On November 9th, 1989, Gunter Schabowski was in a press conference. He was the unofficial press officer for the new East German Government led by Egon Krenz, who had replaced the ailing tyrant, Erich Honecker. Reading from a note that he had not long received, and did not fully understand, Schabowski announced that GDR citizens […]
HS2 phase 2 is the high-speed train line that will connect Manchester and Leeds to Birmingham and on to London. Promoted as an attempt to bring ‘the UK’s Victorian railway infrastructure dramatically into the 21st Century,’ the Government expects to spend billions in a plan set to transform North-South transport infrastructure, encourage business, boost employment […]
“Little men” compensate for their below average height by propelling themselves into quests for power, ambition and self-confidence. In essence, short leaders have defined key moments in history. In 2015, government scientists conducted research to show that ‘men who feel the least masculine are at risk of committing violent acts’. For many, this confirmed that the […]
For the British population in the first two decades of the twentieth century, there were few issues as important as the question of Ireland and Irish governance. Over the previous centuries, Irish nationalism had continued to grow and since 1870 the Home Rule movement had gained increasing legitimacy and support, in both Ireland and Britain. […]
Many things have been said about EuropeanMedieval civilizations. A traditional notion describes the downfall of European civilization when the Romans left and northern Europe slipped down in a dark age. The dark times of competing warlords and looting barbarians were seen asdestroying all Roman progress,setting most of Europe back nearly one thousand years. The medieval […]
Chinese presence in Singapore has been prevalent throughout history with archaeological evidence of Chinese contact with Singapore as far back as the Song dynasty and Chinese documentation mentioning travels to Singapore across various centuries. Between 1819 and 1942 widespread economic and political strife in China saw an exodus of Chinese to Singapore. In the present, […]
Kim Jong-Un’s recent more than month-long disappearing act has inspired many speculations. The most credible hypothesis is that the world’s youngest head of state’s love for cheese and alcohol has resulted in a pair of fractured ankles, supported by recent pictures of Kim with a cane. Such bizarreness may seem reminiscent of Team America: World […]
Over the past 50+ years, the rights of LGBT+ people have gone from relatively non-existent to an almost equal standing with heterosexual, cisgendered people. The UK is one of the foremost countries leading the change in how LGBT+ people are treated, and last year we were able to celebrate 50 years since the Sexual Offences […]
Militarism, especially in the US, has long been associated with masculinity and heteronormativity. Between 1993 and 2009, 13,194 gay men and women were discharged from the US Army under the ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ policy. However, after widespread campaigns ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ was repealed in 2010, allowing openly homosexual and bisexual men and women […]
The Olympics, both summer and winter, aim to bring the whole world together to focus on the positivity of sport and excellence, under its philosophy of good sportsmanship and fair play. However, in practice this rarely turns out so easily. The attention of the world and the Olympic pulpit are utilised for political gains and […]
According to Russian legend, Ivan the Terrible was so impressed when seeing the completion of the Saint Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow, that he kindly ordered its architect PostnikYakovlev, to be blinded, so as to never build anything as beautiful again. Whether or not Yakovlev had any choice in this matter we are unsure, but there […]
Witchcraft was something which expanded greatly during the medieval period, particularly from the onset of the fifteenth century. It had been developed from a long tradition of ecclesiastical and secular persecution of the practice of illicit magic, an act deemed wildly heretical. However, by the 1400s a much more extreme and sinister conception of witchcraft […]
On a quest for self-definition, African Americans in post-WWI America sought a new collective identity for themselves through political mobilisation, social commentary, and a mastery of the arts. The Harlem Renaissance was 1920s Harlem’s artistic and intellectual contribution to this quest, known at the time as the ‘New Negro Movement’. This movement was, in many […]
On the 16th of August1819, the area around what is now St Peter’s Square in Manchesterhosted an attack on 60,000 peaceful protesters in what became known as thePeterloo Massacre.It took place against the international backdrop of the American Revolution, French wars and famine and unrest in Ireland; and reflected the political, social and economic discontentin […]