Decolonising Ireland’s education system remains vital despite the country’s wealth and privilege

| Insights & Views

BearFotos / Shutterstock Ireland urgently needs to decolonise its higher education system. British rule spanned several centuries in Ireland and policies during this time sought to replace Irish culture with British norms,...

How our bodies react when we use social media – and when we stop

| Insights & Views

shutterstock rawpixel.com/Shutterstock The typical adult in the UK spends nearly two hours on social media per day. And for younger users, this can easily be up to five hours. The likes of Instagram or TikTok seem to draw...

Abducting women: early modern Europe’s solution to marital problems

| Insights & Views

Queen Juana la Loca confined at Tordesillas with her daughter, Catalina, as depicted by Francisco Pradilla y Ortiz. Museo del Prado Post-Medieval Europe (from the 16th to the 18th century), was when the patriarchal family...

Solar farms can host up to three times as many birds as crop fields – new research

| Insights & Views

A stonechat on the edge of a solar farm. Joshua Copping The UKs installed capacity of solar power expanded rapidly over the past decade to reach 17.2 gigawatts (GW) in 2024 enough electricity to power roughly 4 million...

Netflix’s Toxic Town offers a stark warning on environmental rollbacks

| Insights & Views

Netflixs new drama Toxic Town tells the true story of a group of women from Corby in Northamptonshire, UK, who gave birth to children with limb differences in the 1980s and 90s. The children were born with shortened arms...

Banning first cousin marriage would be eugenic and ineffective – expert view

| Insights & Views

AliAshraf/Shutterstock A bill that proposes to ban first-cousin marriage in the UK will receive its second reading in the House of Commons on March 7. The bill, proposed by Conservative former minister Richard Holden,...

Black women are more likely to die from breast cancer – so why is breast screening attendance still a problem?

| Insights & Views

Gorodenkoff/Shutterstock Breast cancer is the most common cancer diagnosed in women globally. But, in part thanks to screening programmes, over 75% of those diagnosed with breast cancer in England now survive for ten years...