History Lab

History Lab host Dr Tamson Pietsch hands over the mic to Dr Alecia Simmonds, an interdisciplinary scholar of law and history at the University of Technology Sydney. In this bonus episode they dissect how it is the law ‘knows’ and discuss how both history and the law rely on traces from the past to draw conclusions in the present. If truth is uncertain in historical archives - is it even harder to find in the courtroom?

Season 3 of History Lab will be taking a short break returning February 4 2020.

Episode two 'Making a fortune' is dropping in the new year with Dr Alana Piper from the Australian Centre for Public History.

Death, money and family are the key ingredients in any last will and testament. They also make a killer cocktail that unleashes a special force not present in any other part of the law.

In this episode of History Lab, we’re looking at how the law determines your last wishes through some truly unusual cases. Whether it's for reasons of urgency, eccentricity or expediency, courts around the world regularly have to make calls on the wishes of the dead. But how does the law know it’s getting it right and what does it mean for those left behind.

History Lab is back for a third season, fresh from wins at the New York Radio Festival Awards and the Community Broadcasting Association of Australia.

In this special four-part series we’ll be exploring the ‘law’s way of knowing’, looking at histories that intersect with the law.

From fortune telling to fingerprints, unusual wills and the forensic theory that something is always left behind, join us as we delve into the traces left by the law.

Missing your History Lab fix? We’ve got something else for you in the meantime. Introducing a new season of All Things Equal. This series will take you into the school yard and beyond, where kids learn that things aren't always fair. Through the stories of real students and staff, Uniform will change the way you think about education; because when it comes to learning, one size does not fit all.

Subscribe to All Things Equal in your favourite podcast app, or listen to the show here:

https://www.whooshkaa.com/shows/after-metoo-stories-of-social-change

History Lab audio makers explore how we've tried to understand the past through sound in season two

In the aftermath of World War One, nations came together in an attempt to ensure war on the same devastating scale could never occur again. The result? The League of Nations: a revolutionary idea to form the world’s first international organisation. But clearly it did not stop the world from going to war.

A century later we are still questioning our ability to come together. In this episode, Glenda Sluga and Ninah Kopel search for the ephemeral traces of a unified past. They find stories of hope, ambition but also skeletons lurking in the closet. Many say the League failed. But did the spirit live on?

Where do jelly babies come from?

Mass-produced things are all around us. But they all start with a single object. In this episode, Olivia goes looking for the patternmakers, whose invisible hands are the original creators of much of the stuff we use every day. They see a world no-one else can see. So why are they disappearing? And what will we lose when they are gone?

Producer: Olivia Rosenman

Collaborating historian: Jesse Adams Stein

Host: Tamson Pietsch

Executive Producer: Tom Allinson

In 1817, the Bank of New South Wales opened as the first financial institution in the Australian colonies. But when the first customers arrived for the grand opening, they found someone had already made a deposit. Where did the money come from? Our producers, Jason and Nicole, follow the record trail and discover the uncertain foundations of Australia’s first bank.

Sydney's iconic Opera House plays host to musicians and dancers, actors and singers. But beneath the notes of their voices, another song echoes across the city’s waters.

Indigenous Eora fisherwomen passed down their knowledge through their songs while paddling their canoes, a cooking fire at one end and their kids on their shoulders.

Historian Anna Clark and host Tamson Pietsch go looking for the fisherwomen’s world, and discover that, if you listen closely, the past of Sydney Harbour still sings.

• Producers: Tom Allinson and Ninah Kopel
• Collaborators: Anna Clark, Nathan Sentance, Tim Ella and Maddison Lyn Collier
• Executive Producer: Emma Lancaster
• Associate Producer: Anna Clark
• Sound Design: Joe Koning
• Host: Tamson Pietsch
• Voice Actor: Steve Ahern
• Additional production assistance: Ellen Leabeater and Miles Herbert
• Marketing and communications: Andy Huang

Thanks to: Les Bursill OAM for his advice on the Darug language, and Grace Karskens and Renee Cawthorne.

What does it take to make History Lab?

This bonus interlude episode lifts the curtain on all that goes into making history for your ears!

Executive Producer Emma Lancaster steps out from behind the headphones and asks you to listen hard as she and host Tamson Pietsch discover that in the gap between historians and journalists, great things can happen.

The History Lab final episode for Season One 'Fishing for Answers' will be available 25 July 2018.

To find out more about the History Lab pitching process head to https://historylab.net/pitch/