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Get ready with Oxford for the 2015 APA Convention

We’re excited for the upcoming annual conference of the American Psychological Association in Toronto, Canada this year from 6-9 August 2015. The conference will be held at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. The annual convention of the American Psychological Association is the largest assembly of psychologists and psychology students in the world. Each year, nearly 11,000–14,000 people from all parts of the globe convene to discuss areas of specialization in psychology, network with other industry professionals, and learn what’s new in psychology in over 1,000 conference sessions.

We’ve asked our authors and editors for their highlights for the upcoming conference, compiled below. (For the full 2015 APA Annual Convention schedule of events, visit APA.org.) In between sessions, stop by our booth (#824) for a look at new and best-selling books, free trial access to our suite of online products, or enter a raffle to win an iPad mini. You can also follow us for updates on Facebook and Twitter with the conference hashtag #APAAM2015.

Thursday, 6 August 2015

Evidence-Based Approaches to Preventing Suicide in Vulnerable Ethnic Minority Populations; 8:00 a.m. – 8:50 a.m.


Led by Bruce Bongar in Convention Centre/Room 203B North Building-Level 200

Social Media for Social Good—Studies in Online and Face-to-Face Coaching and Sobriety Support, 11:00 a.m. – 11:50 a.m.


Led by Karen Dill-Shackleford in Convention Centre/Room 709 South Building-Level 700

Struggling With Ambiguity and Staying Busy in Neuropsychology Practice, 12:00 p.m. – 12:50 p.m.


Led by Greg J. Lamberty in Convention Centre/Room 201D North Building-Level 200

Should We Be Treating Neuroticism Instead of Anxiety and Depression, 3:00 p.m. – 3:50 p.m.


Led by David Barlow in Convention Centre/Room 104C North Building-Level 100

Launch of Oxford Clinical Psychology, 4:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m.


Join us for champagne, cupcakes, and conversation at booth #824. Oxford Clinical Psychology is the new online home of over 100 trusted titles including the renowned Treatments That Work series.

View of Toronto skyline from Toronto Harbour, 1 August 2008 by John Vetterli. CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

Friday, 7 August 2015

Structural Racism and Critical Psychology—Damage, Desire, and Participatory Research, 8:00 a.m. – 9:50 a.m.


Led by William E. Cross in Convention Centre/Room 206B North Building-Level 200

Marijuana on the Adolescent Brain? Exploring Neurodevelopment and Behavior, 8:00 a.m. – 9:50 a.m.


Led by Cheryl Anne Boyce in Convention Centre/Room 104A North Building-Level 100

Integrating Hip Hop Into Psychotherapy With Ethnic Minority Males, 10:00 a.m. – 10:50 a.m.


Led by Adia Winfrey in Convention Centre/Room 206A North Building-Level 200

Whiteness and White Privilege in Women-Centered Psychotherapy, 10:00 a.m. – 11:50 a.m.


Led by Andrea L. Dottolo Convention Centre/Room 203D North Building-Level 200

Saturday, 8 August 2015

Humanistic Approaches in Hypnosis, 8:00 a.m. – 8:50 a.m.


Led by V.K. Kumar in Convention Centre/Room 103B North Building-Level 100

Psychologists Treating Military Personnel—Read Between The Lines, 9:00 a.m. to 9:50 a.m.


Led by Tiffany Duffing in Convention Centre/Room 203D North Building-Level 200

Psychology of Aesthetics and the Arts, 9:00 a.m. to 9:50 a.m.


Led by Pablo L. Tinio in Convention Centre/Room 707 South Building-Level 700

APA Presidential Candidates Forum, 1:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m.


Led by APA past President, Dr. Nadine Kaslow in the APA Exhibit Hall, Booth #1102 

Sunday, 9 August 2015

Beyond Marriage—The Implications of LGBTQ Policy, 9:00 a.m. – 9:50 a.m.


Led by David Pantalone in Convention Centre/Room 104D North Building-Level 100

Sex Trafficking—A New Look at an Old Problem, 9:00 a.m. – 10:50 a.m.


Led by Lenore E. Walker in Convention Centre/Room 203B North Building-Level 200

Strange Happenings in the Night—The Phenomenology and Treatment of Parasomnias, 9:00 a.m. – 10:50 a.m.


Led by Brian A. Sharpless in Convention Centre/Room 206D North Building-Level 200

Spirituality in a Global Society—Fostering Cultural Competency Across Diverse Traditions, 10:00 a.m. – 10:50 a.m.


Led by Lisa Miller in Convention Centre/Room 714B South Building-Level 700

In and Around Toronto

The Metro Toronto Convention Centre is just around the corner from some great activities after the conference.

Main Pod of the CN Tower in Toronto, Canada, 11 September 2008 by Wladyslaw. CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

CN Tower, 301 Front St W, Toronto, Ontario M5V 2T6


At 553.33 metres high, the CN Tower dominates the surrounding landscape. Stay for the view and fine dining.

Bata Shoe Musuem, 327 Bloor Street West, Toronto, Ontario M5S 1W7


Learn about footwear from all around the world.

Toronto Zoo, 2000 Meadowvale Rd, Toronto, Ontario M1B 5K7


Not sure what to do with your kids after the conference? Head to Canada’s premier zoo to play with some pandas.

Hockey Hall of Fame, 30 Yonge St, Toronto, Ontario M5E 1X8


If you’re an ice hockey fanatic, don’t forget to check out the Hockey Hall of Fame.

St. Lawrence Market, 92-95 Front Street East, Toronto, Ontario M5E 1C3


This spacious market houses over 100 vendors including bakers, butchers, artisans, antique collections and delicious fresh produce.

Niagara Falls, Ontario


No trip to Canada is complete without a visit to Niagara Falls. Make the well worth it 90-minute drive for incredible views of one of the most grandeur waterfalls on earth.

See you in Toronto!

Featured image: Humber Bay Arch Bridge, 4 September 2001 by Paul Bica. CC BY 2.0 via Flickr.

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What is life?

Did you learn about Mrs Gren at school? She was a useful person to know when you wanted to remember that Movement, Respiration, Sensation, Growth, Reproduction, Excretion, and Nutrition were the defining signs of life. But did you ever wonder how accurate this classroom mnemonic really is, or where it comes from?

The definition, though not perfect, has survived for several millennia because its fluidity allows us to deal with all those things that defy neat categorisation. When you look at a limpet how much movement do you see? When you touch a lichen, can it feel any sensation? When you consider a rose, have you ever wondered about its excrement? In reality, few living things plainly exhibit all seven of Mrs Gren’s signs of life. But this flexible system allows us to pick and choose how many of the characteristics must be displayed before we decide that something is or isn’t alive. A crystal can grow, but it isn’t alive. A virus appears to be able to do some of the things on the list (like reproduce) but not without some help from a host, so it isn’t really alive either. On the flipside, some things exhibit fewer than seven of the signs of life, but we do consider them to be alive: most plants, for example, don’t display much sensitivity or movement, but we still class them as living beings.

The idea that living things can be defined by their ability to grow, reproduce, feel, and so on is an ancient one with roots stretching back as far as Aristotle. Aristotle wrote several books about zoology (and a few about botany, but sadly these haven’t survived). In these zoology books, Aristotle listed five markers of animal life: the ability to move, to feel, to reproduce, to digest, and the presence of blood or a similar fluid. We can see instantly that four of these five characteristics are echoed by Mrs Gren. So can we say that to be an animal is to be alive? What about the vegetable kingdom? The word ‘vegetable’ comes from the Latin vegetus, meaning ‘lively’ or ‘vigorous’. Nowadays, the word ‘lively’ connotes being active and energetic; but in a more literal sense, plants really are lively. All plants plainly exhibit three of the seven signs of life: they grow, they reproduce and they need nourishment. They also all respire (although that wasn’t known until the eighteenth century). Some of them can even sense and move.

Today, biologists take it for granted that plants are indeed alive. In fact, this is such a common notion that it was built into the definition of the three kingdoms that dominated eighteenth-and nineteenth-century life sciences. This definition was coined by the famous Swedish botanist Carl Linnæus (1707-1778) who codified the basic differences between three kingdoms of nature in his famous phrase: lapides crescent, vegetabilia crescunt et vivunt, animalia crescunt, vivunt et sentient — rocks grow, plants grow and live, animals grow, live and feel. Here, plants were accorded the property of ‘life’, while animals had ‘life’ and sensation.

Dragonfly, by Enrico Donelli. CC-BY-ND-2.0 via Flickr.

Unfortunately, Linnæus was vague about how exactly he defined this nebulous concept of life. Though many trace Mrs Gren’s roots to Linnæus’s writings, in fact, Linnæus’s maxim assumed that ‘life’ was a necessary quality of a plant or an animal. Linnæus, perhaps prudently, avoided explicitly listing the attributes of life. Despite his vagueness about the meaning of ‘life’, eighteenth-and nineteenth-century naturalists adopted and elaborated Linnæus’s definition until it expanded into the list of seven characteristics still recognised by schoolchildren today.

Linnæus was the figurehead of an eighteenth-century craze for classifying the natural world. This craze was driven in part by the expansion of European empires which lead to huge number of specimens flooding into Europe from far-flung corners of the world. At the same time as these exotic flowers and beasts were being neatly pigeonholed, a different group of life-forms were defying classification. Late in the seventeenth century, tiny animalcules with the power of independent motion had been seen through microscopes. By the nineteenth century, scientists declared that these ‘micro-organisms’ were a group of life forms entirely separate from the animal or vegetable kingdom. Initially, all micro-organisms were placed in the kingdom Protista; but, over time, new kingdoms have been defined to accommodate these small, strange things — Prokaryota, Monera, Fungi, Bacteria, Eubacteria, Archaebacteria, Archaezoa, Archaea, Protozoa, Chromista.

Today, scientists agree that microscopic life-forms far outnumber animals and plants, both in absolute number and as a percentage of the planet’s biomass. What impact have these creatures (which do not always display the traditional seven signs of life) had on how we define life? As we have discovered more living things, the definition has had to become even more fluid. Though many of Mrs Gren’s characteristics still play a role in determining whether something is alive, life can now also be defined by the ability of a thing to metabolise, to evolve, to display homeostasis (internal regularity), to pass on genetic information to offspring, or to maintain negative entropy.

After more than 2000 years of trying, we still don’t have a single, all-encompassing definition of life. Will it ever be possible to fully define this quality, or to give a definitive list of the characteristics of life? It is perhaps more useful to think of life as series of processes, rather than a particular entity or substance. But I suspect the quest to define life will continue for as long as there is life for, as Aristotle said, defining life is part of the process of defining ourselves.

Featured image credit: Seedling, by Ray_from_LA. CC-BY-2.0 via Flickr.

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Monthly etymology gleanings for July 2015

During the month of July I have received some questions, comments, and queries about things new to me. Thus, I know next to nothing about Latvian (my Indo-European interests more often make me turn to Lithuanian) and feel insecure when it comes to Romance etymology. The questions made me examine the areas that would under normal circumstances have not attracted my attention, and I am pleased. Queries about political terms (see below) are quite beyond my expertise, and I have no other choice but to refer our correspondents to those who may help us out. Every now and then I try to dissuade the letter writers from pursuing what I am sure is a wrong track and invariably fail in my endeavor. People are obstinate, and so am I. Many letters present minimal interest to our readership and I answer them privately. It will be observed that, since I write this blog in my so-called free time, my leisure hours are full of Adventure, as chivalric romances put it. This has been as true of July 2015 as of any other month.

Nooalf, spelling reform, and phonetic spelling

The question I received was about my attitude toward Nooalf (that is, New Alphabet), but I’ll add a few considerations on other kinds of proposed innovations and “phonics.” Those who have followed this blog know that I am all for Spelling Reform, but I am against utopian projects. Today the climate for Spelling Reform is not good; the public is indifferent to our efforts because it does not realize how much in terms of labor, money, and educational standards is at stake. It is happy with spell checkers. On both sides of the Atlantic, the last time intellectuals were seriously interested in Reform was before World War I; since 1914 they have had more pressing business to take care of. However, English spelling remains erratic and does us a lot of harm. The most important thing is to “sell” Spelling Reform to the public that is sure to resist clever but disruptive proposals.

Any new alphabet with diacritics (special signs like cedilla, háček, or umlaut) or invented letters is out of the question. Purely phonetic spelling is possible (students have been taught to use transcription for more than a century, and children understand the idea without much trouble), but, given the number and variety of English dialects, the system that would satisfy everybody cannot be achieved. Most advocates of “phonics” have not had the experience of the following type: “Don’t say foyve, say five!”—But I do say foyve!” Speakers hear other people’s accents but not their own. In a language like English, any spelling system is an imposition on someone. Millions in the United States say twenny (with nasalized e), while in the British Midlands thousands say (or used to say not too long ago) Lunnon (also with a nasalized vowel). Making those well-meaning, innocent people say twenty and London is tantamount to enforcing somebody’s will on them. Whatever we end up doing, many words will have to be learned like hieroglyphs.

Will this puss purr as nicely after the implementation of Spelling Reform?

I know that my idea of Spelling Reform being implemented in several steps over several decades has hardly any allies, but I stick to my guns. The public should first be weaned from the spellings for which no one cares. Stop distinguishing between –ise and –ize and replace –our with –or, as has been done in the United States. Get rid of the truly useless double letters, especially word-finally (till, spell, and the like). If pus can be secreted despite one s in its written image, the impact of less will perhaps not be lessened if spelled les, and (horribile dictu!) the majority may agree that the past of mean, if spelled ment, will not be taken for the root of mental or the homonymous suffix. This is not a good place for offering the entire program(me), but my idea is obvious. Even the staunchest conservatives will probably shrug their shoulders and agree that our society may not collapse if till and until have been made to look like related words (which they are) and that, if we can live with stir and whir, we can survive er and pur (for err and purr). I am anxious to see the first step: the English-speaking world’s consensus on the necessity to do something right now. Revolutionary plans, however clever, will remain plans and lose the name of action. Perhaps the projected International Spelling Congress will make a difference. I keep hoping against hope.

Democratic Republican

A correspondent has been researching the origin of the term given in the title of this rubric. He writes: “A far as I can tell, the term came into use sometime in the early 20th century, or possibly a little earlier…. [It] appears to have been coined about a century ago by academics affiliated with the Democratic Party who wished to claim a direct line of descent from Jefferson through Jackson to the present day.” The letter is much longer, but its gist is clear from the passage I reproduced. I’ll now quote its end: “So, who did the deed? That’s my question. I’d be surprised if you can answer. I’d love if you could.” Alas, all I can do is to kick the can down the road, as politicians say nowadays. Can anyone deal with this can?

Bug and buck

In my post on bug, I mentioned the fact that the b-g nouns formed a group of words whose affinity is sometimes hard to determine. The question was whether the b-k group has similar features. I think it does. Thus, to repeat my old example, Engl. bug “bogeyman” resembles Russian buka. All such coinages sound like baby words. The problem is that reference to baby words is fine as long as we stay within the limits of one language, but how do they spread over large territories? Are they the products of independent creation wherever they occur or of some mysterious diffusion? Monogenesis or polygenesis? Those who have access to my etymological dictionary will find full discussion of this problem in the entry boy, a word of highly “disputed etymology.”

What would happen if one of the heroes had lost their hair? Unimaginable.

Troublesome pronouns

From a newspaper: “A June 18 letter writer asked what would happen if one of the students had lost their hair.” I have no idea what would happen, but, while rereading George Eliot’s Middlemarch (which I did not like when I was young and now like even less), I noticed that she discriminated between her usage and that of her characters. The novel was written in the early eighteen-seventies. Celia says about her sister’s husband: “I think he is not half fond enough of Dorothea; and he ought to be, for I am sure no one else would have had him—do you think they would?” Another character (Solomon Featherstone) asks: “Might anybody ask what their brother has been saying?” This is again Celia: “How can we live and think that any one has trouble—piercing trouble—and we could help them, and never try? (pp. 278, 304, and 783 of the 1986 Clarendon Press edition). If I am not mistaken, she herself always says his in such cases.

English idioms

In the previous posts, some space was devoted to the phrase to shoot one’s bolt. At that time, I did not realize that as early as 1375 it was already possible to say a fool’s bolt is soon shot. Another idiom, namely to get down to brass tacks, attracted more attention. The latest verdict was that the idiom is of American provenance and goes back to draping coffins. This may be true, but I read in a 1906 article by the noted English philologist A. L. Mayhew, who would never have polluted his lips by an Americanism: “Wedgwood didn’t care a brass button about phonetic laws.” In Notes and Queries, vol. 161, 1913, p. 105, an American correspondent used the phrase hungry enough to eat brass tacks, and not long ago I wrote about restaurants on the West Bank called “Brass Tacks.” There must have been something unrelated to mortuary business about brass buttons and brass tacks that allowed idioms to absorb them.

Etymology: nothing has changed

From an 1824 review: “We are very far from understanding etymological researches, in their proper place, and soberly conducted: but, unfortunately, the subject affords so many allurements to the indulgence of the imagination, and such easy means for indulging it, that it’s more rare to find sobriety in an etymologist than in any other class of writers” (London). Indeed, sobriety is a relatively rare commodity in etymological research. Amateurs are especially aggressive in promoting their views. They possess little knowledge, but they have opinions.

The American dream, or hankering after a bound copy of Bosworth and Toller’s Dictionary of Anglo-Saxon

“…there must be nearly a thousand voices in America muttering: ‘Give us our book, good or bad, that we may at least bind up and be at rest’.” (New York, 1897). Most American colleges have abolished teaching the history of English, while the extremely few PhDs who were stupid enough to specialize in Old or Middle English have hardly any prospect of employment. The muttering of nearly a thousand voices has dwindled down to an almost inaudible murmur. Everybody is now modern, postmodern, and at rest.

Do we hear what we say?

(From a newspaper) “John is such an interesting young man, and he just devours everything he reads. I just wanted to share it with him, because I knew he would enjoy reading that kind of literature. It would just sit on a shelf at my home.” A classic just so story.

Enjoy the end of the summer! The August gleanings will appear on 2 September.

Image credits: (1) Puss in Boots. American Chemical Mfg. and Mining Co. Miami U. Libraries – Digital Collections. No known copyright restrictions via Miami University Libraries Flickr. (2) Samson and Delilah by Lucas Cranach the Elder, ca. 1528–30. OASC via Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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10 moments in the life of Vincent van Gogh

Today, 29 July 2015 marks the 125th anniversary of the death of Vincent Willem van Gogh, the legendary Dutch post-impressionist painter behind Starry Night and Café Terrace at Night. His talents went widely unrecognized until after his death. Van Gogh was a brilliant artist with a tormented soul suffering from a mental illness. Below, we look at ten moments in the life of van Gogh.

At the age of 16, Van Gogh was apprenticed to the art dealer Goupil & Co. in the Hague. He was posted to the firm’s London office in 1873, where he began collecting English prints and illustrations.
In 1880, Van Gogh travelled to Brussels and studied life drawing at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts to learn anatomy and physiognomy.
In 1883, at his parents’ new home in Nuenen, Van Gogh produced the first watercolours and paintings that he did not consider mere studies or exercises, but full-fledged works of art suitable for public exhibition.
In November 1885, Van Gogh spent three months in Antwerp, studying at the city’s academy and attending drawing classes in the evenings.
In 1886, Van Gogh immersed himself in the avant-garde art scene of Paris and experimented with the Pointillist technique, learning to employ the brush to create rhythmic patterns and adopting the use of contrasting hues and complimentary colors that have come to characterize his style.
In February of 1888, Van Gogh traveled to Arles to pursue his long-held interest in painting the lives of peasants in the vein of Jean-François Millet and Jules Breton.
On Christmas Eve 1888, Van Gogh threatened his friend Paul Gauguin and subsequently cut his own ear in a fit of violent passion.
On 8 May 1889, Van Gogh institutionalised himself at the St-Paul-de-Mausole hospice in St-Rémy-de-Provence. He found no companionship among the other inmates (many of whom were clinically insane) but began painting once more.
In his last months, Van Gogh began at last to experience some artistic recognition. He was invited to exhibit with the avant-garde artists’ society Les XX and sold a painting, Red Vineyard (1890), to the painter Anna Boch.
On 27 July 1890, Van Gogh returned from the fields covered with blood. This might have been a suicide attempt or an accident. He finally died in his brother Theo’s arms two days later.

Venture through his life and work with our new interactive site, Van Gogh: 125 Years of Inspiration and Mystery, featuring content from Oxford Art Online.

Featured Image: Irises, 1889 by Vincent van Gogh (1853 – 1890). Public domain via Wikimedia Commons. 

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What makes a good policing leader?

Over the last 20 years I have been involved in policing leadership development against a backdrop of increasing complexity. I have had the enviable role of having been a police officer, medically retired as a result of an almost fatal stabbing, as well as being a coach and mentor to high performing leaders at all levels in the service.

I propose that too frequently, leaders have been seduced by literature that seeks to reduce the highly contextual aspects of leadership into a set of easily digestible behaviours: ‘the 8 habits’; ‘the 10 success factors’; ‘the 5 essential roles’. In working through the context, complexity, and connections within which policing leaders frequently engage, this focus on simplicity has had little utility. It risks the danger of creating an unrealistic set of almost messianic skills that are unachievable by any one person. Good leaders therefore often feel disempowered and unfulfilled by failing to achieve a decidedly contentious set of principles.

In a significantly structured and stratified profession, policing leadership is never assured simply by the achievement of rank. Some of the most positively influential leaders in operational policing function through an informal network of influence rather than a rank based context. Regardless of rank or role, the various policing cultures pride themselves in their ‘can do’ approach to managing complex operational scenarios, so competence in this field is a necessity of good leadership. If they are to maintain the respect of their followers, high performing leaders recognise and act upon the need to be equipped to fulfil their operational responsibilities. Therefore, we can say that there is a disproportionate alignment between good leadership and operational competence.

From an operational perspective, police officers are acutely aware that they possess power on behalf of the state. Experienced officers, however, are equally mindful that the under-utilisation or enforcement of these powers frequently creates a negotiated settlement, and long-term positive impact for community relations. Implementing powers of arrest is relatively easy; successfully negotiating a valued-based outcome that doesn’t default to the use of state-authorised power takes considerably more skill and leadership.

…a good leader recognises the need to minimise their self-centred approach and move towards a more emotionally intelligent style

While the action-centred aspects of the policing cultures have helped individuals and teams achieve remarkable outcomes, the more reflective aspects of leadership have often been neglected. The public have become increasingly exasperated when policing seems to repeatedly make the same mistakes. In order to compliment the action-centred leadership approach, some policing leaders are increasingly engaged in creating learning rather than learned environments. Self-aware and self-reflective practitioners are encouraged to explore their modus operandi in a constructive manner, focused on continuous professional improvement.

At a personal level, a good leader recognises the need to minimise their self-centred approach and move towards a more emotionally intelligent style, where self-awareness becomes the vital leadership competency. In my experience, poor leaders consistently talk about themselves; good leaders are enthused by the opportunity to explore and nurture the talent that is within their sphere of influence.

In working with high performing policing leaders, one frequent characteristic to emerge is their ability to absorb considerable amounts of personal pressure on behalf of the organisation. Managing the demands of constant change, dealing with a personal complaint under intense public scrutiny, managing highly emotional and emotive public order interactions, coping with the dead and dying: all have a personal cost for those engaged in delivering, managing, and leading the organisational outcomes. While the vocational aspects of policing no doubt help focus individuals towards a greater purpose, nevertheless good leaders are capable of absorbing the strain and recognising its existence in others.

At a strategic level, good leaders demonstrate – and are able to articulate – a clear ethical vision for the future of the service. This has vital importance as it negotiates the often-contradictory space between the internal needs of staff and officers, the short-term requirements of politicians, and the long-term demands of the communities policing seeks to serve. This ethical vision is underpinned by a set of clearly expressed values that help those delivering the service bridge the gap between theory and praxis. Leaders thus create an environment where ethically-informed officers feel empowered and supported to take risks with their decision-making.

Policing leaders are now more conscious than ever that a multi-leader, public service approach to managing resources and outcomes is required. High performing leadership is now more focused towards articulating the value that policing brings to a connected public sector delivery. Negotiating, influencing, and compromise are critical success factors.

Featured image: Inverness Burgh Police Special Constabulary (WW2 era) 2 of 3 by Dave Conner. CC-BY-2.0 via Flickr.

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We are all African, but we also have our own histories

In May 2015, at a press conference in Nairobi, Kenya, a French-led international team announced the discovery of the oldest stone tools known yet. Dating back to more than 3.3 million years ago, these crude flakes, cores, and anvils represent the earliest steps in our evolution into a species reliant on, if not defined by, the use of tools and other manufactured objects. Coined the ‘pre-Oldowan’ or ‘Lomekwian’ after the site in West Turkana at which they were found, these tools are larger and cruder than the more recent Oldowan industry and likely represent both intentional flaking and battering or pounding activities; they are also much older than any fossil specimens yet assigned to the genus Homo. As a species, we are not unique in our ability to make and use tools, and the historical trajectory that emanates from these earliest tools gives rise not just to Homo sapiens but also to our now extinct tool-using cousins Homo Neanderthalensis and Homo Floresiensis. As archaeology literally digs deeper into the past, it reveals an increasingly complex story that both emphasises our shared African origin and evidences the multiple complex trajectories that this evolution undertook.

Human evolution is not a neat story, but the researchers that discovered these stone tools quite rightly emphasise their global significance as evidence of our common ancestry. They further frame this story as one that defines what it actually means to be human. The makers of these earliest stone tools and the ‘technology’ (the methods of flaking) utilised are explicitly compared to the capabilities of other species, especially chimpanzees, and the technical and cognitive capacities that define ‘us’ from ‘them’ are made explicit—a process we might call ‘othering’. Defining ourselves against others can be a positive thing—a celebration of diversity—but it can also be used to marginalise and oppress ‘others’; to make them somehow less human or at least less ‘modern.’ The negative use of ‘othering’ has often been associated with darker moments in human history, but these more obvious enactments of marginalisation often sit within less well defined, and often unconsciously similar, acts that create normalised categories of ‘us’ and ‘them.’ Archaeology, for example, would treat these earliest stone tools as the first step in a series of developments or ‘revolutions’ that give rise to the modern world, such as the first anatomically and cognitively modern humans (in Eastern Africa c. 200,000–100,000 years ago), the first food producers (Mesopotamia c. 11,000 years ago), the first cities and states (Mesopotamia c. 6000 years ago), and the first democracies (e.g., Athens c. 2500 years ago). But in locating these developments in space and time, the narrative inadvertently excludes other places and times from the key thrust of the ‘human story,’ and thus implicitly creates categories of ‘us’ (those on the trajectory to modernity) and ‘them’ (those who are marginal to the main human story).

Within this human narrative, Africa takes on an ambiguous role. Fuelled by spectacular finds like the Turkana stone tools, tropes such as the popular ‘we are all African’ movement rightly emphasise Africa’s role as the progenitor of the human species and do so in an honourable attempt to address the economic and political inequality that continues to marginalise the African continent. However, by emphasising Africa’s early role in the human story, such campaigns also unconsciously reinforce the wider narrative that sees the later phases of the human story move away from Africa, to Europe and Asia. In this sense, Africa’s more recent past continues to be marginalised within global history and Africa itself continues to be presented in popular circles as pre-modern and in need of development. The start of the story aside, Africa’s recent past is seen as marginal to the key events of history at best, and generally remains under-researched and poorly understood.

The pre-Oldowan discoveries in Kenya thus say much—not just about our origins and how we understand ourselves as a species, but also about how we understand our own history. Such finds are certainly important scientific discoveries, but the way in which they are presented and used in the present is not neutral. Rather, the way such finds are presented has a direct impact on the way in which we envisage Africa’s present and future. In their incorporation into the historical narratives that constitute the human story, finds such as the pre-Oldowan shift from being objective scientific objects to being subjectively interpreted brokers in contested histories that include othering and marginalisation. They both positively evidence our shared African origin and emphasise the neglect of Africa’s more recent past. Therefore they point to the need for more nuanced and higher profile expositions of recent African history that critically rethink the global historical narrative, celebrate the continent’s great achievements, and give voice to those communities that have previously lacked historical representation. This call is not just about being politically correct, nor is it just tokenism; rather, the detailed writing of more recent African histories and African archaeologies from a range of individual, personal, and community perspectives can have a real impact on how Africa is perceived, valued, and engaged with today.

Instead of working to end poverty in Africa because of our shared ancestry, we may also do well to try to understand the multiple ways in which our complex historical trajectories have intersected through time, creating global economic and political systems in which African communities have become marginalised. Such an approach shifts focus from a situation in which Africa is perceived as inevitable and perpetual ‘also-ran’ in the human story, to one where Africa’s vast contributions to global history (Great Zimbabwe, Aksum, Timbuktu, literature, music, food, and evolution) have gradually been downplayed within narratives that favour Europe and Asia. We should celebrate the fact that we are all African, but we should not let that overshadow a critical understanding of other historical narratives that need to be understood and appreciated if we are to effectively and respectfully engage with each other in the present.

Image Credit: “South Island of Lake Turkana, Kenya.” by Doron. CC BY SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

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Meet the Economics journals marketing team at OUP!

We are pleased to introduce the marketing team for Economics journals at Oxford University Press. Kelly, Kimberly, Will, Kathleen, and Heather work across two continents, based both in the Oxford office and in Cary, North Carolina. They are responsible for the marketing of academic journals relating to economics, business, finance, and econometrics, and work together on the @OUPEconomics Twitter feed. Get to know them all better below.

Kelly Henwood: Assistant Marketing Manager, Journals End-User Marketing, UK.

What is the most interesting project that you’ve been a part of during your time on the Economics team?

The most interesting project I’ve been a part of has been the (ongoing) development of the Economics brand identity.

Describe your job in three words?

Dynamic, engaging, rewarding.

Kelly Henwood. Image used with permission.

What’s your favorite item on your desk?

I now realise that I have a very functional desk! I don’t have a ‘favorite’ item, though I would miss my pot of coffee that sits on my desk as a morning treat.

How do you spend your personal budget’s surplus?

I spend my personal budget’s surplus on time with friends and family, as well as anything music related; in any form, whether it be watching, partaking, or purchasing.

Kimberly Taft: Assistant Marketing Manager, Journals End-User Marketing, US.

What is the most interesting project that you’ve been a part of during your time on the Economics team?

I enjoyed working on the re-organization of our booth at the Allied Social Science Associations conference in January. This was a time-consuming venture, but in the end we had a more unified and organized presentation of OUP Economics products.

Kimberly Taft. Image used with permission.

Describe your job in three words?

Meaningful, organized chaos.

What’s your favorite item on your desk?

It’s a tie between a cactus and a jar of sand. The cactus was a gift from my colleagues; it is in a hot pink pot and has a hot pink bloom. My family visits Carolina Beach, NC every summer, and last year I brought back some sand for my desk to have as a reminder of the fun and relaxing days I’ve spent at the beach.

How do you spend your personal budget’s surplus?

On concerts! So far this year I’ve seen The Avett Brothers, Shovels and Rope, Bleachers, Eric Church, Lake Street Dive, and Gary Clark, Jr.

Will Bocholis: Marketing Associate, Journals End-User Marketing, US.

What is the most interesting project that you’ve been a part of during your time on the Economics team?

Will Bocholis. Image used with permission.

That’s very difficult to say. I have been with OUP for around 8 months, so my sample size is relatively small. I have assisted with the creation of several themed virtual issues, and the one I found most interesting was about wealth, income, and inequality. Growing wealth and income inequality can be a contentious issue in the United States, but this collection helped me understand the relationship of these components in a more global sense.

Describe your job in three words?

Fast, cooperative, unpredictable.

What’s your favorite item on your desk?

My desk is rather unimpressive for the most part. If I had written this response yesterday I would’ve said the box of peanut butter sandwich Girl Scout cookies. Unfortunately, the cookies met an untimely end in my stomach, so I would have to say my Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles coffee travel mug.

How do you spend your personal budget’s surplus?

I try to make the most of my weekends by organizing as many trips into my schedule as possible. Living in Raleigh, NC provides a wonderful central location to explore the  US South and East Coast. Plans are still materializing for this summer, but so far I have a river tubing trip to Asheville, NC, a short lazy beach vacation on the coast, a brief visit to New York and a long weekend in Washington DC on the books. The downside to all of this is living on an incredibly slim budget when I am home, but that’s what living is about, right? New experiences in new places is the way to go!

Kathleen Sargeant: Marketing Assistant, Journals End-User Marketing, UK.

Kathleen Sargeant. Image used with permission.

What is the most interesting project that you’ve been a part of during your time on the Economics team?

Since joining the Economics team earlier this year, I’ve been lucky enough to have participated in a number of interesting projects. The most exciting project that I’ve been involved with, so far, is a blog post about economic gender inequality, written by one of our journal authors. The great thing about working here is that you get to work alongside so many talented and insightful authors.

Describe your job in three words?

Captivating, challenging, creative.

What’s your favorite item on your desk?

My desk is pretty thoroughly decorated; I’ve essentially moved in to my office. I think my favorite item on my desk currently is a very colorful, abstract drawing that my friend from Riga did for me in oil pastel. He told me that it represents joy. And who doesn’t like a little bit of joy in the workplace?

How do you spend your personal budget’s surplus?

I think I probably spend most of my surplus budget on travelling and restaurants. I was recently in Brussels, and my friend and I spent at least half of our time there seeking out moules-frites and gaufres chaudes.

Heather Saunders: Marketing Assistant, Journals End-User Marketing, UK.

Heather Saunders. Image used with permission.

What is the most interesting project that you’ve been a part of during your time on the Economics team?

I haven’t been a member of the Economics team for very long yet, having joined OUP about two months ago, but I’m looking forward to getting stuck in!

Describe your job in three words?

Fast-paced, varied, stimulating.

What’s your favorite item on your desk?

My desk is pretty minimalist, actually. My favorite item is probably my personal diary. I’m a fan of cute stationary, and it has a unicorn on it.

How do you spend your personal budget’s surplus?

I studied Film at university, and so I go to the cinema quite a lot. I love going to the Phoenix Picturehouse, which is just down the road from OUP in Oxford, or the Ultimate Picture Palace, an independent cinema in Oxford.

Featured image credit: Paper people team work, © STILLFX, via Shutterstock.

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First biosimilar drug approved for sale in the United States

New options for biologic cancer treatment are coming for the first time to the United States, and their arrival could help drive down costs for some of the biggest-ticket items in cancer care.


Treatments that interfere with cancer’s biological underpinnings have revolutionized treatment for some cancers. But their cost now accounts for half of oncology drug spending—up from 11% a decade ago, according to the IMS Institute for Healthcare Informatics.

Biosimilar drugs, close copies of patented biologicals, have been available in Europe for nearly a decade and can cost up to one-third less than their patented counterparts. The competitive principle is similar to that of well-known generics, but since drugs manufactured in living organisms tend to be large, complex molecules that can’t be duplicated precisely, they have been labeled biosimilars.

The US Food and Drug Administration had been slow to follow Europe’s lead. But the Biologics Price Competition and Innovation Act of 2009 began to speed up adoption of these agents and offer competition in the health care marketplace. With a framework for adoption in place, FDA in early March 2015 approved Sandoz’s filgrastim-sndz, a biosimilar of Amgen’s filgrastim, which counteracts chronic neutropenia by stimulating production of immune system–boosting white blood cells. Although filgrastim is classified as supportive treatment, other mainstays of cancer treatment will soon lose their patent-protected status in the United States. The patent on trastuzumab, the hugely successful targeted monoclonal antibody therapy for HER2-positive cancers, expired in Europe mid-2014; the US patent expires at the end of 2018. Trastuzumab biosimilars from at least four companies are completing phase III clinical trials and are expected to be approved by the European Medicines Agency within months.

Whether biosimilars will help lower the price of biologics is an open question that may depend, at least initially, on oncologists’ willingness to prescribe them. Most oncologists are not aware of biosimilars. Even if they have heard of the term, they are confused about how biosimilars relate to more familiar brand-name drugs, according to Andrew Zelenetz, M.D., Ph.D., a medical oncologist at New York’s Memorial Sloan–Kettering Cancer Center. Zelenetz chaired the committee that wrote a 2011 white paper on biosimilars commissioned by the National Comprehensive Cancer Network.

A 2011 survey of oncologists attending the annual National Comprehensive Cancer Network conference revealed that more than half of respondents were either not at all familiar (36%) or were only slightly familiar (19%) with biosimilars. But interest is high, with 27% and 35% responding high and moderate interest, respectively, in prescribing them.

Not much has changed since then, according to Zelenetz. He said even his colleagues at academic medical centers are not clear what biosimilars are. But he expects that to change shortly, when pharmacy formularies and payers start exerting pressure to prescribe these drugs, which will probably have lower prices. In Europe and elsewhere, biosimilars are routinely priced 20%–30% less than the original drug.

Price Pressure

Many questions about the niche biosimilar products will fill remain unanswered. Unlike generic drugs, biosimilar products are unlikely to be automatically substituted at the pharmacy level, at least initially. That would require the product to be deemed interchangeable with its counterpart, and FDA has yet to issue firm guidance on interchangeability standards. Unless institutional pharmacy and therapeutics committees can make automatic substitutions, a delay may occur before people see cost savings from biosimilars, according to Zelenetz.

Even the definition of how similar a copy of a biological drug need be is not set. That’s the “million-dollar question,” said Leah Christl, Ph.D., FDA’s associate director for therapeutic biologics. “A sponsor can’t use a clinical study to compensate for a lack of analytical similarity.”

Conversely, if a product doesn’t share a safety and toxicity profile with the originator drug, it doesn’t meet the biosimilar bar, and can’t claim to be a biosimilar, she said.

Process is Product

Biosimilar products start with essentially the same genetic sequence. But they are produced in living cells, and the particulars of those production processes are guarded trade secrets. Because of the vagaries of biological systems, differences in cell culture systems can influence the product. That’s why FDA pays as much attention to the manufacturing process as to the product.

“It is a challenge to run a complex manufacturing process for biopharmaceuticals,” said Stephen P. Creekmore, M.D., Ph.D., chief of the Biological Resources Branch at the National Cancer Institute. “There is a risk to using these products, and the FDA is trying to minimize the risk to make sure the biosimilar is as close to the reference product as they can.”

Even if a manufacturer can show that a product meets the FDA standard for biosimilarity, some oncologists may be concerned about extrapolation, Zelenetz said. FDA states that a biosimilar must show analytical comparability to the US licensed reference product but might not require full clinical trials for all indications.

“From an ethical standpoint—and the European Medicines Agency and the FDA share this—we don’t want companies to have to repeat clinical trials, so we have established a scientific approach that both entities have adopted in order to support global development,” Christl said.

In practice, that may mean companies conduct a trial in what FDA calls the most sensitive population. But the definition of “most sensitive” may be left up to the company. For instance, several companies are in phase III clinical trials to compare biosimilars of rituximab with its patented reference product in rheumatoid arthritis patients. But if these products become licensed in the United States, oncologists may not be comfortable prescribing them for lymphoma, Zelenetz said.

Many oncologists may want to see direct comparator trials, Creekmore said. “And I would talk to colleagues about their experience with it, just to be a little cautious.”

Note: Zelenetz is on the biosafety monitoring board for a company developing a biosimilar, but he has no financial stake or stock in any company and is conducting no clinical trials on any of these products.

A version of this blog post first appeared in Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

Image Credit: “The Morning Handful” by Derek K. Miller. CC BY NC 2.0 via Flickr.

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A treatment for despair and loss of meaning

The Psychotherapy Laboratory within the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at MSKCC was established about 12 years ago. I have been the Director of the Lab from its establishment. In addition to developing interventions for anxiety, depression, and PTSD, we have studied a whole group of existential problems that had as yet no established interventions. Some of these problems are constructs such as despair, suffering, loss of dignity, demoralization, hopelessness, and loss of meaning in life. On the surface, it doesn’t sound like much fun to research these subjects, and the fact is that many of our colleagues started to call us the “Laboratory of Despair.” But the fact is, these are extraordinarily challenging, exciting, and critically relevant areas of clinical intervention research.

Despair, for instance, is an interesting concept. Etymologically, the word comes form the French: de (meaning without) and espoir (meaning hope). But espoir also means to inspire or spirit. 

For us, Despair became a term we used for that state in which our cancer patients lost the “essence of what made them human.” Often at the heart of Despair was a sense of profound loss of meaning in one’s life when confronted with a cancer diagnosis that forced one to confront mortality. We needed an intervention for that; there was no medication for that problem.

Loss of meaning and hopelessness are two profound and related clinical problems that often lead patients to desire a hastened death or request physician-assisted suicide. In fact, in a series of studies that we conducted in terminally ill cancer and AIDS patients, we discovered that a desire for hastened death was highly correlated with undiagnosed and untreated depression, and depression was the sole cause of desire for hastened death in about 50% of patients. We conducted studies examining the effects of treating depression in cancer and AIDS patients with both depression and desire for hastened death. We found that successful treatment of depression led to the disappearance of desire for hastened death. With further research we found that hopelessness and loss of meaning were independent and synergistic contributors to desire for hastened death; they accounted for the vast majority of those with desire for hastened death who were not clinically depressed. We came to call this triad of hopelessness, loss of meaning, and desire for hastened death: Despair. We had no treatment for Despair.

Silhouette. CC0 via Pixabay

There is no medication for loss of hope and loss of meaning in life. In response we developed a counseling intervention we called Meaning-Centered Psychotherapy (MCP), inspired by the work of Viktor Frankl, a Vienesse psychiatrist who survived the Auschwitz concentration camp. He developed a theory that the need to find meaning in life was a primary motivating force of human behavior. He developed a form of psychotherapy he called logotherapy that focused on meaning.

We looked at Frankl’s work, specifically some of his concepts of the importance of meaning and the common sources of meaning. We developed a brief seven session psychotherapy for patients with advanced cancer, aimed at raising awareness of the importance of meaning and the common sources of meaning in life as a way to enhance meaning. We conducted a series of studies showing that enhanced meaning buffered against depression, hopelessness, desire for hastened death; enhanced quality of life; and reduced symptom burden distress. So our MCP therapy focused on helping patients more fully understand the experience of meaning fulfillment.

We also utilized individual sessions to focus on the common sources of meaning which include:

Experiential sources of meaning (e.g. love, connectedness)
Creative sources of meaning (e.g. work, what you care about in the world, who you are in the world)
Legacy (e.g. the legacy you inherit, the legacy you create, the legacy you leave behind)
Attitudinal Sources of meaning (e.g. choosing the attitude you take toward suffering or limitations in life, turning a tragedy into a triumph)

We’ve studied Meaning-Centered Psychotherapy in four randomized controlled trials (three funded by the NCI), and we’ve been able to show that MCP, in both group and individual formats, reduces Despair and enhances meaning. As a result it reduces hopelessness, depression, desire for hastened death, and physical symptom distress, and improves quality of life. 

Meaning-Centered Psychotherapy is now being replicated in several countries around the world and in five languages. It is also being adapted as an intervention for breast cancer survivors, for caregivers of cancer patient, for bereavement, and for adolescent and young adults with cancer. We’ve just received funding from the National Cancer Institute to train clinicians from all across the United States in MCP. Treatment for Despair will soon be more widely available to those who need it.

Feature image credit: Old man in park. Photo by Burim. CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

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Correspondence of colonial & revolutionary America

The idea of social networks is not new, nor is their range of importance—from shared intimacy, to commercial nicety, to revolutionary provocation. At no time do we see more of their range, variety, and importance than in the letters of Colonial and Revolutionary America. Letters connected families and friends, facilitated commerce and legal disputes, and turned all of these into a porridge of political transformation. Not only can we read history as part of everyday life, but we can see it expressed in language of considerable beauty, grace, and virtue.

Read some of these letters by exploring the free links in the interactive image below.

Image Credit: “Surrender of Lord Cornwallis” by John Trumbull. Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.

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