Life and Language

Gavin Brookes provides insights into the language that people use when they talk about dementia. Language plays an important part in making sense of a health condition. In this episode we cover a wide range of topics - from stigma tohumour. Gavin has some very concrete messages for all of us - whether you have lived experience of dementia, work in social care, or do not know that much about the co...

In this episode, I chat to Lauren Tilton about digital humanities and the ways we can teach AI to view the world. Distant viewing is a theory and method for how computer vision works. It enables a critical view of the social, political, and cultural values and beliefs that are built into computer visionsystems. You will also learn about digital humanities morewidely. And if you want to get the Dis...

Don’t we all love it when we visit places that we know from stories in books and films? In the first episode of Season 5, my guest is the wonderful Lee Jackson. We are talking about his book ‘Dickensland’ and literary tourism. Lee Jackson takes us to places that Dickens’s writing has brought into the public imagination. Some of them are more real than others, but all of them are exciting!

Today’s world is in much need of change. But what can we do as individuals and as a society? And how can we bring a humanities perspectives to the change that the world needs? Who better to talk to than Lyndsey Stonebridge, author of the book “We are free to change the world” . Lyndsey refers to her book a "critical creative biography of Hannah Arendt". It is very topical in the way it h...

Have you given Victorian gothic fiction a try? The Fascination by Essie Fox will certainly be a good one to get you started. It is a novel that takes you to the Victorian country fairgrounds, the glamour of the Drury Lane pantomimes, and a museum in London’s Oxford Street filled with anatomical wonders. It is a story about belonging and finding your family. In this episode, I talk to Essie about h...

Charles Dickens has captured the public imagination like no other. What always fascinates me about him and his work is how fiction and reality intersect. In this episode, I talk to Pete Orford to get his take on the relationship between lived experience and literary examples in the world of Charles Dickens. Pete has recently published the book The Life of the Author: Charles Dickens , which gives...

What makes the First Folio so important and unique? 2023 marks the 400th anniversary of the first published collection of Shakespeare’s plays. In this episode, I talk to Chris Laoutaris, author of Shakespeare’s Book: The Intertwined Lives Behind the First Folio . Chris gives us fascinating insights into the human story of this book that was produced seven years after Shakespeare’s death. The story...

How do you become a successful children’s author? I invited the brilliant Hannah Gold so I could learn her secret. What I really liked was Hannah’s insights into the value of a holistic career including a range of professions as well as life experience before becoming an award-winning author of fiction for children. In Hannah’s books, friendships between children and animals play an important role...

Can the law be the same if the language is different? I invited Karen McAuliffe, an expert in multilingual law, to shed some light on this question. Different languages represent reality in different ways. This has an impact on the legal system, too. So how can law be created that will have the same effect across multiple jurisdictions? Especially in the context of the European Court of Justice th...

Are you be able to spot fake news? Can you even define what fake news is? According to Jack Grieve, ‘fake news’ is deceptive, it is intentionally trying to misinform its audience. Fake news is not the same as news that is untrue or false. But what exactly makes news fake? Are there any linguistic clues? Anything that gives away the intention to deceive? Can linguistic methods help us to find out?...

What is the link between Oscar Wilde, Judy Garland and Arnold Schwarzenegger? Find out in this episode, where I talk to Paul Baker about his new book Camp! The Story of the Attitude that Conquered the World . Paul looks at the history of camp - a phenomenon that went from marginal to mainstream. He explains why laughter is so important in today’s world and how popular culture can help to ground us...

Water is fundamental to life. Water affects us all. But do we talk about water enough to raise awareness of its value? What do we do to accelerate change to solve the water crisis? Are we aware of the various connections that make the water crisis a wicked problem? I am speaking to David Hannah, Professor of Hydrology  and UNESCO Chair in Water Sciences at the University of Birmingham. David expla...

What can historical fiction do for today’s society? Paterson Joseph’s first novel tells the story of Charles Ignatius Sancho, the first known Black person to have voted in a British election. In this episode, we talk about Black presence in history, the challenges of writing historical fiction, and seeing the world through narratives (on the page, on the stage or in films). Paterson tells us about...

What makes Dickens enduringly popular and relevant to modern life? Who’d be better to talk to about this question than Sean Grass, the President of the Dickens Society. In this episode, we look at Charles Dickens in the context of commodity culture. Sean explains how autobiographical writing developed into a commercial genre. We look at the implications of exposing lives to public view and the soc...

What is the connection between software development and Tolkien? In this episode, I talk to James Tauber. He is the founder and CEO of Eldarion , a company that develops web applications for a wide range of clients with a special focus on educational contexts. James leads the Digital Tolkien project and also teaches at Signum University. We talk about fantasy fiction, and how Tolkien creates world...

What are the ingredients of science fiction? To find out, I talk to Peter Stockwell, the author of “The Poetics of Science Fiction”. Starting with an example, Peter reads from “The Martian Chronicles” by Ray Bradbury and explains why this is a great text to get you into science fiction. We talk about the history of the genre, its relationship with pulp fiction, Frankenstein as early sci-fi and tim...

Why is human rights discourse so difficult? In this episode, I talk to Fiona de Londras about what it means to translate human rights into practical instruments and how language frames legal discourses. Fiona explains the difference between a human rights perspective and civil liberties talk that has been so frequent in the pandemic discourse. She shares her insights into why human rights don’t ge...

What if there is no language to describe what the body experiences? In this episode, I talk to Deryn Rees-Jones about poetry and illness. Deryn shares what it feels like being a poet and tackling the complexity of life. With her personal experience of Long Covid, she talks about the challenge of how to use language to describe the precarious state of the body and finding ways to connect with the e...

Starting from Ancestors, the latest book by Alice Roberts, we chat about storytelling and the excitement of embarking on science projects. We hear about some of the protagonists in Ancestors, including stories around gender and the role of women in stories and in science. Using her experience as an anatomist, Alice tells stories of human and bodily experience. She reminds us: “The body doesn’t mak...

Mary Ann Sieghart’s book “The Authority Gap” raises awareness of unseen bias and suggests ways to tackle systemic sexism. In this episode, we talk about how Mary Ann’s experience as a journalist enabled her to write this book, she shares plenty of examples from interviews and research studies. We talk about women finding their strengths, gender and the climate crisis, the profound effect of fictio...

In this episode, I want to find out about ‘water’ in stories – and especially in stories for children and young adults. Who better to chat to about this topic than the wonderful Sita Brahmachari. Sita is an award-winning author of children's books, young adult novels, and short stories. As you will find out, water plays a special part in Sita’s stories. She tells us about and reads from her books,...

Steffen is the Founder and CEO of the California-based TekTailor – a green business! Learn what it means to run a benefit corporation, make real change, and turn things like decommissioned fire hose into products with a truly heroic past. Steffen is a sustainability advocate. It is absolutely amazing to hear about his experience working in the textile manufacturing sector and supporting the maker...

Ryan explains how computers can help us overcome the human constraints on reading time. The distance of distant reading brings out the scale of history. We chat about the computational study of culture and literary history, and what computers have got to do with creativity. Ryan gives plenty of exciting examples from his research. He talks about telling the history of words like ‘culture’, capturi...

Deborah Cameron explains how feminism and linguistics work together and we learn about her experience as a stand-up comedian, too. We chat about the importance of stories and narratives as a powerful way of human thinking. Deborah reminds us to critically look at how repeated narratives get normalised, as in the influence of folklore on crime reporting.  We talk about equality, training targe...

Stephen explains the basic structure of reality in simple terms. We chat about how knowledge is created collectively and how talking and debate are part of the process. Words and actions are closely related, which becomes very clear when Stephen likens certain forms of debate to a blood sport! He shares fascinating examples of the relevance of philosophy to many areas of life, from public health t...