Arts & Ideas

Everyday lives from the past are often hard to reconstruct. As we prepare for the Census 2021, what stories can we tell from past censuses and the records held at Kew at the National Archives? John Gallagher is joined by four researchers whose work sheds light on women entrepreneurs, the health of residents in Brighton and Hastings, and the story of a house in a suburb of York - Tang Hall.Dr Carrie Van Lieshout from the Open University is working on a project called A Century of Migrant Businesswomen comparing census figures from 1911 to 2011.Audrey Collins is Records Specialist in Family History at the National Archives and the author of guides to tracing family history. Dr Deborah Madden from the University of Brighton looks at nineteenth century life writing, at public records and health, and is involved in a project which explores medical archival sources about the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918, including oral history interviews with descendants of families affected by that pandemic, and interviews with NHS key workers.Professor Krista Cowman at the University of Lincoln is researching women’s lives in a number of different contexts: as ‘war brides’ in France during World War One, as campaigners for post-war reconstruction in and out of Parliament in Britain, and in a number of community campaigns for safe play areas in the inter-and post-war period. She has worked on the history of a house in York's Tang Hall.This episode was made in partnership with the AHRC, part of UKRI.You can find more conversations about New Research in a playlist on the Free Thinking website https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03zws90Producer: Emma Wallace

Edogawa Rampo's stories give us a Japanese version of Sherlock Holmes. New Generation Thinker Christopher Harding traces the way detective fiction chimed with the modernising of Japan, when the ability to reason and think problems through logically was celebrated, when cities were changing and other arts mourned a lost rural idyll. In The Black Lizard, the hero Akechi Kogorō plays a cat and mouse game with a female criminal who has kidnapped a businessman's daughter.Christopher Harding is the author of The Japanese: A History in Twenty Lives and Japan Story: In Search of a Nation, 1850 - the Present (published in the US as A History of Modern Japan: In Search of a Nation, 1850 – the Present). He teaches at the University of Edinburgh. He is a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to select ten academics each year who can use their research to make radio programmes.You can find him discussing other aspects of Japanese history in the playlist Free Thinking explores Japanese culture https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0657spq He presented an Archive on 4 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b064ww32 and a series about Depression in Japan also for Radio 4 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07cv0y4 and a series of 5 Essays for BBC Radio 3 called Dark Blossoms about Japan's uneasy embrace of modernity https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b01kb2Producer: Ruth Watts

Timothy Brennan, a scholar of Edward Said, and renowned conductor Daniel Barenboim discuss Said's groundbreaking works like 'Orientalism' and 'Covering Islam'. They explore how Said's experiences shaped his views on Western representations of the East and his advocacy for Palestinian rights. The conversation highlights the significance of the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra in promoting dialogue between cultures. Additionally, they reflect on Said's literary legacy and his multifaceted contributions to cultural criticism and activism.

Viet Thanh Nguyen's novel The Sympathizer won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Its follow-up takes the lead character to Parisian salons and an underworld of drug dealing so Free Thinking tracks the French connection through film, history and philosophy as Matthew Sweet is joined by Viet Thanh Nguyen, by film critic Phuong Le and by Peter Salmon - author of a biography of Derrida - he's been investigating the ideas of the Vietnamese thinker Tran Duc Thao who inspired some of Derrida's work. The Sympathizer and the new novel The Committed by Viet Thanh Nguyen are out now. You can hear Phuong Le in a Free Thinking discussion about Marlene Dietrich https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000q8cq and about Billy Wilder https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000p1dx Peter Salmon's biography of Derrida is called An Event, Perhaps. You can hear him talking about that in a Free Thinking called Derrida and post truth https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000nc7t Free Thinking also has a playlist exploring different takes on the idea of Home and Belonging https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03mb66k Producer: Harry Parker

Mars is the focus of current space exploration but how far back does this interest go? Dr Joshua Nall tells Seb Falk about the Mars globe held at the Whipple Science Museum in Cambridge. Hannah Smithson explains her research into the way we see colour and explains the different perceptions of that blue/black/gold/white dress. Timothy Peacock has been studying the fears about Skylab falling to earth, looking at government files and the media reporting of the 1979 re-entry and distintegration of the first United States space station.Dr Joshua Nall is a BBC/AHRC New Generation Thinker and the Curator of Modern Sciences at the Whipple Museum of the History of Science in Cambridge. His book News from Mars: Mass Media and the Forging of a New Astronomy, 1860–1910 was awarded the Philip Pauly Prize by the History of Science society. Hannah Smithson is Professor of Experimental Psychology and a fellow of Pembroke College at the University of Oxford Dr Timothy Peacock is a lecturer in Modern History at the University of Glasgow and co-director of the University's Games and Gaming Lab (GGLab)Seb Falk is a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by the BBC and Arts and Humanities Research Council to put research on the radio. He is the author of the book The Light Ages: The Surprising Story of Medieval Science. You can hear more from him in a Free Thinking episode called Ancient Wisdom and Remote Living https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000q3by and his short feature for BBC Radio 3 about why we shouldn't compare Covid to the Black Death https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000nkzrYou can find a playlist exploring New Research on the Free Thinking website https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03zws90This episode was made in partnership with the Arts and Humanities Research Council, part of UKRI. Producer: Torquil MacLeod

From prejudice against accents to early attempts to create an artificial voice - Matthew Sweet is joined by the academics Sadie Ryan, Allison Koenecke and Lynda Clark.Sadie Ryan hosts a podcast Accentricity and is part of the Manchester Voices project team https://www.manchestervoices.org/project-team/ You can find a New Thinking podcast episode looking in more detail at that project https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07h30hmLynda Clark is part of the InGAME (Innovation in Games and Media Enterprise) project at the University of Dundee. She's interested in interactive fiction and AI storytelling. She's been researching the experiments of Joseph Faber who created Euphonia in 1846 and created her own take working with games and digital experiences.Allison Koenecke works in the Stanford University Computational Policy Lab and the Golub Capital Social Impact LabYou might also be interested in these programmes from the Free Thinking archives - all available to download as BBC Arts & Ideas podcasts What is Speech? https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b1q2f3 What is Good Listening? https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000djtd The pros and cons of swearing https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09c0r4m Language and Belonging https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0006fh9 AI and creativity: what makes us human? https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0005nml Robots https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08chbpcProducer: Luke Mulhall

Paranoia, the collateral damage on his family and the investigations he makes into drugs used to treat such a breakdown: Horatio Clare talks to Laurence Scott about his Journey through Madness, Mania and Healing. Plus the poetry of Stevie Smith (20 September 1902 – 7 March 1971). Author of the much quoted lines Not Waving but Drowning; Stevie Smith suffered from depression and acute shyness. New Generation Thinker Noreen Masud looks at her writing.Horatio Clare has recorded a series of different walks for BBC Radio 3. His books include The Light in the Dark: A Winter Journal; A Single Swallow; Down the Sea in Ships and his new memoir Heavy Light. Dr Noreen Masud teaches on twentieth century fiction at Durham University. You can hear her talking about nonsense writing in this episode of Free Thinking about Dada https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000k9ws and in this Sunday Feature she looks at aphorisms https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000rtxbProducer: Torquil MacLeod

The films Cuties and Rocks present a contemporary image of girlhood. What do they tell us about what it is to be a girl and to negotiate growing up? We hear from three researchers who look at: the influence of such films made by female directors; the role of aunties in giving advice about health and the body; and the portrayal of female friendship in boarding school novels by authors like Enid Blyton. Shahidha Bari is joined by Chisomo Kalinga, Tiffany Watt Smith, and Elspeth Mitchell. Chisomo Kalinga is researching the way storytelling informs concepts of health and wellbeing in Malawi, and has written about fictional portrayals and the idea of stereotypes. She is a Wellcome Trust Medical Humanities Fellow at the University of Edinburgh.Elspeth Mitchell's Phd looked at ‘the girl’ and the moving image in work by Simone de Beauvoir, Chantal Akerman, and Eija-Liisa Ahtila. She is now researching feminine identities, costume and burlesque at the University of Leeds.Tiffany Watt Smith is the author of books including The Book of Human Emotions, and Schadenfreude, and she is now researching women and friendship. She is Director of the Centre for the History of the Emotions at Queen Mary University London and is a New Generation Thinker - the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), turning research into radio. You can find a range of programming for International Women's Day on 8 March on BBC Radio 3, including a Words and Music playlist of readings and music exploring the idea of Women Walking Alone, and a series of broadcasts featuring the work of women composers - part of an ongoing project BBC Radio 3 is running with the AHRC to record more music written by women past and present. In the Free Thinking archives there is a playlist which includes discussions about women in academia, the woman writer and reader, discrimination and British justice, women and war, and women’s bodies, and hearing from guests including Helena Kennedy, Layla AlAmmar, Kiley Reid, Helen Lewis, and Maaza Mengiste. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p084ttwp This episode was made in partnership with the AHRC, part of UKRI. You can find more about New Research in a playlist on the Free Thinking programme website - https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03zws90 - where you’ll find other episodes in the New Thinking strand, showcasing academic research.Producer: Emma Wallace

Catherine Pepinster, Kate Kennedy, Tim Stanley and New Generation Thinker Dafydd Mills Daniel join Rana Mitter to look at the poet, theologian and now Saint John Henry. The programme marks 175 years since Newman's conversion from the high church tradition of Anglicanism and the Oxford Movement to the Catholic faith on 23 Feb 1846, with a conversation exploring his thinking and poetic writing.Catherine Pepinster is former editor of the Tablet and the author of The Keys and the Kingdom: The British and the Papacy Dafydd Mills Daniel is McDonald Departmental Lecturer in Christian Ethics at the University of Oxford and a BBC/AHRC New Generation Thinker. His book is called Ethical Rationalism and Secularisation in the British Enlightenment Tim Stanley is a columnist and leader writer for the Daily Telegraph who studied history at Cambridge and who is a contributing editor for the Catholic Herald https://www.timothystanley.co.uk/index.html Dr Kate Kennedy is Oxford Centre for Life-Writing Associate Director and a music specialist who has written on Ivor Gurney, and co-edited The Silent Morning: Culture and Memory after the Armistice and The First World War: Literature, Music, Memory.You can find a playlist Free Thinking explores religious belief https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03mwxlp including contributions from Ziauddin Sardar, Richard Dawkins, Karen Armstrong, Rabbi Sacks, Marilynne Robinson and Simon Schama.Producer: Ruth Watts

Shahidha Bari is joined by Lisa Downing, Stuart Elden, and Stephen Shapiro to read volume 4 of Foucault's History of Sexuality, translated into English for the first time, which examines beliefs and practices among the early Christians in Medieval Europe. Although he had specified in his will that his works shouldn't be published after he died (in 1984), the rights holders of Foucault decided that these ideas could now be made public. So what do they tell us and how influential has his approach to sexuality been?Lisa Downing, Professor of French Discourses of Sexuality at the University of Birmingham. She writes about gender and sexuality and she’s the author of The Cambridge Introduction to Michel Foucault and editor of After Foucault.Stuart Elden's books include The Early Foucault, which will be published in June 2021. This continues the work in his earlier books Foucault’s Last Decade and Foucault: The Birth of Power. He is Professor of Political Theory and Geography at the University of Warwick.And Stephen Shapiro, Professor of English and Comparative Literature also at the University of Warwick. He is co-author of how to Read Foucault's Discipline and Punish.Producer: Luke MulhallYou can find other episodes on philosophical themes in a Free Thinking playlist https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07x0twx