Category Archives: The Oxford Comment

The Color Line: Race and Education in the United States – Episode 69 – The Oxford Comment



Black History Month celebrates the achievements of a globally marginalized community still fighting for equal representation and opportunity in all areas of life. This includes education.

In 1954, the United States’ Supreme Court ruled “separate but equal” unconstitutional for American public schools in “Brown v. Board of Education.” While this ruling has been celebrated as a pivotal victory for civil rights, it has not endured without challenge.

On today’s episode, we spoke with Zoë Burkholder, author of An African American Dilemma: A History of School Integration and Civil Rights in the North and Color in the Classroom: How American Schools Taught Race, 1900-1954, and Nina M. Yancy, author of the upcoming How the Color Line Bends: The Geography of White Prejudice in Modern America, examining issues around education, integration, and segregation through their scholarship. In particular, we discussed segregation in northern schools and a recent case study from Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Learn more about Zoe Burkholder and An African American Dilemma here: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/an-african-american-dilemma-9780190605131 and Color in the Classroom here: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/color-in-the-classroom-9780190209322
Learn more about Nina M. Yancy and How the Color Line Bends here: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/how-the-color-line-bends-9780197599433

Please check out Episode 69 of The Oxford Comment and subscribe to The Oxford Comment through your favourite podcast app to listen to the latest insights from our expert authors:
– Apple Podcasts: oxford.ly/2RuYMPa
– Google Podcasts: oxford.ly/38UpF5h
– Spotify: oxford.ly/2JLNTTO
– Stitcher: oxford.ly/2R0fVNZ
– Youtube: oxford.ly/2YY4iMT

The Oxford Comment Crew:
Executive Producer: Steven Filippi
Associate Producers: Christine Scalora and Meghan Schaffer
Host: Meghan Schaffer

Music: Filaments by Podington Bear is licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License.

© Oxford University Press


Holiday Cheer – Episode 68 – The Oxford Comment



As we approach the end of 2021, we can look back at the previous two years of restrictions, lockdowns, COVID tests and vaccination lines, not to mention all the political strife… or we can look to the unknown, ahead to the new year. But let us pause for a moment and enjoy the now: a holiday season that should be livelier than last year’s. After all that’s gone on, we could use some old-fashioned holiday cheer.

On today’s episode, in the spirit of the holiday season, we spoke with Editor-in-chief David Wondrich and Associate Editor Noah Rothbaum of The Oxford Companion to Spirits and Cocktails to talk about their book, the growth of cocktail culture, and some of their favorite holiday drinks from around the world. Then, to speak on Christmas traditions, we revisited our interview with Gerry Bowler, the author of Christmas in the Crosshairs: Two Thousand Years of Denouncing and Defending the World’s Most Celebrated Holiday, from an Oxford Comment of Christmas Past.

Learn more about David Wondrich and Noah Rothbaum and The Oxford Companion to Spirits and Cocktails here: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-companion-to-spirits-and-cocktails-9780199311132
Learn more about Gerry Bowler and Christmas in the Crosshairs here: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/christmas-in-the-crosshairs-9780190499006

Please check out Episode 68 of The Oxford Comment and subscribe to The Oxford Comment through your favourite podcast app to listen to the latest insights from our expert authors:
– Apple Podcasts: oxford.ly/2RuYMPa
– Google Podcasts: oxford.ly/38UpF5h
– Spotify: oxford.ly/2JLNTTO
– Stitcher: oxford.ly/2R0fVNZ
– Youtube: oxford.ly/2YY4iMT

The Oxford Comment Crew:
Executive Producer: Steven Filippi
Associate Producers: Erin Cox and Tom Woollard
Host: Tom Wollard

Music: Filaments by Podington Bear is licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License.

© Oxford University Press


COVID-19 and Mental Health: Where do we go from here? – Episode 67 – The Oxford Comment



The effects of COVID-19 reach far beyond mortality, triggering widespread economic and sociopolitical consequences. It is unsurprising to learn, after everything that has transpired in the past two years, that COVID-19 has also had a detrimental effect on our mental health. Recent studies in the US and UK have shown a huge increase in the number of adults who have experienced symptoms of an anxiety or depressive disorder over pre-pandemic figures.

On today’s episode, we spoke with Professor Seamas Donnelly, editor of QJM: An International Journal of Medicine, and Dr. John C. Markowitz, author of In the Aftermath of the Pandemic: Interpersonal Psychotherapy for Anxiety, Depression, and PTSD, to explore the factors behind these figures, COVID-19’s impact on our mental health, and where we go from here.

Learn more about Seamas Donnelly and QJM here: https://academic.oup.com/qjmed
Learn more about John C. Markowitz and In the Aftermath of the Pandemic here: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/in-the-aftermath-of-the-pandemic-9780197554500
Learn more about COVID-19 and mental health here: https://academic.oup.com/journals/pages/mental-health-and-covid-19

Please check out Episode 67 of The Oxford Comment and subscribe to The Oxford Comment through your favourite podcast app to listen to the latest insights from our expert authors:
– Apple Podcasts: oxford.ly/2RuYMPa
– Google Podcasts: oxford.ly/38UpF5h
– Spotify: oxford.ly/2JLNTTO
– Stitcher: oxford.ly/2R0fVNZ
– Youtube: oxford.ly/2YY4iMT

The Oxford Comment Crew:
Executive Producer: Steven Filippi
Associate Producers: Meghan Schaffer, Victoria Sparkman, and Christine Scalora
Host: Christine Scalora

Music: Filaments by Podington Bear is licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License.

© Oxford University Press


What is the impact of opening research? – Episode 66 – The Oxford Comment



Open research means faster, more equitable access to cutting edge findings, driving disciplines forward, and introducing transparency into the research process. As the world’s largest university press publisher of open access content, Oxford University Press believes a more open world should work for everyone.

Over the past few years, the movement has grown to encompass other aspects of the research journey, from data sets to peer review, and open research has grown up as an umbrella term of experimentation with opening up in all of these areas. So what is the impact of opening research?

For today’s episode of the Oxford Comment, posted during International Open Access Week, we spoke with Dr Tara Spires Jones, Editor in Chief of Brain Communications, Professor Ugo Panizza, Editor in Chief of Oxford Open Economics, Professor Marcus Munafo, Editor in Chief of Nicotine and Tobacco Research, and Adam Leary, Senior Publisher in OUP’s Open Access Publishing team, who offered their perspectives on the impact of opening research.

Learn more about Tara Spires-Jones and Brain Communications here: https://academic.oup.com/braincomms
Learn more about Ugo Panizza and Oxford Open Economics here: https://academic.oup.com/ooec
Learn more about Marcus Munafo and Nicotine and Tobacco Research here: https://academic.oup.com/ntr
Learn more about Open Access at Oxford University Press here: https://academic.oup.com/journals/pages/open_access

Please check out Episode 66 of The Oxford Comment and subscribe to The Oxford Comment through your favourite podcast app to listen to the latest insights from our expert authors:
– Apple Podcasts: oxford.ly/2RuYMPa
– Google Podcasts: oxford.ly/38UpF5h
– Spotify: oxford.ly/2JLNTTO
– Stitcher: oxford.ly/2R0fVNZ
– Youtube: oxford.ly/2YY4iMT

The Oxford Comment Crew:
Executive Producer: Steven Filippi
Associate Producer: Ella Percival
Host: Rachel Havard

Music: Filaments by Podington Bear is licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License.

© Oxford University Press


What is Public Debt? – Episode 65 – The Oxford Comment



What do you think of when you hear the term “public debt?” If you’re familiar with the phrase, you might think about elected officials debating budgets and how to pay for goods and services. Or maybe it’s a vague concept you don’t fully understand.

For today’s episode of The Oxford Comment, we spoke with In Defense of Public Debt co-author Barry Eichengreen, Professor of Economics and Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley, and Jonathan D. Ostry, Deputy Director of the Asia and Pacific Department at the International Monetary Fund, about misconceptions of public debt, how the role of public debt has changed throughout history, and how pandemics such as COVID-19 can affect inequality and the role of public debt in these situations

Learn more about In Defense of Public Debt by Barry Eichengreen, Asmaa El-Ganainy, Rui Esteves, and Kris James Mitchener here: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/in-defense-of-public-debt-9780197577899
Learn more about “The rise in inequality after pandemics: can fiscal support play a mitigating role?” by Jonathan D. Ostry, Davide Furceri, Prakash Loungani, and Pietro Pizzuto here: https://academic.oup.com/icc/article/30/2/445/6312882#267092392

Please check out Episode 65 of The Oxford Comment and subscribe to The Oxford Comment through your favourite podcast app to listen to the latest insights from our expert authors:
– Apple Podcasts: oxford.ly/2RuYMPa
– Google Podcasts: oxford.ly/38UpF5h
– Spotify: oxford.ly/2JLNTTO
– Stitcher: oxford.ly/2R0fVNZ
– Youtube: oxford.ly/2YY4iMT

The Oxford Comment Crew:
Executive Producer: Steven Filippi
Associate Producers: Christine Scalora, Erin Cox
Host: Christine Scalora

Music: Filaments by Podington Bear is licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License.

© Oxford University Press