general lecture

Inaugural Lecture - Professor Charles Stewart

We have had history and anthropology, historical anthropology and the history of anthropology, but as yet there has been no concerted anthropology OF history.  What is needed are ethnographic studies of how the past is known, understood and represented in world societies past and present. This does not amount solely to the appreciation of “others” delegitimized by Western academic historiography.

We also need a reverse anthropology where historicism itself along with other Western practices of relating to the past, such as battlefield reenactments, are opened to ethnographic study. This presentation will ask whether heightened recognition of alternative regimes of historical practice might alter the Western understanding of history.

After a BA in Classics, field research in Greece, and a PhD in Anthropology, Charles Stewart taught Modern Greek, Anthropology, and History at universities on both sides of the Atlantic. He came to UCL as a joint appointment in the Departments of History and Anthropology. His areas of research include the ethnography of Greece, cultural mixture (syncretism and creolization), and psychological anthropology. His recent book Dreaming and Historical Consciousness in Island Greece (2012) presents an anthropological study of historicizing practices on the island of Naxos.

For an Anthropology of History - Professor Charles Stewart (UCL Anthropology)

Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2014

Professor Brian Butterworth, UCL Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience

Do animals possess the capacity to use numerical information? Is this capacity confined to primates, or indeed to mammals? It is thought that humans inherit a numerical capacity upon which more sophisticated mathematics is built. If this is the case, then we may find signs of this capacity in human infants, but we may also find that some humans are born without this capacity.

You can also watch this lecture on the UCLLHL YouTube channel at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_LY4M8nBOY

Can fish count? UCL Lunch Hour Lecture (21 Jan 2014)

Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2014

Professor Dame Anne Johnson, UCL Infection and Population Health

The National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles (Natsal) surveys over 15,000 men and women aged 16-74 who are resident in Britain, and is the largest and most detailed study of sexual lifestyles undertaken anywhere in the world. This lecture discusses the latest findings from Natsal-3 in the context of the importance of sexual health and well-being.

You can also watch this lecture on the UCLLHL YouTube channel at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtnS3Ar_GVM


Studying sex comes of age: results from NATSAL-3 (23 Jan 2014)

Inaugural Lecture - Professor Susan Collins

From In Conversation (1997) which provided a live link between the street and the internet and Transporting Skies (2002) which relayed sky live, in real-time, between Penzance and Sheffield, to more recent pixel-by-pixel transmissions from remote locations including Fenlandia (2004), Seascape (2009) and London 2013; the lecture will present a number of works which each in different ways rely on an ‘open system’ or structure for their realisation. The lecture will also explore issues raised by the works including the role of belief in their construction and interpretation; the relationship between time, landscape and technology, and reflect on what it means materially to record a digital image and transport it across space and time.

Susan Collins is Professor of Fine Art and Director of the Slade School of Fine Art, UCL, where she founded the Slade Centre for Electronic Media in 1995. She works across public, gallery and online spaces often employing networking and time as primary materials. The work is exhibited widely nationally and internationally with key works including the BAFTA nominated Tate in Space for Tate Online, Fenlandia, and Seascape. Public commissions include Underglow, a network of illuminated drains for the Corporation of London.

Transporting Skies - Professor Susan Collins (Slade School of Fine Art)

The UK imports nearly 90% of its fruit and 50% of its vegetables. In light of this, a group of UCL students have gathered under the banner of ‘Bentham’s Farm’, an organic vegetable garden established in 2012. Situated in a disused tennis court behind the Max Rayne halls of residence in Camden Town, ‘Bentham’s Farm’ had more than 30 volunteers last year and secured £4,000 worth of funding from UCL Union. 

This year, as part of UCLU’s ‘Big Ideas Challenge’, they are developing a prototype vertical farm to challenge the Union’s cafés and canteens to grow their own vegetables and fruit onsite. We talked to Calum Bowden, Alex Hough and Becky Mumford about their ambitious plans.
 
Interview: Yohann Koshy
 
More information: 

www.facebook.com/benthamsfarm
http://uclu.org/articles/uclus-big-idea-challenge 

UCL is consistently ranked as one of the world's top universities. Across all disciplines our faculties are known for their research-intensive approaches, academic excellence and engagement with global challenges. This is the basis of our world-renowned degree programmes. Visit us at ucl.ac.uk. 




Bentham's Farm – growing food at UCL

Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2014

Professor Mary Fulbrook, UCL German

Holocaust remembrance has attained an ever-greater place in the consciousness of people across Europe and around the world. But memorialization inevitably entails a selective focus and is accompanied by a marginalization and even erasure of other traces of a disturbing past. This lecture explores some of the diverse and complex legacies of Nazi persecution.

You can also watch this lecture on the UCLLHL YouTube channel at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xDJLSnqMps


Oblivion and memorialisation: The legacies of Nazi persecution in Europe (28 Jan 2014)

Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2014

Professor Essi Viding, UCL Psychology and Language Sciences

Although childhood behavioural problems are relatively common, not all problems develop for the same reason, and only a few individuals will go on to develop psychopathy in adulthood. This lecture reviews behavioural problems in children, in terms of genetics, brain function and development, and considers why some children may be at an increased risk of developing psychopathy when they grow up.

You can also watch this lecture on the UCLLHL YouTube channel at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4yB_syUDbjs


Why do some people become psychopaths? (30 Jan 2014)

On 6 March, 1971, UCL students participated in the first ever national Women's Liberation Movement march in London.

The University College Film Soc was on hand to record audio interviews with students on the march.

1971 first UK Women's Liberation Movement march (Archive audio)

A live panel discussion at UCL, 10 March, 2014
Video: http://youtu.be/mBqgLK9dTk4

There are just 85 black professors out of 18,510 in the UK and the number has barely changed in eight years. The percent of black professors (0.4%) shows a striking disparity with the proportion of black students, which has increased steadily each year and now stands at 6%.

What does it mean when the generation that produces knowledge is so unrepresentative of the generation that consumes it? This panel debate will be chaired by Professor Michael Arthur, UCL President and Provost. It will aim to ask difficult questions and explore even more challenging solutions.

Speakers:
Chair: Professor Michael Arthur, UCL President and Provost
Nathan E. Richards, freelance digital journalist, doctoral researcher at Goldsmiths University and director of 'Absent from the Academy'
Dr William Ackah, Birkbeck, University of London
Dr Lisa Amanda Palmer, Newman University
Dr Shirley Tate, University of Leeds
Dr Nathaniel Adam Tobias C̶o̶l̶e̶m̶a̶n̶, UCL
Deborah Gabriel, Founder and CEO of Black British Academics

Further info:
http://events.ucl.ac.uk/event/event:xe-hobmesz1-pt3gqx/why-isnt-my-professor-black

Why isn't my professor black? UCL panel discussion

Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2014

Professor Richard Moorhead, UCL Laws

Public trust in lawyers is on the decline. Some of this is inevitable: Hackgate, the financial scandal and Hillsborough have all involved lawyers at pivotal moments. But are lawyers just doing their jobs in these cases or crossing ethical boundaries? An analysis of professional rules, lawyer psychology and economics suggest lawyers need to do some work to rebuild trust and behave more professionally.

You can also watch this lecture on the UCLLHL YouTube channel at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unpktCN5--o

Should we trust lawyers? (4 Feb 2014)

Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2014

Professor Laura Vaughan, UCL Bartlett School of Graduate Studies

Is the death of the high street inevitable? Prof Vaughan describes her research using historical, geographical and spatial analysis of suburban centres. The results tell us how land use diversity and road connectivity have helped the high street adapt to significant social and economic change.

You can also watch this lecture on the UCLLHL YouTube channel at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJEQ2Ta38_o


Butcher, baker, candlestick-maker (11 Feb 2014)

Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2014

Dr Chris Brierley, UCL Geography

In Spring last year, carbon dioxide concentrations passed 400 parts per million in the atmosphere -- a level not seen since the Pliocene era (3-5 million years ago), and perhaps not even then. We know that the Pliocene was a warm world without glacial cycles, and that the climate of the tropical Pacific was also structurally different. This lecture discussed the causes and implications of this discrepancy.

You can also watch this lecture on the UCLLHL YouTube channel at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lft4OHt0-gE


A world with this much CO²: lessons from 4 million years ago (13 Feb 2014)

Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2014

Professor Yvonne Kelly, UCL Epidemiology and Public Health

The more advantages a child has early in life, the better their health and development and their own socioeconomic circumstances in adulthood. This talk examines what factors during pregnancy and in the early years of life set children off on better life trajectories, and what can be done to ensure that every child has a good childhood.

You can also watch this lecture on the UCLLHL YouTube channel at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPnZ4PW-xrU


A good start in life (25 Feb 2014)

'Memorandoms' of James Martin, the only extant first-hand account of perhaps the most famous escape by convicts transported to Australia

Website:
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/Bentham-Project/publications/martins-memorandoms/martins-memorandoms.html

About Dr Tim Causer (UCL Bentham Project):
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/Bentham-Project/about/staff/causer

Voice of James Martin: Matt Kyle
Australian narrator: Travis Edwards
Director: Rob Eagle
Researcher: Jack Dean
Sound recording: Ben Stevens​

Further info
The most well-known escape of prisoners transported from England to Australia in the 18th Century has been brought to life, thanks to handwritten accounts by the convicts unearthed in the collections of the philosopher Jeremy Bentham at UCL and now published online for the first time.

The Memorandoms of the convict James Martin are the only first-hand account of the famous escape, which has been the subject of a number of books and a television drama. The document is written in three different hands, potentially of three of the convicts involved, and recounts their fascinating -- and, ultimately, tragic -- tale in full.

Escape from Australia: a convict's tale

Sir Roderic Lyne was the British Ambassador to the Russian Federation from 2000 to 2004 and spent half of his 34 years in the Diplomatic Service working with the USSR and its successor States. Since 2004 he has visited Russia regularly as a businessman, consultant and commentator. He was the co-author, with Strobe Talbott and Koji Watanabe, of "Engaging with Russia: The Next Phase" (a report published by the Trilateral Commission in 2006); and is the Deputy Chairman of the Royal Institute of International Affairs, Chatham House.

Sir Roderic Lyne examines the Ukrainian crisis in the wider context of Russian policy and attitudes since the collapse of the Soviet Union. What triggered the Russian threats to Ukraine? What are Russia's objectives there? How does this fit into Russian policy towards the "post-Soviet space"? Is Russia expansionist or defensive, resurgent or vulnerable? Are we still coping with the aftershocks of the Soviet implosion - and for how long? Does Russia's behaviour reflect a view of the world which will last beyond the Putin regime?

http://events.ucl.ac.uk/event/event:g2b-hsllsjud-cbye3k/is-russia-trying-to-revive-the-soviet-union

Is Russia Trying To Revive The Soviet Union? British ambassasor Sir Roderic Lyne speaking at UCL

Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2014

Dr Claire Dwyer, UCL Geography

Suburbs are conventionally imagined as monotonous, monocultural, materialist and secular, but recent research in West London contradicts this, suggesting that suburbs are shaped by dynamic multicultural connections. Dr Dwyer argues that creativity and modernity are important elements in the changing geographies of religious architecture in the suburbs.

You can also watch this lecture on the UCLLHL YouTube channel at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yg5t3wVLekY

Buddhas of Suburbia: faith, migration and suburban change in London (27 Feb 2014)

Crime fiction expert Barry Forshaw has talked to or interviewed virtually every writer in the Nordic Noir field for various newspapers, magazines, TV and radio, as well as for his book on Scandinavian Crime Fiction, Death in a Cold Climate. 

He has a fund of insights (and anecdotes) about the authors and their work, and is equally au fait with the work of the publishers and translators who are helping to make the field the hottest in the entire crime fiction genre. 

If you're an aficionado of Nordic Noir, you have something to learn from Barry! Chaired by Dr Jakob Stougaard-Nielsen (UCL Scandinavian Studies).

Nordic Noir Book Club blog:
www.scancrime.wordpress.com


Nordic Noir: Crime in Translation with Barry Forshaw

A UCL field study on infant brain development and a chance encounter at a science communication event in a London pub have changed the lives of women in a rural community in Keneba, The Gambia.
Professor Clare Elwell (UCL Medical Physics and Bioengineering)
http://www.engineering.ucl.ac.uk/blog/news/ucl-medical-physicists-and-a-science-fan-support-womens-collective-in-gambia

Nanyara Farm Project in The Gambia

Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2014

Professor Maxine Molyneux, UCL Institute of the Americas

Among the eight Millennium Development Goals were women's empowerment and gender equity. This lecture, marking International Women's Day, focuses on the Latin American region, assessing the progress that has been made, and the obstacles that women still face in achieving greater equality and justice, sexual and reproductive rights and measures to tackle violence against women.

You can also watch this lecture on the UCLLHL YouTube channel at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2k8LFxb8nQ



Gender equality and women's rights in Latin America (6 Mar 2014)

Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2014

Dr Maryam Shahmanesh, UCL Infection and Population Health

What can female sex workers in India teach us about the structural drivers of the HIV epidemic? This talk explores how underlying social and political factors contribute to female sex workers vulnerability to HIV and poor sexual health outcomes.

You can also watch this lecture on the UCLLHL YouTube channel at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F43ebh6Mbf8

general lecture

Saifi Wazir