Episode description

Rummage & waste: Laurie Taylor talks to Emily Cockayne, Senior Lecturer in Early Modern History at the University of East Anglia, about the overlooked story of our throwaway past, from ladies of the First World War who turned dog hair into yarn to Girl Guides inspired to collect bottle tops by the litter collecting Wombles of Wimbledon. What lessons can be drawn from the past to address urgent questions of our waste today? Patrick O'Hare, Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Social Anthropology at the University of St Andrews, joins the conversation and considers our shifting definitions of waste, from domestic homes in the Global North to the rubbish dumps of Uruguay.

Producer: Jayne Egerton