Heads-up for 26 August 2010

Hidden Heritage (National Heritage Week Podcast Series)
A Medieval Witch Burning: Petronella di Midia was burned as a witch in Kilkenny in 1324. She wasn’t even one of the main suspects. Hear how she became the one of the first people in Europe to executed for witchcraft……(this is the final episode in this series)
(review, feed)

Thinking Allowed (BBC)
Alienation: Professor Laurie Taylor talks to Sean Sayers, Donna Dickenson and Ian Fraser about Marx's Theory of Alienation.
(review, feed)

The Memory Palace
Episode 33: Lost lobsters
(review, feed)

Forgotten Classics
The Riddle of the Sands, chapter 26: In which Carruthers discovers what "seven" means.
(review, feed)

History According to Bob
Great Gaulic Revolt Background: This show is about the background to the final blow up by the Gauls to try and throw the Romans out.
(review, feed)

Classic Poetry Aloud
There be none of Beauty's daughters by Lord Byron:
THERE be none of Beauty's daughters
With a magic like thee;
And like music on the waters
Is thy sweet voice to me:
(review, feed)

Quest for meaning - LSE Podcast

Tariq Ramadan spoke at the LSE (feed) about his book, the Quest for Meaning. Although one must argue that religion has more function than just the quest for meaning, Ramadan takes on this aspect and makes a plea for pluralism and tolerance. As he describes it, we are all climbing the same mountain top, but everybody is on a different route. Or if you want to take another metaphor: we are all lost in the desert and looking for the way, but each we have found ourselves in a different spot and in different circumstances and hence we all take a different road.

His argument is against dogmatism in all cultures and his approach is that dogmatism is not exclusive to any one religion, or religions in general, but that it is a state of mind. And he wants to make us aware to stand up against the state of mind.

It is worthwhile to keep listening through the ensuing Q&A, as the questions push him much more to elaborate his points. Had I been there I had challenged him some more about relativism and the pitfall of that. Or with the other task of religion: giving community, which by nature is exclusive.

More LSE:
The plundered planet,
China and India,
The China Hegemony,
The myth of work,
Pasts and futures of Christianity.

Heads-up for 25 August 2010 - Anne is a Man

A blog to follow is Open Culture which not only points out some excellent podcasts, but also other free cultural and educational stuff. For example last month I was happy to be alerted about Tarkovsky films (all of them) that can be viewed for free on-line. And this weekend it has begun posting about places on-line where you can acquire free text-books.

Naxos Classical Music Spotlight Podcast
JoAnn Falletta and the music of Marcel Tyberg: Were it not for Dr. Enrico Mihich, the music of Marcel Tyberg would almost certainly be lost forever. Tyberg entrusted all of his scores with Mihich, just before he was deported to Auschwitz. For more than six decades, Mihich carried the scores with him, trying to find a conductor who would pay attention to them. Finally, in 2005, Dr. Mihich met with JoAnn Falletta, Music Director of the Buffalo Philharmonic. Maestra Falletta saw what so many others had failed to see – that Tyberg’s music was original, beautiful and worth performing. This podcast, with it’s interview with JoAnn Falletta, traces the history of how she and the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra came to rescue the music of Marcel Tyberg.
(review, feed)

Rear Vision
Understanding Pakistan: Pakistan was born on 15 August 1947 and when it emerged from British India, Muslims around the world rejoiced, believing they were witnessing the birth of the first democratic Muslim nation. So why has it all gone so wrong?
(review, feed)

Three new issues of Engines of our Ingenuity. (review, feed)

KMTT - The Torah Podcast
Rav Soloveitchik on Shofar - part 1: The first part of a four-part series on the mitzva of shofar, based on a lecture of Rav Y.B. Soloveitchik delivered in Boston in 1968.
(review, feed)

The Lonely Funeral

I guess this does not happen in small communities, but it does happen every so often in big cities: someone has died and no one shows up to take care of the funeral. Then it is up to the authorities to handle the affairs. The municipality of Amsterdam has some 10-20 of such cases each year. On The State We're In, a podcast by the RNW (Radio Netherlands Worldwide) (feed), there was a documentary by Michele Ernsting about a civil servant and a poet who have taken it upon themselves to do the honors for the municipality in a more special and dignified manner. (Broadcast as part of Last Respects)

I was alerted to this documentary by a podcast from the RTE (the Irish national broadcaster). RTE's Doc on One has a rubric, The Curious Ear, which brings interesting sound bytes such as The Lonely Funeral. (feed)

Ernsting speaks with the civil servant Ger Frits and the city poet Frank Starik. We learn how Frits took up elaborating the municipal funerals. Starik learned about this effort and managed to convince Frits to let him join in. Since they started the anonymous funerals by the city of Amsterdam are attended by them, accompanied by music and ritual, part of which is the reciting of a poem that was specifically written for this lonely case.

Last Respects can no longer be had in the feed of The State We're In, but it can be reached through the website. The Lonely Funeral is available there for download and so I have used Huffduffer to make this documentary a podcast. Check out this feed: Huffduffer funeral.

Reports about Lonely funerals in Amsterdam and other Dutch cities can be read on the blog Eenzame Uitvaart.

Heads-up for 24 August 2010

Occasionally I am looking for a transcript of a podcast show and especially when the show consisted of a conversation, such is not available. The interview podcast Shrink Rap Radio does frequently offer transcripts, but usually this takes some time after the issue has first come out. Recently a transcript was added for show #231 - The meditating brain with Richard Davidson.
Shrink Rap Radio transcripts are a community effort; volunteers from the audience step up and transcribe. It goes to show how a podcast can be a community as well as an audio-product.

Hidden Heritage (National Heritage Week Podcast Series)
Bog Bodies & Iron Age Human Sacrifice: Examining the Iron Age in Ireland and the mysterious Bog Bodies! The Iron Age is an era when celtic culture arrived and dominated life in Ireland. It remains one of the most mysterious and least understood periods of Irish Archeology.
(review, feed)

Omega-Tau Podcast has an issue about the Mountain Wave Project (MWP web site). This interview is in German. The podcast is part English, part German. (review, German feed, English feed, combined feed)

TED Talks
David McCandless: The beauty of data visualization David McCandless turns complex data sets (like worldwide military spending, media buzz, Facebook status updates) into beautiful, simple diagrams that tease out unseen patterns and connections. Good design, he suggests, is the best way to navigate information glut -- and it may just change the way we see the world.
(feed)

Rory Sutherland - TED

Rory Sutherland: Life lessons from an ad man
Another great video on TED Talks (feed)



Thanks to Pablo Brenner and Sergio Fogel for this find.

More TED:
Dimitar Sasselov,
Sir Ken Robinson,
Photos that changed the world - Jonathan Klein,
Karen Armstrong on The Golden Rule,
Media revolution and the effect on power - Clay Shirky.