University of the Air

We may think of the French horn as producing mellow romantic sounds for symphonies, but what happens when you add electronic sounds to this instrument's repertoire?

Ninety-five percent of the universe is invisible. How do we know it’s there and what is it? We'll take a look at the dark side of the universe, including the mysterious forces that affect the spin of our galaxy and the processes that build and destroy the estimated two trillion galaxies out there. Along the way we’ll catch sight of the Big Bang that started it all and get some notion as to where it’s all going.

What role do poverty and economic hardship play in child maltreatment and neglect? And how can child welfare systems prevent them? UW Professor of Social Work Kristen Slack will hare her research into programs designed to prevent child maltreatment. She'll discuss her work with coordinating services and benefits and detail improved strategies for preventing child neglect.

Why have most of us never heard of Ira Aldridge (1807-1867) , America’s first internationally acclaimed African American actor? UW Theatre professor Baron Kelly links his own journey as a Black actor to that of the remarkable Ira Aldridge.

Our guest explores the Declaration of Independence as a "masterstroke of propaganda," links Benjamin Franklin to WikiLeaks, and explains the use of stolen documents, fake news, and leaked letters on both sides of the Revolutionary War.

How a living system capable of evolving complexity first emerged on Earth some 4 billion years ago remains one of the biggest unsolved scientific mysteries. Resolving this puzzle would guide the search for life on other worlds and might even suggest ways to engineer new life-like chemical systems in the laboratory. UW Professor David Baum will discuss different theories that have been proposed to explain the origin of life and summarize ongoing work in his laboratory and elsewhere that aims to test these theories experimentally.

Nandini Pandey, UW Professor of Classical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies, shatters myths and misconceptions and shows how Ancient Rome embraced cultural diversity in surprising ways.

The story of the Boston smallpox epidemic of 1721 includes an improbable cast of characters embroiled in a controversy that would revolutionize not just American medicine but speed the American colonies down the path to revolution.

In a recent study, Catherine Compton-Lilly followed a group of eight inner-city students from grade one through grade 11 to discover how time operates as a contextual factor in children’s lives as they progress through school and construct their identities as students and readers.

Before it ran its course, the Hollywood blacklist sucked in some of the most prominent names in show business. Actors, directors, writers and producers were forced to take sides and those attempting to find a middle ground were subject to condemnation from both sides and the public. Under those circumstances, some filmmakers had to leave the country and some of those who remained resorted to allegory or saber rattling to create movies such as High Noon, and the Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Film historian Jeff Smith will tell us how the blacklist came to be and how various celebrities coped with it.

Behind the headlines of diplomatic breakthroughs, unofficial peace brokers do quiet and discreet work setting up negotiations between hostile nations. Our guest for University of the Air was a member of peace delegations that laid the groundwork for ending hostilities between India and Pakistan, North and South Korea, and North and South Vietnam. Joe Elder will tell us how he came to play the role of international peace broker, what the dangers were, and what it was like to meet in private with world leaders.

"Selection" of Hungarian Jews on the ramp at Auschwitz II-Birkenau in German-occupied Poland

The Allies set up the Nuremberg Trials to bring the Nazis to justice after the devastation of World War II. But the trials also became a turning point in the burgeoning Cold War. How did the aims of the Soviets conflict with what the other three allies wanted from the trials, and what was the result? We'll find out from Francine Hirsch, author of Soviet Judgment at Nuremberg.

Free association, transference—the Oedipus Complex. When he invented psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud also developed therapeutic techniques and concepts that, a hundred years later, are still part of our language. His analysis of dreams as wish fulfillment and his studies of repression led him to develop his theory of the unconscious and his concepts of the three-part structure of the human psyche—the id, the ego, and the super-ego. How well do his ideas about sex, compulsion, hate, death and guilt hold up today?

Professor Emeritus Stanley Temple explores Aldo Leopold's pioneering land ethic and shares some of Leopold's little-known radio shows from "College of the Air" from the 1930s. For a story about Leopold's radio talks and the search for his missing recordings, go to https://www.aldoleopold.org/post/still-searching-leopolds-voice/