The National Archives Podcast Series

Lectures, discussions, talks and other events presented by The National Archives of the United Kingdom.

To accompany the publication of his book 'Digging for Richard III: How Archaeology Found the King', Mike Pitts discusses the achievements, disputes and controversies surrounding the discovery of Richard III's skeleton. Mike Pitts is an archaeologist and award-winning journalist and broadcaster. He has recently co-directed an excavation at Stonehenge and led a pioneering study of an Easter Island statue. For the last ten years Mike has edited Britain's leading archaeological magazine, British Archaeology.

Lectures, discussions, talks and other events presented by The National Archives of the United Kingdom.

Luke Blaxill discusses the ways in which Big Data techniques can introduce quantification into long-standing historical debates. His example is the case of female MPs in the House of Commons. How is the language they use different to that of male MPs and do they represent "women's issues" more effectively than men? Blaxill uses text mining techniques to investigate the feminist claim that women's contributions in the Commons are substantively different to men's and whether any "gender effect" is strengthening or weakening with the rise in female numbers, especially since 1997.

Lectures, discussions, talks and other events presented by The National Archives of the United Kingdom.

It was a year when England won the World Cup and led the world in all aspects of popular culture, including pop music, fashion, and film. But it was also a time of sterling crises, wage and price freezes, and industrial strife. Contemporary specialist Mark Dunton looks at a nation caught between optimism and decline.

Lectures, discussions, talks and other events presented by The National Archives of the United Kingdom.

Professor Maggie Andrews discusses some of the key campaigns and concerns of the Women's Institute, from its origins in the First World War to the 1950s when, with half a million members, it was firmly established as the largest women's organisation in Britain. Maggie is a Professor of Cultural History at the University of Worcester; she has published widely on women, domesticity and the home front in 20th century Britain.

Lectures, discussions, talks and other events presented by The National Archives of the United Kingdom.

In this talk medical historian Richard Barnett explores surgery during the 19th century, from the application of antisepsis to experiments with hypnosis. What happened in the early operations that used anaesthesia, and why were patients initially reluctant to agree to it? Richard Barnett is a writer and broadcaster on the cultural history of science and medicine. He teaches on the Pembroke-Kings Programme in Cambridge, and in 2011 received one of the first Wellcome Trust Engagement Fellowships. His books include Medical London: City of Diseases: City of Cures, The Sick Rose (described by Will Self in the Guardian as 'superbly lucid and erudite') and Crucial Interventions: An Illustrated Treatise on the Principles and Practice of Nineteenth-Century Surgery, which was published by Thames & Hudson in cooperation with the Wellcome Collection in October 2015.

The Campaign for Homosexual Equality (CHE) is the oldest surviving LGBT organisation in the UK. With more than 150 local branches and over 6,000 members, it has grown from a small regional committee lobbying for law reform with local MPs, into Britain's largest democratic gay organisation. Playwright and journalist Peter Scott-Presland examines CHE's roots in Manchester, the traditions it grew out of, and the secret of its survival and ultimate success

Lectures, discussions, talks and other events presented by The National Archives of the United Kingdom.

This presentation discusses the role that the material and intellectual heritage of a community can play in shaping and reshaping its identity, along a historical continuum. With a brief history of the Ismaili Muslims in focus, the presentation highlights some of the challenges faced by the modern Ismaili community in conservation of, and engaging with their heritage, dating back over a millennium. The talk features the heritage conservation initiatives organised by the community, especially in digital media, together with some of the finest pieces from the institutional archives and collections. Zehra Lalji is among the key contributors who created the heritage sites archive at the Institute of Ismaili Studies (IIS). At present, she serves the Institute as the Website Productions Officer, where she is leading a number of creative digital adaptations based on the Institute's published research.

Lectures, discussions, talks and other events presented by The National Archives of the United Kingdom.

Guy Burgess was a brilliant young Englishman who rose through the ranks of MI5 and MI6 during the Cold War. But as a member of 'The Cambridge Spies', he betrayed his country by regularly passing on highly sensitive secret documents to his Soviet handlers. Historian Andrew Lownie, author of 'Stalin's Englishman: The Lives of Guy Burgess' - a Guardian Book of the Year and The Times Best Biography of the Year - will talk about how Burgess was able to avoid exposure as a traitor to his country through his trademark charisma and a network of powerful political connections.