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Printing the body
The 18th century saw multiple technical developments in both printing and medicine. Colourful collaborations ensued – to the benefit of growing ranks of medical students.
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Why the world needs collectors
Those who collect play an important role as “facilitators of curiosity”, says Anna Faherty.
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The birth of the public museum
The first public museums evolved from wealthy collectors’ cabinets of curiosities and were quickly recognised as useful vehicles for culture.
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Demanding a diagnosis for invisible pain
After dozens of hospital visits and handfuls of painkillers, a plethora of scans and tests bring diagnosis closer for Jaipreet Virdi.
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Our endless quest for eternal youth
From poisonous 16th-century cosmetics to the latest “vampire facelift”, discover the fashions in unsavoury methods for improving our appearance.
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History of condoms from animal to rubber
Come on a journey from the first recorded condoms in the 16th century to the modern female condoms in the 1990s – and everything in between.
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The meanings of hurt
In the early modern period, gruesome incidents of self-castration and other types of self-injury garnished the literature of the time. Alanna Skuse explores the messages these wounds conveyed.
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The eye of darshan
The Hindu concept of darshan means “divine revelation”, but it’s also about the multilayered ways in which we see the world around us. Adrian Plau explains how one image in a Panjabi manuscript relates to darshan, and why it’s so striking.
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Getting under the skin
Before the invention of X-ray in 1895 there was really only one way to accurately study the human body, and that was to cut it open.
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The big freeze
In recent years we’ve come to realise that global heating is our biggest threat. But it’s hard to shake off the fear of a return to ice-age conditions, the predominant narrative since the late 17th century.
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Colonialism and the origins of skin bleaching
The widespread practice of skin bleaching was heavily influenced by the Western colonisation and slavery of African and South Asian countries. Ngunan Adamu explores this toxic history.