Pod Academy

Podcast produced by Jo Barratt

Susan Sontag said smelling ‘gives one a sensation of knowledge rinsed clean of thought’.  The effect of smell is powerful, but rarely articulated and therefore rarely recorded.

So how does an historian of smell go about his work?  There are millions upon millions of smells, but how can he recreate them and how does he understand what they meant to people?

In this podcast, first broadcast on Life in Scents, William Tullett – an historian at Kings College London  specialising in 18th Century England and in particular Sensory history, Smell, History of Perfumes, History of the Senses, and Gesture,  – talks about how he rebuilds sensescapes from the things left behind.

This podcast is presented and produced by Craig Barfoot

In 2007, Alan Greenspan, then Chairman of the US Federal Reserve was asked by the Swiss newspaper Tages-Anzeiger who, in his view, would be the next president of the United States.  He replied,

"We are fortunate that, thanks to globalization, policy decisions in the US have been largely replaced by global market forces. National security aside, it hardly makes any difference who will be the next president. The world is governed by market forces"

So, is electoral democracy compatible with the forces of global capitalism?  Or are western governments just ‘buying time’ with short term economic fixes in order to win elections, while real power lies not with the people but somewhere else entirely?

These are the questions at the heart of Craig Barfoot’s conversation with German sociologist Professor Wofgang Streeck, Director of the Max Planck Institute as they discuss Professor Streeck’s book  Buying Time: The delayed crisis of democratic capitalism (Verso, 2014)., which is based on his 2012 Adorno lectures.

Tracing the transformation of postwar capitalism that began in the 1970s , Wolfgang Streeck explores how the relationship between democracy and capitalism in Europe and the US has changed and continues to change.  He argues that western governments have been ‘buying time’ with public spending deficits and private debt (in order to win elections), and that the 2008 economic demonstrated the conflict of interests between the financial markets and the popular will.

After World War II, there was a consensus that those who had fought a war should have the right to the full benefits of citizenship, which included a share of the growing prosperity that came from a growing economy.  But now, says Professor Streeck, we have a democracy that is very different - collective bargaining, a system that ensured wages kept pace with growth, and allowed for redistribution both for social justice and to stimulate the economy,  is largely gone. Increasingly growth is seen as flowing from the empowerment of the rich, for example via tax cuts.

Governments have bought time, but can they do that for ever?

This podcast is produced and presented by Craig Barfoot

In the 20th Century, humans killed hundreds of thousands of wild animals as we sought to build new homes and develop agriculture.  Now the 21st century is characterised by conservation and re-wilding - but can ranchers and environmentalists, wildlife managers and animal-welfare activists, humans and animals ever really co-exist?

Yes, says John Shivik of Utah State University's National Wildlife Research Center /Predator Research in this fascinating conversation with Craig Barfoot.

In parts of the United States, stories of 'backyard bears' and 'cat-eating coyotes' are becoming increasingly common—even for people living in non-rural areas. Farmers anxious to protect their sheep from wolves aren’t the only ones concerned: suburbanites and city dwellers are also having more unwanted run-ins with predators from the wild.

And as carnivore populations increase their proximity to people, pets, and livestock leads to more conflict, and we are once again left to negotiate the uneasy terrain between elimination and conservation. In his book The Predator Paradox, John Shivik argues that we can end the conflict while still preserving and protecting these key species as fundamental components of healthy ecosystems. 

As the boundary between human and animal habitat blurs, preventing the war between humans and wildlife depends both on changing animal behaviour and shifting our own perceptions, attitudes, and actions.

 

You might also be interested in this blog about re-wilding in Chile

Podcast produced and presented by Craig Barfoot

What makes us human? When, why and how did the human brain evolve?

Professor Clive Gamble argues that it was not the tools that form the bulk of the archaeological record, but rather the social world within which our ancestors lived that drove the development of the human brain.

In this conversation with Pod Academy's Craig Barfoot, he suggests that the evolution of the social brain tells us not only about human behaviour in the past but also about the importance of networking in our complex modern world.

Clive Gamble  is Professor of Archaeology at the University of Southampton. His work involves the study of our earliest ancestors and in particular the timing of global colonisation. This podcast focuses on his most recent book, Thinking Big: How the Evolution of Social Life Shaped the Human Mind.

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The featured photo with this podcast is by PhOtOnQuAnTiQuE

Research suggests that 10% of children are victims of bullying and 5% of children are involved in bullying others.

Defined as 'repeated aggressive behaviour intended to harm, and involving an imbalance of power', being bullied can feel like an unending nightmare to a child

who is being targeted.

So who is likely to be a bully, and can we predict who is more likely to be bullied?  What are the gender differences?  And what about cyber bullying?

In this podcast, Emeritus Professor Peter K Smith of Goldsmiths, University of London talks to Pod Academy's Craig Barfoot about his book, Understanding School Bullying, Its Nature and Prevention Strategies, he explains what forms bullying talkes and what parents can do to help.

 

 

 

You may also be interested in our podcast on Young Girls Friendships, which explores the often worrying dynamics of girls' friendship groups.

Featured photo by Thomas Ricker

This podcast is part of our Geoff Dyer series – a series of recordings from a conference dedicated to Dyer’s work held at Birkbeck, University of London. It features Dr Bianca Leggett, Teaching Fellow in British Studies at Harlaxton College and is presented by Jo Barratt.

This year marks 25 years since the publication of Geoff Dyer’s first novel, The Colour of Memory. Geoff is a multi-award winning writer who has written 4 novels and is also known for his essays. He’s been described by the New York Times as ‘one of our greatest living critics’

The colour of memory series was recorded for Pod Academy at Birkbeck, University London at a conference dedicated to Dyer's work.

This podcast is a talk given by Bianca Leggett from Harlaxton College, University of Evansville on Dyer's latest book Another Great Day at Sea: Life Aboard the USS George H.W. Bush.

 

Photo by Chris Boland:  www.chrisboland.com

 

 

Click here for the other podcasts in the series

What colour was the 1990s?

Counting Backwards: a quarter-century of The Colour of Memory

This podcast is part of our Geoff Dyer series – a series of recordings from a conference dedicated to Dyer’s work held at Birkbeck, University of London. It features Dr Morgan Daniels of Queen Mary College, University of London and is presented byJo Barratt

This year marks 25 years since the publication of Geoff Dyer’s first novel, The Colour of Memory. Geoff is a multi-award winning writer who has written 4 novels and is also known for his essays. He’s been described by the New York Times as ‘one of our greatest living critics’

The colour of memory series was recorded for Pod Academy at Birkbeck, University London at a conference dedicated to Dyer's work.

In this podcast, Morgan Daniels steps slightly away from  directly discussing the authors work to consider the fascinating proposition: “What colour was the 1990s?’

 

Photo by Chris Boland:  www.chrisboland.com

 

 

Click below for the other podcasts in the series:

What colour was the 1990s?

All at Sea: Soldiers and Slackers in the Writing of Geoff Dyer

Counting Backwards: a quarter-century of The Colour of Memory

This podcast is part of our Geoff Dyer series - a series of recordings from a conference dedicated to Dyer's work held at Birkbeck, University of London. It features Dr Joe Brooker, Reader in Modern Literature at Birbeck and is presented by Jo Barratt.

This year marks 25 years since the publication of Geoff Dyer’s first novel, The Colour of Memory. Geoff is a multi-award winning writer who has written 4 novels and is also known for his essays. He’s been described by the New York Times as ‘one of our greatest living critics’

The colour of memory series was recorded for Pod Academy at Birkbeck, University London at a conference dedicated to Dyer's work.

In this podcast, Joe Brooker from Birkbeck University of London, looks back at the colour of memory.

 

Photo by Chris Boland:  www.chrisboland.com

 

 

 

Click below for the other podcasts in the series, produced and presented by Jo Barratt.

What colour was the 1990s?

All at Sea: Soldiers and Slackers in the Writing of Geoff Dyer

Photo: @AlexJohnWill

This podcast was presented and produced by Jo Barratt

This year marks 25 years since the publication of Geoff Dyer’s first novel, The Colour of Memory. Geoff is a multi-award winning writer who has written 4 novels and is also known for his essays. He’s been described by the New York Times as ‘one of our greatest living critics’

The colour of memory series was recorded for Pod Academy at Birkbeck, University London at a conference dedicated to Dyer's work.

In this introductory podcast the author sits down with conference convenor Bianca Leggett to talk openly and widely about his work and also hear from several experts on his work.

The following recording accompanies this podcast series and is Geoff Dyer reading two passages from his latest book ‘Another Great Day at Sea: Life Aboard the USS George H.W. Bush’

 

http://podacademy.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/GD_Reading.mp3

 

Photo by Chris Boland:  www.chrisboland.com

Click here for the other podcasts in the series

What colour was the 1990s?

All at Sea: Soldiers and Slackers in the Writing of Geoff Dyer

Counting Backwards: a quarter-century of The Colour of Memory

 

 

Transcript to follow

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Photo credit: www.alexander-williamson.com

This podcast was produced and presented by Lee Millam

Lee Millam has lived in high-rise blocks of flats in London for years.  In this podcast he explores the highs and lows of living high up, and also asks whether high rise is a viable option for tackling current problems in the housing market.

Lee Millam:  I used to live on the 16th floor, then moved to my current flat which is on the 8th floor.

Even after all these years, I am still fascinated by how incredibly light my living space is. I love the views from the windows - and the sense of the whole city being below me. I watch the trains as they go in and out of the train station – they look like toys; the cars as they travel on the roads and people going about their business.

Up in my flat I get a different perspective on the way the city of London moves.

I wanted to know about other people’s experience of living up high. Firstly, though, I take you to The London School of Economics, to talk to Paul Cheshire, Professor of Economc Geography about the housing crisis.

Paul Cheshire: There is a housing crisis because we have been constantly not building enough houses for more than thirty years so we have a shortfall of building compared to what we should have been building in England of between 1.6 and 2.3 million houses.

The lack of building is a symptom of the problem.. But the root of the problem is our planning system. Simply, it does not permit you to build. And there is very little land; it is highly constrained with our urban containment boundaries around all our major cities - the Green-Belt covers nearly thirteen percent of England for example. But equally, we have height restrictions so you can’t build upwards either.

LM: And is this just a problem for London or is this a problem across the country?

PC: The housing is worst in London and the pressure on space is worst in London but it is a problem across the country; worst in the South East of England. Outside London, Oxford has the most expensive housing relative to incomes

Vox pops: I like living High up because, living in London, it is very hard to see horizons but when I come home, I can see a distance. I have a lot of light; I feel safer because I can leave my windows open without anyone coming in. But really it is the fact that I can see a long distance, and people can’t actually look into my flat. So there is a sense of space, a sense of freedom and a sense of privacy that I really enjoy.

Paul Cheshire : Basically the planning system zones so much land as off limits, you simply can’t build on it. Green-field land, or green-belt land, covers 13% of the surface of England, compared to cities which cover only 10% of the surface area of England. So all the people in England are crammed into ten percent of our space and we don’t allow any more. And as people get richer then they try to buy more space; they try to get better homes with bit of gardens and bigger rooms.

LM: But some of us are going to have to compromise, maybe live in flats?

PC: Of course, some people indeed want to live in flats, or flats can be very suitable for some people. But is it difficult to build them too because you can’t build high. And flats are much more effective and efficient if they are in relatively large chucks of housing construction.

Vox pop: I have been asked to say how I would feel about living in a high rise flat, and I definitely wouldn’t like it. I think the only advantage would be the view. But I think I would feel quite cut off from the rest of the world if I lived quite high up. I would see it as a barrier to the outside world because you can’t just open your front door and be outside and there is all the palaver of using the stairs, and having to depend on the lift. And I could get quite scared,