Stories

Our words and pictures explore the connections between science, medicine, life and art. Dive into a story no matter where in the world you are. (Want to write for us? Here's how.)

Photographic full length portrait of a man in a white t-shirt sitting on a leather sofa. In front of him to the left of the frame is a wooden table with a laptop, keyboard and beat-box. To the right of the frame is a bass speaker and a floor standing lamp. Beside him on the sofa is a hat. A single line of text is legible on both the T-shirt and hat, reading 'Viewable'.
  • Article

Giving shape to sound

Fascinated by language and how music feels, Deaf rapper Signkid creates tracks that give shape to sound. He discusses inspiration, access and performing for all audiences, D/deaf and hearing alike.

Part of Art, activism and access

Photographic full length portrait of a woman outside in a woodland scene. She is walking along a rough footpath towards the camera, fingers loosely clasped together. She is looking off to the left. To her left are a series of tree trunks and surrounding the path and the in the background is the green of the grass and leaves of the trees.
  • Book extract

How stories bring us together

Elif Shafak considers how hard it is to be heard in our divided world, but how listening can nurture wisdom, connection and empathy.

Part of Inside Our Books

Photograph of a facsimile of an oil painting in a thin wooden frame, hung within the large green leaf foliage of a bush. The oil painting depicts a scene where a man is giving a small child a vaccination. The child is sat on it's mother's knee and the older sister and father figures look on. The scene is set in the 18th century.
  • Article

Cowpox, Covid-19 and Jenner’s vaccination legacy

The well-known story of vaccination pioneer Edward Jenner has at its heart his drive to make vaccines free of charge and available to all. Now his principles extend to the global campaign for a people’s patent-free vaccine for Covid-19.

Poster warning of the dangers to children from syphilis, showing a young girl standing with a crutch.
  • Article

Public health campaigns and the ‘threat’ of disability

By continuing to represent disability as the feared outcome of disease, public health campaigns help to perpetuate prejudice against disabled people.

Photograph of a man and his mother sat side by side on a sofa in a living room. The man is seated on the right with his arms crossed. He is leaning towards his mother. His mother seated on the left is laughing out loud and leaning in towards her son, placing her right hand over his eyes and forehead. In the background is a shelving unit containing books, ornaments, bottles of spirits and family photographs.
  • Podcast
  • Serial
Part6

What lies ahead

After five long months, Mark Thomas is moving out of his mum’s and looking ahead. In the final episode of his podcast, Mark asks his network of health workers how they feel about the future.

Part of Mark Thomas’s lockdown check-up

Mark Thomas’s lockdown check-up

In this six-part podcast Mark Thomas reflects on lockdown life with his elderly mum while investigating the wider impact of COVID-19. Every night Mark calls health and care workers across the country for a chat. Humbling and often heartbreaking, these conversations reveal what life is like on the coronavirus front line.

Books

Get stuck into one of our books, and explore the complexities of the human condition.

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Photograph of a chart showing locations on the large Intestine channel of arm yangming where acupuncture is prohibited during the eighth month of pregnancy, from Ishinpo [Chinese: Yi xin fang] (Remedies at the Heart of Medicine), by the Japanese author Yasuyori Tanba. The chart is resting on a concrete textured background.
  • In pictures

Imagining the foetus

From the miniature adult in the womb imagined by 15th-century artists to the increasing detail of today’s ultrasound scans, Tania McIntosh traces our changing view of the human foetus.

Part of Inside Our Collections

Photograph of a man and his mother in a kitchen. The man wearing a black t-shirt is stood behind his mother who is sitting on a chair. The man is looking straight to camera, leaning slightly forward, his arms resting on the arms of the chair which are out of shot. His mother is wearing a pink blouse and is looking vertically upwards towards him. She is holding her walking stick up towards him, handle end first. In the background are kitchen units, a Tupperware box of biscuits and the tap of the sink.
  • Podcast
  • Serial
Part5

Stress tests

In episode five of his podcast, Mark Thomas considers coping and resilience, talking to health workers about how they’re weathering a storm like coronavirus.

Part of Mark Thomas’s lockdown check-up

Photograph of a contraceptive pill model, Europe, c. 1970. White crackled glaze, with debossed "THE PILL" text in centre, on a grey concrete textured background.
  • In pictures

A brief history of contraception

From douches to diaphragms, and condoms to caps, discover the wide range of contraception methods people have used over the centuries.

Part of Inside Our Collections

Photograph of a man and his mother stood side by side in a patio doorway. The man wearing a black t-shirt and blue trousers standing on the left is holding a plant pot containing a pink flowering plant. He is looking to camera with a long suffering look on his face. His mother, standing on the right, is wearing a pink blouse and blue patterned skirt and is looking towards him, her face in profile. Her right hand is holding the handle of her walking stick. To the left of them can be seen the patio doors with a bunch of keys in the lock and the brick wall of the back of the house. To the right of them is a section of the door frame.
  • Podcast
  • Serial
Part4

Splendid isolation

In episode four of his lockdown podcast, comedian Mark Thomas considers the impact isolation is having on him and his mum, and on the health workers he chats to every night.

Part of Mark Thomas’s lockdown check-up

  • Article

When contemporary dance meets dyspraxia

Discover why a rare neurological condition meant an enthusiastic club-night dancer struggled with formal dance classes. And how persisting with those classes paid off.

Photograph of an old retractable cine film projector screen and stand, in the corner of a white walled room. To the right of the screen can be seen the reveals of a window with marble-like window sill and moulded wooden panels. On the screen is projected an archive black and white film of a man's face in profile just after he has sneezed. The film has captured the spread of the water droplets of his sneeze, backlight white against a dark background.
  • In pictures

How wartime propaganda encouraged Brits to wear masks

Unlike the UK government today, Churchill’s War Ministry presented a united front on the efficacy of mask-wearing to protect people from illness. And a 1941 propaganda film helped, with striking images created using the new art of electronic flash photography.