science wire

The History of England..By a partial, prejudiced, & ignorant Historian?, a spoof history written by a teenage Jane Austen.

Liverpool, UK - 28 May 2010: A University of Liverpool historian will join museum curators and film-makers in collecting stories of Liverpool¿s `Sailortown' at a public event this month.

Scholars at Stanford consider how one of the leading thinkers of the 20th century helps us link the future and the past - and a former Stanford president recalls a friendship.

Robert Sinclair, the Charles M. Pigott Professor in the School of Engineering, has been named director of the Bing Overseas Studies Program (BOSP).

Currently there are a billion people without access to clean water and as a result five million children die every year.

If you're anything like us, you've been enjoying the BBC's The Story of Science series with Michael Mosley, which charts the progress of science through the centuries [see sample clip above]. You may remember from an earlier post that Pietro Corsi of Oxford University's Faculty of History was one of three leading historians of science that acted as consultants to the series.

Common threads between the Jewish and Muslim attitudes towards dying, and the guidance they may offer those working in the caring professions, will come under scrutiny at a University of Cambridge symposium this week. The event, on Wednesday, May 26th, aims to explore how two traditions which are often portrayed as sharply distinctive handle the question of death, as well as associated issues such as funerary rites and concepts of an afterlife, in surprisingly similar ways.

Stanford's David Kennedy and Silicon Valley investor Noel Perry are launching CaliforniaChoices.org at a May 27 event in Los Angeles.

PA 118/2010 The International Criminal Court (ICC) will make history next week when its supporting States meet in Uganda to consider adding a new crime to the range of offences it can currently prosecute.

They float like tiny jewels encased in stone: most are only a few millimetres or centimetres long but full of incredible detail - boasting tiny tentacles, eyes, legs, and forceps-like pincers.

The historic gardens of Somerset are the subject of a new book by Professor Tim Mowl and Marion Mako, from the University of Bristol's Department of Archaeology and Anthropology. The book is the latest volume in the series of county guides to the Historic Gardens and Landscapes of England, a project supported by the University of Bristol and the Leverhulme Trust , and is the tenth volume in the series.

A new survey of the boom in religious broadcasting in the Middle East reveals how the small screen is becoming an increasingly important battlefield in the struggle for people's hearts and minds.

'What was life like for wartime refugees living in Oxford?' is the question posed by University researchers.

A cancer expert from the University of Sheffield has today (18 May 2010) claimed that the battle against breast cancer is being won.

A remarkable archive of antique manuscripts which opens a window on to the experiences, hopes, fears and interests of people who lived during the 15th to 18th centuries has been put online.

Troilus and Cressida is an oddity in Shakespeare's oeuvre: the wickedly funny play leaves a bad taste in the mouth, unrelieved by a happy ending or any purgative, expiating deaths.

Kettle's Yard has brought together the largest group of paintings by the American painter Agnes Martin to be seen in the UK for more than 15 years.

The forgotten story of the British organisation that enabled the development of a system for measuring Longitude, only to disappear from memory after its demise, is to be told in full for the first time.

Cambridge, Mass.

BERKELEY — This year, four students — Pamela Krayenbuhl, Erik Petigura, Pedro Spivakovsky-Gonzalez, and Reid Zimmerman — were finalists for the University Medal, given to Berkeley’s top graduating senior.

The San Francisco-based Jim Joseph Foundation has awarded $12 million to Stanford's School of Education to create a concentration in education and Jewish studies focused exclusively on preparing doctoral scholars and researchers.

Cambridge, Mass. May 11, 2010 - Martin Puchner, a prolific and wide-ranging author of works on modern drama, philosophy, and world literature, has been named professor of English and comparative literature at Harvard University, effective July 1, 2010.

Thirty-three artists including Susan Collins, Simon Faithful and Martin John Callanan from UCL's Slade School will send live broadcasts from fields direct to users' desktops as part of a live multimedia art project.

PA 108/10 The very latest laser technology combined with old fashioned pedal power is being used to provide a unique insight into the layout of Nottingham's sandstone caves — where the city's re

Most voters on 6 May will be staring at a UK ballot paper, but visitors to the Pitt Rivers can see a more unusual election item.

Cambridge, Mass. May 6, 2010 - Historian David L. Howell, whose research has reframed pre-1868 Japan using perspectives from the nation's geographic and social peripheries, has been named professor of Japanese history at Harvard University, effective July 1, 2010.

Cambridge, Mass. May 5, 2010 - Stephen Burt, a published poet and prolific critic of contemporary poetry whose scholarly interests range across the verse of many nations, has been appointed professor of English at Harvard University.

We live in a world where enhancement of abilities, appearance, and health is commonplace.

This book provides an intriguing account of how conscientious objectors, who opposed war on religious, moral and political grounds, were perceived during the First World War.

The Arthurian legend has inspired European writers and artists for almost fifteen hundred years. From shadowy beginnings in early medieval chronicles and poems, it has developed through medieval romance to modern films and TV series.

One of the most important collections of Anglo-Saxon manuscripts - for centuries kept at Corpus Christi College - has been entirely digitised, making it the first research library to have every page of its collection captured.

A new BBC series starts tonight on BBC2 at 9pm. Presented by Michael Mosley, The Story of Science is an ambitious project: it aims to chart the progress of science through the centuries.

A new research collaboration involving historians from Cambridge is to examine how early medieval societies used the past to form ideas about identity which continue to affect our own present.