Academy of Ideas

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe PODCASTS: PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/12232 In October 2014, Chicago’s public radio WBEZ debuted their ‘Serial’ podcast. By February 2016, it had been downloaded over 80 million times. And with its success, the...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe HOT OFF THE PRESS - FERRANTE FURORE: WHAT'S THE STORY? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/12549 The identity of the popular Italian writer known as Elena Ferrante, author of the award winning Neapolitan Novels, has long been a mystery to her f...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe HOT OFF THE PRESS - CREEPY CLOWNS: HORROR, SOCIAL MEDIA AND URBAN MYTHS http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/12546 In a matter of weeks, the scary-clown craze has made its presence felt across the Anglo-American world. It began in small-town Ame...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe FREE STAGE JAZZ PERFORMANCE Esteemed jazz musicians Jekaterina Sarigina and Eduardas Armonas will be performing a range of songs inspired by the greats of swing and bebop era, featuring a selection of their favourite American songbook jazz standards, with t...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe BOOKSHOP BARNIE: HILLARY RISING WITH JAMES D BOYS http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11663 Who needs a new series of House of Cards when we have the real thing being performed before our very eyes? On 12 April 2015, Hillary Clinton formally an...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe HOW WILL WE FEED BRITAIN AFTER BREXIT? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11664 The Brexit vote throws the future of British farming and indeed how to produce enough food to feed Britain into question. The EU was always notorious for its appar...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe DO WE NEED A COMMON TONGUE? LANGUAGES AND INTEGRATION http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11535 Announcing a new £20 million language fund earlier this year, David Cameron argued that English classes would help disenfranchised Muslim women and...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe THOMAS MORE'S UTOPIA http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11549 More’s Utopia, published 500 years ago this year, is a book that has beguiled historians and political theorists over several centuries. Confronting a portrait of an idyllic communi...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe BRITAIN'S INFRASTRUCTURE: THE ROAD TO NOWHERE? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11577 The bronze bust of Sir Joseph Bazalgette on Victoria Embankment reads ‘flumini vincula posuit’ - ‘he put the river in chains’, a fitting testament to his w...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe HUMANITY'S BIG CHALLENGE: WATER WARS http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11580 Water, so vital for human life, covers 71 per cent of the Earth’s surface. Yet despite huge progress in technology and modern development, water scarcity is one of t...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe DO WE NEED A CLASSICAL EDUCATION FOR THE 21ST CENTURY? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11550 Ofsted Chief Inspector Michael Wilshaw recently claimed that vocational education in England is a ‘disaster’, but some critics go further and argue...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe 'THE PAST, WE WANT NO PART OF IT': THE LEGACY OF FUTURISM http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11578 At the turn of the 20th century, Italy was economically backward and politically stagnant compared with the more advanced nations of Europe. Fil...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe RENÉ DESCARTES: I THINK, THEREFORE I AM http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11552 Often identified as the father of modern philosophy, Rene Descartes’ influence is hard to avoid, and his importance is the subject of intense debate. Famous as a...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe ROUGH TRADE AT 40: NOSTALGIA OR A NEW COUNTERCULTURE? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/12112 Forty years ago, a softly spoken Cambridge graduate, Geoff Travis, set up a small record shop called Rough Trade on Kensington Park Road. It quickly...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe FROM BOWIE TO BIEBER: WHAT MAKES A MUSIC ICON? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11530 The deaths of David Bowie and Prince earlier this year provoked much soul-searching about the state of contemporary popular culture. Many critics observed...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe AFTER THE REFERENDUM: BRITAIN DIVIDED? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11659 In the run up to the UK’s referendum to decide whether the country should remain in the EU or leave, the country saw an enormous expansion of political discussion...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe CULTURAL APPROPRIATION: HOMAGE OR THEFT? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11529 From rows over repatriating artefacts in Western museum collections to controversies over alleged ‘cultural appropriation’ at college parties and music festivals...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe UTOPIA MYOPIA: THE FUTURE OF CITIES http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11579 On the 500th anniversary of the publication of Thomas More’s Utopia, visions of a better world are back in fashion. But while many urbanists dream of utopias, few sho...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe WHO OWNS JAZZ? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11533 Jazz is a musical genre with a global following, taking a variety of forms in many different parts of the world. Musically, it is characterised by a forceful rhythm, improvisation and a d...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe BALLOON DEBATE: WHAT'S THE BEST EVER BOX-SET? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11612 The political upheaval in the UK over the past few months has had commentators and politicians alike making comparison to the wildly popular fantasy drama G...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe IS UTOPIAN THINKING DEAD? ATTITUDES TO THE FUTURE http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11581 From a spate of global terrorist attacks and natural disasters to major political shocks across the West and even the unexpected deaths of a number of c...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe IMMIGRATION: WHAT IS THE FUTURE OF FREE MOVEMENT? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11538 A UKIP poster showing a winding queue of brown-skinned refugees under the slogan ‘Breaking Point’ provoked a storm of condemnation at the height of Brit...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe ARE POLITICAL PARTIES OVER? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11656 At one point this summer, in the wake of the Brexit vote and amid deeply fractious national conventions, all four main political parties in the US and UK appeared to be under...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe WHY DOES KIERKEGAARD STILL MATTER? http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11551 Existentialism arguably begins with the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, who viciously rejected the comfortable and undemanding Christianity of 19th century Europ...

Subscribe to the Academy of Ideas Substack for more information on the next Battle and future events: https://clairefox.substack.com/subscribe LAW AND DEMOCRACY http://archive.battleofideas.org.uk/2016/session/11654 The vote to leave the European Union is sparking an upheaval in the British legal system, which over 40 years has become ever more closely enmeshed with the EU and other European bodie...