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Yaa Gyasi, Daniel Levitin, Peter Bazalgette, James Bartholomew on clarity, civility and strong states

Presented by Philip Dodd. With debates about empathy, rigorous thinking and the welfare state, plus writer Yaa Gyaasi on the importance of home for Africans and African-Americans.

Peter Bazalgette, former Arts Council England chair and TV executive, discusses why we need to become more empathetic. Neuroscientist Daniel Levitin has given the Proms Lecture exploring the mind and music. He talks about lies and statistics and how we can make better decisions. James Bartholomew believes the Welfare State may be holding us back. Together they explore with Philip Dodd, how to build a better stronger Civil State.
Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi is a novel ranging across 250 years and two branches and seven generations of a Ghanaian family shadowed by the experiences of slavery and slaving. Gyasi follows two different branches of one Fante family obsessed by notions of home whilst swept along by different but equally challenging histories on either side of the Atlantic. She talks to Philip Dodd about the importance of home for Africans and African-Americans and the still low representation of writers from modern Africa and the need for more.

Peter Bazalgette has written The Empathy Instinct: A Blueprint for a Civil Society
Daniel Levitin has written The Organized Mind and his new book is called a Field Guide to Lies and Statistics - a Neuroscientist on How to Make Sense of a Complex World.
James Bartholomew, follows up his The Welfare State We're In, with The Welfare of Nations
Yaa Gyasi's novel is called Homegoing.

Producer: Jacqueline Smith.

Available now

45 minutes

Credits

Role Contributor
Interviewed Guest Peter Bazalgette
Interviewed Guest Daniel Levitin
Interviewed Guest James Bartholomew
Interviewed Guest Yaa Gyasi
Interviewed Guest Philip Dodd
Producer Jacqueline Smith

Broadcast

  • Thu 26 Jan 2017 22:00

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