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Editor's note
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If you are dreading the Christmas Eve food shop, you can blame Charles Dickens, whose account of the Scrooge and Cratchit family’s celebratory turkey dinner in A Christmas Carol laid the foundations for Britain’s Yuletide feast. And don’t even mention all the leftovers, although we’re here with some advice about how to reduce the mountain of waste this year. And, if you follow our tips about how to get the best out of your Brussels sprouts, you certainly won’t be throwing any of them away.
While we’re on the subject, we’ve got a few tips about how to make your Christmas greener. In fact, you might want to think about going plastic-free altogether.
Meanwhile, if you still have any last-minute shopping to do for the teenagers in your life, we can recommend some of the best books for young adults to help them make sense of the rapidly changing world around them. And if you’re picky about your presents, and don’t want to play the Grinch – here's how to lie (politely) when you get a bad one.
We’ll be running fewer stories now until January 2, but look out for our special newsletters picking out some themes of the year. Have a great Christmas.
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Jonathan Este
Associate Editor, Arts + Culture Editor
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Mr. Fezziwig’s Ball from A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.
Hand colored etching by John Leech
Joan Fitzpatrick, Loughborough University
If it hadn't been for A Christmas Carol, the menu may well have centred on goose (or a boar's head).
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shutterstock.
Elliot Woolley, Loughborough University
In the UK the equivalent of four million Christmas dinners are wasted every year.
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Djim Loic/Unsplash
Clare Holdsworth, Keele University
Our obsession with busyness is about managing relationships – not just time.
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Arts + Culture
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John Wills, University of Kent
Post-apocalyptic visions reflect society's fears – and gamers get to immerse themselves in it.
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Fiona Shaw, Northumbria University, Newcastle
Here's a bumper crop of thought-provoking and engaging novels for enquiring minds.
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Alison Moulds, University of Oxford
For Victorian shop workers, Christmas could be a miserable time of long hours and low pay.
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Elizabeth Stokoe, Loughborough University; Jessica Robles, Loughborough University
Not giving offence is what Christmas is all about.
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Malte Rödl, University of Manchester
Vegeterian and vegan food is often marketed as close enough to meat that you can hardly tell the difference. This devotion to mimicking meat stifles creative alternatives to Christmas dinner.
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Environment + Energy
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Camille Bellet, University of Liverpool
Farmers are closest to the land and their livestock, and have everything to lose by not taking care of it.
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Denise Baden, University of Southampton
Dystopian fiction is popular, but presenting positive visions of the future in popular culture could help people embrace solutions.
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Politics + Society
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Anna Jackman, Royal Holloway
Cheap, powerful, and more widely used by greater numbers of people, drones are causing a headache at supposedly secure locations worldwide.
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Jo Aldridge, Loughborough University
Thousands of young carers are supporting family members unrecognised and wary of asking for help.
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Mark A Hutchinson, University of York
British is an imperial term, not a national one.
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Erica Consterdine, University of Sussex
The UK government has done little to prove how it will continue to attract highly skilled migrants after Brexit.
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Health + Medicine
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Leigh Jackson, University of Exeter
Discovering a genetic basis for erectile dysfunction that is linked to Type-2 diabetes will make it easier to identify those at risk – and novel treatments.
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Featured events
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Exhibition Space, Emily Wilding Davison Building, Egham, Surrey, TW20 0EX, United Kingdom — Royal Holloway
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Picture Gallery, Egham, Surrey, TW20 0EX, United Kingdom — Royal Holloway
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Exhibition Space, Emily Wilding Davison Building, Egham, Surrey, TW20 0EX, United Kingdom — Royal Holloway
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Picture Gallery, Egham, Surrey, TW20 0EX, United Kingdom — Royal Holloway
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