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17 results
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  • Article

Shame and the online free-for-all

| Lucia Osborne-CrowleyEduardo Rubio

Lucia Osborne-Crowley looks at how shame manifests online, where public humiliation is common and second chances all too rare.

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When everyday environments become anxious spaces

| Louise Boyle

Social anxiety disorder isolates those who experience it. Part of the solution is to design public spaces with mental health in mind.

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The catharsis of cringe

| David JesudasonCamilla Greenwell

Watching cringe comedy can be therapeutic. Find out why some of us are drawn to the build-up of stress in shows like ‘Frasier’ and ‘The Office’.

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A body apart from the head

| Rob Bidder

We look back at the importance of the head, from how it’s influenced our language to the bold political statement of having it removed.

  • Book extract
  • Book extract

Dangers inside and out

| Eimear McBrideAlexandra Gallagher

Eimear McBride reflects on the deadly consequences of misogyny in the wake of the murder of Sarah Everard and argues why advising women to simply “stay indoors” is wrong.

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Why do victims become violent?

| Laura BuiJessa Fairbrother

Witnessing both overt violence and coercive control can cause invisible harm to children. But preventing them from repeating that behaviour in the future remains a challenge.

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Six personal health zines that might change your life

| Loesja VigourNicola Cook

Personal zines put health conditions back in the hands of the people who experience them. Here are six that Wellcome Collection staff love.

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Where does violence come from?

| Laura BuiJessa Fairbrother

The popular understanding of certain ideas in psychology have become so embedded that it’s easy to blame the parents when a young person commits a crime. Laura Bui looks to the past for evidence.

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Living with invisible illness

| Hannah TurnerMaryam Wahid

What happens when the signs of your illness are invisible to the rest of the world? Hannah Turner describes the daily struggles of living with invisible illness.

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What is violence?

| Laura BuiJessa Fairbrother

Criminologist Laura Bui explores her early understanding of violence and outlines its definition and wider consequences.

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Adapting to life as a thalidomide survivor

| Ruth BlueHollie Chastain

Growing up as a thalidomide survivor meant coping with all the usual challenges of childhood and adolescence, while having to fit into a world designed for the able-bodied.

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The fine line between collecting and hoarding

| Georgie EvansNicole Coffield

Being ‘a collector’ is often celebrated but being labelled ‘a hoarder’ can be humiliating, at best. Georgie Evans asks what makes one set of objects a collection and another a hoard.

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Doctor in the house

| Ishani Kar-Purkayastha

A house is not always a home – sometimes it’s impermanent, impersonal. But other aspects of the itinerant life can be the source of a sense of home.

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Rediscovering a love of the game

| Lara GoodwinCarolina Altavilla

Sexism and homophobia in football prompted Lara Goodwin to stop playing the sport at 19. Today, while discrimination in the game is still rife, Lara has found hope – and like-minded players – in an inclusive east London club.

  • Book extract
  • Book extract

Renaissance women and their killer cosmetics

| Jill BurkeSteven Pocock

In this extract from ‘How to be a Renaissance Woman’, Jill Burke delves into a complex world of beauty products, poison and patriarchy – and reveals the impossible contradictions of femininity faced by 16th-century women.

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Befriending heavy breathers

| Mel GrantPhillip Job

Read the fascinating story behind the rare manual that helped volunteers on one of Britain’s first free telephone helplines to deal with masturbating callers.

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A story of death, trauma and austerity

| Marienna Pope-Weidemann

Marienna Pope-Weidemann, whose teenage cousin Gaia died after going missing, advocates a rethink of our systems, which currently fail many in mental distress.