history of the word case study

early 13c., "what befalls one; state of affairs," from Old French cas "an event, happening, situation, quarrel, trial," from Latin casus "a chance, occasion, opportunity; accident, mishap," literally "a falling," from cas- , past-participle stem of cadere "to fall, sink, settle down, decline, perish" (used widely: of the setting of heavenly bodies, the fall of Troy, suicides), from PIE root *kad- "to fall."

The notion is of "that which falls" as "that which happens" (compare befall ). From its general nature, the word has taken on widespread extended and transferred meanings. The meaning "instance, example" is from c. 1300. The meaning "actual state of affairs" is from c. 1400. In law, "an instance of litigation" (late 14c.); in medicine, "an instance of a disease" (late 14c.).

The grammatical sense, "one of the forms which make up the inflections of a noun" (late 14c.) also was in Latin, translating Greek ptōsis "declension," literally "a falling." "A noun in the nominative singular ..., or a verb in the present indicative ..., is conceived as standing straight. Then it falls , or is bent , or declines into various positions" [Gilbert Murray, "Greek Studies"]

The U.S. slang meaning "person" (especially one peculiar or remarkable in any way) is from 1848. The meaning "incident or series of events requiring police investigation" is from 1838. In case "in the event" is recorded from mid-14c. Case-history is from 1879, originally medical; case-study "study of a particular case" is from 1879, originally legal; case-law "law as settled by previous court cases" is from 1861.

"receptacle, box, that which encloses or contains," early 14c., from Anglo-French and Old North French casse (Old French chasse "case, reliquary;" Modern French châsse ), from Latin capsa "box, repository" (especially for books), from capere "to take, hold" (from PIE root *kap- "to grasp").

The meaning "outer protective covering" is from late 14c. Also used from 1660s with a sense of "frame" (as in staircase , casement ). Artillery sense is from 1660s, from case-shot "small projectiles put in cases" (1620s). Its application in the printing trade (first recorded 1580s) to the two shallow wooden trays where compositors keep their types in compartments for easy access led to upper-case for capital letters (1862), so called from its higher position on the compositor's sloped work-table, and lower-case for small letters.

The cases, or receptacles, for the type, which are always in pairs, and termed the 'upper' and the 'lower,' are formed of two oblong wooden frames, divided into compartments or boxes of different dimensions, the upper case containing ninety-eight and the lower fifty-four. In the upper case are placed the capital, small capital, and accented letters, also figures, signs for reference to notes &c.; in the lower case the ordinary running letter, points for punctuation, spaces for separating the words, and quadrats for filling up the short lines. [The Literary Gazette, Jan. 29, 1859]

"enclose in a case," 1570s, from case (n.2). Related: Cased ; casing .

The meaning "examine, inspect" (usually prior to robbing) is from 1915, American English slang, perhaps from the notion of giving a place a look on all sides. Compare technical case (v.) "cover the outside of a building with a different material" (1707), from case (n.) "external portion of a building" (1670s).

Entries linking to case

Old English befeallan "to deprive of; fall to, occur to, be assigned to," from be- "by, about" + feallan (see fall (v.)). Compare Old Frisian bifalla , Old Saxon, Old High German bifallan , German befallen . Intransitive sense of "to happen, come to pass" is from c. 1300. Related: Befell ; befalling .

type of hinged sash-window that swings open like doors, early 15c., originally "hollow molding, frame for glass," probably a shortening of Old French dialectal enchassement "window frame" (Modern French enchâssement ), from en- "in," prefix forming verbs, + casse "case, frame" (see case (n.2)) + -ment . Or possibly from Anglo-Latin cassementum , from casse . The "window" sense is from 1550s in English. Old folk etymology tended to make it gazement .

The Irish surname is originally Mc Casmonde (attested from 1429), from a misdivision of Mac Asmundr , from Irish mac "son of" + Old Norse Asmundr "god protector."

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The History of the Case Study at Harvard Business School

• 28 Feb 2017

Many first-time HBS Online participants are surprised to learn that, often, the professor is not at the center of their learning experience. Instead of long faculty lectures, the HBS Online learning model centers on smaller, more digestible pieces of content that require participants to interact with each other, test concepts, and learn from real-world examples.

Often, the professor fades into the background and lets the focus shift to interviews with executives, industry leaders, and small business owners. Some students might be left thinking, "Wait, where did that professor go? Why am I learning about a grocery store in Harvard Square?"

In the words of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy , “Don’t panic.” These interviews, or cases, feature leaders at companies of all sizes and provide valuable examples of business concepts in action. This case study method forms the backbone of the Harvard Business School curriculum.

Back in the 1920s, HBS professors decided to develop and experiment with innovative and unique business instruction methods. As the first school in the world to design a signature, distinctive program in business, later to be called the MBA, there was a need for a teaching method that would benefit this novel approach.

HBS professors selected and took a few pages to summarize recent events, momentous challenges, strategic planning, and important decisions undertaken by major companies and organizations. The idea was, and remains to this day, that through direct contact with a real-world case, students will think independently about those facts, discuss and compare their perspectives and findings with their peers, and eventually discover a new concept on their own.

Central to the case method is the idea that students are not provided the "answer" or resolution to the problem at hand. Instead, just like a board member, CEO, or manager, the student is forced to analyze a situation and find solutions without full knowledge of all methods and facts. Without excluding more traditional aspects, such as interaction with professors and textbooks, the case method provides the student with the opportunity to think and act like managers.

Since 1924, the case method has been the most widely applied and successful teaching instrument to come out of HBS, and it is used today in almost all MBA and Executive Education courses there, as well as in hundreds of other top business schools around the world. The application of the case method is so extensive that HBS students will often choose to rely on cases, instead of textbooks or other material, for their research. Large corporations use the case method as well to approach their own challenges, while competing universities create their own versions for their students.

This is what the case method does—it puts students straight into the game, and ensures they acquire not just skills and abstract knowledge, but also a solid understanding of the outside world.

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• What Is a Case Study? | Definition, Examples & Methods

What Is a Case Study? | Definition, Examples & Methods

Published on May 8, 2019 by Shona McCombes . Revised on November 20, 2023.

A case study is a detailed study of a specific subject, such as a person, group, place, event, organization, or phenomenon. Case studies are commonly used in social, educational, clinical, and business research.

A case study research design usually involves qualitative methods , but quantitative methods are sometimes also used. Case studies are good for describing , comparing, evaluating and understanding different aspects of a research problem .

Table of contents

When to do a case study, step 1: select a case, step 2: build a theoretical framework, step 3: collect your data, step 4: describe and analyze the case, other interesting articles.

A case study is an appropriate research design when you want to gain concrete, contextual, in-depth knowledge about a specific real-world subject. It allows you to explore the key characteristics, meanings, and implications of the case.

Case studies are often a good choice in a thesis or dissertation . They keep your project focused and manageable when you don’t have the time or resources to do large-scale research.

You might use just one complex case study where you explore a single subject in depth, or conduct multiple case studies to compare and illuminate different aspects of your research problem.

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Once you have developed your problem statement and research questions , you should be ready to choose the specific case that you want to focus on. A good case study should have the potential to:

• Provide new or unexpected insights into the subject
• Challenge or complicate existing assumptions and theories
• Propose practical courses of action to resolve a problem
• Open up new directions for future research

TipIf your research is more practical in nature and aims to simultaneously investigate an issue as you solve it, consider conducting action research instead.

Unlike quantitative or experimental research , a strong case study does not require a random or representative sample. In fact, case studies often deliberately focus on unusual, neglected, or outlying cases which may shed new light on the research problem.

Example of an outlying case studyIn the 1960s the town of Roseto, Pennsylvania was discovered to have extremely low rates of heart disease compared to the US average. It became an important case study for understanding previously neglected causes of heart disease.

However, you can also choose a more common or representative case to exemplify a particular category, experience or phenomenon.

Example of a representative case studyIn the 1920s, two sociologists used Muncie, Indiana as a case study of a typical American city that supposedly exemplified the changing culture of the US at the time.

While case studies focus more on concrete details than general theories, they should usually have some connection with theory in the field. This way the case study is not just an isolated description, but is integrated into existing knowledge about the topic. It might aim to:

• Exemplify a theory by showing how it explains the case under investigation
• Expand on a theory by uncovering new concepts and ideas that need to be incorporated
• Challenge a theory by exploring an outlier case that doesn’t fit with established assumptions

To ensure that your analysis of the case has a solid academic grounding, you should conduct a literature review of sources related to the topic and develop a theoretical framework . This means identifying key concepts and theories to guide your analysis and interpretation.

There are many different research methods you can use to collect data on your subject. Case studies tend to focus on qualitative data using methods such as interviews , observations , and analysis of primary and secondary sources (e.g., newspaper articles, photographs, official records). Sometimes a case study will also collect quantitative data.

Example of a mixed methods case studyFor a case study of a wind farm development in a rural area, you could collect quantitative data on employment rates and business revenue, collect qualitative data on local people’s perceptions and experiences, and analyze local and national media coverage of the development.

The aim is to gain as thorough an understanding as possible of the case and its context.

In writing up the case study, you need to bring together all the relevant aspects to give as complete a picture as possible of the subject.

How you report your findings depends on the type of research you are doing. Some case studies are structured like a standard scientific paper or thesis , with separate sections or chapters for the methods , results and discussion .

Others are written in a more narrative style, aiming to explore the case from various angles and analyze its meanings and implications (for example, by using textual analysis or discourse analysis ).

In all cases, though, make sure to give contextual details about the case, connect it back to the literature and theory, and discuss how it fits into wider patterns or debates.

If you want to know more about statistics , methodology , or research bias , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.

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The Etymology of Words and Their Surprising Histories

The Surprising Origins of Everyday Words

• An Introduction to Punctuation
• Ph.D., Rhetoric and English, University of Georgia
• M.A., Modern English and American Literature, University of Leicester
• B.A., English, State University of New York

The etymology of a word refers to its origin and historical development: that is, its earliest known use, its transmission from one language to another, and its changes in form and meaning . Etymology is also the term for the branch of linguistics that studies word histories.

What's the Difference Between a Definition and an Etymology?

A definition tells us what a word means and how it's used in our own time. An etymology tells us where a word came from (often, but not always, from another language) and what it used to mean.

For example, according to The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language , the definition of the word disaster is "an occurrence causing widespread destruction and distress; a catastrophe" or "a grave misfortune." But the etymology of the word disaster takes us back to a time when people commonly blamed great misfortunes on the influence of the stars.

Disaster first appeared in English in the late 16th century, just in time for Shakespeare to use the word in the play King Lear . It arrived by way of the Old Italian word disastro , which meant "unfavorable to one's stars."

This older, astrological sense of disaster becomes easier to understand when we study its Latin root word , astrum , which also appears in our modern "star" word astronomy . With the negative Latin prefix dis- ("apart") added to astrum ("star"), the word (in Latin, Old Italian, and Middle French) conveyed the idea that a catastrophe could be traced to the "evil influence of a star or planet" (a definition that the dictionary tells us is now " obsolete ").

Is the Etymology of a Word Its True Definition?

Not at all, though people sometimes try to make this argument. The word etymology is derived from the Greek word etymon , which means "the true sense of a word." But in fact the original meaning of a word is often different from its contemporary definition.

The meanings of many words have changed over time, and older senses of a word may grow uncommon or disappear entirely from everyday use. Disaster , for instance, no longer means the "evil influence of a star or planet," just as consider no longer means "to observe the stars."

Let's look at another example. Our English word salary is defined by The American Heritage Dictionary  as "fixed compensation for services, paid to a person on a regular basis." Its etymology can be traced back 2,000 years to sal , the Latin word for salt. So what's the connection between salt and salary?

The Roman historian Pliny the Elder tells us that "in Rome, a soldier was paid in salt," which back then was widely used as a food preservative. Eventually, this salarium came to signify a stipend paid in any form, usually money. Even today the expression "worth your salt" indicates that you're working hard and earning your salary. However, this doesn't mean that salt is the true definition of salary .

Where Do Words Come From?

New words have entered (and continue to enter) the English language in many different ways. Here are some of the most common methods.

• Borrowing The majority of the words used in modern English have been borrowed from other languages. Although most of our vocabulary comes from Latin and Greek (often by way of other European languages), English has borrowed words from more than 300 different languages around the world. Here are just a few examples: futon (from the Japanese word for "bedclothes, bedding")
• hamster (Middle High German hamastra )
• kangaroo (Aboriginal language of Guugu Yimidhirr, gangurru , referring to a species of kangaroo)
• kink (Dutch, "twist in a rope")
• moccasin (Native American Indian, Virginia Algonquian, akin to Powhatan mäkäsn and Ojibwa makisin )
• molasses (Portuguese melaços , from Late Latin mellceum , from Latin mel , "honey")
• muscle (Latin musculus , "mouse")
• slogan (alteration of Scots slogorne , "battle cry")
• smorgasbord (Swedish, literally "bread and butter table")
• whiskey (Old Irish uisce , "water," and bethad , "of life")
• Clipping or Shortening Some new words are simply shortened forms of existing words, for instance indie from independent ; exam from examination ; flu from influenza , and fax from facsimile .
• Compounding A new word may also be created by combining two or more existing words: fire engine , for example, and babysitter .
• Blends A blend, also called a portmanteau word , is a word formed by merging the sounds and meanings of two or more other words. Examples include moped , from mo(tor) + ped(al), and brunch , from br(eakfast) + (l)unch.
• Conversion or Functional Shift New words are often formed by changing an existing word from one part of speech to another. For example, innovations in technology have encouraged the transformation of the nouns network , Google , and  microwave  into verbs.
• Transfer of Proper Nouns Sometimes the names of people, places, and things become generalized vocabulary words. For instance, the noun maverick was derived from the name of an American cattleman, Samuel Augustus Maverick. The saxophone was named after Sax , the surname of a 19th-century Belgian family that made musical instruments.
• Neologisms or Creative Coinages Now and then, new products or processes inspire the creation of entirely new words. Such neologisms are usually short lived, never even making it into a dictionary. Nevertheless, some have endured, for example quark (coined by novelist James Joyce), galumph (Lewis Carroll), aspirin (originally a trademark ), grok (Robert A. Heinlein).
• Imitation of Sounds Words are also created by onomatopoeia, naming things by imitating the sounds that are associated with them: boo, bow-wow, tinkle, click .

Why Should We Care About Word Histories?

If a word's etymology is not the same as its definition, why should we care at all about word histories? Well, for one thing, understanding how words have developed can teach us a great deal about our cultural history. In addition, studying the histories of familiar words can help us deduce the meanings of unfamiliar words, thereby enriching our vocabularies. Finally, word stories are often both entertaining and thought provoking. In short, as any youngster can tell you, words are fun .

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• What Is the "Etymological Fallacy?"
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• Definition and Examples of Monomorphemic Words
• The Possible Origins of the Words Sincere and Sincerely
• Definition and Examples of Morphemes in English
• Jive, Jibe, and Gibe: How to Choose the Right Word
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• Phonesthemes: Word Sounds and Meanings

Synonyms of case study

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Thesaurus Definition of case study

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• case history
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• commentaries
• procès - verbal

Examples of case study in a Sentence

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'case study.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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“Case study.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus , Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/case%20study. Accessed 29 Aug. 2024.

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• Corpus ID: 475449

Etymological Wordnet: Tracing The History of Words

• Gerard de Melo
• Published in International Conference on… 2014
• Computer Science, Linguistics

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Extracting an etymological database from wiktionary.

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A Study on the use of Etymology for Semantic Knowledge Extraction

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• Social Sci LibreTexts - What is Etymology?
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• etymology - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up)

etymology , the history of a word or word element, including its origins and derivation. Although the etymologizing of proper names appears in the Old Testament and Plato dealt with etymology in his dialogue Cratylus, lack of knowledge of other languages and of the historical developments that languages undergo prevented ancient writers from arriving at the proper etymologies of words.

Modern scientific etymological study is based on the methods and findings of historical and comparative linguistics , the basic principles of which were established by linguists during the 19th century. The general principles involved in present-day etymology are:

1. The earliest form of a word, or word element, must be ascertained , as well as all parallel and related forms.

2. Every sound of a given word, or word element, must be compared with the corresponding sound in the form (often called its etymon) from which it is derived.

3. Any deviation in the previously established phonetic correspondences for the language of which the word is a part must be plausibly and rationally explained.

4. Any shift in meaning that has occurred in the historical transmission of the word must also be explained.

5. Words that present nonnative sounds, or combinations of sounds, that appear isolated in the language, or that demonstrate marked deviation from the usual phonetic correspondences, are probably borrowed rather than inherited, and the language of origin must be determined.

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• Case Study | Definition, Examples & Methods

Case Study | Definition, Examples & Methods

Published on 5 May 2022 by Shona McCombes . Revised on 30 January 2023.

A case study is a detailed study of a specific subject, such as a person, group, place, event, organisation, or phenomenon. Case studies are commonly used in social, educational, clinical, and business research.

A case study research design usually involves qualitative methods , but quantitative methods are sometimes also used. Case studies are good for describing , comparing, evaluating, and understanding different aspects of a research problem .

Table of contents

When to do a case study, step 1: select a case, step 2: build a theoretical framework, step 3: collect your data, step 4: describe and analyse the case.

A case study is an appropriate research design when you want to gain concrete, contextual, in-depth knowledge about a specific real-world subject. It allows you to explore the key characteristics, meanings, and implications of the case.

Case studies are often a good choice in a thesis or dissertation . They keep your project focused and manageable when you don’t have the time or resources to do large-scale research.

You might use just one complex case study where you explore a single subject in depth, or conduct multiple case studies to compare and illuminate different aspects of your research problem.

Prevent plagiarism, run a free check.

Once you have developed your problem statement and research questions , you should be ready to choose the specific case that you want to focus on. A good case study should have the potential to:

• Provide new or unexpected insights into the subject
• Challenge or complicate existing assumptions and theories
• Propose practical courses of action to resolve a problem
• Open up new directions for future research

Unlike quantitative or experimental research, a strong case study does not require a random or representative sample. In fact, case studies often deliberately focus on unusual, neglected, or outlying cases which may shed new light on the research problem.

If you find yourself aiming to simultaneously investigate and solve an issue, consider conducting action research . As its name suggests, action research conducts research and takes action at the same time, and is highly iterative and flexible. 

However, you can also choose a more common or representative case to exemplify a particular category, experience, or phenomenon.

While case studies focus more on concrete details than general theories, they should usually have some connection with theory in the field. This way the case study is not just an isolated description, but is integrated into existing knowledge about the topic. It might aim to:

• Exemplify a theory by showing how it explains the case under investigation
• Expand on a theory by uncovering new concepts and ideas that need to be incorporated
• Challenge a theory by exploring an outlier case that doesn’t fit with established assumptions

To ensure that your analysis of the case has a solid academic grounding, you should conduct a literature review of sources related to the topic and develop a theoretical framework . This means identifying key concepts and theories to guide your analysis and interpretation.

There are many different research methods you can use to collect data on your subject. Case studies tend to focus on qualitative data using methods such as interviews, observations, and analysis of primary and secondary sources (e.g., newspaper articles, photographs, official records). Sometimes a case study will also collect quantitative data .

The aim is to gain as thorough an understanding as possible of the case and its context.

In writing up the case study, you need to bring together all the relevant aspects to give as complete a picture as possible of the subject.

How you report your findings depends on the type of research you are doing. Some case studies are structured like a standard scientific paper or thesis, with separate sections or chapters for the methods , results , and discussion .

Others are written in a more narrative style, aiming to explore the case from various angles and analyse its meanings and implications (for example, by using textual analysis or discourse analysis ).

In all cases, though, make sure to give contextual details about the case, connect it back to the literature and theory, and discuss how it fits into wider patterns or debates.

Cite this Scribbr article

If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the ‘Cite this Scribbr article’ button to automatically add the citation to our free Reference Generator.

McCombes, S. (2023, January 30). Case Study | Definition, Examples & Methods. Scribbr. Retrieved 26 August 2024, from https://www.scribbr.co.uk/research-methods/case-studies/

Is this article helpful?

Shona McCombes

Other students also liked, correlational research | guide, design & examples, a quick guide to experimental design | 5 steps & examples, descriptive research design | definition, methods & examples.

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Tracking the history of the future through words.

A historical lexicographer’s perspective on reviewing the OED’s coverage of vocabulary relating to climate change and sustainability.

In 2021, the OED embarked on a project to broaden and review its coverage of vocabulary relating to climate change and sustainability. I’d been feeding my own eco-anxiety by learning more about these topics for some years before I proposed that the OED conduct a review of its coverage. I knew that our New Words team had, over the course of the last 30 years or so, researched and covered a lot of the best-known terms, such as global warming and carbon offsetting , but this is a rapidly changing area of vocabulary. With the world spotlight coming to rest on the UK later this year at the UN climate summit in Glasgow ( COP26 , external website), it is important to continue to monitor developments in this epoch-defining nexus of problems.

When OED editors are investigating the way a word or sense has been used over time, we look for examples of contextual and dateable evidence in our internal files and databases, as well as in external databases, websites, libraries, and archives.

We tend to think of climate change and sustainability as very contemporary issues, but what was interesting about researching some of the terms in this year’s update (as well as revisiting those we had already covered) was being able to put them into a historical perspective and seeing just how far back some ideas could be traced though the vocabulary, as a few examples will show.

Climate change

In her research for the British Council’s Climate Connection podcasts (external website), OED science editor Trish Stewart found that the first use we have traced of the term climate change is in an 1854 article in a scientific journal. It reveals that even then there was disagreement over whether humans could cause changes in climate. The paper goes on to suggest that they may be caused instead by ‘the changeable position of the magnetic poles’.

Source: U.S. Magazine of Science, Art, Manufactures, Agriculture, Commerce and Trade 15 Dec. 1854, p. 234. Via HathiTrust Digital Library.

Climate emergency

The term climate emergency was chosen as Oxford Languages’ Word of the Year in 2019, and statistics show that there was a big jump in its usage during that year. While researching this term we found what looked like a surprisingly early example from 1975, in which deforestation was linked to climate change. On closer inspection there was no link to arguments about global (as opposed to regional) warming, so this quotation is presented for information only, but it was heartening to see evidence of such ecological debate in a US newspaper at this date.

Source: Sarasota Herald-Tribune 25 May 1975, p. 64. Via Newspaper Archive .

Climate strike

We are all familiar with the climate strikes occurring in response to the climate emergency, and the best-known climate striker is of course Greta Thunberg. But her 2018 skolstrejk ( ‘school strike’ , a term which we are continuing to monitor in English) wasn’t the first instance of this form of activism. We tracked down a 2014 proposal to stage a climate strike :

As sometimes happens in our research, however, there were some red herrings along the way, not linked to climate change and therefore not included among our quotations. For instance, in 2012 the shutdown of north-east US states in the face of Hurricane Sandy was dubbed a ‘climate strike’ because it was being likened to a general strike:

Source: Films for Action

Carbon footprint

The climate emergency, of course, has many of us thinking about our own impact on the environment, particularly our carbon footprint . An examination of the quotation evidence for carbon footprint revealed that although not coined by them, it was, surprisingly, the oil giant BP who pushed the term carbon footprint to prominence through their use of it in a 2005 PR campaign:

Source: Financial Times 17 Nov. 2005, p. 7. Via Gale Primary Sources.

Overconsumption

Overconsumption was a term that was already covered by the OED , but in our update, the term has now been antedated by more than 150 years. Our research this year revealed that this word, now much used in discourse on sustainability, can be traced back as far as John Locke, writing in 1695 on the topic of money:

Source: John Locke Further Considerations r egarding raising the Value of Money (1695), p. 39. Via Early English Books Online.

Our work on this update led us to investigate not just words related to the causes of climate change, but also the solutions. This year that we added a new sense of windmill , in the sense of a wind turbine used to generate electricity (as opposed to the more traditional type used for tasks such as grinding grain or pumping water). This unassuming word led me to the fascinating story of the Fram , a Norwegian ship used in the late 19 th century to explore those very polar regions that are now threatened by global warming. Because of the length of the voyages and the lack of opportunity for restocking, the ship was fitted with a windmill to supply electricity for lighting on board. I was happy to be able to include a quotation showing this early use in our entry, but sorry not to have also been able to include a picture!

Image of the Fram with wind turbine set up. Source: Treehugger /Public Domain

So, did this work do anything to solve the eco-anxiety that prompted it? Well, while I’ve been dismayed at what the historical research revealed about missed opportunities and unheeded prophecy, I’ve been delighted to have found out more about just how many people are involved in innovation and adaptation. And it was great to have contributed towards OUP’s educational mission by supplying material for climate change-related school lesson plans (and meeting local secondary school teachers to discuss these) using our entries as starting points for discussion of the issues, the possible solutions, and prompting critical thinking among the generation who will be most affected by climate change. We were also very pleased to have been invited by the British Council to contribute to their podcast series ‘ The Climate Connection ’ (external website) where we were able to explore some of these ideas still further and potentially reach, through worldwide teachers of English, a still wider audience.

Further reading

• Read our new words notes on the language of climate change
• Explore climate change-related classroom materials related to the language of climate change
• For more on climate change research from Oxford University Press, Oxford Open Climate Change (links to OUP’s Journals website) is a broad reaching interdisciplinary journal that aims to cover all aspects of climate change, including its impacts on nature and society, as well as solutions to the problem and their wider implications

Author: Rosamund Ions, Executive Editor, OED Management

The opinions and other information contained in the OED articles do not necessarily reflect the opinions or positions of Oxford University Press.

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“History of the NCO 1700: Valley Forge”: Case Study Analysis

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Introduction, Key Problems, Thesis Statement

Alternatives, proposed solutions, recommendations.

The American Revolution is one of the most pivotal moments in the history of the United States of America. However, when praising the military successes of our compatriots, we should remember at what cost they are achieved. Soldiers who fought in the war, died in combat, gave their lives for good causes. Despite this, death overtook many soldiers not only on the battlefield, but also in the camps. The first key problem of this case study is the poor camp layout and sanitation plan, which put the lives of all participants in the war at risk. This question leads to the second problem, which is the spread of various diseases and diseases.

The survival rate of soldiers, non-commissioned officers, commanders, and other military personnel in the camps must be ensured in order to achieve success. Thus, by setting up a camp at the most advantageous point, creating an effective sanitary plan that will avoid disease, the US army commanders would be able to avoid such a large number of victims.

In 1775, the tension between the Americans and the British reached a peak, after which a full-scale war began. George Washington recruited the Continental Army, which occupied Boston in 1776. However, the same army lost New York and its strategically important harbor. By setting up camp at Valley Forge, Washington secured the protection of the Continental Congress, which was the governing body of the entire revolution. A convenient strategic position of the camp was completely uninhabitable for soldiers. Accordingly, the key character is George Washington, who at any cost achieved the proposed goals.

The army was numerous but many soldiers died from developing diseases. These sicknesses were the result of unsanitary conditions in the camp: prisoners lived in crowded places, ate from dirty dishes, while the animals were left to decompose in the ground.

An alternative to this situation could be to improve the living conditions of the military. If the premises were not so densely populated, Washington would be able to avoid unsanitary conditions. However, in the conditions of war, especially the War of independence of the United States, the budget of the army was small. Thus, most of the expenses were spent on arming the American troops, which were supposed to resist the professional soldiers of the British crown. Accordingly, Washington and the rest of the military elite lacked the means to ensure favorable living conditions.

One of the solutions to the problem of unsanitary conditions and the spread of diseases among soldiers is the development of professional training of the army. Troops who have passed professional training are more resistant to such conditions, which allows them to achieve successful results. Such training should include training in the proper use of weapons, strategic skills, and survival skills. Specifically, survival skills would allow the army of Washington to understand what needs to be done in order to ensure the maximum survival of soldiers in the camps. Thus, with the help of professional training, the head of the army could avoid the spread of unsanitary conditions in the camps and various infections and diseases, ensuring the survival of the soldiers.

Thus, specific strategies to achieve this goal, namely camp survival, should include the training of the army. George Washington, as the undisputed leader and mastermind of the entire American revolution, had to train his soldiers in essential skills (Hayes, 2017). Leading thousands of soldiers, the general must be responsible not only for the success of the army on the battlefield, but also outside it. It is becoming clear that the morale of the military plays a key role in achieving victory in the war. Accordingly, the high mortality rate in the camp from various diseases and sanitary conditions lowered this spirit. In this sense, it was Washington that could ensure the flourishing of the army and its well-being.

Hayes, K. J. (2017). George Washington: A Life in Books . Oxford University Press.

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IvyPanda. (2022, July 17). “History of the NCO 1700: Valley Forge”: Case Study Analysis. https://ivypanda.com/essays/history-of-the-nco-1700-valley-forge-case-study-analysis/

"“History of the NCO 1700: Valley Forge”: Case Study Analysis." IvyPanda , 17 July 2022, ivypanda.com/essays/history-of-the-nco-1700-valley-forge-case-study-analysis/.

IvyPanda . (2022) '“History of the NCO 1700: Valley Forge”: Case Study Analysis'. 17 July.

IvyPanda . 2022. "“History of the NCO 1700: Valley Forge”: Case Study Analysis." July 17, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/history-of-the-nco-1700-valley-forge-case-study-analysis/.

1. IvyPanda . "“History of the NCO 1700: Valley Forge”: Case Study Analysis." July 17, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/history-of-the-nco-1700-valley-forge-case-study-analysis/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "“History of the NCO 1700: Valley Forge”: Case Study Analysis." July 17, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/history-of-the-nco-1700-valley-forge-case-study-analysis/.

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Genocide Studies Program

Founded in January 1998 to expand the work begun in 1994 by Yale University’s Cambodian Genocide Program, the Genocide Studies Program at Yale’s MacMillan Center for International and Area Studies conducts research, seminars and conferences on comparative, interdisciplinary, and policy issues relating to the phenomenon of genocide, and has provided training to researchers from afflicted regions, including Cambodia, Rwanda, and East Timor.

The Program also maintains a Vimeo  website , which features 148 video interviews.

Acknowledgement

Yale University and the Genocide Studies Program acknowledge that indigenous peoples and nations, including Mohegan, Mashantucket Pequot, Eastern Pequot, Schaghticoke, Golden Hill Paugussett, Niantic, and the Quinnipiac and other Algonquian speaking peoples, have stewarded through generations the lands and waterways of what is now the state of Connecticut.  We honor and respect the enduring relationship that exists between these peoples and nations and this land.

word histories

“ad fontes!”

the gruesome origin of the term ‘basket case’

The term basket case denotes someone, or something, that is incapable of functioning normally.

Of American-English origin, this term initially denoted a soldier who had lost all four limbs during the First World War —as stated in the following from the Cleveland Plain Dealer (Cleveland, Ohio) of Saturday 18 th January 1919:

Absurd Stories Without Basis No “Basket Cases” in Big New York Hospital, Correspondent Says. By Karl K. Kitchen. New York , Jan. 17.—I have just spent the greater part of a day in the largest military hospital in America. For “Debarkation Three,” as the United States Military Debarkation hospital No. 3 is called, with its 3560 beds has the largest bed capacity of any military hospital on this side of the Atlantic . As it occupies the old Greenhut department store building at 6 th avenue and 18 th street it is easily accessible and contrary to the prevailing opinion it is open to anyone who wishes to visit it. For many weeks there have been rumors that wards of “basket cases”—soldier patients minus both arms as well as both legs—were in existence at this hospital. There have been rumors of terrible tragedies—meetings between fathers and horribly mutilated sons which ended in murders, followed by suicide. Other stories of wives who jumped out of the upper windows when they met their armless and legless husbands, have also gone the rounds. In fact, these rumors have been so persistent that the writer decided to visit the hospital and find out for himself if there was the slightest basis of truth for even the mildest tale. Accompanied by an orderly, who had instructions to take me wherever I wanted to go, I visited every part of the great hospital and talked with dozens of patients in the various wards of the absurd rumors that are floating around. In addition I talked with Capt. W. E. Lang, the assistant to the commanding officer, who was one of the medical officers who planned and built the hospital as it stands today. And this is what I learned. There is not a single “basket case” in “debarkation No. 3” at the present time. And what is more, there has never been a basket case in any of its wards since they were first opened. In other words there is no soldier in the hospital minus both arms as well as both legs and there never has been such a case there. Consequently the rumors of the existence of such patients, with the additional affliction of blindness, are utterly false. And as no such cases have ever existed there the stories of fathers who have shot their wounded sons and then committed suicide, the stories of the wives who jumped from the upper windows when they saw their armless husbands and so on ad nauseam, are too ridiculous for words. Yet they have been repeated thousands of times and what is more remarkable they have been believed by thousands of intelligent Americans . “Every day we have people come here and ask to see the ‘basket cases’,” said Capt. W. E. Lang. “They are well intentioned people who want to do something for these poor unfortunates, as they call them. I have the hardest time convincing them that we have no such cases. If they seem unwilling to believe me I give them the freedom of the hospital and let them search for themselves. We have not had a single basket case since the hospital has been in existence and a good many thousand cases have passed through its wards. At the time we are running very light—only 1,700 patients—but we have been pretty full at times. “At the present time there are only five men in the hospital who have lost both legs,” continued Capt. Lang. “All five of these men not only have both arms intact, but they are in excellent condition in every other particular. So you see that these absurd rumors are utterly without foundation. “I wish you would make it plain to the public that there are no basket cases over there,” continued Capt. Lang. “There are enough badly crippled soldier boys without inventing these horrors. Nor have we any patients who were mutilated by the Germans . The stories about them are lies made of the same cloth as the basket cases.”

The term basket case originated in the fact that the soldiers who had lost all four limbs had to be transported in baskets—as one Private Bernard Keys, who had fought on the Western Front , explained in an interview published in the Dayton Evening Herald (Dayton, Ohio) of Friday 7 th March 1919:

“What were the saddest incidents which came into your military life at the front?” “The basket cases,” was the answer. They were the most pitiable. Those are the soldiers who are carried off the field in baskets; without arms, legs, eyes—and who remain always in the baskets—helpless. There were 14 such cases on board ship coming to America. Yes, I think they are the saddest cases.”

The earliest instances of basket case that I have found are from Canada Pays the Price of War and Talks Not of Peace , by E. Arthur Roberts, published in the Cleveland Plain Dealer (Cleveland, Ohio) of Sunday 7 th July 1918:

Toronto knows all about the “basket cases.” The people know they come with each train load of wounded. They know that these wicker baskets hold poor fellows who will never walk again, never talk, never hear the sound of a human voice, never see the sunlight. Some will be patched up. Skilled surgeons and devoted nurses are working miracles in Toronto’s military hospitals, but there are “basket cases” for whom the summons of the Great Reaper will come as a merciful release. It isn’t want of sympathy that causes the crowd to disperse before the “basket cases” are removed from the trains. It isn’t because Toronto is afraid to learn the worst that the doctors and nurses stay out of sight until the crowds have gone. This way it saves a few needless heartaches.

The second-earliest occurrences of basket case that I have found are from The Redwood Gazette (Redwood Falls, Minnesota) of Wednesday 1 st January 1919:

No “ Basket” Cases There are no “basket” cases here or in France. If you have heard the story, you know what is meant. Sometimes his wife falls dead, sometimes his mother loses her mind, sometimes his father commits suicide. Always some one dear to someone else has been returned from the front in a “basket”, having lost both legs, both arms, and sometimes an eye or two. For the benefit of those who may have been tortured by the tale, the Red Cross announces that—on the authority of Surgeon General Ireland—there are no such cases among American soldiers in this country or France. Needless to say, the Reconstruction Hospital at Snelling has never heard of such a case. In the future any person hearing such a story should get the name and military designation of the patient, the place of observation, and the name and address of the one reporting. This should be sent to the Northern Division of the American Red Cross. The case will be investigated, the offender will be notified of the truth. There are no “basket” cases.—Bulletin.

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Title: data-centric approach to constrained machine learning: a case study on conway's game of life.

Abstract: This paper focuses on a data-centric approach to machine learning applications in the context of Conway's Game of Life. Specifically, we consider the task of training a minimal architecture network to learn the transition rules of Game of Life for a given number of steps ahead, which is known to be challenging due to restrictions on the allowed number of trainable parameters. An extensive quantitative analysis showcases the benefits of utilizing a strategically designed training dataset, with its advantages persisting regardless of other parameters of the learning configuration, such as network initialization weights or optimization algorithm. Importantly, our findings highlight the integral role of domain expert insights in creating effective machine learning applications for constrained real-world scenarios.

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Michelle Obama: Yes, We Have Affirmative Action for the Wealthy

There are unearned advantages available only to the few—but republicans won’t talk about that..

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Michelle Obama at the DNC on Tuesday. Nate Gowdy

It’s fair to say that Michelle Obama stole the show at the Democratic Convention on Tuesday. (Husband Barack was on point in noting how hard an act she was to follow.) And to a journalist like me who covers wealth and inequality, one line in particular stood out. Listen:

Michelle Obama: She understands that most of us will never be afforded the grace of failing forward. We will never benefit from the affirmative action of generational wealth. pic.twitter.com/ywBjdwZl3E — Acyn (@Acyn) August 21, 2024

The affirmative action of generational wealth . That’s a smart reframing of a longtime conservative hobby horse.

Republican politicians and right-wing media have regularly attacked programs designed to counter the generational impacts of government-sanctioned discrimination in housing , education , and veterans benefits . Now they’re targeting diversity, equity, and inclusion programs—see JD Vance’s recently introduced “ Dismantle DEI Act “— and trying to brand Kamala Harris a “ DEI hire .” That’s a laughable assertion. ( New York Times columnist Lydia Polgreen argues that the moniker applies more aptly to Vance.)

But the critics of DEI and affirmative action want to have their cake and eat it too. For example, if you, like our Supreme Court , think the use of race as a factor in college admissions should be illegal, that’s your prerogative. But I hope you are similarly inclined to outlaw the practice of elite colleges giving an admissions boost to children of alumni and to students ( like Jared Kushner ) whose parents are major donors. Because isn’t that, too, a kind of affirmative action?

In just a handful of words, Michelle Obama managed to convey a simple truth, says Dedrick Asante-Muhammad, president of the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies , a Washington think tank that focuses on the racial wealth-and-opportunity gap: “It is not those asking to break up concentrated wealth and opportunity that are asking for an unfair advantage, but rather those who are hoarding concentrated wealth.”

“Most of us,” as Obama noted, “will never benefit” from generational wealth. And that’s true of everyone, but even truer when you are Black or Hispanic. In the Federal Reserve Board’s 2019 Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF)*, about 47 percent of white respondents said they’d either received an inheritance or expected to receive one. Their median inheritance expected was $195,500 (in 2019 dollars).

Only 16 percent of Black respondents had received or expected an inheritance—and their median expectation was about half the white figure. Less than 12 percent of Hispanic respondents had received or expected an inheritance.

The disparities are similar when you look at federally subsidized retirement savings , which, according to the congressional Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT), will cost US taxpayers a whopping $1.9 trillion from 2020-2024. Most of that cash goes to the wealthiest 10 percent of Americans, who tend to be, yep, pretty white.

In 2021, the JCT identified 8,000 Americans with Individual Retirement Account (IRA) balances in excess of $5 million who were still getting tax breaks for their annual contributions—which is “ shocking but not surprising ,” noted Senate Finance Committee chair Ron Wyden. Peter Thiel, ProPublica reported, even managed, using questionable tactics, to amass a Roth IRA worth $5 billion.

Affirmative action for the rich .

According to the latest (2022) SCF , only 35 percent of Black families and less than 28 percent of Hispanic households even had a retirement account, compared with 62 percent of white families. The accounts of those white families were worth over $380,000 on average, more than triple the Black and Hispanic savings—and again, these numbers don’t account for the fact that a large majority of Black and Hispanic households have no private retirement accounts at all.

Then there’s land ownership—see “ 40 Acres and a Lie ,” our acclaimed multimedia package exploring how the few Black families who received land reparations after the Civil War then had their acres cruelly rescinded a year and a half later. And consider these passages on the Homestead Acts, from a chapter of my 2021 book , Jackpot , titled “Thriving While Black.”

The two acts, passed during and after the Civil War, granted 160-acre parcels of public land—a foundation for generational wealth—to families willing to stake out the plots and make improvements. But the timing and circumstances made it extraordinarily difficult for Black Americans to participate:

It was a once-in-a-lifetime bonanza for white fortune-seekers. “The acquisition of property was the key to moving upward from a low to a higher stratum,” wrote author Everett Dick. “The property holder could vote and hold office, but the man with no property was practically on the same political level as the indentured servant or slave.” […] Between the two acts, about 270 million acres of farmland—14 percent of the total landmass of the continental United States—was granted to 1.6 million white families, but only 4,000 to 5,000 Black families. [ University of Michigan professor Trina] Shanks calculates that more than 48 million living Americans are direct descendants of those Homestead Act beneficiaries. Which means there’s a greater than one-in-four chance your forebears benefited directly from the biggest public-to-private wealth transfer in American history—if you’re white, that is. 

Affirmative action for the rich.

Obama hit the nail on the head. Asante-Muhammad says he was struck by her simple acknowledgement “that affirmative action for the privileged happens,” though “I wish there could have been a follow up to re-emphasize why programmatic affirmative action to advance more equal opportunity is necessary.”

But “it felt good,” he adds, “to hear a political speech that connects so personally with my political ideals, and to the challenges of the racial wealth divide and the action and ideals needed to bridge it.” 

*I used 2019 numbers here because the 2022 inheritance data was only available in raw form.

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https://educationhub.blog.gov.uk/2024/08/20/gcse-results-day-2024-number-grading-system/

GCSE results day 2024: Everything you need to know including the number grading system

Thousands of students across the country will soon be finding out their GCSE results and thinking about the next steps in their education.   

Here we explain everything you need to know about the big day, from when results day is, to the current 9-1 grading scale, to what your options are if your results aren’t what you’re expecting.  

When is GCSE results day 2024?  

GCSE results day will be taking place on Thursday the 22 August.     

The results will be made available to schools on Wednesday and available to pick up from your school by 8am on Thursday morning.  

Schools will issue their own instructions on how and when to collect your results.   

When did we change to a number grading scale?  

The shift to the numerical grading system was introduced in England in 2017 firstly in English language, English literature, and maths.  

By 2020 all subjects were shifted to number grades. This means anyone with GCSE results from 2017-2020 will have a combination of both letters and numbers.  

The numerical grading system was to signal more challenging GCSEs and to better differentiate between students’ abilities - particularly at higher grades between the A *-C grades. There only used to be 4 grades between A* and C, now with the numerical grading scale there are 6.  

What do the number grades mean?  

The grades are ranked from 1, the lowest, to 9, the highest.  

The grades don’t exactly translate, but the two grading scales meet at three points as illustrated below.  

The bottom of grade 7 is aligned with the bottom of grade A, while the bottom of grade 4 is aligned to the bottom of grade C.    

Meanwhile, the bottom of grade 1 is aligned to the bottom of grade G.  

What to do if your results weren’t what you were expecting?  

If your results weren’t what you were expecting, firstly don’t panic. You have options.  

First things first, speak to your school or college – they could be flexible on entry requirements if you’ve just missed your grades.   

They’ll also be able to give you the best tailored advice on whether re-sitting while studying for your next qualifications is a possibility.   

If you’re really unhappy with your results you can enter to resit all GCSE subjects in summer 2025. You can also take autumn exams in GCSE English language and maths.  

Speak to your sixth form or college to decide when it’s the best time for you to resit a GCSE exam.  

Look for other courses with different grade requirements     

Entry requirements vary depending on the college and course. Ask your school for advice, and call your college or another one in your area to see if there’s a space on a course you’re interested in.    

Consider an apprenticeship    

Apprenticeships combine a practical training job with study too. They’re open to you if you’re 16 or over, living in England, and not in full time education.  

As an apprentice you’ll be a paid employee, have the opportunity to work alongside experienced staff, gain job-specific skills, and get time set aside for training and study related to your role.   

You can find out more about how to apply here .  

Talk to a National Careers Service (NCS) adviser    

The National Career Service is a free resource that can help you with your career planning. Give them a call to discuss potential routes into higher education, further education, or the workplace.   

Whatever your results, if you want to find out more about all your education and training options, as well as get practical advice about your exam results, visit the  National Careers Service page  and Skills for Careers to explore your study and work choices.   

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Tags: GCSE grade equivalent , gcse number grades , GCSE results , gcse results day 2024 , gsce grades old and new , new gcse grades

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