Groundings UG is a peer-reviewed, Directory of Open Access Journals accredited academic journal for undergraduate students. We are based at the University of Glasgow and supported by the Glasgow University Union Board of Management and the University Chancellor's Office. Our mission is to showcase the best work produced by our undergraduate community, and to provide an exciting opportunity to engage in the academic process. We also present at conferences, including running workshops at the British Conference of Undergraduate Research 2026 on academic publishing and research dissemination. Submissions of up to 5,500 words are accepted from any subject in the arts, humanities, and social sciences. Successful submissions are selected through an anonymous peer-review process, after which the chosen authors then work one-to-one with a member of the Editorial Board to revise their article before publication. We currently accepting submissions for the British Conference of Undergraduate Research Special Edition and the Wealth of Nations 250th Anniversary Edition in collaboration with the Pluralistic Economics Academia Society. Got any questions? Email us: arts-groundings-ug@glasgow.ac.uk
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Dissident Ghosts of Queer Language in Hope Mirrlees and E. M. Forster
The essay compares Paris: A Poem by Hope Mirrlees and Howards End, a novel by E. M. Forster. I start by arguing that death is portrayed as a mysterious spectacle resulting in the ghostly presence of the dead among the living in both works. The spectre of Ruth Wilcox in Howards End and the dead haunting Paris subvert institutions: they act against the capitalist market resisting commodification of life and death while also opposing the rigid heteronormative timelines mixing past present and future. Ultimately, the ghosts in Forster and Mirrlees's works emphasise the ephemerality of text and language, inventing new ways to talk about queer identity freed from oppressive 'othering'. Escaping through the fractures in the institutions, the ghosts signify the desire for a new language to speak in a non-normative, 'queer' way.
Copyright (c) 2026 Maiia Marina https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Addressing over-inclusiveness and under-inclusiveness of Patrick Macklem’s Sovereignty of Human Rights
The critiques of Macklem’s theory, particularly regarding its perceived over-inclusiveness, underscore the necessity of distinguishing “human rights in international law” from the narrower regime of IHRL. Macklem’s theory emphasizes the broader role of human rights across diverse areas of international law, where human rights principles play a significant yet distinct role. By addressing critiques that conflate these concepts, this essay has highlighted how Macklem’s legal conception of human rights enriches our understanding of their dynamic and multifaceted function within the international legal order. Moreover, recognizing the interplay between human rights and other areas of international law, my extended theory proposed in this essay not only mitigates the risk of fragmentation but affirms the adaptability and positive role of human rights in addressing the complexities of global justice.
Copyright (c) 2026 Lilliana Fan https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
What Does It Mean To Live Together? Memories of Communality at Felin Uchaf
The following oral history paper explores how narratives surrounding communes and counter-cultural movements in the 1960s and 70s have often been distrusted within by academics within oral history. My mother and her siblings grew up in North Wales, on a 'commune.' This project was made up of series of interviews conducted with the people who were a part of the creation of these spaces, and explores how memories of this period can be distrusted.
Copyright (c) 2026 Olive Morgan https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
‘Street level view’: spatial orientation and metropolitical boundaries in Sam Selvon’s The Lonely Londoners and Nell Dunn’s Up The Junction
A traversing of, and wandering through, The Lonely Londoners by Sam Selvon and Up The Junction by Nell Dunn. This essay focuses on the urban infrastructure that imposes boundaries on the characters in both stories, and repeatedly works to marginalise them. This essay also concentrates on the texts' affixion to the local, and how the characters are confined to their material realities, or their 'street level views'. Selvon's text, however, differs from Dunn's, in that the male characters enact a wandering motion which provides them with creative agency and allows them to surpass the orders of the structures of the metropolis. While Dunn's characters are fixed to the local, and their material poverty, they discover solidarity and community through this. This essay explores how both texts contain characters who overcome the notion of the city as an agent of marginalisation via methods of survival and resistance, but are simultaneously bordered in by the spaces they occupy.
Copyright (c) 2026 Ailsa Davies https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Development of Trade Unions: Decline and Growth of Trade Unions 1870-1914
This essay analyses the developments of trade unions and how the reciprocal relationship between unions, the economy, the worker and the employer, developed and evoled the unions into what they became by the eve of WW1. It will contrast union movements in different periods and examine the similarities and differecnes between them and the different causes and consequences of these factors. It writing about a period of great change within the labour movement, when the working class were beggining to find true value in labour organising and so gives insight into the development of later trade union and labour movements of the 20th Century.
Copyright (c) 2026 Finn Ward https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Identifying Factors Limiting Refugee Access to Healthcare and Potential Measures Which Combat Them.
The number of asylum seekers and refugees (ASRs) worldwide has doubled within the last ten years. This dramatic increase has resulted in an influx of ASRs into the UK, many of which requiring healthcare. However, despite their vulnerability to mental and physical health conditions, the forcibly displaced population are found to struggle when accessing health services. The aim of this study was to review the existing literature on ASR access to healthcare, identify any barriers which may impact its utilisation, and to propose measures which may improve its use. A literature search was conducted on three research databases to find relevant qualitative studies with a focus on barriers to refugee healthcare. Studies were included in this review if they were published in the last five years, conducted within the UK, focused on ASR populations, discussed accessibility to healthcare and collected qualitative data. Ten studies were identified, and they highlighted several common themes which hinder ASR access to healthcare: lack of information, communication, accessibility, affordability, health literacy, cultural differences, prioritisation, transience, intersectionality, and psychological factors. Various methods were proposed to tackle these barriers including adequate ASR training for healthcare staff, the availability of translated information, community outreach programmes, and specialist ASR services. In conclusion, ASRs face a multitude of difficulties when accessing healthcare, and future research should focus on the implementation of the measures proposed to follow their effect on ASR utilisation of healthcare.
Copyright (c) 2026 Gwen Wolda https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Euripides and Opera from the Baroque Period to the 20th Century
This essay aims to report on any connections between Eurpides' tragedies and opera over its 500 year history. I will begin by laying out the thematic concerns that are central to Euripides’ writing as the summaries his tragedies that have most often been adapted to opera, which are including but not limited to Medea, Alcestis, and the Bacchae. This argument will focus on key operas that connect the art form to Euripides, mostly by being direct adaptations of one or more plays, such as Lully's Alceste, Cherubini's Medea, and Wellesz's Alkestis. Any diversions from the source material, whether thematic or narrative, will then be assessed and accounted for within the wider musical and historical context. This will determine that, as I hypothesise, the extent to which the plays of Euripides had a place in shaping the development of Western opera was significant.
Copyright (c) 2026 Sevrin Draper https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Peculiarly Criminal: Resolving the prudential deterrence problem
This article contributes to the debate in the philosophy of law over the justification of punishment. It focusses on the ‘communicative’ theory of punishment as articulated by Antony Duff in his chapter of the recently published Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Punishment (2024). In the chapter Duff elaborates his theory and proposes that the ‘prudential deterrence’ problem is the most serious objection to it. In this article I propose a novel solution to the problem. I argue that the problem arises from Duff’s failure to properly outline the role of his theory in relation to the different kinds of law (principally criminal and non-criminal). Accordingly, I clarify this relation by suggesting that the communicative theory ought to be designated as what justifies the criminal law in particular, while the considerations raised by the prudential deterrence problem are what defines the law apart from particular criminal or non-criminal considerations.
Copyright (c) 2026 James Farrow https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The postmodernist re-evaluation of historical study has led to an awareness of the value of the moving image to the historian. Film can present us with glimpses of a past independent of discourse and its unique link with reality carries with it inevitable assumptions of authenticity. Yet the selection and manipulation of material by the filmmaker, and the dependence on causality or the establishment of ‘fact’, makes historical documentary as problematic as any other mode of historiography. National history is shaped as national identity, and, ultimately, acts of commemoration say as much about the present as the past.
Copyright (c) 2007 Laura Smith https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
A shared sense of identity within a state is a stabilising structure allowing a focus for citizens to rally around. As a multi-ethnic state Russia has always been faced with the problem of how to imbue its citizens with a sense of identity that strengthens the state without causing dissent among the majority ethnic Russians or the many different minorities encapsulated within its territory. The choice between a civic based identity and an ethnically based national identity has faced the ruling apparatus for hundreds of years, and still poses a problem for both the people and the government of today’s Russia.
Copyright (c) 2007 Rhiannon J. Price https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Muriel Spark as Auto-Biographer in Curriculum Vitae
Examining Muriel Spark’s main aims as an auto-biographer in her work Curriculum Vitae brings important resources in the exploration of the genre of autobiographical writing. This, with theoretical engagement, allows consideration of the critical issues surrounding the roles of author and reader in the construction of the literary self. Spark demands the reader participate in the construction of textual meaning; overturning the conventions of autobiography, satirising its claims to omniscience and highlighting the impossibility of an authentic voice with regards to the self.
Copyright (c) 2007 Anna Kirkwood https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Inequality and Identity in Contemporary Processes of Labour Market Restructuring
Contemporary processes of labour market restructuring have resulted in increasing social and spatial inequalities in the United Kingdom. While the well-discussed issues of class, race and gender continue to be correlated to inequality, the decline in numbers of manufacturing jobs and rise in low-level service work has brought a new reality of identity-correlation. To remain employed, workers must increasingly present an identity that is appealing to employers: one that transcends geography and current job role. Thus, in today’s labour market with its increasing economic polarisation, previously strong social and work identities are challenged by the logic of capital.
Copyright (c) 2007 Andrew C. Forsyth https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Morality is essential to human identity. Since Darwin and Wallace proposed natural selection to explain the complexities of organisms, evolutionary biologists have sought explanations for all aspects of human nature including morality. One way to establish how far morality is exclusive to humans is to examine moral precursors in closely-related species. The advantage of such a characteristic initially seems contrary to the ‘selfish’ process of natural selection, however various ways in which such a trait has adaptive value have been proposed. Also, the extent to which morality is actually part of human identity, a product of sophisticated human culture rather than being hard-wired into our minds by evolutionary process, is a fascinating and current area of scientific dialogue.
Copyright (c) 2007 Matthew Rutherford https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
While staring right at us, the varied representations of eyes in sculpture have largely gone unrecognised. Their consideration is essential, however, for the contemporary viewer’s perception of, and identification with, the political and mythology subjects of eighteenth and nineteenth century statuary. A historical overview of the depiction of eyes reveals contradictions in neo-classical sculptural practices: a move from the emulation of the antique, with coloured eyes, to the presentation of uncarved marble eyeballs. This is highly significant for the individualisation of a statue is most achieved through the expression of the eyes both in facial appearance and gaze.
Copyright (c) 2007 Anna Vermehren https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The Impacts of Colonial Law and Policy on Indigenous Family Life in Australia
From the moment that Britain colonised the landmass of Australia, the continuation of traditional Indigenous family life was threatened. It has even been argued that the policy and legislation of successive governments attempted to destroy the rights of Indigenous peoples to their children. Indigenous children were removed from their communities. These children are now known as the Stolen Generations. Past colonial law and policy continues to impact upon the enjoyment of traditional family life with disproportionately high removal rates of Indigenous children from their families and communities. Nationwide solutions such as the Aboriginal Child Placement Principle have gone some way in redressing this issue. In its present form, however, it remains a victim of poor implementation, funding, and inadequate consultation with Indigenous communities.
Copyright (c) 2007 Fraser A. W. Janeczko https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
At the heart of the idea of constitutionalism lies a paradox: on the one hand, the legitimacy of governmental power rests on the consent of individuals; on the other, such consent can only be expressed indirectly through already-established institutional forms. The political will, whether as a product of political representation, or as a rare moment of revolution, seems to be in a relationship of mutual antagonism with individual liberties. But if the moral reasoning underlying rights can only be the product of politics, then it is clear that politics must prevail over law and constitutional reason.
Copyright (c) 2008 James A. Grant https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Freedom is a word we hear a lot. Yet it is often unclear what is meant by it. Recent anti-terrorism laws have been argued by some as safeguarding freedoms and argued by others as restricting them. In this paper, I aim to create and defend an explanation of the nature of freedom that is practical and useful. Through offering a set of criteria, and answering potential criticisms, I conclude that “freedom” must consider people’s strongest desires and take into account the multitude of internal barriers to the fulfilment of these desires. Such a definition will hopefully help us gain a clearer understanding of when our liberty is under threat: putting us in a better position to defend it.
Copyright (c) 2008 David P. Macpherson https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The study of democratic transition, or what makes some nations more conducive to the rise of democratic institutions than others, is vitally important in the modern world. Lithuania and Belarus are generally overlooked by literature on the subject of democratisation, but, due to their long historical ties and very different political paths since they established independence from the USSR, they provide an interesting case study into the historical reasons for the adoption of certain political systems. In brief, this article will deal with why since 1991 Lithuania has become democratic, whilst Belarus has become increasingly autocratic. To do this I compared the historical legacy of the interwar years in both states and focussed on the effects this period had on post-independence politics. This research revealed crucial differences, in that Lithuania’s experience of independent statehood laid the foundations for the later transition to democracy, whilst the failure to establish a sovereign Belarusian state made continued authoritarian rule far more likely. Overall this showed the importance of historical legacies when attempting to establish democracy.
Copyright (c) 2008 Benjamin Hiscox https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The legitimacy of the state has traditionally been a core element in how we understand the relationship between individuals and institutions in modernity. Its demise is therefore an important subject of analysis. The concept of globalisation has provided an important theoretical framework which explains many of the profound challenges to the legitimacy, and even existence, of the state. However, this framework risks perpetuating modernity’s tendency towards oversimplification by focusing too much on the state in particular and geopolitics in general, over other sites and processes of governance. The complexities of the problems must be reflected in theories proposing to answer them.
Copyright (c) 2008 Christopher M. J. Boyd https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
“This is for your own good” is often the aphorism of governments and social institutions in their claims upon our freedoms. Our obedience is framed as collective self-preservation, but can it ever be so simple? Yet philosophical debate often seems to overcomplicate the issue. This article argues that the responsible protection of our rights arises, instead, with a constant reappraisal of citizenship. Freedom and obedience are ultimately two sides of an abacus with objective counters with subjective values; each individual’s calculations must be represented for there to be an accurate model of obligation.
Copyright (c) 2008 Maitiu Corbett https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
If an agent acts so as to harm only himself, then is state interference with that action ever legitimate? Paternalistic legislation has been the subject of much debate. For John Stuart Mill, the only legitimate ground for state interference was the harm principle: state interference to prevent an actor harming others is legitimate; the state, however, may not interfere with actions which harm only the actor himself. I introduce a distinction between (1) long-term desires and short-term desires and (2) current desires and future desires. I will argue that state interference with current, long-term desires is never legitimate.
Copyright (c) 2008 Elouisa M. Leonard https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The significance of the changes that Sulla made to the Roman constitution, and to what extent these changes had been reversed by 70 B.C.
The time when Sulla rose to the dictatorship of the Roman Republic was one in which the power of the Senate was waning. On his accession Sulla implemented changes which sought to re-establish the authority of the Senate thus regaining stability within the state. Here I consider: the impact the reforms had on the existing Roman constitution; the reception of the reforms by different social groups; the political and social context surrounding their implementation and, where applicable, their reversal with the ultimate aim of establishing the reforms’ overall success in achieving the goals of their author.
Copyright (c) 2010 Ruth MacDonald https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
This article traces the manifold satirical and poetic manifestations of James B.V. Thomson’s questioning and sceptical attitude towards the progressivist agenda of the Victorian Britain. It presents both Thomson’s proudly blazoned ‘healthy scepticism’ from his biting satirical works, and the dark, contradictory spirit of Thomson’s most accomplished poetical work, The City of Dreadful Night , as two faces of the same moral attitude.
Copyright (c) 2010 Joanna Małecka https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The evolution burial practice among the Ertebølle
Archaeology has traditionally failed to identify the ability of individuals in the past to make conscious decisions and act creatively. Individuals with the power to act are referred to as agents, with the ability and creativity to make decisions and act independently. They are however constantly influenced by structural norms: deeply ingrained ideas about how to live their lives properly. This tension can be observed archaeologically in the cemeteries of the Ertebølle of Denmark. While there are clear norms in the burial practice, such as the style of inhumation and the type of grave goods, there are also variations. One grave has the body of a young woman and a baby boy, the child laid on the wing of a swan; another burial has full male grave goods, but the body of a dog. It is suggested here that these variations are evidence of individuals reacting to unusual situations and personalities. When people act in ways which do not fit into the usual structure there is the potential for both the structure and, as a result society, to change.
Copyright (c) 2010 Coralie Acheson https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Written on the cusp between two movements, El Incongruente by Ramon Gómez de la Serna eloquently illustrates the transition between Dada and Surrealism. Utilising key Dadaist principles – such as the renunciation of logic, chance combinations of chapters and the juxtaposition of contradictory imagery – combined with Surrealist elements such as a focus on dreams and the passing of time, Gómez de la Serna constructs the puzzling world in which Gustavo lives. El Incongruente breaks with literary tradition eulogizing Dadaist elements whilst still representing the harbinger of Surrealism.
Copyright (c) 2010 Emma Wadsworth-Jones https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
During the latter half of the eighteenth century Britain was in her ‘Golden Age’ of empire. From the defeat of the French in the Seven Years War (1756-1763) until the British loss of the Revolutionary War (1775-1783), she claimed herself as the ‘premiere’ kingdom of the world. But during this period, a growing unease prevailed amongst her people. This was social, with an increasing middle-class born of capitalism, economic through her trade and dominance of the seas, and political through the rise of anti-imperialism against the prevailing absolutist monarchy. In this essay I wish to examine how the sense of crisis in the aristocracy manifested itself in public depictions, namely the military portraits of Sir Joshua Reynolds, and to analyse through the social history of art the pictorial rhetoric that the artist employed for these paintings. I hope to be able to show that the determinations of these aristocratic patrons in asserting ‘heroism’ and ‘civic virtue’ through their portrayals unconsciously exposed their self-conscious condition. Their endeavours in creating a modern, patrician appeal reflected the fractured social and political circumstances of the period into which they desperately attempted to adjust, and maintain power.
Copyright (c) 2010 M. J. von Ferscht-Fountain https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Welsh and Drennan’s work demonstrates significant changes in the literary depiction of the Scottish nation. Moving away from traditional counter-colonial and separatist rhetoric, they direct attention to the problem of consumerism as a new colonising power. Their discourse is permeated by violence, which is also made manifest on a thematic level. Drennan’s novel inverts the implications of the treatment of violence by suggesting that it can be both self-inflicted and self-indulgent.
Copyright (c) 2010 Anikó Szilágyi https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
How has NATO enlargement impacted on NATO-Russia relations?
Relations between NATO and the Russian Federation have been turbulent, particularly since the end of the Cold War and the ‘second wave’ of NATO expansion. Despite some initial evidence of cooperation between the two, this has not been present in the majority of cases, and Russian concerns have often been sidelined. Vital in understanding this relationship is the attitudes of both to the Baltic States, and the strain that their status brought to early Russo-NATO engagement. Indeed, perhaps the greatest tension has been caused by NATO expansion into those states, illustrating a central concern in contemporary international society.
Copyright (c) 2010 Tom Disney https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The proponents of modern Islamic fundamentalism draw on elements of the Islamic religion as a justification for terrorist acts. An examination of the sources of Islamic law – the Qur’an, the Sunnah and the principal Islamic schools of thought – questions the similarities between modern terrorism and the classical jihad doctrine. A distinction is drawn between the offensive and defensive theories of jihad and these are then applied to the modern context in which Islamic terrorism is perpetrated.
Copyright (c) 2010 Fraser D. Galloway https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Did Communist rule in the German Democratic Republic live up to its rhetoric regarding women’s emancipation?
Communism in the German Democratic Republic offers an interesting assessment of the reality/perception paradigm. Despite attempts to convey ideas of absolute equality between the sexes, as perceived by the legal and theoretical frameworks created by the state, the GDR remained unable to overcome realities of economics, the ‘double burden’ and entrenched gender roles within East German society to achieve their aims. By examining each of these aspects in turn, this article will illustrate that whilst some improvements regarding female emancipation were made in the public sphere, little progress was made within the private, and as such the reality remained at odds with the idealised perception of communist equality.
Copyright (c) 2011 Felicity Cooke https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0