Odd crime newspaper picked up, involving university lecturer (8)
I believe the answer is:
singular
'odd' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'crime newspaper picked up involving university lecturer' is the wordplay.
'crime' becomes 'sin'.
'newspaper' becomes 'rag' (informal term for a newspaper).
'picked up' says the letters should be written backwards.
'involving' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'university lecturer' becomes 'ul' (this might be a standard abbreviation of which I'm unaware).
'rag' written backwards gives 'gar'.
'gar' placed around 'ul' is 'gular'.
'sin'+'gular'='SINGULAR'
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for singular that I've seen before include "Remarkable; not plural" , "Referring to one thing" , "Extraordinary - just one (8)" , "number" , "Unusual, striking, or unique" .)