Explaining history to children: Otto and Marie Neurath’s work on the ‘Visual history of mankind’

This essay traces the development of Otto Neurath’s ideas that led to the publication of one of the first series of children’s books produced by the Isotype Institute in the late 1940s, the Visual History of Mankind. Described in its publicity material as ‘new in content’ and ‘new in method’, it embodied much of Otto Neurath’s thinking about visual education, and also coincided with other educational ideas in the UK in the 1930s and 1940s. It exemplified the Isotype Institute’s approach: teamwork, thinking about the needs of younger readers, clear explanation, and accessible content. Further, drawing on correspondence, notes and drawings from the Otto and Marie Neurath Isotype Collection at the University of Reading, the essay presents insights to the making of the books and the people involved, the costs of production and the influence of this on design decisions, and how the books were received by teachers and children.

Let's talk about sex(ism): cross-national perspectives on women partners’ narratives on equality and sexism at work in Germany and the UK

While the accounting academy has contributed in important ways to furthering our understanding of the relative absence of women in top positions in Professional Service Firms, in-depth empirical research that focuses specifically on sexism is rare, especially so from a cross-national perspective. Drawing on sixty interviews with women partners in public accountancy firms in Germany and the United Kingdom, this article examines how women partners talk about sexism and equal opportunities in the accountancy profession and considers how these narratives are patterned cross-nationally. Employing cultural theory, this study explores how elite women discursively relate to sexism and equal opportunities through their career histories and demonstrates the complex interrelation between the context in which these narratives are produced and the past and present positions of the respondents. Interestingly, it was the German respondents who drew on problematic notions of ‘choice’ and responsibility, where it was upon women to make a choice between their careers and home lives, while this decision-making process was not expected from men. This was in contrast to the accounts of the UK participants who, although also unveiling tensions in their talk, were more inclined to acknowledge continuing structural constraints.

Making it all work: the engineering graduate of the future, a UK perspective

High skills are today seen as being of vital importance to economies, industries, companies and individuals. The engineering industry is no exception and the graduate engineer has a key position in this regard. In the research reported in this paper, the authors use in-depth interviews with industry experts to investigate the provision of undergraduate engineering education in the UK. The current and future skill needs of industry are examined. A typology of future engineering roles and their requisite attributes is proposed. Implications for undergraduate engineering are also discussed.