All posts tagged: century

How the UK’s microchip industry is bouncing back after a quarter of a century

How the UK’s microchip industry is bouncing back after a quarter of a century

Published by skeptic

Silicon microchips underpin our modern lives. They are at the heart of our smartphones and laptops. They also play critical roles in electric vehicles and renewable energy technology. Today, more than three-quarters of microchips, also known as semiconductors, are produced in Asia. But in the 1990s, chip production was more widely distributed across the globe – and the UK punched above its weight. Scotland’s central belt – the area of highest population density, including Glasgow, Edinburgh and the towns surrounding them – became known as “Silicon Glen”, employing 50,000 people in the electronics industry at its peak. The region exported everything from PCs to Playstation chips. Multinational companies like NEC, Motorola and Texas Instruments operated major facilities there. In the 2000s, the dotcom crash triggered industry-wide consolidation and a shift to lower-cost manufacturing facilities in east Asia. The UK’s domestic capability was almost wiped out. But the UK semiconductor industry is quietly bouncing back. A new wave of companies is focusing on microchips designed for clean energy technology. These chips power electric vehicles and are …

Boat Race row is just the latest example of a century of academic dispute over teacher education

Boat Race row is just the latest example of a century of academic dispute over teacher education

Published by skeptic

When the men’s and women’s boats took to the water for the 2025 Oxford-Cambridge Boat Race, a few students who would have hoped to be part of the crews were missing. Matt Heywood, Molly Foxell and Kate Crowley, all of Cambridge, did not take part after a complaint from Oxford University Boat Club over their eligibility was upheld by an independent panel. All three students are studying at Cambridge for PGCEs, a teacher training qualification. Oxford University Boat Club had argued that a PGCE “is a diploma … not a degree”. The decision seems to reflect a specific ideal of the university as a place of scholarly focus unencumbered by more practical vocational qualifications. It’s also far from a new attitude towards teacher education as an academic discipline. My ongoing PhD research into the history of teacher training shows that for a century, teacher education has maintained a complex and often conflicting relationship with the ivory and red brick towers of higher education. This has been reinforced by over a century of numerous gender- and …

Authoritarian century, with Dr Azeem Ibrahim – how can humanists effectively counter this rising tide?

Authoritarian century, with Dr Azeem Ibrahim – how can humanists effectively counter this rising tide?

Published by skeptic

Dr Azeem Ibrahim OBE will address Humanists UK Convention 2025 with his lecture, ‘Authoritarian century: omens of a post-liberal future’. The Convention is scheduled to take place from 13–15 June 2025 at the Octagon Centre in Sheffield. Tickets for Humanists UK Convention 2025 are on sale now – and running low. Azeem holds a PhD from the University of Cambridge and has completed fellowships at Oxford, Harvard, and Yale. His current roles as Research Professor at the Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College, and Senior Director at the Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy in Washington, DC, underscore his significant influence in strategic and policy discourse. Azeem’s 2022 book, Authoritarian Century: Omens of a Post-Liberal Future, provides a rigorous examination of the factors contributing to the rise of authoritarianism worldwide. In it, he argues that a decline in public confidence in liberal institutions is a key factor, rooted in economic instability and policy shortcomings. By dissecting the historical and present-day dynamics that fuel this trend, his work offers crucial insights for understanding and counteracting …

Christie’s 20th/21st Century Evening Sale in Hong Kong Totals .3 M.

Christie’s 20th/21st Century Evening Sale in Hong Kong Totals $73.3 M.

Published by skeptic

Editor’s Note: This story originally appeared in our special Breakfast with ARTnews newsletter for Art Basel Hong Kong. Sign up here to receive it every day of the fair. The first auction held by Christie’s at its new Asia headquarters in The Henderson building in Hong Kong last September was a buoyant affair, carried by excitement for the glitzy locale, designed by Zaha Hadid Architects. That inaugural evening sale, for 20th- and 21st-century art, brought in $113.4 million (with buyer’s premium), a more subdued haul compared to past boom years, but still a solid result. Related Articles On Friday, the house held its second 20th/21st century auction in its new digs, the first aligned with this week’s Art Basel Hong Kong, which opened to VIPs Wednesday. According to a post-sale release, more than 7,000 people visited the headquarters to take in the lots ahead of the evening sale, many of them in town for Art Basel. While the room was filled to capacity, the pace of Friday’s evening sales was a bit slower, totaling $73.3 million (including buyer’s premium), with few surprises. The sale was …

The Atlantic’s Best American Poetry of the 21st Century

The Atlantic’s Best American Poetry of the 21st Century

Published by José

Also Announced: Atlantic Editions, imprint of The Atlantic and Zando, will publish The Singing Word, a significant collection of poems originally published in The Atlantic since its founding in 1857 Illustration by Miki Lowe March 27, 2025, 10:17 AM ET Today The Atlantic launches “The Best American Poetry of the 21st Century (So Far),” a new editorial project that brings together the 25 most consequential poetry collections of the past 25 years, and follows the March 2024 publication of “The Great American Novels,” The Atlantic’s list of the most consequential novels of the past 100 years. Also announced today, Atlantic Editions, imprint of The Atlantic and Zando, will publish The Singing Word: 168 Years of Atlantic Poetry, a significant collection of poems originally published in The Atlantic since its founding, in 1857. The Singing Word will be published this September, and is available for preorder now. In an introduction to “The Best American Poetry of the 21st Century (So Far),” the project’s editors write that “a quarter of the way into this new century of …

What Are the Most Recommendable Books of the Century So Far?

What Are the Most Recommendable Books of the Century So Far?

Published by skeptic

Welcome to Today in Books, our daily round-up of literary headlines at the intersection of politics, culture, media, and more. What Are the Most Recommendable Books of the Century So Far? If you’re around Portland, OR, join us for a live Book Riot Podcast event discussing the most recommendable books of the century so far at Powell’s on Thursday, March 13. Your $15 ticket doubles as a credit toward in-store purchases, and let’s be real: you’re gonna buy some books. Jeff and I have kept our lists a secret from each other and can’t wait to share our picks and chat with you. Bring a bookish friend or your whole book club! Finalists for the 2025 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction The finalists for the 2025 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, which “honors the best published works of fiction by American permanent residents in a calendar year,” were announced earlier this week. (All awards should be based on the calendar year, full stop.) Percival Everett’s James, which has deservedly swept awards season, is on the shortlist alongside …

15th Century Artifacts in Lithuania Found by Researchers in Cathedral

15th Century Artifacts in Lithuania Found by Researchers in Cathedral

Published by skeptic

A group of artifacts from the 15th and 16th centuries, linked to the Jagiellon dynasty and royal officials within it, has been discovered in Vilnius Cathedral, a prominent Catholic site in Lithuania. The dynasty, which ruled over territories in Lithuania and Poland during a period of cultural change in Central Europe, was a time of economic growth. The artifacts are believed to have been hidden by an unknown source around 1939 at the beginning of World War II. Metallic crowns, scepters, and medallions associated with Alexander Jagiellon (ruled 1501–1506) and Sigismund Augustus (ruled 1548–1572), were found in the grouping by researchers last December in the cathedral’s archives. Related Articles Lithuania, unlike other Baltic countries, retained a largely Catholic identity after its Soviet-era rule, regaining its independence in 1990 and joining the European Union in 2004. Later, officials of the country, trying to establish a bigger draw to it, made the capital city Vilnius a focal point for tourism. The found items, now secured for preservation, may play a role in advancing Lithuania’s cultural tourism efforts. …

The New York Times Presents the 100 Best Books of the 21st Century, Selected by 503 Novelists, Poets & Critics

The New York Times Presents the 100 Best Books of the 21st Century, Selected by 503 Novelists, Poets & Critics

Published by José

For long­time read­ers of Amer­i­can book jour­nal­ism, scrolling through the New York Times Book Review’s just-pub­lished list of the 100 best books of the twen­ty-first cen­tu­ry will sum­mon dim mem­o­ries of many a once-unig­nor­able crit­i­cal fuss. At one time or anoth­er over the past 25 years, some of us felt as if we could hard­ly con­sid­er our­selves lit­er­ate unless we’d read The Amaz­ing Adven­tures of Kava­lier & Clay, say, or A Vis­it from the Goon Squad, or The Brief Won­drous Life of Oscar Wao, or seem­ing­ly any­thing by George Saun­ders — all of which have placed on the Book Review’s list, the prod­uct of sur­vey­ing “hun­dreds of lit­er­ary lumi­nar­ies,” some of whose bal­lots have been made avail­able for pub­lic view­ing. As a reminder of how deep we are into this cen­tu­ry, more than a few of the authors of these not­ed books — Denis John­son, Joan Did­ion, Philip Roth, Cor­mac McCarthy, Hilary Man­tel — have already shuf­fled off this mor­tal coil. Rober­to Bolaño, whose The Sav­age Detec­tives and 2666 placed at num­bers 38 and 6, …

Beautiful 19th Century Maps of Dante’s Divine Comedy: Inferno, Purgatory, Paradise & More

Beautiful 19th Century Maps of Dante’s Divine Comedy: Inferno, Purgatory, Paradise & More

Published by José

Even the least reli­gious among us speak, at least on occa­sion, of the cir­cles of hell. When we do so, we may or may not be think­ing of where the con­cept orig­i­nat­ed: Dan­te’s Div­ina Com­me­dia, or Divine Com­e­dy. We each imag­ine the cir­cles in our own way — usu­al­ly fill­ing them with sin­ners and pun­ish­ments inspired by our own dis­tastes — but some of Dan­te’s ear­li­er read­ers did so with a seri­ous­ness and pre­ci­sion that may now seem extreme. “The first cos­mo­g­ra­ph­er of Dante’s uni­verse was the Flo­ren­tine poly­math Anto­nio Manet­ti,” writes the Pub­lic Domain Review’s Hunter Dukes, who “con­clud­ed that hell was 3246 miles wide and 408 miles deep.” A young Galileo sug­gest­ed that “the Inferno’s vault­ed ceil­ing was sup­port­ed by the same phys­i­cal prin­ci­ples as Brunelleschi’s dome.” In 1855, the aris­to­crat sculp­tor-politi­cian-Dante schol­ar Michelan­ge­lo Cae­tani pub­lished his own pre­cise artis­tic ren­der­ings of not just the Infer­no, but also the Pur­ga­to­rio and Par­adiso, in La mate­ria del­la Div­ina com­me­dia di Dante Alighieri dichiara­ta in VI tav­ole, or The Divine Com­e­dy of Dante Alighieri Described in …

Spring Auction Season Was Worst Financial Performance This Century

Spring Auction Season Was Worst Financial Performance This Century

Published by skeptic

A new report by veteran art market analysts Michael Moses and Jianping Mei of JP Mei & MA Moses Art Market Consultancy, argues that the 2024 spring auction season was “the worst overall financial performance” for the art market this century. The report, titled “How Bad Was the Spring 2024 Auction Season? Financially as Bad as It Gets,” analyzed around 50,000 repeat sales of artworks at Christie’s, Sotheby’s, and Phillips over the last 24 years. Only works first purchased at any worldwide auction from 1970 were included. Related Articles “It’s a very simple methodology,” Moses told ARTnews. “We believe the only way to study the art market is through repeat sales, so we can get a factual analysis of what the returns in the art market are. So, we’re not just looking at revenue, we’re looking at return.” Now retired, Moses was previously a professor at New York University’s Stern School of Business and Mei is a professor at Beijing’s Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business. A cursory glance at auction results over the last two …