In the early years of AIDS,  nurses were stigmatised along with their patients. Now, their story has been told. Plus the great Australian poetry hoax, eighty years on. 

Writer Sonia Purnell reveals the astonishing life of Pamela Churchill Harriman, one of the most significant women in 20th century politics. Plus why are Balkan countries fighting over the origins of their national dishes?

In Guatemala private adoption agencies sent huge numbers of babies overseas - with many of them indigenous. And on Flinders Island in the Bass Strait, restoration work on the Aboriginal settlement Wybalenna has stalled. It is a significant cultural site where many Tasmanian Aboriginal people were sent in 1831. Only 47 survived.

What is the soul? Is it a substance, your conscience or simply a creation of the mind? Most societies and religions have some concept of the soul. Historian Paul Ham has looked at how the idea has changed through history and across cultures. 

Guest: Paul Ham, author of The Soul: A History of the Human Mind (Penguin Random House)

Originally broadcast on 1 August 2024

Des Ball had a long and complicated relationship with Pine Gap, which is explored in a new documentary, we ask whether academic publishing should be making big bucks - for the publishers and the contribution of the notebook to the work of some of our literary and scientific geniuses.

Brody Mullins investigates how lobbyists have changed politics and society in America and Hamilton Sides tells the story of how and why James Cook's last voyage ended up in violence - from the Hawaiian perspective.

For more than 1000 years, India was a trading powerhouse across the globe - not only of spices, wild animals and gemstones but also of language, philosophy, religion, mathematics and astronomy. But why is this part of India's history not so well known, and why did its dominance wane about 1200 AD?

Guest: William Dalrymple, historian, podcaster and author of The Golden Road How Ancient India Transformed the World (Bloomsbury)

Originally broadcast on 3 September 2024

Chas Licciardello, Sashi Perera and First Dog on the Moon - aka Andrew Marlton - join David Marr to survey the profound and the ridiculous from the year we've just had.

A history of Cyprus that's equal parts epic and personal. Plus, Susan Casey on the life that thrives thousands of metres below the surface of the ocean. 

Bruce Shapiro's take on a remarkable year in American politics - and what to expect in the year to come. What's next for Syria after the stunning fall of the Assad regime? Plus humanity's ancient fascination with the red planet.