Arts & Ideas

BBC BBC

Arts & Ideas

A daily Society and Culture podcast featuring Philip Dodd and Anne McElvoy

 2 people rated this podcast
Arts & Ideas

BBC BBC

Arts & Ideas

Episodes
Arts & Ideas

BBC BBC

Arts & Ideas

A daily Society and Culture podcast featuring Philip Dodd and Anne McElvoy
 2 people rated this podcast
Rate Podcast

Episodes of Arts & Ideas

Mark All
Search Episodes...
Sibling rifts, leadership battles in politics and history, philosophical schools of thoughts and their key players all come into our discussion of the way rivalry shapes the world. Roger Luckhurst reflects on the legacy of the American literary
Climate, trust, politics, communication. Some would say we live in a period of crisis several areas of society and life. How can we make sense of the present moment, and where do we go from here?Plus, we hear about the short list for this year'
With the success of the far right Alternative for Deutschland party in the German elections, Donald Trump and Kamala Harris making their pitches to American voters to be their leader and the Conservatives in this country voting for their: we lo
With the success of the far right Alternative for Deutschland party in the German elections, Donald Trump and Kamala Harris making their pitches to American voters to be their leader and the Conservatives in this country voting for their: we lo
Travel, reading, cinema and psychedelic drugs are all means people have used to try to escape. But do they ever really lead us where we want them to? With the election looming, Glastonbury in full swing and lists of beach read suggestions start
As the sun sets on the longest day of the year, Matthew Sweet talks to an eclectic group of guests about the illusion of time, the summer solstice and the philosophy of comedy. They are:Materials scientist & engineer; Director of the UCL Insti
Histories spanning the Big Bang to the present, and the story of an entire continent have been written by two of the Free Thinking guests tonight. What insights do big histories bring and what is the value of focusing on a single family or obje
With D-day commemorations giving us images of "the finest generation" and discussion about how parties are targeting different age groups in the UK election, Anne McElvoy hosts a discussion looking at what divides and unites us in a fracturing
The Insurrectionists' Guide to the Movies looking at some of the latest releases at the cinema and what they say about our culture society and democracy today.Matthew Sweet speaks to Financial Times columnist Stephen Bush, Critic and historian
British politics has long been defined by the labels of left and right but the terms are now often seen as defunct with research showing voters increasingly struggle to identify policies as being from one wing or another.We look at the histori
Sir Richard Evans, Margaret Heffernan, Isabel Oakeshott, Quassim Cassam join Anne McElvoy to look at the ideas shaping our lives today. Are they optimists or pessimists ? How negative should we be in political campaigning, doomscrolling, parent
Does reading really encourage empathy? Are we asked to perform a role when we walk into the workplace? How was early film and technicolour embraced for political ends? Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough finds out about the latest research being unde
Can we still expect a meaningful job, stable income, a chance of owning property? How have expectations changed and what is the place of protest? Matthew Sweet's guests this week are:David Willetts is a former Universities Minister and now a l
Matthew Sweet talks about the philosophy of winning and losing with Professor Lea Ypi a political scientist at the London School of Economics and the journalist and author Peter Hitchens. They'll be joined by the lawyer Michael Mansfield KC who
Marshmallows and Kant, ideas about girl power from Mary Wollstonecraft (born April 27th 1759) to the Spice girls; and galloping horses, sea-gull sounds and life as a goat. On today's Free Thinking Shahidha Bari is joined by literary historian A
Women made up 10-15% of the workforce in the early days of the post office. Looking at a series of different records from the 17th century onwards, Sarah Ward Clavier has discovered stories about spying, how pubs, the links between pubs and pos
Classicist Mary Beard picks Tacitus as a figure who still has relevance if we're thinking about satire, power and celebrity. Shahidha Bari is joined by Mary, historian Helen Carr, who co-edited What is History Now? political sketch-writer from
"The times they are a changin" or are they? In politics people are talking about an appetite for change, or being a candidate for change but how radical can you be? With climate change, seasonal change and a change of broadcast time for this pr
What do you owe the state and what does it provide for us? Writing during the English civil war, Thomas Hobbes came up with an outline for the social contract between individuals and the sovereign – on Free Thinking, Matthew Sweet and guests un
Gold sequins, silk and vibrant colour threads might not be what you expect to find in a sampler stitched by a Quaker girl in the seventeenth century. New Generation Thinker Isabella Rosner has studied examples of embroidered nutmegs and decorat
In 1910 Virginia Woolf and a group of friends caused a stir when they were welcomed on board the HMS Dreadnought, disguised as a delegation of Abyssinian royalty. At the 2017 Conservative Party conference, Theresa May was handed a P45 in the mi
Who's Holding the Baby? was the title of an exhibition organised to highlight a lack of childcare provision in East London in the 1970s. Was this feminist art? Bobby Baker, Sonia Boyce, Rita Keegan and members of the photography collective Hack
The impact of light bulbs on cities like New York and Paris at the turn of the twentieth century and the way modernist poets like Mina Loy and Lola Ridge depicted this, is at the heart of research being done by Dr Nicoletta Asciuto. For this N
Viking burials, preserving archaeology in Uganda, the morgues of Paris and New York and the medieval attitude to dying are our topics as Chris Harding hears about new research from archaeologists Marianne Hem Eriksen and Pauline Harding, and hi
The Flemish Baroque painter Peter Paul Rubens produced around 1,500 artworks, and a new research project explores the Islamic themes in his art. Dr Adam Sammut discusses why the Ottoman Empire’s influence on Rubens has been at the periphery of
Rate
Contact This Podcast

Join Podchaser to...

  • Rate podcasts and episodes
  • Follow podcasts and creators
  • Create podcast and episode lists
  • & much more

Unlock more with Podchaser Pro

  • Audience Insights
  • Contact Information
  • Demographics
  • Charts
  • Sponsor History
  • and More!
Pro Features