Search

Nick Buckley MBE explores the relationship between “givers” and “takers,” and the damaging symbiotic relationship between them. He examines the motivation of disheveled individuals sitting on street corners holding out paper cups, as well as the intergenerational problem of poverty and welfare dependency. Different types of beggars are highlighted, such as politicians begging for votes, charities begging for donations, and even the woke begging for validation and attention. Buckley shows that begging is a complicated topic, part nature and part nurture, and that many engage in such behavior unknowingly. Unlike most authors on this topic, Buckley explores his own history of begging from being raised in a workless household on benefits, to claiming unemployment benefits as an adult, and the journey that eventually led him to found an award-winning charity. Buckley offers us an antidote to such unbecoming behavior: personal responsibility.

The Margins of Late Medieval London is a powerful study of medieval London’s urban fringe. Seeking to unpack the complexity of urban life in the medieval age, this volume offers a detailed and novel approach to understanding London beyond its institutional structures. Using a combination of experimental digital, quantitative and qualitative methodologies, the volume casts new light on urban life at the level of the neighbourhood and considers the differences in economy, society and sociability which existed in different areas of a vibrant premodern city. It focuses on the dynamism and mobility that shaped city life, integrating the experiences of London’s poor and migrant communities and how they found their place within urban life. It describes how people found themselves marginalized in the city, and the strategies they would employ to mitigate that precarious position.