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Hundreds of educational interactives, games, quizzes, videos and podcasts, plus 1000s of articles written by academic experts and guest contributors.
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Languages
Black Blue Plaques
This film explores the under-representation of Black heritage and the linguistic landscape in relation to Blue Plaques.
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Health, Sports & Psychology
Crime fiction: past, present and future – a discussion between Bill Alder and Simon Brett OBE
Crime fiction is the most popular literary genre in Europe today. Watch a discussion between The Open University’s Bill Alder and distinguished crime fiction author Simon Brett OBE on the past, present and future of crime fiction.
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Languages
Crime fiction
Explore the world of crime fiction with The Open University, a world leader in distance learning. Discover free courses, articles, video and audio resources, and interactive activities, free to study and available to start right away.
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Languages
How are social workers portrayed in the media?
Academic research shows how social work is misrepresented in newspapers and on TV. Maria Leedham explains more.
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Languages
Swearing today: have our attitudes changed?
Are people less fussed about swearing today than they were in the past? This article (with an associated film ‘Why do we swear?’) looks at attitudes towards offensive language.
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Health, Sports & Psychology
Heroes and villains: the presentation of the outlaw in early twentieth-century American folk music
This article will consider how the figure of the outlaw is presented in early twentieth-century American folk music. What is constant, and what changes? What lies behind these strands of imitation and innovation?
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Languages
Commemorating Lord Byron on the streets of London
On the 200th anniversary of Lord Byron’s death, we explore the history of his commemoration, and how this sheds light on our understanding of English heritage.
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Languages
Crime fiction in French: le polar français
Le polar, crime fiction, is the most popular literary form in France. In this free course, you will discover the origins and development of French crime fiction, along with its current status, before reflecting on whether it is simply mass entertainment or, rather, genuine literature of quality. You will discover some important authors and work ...
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Education & Development
Introduction to Arabic
In this free course you will learn the Arabic alphabet, vowels, and also a little bit about the history of the Arabic language.
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Languages
Year of the Dragon: Lunar New Year
Happy Year of the Dragon! Learn more about what this year means and how to say some traditional New Year greetings to celebrate.
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Digital & Computing
Tips for using a large language model
How should you use Chat GPT and other language models for work, study and life? This article gives you eight top tips for using this sort of artificial intelligence.
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Digital & Computing
Large language models - the chatty computer
Chat GPT is a large language-model based chatbot but is the information it gives accurate? This article looks at the limitations of this advanced open artificial intelligence.