Dani Linton has coordinated box checks looking for bat roosts rather than bird nests across Wytham Woods for over a decade, amassing a dataset of over 2500 day roosts, containing seven species and c.18,000 bat occupations. This talk will provide an introduction to her research on the social organisation, breeding ecology, and population dynamics, of woodland bats.

The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism is pleased to invite you to join us for a panel discussion to mark the launch of a new UN-published handbook designed to tackle the global “disinformation war” – a “war” in which journalists and journalism have become prime targets.

Featuring guest speakers:
Alan Rusbridger, Principal of Lady Margaret Hall, University of Oxford, and former Editor in Chief of the Guardian
Inga Thordar, Executive Editor (Digital) CNN International
Julie Posetti, Co-author Journalism, ‘Fake News’ & Disinformation (UNESCO 2018), Senior Research Fellow at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford
Professor Rasmus Kleis Nielsen, Director of the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford
Thomas Hughes, Executive Director, Article 19

In a global-first act of collaborative research and knowledge sharing involving leading international experts, the UN has published a new handbook that aims to help equip journalism to tackle the scourge of ‘information disorder’. The book, Journalism, ‘Fake News’ & Disinformation, was edited by Julie Posetti, Senior Research Fellow at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, and Cherilyn Ireton, Executive Director of the World Editors Forum.

The handbook was commissioned by the UN’s Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), in the context of growing international concern about a “disinformation war” — a “war” in which news reporters are now targets. This targeting — by “strongman” politicians and deceptive corporate actors, from Trump to Duterte, Cambridge Analytica to Bell Pottinger — makes fighting back against weaponized information mission critical for journalism.

The book is free to download here.
You can read about the book at Nieman Lab.

Timings:
17:30 – 19:00 Panel Discussion
19:00 -19:30 Drinks Reception

Blackwell’s are delighted to be hosting Roger Riddell for the launch of his latest book and debut novel Tapestries of Difference.

Tapestries of Difference is a gripping love story starting and ending in contemporary London but which journeys to Africa, where it captures the alluring beauty and harshness of today’s Zimbabwe and uncovers deceptions about the past which in all other circumstances ought to be forgotten. It is also a tale of both personal identity and what it means to be British today as the country confronts issues of faith and religion, race and ethnicity as it strives to weave a tapestry of core values to bind people together.

Roger Riddell lived in Zimbabwe for many years, chairing the first Presidential Economic Commission after Independence in 1980. After returning to England, Roger worked at the Overseas Development Institute before becoming a Director of Oxford Policy Management to which he is still affiliated. From 1999 to 2003 he was the International Director of Christian Aid. He has published widely on Zimbabwean and wider development issues. His most recent academic book, Does Foreign Aid Really Work? (Oxford University Press, 2008), has sold in excess of 15,000 copies.

All attendees are entitled to a complimentary glass of wine after which there will be a bar available to purchase drinks.

This event is free to attend, but spaces are limited, so please do register your interest. Doors will open at 6.45pm. For all enquiries please email events.oxford@blackwell.co.uk or call our Customer Service Department on 01865 333623.

An interview with John Lennox, Professor of Mathematics (emeritus) at Oxford University, by Rob Gifford, Senior Editor for The Economist.

In today’s world, isn’t it science, rather than Christianity, that holds the key to answering life’s deepest questions? Haven’t new discoveries rendered religious ideas obsolete? In a pluralistic and interconnected age, what should we put our trust in and is there any hope for humanity?

Join us as John and Rob explore these and many other questions relating to God, science and the meaning of life. This interactive event includes opportunities to submit questions, as well as a book signing for Prof. Lennox’s latest work, Can Science Explain Everything?

This is a joint event with the Oxford Energy Colloquia

Since the late 2000s, science has established that global warming is largely defined by the total amount of carbon dioxide we emit into the atmosphere. This concept not only implies that halting warming to any level implies that global carbon dioxide emissions have to be reduced to net zero, it also allows to estimate carbon budgets that would be compatible with limiting warming to either 1.5°C or 2°C. Once established, the carbon budget concept and its implications were rapidly taken up in policy discussions.

In this talk, Dr Joeri Rogelj, will explore and discuss the latest developments in estimation the remaining carbon budget as well as its usefulness for guiding policy and climate change mitigation action.

This talk will be followed by a drinks reception, all welcome

Warburg Memorial Lecture – Joint with BBOWT
Bryophytes in Cambridgeshire have been recorded continuously since 1927 and with increasing intensity in recent decades. A detailed analysis of the records reveals the remarkably dynamic nature of the bryophyte flora of lowland England.

‘Triboreacted materials as functional interfaces in internal combustion engines and medical implants’

Reducing CO2 and particulate emissions to halt global warming and improve the air cleanliness in developed and developing nations is urgent. A similarly large challenge is the provision of medical implants that will serve the ageing population. Both challenges are underpinned by the need to understand important functional interfaces.
This talk will focus on the engine and the hip and will present how an understanding of the interactions between tribology and chemistry/corrosion play a crucial role in the interfacial friction, wear and integrity. The integration of state-of-the-art surface science with engineering simulations in both of these areas enables engineers to create optimised systems with improved performance

The economic case for limiting warming to 1.5°C is unclear, due to manifold uncertainties. However, it cannot be ruled out that the 1.5°C target passes a cost-benefit test. Costs are almost certainly high: the median global carbon price in 1.5°C scenarios implemented by various energy models is more than US$100 per metric ton of CO2 in 2020, for example. Benefits estimates range from much lower than this to much higher. Some of these uncertainties may reduce in the future, raising the question of how to hedge in the near term.

Simon Dietz is an environmental economist with particular interests in climate change and sustainable development. He has published dozens of research articles on a wide range of issues, and he also works with governments, businesses and NGOs on topics of shared interest, such as carbon pricing, insurance and institutional investment.

Join astrobiologist Lewis Dartnell as he takes us billions of years into our planet’s past and tells us the ultimate origin story. From the cultivation of the first crops to the founding of modern states, Lewis reveals the Earth’s awesome impact on the shape of human civilizations.

How are the Himalayas linked to the orbit of the Earth? Or to the formation of the British Isles? Humans are often thought to shape the environment around us, but as a species the environment shapes us. Geological forces drove evolution in East Africa; mountainous terrain led to the development of the democracy in Greece; and today voting behaviour in the United States follows the bed of an ancient sea. So come along and find out How the Earth Made Us – and made Donald Trump the US president!

Lewis Dartnell is an astrobiology researcher and professor at the University of Westminster. He has won several awards for his science writing and contributes to the Guardian, The Times and New Scientist. He has also written for television, appeared on BBC Horizon, Sky News and Wonders of the Universe as well as National Geographic and History channels. He is also author of the bestselling book The Knowledge: How to Rebuild our World From Scratch.

Lewis will be signing copies of his book Origins – How the Earth Made Us at the end the end of the event.

Suitable for ages 16+

Join us for an evening with the novelist Stacey Halls, author of this year’s most spellbinding debut – The Familiars. Stacey Halls will be in conversation at Blackwell’s Bookshop at Westgate Oxford on Thursday 28 February at 7pm.

This is a joint lecture with The Rockefeller Foundation Economic Council on Planetary Health at the Oxford Martin School

Cooling is critical for many of the sustainable development goals, including those relating to health, shelter, livelihoods, education and nutrition. As the world’s population grows, as disposable incomes grow and as urban areas grow, the need for cooling is booming. However cooling uses super polluting gases and large amounts of energy and is therefore a significant cause of climate change. More efficient, clean cooling has the potential to avoid up to a degree of warming by the end of the century and recently all governments came together to agree action to try to maximize this opportunity. Cooling sits at the intersection of the UNFCCC, the SDGs and the Montreal Protocol, but can these forces ensure success?

Dan Hamza-Goodacre will explain the risks and possibilities in the search for sustainable cooling for all.

This talk will be followed by a drinks reception, all welcome

Currently limited tools exist to accurately forecast the complex nature of disease spread across the globe. Dr Moritz Kraemer will talk about the dynamic global maps being built, at 5km resolution, to predict the invasion of new organisms under climate change conditions and continued unplanned urbanisation.

This book talk is co-organised with the Oxford Martin Programme on Collective Responsibility for Infectious Disease

Vaccination raises ethical issues about the responsibilities of individuals, communities, and states in preventing serious and potentially life-threatening infectious diseases. Such responsibilities are typically taken to be about minimising risks for those who are vaccinated and for those around them. However, there are other ethical considerations that matter when defining the responsibilities of different actors with regard to vaccination. Such ethical considerations are not often given due considerations in the debate on vaccination ethics and policy.

Thus, in this talk Dr Alberto Giubilini aims at offering a defence of compulsory vaccination taking into account not only the importance of preventing the harms of infectious diseases, but also the value of fairness in the distribution of the burdens entailed by the obligation to protect people from infectious diseases. He will offer a philosophical account of the key notions involved in the ethical debate on vaccination, of the types of responsibilities involved, of the possible types of vaccination policies ranked from the least to the most restrictive, and of the reasons why compulsory vaccination is, from an ethical point of view, the best policy available, as it is the most likely to guarantee not only protection from infectious diseases, but also a fair distribution of the burdens and responsibilities involved.

The talk will be followed by a drinks reception, all welcome

Dung beetles in the British Isles are a vital part of their associated ecosystems but have been historically rather overlooked probably due to their chosen habitat. Now our native dung beetles are finally beginning to get some of the invertebrate limelight due to an emphasis on ecosystem services and a much more environmentally friendly farming future. However we are lacking on a great deal of base data about these vitally important species and surveying is the one of the best ways to get information. This means getting into dung and discovering these unsung heroes

The Global Politics, Economy and Society (GPES) Research Centre at Oxford Brookes will be hosting its first annual lecture, given by the writer and activist George Monbiot. All welcome, but please book via the registration link.

The ecology and history of one of the largest atolls in the world. Aldabra, situated in the South West Indian Ocean, supports the largest population of giant tortoises worldwide. A UNESCO World Heritage Site, it is a stronghold for wildlife in a region that is besieged by threats.

This is a joint event with the Oxford Martin School and the Oxford Climate Research Network (OCRN)

Professor David Battisti, The Tamaki Endowed Chair of Atmospheric Sciences, will be talking about global climate sensitivity controlling regional warming uncertainty and its role in impacting on human health, particularly heat stress.

The 11th Annual Human Welfare Conference is entitled ‘Innovate: Balancing Interests in Resource-Constrained Settings’. The conference will focus on solutions being developed at various scales to improve human wellbeing in areas as diverse as poverty alleviation, education, health, and social welfare. The goal is to offer diverse, interdisciplinary perspectives on tackling the most pertinent issues facing our society today. Invited speakers include academics and practitioners, with experience working in government, NGOs and the commercial sector in fields as diverse as health, food, investment and education.

The 5th Annual Oxford Business and Poverty Conference will feature a diverse range of speakers addressing the Paradoxes of Prosperity. Sign up here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/5th-annual-oxford-business-poverty-conference-tickets-57733957822
Hosted at the Sheldonian Theatre, the conference will feature keynotes by:
Lant Pritchett: RISE Research Director at the Blavatnik School of Government, former Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Development
Efosa Ojomo: Global Prosperity Lead and Senior Researcher at the Clayton Christensen Institute
John Hoffmire: Director of Center on Business and Poverty and Research Associate at Kellogg Colleges at Center For Mutual and Employee-owned Business at Oxford University
Ananth Pai: Executive Director, Bharath Beedi Works Pvt. Ltd. and Director, Bharath Auto Cars Pvt
Laurel Stanfield: Assistant Professor of Marketing at Bentley College in Massachusetts
Grace Cheng: Greater China’s Country Manager for Russell Reynolds Associates
Madhusudan Jagadish: 2016 Graduate MBA, Said Business School, University of Oxford
Tentative Schedule:
2:15-2:20 Welcome
2:20-2:50 Efosa Ojomo, co-author of The Prosperity Paradox, sets the stage for the need for innovation in development
2:50-3:20 John Hoffmire, Ananth Pai and Mudhusudan Jagadish explain how the Prosperity Paradox can be used in India as a model to create good jobs for poor women
3:20-3:40 Break
3:40-4:10 Laurel Steinfeld speaks to issues of gender, development and business – addressing paradoxes related to prosperity
4:10-4:40 Grace Cheng, speaks about the history of China’s use of disruptive innovations to develop its economy
4:40-5:15 Break
5:15-6 Lant Pritchett talks on Pushing Past Poverty: Paths to Prosperity
6:30-8 Dinner at the Rhodes House – Purchase tickets after signing up for the conference
Sponsors include: Russell Reynolds, Employee Ownership Foundation, Ananth Pai Foundation and others

Published for the first time, this is Sylvia Pankhurst’s text about her two tours of North America in 1911 and 1912. An English militant suffragette, she was expected to appeal for support from progressive elites. Instead, Pankhurst identified with the marginalised and recorded their stories.

The result was a powerful indictment of American capitalism. Repulsed by the stark inequalities, Pankhurst was nevertheless inspired by the struggles for change. She vividly recalls a courageous strike of laundry workers in New York, the appalling conditions in the prison cells of Chicago, and the horrific racism she witnessed in Tennessee.

This exciting work reveals Pankhurst’s efforts to link the women’s movement to wider emancipatory struggles – efforts that would change the course of suffrage history.

Edited and introduced by Katherine Connelly who will be in conversation with Dana Mills, author of a forthcoming biography of Rosa Luxemburg. Chaired by Tracy Walsh, Programme Coordinator of the Oxford International Women’s Festival.

Blackwell’s is delighted to welcome to the bookshop Dina Nayeri who will be discussing her powerful and thought-provoking book ‘The Ungrateful Refugee’.

In ‘The Ungrateful Refugee’ Dina Nayeri weaves together the story of her own refugee journey – as a child forced to flee Iran, eventually finding asylum in America – with the stories of others making their own journeys today. She sets out the stages of the refugee experience, and gives voice to those in today’s refugee camps, or who are trying to settle in a new country, and for many of whom the search for home can be a forever state.

Dina Nayeri was born in Iran during the revolution and arrived in America when she was ten years old. She is the winner of a National Endowment for the Arts Grant, an O. Henry Award and the UNESCO City of Literature Paul Engle Prize. The author of two novels – Refuge and A Teaspoon of Earth and Sea – and contributor to The Displaced, her work has been published in over twenty countries. Her stories and essays have been published in Best American Short Stories and by the New York Times, Guardian, Wall Street Journal, Granta and many other publications.

Doors will open at 6.45pm where there will be a small bar available to purchase drinks until 7pm. For all enquiries please email events.oxford@blackwell.co.uk or call our Customer Service Department on 01865 333623.

Our wild bees and other pollinators are so important, but they are still the unsung heroes of the environment, gardens and countryside and continue to decline in number and range. The talk will identify what we can all do to help wild bees. Many of the actions we take to protect one pollinator species, such as flower rich habitat creation and reduction in pesticide use, will assist biodiversity as a whole.

News about Britain’s wildlife and ecosystems tends to be grim. In ‘Green and Prosperous Land’, Dieter Helm, a member of the Department of Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) and advisor to the government, shares a radical but tangible plan for positive change. This is not the pale shadow offered by the current government, but a bold generational plan, which assesses the environment as a whole, explains the necessity of protecting and enhancing our green spaces and offers a clear, economically viable strategy to put Britain on a greener path.

Join Dieter Helm in conversation with Kathy Willis, as he explores his recommendations on how we can rescue the British Countryside.

The high seas are under severe pressure from both direct and indirect human impacts, including the effects of over-fishing, plastic debris and climate change. In this talk, Prof Alex Rogers will present what a network of marine protected areas in the high seas might look like, protecting 30% of known conservation features and taking into account climate change impacts. We will also hear from Dr Gwilym Rowlands, who will consider how such a network of marine protected areas could be enforced and the potential benefits to the ocean.

Architectural designer and TV presenter Charlie Luxton joins Oxford based architecture and design cooperative Transition by Design for a talk on sustainable architecture and how Oxford can meet the need for affordable housing whilst limiting the impact on the natural environment.

Following the talk, there will be a panel discussion and Q&A.

This event is for anyone who is interested in or currently building, renovating, converting or extending their home. The panel will include experts on architecture, housing and low-energy design in discussion on low-carbon materials and energy efficiency as well as co-housing, community-led design and other models of housing.

This event is part of Oxford Green Week 2019

This is a joint book talk with The Rockefeller Foundation Economic Council on Planetary Health at the Oxford Martin School

Now that Trump has turned the United States into a global climate outcast, will China take the lead in saving our planet from environmental catastrophe? Many signs point to yes. China, the world’s largest carbon emitter, is leading a global clean energy revolution, phasing out coal consumption and leading the development of a global system of green finance.

But as leading China environmental expert and author of Will China Save the Planet? Barbara Finamore will explain in this talk, it is anything but easy. The fundamental economic and political challenges that China faces in addressing its domestic environmental crisis threaten to derail its low-carbon energy transition. Yet there is reason for hope. China’s leaders understand that transforming the world’s second largest economy from one dependent on highly polluting heavy industry to one focused on clean energy, services and innovation is essential, not only to the future of the planet, but to China’s own prosperity.

We will also hear from respondent Radhika Khosla, Research Director at the Oxford India Centre for Sustainable Development, Somerville College.

This talk will be followed by a drinks reception, book sale and signing, all welcome

The biosphere and econosphere are deeply interlinked and both are in crisis. Industrial, fossil-fuel based capitalism delivered major increases in living standards from the mid-18th through late-20th centuries, but at the cost of widespread ecosystem destruction, planetary climate change, and a variety of economic injustices. Furthermore, over the past 40 years, the gains of growth have flowed almost exclusively to the top 10%, fuelling populist anger across many countries, endangering both democracy and global action on climate change.

This talk will argue that underlying the current dominant model of capitalism are a set of theories and ideologies that are outdated, unscientific, and morally unsound. New foundations can be built from modern understandings of human behaviour, complex systems science, and broad moral principles. By changing the ideologies, narratives, and memes that govern our economic system, we can create the political space required for the policies and actions required to rapidly transform to a sustainable and just economic system.

Dr Larkman is a retired Oxford biologist who has been chairman of OOS for the last 5 years. His main interest is the precipitous decline in the UK’s small, seed-eating farmland birds over the last 50 years.

A storytelling lecture about how we cope with climate change from the ‘attractively impish’ (The Guardian) Dr Matt Winning. Presented by Oxford Comedy Festival.

As seen as the Environmental Correspondent on ‘Unspun with Matt Forde’ on Dave, BBC Three and BBC Radio2.

‘everything a Fringe show should be: hilarious, personal, inventive, and something that will stay with you for some time to come’ ★★★★★ (EdFestMag)