two distinct ecological and climatological regions – the Wet Zone and the Dry Zone – has become firmly entrenched in the way Sri Lanka’s geography has come to be imagined, both on the island and by those looking in from outside. This geographical imaginary has become so thoroughly naturalised that it has yet to be critically examined by historians of empire or historical geographers. This paper will trace the knowledge making practices that produced Sri Lanka’s climate in the context of empire, with a focus on the multiple geographical networks and imaginaries that brought it into being. Using climate as a lens, it will answer the call of historians of Sri Lanka to think through Sri Lanka’s past both beyond the shores of the island and the analytical frameworks of the colony and the nation state. It will show how Sri Lanka’s climate was produced by the collaboration of early nineteenth century meteorologists and climatologists, who imagined Sri Lanka variously as an isolated island, an extension of the Indian mainland, as a node in the Indian Ocean, as an ‘equatorial’ landmass and as part of a global network of data gatherers. It will show how the collection of the longitudinal rainfall data sets that were used to measure these climatic zones was initiated by individuals who traversed and transcended imperial space and how these zones were mapped in line with practices formulated beyond the British Empire in continental Europe. Finally, it will show how early twentieth century demographers’ insertion of the island into a global climatic schema ultimately aided the politicisation of the Wet and the Dry Zones after Independence. *Alison Bennett* (University of Oxford) *Port labour, global commodities, and material skill development: A study of the ivory warehouse in the Port of London and its representation c. 1860–1968* This paper explores how global commodity trade fostered localised skills among Britain’s labouring classes, namely through the creation of new material, geographical, and commercial knowledge. Its lens is the Port of London’s Ivory Floor at St. Katherine’s Dock (built 1860, closed 1968), and its chief focus the warehouse workers and commercial agents who prepared ivory for market, as well as the Port’s publicity department who marketed their work through commissioned photographs and newspaper accounts. As the first substantive examination of ivory warehouses (in London or elsewhere), this case study sheds light on an overlooked part of the global commodification process of ivory while also unravelling the impact of global trade on a local workforce through their development of a specialised epistemological and material skillset. It demonstrates that through their prolonged material and sensory engagement, this group of port labourers became knowledgeable in assessing ivory and its origins without ever seeing an elephant or leaving the British Isles. Scholarship tends to approach the relationship between global commodity trade and local skill development at the level of artisanal and industrial manufacture, yet as this paper shows, material skills, knowledge, and visual marketing were also instrumental to port warehouse storage and trade, adding value to one of the most coveted raw materials of the nineteenth century. The paper develops our understanding of the material and visual cultures behind global trade, port labour history, and ivory commodity chains In turn, it opens space for understanding how other global commodities were mobilised for, and marketed to, manufacturers and consumers around the world via port warehouses.
For our next talk, in the Digital Phenotyping seminar series, we will hear from Professor Ben Goldacre, Director, Bennett Institute for Applied Data Science; Bennett Professor of Evidence-Based Medicine, NDPCHS, University of Oxford on Wednesday 11 February, 2:00pm – 3:00pm, at the Big Data Institute (BDI). Title: Extracting features from electronic health records with shared open tools: ehrQL and OpenSAFELY Date: Wednesday 11 February 2026 Time: 2:00 pm - 3:00 pm Venue: BDI/OxPop, Seminar Room 0; followed by refreshments in the atrium Abstract: OpenSAFELY is a set of tools for working with raw electronic health records data. The platform’s innovative methods for privacy and transparency have earned trust from key stakeholders, and successfully delivered researchers access to an unprecedented scale of data: the full structured and linked NHS GP EHR records of the whole population of England. OpenSAFELY has a large productive user-base from over 20 organisations. NHS England will be expanding the service this year to permit non-COVID uses of the platform; the tools are also being deployed in other nations on top of their local electronic health records, as a federated analytics network. You can read more about the platform online: https://docs.opensafely.org/ OpenSAFELY users work with a wide range of standardised tools for efficient data management, specifically built to meet the needs of analysts working with EHR data, facilitating open and reproducible analytics. This seminar will present those tools, which can be used inside existing OpenSAFELY installations, or as standalone services. There will be live coding demonstrations; users can also read the documentation - or complete the online tutorials with live interactive coding environments in the browser - on the links below. • ehrQL or “Electronic Health Records Query Language” is the core EHR data management tool, allowing portable, legible, composable, standardised and shared code for feature extraction in clinical records. https://docs.opensafely.org/ehrql/ https://docs.opensafely.org/ehrql/tutorial/ https://www.bennett.ox.ac.uk/blog/2023/09/why-ehrql/ • OpenCodeLists allows users to produce, document and share codelists in SNOMED-CT, ICD10 and other terminologies. https://www.opencodelists.org/ https://www.bennett.ox.ac.uk/opencodelists/blog/ • OpenCodeCounts allows any interested user to explore the frequency of SNOMED-CT code usage in English primary care records, through a freely accessible online browser, to infer feasibility and assist in building codelists. https://www.bennett.ox.ac.uk/blog/2025/10/introducing-opencodecounts/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hybrid Option: Please note that these meetings are closed meetings and only open to members of the University of Oxford. Please respect our speakers and do not share the link with anyone outside of the University. The purpose of these seminars is to foster more communication among employees throughout the University, so we strongly advise in-person attendance whenever feasible. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Microsoft Teams meeting https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/35058292636481?p=6Dc9r5XHVIw1mrRSDJ Meeting ID: 350 582 926 364 81 Passcode: Q7ZC9F8B
Cherry Briggs (Independent Researcher), The Multiple Geographies of Sri Lanka’s Climate, 1805-1953 Since the early twentieth century, the division of Sri Lanka into two distinct ecological and climatological regions – the Wet Zone and the Dry Zone – has become firmly entrenched in the way Sri Lanka’s geography has come to be imagined, both on the island and by those looking in from outside. This geographical imaginary has become so thoroughly naturalised that it has yet to be critically examined by historians of empire or historical geographers. This paper will trace the knowledge making practices that produced Sri Lanka’s climate in the context of empire, with a focus on the multiple geographical networks and imaginaries that brought it into being. Using climate as a lens, it will answer the call of historians of Sri Lanka to think through Sri Lanka’s past both beyond the shores of the island and the analytical frameworks of the colony and the nation state. It will show how Sri Lanka’s climate was produced by the collaboration of early nineteenth century meteorologists and climatologists, who imagined Sri Lanka variously as an isolated island, an extension of the Indian mainland, as a node in the Indian Ocean, as an ‘equatorial’ landmass and as part of a global network of data gatherers. It will show how the collection of the longitudinal rainfall data sets that were used to measure these climatic zones was initiated by individuals who traversed and transcended imperial space and how these zones were mapped in line with practices formulated beyond the British Empire in continental Europe. Finally, it will show how early twentieth century demographers’ insertion of the island into a global climatic schema ultimately aided the politicisation of the Wet and the Dry Zones after Independence. Alison Bennett (University of Oxford), Port labour, global commodities, and material skill development: A study of the ivory warehouse in the Port of London and its representation c. 1860–1968 This paper explores how global commodity trade fostered localised skills among Britain’s labouring classes, namely through the creation of new material, geographical, and commercial knowledge. Its lens is the Port of London’s Ivory Floor at St. Katherine’s Dock (built 1860, closed 1968), and its chief focus the warehouse workers and commercial agents who prepared ivory for market, as well as the Port’s publicity department who marketed their work through commissioned photographs and newspaper accounts. As the first substantive examination of ivory warehouses (in London or elsewhere), this case study sheds light on an overlooked part of the global commodification process of ivory while also unravelling the impact of global trade on a local workforce through their development of a specialised epistemological and material skillset. It demonstrates that through their prolonged material and sensory engagement, this group of port labourers became knowledgeable in assessing ivory and its origins without ever seeing an elephant or leaving the British Isles. Scholarship tends to approach the relationship between global commodity trade and local skill development at the level of artisanal and industrial manufacture, yet as this paper shows, material skills, knowledge, and visual marketing were also instrumental to port warehouse storage and trade, adding value to one of the most coveted raw materials of the nineteenth century. The paper develops our understanding of the material and visual cultures behind global trade, port labour history, and ivory commodity chains In turn, it opens space for understanding how other global commodities were mobilised for, and marketed to, manufacturers and consumers around the world via port warehouses.
Primates can solve novel problems through logical and stepwise reasoning. No two real-world situations are the same, and how one ‘figures out’ a solution may be similarly variable. Studying reasoning has thus been challenging. How should one investigate the neural basis of internal events whose timing and nature are uncertain, and are unlikely to ever unfold the same way twice? To meet this challenge, we used large-scale Neuropixels-probe recordings, and a novel reasoning task where monkeys apply abstract knowledge to determine the correct ordering of stimuli on the screen. Our recording system enabled us to measure 1000+ single neurons simultaneously both within a single brain region and across multiple distinct regions. Neural activity in lateral prefrontal cortex (but not in other areas) reflected the ‘figuring out’ of a solution. Population analyses of these large-scale recordings allowed us to observe each distinct internal step of the problem-solving process. As one might expect of any intelligent behavior, the set of internal steps, and their timing, were different on every individual trial, and completely under the monkey’s control. For example, the monkey sometimes figured out the last element first and worked backwards. On another trial they used a different approach. Critically, we could interpret neural events on each individual trial, much like a psychologist can interpret behavior on each individual trial. The same neural strategy can unfold differently on different trials yet still solve the problem at hand successfully. Taken together, this research has revealed a computational mechanism for cognitive flexibility, i.e., the process by which a circuit is able to vary the order, the timing, and the strategy by which to make multi-step decisions. Biography Saurabh Vyas completed undergraduate training in Biomedical Engineering and Electrical Engineering at Johns Hopkins University in 2012. While working on his MSE in Biomedical Engineering, Saurabh was a research engineer at the Applied Physics Laboratory. Saurabh completed his PhD in Bioengineering at Stanford University in 2020, where he was advised by Prof. Krishna Shenoy. His research was recognized with a NSF Graduate Research Fellowship, and a NIH NINDS NRSA (F31) fellowship. In 2021, Saurabh's thesis was awarded the Donald B. Lindsley Prize by the Society for Neuroscience, which "recognizes a young neuroscientist's outstanding PhD thesis in the general area of behavioral (i.e., systems) neuroscience." Saurabh completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Columbia University in 2025, where he was co-advised by Profs. Mark Churchland and Michael Shadlen. Saurabh's work was recognized by both an NIH NINDS Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award (F32), and a K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award. In January 2026, Saurabh joined the Neuroscience Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, where he leads the Laboratory of General Intelligence and Computation (LOGIC).
Are you baffled by open, confused by embargoes? Does the mention of the colour gold or green catapult you into a realm of perplexed irritation? Come to this session, where we’ll break down open access and all its many jargon terms, confusing publishing structures and hint at the advantages you can reap by publishing open. In this session you’ll learn: what is open access? Key terms – Gold, Green, Article Processing Charges; where to get more information and help; where to look for open access material; and useful tools to assist you in publishing open access. Intended audience: researcher and research student; staff
Global supply chains have become increasingly complex, interconnected, and exposed to disruption. Although vast amounts of data are now available, this information remains fragmented, siloed, and dispersed across organisations, systems, and formats. In its raw form, information offers limited value. It becomes useful only when it is structured into knowledge that reveals how supply-chain networks are organised and how dependencies propagate across tiers. From this knowledge, intelligence can be derived to support timely and informed decisions. This talk explores whether recent advances in Large Language Models and agentic AI systems can support this transformation in supply-chain environments. Focusing on visibility and disruption management, it examines how unstructured external information can be converted into structured network knowledge, and how agentic systems can use that knowledge to detect disruptions, analyse their propagation, and support more effective responses, autonomously. About the speaker: Sara AlMahri is a final-year PhD candidate at the Supply Chain AI Lab (SCAIL), University of Cambridge. Her research focuses on using Large Language Models and agentic AI systems to map complex, multi-tier supply chain networks, detect disruptions, and support network-level decision-making for more resilient and sustainable operations. Before starting her PhD, Sara worked as a Senior Researcher at the Technology Innovation Institute (TII) in Abu Dhabi and completed international training programmes with Boeing (USA) and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (Japan). Her entrepreneurial and research work has been recognised with multiple awards, including the Parmee Prize and the Cape Acorn Postgraduate Research Award from the University of Cambridge, as well as the e& Prize for Entrepreneurship in Dubai.
Clinician wellbeing and patient safety are often discussed separately. In practice, they are deeply interconnected and shaped not only by individual resilience, but by the design of the systems and environments in which clinicians work. This Oxford Open Grand Round will explore how workplace design influences engagement, wellbeing, and patient safety, drawing on insights from surgery, anaesthesia, human factors, and improvement science. The event will feature a 45-minute virtual panel discussion, followed by live audience Q&A, focused on: ▪️ What clinicians are really experiencing in today’s healthcare environments ▪️ The explicit and implicit impacts of design on wellbeing and safety ▪️ Practical, system-level opportunities for change. Oxford Open Grand Rounds are part of the MSc in Surgical Science and Practice and the PGCert in Patient Safety & Quality Improvement, and are open to clinicians globally who are interested in making a meaningful difference in and around their workplace.
The Older Scots Reading Group is for people interested in literature produced in Scotland between 1375-1550. This is an incredibly rich period, featuring authors experimenting with form and language. The texts themselves are written in Older Scots – a language closely related to Middle English, but with some unique attributes. This reading group will provide a relaxed introduction to this period and language. This term we will focus on reading the Palyce of Honour, a dream vision poetry by Gavin Douglas that often draws parallels with the House of Fame. But is it purely derivative or is there something more subtle at work? Join us to find out! Please bring your own copy of the text if you can – the 2018 TEAMS METS edition by David Parkinson is recommended. No intensive preparation required. Both undergraduates and postgraduates are welcome and there are usually snacks. If you have any questions, contact megan.bushnell@ling-phil.ox.ac.uk.
*Wesley L Attewell* (University of Hong Kong) *Ann Ngoc Tran* (University of California, Los Angeles) From Vietnam to Hong Kong: “Human Cargo” and the Logistics of Refugee Migration, 1978-1979 *XIANG Fang* (Macau University of Science and Technology) To the Promised Land: Burmese Chinese Re-Migration to Cold War Macau
About the series: This series will feature master classes, seminars, workshops and talks with Laura Rival, research collaborators and colleagues, throughout academic year 2025-2026. Beginning in Michaelmas term 2025, the theme for the term, in answer to the series question, was 'In Latin America, by Greening the State at the Top and from Below'. In Hilary term, the theme is 'By Knowing Nature Differently'. In Trinity term, the theme will be 'By Imagining a New Civilization and Building the Next Political Economic Order'.
A global demographic transition is well underway. Global life expectancy now exceeds 70 years of age and fertility rates are declining. The result is a rising number and proportion of people at older ages. In general, in economics this ‘ageing society’ is seen as a problem with major challenges for growth, pensions and health systems. The theme of this session will be to review this pessimism and consider a range of economic policy and research issues that longer lives create and take stock of what we know and what we need to know in order to better understand the demographic transition and focus less on a changing age structure and more changing how we age.
A film screening and presentation of research on the history of “Rousseau’s Cave”, the garden hermitage at Wootton Hall in Staffordshire, where Jean-Jacques Rousseau wrote the first half of his “Confessions”. 3.30pm Stephen Leach and Stephen Hilyard (University of Wisconsin Madison) ‘Remember a Poor Hermit’: A Reconstruction of ‘Rousseau’s Cave’ (including showing of short film about Rousseau’s Cave at Wootton Hall in Staffordshire). Discussion led by Jenny Mander (Newnham College, Cambridge) From March 1766 to May 1767 Jean-Jacques Rousseau – fleeing from persecution in France and Switzerland – stayed in the remote hamlet of Wootton in Staffordshire. There he wrote the first half of his Confessions in a garden hermitage, a structure half natural and half architectural, ever since known as ‘Rousseau’s Cave.’ Our paper records the hermitage in its current state (exposed to the elements); it creates a digital reconstruction of the hermitage as it was in Rousseau’s lifetime; and it provides digital access to a monument that is otherwise not generally accessible. Through high-quality digital reconstructions, recreating the hermitage as it is now and as it was in Rousseau’s lifetime, we provide a new perspective upon the creation of one of the world’s greatest works of literature. At the same time, in providing an accurate record of a modest but fairly typical eighteenth century garden hermitage we hope to contribute to the study of garden hermitages and to the history of eighteenth century gardens. Tea and coffee will be served at 4.30pm. 5.00pm Roundtable on Rousseau’s Politics of Taste (Edinburgh University Press, 2024) by Jared Holley (University of Edinburgh) Discussants: Jane Cooper (All Souls College, Oxford), Holly Rowe (Lincoln College, Oxford), and Olivier Higgins (New College, Oxford) Response by Jared Holley A small wine reception will follow the event.
Hosted by the EMPTINESS project and co-organised by Stanford University Press, this series of masterclasses will demystify digital project development, publishing, and preservation. While the traditional print book has and will continue to advance scholarly communication, it is becoming increasingly more useful to present scholarly arguments in a multimodal framework. Digital publications allow authors to frame their arguments within and alongside the data, media, and multi-linear pathways that best represent and exemplify those arguments. The masterclasses will present insights into the various aspects of digital publishing, from making the decision to go digital and securing funding and partnerships, to working with a publisher and ensuring a project’s longevity. The event will be of particular interest to Social Sciences and Arts & Humanities researchers and publishers as well as digital technicians/research software engineers interested in digital preservation pathways and web archiving. ‘Digital Infrastructures’ (2nd of 4 masterclasses): Speakers will introduce examples of digital publications and the modalities and platforms they employ; offer insights and experiences on acquiring grant funding for digital projects, and outline the kinds of support and relationships that underpin successful digital project development. Q&A will follow each of the three presentations. Attendance is free, but places are limited. We look forward to seeing you there!
Most audiences in most countries still get their information about climate change from mainstream media, including tv news, online news sites and documentaries. In this seminar, based on discussion, we look at six of the complex challenges facing journalists: Should they be advocates? What language should they use? How are climate misinformation and disinformation changing? How to report extreme weather events? How to balance fear versus hope? How to move climate change 'out of the ghetto’.
After the election of Kwame Nkrumah as president of the Republic of Ghana in 1960, Ghanaian architects explored new building models that were both modern and culturally sensitive, alongside foreign architects attracted to the vibrant cosmopolitan environment.
Amit Chaudhuri, ‘On First Noticing Bergman and Kafka' The Bateson Lecture (NB this lecture is from 5-6 at Corpus Christi College, followed by a drinks reception)
Join online via Microsoft Teams by clicking here: https://tinyurl.com/bdff6tpt
The Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences is delighted to invite you to attend the Inaugural Lecture of Professor Bruce Biccard as The Nuffield Chair of Anaesthetic Sciences 'Safer surgery and anaesthesia: a global health imperative' Dress code: National dress, business attire or black gown and hood Catering at the drinks reception will consist of light canapés including vegetarian, vegan and gluten free options The Inaugural Lecture will be a fully accessible event, within the limitations of the building. https://www.accessguide.ox.ac.uk/examination-schools There will be filming and photography of this event
Graduates working across Faculties are invited to discuss the methodologies through which they conduct their research. Additional information about this session will be circulated in due course.
Jan Wagner and Norbert Hummelt will introduce Tanzt die Orange! 100 Antworten auf Rilke (Hanser 2025). This is a compendium of poems written after Rilke by some of the leading voices in German poetry. This event will be in German and take place in the Memorial Room
The art of conversation begins with a leap of faith. It is increasingly recognised as an invaluable skill in professional and personal development. Good conversational skills helps in forming relationships, sharing ideas, and building communities, whilst raising awareness of ourselves and others. As we rely more and more on technology, are these skills being lost? In this session, our Artist in Residence, Joy Richardson, will explore ways you can develop your communication skills, and increase your confidence when speaking with others. Joy will also be reading extracts from her diary ‘Conversations with Strangers’ in which she shares her extraordinary and unexpected encounters with total strangers that helped her through her life. About Joy Joy RichardsonJoy Richardson is an actor, artist and writer. Her work as an actor includes productions at the National Theatre, Shakespeare’s Globe, the Royal Shakespeare Company, Television and film. Joy is currently Artist in Residence at Kellogg College, delivering art sessions throughout each term, as part of her Art / Nature Project. Joy is currently writing a book on her conversations with strangers, using diary extracts over decades of unexpected and surprising conversations with strangers.
We are an interdisciplinary reading group which focuses on the social science, history, and theology of demons, the Devil, and supernatural evil as they relate to politics, identity formation, and social conflicts. Each week we will examine one academic paper or book chapter on these topics, gaining familiarity with subjects such as: the psychology of dehumanization, the conceptual development of the term “demon,” and contemporary political demonologies like QAnon. Hilary Term 2026, Thursdays from 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM Weeks 1,3,4,5,6,7,8: 21 St Giles (Kendrew Quad) Teaching Room G4 Week 2: 14 St Giles (next door to the Lamb & Flag) Seminar Room H Please contact Scott Maybell for the readings or for any questions: scott.maybell@sjc.ox.ac.uk
In a world of clickbait headlines and algorithm-driven feeds, thinking critically about the information we consume is more vital than ever. This interactive workshop aimed at undergraduates will help you to evaluate the credibility and bias in today’s news and social media. Through hands-on activities and real-world examples, you'll learn how to assess sources, identify misinformation, and trace claims and quotes to their original context. By the end of this session, you will be able to: describe what critical thinking means in the context of news articles and social media sources; identify different forms of bias in news and social media; recognise misinformation and 'fake news'; and understand and apply the SIFT Method to evaluate claims in news and social media sources. Intended audience: Taught student
REACH (www.reachwater.uk) was a long term, interdisciplinary research programme that delivered improved water security for over 10 million people in Africa and Asia. In 2024, it won the Vice Chancellor’s Award for Research Engagement. A defining feature of REACH was its strong commitment to developing early career researchers, embedding them in long-term research observatories, applied policy engagement, and research-informed approaches to water risk and resilience. This lecture is the first in an annual series that will continue to share the latest on water security in research and practice. This year, we will hear from three REACH programme alumni who will share their work on water security in Ethiopia and Kenya, and reflect on research impact pathways in water security. Speakers Dr. Florence Tanui is a hydrogeologist who currently serves as a specialist at the UNESCO Regional Office for Eastern Africa in Nairobi. Her work primarily focuses on water security, groundwater management, and the impacts of climate change on transboundary water resources. Her research under the REACH programme focused on groundwater resources and management in Turkana and Kitui counties, Kenya. Dr Engdasew Feleke worked on the REACH – WISER project, leading and designing social science research using qualitative methods to understand water security inequalities in Awash River Basin, Ethiopia. Her current role is Gender Specialist for the BRIGHT project with Ethiopia’s Water and Land Resource Center (WLRC). A €45 million programme, BRIGHT aims to improve resilience and reduce vulnerability to drought and climate change in Ethiopia. Engda’s work focuses on gender mainstreaming and social inclusion in Integrated Water Resource Management in the five basins covered by this project. Dennis Ochieng Onyango Ong'ech was Observatory Coordinator for the REACH programme in Kenya and has gone on to co-lead research in the Climate Forecasting, Adaptation, and Legitimacy (ClimateForAL) project which aims to identify the optimal way to communicate climate information in Turkana, drawing on the preferences of end-users and the insights of traditional forecasters. Currently studying for a PhD at the University of Nairobi, Dennis holds an MSc. in International Development (Conflict, Security and Development) from Birmingham University (UK).
How should postgraduate and early career researchers in the environmental humanities go about publishing within and beyond academia? What does it mean to envisage one’s work in this relatively novel interdisciplinary context? What opportunities does it offer, and what considerations might it provoke? This panel brings together experienced publishers and academics for a wide-ranging discussion of ways to disseminate your work in this broad field. Anna Henderson (ARC Humanities Press) and Rebecca Brennan (Princeton University Press) will discuss how to develop doctoral and early career research into book proposals and monographs, Jamie Lorimer (Geography) will talk about publishing in Environmental Humanities and similar journals, and Amanda Power (History) will explore options for wider engagement, especially through writing for The Conversation. Come along with your ideas and questions!
Lesson of the week, clinical cases and research. All clinical and academic staff and students welcome. Coffee and Tea will be served.
COURSE DETAILS Join us for an insightful session that aims to equip researchers with the tools needed to engage confidently and effectively with the public on controversial and sensitive topics. In this interactive online session, Science Communicator Hana Ayoob will take us through the importance of engaging with these topics, aiming to equip researchers with the skills and knowledge to engage confidently in an empathetic and effective way. This session is relevant to scientists across the sciences, and will explore topics ranging from the use of animals in research, to nuclear power, and topics arising from your research area. Upon completion of the course, participants will be well-prepared to engage with sensitivity and confidence on controversial topics, contributing to a more inclusive and informed public discourse within their respective fields. LEARNING OUTCOMES Attending this session will give you the opportunity to: Recognise why certain research topics are sensitive or controversial for diverse audience groups. Develop skills to communicate controversial topics empathetically and respectfully. Acquire knowledge and techniques for engaging the public on sensitive subjects. Understand and apply ethical considerations when addressing controversial issues with the public. Build confidence in communicating complex ideas related to sensitive topics. Explore specific controversial themes relevant to your research areas for practical application
Dysfunction in motivation represents an important transdiagnostic facet of psychiatric symptoms, and has been associated with dopamine network dysfunction in animal models. In this talk we will present a series of experiments designed to examine the distinct processes underlying motivation and explore their neural correlates via multi-modal high-field MRI in individuals with and without depression. The efficacy of a motivation-based neurofeedback intervention will also be described, alongside the utility of tracking individuals in the real-world via smartphone app.
An online introduction to using alerts to keep up to date with new research and save you time. A combination of presenter-led instruction and the opportunity for participants to set up email alerts to receive notifications for publications in their field of research. We invite you to send any questions you have in advance to usered@bodleian.ox.ac.uk for the instructors to cover in the session. There will also be opportunities to ask questions in the class. The workshop will cover: how email alerts can help you; setting up alerts on your favourite databases and other platforms for new content in your field; and managing your alerts. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student
Long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (LC-PUFA) are fundamental components of animal biology, playing essential roles in membrane organisation, cell signalling, neural function and developmental processes. In vertebrates, the biosynthesis of LC-PUFA depends on a relatively conserved and often limited set of desaturase and elongase enzymes, rendering many species partially dependent on dietary sources. In contrast, numerous invertebrate lineages retain the capacity to synthesise polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) de novo, supported by a more diverse and flexible enzymatic repertoire. This seminar explores the molecular and evolutionary basis of LC-PUFA biosynthesis in invertebrates, using the marine annelid Platynereis dumerilii as a tractable model system. By combining functional characterisation of fatty acyl desaturases and elongases with phylogenetic analyses, the work reveals how invertebrate pathways differ from vertebrate counterparts in both organisation and metabolic potential. These differences include the presence of alternative desaturation steps, expanded enzyme families and lineage-specific innovations that enable efficient LC-PUFA production from C18 fatty acid precursors. Beyond pathway architecture, the seminar integrates lipidomic analyses to illustrate how LC-PUFA biosynthesis is regulated in vivo and how membrane lipid composition responds to environmental variables such as temperature. Together, these findings highlight the biochemical versatility of invertebrate lipid metabolism and underscore the value of invertebrate models for understanding the evolution, regulation and physiological significance of LC-PUFA biosynthesis across animals.
Hosted by the EMPTINESS project and co-organised by Stanford University Press, this series of masterclasses will demystify digital project development, publishing, and preservation. While the traditional print book has and will continue to advance scholarly communication, it is becoming increasingly more useful to present scholarly arguments in a multimodal framework. Digital publications allow authors to frame their arguments within and alongside the data, media, and multi-linear pathways that best represent and exemplify those arguments. The masterclasses will present insights into the various aspects of digital publishing, from making the decision to go digital and securing funding and partnerships, to working with a publisher and ensuring a project’s longevity. The event will be of particular interest to Social Sciences and Arts & Humanities researchers and publishers as well as digital technicians/research software engineers interested in digital preservation pathways and web archiving. ‘Working with a Publisher’ (3rd of 4 masterclasses): From drafting text and preparing multimedia assets, to writing a proposal and identifying potential publishers, to managing expectations for peer review, contracts, and production, the digital publishing trajectory consists of a series of efforts and milestones that together inform a final product that is equal in value and legitimacy to a traditional book. This masterclass will help authors navigate the process and convey to supporters and stakeholders the scholarly rigor and innovative practices inherent in digital publications. Attendance is free, but places are limited. We look forward to seeing you there!
Recent think pieces, panel discussions and pedagogical initiatives concerning public musicology have proven invaluable in fostering a sense of shared commitment, clarifying what is at stake and providing practical advice for addressing ‘non-academic’ audiences. In our eagerness to overcome the presumed chasm between the university and society, however, we have arguably brushed over some fundamental, if potentially awkward, questions: Which public (or publics) are we talking about? What do we want to achieve by engaging with them? What might they have to teach us? Recently, scholars of Western art music have used their public-facing work to contribute to wider efforts to diversify the concert repertoire and to question established historical narratives. Yet even those important achievements have often been realised through familiar, monological modes of presentation, such as the programme note and the pre-concert talk. Written from the perspective of a music historian, this talk explores an alternative approach, combining elements of what Naomi André (2018) terms ‘engaged musicology’ with the practices of music education and community music. Between 2023 and 2025, I worked with a network of partners from higher education, the cultural sector and beyond to develop ‘Let’s Build a Town!’, a creative arts project in Oxford. Taking inspiration from recent research on Paul Hindemith’s music for children – and seeking to reimagine his aspiration to promote young people’s agency and creativity through play – we organised a series of workshops and rehearsals at a primary school and a secondary school in east Oxford. The project culminated in a performance in which scenes from Hindemith’s Wir bauen eine Stadt (1930), an experimental work of music theatre, were interspersed with new, co-created music, movement and performance games. Drawing on interviews with a multidisciplinary team of artists and workshop leaders, I ask what added value (if any) a music historian might bring to a community arts project of this kind, and reflect on the advantages and limits of a more modest, localised and genuinely collaborative model of semi-public musicology.
This paper examines social mixing at a mixed-tenure neighbourhood in London – a former social housing estate which is undergoing a lengthy radical regeneration process. This process involves rehousing of tenants into newly-built social housing properties, alongside extensive building of large numbers of upmarket flats for sale. The latter has brought about a radically changed neighbourhood demographic involving a far more affluent population, alongside visible signs of gentrification. The research methods include participant observation, a resident survey and semi-structured interviews with residents and officials. The paper explores social mixing between the established social tenants and the newer residents living in the private housing blocks, and it highlights several reasons why such social mixing is overall extremely limited. First is the way that the social housing blocks are physically separated from the private housing blocks. Second is how the spatial focus of the private residents is often the block itself, a process which is reinforced by social media usage, as well as by use of exclusive gyms and swimming pools. Third are the large class and demographic differences between the social tenants and private residents. Fourth is the different usage of local amenities and public space. Fifth are the very different housing governance regimes in operation. Sixth are inter-personal tensions which exist between the two groups. Rather than social mixing, the dominant socio-spatial configuration at the neighbourhood is one of segregation and parallel lives. ———————————————————————————————————————————— Speaker bio: Paul Watt is Visiting Professor in the Department of Sociology, London School of Economics and Political Science, and Emeritus Professor in Urban Studies at Birkbeck, University of London. He has published widely on social housing, urban regeneration, communities and neighbourhoods, homelessness, housing activism, gentrification, suburbanisation, and the 2012 London Olympic Games. He is co-editor with Peer Smets of ‘Social Housing and Urban Renewal: A Cross-National Perspective’ (Emerald, 2017), and co-editor with Phil Cohen of ‘London 2012 and the Post-Olympics City: A Hollow Legacy?’ (Palgrave Macmillan, 2017). His latest book is ‘Estate Regeneration and Its Discontents: Public Housing, Place and Inequality in London’ (Policy Press, 2021) (https://policy.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/estate-regeneration-and-its-discontents) ———————————————————————————————————————————— Booking is required for people outside of the Department of Social Policy and Intervention (DSPI). DSPI Members do not need to register.
Responsibility for post-16 education in the UK was centralised by successive UK governments between 1944 and 1997 and divided into a patchwork of six separate systems for adult education, apprenticeships, further education, higher education, schools and work-based training. Devolution of these responsibilities to Wales began tentatively in 1997 and was then strengthened in 2006, 2011 and 2017. Throughout this period of devolution there were attempts by the Welsh Government to create a panoramic view of an integrated tertiary system of post-16 education covering funding, applications, qualifications and quality enhancement. These attempts contended with established education structures, patterns of funding, administrative systems and working/learning cultures. This seminar will explore the history of these developments and explore the tensions that have been exposed on the way. Professor Huw Morris is on a full-time secondment from the Welsh Government to the Institute of Education to work on research development work and policy engagement. Before taking up this role Professor Morris was Director of Skills, Higher Education and Lifelong Learning for nine years overseeing the work of universities, further education colleges, apprenticeship providers in Wales. Before taking on this role in the civil service he worked in the higher education sector for 27 years holding positions from research assistant to dean, pro vice chancellor and deputy vice chancellor in universities across the UK. Professor Morris was a member of the education sub-panel of the Research Excellence Framework in 2021 and has been a member of the ESRC Grants Approval Panel since 2021. Professor Morris is a member of the editorial board of Policy Reviews in Higher Education and a trustee of UK Research Integrity Organisation (UKRIO).
Camille Serchuk (Southern Connecticut State University) is in conversation with Elizabeth Baigent (School of Geography and the Environment, University of Oxford).
Biology is not constant but highly rhythmic. This includes the fast rhythms of action potentials in the nervous system and the pulsatile release of hormones. At a longer timescale are the daily (circadian) rhythms and annual rhythms observed across much of the biological world. This talk will consider the mechanisms and importance of circadian rhythms to human health and the role of seasonal timing in reproduction and other phenomena in birds, mammals and humans. In biology, like the rest of science, timing is everything. Russell Foster is Professor of Circadian Neuroscience and the Head of the Nuffield Laboratory of Ophthalmology in Oxford. He has featured widely in print and broadcast media on the subject of sleep and circadian rhythms and is the author of several popular books on the subject. Please email external-relations@maths.ox.ac.uk to register to attend in person. The lecture will be broadcast on the Oxford Mathematics YouTube Channel on Thursday 5 March at 5-6 pm and any time after (no need to register for the online version). The Oxford Mathematics Public Lectures are generously supported by XTX Markets.
The global refugee regime has shifted under our feet. Over the last forty years, international asylum practices have expanded to include the queer and trans displaced. At least thirty-seven countries now recognize LGBTIQ refugees on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity, with some states providing specialized support. Yet amid this expansion, backlash has intensified against refugee protection as well as the hard-earned rights of LGBTIQ people. In this disquieting context, the protection of LGBTIQ refugees remains partial and exclusionary. The Way Out examines the complexities of queer and trans displacement around the world. Centring personal narratives of LGBTIQ refugees, the book exposes the shortcomings of an international protection regime that is unable to address the harms that drive displacement. Rebecca Buxton and Samuel Ritholtz's analysis of the stakes of queer and trans inclusion in accounts of displacement justice offers a vibrant example of theory brought to life. About the speakers: Rebecca Buxton is Lecturer in Social and Political Philosophy at the University of Bristol. Samuel Ritholtz is Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Politics at All Souls College, University of Oxford.
Historians are familiar with the idea of the nation as an ‘imagined community’ that bound people across time and space from the late 18th century, predicated on modern communications. This lecture extends this idea into the 20th century and to a wider range of ‘invisible structures’ that were made more palpable via languages of social science, political and especially economic structures.
To join online, please register in advance: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/WWqjr8SgT_WrzTodI65cdg
Extreme right populism is on the rise worldwide, enforcing the exclusion of immigrants and foreigners. Why does the trend towards immigrant exclusion occur? To approach this quiz, I will focus on the case of Japan, where the Sansei party became the first right-wing populist party to enter mainstream politics in the 20 July 2025 Upper House election. Through the Japanese case, I will pursue mechanisms of the emergence of right-wing populism and the exclusion of immigrants and foreigners.
Keith Wrightson, _Ralph Tailor’s Summer: A Scrivener, His City, and the Plague_ (New Haven & London, 2011); Claire Gilbert, ‘An Age of Translation: Towards a Social History of Linguistic Agents in the Early Modern World’, _Journal for Early Modern Cultural Studies_ 21:4 (2021), 1-23; A. D. M. van de Haar, ‘The Linguistic Coping Strategies of Three Netherlanders in England: Jan van der Noot, Lucas d’Heere, and Johannes Radermacher’, _Early Modern Low Countries_ 5 (2021), 192–215 *To attend online via Microsoft Teams, please email "$":mailto:ian.archer@history.ox.ac.uk*
This talk explores how and why Saudi Arabia burst onto the landscape of world football in 2023 and examines what the speed and scale of Saudi engagement, as investor, owner, sponsor, host, and participant, means for the Kingdom and for football more broadly. Analysis will place Saudi Arabia’s startling emergence as one of the hubs in world football in the 2020s in historical and comparative perspective, set against previous periods of Saudi investment in football, in the 1970s, and attempts elsewhere to rapidly kickstart the domestic game, in the United States, Japan, and China. Going beyond labels such as ‘sportswashing,’ which have gained media currency in recent years, Kingdom of Football examines what drives Saudi policymaking and connects the move into football with domestic economic and social developments and external and foreign policy considerations. The talk also examines how the Saudi foray into football builds upon but differs from the approaches taken by other Gulf States, such as the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, and assesses the factors that will determine the sustainability and durability of the Kingdom’s engagement with football in the decade-long runup to the 2034 World Cup. https://www.hurstpublishers.com/book/kingdom-of-football/
Zeppelins played a significant role in shaping the British home front experience during World War I, which Trudi Tate characterised as “a fantasmatic, infantile, and pleasurable relationship to the war and its objects.” In September and October 1916, three German airships were shot down over Essex, events that drew tens of thousands of spectators, including journalists, who collected souvenirs or photographed the wreckage. Despite widespread disillusionment with the war, the presence of zeppelins elicited a paradoxical mix of intoxication, exhilaration, and horror (Freedman, 2004), a response reflected in the broader public imagination. Photographs and illustrations of burning airships and bombed houses, reproduced in the illustrated press, formed part of the burgeoning visual culture surrounding these spectacular events. This lecture examines the public emotional response, the extensive visual culture, including media narratives, and the mass consumption of wreckage souvenirs and postcards that emerged from these spectacles, thereby constituting what became known as the “Zeppelin Sublime.”
Thursday February 12, Room 10.424 (week 4) Hannah Fagan (Mansfield, Oxford), ‘New Granddaughters of Africa: the genealogical sagas of Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi, Namwali Serpell and Yaa Gyasi’
What does it mean to say ‘I am’? Is the sense of subjectivity a delusion? Are only humans conscious? What about whales, AI, and electrons? How should we use our consciousness? All these questions, and many others, will be examined by expert speakers in conversation with one another and with the audience in this 3-part symposium series. In this second event on 12 Feb, we will examine who has consciousness. Do non-human animals experience a sense of consciouness similar to our own? Is a sophisticated AI capable of consciousness? In fact, does even a table have some degree of consciousness, or is it only held by animate objects? Three short talks will provide a range of expert perspectives on these questions, followed by Q&A with the audience. Philip Goff (Philosophy, Durham University) Consciousness is everywhere Heather Browning (Philosophy, University of Southampton) Evidence for consciousness in non-human animals Patrick Butlin (Global Priorities Institute, University of Oxford) The case for AI consciousness
Has artificial intelligence reached the point of moving from providing intelligent responses, to elevating humans by actively shaping scientific discovery? In this special lecture, Lennard Lee showcases work initiated at Green Templeton College, setting out a new AI opportunity landscape for the college and its community. He explores the emerging concept of the “AI Scientist”: autonomous and semi-autonomous systems that can generate hypotheses, design experiments, learn from data, and work alongside human researchers. Drawing on the Oxford-led AI Scientist and Supercomputing project, the lecture examines how this approach can accelerate cancer vaccine research and signal a broader shift in how knowledge is created, tested, and translated for societal benefit. This talk speaks directly to those navigating the AI inflection point, as the world moves through a fourth technology revolution, and highlights the unique role Green Templeton can champion in shaping the future of medicine. Dr Lennard Lee is a Research Fellow of Green Templeton College and associate professor at the Nuffield Department of Medicine, University of Oxford. He is Chief Medical Officer of the Clinic at the Ellison Institute of Technology and a medical cancer doctor focused on using technology and data to deliver flagship national health programmes. This is the first of the Green Templeton Lectures 2026, exploring healthcare innovation. The series, Innovation and the Future of Health: Find, Fail, Fly, is convened by Associate Fellow Dr Christiaan de Koning and forms part of the activities of the Oxford Health Innovation Forum. The lecture series is generously sponsored by Mills & Reeve. To request a livestream link for this event, please email academic.projects@gtc.ox.ac.uk. Please note that the quality of the livestream will be limited as this is primarily designed as an in-person event.
Refreshments provided from 5.40 This talk is jointly organised by the NIHR Oxford Biomedical Research Centre and the NIHR Oxford Health Biomedical Research Centre Deep brain stimulation (DBS) has become a recognised way of tackling tremors in people with Parkinson’s disease. Now this technique – delivering an electrical pulse into the brain – is being explored as a potential treatment for other neurological conditions. A new study is looking at whether DBS can help to treat chronic pain in people who have suffered a stroke. Central post-stroke pain is a disabling – and currently untreatable – condition which affects areas of the brain and central nervous system that process pain signals. In this public talk, Alex Green, Professor of Neurosurgery, and Ben Seymour, Professor of Clinical Neuroscience, will discuss the EPIONE study, which is investigating whether DBS could be used to treat CPSP, and discuss whether DBS might be a way of tackling other brain-related conditions. The EPIONE study (Effective Pain Interventions with Neural Engineering) is supported by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Oxford and Oxford Health Biomedical Research Centres (BRC), who are jointly organising this talk. FREE entry, no booking required.
Event Overview: Pending Speaker Bio: Jen Easterly is a Visiting Fellow of Practice with the Oxford Programme for Cyber and Technology Policy (OxCTP) at the Blavatnik School of Government. Jen’s career spans more than three decades, including multiple combat deployments in the US Army, where she played a pivotal role in the creation of US Cyber Command and built and led the Army’s first cyber battalion. Jen is the former director of the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and served twice at the White House, including as Special Assistant to President Obama and Senior Director for Counterterrorism and earlier as Senior Policy Advisor to National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice. She also served as the Deputy for Counterterrorism at the National Security Agency and as a senior leader in Tailored Access Operations, NSA’s elite hacking team. A distinguished graduate of West Point and Rhodes Scholar, Jen is a two-time recipient of the Bronze Star as well as numerous awards, including the George C. Marshall Award in Ethical Leadership, the Girls Who Code Sisterhood Award, the Champion of Internet Freedom Award, the Admiral Grace Hopper Award, and the James W. Foley American Hostage Freedom Award. A member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Jen is the recipient of the Aspen Institute Finance Leaders Fellowship, the New America Foundation Senior International Security Fellowship, and the Director, National Security Agency Fellowship. Speaker Bio: Avril D. Haines is the former US Director of National Intelligence. As a member of President Biden’s cabinet, she led the US Intelligence Community and served as the President’s principal intelligence adviser. Haines has held senior roles across government, including principal deputy national security advisor, deputy director of the Central Intelligence Agency, legal adviser to the National Security Council, and deputy chief counsel to the US Senate’s Committee on Foreign Relations. She has also worked in academia, having served as a senior research scholar at Columbia University and a senior fellow at Johns Hopkins University. She is currently a visiting fellow at All Souls College at Oxford University. Haines received her Bachelor of Arts in Physics from the University of Chicago and a Juris Doctor from Georgetown University Law Center. She served as a law clerk for Judge Danny Boggs on the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and founded and ran a bookstore café for five years while engaged in community service in Baltimore. In 2017, President Obama appointed her to the National Commission on Military, National, and Public Service. She has also served on several boards and advisory groups over the years.
Title and speaker to be announced The Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that attendance at the Surgical Grand Rounds can count toward internal CPD, with 1 point awarded per hour. Please note that in-person attendance is required, and you will need to sign the attendance register. All members of the University and NHS clinical staff are welcome. Please email Tarryn Ching if you would like to attend online.
How do our methods of data collection and analysis impact on the populations we study? What does it mean to use queer methods for social research? Are queer methods only for studying LGBTIQ+ people? This workshop for students and early queer researchers using, or interested in using, queer methods for social science research, aims to explore what it means to queer our data and methods, and how we can think about social research and the impact our work can have on marginalised populations. The event begins with a keynote lecture and Q&A from Dr Kevin Guyan. We then have time for participants to present their work in progress and ongoing research for discussion feedback. This workshop is for anyone interested in considering how we collect data, and what it means for the populations we work with, whether you work directly with LGBTIQ+ populations, or are looking to bring queer methodologies to the study of broader social questions. Would you like to present at the workshop? We are looking for 3 people to give a 10 minute presentation on their current research, followed by a discussion. You can be at any stage of your career, and any discipline. You may be researching LGBTIQ+ populations in a range of contexts, or using queer methods to explore broader questions in social science. Please submit a title and abstract of no more than 200 words by Friday 30th January to emma.pritchard@sociology.ox.ac.uk. We will confirm your participation by Friday 6th February. Kevin is also available from 2-4 pm for one-to-one or small group discussions with students. Please contact him directly [kevin.guyan@ed.ac.uk] if you are interested.
Hosted by the EMPTINESS project and co-organised by Stanford University Press, this series of masterclasses will demystify digital project development, publishing, and preservation. While the traditional print book has and will continue to advance scholarly communication, it is becoming increasingly more useful to present scholarly arguments in a multimodal framework. Digital publications allow authors to frame their arguments within and alongside the data, media, and multi-linear pathways that best represent and exemplify those arguments. The masterclasses will present insights into the various aspects of digital publishing, from making the decision to go digital and securing funding and partnerships, to working with a publisher and ensuring a project’s longevity. The event will be of particular interest to Social Sciences and Arts & Humanities researchers and publishers as well as digital technicians/research software engineers interested in digital preservation pathways and web archiving. ‘Working with a Publisher’ (4th of 4 masterclasses): While books enjoy long-established archiving and preservation methods, digital projects are distinguished by their ephemerality in the face of changing and evolving technologies. This masterclass will explore three pathways for mitigating the seeming fragility of digital projects and provide insight and guidance on how the digital can persist as reliably as print in the scholarly record. Attendance is free, but places are limited. We look forward to seeing you there!
Specialist species thrive under specific environmental conditions in narrow geographic ranges and are widely recognized as heavily threatened by climate deregulation. Many might rely on both their potential to adapt and to disperse towards a refugium to avoid extinction. It is thus crucial to understand the influence of environmental conditions on the unfolding process of adaptation. I will present a PDE model of the eco-evolutionary dynamics of a specialist species in a two-patch environment with moving optima. The transmission of the adaptive trait across generations is modelled by a non-linear, non-local operator of sexual reproduction. In an asymptotic regime of small variance, I justify that the local trait distributions are well approximatted by Gaussian distributions with fixed variances, which allows to report the analysis on the closed system of moments. Thanks to a separation of time scales between ecology and evolution, I next derive a limit system of moments and analyse its stationary states. In particular, I identify the critical environmental speed for persistence, which reflects how both the existence of a refugium and the cost of dispersal impact extinction patterns. Additionally, the analysis provides key insights regarding the path towards this refugium. I show that there exists a critical environmental speed above which the species crosses a tipping point, resulting into an abrupt habitat switch from its native patch to the refugium. When selection for local adaptation is strong, this habitat switch passes through an evolutionary ‘‘death valley’’ that can promote extinction for lower environmental speeds than the critical one.
Good research data management is a vital component of academic practice. Part of this is the principle that the data used to develop the arguments and outcomes of your research should be effectively stored and managed during a project, preserved for the future and - where possible - shared with other academics. This session introduces the University’s research data policy and outlines the practical impact this will have on your work. The services available at Oxford to assist you will be outlined. This session is not only essential during your current studies but will be invaluable if you plan to continue in research as a career. Topics to be covered include: common dangers and pitfalls of digital data; key principles of RDM and organising your data effectively; producing a data management plan; institutional, funder and publisher requirements; issues around preserving data and cybersecurity; ORA-Data, GitHub and other preservation services; sharing thoughts and insights about the potential of data management in your own field; and accessing Oxford based tools for research data management. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student; staff
This paper studies how the intergenerational transmission of political preferences shapes citizens’ political involvement. I develop a two-period model in which parents choose a costly level of transmission effort, and children decide their level of political involvement. Higher transmission effort increases children’s incentives to choose a high level of involvement. Each child is then randomly paired with another child and incurs a cost when their political preferences differ, with this cost being larger when both are highly involved. The model shows how parental influence links the evolution of political preferences with political involvement.
Aquaporins facilitate the passive, bidirectional flow of water in all cells and tissues. In the brain and spinal cord, aquaporin-4 is highly expressed and enriched at astrocyte endfeet, synapses and the glia limitans. It facilitates the exchange of water across the blood-spinal cord and blood-brain barriers, controlling cell volume, extracellular space volume and astrocyte migration. The perivascular enrichment of aquaporin-4 is consistent with its central role in CNS fluid flow and brain clearance, although the mechanism by which that role is exerted remains unknown. We have demonstrated that aquaporin-4 localization is dynamically regulated at the subcellular level, affecting membrane water permeability. In animal models of ageing, stroke, traumatic injury and sleep disruption, impairment of CNS fluid flow is associated with changes in perivascular aquaporin-4 localization. Each of these conditions represent established and emerging risk factors in developing neurodegeneration. Brain and spinal cord oedema are caused by the influx of water through aquaporin-4 in response to osmotic imbalances that occur following insults such as traumatic injury, stroke or tumour development. We have demonstrated that reducing dynamic subcellular relocalization of aquaporin-4 to the blood-spinal cord or blood-brain barriers reduces oedema and accelerates functional recovery in rodent injury models. Given the difficulties in developing pore-blocking aquaporin-4 inhibitors or activators and controversies in the field over the status of many proposed molecules, targeting dynamic aquaporin-4 subcellular relocalization provides a new approach to modulating aquaporin-4 function. This approach also opens up new treatment avenues for CNS oedema, neurovascular and neurodegenerative diseases, and provides a framework to address fundamental unanswered questions about water homeostasis in health and disease. SPEAKER BIOGRAPHY Roslyn Bill is Aston University’s 50th Anniversary Professor of Biotechnology and Director of Aston Institute for Membrane Excellence, which is funded by a £10M grant from Research England. Roslyn obtained her Batchelor, Master and Doctoral degrees from Oxford University and spent postdoctoral periods in Cambridge, the University of Michigan (as a Fulbright Scholar) and Gothenburg University before moving to Aston in 2002. She was awarded an ERC Advanced Grant in 2023 for her work on the regulation of aquaporin water channels in the human brain. She is a founding member of the aquaporin sub-committee of the IUPHAR/Guide to Pharmacology and Chief Scientific Officer of Estuar Pharmaceuticals. She served two terms as Chair of BBSRC Research Committee E and recently completed her tenure as Executive Editor of BBA Biomembranes. Roslyn is currently a Visiting Fellow hosted by Corpus Christi College and DPAG and a ‘Big if True Science’ Fellow supported by Renaissance Philanthropy and ARIA.
In the early 1970s, the Black Power Movement in Britain was in a state of peril. Having long been pushed to the sidelines of the movement, Black women activists were in open rebellion. Challenging the patriarchal arrangements of Black organising spaces, they began meeting independently of the men in their organisations. Forming women’s caucuses in organisations such as the Black Panthers and the Black Unity and Freedom Party, these early study groups were to lay the foundation for the burgeoning Black Women’s Movement. This paper maps a cartography of the social, cultural and intellectual experiments cultivated by Black women’s groups in the 1970s and 1980s. Honing a collective voice, Black women crafted an analysis of the racialised, gendered and economic dimensions of their subjection in Britain. Focusing on the debates, sites of contention and knowledge produced by working-class Black women in the second half of the twentieth century, this paper illuminates the genealogies of Black women’s artistic and intellectual practices and the contributions they made to contemporary Black feminist thought. - Jade Bentil is a writer and historian from South London. She holds a DPhil in History from Merton College, the University of Oxford. Situated in Black feminist thought, her scholarship uses oral history methodologies to centre the experiences of Black women of African and Caribbean descent in Britain and their long histories of rebellion. For her doctoral scholarship on the Black Women’s movement, Jade was awarded the 2022 Diversity and Inclusion Fellowship from the North American Conference on British Studies, the 2023 Justin Champion Fellowship in Black British History from the Institute of Historical Research, and the 2024 Drusilla Dunjee Houston Award from the Association of Black Women Historians. Jade’s debut book, REBEL CITIZEN, uses oral history interviews to explore the lived experiences of Black women who migrated to Britain following the Second World War and is forthcoming from Allen Lane. Her debut monograph, an oral history of the Black Women’s movement, is forthcoming from Oxford University Press. Jade is currently teaching a course on Black British Feminism as part of the MSt in Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Oxford.
A principal seeks to contract with an agent but must do so through an informed delegate. Although the principal cannot directly mediate the interaction, she can constrain the menus of contracts the delegate may offer. We show that the principal can implement any outcome that is implementable through a direct mechanism satisfying dominant strategy incentive compatibility and ex-post participation for the agent. We apply this result to several settings. First, we show that a government that delegates procurement to a budget-indulgent agency should delegate an interval of screening contracts. Second, we show that a seller can delegate sales to an intermediary without revenue loss, provided she can commit to a return policy. Third, in contrast to centralized mechanism design, we demonstrate that no partnership can be efficiently dissolved in the absence of a mediator. Finally, we discuss when delegated contracting obstructs efficiency, and when choosing the right delegate may help restore it.
Identification in Structural Vector Autoregressions (SVARs) often relies on external proxy variables that are assumed to be valid instruments—highly correlated with a single structural shock and uncorrelated with all others. In practice, however, researchers often face a ``proxy zoo'' of imperfect candidates, where these exclusion restrictions are unlikely to hold. This paper develops a novel framework for set identification in SVARs that relaxes the need for valid instruments. We introduce a generalized ranking assumption, requiring only that a proxy is more strongly correlated with the target shock than with any other. This much weaker condition allows us to work with contaminated proxies that would be invalid under a standard instrumental variable approach. We combine this with traditional sign restrictions to construct sharp identified sets for monetary policy impulse responses. We characterize the geometric structure of the feasible set of structural parameters, which is formed by the intersections of spherical caps determined by the proxy information. Our method provides a robust tool for researchers to compute valid bounds on dynamic causal effects when only imperfect proxies are available.
Do you need help managing your references? Do you need help citing references in your documents? This online session will introduce you to EndNote, a subscription software programme which can help you to store, organise and retrieve your references and PDFs, as well as cite references in documents and create bibliographies quickly and easily. On completing the workshop you will be able to: understand the main features and benefits of EndNote; set up an EndNote account; import references from different sources into EndNote; organise your references in EndNote; insert citations into documents; and create a bibliography/reference list. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; taught student; researcher and research student
On 13 February 2026, the University of Oxford will mark the centenary of the death of Francis Ysidro Edgeworth, one of the most original and influential figures in the history of Economics. Edgeworth held the Drummond Professorship of Political Economy at Oxford and was a Fellow of All Souls College. He is celebrated for pioneering the use of mathematical methods in Economics, developing utility theory, and introducing concepts - such as indifference curves and the Edgeworth box - that remain at the core of microeconomics today. To honour Edgeworth’s legacy, we invite you to a special two-hour event designed for a broad economics audience, from interested undergraduates and graduate students to faculty and friends of the subject. The event will also recognise Edgeworth’s central role in the profession: as founding editor of the Economic Journal, the journal of the Royal Economic Society, he shaped economic discourse for 35 years and helped to establish standards that still influence the field. The programme will feature four short talks highlighting different dimensions of Edgeworth’s life and work. Prof Sir John Vickers will reflect on Edgeworth as an Oxford figure and theorist of monopoly. Prof John Sutton will explore Edgeworth’s contributions to oligopoly theory. Prof Mary Morgan will discuss Edgeworth in the context of her work on models in economics, and Prof Kevin O’Rourke will examine Edgeworth’s insights on trade and international economics. Together, these perspectives will offer an accessible yet intellectually rich introduction to Edgeworth’s ideas and their lasting impact. The event is organised by Michael McMahon and John Vickers. It will take place in Oxford from 4pm to 6pm and will be streamed live for those unable to attend in person. All those with an interest in economics - students at all levels, faculty, and members of the wider economics community - are warmly encouraged to join
Week Four (13 February, Lecture Room VII) Primary: Marge Piercy, Woman on the Edge of Time, Chapters 10-12 Supplementary: Shulamith Firestone, The Dialectic of Sex (1970), Chapter 1
Seminar followed by Q&A and drinks - attend in person or join online - all welcome Abstract: The mainstreaming of Green Infrastructure has grounded multi-functionality, connectivity, access to nature, and the alignment of people, nature and place in praxis in both the UK and internationally. This is supported by a growing set of policy and evaluative approaches that provide a framework for planners and the environment profession to deliver more resilient places. As “greening” efforts continue it remains critical to reflect on best practice to identify what types of investment are developed. Moreover, by reflecting on how and why Green Infrastructure in geographically diverse places we are better able to assess the influence of scale, time and disciplinary differences in what is delivered. The talk will draw on research from the UK and Asia to discuss how the politics of place shapes the form, function and quality of investment in urban Green Infrastructure. Biography: Ian Mell is Professor in Environmental & Landscape Planning at the University of Manchester. He has over twenty years of experience in academia and practice examining the ways in which Green Infrastructure is designed, planned for, and evaluated in both the UK and internationally. His work supported the development of the National Green Infrastructure Standards Framework (Defra/Natural England, 2023) and he is the author of growing Green Infrastructure Green Infrastructure in Contemporary Asian Cities (Routledge, 2025) and co-author of Rural Planning Futures (Scott et al., 2025, Routledge).
What does it mean for distant peoples to need each other without knowing each other, for “us” to need “them,” and vice versa? Since Adam Smith, interdependence between strangers has been the source of opportunism, utopianism, and unspeakable atrocity. This lecture, looking especially at controversies since the 1970s, puts the fevered debates about globalisation of our times into historical perspective — and asks what we can learn from disputes past to create better arguments for the future. *Jeremy Adelman* is the Henry Charles Lea Professor Emeritus of History at Princeton University and the Director of the Global History Lab at the University of Cambridge, which is based at the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and the Humanities (CRASSH). His works cover Latin American and global history, including _Worlds Together, Worlds Apart: A History of Humankind from Origins to the Present_ (W W Norton, 8th edition 2026) and the forthcoming _The Capitalist Age: Making and Unmaking of the Global Mind_ (Princeton University Press, late spring 2026). Dress code: Business dress
Why should clinicians care about economic value? How does the economics of the health system affect day-to-day working practices and experiences? How can clinicians influence resourcing decisions that improve value? During the seminar, Jacque will explore the economic paradigm of the NHS, and how economics can help grow value through cycles of improvement. The workshop is organised in two parts: Part A: The economics of the system Who pays for what and how does the money flow? What are the opportunities for increasing value as we move forward? Part B: Using the economic lens to drive value over time How can clinicians use economic principles to influence investment and resource allocation.
Eukaryotic cells sense and decode chemical and mechanical signals via plasma membrane receptors such as integrins. Evidence, including our own[1], shows the plasma membrane encodes, amplifies, and feeds back on these extracellular cues. How can a compositionally heterogeneous fluid bilayer process information? We find that upon integrin activation, cells generate localized mesoscale liquid-ordered membrane domains (“active emulsions”[2]) downstream of RhoA signaling and mechanotransduction[1]. These domains encode substrate chemistry and mechanics, regulating integrin function, cell spreading, and migration. Such organization arises from engagement with myosin motors, a dynamic cortical actin meshwork, and actively maintained bilayer asymmetry, creating an ATP-fueled, mechano-responsive medium integrating peripheral cues. 1. PMID: 31104842; 2. PMID: 35867835
Week 5 Monday 16th February 12.15pm, Room 10.424, Schwarzman Centre, Adelene Buckland, King’s College London ‘The Artificial Mother: Inventing Attachment in the Gilded Age'
If you’re interested in presenting a 10-20 minute paper on your research, please email us by the end of Week 3 latest.
The achievement goal complex integrates the specific goal an individual pursues with the underlying reasons for that pursuit. Using a person-centered approach, this study identified subgroups of undergraduates differing in their reasons for endorsing a performance-approach goal and examined associations with background factors (gender, prior achievement, faculty) and psychoeducational outcomes (e.g., interest, satisfaction, grades). Participants were 659 Thai undergraduates (27.5% female; M = 19.09, SD = 0.73) from Humanities, Social Sciences, and Management faculties. Latent Profile Analysis revealed four subgroups: Highly Motivated, Moderately Motivated, Minimally Motivated, and Autonomously Motivated. Background characteristics predicted membership, and the Highly and Autonomously Motivated profiles showed higher self-efficacy and lower hopelessness than the other groups. Findings are interpreted through a sociocultural lens, contributing to understanding how different motivational configurations underlie performance-approach striving.
This presentation outlines a constrained use of large language models (LLMs) in sociology and demography, grounded in an information-theoretic account of language. LLMs are treated as lossy statistical compression systems operating over non-injective mappings from social meaning to text. On this basis, their appropriate uses are limited to supporting existing analytical work: improving clarity of expression, surfacing textual regularities, and stress-testing arguments and assumptions. They are not sources of evidence, explanation, or social inference. Used within these limits, LLMs can reduce linguistic friction without being mistaken for epistemic agents. Biography: Daniel is a Senior Data Scientist and Postdoctoral Researcher in Computational Social Science at the Leverhulme Centre for Demographic Science. His research in the Centre is focused on the development of robust estimation methods for social science and in the development of software libraries in Python and R to perform multiverse-type estimations. Additionally, he researches the application of machine learning / deep learning models (e.g., BERT, RoBERTa, GPT-2) on social science problems like misinformation detection and characterisation on social media text, and the characterisation of social movement emotions over time based on associated tweets. Prior to joining Oxford, Daniel completed his PhD in Computational Social Science at the University of Leeds, and before that worked for several years as a quantitative analyst at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile. His general interests are related to the use of machine learning methods to understand human behaviour and the application of novel methods for robust parameter estimation, either using multiverse-type approaches or Bayesian / probabilistic approaches. Please join either in person or online. For in-person attendees, the talk will be preceded by a light lunch at 12.15pm.
In this paper, we provide systematic evidence in support of the long-standing hypothesis that taxation was an important driver of the French Revolution. We first document that areas with heavier taxes experienced more riots between 1750 and 1789 and voiced more complaints against taxation in the {cahiers de dol\'eances} of 1789. After showing that these effects are driven by indirect taxes, we exploit sharp changes in the salt tax and the {traites}—the two principal indirect levies—to implement a regression discontinuity design (RDD). We find that unrest was higher on the high-tax side of the border. These effects intensified over time, peaking in the 1780s, and were stronger where fiscal disparities were larger and Enlightenment ideas more widespread. Combining the RDD with weather shocks during the 1780s, we further show that unusually hot summers amplified unrest in high-tax municipalities. We then document that taxation fuelled the spread of unrest during the {Grande Peur}—the wave of revolts that swept France in July 1789 and culminated in the abolition of feudal privileges. Finally, we link taxation to revolutionary politics in Paris, documenting that deputies from heavily taxed constituencies were more likely to frame the tax system as oppressive and unequal, support the Revolution, demand the abolition of the monarchy, and vote for the king’s execution.
Group identities shape how individuals understand themselves and orient social behaviour. Group identities are built on different levels. On the largest scale they are built on established social categories such as gender, race, or nationality. On the smallest scale they emerge in informal groups that are built in specific social contexts through everyday interactions. Sociological research has focused primarily on studying identification with established social categories. Less is known about how identification develops within informal, overlapping groups that emerge from everyday interaction. This study examines identification with emerging social groups that are perceived and reported by individuals in the context of a newly established community of engineering undergraduate students in Switzerland. The study integrates social identity theory with relational approaches to social structure. We conceptualize identification as an evaluative orientation toward group membership shaped by interdependent social processes rather than by individual attributes or dyadic ties alone. Using network autocorrelation models that account for interaction-based dependence and correlated outcomes induced by overlapping group memberships, we assess relational, experiential, and contextual mechanisms of identification. The results show that identification is systematically patterned by multiple, interacting dimensions of social organization. Relational interdependence through interaction ties and locally defined norms, cognitively mediated environments arising from overlapping group memberships, and experiential evaluations all contribute independently to variation in identification. In addition, the activities organizing group life differentiate contexts of identification, indicating that groups function as distinct social situations rather than interchangeable containers for social ties. Together, these findings advance a sociological account of identification grounded in everyday social structure and demonstrate how identity processes can be systematically linked to relational and contextual interdependence in informal group settings.
For some of us, our research projects are situated back home or in locations where we have already spent considerable time. For the rest of us, our field sites could be in locations where we are visiting or living for the first time. Some of us work closely with people in our own communities, whilst others join local communities as external fieldworkers. Depending on our backgrounds, we may navigate fieldwork as "insider" researchers, "outsider" researchers, or both. There may be varying kinds of social norms and local expectations for researchers from different backgrounds. Some of us might start our fieldwork as outsiders, but we may find ourselves no longer entirely outsiders after spending some time in the field, and the ways in which locals consider us may also shift over time. Similarly, insiders may be subject to new expectations from their local communities when returning home for fieldwork after spending some time outside their communities. At this workshop, former fieldworkers will share their experiences in the field, and we will discuss the opportunities and challenges of navigating fieldwork as insiders, outsiders, or both. The workshop is an open space for meeting other fieldworkers and discussing various fieldwork-related topics, including but not limited to tips and strategies to prepare for and navigate fieldwork smoothly. Panellists: Professor David Gellner, FBA — Professor Emeritus of Social Anthropology; Fellow of All Souls College Xin Qu — DPhil Student, School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography Dr Natasha Robinson — Postdoctoral Researcher, Department of Education Moderator: Dr Keiko Kanno
We study the distributional impacts of carbon pricing policies using a multi-sector general equilibrium (GE) model with input-output linkages, heterogeneous agents and segmented labor markets. Households differ in their consumption patterns, labor types, and ownership of equity and capital. Pricing the carbon content of products affects households real income through an expenditure channel, according to the emissions intensity of their consumption baskets, and an earnings channel, as GE responses shift the relative demand for labor types, and returns on profits and rents. Calibrating the model with matched microdata for the Brazilian economy, we find regressive effects stemming from both channels. Ignoring the production networks and the gross complementarity between fuels, inputs and factors leads to a substantial underestimation of both aggregate and distributional effects. The incidence of the policy depends on how the revenue is recycled: expanding targeted social transfers fully offsets the regressive impact, whereas using the revenue to reduce preexisting consumption taxes improves efficiency but does not eliminate regressivity.
Puzzled by PICO? Daunted by databases? Baffled by Boolean? This one-hour introductory class will offer top tips and advice on how to find literature to answer a research question. No prior experience necessary! Together, we will break down a question into the PICO format, put together a structured search, and try it out in PubMed. By the end of this session, you will be able to: explain what structured searching is, and when to use it; break your research question down into searchable concepts; and make use of Boolean operators (ANDs/ORs) in your structured searches. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; taught student; researcher and research student
This talk is located in a post-colonial setting of urbanization and industrial modernization between the 1940-70s in India, when experts and publics began to remake knowledge regarding the bodies of workers and vulnerable citizens. This talk offers a framing to better understand post-colonial governmentality and health in Asia, specifically its symbolism, promise and limits for urban citizens. It argues that thinking about these modern, urban and industrial pathologies and diseases was narrowly focused on precarious metabolisms and unstable behaviors; and on questions of mental fitness, bodily stress and adaptability. At the same time this new metabolic thinking and studies led by Indian medical and social experts left out surrounding social risks and stressors. How did understandings of infection, immunity and risk get interpreted socially and epidemiologically, based on the needs of national productivity and morale, and what does it tell us about how knowledge of infectious and chronic diseases has emerged together rather than apart in India's health history and lifecourse. *Dr Kavita Sivaramakrishnan* is Ronald H Lauterstein Associate Professor at Columbia University. She is Co-Director of the Center for the History of Public Health at the Mailman School of Public Health. Her research focuses on history of medicine and health in modern South Asia, global health history and the relationships between disease outbreaks, the politics of medical expertise and care in late colonial and post-colonial South Asia. She is the author of, _As the World Ages: Rethinking a Demographic Crisis_ (Harvard University Press, 2018), and _Old Potions, New Bottles: Recasting Indigenous medicine in colonial Punjab_ (Orient Longman, 2006); and has two forthcoming books. A recently completed book manuscript on the politics of cardiology as a new and self-reliant technology of Indian modernity (co-authored with David Jones, Harvard University); and on the inescapable and pervasive remaking of new and chronic metabolisms in post-colonial India (supported by a grant the National Science Foundation). She is also working on a project on how resilience and coping amongst older populations has been understood and challenged as a lifecourse; and on a comparative, international history of consultants and expertise.
Speaking about the Scandinavian model of the social welfare system, former Prime Minister of Pakistan Imran Khan described it as inspired by and named after the ‘Umar Laws,’ due to its borrowing from the welfare state model established by the second caliph of Sunni Islam, Umar b. al-Khattab. The Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, in his inaugural speech in parliament in 2014, described his ascendancy to power as marking an end to one thousand years of slavery - an explicit reference to the so-called ‘Muslim period’ in Indian history as a humiliating subjugation of Hindus. The US President, Donald Trump, projects himself as a powerful force against the ‘Establishment’ and an upholder of traditional American values. The Italian Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, similarly vows to uphold traditional Italian values while assailing the atomization of society into dissoluble individual units. What is common between these and many other instances of political rhetoric across the globe is the peculiarity of the moment, reminiscent of the interwar period, when competing groups - reeling under inflationary pressures and a psychology of defeat - aspired to a utopian future based on an idyllic vision of the past, but ended up creating a dystopian present. It is this yearning for authenticity that provides the moral language of political content in both moments - too distant and yet too close. Beyond the globality of the shared moment, what is also common is the political and moral language of decoloniality, appropriated by the right wing: enabling Trump to champion a crusade against crony capitalism; allowing Modi and his supporters to advocate for a Hindu rashtra as a decolonial project; painting Imran Khan as a decolonial thinker for locating a welfare state model in Islamic history as an alternative superior to Scandinavia; and positioning the Italian Prime Minister as a critic of atomized consumerist subjectivity reduced to abstraction. What is also common among these and similar political rhetorics emerging from countries like Turkey and Russia - not to mention across the European Union - is the claim to national identity grounded in civilizational terms. Whereas national claims to sovereignty were previously made through the framework of the nation-state, in the new political rhetoric, it is the master signifier of civilization that encapsulates the nation, to be protected from external and, more importantly, internal threats. With a focus on South Asia, I explore in my talk the parallel trajectories of multiple civilizational discourses: the Nehruvian vision of India as a flowing stream enriched by diverse currents; the racial exclusivity of Savarkar’s core Hindutva identity, centered on the sacralized geographical entity of Bharat; and the Muslim nostalgia for empire as a civilization, which served as a mode of belonging and a claim to equality during colonial subjugation. My talk provides an analytical and historical overview of these various trends within civilizational discourse, with a focus on contemporary debates that explore the link between the right-wing weaponization of decoloniality and the rise of populist politics globally. Biography Born and raised in Lahore, Ali Usman Qasmi is a historian of modern South Asia and Islamic reform movements. He has published extensively in his area of expertise, including three monographs and three edited volumes. His most recent monograph is Qaum, Mulk, Sultanat: Citizenship and National Belonging in Pakistan (Stanford University Press, 2023), which won the American Institute of Pakistan Studies (AIPS) Book Prize for 2024. Since 2012, Qasmi has taught history at LUMS’ School of Humanities and Social Sciences. Currently, Qasmi also serves as the Director of the Gurmani Center for Languages and Literature.
The seminar will be followed by drinks.
Does the democratisation of news and information sources help or hinder actual democracy? How to tackle disinformation (hostile states, fraudsters or other bad actors) and how to balance resisting misinformation with protecting free speech.
The Asian Development Bank launched the fifth edition of its flagship report, the Asian Water and Development Outlook (AWDO) in December 2025. Speakers Professor Katrina Charles, Dr Sonia Hoque and Irina Gribanenkova led on the analysis of Key Dimension 1 (KD1) on Rural Household Water Security in the report. Updating earlier AWDO methods to reflect a shift in global WASH thinking, this seminar will describe how their analysis extends beyond access to infrastructure to also incorporate quality, reliability and resilience of water, sanitation and hygiene services, interrogating health data to assess whether these services actually reduce disease burden. The team will present their findings and highlight their implications for governments, donors and implementing organisations – what should be prioritised over the next decade to transform rural WASH services and fill the gaps that have been identified? Speakers - Katrina Charles is Professor of Environmental Health Risks Professor Charles’ research focuses on how to advance drinking water safety for all, particularly in low resource environments, and addressing the additional challenges faced by climate change. - Dr Sonia Hoque is Senior Research Associate in Water Security and Society. As an environmental social scientist, Sonia’s research focuses on drivers and distribution of water risks and socio-spatial inequalities in Asia and Africa. Her recent book, The Water Diaries (2025), combines empirical fieldwork with methodological innovation to examine the lived experiences of the global water crisis in Kenya, Ethiopia, and Bangladesh. - Irina Gribanenkova has held consultancy and research roles with ADB, The World Bank, Global Water Partnership, and the Stockholm Environment Institute, with a focus on water governance, climate finance, integrated water resources management, and translating research into policy-relevant insights. She completed her MSc in Water Science, Policy and Management from the University of Oxford in 2023.
As a leading administrative-cultural center, the Roman metropolis constituted a major tourist attraction for visitors from both the center and the periphery of the empire, among them Jews from the land of Israel. Using ancient Jewish culture as a test case, this lecture addresses the extent and type of influence of such visits on local cultures. It focuses on how the encounter with the city’s spatial aspects, its buildings and traditions, left their impress on Jewish culture, law, collective memory, and art in the first centuries CE. The examples taken from the literary realm – rabbinic law and legend – and the numismatic sphere, all relate to space identity and shed light on how the encounter with the city of Rome influenced a minority culture. The presentation will be followed by discussion and drinks. The event is free. This event will take place in accordance with the framework developed by a number of Oxford colleges, including Worcester College, to promote free speech at Oxford. Details of this framework and 'tips' for productive discussion of difficult topics are to be found at: www.worc.ox.ac.uk/fos. By attending this event, attendees agree to adhere to these guidelines and the terms and conditions of the event which uphold Worcester College's commitment to freedom of speech: www.worc.ox.ac.uk/fos/massada
Speaker: Xavier Prévost, Professeur d'histoire du droit à l'université de Bordeaux. Principal investigator of the ERC-funded project ISTHisFrench Chair: Ian Williams (St John's College, Oxford) Xavier Prévost, Professor of Legal History at the University of Bordeaux and Principal Investigator of the ERC-funded ISTHisFrench project, will present a summary of his research. Legal history has often relied too heavily on national frameworks, which can distort the transmission of legal knowledge through outdated nationalist lenses. A key example is the Legal Humanism of the Renaissance, commonly seen as a predominantly French phenomenon and encapsulated by the term mos gallicus jura docendi (the French method of teaching law), which obscures the transnational character of this intellectual movement. The ISTHisFrench project seeks to reframe our understanding of Legal Humanism by situating it within a broader European context, mapping its historical representation, examining the emergence of legal nationalisms, and challenging the traditional “French method” narrative. Through this approach, the project aims to redefine legal historiography and illuminate its enduring impact on European national legal systems.
Geoengineering is no longer confined to academic speculation. As climate impacts outstrip political will and adaptation capacity, proposals to deliberately alter Earth systems—whether by reflecting sunlight, modifying clouds, or extracting carbon at scale—are entering serious policy conversations. These interventions promise speed, but at the cost of unprecedented uncertainty. This session examines geoengineering as a strategic choice under pressure: one shaped by asymmetries of power, uneven exposure to risk, and the absence of robust global consent. What happens when climate intervention becomes a tool of last resort—or quiet experimentation? The panel will explore geoengineering through the lens of governance, security, and global responsibility, drawing on research at the intersection of climate science and international politics. With contributions including Danielle Young (University of Leeds), the discussion will probe how scientific expertise travels into policy, how legitimacy is constructed in the face of deep uncertainty, and whether existing international frameworks can constrain unilateral action. As climate stress sharpens geopolitical competition and crisis decision-making, geoengineering raises a central dilemma for the emerging climate–security nexus: how to manage planetary-scale interventions in a world still organised around sovereign states, contested authority, and strategic mistrust. Panelists: Dr Danielle Young is a UKRI Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Leeds, specialising in international security, global governance, and environmental politics. Her research examines how emerging and high-risk technologies are governed under conditions of uncertainty, with a particular focus on the security and geopolitical implications of solar geoengineering and its parallels with nuclear governance. She explores how states, institutions, and norms respond to technologies that blur boundaries between environmental intervention, deterrence, and global risk. Dr Young holds a PhD in International Politics from Aberystwyth University and is affiliated with the Centre for Global Security Challenges at Leeds.
For our next talk, in the BDI/CHG (gen)omics Seminar series, we will be hearing from Siddharth Banka, Professor of Genomic Medicine and Rare Diseases at the University of Manchester; Consultant Clinical Geneticist, Manchester Centre for Genomic Medicine and Clinical Director, Manchester Rare Conditions Centre. We’re delighted to host Sid in what promises to be a great talk! Talk title: Analysis of R-loop forming regions identifies RNU2-2 and RNU5B-1 as neurodevelopmental disorder genes Date: Tuesday 17 February 2026 Time: 9:30 – 10:30 am Location: BDI/OxPop Seminar room 0 Bio: Sid is a Professor of Genomic Medicine and Rare Diseases at the University of Manchester, a Consultant Clinical Geneticist at the Manchester Centre for Genomic Medicine and Clinical Director of the Manchester Rare Conditions Centre. His research programs focus on novel disease-gene discovery; improving diagnosis through innovative data analysis and multi-omic approaches; understanding mechanisms and natural history of developmental diseases; and performing therapeutic clinical trials. He co-leads the Rare Conditions theme of the NIHR Manchester Biomedical Research Centre, the EpiGenRare node of the MRC UK Rare Disease Research Platform, and NHSE Rare Disease Genomics Network of Excellence. Abstract: R-loops are DNA–RNA hybrid structures that may promote mutagenesis. However, their contribution to human Mendelian disorders is unexplored. Here we show excess de novo variants in genomic regions that form R-loops (henceforth, ‘R-loop regions’) and demonstrate enrichment of R-loop region variants (RRVs) in ribozyme, snoRNA and snRNA genes, specifically in rare disease cohorts. Using this insight, we report neurodevelopmental disorders (NDDs) caused by rare variants in two major spliceosomal RNA encoding genes, RNU2-2 and RNU5B-1. These, along with the recently described RNU4-2-related ReNU syndrome, provide a genetic explanation for a substantial proportion of individuals with NDDs. ———————————————————————————————————————— All members of the University are welcome to join, please let reception at BDI know you’re here for the seminar and sign-in. We hope you can join us! We also now have a mailing list – To be added, ping genomics_bdi_whg-subscribe@maillist.ox.ac.uk (with any message), you should get a bounce-back with three options to confirm your subscription. Follow any of those options, and with a bit of luck you should be signed up! As a reminder, the (gen)omics seminar series runs every other Tuesday morning and is intended to increase interaction between individuals working in genomics across Oxford. We encourage in-person attendance where possible. There is time for discussion over, tea, coffee and pastries after the talks. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Hybrid Option: Please note that these meetings are closed meetings and only open to members of the University of Oxford to encourage sharing of new and unpublished data. Please respect our speakers and do not share the link with anyone outside of the university. Microsoft Teams meeting https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/33903363866658?p=GmKAkkTnYKSo87LlUN Meeting ID: 339 033 638 666 58 Passcode: 4Zg7Xn9k
Join Dr Susan Black and July Kim from Bentham Publishers for a roundtable discussion on the challenges of academic publishing from a researcher perspective. July is keen to hear directly from researchers at Oxford about their publishing experiences and to explore how publishers could better support researchers across the publication process
Postgraduate students, fellows, staff and faculty from any discipline are welcome. This group aims to foster frequent interdisciplinary critical dialogue across Oxford and beyond about the political impacts of emerging technologies. Please contact Callum Harvey (callum.harvey@oii.ox.ac.uk) in advance to participate or with any questions. Attendance is online only. You do not currently have to be affiliated with the University of Oxford to attend and participate in discussions.
This is coauthored work with Ryan Jablonski (London School of Economics) and Brigitte Seim (University of Minnesota). Fiscal theories of state development emphasise a complementarity between government revenue, taxation, and citizen demands for public services. We assess the relevance of this logic for understanding the political and redistributive consequences of massive cuts to foreign aid budgets following the closure of USAID in 2025. We conduct over 4,500 in-person surveys, survey experiments and interviews with citizens and bureaucrats before and after the cancellation of USAID contracts in Malawi, one of the world’s most impoverished and aid-dependent countries. Focusing especially on public health, we document three emerging trends. First, the effects of cuts on health provision and morbidity are large and unequal, with impacts felt most among those in extreme poverty. Second, politicians and local service providers are often blamed for declining relations with donors and corresponding cuts to services. However, this varies significantly by partisan affiliation, and we document little evidence of changing sentiment towards the USA. Third, we document high, but heterogeneous, demand for the government to replace cancelled health services through taxation, particularly when respondents are experimentally assigned more information about aid cuts or presented with tangible policy trade-offs. Consistent with theory, we conclude that the aid shock is changing expectations of the state by increasing inequality and shifting demand for progressive and redistributive social policy, especially among the poorest.
Oral language competence is fundamental to children’s academic achievement and emotional well-being, yet many children enter school with delayed language development. Early Years Practitioners can play a pivotal role in supporting language growth through high-quality interactions integrating linguistic, interactive and conceptual elements. In-service professional development can support practitioners to enhance provision, especially when its design is informed by an understanding of existing provision and the contextual factors that shape it. This talk will present findings from a study which employed fine-grained analysis to examine the quality of language support in small-group practitioner–child interactions in English nurseries. Interactive and conceptual features of practitioner input - including prompt use, extensions and expansions of child language, conversational exchanges and the use of decontextualized language - were examined across three content-rich activity contexts: text-and-picture book sharing, wordless book sharing, and toy play. Comparisons across these contexts highlight their relative affordances for language learning and identify priorities for professional development and practice. The presentation will also discuss the methodological challenges of capturing language support through a bespoke coding approach and consider pathways for future refinements. Teams link: https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/3825967966058?p=oaa4boDA3tu5ZnqMja
While existing literature often connects the persistent gender gap in South Asian student migration to parents’ patriarchal biases and fears about female safety overseas, we argue that parents’ views in the South Asian diaspora are far more nuanced. Drawing on a survey of 110 South Asian parents in the UAE and 32 in-depth interviews, we found no statistically significant difference in the proportion of daughters versus sons sent overseas to Western universities. This decision was largely motivated by parents’ beliefs in gender egalitarianism. However, our research also revealed that parents’ gendered safety concerns continued to play a role in a series of “sub-migration decisions” where parents steered their daughters’ country, university, and accommodation choices even as they supported their international migration overall. These risk mitigation strategies were a byproduct of parents’ view of the UAE as exceptionally safe, while almost all other countries, but especially the United States and India, were seen as more dangerous in geographically specific ways. Simultaneously, parents rationalized their daughters’ international studies using a narrative previously reserved for male migrants—that independent migration helps these young women learn to live with risk and develop independence. In other words, gender continues to shape the international student migration process even amongst South Asian families holding egalitarian gender views, but in more nuanced ways than previously acknowledged.
Hybrid Sovereignties and Generational Rupture: Reconfiguring Governance in Post-Crisis Madagascar Velomahanina Tahinjanahary Razakamaharavo Madagascar’s 2025 conflict and political crises represent the apex of a long-entrenched hybrid political order in which formal institutions, military actors, oligarchic networks, religious intermediaries, and digitally mobilized youth compete for authority and legitimacy. The Gen Z-led uprising exposed deep generational cleavages and the fragmentation of sovereignty, while the military’s renewed political role features the persistence of praetorian dynamics. Rebuilding civilian authority will require embracing managed hybridity through inclusive political compacts and targeted structural reforms aimed at curbing state capture, strengthening civil-military relations, and addressing the vulnerabilities introduced by digital mobilization. Dr Velomahanina Tahinjanahary Razakamaharavo is a Research Fellow at the University of Reading. Her work focuses on peacebuilding, conflict recurrence, governance of emerging technologies, and resilience to climate-related risks. She holds a PhD in International Conflict Analysis from the University of Kent and has held research, policy and teaching positions across Europe, including at the Technical University of Munich, the European University Institute, Geneva Graduate Institute, Uppsala University, Umeå University and UCLouvain. She led the ESRC-funded HYBRICON project on conflict and hybrid governance and is the Author of the Monograph "Peacebuilding in Madagascar. A Multi-levelled Peace". Nepal’s Gen-Z ‘Revolution’: Was it a Revolution and What is Likely to Happen in the Elections in March? David Gellner and Krishna Adhikari Both participants and observers are even now puzzling over what happened in Nepal on September 8 and 9th 2025. Plenty of conspiracy theories, simplistic explanations, and instant analyses are on offer: Was it a monarchist plot? Could it have been organized by a distant or neighbouring foreign power? Was it just a nihilistic expression of fury from a social-media-saturated youth angry at the banning of Facebook and WhatsApp and furious at the images they had seen of Nepokids (the children of politicians and the business elite) cavorting in ski resorts while they battled with unemployment? What was the role of the Army, of India, and of the monarchists? How was it possible for life to go back to ‘normal’ so quickly? Much of the arson and violence on the second day was planned, though whether anyone will ever be held to account is very much an open question. Whether the new political forces claiming to represent the aspirations of Gen-Z will be able to defeat the established parties in the elections is very much an open question. If they do so, whether and how they will be able to renew the country is also an open question. Whether the programme of the new forces will involve undoing the achievements of the 2015 Constitution (secularism, republicanism, federalism, quota systems for minorities) also remains to be seen and, either way, their position is likely to be highly contentious. By comparing Nepal to Madagascar, it is hoped that some larger issues of youth, development, migration, and networked globalization can be addressed. David Gellner FBA is Emeritus Professor of Social Anthropology and Emeritus Fellow of All Souls, University of Oxford. He has been doing research on Nepal since 1980. His most recent publications with Krishna Adhikari are the co-edited Nepal’s Dalits in Transition (Vajra, 2024) and an analysis of the September ‘revolution’ published six weeks after the events: https://www.theindiaforum.in/politics/gen-z-and-nepals-ongoing-struggle-change. Krishna Adhikari is an Affiliate of the School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography, University of Oxford. He was in Nepal during the events of September. He has a Master’s in Social Work from Goteborg, Sweden, and a PhD on the dynamics of social capital in CBOs in Nepal from the University of Reading (2007).
https://www.cmcsoxford.org.uk/our-events
In a celebrated passage of The Blind Watchmaker, Richard Dawkins writes: “It is raining instructions out there; it’s raining programs; it’s raining … algorithms. That is not a metaphor, it is the plain truth.” This picture can be formalised through an algorithmic reworking of the infinite monkey theorem: replace monkeys at typewriters with monkeys at universal computers. The result is a clear: random mutation does not sample phenotypic space uniformly but instead generates an exponential bias toward simple outcomes describable by short algorithms.
In this session we will examine metrics for individual researchers. Using tools such as Web of Science, Google Scholar and Scopus you will learn about the researcher h-index and its limitations. You will be introduced to additional metrics tools such as author beamplots which help to contextualise a researcher’s output over time. By the end of the session, you will be familiar with: accessing citation data for specific researchers on Scopus, Web of Science and Google Scholar; understanding how the h-index is calculated and its inherent limitations; creating an ORCID number to help track all your own research outputs; and the importance of research outputs beyond journal and conference papers when assessing a researcher’s impact. Intended audience: Taught student; Researcher & research student
In this PSI Seminar, Dr Helen Esser, Wageningen University will present 'From local to continental: how vector ecology shapes tick‑borne disease emergence in Europe.' The session will be hosted by PSI and chaired by Marieke de Swart. The seminar will take place on Tuesday, 17 February 2026 from 15.00 to 16.30. Following the seminar, tea and cake will be provided, along with an opportunity to network with attendees. About the speaker Helen Esser is an assistant professor at the Wildlife Ecology and Conservation Group at Wageningen University & Research, the Netherlands. Esser is a disease ecologist whose research examines how environmental change, such as biodiversity loss and land-use change, alters host-vector interactions and creates conditions for pathogen emergence. By combining field studies with ecological modelling, she studies the mechanisms that drive the emergence of wildlife and vector-borne diseases. Seminar outline The ecology of arthropod vectors, such as ticks and mosquitoes, plays a crucial yet often underappreciated role in the emergence and spread of zoonotic pathogens. In many vector-borne disease systems, transmission is highly uneven: a minority of hosts account for most new infections. Tick borne encephalitis virus (TBEV), medically the most important arbovirus in Europe, is a clear example. Its persistence depends on ticks feeding in close proximity on the same rodent, even when that rodent is immune. This so-called co-feeding transmission occurs on only a small fraction of rodents and was historically associated with specific climatic conditions. Nevertheless, TBEV has recently expanded into parts of northwestern Europe previously considered climatically unsuitable, including England. The ecological conditions promoting TBEV transmission in these new areas of emergence remain poorly understood.
Are you preparing a poster presentation for an upcoming conference, meeting or symposium? This interactive session, or ‘poster clinic’, will include a group discussion of different examples of poster presentations, as well as an opportunity to present your own draft of your poster presentation to your fellow attendees. It is expected that the small group of peers in attendance will provide feedback and respectful comments on each other’s work. By the end of this classroom-based session you will be able to: evaluate the effectiveness of your poster presentation and others; and summarise the content of your poster concisely in preparation for a conference. Intended audience: Medicine and NHS; Researcher and research student
In early 1977, international authorities began noticing a new and mysterious cargo airliner flying the skies. A Douglas DC-8 in green and red livery and emblazoned with the name ‘CargOman’ in both Arabic and English. The plane’s roundel, featuring an Omani-style khanjar knife, only further added to the impression that this was an Omani plane. In fact, ‘CargOman’ was a front organisation, a joint Omani-Rhodesian covert operation and the most visible sign of a secret relationship stretching across Africa and the Indian Ocean. DPhil candidate Naif Alrogi (Nuffield College) will present a chapter from his doctoral thesis shedding light on this little known Cold War story, of how and why a newly independent Gulf Arab country served as a crucial lifeline for sanctioned and isolated Rhodesia.
Belarus was once Europe’s forgotten country, although that is no longer the case. President Lukashenko has been in power now for 31 years, the last dictatorship in Europe, remaining Russia’s closest ally. The country has suffered an extremely turbulent period, with mass protests in 2020, a brutal ongoing human rights clampdown taking place ever since, the forced diversion of Ryanair Flight 4978 to arrest a civil society activist and the fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine which was launched from Belarusian territory. Jack served on the ground during this extraordinary period and will share his views and observations on these events, looking past the headlines to offer a fresh perspective on the country. Jack will discuss what life was like for a British diplomat living inside Belarus and why the country matters more than ever, also looking ahead to what next. Jack Hands served as Britain’s Deputy Ambassador and His Majesty’s Consul to Belarus from 2021 to 2024. Jack is currently Head of the UK Central European Foreign Policy Network, based in Vienna. Prior to this, he was Press Officer to the Minister for Exports and held roles in the UK and European Parliaments, with a stint in South Korea reporting on Korean peninsula issues.
When Korea’s first modern hospital opened in 1885, it was called the "House for Relieving the People" (Chejungwŏn 廣惠院). This was more than a translation; it hints a historical narrative linking politics and medicine. This study traces how the Confucian imperative to "relieve the people" (Chejungwŏn) was introduced from China to Chosŏn Korea and subsequently shaped royal responses to the devastating epidemics that swept Korea in seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Moving beyond a narrative of crisis management, it examines how epidemics, in addition to other natural disasters, became a political theatre for demonstrating benevolent governance (injǒng仁政). By analysing policies, institutions, medical texts, and rituals, this study explores a pre-modern Korean framework in which epidemics were interwoven with cosmic disorder and royal virtue, drawing comparisons with the modern discourse of public health.
Bio Valeria Cetorelli has been with UNRWA since 2018, serving six years as Head of Refugee Registration and Eligibility and currently as Deputy Director of Relief and Social Services. She holds a PhD in demography from the LSE and has extensive experience leveraging data to guide humanitarian assistance and development policies and advance human rights and international justice for conflict-affected and displaced populations. She has led large multidisciplinary teams, managed complex multimillion-dollar programmes, and published high-impact research. Prior to joining UNRWA, she worked as Demographic Statistician at UNESCWA and as Research Officer at the LSE Middle East Centre and at the Johns Hopkins Center for Refugee and Disaster Response. Abstract In 1950-51, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) conducted a census to register those who had lost their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 war in Palestine –known in Arabic as al-Nakba, the catastrophe. The registration records from this census constituted the backbone of UNRWA’s operations at that time and the foundation on which registration records of subsequent generations of refugees have been built. However, they have so far never been thoroughly analysed. For 75 years, the original census cards remained archived in UNRWA field offices in Gaza City, East Jerusalem, Amman, Damascus and Beirut. Their scanning was completed only at the end of 2025, following the rescue of the Gaza City archive after the outbreak of hostilities in October 2023 and the transfer of the East Jerusalem archive to Amman due to the Israeli Parliament’s bills banning UNRWA in October 2024. The digitisation of the registration records contained in these cards is now underway through a semi-automated workflow with human-in-the-loop oversight. Once finalised, this project will make it possible to identify all refugees who were registered by the census and attest their place of origin in pre-1948 Palestine. It will also provide an evidentiary basis for reconstructing family lineages and substantiating the historical claims of the current Palestine refugee population.
Henry will be sharing insights into how SNRG’s fully funded MicroGrid solutions can support residential, Industrial & Commercial and e-mobility developers to reduce cost and carbon.
The tenth anniversary of the EU referendum is fast approaching and many will be focused on how Brexit has, or has not, changed the economic and political world. But what if the most important change was not to institutions, political parties and the economy, but to us? This lecture series explores how the referendum, and its aftermath, sparked a form of ‘tribal politics’ that reshaped how people saw themselves, each other and the wider world. This second lecture turns to the consequences of the transformation. Why did Leavers and Remainers dislike, look down on and discriminate against people simply because they belonged to the other group? And how did those brand-new political identities come to change our views of not just other people, but reality itself?
_Isos_ and _homoios_, both often translated as equality in Plato’s dialogs, signify differently. In _Phaedo_, for example, isos appears as “the Equal itself,” knowable by intellect, while homoios appears as “what is equal,” and refers to things that are perceived by the senses as the same in some respects and not in others. This lecture develops an account of _democratic equality_ by exploring the political and theoretical implications of these differences, including by attending to the distinction between arithmetic equality and geometric or proportional equality in _Statesman_.
This screening programme explores a collection of Sinophone films whose genres sit in between an ethnographic film, documentary, essay film, and fiction. Through this screening journey, we will engage with various languages, narratives, perspectives, styles and textures of films that come across and reflect on the ever-changing realities of contemporary Chinese society – rich with nuances, obscurities, complexities, and uncertainties. The series will cover four themes, including COVID-19, Gender, Art and Society, and Rural-Urban, and will run from Feb to May 2026. Session 2 (Gender): Bad Women of China 中华坏女人 Director: HE Xiaopei Release year: 2021 Run time: 82 min Region: Mainland China Screening Talk and Q&A: with Dr HE Xiaopei (in-person), Q&A chaired by Susie Jolly Synopsis: The film documents the life experiences and desires of three generations of Chinese women from the 1920s to the present day, across generations and continents. It is the director's intention to document women's sexuality and desires. As women's voices, experiences and desires are often overshadowed and ignored by the mainstream media; women often unconsciously belittle their own desires, ideals and life experiences, video creation can help women to express their desires and value their personal needs and experiences. By documenting the life stories and desires of women and other neglected groups such as sex workers, people with disabilities, sexually discriminated people and people living with HIV, the director hopes to give voice to oppressed desires
(https://www.mfo.ac.uk/) Hosted jointly with the Medieval French Seminar
COURSE DETAILS The ability to influence others is a significant skill in any walk of life. This workshop will explore the impact of our communication preferences on others when seeking to influence. By also understanding the thinking process that underlies people’s decision making, we can use learnable skills to help people say ‘yes’ to us. The aim is always to influence others to the right decision, not just the decision we may want. LEARNING OUTCOMES After attending this workshop you will: Understand the impact of your own communication preferences when seeking to influence. Review how people think things through when making decisions and develop skills to positively impact the thinking process. Plan for the right outcomes and work out a healthy motive for the influence conversation. Help people say ‘yes’ to you. Understand the role of emotions when seeking to influence. Spot and adapt to the communication style of others to better land your message. Develop assertive communication skills. Plan for, and practice, an influence conversation.
Open access publication of monographs and other longform works is an emerging movement, offering many opportunities to scholars looking to publish their research. With several major funding agencies now requiring longform open access publication, the impact of this is only set to grow. However, for those looking to publish their monograph open access, the novelty of this can present a challenge. What do funders require? What are the different publishing models? This webinar will cover the basics of this emerging field, including benefits, funder requirements, publication models and tools and resources. At the end of the session participants will be able to: explore the benefits of open access publication for longform works; consider the more challenging aspects of open monograph publication that that may not arise in traditional monograph publishing; follow the open access requirements of major funders for longform works; and understand the range of open access publication models offered by publishers. Intended audience: researcher and research student; staff
Newspapers are a valuable resource for researching not only news but also many other aspects of political, economic, social and cultural life. In this session we will introduce key online sources of news and how to make best use of them. The focus will be on historical and contemporary newspapers from the 17th century across most countries of the world. After the session participants will understand: the value of newspapers in research; the difficulties of using newspapers in research and effective search techniques, and be able to use a range of sources for searching and reading: 1. historical newspapers 2. contemporary newspapers 3.audio-visual news sources. Intended audience: Taught student; Researcher and research student
TBC
The Older Scots Reading Group is for people interested in literature produced in Scotland between 1375-1550. This is an incredibly rich period, featuring authors experimenting with form and language. The texts themselves are written in Older Scots – a language closely related to Middle English, but with some unique attributes. This reading group will provide a relaxed introduction to this period and language. This term we will focus on reading the Palyce of Honour, a dream vision poetry by Gavin Douglas that often draws parallels with the House of Fame. But is it purely derivative or is there something more subtle at work? Join us to find out! Please bring your own copy of the text if you can – the 2018 TEAMS METS edition by David Parkinson is recommended. No intensive preparation required. Both undergraduates and postgraduates are welcome and there are usually snacks. If you have any questions, contact megan.bushnell@ling-phil.ox.ac.uk.
About the series: This series will feature master classes, seminars, workshops and talks with Laura Rival, research collaborators and colleagues, throughout academic year 2025-2026. Beginning in Michaelmas term 2025, the theme for the term, in answer to the series question, was 'In Latin America, by Greening the State at the Top and from Below'. In Hilary term, the theme is 'By Knowing Nature Differently'. In Trinity term, the theme will be 'By Imagining a New Civilization and Building the Next Political Economic Order'.
This seminar explores the value of mixed qualitative methods in advancing our understanding of changing urban environments and forms of informal work. It draws primarily on in-depth ethnographic research conducted over one year from August 2018 with 22 young informal workers in Dar es Salaam and Arusha, Tanzania. It is also complemented by more recent research undertaken in January 2025 with young vendors conducting business using smartphones and social media platforms, including WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram. The talk highlights how integrating mobile GPS tracking, life-mapping interviews, observations and participatory timeline diagrams captures nuanced perspectives on how informal workers navigate and respond to shifts in social, cultural, economic and physical environments. Annotated GPS maps and observations provide detailed insights into vendors’ everyday spatial movements, while life-mapping interviews and participatory timelines illuminate connections between past experiences, present livelihood practices and future aspirations in relation to broader socio-cultural and environmental dynamics. Drawing on the 2025 research, the seminar also reflects on the transferability of these methods in combination, particularly interviews and life-mapping approaches, for investigating forms of online informal work and engagement with digital platforms. Together, the findings demonstrate how mixed qualitative methods can deepen understanding of changing environments across both physical and digital spaces, highlighting the adaptability and agency of young informal workers. The seminar concludes by reflecting on the implications of these insights for future research and for policies aimed at supporting marginalised communities amidst increasing precarity and environmental and technological change.
With the reform of adult social care once again being considered – this time by the Casey Commission – this session builds on lessons from the work of IMPACT, the UK centre for implementing evidence in adult social care. It looks at what we mean by evidence, why lived experience is an important form of evidence in its own right, and how to get evidence of what works implemented in practice. In the process, it draws out key lessons from IMPACT’s work across the four nations of the UK that could form the building blocks of a future National Care Service. Jon Glasby trained as a social worker, and is now Professor of Health and Social Care at the University of Birmingham and Director of IMPACT. In his spare time, he is a Non-Executive Director of an NHS Trust and of a local authority children’s services. In 2022, he was an advisor to the House of Lords Adult Social Care Committee. This hybrid event is run by Green Templeton’s long-running Care Initiative, led by Professor Mary Daly. After the talk there will be a short drinks reception in the Stables Bar.
Join online via Microsoft Teams by clicking here: https://tinyurl.com/bdff6tpt
Join Oxford Saïd Entrepreneurship Centre at the Nest for our networking event over drinks and pizza. This event is designed for aspiring entrepreneurs, start-ups and start-up support organisations to connect, share insights and build meaningful relationships within the entrepreneurial community across Oxford. Whether you're a researcher with an idea, a founder searching for a partner or an entrepreneur curious about building lasting startup teams, join us for food, drinks and the chance to make new connections.
*Fanny Cornu* (University of Edinburgh) Blurring the Line between Friendship and Duty: Members of the First French Military Mission to Japan and the Boshin Civil War, 1867-1869 *Lian Huiqi* (Korea University) Hairstyles across Borders: The Transnational Circulation of the Pompadour in Modern East Asia
Alex Patelis discusses insights from his book “Η Μεγάλη Έπιστροφή” (The Great Return), offering an inside account of the policy choices, economic reforms, and credibility signals that opened the road for Greece to return to investment grade, attract foreign capital, and rebuild trust with markets, institutions, and partners after a decade of crisis. Alex Patelis served as Chief Economic Adviser to the Prime Minister of Greece, from 2019 to 2024. He has over three decades of experience as an economist, analyst, and strategist in New York, London, and Athens, including senior roles at Goldman Sachs, Citigroup Asset Management, Merrill Lynch, and leadership of his own research firm, Patelis Macro. Alex holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Princeton University where he studied under Ben Bernanke and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and Mathematics from Sussex University.
This talk recovers the histories and legacies of ‘coolie’ migrants as foundational to Indian diplomacy. Drawing on multi-archival research spanning the vast geographies of indenture and labour migration from India to Ceylon, the Caribbean, and Britain, I argue that Indian notions of the international realm were shaped by the prolific if ‘undesirable’ mobility of labourers and remained a space of anxiety defined by a caste-coded paranoia over the figure of the coolie. Through such a paradigm, my book addresses the longstanding neglect of caste and labour migration in Indian diplomatic history. It thereby provides a bottom-up approach to diplomatic studies and international relations that centres the experiences of migrants who have for too long been simply regarded as recipients and ‘problems’ of diplomacy. About the speaker: Dr Kalathmika Natarajan is Lecturer in Modern South Asian History at the University of Exeter and co-director of the Exeter South Asia Centre. Her interdisciplinary research combines critical approaches to diplomatic history and South Asian migration. She has worked at the University of Edinburgh, and received her doctoral degree from the University of Copenhagen.
Inaugurated in 1960, the new capital of Brazil was designed by architects Oscar Niemeyer and Lúcio Costa. While the elegance of Niemeyer’s concrete shells elicited admiration, the workers who built Brasília were exiled in shantytowns far from the city.
Ben Philipps (Merton): 'John Ashbery's Boredom' Lochie Springett (St John's): ‘Serially Late: the Long Poems of Walt Whitman and Nathaniel Mackey’
The event will feature Wycliffe's own John Screnock, presenting his new publication. Expect an exciting new look at well-known biblical texts and meet the ancient Scribes through what we can see of their work. Though current scholarship has extensive knowledge of these ancient texts, there is much we can learn from the scribes of the Second Temple period. When we focus our attention on the places in the text where the scribes were at work — when we explore some of the paths that scribes have made in the text — we can consider psalms and other ancient Hebrew texts in new ways.
The event will feature Yuval Shany, former Chair of the UN Human Rights Committee and Inaugural Accelerator Fellow at the Institute, who will make the case for a new bill to address critical gaps in existing international human rights law. The White Paper outlines seven foundational rights for the age of AI, including: the right to access AI, privacy protections, anti-bias and fairness, algorithmic transparency, freedom from manipulation, meaningful human decision-making and interaction, and accountability for the use of AI. These ideas will be examined and discussed by a distinguished panel of experts: Robert Spano, former President of the European Court of Human Rights Kate Jones, CEO of the Digital Regulation Cooperation Forum Caroline Green, Director of Research at the Institute for Ethics in AI and a leading voice on the ethics of care This timely discussion brings together law, policy, ethics, and technology to explore how human rights can be protected—and reimagined—in an AI-driven world. Essential for policymakers, legal professionals, technologists, researchers, and anyone interested in the responsible governance of AI. The session will conclude with dedicated time for audience Q&A and discussion.
Andrew Lambert is Laughton Professor of Naval History in the Department of War Studies at King's College. After completing research in the Department he taught at Bristol Polytechnic,(now the University of West of England), the Royal Naval Staff College, Greenwich, and the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and also Director of the Laughton Naval Unit housed in the Department. In 2020 he was made a Fellow of Kings College London (FKC). His work focuses on the naval and strategic history of the British Empire between the Napoleonic Wars and the First World War, and the early development of naval historical writing. His work has addressed a range of issues, including technology, policy-making, regional security, deterrence, historiography, crisis-management and conflict. He received the 2014 Anderson Medal for The Challenge: Britain against America in the Naval War of 1812. Professor Lambert has lectured on aspects of my work around the world, from Australia and Canada to Finland, Denmark and Russia.
To mark the centenary of Rilke’s death there will be a series of Oxford Centenary Readings held in the Queen’s College in HT 2025. These will be informal papers with plenty of discussion, about one poem or a handful of poems, that offer close readings and new insights. Papers will be in English and English translations will be provided for all poems and quotations (except for the session in week 4 with the visiting poets) making these sessions accessible to anyone with an interest in this remarkable poet and poetry in general. Frey Kalus – ‘Rilke’s Petromodernism: Oil and its Absence in the Sonnets to Orpheus’. (Sonette an Orpheus, II. X).
COURSE DETAILS This short practical session will help you understand more about the career context for research staff at Oxford and beyond. It will enable you to identify the skills and abilities that you need to develop and give you guidance on how to enhance them so you are prepared for a useful conversation in your next CDR. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this session you will have: An understanding of the career challenges and opportunities facing research staff at Oxford. An understanding of the skills you need to acquire. Started to apply a process of developing these skills.
We are an interdisciplinary reading group which focuses on the social science, history, and theology of demons, the Devil, and supernatural evil as they relate to politics, identity formation, and social conflicts. Each week we will examine one academic paper or book chapter on these topics, gaining familiarity with subjects such as: the psychology of dehumanization, the conceptual development of the term “demon,” and contemporary political demonologies like QAnon. Hilary Term 2026, Thursdays from 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM Weeks 1,3,4,5,6,7,8: 21 St Giles (Kendrew Quad) Teaching Room G4 Week 2: 14 St Giles (next door to the Lamb & Flag) Seminar Room H Please contact Scott Maybell for the readings or for any questions: scott.maybell@sjc.ox.ac.uk
*2-Day Workshop - 19-20 February 2026* *Christian Arabic Manuscripts: Research Skills for a New Generation* Students and researchers are invited to join us for a two-day intensive research workshop at the Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities related to Christian Arabic manuscripts. The workshop will include introductory sessions on the foundations and research horizons of the field, as well as sessions introducing the latest digital tools and technologies advancing research. Attendees will have a chance to practice using these tools and technologies with a range of Christian Arabic texts located in the Bodleian Library. Lunch and refreshments will be provided free of charge on both days. *Requirements:* * A solid foundation in Arabic (at least 1 year of Classical or Modern Standard) * A studentship or research a:iliation with Oxford University or another academic institution; OU participants will receive priority, followed by qualified academics and students from other institutions * Demonstrable interest in Christian Arabic Manuscripts, including those for whom Christian Arabic may be tangential to their overall study or research interests, e.g. those working in Byzantine Studies, Islamic Studies, Patristics, and Syriac Studies *How to apply:* https://tinyurl.com/2jzj3me7 *Deadline to apply:* 9 February 2026 *Questions:* Dr Steven Firmin "$":mailto:steven.firmin@theology.ox.ac.uk
COURSE DETAILS During the course you will have the opportunity to manage a project. You will be able to apply the techniques you learn to a project that you bring along. Topics covered: project initiation, managing stakeholders and risk, time estimation, planning. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this session you will understand more about: The importance of planning. The tools to make project management succeed. How to estimate the time a project will take realistically. The skills you need to be a good project manager.
Serotonergic inputs innervate nearly the entire brain and broadly influence behavior, but how serotonin shapes neural circuit function at the synaptic and cellular levels remain poorly understood. The Swanger lab has discovered cell-type-specific mechanisms by which serotonin regulates communication between the hippocampus and anterior nucleus of the thalamus. This seminar will discuss how serotonin influences excitation and inhibition within this circuitry as well as the lab's ongoing work investigating how targeting serotonin signaling counteracts circuit hyperexcitability in an epilepsy mouse model.
This workshop brings together historians of marginalised communities using magazines in their research to share our approaches to this particular source base, grappling with magazines’ unique methodological challenges as well as their tantalising opportunities. Each session is broadly organised around a different theme, and participants are invited to bring examples from their own research. Pastries and snacks will be provided. Please email "$":mailto:katie.burke@st-hildas.ox.ac.uk for more information.
A pipeline was developed to quantify EBV DNA from whole-genome sequencing data in a cohort of over half million subjects identifying 39 susceptibility risk loci. A significant overlap with genetic variants associated with MS risk was observed p<10-12. These data suggest that EBV-infected B cells may constituted a critical hub that modulates T cell responses while activating MS gene linked susceptibility pathways within B cells. Finally, B cell depletion is almost totally effective in stopping autoimmune MS. Thus, we define a genetic and cellular framework linking B cells to the initiation of MS and support a causal role of EBV activity on MS risk.
Recent advances in ophthalmology have shown that retinal images can detect much more than ocular disorders. Retinal imaging can identify early signs of systemic diseases like Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, diabetes, and cardiovascular (heart) conditions, often years before traditional symptoms appear. This emerging field, known as Oculomics, shows the eye’s potential as a window into overall health. Charity-owned Foresight Research Ltd. aims to collect community-level, pre-disease data from hundreds-of-thousands participants, through a UK-wide network of optical practices. Through collaborations with national health research initiatives, they plan to build comprehensive datasets from early-stage and healthy participants – and make these accessible for industry and academic researchers working on healthcare innovation (biomedical, AI, health economics, etc.). These datasets will be fundamental for enabling prevention and early interception of various ocular and systemic diseases.
In this online workshop you will be shown the functionality of Zotero, which is a free-to-use software programme used to manage references and create bibliographies. Zotero will be demonstrated on a Windows PC but users of MacOS or Linux computers will be able to follow the demonstration. The workshop will cover: understanding the main features and benefits of Zotero; setting up a Zotero account; importing references from different sources into Zotero; organising your references in Zotero; inserting citations into documents; and creating a bibliography/reference list. Intended audience: Medicine and NHS; Taught student; Researcher and research student
The leet court served as a means for medieval English communities to police themselves. It did not deal with private suits or have jurisdiction over felonies. It was concerned with misbehaviour which disturbed the public. Local officials were appointed to keep note of issues and at the annual court session, offenders would be presented and fined. Amongst the business of the leet were several environmental offences such as incorrect dung disposal, poor gutter maintenance, and illegal latrine placement. The records of these courts provide valuable insight into communal responses to the problems affecting the medieval urban environment. However, because leet court sessions were usually held annually, they can present a static image of what was a dynamic and pressing issue. When gutters are blocked, flooding can occur just as how a poorly placed latrine can pollute drinking water. These events required an immediate response and could not be left unresolved until the next court session. The court rolls record final judgements and fines but give very little detail as to what might have happened at the time of the offence. This paper examines waste management as a temporal issue in two fenland towns: Peterborough and Ramsey, between c.1300-c.1500. It seeks to shed further light on what might have happened at the moment of these crimes occurring and explore how medieval communities managed the urban environment. Utilising the records of the leet court, this paper demonstrates the use of environmental management as a means to understand the lived reality of crime and policing in medieval England.
*Readings:* Marga Vicedo, “Clara Park: A Mother’s Intimate Knowledge and Child Science,’ in Amelia Bonea and Irina Nastasa-Matei (eds.), _Negotiating In/Visibility_ (Manchester University Press, 2025)
Lesson of the week, clinical cases and research. All clinical and academic staff and students welcome. Coffee and Tea will be served.
This conference honours the memory of Patrick McCarthy—Pembroke alumnus, Johns Hopkins SAIS Bologna professor, and a penetrating scholar of European politics, culture, and political economy. McCarthy's work cut across disciplines and genres, moving from literature to economics with a keen eye for liminal figures, the politics of sexuality and language, and the intersections of sport, culture, and power. The contradictions of Italian politics, McCarthy demonstrated, repeatedly foreshadowed Europe’s future. Today, under Giorgia Meloni, Italy again stands at the centre of continental and transatlantic debates. By highlighting Italy in this bellwether role, the conference seeks to carry Patrick McCarthy’s insights into the present, asking what Italy’s trajectory reveals about the future of European democracy and its place in the Atlantic order. For more information, or to join in-person or remotely, please email the ISO Events Co-ordinator, Kate McKee, at italianstudies@area.ox.ac.uk. Programme 13:30 – Arrival and registration 14:00 – Introductions: Guido Bonsaver, Aida Hozić, Erik Jones 14:30 – Culture and society roundtable (Guido Bonsaver, chair/discussant) - Prof. Stephen Gundle (Warwick) – ‘Culture and politics’ - Prof. Charlotte Ross (Oxford) – ‘Meloni’s populism’ - Prof. David Ellwood (Johns Hopkins, Bologna) – ‘Italy’s soft power’ - Prof. Felia Allum (Bath) – ‘Italian mafia, civic society and the state’ 16:00 – Refreshment Break 16:30 – Politics roundtable (Aida Hozić, chair/discussant) - Prof. Federica Genovese (Oxford) – ‘Italian public opinion’ - Prof. Kalypso Nicolaïdis (Oxford) – ‘Italy in Europe’ - Prof. John Harper (Johns Hopkins, Bologna) – ‘Italy and the USA’ - Prof. Erik Jones (EUI, Florence) – ‘The future of transatlantic relations’ 18:00 – Drinks reception
Oxford DPhil students are required to deposit a copy of their thesis in the Oxford University Research Archive (ORA). This online session will focus on what ORA is and how to deposit one's thesis in ORA, and how to access help with this process. It will also cover the relevant rights and permissions required and other issues that DPhil students need to take into account when preparing their thesis for upload to ORA. Topics include: what ORA is and what you need to deposit; how to deposit your thesis in ORA; observing relevant rights and permissions; and accessing help with depositing your thesis in ORA. Intended audience: researcher and research student; staff
Each spring, billions of Bogong moths escape hot conditions across a vast swathe of southeast Australia by migrating over 1000 km to a limited number of cool caves in the Australian Alps, historically used for aestivating over the summer – a place they have never previously been. At the beginning of autumn, the same individuals make a return migration to their breeding grounds to reproduce and die. To make these incredible journeys, we have discovered that Bogong moths rely on the stars and the Earth’s magnetic field as compasses to fly in their inherited migratory direction, and an innately recognised odour wafting from the cave that identifies the destination and provides a navigational beacon at the very end of their long journey. In my talk I will describe the experiments that led to these findings and explain the nature of the visual, magnetic and olfactory sensory mechanisms that underly the Bogong moth’s remarkable navigational abilities.
Discussants (Oxford): Benjamin Copeland Ben Jackson Grace Whorrall-Campbell Freya Willis Attendees may also like to attend Peter Mandler’s Ford Lectures on Thursdays at 17:00 in weeks 1-6, at the Examination Schools: https://www.history.ox.ac.uk/james-ford-lectures-british-history
Are you looking for a streamlined approach to gathering, managing and citing your references? Join us for this interactive online session in which we introduce RefWorks, a subscription reference management tool that University of Oxford members can use for free during their time at the university and as alumni. RefWorks is web-based and helps you to collect and manage references and insert them into your word-processed document as in-text citations or footnotes, and you can generate bibliographies. Being web-based, RefWorks can be used with any operating system and, to cite your references in a document, provides a plugin for Microsoft Word on Windows or Mac computers. By the end of the session, you will understand: how RefWorks can help you; how to add references to RefWorks from a range of sources; how to manage your references; how to add in-text citations and/or footnotes to your documents; how to create bibliographies; and where to get help with RefWorks. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student
How can liberal democratic actors counter the normalisation of the radical right? While much research documents how radical right ideology and anti-immigration positions have moved into the political mainstream across many Western democracies, far less is known about the counter-strategies that can be used to combat the normalisation of exclusionary policy agendas. In this seminar, Katharina Lawall, Quantitative Social Scientist, will present the design and findings of a study that tests the effectiveness of different forms of counterspeech against a prominent radical-right normalisation strategy: femonationalism, which presents an anti-immigration position through the more acceptable frame of gender equality. Katharina will delve into the experiment, in which nearly 4,000 German adults were exposed to anti-immigration rhetoric with a gender-equality justification in a short, news-style video, followed by alternative rebuttals, with the findings highlighting fact-based counterspeech as most effective for reducing support for femonationalist and anti-immigrant views. Register to join on Zoom: https://zoom.us/meeting/register/pbFSmnaxQcq9n70pS2PBZA
Why has the world performed so poorly in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and limiting climate change? Humanity has performed far better in addressing other environmental challenges, such as protecting the ozone layer, mitigating acid rain, improving air quality, and reducing people's exposure to dioxins and lead. In this talk Professor Fairbrother will consider different environmental outcomes in comparative perspective, and conditions leading to better versus worse outcomes. He will argue, contrary to other perspectives, that there have been two key differences between climate change and more successfully mitigated problems. First, polluting industries have resisted regulation more strongly in the case of climate change, with exceptional political efforts to deny and delay in turn due to the uniquely unconvertible character of key industry assets. Second, in the success cases, ordinary people were asked to make little or no material sacrifice, whereas in the case of climate change there is more of a price to be paid--and most people appear unwilling to pay a price, even though it is modest, because of distrust. Professor Fairbrother will conclude by elaborating implications for how we should seek to resolve the climate crisis.———————————————————————————————————————————— Speaker bio: Malcolm Fairbrother is a professor of sociology at Uppsala University and the Institute for Futures Studies, Sweden. His research focuses on climate and environmental policy and politics, social and political trust, globalization, and social science research methods. His current projects investigate the decoupling of greenhouse gas emissions from economic growth, and public attitudes towards policies for environmental protection. Originally from Vancouver, Canada, he received his PhD from the University of California, Berkeley; worked for ten years in the School of Geographical Sciences at the University of Bristol; and has been a visiting researcher at institutions in Mexico, the U.S., Canada, Italy, and Catalonia. ———————————————————————————————————————————— Booking is required for people outside of the Department of Social Policy and Intervention (DSPI). DSPI Members do not need to register.
Possibilities & challenges confronting dual-sector institutions - Professor Leesa Wheelahan England’s post-16 white paper aims for closer integration between further education colleges and universities. This is expected to: improve student opportunities by improving pathways through vocational, technical and higher education; respond more coherently to regional skills plans and encourage new qualifications reflecting the changing nature of work; reduce course duplication and develop institutional economies of scale, thereby securing a sustainable pattern of tertiary education in local areas throughout the country. By reducing polarisation between the two sectors of post-compulsory education, the government aims address the nation’s broader cultural, social and economic divisions, which often correlate with education and geography. That will, though, require a re-configuration of the relationships that have developed between further education colleges and universities. This presentation will explore the current landscape for dual-sector working, the factors that have shaped this during the 21st century to date, and what needs to change to deliver the vision identified within the 2025 white paper. A new model for England? The potential for dual-sector integration to support pathways & reduce polarisation in tertiary education - Professor Chris Millward England’s post-16 white paper aims for closer integration between further education colleges and universities. This is expected to: improve student opportunities by improving pathways through vocational, technical and higher education; respond more coherently to regional skills plans and encourage new qualifications reflecting the changing nature of work; reduce course duplication and develop institutional economies of scale, thereby securing a sustainable pattern of tertiary education in local areas throughout the country. By reducing polarisation between the two sectors of post-compulsory education, the government aims address the nation’s broader cultural, social and economic divisions, which often correlate with education and geography. That will, though, require a re-configuration of the relationships that have developed between further education colleges and universities. This presentation will explore the current landscape for dual-sector working, the factors that have shaped this during the 21st century to date, and what needs to change to deliver the vision identified within the 2025 white paper. Professor Leesa Wheelahan is Professor Emerita, William G. Davis Chair in Community College Leadership, University of Toronto and Honorary Research Fellow at the Department of Education, University of Oxford. Her research interests focus on the role of theoretical knowledge in qualifications; equity and social justice in tertiary education; pathways between the sectors of tertiary education and between tertiary education and the labour market; relations between colleges and universities; and tertiary education policy. In recent years, her research has focused on baccalaureate degrees in colleges; marketisation and privatisation in vocational education and in the college sector; and the role that colleges play in society and in their communities. Professor Chris Millward is Professor of Practice in Education Policy at the University of Birmingham and interim Director for Fair Access and Participation at the Office for Students. Chris joined the University of Birmingham in January 2022 as Professor of Practice in Education Policy, having previously served as Director for Fair Access and Participation and as Director of Policy for England’s regulatory and funding agencies. His work is focused on generating and deploying robust evidence for tertiary education policy and practice. He is particularly interested in issues of equity and inclusion across the life-course, how different educational systems influence local and national prosperity, and how they could be improved.
Is the state still relevant as a tool for critical analysis? Until recently, the state has largely been understood as a foil, as if the whole of nineteenth-century US fiction were caught up in a project against state-building. The book in progress from which this paper is drawn questions this hitherto dominant paradigm and explores nineteenth-century US literature in light of recent revisionist studies in sociology, political science, law and history that have challenged the Marxian and Weberian conceptions of the state and proposed a less ideal conception of democracy and a more pragmatic conception of the state that depart from the logic of a zero-sum game – more state, less democracy; more democracy, less state. While literature has remained largely outside this investigation, the project builds on these novel epistemological frames to ask: how can nineteenth-century US literature be reread in the light of this new State-Democracy articulation? In particular, the project explores how the need for democratic regulations were not just the prerogative of a (largely male) judiciary but also widely relayed in women’s fiction. My case study in this talk is Sarah Orne Jewett’s regionalist fiction. Granted, the transformation of the State, social legislation, public utility are not usual keywords associated with Jewett’s regionalism, which usually evokes resistance to “the beginnings of a new American police state” and a “more generalized policing of the social norms.” While this is true, the problem with most scholarship, I suggest, is its tendency to throw the social provision and social welfare part of Progressive reforms with the bathwater of the police state. This talk proposes to read Jewett’s understudied industrial story “The Gray Mills of Farley” (1898) as a fictional engagement with the problem of democratic action in a capitalist society in transition, away from the myth of the “well-regulated” society.
At a time of widespread instability in the Middle East, this book reflects on the construction and contestation of order across the region. Combining conceptual reflections with contemporary empirical analysis, the book offers a timely account of how competing visions of order play out and shape the Middle East. The book seeks to offer a discussion of the concept of order that is grounded in International Relations approaches but applied to the Middle East using a range of important case studies. Bringing together established scholars and exciting new voices, this collection is essential reading in understanding the shifting contours of the Middle East. https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-order-and-region-making-in-the-middle-east.html
The decades between the late 1940s and the late 1970s are widely seen as the heyday of social science (and of social democracy), though usually from the point of view of educated or cultivated elites. This lecture seeks evidence of the ‘sociological imagination’ in everyday life, in conditions of ‘affluence’, ‘permissiveness’ and a therapeutic society.
This event explores how motherhood shapes women’s lives through both economic and clinical lenses. It will examine how having children influences mothers’ career paths, income, and labor market opportunities, while also addressing the psychological and physical health effects that often accompany these changes. By integrating economic analysis with clinical research, the session aims to provide a holistic understanding of the costs, benefits, and broader implications of motherhood for women’s well-being and society as a whole.
For foreign observers, China is often perceived as a closed political system, marked by opacity in decision-making and one-party rule, which creates clearly demarcated boundaries between those included and excluded from power. Upon closer inspection, however, there are designated spaces for the political engagement of Chinese elites outside the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), such as the so-called 'democratic parties and groups' (DPGs). Closely supervised by the CCP’s United Front Work Department, they operate in what Dr Rudolph calls the peripheries of power, bridging the divide between the party-state and non-party elites. This talk examines the symbolic and practical functions of these peripheral organizations in China’s political system and presents a brief history of China’s DPGs, from their institutionalization in the 1940s to their current reevaluation under Xi Jinping. Drawing on theories of the spatial and relational dimensions of power, the talk sheds light on understudied political structures and their role in stabilizing the political regime. It thus contributes to the existing research on space in authoritarian contexts, which often neglects coopting mechanisms and focuses either on the spatiality of anti-hegemonic contentious politics or on the state’s repressive ordering of space. Understanding China’s DPGs as networked structures grounded in spatial realities and imaginaries contributes to a clearer understanding of their current reconfiguration within new Chinese policies of 'whole-process people’s democracy'. Henrike Rudolph is a lecturer at the Department of East Asian Studies at the University of Göttingen. Trained in Sinology and Political Science, she completed her PhD at Hamburg University and Fudan University, Shanghai, in 2017. Rudolph worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the Chair of Contemporary Chinese Studies at Friedrich-Alexander University in Erlangen-Nuremberg. Before coming to Göttingen, she held an interim professorship at the University of Heidelberg. Rudolph’s research interests include the transcultural exchange of knowledge and skills, educational thought, and network approaches to social and political history, with a focus on twentieth-century China. Her current book project examines the history and current political function of the Jiusan Society, one of China’s so-called 'democratic parties and groups'.
Alexandra Walsham, ‘The Social History of the Archive: Record-Keeping in Early Modern Europe’, _Past and Present_, 230:11 (2016), 9-48; Anna Woodham, Laura King, Liz Gloyn, Vicky Crewe and Fiona Blair, ‘We Are What We Keep: The “Family Archive”, Identity, and Public/Private Heritage’, _Heritage and Society_, 10:3 (2017), 203-20; Elizabeth Yale, ‘The History of Archives: The State of the Discipline’, _Book History_, 18 (2015), 332-59 *To attend online via Microsoft Teams, please email "$":mailto:ian.archer@history.ox.ac.uk*
In 1961, Thomas C. Smith published a short essay entitled “Japan’s Aristocratic Revolution.” In his characteristically clear and economical prose, he begins, “There was no democratic revolution in Japan because none was necessary: the aristocracy itself was revolutionary.” The essay goes on to make an argument now so familiar as to feel self-evident: low-ranking samurai carried out the revolution we call the Meiji Restoration without much help from either the peasant masses or the bourgeoisie. In this talk I will substitute Smith’s “aristocracy” with a less clearly defined class of actors who inhabited a spongy middle stratum of Tokugawa society: status-straddlers, some on the lowest fringe of the samurai class and others well-connected commoners. In addition to complicating our understanding of Tokugawa society, I will propose a way to frame the collapse of the early modern order as social history.
Behind most stories of impact sit failures that are rarely discussed. In this session, Catherine Hasted reflects on failures from her own career and from the people and organisations she has worked with, examining how progress actually happens when problems cannot be solved by individuals alone. The focus is on what emerges through collaboration, not heroics, and what becomes possible when we shift from working as an I to acting as a We. Students and researchers will learn how others have used failure as a collaborative tool rather than a solitary setback.
Attorney General Tim Griffin, Dr Nicholas Cole, and Dr Jason Battles will discuss a new transatlantic partnership to preserve, present, and research the constitutional history of the state of Arkansas, explaining the value of the project's outputs to the legal profession and how it is setting a standard for similar digital research endeavours.
As the 200th anniversary of his death approaches in 2027, Ludwig van Beethoven remains ubiquitous: his music still dominates concerts, films and advertising, while his image continues to serve as shorthand for struggling male genius. Beethoven would not have come to prominence, however, without the composer establishing a network of friends and colleagues with whom he could collaborate, and by writing marketable as well as remarkable music. This lecture sets Beethoven in the everyday, exploring the musical relationships that enabled him to come to prominence.
To join online, please register in advance: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/WWqjr8SgT_WrzTodI65cdg
St John's welcomes Dr Catherine Hasted, Deputy Director of the Skoll Centre at Saïd Business School, for an exploration of 'failing well'. From I to We: Lessons in Failing Well Behind most stories of impact sit failures that are rarely discussed. In this session, Catherine Hasted reflects on failures from her own career and from the people and organisations she has worked with, examining how progress actually happens when problems cannot be solved by individuals alone. The focus is on what emerges through collaboration, not heroics, and what becomes possible when we shift from working as an I to acting as a We. Students and researchers will learn how others have used failure as a collaborative tool rather than a solitary setback. Biography Dr Catherine Hasted is Deputy Director of the Skoll Centre at Saïd Business School, Oxford University. With a background in innovating large-scale change, she founded ThinkLab at the University of Cambridge and later led the University’s global business partnerships. Catherine is known for her research and practice on inter-organisational change, including the development of Relational Fusion as a framework for large-scale collaboration. She completed her studies at Lancaster, Oxford and Cambridge universities, and her work has featured in the BBC, The Guardian and The Times.
Campion Hall has the pleasure of welcoming Professor Jane Stevenson to deliver the Hilary Term Campion Lecture entitled “1758 – The Secret History of a Papal Election”. This lecture will explore the intrigue, politics, and personalities behind one of the eighteenth century’s most consequential papal conclaves, revealing how power, diplomacy, and secrecy shaped its outcome.
This lecture will explore the intrigue, politics, and personalities behind one of the eighteenth century’s most consequential papal conclaves, revealing how power, diplomacy, and secrecy shaped its outcome. *Professor Jane Stevenson* is a Senior Research Fellow at Campion Hall, Oxford, and a member of the English Faculty. She studied Anglo-Saxon, Norse, and Celtic at the University of Cambridge, and has previously held academic posts at the universities of Cambridge, Sheffield, Warwick, and Aberdeen, where she was Regius Professor of Humanity. She is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries.
Join Worcester College Provost, David Isaac CBE, as he interviews leading role models about their lives and careers. Peter Tatchell has been campaigning for human rights, democracy, LGBT+ freedom and global justice since 1967. Among his many involvements, he was a leading activist in the Gay Liberation Front 1971-74 and in the queer human rights group OutRage! 1990-2011. Through the Peter Tatchell Foundation, he currently campaigns for human rights in Britain and internationally. A summary of his motives, morality and methods is available on his website. Peter’s key political inspirations are Mahatma Gandhi, Sylvia Pankhurst, Martin Luther King and, to some extent, Malcolm X and Rosa Luxemburg. He has adapted many of their methods to his contemporary non-violent struggle for human rights – and invented a few of his own. Join us at Worcester College to hear Peter in conversation. All are welcome to join for drinks after the event. Please note that entry to the venue is via the Worcester College Porters’ Lodge on Walton Street.
The global order is under assault from major powers. Normative and geopolitical revisionism have become widespread. This picture calls for a new partnership to reform and remake the international multilateral system, as well as to uphold rules, norms, and values. It is the middle powers that can take on this role. As both a middle power and a leading European actor, France is well-positioned to assume such a role. In this seminar, Tristan Aureau and David Behar will reflect on how France views the evolution of the global order and the role of the middle powers in remaking the international multilateral system. Key Questions: How can France, Europe and Middle Powers make a common cause for a new multilateral order? What values, principles and priorities should underpin such a partnership? What role should France and Europe play in upholding international law and rebuilding bridges with the Global South?
We are pleased to announce the upcoming Winter Lecture Series which will take place between January and March 2026. Across five thought-provoking lectures, special guests will discuss a range of subjects, with topics to be announced soon. Each lecture will be hosted at the University of Oxford Museum of Natural History. Join us on Thursday 19th February when natural history writer and photographer Jon Dunn will deliver his lecture.
*2-Day Workshop - 19-20 February 2026* *Christian Arabic Manuscripts: Research Skills for a New Generation* Students and researchers are invited to join us for a two-day intensive research workshop at the Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities related to Christian Arabic manuscripts. The workshop will include introductory sessions on the foundations and research horizons of the field, as well as sessions introducing the latest digital tools and technologies advancing research. Attendees will have a chance to practice using these tools and technologies with a range of Christian Arabic texts located in the Bodleian Library. Lunch and refreshments will be provided free of charge on both days. *Requirements:* * A solid foundation in Arabic (at least 1 year of Classical or Modern Standard) * A studentship or research a:iliation with Oxford University or another academic institution; OU participants will receive priority, followed by qualified academics and students from other institutions * Demonstrable interest in Christian Arabic Manuscripts, including those for whom Christian Arabic may be tangential to their overall study or research interests, e.g. those working in Byzantine Studies, Islamic Studies, Patristics, and Syriac Studies *How to apply:* https://tinyurl.com/2jzj3me7 *Deadline to apply:* 9 February 2026 *Questions:* Dr Steven Firmin "$":mailto:steven.firmin@theology.ox.ac.uk
Imagine a world in which every child’s future is mapped before their first breath. Their genome is sequenced, their probabilities calculated, their life trajectory quietly predicted. The Valley Children, a theatrical script in development by Felix Westcott, opens within this imagined world and turns the abstract logic of prediction into human drama. The characters wrestle with decisions that no parent, doctor or policymaker has ever had to face, yet which all of us may one day encounter. Traditional public engagement and bioethical analysis often struggle to capture the complexities of how people actually interpret and live with predictive genomic information. In this workshop we will explore how collaborative practices such as performances, facilitated conversations, and co-designed creative workshops can be used to engage with different communities in a nuanced discussion around predictive genomics. The plot and excerpts from the script will be used as a springboard to discuss how we can use these practices to inform bioethical research, clinical practice and policy development. All are welcome to join and especially those with a research interest in genomics, medical humanities or bioethics.
EndNote is a desktop-based reference management tool for Windows and Mac users. It helps you to build libraries of references and insert them into Word documents as in-text citations or footnotes, and to automatically generate bibliographies. This classroom-based introduction to EndNote is open to all University of Oxford students, researchers and staff and teaches you how to use the software so that you can effectively manage your references. Please note we also run an online EndNote workshop. Please check the iSkills course listing for availability. The workshop will cover: what EndNote can do for you; adding references to EndNote from a range of sources; managing your references in an EndNote library; adding in-text citations and/or footnotes to your essays and papers; and creating bibliographies. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student
Normal heart function relies of the fine-tuned synchronization of cellular components. In healthy hearts, calcium oscillations and physical contractions are coupled across a synchronised network of 3 billion heart cells. When the process of functional isolation of rogue cells isn’t successful, the network becomes maladapted, resulting in cardiovascular diseases, including heart failure and arrythmia. To advance knowledge on this normal-to-disease transition we must first address the lack of a mechanistic understanding of the plastic readaptation of these networks. In this talk I will explore coupling and loss of synchronisation using a mathematical model of calcium oscillations informed by experimental data. I will show some preliminary results pointing at the heterogeneity hidden behind seemingly uniform cell populations, as a causative mechanism behind disrupted dynamics in maladapted networks.
'Guilt as a response to personal wrongdoing is healthy. But false guilt is not. ... Today we are again succumbing to a fresh and more general bout of false guilt about our colonial past, which is misshaping the policies of our governments and cultural institutions and weakening our international standing.' — Lord Biggar, Reparations: The Tyranny of Imaginary Guilt. Lord Biggar will speak about his latest book, why he chose to write it, what its argument is, how it builds on his previous book, Colonial: A Moral Reckoning, and what impact he hopes it will have.
Where loyalty drives political survival, why do women praise autocrats more than men? Extensive research demonstrates the centrality of loyalty for women's political advancement, yet how women rhetorically signal this loyalty remains underexplored. I argue that sycophantic appeals offer a gendered pathway to power in conservative authoritarian contexts. Excessive praise enables women to exhibit loyalty while conforming to feminine ideals of social warmth and deference, mitigating backlash where their political presence challenges prevailing gender expectations. Using natural language processing on speeches from Turkey's Grand National Assembly from 2015 to 2023, I find that women in the ruling party are more likely than men to profess loyalty to autocrats and employ gender-congruent praise emphasizing their compassion. This strategy yields tangible rewards, with women who adopt such praise securing better list positions and reelection. These findings reveal how gender shapes expressions of loyalty and their political returns, illuminating gendered pathways to power under authoritarian rule.
This paper interrogates the historical and contemporary nexus between the logics of racialized policing and global security regimes, tracing their origins to the design and defense of slave societies and the system of chattel slavery. Drawing on postcolonial theories of international relations and Black Studies scholarship, the paper examines how 17th century slave codes and post-slavery colonial policing structures were designed to secure the social, economic and political relations undergirding chattel slavery by positioning Black bodies as criminally deviant and expendable. The paper highlights how racialized policing not only secured the system of chattel slavery, but also informed the development of global securitization norms long after abolition. Through historical focus on the Anglophone Caribbean from abolition through to contemporary US-driven policing interventions in the region, the paper reveals how transnational and domestic policing and security initiatives perpetuate slavery’s legacy by criminalizing racialized populations to uphold capitalist and imperial interests. By situating policing as a fundamental component of slavery’s afterlife, the paper underscores its historic role as a critical instrument of world ordering and regional hegemony, with enduring implications for sovereignty, justice, and the global valuation of Black life. - Morgan DaCosta is a Junior Research Fellow at New College examining the implications of post-slavery domestic and transnational policing for the perpetuation of slave society logics of racialized deviance and expendability. Through archival study of policing in Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago (1838-2015), she conceptualizes post-slavery police power as reiterative violence which reproduces forms of racialized subjugation in service of international hierarchy, regional hegemony, and state power. Previously, she was a fellow in the Department of Black Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara and senior research and advocacy associate at Human Rights Watch. She holds a Bachelor of Arts from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and a DPhil from the University of Oxford Department of Politics and International Relations.
We demonstrate that a ubiquitous feature of network games, bilateral strategic interactions, is equivalent to having player utilities that are additively separable across opponents. We distinguish two formal notions of bilateral strategic interactions. Opponent independence means that player i's preferences over opponent j's action do not depend on what other opponents do. Strategic independence means that how opponent j's choice influences i's preference between any two actions does not depend on what other opponents do. If i's preferences jointly satisfy both conditions, then we can represent her preferences over strategy profiles using an additively separable utility. If i's preferences satisfy only strategic independence, then we can still represent her preferences over just her own actions using an additively separable utility. Common utilities based on a linear aggregate of opponent actions satisfy strategic independence and are therefore strategically equivalent to additively separable utilities---in fact, we can assume a utility that is linear in opponent actions.
We present four novel tests of equal predictive accuracy and encompassing à la Pitarakis (2023, 2025) for factor-augmented regressions, where factors are estimated using cross-section averages (CAs) of grouped series. Our inferential theory is asymptotically normal and robust to an overspecification of the number of factors. Our tests are empirically relevant as they accommodate for different degrees of predictor persistence and remain invariant to the location of structural breaks in the loadings. Monte Carlo simulations indicate that our tests exhibit excellent local power properties. Finally, we apply our tests to the novel EA-MD-QD dataset by Barigozzi et. al. (2024) - which covers the Euro Area as a whole and its primary member countries - and show that factors estimated by CAs offer substantial predictive power.
Join writer Adam Sisman in conversation with Bodley’s Librarian, Richard Ovenden, as they explore the secrets of John le Carré’s archive. As le Carré’s biographer, Sisman spent four years researching the author, navigating his unsorted archive and engaging in revealing discussions, often surprising Le Carré with his discoveries. The archive spans le Carré’s childhood, National Service, Oxford years—where he spied for MI5—and his early intelligence and writing careers. It also includes drafts of his novels, showcasing his meticulous writing process. Richard Ovenden, who worked with the author and his family over the bequest, discusses its significance and its journey to the Bodleian. Richard Ovenden OBE, Hon FBA is the 25th Bodley's Librarian and the Helen Hamlyn Director of the University Libraries, and Head of Gardens, Libraries and Museums at the University of Oxford. He is also the author of Burning the Books: A History of Knowledge Under Attack. Adam Sisman FRSL is a writer specialising in biography, who has written the lives of AJP Taylor, Hugh Trevor-Roper, Asa Briggs and John le Carré. His second book, Boswell’s Presumptuous Task, won a National Books Critics Circle award. In 2019 he published The Professor and the Parson: A Story of Desire, Deceit and Defrocking. He is an Honorary Professor at the University of St Andrews.
Laure Miolo, Associate Professor in Medieval Latin Manuscript Studies at the University of Oxford, will be giving a workshop, demonstrating how medieval people observed and measured the heavens. As part of the workshop, we will visit the History of Science Museum and Weston Library. Please note that space is limited, so please email oxfordmedievalmss@gmail.com to reserve your place.
Week Five (20 February, Old Library) Primary: Marge Piercy, Woman on the Edge of Time, Chapters 13-14 Supplementary: Mark Fisher, ‘Good For Nothing’ (2014); Johanna Hedva, ‘Sick Woman Theory’ (2022)
Week Five (20 February, Old Library) Primary: Marge Piercy, Woman on the Edge of Time, Chapters 13-14 Supplementary: Mark Fisher, ‘Good For Nothing’ (2014); Johanna Hedva, ‘Sick Woman Theory’ (2022)
Seminar followed by Q&A and drinks - attend in person or join online - all welcome Abstract: Lee will describe his journey from growing up as a young boy in Uganda, whose brother was an orphan chimpanzee, to becoming the Minister of Water, Forests, Sea and Environment in Gabon and the importance of science on that journey. From meeting wild chimps in Budongo Forest aged 5, taking his first steps into science and conservation in the Gola Forest in Sierra Leone aged 14, to arriving in Gabon ten years later, where his scientific journey began in earnest. He will describe learning to know and read the forest, piecing together the natural history of the wildlife, understanding forest history and appreciating the global significance of the Congo Basin. Biography: Lee White CBE is a scientist, conservationist and politician with over 40 years experience in natural resource conservation and management in Equatorial Africa. He was director of the WCS Gabon programme (1992-2008); head of Gabon’s National Parks Agency (2009-2019); and served as Gabon’s Water, Forests, Sea and Environment Minister (2019-2023). He helped create over 50 protected areas, including Gabon’s network of 13 national parks. As head of national parks in Gabon he led the fight against ivory poaching, protecting the biggest population of forest elephants in Africa and dismantled an illegal forestry network stealing $400 million per year from the Gabonese economy. He raised over 500 million US$ of donor funding; registered 187 million tons of REDD+ results with the UNFCCC; put in place a Blue Bond for $500 million; and spoke on behalf of Africa at UNFCCC COP26 in Glasgow. He founded Pangea Nature Partners in 2024 to design and implement a new financial mechanism to make forests more valuable alive than dead. He also acts as the Special Envoy of the Science Panel for the Congo Basin and is an honorary professor in the University of Stirling’s School of Natural Sciences.
The 2026 Neill Law Lecturer, Lord Burnett of Maldon will be giving a talk on Sentence inflation, its causes and consequences for prisons, rehabilitation and public finances on Friday 20 January in the All Souls College Library at 5pm.
Join Dr Morwenna Blewett, former Worcester Research Fellow, for the launch of her new book, Art Restoration Under the Nazi Regime: Revelation and Concealment. Culture today is being used to misrepresent. Political and military regimes have manipulated visual culture in their attempts to re-shape reality – from looting and destroying objects and archives, to making new visual representations, and appropriating visual symbols. As authoritarian populisms and ethno-nationalisms remerge, scholars are now turning from writing the history of representation to that of misrepresentation. Through meticulous research, Morwenna Blewett offers a courageous and detailed study of the abuse of a field of art and culture that has largely been overlooked in histories of the manipulation of culture: the conservation of art. This is the first in-depth study of art conservation and restoration under the Nazis. The author not only exposes patterns of complicity behind the participation of the conservation and restoration profession in this complex and opaque network of profit, crime, persecution and ideological broadcast but asks us to reflect on the enduring danger that knowledge and skill are vulnerable to being co-opted by power and its misrepresentation of reality. Art Restoration under the Nazi Regime makes a groundbreaking contribution to tackling the uncomfortable truths of ‘culture wars’ – past, present and future.
OMMG welcomes Emma J. Nelson (Chetham's Library, Manchester) and Elliot Cobb (Independent Scholar) who will present their latest research at our Graduate Research Forum. 'No take-backsies? Gerald of Wales and the boundaries of book donation' | Emma J. Nelson The second half of the twelfth century witnessed a major shift in the history of medieval libraries, as individual donation came to replace communal acquisition as the dominant mode of library growth. This development can be characterised as a shift from a monastic to a secular-clerical model of library growth, and book donation represented just one aspect of a multi-faceted pattern of patronage by the twelfth-century secular clergy. Such donations were underpinned by contemporary thought on gift-giving, which emphasised that gifts ought to be given freely and open-handedly, but in practice, donation could be more complicated. This paper explores the donations made by the author Gerald of Wales to various religious institutions and individuals with the aim of furthering his goals. Gerald’s discussions of his donations reveal how he conformed to, co-opted and transgressed twelfth-century models of donation, and provide the starting point for an examination of these models’ boundaries. Such an examination connects approaches to patronage and publication, textual dissemination and reception, and the suitability of certain genres as subjects of clerical writing and their appropriateness for inclusion in secular-clerical libraries. 'Miraculous and Marginal Women in the Metz Psalter-Hours' | Elliot Cobb Throughout the margins and historiated initials of a late thirteenth-century personal prayerbook, a remarkable variety of women are depicted. The richly illuminated Metz Psalter-Hours contains images of women praying with devotional aids including rosaries and books; women sporting floral garlands and golden crowns; and female saints miraculously victorious over evildoers. This paper interrogates how word and image functioned concurrently in late medieval prayerbooks to construct a gendered devotional experience specific to the recipient – in this case, a wealthy lay woman living in northeastern France. I question how the use of different zones of the mise-en-page mediates the meanings of the varying images, and how gendered themes come to a head in the Hours of the Virgin through a fascinating depiction of the book owner kneeling before the Virgin and Child. Unusually, she is offered a golden crown by the Christ-Child. Furthermore, I draw attention to the exceptionally high number of lay women portrayed using books, situating this as yet understudied manuscript within ongoing topical discussions surrounding the role of medieval owner portraits in prayerbooks. The Graduate Research Forum is open to the public.
Ines Koeltzsch is a visiting professor at the Jewish Studies Program at CEU Vienna. This lecture offers a new perspective on the early afterlife of Kafka and examines both the significance of the media (text, voice, image) and of intellectual networks and communities of remembrance across nation-state borders in creating the author’s legend. This hybrid event is organised by the AHRC-funded project Kafka’s Transformative Communities and all are welcome.
Heritage physics involves the application of scientific techniques and technologies to answer questions about our cultural heritage and to enable our understanding and conservation of this. As scientific techniques have evolved across the past century from the earliest methods for age determination to modern day composition analysis, these have increased our ability to deepen our knowledge about ancient and historical artefacts as well as to preserve and restore them. This conference will survey the history of how the illumination of the past has developed as new fields of physics have progressed.
Heritage physics involves the application of scientific techniques and technologies to answer questions about our cultural heritage and to enable our understanding and conservation of this. As scientific techniques have evolved across the past century from the earliest methods for age determination to modern day composition analysis, these have increased our ability to deepen our knowledge about ancient and historical artefacts as well as to preserve and restore them. This conference will survey the history of how the illumination of the past has developed as new fields of physics have progressed. There will be a conference dinner at St Cross College at 18:30, for which booking is required. For programme, and to book for the dinner, please see website: https://www.stx.ox.ac.uk/event/happ-one-day-conference-heritage-physics-illuminating-the-past Registration is required for both in-person and livestream.
Python is one of the most popular programming languages for data science, both in academia and industry. It is also a good entry programming language for anyone trying their hand at coding for the first time. This gentle introduction to Python is aimed at all students or staff around campus with little to no prior experience with Python or programming wanting to take that first step. The course will cover all the basics needed to get future coders started on their journey. By the end of the session, you will have written your first bits of code and be ready to explore what Python can do for your own data or personal projects. The training will be delivered by Matthieu Miossec, Head of Computational Genomics Group, Centre for Human Genetics, University of Oxford. The course is divided into two sessions: Session 1, 23 February, 9:00 am – 11:00 am Session 2, 26 February, 9:00 am – 11:00 am This will be an interactive session where participants will be expected to follow along with the demonstration, coding throughout the session. Topics to be covered: -Why use Python? -Data types and data structures in Python. -Conditional statements and loops. -Writing flexible functions. -Reading and writing to files. -Putting it altogether in a simple bit of code. Intended Audience: Staff and students with little to no prior experience with Python or programming in general. Objectives: -Become more comfortable with Python and programming in general. -Have a basic understanding of the main data types and structures in Python. -Have a basic understanding of error messages and how to resolve them. -Write some code to automate the resolution of a small problem. -Be able to write a short bit of code to extract or write information from a file. -Learn how to break a bigger problem into smaller problems through divide and conquer approach. -Know where to find additional information on Python. Requirements: Participants are expected to bring their own laptops so they can follow along with the interactive session. Pre-course work: None. There will be a small challenge in between the two sessions for participants to attempt. Software required: Python with Python IDLE or similar Register - https://forms.office.com/e/hsUZ3FHdMw?origin=lprLink
Convened by Carlo Emilio Biuzzi (EPHE) "This workshop explores the formulation and expression of social thought within Christian communities of the First Millennium, a field that has recently attracted renewed scholarly attention. Bringing together researchers working on different regions and traditions, it seeks to reassess the conceptual tools commonly used to describe Late Antiquity when applied to medieval societies, particularly beyond the familiar settings of imperial courts, major urban centres of the Christian East, or Byzantium. The workshop asks how narratives of society might be constructed outside political treatises; what visions of social order emerge from monastic relationality or from rural and peripheral communities; and whether notions such as the “body of the Church” can illuminate not only ecclesiastical structures but also bonds such as marriage or the household. It further considers the role of urban space in relation to the chōra, the evolution of elites beyond the city, and the transformation of social concepts inherited from Roman tradition within Eastern Christianity. The day is structured around three movements: a methodological reflection on writing social history with ancient categories; a discussion of context and chronology across the medium and longue durée; and an exploration of renewed approaches, with particular attention to gender." https://mfo.web.ox.ac.uk/event/workshop-beyond-body-church-formalisations-social-ideas-medieval-christianity
Do you need help managing your references? Do you need help citing references in your documents? This online session will introduce you to EndNote, a subscription software programme which can help you to store, organise and retrieve your references and PDFs, as well as cite references in documents and create bibliographies quickly and easily. On completing the workshop you will be able to: understand the main features and benefits of EndNote; set up an EndNote account; import references from different sources into EndNote; organise your references in EndNote; insert citations into documents; and create a bibliography/reference list. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; taught student; researcher and research student
All welcome, and to join us for lunch afterwards.
*Readings* Primary source: Francisco Negrão, _Origem de toda a theologia gentilica, e da Trindade divina, que os gentios adorão_ (1617) Ângela Barreto Xavier, _Religion and Empire in Portuguese India: Conversion, Resistance and the Making of Goa_ (2022), 244-277 (Ch. 6: ‘The Martyrs of Cuncolim and Other Episodes of Resistance’) (available online here: https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/35n82s/alma991027379042007026) Catherine Infante, _The Arts of Encounter: Christians, Muslims, and the Power of Images in Early Modern Spain_ (2022), 89-114 (Ch. 4: ‘Marian Images of Conversion’) (available online here: https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/35n82s/alma991025489954507026) Pete Sigal, ‘Franciscan Voyeurism in Sixteenth-Century New Spain’, in _Ethnopornography: Sexuality, Colonialism, and Archival Knowledge_, ed. Pete Sigal, Zeb Tortorici, and Neil L. Whitehead (2020), 139-168 (available online here: https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/35n82s/alma991027040158007026) Justyna Olko and Julia Madajczak, ‘An Animating Principle in Confrontation with Christianity? De(re)Constructing the Nahua “Soul”’, _Ancient Mesoamerica_ 30, 1 (2019): 75-88 (available online here: https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/ao2p7t/cdi_proquest_journals_2208307317) Sanjay Subrahmanyam, _Three Ways to Be Alien: Travails and Encounters in the Early Modern World_ (2011), 73-132 (Ch. 2: ‘The Perils of Realpolitik’) (available online here: https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/35n82s/alma991027379440607026)
The use of market-based mechanisms to address environmental externalities is a major source of enquiry in environmental economics; so I hope it may be of interest to explore the history and creation of one local nature market in detail. In 2024 the English government introduced a new policy aiming to ensure that all new developments in England leave biodiversity ‘10% better off’ than before development, with a market enabling the creation of new habitat to be sold to developers constituting part of the policy. I have been involved in the academic study of this market (primarily from an ecological perspective) and as an advisor to several UK and EU government bodies, since 2020, and have had an overview of exactly how this market has been created and developed in practice. This is not a traditional economics lecture; it is an in-depth case study into the realities of contemporary environmental policymaking and market creation.
This talk presents a Bayesian framework for estimating international migration flows using imperfect and partially observed data. Migration statistics are often fragmented across sources and time, with substantial undercounting and measurement error, limiting their usefulness for understanding migration systems. Focusing on migration corridors between the EU-27 and the UK from 2011 to 2022, I show how traditional demographic data can be integrated with digital trace data to improve the estimation of migrant stocks and, subsequently, migration flows. The approach proceeds in two stages. First, Bayesian hierarchical models are used to estimate observed and unobserved migrant stocks by combining census-based sources with social media data. Second, these stock estimates are used as inputs to derive consistent estimates of migration flows across corridors and over time. The talk introduces key concepts such as migration systems, corridors, and the stock–flow relationship, and illustrates how Bayesian modelling enables uncertainty quantification and comparability across data sources. I conclude by discussing implications for migration research and official statistics. Please join either in person or online. For in-person attendees, the talk will be preceded by a light lunch at 12.15pm.
My doctoral project in Comparative Literature examines the earliest detective fiction of Japan and Argentina. The novel comparative axis between Asia and South America aspires not to transpacific studies but rather to a decentralised re-evaluation of literary networks between the West and the wider world. Emerging from the pages of Vidocq, Poe, Gaboriau and Conan Doyle, detective fiction spread rapidly in a self-referential chain that reached around the world. On close inspection, the earliest practitioners in Japan and Argentina display remarkable parallels despite limited direct contact. My research looks behind the canonical figures of these literatures (Jorge Luis Borges, Edogawa Ranpo) to focuses on the pioneers whose similarities have been hitherto unnoticed. Little examined in national scholarship, writers such as Kuroiwa Ruikō and Hamao Shirō (from Japan) have never before been read in conjunction with Luis Varela and Felix Alberto de Zabalía (from Argentina). Yet they reveal echoes in the narrative, translation and publishing practices of the genre that complicate a hegemonic literary history. These are acts of adaptation and resistance which demonstrate a complex relationship between crime narratives, modernity, and law enforcement. Oliver Eccles is in the last year of his PhD in Comparative Literature at University College London. He completed a MA (also in Comparative Literature) at King’s College London, and a BA in French and Spanish at New College, Oxford. The broad scope of his doctoral research has seen his academic interests range over narratology, memory studies, queer studies and translation studies. His research has been supported by the London Arts and Humanities Partnership, the Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation, the British Association for Japan Studies and the Literary Encyclopedia.
I will present two studies examining preservice teachers’ dialogic teaching practices within an immersive virtual reality (VR) classroom simulation powered by a large language model (LLM). Study 1 investigated 23 preservice teachers’ perceptions of authenticity, situational interest, and self-efficacy during VR-based classroom debates, and analyzed their talk-move patterns using a hidden Markov model. Study 2 explored whether repeated simulation experiences combined with peer feedback influenced 22 preservice teachers’ beliefs about classroom ownership of ideas and activities. Together, the findings suggest that AI-driven VR simulations offer authentic and scalable environments for capturing dialogic teaching practices and fostering more student-centered instructional beliefs among preservice teachers.
Professor Guy Thwaites University of Oxford https://www.ndm.ox.ac.uk/team/guy-thwaites
In this event we will introduce the Pharmaceutical and Biotechnology industries, providing information on the types of roles available, the skills needed and ideas on how you can build experience There will be opportunities to ask questions.
affecting over 230 million people worldwide across 68 developing countries. This seminar will focus on two areas of our research on Schistosoma mansoni that open new possibilities for the development of novel anti-schistosome therapeutics: (i) the unravelling of heat shock protein 90 (HSP90) as a vital signalling hub in the parasite; and (ii) the development of a novel in vitro stem-cell focused drug screening platform using the developing liver schistosomula stage. HSP90s are molecular chaperones often produced by cells in response to hostile conditions. We discovered that HSP90 was upregulated in the developing schistosomula, and phenotype assays revealed that various HSP90 inhibitors profoundly attenuated parasite viability/development. In vitro liver-stage, ex-vivo adult male/female worms and eggs were also killed. Strikingly, stem cell proliferation in the skin, lung and liver schistosomula, and the testicular lobes and ovaries of adult worms was blocked. SiRNA-mediated knockdown of the cytoplasmic HSP90 alpha isoform 2 (Smp_072330) also attenuated stem cell proliferation and restricted schistosomulum growth, supporting the importance of this HSP90 isoform. Phosphorylation of schistosomula Akt/protein kinase B, extracellular signal-regulated kinase, and p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase were also modulated by inhibition, suggesting HSP90 regulates core ‘system-based’ signalling pathways in the parasite. Building on our interest in schistosome stem cell biology we aimed to develop a novel drug screening platform employing non-synchronous in vitro grown liver-stage schistosomula with high-content quantitative analysis of dividing somatic neoblasts within the parasite to define phenotype. Drug screening employed a stem cell focused library containing 280 compounds, 44 of which supressed stem cell proliferation by at least 75%. Sixteen ‘hit’ compounds from the primary screen were prioritised for further testing/confirmation with testing done in both simple and complex media. Six compounds were finally selected for further investigation, all of which killed developing schistosomula and abolished both somatic and germinal stem proliferation in adult male and female worms. In addition to identifying a panel of new anti-schistosomal compounds with associated predicted targets, the findings provide mechanistic insights into the somatic stem cell biology of schistosomes. Bio Sketch: Tony Walker is Professor of Cell Biology in the School of Life Sciences, Pharmacy and Chemistry at Kingston University (KU) London. Since starting at KU over two decades ago, his research has aimed to better understand the basic biology of schistosome parasites and how they interact with their mammalian and snail hosts. Using techniques such as protein kinase assay, immunohistochemistry, confocal laser scanning microscopy, RNA interference, and phenotype assays, his research seeks to define the fundamental mechanisms by which cellular proteins regulate schistosome form and function. The research could result in the identification of candidate proteins for the development of novel anti-schistosome drugs to help control the neglected tropical disease, human schistosomiasis.
During this forum speakers from Bodleian Open Scholarship Support and across Oxford will discuss current changes in the field of open scholarship. Including subjects like data, open access, open monographs, copyright and more. It is advised that attendees of the forum have previously attended the Fundamentals and Logistics courses to improve understanding. Intended audience: researcher and research student; staff
Are you planning to present a poster at an upcoming conference, meeting or symposium? This introductory session will provide you with some top tips on how to create a poster presentation which will help you to communicate your research project and data effectively. There will be guidance on formatting, layout, content, use of text, references and images, as well as advice on printing and presenting your poster. This session will also provide help with locating resources such as templates, free-to-use images and poster guidelines. By the end of this classroom-based session you will be able to: evaluate the effectiveness of templates, formatting, text and images; and plan, prepare and present your poster. Intended audience: Medicine and NHS; Researcher and research student
This paper looks at the history of Britain’s first community-based mental health charities, focusing on the Mental After-Care Association (MACA), founded in 1879. It looks at how these charities approached recovery from mental illness, and consequently sheds light on the birth of British psychotherapy. It shows how psychotherapy emerged from a collection of interpersonal practices developed by philanthropists and medical professionals to engender and sustain mental health. It reveals how women working in administrative and professional psychiatric capacities were influential in this process. Appreciating early psycho-medical charities’ involvement in the germination of British psychotherapeutics uncovers how philanthropists’ ideals regarding the good and healthy self, the moral virtues of certain kinds of friendship, and Chrisian social duties, were actively woven into practices adopted and claimed by psychiatric professionals, and which have since become presented as value-free medical interventions. *Dr Hannah Blythe* is a historian and health humanities researcher with a background in policy and public affairs. Her research focuses on mental health, psychiatry, psychology, charity, and the National Health Service. At Leeds, she works on the Constructing Moral Babies project, using interdisciplinary methods to explore the history and policy of the infant mind. Before joining Leeds, Hannah was a Research Fellow at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, where she researched the role of charity in the British National Health Service. Before that, she completed her PhD at the University of Cambridge, with an affiliation at the Birkbeck Centre for Interdisciplinary Research on Mental Health. Her PhD examines the history of Britain's first community mental health charities, 1879-1939, with a focus on their approaches to recovery from mental illness and their roles in the birth of British psychotherapy. She has also worked in policy and public affairs in the charity sector, local government and UK Parliament.
There has been increasing recognition that anxiety disorders and symptoms are very common in the perinatal period (from pregnancy to the first year postpartum). Anxiety has been defined in the DSM as apprehension, tension, or uneasiness that stems from the anticipation of danger, which may be internal or external. It is important to consider perinatal anxiety in the context of increased threat and dysregulation due to physical, social and emotional changes at this time, and the interface with the tasks and demands of caregiving. This can be particularly difficult in the context of unwanted intrusive thoughts of infant harm, especially when appraised that the risk is from the parent themselves. Presenting data from a range of studies, this talk will centre on the phenomenology of anxiety in the perinatal period, considering the interactions between parenting, perceived parenting and mental health, and how psychological treatments need to be adapted to attune to these factors to optimise outcomes for parent and child.
The seminar will be followed by drinks.
What are the implications of AI for state and non-state threats, conventional and hybrid warfare, and our international relationships?
Taiwan Undaunted, an award-winning documentary, explores the emergence of Taiwanese nationhood and identity from colonial and dynastic times through the democratic awakening. Drawing on over 80 in-depth interviews with ordinary people, experts, and politicians, director-presenter Neal E. Robbins captures Taiwanese aspirations, dreams, hopes, and fears. At the centre of his account lie the tensions between Taiwan's indigenous heritage, immigrant roots and the geopolitical complexities across the strait. With China's territorial claims intensifying, the documentary and Robbins’s eponymous book, out in February, reflect on the resilience of Taiwan's democracy and the uncertain future that lies ahead. The film and the Q & A with the director afterwards will also afford the opportunity to consider the challenges posed by documentary and book creation on the same topic. “In documentary I could let viewers fly like a bird over the land, stand in the trenches of World War II battles and take VIP seats at military parades in Beijing while commentary flowed over the scenes,” says Robbins. “The images had emotional impact but at the expense of truncated intellectual breadth and depth. The book echoes the documentary, but refocuses on nuances, interconnections and subtleties, creating a much fuller, more organic vision.” About the Speaker: After doing a degree in Chinese at Washington University in St Louis, Neal E. Robbins studied the language in Taiwan from 1976-78, when he also collected Taiwanese short stories later published by Yale University Press. After graduating from Columbia University in journalism in 1979, he worked as a foreign correspondent in Hong Kong, New Delhi and Washington. He was a professor of journalism at Roosevelt University in Chicago from 1986 and from 1991-93 at National Taiwan University (NTU). While in Taiwan he contributed to The Washington Post, National Public Radio, and the BBC. From 1993–1995 he was Europe correspondent based in London for the Taiwan newspaper China Times, and from 1997 launched a community website for Cambridge, England, where he lives with his family. After completing a Taiwan Studies degree at SOAS, University of London, in 2023 he returned to Taiwan in 2023-24 as a visiting scholar at NTU.
Week 6 Monday 23rd February 5.15pm 10.019 Christy Wensley, University of Oxford ‘So strange a dreaminess did there reign’: Herman Melville’s Economies of the Drift
The Revd Dr Rosalind Lane was a Prison Chaplain from 1996-2012. She was awarded her Doctorate in 2016 for a thesis entitled 'Imprisoned Grief: A theological, Spiritual and Practical Response'. In her research, she highlights the role of the Prison Chaplain as one who 'shepherds away from home' and argues that Chaplains are uniquely placed to support those who are disenfranchised in their grief whilst in prison. Her epistemological standpoint is one of a practitioner/researcher as a practical theologian, and arises from theological reflection on the experiences of those in her care. Her research highlights that those in prison as well as being disenfranchised whilst grieving can become imprisoned in their grief in many different ways. She investigates the distinctive work of the chaplain, what is spiritual, religious, symbolic, and/or theological about it, and in so doing what areas of prisoner lives could be enfranchised and liberated in addressing these painful parts of their lives. She offers a unique insight to how faith operates in this hidden part of public life. A response to her talk will be given by The Revd Paul Cowley, MBE, drawing on his own experience of both serving time in prison and of working through various organisations to help ex-offenders reintegrate into society. As a young man, Paul Cowley spent time in HMP Risley; he then served for seventeen years in the British Army. On leaving, he had a career in business, before changing his vocation to become a priest in the Church of England, serving at Holy Trinity Brompton. In 2005 he founded the charity Caring for Exoffenders, which has helped over 2,000 men and women re-integrate and re-join the workforce, and for which he was awarded an MBE in 2016.
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence is responsible for assessing most medicines launched in England, diagnostics, devices and digital products and creating clinical guidelines that identify the most clinically and cost-effective care. We’ll discuss how NICE assesses clinically and cost-effective care, including an interactive session where we work through different scenarios, such as a very expensive medicine for a few people and a very cheap medicine for many people. Finally, we’ll end with what kinds of innovations NICE are seeing now and anticipate in the near future, what they may mean for the health and care service, the practice of medicine and NICE assessment.
The ASCEND Network is hosting a leadership workshop on ‘Research Ideation – Finding the White Space’ and ‘Funding Pathways Beyond the Obvious’. This workshop will aim to give participants one or two new ideas or directions for their research and a new list of funding options, with one of those options having been explored in more depth. Please note, you must be a member of the network to attend the workshop. You can join the network here: https://www.medsci.ox.ac.uk/about-us/who-we-are/departments-networks-clinical-trial-units/networks/ascend-1/membership-and-joining
TBA
Are you looking for a streamlined approach to gathering, managing and citing your references? Join us for this interactive online session in which we introduce Zotero, a reference management tool that helps you to collect and manage references and insert them into your word-processor document as in-text citations or footnotes, as well as generating bibliographies. The demonstration will be on Windows although Zotero is also available for Mac and Linux. By the end of the session, you will understand: how Zotero can help you; how to add references to Zotero from a range of sources; how to manage your references; how to add in-text citations and/or footnotes to your documents; how to create bibliographies; and where to get help with Zotero. Please note that, whilst this session is mostly aimed at beginners, there will be a chance at the end to ask more specific questions about how to use Zotero. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student
Join us for a digital scholarship coffee gathering - tea and coffee will be provided. At this session we'll have a talk titled Spectral Analysis and the Shelley Circle: Towards a New Digital School of Textual Criticism About the speaker Michael J. Sullivan is a literary critic at the University of Oxford and General Editor of The Complete Works of Alfred Tennyson for Oxford University Press. His interests span the poetics and verse cultures of the late eighteenth to twentieth centuries, with publications on Victorian and Romantic literature and special interests in poetic drafts and the transnational drift of verse forms. His work in digital editing includes the project Recovery of Literary Manuscripts, which is among the first sustained applications of multispectral imaging to the study of modern anglophone literature. The project’s work on Tennyson received recent media coverage in The Smithsonian magazine and Artnet among others, and a video on Recovery of Literary Manuscripts was released by the University of Oxford in 2025: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvIqW-qj7eA. He is currently finishing Tennyson: A Life in Manuscripts for Princeton University Press and writing Transnational Verse Forms: The Making of Stanzas in Modern Poetics. These will be held in the Visiting Scholars Centre, so to attend you’ll need to bring your Bodleian Card and to leave your bags in the lockers - this event is only open to University staff and students.
Narrative CVs are being adopted by many funders, nationally and internationally, to give researchers the opportunity to showcase a wider range of skills and experience than is possible in a traditional academic CV; an example is the UKRI Résumé for Research and Innovation (R4RI). Writing a narrative CV requires a different way of thinking about and describing your skills, experience and contributions to research and innovation compared to a traditional CV. Writing your first narrative CV will take some time and effort; you might not be sure about what activities to include, and how to describe their quality, relevance, and your involvement in them. This presentation will try to demystify and simplify narrative CVs by providing advice, prompts and suggestions for how to write one. Speakers Mary Muers Research Culture Facilitator, MSD Kanza Basit Senior Research Facilitator, SSD Gavin Bird Head of Research Facilitation and Support, SOGE, SSD Susan Black, Careers Adviser, Oxford Careers Service Everyone welcome, please register to receive the TEAMS link for this event If you are a student or researcher with a CareerConnect account, please register "here":https://oxford.targetconnect.net/leap/event.html?id=22970&service=Careers%20Service All other staff register "here":https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=G96VzPWXk0-0uv5ouFLPke7xLB0LNIFKuA055EWF9ZtUOUhSTjVFMExHUzlVSkU1WFZER1JKTU9VTy4u, the joining link will be in the registration confirmation email
Postgraduate students, fellows, staff and faculty from any discipline are welcome. This group aims to foster frequent interdisciplinary critical dialogue across Oxford and beyond about the political impacts of emerging technologies. Please contact Callum Harvey (callum.harvey@oii.ox.ac.uk) in advance to participate or with any questions. Attendance is online only. You do not currently have to be affiliated with the University of Oxford to attend and participate in discussions.
Join us for a special discussion to hear two very different stories about the Women of Bletchley Park – a personal account and a researcher’s perspective. Sir Dermot Turing is the award-winning author of X, Y and Z – the real story of how Enigma was broken and Enigma Traitors, which reveals the failings of Allied cipher security during World War II. He will share insights from his latest book, Misread signals, which highlights the crucial, often overlooked roles of women at Bletchley Park. We are also honoured to welcome Mary Stewart, who will tell us about her experiences serving as a bombe operator in the Women’s Royal Naval Service (WRNS) during the Second World War. The Wrens, as they were known then, were the female branch of the British Royal Navy, formed initially in 1917 (WWI) and reformed in 1939 (WWII) to release men for sea service by filling crucial land-based roles like clerks, drivers, wireless operators, and codebreakers, serving globally and integrating into the Navy until officially disbanding in 1993 as women joined the Navy directly. Tea, coffee and biscuits are provided immediately before the talk, from 11.30am. Dermot Turing Sir Dermot Turing Sir Dermot Turing is a Visiting Fellow of Kellogg College, and the acclaimed author of Prof, a biography of his famous uncle, The Story of Computing, and most recently Misread Signals. Mary Stewart was a Bombe operator during the War. Bombe machines were designed by Alan Turing and Gordon Welchman to break German Enigma codes. Operators were mostly women from the Women’s Royal Naval Service (Wrens), who worked shifts in a tedious but vital role that involved setting up the machines, identifying “stops,” and passing potential settings to codebreakers, Mary Stewart Mary Stewart Bletchley Park Week: This event is part of our annual Bletchley Park Week (22-27 February) programme of events celebrating a partnership between Kellogg College and Bletchley Park. This year’s theme is: “The Age of AI”.
In the era of accelerating global climate change, freshwater is increasingly becoming a strategic and contested resource. Few regions illustrate this more clearly than Tibet: the source of some of the world’s most important rivers that sustain nearly half of the global population. This lecture will explore the emotional dimensions of water politics in China–India relations, focusing on the narratives of pride, anger, fear, and national identity regarding the Himalayan region and shared river systems. Moreover, the lecture will shed light on how the 75-year territorial dispute between the world’s two most populous countries is intrinsically intertwined with the emerging conflict over water security. Finally, the presenter will assess the role of emotions in possible future trajectories in China–India relations and beyond. Dr Antonina Luszczykiewicz-Mendis is an educator, author, and commentator on China–India relations and Indo-Pacific affairs. She is currently a visiting scholar at the University of Oxford China Centre. Antonina previously served as a Fulbright senior scholar at Indiana University in the United States. A former Taiwan fellow of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of China (ROC), she was also a Confucius Institute scholar at Xi’an Jiaotong University in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and a Kosciuszko fellow in the United States. She is an assistant professor at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, a research fellow at the Central European Institute of Asian Studies in Slovakia, and an associate fellow of the World Academy of Art and Science. She received her graduate education and research training at the Jagiellonian University and the University of Cambridge.
This session explores how interviews can be used effectively as a Voice of the Customer tool in CI work, helping teams capture what customers say, need and experience. While they offer rich, honest insight into customer needs and behaviours, interviews are often underused; this session shares practical techniques, inclusive approaches and real world lessons from CI practitioners.
Hybrid. Email oxchildpsych@psych.ox.ac.uk to request the link to attend online.
24 February, 12.30pm (room 00.056, Schwarzman Centre) Thomas Leonard-Roy (Università degli Studi di Sassari), 'Writerly Hate'
Across Western Europe and North America, immigration is a high-profile issue at the center of election campaigns. Yet, we do not know whether people are committed to their immigration preferences, and how that varies across people who support or oppose immigration. We address these questions with four original surveys from Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States. One key finding is that people with pro-immigration preferences are more civically engaged to support immigration. However, we also find that people with anti-immigration preferences are more likely to support politicians on the basis of their immigration proposals. In addition, people with anti-immigration preferences are more likely to support politicians who agree with them on immigration but violate democratic norms. These differences in electoral prioritization are largely explained by ideological extremity. Our findings have numerous implications for understanding immigration divides and political engagement more generally.
Media and public discourse on digital technology use in early childhood often highlight narratives of concern about children’s screen time, online safety, digital choices, and emotional and behavioural challenges surrounding their digital activity (e.g., ‘techno-tantrums’ when requests for digital devices are denied or when required to transition away from a digital device). Our recent meta-analysis suggests that children’s self-regulation is associated with these digital behaviours and reactivity from childhood through to adolescence, although its role is nuanced. Unfortunately, most research has focused on associations of self-regulation with screen time and problematic patterns and risky forms of digital engagement, providing low clarity regarding when, for what, and under what conditions self-regulation is involved in different types and contexts of young children’s digital engagement. This seminar will unpack those meta-analytic findings on the role of self-regulation in young children’s digital activity, and add emerging research and essential future research directions that further consider interactions of individual, educational, digital design, and contextual factors – which may point to better solutions to prepare children for the digital demands of their present and future. Teams link: https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/3825967966058?p=oaa4boDA3tu5ZnqMja
We study the bounds of mediated communication in sender-receiver games in which the sender’s payoff is state-independent. We show that the feasible distributions of beliefs under mediation are those that induce zero correlation, but not necessarily independence, between the sender’s payoff and the receiver’s belief. Mediation attains the upper bound on the sender’s value, i.e., the Bayesian persuasion value, if and only if this value collapses to the lower bound, i.e., the cheap talk value. Mediation is strictly above this lower bound when the sender has countervailing incentives in the space of the receiver’s belief, as captured by a failure of a weak single-crossing condition. We apply our results to asymmetric-information settings such as bilateral trade and lobbying and explicitly construct mediation policies such that the informed and uninformed parties are better off than under unmediated communication.
TBC Teams link: https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/33810063282855?p=drc3Y5xteIW6y0P8sG
Bio: Stephan Sanders is Professor of Paediatric Neurogenetics in the Department of Paediatrics at the University of Oxford, a member of faculty at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), and an affiliate of the New York Genome Center (NYGC). He trained as a paediatrician before undertaking a PhD and Postdoctoral studies in Genetics and Bioinformatics at Yale University. In 2014, he started his lab at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) before moving to Oxford in 2022. His group specialises in the genetics of autism spectrum disorder and other neurodevelopmental disorders, including genomics, functional genomics, and therapeutics. Dr. Sanders is the Director of the MRC Centre of Research Excellence in Therapeutic Genomics, co-leads the Genetics Medicine Frontier Hub of the Aligning Research to Impact Autism (ARIA) project and is a leader of the Autism Sequencing Consortium and a SFARI Sex Differences Collaboration project. Join the meeting online: https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3ameeting_YTlmOWQyODgtYzJhMS00NDQyLWExYmQtOTkzNmFiZWRmMWEy%40thread.v2/0?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%22cc95de1b-97f5-4f93-b4ba-fe68b852cf91%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%22902ce32a-9317-4399-9f23-a83c7907d4bd%22%7d
Discover how to combine creative problem-solving with AI-powered tools in this fast-paced, hands-on workshop. You’ll learn the essentials of Design Thinking, practice refining real-world challenges, and explore how AI can accelerate ideation and solution development. Bring a problem from your research area—or use one we provide—and collaborate with peers to generate innovative ideas.
Unlock the full potential of your literature review with Scopus, a vital database for social sciences, medical sciences, and physical and life sciences. This interactive session will cover basic and advanced searching, highlighting features unique to Scopus and recent updates to the database. Ideal for new researchers and a great refresher for experienced researchers, with plenty of hands on searching and time for questions. By the end of the session you will be able to: construct simple and complex searches; navigate filters; understand effective search query techniques; save and export results; and extract further information from your results. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student
Beyond the dramatic and consequential attacks by the Trump administration, American higher education is under pressure to demonstrate its effectiveness in enhancing student success and employability. There has been criticism that students don’t learn enough, are disengaged, and are not getting value for money. This presentation presents the results of a recent study The Multi-Engagement Model: Understanding Diverse Pathways to Student Success at Research Universities that provides a unique data driven and holistic perspective on understanding the undergraduate experience at large U.S. public research-intensive universities. Leveraging 11 years of survey and institutional data collected by the Student Experience in the Research University (SERU) Consortium, our research shows the significance and interconnectedness of various college experiences — academic engagement in and outside of classroom settings, research activities, extracurricular, civic, and career development — and that this results in distinct and diverse pathways to success. This research contradicts the narrative of students being academically adrift popular in the media, and offers a path for institutions to better understand the experience of students from diverse backgrounds, and to better articulate to stakeholders the robust nature of their educational enterprises. This study also found that student engagement across the areas we measured declined during the pandemic and had yet to fully recover in 2023. My co-authors and I also found inequities in experiences and opportunities for students from lower-income families and underrepresented groups.
Digitization in ‘New India’: A Material and Moral Technology Dr Nafis Aziz Hasan (University of Amsterdam) As a material, ideological, aesthetic and moral force, digitization of public administration in India, has, over the past four decades, intervened in the social, political and technological life of the state, broadly conceived. In this talk, drawing on an ethnography of public bureaucracy as it encounters the multiple infrastructures of mobile apps, dashboards and databases as the interfaces through which forms of algorithmic software and now AI meet prior writing and documentary technologies, I describe some key effects of the charisma of new technology on a diverse constituency of actors and institutions – local bureaucrats and their offices, senior bureaucrats and new forms of expertise and national pride and the everyday hopes and despairs of people interacting with a digitizing state. Undergirding these descriptions are anthropological concerns about the shaping and re-shaping of collective and individual identities in ‘New India’. Dr. Nafis Aziz Hasan is an assistant professor in the department of Anthropology at the University of Amsterdam (UvA) specializing in the human and organizational effects of digitization in the Global South. Prior to joining the UvA, he was a postdoctoral research fellow at the Center for the Advanced Study of India at the University of Pennsylvania. His articles have appeared in American Ethnologist, Science Technology and Human Values and South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, among other venues. Along with Ashish Rajadhyaksha and Nishant Shah, he is also the author of the open access book Overload, Creep, Excess: An Internet from India. Dwelling in Ambiguity: Tanzanian-led AI Innovation and the Technological Otherwise Tom Neumark (University of Oslo) This talk draws on my ethnographic research among Tanzanian computer and data scientists working on healthcare and medical technologies. I begin by posing a simple question: should Tanzanian-led digital technological innovation fill us with despair or inspire us? Debates that hinge on the idea of a technological otherwise often polarise. Critics see sameness in a derivative Silicon Valley solutionism, techno-fixing, and neoliberal capture. In contrast, others emphasise difference, pointing to local, situated knowledge, forms of care, or technological self-determination. I argue that both perspectives are as problematic as they are illuminating, and we must focus more consistently on ambiguity. My argument is not simply descriptive – that ambiguity exists in practice – but normative and methodological: we should retain and centre it in our explanations and political response. I show how centring ambiguity potentially offers new opportunities for learning with not only our interlocutors but also other disciplines. Tom Neumark is a social anthropologist whose research focuses on interventions to alleviate poverty and ill health in East Africa. He is the author of Caring Cash: Free Money and the Ethics of Solidarity in Kenya, published by Pluto Press, and holds a PhD in Social Anthropology from the University of Cambridge.
The idea that new species can arise as a by-product of natural selection acting on ecological and morphological traits is gaining increasing support from studies of recently diverged species. In this seminar, I present evidence for rapid ecological and morphological divergence in cichlid fishes living in small, isolated crater lakes in Tanzania. I begin by describing phylogenomic evidence for a striking case of body size–related speciation among predatory, open-water cichlids in crater Lake Kingiri (approximately 600 m in diameter). I then turn to a second example from crater Lake Masoko (approximately 700 m in diameter), where speciation appears to be linked to habitat differences. Here, I focus first on the role of visual adaptations in driving divergence, before presenting quantitative evidence showing how natural selection acts on ecological and morphological traits. Together, these case studies help to clarify how natural selection can drive ecological speciation, a process that likely underlies the remarkable and much more extensive cichlid mega-radiations of the East African Great Lakes. Martin Genner is an ecologist and evolutionary biologist, with interests in the origins of diversity (speciation and adaptive radiation), how it is maintained (species coexistence) and how it is influenced by changing environments (climate and invasive species). His research focusses on fishes, and he has worked most extensively on species from East African freshwaters, European seas and the Southern Ocean. His research uses a wide range of approaches, including field surveys of biodiversity, analyses of long-term fisheries data, experimental field studies, quantitative observations of behaviour, and analyses of morphology. He also uses analyses of environmental DNA, stable isotope ratios, and genome/transcriptome/methylome data for the study of biodiversity, genetic structure and evolutionary adaptation.
Join us at Oxford Edge for a Humanities Beyond Academia Skill Workshop with *Dr Pegram Harrison*. This session will focus on "Skills for Teams", teaching valuable skills on how to build teams and foster teamwork. All welcome.
After having worked for two years at the Ministry of Health’s Blair Research Institute (now the National Institute for Health), on malaria research in the Zambezi Valley, Tim Freeman established Malair (Pvt) Ltd, a private consultancy company that operated from 1993 to 2000. Under sponsorship from EMNET (Pvt) Ltd, Freeman implemented the Gokwe Malaria Project, taking exclusive control of mosquito-net distribution in the district. In his project report, Freeman framed rural communities as largely ignorant of malaria, positioning himself as a necessary intermediary. Yet his motives were far beyond humanitarianism as he explicitly sought to turn Gokwe into a profitable market space for mosquito nets, treating them as commodities to be sold the same way pharmaceuticals sell drugs. In this talk, I will be drawing on this to speak about the blurred and often contested boundary between public health interventions and market profit. I argue that Freeman’s project exemplifies how malaria control has repeatedly been shaped by the entanglement of humanitarian rhetoric with market‑driven imperatives.
Facing a fiscal threat from mass suburbanization, Sun Belt cities expanded their municipal boundaries nearly six-fold between 1945 and 2000, while Northern cities, constrained by state annexation laws, saw little expansion. Using newly digitized data on city boundaries, we estimate that the average expansion increased municipal population by over 35%, adding whiter and higher-income neighborhoods than the pre-existing core. Through a stacked difference-in-differences design comparing annexing cities to similar non-annexing cities, we evaluate how boundary expansions impacted municipal finance and public good provision. While total revenues and expenditures increased after annexation, per capita levels declined by roughly 25%, with the largest declines in current expenditures and labor-intensive services like fire and policing. However, proxies for public good provision show no decline post-annexation, suggesting cities maintained service quality by leveraging economies of scale in high fixed-cost sectors. Despite contemporary claims that annexation would spur broader economic growth, we find no evidence of increased county-level employment.
The event will be followed by a drinks reception.
Alarmism persists over a growing Chinese Navy, yet Chinese naval strategy suggests defence rather than offence. The root of the problem is inferring too much from Beijing’s naval building programme. Simple capability analysis is too scientific – there is no room for analysis of Chinese maritime intent amidst counting new hulls and long-range missiles. If the West overreacts to a growing Chinese Navy, the risk of a damaging arms race in the Western Pacific increases. Ever more capable warships operating in the confined waters of the East and South China Sea risk a war begun by miscalculation. In this talk, Lt Cdr Ward will reprise his theme of the ‘the mirroring fallacy’, first described at a CCW lunchtime lecture in Trinity Term 2024. Now informed by operational experience from 2025, Andrew will show that inferring Chinese naval intent as a mirror of Western naval intent is fallacious. Andrew Ward was the 2023-24 Royal Navy Hudson Fellow and a Visiting Fellow at CCW. Andrew joined the Royal Navy in 2012, serving at sea in destroyers HMS DRAGON and DUNCAN in the Middle East. Recently he has been working in international policy at the Ministry of Defence and Northwood Headquarters. He read Philosophy, Politics and Economics at University College, was a visiting student at Washington & Lee University and completed an MA in Defence and Security Studies (Maritime) at King’s College London in 2021. His paper on the Royal Navy and the Early Cold War was published in January 2022. In 2025 Andrew sailed with the aircraft carrier HMS Prince of Wales on deployment to the Asia-Pacific region.
Former Irish Minister for Housing Eoghan Murphy offers a rare, deeply personal look into the realities of modern political life in a candid fireside chat based on his bestselling book Running From Office: Confessions of Ambition and Failure in Politics. The event will feature a a moderated conversation with Michael McMahon, Professor of Economics, and David Doyle, Professor of Politics, and an audience Q&A.
Both a love story and a coming-of-age tale that spans countries and continents, 'Fire in Every Direction' balances humour and loss, nostalgia and hope, as it takes us from the Middle East to London, and from 1948 to the present. Tareq Baconi crafts a deeply intimate, unforgettable portrait of how a political consciousness – desire and resistance – is passed down through generations. In 1948, Tareq’s grandmother would flee Haifa as Zionist militias seized the city. In the late 1970s, she would flee Beirut with her daughter, as the country was in the throes of a civil war. In Amman, the family would eventually obtain the comfort of middle-class life – still, a young Tareq would feel trapped: by cultures of silence, by a sense of not belonging, by his own growing awareness that he is in love with his childhood best friend, Ramzi. After relocating to London, Tareq hopes to put aside his past. Yet as the Iraq War radicalizes young people around the world towards anti-war protest, history comes back to him. Living between the region and London, Tareq fits in neither and feels alienated from both. Queerness is policed back in Amman, just as his Palestinian-ness is abroad. These gradual estrangements escalate, forcing him to grapple with what it means to live in liminal spaces, and rethink the meaning of home. https://www.hachette.co.uk/titles/tareq-baconi/fire-in-every-direction/9781399739634/
The seminars will take place on Tuesdays during term time, from 5:00 to 6:30 p.m. at Corpus Christi College in Merton Street. Please ask the porters for directions. No registration is required. For more details: https://tolkien50.web.ox.ac.uk/event/tolkien-seminars-ht-2026
This talk argues that divine and mythical beasts were not decorative motifs but core translational operators in the French Jesuit Figurists’ early Qing re-making of the Yijing and related classics into a Christian-readable archive. Building on previously underexamined manuscript corpora—Yi yao 易鑰, Yi yin 易引, and Yi gao 易稿—the talk shows how Joachim Bouvet, Jean-François Foucquet, and Joseph Henri-Marie de Prémare deployed animal figures to construct a shared “antiquity–salvation” time-space, through which Christian notions of God, evil, and salvation could be negotiated within the Yijing and adjacent classical traditions. Focusing on Bouvet’s and Prémare’s writings on hexagrams and mythic geography, I show how their figural hermeneutics treated beasts as evidence-bearing signs embedded in Chinese cosmology. Mystic figures such as 亢龍 (Kang Long, the Rebel Dragon), 陸吾 (Lu Wu, the Nine-Tailed Tiger), 滕蛇 (Teng She, the Soaring Snake), and 鬼斗 (Gui Dou, the Nine-Headed Bird) are reread as anticipatory signs of Satan and the drama of angelic rebellion, temptation, and the fall of humanity. At the same time, dragon imagery associated with the Qian 乾 hexagram is mobilized to craft a counter-figure: a divine, sage-like dragon that foreshadows Christ as the flying dragon, mediator, and savior. By tracing these paired constructions of “good” and “evil” beasts, the paper argues that the Figurists did not merely borrow Chinese zoomorphic motifs; they reshaped the mythological bestiary into a moral and theological cartography. Mythical creatures become moving points within a shared symbolic field where biblical and Chinese cosmologies intersect. Bringing together translation studies, the history of religions, and myth criticism, the talk contends that Jesuit reimaginings of Chinese divine beasts are not ornamental curiosities but a crucial site where early modern global Christianity and Chinese classicism co-produced a new, hybrid grammar of the sacred and the demonic.
Usually translated as the “admirable,” “noble,” or “fine,” to _kalon_ in Plato is generally parsed as “Beauty in itself” and counterposed to what is _poikilon_, the “ornamentation,” “embroidery,” “variety,” or “diversity” perceived by the senses. In _Hippias Major_ and other dialogs, by contrast, including in the context of the democratic souls and constitution under scrutiny in _Republic_, kalon appears to be embedded with poikilia. This lecture argues for a phenomenological understanding of beauty in Plato and explores the implications of this understanding for the dialogs’ political philosophy.
The tenth anniversary of the EU referendum is fast approaching and many will be focused on how Brexit has, or has not, changed the economic and political world. But what if the most important change was not to institutions, political parties and the economy, but to us? This lecture series explores how the referendum, and its aftermath, sparked a form of ‘tribal politics’ that reshaped how people saw themselves, each other and the wider world. This final lecture explores the resilience and future of tribal politics in Britain. Why did some people embrace their identity so fervently while others did not, and what does this tell us about both the future of British politics but also political divides in other countries at other times?
Professor Geraghty's lecture will revisit one of the great moments in British architectural history – the emergence of the English baroque style in the years around 1700. It will look afresh at the principal architects involved – Christopher Wren, Nicholas Hawksmoor, and John Vanbrugh – and it will offer new interpretations of their haunting, compelling designs. More specifically, the lecture will show how each of these architects grounded their work in a distinctive set of philosophical first principles, and how it was the coming together of these discrete artistic personalities that brought the English baroque into being. The lecture will thereby revisit two of the main research areas associated with Sir Howard Colvin: the centrality of the Office of Works in the history of British architecture, and the place of biographical analysis within the discipline of architectural history. *Anthony Geraghty* is Professor of the History of Art at the University of York. He is best known for his work on Sir Christopher Wren and the architecture of the English baroque, including a catalogue of the Wren drawings at All Souls College, Oxford (2007) and a history of Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford (2013). His most recent book is a study of the Empress Eugénie in England (2022).
This talk examines the intersection of China’s 'Industrial Party' (gongye dang 工业党) ideology and time-travel fiction in contemporary Chinese popular culture. The 'Industrial Party' refers to a distinctive composition of Chinese netizens who champion technocratic governance and rapid industrialization as pathways to national strength. Sharing similar conservative views as the US and European alt-right, they also position themselves as critics of the identity politics of what they term the 'Emotional Party' (qinghuai dang 情怀党). One of their most prominent cultural expressions is speculative time-travel fiction, in which protagonists leverage future knowledge to accelerate China’s development. My analysis focuses specifically on Qi Cheng’s 齐橙bestseller novel Daguo zhonggong 大国重工 (Great Power Heavy Industry, 2021), which, although formally a work of speculative fiction, combines a technomodernist pretense to scientific objectivity and rationality with the mythologization of (infrastructure) metrics as indicators of economic and political success. Reading Qi’s novel within the metric-driven logics of online literature platforms and the broader fantasy fiction boom, this talk argues that speculative fiction has become a key meta-political site for negotiating history and national identity, and considers the implications for how we conceptualize popular literary culture in China today. Jessica Imbach is Assistant Professor of Sinology/contemporary China at the University of Freiburg, Germany. Her research focuses on modern and contemporary Chinese literature, narrative theory, new media, and the aesthetics and politics of genre fiction, particularly fantasy and science fiction. Her recent publications include Digital China: Creativity and Community in the Sinocybersphere (Amsterdam University Press, 2024) and Rethinking Literary China: Essays in Honor of Andrea Riemenschnitter (DeGruyter, 2025). She is the PI of the ERC-funded research project SINOFANTASY, which investigates the contemporary Chinese fantasy fiction boom.
Lena Rethel is Professor of International Political Economy at the University of Warwick. She is the principal investigator of the ERC-selected/UKRI-funded FINDEM project, which explores the impact of middle-class expectations on financial policy and politics in Indonesia and Malaysia.
This seminar will explore the feasibility of making the UK energy system fully renewable across electricity, transport, heat and industry. Much is achievable where there are political or regulatory barriers. However other segments present much more of a challenge. This seminar will explore both.
Emma Sibbald (Trinity) - 'She makes each place where she comes a Library': Women Users of Oxbridge University Libraries, 1600-1850
Join Kellogg President Professor Jonathan Michie for a conversation with Jacqueline de Rojas, Chair of Bletchley Park Trust, and Bletchley Park Fellow at Kellogg College. Jacqueline de Rojas is a leading figure in the technology sector, with a distinguished career spanning software, digital innovation and tech leadership. She is a prominent advocate for diversity and inclusion, and has advised both industry and government on digital transformation and navigating technological change. Their conversation will draw on her extensive experience to give insights into “The Age of AI” – how we got here and what it means for our future. All event attendees are invited to arrive from 5pm, when tea and coffee will be served, and to stay for a drinks reception, which will immediately follow the event. Bletchley Park Week: This event is part of our annual Bletchley Park Week (22-27 February) programme of events celebrating a partnership between Oxford and Bletchley Park. This year’s theme is: “The Age of AI”.
Join us for an inspiring Publishing and Entrepreneurship event with *Alice Curry*, founder and CEO of Lantana Publishing, an award-winning independent press championing diversity and inclusion in children’s literature. Named after lantana camara, ‘a flowering plant in the Verbena family with many-coloured petals on a single stem’, used as an allegory for children of all colours reading happily on one earth, Lantana’s mission is to promote diversity and inclusion in children’s literature. The award-winning publishing house gives authors and illustrators of colour a platform to publish, and gives children of diverse backgrounds ‘a chance to see themselves in the books they read’. Since launching in 2014, Lantana has published 28 titles, many of which have earned their own awards. In 2017, Curry was awarded the Kim Scott Walwyn Prize for women of promise in publishing, and in 2018, Lantana was selected for the Oxford Foundry’s L.E.V8 accelerator for high-potential ventures. Curry earned a BA in English Language and Literature from St. Hilda’s College, Oxford, in 2005, and went on to earn an MA and PhD in Children’s Literature from Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, where she also worked as a lecturer.
You’re invited to explore the History of Science Museum after dark through guided creative writing. Everyone’s welcome, from history, science, or writing buffs to complete newbies in any or all of those. In this workshop you will: - Discover the astrolabes up close with a museum curator - Take part in a writing workshop with a published poet and experienced teacher to create something that delights you - Collaborate in a friendly supportive atmosphere to create a poem about the museum’s astrolabes – no experience necessary All in the magical space of the museum’s vaulted Basement Gallery and sweeping Upper Gallery, after dark.
This Week's Focus: From Congresses to Authorities. Representation, leadership, and Palestinian politics beyond the nation-state. Reading Group: Palestine(s): Rethinking Politics of Fragmentations This reading group examines the political, geographic, economic, cultural, and linguistic fragmentations that have shaped Palestinian life over the past century, from the West Bank, Gaza, and the ’48 territories to the multiple Palestinian diasporas. By engaging with scholarship across history, political theory, and cultural studies, this reading group interrogates how these divisions have been produced, institutionalised, and normalised, and how they continue to shape Palestinian belongings, identities, and futures. Our aim is to consider both the unity that persists within fragmentation and the fragmentation that structures the very notion of Palestine. Central Question: How are ideas of Palestine and Palestinian collective identity shaped, challenged, and rearticulated under conditions of fragmentation? Structure: The group will convene biweekly throughout Hilary and Trinity Terms 2026, with each session lasting two hours
COURSE DETAILS Topics will include presenting your CV, how to approach employers, writing covering letters and interview skills. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this session you will understand: How to improve your CV. How to approach employers. How to write a covering letter. How to plan for an interview. How to interview well.
COURSE DETAILS The supervisory relationship is key to the success of your DPhil and we know that positive and effective relationships contribute to the timely completion of the doctorate. As with many things, the more you put into the relationship with your supervisor, the more you will benefit from it. There is much you can do to be proactive and play and active role in the relationship. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of the session participants will be able to: Find information about University, divisional and departmental regulations and the supervisory relationship. Be aware of the student's areas of responsibility in the relationship. Take appropriate responsibility within the relationship. Develop a range of skills and strategies to manage relationships effectively. Find and make appropriate use of additional sources of help and support.
*Please email "$":mailto:mori.reithmayr@history.ox.ac.uk to join the reading group mailing list.* *Session Theme: TBD*
This seminar lecture examines challenges of transport, mobility, and traffic in and around Homs, a central Syrian city in the post-war and reconstruction era. At the intra-city scale, the presentation focuses on Homs' historic core; the Old City in addition to the Homs University Campus, exploring issues of accessibility, congestion, and the coexistence of pedestrians, public transport, and private vehicles. At the inter-city scale, the lecture reflects on the Homs–Hama corridor, with particular attention to the damage to a strategic bridge shelled during the war and its wider implications for regional connectivity and flow. The presentation concludes with an interactive discussion aimed at engaging participants to identify potential solutions, policy directions, and context-sensitive interventions to improve mobility and resilience in post-war contexts.
Join us for a conversation with Dr Hazem Zohny, to explore some of the ethical questions for academics as AI makes instant text generation a new normal in the expression of ideas. Tea, coffee and biscuits are provided immediately before the talk, from 11.30am. Dr Hazem Zohny is a Senior Research Fellow in Practical Ethics, Neuroscience, and Society at the Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics.
TBC
This session will help you to understand what IP is, who "owns" it, and the things to think about when you think you have created IP. Whether you're an undergraduate, masters or DPhil student, or Staff at the University of Oxford, it is important to understand your rights and responsibilities when it comes to intellectual property (IP). This session will help you to understand what IP actually is, who "owns" it, and the things to think about when you think you have created IP. Case studies will also be presented to help explain the University's policy. Come prepared to ask any IP related questions in the second half of the session, where our expert presenters will give you the official University answers to any of your queries. In collaboration with Research Services, Oxford University Innovation, and The Careers Service. The talk will be from 12:30-1:30pm. If you have specific questions, the presenters will be available to answer questions until 2pm. Note: The sign up is through Inkpath, you will need to create an Inkpath account to sign up if you’ve not already got one.
Classical liberals argue that the expansion of market access promoted prosociality, hard work, and thrift, while according to more critical schools of thought, markets ushered in a more self-interested, secular, and unsatisfied homo economicus. We examine these ideas in a field experiment involving 4,200 individuals across 300 Congolese villages that provided free motorcycle transportation to the largest urban market in the province one day per week for six months. Market access increased household income by 15% nine months after the intervention by facilitating enduring connections to urban traders and stimulating trade in cash crops. However, it eroded subjective wellbeing on average and made participants feel further away from their desired income, likely by generating within-village inequality and altering the reference points of market ``losers.'' Market access also has a secularizing effect: participants view religious faith as a less important moral value and a weaker determinant of success in life. Instead, they believe more in their own agency and in the value of hard work, productivity, education, income, and saving. An urban placebo treatment arm helps attribute these effects to market access, separate from exposure to the city and urban social networks more generally. Written with Ngoma M, Sievert C, Jaravel X, Nunn N, Weigel
This paper examines the global adoption of technology in the late nineteenth century. We construct several novel datasets to test the idea that the codification of technical knowledge in the vernacular was necessary for countries to absorb the technologies of the First Industrial Revolution. We find that comparative advantage shifted to industries that could benefit from these technologies in countries and colonies with access to codified technical knowledge, but not in other regions. Using the rapid and unprecedented codification of technical knowledge in Meiji Japan as a natural experiment, we show that this pattern emerged only after the Japanese government codified vast amounts of technical knowledge. Our findings shed new light on the frictions associated with technological diffusion and offer a novel explanation for why Meiji Japan was unique among non-Western countries in successfully industrializing during the first wave of globalization.
Camille Neufville (University of Strasbourg), The Transnational Origins of Soviet Tea: Foreign Expertise and Foreign Presence on the South Caucasian Tea Plantations Before and After the Establishment of Soviet Power (1915-1935) When the Bolsheviks took over the Georgian Democratic Republic in 1921, they inherited, among the country’s most valuable (and little-known) assets, its tea-growing and tea-making industry. This budding branch of the rural economy had been established in Western Georgia in the 1880’s-1890’s, following the conquest of the formerly Ottoman region of Adjara. Tea culture was promoted as the perfect tool for imperial integration, as it made the landscape more « legible » through agronomy, soil sciences and plant biology, and enabled better control over an unruly and elusive local workforce composed of ottomanized Muslim Georgians (Adjarans), Greek, Armenian and Gurian peasants, and Kurdish nomadic groups. The founding of a South Caucasian tea industry was made possible by the tireless efforts of a few Russian scientists and adventurers who travelled to the main tea-producing regions of Asia, in order to extract knowledge, tools, seedlings, and even men who could help them in their enterprise, like the Cantonese tea master Liu Jenzhou. The South Caucasian tea industry was therefore a transnational enterprise from its very inception, having taken inspiration from both traditional Chinese tea farming, and the colonial tea plantations established by the British in Assam and on Ceylon, and by the Dutch in Java. But how did this transnational character evolve past the critical years of World War I, the 1917 Russian Revolution and the Civil War ? Could the tea industry survive the severing of international ties that followed the Bolshevik takeover of the country ? And was this transnational heritage ideologically compatible with the Soviet ideal of proletarian self-sufficiency ? I will show how local actors of the tea industry (workers, managers, as well as plant scientists) and local, regional and national authorities tried to navigate the hardships of post-war disorganisation, and the conundrum of having to build a highly modern and productive Soviet tea industry from the rubbles of a once cosmopolitan one. Amrit Deol (California State University, Fresno), A Bridge Between Empires: Anticolonialism, Labor, and the Geopolitics of Labor and Surveillance in Panama This paper situates Panama as a critical yet under-examined site in the global and transnational history of the Ghadar movement, foregrounding the intersection of migrant labor, anticolonial politics, and imperial surveillance in the early twentieth century. Centered on South Asian laborers who traversed the Panama Canal Zone and surrounding port cities, the paper argues that Panama functioned not merely as a transit space but as a politically charged site where imperial infrastructures of labor extraction and intelligence gathering converged. The Canal, then, simultaneously generated transnational working-class solidarities and heightened anxieties among colonial and imperial authorities. Drawing on British India Office records, U.S. news/media publications, and scattered references in revolutionary correspondence and intelligence reports, the paper demonstrates how Ghadar ideology circulated through maritime routes, labor camps, and emerging diasporic social networks in Panama. British and U.S. officials closely monitored South Asian workers, viewing them as mobile political threats whose anticolonial consciousness exceeded the territorial boundaries of empire and nation-state alike. This paper reveals how cooperation and tension between British and U.S. surveillance regimes shaped intelligence sharing, deportation practices, and racialized categories of suspicion (particularly as the United States emerged as a hemispheric imperial power after 1904). Methodologically, the paper bridges labor history and the history of surveillance, treating censorship, policing, and intelligence not as reactive measures but as foundational features of imperial governance. By centering Panama, this paper challenges nationalist historiographies of Ghadar that privilege North America or South Asia alone, and instead advances a transoceanic framework attentive to infrastructure, mobility, and state power. In doing so, it repositions Panama as a vital site in the making of global anticolonial radicalism and the early architecture of modern imperial surveillance.
*Camille Neufville* (University of Strasbourg) *The Transnational Origins of Soviet Tea: Foreign Expertise and Foreign Presence on the South Caucasian Tea Plantations Before and After the Establishment of Soviet Power (1915-1935)* When the Bolsheviks took over the Georgian Democratic Republic in 1921, they inherited, among the country’s most valuable (and little-known) assets, its tea-growing and tea-making industry. This budding branch of the rural economy had been established in Western Georgia in the 1880’s-1890’s, following the conquest of the formerly Ottoman region of Adjara. Tea culture was promoted as the perfect tool for imperial integration, as it made the landscape more « legible » through agronomy, soil sciences and plant biology, and enabled better control over an unruly and elusive local workforce composed of ottomanized Muslim Georgians (Adjarans), Greek, Armenian and Gurian peasants, and Kurdish nomadic groups. The founding of a South Caucasian tea industry was made possible by the tireless efforts of a few Russian scientists and adventurers who travelled to the main tea-producing regions of Asia, in order to extract knowledge, tools, seedlings, and even men who could help them in their enterprise, like the Cantonese tea master Liu Jenzhou. The South Caucasian tea industry was therefore a transnational enterprise from its very inception, having taken inspiration from both traditional Chinese tea farming, and the colonial tea plantations established by the British in Assam and on Ceylon, and by the Dutch in Java. But how did this transnational character evolve past the critical years of World War I, the 1917 Russian Revolution and the Civil War ? Could the tea industry survive the severing of international ties that followed the Bolshevik takeover of the country ? And was this transnational heritage ideologically compatible with the Soviet ideal of proletarian self-sufficiency ? I will show how local actors of the tea industry (workers, managers, as well as plant scientists) and local, regional and national authorities tried to navigate the hardships of post-war disorganisation, and the conundrum of having to build a highly modern and productive Soviet tea industry from the rubbles of a once cosmopolitan one. *Amrit Deol* (California State University, Fresno *A Bridge Between Empires: Anticolonialism, Labor, and the Geopolitics of Labor and Surveillance in Panama* This paper situates Panama as a critical yet under-examined site in the global and transnational history of the Ghadar movement, foregrounding the intersection of migrant labor, anticolonial politics, and imperial surveillance in the early twentieth century. Centered on South Asian laborers who traversed the Panama Canal Zone and surrounding port cities, the paper argues that Panama functioned not merely as a transit space but as a politically charged site where imperial infrastructures of labor extraction and intelligence gathering converged. The Canal, then, simultaneously generated transnational working-class solidarities and heightened anxieties among colonial and imperial authorities. Drawing on British India Office records, U.S. news/media publications, and scattered references in revolutionary correspondence and intelligence reports, the paper demonstrates how Ghadar ideology circulated through maritime routes, labor camps, and emerging diasporic social networks in Panama. British and U.S. officials closely monitored South Asian workers, viewing them as mobile political threats whose anticolonial consciousness exceeded the territorial boundaries of empire and nation-state alike. This paper reveals how cooperation and tension between British and U.S. surveillance regimes shaped intelligence sharing, deportation practices, and racialized categories of suspicion (particularly as the United States emerged as a hemispheric imperial power after 1904). Methodologically, the paper bridges labor history and the history of surveillance, treating censorship, policing, and intelligence not as reactive measures but as foundational features of imperial governance. By centering Panama, this paper challenges nationalist historiographies of Ghadar that privilege North America or South Asia alone, and instead advances a transoceanic framework attentive to infrastructure, mobility, and state power. In doing so, it repositions Panama as a vital site in the making of global anticolonial radicalism and the early architecture of modern imperial surveillance.
The Older Scots Reading Group is for people interested in literature produced in Scotland between 1375-1550. This is an incredibly rich period, featuring authors experimenting with form and language. The texts themselves are written in Older Scots – a language closely related to Middle English, but with some unique attributes. This reading group will provide a relaxed introduction to this period and language. This term we will focus on reading the Palyce of Honour, a dream vision poetry by Gavin Douglas that often draws parallels with the House of Fame. But is it purely derivative or is there something more subtle at work? Join us to find out! Please bring your own copy of the text if you can – the 2018 TEAMS METS edition by David Parkinson is recommended. No intensive preparation required. Both undergraduates and postgraduates are welcome and there are usually snacks. If you have any questions, contact megan.bushnell@ling-phil.ox.ac.uk.
Confession is perhaps the most misunderstood of all the sacraments. It is a new beginning, a means of renewing one’s hope for eternal glory, and of encountering again the forgiveness of the Father. Concerns about the Church’s care for the vulnerable, safe-guarding, means that the absolution confidentiality of what is said in private confession, the ’seal’ of confession, is both misunderstood and attacked by many today, both within and outside the Church. In what is sometimes called a ’therapeutic’ society, which self-care is understood and the hope of repentance is not, how what is the connection between what secular and ecclesial counselling and forgiveness? Finally, in an age which there are calls for the Church, organisations, and governments to apologise for things which took place in previous generations or centuries, how do we understand corporate responsibility, guilt, and forgiveness? Although the practice and theology of confession have varied among the different traditions of the universal church, and yet there is enough in common for Anglicans, Roman Catholics, and Eastern Orthodox Christians to be united in cherishing the same gift. Our conference will gather an ecumenical array of speakers from these different traditions to consider some of the pastoral challenges and contemporary issues that are being faced by clergy today in the ministry of hearing confessions, and by the Church and Christians more generally. This will include, among other concerns, how confession relates to the commitment to safeguarding and the protection of the vulnerable, to the inviolability of the seal, and to the wider significance of confession in a culture that preaches tolerance without practicing forgiveness. We hope that this colloquium will be not only interesting, but also a source of encouragement for ordinands, seminarians, and clergy across different ecclesial traditions. This conference can also serve as a form of formation or education for those preparing to hear confessions, seeking renewal in this ministry, or looking to the hope which the Church offers the world through the gift of renewal and reconciliation. Further details: https://www.puseyhouse.org.uk/conferences/confession
About the series: This series will feature master classes, seminars, workshops and talks with Laura Rival, research collaborators and colleagues, throughout academic year 2025-2026. Beginning in Michaelmas term 2025, the theme for the term, in answer to the series question, was 'In Latin America, by Greening the State at the Top and from Below'. In Hilary term, the theme is 'By Knowing Nature Differently'. In Trinity term, the theme will be 'By Imagining a New Civilization and Building the Next Political Economic Order'.
In this 60-minute online workshop you will be introduced to the methodologies and principles underpinning the conduct of literature searches for systematic reviews, scoping reviews and other evidence reviews. The session will cover: formulating a focused research question; preparing a protocol; developing a search strategy to address that research question; choosing appropriate databases and search engines; searching for grey literature and ongoing studies; managing your references in Covidence; and documenting and reporting your search. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
Fr Ben's Public Lecture will be the opening event of the conference on 'Confession: The Church's Gift to the World?' which will continue on the following day. Tickets will be required to attend the following day's presentations but Fr Ben's Public Lecture is free to attend. Abstract: Dr Pusey heard more confessions in the 19th century than any other single priest in the Church of England. As is well known, his personal exercise of this ministry, together with his public defence of its lawfulness and usefulness in the Church of England, single-handedly made auricular confession a core element of the catholic revival. Less well known is the significant difference between Pusey's own theology of absolution and that of his successors. As auricular confession became popular (and popularly written about), the theology of auricular absolution which Dr Pusey had presented came to be elided with the standard Roman Catholic teaching. By the 1920s, Anglo-Catholic clergy taught no different than their Roman counterparts, namely, that Absolution not only restores the soul to a state of grace, but cleanses the soul as thoroughly as the waters of Baptism had once done. This was a teaching that Pusey explicitly repudiates, as being of human origin and bringing a false-comfort to the Christian. Dr Pusey’s understanding of absolution, the effects it has on the soul, the role it plays in the sanctification of man, and its relationship to Christ’s own judgment at the Last Judgment all differ markedly from the views that would become regnant among later Anglo-Catholic theologians. An exploration of Dr. Pusey’s own views reveals a coherent theology that comports more harmoniously with the patristic (and monastic) emphasis on the Christian life consisting of continual and ever deeper repentance. This exploration suggests a fresh re-framing of how this important ministry is taught about and exercised in the life of the Church today
This screening programme explores a collection of Sinophone films whose genres sit in between an ethnographic film, documentary, essay film, and fiction. Through this screening journey, we will engage with various languages, narratives, perspectives, styles and textures of films that come across and reflect on the ever-changing realities of contemporary Chinese society – rich with nuances, obscurities, complexities, and uncertainties. The series will cover four themes, including COVID-19, Gender, Art and Society, and Rural-Urban, and will run from Feb to May 2026. Session 3 (Gender): Answer 向历史要答案 Director: Chinese Feminist Documentary Team Release year: 2023 Run time: 38 min Screening Talk and Q&A: with Xianzi (online) and a member from the film production team (TBC) Synopsis: Answer records a pivotal case in China’s #MeToo movement—Zhou Xiaoxuan’s (known as Xianzi) sexual harassment lawsuit against Zhu Jun. Between 2020 and 2022, the case underwent three court hearings, during which both Chinese society and the #MeToo movement saw significant shifts. Each hearing brought together supporters outside the courthouse who stood by Xianzi, sharing moments of laughter, tears, and political awakening. The film captures the setbacks and triumphs of this case, both inside and outside the courtroom.
*Wing Shan Chan (Esme)* (School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London) Legal codes and jurisprudence in Chosŏn Korea: The reflection of the ideology of female chastity in the execution of law *Zexing Zheng* (Seoul National University) Horticulture as Literati Sociability: Knowledge Production through Networked Everyday Practices in Late-Chosŏn Korea
Join online via Microsoft Teams by clicking here: https://tinyurl.com/bdff6tpt
Many camps are now the size of cities, with populations in the hundreds of thousands. Around the globe, architects and NGOs operating on a shoestring budget, struggle to design shelters and schools responsive to the needs of refugees traumatized by persecution and genocide.
Manhua Li (Royal Holloway College, University of London) Discussants: Nicholas Bunnin (China Centre, University of Oxford), Frances Wood (Chinese Collections, British Library), and Michelle Castelletti (Oxford Festival of the Arts) Host: Zoe Y. Zhong (University of Oxford) Join Dr Manhua Li as she uncovers the hidden stories of over a hundred ceramic objects quietly "sleeping" in the Ashmolean Museum's collections. These non-displayed treasures hold secret narratives of women's imagery, waiting to be brought to light. Drawing on French feminist philosophy, the yinyang icons, and Ming-dynasty ceramics, Dr Li shows how material culture can spark fresh and imaginative ways of thinking about gendered symbols, creative practices, and intercultural history of ideas. https://mfo.web.ox.ac.uk/event/whats-vase-when-french-feminism-meets-chinese-art
This presentation explores the impulses which led so many to volunteer their time and energy to welcome and make Syrians feel ‘at home’ upon arrival in the United Kingdom and Sweden. Rather than focus on the suffering of Syrians seeking safety (Chatty, 2018: Rabo et al, 2021: Beck, 2021; Cantat, 2021), it turns to interrogate the motivations which drove so many citizens and residents, alike, to step forward and be generous to those in need (Chatty, 2017). These two study sites offered an opportunity to study volunteering to come to the aid of Syrians and other asylum seekers in both a relatively hostile policy and media environment and a sympathetic one. Framing the study from primarily an anthropological perspective, rather than from within the disciplines of psychology, religious studies, or economics provides an opportunity to explore notions of social duty, of doing the right thing, and of humanity. About the speaker Dawn Chatty, is Emeritus Professor in Anthropology and Forced Migration and former Director of the Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford, United Kingdom. She is also Fellow of the British Academy. Her research interests include coping strategies and resilience of refugee youth; tribes and tribalism; nomadic pastoralism and conservation; gender and development; health, illness, and culture. She has worked with nomadic pastoral groups in Lebanon and Syria since the mid-1970s and extended her research to Oman in 1979. She has continued to be engaged with these communities and advocate for their rights to resist forced settlement. Since 1998 she has worked with refugee youth in situations of prolonged armed conflict in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza, Algeria ( with Sahrawi refugees) and Iran ( Afghan Hazaras). She has edited numerous books including: Deterritorialized Youth: Sahrawi and Afghan Refugees at the Margins of the Middle East, Berghahn Books, 2010; Nomadic Societies in the Middle East and North Africa: Facing the 21st Century, Leiden, Brill, 2006; Children of Palestine: Experiencing Forced Migration in the Middle East, Berghahn Books, 2005; and Conservation and Mobile Peoples: Displacement, Forced Settlement and Sustainable Development Berghahn Press, 2002. She is the author of Displacement and Dispossession in the Modern Middle East Cambridge University Press, 2010, From Camel to Truck, White Horse Press, 2013, and Syria: The Making and Unmaking of a Refuge State, Hurst Publishers, 2018.
Speakers TBC
Join us for a conversation with Sir Nigel Shadbolt, as he explores the many dimensions of response to the question: “What would happen if AI were human?” Sir Nigel Shadbolt is Principal of Jesus College, Oxford, and Professorial Research Fellow in Computer Science, where he leads the Human Centred Computing Group. This event is chaired by President of Kellogg College, Professor Jonathan Michie. All event attendees are invited to arrive from 5pm, when tea and coffee will be served, and to stay for a drinks reception, which will immediately follow the event. Bletchley Park Week: This event is part of our annual Bletchley Park Week (22-27 February) programme of events celebrating a partnership between Kellogg College and Bletchley Park. This year’s theme is: “The Age of AI”.
To mark the centenary of Rilke’s death there will be a series of Oxford Centenary Readings held in the Queen’s College in HT 2025. These will be informal papers with plenty of discussion, about one poem or a handful of poems, that offer close readings and new insights. Papers will be in English and English translations will be provided for all poems and quotations (except for the session in week 4 with the visiting poets) making these sessions accessible to anyone with an interest in this remarkable poet and poetry in general.
We are an interdisciplinary reading group which focuses on the social science, history, and theology of demons, the Devil, and supernatural evil as they relate to politics, identity formation, and social conflicts. Each week we will examine one academic paper or book chapter on these topics, gaining familiarity with subjects such as: the psychology of dehumanization, the conceptual development of the term “demon,” and contemporary political demonologies like QAnon. Hilary Term 2026, Thursdays from 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM Weeks 1,3,4,5,6,7,8: 21 St Giles (Kendrew Quad) Teaching Room G4 Week 2: 14 St Giles (next door to the Lamb & Flag) Seminar Room H Please contact Scott Maybell for the readings or for any questions: scott.maybell@sjc.ox.ac.uk
The Bodleian Libraries are delighted to announce the second Sunderland Collection Symposium: *_MAPS Digital | Analogue_*. This day-long event will take place in-person at the Weston Library and online. Discover the fascinating art and science of digitising historical maps and atlases, the analysis of colour on antique maps, and cutting-edge conservation techniques. Speakers for the event include: * the Bodleian Libraries' own Map Librarian *Nick Millea* introducing the remarkable late-sixteenth century Sheldon Tapestry Maps. * *Donna Sherman* and *Jamie Robinson* showing two treasures from The Rylands Institute: the Borgia/Velletri map and Pierre Desceliers' world map. * Architect and graphic designer *Eric de Broche des Combes* introducing the world of native digital maps and maps in online game design. * Leading globe authority *Sylvia Sumira* will unveil her work as an expert and conservator of historic printed globes. * Professors *Dr Diana Lange* and *Dr Oliver Hahn* will discuss their pioneering research into colours on old maps with *Dr Sara Öberg Strådal*, Managing Director of Jörn Günther Rare Books. Please see our website for full programme: https://oculi-mundi.com/maps-digital-analogue You can attend the event either in person or online, but registration is required for both.
Confession is perhaps the most misunderstood of all the sacraments. It is a new beginning, a means of renewing one’s hope for eternal glory, and of encountering again the forgiveness of the Father. Concerns about the Church’s care for the vulnerable, safe-guarding, means that the absolution confidentiality of what is said in private confession, the ’seal’ of confession, is both misunderstood and attacked by many today, both within and outside the Church. In what is sometimes called a ’therapeutic’ society, which self-care is understood and the hope of repentance is not, how what is the connection between what secular and ecclesial counselling and forgiveness? Finally, in an age which there are calls for the Church, organisations, and governments to apologise for things which took place in previous generations or centuries, how do we understand corporate responsibility, guilt, and forgiveness? Although the practice and theology of confession have varied among the different traditions of the universal church, and yet there is enough in common for Anglicans, Roman Catholics, and Eastern Orthodox Christians to be united in cherishing the same gift. Our conference will gather an ecumenical array of speakers from these different traditions to consider some of the pastoral challenges and contemporary issues that are being faced by clergy today in the ministry of hearing confessions, and by the Church and Christians more generally. This will include, among other concerns, how confession relates to the commitment to safeguarding and the protection of the vulnerable, to the inviolability of the seal, and to the wider significance of confession in a culture that preaches tolerance without practicing forgiveness. We hope that this colloquium will be not only interesting, but also a source of encouragement for ordinands, seminarians, and clergy across different ecclesial traditions. This conference can also serve as a form of formation or education for those preparing to hear confessions, seeking renewal in this ministry, or looking to the hope which the Church offers the world through the gift of renewal and reconciliation. More information here: https://www.puseyhouse.org.uk/conferences/confession
The 3 Minute Thesis competition challenges doctoral candidates to present a compelling spoken presentation on their research topic and its significance in just three minutes to a non-specialist audience. This course helps you prepare for the competition and ensure that you have the best chance possible to represent Oxford nationally.
For our next AI/ML workshop we will be joined by Dr Lei Clifton, Programme Director of the MSc in Applied Digital Health, Primary Care Department, Dr Joshua Fieggen, DPhil candidate, CHI Lab, Department of Engineering Science and Greg Simond, DPhil student, NDPH. Title: Combining Machine Learning (ML) with Medical Statistics - A Worked Example When: Thursday 26 February Time: 11:00 – 12:30 Venue: OxPop Seminar room 0 11:00 – 12:00 – Presentation and Q&A 12:00 – 12:30 – Optional coding session to show pipeline work (Python) In person only Overview: As larger biomedical datasets emerge, it becomes increasingly challenging to identify potentially relevant features using only conventional approaches. In this workshop we will demonstrate how one can combine machine learning (ML) with classical statistical models for disease predictions, using worked examples on the UK Biobank. Who it’s for: Any researcher curious about combining AI and statistics. No coding required for the presentation. An optional coding session after presentation to show how we have implemented this approach in our published papers. Bios: Lei Clifton: Programme Director of the MSc in Applied Digital Health, Primary Care Department. Lei has 20+ years of experience at the intersection of medical statistics and AI. As Programme Director of the MSc in Applied Digital Health, she specialises in foundation models and large language models for healthcare, bringing expertise from engineering, machine learning, and medical statistics. Joshua Fieggen: DPhil candidate, Computational Health Informatics (CHI) Lab. Josh is a medical doctor, and DPhil candidate from the CHI Lab in the Engineering Department. He has an MPH in Epidemiology and Biostatistics and his DPhil has focused on applications of ML and generative deep learning to the plasma proteomics data in UK Biobank. Gregory Simond: MD-DPhil candidate in Cancer Science, conducting his doctoral research in the UK Biobank group at the Big Data Institute. His research focuses on developing multi-modal machine learning approaches to improve early cancer detection and risk prediction in the general population. Registration- https://forms.office.com/e/ddQhg7pG2N?origin=lprLink
Historian of Victorian childhood *Catherine Sloan* investigates what she does with boredom: how as the reader of a mass of Victorian magazines she has sat with the problem of repetitive sources, and developed new techniques of interpretation. *Anthea Butler* is a historian of twentieth-century race, power and religion. She asks what we can learn from when there is a glut of archival material about women’s activities around reproduction, but historians focus unduly on white women and the right to the exclusion of work on the left. How do we weigh where to place our attention? *Respondents:* Meryem Kalayci (Oxford) Tehila Sasson (Oxford) Emily Cousens (Northeastern University, London)
Revealing the cellular impact of immune-mediated disease-associated (IMD) variants requires measuring their effects within the dynamic gene expression and phenotypic programmes that shape immune cell function. In this seminar, I will present our recent work, which resolves context-specific eQTLs across T cell activation states and reveals how polygenic IMD risk converges on discrete, activation-dependent gene programmes. These analyses uncover regulatory axes that link genetic architecture to effector function and disentangle proliferation, differentiation, and metabolic rewiring to pinpoint key contexts in which disease variants exert their impact. I will then introduce TGlow, our high-content imaging platform that profiles T cell morphology at scale, enabling us to capture phenotypes beyond transcript abundance. By quantifying morphodynamic trajectories during activation and exhaustion, TGlow provides an orthogonal layer for studying variant-relevant biology, allowing us to map how genetic- and drug-induced perturbations, reshape T cell states. Together, these approaches outline our strategy for decoding IMD variant effects through large-scale multimodal profiling of gene regulation, cellular programs, and functional phenotypes.
[TBC] Senior Water Risk Expert Jennifer Moeller‑Gulland shares the development of her Water Risk Assessment Blueprint—a practical tool to uncover, understand and manage rising water‑related risks in the business context. With four of the top five global risks now linked to water and inaction costing far more than proactive measures, businesses need clearer insight into their exposure. This talk will outline a framework to assess water risks across resources, infrastructure, and governance, how to navigate uncertainty in risk assessment, and how to communicate findings in a way that drives effective decision-making and collaborative solutions. Speaker Jennifer Moeller-Gulland is a Water Risk and Economics Expert with over 16 years of experience advising the World Bank, 2030 Water Resources Group, the United Nations, the European Commission, and multinational companies. She has worked across 25+ countries on national, site-level, and supply-chain water risk assessments. Jennifer is the Founder and Managing Director of Water Security Collective, where she works to build a global network of credible water risk experts. She is the developer of the Water Risk Assessment Blueprint, a proprietary framework she teaches through the CPD-accredited 12-week Water Risk Assessment Certification. She holds degrees from Tilburg University and the University of Oxford.
Lesson of the week, clinical cases and research. All clinical and academic staff and students welcome. Coffee and Tea will be served.
The presentation will introduce a special issue just published in the Education Policy Analysis Archives entitled: ‘Advancing Equitable Access to Quality Education Globally: Innovations in curriculum, teacher education, and professional development,’ https://epaa.asu.edu/index.php/epaa/issue/view/52 This issue presents findings from a multi-country project exploring the challenges and opportunities of globalization in advancing equity and quality in education. We focus on three areas of reform that have seen significant innovation over the past decade: • School curriculum • Teacher education • Teachers’ professional development The countries featured—India, New Zealand, Peru, Scotland, and Wales—were undergoing rapid transformations incorporating these reforms when our work began. Each article, authored by respected education researchers in their respective contexts, offers a candid analysis of the reforms and the complexities of pursuing fair and equitable education. The seminar will include a series of short presentations by the editors of the special issue and by some of the authors, with scope for questions and discussion afterwards. Teams link: https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3a977e970b5670431f8f293fbaff57009a%40thread.tacv2/1769366745064?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%22cc95de1b-97f5-4f93-b4ba-fe68b852cf91%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%2220c48e67-b666-49ae-a9b1-d31d1be325ec%22%7d Speaker bio: Maria Teresa Tatto’s scholarship is characterized by the use of international comparative frameworks to study education policy and its impact on education systems. She has published extensively on areas such as the structure and impact of different approaches to educating teachers, the relationships between teaching and learning, the influence of early childhood education on improved knowledge levels for the rural poor and children of underserved populations, the role of values education on citizenship formation, and the development of effective policies to support the education of children of migrant workers in the U.S. among others. She is also an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Oxford Department of Education. Trevor Mutton was Professor of Teacher Education at the Department of Education, University of Oxford. His principal research interests are in the fields of initial teacher education, teacher education policy and teachers’ continued professional learning. He is Deputy Editor of the Journal of Education for Teaching and is on the editorial board of Teaching Education. He is also a Visiting Professor at Cardiff Metropolitan University.
What comes after American hegemony? In this book, Acharya and Pardesi compare the interplay of power and ideas in the ancient Mediterranean and Indian Ocean to explain why the two regions took divergent paths to peace and stability. They also discuss its lessons for international order today. While the ancient Mediterranean order was shaped by the hegemony of Rome, the Indian Ocean developed an open and inclusive international order without the dominance of any single power. Moreover, the Indian Ocean provides a more robust example of the peaceful spread of ideas and culture than the ancient Mediterranean where Hellenization or the spread of Greek ideas was often accompanied by violence and imperialism. Applying the divergent experiences of the two regions, the book argues that the history the Indian Ocean before European colonization offers a more useful framework for reshaping world order as the US- and Western- dominated Liberal International Order comes to an end. The Indian Ocean framework points to an alternative model of order building, a multiplex rather than a multipolar approach, that could sustain efforts to build peace and stability in the emerging Indo-Pacific region. Book: Amitav Acharya and Manjeet S. Pardesi, Divergent Worlds: What the Ancient Mediterranean and Indian Ocean Can Tell Us About the Future of International Order https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300214987/divergent-worlds/ Manjeet S. Pardesi is Associate Professor of International Relations in the Political Science and International Relations Programme and Asia Research Fellow at the Centre for Strategic Studies, Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington. His research focuses on global orders and global history, great power politics, Asian security, and the Sino-Indian rivalry. His most recent book, Divergent Worlds: What the Ancient Mediterranean and Indian Ocean Can Tell Us About the Future of International Order (co-authored with Amitav Acharya), was published by Yale University Press in 2025 and received the 2026 T. V. Paul Book Prize from the International Studies Association. A Chinese-language edition is expected in 2026. He is also co-author of The Sino-Indian Rivalry: Implications for Global Order (with Sumit Ganguly and William R. Thompson, Cambridge University Press, 2023). His work has appeared in journals such as European Journal of International Relations, Security Studies, Survival, and Global Studies Quarterly, as well as in edited volumes. He received his PhD in Political Science from Indiana University, Bloomington. He holds an MSc in Strategic Studies from the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies (now the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, and a BEng in Electrical and Electronic Engineering from Nanyang Technological University.
What secrets about sanctions evasion are hidden in trade data? Who fears secondary sanctions - and who shrugs them off? And why has Russia’s pivot toward the Chinese renminbi accelerated so dramatically under Western restrictions? This talk explores these questions in the context of the unprecedented sanctions imposed on Russia after its 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
Abstract tbc ———————————————————————————————————————————— Speaker bio: Christof is Assistant Professor of Social Innovation at the Emlyon Business School. ———————————————————————————————————————————— Booking is required for people outside of the Department of Social Policy and Intervention (DSPI). DSPI Members do not need to register.
The 'good food cycle' promises much as the outcome of the new 'Food Strategy', along with several other UK strategies on farming, food and the environment. And they should, given the crises in public health, nature and ecosystem decline, climate change, and rural economies from the current food system. This talk will look at the current state of play in farm and food policy, and glance at where and why past strategies have succeeded or otherwise. Finally, we will assess the key attributes needed for a food strategy to deliver a sustainable, viable, and climate resilient farming sector, nature recovery, and healthy food for all.
Recent policy developments to create an integrated tertiary education system in England must tackle the challenges of bringing together sectors and institutions that have long operated in fragmented and isolated ways. The sector also faces ongoing contestations of ideas and values that shape perspectives and practices. In particular, the purposes of tertiary education can be contested. This presentation examines stakeholders’ perspectives on the purposes a coordinated tertiary system should serve. Drawing on 26 interviews with key stakeholders across the tertiary education sector in England and five workshops with learners, the presentation shows that many participants agree that current policy debates tend to frame the purposes of the tertiary education system in narrow economic and instrumental terms. In contrast, participants articulated a range of broader purposes extending beyond economic growth, including social justice, equality and public good, as well as students’ development and agency. The presentation highlights the importance of articulating shared principles to support collaboration and coordination within a new system, and cautions against depoliticised policy narratives that reduce political concerns to issues of technical efficiency and purely economic agendas. Xin Xu is Departmental Lecturer in Higher/Tertiary Education at the Department of Education, University of Oxford, and Deputy Director of the Oxford University Centre on Skills, Knowledge and Organisational Performance. Her research focuses on the cultural political economy of higher and tertiary education. Gonzalo Hidalgo-Bazán is a Postdoctoral Researcher in the Department of Education at the University of Oxford. His research interests include the political dimensions of education policy across macro, meso, and micro levels, with a particular focus on the lived effects of ‘quality’ discourses on education actors.
Holly Brewer, 'Creating a Common Law of Slavery for England and its New World Empire', _Law and History Review_ 39:4 (2021), 765-834; Jacob Selwood, 'Jewish Immigration, AntiSemitism and the Diversity of Early Modern London', _Jewish Culture and History_, 10:1 (2008), 1–22 *To attend online via Microsoft Teams, please email "$":mailto:ian.archer@history.ox.ac.uk*
From microelectronics in the 1980s to AI in the 2020s, technological innovation has played a major role in reshaping economies and employment. As have financialization and its ideological partner neoliberalism. Reflecting on 40 years of research focused especially on Japan, this presentation will also consider possible futures. With commentaries from Simon Deakin (Cambridge), Mari Sako (Oxford) and Tim Sturgeon (MIT).
Join us for a screening of Victim (1961), followed by a post-film discussion. Starring Dirk Bogarde as a closeted barrister determined to bring a sexual blackmailer to justice, Victim was groundbreaking as the first British film to explicitly name homosexuality and to portray it with sympathy and seriousness.
The assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafic Hariri in a massive car bomb in Beirut on Valentine’s Day 2005 sends shockwaves through the Middle East. With a rolodex of international contacts, the murder of this billionaire-turned-statesman known as ‘Mr Lebanon’ triggers a massive investigation. But the terrorists behind his murder have done everything to hide their tracks. With all the twists of a dark conspiracy thriller, this feature documentary follows the complex investigation to track down his killers.
To join online, please register in advance: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/WWqjr8SgT_WrzTodI65cdg
The Alamire codices have traditionally been seen as diplomatic gifts, or at the very least commissions from magnates and super-rich aficionados. This article argues that for most of the later, paper codices at least, the sequence happened in reverse: in other words they comprised workshop material that was first produced and then sold once buyers could be found. The same conclusion prompts also a review of the construction of some of the more elegant, parchment sources, and the proposal that the ‘bespoke’ aspects of such codices may have extended no further than their opening—and hence most immediately visible—pages.
Although few could define it, “civilian morale” became one of the twentieth century’s most lethal concepts. In its name, millions of civilians were bombed and starved, as belligerents sought to break enemy morale through air raids and food blockades. How did it become normal to wage war by attacking cities and civilian morale? From the First World War through the Second, ideas and practices surrounding morale and the “home fronts” circulated rapidly in a transnational process. During 1914–18, states claimed to have discovered “civilian morale”: British and German blockaders explicitly targeted it, while governments in Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia, and France compiled national “moral reports.” Interwar strategists such as Giulio Douhet and Hugh Trenchard argued that aerial bombardment would decisively shatter civilian morale. These ideas culminated in the area bombing of German and Italian cities during the Second World War and also shaped the Asia-Pacific theatre. Japanese air forces bombed Chinese cities in 1937–39 with morale as a central target, while U.S. strategists later endorsed firebombing and food blockades—including “Operation STARVATION” in 1945—as means of forcing surrender. The narrative ends in 1945 with the rise of American social psychologists who theorised morale destruction at the dawn of the Cold War.
Critics of neoliberalism claim that in the final decades of the 20th century ‘homo politicus’ was replaced by ‘homo economicus’. This lecture challenges the primacy of either of these imaginings of the human condition and draws attention to other burgeoning identities – the very word ‘identity’ being one of them – supported by the language of social science.
Thursday February 26, Room 10.424 (week 6) Caitlin Stobie, ‘Collaborative creative practice in South African fiction’
This presentation examines disaster preparedness in the Baltic capitals of Riga, Tallinn, and Vilnius by analyzing both household readiness and institutional responses. Based on a survey of 3,016 residents and interviews with crisis-preparedness experts in 2025, it applies a Complex Adaptive Systems framework to show how urban resilience emerges from interactions among diverse actors within dynamic security environments. Dr. Didzis Kļaviņš is a Senior Researcher at the University of Latvia, Faculty of Social Sciences, and the Advanced Social and Political Research Institute.
Join us for a conversation with Dr Ping Lu about how history’s greatest codebreakers inspire today’s AI breakthroughs in healthcare. Moderated by Xavier Laurent, Research Member of Common Room and Lead Training Coordinator at the AI Competency Centre. Dr Ping Lu is Assistant Professor in Computer Science at the University of Leeds. She holds a PhD in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Bern, Switzerland, and completed her postdoctoral research in medical imaging and biomedical signal analysis at the University of Oxford. Her research sits at the intersection of imaging and non-imaging machine learning in healthcare and computer science. All event attendees are invited to arrive from 5pm, when tea and coffee will be served, and to stay for a drinks reception, which will immediately follow the event. Bletchley Park Week: This event is part of our annual Bletchley Park Week (22-27 February) programme of events celebrating a partnership between Kellogg College and Bletchley Park. This year’s theme is: “The Age of AI”.
What does it mean to say ‘I am’? Is the sense of subjectivity a delusion? Are only humans conscious? What about whales, AI, and electrons? How should we use our consciousness? All these questions, and many others, will be examined by expert speakers in conversation with one another and with the audience in this 3-part symposium series. In this third and final event on 26 Feb, we will examine what we do and what we should do with our consciousness as human beings. Does it help us act rationally, optimally or morally? How is the conscious mind represented in literature? And what role does it play in our mental health? Iain McGilchrist (Psychiatry, All Souls College, Oxford) What on earth are we doing here? Chris Fletcher (English, University of Oxford) ‘I am!’: Literature and consciousness Catherine Harmer (Psychiatry, University of Oxford) The mind’s filter: Shaping experience and mental health
Supported by the APGRD, Archilochus' Fragments is a new musical work by composer Costas Kafouros blending ancient Greek poetry with modern sound; a contemporary reimagining of the poetry of Archilochus of Paros (c. 680 B.C.), one of the boldest and most original voices of antiquity. Performed by world-class musicians Katerina Mina (vocals), Rami Sarieddine (piano), Marios Nicolaou (bassoon) and Mariana Parás (percussion), the piece explores timeless themes and the enduring dialogue between past and present, voice and instruments. Prof. Armand D’Angour will give a pre-performance talk entitled “The Poetry of Archilochus” Armand D’Angour is Professor of Classical Languages and Literature at the University of Oxford and Fellow and Tutor in Classics, Jesus College. His books include The Greeks and the New, 2011; Socrates in Love: The Making of a Philosopher, 2019; How to Innovate: An Ancient Guide to Creative Thinking, 2021; How to Talk About Love: Plato’s Symposium, 2025. In addition to numerous broadcasts on radio and television, he has produced a short film on ancient Greek music on Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hOK7bU0S1Y) which has reached over a million views since its publication in 2017. More details of his work are available on his website www.armand-dangour.com.
Convenor: Andrew Moeller, Project Leader, Biotechnology and the Humanities, TORCH As biotechnologies advance, many ethical questions take on a new sense of urgency. This conversation brings together diverse religious perspectives on preimplantation genetic testing (PGT), exploring how ancient moral and spiritual frameworks might respond to these novel interventions in human life. The discussion will consider wide-ranging questions about the nature of human limits, moral responsibility, dependence, vulnerability, and the very meaning of life itself.
As biotechnologies advance, many ethical questions take on a new sense of urgency. This conversation brings together diverse religious perspectives on preimplantation genetic testing (PGT), exploring how ancient moral and spiritual frameworks might respond to these novel interventions in human life. The discussion will consider wide-ranging questions about the nature of human limits, moral responsibility, dependence, vulnerability, and the very meaning of life itself. This event is supported by the Oxford Medical Humanities Research Hub and the Uehiro Oxford Institute.
Associate Professor Tim Theologis will discuss 'Research in paediatric orthopaedics'. Dr Eileen Morrow will discuss 'Developing a set of core outcomes for lower limb surgery in paediatric orthopaedics'. The Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that attendance at the Surgical Grand Rounds can count toward internal CPD, with 1 point awarded per hour. Please note that in-person attendance is required, and you will need to sign the attendance register. All members of the University and NHS clinical staff are welcome. Please email Tarryn Ching if you would like to attend online.
This session will cover some more advanced techniques for finding medical literature to answer a research question. We will recap some basics, then demonstrate searching in several medical databases, including using subject headings (MeSH) and the differences between platforms. After the main 90-minute workshop, one of the Bodleian Health Care Libraries Outreach Librarians will be available for another 30 minutes to answer questions about your own searches, so feel free to bring along what you are working on. By the end of this session, you will be able to: explain what subject headings are, and how to use them; search for words that appear near to other words; take a search from one database into another; and save a search and document it. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
This talk will reflect on the experience of researching the Oxford lives of C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. It will look in particular at the kinds of materials available in the Bodleian Library, University Archives and College libraries and archives to reconstruct the academic worlds of these two important Oxford figures. As well as showing the potential such resources offer for deepening our understanding of the biographies of Lewis and Tolkien, I will consider their potential for life writing more generally. *Simon Horobin* is Professor of English Language and Literature and Fellow and Tutor in English at Magdalen College. He has published widely on medieval literature and the English language. He has lectured to a variety of audiences on C.S. Lewis, has published articles on Lewis’s scholarly writings and is the author of _C.S. Lewis’s Oxford_ (Bodleian Publishing 2024). Please note that this event is exclusively open to current members of the University of Oxford. Workshop places will be allocated on a first-come, first-served basis, with priority given to members of the English Faculty.
We survey the life of a Turing pattern, from initial diffusive instability through the emergence of dominant spatial modes and to an eventual spatially heterogeneous pattern. While many mathematically ideal Turing patterns are regular, repeating in structure and remaining of a fixed length scale throughout space, in the real world there is often a degree of irregularity to patterns. Viewing the life of a Turing pattern through the lens of spatial modes generated by the geometry of the bounded space domain housing the Turing system, we discuss how irregularity in a Turing pattern may arise over time due to specific features of this space domain or specific spatial dependencies of the reaction-diffusion system generating the pattern.
Abstract The idea that worlds around other stars could develop and maintain environments hospitable to life, in a way like our planet, has captivated scientists for centuries. Yet, to investigate this question, we must recognize and characterize the key conditions that make a planet habitable. Earth ― the only planet on which life is known to have originated ― is unique in many ways, including the presence of abundant surface water, a large moon, a long-lived magnetic field, and plate tectonics. Yet, which of these and other characteristics are essential for its long-term habitability? A major challenge is that habitability factors vary because they are time-dependent due to changes in the Sun’s energy and our planet’s chemical, thermal and (thereby) physical and tectonic evolution. Plate tectonics regulates interior temperatures, atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations and surface temperatures. Subduction enables recycling of volatile elements between the surface and the mantle and is probably essential for sustaining planetary habitability. Because the questions of when, why and how plate tectonics started are debated, an improved understanding of Earth’s evolution is critically needed. It is not necessarily obvious that key habitability factors such as plate tectonics will persist once started, a dynamo-driven magnetic field can stop and perhaps re-emerge later through inner-core nucleation, and the Earth’s axial tilt may also become unstable as the Moon is moving away. Ultimately, all planets lose their habitability, and in about two billion years when the Sun’s energy has increased by 15%, Earth will enter a moist greenhouse, followed by runaway evaporation of the oceans. An in-depth knowledge of Earth-like habitability, and how our planet sustained conditions for life’s evolution over geological timescales, is critical for identifying habitable planets orbiting other stars that potentially are, or have been, habitable around other stars.
Do you have some writing you’ve been meaning to start or finish? Are you struggling to carve out focused time to work? Join us this week for an hour dedicated to writing! This session is open to students, staff, and the wider Oxford community who are looking for a focused space to work on their writing craft. Whether you’re drafting, editing, outlining, or simply trying to get words on the page, this session will offer a supportive space to work alongside others. All are welcome and a light lunch will be provided.
How do organisms survive when food becomes scarce? My lab investigates the extraordinary metabolic strategies evolved by animals that thrive under extreme nutrient limitation. A central model in our work is the Mexican cavefish Astyanax mexicanus, a species that has repeatedly colonized lightless, nutrient-poor caves and evolved remarkable adaptations to starvation. These fish exhibit metabolic phenotypes that resemble human disease states—such as insulin resistance, extreme hyperglycemia, and fat accumulation—yet remain healthy and long-lived. Using tools ranging from transgenic lines, gene editing, and organoid models to multi-omics and cell-based assays, we explore how cavefish rewire classical metabolic pathways. Our work reveals how evolutionary processes can turn pathological states into adaptive solutions, shedding light on fundamental questions in energy balance, resilience, and longevity. In this talk, I will present recent findings from our group, including cellular and systemic adaptations to starvation, evolved shifts in autophagy and sugar metabolism, and emerging parallels to mammalian fasting biology. By combining evolutionary biology with molecular physiology, we aim to uncover new principles of metabolic resilience with relevance far beyond the cave.
Curious about using AI to find research papers? Not sure how to properly reference GenAI and avoid plagiarism? This beginner-friendly workshop introduces three GenAI tools (ChatGPT, Elicit, and Research Rabbit), showing how they can support information discovery and analysis. Designed for those new to AI, this practical session will allow you to independently experiment with these tools and participate in group discussions to explore their strengths, limitations, and suitability for different tasks. By the end of this session, you will be able to: explain what AI means and some key terms; differentiate between several categories of AI tools; describe how some GenAI tools can be used to discover information, including their strengths, limitations, and best practices; critique GenAI tools and their outputs at an introductory level using evaluative criteria; and state the University’s policies on AI, and avoid plagiarism by creating citations for AI-generated content. Intended audience: Taught student; Researcher and research student
In this paper we study a class of weighted estimands, which we define as parameters that can be expressed as weighted averages of the underlying heterogeneous treatment effects. The popular ordinary least squares (OLS), two-stage least squares (2SLS), and two-way fixed effects (TWFE) estimands are all special cases within our framework. Our focus is on answering two questions concerning weighted estimands. First, under what conditions can they be interpreted as the average treatment effect for some (possibly latent) subpopulation? Second, when these conditions are satisfied, what is the upper bound on the size of that subpopulation, either in absolute terms or relative to a target population of interest? We argue that this upper bound provides a valuable diagnostic for empirical research. When a given weighted estimand corresponds to the average treatment effect for a small subset of the population of interest, we say its internal validity is low. Our paper develops practical tools to quantify the internal validity of weighted estimands.
We study the information content of bids in auctions about the distribution of values. Which auction formats provide better information about the value distribution? Our main result shows that among a large class of standard auctions (e.g., kth-price, all-pay), the first-price auction is (Lehmann) most informative.
Human neurons generated through transcription factor (TF) overexpression have transformed the way we study neurodevelopment and model neurological diseases, opening new avenues for therapeutic discovery. Despite this progress, the full range of neuronal subtypes that can be programmed in vitro remains largely uncharted. In this seminar, I will talk about our work in expanding the diversity of neurons derived from human pluripotent stem cells by combining TF-driven reprogramming with systematic modulation of developmental signaling pathways. We performed a large-scale screen of 480 signaling conditions in parallel with NGN2 or ASCL1/DLX2 induction, using multiplexed single-cell transcriptomics to capture cellular outcomes across 700,000 cells. Our analysis revealed a broad spectrum of excitatory and inhibitory neurons that align with the developmental patterning axes of the neural tube. Electrophysiological profiling showed that these patterned neurons possess distinct functional and morphological properties shaped by their respective signaling environments. We perturbed TFs at the hub of gene regulatory networks (GRNs) and demonstrated their necessity and sufficiency to drive the specification of distinct neuronal subtypes. We further found that patterning neural progenitors before TF induction unlocks a greater range of neuronal diversity by activating regulons that mirror those of primary human neurons. Comparisons with primary tissue uncovered closely matched neuronal subtypes sharing transcriptional signatures in TF expression, neurotransmitter usage, and ion channel composition, while highlighting persistent differences in metabolic pathways. Together, we put together an in vitro atlas of human neuronal diversity of over 200 neuronal subtypes, as well as providing a framework for programming a wide array of human neurons and for understanding how transcriptional and signaling cues cooperate to shape neuronal fate.
Situated within the health humanities, this presentation explores ways in which music engages with health, illness, and wellbeing. It begins by highlighting research and practice in healthcare and arts-in-health contexts, where music supports patients and caregivers by reducing pain and anxiety, regulating emotion, and fostering connection. It then turns to musicology, which has long examined illness, suffering, and psychological distress through composers’ biographies. While this scholarship provides rich aesthetic and historical insight, it has largely remained on the periphery of the health humanities, seldom extending to questions of care or lived experience. Finally, it explores how lived experience could be used to influence the treatment of patients, through music and sound, to reduce trauma and improve patient outcomes. Panelists: Peter Shannon is an orchestral conductor and interdisciplinary scholar working at the intersection of music, medicine, and the health humanities. Over the past 15 years in the United States, he has led professional orchestras as artistic director and conductor and founded the American Institute for Music and Healing, developing music-based programs for hospitals, cancer centres, and healthcare professionals. He has served as a Visiting Instructor in the Department of Medicine at Stanford University and is currently Affiliate Professor of Bioethics and Medical Humanities at Mercer University School of Medicine and a Visiting Scholar at the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital. Hester Crombie is a musician and sound artist specialising in collaborative piano with a long standing love of Schubert’s chamber music and songs, and having experienced several early pregnancy complications, Hester is also a patient tutor for the Nuffield Department of Women’s and Reproductive Health. A graduate of University College, Oxford and the Royal Academy of Music, Hester now lives in Oxford, where she is in great demand as a pianist and teacher, and draws the local pigeons. Her composition Please Hold follows the excruciating journey of a parent’s experience navigating the John Radcliffe Hospital’s automated switchboard. You can follow her work @musicintheshed.
The Insights for Action seminar series explores how researchers and practitioners within and beyond Oxford are using research insights to drive social change. In this seminar, we will explore the opportunities for cities to address climate change, exploring insights and examples from Professor Christof Brandtner's forthcoming book, Cities in Action: Organizations, Institutions, and Urban Climate Strategies, which argues that whether—and how—cities respond to climate change is best understood by examining their organisational structures and institutional embeddedness, rather than by focusing solely on political will or resources. Christof will be in conversation with practitioners working in urban climate action in Oxford and globally. Cities in Action: Organizations, Institutions, and Urban Climate Strategies is forthcoming from Columbia University Press, and copies will be available at the event.
Week Six (27 February, Lecture Room VII) Primary: Marge Piercy, Woman on the Edge of Time, Chapters 15-16 Supplementary: Valerie Solanas, ‘SCUM Manifesto’ (1967)
Please join the Oxford Medieval Manuscripts group for a tour of the All Souls College library with Peregrine Horden, Fellow Librarian, All Souls College, where we will learn about the library's history as well as view some of their manuscript collection. Please note that places are limited, write to oxfordmedievalmss@gmail.com to reserve your place.
Seminar followed by Q&A and drinks - attend in person or join online - all welcome Abstract: Nature recovery depends on turning ecological data into clear, timely, and actionable insights. This talk explores how sensing technologies, automated acoustics, and AI can strengthen that data-to-decision journey by improving how we monitor ecosystems and interpret change. Through examples from her research, Kate will outline the opportunities and limitations of applying AI to real-world ecological data, and show how better tools can support more effective decisions for nature recovery. Biography: Kate Jones is an ecologist whose interdisciplinary research investigates the interface of ecological and human health. Her research understands the impact of global land use and climate change on ecological and human systems, with a particular focus on emerging infectious diseases from animals. Kate’s work also focuses on generating better tools for monitoring the status of wildlife populations, developing some of the first applied artificial intelligence tools for monitoring ecosystems, and further understanding how citizen science data can be used to understand biodiversity trends. Kate is the Director of The People and Nature Lab at UCL’s new cross-disciplinary campus in London’s Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park (UCL East). Kate has held appointments at the Zoological Society of London, University of Cambridge, Columbia University, University of Virginia, and Imperial College London. She has written over 150 articles and book chapters in prestigious journals, is a UK government scientific advisor, chaired The Bat Conservation Trust for 5 years, and served as an expert advisor to the UK’s Climate Change Committee. Kate won the Leverhulme Prize for outstanding contributions to Zoology in 2008, and in 2022 won both ZSL’s Marsh Award for Conservation Biology and British Ecology Society’s Marsh Award for Ecology.
Join award-winning Polish reportage writer and journalist Mariusz Szczygieł in conversation with his translator Antonia Lloyd-Jones and publisher Linden Editions about his work, Not There. Not There is a collection of literary reportage about loss, absence and memories from one of Poland’s most celebrated writers. Szczygieł follows a Czech poet, a Ukrainian soldier, a Polish accountant, an Albanian poet and an Israeli writer as they account for their losses and gains; tracing lost conversations, cheese forks, poems, houses and lives. It is beautiful, profound and quietly uplifting. His work may be an inventory of losses, but ‘its pages are alive with the traces of what is not there: it is a meditation on absence that hums with the quiet pulse of what remains’ (Frank Wynne, Irish Times). Mariusz Szczygieł is one of Europe’s most celebrated journalists. A reporter for Gazeta Wyborcza, he is the author of a number of books of reportage about the Czech Republic and Poland. His books have been published in twenty-one countries and have been awarded the Europe Book Prize and the Prix Amphi, among other honours. From 1995–2001, he hosted a popular talk show on Polish television. Szczygieł runs the Institute of Reportage in Warsaw, a creative writing reportage school, and Dowody na Isnienie, an independent publishing house. Not There won the Nike Award and Nike Readers' Award in Poland on publication in 2019. Antonia Lloyd-Jones translates fiction, non-fiction, poetry and children’s books from Polish. Her translation of Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by 2018 Nobel Prize laureate Olga Tokarczuk was shortlisted for the 2019 Man Booker International prize. For ten years she was a mentor for the Emerging Translators’ Mentorship Programme, and is a former co-chair of the UK Translators Association. Linden Editions is an independent publisher specialising in works of literary fiction, narrative non-fiction and essays from Europe, the Francophonie, and the Mediterranean region. It was established by Tasja Dorkofikis, Nermin Mollaoğlu, and Geraldine D’Amico in 2023. Linden Edition’s books have been awarded the Prix Femina, Prix Goncourt des Lyceens and Prix Millepages, and long-listed for the Dublin Literary Award, among others.
Join us for a conversation with Stephen Taylor, as he shows how Large Language Models (LLMs) can be used to explore and analyse biological datasets. Understanding how diseases work and finding new treatments often involves working with massive, complex biological datasets. Traditionally, this required deep expertise in both biology and programming. Stephen and his team at the Centre for Human Genetics have developed a Multi-Dimensional Viewer (MDV) to simplify this process, and now, with advances in AI, their new tool, ChatMDV, allows anyone to explore and analyse these datasets using everyday language. This opens the door for wider participation in discoveries, improves transparency, and accelerates progress toward new therapies. Stephen Taylor is Head of Integrative Computational Biology at the Centre for Human Genetics in the Nuffield Department of Medicine. The aim of his group is to develop state-of-the-art computational methods to break down barriers to aid the integration, visualisation, and analytics of biological datasets. Moderated by Xavier Laurent, Research Member of Common Room and Lead Training Coordinator at the AI Competency Centre. All event attendees are invited to arrive from 5pm, when tea and coffee will be served, and to stay for a drinks reception, which will immediately follow the event. Bletchley Park Week: This event is part of our annual Bletchley Park Week (22-27 February) programme of events celebrating a partnership between Kellogg College and Bletchley Park. This year’s theme is: “The Age of AI”.
Join the Health Economics and Policy Evaluation ONLINE Course 2026, delivered by the University of Oxford. This intensive 2-day online course (plus one day for Stata) offers a comprehensive overview of health economics and policy assessment. Key topics: Health economics and policy evaluation, Advanced evaluation techniques (interrupted time series, panel data, instrumental variables, DIFF-DIFF), Agency problems and incentive structures in healthcare, Hospital competition and payment scheme impacts, Economic evaluation methods 📅 2nd March 2026 – 4th March 2026 ONLINE ✅ Learn from leading experts ✅ Flexible, online format ✅ Global networking opportunities Who Should Attend? Students, healthcare professionals, policymakers, researchers, and analysts.
VS Code for Python Development: A Complete Beginner's Guide Monday 2 March, 11:00 – 12:00 OxPop/BDI Seminar room 0 Led by – Dr Mcebisi Ntleki, DPhil, Department of Biochemistry, University of Oxford Master Visual Studio Code, the world's most popular code editor, through hands-on Python development. This practical tutorial takes you from installation to building a BMI calculator and health data analyser while learning professional development workflows. You'll set up Python environments, manage dependencies, and master version control with Git and GitHub – all within VS Code's intuitive interface. No prior experience with VS Code, Git, or virtual environments needed. By the end, you'll confidently navigate VS Code, structure Python projects professionally, and collaborate using industry-standard practices. Perfect for medical science students ready to level up their research coding toolkit and work with reproducible, shareable code. This session will cover: 1. VS Code fundamentals: Interface navigation, essential keyboard shortcuts, integrated terminal, and customisation options 2. Python environment setup: Installing extensions, creating and activating virtual environments, selecting interpreters 3. Package management: Working with requirements.txt, installing dependencies with pip, managing environment variables securely 4. Building a health data analyser: Creating a BMI calculator and patient data processor with CSV file handling and statistical analysis 5. Version control with Git: Initialising repositories, staging changes, committing, branching, and viewing history through VS Code's interface 6. GitHub collaboration: Creating repositories, pushing code, working with branches, and creating pull requests without leaving VS Code. Pre requisites: 1. Basic Python syntax knowledge (variables, functions, loops, conditionals) 2. Familiarity with basic file and folder operations on their computer 3. Ability to navigate their operating system and install software No prior experience with code editors, IDEs, version control, or command-line tools is required Intended audience: Undergraduates, graduates, early researchers Participants will need: A laptop (Windows, macOS, or Linux), Administrator access to install software. This is a BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) friendly session. Pre-Course Preparation: 1. Install Python: Download and install Python 3.8 or later from python.org 2. Install VS Code: Download and install from code.visualstudio.com 3. Create a GitHub account: Sign up at github.com (free account is sufficient) 4. Install Git: Download from git-scm.com and complete basic configuration Duration: 50 minutes for presentation and practical, 5 minutes practical exercises post session, 5 minutes – Q&A. Registration: https://forms.office.com/e/mgHjvw8UBU?origin=lprLink
In September 2014, foreign languages (FL) became a compulsory part of the primary school curriculum in England, with the clear expectation that learners should make “substantial progress in one language” (DfE, 2013) throughout the four years of language learning at primary school (age 7-11). However, schools face considerable difficulties (e.g., limited time, low teacher subject knowledge and confidence), exacerbated by a lack of clarity regarding core content and learning outcomes for language learning at this level. Further, the limited research exploring children's experiences with FL learning (of languages other than English) makes it difficult to assess the feasibility of the National Curriculum guidance. In this talk, Rowena will present the Progression in Primary Languages project; a longitudinal study tracking young learners’ linguistic development in French, German and Spanish over the four years of learning at primary school in England and the individual, instructional and contextual factors affecting learning. 2,231 students aged 7-11 from 17 primary schools participated in the study completing a range of linguistic measures (e.g. vocabulary, phonics, grammar) each year. The design of the language tests developed for the project will be discussed, alongside preliminary results in relation to children's linguistic progression. In light of the initial findings, the implications for young learners’ language learning in the classroom-context will be explored.
AI is reshaping sociology both as an object of inquiry and as a methodological resource. This talk examines this dual transformation through two complementary perspectives. First, drawing on a comparative analysis of elite sociology departments, faculty profiles, and national sociology conferences in China and the United States, it traces how AI has been incorporated into sociological knowledge production across different institutional and societal contexts in recent years. The analysis reveals both divergent and convergent trajectories, highlighting how scholars in the Global North and Global South engage with AI in distinct yet increasingly interconnected ways. Second, the talk demonstrates the research potential of AI for sociology through an original case study modelling future societal instability across four countries. By integrating demographic and fiscal data with large language models, we develop and evaluate predictions concerning the structural constraints facing welfare states through the mid-twenty-first century. Together, these analyses illustrate how AI is transforming what sociologists study, how they study it, and what futures we might anticipate. Please join either in person or online. For in-person attendees, the talk will be preceded by a light lunch at 12.15pm.
Professor Brian Angus University of Oxford https://www.ndm.ox.ac.uk/team/brian-angus
Patents and standards are a valuable source of technical information relevant to the fields of engineering, materials sciences, and more. Together, they provide approved rules and guidelines whilst helping to protect inventions and innovative ideas. They can, however, be tricky to find. Join this session to find out more about what patents and standards are, why they might be useful for your research and how to find them in specific databases. By the end of this session, you will: know what a patent is and where to find it; know what a standard is and where to find it; and be able to reference patents and standards. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student
This talk outlines how mathematical modelling can inform sustainable public health policy when integrated with other disciplines, illustrated through work on Cystic Echinococcosis, a parasitic zoonosis. I present practical examples that bring together transmission models, field epidemiology, veterinary practice, social science and economic assessment to co produce interventions that are feasible, acceptable and maintainable over time. Emphasising a One Health perspective, the session shows how integrated approaches improve surveillance, target control measures, and clarify trade offs and uncertainties for decision makers. Attendees will see how collaborative, people centred modelling generates operational recommendations that are more likely to be adopted and sustained in real world settings. I am Co‑Director of the Surrey Institute for People‑Centred Artificial Intelligence and Senior Lecturer in Epidemiology at the University of Surrey. My background is in industrial engineering and working as a mathematical modeller I develop and integrate practical, multidisciplinary approaches that combine mathematics, statistics, computing, biology and social science to inform surveillance, control and elimination of infectious diseases in humans and animals. I focus on producing transparent, usable evidence — including models, forecasts and decision tools — that supports frontline health practitioners, veterinary services and policymakers. My work emphasises responsible AI and One Health approaches, co‑producing analyses with stakeholders to ensure relevance, equity and clear communication of uncertainty. I teach and supervise students in applied epidemiology and modelling, and I actively translate research into policy and operational guidance to improve real‑world disease prevention and response. https://www.surrey.ac.uk/people/joaquin-m-prada
How is generative AI creating challenges for openness of research? How open are AI models themselves, when used in research? And will evil AI bots destroy digital libraries?
Need a burst of focused time to get words flowing on the page? Join OCCT for our new series of Shut Up and Write (or Translate) sessions this term. These dedicated afternoons are a chance to step away from distractions, sit alongside fellow writers and translators, and make real progress on whatever project matters most to you. We’ll gather from 2–5pm on Mondays of Week 1, 3, 5, and 7 this term in a supportive, low-pressure environment designed to boost productivity and creativity alike. Bring along your laptop, notebooks, or translation drafts - anything you’d like to work on. After a quick check-in, we’ll dive into quiet writing or translating sprints, with breaks for coffee (which will be supplied) and conversation in between. Whether you’re polishing a chapter, drafting an article, working on a translation, or simply hoping to carve out space for your own work, these sessions are for you. Come for one, two, or all three afternoons, and leave with words on the page and renewed momentum for your projects.
Are you looking to learn about the ways in which to transmit scientific ideas and make your research accessible to a non-specialist audience through a variety of mediums? This session will serve as an introduction to science communication and how it can be successfully incorporated into our roles. By the end of this session you will be able to: define science communication and provide a list of examples; explain why science communication is important for both our CPD and the public; and list ways in which we can all get involved in science communication. Intended audience: Medicine and NHS; Researcher and research student
We develop and quantify a novel growth theory in which economic activity endogenously shifts from material production to quality improvements. Consumers derive utility from goods with differing environmental footprints: necessities are material-intensive and polluting, while luxuries are more service-based and emit less. Innovation can be directed toward either material productivity or product quality. Because demand for luxuries is more sensitive to quality, the economy gradually becomes “weightless”: growth is driven by quality improvements, services become the dominant employment sector, and material production stabilizes at a finite level. This structural transformation enables rising living standards with declining environmental intensity, providing an endogenous path to degrowth in material output without compromising economic progress. Policy can accelerate the transition, but its burden is uneven, falling more heavily on the poor than on the rich.
The late nineteenth century and early twentieth century saw the establishment of a distinct form of science writing, “popular” science writing. Ostensibly directed towards the “laity” or the “man in the street,” it also enabled communication between scientists in distinct sub-disciplines, and may have been directed towards those who controlled university funding. Its status in relation to technical science writing has been extensively debated, in books by Shinn and Whitley (1985), and articles by Hilgartner (1990), Cooter and Pumfrey (1994), Myers (2003), Secord (2004), O’Connor (2009), Schmalzer (2012) among others. Scholars in the field of literature and science have also studied it, and the present paper, as well as discussing what we are to do with the contested term “popular,” will ask what literary studies can bring to the study of popular science writing. It will focus on examples primary from the physical sciences in the early twentieth century, including work by A S Eddington and Oliver Lodge. *Professor Michael H Whitworth* is the author of _Einstein’s Wake: Relativity, Metaphor, and Modernist Literature_ (2001) and many other articles and chapters on literature and science. He was the co-founder, with Alice Jenkins, of the British Society for Literature and Science. He is a Tutorial Fellow in English at Merton College and Professor of Modern Literature and Culture in the English Faculty.
The Autism Long-term Outcomes Study (ALTOS) examined adolescents and young adults who were diagnosed with autism early in development according to gold standard expert clinical evaluation, who currently have no symptoms. In prior work, we described the unique brain networks that were involved in language processing in such a population, in comparison with individuals with a current autism diagnosis and those without a history of autism. This talk will describe results of our current behavioral and fMRI studies of language outcomes and their association with other cognitive and communication abilities as well as mental health and quality of life.
This paper explores the reconstitution of Brahmans as caste subjects in the late colonial period, with a particular focus on Maharashtra. As is well known, Brahman scribal elites achieved remarkable success within the successor states of the eighteenth century. In many parts of India, this professional heritage helped consolidate their dominance as Anglophone professionals in colonial service, as writers and publicists in the sphere of vernacular print, and as leading interlocutors in the meanings of colonial modernity for Indian politics and society. Non-Brahman challenges from south and western India, as well as the rise of Gandhian politics prompted Brahman communities to look for new forms of social and political leadership, from Hindu nationalist politics to investments in new genres of vernacular literature and poetry. For Brahman communities in western India, the writing and publication of family histories also provided a means to project their accomplishments in service of the nation. These family histories or kulavrttanta emerged out of precolonial genres of historical writing and caste categorisation, reworked with family trees and photographs for the age of vernacular print. Kulavrttantas presented these transformations as successful passages from tradition to modernity. In doing so, they also contributed to what has been described as the “culturalization” of caste, its transmutation from structured social hierarchy to an aspect of family “culture” and private life. Bio: Rosalind O’Hanlon is Professor Emeritus of Indian History and Culture in the Faculty of Asian and Middle East Studies in Oxford, and a fellow of Clare College, Cambridge. She has written extensively on caste and gender in India from the early modern to the late colonial period. Her most recent publication is Lineages of Brahman Power: Caste, Family and the State in Western India, 1600-1900 (SUNY and Permanent Black, 2025).
Governments are spending a lot of money, including on debt interest, but most reforms cost money and society needs to pay for them. How and what consequences does this have for government planning?
The seminar will be followed by drinks.
For generations, many Christians have imagined the Bible’s story as one in which we leave earth behind and “go to heaven” when we die. But, as Tom Wright has spent decades patiently explaining, from Surprised by Hope to his latest major work God’s Homecoming, that is simply not the scriptural narrative. The Bible does not give us a tale of souls escaping upward; it gives us the astonishing announcement that God intends to come and dwell with us. In this special Oxford evening, Tom Wright will guide us through the central biblical theme that has been hidden in plain sight: God’s longing to make creation his home. Drawing on careful historical scholarship, robust biblical exegesis, and the earthy, hope-filled tone familiar from his recent conversations on the Ask NT Wright Anything podcast, Tom will show how the whole sweep of Scripture, from Genesis to Revelation moves towards one destination: the renewal of all things through God’s personal presence. Following the taped interview, there will be a time for audience questions, followed by a reception, book sale and signing. All are welcome!
COURSE DETAILS The course will include: Critique of readability in relevant papers. Use of tenses in academic papers. Writing with impact. Concise writing. Grammar and proof reading. Scientific table and chart technique. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of the session participants will be able to: Develop understanding of the characteristics of scientific writing; write in simple, clear and concise scientific English. Develop knowledge of how to write grammatically correct English. Improve proof reading skills; organise the sections of a scientific paper effectively. Develop a scientific argument with appropriate language that conveys the message effectively. Make effective use of charts and tables.
Over recent decades, the theory that there is an imbalance between excitation and inhibition in cortical circuits in people with psychosis has become increasingly popular. The exact nature of this imbalance is still unclear, however. One issue is that it is conceptually ill-defined. Another reason is that it is hard to measure in vivo. We have found, using rodent recordings of simultaneous LFP and cell spiking data, that most 'traditional' measures of E/I imbalance (e.g.m, gamma power, 1/f power spectrum slope, etc) are not reliable. WE have sued computational modelling of Me/EEG and (fMRI) data to show that there is hypo function of excitatory neurone in both established schizophrenia and in the prodromal period (NAPLS2 dataset), although this pathology may not be present in all subgroups of psychosis (analysing 'biotypes' from the BSNIP consortium dataset). Symptoms such as hallucinations, however, seem to relate to disinhibition (the opposite effect). I discuss why this might be, and what this might mean for treatments. This seminar is hosted in person, to join online, please use the Zoom details below: https://zoom.us/j/93311812405?pwd=9kbjSbEcO2fa7n7gFLZVqrChvr467B.1 Meeting ID: 933 1181 2405 Passcode: 169396
Are you baffled by open, confused by embargoes? Does the mention of the colour gold or green catapult you into a realm of perplexed irritation? Come to this session, where we’ll break down open access and all its many jargon terms, confusing publishing structures and hint at the advantages you can reap by publishing open. In this session you’ll learn: what is open access? Key terms – Gold, Green, Article Processing Charges; where to get more information and help; where to look for open access material; and useful tools to assist you in publishing open access. Intended audience: researcher and research student; staff
In a radically changing intellectual property landscape, how can we re-envision the system to protect research(ers)? We discuss how the current strategies of Rights Retention may need to adapt to fit future challenges
Postgraduate students, fellows, staff and faculty from any discipline are welcome. This group aims to foster frequent interdisciplinary critical dialogue across Oxford and beyond about the political impacts of emerging technologies. Please contact Callum Harvey (callum.harvey@oii.ox.ac.uk) in advance to participate or with any questions. Attendance is online only. You do not currently have to be affiliated with the University of Oxford to attend and participate in discussions.
Teams link: https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/3825967966058?p=oaa4boDA3tu5ZnqMja
The internationalisation of higher education has contributed to the rapid expansion of English Medium Instruction (EMI) in Japan. The talk draws on empirical research on content learning outcomes in EMI programmes. It also includes a policy analysis of the final evaluation of the Top Global University Project. The findings highlight how the choice of medium influences academic outcomes. The talk also raises broader questions about fairness, inclusivity and the future direction of internationalisation in Japan. Bio: Ikuya Aisawa is an Assistant Professor in Applied Linguistics at Nottingham university’s School of English. He lectures and supervises on the BA English Language and Literature and the MA Applied Linguistics and English Language Teaching. Before to moving to Nottingham in 2022, he completed his DPhil in Education in 2022 at the University of Oxford, having served as a tutor on the MSc ALSLA and a research assistant in the English Medium Instruction (EMI) Research Group. He also worked on the BA Japanese Studies at the School of English and Modern Languages at Oxford Brookes University. Teams link: https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3aM_SoBsI8nakThXNUxEguh57-GSvT6JopDdhFnEBgr3I1%40thread.tacv2/1759499701700?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%22cc95de1b-97f5-4f93-b4ba-fe68b852cf91%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%22e0e2c03d-d313-4dab-bd7c-afbd83792648%22%7d
Bio: Melinda Mills is a Professor of Demography and Population Health, Director of the Leverhulme Centre for Demographic Science and Demographic Science Unit at NDPH and Nuffield College. Her work focuses on demographic change, combining multiple types of high-dimensional data and advanced statistical methods. In addition to others, she has held both an ERC Consolidator and ERC Advanced Grant, examining the intersection of social and genetic factors. She has served on No 10's Data Science Advisory Group, as an advisor on SAGE (SPI-B), and as one of three special Advisors to the European Commissioner of the Economy. She is also a Trustee of the UK Biobank and on the Scientific Advisory Boards of Our Future Health, LifeLines, Health & Retirement Survey. She received an MBE in 2018 for her research contributions and an Honorary Doctorate in 2025 from the EUI for her work in sociogenomics. She also holds a part-time position at the Department of Economic, Econometrics & Finance, University of Groningen and Department of Genetics, University Medical Centre Groningen, Netherlands. Abstract: Recent changes in the postponement of the timing and number of children across many countries has resulted in renewed interest in the underlying reasons, consequences and effectiveness of policy interventions related to fertility. Many are having their first child in their early 30s, with percentage of the population who remain childless now around 20% (born ~1965) in many Western European countries, with high levels of lifetime childlessness in East Asia (e.g., 28% (Japan); (35% Hong Kong), women born 1975). Recently, the UK has also reported the lowest total fertility rate for the last 80 years. But reproduction is a complex behavioural and biological trait influenced by socio-environmental and genetic factors. This talk brings together research in demography and genetics to explore contemporary fertility patterns. It first examines broader changes in the timing and number of children, the most recent 'low fertility panic', social determinants and effectiveness of various policy interventions. Linking whole population administrative register data with hospital records, the talk then demonstrates how lifetime fertility and health trajectories are strongly associated with mental-behavioural, substance use and metabolic disorders. Large-scale genetic association studies of reproductive traits are then explored in addition to their relationship with health and longevity. Join the meeting online: https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3ameeting_YTlmOWQyODgtYzJhMS00NDQyLWExYmQtOTkzNmFiZWRmMWEy%40thread.v2/0?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%22cc95de1b-97f5-4f93-b4ba-fe68b852cf91%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%22902ce32a-9317-4399-9f23-a83c7907d4bd%22%7d
Which firms drive aggregate productivity growth? A strong form of Gibrat's Law says that firm growth rates are iid, so that their expected contribution is proportional to their sales share. In contrast, we document that firms with high price-earnings ratios tend to see increases in their subsequent earnings relative to sales, which we interpret as rents from ideas. We construct an endogenous growth model with shocks to firm innovation step-sizes and R&D efficiency and calibrate it to match patterns in the data. The model implies that growth would be much lower, even with the same innovative effort, if firms had the same step sizes. The model can be used to infer expected growth contributions of individual firms (such as members of the Magnificent Seven) and individual sectors (such as AI firms). We find that the share of growth coming from the smallest listed firms substantially exceeds their 10\% sales share, whereas the largest firms account for less than their 10% sales share.
Contested Sovereignty: Chinese-led urban development, city-making, and urban futures in Nairobi, Kenya Elisa Tamburo (Harvard University & Oxford) The paper examines city-making and its stakeholders to show how sovereignty is negotiated beyond the polity of the nation-state. Since the early 2000s, the rise of Chinese private construction firms in Nairobi, Kenya, has transformed how the city is planned, built, and inhabited. Chinese-led urban development not only fragments the Kenyan urban middle class but also reveals divergent and sometimes conflicting interests among Chinese actors themselves. Drawing on eight months of ethnographic fieldwork in Nairobi, I analyse the effects of private Chinese financial engagement in Kenya and probe which contested visions of the city may emerge, tracing how these are entangled with notions of citizenship, governance, and sovereignty in Nairobi. I argue for the need to distinguish carefully among different stakeholders – builders, residents, and municipal authorities – and propose that we venture beyond a nation-centered analysis of sovereignty. Focusing on the scale of the city offers new vistas on the forces that shape visions of the future, which often diverge from those that urban dwellers imagine and aspire to. Elisa Tamburo is a social anthropologist and Skłodowska Curie Global Postdoctoral Fellow jointly in the Department of Anthropology at Harvard and the School of Geography and the Environment at Oxford. Her second main research project Negotiating the City, focuses on urban planning and dwelling amidst China-built urban infrastructure in Nairobi, Kenya. Her work appeared in international peer-reviewed journals such as the JRAI, Focaal, and the Journal of Current Chinese Affairs. Elisa is currently revising her first book manuscript, Exiled in the City, for Cornell University Press. Business as (un)usual: Migration and Urban Life in Afro-Asian Delhi Bani Gill (University of Tubingen) Contemporary Africa–India circulations have brought a growing number of African migrants to India for trade, education, asylum, medical travel. Drawing on long-term ethnographic research with West African migrants in Delhi who describe “doing business” as central to their mobility regardless of visa category, this talk explores how “doing business,” exceeds economic exchange; it is not only a livelihood strategy, but also a set of spatial practices, a social identity, and a negotiation of risk. The talk shows how “doing business” gives rise to “new” urban constellations, such as African hair salons and grocery stores, that are located largely in mixed-demographic, unplanned settlements, and argues that such sites are analytically significant for understanding contemporary processes of urbanism in Delhi. For migrants with precarious legal status, “doing business” involves navigating India’s legal regime, where discretionary state authority and bureaucratic logics foreclose and open opportunities for entrepreneurial aspiration. Migrants cultivate shared vocabularies and practices of licitness—socially permissible yet legally ambivalent forms of work—through which they negotiate regulatory grey zones. Yet the fluidity of licitness generates both possibility and anxiety, offering opportunity yet also exposing migrants to uncertainty. By tracing how opportunity and friction converge in this daily labor, the talk traces how “doing business” becomes a relational and affective site through which contemporary Afro-Asian encounters are produced, contested, and transformed. Dr Bani Gill is a Junior Professor at the Institute for Sociology, University of Tübingen and a Marie Curie Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Halle. She is a qualitative sociologist grounded in ethnographic sensibilities and a regional focus on South Asia and contemporary Africa- India encounters. Her research interests include urbanisms, migration, race and racialization, gender, and the sociology of law, bureaucracy, and the state. Her current project explores practices of deportation and policing in urban India.
Since the summer 2020 racial reckoning in the U.S., which reverberated across the world, diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts have come under political scrutiny from conservative policy actors. Prior to the 2025 Trump administration’s federal anti-DEI policy stance, anti-DEI action was created and crafted at the state level. From 2021 to 2024, hundreds of legislative and administrative actions were introduced and/or passed that limited speech, curriculum, and programming designed to create inclusive and equitable college environments for students, faculty, and staff. This presentation is based on a national qualitative study of 30 diversity officers responding to pre-Trump administration anti-DEI actions. Results will focus on organizational responses to various anti-DEI actions, and a second set of findings will highlight the personal consequences of such actions for diversity officers. While this is a specific U.S.-based study, anti-DEI actions have transcontinental foundations and reach. Implications for future research and action for higher education leaders and scholars will be discussed.
https://www.cmcsoxford.org.uk/our-events
What would a HSS-led vision of openness actually look like in practice, from monographs and data to open review and licensing? How can stewardship reshape ideas of knowledge ownership in community-engaged research? And can “subscribe to open” models deliver a financially sustainable and globally equitable future for open access publishing?
This paper investigates whether severe economic hardship undermines preferences for honesty. We use controlled, incentivized measures of cheating for private benefit in a large, diverse sample of 5,676 Kenyans, exploiting three complementary sources of variation: experimentally manipulated monetary incentives, randomized increase in salience of own financial situation, and the Covid‑19 income shock, exploiting randomized survey timing as a natural experiment with respondents surveyed before and during the crisis. We find that severe economic hardship—marked by a 40% drop in monthly earnings— leads to a sharp increase in the prevalence of cheating, from 43% to 72%. Cheating behaviour is highly responsive to financial incentives and increases gradually with prolonged hardship. The effects are largest among the most economically impacted and are amplified when salience of own financial situation is experimentally increased. Predictable seasonal income fluctuations, in contrast, do not affect honesty. The results demonstrate that while most individuals exhibit a strong preference against cheating under normal conditions, severe economic hardship substantially erodes honesty.
Livia Holden (Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne/CNRS) & Dina Hadad (Université Paris Nanterre) Cultural Expertise: Theories, Laws, and Practices , a major new contribution to the interdisciplinary study of law, culture, and expertise, will be launched at the Maison Française d’Oxford, with the support of COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) and the European Union. Authored and edited by Livia Holden, with a chapter by Dina Hadad on cultural expertise in common law and civil law systems, and a chapter by Noora Arajärvi on cultural expertise across legal procedures, the volume offers an unprecedented examination of how cultural expertise is produced, mobilised, and theorised across legal systems and institutional settings. The launch will be jointly presented by Livia Holden (CNRS- University of Panthéon Sorbonne Paris1) and Dina Hadad (University of Paris Nanterre). Together, the speakers will address key theoretical debates, legal frameworks, and practical challenges surrounding the use of cultural expertise in courts and public decision-making. The event will be of particular interest to scholars, legal practitioners, judges, and policymakers working at the intersection of law, anthropology, and cultural diversity.
Hybrid. Email oxchildpsych@psych.ox.ac.uk to request the link to attend online.
Two recent undergraduates will discuss the experience and findings of their thesis.
This lecture draws together the findings of the first five lectures to paint a different picture from the rationalist, transcendentalist, idealist, and universalist depiction of “Plato’s Theory of Forms” that dominates the history of political thought. Analyzing the co-implications of _eidos_, usually translated as “Form,” with _eidos_ as a “look” or “shape” grasped by the senses, the lecture develops an account of _democratic form_ that inhabits the spaces of opinion, appearance, and practice explored in the preceding lectures.
The talk explores what mistakes were made with regard to the semi-periphery by focusing on two pivotal countries that were mostly left out of the liberal international order (LIO) in the 1990s even though they sought to belong: Russia and Turkey. The LIO never settled on a consistent policy regarding their incorporation. Halfway recognition—or alternating between inclusion and exclusion—is even worse than aloofness or full alienation because it first creates expectations and then creates resentment when those expectations are not met. This lesson has present day implications for Ukraine as well.
In this talk, Dr Marielle Snel will present a study focused on the careers of mainly women who have worked in the water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) sector for more than fifteen years. Including insights from experienced professionals in both humanitarian and development settings, the study examines how women think about their careers, identities, motivations, and leadership paths in a field often influenced by deep-rooted structural and gender issues. The findings present a complex view. Women in WASH show strong commitment, resilience, and a sense of belonging to the sector. However, they also face ongoing challenges related to gender norms, organizational structures, and work-life balance. This practical research goes beyond basic surveys and token gender discussions. It focuses on real experiences to better understand the root causes of inequality as identified by the participants. The talk will conclude with a discussion of ways to foster change and highlight recommendations from practitioners that aim to create more equitable, supportive, and empowering work environments in the WASH sector.
'Contemporary Islamist Opposition in Morocco: Resisting Inclusion and Moderation' offers an in-depth and yet-unexplored analysis of the evolution and actions of Moroccan Islamist association Justice and Spirituality (al-Adl wa-l-Ihsane). By examining its mobilisation structure, the book enhances the understanding of Islamism as an oppositional force in non-democratic regimes, with a particular focus on Morocco. Contrary to the common premises of inclusion–moderation theory, al-Adl wa-l-Ihsane has undergone a politicisation process but rejects political inclusion; it promotes street mobilisation but refuses to resort to violence. Despite its illegal status and disregard for the regime’s red lines, al-Adl wa-l-Ihsane remains highly relevant as an anti-establishment actor. Addressing these apparent contradictions broadens our understanding of inclusion–moderation approaches by introducing novel explanatory factors into the relationship between authoritarian regimes and Islamist opposition actors, including responses to shifts in opportunity structures and the effects of internal dynamics and learning mechanisms. It also deepens our knowledge of al-Adl wa-l-Ihsane, Morocco’s largest opposition actor, which nevertheless remains largely understudied. https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-contemporary-islamist-opposition-in-morocco.html
The seminars will take place on Tuesdays during term time, from 5:00 to 6:30 p.m. at Corpus Christi College in Merton Street. Please ask the porters for directions. No registration is required. For more details: https://tolkien50.web.ox.ac.uk/event/tolkien-seminars-ht-2026
This seminar presents findings from a four-phase clean energy programme delivered in Kenya between 2022 and 2025. Beginning with solar providers, Phase 1 strengthened how sales agents communicated the real-life benefits of solar technologies through an SDG lens. Phase 2 piloted training with women’s chamas, showing strong knowledge gains and increased confidence to adopt clean energy. Phase 3 expanded this model to more than 200 women across 13 counties, cultivating leadership and uptake. Phase 4 supported 17 community-led clean energy projects, improving health, savings, safety, and education access. The model has now been recognised by the UNFCCC as a global grassroots reference project.
Online - Please contact Andrew Moeller to express interest regarding the readings and video call link: andrew.moeller@history.ox.ac.uk. The particular topic under focus this week will be mass automation and universal basic income. Boundaries of Humanity Discussion Group Series With the rapid development of AI and biotechnologies (including those relating to germline gene editing, brain-computer Interfaces, life extension, etc.) come vast powers to reshape ourselves and the natural world. As technological advances grant us new powers, so do they blur some boundaries between humans, animals, and machines, prodding us to ask the question: what does it mean to be human? Drawing upon readings in the humanities (including philosophy, theology, literature, etc.) and the sciences, this group will attempt to bridge the existential and empirical study of human identity - and within that context, ask if and how such reflections might help chart a path forward in relation to the right uses of new and potent technologies. We will focus in particular on questions of human purpose, place, and flourishing within the natural order. The reading group is open to students at all levels of study (including medical students), as well as faculty. We will meet for about 1 hour, twice per term. Under the umbrella of the medical humanities, this will be a casual reading and discussion group. The readings for each session will be introduced by a different participant - and the readings for each session will take a total of roughly 1 hour to complete.
In fiction, it’s often assumed that everything the writer produced is fully imagined—or, in the case of autofiction, that nothing is made up, each character representative of an established, real-life parallel. The truth is normally far less interesting. Fiction writers peel from life to create their fictional worlds, sometimes borrowing heavily, sometimes very little at all. This masterclass with acclaimed author Isle McElroy will explore strategies for bringing real life into fiction. Participants will consider questions including: Why might a writer borrow from real life to write fiction? How might real-life details undermine the narrative? When is it necessary to fictionalise? Speaker Details: Isle McElroy Credit: Jih-E Peng Isle McElroy is the author of The Atmospherians, a New York Times Editors’ Choice, and People Collide, named a best book of 2023 by Vulture, NPR, Vogue, and the New York Times Critics. Other writing appears in The Cut, The Atlantic, The New York Times Magazine, and elsewhere. They are currently a Shearing Fellow at the Black Mountain Institute at UNLV. Their third novel, The Channel, will be published in 2027 by Viking in the U.S. and Bloomsbury in the U.K. About OCLW’s Global Majority & Underrepresented Writers’ Programme: This event is part of OCLW’s flagship Global Majority and Underrepresented Writers’ Programme (GMUWP). The GMUWP supports talented yet historically excluded writers in developing their work, building confidence, and navigating the publishing industry by providing free lectures, workshops, and mentorship. The Programme aims to create a more inclusive writing community, ensuring that life-writing reflects the diverse range of voices that surround us. Find out more about the Programme here. Further Details and Contacts: This event is free and open to: Those identifying as members of the global majority or groups underrepresented in life-writing (see definitions) Friends of OCLW (join here) Members of OCLW’s Life-Writing Research Network (join here) Scholars of OCLW’s Global Majority and Underrepresented Writers’ Programme OCLW Visiting Scholars CWAR Fellows Delivering masterclasses costs the Centre around £20 per attendee. If you are able, please consider making a voluntary donation of £5, £10, or £20 to help us cover these costs and keep our events accessible to all. No one will be turned away for lack of funds. Places for this masterclass are limited. Registration is required. Registration will close at 17:00 on 24/02/2026. All registrants will be informed of the outcome of their registration after the closing date. The event will be recorded and made available on the OCLW website soon after. Registration is not required to access the recording. Queries regarding this event should be addressed to OCLW Events Manager, Dr Eleri Anona Watson.
A special event hosted in collaboration with Fitzcarraldo Editions celebrating the upcoming release of An Army of Lovers Cannot Fail, a “slantwise account of queer life in the twentieth century and a testament to the liberatory power of friendship.” Author Hélène Giannecchini will discuss the book and its historical exploration of queer kinship in conversation with LGBTQ+ History Network committee members Katie Burke and Eszter D Kovács, followed by an audience Q&A and drinks reception.
This event is free and open to everyone, but online booking is required.. Special event in collaboration with the Québec Government Office in London, and the Alliance Française in Oxford. From 7.00pm we invite you to a small wine reception before the screening to celebrate the Mois de la Francophonie 2026. The screening will then begin at 8.00pm. Directed by Jill Lefaive, 2024, 51 min - In French with English Subtitles Boyer, Québécois de naissance et Franco-Ontarien d’adoption, se trouve confronté à la question cruciale dr savoir s'il est le dernier représentant de cette identité en constante évolution. En parcourant le pays, du Yukon à l’Acadie en passant par les Prairies et Québec, Boyer et ses compagnons de voyage explorent les réalités linguistiques qui unissent les francophones canadiens. Ils se demandent si la langue commune est suffisante pour assurer le futur de leurs communautés diverses.
Please mark 4-5 March 2026 in your diary for the next IDEU Symposium. We will showcase the work of the IDEU researchers, especially our early and mid-career researchers, and will also have speakers from across Oxford who will discuss their recent work. It will be two days of excellent science and plenty of opportunities for networking, so please do join us! More details and register here: https://www.ndph.ox.ac.uk/events/ideu-symposium-2026
The in-person conference day for the Oxford forum on Open Scholarship. Current agenda as follows: Conference day (Weston Library lecture theatre, OX1 3BG) 09:00-10:00: Registration and coffee 10:00-11:30: Envisioning the future of 'open' in a generative AI world 11:30-12:00: Pointless gameshow - Open research 12:00-13:00: Lunch 13:00-15:00: Reimagining ‘open’: Sharing research outside of traditional formats 14:00-14:30: Would I Lie to You: Reproducibility edition 14:30-15:00: Reimagining ‘open’ (continued) 15:00-15:30: Coffee break 15:30-17:00: Helping researchers navigate ‘open’: Communities and reforms 17:00-18:00: KEYNOTE lecture: Dorothy Bishop on the future challenges of open research 18:00-19:00: Drinks reception and poster session
In this online workshop you will be shown the functionality of Zotero, which is a free-to-use software programme used to manage references and create bibliographies. Zotero will be demonstrated on a Windows PC but users of MacOS or Linux computers will be able to follow the demonstration. The workshop will cover: understanding the main features and benefits of Zotero; setting up a Zotero account; importing references from different sources into Zotero; organising your references in Zotero; inserting citations into documents; and creating a bibliography/reference list. Intended audience: Medicine and NHS; Taught student; Researcher and research student
Olink’s mission is to accelerate proteomics together with the scientific community, to understand real-time biology and gain actionable insights into human health and disease. Their innovative solutions deliver highly sensitive and accurate protein quantification, giving scientists the power to investigate complex biological processes with precision.
TBC
In both the United States and France, each side of the legal battle over same-sex marriage and parenthood relied heavily on experts. Despite the similarity of issues, however, lawmakers in each country turned to different sets of authorities: from economists and psychoanalysts to priests and ordinary people. They even prized different types of expertise—empirical research in the United States versus abstract theory in France. Exploring the legalization of same-sex marriage in the United States and France, this book sheds new light on the power of experts to influence high-stakes democratic debates. Drawing on extensive interviews and ethnographic observation, Michael Stambolis-Ruhstorfer traces the divergences between the two countries, showing why some experts are ubiquitous in one but absent in the other. He argues that lawmakers, judges, lawyers, journalists, and activists covet something only experts can provide: the credibility and aura of authority, or “expert capital,” which they deploy to advance their agendas. Expert capital is not derived from scientific or technical merit alone but is produced through cultural norms, material resources, and social relationships, which vary greatly across national contexts. Through the story of the fight over gay rights, By the Power Vested in Me reveals how and why certain experts—but not others—obtain the authority to shape public opinion and policy. At a time of soaring public distrust in experts, this book offers new ways to understand the contested political role of expertise and its consequences. About the Author Michael Stambolis-Ruhstorfer is a sociologist and associate professor of American studies at the University of Toulouse–Jean Jaurès and junior member of the Institut Universitaire de France.
Cornall Group Speaker 1: Mukta Deobagkar Title: TBC Handunnetthi Group Speaker: TBC Title: TBC
Join us for a thrilling live experiment pitting human creativity against machine automation. In this talk, a veteran 3D artist with over 20 years of experience will go head-to-head with AI to see who can create the most compelling character concept in real time. We’ll explore how an artist approaches 3D character modelling—considering anatomy, reference, style, shape, form, pose, and topology—while the AI simultaneously generates its own 2D concept and transforms it into a 3D design using web-based tools. The session will focus primarily on ZBrush, with insights also applicable to Blender and Mayausers. It’s part technical deep-dive, part creative showdown—will decades of human artistry triumph, or will AI steal the spotlight? About the Speaker: Adam Dewhirst is a seasoned British 3D artist and modelling specialist with over 20 years of experience in high-end VFX for film, television, commercials, and games. He has held senior leadership roles across major studios, including serving as Head of Assets at The Mill and Head of Creatures and Characters at UNIT Studios. Throughout his career, Adam has contributed to blockbuster productions such as The Golden Compass, The Dark Knight, World War Z, and Guardians of the Galaxy, where his team helped bring Rocket Raccoon to life. With a background spanning studios like Framestore, MPC, DNEG, and Cinesite, he combines deep technical expertise with creative artistry and now also shares his knowledge through education and mentorship in 3D modelling and creature creation. Adam is currently working as a freelance Asset Supervisor, working on such shows as The Witcher, Andor and Alien Earth to name a few.
'Liberalism is in crisis. Or so it seems. In the aftermath of Brexit and Trump’s election, a plethora of books and articles reporting the end of liberalism emerged from both ends of the political spectrum. While the majority of voices from the American left and mainstream right mourned this perceived decline, a new faction within the right saw it as an opening for envisioning a fresh political paradigm beyond the constraints of liberalism. Many of these right-wing thinkers and activists, with whom U.S. Vice-President J. D. Vance publicly identifies, call themselves postliberals. Yet the early uses of the term “postliberal” were strikingly different, denoting communitarian attempts to transcend liberal individualism rather than the illiberal rejection of liberal-democratic norms.' -- Jacob Williams & João Pinheiro da Silva, 'Postliberalism: A Genealogy'. Timetable: 2 - 2.45pm, João Pinheiro da Silva (University of St. Andrews) and Jacob Williams (Oxford) will introduce their essay, 'Postliberalism: A Genealogy' (Telos, no. 212, 2025), why they wrote it, and what its thesis is. 2.45 - 3.30pm First response will be given by Professor John Milbank (Emeritus, Nottingham). 3.30 - 4pm Break for tea and coffee. 4 - 4.30pm Second response will be given by Professor Paul Kelly (London School of Economics), author of Against Postliberalism: Why 'Family, Faith and Flag' is a Dead End for the Left (Polity, 2025). 4.30 - 5.20pm panel discussion with all of the speakers, moderated by a chair, and Q&A with the audience.
The presentation will focus on the expected macroeconomic productivity gains from Artificial Intelligence (AI) over a 10-year horizon in OECD and G20 economies. It relies on a micro-to-macro framework by combining existing estimates of micro-level performance gains with evidence on the exposure of activities to AI and likely future adoption rates, feeding into a general equilibrium multi-sector model to aggregate the impacts. In the baseline scenario, where AI diffuses at a similar pace that was observed for previous digital technologies such as computers and the internet, the paper finds that AI-driven productivity gains are expected to raise labour productivity and per capita real income growth by about 0.6 percentage points on average. However, the gains vary widely across the OECD, in a range of 0.1–0.95 percentage points, with stronger specialisation in highly AI-exposed knowledge intensive services such as finance and ICT services and more widespread adoption key to higher gains. It is based on a series of papers with colleagues Francesco Filippucci, Katharina Laengle, Matthias Schief (OECD) and Muhammed Yildirim (Harvard Growth Lab). About the speaker: Peter Gal is Deputy Head of Division and Senior Economist in the Structural Policy Research Division of the Economics Department at the OECD. Over the past few years, he has led a team of economists examining the macroeconomic productivity implications of artificial intelligence. During his 15 years at the OECD, he has worked on both micro- and macroeconomic aspects of productivity, labour markets, and the role of structural policies, published in policy reports and academic journals. He previously worked at the IMF and the Central Bank of Hungary. He holds a PhD in Economics from the Tinbergen Institute (Amsterdam) and a Master’s degree in Economics from Corvinus University of Budapest.
About the series: This series will feature master classes, seminars, workshops and talks with Laura Rival, research collaborators and colleagues, throughout academic year 2025-2026. Beginning in Michaelmas term 2025, the theme for the term, in answer to the series question, was 'In Latin America, by Greening the State at the Top and from Below'. In Hilary term, the theme is 'By Knowing Nature Differently'. In Trinity term, the theme will be 'By Imagining a New Civilization and Building the Next Political Economic Order'.
The aim is to look at the development of regional identities within state structures since the late nineteenth century and how they linked to regional government bodies or other regional organisations designed to promote the interests of the region, for example economic development, tourism, agriculture and preserving regional cultures. *Dr Terry Cudbird* will talk about his new book _The Origins of Economic Regions in France_. He gained his DPhil in 2021 and is an Associate Member of the History Faculty. *Peter George* will talk about his forthcoming DPhil thesis - Discourses of identity and dialect writing in the press, c.1890-1940 in France, Britain and Jersey. Discussants: *Dr Talitha Ilacqua*, Durham University, who published the following book in 2024: _Inventing the Modern Region: Basque Identity and the French Nation-State_, Manchester University Press. *Dr Timo Aava*, Estonia-Oxford Postdoctoral Visiting Fellow at St. Anthony’s College. Followed by drinks from 18:00.
We all decide our own paths in space and time, and we all have intuitive expectations as to how space and time behave. Before relativity space and time were just a blank canvas; an empty stage where events can occur. Our intuitions about space and time are still grounded in this notion, but relativity tells us that this is just a glimpse of a far grander picture. In this talk, we’ll discover how space and time are woven together to form the dynamic fabric of space-time, and explore how relativity explains some of the last great questions of classical physics. We’ll discuss how relativity not only had a seismic effect on the history of the 20th century, but also provides a unique perspective on our own path in space-time. As we study phenomena in the wider Universe beyond the distance-, speed- and time-scales of human experience, we encounter a wide range of relativistic phenomena in ‘extreme’ environments and in the fabric of the Universe itself. We will explore some of these situations that present a compelling validation of Einstein’s theory.
Dr David Cooper will highlight why urgent action to halt and reverse biodiversity loss is important, describe progress in achieving the goals and targets of the Kunming-Montreal Global Diversity Framework, and discuss what further steps are needed. The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework was agreed by all governments at COP-15 of the Convention on Biological Diversity in December 2022. It sets out an ambitious agenda to halt and reverse the loss of biodiversity and put nature on a path to recovery by 2030. Later this year, at COP-17, the international community will take stock of progress towards the 2030 targets and 2050 goals of the KMGBF. In this talk, Dr David Cooper will highlight why it is important to take urgent action - why biodiversity is important for people's security and wellbeing. Drawing upon recent reports he will present what we know about progress towards the goals and targets, in the UK and globally, and describe future prospects. He will argue that current efforts must be complemented by actions across all sectors of the economy and society to promote and enable the transformable changes needed to ensure that people and nature can thrive together.
Join online via Microsoft Teams by clicking here: https://tinyurl.com/bdff6tpt
AI and human agency Narratives in AI safety mostly focus on the growing capability of AI models. For example, there are concerns that highly intelligent AI models could be used for criminal or disruptive purposes, may transform labour markets, or even seek to attain their own misaligned goals. In my lecture, I will argue that the most pressing question in AI safety is not artificial intelligence but artificial influence - the many ways that AI can be used to influence people. The widespread embedding of AI in digital platforms, applications and websites opens the door for a highly automated ‘influence economy’ in which conversational AI systems compete to directly influence our commercial and political choices. I will discuss with reference to empirical work showing that current AI systems can be highly persuasive, socially perceptive, and effective in parasocial relationship-building. I argue that we urgently need to consider how to build AI that enhances rather than degrades human agency.
Existing accounts of life under the Colonels’ dictatorship (1967-1974) contend that cultural activity in Greece was all but eradicated due to repression and censorship. However, our research uncovers exactly the opposite, nothing less than a cultural Big Bang. I outline the evidence and address two questions: First, what made this development possible--and, more generally, which conditions facilitate the development of cultural life under authoritarianism? And second, why was this cultural boom erased from collective memory?
With extensive and volatile disagreement on the existence and extent of the obligations of states in the Global North towards refugees, this talk will seek to develop an understanding of the grounds of specific obligations that states owe to refugees. These obligations will then constitute the components of an ethical response. The talk aims to highlight the limitations of the dominant philosophical approach to understanding obligations to refugees – the duty of rescue approach – to reach a new understanding. It will first analyse certain state practices used in response to refugees including border violence, detention, encampment and containment, which the duty of rescue approach fails to sufficiently engage with, in order to ground states’ negative duties towards refugees. It will then analyse specific harms and injustices refugees face as a result of their displacement, which the duty of rescue approach fails to sufficiently engage with, in order to ground states’ positive duties towards refugees. Taken together these negative and positive duties constitute the foundational elements of an ethical response. The talk will then briefly explore what this ethical response might look like and how it may be possible in practice. About the speaker Bradley Hillier-Smith researches, teaches, and writes political, moral, and legal philosophy at the University of St Andrews. His research specialises in applied political ethics, global justice, and human rights, with a specific focus on migration ethics and obligations to refugees. He is the author of The Ethics of State Responses to Refugees (Routledge 2024), and numerous journal articles on topics including understanding injustice against refugees, the grounds and implications of human rights, and the limitations of a right to control borders. Bradley is also a charity worker, former long-term Calais camp volunteer, and political campaigner advocating for the rights and settlement of refugees in the UK.
In celebration of International Women’s Day (8 March 2026) and its theme “Give to Gain,” Kellogg College and the Skoll Centre invite you to an inspiring conversation exploring how social impact organisations are advancing gender equity while generating broader positive social change. Give to Gain posterThis timely discussion brings together voices from entrepreneurship research, impact investing and purpose-driven enterprise to examine how giving – of time, capital, expertise and leadership – can drive transformative social outcomes. Our panel will explore how organisations can prioritise gender equity alongside wider sustainability goals, and why such inclusive strategies generate stronger economic outcomes, greater resilience and lasting value. The conversation will address critical questions facing social impact organisations today: How can we support equity in increasingly challenging times? What does it truly mean to invest in women as founders and leaders? And why are inclusive approaches to entrepreneurship not only fairer, but demonstrably more effective? Drawing on research, practice and lived experience, speakers will illuminate how generosity of vision, collaboration and commitment unlock innovation, amplify impact and drive meaningful change. Together, we’ll explore how the social entrepreneur’s mindset of “Give to Gain” can widen opportunity, strengthen innovation and contribute to more robust and equitable economies. Join us for an engaging exchange that connects values to action, and discover how giving creates the foundation for sustainable impact. Speakers: Professor Pinar Ozcan, Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation at Saïd Business School; Academic Director of the Oxford Entrepreneurship Centre and the Oxford Future of Finance and Technology Initiative Tara Sabre Collier, Senior Director of Impact Investing at Chemonics Europe; Visiting Fellow at Kellogg College; Visiting Fellow and Advisory Board Member at Skoll Centre Lucy Turner, Chief Purpose Officer at The Game Changer Collective Moderated by: Dr Ana Nacvalovaite, Sovereign Wealth Funds Research Fellow at Kellogg College Light refreshments will be available at the event from 5.00pm. All audience members are also invited to join a drinks reception immediately following the panel discussion to continue the conversation informally.
To mark the centenary of Rilke’s death there will be a series of Oxford Centenary Readings held in the Queen’s College in HT 2025. These will be informal papers with plenty of discussion, about one poem or a handful of poems, that offer close readings and new insights. Papers will be in English and English translations will be provided for all poems and quotations (except for the session in week 4 with the visiting poets) making these sessions accessible to anyone with an interest in this remarkable poet and poetry in general.
We are an interdisciplinary reading group which focuses on the social science, history, and theology of demons, the Devil, and supernatural evil as they relate to politics, identity formation, and social conflicts. Each week we will examine one academic paper or book chapter on these topics, gaining familiarity with subjects such as: the psychology of dehumanization, the conceptual development of the term “demon,” and contemporary political demonologies like QAnon. Hilary Term 2026, Thursdays from 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM Weeks 1,3,4,5,6,7,8: 21 St Giles (Kendrew Quad) Teaching Room G4 Week 2: 14 St Giles (next door to the Lamb & Flag) Seminar Room H Please contact Scott Maybell for the readings or for any questions: scott.maybell@sjc.ox.ac.uk
Emerging evidence suggests climate change may contribute to human violence, but it is unclear why associations exist. In this seminar, Dr Sokol will present a case study of Wayne County, Michigan. This case study employed distributed lag models (DLMs) to evaluate associations of different types of extreme weather with firearm violence and child maltreatment in Wayne County, Michigan between 2014-2022. To understand contextual influences, models used data from before (2018–2019), during (March 2020–March 2021), and after (2022–2023) the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Overall findings suggest that, for firearm violence, extreme weather immediately reduced risk, with effects waning as people likely resumed regular activities. Yet for child maltreatment, extreme weather created accumulating risk over several days when it disrupted an already stressed environment. Dr Sokol will discuss how this study informs the Hazard-Violence Model–a novel conceptual model of extreme weather’s association with interpersonal violence, including community and home-based violence. The seminar will conclude with discussing implications for theory development, future research, and policy. ———————————————————————————————————————————— Speaker bio: Rebeccah Sokol is an associate professor at the University of Michigan School of Social Work and a faculty member of the Institute for Firearm Injury Prevention. Her research programme evaluates strategies to promote child and adolescent safety, with a focus on recognising and addressing fundamental causes of violence. Dr Sokol collaborates with interdisciplinary and cross-sectoral teams to understand the effects of programmes and policies that address material hardships on youth safety. Dr Sokol holds an Astor Visitor Lectureship. ———————————————————————————————————————————— Booking is required for people outside of the Department of Social Policy and Intervention (DSPI). DSPI Members do not need to register.
EndNote is a desktop-based reference management tool for Windows and Mac users. It helps you to build libraries of references and insert them into Word documents as in-text citations or footnotes, and to automatically generate bibliographies. This online introduction to EndNote is open to all University of Oxford students, researchers and staff and teaches you how to use the software so that you can effectively manage your references. Please note that we also run a face-to-face EndNote workshop. Please check the iSkills course listing for availability. The workshop will cover: what EndNote can do for you; adding references to EndNote from a range of sources; managing your references in an EndNote library; adding in-text citations and/or footnotes to your essays and papers; and creating bibliographies. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student
This conference brings together leading experts on economic security and economic statecraft to share views on how debates and policies on these issues are evolving in different regions of the world. Over the past decade, economic relations have become highly politicized—and in some cases, securitized—due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine, the rise of economic coercion, and the return of trade war. Governments have become acutely aware of the vulnerabilities associated with interdependence and attempted to bolster their economic resilience through both domestic measures and international cooperation. At the same time, many governments have also attempted to wield economic statecraft, both as “sticks” to punish other countries through sanctions, tariffs, and export controls, as well as “carrots” to entice cooperation through promises of aid, trade, and investment. However, despite increasing academic debate and policymaking related to economic security and economic statecraft, there is no agreement about the definitions of these terms and little consideration of how they relate to one another. Therefore, the time is ripe for deeper discussion of these issues and consideration of what insights might be drawn from the Japanese, European, and American experiences, as well as how these countries might more effectively work together. Confirmed speakers include: Aya Adachi (German Council on Foreign Relations), Michael Beeman (UC San Diego), Creon Butler (Chatham House), Victor Cha (Georgetown University), Douglas Fuller (Copenhagen Business School), Kristi Govella (University of Oxford), Akira Igata (University of Tokyo), Keisuke Iida (University of Tokyo), Robyn Klingler-Vidra (King’s College London), Abraham Newman (Georgetown University), William Norris (Texas A&M University), Minako Morita-Jaeger (University of Sussex Business School), Martijn Rasser (Special Competitive Studies Project), Mariko Togashi (Institute of Geoeconomics), Anna Vlasiuk Nibe (University of Southern Denmark), Shino Watanabe (Sophia University), Hugh Whittaker (University of Oxford), and Jiakun Jack Zhang (University of Kansas).
Part of the Online Inclusivity Training for Health and Care Researchers Series This online workshop uses behavioural science to explain how people decide whether to participate in research. You’ll explore fast (System 1) and slow (System 2) thinking, map key recruitment decision points, and identify what drives awareness, interest, and confident consent, supporting an effective, ethical, and participant centred recruitment pathway.
*Session Theme: Community* This workshop brings together historians of marginalised communities using magazines in their research to share our approaches to this particular source base, grappling with magazines’ unique methodological challenges as well as their tantalising opportunities. Each session is broadly organised around a different theme, and participants are invited to bring examples from their own research. Pastries and snacks will be provided. Please email "$":mailto:katie.burke@st-hildas.ox.ac.uk for more information.
This session is open for anyone to join. This career panel aims to: Showcase the breadth and diversity of operations career paths across the University and beyond. Highlight that operations roles are very varied, even when “operations” isn’t in the job title. Inspire colleagues by sharing real career stories – including the twists, turns, and moments of decision that shaped our panelist's journey. Provide practical insights into career progression, resilience, and development in the professional service staff space. Our panelists are: Sally Vine, Head of Administration and Finance, DPAG Anne Wolfes, Senior Project Manager, Department of Psychiatry Lindsay Rudge, Registrar and Chief Operating Officer, GLAM Chris Manning, Bursar, Harris Manchester College
Dr Sebastian Lund will be presenting a book chapter from his upcoming monograph on Climate Control and the Fiction of the Fin de Siècle. The book argues that a range of canonical fin de siècle-authors such as Jules Verne, H. G. Wells, and Mark Twain gave aesthetic form to the idea that humanity could affect global climate change. Paradoxically, they did this not through the scientific paradigm of global warming, but its perverse inverse: climate control. The book provides thus a literary history of anthropogenic climate. The chapter will be discussed by DPhil candidate Claire Qu (English, Oxford). Dr Sebastian Egholm Lund is a Junior Research Fellow at Linacre College Oxford. His work focuses on nineteenth-century ecology, literature and science. His current project, Empire of the Sun: Imagining Solar Energy in Colonial India, 1878-1915, examines how British engineers, literary authors, and the greater English-language newspapers from colonial India imagined solar energy as an imperial infrastructure. Proposing the term “solar imperialism” to describe this understudied geopolitical doctrine, the project aims to provide an imperial history of the current energy transition.
In 1892, U.S. President Benjamin Harrison designated a forest reserve in the San Gabriel Mountains to protect the watersheds supplying an expanding Los Angeles. Local developers and politicians supported the reserve, believing it would curtail fires set by sheepherders and campers that threatened agricultural and residential development in the foothills of the San Gabriels. Over the course of the early twentieth century, the U.S. Forest Service and the Los Angeles city and county fire departments advanced an aggressive policy of fire suppression in Los Angeles’s mountains and canyons. Growing scientific expertise and substantial firefighting infrastructure failed to contain the year-by-year increase in human-caused fires as developers, undeterred by increasing risk, expanded into foothill and coastal areas. Drawing upon regional newspapers, the papers of local conservationists, and city, county, state, and federal records, this presentation examines how fire management practices in Los Angeles came to prioritize total fire suppression over land use restrictions and prescribed burning in fire and flood-prone communities.
This interactive session highlights initiatives and tools from researchers, publishers and institutions, to show how good research data management and FAIR principles can be promoted consistently and meaningfully across the research ecosystem.
For this lunchtime seminar, we invite you to read James (2024) by Percival Everett and come along for a book club-style discussion about the novel. Participants may wish but are not at all required to read or revisit Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884) by Mark Twain before or after reading James.
Lesson of the week, clinical cases and research. All clinical and academic staff and students welcome. Coffee and Tea will be served.
*Reading:* Sophie Lewis' _Abolish the Family: A Manifesto for Care and Liberation_ (Verso, 2022)
Engagement describes the ways in which we can share our research and its value by interacting with wider public audiences, generating mutual benefit. In this introductory session tailored to those new to engagement, we look at what public engagement is and some of the reasons why you might want to do it. We’ll highlight the multitude of different approaches you can take, and provide tips on getting started and where to get support.
In recent years, “depression” has become an undeniable focal point in Anglo-American popular music in several key ways, including: as a term loosely invoked by pop artists and fans to disclose, destigmatize, and normalize everyday experiences of sadness, loneliness, and despair; as an organizational theme on music streaming platforms in connection with mood and activity-based listening; and as a diverse musical and visual style forming around key musical personae and genres. I ultimately call this phenomenon the musical vernacular of depression, a dynamic expressive category that speaks to the prevalence of clinical depression in young people, widespread destigmatization of mental health among Gen Z, and intense cultural debate over what “depression” is. This talk treats pop singer Billie Eilish and rapper Princess Nokia’s creative output, reception, and fandom as emblematic of the musical vernacular of depression. Nokia and Eilish are alike in confronting the feminization of depression and moral panic around its “trendification” through striking visual appeals to feminine abjection and horror. Yet, their differing musical approaches to mental health reflect on certain racial inequalities: while Eilish tends towards hushed, intimate vocals, atmospheric soundscapes, and abstract lyrics, Nokia’s music rather offers a sobering and deeply personal account of sexual assault, depression, and PTSD, while bemoaning the disavowal of black women’s pain in her signature deadpan voice. I reveal that fans instrumentalize Eilish’s and Nokia’s music to emotionally self-regulate and even self-diagnose independent of clinical diagnosis and medical supervision. Eilish and Nokia thus offer insight into how the musical vernacular of depression is transforming the ways young people conceive of, communicate about, and tend to their mental health for better or worse amid a worldwide disparity of mental health care and increasing distrust in public health.
Ethnic, racial and religious minorities experience discriminatory behaviour and prejudicial attitudes across multiple areas of their lives, with these experiences accumulating over the life course. In this seminar, Valentina Di Stasio, Professor of Sociology, and Stefanie Sprong, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, will present the EqualStrength project. This Horizon Europe-funded project aims to investigate cumulative and structural forms of discrimination through cross-national field experiments conducted in nine European countries. The speakers will discuss the breadth of their research, ranging from analyses of setting-specific discrimination, such as hiring discrimination, to examinations of cumulative and structural discrimination that unfold simultaneously across multiple life domains, including childcare, employment, and housing, and that carry over across generations. They will also share how the findings provide valuable insights into a potential pathway through which the effects of discrimination are passed on from one generation to the next. Dan Muir, Senior Economist, and Katy Neep, Head of Employer Engagement and Partnerships, will close the seminar by providing insight into future research and the impact of discrimination research on policy. Register to join on Zoom: https://zoom.us/meeting/register/pbFSmnaxQcq9n70pS2PBZA
Abstract tbc ————————————————————————————————————————————— Speaker bio: Milena is Professor of Sustainable Welfare at the University of Leeds. ————————————————————————————————————————————— Booking is required for people outside of the Department of Social Policy and Intervention (DSPI). DSPI Members do not need to register
Abstract to follow. Teams link: https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3a977e970b5670431f8f293fbaff57009a%40thread.tacv2/1769368763266?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%22cc95de1b-97f5-4f93-b4ba-fe68b852cf91%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%2220c48e67-b666-49ae-a9b1-d31d1be325ec%22%7d Speaker bio: Dr Aliya Khalid is the Course Director for the MSc in Comparative and International Education. Her research examines how intersecting forms of marginalisation, such as gender, class, ethnicity, migration, and displacement, inform educational aspirations, experiences of exclusion, and expressions of agency. Her work spans post-crisis education in Pakistan, and educational recovery following COVID-19 in the UK. She works closely with young people, families, teacher-educators, and community members in Pakistan and the UK, with the aim of contributing to more inclusive and responsive educational practices by learning from their experiences. Dr Ian Thompson’s primary research interests are in understanding all aspects of school inclusion and exclusion and the unintended outcomes of policy and practice for marginalised young people and children in need. Ian is the lead editor of the journal Teaching Education and a member of the editorial board of Emotional Behavioural Difficulties. Salma Ahmed Alam is a prominent Pakistani educationist who has been working in the public education sector of Sindh since 2008, first at the school level and then the government level, while consulting with the World Bank. She is the CEO of Durbeen, a non-profit organization dedicated to reforming public education in Sindh by focusing on high-quality teacher training, licensing, and professional development. She holds a Masters in Education Policy from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and qualified as a primary school teacher from the National Institute of Education in Singapore in 2016. Professor Fauzia Shamim is a former Professor and founder Dean of the Faculty of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences, Ziauddin University, Karachi, Pakistan. She has previously worked as a teacher/researcher, and in leadership positions at various universities in the public and private sector in Pakistan and abroad. These include: The Aga Khan University’s Institute of Educational Development, University of Karachi, Institute of Business Management, and Taibah University, KSA. She is a founder member and Vice President of the Society of Pakistan English Language Teachers (SPELT) and was Chair of TESOL International’s Research Professional Council, USA (2018-19).
The global epidemic of obesity presents a major and growing threat to both health and equity. The arrival of GLP1 agonist drugs has been transformational for many people, but they do not eliminate the problem, and they bring some problems of their own. Public, media and political discourse around obesity is dominated by a framing that places responsibility at the individual level, but the fundamental drivers of the problem are structural. It has become a cliché to describe obesity as a complex problem, but all too often this rhetoric does not translate into reality. We need to move beyond cliché to examine and address complex interactions between multiple factors, ranging from structural incentives within our research systems to the actions of corporations, from sustainable food systems to tackling stigma. None of this is or will be easy, especially in the current geopolitical climate, but meaningful engagement with complexity may help us to meet at least some of these pressing challenges.
This seminar will present an analysis on the coherences and fragmentations within Scotland’s tertiary education system. It will expand on the role of distinct institutional settings such as universities, Further Education Colleges, and other training providers within the wider post-school education and training sector. The presentation will provide the latest insights on the Tertiary Education and Training (Funding and Governance) (Scotland) Bill, published in February 2025. In doing so, it will synthesise and contrast the current operations of agencies such as the Scottish Funding Council and Skills Development Scotland. The seminar will underline the country’s ambition for further streamlining of and integration between relevant stakeholders, and relate this to the core policy objective ‘to be more responsive to the needs of learners and the economy’. Ellen Boeren is Professor of Education at the University of Glasgow’s School of Education. She is an active member of the School’s Centre for Research on Adult Development and Lifelong Learning (CR&DALL). She holds a PhD in Educational Sciences from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in Belgium, has worked at the University of Edinburgh, and joined the University of Glasgow in 2019. Between 2023 and 2025, she led the £605k FEC ESRC Standard Grant project on the state-of-art and use of adult learning and education statistics across the countries of the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland. She is currently leading an ESRC Secondary Data Analysis grant on longitudinal patterns in lifelong learning participation, utilising data from the UK’s Understanding Society. She recently co-authored the OECD’s report on ‘Rethinking Informal Learning’, published in November 2025. Her other publications include the monograph 'Lifelong Learning Participation in a Changing Policy Context: an Interdisciplinary Theory' for which she won the 2017 Cyril O. Houle Award for Outstanding Contribution to the Adult Education Literature.
AI is inescapable, from its mundane uses online to its increasingly consequential decision-making in courtrooms, job interviews, and wars. The ubiquity of AI is so great that it might produce public resignation—a sense that the technology is our shared fate. As economist Maximilian Kasy shows in The Means of Prediction, artificial intelligence, far from being an unstoppable force, is irrevocably shaped by human decisions—choices made to date by the ownership class that steers its development and deployment. The book clearly and accessibly explains the fundamental principles on which AI works, and, in doing so, reveals that the real conflict isn’t between humans and machines, but between those who control the machines and the rest of us. The Means of Prediction offers a powerful vision of the future of AI: a future not shaped by technology, but by the technology’s owners. Amid a deluge of debates about technical details, new possibilities, and social problems, Kasy cuts to the core issue: who controls AI’s objectives, and how is this control maintained? The answer lies in what he calls “the means of prediction,” or the essential resources required for building AI systems: data, computing power, expertise, and energy. In a world already defined by inequality, one of humanity’s most consequential technologies has been and will be steered by those already in power. In this book talk, Kasy will discuss the book's framework both for understanding AI’s capabilities and for designing its public control, and its compelling case for democratic control over AI objectives as the answer to mounting concerns about AI’s risks and harms.
In 1928, Sheng Cheng, a work-study student who had studied and worked in France for eight years, published a book in French, titled Ma mère, to which Paul Valéry wrote a sixteen-page preface. Contrary to Valéry’s interpretation, this Francophone work was scarcely intended to illuminate the essence of Chinese life or stimulate East-West civilizational exchange. While cultural intermediaries active in the Sino-Western contact zone frequently concerned themselves with issues of East-West communication, world civilization, and the commonality of the human spirit, Chinese Francophone intellectuals of the early twentieth century also increasingly devoted themselves to the question of the self. Their use of the French language, rather than solely addressing an external audience, whether French or Chinese, or communicating a value-imbued, coherent message, also served to constitute an internal dialogue. This talk demonstrates that Ma mère, by delving into the most personal experiences and intimate relationships that shaped selfhood while negotiating the deepest pain, fear, and hope embedded in life and death, mostly functioned as Sheng Cheng’s Francophone journal intime (private diary). Writing in French shielded him from the May Fourth discourses and the sense of intellectual responsibility that had dominated his views, relationships, and communication, transporting him into a new linguistic, literary, and cultural milieu. This milieu, and its linguistic agency in particular, has been neglected in previous research on the work-study movement specifically and on Sino-Western cultural and educational exchanges more broadly. Dr Vivienne Xiangwei Guo is a senior lecturer in modern Chinese history in the History Department of King’s College London. Her research focuses on the intellectual, political, and cultural history of modern China, particularly the history of China’s intellectual elites in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Her first monograph, Women and Politics in Wartime China (Routledge, 2018), examines the political networks of Chinese elite women during the Second World War and their roles in promoting ‘national resistance and reconstruction’ from the 1930s to the 1950s. Her second monograph, Negotiating a Chinese Federation (Brill, 2022), studies how Chinese warlords and intellectuals engaged with one another in the making of a Chinese federation between 1919 and 1923. Her recent research explores the history of the learning and use of French among Chinese intellectuals in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Integrating the concepts, methods and approaches intrinsic to sociolinguistics and cultural linguistics into historical studies, she aims to shed new light on the relationship between foreign languages, ideas, and identity within a transnational context.
To join online, please register in advance: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/WWqjr8SgT_WrzTodI65cdg
The term “un-American” has been wielded as a powerful tool throughout US history, from Jefferson’s vision of the early Republic to the Trump era, yet no objective definition has ever been universally agreed upon. For the first time, George Lewis’s Un-Americanism offers a long history of this term, tracing what it has meant to whom through close looks at the most prominent contests for control of its definition and deployment. Lewis examines case studies that show politicians using the idea of the un-American to advance their agendas, organizations using it in racial nationalist campaigns, and federal committees using it in investigations such as those of the anticommunist “Red Scare” of the Cold War—along with activists and coalitions who have countered rhetoric of the “un-American” by claiming their own use of the term. In these chapters, Lewis delves into the role of institutions and organizations such as the American Legion, the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Lewis paints a compelling picture of how the term has both shaped and been shaped by the country’s social and political landscape. Un-Americanism offers a profound analysis of how this term has drawn and redrawn lines between what is considered “good” or “bad” politically. By exploring its complex evolution, the book highlights how the term has impacted each generation’s understanding of national values and American identity. Lewis challenges readers to reflect on its ongoing influence in defining who truly belongs in the American story.
*To attend online via Microsoft Teams, please email "$":mailto:ian.archer@history.ox.ac.uk*
This lecture examines the entanglement of photography with the past and its potential future within a post-archival context. Specifically, it examines photographs taken by the East German Stasi from the 1960s to 1989, highlighting the extensive material and photographic residue that serve as tangible traces of surveillance activities. Through key case studies, the lecture considers photography’s multiple registers as a tool for covert surveillance and as an evidential record, which nonetheless become haunting traces of unseen surveillance forces and a testament to photography’s unsettling potential.
Thursday March 5 (week 7) Julia Hori (Cambridge) ‘Planter's Pageantry and the Pedagogy of Gardening’
Lecture title and abstract TBC
Sustainability in health care is widely framed as a problem of implementation: policies are designed, evidence is assembled, and failure is diagnosed when action does not follow. This lecture challenges that framing. Prof Engebretsen argues that sustainability in health care cannot be implemented because it is not a stable programme but a contested, value-laden practice that takes shape through mediation rather than delivery. Treating sustainability in health care as implementable is therefore a category error—one that helps produce the very problem it seeks to resolve, by recoding alternative values as barriers and situated practices as deficits requiring correction. Drawing on a recent systematic review of grassroots indicators across fields and sectors—including sustainability indicators—Prof Engebretsen shows that in these projects sustainability was not absent, waiting to be implemented, but already being practised—through livelihoods, norms of resource use, and shared understandings of what could and could not be sustained. What was missing was not action, but a language in which such practices could count as sustainability within policy frameworks. What is commonly described as an “implementation gap” is therefore better understood as a space of ongoing mediation, where knowledge, values, and authority are continually renegotiated. Sustainability in health care, on this view, is always already happening—not as logistical rollout, but in grassroots initiatives, everyday practices of care, and irresolvable disagreements over what should be sustained, for whom, and at what cost. The task is not to implement sustainable health care more efficiently, but to recognise, engage with, take responsibility for, and strengthen the forms of sustainability already in motion by rendering them visible and politically intelligible. This talk is part of the Sustainability Health Care course, which forms part of the Translational Health Sciences programme. This event is free and open to all.
We are pleased to announce the upcoming Winter Lecture Series which will take place between January and March 2026. Across five thought-provoking lectures, special guests will discuss a range of subjects, with topics to be announced soon. Each lecture will be hosted at the University of Oxford Museum of Natural History. Join us on Thursday 5th March when writer and organic food grower Claire Ratinon will deliver her lecture.
The Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that attendance at the Surgical Grand Rounds can count toward internal CPD, with 1 point awarded per hour. Please note that in-person attendance is required, and you will need to sign the attendance register. All members of the University and NHS clinical staff are welcome. Please email Tarryn Ching (tarryn.ching@nds.ox.ac.uk) if you would like to attend online.
In this 60-minute online workshop you will be introduced to the methodologies and principles underpinning the conduct of literature searches for systematic reviews, scoping reviews and other evidence reviews. The session will cover: formulating a focused research question; preparing a protocol; developing a search strategy to address that research question; choosing appropriate databases and search engines; searching for grey literature and ongoing studies; managing your references in Covidence; and documenting and reporting your search. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
How can you make your research 'as open as possible, as closed as necessary?' Come to hear guidance on how to determine what you should and shouldn't share (e.g., with privacy or security concerns), and how to navigate the considerations of accessing datasets through VPNs.
Effective application of mathematical models to interpret biological data and make accurate predictions often requires that model parameters are identifiable. Requisite to identifiability from a finite amount of noisy data is that model parameters are first structurally identifiable: a mathematical question that establishes whether multiple parameter values may give rise to indistinguishable model outputs. Approaches to assess structural identifiability of deterministic ordinary differential equation models are well-established, however tools for the assessment of the increasingly relevant stochastic and spatial models remain in their infancy. I provide in this talk an introduction to structural identifiability, before presenting new frameworks for the assessment of stochastic and partial differential equations. Importantly, I discuss the relevance of our methodology to model selection, and more the practical and aptly named practical identifiability of parameters in the context of experimental data. Finally, I conclude with a brief discussion of future research directions and remaining open questions.
A workshop outlining some of the key principles to bear in mind when working with sensitive or restricted research; whether collected yourself or obtained from a third-party source such as a data archive. Issues of confidentiality, informed consent, cybersecurity and data management will be covered. Examples of scenarios or concerns drawn from the research of participants are particularly welcome. The role of support services at Oxford will also be outlined and in particular the role of the Bodleian Data Librarian who will lead the session. Follow up consultations with the Data librarian or other subject consultants are also offered. Topics to be covered include: key best practice principles when working with sensitive or restricted research data; issues around creating original data; informed consent agreements; maximising the usage potential of data during and after a project; strengths and weaknesses of anonymisation, data blurring and similar techniques; key strategies for protecting data including encryption, embargoes, future vetting and access restrictions; and obligation put on researchers by legislation and research partners. Intended audience: taught student; researcher and research student; staff
Throughout its life the ocean crust is a key boundary between Earth’s interior and the oceans/atmosphere. Hydrothermal circulation of seawater-derived fluids through the cooling and aging crust results in chemical exchange between Earth’s interior and oceans and atmosphere, playing an important role in long-term biogeochemical cycles. Altered ocean crust provides a time-integrated record of its geochemical exchange with seawater. Furthermore, hydrothermal minerals formed from ridge flank fluids record the evolving chemistry of the overlying oceans – itself an integrator of a range of Earth processes. I will present an overview of how scientific ocean drilling experiments across ridge flanks contribute to our understanding of the processes that control ridge flank hydrothermal exchanges, the role these exchanges play in global geochemical cycles, and the extent to which they record and respond to wider changes in the Earth system. In particular, the South Atlantic Transect (IODP Expeditions 390/393), designed to recover the upper crust and overlying sediments across the western flank of the slow-spreading Mid-Atlantic Ridge to investigate hydrothermal aging and microbiological evolution of the ocean crust, and the paleoceanographic evolution of the overlying South Atlantic.
Recent IR literature suggests that populist ideology, while primarily a domestic phenomenon, has distinct foreign policy implications, as populist leaders reject Western hegemony, transnational elites, and liberal international institutions. Yet how impactful is this stance, given the potential costs of defying the liberal order? This paper argues that populist leaders can pursue more radical foreign policies only when shielded from international economic constraints – most notably through natural resource rents. The interaction of populism and resource wealth enables a distinct brand of radicalism, combining sovereigntist rhetoric with defiant foreign policy postures and withdrawal from institutional institutions. We evidence this argument through case studies of Bolivia, Ecuador, Iran, and Venezuela, showing how resource-backed populist leaders engage in sharp opposition to Western influence and retreat from liberal international organisations. To test the broader applicability of our theory, we conduct cross-national econometric analyses. Our findings show that neither populism nor resource rents alone reliably predict radical foreign policy. However, their interaction does: Countries with both features are significantly more likely to vote against the West at the UN, use sovereigntist rhetoric, avoid human rights-linked trade agreements, sign fewer investment treaties, and withdraw from international institutions.
Megakaryocytes are one of the rarest, yet largest, cells in the human body and have huge synthetic capabilities - with a handful of megakaryocytes releasing billions of platelets into our bloodstream every day. To achieve this, they undergo a unique form of the cell cycle that results is successive rounds of whole genome doubling (WGD) and an average ploidy of 16N. They then give rise to platelets - with no nucleus at all. This talk will cover two projects: The first - focusing on these fascinating and unusual aspects of their cell biology. Firstly, we performed a detailed interrogation of the megakaryocyte genome to unpick how megakaryocytes bypass cell cycle checkpoints and tolerate whole genome duplication while retaining p53 responses to other triggers, and examined the consequences for the genome integrity. Unexpectedly, we uncovered a conserved tolerance mechanism shared between megakaryocytes and WGD+, p53-intact solid tumours. In the second part of the talk, I will outline our recent discovery that despite lacking a cell nucleus, platelets contain a repertoire of DNA fragments acquired by sequestration of cell free DNA during peripheral circulation, including free fetal and cancer cell-derived DNA. SPEAKER BIOGRAPHY Beth is a Professor of Haematology and Group Leader at the MRC Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine, University of Oxford. Her group has two research areas - identifying targetable disease mechanisms in myeloid blood cancers, and studying the cell biology of megakaryocytes and platelets, and their roles in cancer. Beth spends 20% of her time in the clinic, including running clinical trials with a particular interest in emerging mutation-selective targeted therapies for patients with myeloproliferative neoplasms, and has a national role in the delivery of clinical research as Chair of the Blood Cancer UK Research Network MPN Subgroup. Outside of work, she enjoys adventures with her family and running around beautiful Oxford with her overly-enthusiastic but surprisingly obedient cockapoo.
The significance of Hubert Henry Harrison (1883-1927) – as a journalist, activist, and educator – lies in his innovation of radical solutions to grave injustices, especially the staggering luxury for the few alongside the crushing poverty for the many in the first few decades of the twentieth century. White mob violence continually haunted African American communities, while imperial conquest and world wars wrought wanton destruction upon entire nations of people. These conditions sparked a global political awakening to which Harrison gave voice as a leading figure in cutting-edge struggles for socialism, in the free love movement, and in the Harlem Renaissance. He also played a pivotal role in the rise of Marcus Garvey and the establishment of the largest international organization of Black people in modern history. Because of his fierce and fearless radicalism, however, he has been erased from popular memory. Hubert Harrison presents a historical restoration of Harrison's numerous intellectual and political breakthroughs. Offering a fresh interpretation of his contributions to social movements for economic, racial, and sexual liberation, Brian Kwoba's richly textured narrative highlights the startling and continued relevance of Harrison's visionary thinking across generations. - Dr. Brian Kwoba grew up in Boulder, Colorado. After earning his undergraduate degree in philosophy at Cornell University, he spent six years teaching high school and middle school history and getting a Master’s in teaching at Tufts University in Boston before heading to the University of Oxford for his doctoral degree in history. Dr. Kwoba is currently an associate professor of history and also the director of African and African American Studies at the University of Memphis. Over the past two decades, Dr. Kwoba has been an activist on issues including anti-imperialism, immigrant workers rights, climate justice, Falastin, decolonizing education, pan-Africanism, and the movement for Black lives. In his spare time, he is a big time music lover (especially live jazz), an Afrobeats DJ, and a frequent traveler to Kenya where he visits his dad's side of the family.
*Professor Cora Gilroy Ware* is Associate Professor in the History of Art at Oxford. In her publications, exhibitions and teaching, she seeks to challenge the assumed universality of Western hegemonic perspectives. She is particularly interested in the fabrication of ideal beauty from the 17th century to the present day, and the role of classicising sculpture and pictorial art in the reification of "racial” difference. She is the author of The _Classical Body in Romantic Britain_ (2020).
The International Commission on the History of Mathematics are holding a meeting to celebrate honours recently awarded to historians of mathematics. A book of abstracts can be found here: https://www.bshm.ac.uk/sites/default/files/international_commission_on_the_history_of_mathematicsmeetin_0.pdf, and you can register for the meeting here: https://www.bshm.ac.uk/registration-ichm-meeting-celebrate-recent-honours. This event is followed by the annual Research in Progress meeting of the BSHM on 7 March, also in Oxford: find out more here: https://www.bshm.ac.uk/events/ichm-celebration-honours-recently-awarded-historians-mathematics *Programme* 14:00-14:45 Ursula Martin (University of Oxford) – DBE 2025 _Hidden figures: the women who made Oxford computing_ 14:45-15:30 Henning Heller (University of Bonn) – ICHM Montucla Prize 2025 _Mellen Woodman Haskell (1863–1948): An American mathematics student of the Wanderlust generation_ 15:30-16:00 Break 16:00-16:45 David E. Rowe (University of Mainz) _What Riemann learned from Gauss: When and How_ 16:45-17:30 Jan Hogendijk (University of Utrecht) _Applied mathematics in Ottoman Palestine: The treatise by Taqi al-Din on sundials_ 17:30-18:30 Drinks reception
We develop a unified, nonparametric framework for sharp partial identification and inference on inequality indices when the econometrician only has coarse observations in the dimension of interest -- for example via grouped tables or individual interval reports, possibly with additional linear restrictions such as income ratios. First, for a broad class of Schur-convex inequality measures, we characterize extremal allocations and show that sharp bounds are attained by distributions with simple, finite support, reducing the underlying infinite-dimensional problem to finite-dimensional optimization. Second, for indices that admit linear-fractional representations after suitable ordering of the data (including the Gini coefficient, quantile ratios, and the Hoover index), we recast the bound problems as linear or quadratic programs, yielding fast computation of numerically sharp bounds. Third, we establish $\sqrt{n}$ inference for bound endpoints using a uniform directional delta method and a bootstrap procedure for standard errors. In our empirical examples we compute sharp Gini bounds from household wealth data with mixed point and interval observations, and use historical U.S.\ income grouping tables to provide bounds on the time-series for the Gini, quantile ratios, and Hoover index.
This 90-minute session will cover some more advanced techniques for finding medical literature to answer a research question. We will recap some basics, then demonstrate searching in several medical databases, including using subject headings (MeSH) and the differences between platforms. By the end of this session, you will be able to: explain what subject headings are, and how to use them; search for words that appear near to other words; take a search from one database into another; and save a search and document it. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
Week Seven (6 March, Lecture Room VII) Primary: Marge Piercy, Woman on the Edge of Time, Chapters 17-18 Supplementary: Frances M. Beal, ‘Double Jeopardy: To be Black and Female’ in Black Women’s Manifesto (1969)
Seminar followed by Q&A and drinks - attend in person or join online - all welcome Abstract: Nature is in crisis in England; a country where half the land is owned by less than 1% of the population. Landowners often like to style themselves as stewards of the earth, but how can we ensure this isn't just greenwash? Can we design better policies to hold the biggest landowners to account for how they treat habitats and wildlife? This talk, drawing on Guy Shrubsole's latest book The Lie of the Land, will look at several proposals for making landownership more accountable and transparent: from the forthcoming Land Use Strategy and the government's new National Estate for Nature group, to Community Right to Buy and other initiatives to democratise decision-making over land use. Biography: Guy Shrubsole is an environmental campaigner and author of The Lie of the Land (William Collins, 2024), The Lost Rainforests of Britain (2022), and Who Owns England? (2019). He has twice won the Wainwright Prize for writing on conservation; worked for Friends of the Earth, Rewilding Britain, and DEFRA; and co-founded the Right to Roam campaign.
Our annual meeting which provides an opportunity for research students in any area of the history of mathematics to present their work to a friendly and supportive audience. Alongside the student speakers there will be a selection of posters on display throughout the day. The meeting will be held in person only, and will be held in English. Booking is required. Please note that bookings will close a week before the event, so do book in good time. If you would prefer to pay the registration fee by cash or cheque on the day of the meeting, please contact the meetings co-ordinator at "$":mailto:brigitte.stenhouse@bshm.ac.uk. The programme can be found on the website: https://bshm.ac.uk/event/research-in-progress/, or on the booking link: https://tinyurl.com/upcu4ms
*Kiera Vaclavik* (Department of comparative Literature & Culture, QMUL) and *Sophie Ratcliffe* (Faculty of English, Oxford) will talk about how their work crosses the boundaries of childhood histories and literary studies, opening up a wider discussion about interdisciplinarity in childhood studies. All welcome, and to join us for lunch afterwards.
*Readings* Primary source: Jerónimo de Barrionuevo, _Avisos_ (1654-1658), 4 vols. (1892), vol. 3, 261-280 (available online here: https://archive.org/details/avisos1654165803barruoft/page/260/mode/2up) Tamar Herzog, ‘Early Modern Information: Collecting and Knowing in Spain and Its Empire’, in _Communication and Politics in the Spanish Monarchy: Managing Times of Emergency, 16th-18th Century_, ed. Domenico Cecere and Alessandro Tuccillo (2023), 39-58 (available online here: https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/101jqdh/cdi_proquest_ebookcentralchapters_31361057_6_477) Isabel Yaya, ‘Wonders of America: The Curiosity Cabinet as a Site of Representation and Knowledge’, _Journal of the History of Collections_ 20, 2 (2008): 173-188 (available online here: https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/ao2p7t/cdi_proquest_miscellaneous_1035909781) Edward Wilson-Lee, _The Catalogue of Shipwrecked Books: Young Columbus and the Quest for a Universal Library_ (2018),13-58 (Ch. 1: ‘The Return from Ocean’, and Ch. 2: ‘In the Chamber of Clean Blood’) (available online here: https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/35n82s/alma991027187232507026) Daniela Bleichmar, ‘The Cabinet and the World: Non-European Objects in Early Modern European Collections’, _Journal of the History of Collections_ 33, 3 (2021): 435-445 (Ch. 1: ‘The Relative Native’) (available online here: https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/ao2p7t/cdi_crossref_primary_10_1093_jhc_fhaa059)
What diversity of perspectives on the climate crisis become available to young readers not only through literature, but through literature in translation? In the Netherlands, the Dutch literary market has long shunned thematizations of the climate crisis in home-grown literature. Only recently has posthumanist Dutch author Eva Meijer earned accolades for her novel Zee Nu (2022), set in a distant dystopian future: the sea level has risen, and the Netherlands is lost to the water. Water management defines Dutch identity: the below-sea-level nation has only been made habitable by dikes, dams, windmills, and polders. But water has also defined the nation’s darker history: it was the sea that facilitated extractivist colonial commerce, and the long Dutch slave trade. Dutch authors, however, do not draw this link between environmental precarity and colonial history. Meanwhile, Indonesian flood narratives from the below-sea-level (and sinking) former capital of the Dutch East Indies stand in stark contrast to Dutch flood narratives. They are not speculative or futurist but respond to ongoing and existing crises. Through a close reading of Khairani Barokka’s poetry on “flood women”, I first tease out the Indonesian subjectivities of flood in contrast to Dutch subjectivities of flood as characterized in Zee Nu. I then turn to the short story “Buyan” by utiuts, in which self-driving electric cars fail to navigate a flooded Jakarta. This story moves beyond flood alone, linking major industries of the Capitalocene – the mining of nickel for batteries, the farming of rubber and palm oil, and the overdevelopment of urban areas – to Dutch colonization, ongoing green colonialism, and the epistemicide of indigenous language and knowledge. Whereas Dutch and Anglophone literary markets quickly categorize novels as “CliFi” or “Ecofiction”, Indonesian texts that deal with climate as one among many other pressing issues are now branded as such in translation, packaged and anthologized for Global North readers. How does this impact the characterization of Indonesian literature on the world stage, and the indigenous perspectives on climate precarity therewithin? Lucelle Pardoe is a doctoral researcher at University College London, where her interdisciplinary research is supported by scholarships in Translation Studies and Education Studies. With one foot in each field, she develops pedagogical methods based on translation and translanguaging theories to support creative self-narrative in multilingual classrooms. Drawing on her linguistic repertoire of Dutch, English, and Indonesian, her doctoral thesis explores the decolonizing potential of Indonesian literature in the Dutch curriculum. Her other research interests include children’s literary culture, translation for the cultural heritage sector, sustainability in literature, gender in translation, and digital literature. She is a translator from Dutch into English of scholarly articles, children’s books, and museum catalogues.
Teacher emotion regulation is widely recognized as a crucial factor influencing classroom climate and student engagement. However, much existing research relies on prespecified models that assume linear, static, and often unidirectional—or occasionally reciprocal—relationships, oversimplifying the complex interplay between teacher emotion regulation and student engagement. These studies typically treat emotion regulation and student engagement as separate constructs linked by pre-specified causal pathways, overlooking the dynamic and systemic nature of classroom emotional processes. This oversimplification has led to theoretical tensions, including inconsistent findings regarding directionality—for example, teacher emotion regulation influencing student engagement (Burić, 2025), student engagement influencing teacher emotion regulation (Wang et al., 2021), or reciprocal relationships between the two (Frenzel et al., 2018)—and an underappreciation of the multifaceted, evolving interactions between teachers and students. Dynamic network approach is a novel framework that conceptualizes teacher emotion regulation and student engagement as interconnected components within a multidirectional system. Unlike traditional models, this approach does not require prespecifying causal pathways, allowing it to reveal the complex teacher-student interactions occurring in classrooms. By modeling constructs as mutually influencing nodes in a dynamic network, the approach captures the simultaneous, reciprocal, and multidirectional relationships that shape classroom emotional exchanges. This perspective addresses key theoretical challenges by revealing how teachers’ emotion regulation strategies and student engagement co-evolve through complex feedback loops. Incorporating network approach into research on teacher emotion regulation offers a nuanced and systemic understanding of emotional dynamics in the classroom. This advancement not only deepens theoretical insight but also informs the development of more adaptive interventions to better support both teachers and students. Teams link https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3ameeting_NzY5NWMwM2EtYjVkNy00NDA4LWE4ZmEtNDFlYzM3Y2Y1ZTgw%40thread.v2/0?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%22cc95de1b-97f5-4f93-b4ba-fe68b852cf91%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%224003529c-f252-47aa-8e83-ce1eff28df4a%22%7d
Interdisciplinary research is increasingly recognised, both within and beyond academia, as essential to addressing many of today’s most pressing global challenges. In tackling complex, multi-faceted issues, cross-disciplinary approaches are not only valuable but vital for generating innovative and impactful solutions. Nonetheless, undertaking interdisciplinary research presents a distinctive set of challenges. These may include communication barriers, divergent research paradigms, difficulties in publishing and securing funding, and broader structural or institutional constraints. While interdisciplinary work is gaining momentum, it remains relatively new in comparison to long-established disciplinary traditions, and many of its practices and support structures are still developing. This panel will explore the value of interdisciplinary research, consider the practical challenges it entails, and share strategies for fostering effective collaboration—whether through team-based initiatives or individual researchers working across disciplinary boundaries. Bringing together scholars from a range of research backgrounds, the session will offer practical insights, highlight common pitfalls, and outline best practices for navigating the interdisciplinary research landscape. Ample time will be allocated for audience questions and discussion. Academic staff and doctoral researchers currently engaged in or considering interdisciplinary work are warmly invited to join the conversation. Objectives • Identify key challenges and barriers to effective interdisciplinary collaboration in research. • Recognise the potential of interdisciplinary research to drive innovation, enhance societal impact, and support both academic and professional development. • Gain insights from researchers engaged in interdisciplinary work and understand practical strategies for integrating diverse disciplinary approaches. Panellists Lena Easton-Calabria — DPhil Student, School of Geography and the Environment Amarachukwu (Amara) Ifeji — DPhil Student, School of Geography and the Environment Dr Maaret Jokela-Pansini — Senior Research Associate, School of Geography and the Environment Professor Federica Lucivero — Associate Professor in Ethics of Technology, Ethox Centre; Oxford Centre for Ethics and Humanities; Oxford Population Healt Moderator Dr Keiko Kanno
The lymphatic vessels were once considered like ‘pipes’ that drain excess fluid, lipids and immune cells from tissues back to the blood circulation. We now know that lymphatic vessels and lymph nodes are dynamic structures, constantly changing in response to the surrounding environment, communicating with tissues such as fat and actively regulating the transport of molecules and cells to influence health and disease. The lymphatic system has also been found to play an active role in a range of diseases from cancer to inflammatory and metabolic diseases. Join me to hear about our adventures developing new ways to deliver medicines into the lymphatics and better treat metabolic and inflammatory diseases. Biography: Natalie Trevaskis is a Professor, Pharmacist and Heads the Lymphatic Medicine Laboratory at the Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Melbourne, Australia. Her research program is focussed on the role of lymphatics in acute, inflammatory and metabolic diseases, and understanding the delivery of therapeutics and vaccines to the lymphatics to treat these diseases. She has extensive experience in biopharmaceutics, pharmacokinetics and delivery of a range of therapeutic types. Natalie’s research has resulted in >100 peer reviewed papers (9848 cites) including significant papers in Nature, Nature Metabolism, Nature Nano, Nature Rev Drug Discovery, Angew Chemie, J Control Rel etc. She is also an inventor of 10 patent families (>60 individual patents), including for a lymph-directing prodrug technology licensed to Seaport Therapeutics with three candidates currently in clinical trials. Natalie has worked and consulted extensively with industry (Pfizer, Novartis, Astra Zeneca, Eli Lilly, Amgen, Genentech, Janssen, Protagonist, PureTech Health, Noxopharm etc.) to solve drug delivery problems. Natalie has received several notable academic prizes. From 2022-24, Natalie was named a Clarivate highly cited (Hi-Ci) researcher in pharmacology (top 0.1% or ~120 worldwide). She received the Vice Chancellor’s Researcher of the Year for Monash University in 2025.
While public concern about climate change is growing, individuals often face information frictions and psychological barriers to pro-environmental behaviour. In this study, we design and test an edutainment intervention that aims at promoting more sustainable food consumption through a serious video game. Different game versions either link player actions to visual impacts on the in-game environment or to social feedback through interactions with non-player characters, or both. To evaluate the effects on real-life attitudes, knowledge, and behaviour, we conduct an online survey experiment (n = 4,034 UK adults) that embeds an incentivised grocery shopping task. Compared to subjects who played a control version without educational content, treated subjects purchase food products that are around 20% more environmentally sustainable immediately after playing the game. In a follow-up survey several weeks later, effects are still strongly significant at around 8-10%. These behavioural changes are driven both by improved knowledge about environmental impacts of food as well as an increase in pro-environmental attitudes. Effects are particularly persistent among individuals with lower baseline environmental attitudes.
Dr Lidwell-Durnin will be discussing his forthcoming book, _Explaining Famine in the British Empire_. The book retraces efforts to observe and measure the famines and food shortages that struck India and Britain at the close of the eighteenth century, and it explores how these crises and episodes of scarcity gave rise to scientific efforts to explain and quantify 'famine.' Focusing on the time period between the Bengal famine of 1770 and the food shortages in Britain in 1800, it explores the development of the concepts of 'artificial scarcity' (and 'artificial famine'), and how statistical science and philosophy played a role in the naturalization of famine. The talk will focus in particular on the formation of Britain's Board of Agriculture and its efforts to expand its own influence within Bengal and Madras. *Dr John Lidwell-Durnin* is a lecturer in the History of Science specializing in the intersection of agricultural science and environmental history. His research delves into how scientific practices have shaped societies' responses to challenges like food security and ecological change. With a diverse array of publications spanning leading historical journals (_The Historical Journal, British Journal for the History of Science) and scientific outlets (_Global Food Security_), his work bridges disciplinary divides. He is currently working to develop the History of Entomology, and his most recent publications have been working to strengthen our understanding of how entomological science has both contributed and responded to the environmental costs of agriculture and meeting the subsistence needs of the planet.
Dr Zilu Liang - Distinct roles of hippocampus and neocortex in compositional generalization Dr Alex Lau-Zhu - Disrupting “flashbacks" and “flashforwards": Translating experimental psychopathology for youth mental health’
This talk argues that prostitution in colonial India was governed not through a stable definition of sexual commerce but through fluctuating demands about women’s presence and knowability. Taking as its analytic point of departure a reformist anxiety about “disguised prostitutes” in 1961, it reads this concern retrospectively to illuminate a longer colonial genealogy in which governance depended on rendering prostitution legible while never fully securing it. Through close readings of three archival encounters—Ameer Baksh in 1875, Munni in 1893, and Moti Jan in 1926—the talk shows how women actively shaped the terms under which they could be seen and governed. By claiming exemption or respectability, refusing bodily discipline, or calibrating narratives of intimacy and residence, women worked upon the classificatory logics of law and policing, producing an archive marked by faintness, excess, and distortion. Methodologically, the article holds recuperative and nonrecuperative approaches in tension to treat these uneven traces not as archival failures but as historically meaningful effects of struggle over visibility and presence. Bio Zoya Sameen is an Assistant Professor of History at Aga Khan University whose work focuses on gender, law, and empire in nineteenth- and twentieth-century South Asia; her current book project examines women subjected to colonial prostitution laws to explore the uncertainties of empire. She is committed to developing students’ historical and critical thinking, serves on the organizing committee of the Pakistan History Workshop, and has contributed to Pakistan’s national history curriculum review. She previously taught at University of Chicago, where she earned her PhD in History.
The seminar will be followed by drinks.
Deliberative politics versus the Internet: is technology creating a democratic deficit? Constitutions like the US’s were deliberately designed to slow down decision-making and put ‘grit in the system’ (and England’s did so organically). Tech can speed things up dramatically with real-time polling and electronic voting, and facilitates a huge increase in immediate voter-to-legislator contact. Is that a boon for good decision-making or a challenge? Are there implications for parties and parliaments?
This event showcases the work of Professor Maia Chankseliani and Prof Velda Elliott, following the award of their professorships in 2025 by The University of Oxford. The schedule for the event will be: 5pm: Welcome Address 5.10pm: Lecture by Professor Maia Chankseliani and Q&A 5.55pm: Lecture by Professor Velda Elliott and Q&A 6.40pm: Drinks reception --- Professor Chankseliani will deliver her lecture titled “Seeing Otherwise: International Higher Education and the Possibility of Change”. This inaugural lecture examines international higher education as a formative process that reshapes how individuals learn to judge, act, and remain engaged in public and institutional life. Drawing on a large global body of qualitative research with returnees, it asks how experiences of international study are later carried into contexts marked by constraint. The lecture argues that international higher education works less through transfer or measurable impact than through formation, cultivating comparative judgement and sustained engagement. It introduces the concept of presence to explain how learning abroad becomes consequential after return, even when systemic change is slow or resisted. --- Professor Elliott will deliver her paper titled “Considering context through Shelley’s ‘England 1819’, or, How to Murder a Poem and Get Away With It.” In this paper I use the example Shelley’s (fairly obscure) ‘England in 1819’ to explore how we think about context when analysing and interpreting poems. The current assessment objectives for GCSE English Literature include AO3: ‘Show understanding of the relationships between texts and the contexts in which they were written’ (DfE, 2013, p.6). As well as playing whack-a-mole the historical allusion, I will consider the types of context that illuminate or obscure the poem and its meaning, and think about how and when we should be introducing context in the English classroom, drawing on Barbara Bleiman’s metaphor of ‘door-opening knowledge’ (2020). It is all too easy to murder a poem with context: the question is whether we really can get away with it.
Convened by Stéphane Van Damme (MFO Director) Emerging as a historiographical field in the 1960s under the impetus of Philippe Ariès, the history of childhood long occupied a fragmented position, split between the study of literary and artistic representations, the sociology of the family, the sciences of education, and labour history. Following the pioneering scholars—some of whom, such as the historian Didier Lett, are invited to this Week—historical research on childhood has gradually become institutionalised within academia. In this respect, the Oxford Centre for the History of Childhood has played a key role in making research on childhood visible in Great Britain. Bringing together a range of disciplinary perspectives (anthropology, psychology, psychoanalysis, sociology, and history), this Childhood Week will showcase new approaches in the social sciences and humanities. As the sociologist Régine Sirota has observed, “we have moved from an invisible childhood to the child as a genuine cause,” whether through recognition of children’s rarity and preciousness in the context of advances in biomedicine, or through analysis of the widespread fascination with childhood that characterises contemporary societies. This growing awareness—embodied in the Convention on the Rights of the Child—has also drawn attention to issues such as abuse and children at risk. This Childhood Week seeks to reflect these renewed scholarly perspectives by addressing emerging topics such as infant cognition, emotions, and care, including the history of children’s hospitalisation, while also revisiting more established themes such as work, children’s art and literature, and naturalist approaches to learning. It will highlight avenues of scholarly renewal by questioning how childhood has been defined across different periods and societies, from transnational, imperial, and global perspectives. In turn, this body of research has shaped early childhood policies, fostering an expert milieu that challenges educational institutions and lends legitimacy to alternative forms of education. Keynote lectures, round-table discussions, and film screenings will punctuate the event. From the poor child to the “wild” child, from the workshop to the classroom, this Childhood Week offers an opportunity to reflect on a shared future for childhood in a time of uncertainty. https://mfo.web.ox.ac.uk/event/childrens-week
The subject of our 2026 Manchester Lecture will be the Worthingtons, the Manchester-based family firm of architects that was responsible for designing and building the main college quad between 1889 and 1893, as well as many other buildings in Oxford and the North of England – and whose founder, Thomas Worthington, was a committed social reformer. William Whyte, Professor of Social and Architectural History at the University of Oxford and a Fellow at St John's College, will deliver the lecture.
Week 8 Monday 9th March 5.15pm 10.019 Chris Pittard, University of Portsmouth ‘Arthur Conan Doyle and Cornwall’
Disputes between colleagues can have a significant impact on performance and wellbeing as well as affecting patient experience and safety. This course is designed to help healthcare professionals understand how and why conflicts arise within and between teams, as well as what they can do to try and resolve issues. This course aims to help participants: understand the causes and impact of colleague-to-colleague conflict in a healthcare context appreciate different types of conflict personalities identify how conflict develops learn de-escalation strategies
R Code Clinic: Variant Annotation Using Bioconductor Tuesday 10 March, 9:00 – 10:00 am OxPop/BDI Seminar room 1 Facilitator – Dr. Ana-Marija Krizanac This hands-on training session will introduce participants to variant annotation workflows using the Bioconductor project in R. The session will begin with an overview of key concepts in variant annotation, including genomic ranges, variant file formats, and commonly used annotation resources. Participants will afterwards work through practical examples using real-world data. By the end of this course, you'll have hands-on experience with: Through guided coding exercises, participants will learn how to import and manipulate variant data, map variants to genes and genomic features, and enrich variant calls with biological and functional annotations using Bioconductor packages such as VariantAnnotation, GenomicRanges, and annotation databases. Emphasis will be placed on understanding Bioconductor data structures and applying reproducible workflows. Pre requisite: Participants should ideally have basic familiarity with the R programming language; please bring your own device. Pre-Course Preparation – software required – Rstudio, BiocManager should be installed prior to the session. Registration - https://forms.office.com/e/KQuAZ57srR?origin=lprLink
This 90-minute session will cover some more advanced techniques for finding medical literature to answer a research question. We will recap some basics, then demonstrate searching in several medical databases, including using subject headings (MeSH) and the differences between platforms. By the end of this session, you will be able to: explain what subject headings are, and how to use them; search for words that appear near to other words; take a search from one database into another; save a search and document it. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
The way we work and interact with our peers and wider networks, has a huge influence on research outputs and outcomes. This workshop explores a set of core skills and mindsets to help you thrive in research and positively influence your working environment and teams. You will also be able to share your lived experience with peers and participate in focused discussions. COURSE DETAILS A powerful workshop for senior postdocs, aspiring PIs, new PIs, and research group leaders wanting to increase their impact and agility at a strategic time. Join this highly participative, in-person workshop, facilitated by Natacha Wilson, to explore three core skills and mindsets to thrive in research and positively influence your ecosystem: Developing and nurturing effective interdisciplinary and multi-sectorial collaborations for impact. Embracing openness and visibility in research across specific stakeholder groups to increase reach (including open science practices). Boosting creativity and innovation in your research project and team to overcome challenges. LEARNING OUTCOMES At the end of the workshop you will be able to: Prioritise areas supporting your own personal development. Identify relevant frameworks and guidelines. Share your experience with peers and reflect on best practice.
Join us for a digital scholarship coffee gathering - tea and coffee will be provided. At this session we'll have a talk titled 'Digital Methodologies for Understanding Historical Poetry Reading Styles' About the speaker Isabelle Stuart is a final year DPhil student in the English Faculty at Oxford, where she researches early twentieth century poetry recitation practices and their influence on modernist poetics. She is also part of the Shakespeare and Company Lab at Princeton University, which uses digitised library records from the Parisian bookshop to understand the early circulation of modernist literature. These will be held in the Visiting Scholars Centre, so to attend you’ll need to bring your Bodleian Card and to leave your bags in the lockers - this event is only open to University staff and students.
Are you planning to present a poster at an upcoming conference, meeting or symposium? This introductory session will provide you with some top tips on how to create a poster presentation which will help you to communicate your research project and data effectively. There will be guidance on formatting, layout, content, use of text, references and images, as well as advice on printing and presenting your poster. This session will also provide help with locating resources such as templates, free-to-use images and poster guidelines. By the end of this online session you will be able to: evaluate the effectiveness of templates, formatting, text and images; and plan, prepare and present your poster. Intended audience: Medicine and NHS; Researcher and research student
Email oxchildpsych@psych.ox.ac.uk to request the Zoom link to attend online.
TBC Teams link: https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/3825967966058?p=oaa4boDA3tu5ZnqMja
Bio: Tom Bearpark is a PhD candidate in Science, Technology, and Environmental Policy, advised by Professor Michael Oppenheimer. Tom is an interdisciplinary environmental economist who develops and applies statistical methods to quantify the socio-economic impacts of climate change. His dissertation research includes an econometric study of the mortality consequences of urban flooding in Mumbai, an interdisciplinary comparison of approaches to modelling climate-driven migration, and a methodological paper proposing new criteria for selecting time controls in climate impact studies. Before coming to Princeton, Tom was a pre-doctoral fellow at the Climate Impact Lab at the University of Chicago, and worked for two years as an economist at the UK government’s energy regulator. He holds an undergraduate degree in Economics and Philosophy from the London School of Economics, and an MPhil in Economic Research from the University of Cambridge. Abstract: Rainfall and flooding frequently disrupt the lives of urban residents worldwide, posing significant public health risks. Rapid urbanisation is exposing larger and more vulnerable populations to flooding, while climate change intensifies rainfall patterns and rising sea levels impair drainage systems. Despite the growing recognition and urgency of these hazards, the health impacts of rainfall remain poorly understood, and those of sea level rise are entirely unquantified. Here, we estimate the mortality consequences of rainfall in one of the world’s largest cities – Mumbai, India. We integrate high-resolution data on rainfall, tides, and mortality, to analyse how unmanaged rainfall and its interaction with tidal dynamics contribute to urban health risks. We find that rainfall causes more than 8% of Mumbai’s deaths during the monsoon season, and that more than 80% of this burden is borne by slum-residents. Children face the biggest increase in mortality risk from rainfall, and women face a greater risk than men. Additionally, we demonstrate that mortality risk from rainfall increases sharply during high tides and use this relationship to evaluate how rising sea levels could amplify rainfall-induced mortality in the absence of adaptation. Our findings reveal that the mortality impacts of rainfall are an order of magnitude larger than is documented by official statistics, highlighting the urgent need for investment in improved drainage, sanitation, and waste management infrastructure. Join the meeting online: https://shorturl.fm/HRHIm
We will have a plenary session with a talk by Professor Anneke Lucassen, Professor of Genomic Medicine. Director of the Centre for Personalised Medicine, University of Oxford
Higher Education in the UK and worldwide faces multiple challenges and calls for reform. Some people argue for a higher level of participation, some for less, and some for more focus on employer needs, some for more attention to the wider self-formation of students. At the same time, there are deepening concerns about the sustainability of an economy based on over-consumption and trust in knowledge amid epistemic fracture. In this talk, Tim Blackman sets out why the dominant qualification in the sector – the full-time, often residential, honours degree – is a cause of many of the issues higher education and society face on these fronts. Past policy failures point to a need for a radical rethink, including limiting higher education providers’ freedom to design their own courses and a complete overhaul of how they are accountable for their contribution to a sustainable economy and rebuilding trust in knowledge.
The Production of Value: Metrology, Land Revenue, and the State in Colonial India, 1820-1900 Shankar Nair (Oxford) The mapping of India has long been viewed as an instrument of colonial governmentality and control. In this view, scientific survey and map-making legitimised British territorial possession and extraction, presenting an image of imperial rule at once enlightened and powerful. More recently, historians of science have called for a greater focus on local contributions to colonial cartography, emphasising the labour and knowledge of the ‘go-between’ in the circulation of scientific knowledge and the often-imperfect manifestation of science-making on the ground. The focus in all these studies has been on grand surveys, notably The Great Trigonometrical Survey of the nineteenth century, and on particular scientific innovations. This paper, part of the AHRC-funded ‘Colonial Standards’ project at History of Science Museum (HSM) Oxford, looks instead at the ideas and practices of land surveying in the nineteenth century that underpinned a vital function of the British colonial state: the land revenue system. The largest single source of colonial revenue, the land tax has long been a contentious issue in Indian economic and social history. Yet, little is known of the social, material, and political-economic considerations of this system, the techniques used to determine value, and the interaction of this cadastral knowledge with local forms of power and ordering such as caste. Using the scientific instrument collections at HSM Oxford and archival materials, the paper argues that an engagement with the material and social practice of land surveying provides fresh insight into the making of the colonial state and the lasting entanglement of land and power in India. My research focuses on the social and economic history of science and technology and its relation to the history of empire in South Asia in the 19th and 20th century. I am particularly interested in agricultural and rural industrial production, and the history of scientific and commercial standardisation in a transnational and comparative perspective. I am currently a Linda Hall Library Fellow in the History of Science and Technology (2025-26). I previously worked as a Lecturer in the History of Science and Technology at King’s College London (2024-25) and co-convened the Centre for the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine (CHoSTM) during this period. The Big Sequence: chronology and the pan-Africanisms of the twentieth century Rachel King (UCL) During the mid-twentieth century archaeology on the African continent was fixated on producing chronological sequences of artefacts and dirt: elements that held the key to a comprehensive picture of the continent's deep past. This recognition catalysed an unprecedented project to collate a continent's worth of distinct sequences, excavated under varying paradigms by different research teams in various languages, with an ambition of presenting the first scientific pan-African archaeology: an Atlas and accompanying Lexicon of African Prehistory. While this archaeological project did not explicitly align itself with other contemporary pan-African politics, it had to contend with these amidst the rapidly changing landscape of the independence period. In particular, the ultimate pariah status of the apartheid government - representing the country with one of the best-documented human fossil chronologies on the continent - forced conversations about the limits of scientific cooperation, with fractures ultimately forming between African and Euro-American archaeologists. This seminar explores how aspirations of organising time without borders in Africa's deep past confronted other forms of solidarity and resistance, and led to a reckoning in archaeology's purpose on the continent. Rachel King is an inter-disciplinary scholar specialising in the study of the recent past in southern Africa. Her most recent publications include her 2025 book The Neoliberalisation of Heritage in Africa (Cambridge University Press), her 2024 co-edited textbook Methods and Methodologies in Heritage Studies (UCL Press), and several forthcoming articles on the impacts of South Africa's framework for protecting the past after 30 years of democracy.
This paper offers a comparative analysis of the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus in the Gospel of Luke alongside analogous eschatological motifs in the Qur’an, situating both within the broader landscape of religious exchange in Late Antiquity. Focusing on the Qur’anic articulation of impassable barriers between the blessed and the damned, as well as between the living and the dead, the study examines three key passages (i.e., Qur’an 7:41–53, Qur’an 23:99–115, and Qur’an 57:10–24) to explore how Christian narrative themes are received, reworked, and reinterpreted within the Qur’anic discourse. Central to the analysis is the Qur’an’s use of distinct yet interrelated concepts of barriers (aʿrāf, sūr, and barzakh), which resonate with the Lukan depiction of an unbridgeable chasm between the righteous and the condemned. Building on earlier observations by Geoffrey Parrinder and Emran El-Badawi regarding stylistic and thematic correspondences between the Qur’an and Christian texts, as well as the work of Tommaso Tesei and George Archer on the Qur’an’s engagement with extra-biblical traditions, this study argues that such parallels reflect a complex intertextual environment rather than simple borrowing or replication. Although the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus is not explicitly referenced in the Qur’an, the recurrence of comparable motifs points to a nuanced engagement with pre-Islamic traditions familiar to the Qur’an’s audience. In particular, the analysis of Qur’an 7 reveals an awareness of Gospel imagery, including motifs such as the camel passing through the eye of a needle. The diversity of Qur’anic terminology for barriers further suggests interaction with multiple streams of tradition or layered interpretive processes operative in Late Antiquity rather than direct textual dependence. The paper concludes that the motifs associated with the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus likely belonged either to a broader pre-Gospel tradition that continued to circulate into the Qur’anic milieu, or to a constellation of derivative traditions that evolved from the parable itself. By tracing these intertextual dynamics, the study illuminates how the Qur’an participates in a wider dialogue of religious narratives, offering valuable insight into the reception and transformation of Gospel themes among early Islamic and Arabian communities.
Is nuclear conflict manageable, or does any use of nuclear weapons inexorably push states toward escalation? And how do these dynamics differ between nuclear- and conventional-armed attacks? Many theorists have considered these questions, but empirically answering them is difficult given the absence of historical data. We address this challenge by fielding a pre-registered experimental survey of American adults designed around a series of hypothetical vignettes featuring attacks on the United States. The vignettes vary in the targets struck (conventional military installations, nuclear facilities, or civilian facilities) and the means of attack (conventional munitions or nuclear weapons). We then measure preferences over concession versus retaliation, the form and intensity of retaliation (including nuclear options), and respondents’ stated reasons for and against nuclear use. To probe mechanisms, we capture emotional reactions and broader situational assessments using both closed-ended measures and free-response prompts. By assessing the public’s response to various attacks across a range of targets, our study identifies what actions are more (less) likely to generate public pressure for (de)escalation. And by probing the emotional reactions and logic evinced by respondents, our study offers potential insights into the affective microfoundations underlying nuclear conflict dynamics. Dr Lauren Sukin is the John G. Winant Associate Professor in US Foreign Policy in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Oxford, as well as a Professorial Fellow in Nuffield College at the University of Oxford. Dr Sukin's research examines historical and contemporary challenges in international security, focusing particularly on the role of technology—including nuclear weapons—in alliances. Dr Sukin is an Affiliate at Stanford University's Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), a Nonresident Scholar in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and a Fellow at Charles University's Peace Research Centre Prague. She holds a PhD and MA from the Department of Political Science at Stanford University and ABs in political science and literary arts from Brown University. Dr Sam Seitz is a Postdoctoral Fellow at Oxford's Department of Politics and International Relations and a Deterrence Futures Fellow at the Royal United Services Institute. He was previously a Stanton Nuclear Postdoctoral Fellow at MIT, where he was affiliated with the Security Studies Program. De Seitz’ work primarily concerns the causes and consequences of states' military procurement choices and the effect of these choices on alliance politics. He is especially interested in the way that procurement choices relate to issues of nuclear strategy and the role that status and prestige concerns play in shaping military force postures.
I will be presenting part of my research on anti-colonial dissent in 1884–1915 German Southwest Africa, present-day Namibia. Drawing on and critically engaging with the archives of the German colonial administration in Windhoek and Berlin, the project explores how labour was a key site of both collective and everyday resistance to German colonial rule. One strand of the project sheds light on the exploitation of Namibian labour in railway construction and mining. Here, I discuss unstudied archival material on numerous workers’ strikes and their violent suppression, emphasising the sustained challenge of Namibians to colonial accumulation. A second strand turns to the exploitation of domestic labour, an arena crucial to the reproduction of empire, yet usually marginalised in accounts of colonial expropriation. My research traces the varied ways in which Namibian women, forced to perform domestic labour in the German home, resisted their oppressors through fugitivity, work refusal, and troublemaking. Methodologically, this project is grounded in an approach of reading against the archival grain, challenging the epistemic violence of colonial archives and stretching their interpretive boundaries to trace otherwise obscured voices and practices of resistance.
Personal correspondence and early modern diplomacy: information flow and career strategies in the correspondence of Jacob and Peter von Stählin (1770s-1780s) and a presentation of the new volume Vladislav Rjéoutski et al. (eds.), _Translation in Early Modern Diplomacy_ (London, 2026)
Does public sector employment make graduates less likely to join anti-regime protests? Recent scholarship argues yes, with consequences for bottom-up democratization in late-developing economies with expansive public and higher education sectors. This paper examines whether this thesis travels to the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). We find that well-educated public sector employees were actually more likely to join anti-regime protests in Algeria and Egypt, while we estimate null effects for state dependency in Lebanon, Iraq, Sudan, and Tunisia. Supplementary analyses show that educated public sector employees who protested in Algeria – a critical case for the state-dependency argument – prioritized political rights and grievances over economic considerations. Importantly, these preferences were not visible in surveys from the pre-protest period. The findings put bounds on the external validity of the state middle class thesis, caution against inferring future protest participation from attitudinal data, and identify political conditions when the state middle class may suddenly become more protest prone.
To follow
TBC
The seminars will take place on Tuesdays during term time, from 5:00 to 6:30 p.m. at Corpus Christi College in Merton Street. Please ask the porters for directions. No registration is required. For more details: https://tolkien50.web.ox.ac.uk/event/tolkien-seminars-ht-2026
All College members and colleagues are invited to the JRF Research Showcase, a fantastic opportunity to gain insights into the research activities of early career researchers at Kellogg. Junior Research Fellows (JRFs) are an important part of Kellogg College’s academic community. Together, they represent an impressive breadth of disciplinary expertise and research interests, from the sciences and social sciences to the humanities and beyond. Presenters will share not only what they do, but why it matters. They’ll be telling us about the intellectual journey behind their research: the questions that drive them, the methods they use, and the insights their work offers. The aim is to inspire curiosity, invite constructive feedback, and build bridges across disciplines. Join us to be part of a rich and fascinating journey of multidisciplinary discovery with our JRFs. Each presentation will be no more than 10 minutes, with opportunities for questions with the researchers. The event will be followed by a drinks reception for networking and further conversations. Presenters to be announced shortly
In this talk, Arthur Rose (Exeter University) will revisit earlier work on the reception of Franz Kafka’s part ownership of an asbestos factory to think about the sights, sounds and textures that Kafka’s biography and works conjure up. This hybrid event is organised by the AHRC-funded project Kafka’s Transformative Communities and all are welcome.
10 March (Week 8) Speakers TBC
An exemplary life: the scientific and humanitarian legacy of Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin Georgina Ferry is a science writer, author and broadcaster. A former staff editor and feature writer on New Scientist, she has presented science programmes on BBC Radio. Her biography of Britain's only female Nobel-prizewinning scientist, Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin: Patterns, Proteins and Peace, was reissued by Bloomsbury in 2019. She has published further books on 20th and 21st-century science. Currently she edits obituaries for Nature and contributes reviews, obituaries and features to The Guardian, Nature and The Lancet. She lives in Oxford.
10 March, 5.30pm (room 00.079, Schwarzman Centre) '"The Universal Vibration of Life": William Bartram's Swarm Ecology'
This Week's focus: Religion as a Site of Fragmentation, Unity, and Re-Articulation. Religious institutions, identities, and sacred space as sites of division and re-articulation. This reading group examines the political, geographic, economic, cultural, and linguistic fragmentations that have shaped Palestinian life over the past century, from the West Bank, Gaza, and the ’48 territories to the multiple Palestinian diasporas. By engaging with scholarship across history, political theory, and cultural studies, this reading group interrogates how these divisions have been produced, institutionalised, and normalised, and how they continue to shape Palestinian belongings, identities, and futures. Our aim is to consider both the unity that persists within fragmentation and the fragmentation that structures the very notion of Palestine. Central Question: How are ideas of Palestine and Palestinian collective identity shaped, challenged, and rearticulated under conditions of fragmentation? Structure: The group will convene biweekly throughout Hilary and Trinity Terms 2026, with each session lasting two hours
LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this session you will understand more about: What experience and characteristics you need to have to gain a fellowship. The application process. How to work with University’s systems and procedures to optimise your application and its chance of success. You will have an opportunity to practice interviewing/being interviewed for fellowship applications.
*Please email "$":mailto:mori.reithmayr@history.ox.ac.uk to join the reading group mailing list.* *Session Theme: TBD*
TBC
Join Philippa Christoforou, Social Venture Lead at Oxford University Innovation, for an inspiring GROW session on building businesses that create positive social and environmental impact. Discover practical strategies for turning research into ventures that tackle global challenges, and learn how to embed purpose and sustainability into your entrepreneurial journey.
In this seminar, Professor Kathryn Oliver will introduce research drawing on interviews with policymakers and academics to explore how different forms of knowledge gain credibility in policymaking, and what this means for transparency and public health. The seminar is hosted by PSI and will be chaired by Tess Johnson. It will take place on Wednesday, 11 March 2026, from 12.30 to 13.30, followed by lunch and a chance to network with colleagues. About the speaker Professor Kathryn Oliver is a social scientist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She is interested in how we make, mobilise and use evidence in policy and practice. Professor Oliver co-directs the research collaboration 'Transforming Evidence', which brings together funders, decision-makers, practitioners and researchers from a range of disciplines and sectors. This collaboration aims to both do research on evidence production and use, and to ensure that the research scientists do is used by policymakers. Seminar outline Debates about the role of evidence in policymaking have tended to focus primarily on how to increase the influence of academic research evidence on policy. This approach to the role of knowledge in policy sidesteps the question of what types of knowledge are used and valued in policymaking, and how different forms of knowledge may interact with policy. Drawing on 55 interviews with policymakers and academics, Professor Oliver will explore how personal/institutional characteristics and processes confer credibility to knowledge for policy in informal and formal contexts. Using the generation of credibility as a lens to understand the effects of these values on scientific and policy processes allows us to understand the broader strengths and limitations of different forms of knowledge within the policy arena. Professor Oliver will close with some reflections on transparency in policymaking, and the implications of this for public health.
*Sudarshana Banerjee* (University of St Andrews) *Incorporation and Marginalization: Medical Knowledge-Making, Power, and the Politics of Knowledge Circulation during the Company Era* This paper examines the contested nature of scientific and medical knowledge-making in colonial spaces and the complex politics of knowledge transmission beyond the colonial borders in the early nineteenth-century by focusing on the activities of George Playfair (1782–1846), an East India Company official and member of the Indian Medical Service. Playfair’s medical career in India, spanning from 1805 to 1842, was marked by active engagement with indigenous remedies and medical texts and efforts to incorporate them into Western medical practices. Recent scholarship on the transnational circulation of knowledge has emphasized the need to recognize the barriers to knowledge transmission. While earlier studies have focused on the movement of knowledge, they have often overlooked the role of the State and institutional structures in shaping what knowledge was allowed to circulate. Playfair’s career offers a lens through which to explore these frictions in medical knowledge circulation during the Company era. This paper analyzes two key moments: Playfair's attempt to introduce Mudar (powdered form of a plant abundantly found in various regions of India and utilized by native healers) into Western medicine as a remedy for various disruptive diseases like leprosy, and his English translation of the Taleef Shereef, an eighteenth-century Unani medical text (Playfair’s translation was published by the Calcutta Medical and Physical Society in 1833). I will contrast and interrogate the enthusiasm with which knowledge of Mudar was circulated and received in the British medical press with the relative silence surrounding the Taleef. I will demonstrate that while early nineteenth-century knowledge-making by Company officials within the Indian subcontinent was characterized simultaneously by processes of collaboration (albeit marked by asymmetrical relations of power) and erasure, the circulation and reception of this knowledge within the metropole and broader Empire were further shaped by concerns of imperial utility, commercial profitability and racial prejudice. Operating both at the level of the Company-State and metropolitan medical press these concerns ensured selective, calculated incorporation and systemic marginalization of indigenous medical knowledge. *Rishabh Bajoria* (National University of Singapore) *High Developmentalism and Stubborn Ecologies: A Pre-History of the Indus Waters Treaty, 1948-54* This paper focuses on attempts by diplomatic elites to decontextualise the Indus rivers from the territory over which they flow—the disputed region of Kashmir. The most pronounced of such attempts was by David Lilienthal in 1951. Lilienthal was the former Chairman of the Tennessee Valley Authority—an ambitious dam-building project designed to be the centrepiece of US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal in the US South—and his intervention reflected the same ‘high developmentalist’ ideal. I show how Lilienthal changed the future of Kashmir and the Indus waters by arguing that harnessing the waters for India and Pakistan’s postcolonial development required setting aside Kashmiri demands for self-determination. Lilienthal’s 1951 piece for Collier’s magazine set the agenda for World Bank-led negotiations between India and Pakistan during 1951-54. The paper draws on diplomatic archives from the US, UK, and India to trace how Lilienthal’s proposal to set up a Tennessee Valley Authority [‘TVA’] for the Indus could not be realised because even while the territory of Kashmir could be abstracted from the Indus waters in legal and political discourse, the ecology of Kashmir could not be disappeared from riparian politics altogether. Thus, it explores how the inability of regional and global elites to align recalcitrant ecologies with their developmental agendas opened up political possibilities for subalterns to assert self-determination over Kashmiri territory and waters. Six decades on, dams constructed under the Treaty continue to cause flooding in Kashmir, placing the environmental costs of New Delhi and Karachi’s development onto Kashmiris.
Sudarshana Banerjee (University of St Andrews), Incorporation and Marginalization: Medical Knowledge-Making, Power, and the Politics of Knowledge Circulation during the Company Era This paper examines the contested nature of scientific and medical knowledge-making in colonial spaces and the complex politics of knowledge transmission beyond the colonial borders in the early nineteenth-century by focusing on the activities of George Playfair (1782–1846), an East India Company official and member of the Indian Medical Service. Playfair’s medical career in India, spanning from 1805 to 1842, was marked by active engagement with indigenous remedies and medical texts and efforts to incorporate them into Western medical practices. Recent scholarship on the transnational circulation of knowledge has emphasized the need to recognize the barriers to knowledge transmission. While earlier studies have focused on the movement of knowledge, they have often overlooked the role of the State and institutional structures in shaping what knowledge was allowed to circulate. Playfair’s career offers a lens through which to explore these frictions in medical knowledge circulation during the Company era. This paper analyzes two key moments: Playfair's attempt to introduce Mudar (powdered form of a plant abundantly found in various regions of India and utilized by native healers) into Western medicine as a remedy for various disruptive diseases like leprosy, and his English translation of the Taleef Shereef, an eighteenth-century Unani medical text (Playfair’s translation was published by the Calcutta Medical and Physical Society in 1833). I will contrast and interrogate the enthusiasm with which knowledge of Mudar was circulated and received in the British medical press with the relative silence surrounding the Taleef. I will demonstrate that while early nineteenth-century knowledge-making by Company officials within the Indian subcontinent was characterized simultaneously by processes of collaboration (albeit marked by asymmetrical relations of power) and erasure, the circulation and reception of this knowledge within the metropole and broader Empire were further shaped by concerns of imperial utility, commercial profitability and racial prejudice. Operating both at the level of the Company-State and metropolitan medical press these concerns ensured selective, calculated incorporation and systemic marginalization of indigenous medical knowledge. Rishabh Bajoria (National University of Singapore), High Developmentalism and Stubborn Ecologies: A Pre-History of the Indus Waters Treaty, 1948-54 This paper focuses on attempts by diplomatic elites to decontextualise the Indus rivers from the territory over which they flow—the disputed region of Kashmir. The most pronounced of such attempts was by David Lilienthal in 1951. Lilienthal was the former Chairman of the Tennessee Valley Authority—an ambitious dam-building project designed to be the centrepiece of US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal in the US South—and his intervention reflected the same ‘high developmentalist’ ideal. I show how Lilienthal changed the future of Kashmir and the Indus waters by arguing that harnessing the waters for India and Pakistan’s postcolonial development required setting aside Kashmiri demands for self-determination. Lilienthal’s 1951 piece for Collier’s magazine set the agenda for World Bank-led negotiations between India and Pakistan during 1951-54. The paper draws on diplomatic archives from the US, UK, and India to trace how Lilienthal’s proposal to set up a Tennessee Valley Authority [‘TVA’] for the Indus could not be realised because even while the territory of Kashmir could be abstracted from the Indus waters in legal and political discourse, the ecology of Kashmir could not be disappeared from riparian politics altogether. Thus, it explores how the inability of regional and global elites to align recalcitrant ecologies with their developmental agendas opened up political possibilities for subalterns to assert self-determination over Kashmiri territory and waters. Six decades on, dams constructed under the Treaty continue to cause flooding in Kashmir, placing the environmental costs of New Delhi and Karachi’s development onto Kashmiris.
The Older Scots Reading Group is for people interested in literature produced in Scotland between 1375-1550. This is an incredibly rich period, featuring authors experimenting with form and language. The texts themselves are written in Older Scots – a language closely related to Middle English, but with some unique attributes. This reading group will provide a relaxed introduction to this period and language. This term we will focus on reading the Palyce of Honour, a dream vision poetry by Gavin Douglas that often draws parallels with the House of Fame. But is it purely derivative or is there something more subtle at work? Join us to find out! Please bring your own copy of the text if you can – the 2018 TEAMS METS edition by David Parkinson is recommended. No intensive preparation required. Both undergraduates and postgraduates are welcome and there are usually snacks. If you have any questions, contact megan.bushnell@ling-phil.ox.ac.uk.
We all understand that knowledge shapes the fate of business and the growth of nations, but few of us are aware of the principles that govern its motion. The Infinite Alphabet unravels the laws describing the growth and diffusion of knowledge by taking you from a failed attempt to build a city of knowledge in Ecuador to the growth of China’s innovation economy. Through dozens of stories, you will learn why aircraft manufacturers in Italy began manufacturing scooters after the Second World War and how migrants like Samuel Slater shaped the industrial fabric of the United States. Knowledge is the secret to the wealth of nations. But to understand it, we must accept that it is not a single thing, but an ever-growing tapestry of unique ideas, experiences and received wisdom. An Infinite Alphabet that we are only beginning to fathom. César A. Hidalgo, will walk you through the “three laws” and the many principles that govern how knowledge grows, moves, and decays. By the end of this journey, you will understand why knowledge grows exponentially in the electronics industry and what mechanisms govern its diffusion across geographic borders, social networks, and professional boundaries. Together these principles will teach you how knowledge shapes the world. About the speaker: César A. Hidalgo is a Chilean-Spanish-American scholar, Professor at the Toulouse School of Economics (TSE), and head of the Center for Collective Learning (CCL), a multidisciplinary research laboratory with offices at TSE and at Corvinus University of Budapest. Hidalgo is known for developing methods to estimate economic complexity and relatedness, building several national economic data observatories (oec.world, datamexico.org, datasaudi.sa, etc.), and proposing the idea of augmented democracy. These contributions have been recognized with numerous awards including the 2018 Lagrange Prize and three Webby Awards. Hidalgo holds a PhD in Physics from the University of Notre Dame and is the author of four books, The Atlas of Economic Complexity, Why Information Grows, How Humans Judge Machines, and The Infinite Alphabet that explores the principles governing the growth, diffusion, and valuation of knowledge.
About the series: This series will feature master classes, seminars, workshops and talks with Laura Rival, research collaborators and colleagues, throughout academic year 2025-2026. Beginning in Michaelmas term 2025, the theme for the term, in answer to the series question, was 'In Latin America, by Greening the State at the Top and from Below'. In Hilary term, the theme is 'By Knowing Nature Differently'. In Trinity term, the theme will be 'By Imagining a New Civilization and Building the Next Political Economic Order'.
Achieving a more fair and equitable sharing of refugee protection responsibilities between states has been a perennial challenge of the global refugee regime. The Refugee Convention did not codify a legal obligation of responsibility sharing and as a result any assistance to refugee host states remains voluntary. This responsibility sharing gap has in turn negatively impacted on the quality of refugee protection and on interstate relations by exacerbating existing inequalities undermining the fairness of the international refugee law regime. This book offers a pragmatic yet principled solution to the responsibility sharing gap. It puts down a detailed proposal for the long-resisted UN Protocol on Responsibility Sharing which would codify a light package of responsibility sharing obligations by requiring states to contribute to refugee protection and solutions under a framework of common but differentiated responsibilities based on capabilities. Building on the Global Compact on Refugees and drawing inspiration from international climate change law, the book makes a compelling case for further multilateral law making. About the speaker Elizabeth Mavropoulou, Ph.D. (2021), is a Lecturer in International Law at the University of Westminster. Elizabeth researches and publishes in the fields of international refugee and human rights law. Her research has focused on international cooperation on refugees, externalisation of asylum and the protection of human rights at sea. She had held visiting lecturer positions at University of Westminster and at the School of Advanced Legal Studies, University of London. Before joining academia full time, she worked eights years for a human rights NGO, leading its research and advocacy work and overseeing its programmes. She currently sits on the advisory board of the NGO Human Rights at Sea, as Non-Executive Director (NED).
Join online via Microsoft Teams by clicking here: https://tinyurl.com/bdff6tpt
*Leo Shen* (University of Cambridge) The Missed Encounter: Yan Fu and the Glocalization of Logical Knowledge in Late Imperial China *Yuxuan Zhou* (University of Geneva) The Qing Empire’s Gift to the Permanent Court of Arbitration: Transforming Gift- Giving Practices and Engaging the International Order (1907–1911)
Godfrey Stafford’s career as a physicist began with research in cosmic rays in the 1940s and he lived to see the discovery in 2012 of the Higgs boson at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. He made major contributions to the construction and exploitation of accelerators at the Rutherford Laboratory in the UK and was its Director from 1969 to 1981. During this period he oversaw the diversification of the Laboratory into the multi-disciplinary centre it is today. He was Master of St Cross College, Oxford from 1979 to 1987 and led the College as it settled into its new home on the Pusey House site. His tenure as Master was seen as transformational in several respects, and he maintained strong links with the College and its Fellowship throughout his subsequent retirement. His association with St Cross as Visiting Fellow, Master and then Honorary Fellow, spanned more than 40 years.
Godfrey Stafford’s career as a physicist began with research in cosmic rays in the 1940s and he lived to see the discovery in 2012 of the Higgs boson at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. He made major contributions to the construction and exploitation of accelerators at the Rutherford Laboratory in the UK and was its Director from 1969 to 1981. During this period he oversaw the diversification of the Laboratory into the multi-disciplinary centre it is today. He was Master of St Cross College, Oxford from 1979 to 1987 and led the College as it settled into its new home on the Pusey House site. His tenure as Master was seen as transformational in several respects, and he maintained strong links with the College and its Fellowship throughout his subsequent retirement. His association with St Cross as Visiting Fellow, Master and then Honorary Fellow, spanned more than 40 years. All the details and the weblinks to register for the lecture to attend in person or online are given on the webpage below: https://www.stx.ox.ac.uk/event/happ-lecture-godfrey-stafford-physicist-director-master
Join Ngaire Woods, Dean of the Blavatnik School, in conversation with Devi Sridhar, author of How Not to Die (Too Soon) - The Lies We’ve Been Sold and the Policies That Can Save Us. In her latest book, Devi Sridhar asks if you have ever questioned why, despite the avalanche of self-help books and optimisation hacks, we remain embroiled in multiple global health crises. Populations worldwide are gaining life-shortening excess weight (even in poorer countries), and water contamination is rampant (even in richer countries). In such dire circumstances, a gratitude journal won’t help. She writes that the stark reality is that we’ve been sold a monumental lie. The obsession with individual health optimisation is a distraction from the real game-changer: holding governments accountable for policies that can significantly extend lifespans. How Not to Die (Too Soon) is a vital, transformative guide that shifts the focus from individual responsibility to societal accountability. It’s time to demand the changes that will save lives. Devi Sridhar is a writer, broadcaster and world-leading expert in public health and wellbeing. She is Professor and Chair of Global Public Health at the University of Edinburgh and has advised the WHO, UNICEF, UNESCO and the Scottish, UK and German governments. Devi appears regularly on ITV and Channel 4 News, has a weekly column in the Guardian, tweets to over 300,000 followers, and recently became a certified Level 3 Personal Trainer. Her first book, Preventable, was a BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week and a Sunday Times bestseller.
To mark the centenary of Rilke’s death there will be a series of Oxford Centenary Readings held in the Queen’s College in HT 2025. These will be informal papers with plenty of discussion, about one poem or a handful of poems, that offer close readings and new insights. Papers will be in English and English translations will be provided for all poems and quotations (except for the session in week 4 with the visiting poets) making these sessions accessible to anyone with an interest in this remarkable poet and poetry in general.
This popular day seminar provides an ideal opportunity for practitioners to update their current immunisation knowledge and learn the latest news on the topic of vaccination. Our target audience consists of (but is not limited to) practice nurses, health visitors, school nurses, community nurses and general practitioners. Click here to for the full programme: https://www.ovg.ox.ac.uk/events/2026-imms-seminar Programme highlights: • Determinants of future health with Dr James Gilchrist, Honorary Consultant in Paediatric Infectious Diseases & Immunology • Communicating the importance of maternal vaccination programmes with Professor Chrissie Jones, Professor of Paediatric Infection and Immunity, University of Southampton • Chickenpox and Shingles vaccination with Dr Gayatri Amirthalingam, Immunisation and Vaccine Preventable Diseases, UKHSA • Advantages and disadvantages of higher valent pneumococcal vaccines with Professor Stefan Flasche Einstein-BUA Strategic Professor of Infectious Disease Dynamics and Global Health, CharitéCenter for Global Health, Berlin Click here to register – https://www.oxforduniversitystores.co.uk/product-catalogue/paediatrics/events/ovg-immunisation-seminar-2026-hcps
We are an interdisciplinary reading group which focuses on the social science, history, and theology of demons, the Devil, and supernatural evil as they relate to politics, identity formation, and social conflicts. Each week we will examine one academic paper or book chapter on these topics, gaining familiarity with subjects such as: the psychology of dehumanization, the conceptual development of the term “demon,” and contemporary political demonologies like QAnon. Hilary Term 2026, Thursdays from 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM Weeks 1,3,4,5,6,7,8: 21 St Giles (Kendrew Quad) Teaching Room G4 Week 2: 14 St Giles (next door to the Lamb & Flag) Seminar Room H Please contact Scott Maybell for the readings or for any questions: scott.maybell@sjc.ox.ac.uk
Designed for research staff who are considering their next career move—whether within Oxford, within academia more broadly, or in other sectors. This interactive workshop supports researchers in navigating their career development with greater confidence and clarity. It offers participants the space to reflect on their ambitions, explore alternative futures, and engage in structured peer discussions to share insights and challenges. Participants will use design-thinking approaches to consider different career scenarios. The session then moves into goal setting and peer advice-sharing, helping researchers to build practical short-term plans and identify supportive resources and networks. Participants are introduced to key tools and services available through Oxford to support their development as they prepare for their next step, whatever that may be. By the end of this session, participants will be able to: * Articulate multiple possible career directions, including both preferred and alternative pathways. * Identify actionable short-term goals that support career progress. * Reflect on and assess their professional development to date, including skills, motivations, and values. Everyone welcome, please register to receive the TEAMS link for this event If you are a student or researcher with a CareerConnect account, please register "here":https://oxford.targetconnect.net/leap/event.html?id=23006&service=Careers%20Service All other staff register "here":https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=G96VzPWXk0-0uv5ouFLPke7xLB0LNIFKuA055EWF9ZtUNFk4NDEwVkVLWklPNDc5WjZKWFU2VEMwWC4u, the joining link will be in the registration confirmation email
Lesson of the week, clinical cases and research. All clinical and academic staff and students welcome. Coffee and Tea will be served.
A practical 180-minute workshop where participants will work on searches for their review across multiple databases. Librarians from the Bodleian Health Care Libraries will be on hand to demonstrate online tools for facilitating the process and give practical advice on refining individual search strategies. By the end of this classroom-based session you will be able to: improve a search strategy that you are working on; adapt the search across multiple databases; use tools such as Yale MeSH Analyzer and Polyglot; describe alternative methods for identifying references, including citation chaser; use Covidence for your review; and report your search methods according to PRISMA-Search. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
The field of movement ecology has benefited hugely from tags that allow animals to be tracked as they use the landscape, and such information has been vital to many conservation efforts. However, tags for tracking bees are either too heavy for the study of most species, too expensive, or are unable to function in complex environments, precluding study of bees in many natural habitats. We have developed and deployed a prototype landscape-scale bee tracking method using rotating Bluetooth transmitters placed across a landscape and <40mg tags attached to foraging bees. Power constraints cause uncertain and noisy data, so a Gaussian Process prior is placed on the flight path, incorporating our assumptions around possible flight paths made by insect foragers. Doubly stochastic variational inference is used, which results in ‘probabilistic triangulation’ of the probable flight path the bee took. The system has successfully tracked and inferred the movement path of foraging Bombus terrestris workers through a complex outdoor landscape. Preliminary work has begun on integrating sensors including photodiodes and accelerometers with the tags to infer behaviour alongside position, enabling biologging of flying insects for use in fields such as energetics. Bio-sketch: Mike Smith is a senior lecturer in Machine Learning in the School of Computer Science, at the University of Sheffield. He currently works on developing new methods for tracking small animals at a variety of scales, from lab to landscape. His focus is how Bayesian machine learning can be employed to extract as much information as possible from situations where there are substantial limitations on energy- and compute-. He is also leading a Leverhulme grant that includes the development of novel hardware, including microbatteries and on-board active learning.
Policy debates are fundamentally distributive: who bears costs and who receives benefits influences perceived fairness and shapes public acceptability. Although fairness is known to correlate with environmental policy support, evidence comes mainly from wealthy Western democracies. We address this gap by examining how cost and benefit targeting affects fairness judgments and public support for environmental policies targeting urban transportation in Delhi (India) and Jakarta (Indonesia), two cities that recently experienced fairness-driven public resistance in response to government action. We field a pre-registered factorial vignette survey experiment in both cities (n = 3,400) that randomises who pays and who benefits, measuring fairness-to-me and fairness-to-others perceptions and testing heterogeneity through car-ownership interactions. Results show that targeting benefits and costs reduces both fairness perceptions compared to universal allocations, more asymmetrically so in Jakarta. In both cities, fairness-to-me is a stronger correlate of policy support than fairness-to-others. Car ownership shifts only fairness-to-me evaluations, implying that material stakes shape self-oriented fairness without spilling over into broader societal fairness assessments. Benefit targeting under shared costs carries higher backlash risk, while targeted costs can remain viable when benefits are universal, especially where equality norms shape collective fairness independently of material stakes. ————————————————————————————————————————————— Speaker bio: Dr. Liam F. Beiser-McGrath is an Associate Professor in International Social and Public Policy in the Department of Social Policy, Chair of the Sustainable Social Policy and Welfare States Research Hub, Associate of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, and Affiliate of the Data Science Institute at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Liam is also an Editor for the journal Environmental Politics and the organiser of EPG Online, an online seminar series covering Environmental Politics and Governance. Liam’s research primarily focuses on the political economy of climate change, using experimental research designs and machine learning. This research has been published in peer-reviewed journals such as Nature Climate Change, the Journal of Politics, Science Advances, European Journal of Political Research, Comparative Political Studies, Political Analysis, Climatic Change, Political Science Research & Methods, Environmental Politics, Global Environmental Politics, the Journal of European Social Policy, Energy Policy, Regulation and Governance, Electoral Studies, and the Journal of Public Policy. ————————————————————————————————————————————— Booking is required for people outside of the Department of Social Policy and Intervention (DSPI). DSPI Members do not need to register
This week brings together members of WGQ (perhaps the MSt cohort in particular) and participants in the Archival Fragments, Experimental Modes Collective, reflecting on what we have learned methodologically, conceptually and theoretically across the series. *Contributors/Respondents:* Archival Fragments, Experimental Modes Sara Johnson (UC San Diego, and AFEM) will be here in person.
Professor Ellen Hazelkorn is Professor Emeritus, Technological University Dublin; Joint Managing Partner, BH Associates; and Joint Editor, Policy Reviews in Higher Education (http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rprh20/current). She has authored/co-authored over 200 peer-reviewed articles, policy briefs, books and book chapters, and delivered over 200 keynotes speeches. Ellen is internationally recognised for her writings and analysis of rankings and other forms of quality and transparency instruments, and on higher education and policy. Ellen was named one of the ‘top 2%’ of all scientists in 2020, when self-citations are excluded, on the list released by Elsevier/Scopus and Stanford University. She was placed 956th out of 70,063 scientists whose primary field was Education, ranking her in the top 1.3% in Education worldwide.
Japan and Germany have been the “Reluctant Warriors” among postwar democracies, limited in part by their “peace constitutions” and a significant subculture of antimilitarist sentiment. The first part of this talk will describe Japan’s earlier postwar development as a reluctant warrior under its “peace constitution” but also as a strategic player in the U.S.-Japan alliance. Former Prime Minister Abe's policies and the invasion of Ukraine by Russia brought about major recent changes under Prime Minister Kishida and now Prime Minister Takaichi. Following this, I will compare the similarities and differences between Japan and Germany, how far each has come despite the limitations of their peace constitutions, but in what ways their trajectories in the postwar have been somewhat similar but also in many ways quite different, and why?
To join online, please register in advance: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/WWqjr8SgT_WrzTodI65cdg
*To attend online via Microsoft Teams, please email "$":mailto:ian.archer@history.ox.ac.uk*
The DORMEME project investigates how early modern owners, readers, and users engaged with printed polyphonic music books, focusing on 1500–1545, when music printing introduced new modes of circulation alongside manuscript and oral transmission. This technological shift expanded and reshaped how individuals interacted with music books—as tools for performance and teaching, as collectable objects, and as sites of confessional negotiation. Our project undertakes a copy-based survey of surviving printed polyphonic books across European and North American collections, documenting marks of use and developing case studies that reveal how these books were used, altered, and understood. This paper presents the project’s first synthetic results. We outline a taxonomy of interventions—textual, musical, material, and paratextual—and consider them in relation to user motivations such as correction, performance facilitation, confessional adaptation, education, personalisation, and proof-reading. Drawing on detailed examples, we examine textual changes in religious motets, musical annotations including crosses, numbers, custodes, and barline-like dashes, and patterns of personalisation that illuminate different types of owners and users. We also address the distinctive role of the proof-reader as the “first reader,” whose interventions bridge production and use. Together, these findings show how annotations can reshape our understanding of early modern musical practice and book culture.
How do we talk about surveillance—and its role in tracking and preventing outbreaks of disease? Disease surveillance helps us spot outbreaks early, track patterns, and look after public health. But it can also feel uncomfortable. As more everyday data is used to predict and prevent pandemics, questions about trust, transparency, and who gets a say become harder to ignore. We're excited to share our second 'Let's Talk About' event created with the Pandemic Sciences Institute. Join us at the History of Science Museum for conversations exploring questions such as ‘how do you identify emerging pandemic threats?’ and ‘how should we navigate everyday data — from social media to wearable devices — being used in public health?’. You'll hear from four thought-provoking speakers who will guide small breakout discussions centred around unique objects that tell a story about their work. You'll also have an opportunity to contribute to the conversation as we explore how all of us can shape future research on these topics. Will hearing each other’s stories shift how we think? Let’s talk about surveillance.
We are joined by Alister McGrath, speaking on a cross-section of some of his most well known areas, Science and Religion, and C.S Lewis. Interviewed by Ruth Jackson co-host of Premier Unbelievable's The CS Lewis Podcast , Alister will be speaking to us about his newest publication, followed by a time of audience questions, refreshments, and selling initial release copies of the book. About the event Alister McGrath’s Science and Religion in the Imagination of C. S. Lewis offers the first comprehensive exploration of Lewis’s perspectives on the interplay between science and religion. Written by a globally recognized expert on both Lewis and the science-religion dialogue, this work offers an original and penetrating analysis of Lewis’s views on the roles that science and religion play in humanity’s quest for meaning and significance. This study emphasizes the vital, constructive role of imagination—not just the analytical function of reason—in shaping an authentic “model of the universe.” It breaks new ground by investigating Lewis’s apologetic use of scientific concepts and methods, particularly the idea of identifying the “best explanation” or “best model” of our universe. This book serves as an essential introduction to a crucial yet often overlooked dimension of Lewis’s thought and its relevance to the life of faith today. The evening continues with a drinks reception, book sale and signing. All are welcome, and booking will be essential!
We are pleased to announce the upcoming Winter Lecture Series which will take place between January and March 2026. Across five thought-provoking lectures, special guests will discuss a range of subjects, with topics to be announced soon. Each lecture will be hosted at the University of Oxford Museum of Natural History. Join us on Thursday 12th March when Plantsman and horticultural educationalist Fergus Garrett will deliver his lecture.
Title and speaker to be announced The Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that attendance at the Surgical Grand Rounds can count toward internal CPD, with 1 point awarded per hour. Please note that in-person attendance is required, and you will need to sign the attendance register. All members of the University and NHS clinical staff are welcome. Please email Tarryn Ching if you would like to attend online.
Do you need help managing your references? Do you need help citing references in your documents? This online session will introduce you to EndNote, a subscription software programme which can help you to store, organise and retrieve your references and PDFs, as well as cite references in documents and create bibliographies quickly and easily. On completing the workshop you will be able to: understand the main features and benefits of EndNote; set up an EndNote account; import references from different sources into EndNote; organise your references in EndNote; insert citations into documents; and create a bibliography/reference list. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; taught student; researcher and research student
Everything you have been taught about Turing patterns is wrong! (Well, not everything, but qualifying statements tend to weaken a punchy first sentence). Turing patterns are universally used to generate and understand patterns across a wide range of biological phenomena. They are wonderful to work with from a theoretical, simulation and application point of view. However, they have a paradoxical problem of being too easy to produce generally, whilst simultaneously being heavily dependent on the details. In this talk I demonstrate how to fix known problems such as small parameter regions and sensitivity, but then highlight a new set of issues that arise from usually overlooked issues, such as boundary conditions, initial conditions, and domain shape. Although we’ve been exploring Turing’s theory for longer than I’ve been alive, there’s still life in the old (spotty) dog yet.
This seminar lecture addresses some profound challenges facing post-war reconstruction in Syria after more than a decade of destructive conflict. Entire neighbourhoods, towns, and in some cases, cities were reduced to rubble. Millions of people were forcibly displaced both internally and externally. Approximately 2.2 million people resided in camps, of whom around 1.2 million remain today. In parallel, an estimated 2.5 million residential units were damaged or destroyed to varying degrees. A current governmental priority is to ensure that no one continues to live in camps, placing the return of displaced populations as a central mission. However, restoring housing and livelihoods requires unprecedented reconstruction at multiple scales, ranging from repairing individual homes and basic infrastructure to rebuilding entire towns and cities. While the presentation itself focuses primarily on housing and reconstruction dynamics, the discussion session will engage participants in reflecting on how these processes impact traffic, transport, and mobility systems—already under strain from both long-standing and post-war conditions—and in exploring policy directions and interventions that could steer reconstruction toward a more sustainable future.
As neuroscientists, we are accustomed to using biological reagents to manipulate neural activity and to discover brain functions. These reagents can be drugs, genetic tools, light-activated molecules, and so on. Their use has given us great insights in all areas of neuroscience. Visual neuroscientists have a additional advantage – another set of reagents: visual stimuli. By designing and implementing images and movies with particular properties based on the long and rich traditions of visual psychophysics, we have been able to identify and characterize brain circuits that process visual information about pattern, form, color, and motion. By using well chosen stimuli, we can draw strong conclusions about the brain mechanisms of visual information processing. Moreover, the widespread influence of visual neuroscience on systems neuroscience more broadly has shown that similar mechanisms play important roles in other brain systems. SPEAKER BIOGRAPHY Tony Movshon studies vision and visual perception, using a multidisciplinary approach that combines biology, behavior and theory. His work explores the way that the neural networks in the brain compute and represent the form and motion of objects and scenes, the way that these networks contribute to perceptual judgments and to the control of visually guided action, and the way that normal and abnormal visual experience influence their development in early life. Movshon was born and raised in New York, received his BA and PhD from Cambridge University, and then joined the Department of Psychology at New York University in 1975. In 1987 he became founding Director of NYU’s Center for Neural Science. Among his honors are the Young Investigator Award from the Society for Neuroscience, the Rank Prize in Optoelectronics, the António Champalimaud Vision Award, and the Karl Spencer Lashley Award from the American Philosophical Society. He is a Member of the US National Academy of Sciences, a Foreign Member of the Royal Society, and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and of the Association for Psychological Science.
Dr. Lo grew up in Taiwan and trained in the U.S., completing her PhD with Paul Allen at Washington University in St. Louis and her postdoctoral training with Art Weiss at UCSF. She now leads a lab at the University of Utah investigating how T cell ligand recognition is translated into faithful intracellular signaling, and how tuning T cell receptor signaling shapes self-reactivity, activation thresholds, and T cell fate decisions
This paper presents a novel application of graph neural networks for modeling and estimating network heterogeneity. Network heterogeneity is a concept characterizing the dependence of an individual’s outcome or decision on their diverse local network scenarios. Graph neural networks are powerful tools for studying this dependence. We delineate the convergence rate of the graph neural networks estimator, as well as its applicability in semiparametric causal inference with heterogeneous treatment effects. The finite-sample performance of our estimator is evaluated through Monte Carlo simulations. In an empirical setting related to microfinance program participation, we apply the new estimator to examine the average treatment effects and outcomes of counterfactual policies, and to propose a Pareto frontier of strategies for selecting the initial recipients of program information in social networks.
Week Eight (13 March, Old Library) Primary: Marge Piercy, Woman on the Edge of Time, Chapters 19-20 Supplementary: Sara Ahmed, ‘A Killjoy Manifesto’ (2017)
Seminar followed by Q&A and drinks - attend in person or join online - all welcome Abstract: The relationship between forests and rainfall has intrigued humankind for millennia and has been a focus of scientific inquiry for more than a century. Forests strongly influence land–atmosphere exchanges of energy, water, and trace gases, giving rise to complex climate interactions that are still not fully understood. In this talk, I will present recent advances in our understanding of the mechanisms through which forests shape climate across local to regional scales. Rapid deforestation across the tropics is transforming land surfaces, altering regional temperature and rainfall patterns, and affecting the livelihoods of millions of people. By combining observational datasets with climate and Earth system models, we quantify how tropical deforestation modifies local and regional climate. We then use this improved process-level understanding to assess the impacts of deforestation on human health, agriculture, and fire activity. Our results demonstrate that tropical deforestation has profound consequences for local climate and public health. Beyond its role in driving global climate change, tropical deforestation emerges as a major and immediate public health hazard. A clearer understanding of this hazard may help broaden societal consensus around the value of tropical forest conservation. Biography: Dominick Spracklen is Professor of Biosphere-Atmosphere Interactions at the University of Leeds. His research focuses on understanding how land-use change, particularly tropical deforestation, influences climate, air quality, and human health. Using a combination of observations and Earth system modelling, his work has helped quantify the impacts of forests on rainfall, temperature, fire, and public health across the tropics. He works in partnership with organisations worldwide to support evidence-based and community-led approaches to nature recovery. He serves on the Conservation Advisory Panel of the World Land Trust. In the UK, he leads the Upper Duddon Landscape Recovery and Restoring Hardknott Forest projects, sits on the steering group of Wild Ingleborough, and is a Trustee of the John Muir Trust.
Please join the Oxford Medieval Manuscripts Group (OMMG) for a lecture by Julian Harrison, Curator of pre-1600 Historical Manuscripts at the British Library. Dr Harrison will be presenting on Sir Robert Cotton and Oxford. This event is free and open to the public.
TRAVELS THROUGH PREHISTORIC SPAIN Professor Gary Lock (Emeritus Fellow) Spain is a large country with many different landscapes presenting a wide range of prehistoric monuments. This talk will be a chronological review of the main monument types covering most of Spain together with some background information. Included will be the cave paintings of Cantabria (could Neanderthals have started them?) and the castros of Asturias (were Iron Age people fond of saunas?). Some sites are truly remarkable like the scenes within Levantine art and the settlement of Los Millares. Other categories of site are interesting for their variation, like the thousands of dolmen which occur all over Spain both in large cemeteries and as isolated individuals. So, if you only know Spain through beaches and the Costas, now is your chance to dig deeper. Tea, coffee, and biscuits provided from 5.00pm. No booking required
Are you preparing a poster presentation for an upcoming conference, meeting or symposium? This interactive session, or ‘poster clinic’, will include a group discussion of different examples of poster presentations, as well as an opportunity to present your own draft of your poster presentation to your fellow attendees. It is expected that the small group of peers in attendance will provide feedback and respectful comments on each other’s work. By the end of this classroom-based session you will be able to: evaluate the effectiveness of your poster presentation and others; and summarise the content of your poster concisely in preparation for a conference. Intended audience: Medicine and NHS; Researcher and research student
Are you looking to learn about the ways in which to transmit scientific ideas and make your research accessible to a non-specialist audience through a variety of mediums? This session will serve as an introduction to science communication and how it can be successfully incorporated into our roles. By the end of this session you will be able to: define science communication and provide a list of examples; explain why science communication is important for both our CPD and the public; and list ways in which we can all get involved in science communication. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; taught student; researcher and research student
COURSE DETAILS By participating in exercises and discussions the attendees will learn how to review manuscripts quickly and effectively. Learning Outcomes By the end of this session participants will have: Developed an understanding of how the peer review system works. Developed an understanding of reveiwers' responsibilities. Awareness of what editors expect in a review; critically evaluate a manuscript. Developed an understanding of what to include in written comments to editors and authors. Developed practical methods for reviewing a manuscript quickly and effectively.
COURSE DETAILS Issues covered will include work-life balance, planning, prioritising, the need to differentiate between importance and urgency, and using a range of strategies and time-saving ideas. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this session you will understand more about: A range of time saving techniques. Time wasting activities and learn how to deal with them. The difference between important and urgent. The importance of planning and setting time aside.
An introduction to the what, why and how of public involvement
Carter Group Speaker(s): TBC Title(s): TBC Band Group Speaker: Lydia Jennings Title(s): Does malaria parasite genetic variation affect vaccine efficacy?
A showcase of recent innovations in surgical practice and policy. For surgically inclined students, trainees and consultants. Save the date. Tickets available in December 2025. Call for abstracts for posters and presentations will open in December 2025.
This session provides doctoral students in the third year and above with information about the viva, guidance on planning a proactive approach to it, and opportunities to practise. COURSE DETAILS The course will look at the rules and expectations of the viva exam and identify and practise practical ways to prepare. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of the session participants will be able to: Develop their awareness and understanding of the rules and expectations of the viva exam. Use tools and strategies to prepare for the exam. Develop an awareness of the examiner's perspective. Know what to expect of the exam.
Discover what elements of storytelling and narrative can be used to enhance a profession in the sciences. Craft compelling and moving stories from your experiences as a scientist using these key story elements: character, conflict, structure, metaphor and description. Apply these storytelling and narrative skills to working in the sciences: communicating research to a range of audiences (including publics, media and funding bodies); enhancing presentation skills; telling scientific stories across a range of media.
Lesson of the week, clinical cases and research. All clinical and academic staff and students welcome. Coffee and Tea will be served.
Despite substantial growth in implementation research, the field has become increasingly dominated by frameworks and studies that catalogue barriers and enablers to implementation success. While these approaches have been instrumental in identifying contextual determinants of uptake, they often stop short of explaining how implementation strategies produce change. As a result, implementation studies frequently emphasize what strategies were used to support putting an innovation into practice, and whether those strategies achieved intended outcomes, while paying far less attention to the cognitive, relational, organizational, and team-level processes through which change unfolds. This imbalance has left a noted critical gap in our understanding of the underlying mechanisms that are activated by strategies to generate desired implementation outcomes. In this lecture, Dr. Carolyn Steele Gray draws on insights from cognitive psychology (e.g., habit formation and mental models), sociology (e.g., professional identity, power, and social networks), organizational and team science (e.g., leadership, sense-making, and team processes), and theories of innovation and adoption (e.g., diffusion of innovations) that can help reveal the mechanisms that can underlie strategy success. Using empirical examples from studies of digital health and integrated care implementation, the lecture illustrates how a developed understanding mechanisms can help better tailor strategies to unique environments, helping to shape adaptation, spread, and sustainability of innovations in complex health systems. The session also explores the methodological challenges associated with studying mechanisms, including issues surrounding definitional clarity, complexity, temporality, and multi-disciplinary dynamics that may not be adequately captured by dominant evaluation approaches. By foregrounding mechanisms as a critical but understudied force in implementation, this lecture argues for a more theory-driven and mechanism-informed approach to strategy development which can help to enable scale, transferability, and long-term sustainability of innovation. This talk is part of the Health Organisations and Policy course, which forms part of the Translational Health Sciences programme. This event is free and open to all. Carolyn Steele Gray, MA, PhD holds a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair in Implementing Digital Health Innovation. She is a Senior Investigator at the Science of Care Institute and in the Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute at Sinai Health, and an Associate Professor in the Institute for Health Policy, Management and Evaluation at the University of Toronto in Canada. Dr. Steele Gray is an Implementation Scientist whose program of work focuses on the role of digital health in supporting integrated, person-centred and primary care delivery for patients with complex care needs, applying implementation science theory and approaches, along with evaluation methods to uncover to how best to embed technology into novel delivery models. Key to her transformational work is her international leadership in the areas of digital health and integrated care, notably through her work as a Senior Associate with the International Foundation for Integrated Care (IFIC), and a member of the Executive committee with IFIC Canada, where she co-leads a Special Interest Group in Digital Services and Data Enabling Integrated Care, providing strategic guidance and expertise through IFIC programs like their international Integrated Care Academy. Her national and international leadership in the fields of digital health implementation and integrated primary care was recognized by Digital Health Canada who awarded her Digital Health Leader of the Year in 2025 as well as by the North American Primary Care Research Group who awarded her the Mid-Career Scientist Award in 2025.
Is current law and practice fit for purpose and how can we work together to make it better? Professor Turner-Stokes is a consultant in Rehabilitation Medicine and Director of the Regional Hyper-acute Rehabilitation Unit at Northwick Park Hospital; and Chair of the Royal College of Physicians Guideline Development Groups for Prolonged Disorders of Consciousness. All welcome. The lecture will be followed by a short drinks reception. This lecture is convened by Professor Jenny Kitzinger (University of Cardiff) as part of a project supported by the Sheila Kitzinger Programme.
Romain Bertrand (Sciences Po/CERi) Now almost forgotten, Jean and Raoul Parmentier's 1529 expedition from Normandy to Sumatra's Westcoast was posited in the XIXth century as a successful, even glorious French contribution to the (alas mostly Iberian) achievements of the "Age of Discovery". Whereas it actually was a pitiful endeavor, either by economic or by political standards, it was raised to the status of an almost fabled event so as to boost French wavering colonial credentials. Even if it has shed a more realistic light on this enterprise, contemporary intellectual history may have helped restore its mystifying aura by turning it into a piece of evidence of the way "Renaissance high culture" travelled on board commercial ships by the early XVIth century. Using a social history perspective and building on unpublished archival material from Dieppe, Rouen and Le Havre, this presentation will attempt to show that officers and mariners on board "La Pensée" and "Le Sacre" were not would-be literati, but the bearers of highly localized, "situated" knowledges that had more to do with subaltern analogist understandings of the world than with any naturalist ontology-in-the-making. This, in turn, will lead us to reappraise the epistemic conditions of possibility of the (failed) "first encounters" between Europe and Southeast Asia.
The Graupera lab takes advantage of the PI3K pathway as a paradigm to understand how intracellular signalling pathways regulate vessel morphogenesis, and how this knowledge can be translated into therapeutic opportunities for diseases characterized by aberrant vessel growth. Our research has identified key and selective roles of several members of the PI3K pathway, including PI3Ka, PI3Kb, PTEN, and PI3K-C2b (J Exp Med, Nat Commun, Clin Cancer Res, Sci Transl Med, Circulation, Nature Metabolism, EMBO Mol Med, Sci Sig). Over the last decade, PI3Kα/PIK3CA has been recognised as a master regulator of EC biology. M Graupera has dedicated more than 20 years to studying this isoform in ECs. These discoveries span from: (1) the selective and cell-autonomous requirement of PI3Ka in developmental angiogenesis (Graupera et al. Nature 2008); (2) the contribution of PI3Ka in tumour angiogenesis (Soler et al. JEM 2013); (3) the understanding of the primary cell biological function of PI3Ka in angiogenic ECs (Angulo-Urarte et al. Nat Commun 2018); (4) the discovery that PIK3CA is mutated in the embryonic ECs, leading to venous malformations (Castillo et al. Sci Trasl Med 2016); (5) the PIK3CA-dependency to growth factor for pathogenesis (Kobialka et al. Embo Mol Med 2022). We have published a very comprehensive review on PIK3CA mutations in congenital disorders (Angulo-Urarte et al. NCVR 2022). Together, these observations have represented a breakthrough in the field, capitalizing on the repurposing of PI3K for these diseases. The Graupera lab works in close collaboration with paediatric clinicians at Hospital Sant Joan de Déu, Barcelona, to apply her discoveries in clinical practice to treat these patients. About Mariona Graupera: I am a vascular biologist with expertise in signalling. I have been trained in several institutions, including the University of Barcelona, the Hospital Clinic de Barcelona, the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, and the Bart’s Cancer Institute in London. In 2009 I established my lab as an independent investigator at d’Investigació Biomèdica de Bellvitge (IDIBELL) funded by the Ramon y Cajal program. In February 2021, I joined the Josep Carreras Leukaemia Research Institute as Group leader. In June 2022, I was elected President of the European Vascular Biology Organization (EVBO), and I served as a resident until June 2025. In January 2023, I was appointed ICREA Research Professor.
John le Carré’s books famously explored the constantly shifting ethical borders “between us and them” in the murky world of espionage. This talk explores how the concept of spying differs in reality between authoritarian regimes—marked by internal security obsessions and paranoia—and democracies, and how it manifests itself in Putin’s Russia today. Andrei Soldatov is a Russian investigative journalist in exile, a visiting fellow at King’s College London and the co-author of Our Dear Friends in Moscow: The Inside Story of a Broken Generation (2025). Irina Borogan is a Russian investigative journalist in exile, a visiting fellow at King’s Centre for the Study of Intelligence, and the co-author of Our Dear Friends in Moscow: The Inside Story of a Broken Generation (2025).
The speaker will argue that as the most diverse employer in the country, the NHS faces the formidable task of not only becoming an inclusive and fair workplace for its employees but also promoting the fair treatment of patients in relation to healthcare access, experiences and outcomes. This workshop will begin by looking at five schisms or tensions being witnessed in relation to EDI, and how that might challenge work as healthcare professionals. It will then utilise the following three-step framework to develop a sense of self-awareness and presence that can promote cultures that build greater inclusion: Looking inward: Self-reflection Looking outward: Considering others Looking around: Mindful presence
Applications are now open for Oxford Spring School in Advanced Research Methods 2026! Apply now: https://cvent.me/0EaK99 This renowned social science methods course will take place from Monday 23 March to Friday 27 March 2026, in both in-person and online formats. Our week-long programme offers graduate students and researchers a unique opportunity to learn cutting-edge methods in social science. Oxford Spring School 2026 consists of eight courses, which will be taught over five days. Four of the courses will run concurrently in the mornings (09:30-12:30) and four courses will run concurrently in the afternoons (14:00-17:00). The full list of course options for 2026 are: Morning Courses: Qualitative Methods: Interviews & Fieldwork Machine Learning Causal Inference 1: Social Science Experiments Text Analysis Afternoon Courses: Data Analysis for the Social Sciences Large Language Models Advanced Qualitative Methods Causal Inference 2: Design Based Approaches Applicants can select any morning course and any afternoon course together, and those selecting two courses will receive a 20% discount on the second course fee. In-person attendees will have the opportunity to experience a formal dinner at Lady Margaret Hall. There is also the option to book accommodation at Lady Margaret Hall, with breakfast included (please see the Spring School website for room options and prices). Find and more and apply: https://www.politics.ox.ac.uk/spring-school
We are pleased to invite colleagues from outside the Nuffield Department of Surgical Sciences (NDS) to join us for the first half of the inaugural NDS Research Symposium on Monday 23 March 2026 at the Richard Doll Lecture Theatre, Old Road Campus. The morning session will feature a series of 15-minute research presentations from NDS early and mid-career researchers, showcasing the breadth and diversity of scientific work taking place within the department. This will be an excellent opportunity to hear about emerging research, spark new conversations, and explore potential collaborative links ahead of the interactive afternoon workshop reserved for NDS participants. Representatives from our sponsors 10x Genomics and ThermoFisher will be in attendance and available to discuss research needs with participants during the networking breaks. Please register to attend the NDS Research Symposium by Friday 13 February 2026.
Do you want to make sure that your work complies with the open access policy for REF 2029? In this focused online briefing, we will: step you through the changes and new requirements; provide links to further REF information and guidance; let you know where to find help at Oxford; and answer as many questions as we can. Intended audience: Researcher & research student; Staff
We are thrilled to invite you to attend the European Phagocyte Workshop taking place on March 23-25, 2026 at Keble College, in the historic and iconic city of Oxford, United Kingdom. This popular workshop series highlights the latest advances in phagocyte biology. We will bring together 250 researchers from across the globe, providing plenty of networking opportunities to encourage new connections and collaborations. Our keynote speakers will be Ana-Maria Lennon-Duménil (Institut Curie) and Steffen Massberg (Ludwig-Maximilians University) and expert speakers from varied career stages will discuss key topics including Phagocytosis & Efferocytosis; Paediatric Innate Immunity; Phagocyte Mechanosensing; Phagocyte Flavours; Evolution & Development of Phagocytes; Phagocytes in Infection; Phagocyte-stromal interactions in Disease. The programme offers opportunities for junior researchers to deliver oral presentations, flash talks and posters. Registration is now open, please register early to avoid disappointment. Visit the conference website for more details: https://www.phagocytes2026.com/ Key dates Early registration deadline: 1 December 2025 Abstract submission deadline: 9 January 2026 Standard registration deadline: 1 February 2026 Late registration deadline: 1 March 2026 Please direct any questions about the workshop and registration to Charlotte: phagocytes2026@kennedy.ox.ac.uk
Join Kieran Nevin from Student Welfare and Support Services as he shares his CI story, showing how making a complex process visible revealed risk, waste and opportunity. The session explores how data and customer insight were used to shape clear options, build a strong funding case and move confidently from analysis to action.
Coaching skills can help you build positive and effective working relationships with all those you work with. Coaching is a highly impactful approach to people development and can support individuals to identify goals, gain insights into challenges, consider options and plan actions. They are a valuable asset to leaders and managers and can be useful in a range of workplace conversations, such as feedback, delegation and career development reviews.
Do you need help managing your references? Do you need help citing references in your documents? This online session will introduce you to EndNote, a subscription software programme which can help you to store, organise and retrieve your references and PDFs, as well as cite references in documents and create bibliographies quickly and easily. On completing the workshop you will be able to: understand the main features and benefits of EndNote; set up an EndNote account; import references from different sources into EndNote; organise your references in EndNote; insert citations into documents; and create a bibliography/reference list. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; taught student; researcher and research student
How do you ensure that your research is credible, to yourself and others? Preregistration means specifying in advance your hypotheses, methods, and/or analyses for a study, in a time-stamped file that others can access. Many fields, including behavioural and medical sciences, are increasingly using preregistration or Registered Reports (where a journal accepts your study at preregistration phase, and guarantees to publish the results if you follow the registered plan). If you've never preregistered a study before (or even if you have!) it can be complicated and hard to do well. In this workshop, we will go over the 'what,' 'why,' and 'how' of preregistration, and after some practice exercises, you will start drafting your own preregistration. We will also discuss some of the common challenges of preregistration, and its limitations. After the course, you will be able to: describe what preregistration and Registered Reports are (and how they differ); explain the benefits (and drawbacks) of preregistration and Registered Reports; identify what types of research are most suited for preregistration and Registered Reports; recognise the common pitfalls in writing a preregistration; identify the logistics of preregistering: which format and platform to use; and demonstrate the ability to write an effective preregistration, with an appropriate balance of specificity and concision. Intended audience: researcher and research student; staff
COURSE DETAILS The session will cover: What makes a good DPhil Planning to write up your DPhil – structure, content and what makes good writing What the viva will explore What the examiners are asked to consider FAQs and Q&A LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of the session participants will be able to: Engage productively with the final stages of the DPhil. Apply a range of time management techniques. Identify and apply the characteristics of effective writing. Apply effective structure to the thesis. Understand what is required in the viva. Take opportunities to raise and discuss concerns.
The second in a duo of courses (attendees should attend the Fundamentals course prior to Logistics) that will cover the logistics of researching, publishing, and locating open scholarship resources and tools at the University of Oxford. Subjects include: what is the Oxford University Research Archive? depositing work into ORA via Symplectic Elements; depositing data into ORA-data; applying for one of Oxford’s APC block grants; registering or connecting your ORCID; how to be included in the rights retention pilot; and locating and checking funder policies. Ideally the Fundamentals of open access course will have been attended. If you’re not in a position to attend this course you can find similar information in our e-learning package (Digital induction to open access (MSD)) to work through prior to attending Logistics. Intended audience: researcher and research student; staff
Lesson of the week, clinical cases and research. All clinical and academic staff and students welcome. Coffee and Tea will be served.
Puzzled by PICO? Daunted by databases? Baffled by Boolean? This one-hour introductory class will offer top tips and advice on how to find literature to answer a research question. No prior experience necessary! Together, we will break down a question into the PICO format, put together a structured search, and try it out in PubMed. By the end of this session, you will be able to: explain what structured searching is, and when to use it; break your research question down into searchable concepts; and make use of Boolean operators (ANDs/ORs) in your structured searches. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; taught student; researcher and research student
The Centre’s Annual Symposium is a celebration of the passion and commitment to cancer research that is shared across our community. Registration to attend the symposium will be open until Tuesday 3rd March 2026. With approximately 300 people attending each year, it provides an opportunity for our members to network and build new collaborations.
Are you baffled by open, confused by embargoes? Does the mention of the colour gold or green catapult you into a realm of perplexed irritation? Come to this session, where we’ll break down open access and all its many jargon terms, confusing publishing structures and hint at the advantages you can reap by publishing open. In this session you’ll learn: what is open access? Key terms – Gold, Green, Article Processing Charges; where to get more information and help; where to look for open access material; and useful tools to assist you in publishing open access. Intended audience: researcher and research student; staff
In 1969 Michel Serres was elected professor in the history of science at University Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne where he served until 1989. However, this mathematician turned philosopher considered this election as a mistake or even a mischief and he never endorsed the role of historian. He taught the history of science in spite of himself although he was an expert in this domain, unlike Sganarelle, the Doctor in spite of himself staged by Molière. For him, teaching the history of science was a way to reconcile his two passions for science and literature. In this paper I will outline three aspects of Serres’s unorthodox view of the history of science: i) there is no rigid boundary between science, fable and myths; ii) science generates a time of its own that is neither amenable to the arrow of progress nor to a timeline; iii) his history science raises a philosophical question: who are the subjects of knowledge?
Convened by Frank A.J.L. James (UCL) This meeting is being held to commemorate the life, work and legacy of William Hodgson Brock (1936-2025), who spent his entire career at the University of Leicester. Sometime chair of SHAC and editor of its journal Ambix, Brock was one of the leading historians of chemistry in his time, writing the Fontana/Norton History of Chemistry, as well as biographies of William Crookes, Justus von Liebig and Henry Edward Armstrong. (An extended obituary can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00026980.2025.2489298). The papers to be presented at this meeting take their starting point from Brock’s work and historical interests. There is no charge for this meeting, but please let Frank James, frank.james@ucl.ac.uk, know if you wish to attend. Programme 9.30am Welcome: Stéphane Van Damme, MFO, and Frank James, SHAC 10.00am First Brock Award Lecture: Bernadette Bensaude-Vincent, Université Paris 1-Panthéon-Sorbonne 'The history of chemistry through the lens of materials. A very short introduction' 10.45am Session 1: Alan Rocke, Case Western Reserve University: The Best of Frenemies: Liebig and Dumas (A Tribute to William H. Brock) 11.15 Coffee Session 2: Eira H. Betthell (Booth), University of Essex: 'From Laboratory to Library: Bill Brock’s Prolific Writing as Chemical Practice' Matthew Daniel Eddy, Durham University: 'A Context for Colonial Chemistry: Thinking with Bill Brock about the Biomedical Relevance of Dr J. A. B. Horton's Experiments on the Soil of Sierra Leone' Georgiana D. Hedesan, University of Oxford: 'The Foundation of the Society for the Study of Alchemy and Early Chemistry in 1935: Between Historical Research and the Transmutational Paradigm' Michael Jewess, Independent Scholar: 'Working with Bill: Robert Fergus Hunter (1904-1963)' 13.15 Lunch 14.30 Tribute from the Brock family: Susannah Ahluwalia, Gareth Brock and Benjamin Brock 14.50 Session 3: Julia Carr-Trebelhorn, University of Cincinnati: 'Burning Diamonds: Lavoisier, Guettard, and the 1771 Development of Reduction Firing and Hard-Paste Porcelain in Paris' John R.R. Christie, University of Oxford 'Commerce, Manufacture and Practical Chemistry in 18th-Century Britain' Robert Bud, Science Museum/UCL: 'Poison gas and Art Deco: analysing early 20th century ambivalence about chemistry' 16.00 Coffee 16.20 Session 4: Robin Mackie (Open University and Gerrylynn K Roberts, Independent Scholar) 'Counting the British Chemical Community, 1881-1971: Opening the ‘Black Box'' Annette Lykknes, Norwegian University of Science and Technology: 'Crookes’ Vis Generatrix in teaching and learning' 17.15 Closing remarks
The present study focuses on persistence in research productivity over the course of an individual’s entire scientific career. We track “late-career” scientists—scientists with at least 25 years of publishing experience (N = 320,564)—in 16 STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine) and social science disciplines from 38 OECD countries for up to 5 decades. Our OECD sample includes 79.42% of late-career scientists globally. We examine the details of their mobility patterns as early-career, midcareer, and late-career scientists between decile-based productivity classes, from the bottom 10% to the top 10% of the productivity distribution. Methodologically, we turn a large-scale bibliometric data set (Scopus raw data) into a comprehensive, longitudinal data source for research on careers in science. The global science system is highly immobile: Half of global top performers continue their careers as top performers and one-third of global bottom performers as bottom performers. Jumpers-Up and Droppers-Down are extremely rare in science. The chances of moving radically up or down in productivity classes are marginal (1% or less). Our regression analyses show that productivity classes are highly path-dependent: There is a single most important predictor of being a top performer, which is being a top performer at an earlier career stage.
From militarised border regimes to racialised technologies of policing, from extractive geopolitics to nationalist media and electoral campaigns, the grammar and practice of fascism is global. This interdisciplinary conference examines how fascism and global Africa are entangled politically, economically, and imaginatively across time and space. By foregrounding geographies of anti-Blackness and imperial capitalism as core dimensions of fascist rule, we set out to look at how racial capitalism, colonial legacies, and authoritarian formations intersect in the making of global fascist orders. The concept of global Africa builds upon contemporary Pan-African thought and practice as generative and contested geographies of thought, solidarity, resistance. We are witnessing a revival of Pan-African solidarities in activist, intellectual, and cultural spaces, including transnational campaigns against state violence, police brutality, constitutional amendments, arbitrary detainment, mobilisations for liberation, and more in Burkina Faso, Sudan, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Congo, Senegal, South Africa (and so many more!), signalling renewed possibilities for anti-imperial, anti-fascist, and (potentially) anti-capitalist futures. Across the Americas, from Brazil and Colombia to the United States and the Caribbean, Black and Afro-Indigenous movements continue to confront police killings, environmental dispossession, and authoritarian repression while forging alliances that link struggles on the African continent. We are particularly interested in bringing geographers into conversation with scholars of politics, history, anthropology, and media studies. Geographers, with our attention to spatiality, mobility, territory, and networks, possess a valuable toolkit for examining how fascism travels and operates transnationally—through shared ideas, international activist and organisational networks, capital (including surveillance capital, far-right tech investors and platform owners, and artificial intelligence systems), militarised technology, and the legal, activist, intellectual, and political struggles that resist it.
To elucidate the virological characteristics of newly emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants in real-time, I launched a consortium, “The Genotype to Phenotype Japan (G2P-Japan)”. With the G2P-Japan consortium colleagues, we have revealed the virological characteristics of SARS-CoV-2 variants. In this talk, I briefly introduce the scientific activity of G2P-Japan consortium and our current study focusing on the dynamics of coronavirus infection and spread in Asian countries in the wild. I would like to discuss the possibility for international collaboration to prepare for the outbreaks and pandemic that will happen in the future. Bio Sketch: Dr. Kei Sato is a professor in the Institute of Medical Science, the University of Tokyo, Japan. In March 2010, he got a Ph.D. (Medicine) in Institute for Virus Research, Kyoto University, Japan. In April 2018, he started his own laboratory as a principal investigator in the Institute of Medical Science, the University of Tokyo, Japan. His laboratory is named "Systems Virology", and the aim of his laboratory is to expand and deepen the knowledge and method in virology. To investigate the dynamics of virus infections such as HIV and emerging viruses including SARS-CoV-2, he uses a variety of multiscale analytic techniques, such as experimental virology, bioinformatics and molecular phylogenetic. Such interdisciplinary investigations through experimental virology and other sciences will pioneer a new scientific field of infectious diseases. In January 2021, he launched a consortium, "The Genotype to Phenotype Japan (G2P-Japan)". https://www.ims.u-tokyo.ac.jp/SystemsVirology/eng-index.html
In this 60-minute online workshop you will be introduced to the methodologies and principles underpinning the conduct of literature searches for systematic reviews, scoping reviews and other evidence reviews. The session will cover: formulating a focused research question; preparing a protocol; developing a search strategy to address that research question; choosing appropriate databases and search engines; searching for grey literature and ongoing studies; managing your references in Covidence; and documenting and reporting your search. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
We are thrilled to announce that registration is open for OGOS 2026, taking place on 16 April 2026. Building on the success of the last three years, another exceptional programme has been curated - this time delving into covering the breath of UGI benign and malignant disease! The 2026 faculty line up once again brings together world-class experts who will share cutting-edge insights and foster dynamic, thought-provoking discussions, promising unparalleled opportunities to learn, engage and get inspired. There are places for consultants, trainees, Allied Health Professionals, medical students and patient advocates and we encourage you all to register as soon as possible to secure your place before registration closes at midday on 27 March.
This 90-minute session will cover some more advanced techniques for finding medical literature to answer a research question. We will recap some basics, then demonstrate searching in several medical databases, including using subject headings (MeSH) and the differences between platforms. By the end of this session, you will be able to: explain what subject headings are, and how to use them; search for words that appear near to other words; take a search from one database into another; save a search and document it. Intended audience: medicine and NHS; researcher and research student
OxPeace invites applications for this year’s (2026) intensive two-day training workshop, Thurs 23 - Fri 24 April 2026 (0th Week, Trinity Term) in international and local negotiation, mediation, and diplomacy, covering core concepts, lessons learned from the field and hands-on exercises. The course will in particular focus on how to mediate conflict and negotiate with difficult actors, who resist agreements for mutual gain and disregard established international norms and principles. Participants gain an overview of the practice — and theory — of peace and conflict negotiation and mediation. They will develop an understanding of the core concepts of distributive and integrative negotiations and will explore the particularities of international political negotiations, including intercultural aspects and value conflicts. Lessons learned from real-life peace mediation cases will be presented. Several role-plays help participants fine-tune key techniques for reaching agreements that work in the real world. Participants will explore evidence-based conflict mediation and negotiation tools and apply them in a wide range of practical exercises. They will learn about best practices from real life international negotiation and peace mediation cases and will discuss the benefits and challenges of using these concepts when dealing with difficult actors. On Day 2, participants build on their learnings, applying the concepts to engaging with difficult actors. Interactive discussions and exercises support participants to anchor and apply these concepts further. Who can apply: Applications are invited from students, practitioners, and academics from the areas of government and diplomacy, civil society including business and faith-based organisations, NGOs, the media, and all with a particular interest in international and local negotiations, conflict mediation, peacemaking and peacebuilding. Trainers: Martin Albani and Valentin Ade. Martin Albani is the former Head of the Peace Mediation and Dialogue Sector in the Foreign Service of the European Union (European External Action Service). A career EU diplomat (currently on sabbatical) he has more than 15 years’ experience in foreign affairs, conflict resolution and peacebuilding. Martin regularly lectures and holds workshops on peacebuilding and international negotiations at different universities and for international organisations. Dr Valentin Ade teaches negotiation at the University of St. Gallen, for the UN, and for a wide range of businesses, government organisations, and civil society actors. He is the founder of The Negotiation Studio (www.negotiationstudio.com). Participation fee and practical details A subsidy from the Oxford Peace Research Trust allows the fee to be just £50 for students, £100 for academic staff, and £350 for practitioners, with the voluntary option to help subsidise the student fee by paying an additional £50 or £100.The fee includes teas, coffees, sandwich lunches, and informal dinner on Thursday, but please note that accommodation is not included. The course organisers are not able to help participants to find accommodation, which can be expensive in Oxford and needs to be booked well in advance. Application Please submit a short statement (up to 200 words) stating why you would like to participate in this workshop, together with your brief CV (including your present course of study if you are a student), any dietary requirements, and your full contact details (email, phone, and full postal address) to Assistant Organiser Thomas Chapman Thomas.chapman@balliol.ox.ac.uk, Please apply as soon as possible, and at latest by 1 April 2025. Early applications are encouraged. We will reply as quickly as possible to let you know if you have a place. We will send bank details for payment, and your place will be confirmed on reception of the fee. NB: Visas: Any applicant who needs a visa should request an invitation letter (email all necessary personal details to Thomas Chapman) and start applying, immediately on acceptance to the workshop.
This is the centre’s eleventh annual conference, hosted by Oxford’s Department of Education. Building on the success of 2025, this will be fully hybrid, with 30 parallel panels and roundtables across six different streams: ‘Why it’s hard to make the finances add up’, ‘Equity, quality and affordability’, ‘Mobilities and inequalities’, ‘Freedoms and geopolitics’, ‘Governance and leadership and democracy’ and ‘Sustainability and reparative futures’. The opening plenary of CGHE 2026, to be held in Wolfson College, will celebrate the life and contributions of Professor Claire Callender, whose academic and policy interests helped prepare the ground for CGHE. Her groundbreaking work on student attitudes towards debt and its long-term consequences, along with her policy advocacy, are being taken forward by colleagues across CGHE’s international community. A key focus for the conference is equity and sustainability. Across the world, governments are wrestling with how to fund the escalating costs of higher education. The global shift to knowledge-based economies, a focus on life-long learning, and the aspiration for universal tertiary education all put traditional models under strain. These new financial models have to balance a range of societal expectations: affordability, equitable access, high quality provision, flexibility and long-term sustainability. Some countries, such as England, Canada and Australia, have chosen a high-tuition/high-aid funding model, often predicated on income-contingent student loans. Others, including much of Europe, have opted for low-tuition models to prioritise affordability, though there is also a growing private sector. Emerging economies in Africa, Latin America and Asia see rapid higher education expansion and differentiation, with fierce competition for the free or low-fee elite public universities, alongside growing tuition-charging private HE provision. Chile, South Africa, and the Philippines have recently implemented income-targeted free-tuition policies, highlighting the failings of previous systems. There is much to learn from these different models and the shared challenge of protecting the public good dimensions of higher education amidst constrained state finances.
Neil Henderson is an academic hepatologist and Chair of Tissue Repair and Regeneration at the University of Edinburgh. Neil’s group leverages cutting-edge approaches including the rapidly evolving field of single cell and spatial genomics to develop precision therapies for patients with fibrosis.
This interactive workshop will take participants through the full journey of health service improvement, beginning with the importance of defining and understanding the problem before leaping to solutions. Participants will consider how to approach problems thoughtfully, experiment with designing interventions, and reflect on the challenges of making change in complex health systems. Through practical activities and group discussion, the session will encourage participants to think critically about what makes interventions succeed or fail.
Professor Judith Breuer University College London https://profiles.ucl.ac.uk/9641
There is a growing literature on climate-policy mixes, much of which relies on ad hoc criteria and framings. A widespread, often implicit, assumption in this literature is that policy performance improves as more instruments are used. This lecture synthesizes existing approaches by systematically assessing their underlying criteria and rationales. It identifies policy-mix arguments distinguished by their focus on market failures, instrument synergies, multiple objectives, distinct policy levels, sector-specific challenges, intertemporal considerations, systemic coverage and effects, and policy processes. A comparative assessment is undertaken of the implications of these approaches for the policy mix, highlighting consistency, complementarity and incoherence. For balance, arguments in favour of keeping policy mixes simple are also considered, with particular emphasis on transparency, adaptive flexibility and international harmonisation. Finally, the links between policy-mix features and political feasibility are explored. The findings inform the formulation of an integrated framework and a set of guiding principles for designing climate-policy mixes.
Incumbency advantage in U.S. congressional elections has been a well-established feature of American politics. Since the late 2000s, this advantage has significantly declined, falling from a longstanding average of 10 percentage points to just 3, as we document using a regression discontinuity design. We show that this decrease was driven primarily by the expansion of mobile broadband. Both Democrats and Republicans were affected, though the decline was initially greater for the party holding the presidency at the time. Mobile broadband disadvantaged incumbents and benefited challengers. It improved voter knowledge of both, increased disapproval of incumbents, and enhanced challengers’ fundraising capacity.
We live in a world rich in data. This talk seeks to revive the philosophical tradition of cosmopolitanism to rethink some of the challenges associated with data governance. Although data cosmopolitanism can be applied to a wide variety of data types, this talk will focus on health data. Previously, I defined data cosmopolitanism as “a normative ideal aimed at addressing global data injustices, promoting data solidarity across the world, and fostering international cooperation on data initiatives to improve global health” (Rueda et al., 2025). This talk aims to broaden our understanding of the nature, benefits, and trade-offs of data cosmopolitanism. In doing so, it brings cosmopolitan philosophy into dialogue with global health ethics to examine the duties surrounding the collection, management, and sharing of data while considering the interests of the global community. In addition, I will critically contrast data cosmopolitanism with two competing positions: data nationalism and data regionalism. Unlike both approaches, data cosmopolitanism maintains that justice, solidarity, and cooperation are not confined to a specific country or region but should extend globally. Finally, the talk will conclude by addressing potential objections and acknowledging the limitations of data cosmopolitanism in a world marked by heated geopolitical tensions, a competitive global data economy, and the absence of robust global governance structures. This is a hybrid seminar. If you would like to register to join online, please complete the form below: https://forms.office.com/e/vUeSPgGnq8
We are delighted that the 2026 CPM Annual Lecture will be given by Professor Trish Greenhalgh; Personalised Medicine: A Primary Care Perspective. This will take place at the Maths Institute on Tuesday 28th April at 5:30pm. Trish Greenhalgh is Professor of Primary Care Health Sciences and Fellow of Green Templeton College at the University of Oxford. She studied Medical, Social and Political Sciences at Cambridge and Clinical Medicine at Oxford before training first as a diabetologist and later as an academic general practitioner. She has a doctorate in diabetes care and an MBA in Higher Education Management. She leads a programme of research at the interface between the social sciences and medicine, working across primary and secondary care. Her work seeks to celebrate and retain the traditional and the humanistic aspects of medicine and healthcare while also embracing the exceptional opportunities of contemporary science and technology to improve health outcomes and relieve suffering. Three particular interests are the health needs and illness narratives of minority and disadvantaged groups; the introduction of technology-based innovations in healthcare; and the complex links (philosophical and empirical) between research, policy and practice. She has brought this interdisciplinary perspective to bear on the research response to the Covid-19 pandemic, looking at diverse themes including clinical assessment of the deteriorating patient by phone and video, the science and anthropology of face coverings, and policy decision-making in conditions of uncertainty. She is a member of Independent SAGE, an interdisciplinary academic team established to provide independent advice on the pandemic direct to the lay public. Trish is the author of over 500 peer-reviewed publications and 16 textbooks. She was awarded the OBE for Services to Medicine by Her Majesty the Queen in 2001 and made a Fellow of the UK Academy of Medical Sciences in 2014. She has also been elected to Fellowship of the UK Royal College of Physicians, Royal College of General Practitioners, Faculty of Clinical Informatics and Faculty of Public Health. In 2021 she was elected to the Fellowship of United States National Academy of Medicine for "major contributions to the study of innovation and knowledge translation and work to raise the profile of qualitative social sciences". She became a Fellow of the Faculty of Leadership and Management in Medicine in 2024.
TBC
Course description This ½ day course is run by Professor Helen Higham (Director of OxSTaR & a Consultant Anaesthetist at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford) and is suitable for clinical and non-clinical staff and aims to provide an introduction to the fundamentals of human factors in healthcare. The course introduces participants to basic human factors frameworks, including the Systems Engineering Initiative for Patient Safety (SEIPS), and focuses on practical applications in the workplace to improve understanding of systems in healthcare. This course will align with the new National Patient Safety Syllabus Learning Objectives Improve understanding of human factors principles Introduce and explore a human factors framework (SEIPS) Provide opportunities to practise applying SEIPS to real world examples Course content Definition and background of human factors Human factors applied to healthcare Importance of work place culture (including Just Culture tool) Explanation of SEIPS framework Exercises using SEIPS Plenty of opportunity for discussion and questions
Title and speaker to be announced The Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that attendance at the Surgical Grand Rounds can count toward internal CPD, with 1 point awarded per hour. Please note that in-person attendance is required, and you will need to sign the attendance register. All members of the University and NHS clinical staff are welcome. Please email Tarryn Ching if you would like to attend online.
We study how immigrant legalization affects political representation and public service delivery, focusing on the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA), which granted legal status to nearly three million undocumented Hispanic migrants. Using geographic variation in IRCA exposure and newly digitized data on 12,000 Hispanic officials, we find legalization increased Hispanic representation in local government and facilitated upward mobility from school boards into municipal and county offices. These changes altered institutional behavior, shifting education spending toward capital investment and diversifying the racial composition of the teaching workforce. Immigration policy thus reshapes who governs and how public goods are allocated.
Join the Centre for Personalised Medicine (CPM), University of Oxford for a day-long symposium exploring the evolving landscape of direct-to-consumer (DTC) medical testing. Bringing together academic experts, clinicians, industry innovators, and regulatory professionals, this event will delve into the opportunities and challenges of DTC testing across hormone health and fertility, gut and nutrition, and genetics, and its broader impact on patients and the NHS. The day will feature presentations and panel discussions, examining how these technologies are influencing, and may continue to shape, patient pathways, clinical practices, and patient-clinician relationships within healthcare. The programme will also engage with the ethical, philosophical, and regulatory implications of DTC medical testing, asking critical questions about evidence, oversight, and responsibility in a rapidly changing health consumer market and its impacts on the NHS. With contributions from thought leaders across medicine, ethics, philosophy, regulation, and industry, this event provides a timely platform for interdisciplinary dialogue on a topical issue in modern healthcare. This event will be structured around three key themes: 1. Developments in direct-to-consumer medical testing 2. Implications of direct-to-consumer medical testing for clinical practice and patient pathways 3. Ethical, philosophical, and regulatory considerations of direct-to-consumer medical testing The provisional agenda is available to view here: https://tinyurl.com/czeny2bm Attendance for this event is in-person only. Recordings of all presentations will be available on the CPM website and YouTube channel following the event. As capacity for this event is limited, we kindly ask that you inform us if you are unable to attend after registering, so that your place may be offered to another participant.
We examine the rapid growth of Brazil's private online higher education sector and its impact on market structure and college enrolment. Exploiting regional and field-specific variation in online education penetration, we find that online programs increase enrolment for older students but divert younger students from higher-quality in-person programs. Increased competition lowers the prices of in-person programs but leads to a decline in their provision. Using an equilibrium model of college education, we quantify that in the absence of online education, the average student would experience 3.4% higher value added. While young students benefit from fewer online options, older students are disadvantaged. Targeted policies limiting online education to older cohorts have the potential to improve value added across all groups.
Complimentary refreshments from 3:30pm in the Hume-Rothery Meeting Room. Composites with intricate microstructures are ubiquitous in the natural world where they fulfil the specific functional demands imposed by the environment. For instance, nacre presents a fracture toughness 40 times higher than its main constituent, a crystalline form of calcium carbonate. This relative increase in toughness value is obtained as a crack propagating within this natural brick-and-mortar structure must interact with multiple reinforcing mechanisms, leading to a millimetre-sized process zone. The boost in performance obtained has pushed scientists for a few decades to use nacre as a blueprint to increase the toughness of synthetic ceramics and composites. Our ability to reproduce accurately the structure of nacre from the nanometre to the millimetre scale has improved with the introduction of Magnetically-Assisted Slip Casting (M.A.S.C.), a technique that combines an aqueous-based slip casting process with magnetically-directed anisotropic particle assembly. Using this technique, we can now fine-tune the structural properties of nacre-inspired alumina-based composites to reach strengths up to 670 MPa, KIC up to 7 MPa.m1/2 with subsequent stable crack propagation and this even at temperature up to 1200°C. While these materials already present interesting properties for engineering applications, we fail to see the large process zones that are acting in natural nacre. This led us to work on a new composite system, using this time monodisperse silica rods that can self-assemble into bulk colloidal crystals to finally test the effect of order in the microstructure on the toughness. The presence of this regularity in the microstructure proved crucial in enabling a large process zone. We obtained a 40-fold increase in toughness compared with the polymer use as a matrix in a composite made of 80% in volume of ceramic, all of which is processed at room temperature. From these two studies, we can extract the role of the interface and grain morphology in tough bioinspired composites and what will be the next steps for these materials. Brief biography Florian Bouville is a senior lecturer in the Centre for Advanced Structural Ceramics in the Department of Materials of the Imperial College London. His group is researching both colloidal processing and fracture mechanics, to design more robust and durable materials based on their microstructure and not composition, with applications ranging from high temperature structural components for aerospace to energy storage devices. These studies are supported by various funding sources, including an ERC Starting Grant and the European Space Agency. He obtained his Master's degree in Material Sciences at the Institut National des Sciences Appliquées de Lyon (INSA de Lyon, France) in 2010. He then moved to the South of France for his PhD between three partners: the company Saint-Gobain, the Laboratory of Synthesis and Functionalization of Ceramics and the MATEIS laboratory (INSA de Lyon). From 2014 to 2018, he was a postdoctoral researcher and then scientist in the Complex Materials group at the Department of Materials at the ETH Zürich.
Title and speaker to be announced The Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that attendance at the Surgical Grand Rounds can count toward internal CPD, with 1 point awarded per hour. Please note that in-person attendance is required, and you will need to sign the attendance register. All members of the University and NHS clinical staff are welcome. Please email Tarryn Ching if you would like to attend online.
Professor Merryn Voysey University of Oxford https://www.ovg.ox.ac.uk/team/merryn-voysey
Neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s are devastating conditions with poorly understood mechanisms and no known cure. Yet a striking feature of these conditions is the characteristic pattern of invasion throughout the brain, leading to well-codified disease stages visible to neuropathology and associated with various cognitive deficits and pathologies. This evolution is associated with the aggregation of key toxic proteins. In this talk, I will show how we use multiscale modelling to gain insight into this process In particular, by looking at protein dynamics on the connectome, we can unravel some of the universal features associated with dementia that are driven by both network topology and protein kinetics leading to changes in brain activity. Alain Goriely is a mathematician with broad interests in mathematical methods, sciences, and engineering. He is well known for his contributions to fundamental and applied solid mechanics, and, in particular, for the development of a mathematical theory of biological growth, He joined the University of Oxford in 2010 as the inaugural Statutory Professor of Mathematical Modelling and fellow of St. Catherine's College. He is currently the Director of the Oxford Centre for Industrial and Applied Mathematics. In addition, Alain enjoys scientific outreach based on problems connected to his research including tendril perversion in plants, twining plants, umbilical cord knotting, whip cracking, the shape of seashells, visual illusions, and brain modelling,. For his contribution to mathematics and sciences, he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 2022, received the Society of Engineering Science Engineering Medal in 2024 and the David Crighton Medal in 2025. https://www.maths.ox.ac.uk/people/alain.goriely
We all have emotions, but where do they come from? In this talk, I will present evidence that some emotional states are associated with discrete, innate expressions. I will draw on investigations of vocal expressions of emotions in non-human primates and congenitally deaf individuals, as well as across different cultures. These findings support the notion that emotional vocalisations are specialised adaptations that have evolved to help us deal with recurring challenges and opportunities, and are modulated by learning. I will argue that our understanding of what emotions are should include a functional perspective centred around emotion preparedness.
What makes teaching a profession—and how does initial teacher education (ITE) contribute to that status? One influential idea, introduced by Lee Shulman, is that professions are often defined by a signature pedagogy: a distinctive way of teaching that reflects the profession’s core values, alongside agreed knowledges and practices. If teacher education had such a pedagogy, could it strengthen claims to legitimacy, authority, and agency? And if so, what would it look like—and would it even be desirable? This seminar explores these questions through findings from three research projects that examine teacher education at different scales: within a single institution across subjects and phases; across multiple institutions during a period of policy reform; and across diverse international contexts. Together, these studies shed light on whether a signature pedagogy for teacher education is desirable, if it exists, what form it might take, and how this could reshape our understanding of ITE—not only for educators, but also for policymakers seeking to influence it. Speaker Bio: Clare Brooks is a Professor of Education at the University of Cambridge. Her research focuses on how policy influences access to teacher education for isolated communities, and the implications for high-quality initial teacher education at scale. She takes up the role of Head of the Faculty of Education in October 2026.
In this session we will cover how to locate and interpret journal level metrics such as the Journal Impact Factor (JIF). We will examine the tools you can use to locate journal level metrics, such as Journal Citation Reports and Scopus Sources. We will also consider the uses, limitations and pitfalls inherent in these metrics and how they can be used responsibly. By the end of the session, you will be familiar with: the major journal metrics and how these are calculated; accessing journal citation data using Journal Citation Reports and Scopus Sources; using JIF, CiteScore and SJR journal metrics to rank journals; and the limitations of different metrics, including how journal metrics may be skewed or distorted. Intended audience: Taught student; Researcher & research student
This paper proposes a new class of time varying models for which a vector of unknown parameters may vary stochastically or deterministically over time or be a mixture of both types. There are novel features to this class and its econometric treatment differs from the existing literature which typically separates stochastic and deterministic time variation in the parameters. Estimation methods for the former are often based on Bayesian resampling algorithms whereas nonparametric estimation methods are usually employed for fitting unknown deterministic functional forms. This paper develops instead a unified approach based on orthonormal series decompositions to estimating time variation irrespective of whether that variation is stochastic or deterministic. The proposed procedure has wide applicability, covering linear and nonlinear time series models as well as stochastic trends. Consistent estimators of the time varying structures are developed and the limit theory for each of the settings is established. A notable outcome is that unit root time-varying parameters can be estimated with asymptotic validity and fast rates of convergence when the unit root structure is captured by an orthonormal series representation. Other advantages include the flexibility and convenience of the approach in practical implementation. Simulations are conducted to examine finite sample performance and the procedures are illustrated in several real data examples.
Capital in modern economies increasingly takes the form of intangible capital, whose formation heavily depends on the contributions of specialized workers—such as inventors, managers, and entrepreneurs. To examine the macroeconomic implications of this fact, we develop and calibrate a general neoclassical model where capital formation requires both investment goods (tangible investments) and specialized labor (intangible investments). We show that rising intangibles renders the supply of capital more inelastic owing to the limited supply of specialized labor. Rising intangibles also change the incidence of capital taxation: whereas in traditional neoclassical models the tax burden falls entirely on production workers, in intangible economies, it is borne primarily by specialized workers and capital owners.
As part of ‘French Sciences in Oxford: Cross-Channel Conversations’ Christophe Prieur (CNRS) Chaired by Dong (Lilly) Liu (University of Oxford) Abstract: This lecture aims to provide a comprehensive overview of current research in control theory and its applications. Rooted in physics, engineering, and mathematics, this field integrates the modeling of dynamical systems, stability analysis of control models, and the design of efficient (or even optimal) control strategies. The lecture will highlight the key milestones that have shaped modern research in control theory and systems, with a particular focus on my contributions, as CNRS researcher, obtained with co-authors. We will explore how control plays a central role in addressing critical societal, informatics, and engineering challenges. Additionally, we will introduce ongoing research projects, including those related to high-dimensional systems, the control of uncertain systems, and the « deluge » of AI-based approaches transforming the field.
TBC
This screening programme explores a collection of Sinophone films whose genres sit in between an ethnographic film, documentary, essay film, and fiction. Through this screening journey, we will engage with various languages, narratives, perspectives, styles and textures of films that come across and reflect on the ever-changing realities of contemporary Chinese society – rich with nuances, obscurities, complexities, and uncertainties. The series will cover four themes, including COVID-19, Gender, Art and Society, and Rural-Urban, and will run from Feb to May 2026. Session 4 (Boundaries of Art): China's Van Goghs 中国梵高 Directors: Yu Haibo, Yu Tianqi Kiki Region: Mainland China Run Time: 82 min Screening Talk and Q&A: with Dr Yu Tianqi Kiki (in-person) Synopsis: An intimate portrait of a peasant-turned oil painter transitioning from making copies of iconic Western paintings to creating his own authentic works of art. China’s Van Goghs tells the story of the world’s largest oil painting reproduction village - Dafen Oil Painting Village (大芬油画村) in Shenzhen - and how its peasant painters, after years of copying Western masterpieces, confront reality, face themselves, and navigate the complex choices between morality, livelihood, and artistic pursuit. The film documents the difficulties, struggles, despair, and hope that these painters experience on their journey of transformation, as well as the clash and compromise between personal ideals and everyday reality. At the same time, the transformation of the Dafen painters mirrors the complexities and contradictions in China’s broader shift in the 21st century from Made in China to Created in China. It also critiques the exclusivity of the mainstream contemporary art world and the absurdity of how society assigns value to art.
"The Beating Heart is a cultural detective trail to try to understand how and why we have come to see the heart as we do." Professor Robin Choudhury Join cardiologist and author Professor Robin Choudhury in conversation with Dr Silke Ackermann, Director of the History of Science Museum to explore the cultural clues in Robin’s recent book, The Beating Heart: The Art & Science of Our Most Vital Organ. Robin and Silke will uncover the saints, artists, lovers, scholars, and scientists, who unwittingly influenced each other in building an understanding of the beating heart. They will discuss some of the beautiful heart images revealed in The Beating Heart that illuminate the age-old dance between art, religion, philosophy and ‘scientific’ thinking. Join us in our atmospheric Basement Gallery for a stimulating fireside chat.
This interactive session exploring the personal need to address Authority, Presence and Impact, for healthcare leadership.
In this session we will examine article level metrics. We will discuss how citation counting can help identify influential papers in particular fields and how altmetrics provide a different perspective on research output. Using tools such as Web of Science, Google Scholar and Scopus you will learn how to locate different article metrics. The session will also allow you to appreciate the limitations of different metrics and the importance of their cautious interpretation. By the end of the session, you will be familiar with: using Web of Science, Scopus and Google Scholar to track and count citations to papers and individual researchers; measuring impact using altmetrics; understanding how to contextualise metrics against other, similar papers in a field; and the limitations of different metrics. Intended audience: Taught student; Researcher & research student
This session will help you to understand what IP is, who "owns" it, and the things to think about when you think you have created IP. Whether you're an undergraduate, masters or DPhil student, or Staff at the University of Oxford, it is important to understand your rights and responsibilities when it comes to intellectual property (IP). This session will help you to understand what IP actually is, who "owns" it, and the things to think about when you think you have created IP. Case studies will also be presented to help explain the University's policy. Come prepared to ask any IP related questions in the second half of the session, where our expert presenters will give you the official University answers to any of your queries. In collaboration with Research Services, Oxford University Innovation, and The Careers Service. The talk will be from 12:30-1:30pm. If you have specific questions, the presenters will be available to answer questions until 2pm. Note: The sign up is through Inkpath, you will need to create an Inkpath account to sign up if you’ve not already got one.
This screening programme explores a collection of Sinophone films whose genres sit in between an ethnographic film, documentary, essay film, and fiction. Through this screening journey, we will engage with various languages, narratives, perspectives, styles and textures of films that come across and reflect on the ever-changing realities of contemporary Chinese society – rich with nuances, obscurities, complexities, and uncertainties. The series will cover four themes, including COVID-19, Gender, Art and Society, and Rural-Urban, and will run from Feb to May 2026. The fifth session (Rural and Urban) includes two films: The Mountain Sing 欢墟 Director: Badlands Film Group Release year: 2021 Run time: 40min Synopsis: 'Hawfwen', a traditional gathering that used to be popular, where the Zhuang people would sing folk songs. It often takes place around clan temples or under old trees. Singers are divided into male and female groups. They improvise their lyrics to sing in correspondence with one another. Travelling along the songs in antiphonal style, the camera has found different singers and gatherings, lingering in rural areas and cities, trying to find the broken echoes of 'hawfwen'. Before the Flood 淹没 Director: LI Yifan, YAN Yu Release year: 2005 Run time: 150 min Screening Talk and Q&A: with LI Yifan (online) Synopsis: To build the world’s largest hydroelectric power station on China’s Yangtze River - the Three Gorges (sanxia三峡) Hydropower Station, the world’s largest reservoir will also be created in the Three Gorges region. The reservoir began storing water in 2003, and by 2009, it was completed. Many towns, villages, cultural relics, and natural landscapes along the river would be submerged. Among them was Fengjie County, made famous by the poems of Li Bai, one of China’s greatest ancient poets. This film documents the entire process in 2002 of relocating and demolishing the old county town of Fengjie in the first stage of water storage for the Three Gorges Reservoir. It records the helplessness of an elderly Korean War volunteer and innkeeper facing the loss of his livelihood; the loss of faith of a Christian church in pursuit of relocation compensation; and the unavoidable conflicts, entanglements, and painful inner struggles experienced by resettlement officials and urban poor during the relocation and demolition of the old city. Before the Flood is the debut work of the two directors. It won the Wolfgang Staudte Award at the 2005 Berlin International Film Festival’s Forum for Young Cinema and was selected for the 2005 Cinéma du Réel Festival in France.
This informative and practical online training session will discuss the importance of lay summaries (or Plain English Summaries) in medical research and what’s involved in a lay reviewer role. Link to event – https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/5d178171-7adc-45f8-90e8-f808a9cdd83f@25d273c3-a851-4cfb-a239-e9048f989669 Who this is for? It’s aimed at any adult who would like to contribute to the research process. This session will give you the skills and confidence to be a lay reviewer when the opportunity arises. You will get practical advice from a public partner and researchers who work in patient and public involvement and research. You can have a go at reviewing a lay summary as part of a supportive team. You will also get a checklist of what to do if you are asked to be a reviewer. Speakers: Sue Duncombe: Patient and Public Advisory Group member, NIHR Oxford Biomedical Research Centre Cassy Fiford: Public Engagement Officer and infectious disease researcher, University of Oxford Polly Kerr: Patient and Public Involvement Manager, Medical Sciences Division, Department of Primary Health Care Research, University of Oxford Angeli Vaid: Training and Inclusion Manager, Patient and Public Involvement, NIHR Oxford Biomedical Research Centre
The talk will explore how artificial intelligence can achieve some of the core goals of a liberal society, by overcoming human error that produces discrimination and unfairness, but also how AI cannot overcome problems of randomness and contingency, which are core concerns of liberal thinking with respect to justice.
In this session we will examine metrics for individual researchers. Using tools such as Web of Science, Google Scholar and Scopus you will learn about the researcher h-index and its limitations. You will be introduced to additional metrics tools such as author beamplots which help to contextualise a researcher’s output over time. By the end of the session, you will be familiar with: accessing citation data for specific researchers on Scopus, Web of Science and Google Scholar; understanding how the h-index is calculated and its inherent limitations; creating an ORCID number to help track all your own research outputs; and the importance of research outputs beyond journal and conference papers when assessing a researcher’s impact. Intended audience: Taught student; Researcher & research student
Land use and the geographic distribution of economic activity are key determinants of a territory’s emissions of greenhouse gases. Emissions depend on whether land is built-up in cities, used for agriculture, or covered with forests. In cities, emissions depend on the extent of sprawl. We develop a quantitative spatial theory of land use where different sectors compete for land. Technological and demographic evolutions trigger structural change and shape land use, commuting and residential choices. Emissions change as a result. We estimate the quantitative model using French spatial data since 1950 across sectors. The estimation delivers novel insights on the determinants of land use and emissions across space and time and allows to evaluate the effect of technological change and agricultural policies on welfare, productivity and the environment.
A foundational question in perceptual science is the extent to which we can describe the relations between stimuli within the framework of a metric geometry. In the case of color, careful experiments have rejected the possibility that a Euclidean geometry can accurately describe suprathreshold judgments. Open, however, is whether a more general Riemannian geometry can play this role. A key factor that has limited firm conclusions is that to fully test Riemannian ideas, one requires a full characterization of color discrimination thresholds around every point in color space and for perturbations in every color direction. Recent advances in machine learning make measurement of this discrimination field tractable, and we have now made comprehensive measurements of color discrimination thresholds. The measurements enable computation of Riemannian geodesic distance between any two points in color space. I will describe our procedures, threshold and suprathreshold color difference measurements, and evaluation of geometric models of color comparison.
COURSE DETAILS During the course you will have the opportunity to manage a project. You will be able to apply the techniques you learn to a project that you bring along. Topics covered: project initiation, managing stakeholders and risk, time estimation, planning. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this session you will understand more about: The importance of planning. The tools to make project management succeed. How to estimate the time a project will take realistically. The skills you need to be a good project manager.
Joint with CSAE
https://profiles.ucl.ac.uk/7097-david-goldblatt
Our minds do more than simply react to the world; they adapt by flexibly controlling what we focus on and which memories we bring forward in the moment. Drawing on recent empirical work from our group, I will demonstrate how adaptive control is supported by both the internal selection of memory representations and the strategic trade-off between memory-based and sensory-guided behaviour. I will show that internal attention shapes successful retrieval across short- and long-term visuo-spatial memory and we will see that these same internal attentional mechanisms extend to language, where the dynamic attentional selection of memory representations supports sentence comprehension. Moving beyond traditional laboratory tasks, I will then show that in immersive, naturalistic settings, people differ in how and when they rely on memory, revealing stable, adaptive strategies that are largely independent of memory capacity. Finally, we will see that across the lifespan, older adults often underuse working memory in everyday contexts, yet retain a strong ability to flexibly increase memory use when task demands rise. Together, these examples offer insight into how internal attention and flexible memory use support an adaptive behavioural repertoire in a complex world.
This session will provide an introduction to the production, implementation and implications of the 10 Year Health Plan (10YHP) for England. It will provide an opportunity for participants to reflect on how it might affect them and the opportunities and risks that it creates. Nick is currently seconded into the Department of Health’s System Strategy Unit that supported the development of the 10YHP and chairs a working group of the National Neighbourhood Health Implementation Programme Taskforce.
COURSE DETAILS Topics will include presenting your CV, how to approach employers, writing covering letters and interview skills. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this session you will understand: How to improve your CV. How to approach employers. How to write a covering letter. How to plan for an interview. How to interview well.
Uhlig Group Speakers: Nima Gharahdaghi & Pai-Jui Yeh Title: “Anti-IL10 as a cause of intestinal Immunopathology” Lang Group Speaker(s): TBC Title(s): TBC
COURSE DETAILS This short practical session will help you understand more about the career context for research staff at Oxford and beyond. It will enable you to identify the skills and abilities that you need to develop and give you guidance on how to enhance them so you are prepared for a useful conversation in your next CDR. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this session you will have: An understanding of the career challenges and opportunities facing research staff at Oxford. An understanding of the skills you need to acquire. Started to apply a process of developing these skills.
Narrative CVs are being adopted by many funders, nationally and internationally, to give researchers the opportunity to showcase a wider range of skills and experience than is possible in a traditional academic CV; an example is the UKRI Résumé for Research and Innovation (R4RI). Writing a narrative CV requires a different way of thinking about and describing your skills, experience and contributions to research and innovation compared to a traditional CV. Writing your first narrative CV will take some time and effort; you might not be sure about what activities to include, and how to describe their quality, relevance, and your involvement in them. This presentation will try to demystify and simplify narrative CVs by providing advice, prompts and suggestions for how to write one. Speakers Mary Muers Research Culture Facilitator, MSD Kanza Basit Senior Research Facilitator, SSD Gavin Bird Head of Research Facilitation and Support, SOGE, SSD Susan Black, Careers Adviser, Oxford Careers Service Everyone welcome, please register to receive the TEAMS link for this event If you are a student or researcher with a CareerConnect account, please register "here":https://oxford.targetconnect.net/leap/event.html?id=22972&service=Careers%20Service All other staff register "here":https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=G96VzPWXk0-0uv5ouFLPke7xLB0LNIFKuA055EWF9ZtUMDI4VEEwVVk3RkNGRE5MTjRWWDNLRFRRTy4u, the joining link will be in the registration confirmation email
Title and speaker to be announced The Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that attendance at the Surgical Grand Rounds can count toward internal CPD, with 1 point awarded per hour. Please note that in-person attendance is required, and you will need to sign the attendance register. All members of the University and NHS clinical staff are welcome. Please email Tarryn Ching if you would like to attend online.
Dr Charlene Rodrigues LSHTM and St Marys Hospital London https://www.lshtm.ac.uk/aboutus/people/rodrigues.charlene
Further details to follow
From Diogenes the Cynic onwards, talk of shared humanity and articulations of humanism challenge the boundaries of citizenship and unsettle established patterns of meaning and identity. But from the early modern period, humanism as a term became associated with secular and anti-religious philosophies. And recent critical treatments of modern western humanism identify how it was aligned with and contributed to colonial and racist projects of domination. However, there are moves to recover and repair humanism as a moral and political framework, moves that also point to its varied religious forms and how humanism was never just western, but is articulated in different ways in multiple traditions around the world. Historians also identify how different humanisms developed as part of and overlapped within varied projects of liberation and social healing ranging from the abolition movement, the origins of humanitarianism, and the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa. This conference contributes to these debates by examining religious traditions of humanism and how they form a point of connection between divergent and often conflicting religious and philosophical frameworks. In particular, it focuses on how Christian humanism intersects with other religious humanisms, most notably those within Judaism and Islam, tracing their entangled histories, overlapping conceptions of the human, and interwoven expression in contemporary democratic movements and humanitarian initiatives. At its core, the conference explores whether theologically grounded humanisms can serve as analytical, critical, and constructive frameworks for addressing pressing ethical and political questions, especially those concerning the ordering of our common life nationally and internationally and the peaceable negotiation of pluralism. A background and implicit question is whether historical and contemporary articulations of religious humanism can ground an ethic and politics of responsibility and solidarity that offer alternative pathways to forms of anthropocentric humanism, secular and other anti-humanisms, ethnoreligious nationalism, and civilizational chauvinism that are emerging around the world. Alongside academic papers, the program will feature a panel of practitioners whose work speaks to the concerns of the conference through initiatives to build bridges between different faith communities as part of democratic organizing, civic trust-building, community development, or conflict transformation. Contributions from the 2026 conference will be published in a special issue of the Journal of Religious Ethics dedicated to religious humanisms as moral and political frameworks. This event builds on last year’s conference, Christian Humanism and the Black Atlantic, which examined theological articulations of what Paul Gilroy has termed “reparative humanism.” Dates of conference: 11 - 13 June Location: Michael Dummett Lecture Theatre, Christ Church, St Aldgate's For any other queries, please email mcdonald.centre@theology.ox.ac.uk
Title and speaker to be announced The Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that attendance at the Surgical Grand Rounds can count toward internal CPD, with 1 point awarded per hour. Please note that in-person attendance is required, and you will need to sign the attendance register. All members of the University and NHS clinical staff are welcome. Please email Tarryn Ching if you would like to attend online.
Designed for medical students, doctors in training and other healthcare professionals, this experiential and practical workshop will focus on personal qualities, developing self-awareness, managing yourself, building and maintaining relationships, working with teams and developing networks.
Professor Kirsty Mehring-Le Doare World Health Organisation & St. George's https://www.sgul.ac.uk/profiles/kirsty-le-doare
An important driver of climate change inaction is the belief that individuals cannot have any tangible impact on climate change through their own actions. Currently available statistics are not suited to systematically assess or challenge this belief. In this paper, I derive the marginal impact of emission reductions – the effect of reducing emissions by 1 tonne of CO₂ (tCO₂) – on physical climate change outcomes, document important misperceptions, show how they affect behavior, and derive policy implications. Using climate models, I find that the impact of reducing emissions by 1 tCO₂ is thousands of liters less glacier ice melting, several additional hours of aggregate life expectancy, and multiple m² less vegetation undergoing ecosystem change. Subjects underestimate these figures by orders of magnitude. Moreover, their mental model is inconsistent with climate models. First, they misperceive climate change as a threshold public goods game. Second, they incorrectly assume that the marginal impact increases when others also reduce their emissions (strategic complementarity). Providing subjects with the climate scientific findings causally increases perceived self-efficacy, intentions to reduce own emissions, and real donations to reduce global emissions. The misperceptions and treatment effect are consistent with a mental model of threshold thinking, which predicts positive overall emission reductions of information provision in equilibrium. Providing information about the marginal impact is a cost-effective demand-side mitigation strategy. The information can also serve as a catalyst for other climate policies by reframing their benefits and challenging arguments against unilateral action that are based on threshold thinking.
Designed for research staff who are considering their next career move—whether within Oxford, within academia more broadly, or in other sectors. This interactive workshop supports researchers in navigating their career development with greater confidence and clarity. It offers participants the space to reflect on their ambitions, explore alternative futures, and engage in structured peer discussions to share insights and challenges. Participants will use design-thinking approaches to consider different career scenarios. The session then moves into goal setting and peer advice-sharing, helping researchers to build practical short-term plans and identify supportive resources and networks. Participants are introduced to key tools and services available through Oxford to support their development as they prepare for their next step, whatever that may be. By the end of this session, participants will be able to: * Articulate multiple possible career directions, including both preferred and alternative pathways. * Identify actionable short-term goals that support career progress. * Reflect on and assess their professional development to date, including skills, motivations, and values. Everyone welcome, please register to receive the TEAMS link for this event If you are a student or researcher with a CareerConnect account, please register "here":https://oxford.targetconnect.net/leap/event.html?id=23008&service=Careers%20Service All other staff register "here":https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=G96VzPWXk0-0uv5ouFLPke7xLB0LNIFKuA055EWF9ZtUNDZHUzhVQ1RSTjRJNjA4QkJTWDROVkwwNS4u the joining link will be in the registration confirmation email.
An introduction to the what, why and how of public involvement
Title and speaker to be announced The Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that attendance at the Surgical Grand Rounds can count toward internal CPD, with 1 point awarded per hour. Please note that in-person attendance is required, and you will need to sign the attendance register. All members of the University and NHS clinical staff are welcome. Please email Tarryn Ching if you would like to attend online.
COURSE DETAILS You will learn how to read a group, deal with difficult situations, use humour, match your presentation to the audience, and make an impact. You will learn how to get your message across so it is remembered. You will learn about timing and when you should deliver key messages. You will develop your self-awareness and understand its role in presenting. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this session you will understand more about: How to structure your presentation for impact. How your psychological state affects your presentation skills and how you can manage it. How to read a group and how to deal with difficult situations. How to deliver your presentation with more confidence.
More information and how to apply for a bursary: https://www.ovg.ox.ac.uk/iic Hot Topics in Infection and Immunity in Children (IIC) – The ESPID-Oxford Course is a residential training course which aims to provide basic information and updates in key areas of paediatric infection. The course is targeted at paediatric infectious disease PID trainees and trainers, including SAS, LED & Consultant doctors and all those who manage children with infections, covering topics in Paediatric infection. Delegates come from all over the world there is usually a 50/50 mix of trainees/consultants. All sessions are plenary and include a mix of lectures, case rounds, The Debate and the Annual IIC Quiz. Click here to view the programme - https://www.ovg.ox.ac.uk/iic/programme Programme Highlights: • The McCracken lecture: Meningitis, a history with Professor Xavier Sáez-Llorens Chief of Infectious Diseases and Director of Clinical Research, Dr José Renán Esquivel Children’s Hospital, Panama • Climate Change and Health with Dr Kate O’Brien Director, Department of Immunization, Vaccines and Biologicals, World Health Organization (WHO) • Determinants of Future Health with Dr James Gilchrist Wellcome Career Development Fellow, Oxford Vaccine Group & Honorary Consultant in Paediatric Infectious Diseases & Immunology • Sustainable antibiotic prescribing by Dr Emma Lim Paediatric Consultant and Paediatric Sepsis Lead, Great North Children’s Hospital • AI and microbiology with Professor Adrian Egli Director, Institute for Medical Microbiology, University of Zurich Early bird Registration Fees • Earlybird Trainee - ESPID/BPAIIG/PID Member £700.00 • Earlybird Trainee £790.00 • Earlybird Consultant - ESPID/BPAIIG/PID Member £825.00 • Earlybird Consultant £925.00 • Ensuite Accommodation with Breakfast £115 per night
Coaching skills can help you build positive and effective working relationships with all those you work with. Coaching is a highly impactful approach to people development and can support individuals to identify goals, gain insights into challenges, consider options and plan actions. They are a valuable asset to leaders and managers and can be useful in a range of workplace conversations, such as feedback, delegation and career development reviews.
TBC
Delivering effective health care requires a significant amount of teamwork among different groups of workers. Team structures are acknowledged increasingly as vital to delivering value, efficiency, and quality for patient care, particularly in the general practice space. But why are teams necessarily better than more traditional hierarchical work structures? When are teams best deployed for maximum success in patient care? How does one best work within a team? What are the key leadership approaches to making health care teams fulfil their potential? This workshop will address these questions in depth, through an interactive session that allows participants to gain exposure to the best practices associated with health care teams and their implementation.
Course description This ½ day course is run by Professor Helen Higham (Director of OxSTaR & a Consultant Anaesthetist at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford) and is suitable for clinical and non-clinical staff and aims to provide an introduction to the fundamentals of human factors in healthcare. The course introduces participants to basic human factors frameworks, including the Systems Engineering Initiative for Patient Safety (SEIPS), and focuses on practical applications in the workplace to improve understanding of systems in healthcare. This course will align with the new National Patient Safety Syllabus Learning Objectives Improve understanding of human factors principles Introduce and explore a human factors framework (SEIPS) Provide opportunities to practise applying SEIPS to real world examples Course content Definition and background of human factors Human factors applied to healthcare Importance of work place culture (including Just Culture tool) Explanation of SEIPS framework Exercises using SEIPS Plenty of opportunity for discussion and questions
A five-day intensive course exploring the critical challenges facing those working towards universal access to safe and affordable surgical, anaesthesia and obstetrics care. The course is suitable for those in all disciplines interested in global surgery, anaesthesia and obstetrics.
