Speech Radio You Have Listened To Lately

[Serial_Apologist]

This series is turning out to be very much old-style Radio 3, the sort of thing in which "essayists" once expounded with learning on subjects one could muck up on with the help of The Listener next edition transcription to audiences hanging on every word. Where are they? - not on this forum, where they should be and could be were it not for narrow definitional restrictions on political inclusiveness. But I for one am interested to know where 18th/19th century indigenous working class consciousness feeds into Enlightenment thinking, because in these times when the latter is under attack from fundamentalisms of this and that sort, we can decided if and where EPT's ideas still hold contemporary relevance. Last night's Christienna Fryer had a pop at Thompson for excluding slavery and its aftermath in delineating the then-possible limits of working class radicalisation, along with the women's question. Perhaps he was not quite the internationalist some of us thought and hoped in the early 1980s; perhaps Stalinism had bored in too deep. In tonight's enthralling episode will David Aaronvitch's powers of theoretical recall stand up after so long to exploring "[h]ow Thompson's communism was essential to the writing of his great book"?

Well I was too preemptive in my pre-assessment of Aaronovitch's contribution, who managed in his 15 minutes to re-locate Thompson where he belonged, at the pivot point when Stalinists finally had their eyes belatedly opened by the USSR's invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. The trouble as always with this series was in the opacity of what each contributer was trying to put across on a broader range of questions than time allowed in the given format, and the unquestioning resort to (obsolete?) jargon. Even I am left wondering what "revisionism" as mentioned by Aaronovitch was referring to? The post-1975 definitive turn to parliamentary reformism advocated by all Western CPs? Or the (to some, but not me) adulteration of whatever their idea of "pure Marxism" was by postmodernist thinking of various kinds, eg alternative psychology, eco politics, panculturalism, Eurocommunism, Post-Structuralism? Arguably what it needed was one intelligent informed individual presenting the various issues comparatively, though finding one such in today's dumbed-down intellectual climate is now probably hard to find. Tariq Ali, perhaps?

[johncorrigan]

In the car this morning I chanced on a Radio 4 series that I had never encountered before. 'Wild Inside' took a Californian Sea Lion and did an autopsy on the animal as they discussed the various elements of the animals structure that fitted it for its environment. I found it fascinating - had to sit for five minutes in the car when I got home so that I could hear the end of the programme. I see that there are others in the series - I think I'll tune in to a few more.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001w157

[smittims]

While this thread is up I'll recommend 'Wokewash' also on Radio 4, examining advertisers' sudden interest in public social trends such as feminism and BLM. How sincere are they? Not much, as the presenter discovers.

[Serial_Apologist]

While this thread is up I'll recommend 'Wokewash' also on Radio 4, examining advertisers' sudden interest in public social trends such as feminism and BLM. How sincere are they? Not much, as the presenter discovers.

Capitalism is always in search of new "demographics" to target for its products, and it will use any means.

[french frank]

Capitalism is always in search of new "demographics" to target for its products, and it will use any means.

[LMcD]

A new series of 'Conversations From A Long Marriage' began on Radio 4 tonight. Roger and Joanna on top form, as ever!

[Jazzrook]

Harold Pinter’s ‘The Dumb Waiter’ on Radio 4 today(Sunday 24/3/24, 3pm):

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001xm68

JR

[gradus]

Kirsty Young's discussion with Phillip Pullman in her series Young Again. There is nothing of comparable quality on contemporary television.