Big Ideas

After five nominations, Ruthie Foster has taken home the 2025 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album - affirming her status as an American music legend.  In this intimate conversation, she shares what made her want to be a singer; the roles of her grandmother and mother in her life; why faith is so important to her and why she wants to sing about real people. And much more… A Heartlands Co...

When you enter your childbearing years, it can feel like everyone from the treasurer, your mum, and probably your Instagram reels really wants you to have a kid. But is it the right decision? Few women escape this conundrum of modern family-making, and unfortunately there is no easy or simple answer. But in this talk presented by the Sydney Opera House at the All About Women Festival 2025 , you’ll...

Meet two men who will change the way you think about an experience most of us fear but will be touched by in some way.  In Patting the Shark, surfing writer Dr Tim Baker describes his wild ride to reclaim a sense of control and agency after a cancer diagnosis. Celebrated author and GP Peter Goldsworthy’s memoir The Cancer Finishing School started out as a journal but became so much more. They join...

Are fermented foods really good for us? Do antibiotics destroy our gut flora? And have you heard about poo transplants? Our gut is teeming with trillions of microbial cells, and we are learning more all the time about how this affects everything from our digestion, to immunity, to mental health. So crack open your kombucha, because these leading researchers will cut through the noise with some har...

Doctor Who has acted as a mirror to more than six decades of social, technological and cultural change. It's been able to evolve and adapt more radically than any other fiction. Why we are so addicted to fiction, and why does this wonderful wandering time traveller mean so much to so many. This talk was provided by the York Festival of Ideas . The Festival is led by the University of York, UK. Ori...

The connection between body and mind is well established. But mental health expert Daniel Fung also includes the soul in this 'ecosystem' that shapes your overall wellbeing. He envisions a future for mental health services, that is person-centred, holistic and consciously uses digital tools and social media. Beautiful minds, Loving hearts: Asian Mental Health Ecosystems in 2050 was presented at Th...

From innocently conning controversial radio duo Kyle and Jackie O as a kid, time in a Zambian convent as a teen, to nearly becoming an air traffic controller before finding her real passion - helping others find their voice - Astrid Jorgensen has quite a story to tell. Her new memoir is called Average At Best. She is anything but. She is anything but. On any one night, anywhere in the world, you’l...

Australia now has its first treaty with this country's first peoples. After nearly a decade of formal consultation and negotiation, the Victorian Statewide Treaty has become law, and will come into effect from early December. This address outlines the long road to achieving the treaty, why it's important, and what comes next. The 25th Dr Charles Perkins Oration was recorded on 28 October 2025 at t...

Humans are by nature creative, but how do we turn a spark of inspiration into something more tangible? Author Emily Maguire draws inspiration from some of the world's most creative minds — from Lin Manuel Miranda, to Susan Sontag, to explore the ingredients of a truly creative life. The 2025 Colin Roderick Memorial Lecture , hosted by the Foundation of Australian Literary Studies at James Cook Uni...

As we grow older, changes to our bodies and minds are inevitable. But what if science could help us age better? Our experts on Big Ideas uncover the latest science behind healthy brain aging. What's possible in the fight against cognitive decline and dementia? How might you live a longer, healthier, and more meaningful life? Presented by Sydney Ideas , the talk program at the University of Sydney...

When acclaimed Australia author Christos Tsiolkas was invited to give the 2025 Ray Mathew Lecture at the National Library of Australia , he had in mind what he wanted to say, as difficult as it was. Then he got a rage-filled message from a longtime friend. How did Christos respond? Is fence-sitting an indulgence in an ethically troubled, divisive, dislocated world? Or, is 'speaking across the fenc...

From The Don to Warny, the Gabba to the G, from its legacy of British colonialism, to the Asian powerhouse nations of today — cricket is not just a sport, but also a reflection of the societies who play it. Drawing on a wealth of writing about the sport, including novels, biographies, and media reporting, this lecture explores the cultural and historical legacy of cricket. This event was recorded...

Born in apartheid South Africa, she became the country's first female high court judge. She sat on the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, and helped to establish sexual violence and rape as war crimes in international law. At a time of global conflict and instability, the work and achievements of Navi Pillay are a reminder of what can be achieved when accountability trumps impunity, when...

Young Australians are losing faith that our politics, our civic institutions and the mainstream media are working for them. Why is this? And how can our democracy adapt to win back the trust and engagement of new generations? The 2025 Speaker's Lecture was recorded at Parliament House on 27 October 2025. Speakers Holly Rankin - Musician and recording artist Jack River , founder, Sentiment , direct...

Are our universities facing an existential crisis by trying to be too many things? Places for learning, research, the production of new knowledge, the production of job-ready graduates, and profit-making enterprises? Does everything they do have to produce a tangible, measurable, practical, or profitable outcome? Should they also foster intellectual life and the pursuit of ideas just for curiosity...

We often hear about "failing schools", but what if it is us, the Australian community, who are failing them?  Public school advocate Jane Caro argues that Australia's pursuit of school choice, and the tax payer funding that enables it, has come at a huge cost to the school system, to children's education, and to our broader society. The 2025 Dymphna Clark Lecture at Manning Clark House was recorde...

Join ABC's Mon Schafter and four incredible speakers as they share honest, powerful stories about revealing their identities on their own terms. From fear to freedom, isolation to community - this is a conversation about truth, courage, and connection. Held in recognition of 40 years of ACON , it celebrates every journey of coming out and shines a light on personal stories, collective resilience,...

If you're a feminist, or pro-civil or gay rights, does that make you "woke"? And if you're not, does that mean you should be cancelled, or abused online, or lose your job? So many of our public debates nowadays are divided along these lines, but is there a better way? This event was recorded at the 2025 Melbourne Writers Festival . To explore more Melbourne Writers Festival talks, visit mwf.com.au...

Friends are different from family. We choose them and they choose us. Philosophers long wondered about what makes friendship such a distinctive relationship in our lives. Is being a good friend a kind of moral virtue?  Can friends help us find our true selves? What about the dark and difficult side of friendship — toxic friends and frenemies? How is the love between friends different from romantic...

To deal with China as a major trading partner, and also a national security threat requires understanding the history that made China what it is today.  That history is shaped by resistance and different waves of uprising. How have governments dealt with these movements? How do they influence politics today? China: Past, Present, Future was recorded live at the 2025 Sydney Writers' Festival. Liste...

The United States has long been famous for its world leading universities. But in the face of research funding cuts, government attacks on free speech, DEI and the right to protest, and the persecution of foreign students, could all that be changing? The speech, Poison Ideas: Universities and other Antidotes to Authoritarianism, was recorded at the 2025 conference of the Australasian Council of De...

The Western world is supposed to stand for values like freedom, justice and human rights, a commitment to meet wrongdoing with consequence, guided by rules and obligations. How then, do we reconcile that with Western governments' and media's support of and complicity in the horrors in Gaza? How do we witness the bloodshed and destruction, and yet look away? This conversation was recorded at the Ca...

Build more houses. That'll fix Australia's housing crisis won't it?  If you listen to governments, you'd sure think so. Under the National Housing Accord, all governments have agreed to support a target of building 1.2 million new, well-located dwellings in 5 years.  But will that increase housing affordability, availability, quality, security of tenure, and the growing gap between the haves and h...

Whitlam's dismissal and following double dissolution 50 years ago, was arguably the most tumultuous period in Australia's political and constitutional history. This political crisis raises key questions about constitutional change and the robustness of Australia's current democracy.  What are the lessons? And could it happen again? Presented at the National Archives of Australia Speakers Anne Twom...

In the 1930s, New Zealand-born, Cambridge educated Arthur Dale Trendall carved a niche for himself as the world's foremost expert in the study of ancient South Italian vase painting. How then, did he end up leading a crack team of code-breakers working in Melbourne to decipher Japanese messages for the Allies during the Second World War? This lecture was recorded at Melbourne's Shrine of Remembran...