Table of contents for No 485 in Speak Up

Nature is essential for our physical and mental wellbeing1. What’s more, research shows that without a physical connection to the natural world, we’re less likely2 to care about it or act to protect it. Across Europe, especially Northern Europe, many countries have a legal ‘freedom to roam3’; this means that the public have the right to wander around4 their countryside and can freely enjoy their natural environment, as long as their activities are non-commercial. NOT ALLOWED But in Britain the public has a very limited right to access land. Only about eight per cent of England and Wales, much of it remote and very little of it around urban areas, are open access. In the southeastern county of Kent, for example, only 0.6 per cent of its beautiful green landscape…

I always had a repulsive sort of need to be something more than human. I felt very, very puny 12 as a human. I thought, ‘Fuck that. I want to be a superman.’ David Bowie is one of the most influential figures in the history of modern music, famous for his constantly-changing image and musical style. Known as the Chameleon of Rock, he astonished1 Britain in the 1970s, his most important decade, with his theatrical character Ziggy Stardust2, one of the most iconic creations in pop history, and the vehicle for some of his most famous songs. MAKING MUSICAL HISTORY Born David Robert Jones in Brixton, South London in 1947, David Bowie’s career began in 1969, with the hit single Space Oddity3, about an astronaut, Major Tom, marooned4…

Whiskey is one of Ireland’s primary exports, with an estimated value of over €1 billion per year. Since its creation in the 12th century, this amber-coloured liquor has been a prominent player in Irish life and culture, but recently, it has been experiencing a renaissance. RISE AND DECLINE Irish whiskey experienced its golden era between the 18th and 19th centuries, when it became one of the best-known distilled spirits in the world. Ireland was then part of the British Empire, and Irish whiskey was sold throughout its dominions, especially across the ocean to the young nation of the United States, which became one of its biggest markets. However, two events dealt a major blow1 to Irish whiskey sales globally: the rise of blended2 Scotch whisky in the late 19th century,…

Lucy Sante is a Belgian-born American writer and photographer who emigrated to New Jersey in the early 1960s. As a child, she only spoke French, but ended up excelling in English to the point that she taught essay writing1 at New York’s Bard College for nearly twenty-five years. A frequent contributor to The New York Review of Books, Sante’s own publications include a biography of New York City from the early 19th to the 20th century called Low Life: Lures2 and Snares3 of Old New York (1991); a collection of photographs of suicides and homicide victims from 1914 to 1918 called Evidence (1992) and a book of essays called Kill All Your Darlings4: Pieces 1990-2005 (2007). In 2002, the writer worked as a historical consultant on Martin Scorsese’s film Gangs of New…

Good morning! I’m here for my appraisal. Hi, Tom. Please sit down while I review your self-assessment form. Hmmm. You’ve had a busy1 year! Yes, I have. My line manager has told you all about it, right? She has. She also said our policy2 of continuous feedback has helped to keep your progress on track. It’s been really useful with my personal development goals, especially time management3. Ah, yes. She says you’ve really done well organising your schedule4. Thanks! I also did some training to boost my negotiation techniques. And look what happened! You closed the biggest deal in our history. Well, it was a team effort5. I’m really proud of how we worked together on that. Teamwork is a critical soft skill, not only for you, but also for the…

The word ‘nice’ has a surprising history and it’s a perfect example of how words can dramatically change meaning over time. Today we use ‘nice’ to mean that something or someone is ‘pleasant’, ‘attractive’, ‘pretty’ or ‘kind1’, but its original meanings weren’t flattering2 at all3. NOT KNOWING It all began with the Latin word ‘nescius’, which means ‘ignorant’, ‘unaware4’, ‘not knowing’. It comes from ‘ne’ (‘not’) and ‘scire’ (‘to know’); which is the same root5 for the word ‘science’ and many related words such as ‘conscience’, ‘prescient’, and ‘omniscient’! When nescius passed into Old French as nice, it kept the negative meaning: it described an unaware, ignorant, senseless6 person: someone who ‘didn’t know’. NEUTRALISATION The word entered the English language with the Norman Conquest in 1066; the Anglo-Norman nice is documented…

Zohran Kwame Mamdani, the new mayor of New York City, is a living example of the American dream. Born in Uganda to Indian parents, the family lived in South Africa for three years before moving to New York City when Zohran was seven. On 1 January 2026 he will not only become the mayor of arguably1 the most iconic and globally significant city in the world but, at the age of thirty-five, he will be its youngest mayor since 1889. He will also be the first Muslim and first African-born American to hold the post2. FAMILY TIES Mamdani’s mother, Mira Nair, is an Academy Award-nominated3 film director. His father, Mahmood, is a college professor and author who moved to the Ugandan capital Kampala with his family as a child, as…

Among the most influential musicians ever, English singer David Bowie was a musical magpie1, taking inspiration from a wide range2 of genres. His eclectic career spanned3 five decades and incorporated everything from folk, glam rock, R&B, disco and pop to drum’n’bass and jazz. He was an avid reader and explored many recurring themes in his lyrics, creating multiple personas4. Outer Space was an early motif with his first hit Space Oddity and his alter ego Ziggy Stardust, and later again in 1980’s Ashes to Ashes5. Bowie’s half-brother Terry suffered from schizophrenia and therefore many of Bowie’s songs deal with isolation and alienation. 1. Space Oddity (1969) Bowie’s first chart success coincided with the 1969 Moon landings6. A psychedelic folk tale of an ill-fated7 astronaut, it begins with a countdown while…

Sixteen hundred Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington is no common address. It is the seat1 of power of the United States of America and, some would say, of the free world. It is also the home of the president and his family. The White House has been the official residence of every president since the second, John Adams (1797-1801). As such2, it is a museum of American history. Everyone knows what the White House looks like. Numerous films have shown the building being blown up3 by aliens or attacked by terrorists! But what is it really like inside? THE RESIDENCE The White House consists of a residence and two wings4. The residence was designed by James Hoban and built in the neoclassical style between 1792 and 1800. It has 132 rooms and…

Prince Andrew is to be stripped1 of his royal titles and will move out2 of his home at the Royal Lodge3 in Windsor, Buckingham Palace has announced. King Charles has initiated a “formal process to remove4 the style5, titles and honours of Prince Andrew,” who will now be known as Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, the Palace said. It is understood the King had the support of the Prince of Wales in the decision and Andrew did not object to the process. The decision follows anxiety within the royal household6 about the reputational risk to the monarchy caused by continual headlines concerning Andrew’s friendship with the late7 child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and allegations8 of sexual assault against him by one of Epstein’s victims, Virginia Giuffre. In October, Giuffre, who died by…

Born in Cape Town, South Africa, in 1940, John Maxwell Coetzee is one of the world’s most acclaimed English-language authors. Novelist, essayist, linguist and translator, his work explores social, political and moral issues. Waiting for the Barbarians was published in 1980 during Apartheid. It is set in a distant outpost1 of an unnamed empire where citizens live in fear of an invasion by “barbarians.” This land represents South Africa in a state of emergency due to2 widespread internal unrest3 and popular resistance. JUSTICE The story is protagonised and narrated by the ageing Magistrate, who lives a comfortable life dispensing justice in a hot, dusty4 frontier settlement5. One day, Colonel Joll and his men arrive from the empire’s dreaded6 Third Bureau7. The Magistrate fears Joll, who believes in the efficacy of…

In a sense, Tilly Norwood is like many other aspiring actors. She is young, beautiful, and the star of a new comedy sketch that has gone viral on YouTube. She has, however, one distinctive characteristic: she isn’t human. Tilly is an AI-generated character and now she is at the centre of controversy in Hollywood, where many fear AI actors will soon replace1 humans in the film and TV industry. HALF A MILLION VIEWS “You’ll either get it or pretend2 you don’t. I’m a creation.” This is the tagline3 on Tilly Norwood’s Instagram account, which has over sixty thousand followers. Of course, the tagline wasn’t written by Tilly but by her creators at Xicoia. Xicoia is the AI division of the UK-based Particle6 Group, a video production service which was founded…

Zohran Mamdani’s historic election as the mayor of New York City has shaken the foundations1 of the US political establishment at a critical time. And not just because he became the first Indian or the first Muslim, and the first self-declared democratic socialist, to lead the city at the forefront2 of cultural and economic transformations. His political style and rhetoric — full of idealism and utopian promises — echo the voices of past leaders like Barack Obama or even Martin Luther King Jr. Mamdani’s speech on the night of 4 November has been hailed3 as one of the most inspiring in recent memory. Time magazine called it “a moment of generational shift4, delivered with the cadence of a movement leader rather than a politician,” while Politico defined his words as…

On a recent morning, I knocked on the front door of a handsome two-story home in Redwood City, California. Within seconds, the door was opened by a faceless robot dressed in a beige bodysuit that clung tight1 to its trim waist2 and long legs. This svelte humanoid greeted me with what seemed to be a Scandinavian accent, and I offered to shake hands. As our palms met, it said: “I have a firm grip3.” When the home’s owner, a Norwegian engineer named Bernt Børnich, asked for some bottled water, the robot turned, walked into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator with one hand. Artificial intelligence is already driving cars, writing essays and writing computer code. Now humanoids, machines built to look like humans and powered by AI, are poised4 to…

Major world events always change the language we use. The digital revolution provided many new words related to technology. In the near future, confronting the challenges of climate change marks a huge transformation in our societies, as we transition from fossil fuels to renewable energies. Meanwhile, social or cultural transition looks forward to more open and fairer1 societies. In all cases, while various forces of transition are under way2, a flood3 of new terminology accompanies them. SIMPLY SUSTAINABLE ‘Sustainable’ is an adjective that originally meant “[something] that can be maintained at a certain rate4 or level”. Nowadays, we associate the word with the environment and sustainable development, meaning economic or industrial development that does not deplete5 natural resources. Similarly, in the past a person described as ‘green’ was considered ‘ingenuous’…

Lexy watched as ten thousand new DomBots V27 came to life on the factory floor of XpertAI. They were facing1 ten thousand Dom-Bots V26 and immediately began their first task — dismantling their predecessors, whose hardware and software would be recycled and reused. “Oh, the poor bots,” said Lexy’s grandmother, who was touring the factory before they went to lunch together. She was fascinated, if a little horrified, by Lexy’s role as XpertAI CEO2. “Don’t you feel bad for them?” Lexy rolled her eyes3. Her grandmother was a typical Gen Z-er. She viewed humanoid AI as more human than AI, convinced they’d eventually become self-aware4 and replace humanity. “No, Gran5 ,” she said. “They’re machines, not sentient beings6. Every new generation is programmed with the New and Improved Directive, to…