You know what you know, and I know what I know, but only when we know what the other knows do we have common knowledge. That’s the crux of cognitive psychologist Steven Pinker’s latest work, focusing on the shift from private to public knowledge, and how this can suddenly change behaviours or even start revolutions. Steven Pinker joins Tanjil Rashid to discuss. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/priva

Every story, they say, needs a beginning, a middle and an end; every story needs a setting. What if that isn’t true? Can you write when everything is in flux, when you are unmoored from places, and when the time is out of joint? Tanjil Rashid is joined by Amit Chaudhuri, a singer, composer, poet, critic and novelist, to discuss how a story is less important – and less interesting – than the moveme

"We live in a world that deserves unicorns," says Katherine Rundell. If you haven't come across Rundell's work yet, you will soon. She's written over a dozen books, including an award-winning biography of John Donne and the children's fantasy series Impossible Creatures - a copy of which every Year 6 child in the country will receive this Christmas. Disney has just signed a seven-figure deal for t

A third of British adults who used to read for pleasure don't anymore. And according to the OECD, literacy itself, not just the habit of it, is declining or stagnating across most of the developed world. In a new book, The New Dark Ages, James Marriott argues that we're living through a great unwinding: a retreat from the written word and the kind of rational, analytical mind that print culture bu

Terror has sought Salman Rushdie out time and time again for the past 40 years, ever since the controversial publication of his novel The Satanic Verses and the furious response to it from much of the Muslim world. He believed that his life of extreme measures and isolation was a closed chapter in 1998, after Iran stepped back from the fatwa issued by Ayatollah Khomeini. But four summers ago, in a

Historical fantasy, campus satire, industry exposé; five books in, and no one's quite worked out what a "RF Kuang novel" is supposed to look like. That's rather the point. This September she publishes her sixth: Taipei Story, a semi-autobiographical account of a summer spent learning Mandarin in Taiwan - her most personal book yet. She joins Tanjil Rashid in this episode of the podcast. Hosted on

From the fall of the Ottoman Empire to the current escalation of the war between Israel, Palestine and their neighbouring countries, the Middle East has been besieged by almost constant conflict. Is it history? Politics? Resources? Or religion driving these tensions? Tanjil Rashid is joined by historian and author Simon Sebag Montefiore, whose new book The Cauldron tells the story of the making of

Charlotte Higgins has spent most of her career interviewing and critiquing artists, authors and poets as the Guardian's chief culture writer. It was unlikely that her work would ever take her to a warzone. But following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, she found herself drawn to this country under siege. She wanted to ask, what happens to art under war? And could Ukrainian culture not just

In the summer of 2024, riots tore through British towns, and since then old questions have continued to resurface about who belongs in the country. Taj Ali has spent years digging into a history that’s rarely told in full: the long tradition of South Asian political activism in Britain. His debut book, Come What May, We’re Here to Stay, traces that tradition and asks what it means for Britain now.

Every year, more libraries across Britain close their doors. As councils have their funding slashed, these are often the first spaces to go. What do we lose when we stop reading and collecting? What is a library to a community, beyond its books? Tanjil Rashid is joined by the University of Oxford's Bodley's Librarian, Richard Ovenden. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

To hear more conversations like this search "The Exchange" wherever you get your podcasts. When Amia Srinivasan published The Right to Sex: Feminism in the Twenty-First Century in 2021, it sparked widespread debate about the politics of desire, consent, and sexual justice. In this episode of The Exchange, the Oxford academic joins Tanjil Rashid to discuss how philosophy can illuminate some of the

Throughout history, art, and artists, have caused moral outrage. For a long time we had the liberal notion that we could separate great art from bad artists, but we do seem to live in a time of heightened moralisation around works of art and their creators. Why is that? Tanjil Rashid is joined by Daisy Dixon, who has written the book Depraved: The Story of Dangerous Art. Hosted on Acast. See acast

Christopher Nolan’s film adaptation of Homer’s epic poem is one of the most anticipated films in recent cinema history. But what is it about this story, first told maybe 3000 years ago, that so fascinates us? Who really wrote it and why does it represent, with Homer’s other great work The Iliad , the foundation of western literature? Tanjil Rashid is joined by The Odyssey’s latest translator, clas

Hot dogs, fireworks, old glory, it’s the 4th July. This year marks the 250th anniversary of the USA’s Declaration of Independence. What led up to these crucial events in 1776? Was the revolution truly American? And what does this anniversary represent today? Tanjil Rashid is joined by Sarah Pearsall, historian and author of Freedom Round the Globe: How the World Made the American Revolution. Hoste

Tayari Jones is one of America's most celebrated novelists, twice chosen by Oprah, shortlisted for prizes on both sides of the Atlantic, and read by presidents. Her newest book was meant to be a tale of gentrification in the American South, she found herself an entirely different story. Kin follows two motherless girls coming of age in 1950s Louisiana, the Jim Crow South.It's a novel about female

Andrew Marr and the New Statesman's art critic Michael Prodger join Tanjil Rashid to discuss the life and legacy of David Hockney, who passed away last week. A Bradford boy who became one of the most famous artists in the world. A gay man who made desire visible decades before it was safe to do so. A painter who took on the iPhone and the iPad and bent new technology to the oldest of artistic impu

“The traveller sees what he sees. The tourist sees what he has come to see.” Andrea Wulf joins us to discuss her new book The Traveller , about George Forster - the forgotten naturalist who sailed with Captain James Cook at seventeen and came back convinced of something radical: that all human beings are equal. We ask why that idea was so scandalous in the Enlightenment, why Forster has been large

There is in Britain today a widespread mood of public despair, a deep premonition of imminent national decline. According to Ipsos, just over half of Britons feel worse off since Keir Starmer was elected. Going further back, 60% feel the country has gone backwards since 2022. Are Britain's best days really behind it? Pratinav Anil, Rachel Clarke, Tanjil Rashid, John Kampfner, Gary Stevenson, and P

What is the relationship between politics and the built environment? between the spaces inhabited by the public and the policies that govern them? From parliaments to monuments… from open squares to closed off palaces… there clearly is a connection, but how that manifests itself remains deeply contested. Tanjil Rashid is joined by Jan Werner-Muller, a German philosopher and historian, whose latest

Political instability, democratic decline, the rise of populist movements - politicians and headlines today are quick to diagnose things as modern day Weimar. But what was Weimar actually like, and how did a city associated with culture and intellectual life become bound up with the rise of Nazism? Historian Katja Hoyer joins us to discuss her new book on Weimar, the process of fascism taking hold