Animals ‘in the Fraternity of universal Nature’

The Romantics took great interest in science, the natural world and animals. In his utopian community the Pantisocracy (the all-governing society – where labour would be minimised and time devoted to study, liberal discussions and educating children) Samuel Taylor Coleridge said animals were to be brothers and sisters ‘in the Fraternity of universal Nature’. His poem ‘To a Young Ass’ hailed the animal he had befriended in Jesus College as ‘Brother’. Though mocked at the time for these views, animal rights and animal welfare were debated widely amongst the Romantics and remain controversial issues today, as Andrew Kelly reveals.

Photo credit: Nick Smith

Andrew Kelly 26 March 2015

21 November 2024
Michael Ohajuru

An introduction to John Blanke and the John Blanke Project. John Blanke was the Black trumpeter to the courts of Henry VII and Henry VIII, the first person of Black African descent in British history for whom we have both a record and an image. He has become the poster boy for the Black presence at the court of Henry VII and Henry VIII. The John Blanke Project is a contemporary art and archive project celebrating John Blanke’s presence in British history through the works of artists, poets, rappers, photographers, playwrights and historians.

Michael I. Ohajuru DUniv, FRSA

Art & Cultural Historian

https://about.me/michaelohajuru/

Michael I. Ohajuru Has an Honorary Doctorate from the Open University (2024), a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (2022) Senior Fellow of the Institute of Commonwealth Studies (2014) with honours degrees in Physics (Leeds, 1974) and Art History (Open University, 2008). He retired in 2014 after a twenty-five-year career holding senior positions in international sales and marketing in the data and mobile communications industry, he lives in South London with partner the artist Ebun Culwin. He blogs, writes and speaks regularly on the black presence in Renaissance Europe, he has spoken at the Metropolitan Museum, New York, the National Gallery, London Tate Britain, British Library, National Archives and the Victoria Albert Museum on the subject. Founder of Image of the Black in London Galleries a series of gallery tours highlighting the overt and covert black presences to be found in the national art collections in London. He is the Project Director and Chief Evangelist of The John Blanke Project: a contemporary Art and Archive project celebrating John Blanke the Black trumpeter to courts of Henry VII and Henry VII now in the permanent collections of National Portrait Gallery and National Archive. Michael was co-convener of the Institute of Commonwealth Studies What’s Happening in Black British History series of workshops fostering a creative dialogue between researchers, educationalists (mainstream and supplementary), archivists and curators, and policy makers, a series of 10 workshops over five years and is a founder member of the Black Presence in British Portraiture network, managing their podcast – The BP2 Podcast

Photo of Michael by David VY Wallis ©.


The John Blanke Project: Reimagining the Black Tudor Trumpeter

Who Gets What - And Why: The Hidden World of Matchmaking and Market Design
In many parts of life – jobs, housing, medical care, education, even a date on the internet – price is not the only determinant of who gets what. So how do the other processes that influence who gets which goods, jobs, university places and partners really work? In Who Gets What, Nobel Prize-winning economist Alvin Roth uncovers the global rules of how markets allocate, how matchmaking shapes lives, where markets exist that we may not even realise, and how everything about our biggest experiences – from getting accepted at university or living where we want – can be better understood and negotiated when one understands the design of those matching markets. The distribution of rewards is often unfair, but it’s seldom as random as it seems. Roth reveals just how much of our life takes place in marketplaces, and leads us to a new understanding of who gets what and why. He sheds new light on the politics of free markets and how many things that we choose in life also must choose us.

Alvin Roth 13 July 2015

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The John Blanke Project: Reimagining the Black Tudor Trumpeter

University of Bristol

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