Researcher (senior)

Academia’s exacting standards on attribution are spot on. It is their inconsistent implementation that is the problem, says David Sanders

Scholars should not be walled off from mainstream biography’s playground of unlicensed fun, says Richard Bradford

The research excellence framework’s reliance on hasty peer review by generalists limits sample size and accuracy, three academics argue

Recording the day-to-day during the Holocaust did not restore victims’ sense of self, finds Dan Stone

Book of the week: In dire political times, Lyndsey Stonebridge discovers a welcome example of slow reading

Over time, one symbol of dehumanisation has served different purposes, finds Catherine Molineux

Jenny Pickerill argues that we need more practical suggestions on how to tackle institutions’ resistance to decolonisation

The good and evil of opium is documented in this eloquent history, writes Jonathan Mirsky

This deeply researched history of a conflict has an unfinished feel, finds Kori Schake

This unusual and intellectually invigorating book should be an essential starting point for feeling our way ahead in this field, says Shane O’Mara

Robert Montgomerie is impressed by a novel account of the backbone’s evolution

Up, up and away; hallowed grounds; degrees of evolution at Oxford; and making peace and making up

Science blooms when colleagues’ ideas cross-pollinate. Impediments to free movement will lead to a disastrous withering, says Sir Keith Burnett

The UK’s new research mega-body has huge power to tackle long-standing inequalities, says its new diversity tsar Jennifer Rubin

Book of the week: It is not so hard to tell when people are lying, says Robert Eaglestone, of an unconvincing analysis

The political craving for simple measures of learning gain is neither pedagogically informed nor sufficiently nuanced. Four academics argue that only by changing focus will the concept become useful

Yuval Noah Harari, having done the past and the future, offers us 21 Lessons for the 21st Century

European funders’ beefed-up open access mandate sounds the death knell for subscription publishing, but academic Armageddon is no closer, says Lenny Teytelman

A move to combat India’s love affair with predatory journals is an encouraging sign – even if it took a newspaper exposé to prompt it, says Pushkar

For internationalism to succeed, universities must engage more with their local communities and students, major study says

List of finalists for the ‘Oscars’ of the higher education sector released

Universities must look beyond a narrow conception of impact to communicate the true value of higher education to society, say Ulrike Felt, Maximilian Fochler, Andreas Richter, Renée Schroeder and Lisa Sigl

Patriarchy’s perpetuators; magical morphing gender; a physicist’s-eye view of the world; and what’s with all those buttons?

A study of seemingly irrational romantic feelings reveals much about sexuality in 19th-century literature, finds Charlotte Jones

Book of the Week: Emma Rees on the key role of feelings in spurring individuals to political action

Peter J. Smith wishes the UK would adopt a US approach to making the Bard more accessible

A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

Transnational research is vital to academic pursuits but it shouldn’t be carried out at the cost of vulnerable people in resource-poor countries, says Kate Chatfield 

Bill Niven examines a project that attempted to preserve Teutonic traditions in the wake of defeat

Zoë Waxman praises a study that debunks the comforting post-war myth of the resisting majority in countries such as France, Belgium and the Netherlands

Ugly, hateful talk must be countered with debate and argument, not bans, says Joanna Williams

A forensic linguist’s compelling and sometimes chilling case files demonstrate how criminals’ punctuation can be their undoing

The Dutch anthropologist discusses growing up in the sectarian Netherlands, following the hippie trail and whether religious tolerance has a future

Independent research institutes are hailed as hothouses for cutting-edge science, but they seem to be falling out of fashion. Rachael Pells asks if concentrating research in universities is a better strategy

Sexual harassment of female lecturers by their students is one of the less discussed aspects of the interplay between gender and power in academia. Kate Cantrell tells her story

Researchers as interested in the impact of supernatural belief on society as whether those views are grounded in fact or fiction

Life as a comedian at the Edinburgh Fringe has many parallels with the experiences of early career academics, explains Anna Ploszajski

Analysis concludes universities are ‘moving towards a nearly exclusive monopoly’ over research articles

As Elsevier buys another academic workflow company, some worry about potential for publishers to ‘lock in’ scholars to their services

The UK’s highly internationalised university system – a major factor in its research success – is a treasure that must be saved from a political altar

Matthew Reisz meets Andrea Pető, recent recipient of the Madame de Staël prize, a scholar at Hungary’s Central European University whose feminist probing into the dark corners of Hungary’s past is provoking strong reactions in the ‘illiberal democracy’

Fascinating autobiographical experiences make a practical guide for those embarking on immersive research, says Mark Jamieson

Book of the week: A ‘thought biography’ reveals elements that make for success in science, Rivka Isaacson finds

Nearly 50 years since war on cancer was declared, declarations of victory remain a distant prospect. Here, six cancer researchers assess the lie of the land

German students – and academics – still go along with controversial mainstream theories in order to get ahead, researcher argues

European Research Council says move is to support open access and get round often lengthy publishing process

Guilt grew as green spaces became pleasurable more than productive places, says Lisa Hopkins

Book of the week: Not trusting fellow citizens to vote erodes the foundation of polity, writes John Shand

University managers can learn from Geraint Thomas’ example that success can be won without having to be domineering and overbearing

Senior management has its perks but it also comes with a host of new practical, philosophical, psychological and even physical challenges. Here, seven people who have lived through that fiery baptism tell their tales

A Stoic history; influencers and other stars of the web; an English revolutionary; and chapter and verse on the books-artist nexus

Cutting partner labs out of awarded grant budgets is a common but destructive phenomenon in modern academia, says Anne Carpenter

He may once have disdained older scholars, but, having reached seniority in a managerialist age, John Brinnamoor now values their ability to say what others can’t

The differences between Jesus and philosophers cannot be ignored, writes Robert Segal

An original book about the changes to arts and technology reaches a disappointing conclusion, finds Scott Mandelbrote

A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

Outside the anglophone world, universities are under pressure to conduct research in English – but teach in their local language, says David Matthews

Book of the week: Dream homes, women on the edge, murder – we’ve been here before, says Sharon Wheeler

Precarity is a significant feature of the academy worldwide, creating a feeling of ‘academic apartheid’ as it grows. Ellie Bothwell explores its impact

Lincoln Allison was inspired to teach by academics who loved what they did and communicated this to students. But has all passion for teaching been eliminated by creeping assessment and instrumentalism?