An imagined journal, inspired by the work of the naturalist and scientific illustrator Maria Sibylla Merian – by Lara Louise Bevan-Shiraz Thursday, December 8, 1701 Today was faded, like it had been left out in the frosted sun too long. Though no sun could be found in the sky. By eight, the cobbled streets…
Greta Thunberg’s resilient climate activism has inspired a growing movement. Greta Thunberg, from Sweden, is sitting out of school on Fridays until climate change is a globally mobilised priority. Her simple action of sitting with a sign stating “school strike for climate” outside the Swedish parliament building in Stockholm led to her being invited to…
Extract from A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle, where Mrs Whatsit explains how tessering works. Do you enjoy science fiction? I find it can be a bit too dystopian and scary for my bedtime reading. However, I love how science fiction writers go beyond the limits of their time and pattern spot to see…
On September 10th, 2018, the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres delivered a major address on climate change, warning that humanity is “careening towards the abyss”. Referencing the “extreme heat waves, wildfires, storms, and floods, leaving a trail of death and destruction”, Guterres said, “I have asked you here to sound the alarm. We face a…
Girls in STEM carry the weight of gender prejudice. Picture credit: The Conversation Psychologist Professor Stoet’s 2018 study, “The Gender-Equality Paradox in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Education”, challenges our conventional understanding of gender inequality in education, indicating that in gender unequal societies, girls are relatively motivated to continue STEM education, but in more gender equal…
Empowering circles of women and girls. Picture credit: Anea Bogue As girls, we need the fabric of female narrative in our lives. For example, at the age of 7, I attended some workshops called “The Conversation of Women”, designed for girls 9-13 years old, by my old headmistress Dr Jadis Blurton at The Harbour School…
Picture credit: The Ocean Cleanup In 2015, I was cast in two roles – as a jellyfish, and as a piece of personified plastic – in Noble Material: A Plastic Musical, about disposed plastics in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch; jellyfish and disintegrating plastics appear remarkably similar to turtles, for whom jellyfish are a food…
Wildfires have set the Arctic aflame. Climate solutions are urgently needed. Image source: NRK The United Nations (UN) forms a platform for 193 nations to work through their difficulties, including, most pressingly: climate change. But does the UN risk becoming increasingly incohesive and ignored? How can the UN adapt to ensure it equally impacts all nations? Could…
