In a special programme looking ahead to International Women’s Day on March 8th, Shahidha Bari looks at how women express themselves in language, argument, poetry and art. Her guests include:

Sara Ahmed is the author of No is Not a Lonely Utterance

Producer: Luke Mulhall

Is authority a justly unfashionable quality that we should consign to the past? Or does it still have a place in political and business leadership, schools, medical settings and in the home? What is the difference between authority and power, how have historical shifts such as the advent of the internet affected public perceptions of authority, and how much should authority feature in the raising of children?

In Radio 4's roundtable discussion programme about ideas past and present, Anne McElvoy and guests explore these questions and more.

Justine Greening is a former Conservative Secretary of State for Education and Minister for Women and Equalities

Producer: Eliane Glaser

How have attitudes to punishment changed over time, and what ideas about the rationale for punishment are circulating today? In Radio 4's roundtable discussion programme, Matthew Sweet and guests explore the criminal justice system through history.

With:

Stephanie Brown, Lecturer in Criminology at the University of Hull and BBC / AHRC New Generation Thinker on the scheme which puts research on radio

Scout Tzofiya Bolton, poet and broadcaster who presents on National Prison Radio, and for Radio 4 the Illuminated episode called The Ballad of Scout and the Alcohol Tag. Her poetry collection is called The Mad Art of Doing Time

Joanna Hardy-Susskind, criminal barrister and presenter for Radio 4 of a series called You Do Not Have To Say Anything

Stephen Shapiro, Professor of American Literature at the University of Warwick

Jonathan Sumption, former Supreme Court judge and now Moral Maze panellist for BBC Radio 4 and author of a five-volume account of The Hundred Years War

Producer: Eliane Glaser

From an impoverished neighbourhood in South London, Charlie Chaplin became one of the most significant figures in the development of cinema. More recently, TV writers like Sophie Willan and Michaela Coel have transformed the way working class lives are depicted on TV, from the concerned paternalism of the 1960s to a more celebratory view from the inside in the 2020s. In this week's edition of Radio 4's arts and ideas discussion programme, Matthew Sweet charts these changes, and considers what they mean for our understanding of class categories in wider society. With TV historian Laura Minor, art historian Jacqueline Riding, novelist Adelle Stripe, and historian Samuel Johnson-Schlee. Plus, an interview with Ian La Frenais, co-creator of such comedy classics as The Likely Lads and Porridge.

'The strong do what they will, the weak suffer what they must'. So claimed the powerful Athenians, according to the Ancient Greek historian Thucydides. Plato tried to demonstrate that might does not make right, and thinkers ever since, from Hobbes and Rousseau to Kant and Carl Schmitt, have placed the idea that might is right at the centre of their political philosophies, for better or worse. Matthew Sweet traces the intellectual history of the idea, with Angie Hobbs, Margaret MacMillan, Lea Ypi, and Hugo Drochon.

What do we mean when we talk about productivity?

Anne McElvoy and guests discuss labour in the context of both work and motherhood: what the language of childbirth tells us about how mothers and their bodies are viewed today; how the language of production and reproduction is used in the public and private contexts of the workplace, in macroeconomics, in the labour ward and at home; and the current public debates about parental and domestic labour, the maternal pay gap and the 'productivity puzzle'.

With:

Producer: Eliane Glaser

From undercover field operatives to online anonymity, via lives led in the closet and large scale infidelity, Matthew Sweet discusses the what can prompt people to lead double lives.

Producer: Luke Mulhall

What does the phrase 'Victorian values' conjure today? Matthew Sweet and guests explore what we have inherited from that formative era in relation to political ideas, civic culture, aesthetics, and social and sexual mores. How does our view of the Victorian age match the historical reality? And can we move beyond stereotypes of repression and the stiff upper lip?

AN Wilson, writer, biographer and historian

Gisela Stuart, Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston, crossbench peer in the House of Lords

Sarah Williams, Research Professor in the History of Christianity at Regent College in Vancouver, Canada and author of When Courage Calls: Josephine Butler and the Radical Pursuit of Justice for Women

Fern Riddell, historian and writer. Her latest book is Victoria’s Secret: The Private Passion of a Queen (2025)

And Matthew Stallard, Research Associate from the Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slavery at University College London.

Producer: Eliane Glaser

Are we addicted to novelty? What are the cultural settings that allow innovation to flourish? And are novelty and innovation things we've always valued?

Tim Minshall is the author of Your Life is Manufactured.

Producer: Luke Mulhall

Are you planning your summer holiday? The first Saturday in January is called Sunshine Saturday because typically more holidays are booked on that day than on any other in the year. Today, planning a trip might involve consulting AI rather than reading a travel guide or visiting a travel agent. And the trip itself is more likely to involve an airplane than a stagecoach. But it's not just the practicalities of travel that have altered over the years. Reasons for travelling have changed, so have the meanings assigned to it. Was it ever a good vehicle for self discovery?

Producer: Luke Mulhall