Episodes
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Waiting for the world to begin again: a letter from a plague
Pod Academy's Chair, Chris Creegan, reflects on Covid-19 and HIV.
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Adventures in Abyssinia – Introducing James Bruce of Kinneard
Take a look at The Tribuna of the Uffizi by Johan Zoffany. What do you see? A group of Georgian Grand Tourist poseurs. But one figure, towers above the rest, stands apart, on the far right of the painting. It is James Bruce of Kinneard, the real Indiana Jones. James Bruce is introduced in this...
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Trump: the first hundred days
What is the scorecard for President Donald Trump after the first 100 Days? "C minus overall," says Peter Trubowitz, Professor of International Relations and Director of the US Centre at the London School of Economics and Political Science and Associate Fellow at Chatham House, Royal Institute of...
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Class – what is it?
Class is not only one of the oldest and most controversial of all concepts in social science, but a topic which has fascinated, amused, incensed and galvanized the general public, too. But what exactly is a ‘class’? How do sociologists study and measure it, and how does it correspond to everyday...
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Julian Assange: The Wikileaks Files
Craig Barfoot talks to Julian Assange. Wikileaks came to prominence in 2010 with the release of 251,287 top-secret State Department cables, which revealed to the world what the US government really thinks about national leaders, friendly dictators, and supposed allies. It brought to the surface…
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Matching Markets: Who gets what and why
Most of the study of economics deals with commodity markets, where the price of a good connects sellers and buyers. But what about other kinds of “goods,” like a kidney or a surrogacy arrangement. This is the territory of matching markets, where “sellers” and “buyers” must choose each other, and...
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Jellyfish: aliens, assassins or adventurers?
Did you know that jellyfish can sink boats, compromise fisheries by destroying captive breeding pens, and enter industrial sites that use seawater intake for cooling – including desalination plants, nuclear plants and nuclear aircraft carriers. Yes, they have all fallen victim to jellyfish. A...
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Adventures in Human Being
We have a lifetime's association with our bodies, but for many of us they remain uncharted territory. In Adventures in Human Being, Gavin Francis leads the reader on a journey through health and illness, offering insights on everything from the ribbed surface of the brain to the secret workings…
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How to Clone a Mammoth
Podcast produced and presented by Craig Barfoot Cloning extinct species - such as woolly mammoths - presents massive ethical as well as practical challenges. And at the moment there is no legal oversight of the issues. Beth Shapiro, author of How to Clone a Mammoth explores the complexities…
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A TripAdvisor for Fertility Clinics?
These days many of us check out TripAdvisor if we are booking a hotel. We want to see what people like us think of the service, the staff, the food, the pool....... It's a great idea for bed and breakfast, but is the TripAdvisor approach, where consumers are encouraged to give their unvarnished...
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The Edge of the Sky: all you need to know about all there is
Is it possible to describe the origins of the universe, dark matter, planets, alien worlds, particle physics, galaxies and telescopes in just 1000 words? Yes, says astrophysicist, Dr Roberto Trotta in this interview with Craig Barfoot. Roberto Trotta, Senior Lecturer in Astrophysics at Imperial...
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Marxism and the Oppression of Women
First published in 1983, Lise Vogel's seminal work, Marxism and the Oppression of Women: Towards a Unitary Theory, was seized on by a generation of feminists who called themselves Marxist feminists, but were finding the fragmentation of socialism and feminism difficult to navigate. Now…
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Alistair Parvin: Open Source Architecture
Jo Barratt talks to architect, designer and inventor, Alistair Parvin in this latest podcast from Civic Radio. Alistair Parvin says it is easier to capture what a citizen is not, than what a citizen is, and notes the language of ‘customers’ and ‘consumers’ that has been increasingly employed as...
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A Disease Called Childhood: Why ADHD became an American Epidemic
Child and family therapist Dr Marilyn Wedge talks to Craig Barfoot about her latest book, A Disease Called Childhood: Why ADHD Became an American Epidemic. Over the course of her career as a child and family therapist, Marilyn Wedge has witnessed an 'astronomical rise' in the number of children...
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New Citizenship Project
The New Citizenship project wants to challenge the idea of an individual as a consumer - and replace it with the individual as a citizen, using the techniques of marketing and public relations(usually associated with consumerism) to do so. in this latest podcast from Civic Radio, Jo Barratt talks...
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Civic innovation and the interconnected city
"Citizenship is about participating in a thing that is bigger than yourself and in which everyone has an equal stake.” says architect Bryan Boyer. In this latest podcast from Civic Radio, Bryan Boyer a US architect who spent some time in the Finnish Innovation Fund in Helsinki, talks to Jo…
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Biocode – The New Age of Genomics
This interview takes us to the heart of a new age of scientific discovery. The ability to read DNA has changed how we view ourselves. Genomics is literally changing our understanding of humanity's place in nature. Professor Dawn Field of the University of Oxford, and Dr Neil Davies, Senior…
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Can public servants change the face of local government?
"Government is made up of people", says Dave Seliger, a civil servant in New York City. So, what might public servants do to change the face of local government? This is the 6th podcast from Civic Radio. In it Dave Seliger talks to Jo Barratt about the role of civil servants and local government...
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Aral Balkan on being a citizen
"Being a citizen is crafting the society you live," in says Aral Balkan, Founder of Ind.ie and a champion of democracy and design. In this podcast, the 5th from Civic Radio, Aral Balkan talks about how we communicate with each other, the tools and programmes we use to do this (and the perhaps...
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Work, Sex and Power – The Forces that Shaped our History
The deep past extends its tentacles into the present and, in Work, Sex and Power Willie Thompson, until his retirement Professor of Contemporary History at Glasgow Caledonian University, demonstrates how this affects our species. He talks to Pod Academy's Craig Barfooot about how, in recent years...
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Re-imagining local government
Anna Randle, Head of Strategy at London Borough of Lambeth in south London talks to Jo Barratt about redefining local government in the fourth Civic Radio podcast If citizenship is a reciprocal relationship between the individual citizen and everyone else in the communities of which we are part,...
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At the service of the citizen: redefining ‘Civic Tech’
This is the third of our podcasts from Civic Radio, exploring the role of the 'civic' in today's world - a world in which commerce often squeezes out our collective experience as citizens, and in which the term 'citizenship' is usually used to mean the individual's relationship with government,...
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Civic Radio: Social inequality and civic participation
In this second podcast from Civic Radio, Jo Barratt talks to Simon Willis, Chief Executive of the Young Foundation about social inequality ad civic participation. Willis says that many people in the UK feel forgotten and disenfranchised, he is concerned to find ways to hand voice and power to...
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Launch of Civic Radio
Has the world of commerce encroached irrevocably on our civic spaces, and how much do we care? Civic Workshop is asking that question and looking at ways to reframe our everyday local experiences with an awareness of our collective social and political future. A key part of Civic Workshop is the...
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Making a podcast about academic research
Here at Pod Academy we are convinced that podcasting is a great way to get research out to a wide audience, to make an impact. If you'd like to try your hand at making a podcast, here are some tips to help you, they came out of a course we ran for our volunteer producers. And take a listen to the...
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The Price of Thirst: Global Water Inequality and the Coming Chaos
'Water wars' used to seem like the stuff of science fiction. But water poverty is creating major geopolitical upheaval right now in the real world. It contributed to the Arab Spring in Egypt, and to the growth of ISIS in Syria argues Dr Karen Piper, who teaches post colonial studies and English…
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The Bible’s Cutting Room Floor
Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, and Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Revelation. But what about Josephus or the Book of Enoch? Did you know that the Bible with which we are familiar is not the complete story? Or that there are mistakes in the accepted version? And did you know that Jesus had a brother,...
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Treating Autism: full recording of EU AIMS dialogue October 2014
What would it mean to develop medical treatment for the core features of autism? Recent research has enriched our understanding of the biology of autism, as well as the social experiences of being autistic, but the core biological features of autism are still not well understood. Any medication…
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Ecofeminism
"Nature has been defined as a woman, and both nature and women were then defined into objectification and therefore into objects of violence. Ecofeminism is a celebration of the creativity of nature and the creativity of women," says Dr Vandana Shiva, world renowned Indian environmentalist,...
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The Cosmic Cocktail: three parts dark matter
What is the universe made of? What is 'dark matter'? Why is the universe still expanding? These are just some of the questions astrophysicist Professor Katherine Freese tackles in this wonderfully accessible interview with Pod Academy's Craig Barfoot. Katherine Freese, is the George Eugene...
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Nuclear energy: a safe bet?
In October 2013, the British government gave a green light to the UK's first nuclear power station in a generation. It will be built at Hinckley Point in Somerset by a consortium which is led by France's EDF Energy and includes Chinese investors. The government is backing nuclear energy and is...
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The Predator Paradox
This podcast is produced and presented by Craig Barfoot In the 20th Century, humans killed hundreds of thousands of wild animals as we sought to build new homes and develop agriculture. Now the 21st century is characterised by conservation and re-wilding - but can ranchers and environmentalists,...
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All at sea: soldiers and slackers in the writing of Geoff Dyer
This podcast is part of our Geoff Dyer series – a series of recordings from a conference dedicated to Dyer’s work held at Birkbeck, University of London. It features Dr Bianca Leggett, Teaching Fellow in British Studies at Harlaxton College and is presented by Jo Barratt. This year marks 25 years...
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What colour was the 1990s?
This podcast is part of our Geoff Dyer series – a series of recordings from a conference dedicated to Dyer’s work held at Birkbeck, University of London. It features Dr Morgan Daniels of Queen Mary College, University of London and is presented byJo Barratt This year marks 25 years since the...
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Counting Backwards: a quarter-century of The Colour of Memory
This podcast is part of our Geoff Dyer series - a series of recordings from a conference dedicated to Dyer's work held at Birkbeck, University of London. It features Dr Joe Brooker, Reader in Modern Literature at Birbeck and is presented by Jo Barratt. This year marks 25 years since the…
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Behind the Curve: Science and the Politics of Global Warming
In 1958 Charles Keeling began measuring the carbon dioxide in our atmosphere - the graph of his year-on-year measurements is called 'The Keeling Curve'. Fast forward 50 years, and we are all familiar with debates on global warming, but it is a complex, interrelated problem, with no clear end…
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The Son Also Rises: How your surname predicts your social status
How much of our social status is tied to that of our parents and grandparents? How much does this influence our children? More than we wish to believe. While it has been argued that rigid class structures have eroded in favour of greater social equality, Gregory Clark's The Son Also Rises, proves...
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The Global Development Crisis
A third of workers, internationally, earn less than $2 a day. The World Bank sets the poverty line at $1.25 a day, and on that basis asserts that poverty is declining. But is that right? Where did that figure come from? The New Economics Foundation estimates that it should be set at $5 a day, and...
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The new gourmet dining
Between 1975 and 2010 the style of gourmet dining, in America and beyond, was transformed. Increasingly, restaurants of ‘fine’ dining incorporated food, décor, and other elements previously limited to the ‘casual’ dining experience. The celebrity chef, working in an open kitchen, took over from…
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The world beyond 2015: Is Higher Education ready?
In 2015, the UN's eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) - broad targets for eradicating poverty and disease and improving worldwide rates of primary education, maternal health and gender equality- will be replaced with newly agreed goals. The MDG approach was a new one for development policy,...
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The Promise of Participation: Experiments in Participatory Governance
Involving citizens in the governance of public services - education, housing, transport - holds out the promise of more responsive, better run and more democratically accountable services. But it is a big ask. Many people won't have the experience, the time or the confidence to get involved. In...
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Getting Better Acquainted……
Hello! My name's Dave Pickering and I make the weekly podcast Getting Better Acquainted where I record conversations with people I know, Part interview show, part oral history project, the show was nominated for a 2012 Radio Production Award, goes out regular on Resonance 104.4 FM and was…
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The death of print in a digital age – Part 2
If newspapers' online production is taking over from print - how should they be regulated? They carry video and audio, yet are not subject to the same constraints as broadcast media. This is the issue addressed by Hugh Linehan (twitter: @hlinehan), Digital Development Director of the Irish Times…
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Stitched Up: the anti-capitalist book of fashion
Some of us love fashion. But all that alluring glamour comes at a price. Sally Feldman talks to journalist and campaigner, Tansy Hoskins, about her book Stitched Up: The anti-captalist book of fashion. They explore what is behind the clothes we wear - the money, the advertising that distorts...
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White Bread: A social history of the store-bought loaf
When we think of the stuff that dreams are made on, we might think of the spirits that Shakespeare’s Prospero conjures up in “The Tempest”; we might think of stars, rainbows, maybe even wishing wells, but what probably doesn’t leap to mind is a loaf of Wonder Bread. And yet, ever since the...
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Freedom of Expression Awards 2014
"Freedom of expression is the ultimate freedom. It means the freedom to live, to think, to love and be loved, to be secure, to be happy...." So said Pakistani campaigner Shahzad Ahmad accepting the Advocacy Award at this year's Freedom of Expression Awards in London last week. Shahzad Ahmad…
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The Accidental Universe: The World You Thought You Knew
"Our minds are made up of all the same atoms and molecules as everything else in nature - the architecture of our brains was born from the same energy principles, the same pure mathematics that happens in flowers, and jellyfish and Higgs particles..." says astrophysicist Alan Lightman, Professor…
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Mindwise – can we ever understand what others think, believe or feel?
How good are we at understanding each other? Other people are complicated, so when we try to guess what they’re thinking we often get it wrong. Even with our partners! Research suggests that partners are hardly any better (and sometimes worse) at guessing what each other believe or feel than a...
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Branding the Nation: The global business of national identity
In a globalised market economy, even nations have been branding themselves. 'Cool Britannia', Brazil a vibrant world class player, Italy the nation of high fashion and great food are just some examples. Can rebranding really maintain, extend, or even reconstitute the nation? Jeff Pooley of...
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Corporate capture?
The role of large corporations in lobbying for policy change was the subject of a workshop at Medact's recent conference. A number of Government appointed expert committees have recently made recommendations on pressing health issues, including minimum pricing of alcohol and food labelling. But...
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Lively and entertaining podcasts on current research in science and environment, arts and culture, humanities and economics. It’s sound thinking.
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