How did humans, a species that evolved to be cooperative and egalitarian, develop societies of enforced inequality? Why did our ancestors create patriarchal power and warfare? Did it have to be this way? These are some of the key questions that Dr. Nancy Lindisfarne and Dr. Jonathan Neale grapple with in Why Men? A Human History of Violence and Inequality (H ... Show More
Sep 15
Tom Hulme, "Belfastmen: An Intimate History of Life Before Gay Liberation" (Cornell UP, 2026)
Professor Tom Hulme's second book reconstructs the erotic and romantic lives of queer men in Belfast across roughly seventy years, from the recriminalisation of sex between men in the 1880s to the emergence of a mainstream public debate about homosexuality in the 1950s. It follow ... Show More
48m 1s
Sep 12
John Charles Simon and Jennalee Donian, "Understanding Laughter and Humor: Why We Laugh, Why We Don’t, and Why It Matters" (Palgrave MacMillan, 2026)
In John Charles Simon and Jennalee Donian’s Understanding Laughter and Humor: Why We Laugh, Why We Don’t, and Why It Matters (Palgrave Macmillan, 2025), the authors put forward a comprehensive new theoretical approach to understanding laughter and the humour we use to inspire it. ... Show More
1h 7m
Mar 2023
The Origins of Inequality (Angela Saini)
“People have always fought against anyone trying to impose power on them or trying to assert their status on them. That is true right throughout history, from written records onwards, certainly, you know, we have evidence of it, even in some of the most misogynistic societies on ... Show More
1h 3m
Mar 2025
Surekha Davies, "Humans: A Monstrous History" (U California Press, 2025)
Monsters are central to how we think about the human condition. Join award-winning historian of science in Humans: A Monstrous History (University of California Press, 2025) by Dr. Surekha Davies as she reveals how people have defined the human in relation to everything from apes ... Show More
1h 1m
Jul 2018
Fearing and Loving: Making Sense of the Warrior
Historian Margaret MacMillan asks why both men and women go to war. "We are both fascinated and repulsed by war and those who fight," she says. In this lecture, recorded at York University, she explores looks at the role of the warrior in history and culture and analyses how warr ... Show More
57m 27s
Feb 2023
The Incredible Evolution Of Human Violence - Dr Richard Wrangham - #594
Dr Richard Wrangham is an anthropologist and primatologist, a Professor of Biological Anthropology at Harvard University and an author whose research focuses on ape behaviour, human evolution, violence, and cooking. Humans have the capacity for incredible benevolence and kindness ... Show More
1h 20m
Nov 2022
Inventing Society with Yuval Noah Harari
<p>How did humans come to create society? On this episode, Neil deGrasse Tyson and Yuval Noah Harari, historian and author of “<i>Sapiens”</i> & “<i>Unstoppable Us</i>,” discuss our species’ ability to cooperate, the role of artificial intelligence, and more.</p><p>NOTE: StarTalk ... Show More
43m 2s