Insular definitions of the national past overlook the very things we should take pride in
AI is not just disrupting our lives but our very language too, writes Dan Clayton
Penny Pepper explores how she encourages disabled people to reclaim labels – to twist and refute them
It’s not hard to see how the evolution of cooperation and the evolution of language are mutually reinforcing, writes John Mitchinson
Did the Greeks invent irony? Rahila Gupta makes the case for Britain’s mastery and ownership of the device
Sian Norris considers Martha Gellhorn’s classic 1966 examination of propaganda, Real War And War Of Words, and updates it for Putin’s invasion of Ukraine
Anneke Campbell – Boris Johnson’s cousin – explores how ‘culture wars’ aim to demonise and divide and how their language is key
As Prince Harry calls out the British press for its cultures of attack, Dr Bethany Usher explores the history of journalism targeting specific individuals and how we might spot and counter it
Mic Wright explores the erratic approach of certain outlets to stories of corruption and wrongdoing
During lockdown, Keith Kahn-Harris discovered a strange anomaly inside Kinder Surprise Eggs, and almost began to uncover a vast corporate conspiracy…
Mic Wright on Boris Johnson’s obsession with The Godfather, and why director Francis Ford Coppola decried him for bringing “the beloved United Kingdom to ruin”
n the same week that Dawn Butler was expelled from the House of Commons, MP Dr Rosena Allin-Khan was ‘tone-policed’ by a white MP – and not for the first time. Sian Norris analyses a worrying trend
Government policy around counter-terrorism and programmes such as Prevent, not just media coverage, must be examined to shift damaging narratives around Islam in Britain
A new report shows there can be no excuses for journalists, says Brian Cathcart: if Al Qaeda was ‘terror’, then so were the Christchurch killings and the murder of Jo Cox
The UK Government is deploying legal dupery to criminalise vulnerable asylum seekers while taking the moral high ground, argues Amina Shareef
Alex Andreou dissects how the Vote Leave Government’s latest hollow message around the Coronavirus is devoid of any real meaning and betrays the contempt it holds the British public in
Iggy Ostanin unearths troubling new evidence of anti-Muslim racism in a rediscovered personal blog of Britain’s Prime Minister
Mary O’Hara explains what the Government’s announcement that benefits sanctions will be reinstated after a COVID-19 hiatus reveals about its whole approach to poverty
Duncan Campbell discusses how the words ‘lockdown’ and ‘stir-crazy” were an all too familiar reality for a section of our society long before the Coronavirus pandemic appeared.
John Mitchinson on why we should celebrate the success of the flexibility of the English language which enables its richness.
John Mitchinson on why biodiversity helps explain why we are all impoverished by the loss of languages.
Luke Murphy dissects the slogans of the General Election 2019 and what they reveal about class, empire, royalty and racism in Britain today.
(n.) secrecy, concealment; (adj., adv.) clandestine, hidden from view Rely solely on the headlines and you’d be forgiven for thinking not much of any consequence has happened this week, save for two former Labour MPs endorsing Boris Johnson in the upcoming December election. It’s true, Ian Austen and John Woodcock’s words were hardly beneficial to…
(n.) someone tasked with maintaining rules and keeping order
(v.) to fall short in replicating something already done by someone else Well, well, well. He’s only gone and done it. Apparently. After a week of frantic into-the-night renegotiations, a plume of white smoke finally puffed its way up from the Brussels skyline early Thursday morning. Rumour has it, from a burning pile of three…
Otto English considers how we have entered into an Orwellian world in which Brexit governs all and its supporters attempt to convince us daily that night is day and day is night.
scowth (n.) a period of time off from work; scope or freedom to focus on other things
public house bargain (n.) a poor or unprofitable bargain; a questionable deal For the past several weeks, it has seemed that Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s approach to the on-going Brexit negotiations has been to keep his cards close to his chest, and then at the very last moment reveal that he wasn’t ever actually holding…
(adj.) bitten by a spider They say heroes come in all shapes and sizes. If you support Brexit, for example, your current hero likely comes in the form of the glabrous Machiavelli currently working the gears of 10 Downing Street—and whose supposed reputation for political shrewdness belies the fact that he’s now engineered the government’s…
seagull manager (n.) an overseer who arrives, ruins everything, then departs without fixing it Two former UK Prime Ministers stepped back into the political limelight this week. One is a level-headed, fiercely pro-European, and still highly respected statesman, who has boldly used his platform to wade into the on-going High Court battle over Boris Johnson’s…
(n.) someone who treats the law with contempt; someone who deliberately flouts rules that are difficult to enforce
(n.) someone who supports a liar, or helps propagate their untruths
(n.) a worker who only busies themselves when they’re being observed
(n.) a messenger who arrives too late to be of use, or not at all
Salena Godden with an excerpt from the new book Others, published by Unbound, about her sister Jo-Ann who has Williams Syndrome. Others is published this week. This tremendous anthology celebrates how words can take us out of the selves we inhabit and show us the world as others see it. Fiction writers and poets make…
The Odeon of Death takes a look at the week’s events through the medium of cinema.
Salena Godden’s fourth episode of ‘Pessimism is for Lightweights’ warns of the dangers of too much bad news and the need for hope.