Eric Arthur Blair was a British novelist, poet, essayist, journalist, and critic who wrote under the pen name of George Orwell, a name inspired by his favourite place River Orwell. His work is characterised by lucid prose, social criticism, opposition to all totalitarianism, and support of democratic socialism.
Oxbridge is a portmanteau of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, the two oldest, wealthiest, and most famous universities in the United Kingdom. The term is used to refer to them collectively, in contrast to other British universities, and more broadly to describe characteristics reminiscent of them, often with implications of superior social or intellectual status or elitism.
Positive psychology is a field of psychological theory and research of optimal human functioning of people, groups, and institutions. It studies "positive subjective experience, positive individual traits, and positive institutions... it aims to improve quality of life."
Andrew Paul Gilligan is a British policy adviser and ex-journalist. He was, as of February 2024, a special adviser to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, having previously worked as a transport adviser to Boris Johnson both as Mayor of London and as Prime Minister.
Cam FM is a student-run radio station at the University of Cambridge and Anglia Ruskin University. The station broadcasts online and has an FM frequency of 97.2 MHz. The station opened studios at Anglia Ruskin University and Fitzwilliam College and started broadcasting in 2012 from these locations after having spent its first 32 years located in Churchill College. Cam FM once held the world record for the longest team broadcast marathon, at 76 hours, and following the significant technical overhaul as a result of the two new studios in 2012, provided the first-ever broadcast media coverage of the Oxford vs Cambridge Women's Boat Race from Dorney Lake, as well as live outside broadcasts from Newmarket Races and the Varsity Ski Trip.
Varsity is the oldest of Cambridge University's main student newspapers. It has been published continuously since 1947 and is one of only three fully independent student newspapers in the UK. It moved back to being a weekly publication in Michaelmas 2015, and is published every Friday during term time.
Nicholas Cohen is a British journalist, author and political commentator. He was a columnist for The Observer and is a blogger for The Spectator. Following accusations of sexual harassment, he left The Observer in 2022 and began publishing on the Substack platform.
Paul Andrew Ormerod is a British economist who is a partner at Volterra Partners consultancy. Additionally, he is a visiting professor at UCL Centre for Decision Making Uncertainty.
Mihaly Robert Csikszentmihalyi was a Hungarian-American psychologist. He recognized and named the psychological concept of "flow", a highly focused mental state conducive to productivity. He was the Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Management at Claremont Graduate University. Earlier, he served as the head of the department of psychology at the University of Chicago and of the department of sociology and anthropology at Lake Forest College.
Huntington School is a coeducational, comprehensive secondary school situated in Huntington, York, England, with approximately 1,500 pupils.
Alexis Petridis is a British journalist. He is the head rock and pop music critic for The Guardian, and a regular contributor for GQ. In addition to his music journalism for the paper, he has written a weekly column in the fashion section of The Guardian's Weekend section, as well as contributing to its Lost in Showbiz column.
Quantum healing is a pseudoscientific mixture of ideas which purportedly draws from quantum mechanics, psychology, philosophy, and neurophysiology. Advocates of quantum healing assert that quantum phenomena govern health and wellbeing. There are different versions, which allude to various quantum ideas including wave particle duality and virtual particles, and more generally to "energy" and to vibrations. Quantum healing is a form of alternative medicine.
Andy Martin is a British author and academic. He is a regular contributor to BBC radio programmes and sometimes writes for "The Stone" and "Opinionator" columns in The New York Times. He has also written articles for the web broadcasting service SBS Broadcasting Group. He scripted and produced the short film "Once Upon a Time in New York" in collaboration with Moving Content and likewise "MML the Movie: Languages at Cambridge", directed by Will Frears with Norman Lomax. Both films feature original soundtracks by brothers Jack and Spencer Martin. He is the inventor of Becksistentialism, inspired by David Beckham's stint at Paris St Germain in 2013 and featured at Cambridge University's Festival of Ideas. His essay "The FBI Files on Being and Nothingness" was published by Prospect Magazine and based on a lecture given at the Maison française, Columbia University, New York, as part of its centenary celebrations.
Johann Eduard Hari is a Scottish writer and journalist who wrote for The Independent and The Huffington Post. In 2011, Hari was suspended from The Independent and later resigned, after admitting to plagiarism and fabrications dating back to 2001 and making malicious edits to the Wikipedia pages of journalists who had criticised his conduct. He has since written books on the topics of depression, the war on drugs, the effect of technology on attention span, and anti-obesity medication, which have attracted criticism for inaccuracies and misrepresentation.
The Faculty of Human, Social, and Political Science at the University of Cambridge was created in 2011 out of a merger of the Faculty of Archaeology and Anthropology and the Faculty of Politics, Psychology, Sociology and International Studies. According to the Cambridge HSPS website: graduates pursue careers in "research, the Civil Service, journalism, management consultancy, museums, conservation and heritage management, national and international NGOs and development agencies, the Law, teaching, publishing, health management, and public relations."
Pelmanism was a system of brain training which was popular in the United Kingdom during the first half of the twentieth century.
Paul Dolan is Professor of Behavioural Science in the Department in Psychological and Behavioural Science at the London School of Economics and Political Science. He is Director of the Executive MSc in Behavioural Science which began in September 2014. Dolan conducts research on the measurement of happiness, its causes and consequences, and the implications for public policy, publishing in both scholarly and popular outlets. He has previously held academic posts at York, Newcastle, Sheffield and Imperial College London and he has been a visiting scholar at Princeton University. He is the author of two popular press books: Happiness by Design and Happy Ever After and the creator and presenter of the Duck-Rabbit podcast.
Jason Osamede Okundaye is a British writer. The Evening Standard named him one of London's leading emerging writers. He works as a freelance journalist and essayist, covering topics such as politics, history, and popular culture and media, and previously had a column in Tribune. His debut book Revolutionary Acts was published in 2024.
Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals is a 2021 non-fiction book written by British author Oliver Burkeman.
Emrys Westacott is an American philosopher and Professor of Philosophy at Alfred University. He is known for his works on ethics.
