Faculty of Classics

Podcasts from the Faculty of Classics.

From Communism to Zionism: Moses Hess (1957)

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1957 Lucien Wolf Memorial Lecture. Lecture on the Jewish philosopher Moses Hess, one of the founders of Zionism and a committed Socialist. Berlin also discusses Hess’s evolution as a philosopher, from International Socialism to Zionism.

Published in Berlin's collection 'Against the Current' (1979; 2nd ed. 2013)

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Department: Wolfson College

Date Added: 15/04/2009

Duration: 01:01:56

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A Fire at Sea (1957)

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Isaiah Berlin

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Isaiah Berlin introduces and reads his translation of Russian novelist Ivan Turgenev's short story 'A Fire at Sea', in which Turgenev recounts an embarrassing episode from his youth. Originally broadcast on the BBC Third Programme on 23 July 1957.

Published with Berlin's translation of Turgenev's 'First Love' in 'First Love [and] A Fire at Sea' (1982)

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Department: Wolfson College

Date Added: 15/04/2009

Duration: 00:29:37

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Alexander Herzen: His Opinions and Character (1955)

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Isaiah Berlin

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Lecture on Alexander Herzen, philosopher and founder of Russia’s first free press. Berlin discusses Herzen’s passionate belief in individual liberty and his distaste for the new violent radicalism in the Russia of his time.

The last of four Northcliffe Lectures delivered at University College London in October–November 1954 as 'A Marvellous Deacde: Literature and Social Criticism in Russia 1838–48' and published as 'A Remarkable Decade' in Berlin's collection 'Russian Thinkers' (1978; 2nd ed. 2008); re-recorded for the BBC 16 December 1954 – the only recording surviving from the series

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Department: Wolfson College

Date Added: 15/04/2009

Duration: 00:40:54

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Dark Matter and Architecture in Science

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Inside Oxford Science

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In the second edition of Inside Oxford Science Pedro explores dark matter and cosmic voids whilst Marcus leads a debate on whether great architecture can inspire great science.

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Inside Oxford Science

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Department: Mathematical, Physical and Life Sciences (MPLS)

Date Added: 14/04/2009

Duration: 00:35:27

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Early Childhood Poverty and Adult Attainment

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Sidney Ball Memorial Lectures

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Professor Greg Duncan discusses the connections between poverty and child development, and suggests social policy strategies to improve the welfare of children in poverty.

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Sidney Ball Memorial Lectures

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economic redistribution

child development

society

child poverty

Department: Department of Social Policy and Intervention

Date Added: 14/04/2009

Duration: 00:44:17

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Sidney Ball Memorial Lectures

The Sidney Ball Memorial Lectures were established after the First World War in memory of Sidney Ball who was a philosophy fellow at St John's College, Oxford. Sidney Ball was both a political radical and 'an energetic university reformer' concerned that contemporary social and economic problems should be studied at Oxford.

Freedom and Its Betrayal: 2 – Jean Jacques Rousseau (1952)

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Isaiah Berlin

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Berlin lectures on Rousseau's 'On the Social Contract' and discusses his anti-intellectualism, his idealism of Nature, and the worryingly authoritarian implications of his philosophy. Originally broadcast on the BBC Third Programme in 1952.

The only recording that survives from this six-lecture series, based on his Mary Flexner Lectures, 'Political Ideas in the Romantic Age', at Bryn Mawr College, Pennsylvania, in spring 1952; published in 'Freedom and Its Betrayal' (2002; 2nd ed. 2014)

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Department: Wolfson College

Date Added: 14/04/2009

Duration: 00:52:02

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Isaiah Berlin

Isaiah Berlin (1909–1997), founding President of Wolfson College, University of Oxford, is regarded as one of the leading thinkers of the twentieth century. He was famous as an extempore lecturer, and his inimitable speaking style is well illustrated in this series of podcasts.

Defence of Women and Imagination in French Medieval Literature

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St Hilda's College Podcasts

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Interview with St Hilda's College Fellow and teacher of Medieval French Literature Dr Helen Swift about her book; Gender, Writing, and Performance: Men Defending Women in Late Medieval France as well as other developments in Medieval Literary Studies.