In blues, jazz, and music that traces its roots to those genres, the riff is a repeated chord progression or set of notes that ties a song together. A guitar riff returns again and again in a song as though to tell listeners where they are, even as the instruments take excursions elsewhere. The song […] … learn more→

A relation of cruel optimism exists when something you desire is actually an obstacle to your flourishing. It might involve food, or a kind of love; it might be a fantasy of the good life, or a political project. It might rest on something simpler, too, like a new habit that promises to induce in […] … learn more→

I’ve been thinking about all the writing that I need to get done this year. There’s three book contracts, yes three, and a host of papers which are undoubtedly going to need revising. Looking at all this unfinished work, I feel that familiar academic mixture of determination and dread. I know exactly what needs to […] … learn more→

When you’re deep into writing a journal article, it’s easy to feel that every claim needs immediate validation, every statement must be backed up by a citation. This impulse becomes particularly acute in the abstract, where you’re condensing months or years of thinking into a few hundred words. Surely, you think, if I’m making important […] … learn more→

Did Guillaume Musso plagiarize Diana Katalayi Ilunga’s work, as she claims? Is the Christmas video featuring the wolf from Intermarché a plagiarism of the children’s book *Un Noël pour le loup * by Thierry Dedieu? Is the song * On va s’aimer *, performed by Gilbert Montagné, a plagiarism of the song * Une fille de France *, performed by Gianni Nazzaro? These […] … learn more→

There’s a particular kind of exhaustion that comes from staring at a word count that’s meant to reach 80,000 or 100,000, knowing you’re only at 12,000. Or from looking at a journal article deadline that’s three weeks away when you haven’t yet written a single word of the results. For doctoral and early career researchers, […] … learn more→

  Don’t be tricksy. As with all stories, don’t play tricks on the reader. Don’t bring a rabbit out of the hat at the last moment. If there is a big reveal, make sure it’s planted well in advance. Don’t fade and die. If you start off strong, make sure you have an ending that’s […] … learn more→

One of the most paralysing questions for academic writers is often the simplest: where do I start? For early career researchers staring at months of data, dozens of theoretical sources, and a looming submission deadline, the blank page can feel like an impossible threshold to cross. John McPhee,  Pulitzer Prize winning author and sometimes a professor […] … learn more→

When writer Cory Doctorow introduced the term enshittification in 2023, he captured a pattern many users had already noticed in their personal lives. The social media platforms, e-commerce sites and search engines they were using had noticeably deteriorated in quality. Many had begun to prioritise content from advertisers and other third parties. Profit became the main goal. […] … learn more→

Most research proposals, dissertations and funding bids start off with some kind of problem statement. A research/thesis problem statement needs to do several interconnected things to work well. At its core, it needs to articulate what specific issue or puzzle your research addresses. This is the “problem” part. But it’s not just about stating that […] … learn more→