East Prussia: on Europe’s edge

Max Egremont, Acclaimed novelist and biographer

Tuesday 11 October

Max Egremont

No country embodied the turbulence of twentieth century Europe more than East Prussia, once Germany's most eastern redoubt and now divided between Poland and Russia. A land of apparent contradictions, it produced astonishing intellectual achievement, raw militarism and anxiety, cruelty and suffering, tolerance and extremism, domineering red brick castles left by the Teutonic knights and neat villages and productive farming and a symbolic identity as a beleaguered bastion of western European civilisation.

Max Egremont's most recent book is Forgotten Land - Journeys among the Ghosts of East Prussia. His lecture will tell of a frequently troubled and now mythical place.

Podcast

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The stories of English – development of the language from Anglo-Saxon times to the present

Professor David Crystal OBE, President of the UK National Literacy Association and Honorary Professor of Linguistics at the University of Wales.

Tuesday 10 May

Professor David Crystal OBE

David Crystal is currently patron of the International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language (IATEFL) and the Association for Language Learning (ALL), President of the UK National Literacy Association, and an Honorary Vice-President of the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists, the Institute of Linguists, and the Society for Editors and Proofreaders, and Honorary Professor of Linguistics at the University of Wales, Bangor.

The lecture is in conjunction with the English Speaking Union and will be focusing on the way accents and dialects have evolved in parallel with the standard language - and continue to evolve worldwide

Podcast

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London 2012 and the opportunity for British sport

Hugh Robertson, Minister for Sport and Olympics

Friday 11 March 2011

Hugh Robertson

Hugh Robertson MP, was promoted to the Conservative front bench in November 2002 as a Conservative Whip before becoming Shadow Sports Spokesman in September 2004. He became Shadow Minister for Sport in February 2005 and was re-elected to Parliament. He was reappointed Shadow Sports Minister. Following the successful bid for the London Olympics, Hugh was also appointed Shadow Olympics Minister. Hugh was re-elected to Parliament again in 2010 and was appointed Sports and Olympics Minister for the new Coalition Government.

Podcast

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Dreamland Margate

Jonathan Bryant, Project Director, Dreamland Trust

Thursday 03 March 2011

Jonathan Bryant

The Dreamland Margate project is being led by Jonathan Bryant, who has a wealth of experience in the heritage and leisure sectors and business leadership.

Jonathan will be giving an insight into the project to restore Dreamland in Margate to one of the country’s leading amusement parks. He will describe the history behind the site and the work which remains to be done before it can re-open its doors.

Podcast

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Material Girls: the nineteenth century sensation novel and the ethics of the marketplace

Professor Lyn Pykett, Pro-Vice Chancellor of the University of Aberystwyth

Tuesday 1 March 2011

Professor Lyn Pykett

This lecture will look at the role of women writers in the boom in sensation fiction in the nineteenth century and the ways in which novelists like Mary Elizabeth Braddon and Ellen Wood both participated in a burgeoning literary marketplace and in debates about the commodification of literature. The talk will also look at some of the ways in which the women’s sensation novel explored the ethics of materialism and consumption.

Podcast

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How to make a living from music

David Stopps, Managing Director of FML International Artist Management and Director 3DiCD Media Ltd

Thursday 17 February 2011

David Stopps

David will give a short history of the music business and how copyright has developed for songwriters and performers. He will discuss the use of music in film, TV productions, advertising and video games and why it is so important. He will also discuss the transition from physical sound carriers to digital online delivery and what the solutions are.

Podcast

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The linked conundrum of nuclear weapons and nuclear power

Professor John MacGregor CVO, Formerly British Ambassador in Warsaw and Vienna and UK Representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency

Thursday 10 February 2011

Professor John MacGregor CVO

As a British diplomat, John Macgregor served as Political Secretary in New Delhi, twice in the European Departments in London, as the Foreign Secretary’s speechwriter, as No 2 in Prague during the Velvet Revolution and as Head of Chancery in Paris. He was Director-General, for Trade and Investment in Germany, British Ambassador to Poland, Director for Wider Europe in London and finally Ambassador to Austria, as well as UK Governor of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

He was appointed Dean of the University of Kent at Brussels in 2007, and is currently Visiting Professor of International Relations at the Instituto Tecnologico Autonomo de Mexico in Mexico City, where his wife, Judith, is British Ambassador

John will look, in layman’s terms, at how modern nuclear reactors work, the prospects for a new generation of nuclear power stations, in Britain and worldwide, and how, if they are built, to make them as safe and secure as possible. Where are the catches in this ‘clean’ power generation, and how can the potential link of parts of the nuclear fuel cycle to the production of nuclear weapons be internationally policed and controlled. Why has the spread of nuclear power generation not led to the wider spread of nuclear weapons predicted in the 1960s? To a remarkable degree, so called ‘non proliferation’ has worked to date, but will the Non Proliferation Treaty be fit for purpose in the 21st Century, and what are the key indicators to look for to judge its success or failure?

Podcast

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Nick Burton Memorial Lecture: Culturally English filmmaking in the 2000s

Andrew Higson, Greg Dyke Professor of Film and TV, University of York

Thursday 08 February 2011

Andrew Higson

Running through much of Professor Andrew Higson’s work is a concern for questions of national cinema; his article ‘The concept of national cinema’, first published in Screen in 1989, has proved very influential and has been translated and/or reprinted several times.

He has published various papers since 1989, which revise his arguments about national and transnational cinema as well as papers on the British heritage film, on the British new wave, on silent cinema, on Channel 4 television and on film acting.

He is currently working on three separate projects. He is editing the Routledge Encyclopedia of Film History, with Kristian Moen, Nathalie Morris and Jonathan Stubbs. He is working on a history of Anglia Television, the ITV company for the East of England. He is completing a book on British cinema in the 1990s and 2000s, provisionally entitled Film England, 1990-2008: (Trans)National Cinema, English Literature and Narratives of the Past and Present some of which forms the basis for the Nick Burton Memorial Lecture 2011.

Podcast

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An insight into the visual effects industry

Dayne Cowan, Chair of the UK Visual Effects Society and Creative Director Molinare VFX

Wednesday 26 January 2011

Dayne Cowan

The visual effects industry in the UK is one of the most highly regarded in the world, regularly producing work on the biggest Hollywood blockbusters.

This talk will give you an insight into the various disciplines that make up this field and how they fit together, plus an overview of the major companies that make up the European and International market.

The topics will be covered in a way that is easy to grasp, whether you are looking for a job in this area or would just like to know more about this rapidly growing industry."

Podcast

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Fish and Sandwich: art and cultural politics

Andrea Rose, Director of Visual Arts at the British Council

Tuesday 19 October 2010

Andrea Rose

This lecture looks at why decisions are taken about sending particular works of art abroad, and what they say about us, and about those who receive them. Examples include: David Hockney, sent to Mexico the year after homosexuality was decriminalised in Britain; works by Mona Hatoum, sent to Iran during the Islamic Revolution; and works by Antony Gormley, which we chose not to send to Bosnia despite the artist’s entreaties during the Balkan wars. Other parts of the world, as varied as Saudi Arabia, the US, and Northern Ireland, are also considered in this lecture, and how our perspectives shift when seen from very different angles.

Podcast

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The next stages of welfare reform

Frank Field, MP for Birkenhead and Chair of the Independent Review on Poverty and Life Chances

Thursday 14 October 2010

Frank Field

Frank Field’s entire career has been concerned with improving the lives of those worst off in society, initially as Director of the Child Poverty Action Group, and for the last thirty years as MP for Birkenhead. The new Coalition Government has now asked him to lead an independent review on poverty and life chances.

The Review will look at how we measure poverty in Britain today - whether low income alone constitutes poverty, and if not what are the other aspects of poverty, and how they are measured - what the key determinants of good life chances are - taking account of the importance of a child's development before attending school and how good influences at this stage of a child's life can best be embedded in society.

Podcast

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Why are systematic reviews of research on the effects of policies and practices so important?

Sir Iain Chalmers, Coordinator, James Lind Initiative and Editor, James Lind Library

Tuesday 28 September 2010

Sir Iain Chalmers

Acting with the best of intentions, professionals sometimes do more harm than good when they intervene in the lives of other people. Decisions to use or withhold interventions in health care, social care and education should take account of findings in systematic reviews of relevant and reliable research evidence. Continued failure to do this will result in continued avoidable suffering and death, and waste of resources.

Podcast

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That’s what I go to school for – new perspectives on learning and behaviour

Simon Ellis and Janet Tod, Centre for Enabling Learning, CCCU

Wednesday 22 September 2010

Simon Ellis and Janet Tod

‘What do pupils come to school for?’ is a question that is likely to draw different responses from policy makers, employers, parents and the pupils themselves.

Podcast

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Annual Becket lecture: The second martyrdom of Thomas Becket

Professor Alec Ryrie, Department of Theology and Religion, Durham University

Wednesday 10 March 2010

Professor Alec Ryrie

The suppression of Thomas Becket's cult in 1538 was more than a matter of demolishing his shrine. This lecture will explore how it was entangled with King Henry VIII's bitter battle with another defiant English prince of the Church, and how it made itself felt in every monastery and parish church in the land.

Podcast

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Not a load of old rubbish

Marion Green, Canterbury Archaeological Trust

Thursday 4 March 2010

Marion Green

Canterbury Archaeological Trust

Podcast

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Early Canterbury and the Augustinian mission

Dr Andrew Richardson, Canterbury Archaeological Trust

Tuesday 23 February 2010

Dr Andrew Richardson

Canterbury Archaeological Trust

Podcast

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The Annual Martin Luther King Lecture: Life after death - The second coming of Rev Dr Martin Luther King, 1968-present

Professor Kirk will explore the memory and legacy of Dr Martin Luther King in modern American society.

Wednesday 10 February 2010

Professor John Kirk

Professor of United States History, Royal Holloway, University of London

Podcast

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Darwin, Darwinism and butterflies

The Department of Geographical and Life Sciences Annual Christmas Lecture

Tuesday 8 December 2009

Professor Dick Vane-Wright

Formerly Keeper of the Entomology Department, the Natural History Museum, and Honorary Professor of Taxonomy, DICE, University of Kent

Podcast

Download  |  MP3 67Mb

Faith in media?

Thursday 22 October 2009

Reverend Richard Coles

Journalist, musician and curate, St Paul’s Knightsbridge, London

Podcast

Download  |  MP3 38Mb