By Human Rights Watch
Click to expand Image A doctor working with a UN agency examines a woman at a clinic in Herat, Afghanistan, July 5, 2025. © 2025 Elise Blanchard/Getty Images The Taliban in Afghanistan’s western province of Herat have recently banned women doctors, patients, and healthcare workers from entering hospitals without wearing a burqa. On November 10, 2025, authorities prevented Shabnam Fazli, a female surgeon, from entering a major hospital in the provincial capital and detained her for several hours, allegedly for not wearing a burqa.The requirement of a burqa, a full-face and…
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By David Tindall, Professor of Sociology, University of British Columbia
We live in a time often characterized as a polycrisis. One of those crises is human-caused climate change, an issue currently being discussed by delegates at the COP30 climate talks in Belém, Brazil.
Another is disinformation, much of which has been focused on climate change. A third potential crisis comes from the implications of artificial intelligence for society and the planet.
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By Andrew J. Green, Lecturer in the Anthropology of Music, King's College London
Especially when Iberian and Latin American music is in the mix, it’s not quite so easy to separate ‘classical’ and ‘popular’.
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By Nazrul Islam, Professor of Business and Associate Director, Centre of FinTech, University of East London
Across the world, workers are increasingly anxious that artificial intelligence (AI) will make their jobs obsolete. But the evidence from research and industry tells a very different story. AI is not taking over the workplace. Instead, it’s quietly reshaping what human work looks like – and what makes people valuable within it.
In my research on how the workforce is being transformed by AI, I found that the most successful organisations are not the ones replacing employees with algorithms,…
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By Stephen Ryan, Course Director, MA in Songwriting, University of Limerick
The Netflix animated film KPop Demon Hunters has become the most watched film in Netflix history. The all-pervasive musical phenomenon centres on two fictional K-pop bands, Huntr/X and Saja Boys.
If you somehow haven’t yet seen it, think of an anime-inspired version of Star Wars via West Side Story. It’s not the first film to find major success with fictional bands. Here are five movie bands that transcended and overshadowed their celluloid source material to soar into a life…
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By Daniel Kelly, Senior Lecturer in Biochemistry, Sheffield Hallam University
Social media has made testosterone therapy (TTh) look like a lifestyle fix, but men without deficiency may be doing more harm than good.
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By Ellen Ruth Kujawa, Coastal Change Research Fellow, University of Hull; University of Cambridge
Hurricane Melissa devastated Jamaica in late October, killed dozens in Haiti and forced nearly three-quarters of a million Cubans to evacuate. The death toll across the region is still unknown – but Melissa will go down as one of the strongest storms ever recorded.
It also represents a bellwether for a new era of dangerous hurricanes, driven by climate change. These storms are becoming increasingly violent and harder…
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By Matthew Alford, Lecturer in the Department of Politics, Languages and International Studies, University of Bath
I went to Moscow this summer on a trip that was as awkward as it was illuminating. I left feeling Russia is not just a changed country, but a separate civilisation.
As one academic I met there explained: “Russia is not a fortress. Maybe as the Soviet Union, it was. But we are very open to the rest of the world – this time it’s the west that has drawn the iron curtain.”
Due to western sanctions over the war in Ukraine,…
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By Fatema Kawaf, Professor in Digital Marketing, Nottingham Trent University
Ashleigh Logan-McFarlane, Lecturer in Marketing, Edinburgh Napier University
During the first COVID-19 lockdown, we were both mothers trying to stay sane. Our chats often revolved around nappies, feeding, sleep deprivation and motherhood chaos. Between laughter and exhaustion, cloth nappies kept coming up in conversation.
Just the thought of all that laundry was enough to make us tired. Sure they would help reduce the 4,000–6,000 disposable nappies sent to landfill per child each year, but would they be detrimental to our wellbeing?
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By Andrea Holck, Doctoral Researcher, City St George's, University of London
Watching a film about dementia is, ordinarily, a sobering activity. We watch someone become imprisoned in the temporal chaos of their mind. We empathise with the family members nobly trying their best to do what’s right. We leave the film in a fog of melancholia, having been reminded of how sad the condition is.
And dementia is sad. But the stories we tell about it need not only be a premature elegy for someone…
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