Frankenstein’s creature is a classic example of a monster in popular culture. But what can fictional beings tell us about the hopes and fears of the society in which they were created?

This month, Phil Ball chairs a panel of experts discussing how monsters survive in our culture, how they reflect gender and power dynamics, and what happens in our brains when we see monsters on screen.

Liz Gloyn is a lecturer in Classics at Royal Holloway. Her research focuses on the intersections between Latin literature, ancient philosophy and gender studies.

Evan Hayles Gledhill is currently doing a PhD at the University of Reading. Their PhD thesis examines the liminal figures of the monster and the child in the Gothic imagination, and the 'deviant subjectivities' these representations make space for in otherwise seemingly conventional genre texts.

Jeremy Skipper is Director of the Language, Action, and Brain Lab (LAB Lab) at University College London. He studies the neurobiology of natural language use and oversees the Neurocinematics database.

Check out our website: www.rigb.org/

Twitter: twitter.com/Ri_Science

YouTube: www.youtube.com/user/TheRoyalInstitution

And Patreon: www.patreon.com/TheRoyalInstitution