April 29, 2019

Monsters, Science and Society - with Expert Panel

1 hour 18 minutes

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.Ri Science Podcast episodes are released on the last Wednesday of every month, and our new ‘From the Theatre’ episodes are released on the second Wednesday of the month. Subscribe to be notified as soon as the next episode is released!