Fellows of the British Academy in conversation on matters relating to their work and interests.

From Our Fellows Podcast

The latest from live events at the British Academy.

Events Podcast

Revolutions

Identities & Belonging

Great Thinkers

The Dasgupta Review is an independent, global review on the economics of biodiversity led by world-renowned economist Partha Dasgupta. Commissioned by the UK Treasury in 2019, the Review is expected to help set the agenda for the UK Government’s 25-year environment plan and was prompted by a growing body of evidence that in recent decades humanity has been degrading our most precious asset, nature, at rates far greater than ever before. At the heart of the problem, according to the Review, lies deep-rooted, widespread institutional failure.

Join the lead author Partha Dasgupta in-conversation with Hetan Shah as he discusses how our economies are embedded within nature, why we need to change how we think, act and measure success, and what role the discipline of economics can play in sustaining biodiversity.

Sign up to watch the event live and have the opportunity to submit your question during the audience Q&A.

The Economics of Biodiversity: The Dasgupta Review was published in February 2021.

Speaker: Professor Sir Partha Dasgupta FBA, Frank Ramsey Professor Emeritus of Economics, University of Cambridge

Chair: Hetan Shah, Chief Executive, The British Academy

The Dasgupta Review

David Olusoga, winner of the 2021 British Academy President’s Medal, joins Professor Julia Black in conversation to discuss his life and career as one of the UK's foremost historians.

Professor David Olusoga OBE is a British-Nigerian historian, writer, broadcaster and filmmaker, best known as the author of Black and British: A Forgotten History and presenter of acclaimed documentaries, such as the BAFTA-winning Britain's Forgotten Slave Owners, Black and British: A Forgotten History and the current A House Through Time. He is Professor of Public History at the University of Manchester and received an OBE in the 2019 New Year Honours list for services to history and to community integration.

He receives the President’s Medal – the British Academy’s highest honour – in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the humanities and social sciences through his championing of inclusive approaches to British and international history and his impact on how we understand our collective histories.

The medal is awarded by the President of the British Academy, Professor Julia Black who is Strategic Director of Innovation and Professor of Law at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Speaker: Professor David Olusoga OBE, historian, writer and broadcaster

Chair: Professor Julia Black PBA, President, the British Academy

This event took place at the British Academy(10–11 Carlton House Terrace, London SW1Y 5AH) on 12 May 2022. 

Image: historian and broadcaster Professor David Olusoga

The British Academy President’s Medal winner’s event 2022: David Olusoga

Meet the most influential figures within and beyond academia, shaping the fields of social sciences, humanities and the arts.

Historian Roy Foster talks to Richard English about his life, career and the making of modern Ireland.

Born and educated in Waterford, Roy Foster read history at Trinity College Dublin and has held posts at Birkbeck, Oxford and Princeton. One of the foremost historians of modern Ireland, in 1991 he became Carroll Professor of Irish History at the University of Oxford, the first endowed chair of Irish history in Britain, a post he held until 2017. The chair is now named after him.

His seminal work Modern Ireland 1600-1972 is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the history of Ireland and Irish identity. His book Vivid Faces: the revolutionary generation in Ireland 1890-1923 charts the colourful lives of Ireland's revolutionary generation, exploring how bohemian idealism underpinned the independence movement in the lead-up to the Easter Rising in 1916 and Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921.

In addition to his work as an historian, Foster has also written biographies of WB Yeats and Seamus Heaney, the latter published in 2020 to great acclaim.

Leaders In SHAPE: Roy Foster

Author, broadcaster and editor-at-large for The Guardian Gary Younge discusses how identity politics has effectively come to mean anything you want it to, so long as you don’t like it. As such, since it is a term so wilfully misunderstood, he argues it is no longer worth claiming or even necessarily critiquing. But the original idea that underpins it still holds true. None of us come to politics from a vacuum – we arrive with affiliations that mould our worldview. Who and what we are does not define what we think, but it certainly helps shape it.

Speaker: 
Gary Younge, Author, broadcaster and editor-at-large for The Guardian

Chair:
Professor Ann Phoenix FBA, Professor of Psychosocial Studies, Institute of Education, UCL

British Acadamy

Identity politics: a term whose time has gone?

Françoise Vergès discusses the history of counter revolution against women’s liberation from the 1970s to the 2000s and the forms it concretely took (femonationalism, femi-imperialism in the name of women’s rights) and current forms of decolonial feminism.

Speaker:
Dr Françoise Vergès, Chair of Global South, Collège d'études Mondiales, Paris

Chair: 
Professor Tamar Garb FBA, Durning-Lawrence Chair of History of Art, UCL

Global Perspectives: decolonial feminism

What does ‘TubeCrush’ reveal about modern desire?

Thinkers for our Time: Merce Cunningham

The publication of his 12-volume 'A Study of History' made Arnold Toynbee one of the most celebrated scholars of the 20th century – he was even featured on the cover of Time magazine in 1947. In this episode, his granddaughter Polly Toynbee joins historian Rana Mitter FBA for an exploration of the man, the books and their enduring legacy.

Great Thinkers: Rana Mitter FBA on Arnold J. Toynbee FBA

M.R. James, the writer behind some of Edwardian Britain’s most terrifying ghost stories, also happened to be a respected medievalist and a Fellow of the British Academy. In this episode, psychologist Uta Frith delves into the origins of James’s unsettling stories and what they reveal about our love of a good scare.

Great Thinkers: Uta Frith FBA on M.R. James FBA

Elizabeth Anscombe FBA was one of the most important moral philosophers of the 20th century. In this episode, Jane Heal FBA and Dr Rachael Wiseman discuss highlights of her exceptional life, including working with Wittgenstein, pioneering ‘action theory’, and taking a stand against a US President.

BA Podcast

Great Thinkers: Jane Heal FBA on Elizabeth Anscombe FBA

‘Captain Professor’ Michael Howard FBA is a British Army veteran who was awarded the Military Cross for his service in WWII before he turned to academia, becoming one of the country’s most celebrated military historians. In this episode, Hew Strachan FBA traces Howard’s unusual journey from active participant in conflict to the leading expert on its study.

Great Thinkers: Hew Strachan FBA on Michael Howard FBA

What would A.V. Dicey FBA, the leading advocate of the ‘rule of law’ who died in 1922, think about Britain’s current constitutional tangles? In this episode, Vernon Bogdanor FBA and Conor Gearty FBA try to answer that question, with a look back at the jurist’s life and work.

Great Thinkers: Vernon Bogdanor FBA on A.V. Dicey FBA

Professor Martin Kemp FBA reflects on Leonardo's extraordinary life and legacy, the commercial implications of his worldwide fame, and the endless conspiracy theories he inspires.

Thinkers for our Time: Martin Kemp FBA on Leonardo da Vinci

'Purity and Danger', a book exploring the concepts of pollution and taboo in societies around the world, made its author Mary Douglas one of Britain’s most celebrated anthropologists. In this episode, Fellows of the British Academy Richard Fardon and Henrietta Moore discuss the book’s lasting impact and Douglas’s equally fascinating later work.

Great Thinkers: Richard Fardon FBA on Mary Douglas FBA

Governments across the world are using behavioural ‘nudges’ to help slow the spread of coronavirus: wash your hands, don’t touch your face, stay at home. Based on an idea popularised by Cass Sunstein and Richard Thaler, nudge theory encourages us to do the “right thing” by making the desired action easy, more obvious and more normal. But how far does nudging work in the context of a global pandemic, and what are its limits? If we are expected to nudge our way out of a crisis, what behavioural barriers – or sludge – need to be removed? In this event, eminent political scientist and Fellow of the British Academy Cass Sunstein joins Hetan Shah to discuss nudge and sludge in the age of COVID-19.

The British Academy's Shape the Future programme examines the societal, economic and cultural implications of the pandemic

Speaker: Professor Cass Sunstein FBA, Robert Walmsley University Professor, Harvard Law School; Co-author Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness; former Senior Advisor to President Obama

Chair: Hetan Shah, Chief Executive, The British Academy

In this talk Professor Cass Sunstein FBA’s comments could be taken to imply that the Behavioural Insights Team (BIT) was involved in the creation of the UK's 'Stay Alert' message. BIT have asked us to make clear that they were not involved in the creation or implementation of this message.

Confronting COVID-19: nudge and sludge

The course of human history has been shaped by war, disease and natural disaster. Whether the Black Death, world wars or COVID-19, these crises have sent shockwaves across the globe, with far-reaching social, political and economic consequences. In this event, distinguished historian Margaret MacMillan joins Hetan Shah to discuss major turning points in history, and how insights from the many and varied catastrophes of the past can help us to make sense of the present.

The British Academy’s Shape the Future programme examines the societal, economic and cultural implications of the pandemic

Speaker: Professor Margaret MacMillan Hon FBA, Historian; public intellectual; Emeritus Professor of International History, University of Oxford; Professor of History, University of Toronto

Chair: Hetan Shah, Chief Executive, The British Academy

Is COVID-19 a turning point in history? Learning from the past

Statistics are vital in helping us tell stories – we see them in the papers, on social media, and we hear them used in everyday conversation - and yet in this era of fake news we doubt them more than ever. In his timely new book 'How to Make the World Add Up', Tim Harford navigates a world of disinformation, bad research and misplaced motivation to help us make sense of the numbers that swirl around us. Join him in-conversation with Hetan Shah as he outlines his 10 rules – plus one golden rule – for thinking differently about numbers.

Speaker: Tim Harford, Economist, journalist and broadcaster; Author 'How to Make the World Add Up: Ten Rules for Thinking Differently About Numbers'.

Chair: Hetan Shah, Chief Executive, The British Academy

How To Make The World Add Up

The British Academy is the UK’s national academy for the humanities and social sciences. We mobilise these disciplines to understand the world and shape a brighter future. ​

From artificial intelligence to climate change, from building prosperity to improving well-being – today’s complex challenges can only be resolved by deepening our insight into people, cultures and societies.​

We invest in researchers and projects across the UK and overseas, ​engage the public with fresh thinking and debates, and bring together scholars, government, business and civil society to influence policy for ​the benefit of everyone. ​

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