logo
episode-header-image
Dec 2023
9m 52s

'The bad boy of Welsh politics'

Bbc World Service
About this episode

In the 1960s, the singer Dafydd Iwan started campaigning for the Welsh language to gain official status in Wales.

For years, Dafydd received little support. In January 1969 he decided to up the pressure, defacing a police station sign written in English with paint.

He ended up in prison, but soon young people across the country were picking up paint pots and taking up the cause.

Today, the Welsh language is found in schools, on documents and on police station signs. Dafydd tells Anoushka Mutanda-Dougherty about his activism and singing.

(Photo: Dafydd after his release from Cardiff prison. Credit: Central Press/Getty Images)

Up next
Yesterday
The man who said ‘no’ to Disney
In 1941, Walt Disney made a tempting offer to a fellow pioneer of the animation industry, Quirino Cristiani - the author of the first animated feature film.Cristiani was an Italian immigrant raised in Argentina who built a career creating animated political satires in the early d ... Show More
9m 55s
Jul 10
Ni Una Menos women’s movement in Argentina
On 3 June 2015, tens of thousands of people gathered in the capital, Buenos Aires, and in dozens of cities and towns demanding an end to violence against women. There were demonstrations in Chile and Uruguay in solidarity too. Argentina was reporting a female murder rate of one e ... Show More
9m 31s
Jul 9
Argentina’s national genetics bank created to identify stolen babies
In 1982, Argentine geneticist Victor Penchaszadeh was living in exile in New York when he received a call that would change the course of his career. Two founding members of the campaign group, the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo, were asking for his help to find their kidnappe ... Show More
10m 41s
Recommended Episodes
Feb 2023
The forgotten years that forged Wales
In Welsh history, the period that lies between the medieval era of resistance to English occupation, and the rapid industrialisation of the 18th and 19th centuries, is often forgotten. Yet, there was much more going on in Wales in the early modern period than might initially meet ... Show More
55m 43s
Sep 2014
Flower of Scotland
In 1968, the Scottish folk group, the Corries, performed a song that became Scotland’s unofficial anthem decades later. We speak to Corries member, Ronnie Browne.(Photo: A Scottish flag. Credit: PA) 
10m 39s
Mar 2022
#153 All About Wales with Dafydd Morse
Dafydd Morse kindly joined me on the show this week to introduce us to Wales - his home country on the west side of Britain. I feel like the Welsh culture (people, language, etc.) is often overlooked on a global scale, and perhaps some of you are hearing about it for the first ti ... Show More
49m 13s
Jul 2017
When Homosexuality Was a Crime
Comedian and broadcaster Pete Price speaks about being subjected to horrific aversion therapy to "cure" him of his homosexuality in 1960s Britain. Plus the 99-year-old former aide to the Chinese nationalist leader, Chiang Kai Shek, a radical new approach to housing in the former ... Show More
50m 36s
May 2019
The Gordon Riots
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the most destructive riots in London's history, which reached their peak on 7th June 1780 as troops fired on the crowd outside the Bank of England. The leader was Lord George Gordon, head of the Protestant Association, who objected to the relaxing ... Show More
50m 19s
Dec 2021
Lenny Bruce Is Not Afraid (1962)
It’s December 5th. This day in 1962, comedian Lenny Bruce is arrested in Chicago during a performance at a nightclub. His arrest is ostensibly because of underage patrons at the club, but Bruce had been targeted and arrested a number of times for his use of obscenity, and for mak ... Show More
16m 19s
Feb 2021
Knock, Knock... (with Daisy Cooper MP)
Urgent testing for the South African variant of Covid-19 is beginning in England, after cases were discovered in several different locations.Daisy Cooper, deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats and MP for St Albans, tells Bloomberg Westminster's Roger Hearing and Sebastian Salek ... Show More
22m 50s
Nov 2022
267: Wales: The Roar of the Red Dragon
What are the origins of Wales? And how do the Welsh define themselves against Englishness? As England play Wales in the World Cup today, Tom and Dominic are joined by Martin Johnes, Professor of History at the University of Swansea, to explore the age old rivalry between the two ... Show More
1h 4m
Aug 2023
The English woman who woke up with a Welsh accent
Zoe Coles woke up 10 weeks ago and started speaking with a Welsh accent, despite being from Lincolnshire. She has never been to Wales and has no connection to the country... Image: TikTok via @zoecoles1 
10m 36s
Apr 2008
Yeats and Irish Politics
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the poet W.B. Yeats and Irish politics. Yeats lived through a period of great change in Ireland from the collapse of the home rule bill through to the Easter Rising of 1916 and the partitioning of the country. In May 1916, 15 men were shot by the B ... Show More
42m 17s