I’ve written here before about different stages in my academic career, and the opportunities and challenges each one has brought. I’m now three months in to a postdoc research fellowship, my first full-time academic role after finishing my DPhil in 2020. It’s been a big move in various ways – Read more
Dear Robert/a, I’m so glad you came to see me in my office yesterday. It was good to hear how the year is going for you. It was also good to see your courage on display – it’s not easy to approach your professor with questions like the ones you’re Read more
This is the title of a conference I have just returned from in Liverpool – and also, I would say, the result. The Hope Ecumenical Network was launched last week with a two-day international meeting that brought together representatives from at least fifteen universities and colleges with Christian identities, and Read more
The post two weeks ago by Richard described the inspiration found in C.S. Lewis’s The Abolition of Man for a fresh research direction. As a companion piece, and in the spirit of the upcoming TFN event which seeks to learn from Lewis, I want to reflect on the vocation which Read more
Dear Christian Graduate Student, In my last post, I encouraged you to begin the academic year with a sense of adventure when it comes to the research questions you entertain, formulate, and pursue. We can have freedom to be academically curious because we live in God’s Creation and Jesus calls Read more
Many people know of C.S. Lewis through his Narnia stories. Many Christians also know him as an apologist, whose own journey from atheism to Christianity informed his defence of the faith on radio and in person as well as in numerous writings. Not so many know him as a contributor Read more
Today I want to follow up my last post, about how exemplary figures, whether in our lives, in the Bible, or in our fields of study, contribute to our formation – particularly as we live and think in community. Earlier this year, I was asked to fill in on a Read more
Some years ago now, I wrote a post about the relationship between my faith and my love for avant-garde music. One thing I pointed out was the tension between beauty and deliberate discomfort (one might even call it ‘ugliness’) in a lot of this music: I suggested that whilst moments Read more
New and returning graduate students, Welcome to this new 2022-2023 academic year! You have come to this place and to this moment from a wide diversity of backgrounds, experiences, achievements, and challenges. But, nonetheless, one thing binds you together with a shared commonness: you have formulated a question. Your research Read more
Now is a time when many students are choosing subjects to study. Those applying for undergraduate degrees in the UK will be browsing university prospectuses, booking open days and filling out UCAS forms. Those already at university may be finalising module choices for the coming academic year. And some doctoral Read more