- Book extract
- Book extract
The science of why things spread
From deadly pandemics to viral tweets, Adam Kucharski explores what makes something contagious.
- Article
- Article
The politics and power of audio-description
Traditional theatre audio-description often lets down artists and audiences. But, done well, it has the potential to be a force for creativity as well as accessibility.
- Article
- Article
Aphasia and drawing elephants
When Thomas Parkinson investigated the history of “speech science”, he discovered an unexpected link between empire, elephants and aphasia.
- Book extract
- Book extract
My important, ridiculous nose
The nose is a much-maligned appendage, but it’s a powerful organ capable of invoking powerful emotions from past memories and sexual attraction.
- Long read
- Long read
Healthy scepticism
Healthcare sceptics – like those opposed to Covid-19 vaccinations – often have serious, nuanced reasons for doubting medical authorities.
- Article
- Article
The Martians are coming
For over a hundred years, antagonistic alien invaders have been a popular focus for the imagined end of the world. But the destructive consequences of human behaviour is far more frightening.
- Article
- Article
People against pollution
Alice Bell reflects on what happens when communities help solve environmental problems, and whether citizen science can help fight industrial pollution today.
- Article
- Article
Bloody capitalism and the cash flow of the menstrual cycle
Once they thrived on taboos and shame. Now period-product manufacturers are finding new ways to flourish in this era of period activism – but products aren’t the end of the story.
- Article
- Article
Going viral in the online anti-vaccine wars
‘Anti-vaxxers’ are taking their message online using powerful images as well as words. But is the pro campaigners’ response any better?
- Book extract
- Book extract
The history of brainwashing
Is it possible to control what other people think? In this abridged extract from his book ‘Brainwashed’, psychoanalyst and historian Daniel Pick offers us a new history of thought control.
- Article
- Article
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.
- Article
- Article
What our facial hair says about us
Five bearded and moustachioed men choose five hirsute archive images to help them reflect on the way facial hair is linked with personality and identity.
- Article
- Article
Sacred cows and nutritional purity in India
Apoorva Sripathi explores the complex reasons behind India’s recent boom in all things dairy – beginning with a 1970s Western food-aid programme.
- Article
- Article
Does mass media pave the way to fascism?
In the aftermath of World War II, psychoanalysts found the psychological roots of authoritarianism closer to home than was comfortable.
- Article
- Article
How the Peckham Experiment inspired my fiction
Find out how an unruly mass of archive material from a 1930s radical health centre has inspired brand new writing.
- Interview
- Interview
Meet the climate emergency
Find out what led Yinka Shonibare to create the compelling artwork ‘Refugee Astronaut’.
- Article
- Article
When the sun goes down
Despite the country’s colonial and industrial dominion, the finest minds of Victorian Britain began to fear the devastating effects of declining natural resources. Even the death of the sun.
- Book extract
- Book extract
You, a thousand years ago
Jack Hartnell argues that, if we were transported into the medieval past, we’d find ourselves somewhere different yet strangely familiar.
- Interview
- Interview
Inside the minds of A R Hopwood and Honor Beddard
The curators of ‘Smoke and Mirrors’ reveal the stories behind the exhibits, and the intriguing truths the show confronts us with.
- Article
- Article
Bubbles of history
Since the 1960s, scientists have been able to study the air from past centuries by analysing particles in Arctic ice samples. But as the polar ice melts, the future of this research is changing.
- Article
- Article
Mark O’Connell’s prescription for writing
The Wellcome Book Prize shortlisted author of ‘To Be a Machine’ answers five questions on health, inspiration and storytelling.
- Article
- Article
In search of the ‘nature cure’
Under the competing pressures of modern life, many of us succumb to mental ill health. Samantha Walton explores why so-called ‘nature cures’ don’t help, and how the living world can actually help us.
- Article
- Article
Epidemic threats and racist legacies
Epidemiology is the systematic, data-driven study of health and disease in populations. But as historian Jacob Steere-Williams suggests, this most scientific of fields emerged in the 19th century imbued with a doctrine of Western imperialism – a legacy that continues to influence how we talk about disease.
- Article
- Article
How do advertisers get inside our heads?
Vance Packard exposed techniques of mass manipulation developed by 1950s advertisers that are still at work today in the age of big data.
- Article
- Article
Believe yourself better
There’s more to recovery than medication. In future, our unconscious minds could be recruited to put a positive spin on our health problems, helping us feel better faster.