By Danielle Turton, Senior Lecturer in Sociolinguistics, Lancaster University
Imagine time-travelling to Manchester, England in the late 1700s. What do you think people would sound like?
That’s the challenge facing Amanda Seyfried in The Testament of Ann Lee: portraying a working-class Mancunian accent from three centuries ago.
When historical linguists reconstruct past speech, it is an interpretative process. It relies on…
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By Alex Ford, Professor of Biology, University of Portsmouth
A new three-part factual drama, Dirty Business, highlights the murky world of the English water industry. This Channel 4 docudrama follows the lives of two concerned citizens from Oxfordshire in south-east England: a retired police detective called Ash Smith and a retired university professor called Peter Hammond, who is an expert in deciphering patterns in big data sets. Together, they have been investigating sewage discharges into their local river for more than a decade.
The series spotlights their…
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By Maryam Lotfi, Senior Lecturer in Sustainable Supply Chain Management, Cardiff University
The escalating conflict between Iran, the US and Israel has taken a critical turn. The strait of Hormuz – one of the most important shipping routes for oil and gas – is facing significant disruption. The strait is the main route connecting Persian Gulf ports in Iran and some of the region’s other oil producers to the open ocean.
The strikes on Iran are already having tangible…
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By Geraint Hughes, Reader in Diplomatic and Military History, King's College London
The British government confirmed on Monday that the RAF base at Akrotiri, Cyprus, had been hit in a drone strike. The resumption of US and Israeli air attacks on Iran – and Iranian reprisal strikes on its neighbours – also highlights the risks to around 300,000 British citizens in the Persian Gulf.
And there is clearly a danger of wider, direct UK military involvement in what appears to be an escalating regional war. Following the launch of “Operation Epic Fury” – the US and Israel’s coordinated strikes across…
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By Kirk Chang, Professor of Management and Technology, University of East London
Susan Akinwalere, Senior Lecturer in Business and Management, University of East London
Reports suggest younger workers are turning to trades – but the best option may be to stick in an industry you know.
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By Dónal Mulligan, Lecturer, School of Communications, Dublin City University
For most of us, generative AI (GenAI) has moved from novelty to everyday infrastructure astonishingly fast. Many adults now use tools like chatbots at work or casually, and many children are already encountering them through homework “help”, entertainment, or social sharing.
Unsupervised use of generative AI can expose children and young people to confidently presented misinformation, manipulative “keep chatting” dynamics, and inappropriate or emotionally risky content. The tone and conversational…
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By Federico Iannacci, Senior Lecturer in Management, University of Sussex Business School, University of Sussex
Stan Karanasios, Professor in Information Systems, The University of Queensland
Police officers often work with partial information under severe time constraints in situations that can change in seconds. Whether investigating a crime or patrolling a neighbourhood, they regularly have to make predictions based on instinct.
This “gut policing” isn’t just guesswork – it’s fast pattern recognition. It comes from training and years of dealing with real incidents, learning from colleagues, and building an instinctive sense of what matters and what doesn’t.
But instincts are no longer the only way police connect the dots. Many police forces are investing in…
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By Eric Lob, Associate Professor of Politics and International Relations, Florida International University
Khamenei was a deeply polarizing figure in Iran – perceived by some as a martyr and others as an oppressor.
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By Erhan Kilincarslan, Reader in Accounting and Finance, University of Huddersfield
The UK’s trade deficit of goods is the widest it has ever been. In 2025, the country spent £248.3 billion more on things than it sold to the rest of the world.
This is not just some abstract number, of interest only to markets and economists. The UK’s trade deficit has practical consequences which help to explain why global events show up so quickly in people’s food and energy bills.
Nor is this a new situation. While the UK runs a strong surplus in services such as finance and professional…
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By Lee John Curley, Lecturer in Psychology, Glasgow Caledonian University
Dominic Willmott, Associate Professor in Legal Psychology, Loughborough University
Kennath Widanaralalage, Lecturer in Psychology (Education), King's College London
Are juries really impartial? Or is it the beliefs and attitudes they bring to trial that leads them to vote guilty or not? These questions are particularly important when it comes to the influence that rape myths may have on juror and judicial decision-making in sexual offence trials.
Rape myths are widely held but misleading ideas about sexual violence:…
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