This year's Reith lecturer is the Palestinian American academic, political activist, and literary critic Edward Said. He joined the faculty of Columbia University in 1963 where he is now Professor of English and Comparative Literature. Regarded as one of the founders of post-colonial theory, his 1978 book Orientalism is one of the most influential scholarly books of the 20th century. In his second lecture, Edward Said explores the role of intellectuals from different cultures and backgrounds, an...
Jun 30, 1993•30 min
This year's Reith lecturer is the Palestinian American academic, political activist, and literary critic Edward Said. He joined the faculty of Columbia University in 1963 where he is now Professor of English and Comparative Literature. Regarded as one of the founders of post-colonial theory, his 1978 book Orientalism is one of the most influential scholarly books of the 20th century. In his first of six Reith Lectures, Edward Said examines how intellectuals have been defined by academics, sociol...
Jun 23, 1993•29 min
Dr Steve Jones, Reader in Genetics at University College, London delivers his final Reith lecture, in a series about the new biological insight into humanity. In this lecture, Dr Jones explores the long history of genetic engineering including Frances Galton's founding of the 'science' of eugenics and its consequences. There has long been a history of attempted genetic engineering by parents trying to dictate the sex of their offspring by various, almost always futile, and often painful, methods...
Dec 18, 1991•30 min
Dr Steve Jones, Reader in Genetics at University College, London delivers his penultimate Reith lecture, in a series about the new biological insight into humanity. In this lecture, Steve Jones examines how science has been used to discriminate, arguing that the history of race illustrates more than anything else the way science can be used to support prejudice. He examines the limitations of biology in understanding human affairs and by using the example of the genetic differences between snail...
Dec 11, 1991•30 min
Dr Steve Jones, Reader in Genetics at University College, London gives a series of lectures on the new biological insight into humanity. In his fourth lecture, Dr Jones examines the correlation between genetic change and economic development. While society tends not to be driven by its genes, social and economic changes produce many of the genetic patterns seen in the world today. He also draws parallels between the evolution of languages and the evolution of genes. Languages evolve, he argues, ...
Dec 04, 1991•30 min
Dr Steve Jones, Reader in Genetics at University College, London gives a series of lectures on the new biological insight into humanity. In his third lecture, Dr Jones explores the power and consequences of natural selection. Differences in animals' physical characteristics vary according to longitude. Creationists see this as evidence of God's subtle design whereas Darwinists point to natural selection. Dr Jones explains how selection works and argues that there is less chance of it in modern W...
Nov 27, 1991•30 min
Dr Steve Jones, Reader in Genetics at University College, London gives a series of lectures on the new biological insight into humanity. In his second lecture, Dr Jones explores the importance of mutation in the development of individuals and species. Recent advances in molecular biology have revolutionised the study of mutations in human DNA. Dr Jones explains how mutation leads to diversity and change, some good, some bad, and argues that humanity is not a decayed remnant of a noble ancestor, ...
Nov 20, 1991•29 min
Dr Steve Jones, Reader in Genetics at University College, London gives the first of six Reith Lectures on the new biological insight into humanity. He explains how the study of genetics has been transformed in recent decades and argues that while fossil records and ancient myths preserve some limited truths about humanity's origins; our genes hold a far more complete picture. Like anatomy, sociology or psychoanalysis, he says, genetics can give us a significant glimpse into aspects of our histor...
Nov 13, 1991•30 min
In his sixth and final Reith Lecture, Dr. Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, explains why faith will survive. Dr. Jonathan Sacks explores in his lecture entitled 'A Community of Communities' the bond of religion. He explains that although the numbers of religious believers seems to be dwindling, religion will never totally fade away. He believes that the values it provides communities are still needed by the individual and the nation....
Dec 19, 1990•29 min
Dr. Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth evaluates the effects of combining religious revival with nationalism in his fifth Reith Lecture. Reviewing the topic of religious fanaticism in his lecture entitled 'Fundamentalism', he argues that when faith and national identity are united they create an explosive mix. Yet, paradoxically, he believes secularism does not provide a solution either.
Dec 12, 1990•29 min
Dr. Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth explores the language of religion in his fourth Reith Lecture on 'The Persistence of Faith'. In this lecture Dr. Jonathan Sacks puts forward the idea of a society which speaks both a public language of citizenship as well as a local language of community in this lecture entitled 'Paradoxes of Pluralism'. Expanding on this concept of pluralism, he asks whether it has diluted religion or created cultural space f...
Dec 05, 1990•29 min
Dr. Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth explores the importance of the family relationship in his third Reith Lecture on 'The Persistence of Faith'. In this lecture entitled 'The Family', Dr. Jonathan Sacks investigates the persistence of the religious institution of marriage in the modern secular age. He explores the values of the nuclear family as a framework for how we understand society and wonders how the new age of increased divorce, co-habita...
Nov 28, 1990•28 min
Dr Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, explores religious ethics in his second Reith Lecture in the series 'The Persistence of Faith'. He investigates whether today's moral dramas centre more on the free-self than the saint or the hero. In this lecture entitled 'The Demoralisation of Discourse', Dr Jonathan Sacks focuses on how modern morals are founded in faith. It is his belief that without the objective standards of religion we would have no coh...
Nov 21, 1990•30 min
Dr Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, lectures in his first Reith Lecture on the 'The Persistence of Faith'. Explaining how he believes that the moral framework provided by religion is still the best alternative to the personalised, free-market ethics which prevail today. In this lecture entitled 'The Environment of Faith', Dr Jonathan Sacks considers the state of Britain's religions. He asks; have modern cultures forgotten their faith forever?...
Nov 14, 1990•29 min
French poet Jacques Darras delivers his final Reith Lecture from his series entitled 'Beyond the Tunnel of History'. In his fifth and final Reith Lecture entitled 'Towards the Light', Jacques Darras finds a clue to our shared European future in an early cross-Channel cultural interaction: the 'School of Light'. The school was established by Irish monks in the medieval city of Laon and Jacque Darras explains that learning from the past will allow us to create a unified Europe.
Dec 20, 1989•30 min
French poet Jacques Darras delivers the fourth of his Reith Lectures entitled 'Beyond the Tunnel of History'. He explores the question: 'Have the enormities of the Second World War, like the Holocaust and the dropping the atomic bomb, caused us to ignore the lessons of the First?' In his fourth lecture entitled 'Remembering the Somme', Jacques Darras explores the memories of the First World War. He explains the importance of all parts of history and the need for them to be remembered....
Dec 13, 1989•28 min
French poet Jacques Darras delivers the third of his Reith Lectures entitled 'Beyond the Tunnel of History'. He argues that with the opening of the Channel tunnel a new age of mobility is within everyone's grasp. Many can now follow in the footsteps of the wealthy and literary by going on their very own 'Grand Tour' of Europe. This freedom, Darras argues, will bring cultures closer together and unify Europe. In his third lecture entitled 'Highways of Freedom', Jacques Darras explores the new Eur...
Dec 06, 1989•28 min
French poet Jacques Darras delivers the second of his Reith Lectures entitled 'Beyond the Tunnel of History'. He explores the concept of multicultural cities and draws from examples. He highlights the city of Bruges during the Burgundian era as a beacon of advancement in European unification. In his second lecture entitled 'The Golden Fleece', Jacque Darras argues that the reason why it was such a prosperous city is because it was multicultural. Its multilingual artists, merchants and bankers co...
Nov 29, 1989•27 min
French poet Jacques Darras delivers the first of his Reith Lectures entitled 'Beyond the Tunnel of History'. Taking inspiration from the formation of the Channel Tunnel, Durras looks back through the shared history of France and Britain and suggests that their respective national pasts will need to be reinterpreted in the light of a shared future. In his first lecture entitled 'The Time Traveller', Jacque Darras asks the question, now that their destinies are increasingly converging within a wid...
Nov 22, 1989•29 min
Geoffrey Hosking, Professor of Russian History at University College London, debates the role of pluralist politics in the sixth of his Reith Lectures entitled 'The Rediscovery of Politics'. In this lecture entitled 'The Paradox of Gorbachev's Reforms', Professor Hosking explores the role that Mikhail Gorbachev has played as the General Secretary of the Communist Party for the Soviet Union and what lasting effect he will have on the State. He considers how the state will develop and asks can a t...
Dec 13, 1988•30 min
Geoffrey Hosking, Professor of Russian History at University College London, explores Soviet religion in the fifth of his Reith Lectures entitled 'The Rediscovery of Politics'. In this lecture entitled 'Religion and the Atheist State', Professor Hosking analyses what part religion has to play in reuniting the Soviet peoples and explores the recent easing of tensions between the Soviet state and the Church. Can faith act as a potential antidote to the problem of demoralisation?
Dec 06, 1988•29 min
Geoffrey Hosking, Professor of Russian History at University College London, explores national aspirations in the fourth of his Reith Lectures entitled 'The Rediscovery of Politics'. In this lecture entitled 'The Flawed Melting Pot', Professor Hosking discusses the national desires and ambitions of the various Soviet peoples. He explores how nationalism will affect the Soviet Union.
Nov 29, 1988•29 min
Geoffrey Hosking, Professor of Russian History at University College London, explores changes in Soviet behaviour his third Reith lecture from his series entitled 'The Rediscovery of Politics'. In this lecture entitled 'A Civil Society in Embryo', Professor Hosking examines a trend which could mark the beginning of the end of totalitarianism in the Soviet Union. He considers the civil rights movements and environmentally conscious industrialisation as turning points in society. He believes the S...
Nov 22, 1988•29 min
Geoffrey Hosking, Professor of Russian History at University College London, explores the issues of a collective memory in his second Reith lecture from his series entitled 'The Rediscovery of Politics'. In this lecture entitled 'The Return Of The Repressed', Professor Hosking describes how Soviet society is recovering from a state of communal amnesia. Only with a common history can a society move forward cohesively, but has Soviet society succumbed to a totalitarian rewriting of the past?...
Nov 15, 1988•29 min
Geoffrey Hosking, Professor of Russian History at University College London, discusses the changes in Soviet society in his first Reith lecture from the series entitled 'The Rediscovery of Politics'. In this lecture entitled 'A Great Power in Crisis', Professor Hosking discusses the relationship between the Soviet economy and the 'glasnost'. This transparency of government institutions, introduced by Mikhail Gorbachev to reduce corruption, has had a fractious effect on society. He asks is this g...
Nov 08, 1988•29 min
English composer Alexander Goehr gives his sixth Reith Lecture from the series entitled 'The Survival of the Symphony'. In this lecture entitled 'Stand Up and Be Misunderstood', he concludes his series by stressing why musicians and the public alike should fight to renew the symphony. Extolling it as the greatest and yet most often rejected musical institution. Professor Goehr warns that the 'neglect of established cultural institutions can only further contribute to the neglect of city centres'...
Dec 27, 1987•28 min
English composer Alexander Goehr gives his fifth Reith Lecture from the series entitled 'The Survival of the Symphony'. In this lecture entitled 'Let the People Sing', Professor Goehr looks at modern composers who aim to break down the barriers between the audience, the performer and the composer. This fracture allows for composers to create a 'community' of music, but can composers adequately fulfil a social ideal and produce enduring works of art?
Dec 16, 1987•27 min
Once an iconoclastic force, the avant-garde is now comfortably absorbed into modem society. These are the sentiments of English composer Professor Alexander Goehr in his fourth Reith Lecture entitled 'A Licence for Licence'. Speaking in his series 'The Survival of the Symphony', Professor Alexander Goehr warns of the creative death such acceptance can bring. Avant-garde is supposed to be nonconformist, modern and experimental but how can it be these things when the modern listeners find it educa...
Dec 09, 1987•29 min
Professor of Music at the University of Cambridge and English composer Alexander Goehr gives his third Reith Lecture from his series 'The Survival of the Symphony'. He diagnoses the stifling and possibly fatal pressures of contemporary music-making. In this lecture entitled 'Past and Present', Alexander Goehr explains that despite the near ubiquity of music, there is a drastic shortage of major new works available in the concert halls. He explores how tradition and innovation, previously necessa...
Dec 02, 1987•29 min
Professor of Music at the University of Cambridge and English composer Alexander Goehr gives his second Reith Lecture from the series 'The Survival of the Symphony'. He examines the effect of recorded sound on our perception of music. In this lecture entitled 'An Orchid in the Land of Technology', Professor Alexander Goehr asks whether a recording devalues the original performance. He explores how recorded performances are changing the way people listen to music.
Nov 25, 1987•28 min
