Gresham College Lectures

A Gresham lecture that Delahunty gave in November 2017 was one of the first public identifications of the exodus of experienced women from the self-employed Bar - and gave a call for action. That loss affects the number of women who take Silk and that, in turn, drains the pool from which judges are largely drawn.

In 2018 the Bar Council and Specialist Bar Associations acknowledged the issue and a "Retention of Women at the Bar' survey was launched. It's time to look at the results and test how the legal profession has responded to the challenge.

A lecture by Jo Delahunty QC, Gresham Professor of Law 28 November

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/100-years-women-in-law

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

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The study of the natural and physical world from a scientific viewpoint began in Greek cities on the western coast of Turkey around Miletus in about 600 BCE. The first scientists were known as physiologoi, or men who discoursed about nature (physis). Each tried to put his various observations together in a way that constituted a coherent, unified model.

This lecture discusses the pioneering physical theories of Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes, Anaxagoras and Democritus.

A lecture by Edith Hall, Visiting Professor of Classics 28 November

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/birth-of-physics

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

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This lecture will consider the treatment and prevention of common cancers in women. The outlook for those with breast cancer and uterine cancer have substantially improved in the last three decades, and the great majority with the diagnosis will be alive and well a decade later. The outlook for ovarian cancer is less good although improving.

This lecture will consider the evolving treatments, including the importance of genetic markers and hormonal treatments and approaches to prevention and screening.

A lecture by Chris Whitty 27 November

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/breast-uterine-ovarian-cancers

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

Support the show

Barely a day goes by without some lunatic assertion on social media. Thinking-people shake their heads, but what can be done about this?

It turns out that there are a variety of scientific and engineering approaches which might be adapted to tame the trolls of social media. In this lecture we will review the tricky alliance between social media, email and the government, and we will present options for the future in which, possibly, the benefits of social media might been to outweigh the negatives.

A lecture by Richard Harvey, IT Livery Company Professor of IT 26 November

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/taming-the-trolls

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk

Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

Barely a day goes by without some lunatic assertion on social media. Thinking-people shake their heads, but what can be done about this?

It turns out that there are a variety of scientific and engineering approaches which might be adapted to tame the trolls of social media. In this lecture we will review the tricky alliance between social media, email and the government, and we will present options for the future in which, possibly, the benefits of social media might been to outweigh the negatives.

A lecture by Richard Harvey, IT Livery Company Professor of IT 26 November

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/taming-the-trolls

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

Support the show

Mary Ann Evans experienced difficult relationships with her family while growing up in Warwickshire, and with nineteenth-century London society more generally after she moved to the city and lived with a married man, George Henry Lewes.

Her seeking of independence in London as a writer (with her later emergence as 'George Eliot'), her experience of rejection, and the widening of her intellectual and cultural life, will be discussed, interwoven with analysis of the deep understanding of relationships in her novels characterised by authorial sympathy and humour.

A lecture by Rosemary Ashton, University College London 25 November

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/eliot-relationships

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk

Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

Mary Ann Evans experienced difficult relationships with her family while growing up in Warwickshire, and with nineteenth-century London society more generally after she moved to the city and lived with a married man, George Henry Lewes.

Her seeking of independence in London as a writer (with her later emergence as 'George Eliot'), her experience of rejection, and the widening of her intellectual and cultural life, will be discussed, interwoven with analysis of the deep understanding of relationships in her novels characterised by authorial sympathy and humour.

A lecture by Rosemary Ashton, University College London 25 November

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/eliot-relationships

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

Support the show

From ancient times to popular self-help books today, eyes have been viewed as 'windows to the soul'. The interpretation of eye shape and colour have been used to distinguish between different degrees of 'civilization' (scientific racism), to identify personality traits, and to detect terrorists (recent research carried out by the CIA and the U.S. Transportation Security Administration). In some Asian societies, double eyelid surgery is popular.

This lecture explores the politics of scientific theories about eyes.

A lecture by Joanna Bourke, Gresham Professor of Rhetoric 21 November

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/history-of-the-eye

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk

Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

From ancient times to popular self-help books today, eyes have been viewed as 'windows to the soul'. The interpretation of eye shape and colour have been used to distinguish between different degrees of 'civilization' (scientific racism), to identify personality traits, and to detect terrorists (recent research carried out by the CIA and the U.S. Transportation Security Administration). In some Asian societies, double eyelid surgery is popular.

This lecture explores the politics of scientific theories about eyes.

A lecture by Joanna Bourke, Gresham Professor of Rhetoric 21 November

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/history-of-the-eye

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

Support the show

Medieval England was proudly Catholic and ostentatiously loyal to Rome. But from the late sixteenth century until recent times – and even now – anti-Catholic prejudice has been a cornerstone of English and British identity.

This lecture will look at how this prejudice grew out of the persecution of Protestants in the 1550s, at the idealistic historian who crystallised it, and at the political crises, real and invented, which turned his text into a paranoiacs’ charter.

A lecture by Alec Ryrie, Gresham Professor of Divinity 20 November

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/how-the-english-learned-to-hate-catholics

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk

Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege