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‘Whose language is it anyway?’ The evolution of English, from ‘loaf’ to ‘LOL’
English is a uniquely weird language largely because its evolution has been a long, twisting road through history, happenstance and – as Shakespeare might say – strange bedfellows. This briskly paced jaunt through the history of the English language from The Open University condenses nearly 1500 years of its evolution, from the Anglo-Saxons to the internet, into eleven lively, animated minutes.
Video by The Open University
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Animals and humans
Are zoos and natural history museums born of a desire to understand, or to control?
57 minutes
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Archaeology
What’s an ancient Greek brick doing in a Sumerian city? An archeological investigation
16 minutes
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Family life
The migrants missing in Mexico, and the mothers who won’t stop searching for them
21 minutes
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Virtues and vices
Why Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Adam Smith were divided on the virtues of vanity
5 minutes
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Ecology and environmental sciences
The tree frog die-off that sparked a global mystery – and revealed a dark truth
15 minutes
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History
From Afghanistan to Virginia – the Muslims who fought in the American Civil War
22 minutes
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Family life
One family’s harrowing escape from postwar Vietnam, told in a poignant metaphor
10 minutes
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Fairness and equality
Visit the small Texas community that lives in the shadow of SpaceX launches
14 minutes
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War and peace
A frontline soldier’s moving account of the fabled ‘Christmas truce’ of 1914
12 minutes