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	<title>Love of History &#187; BBC</title>
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	<link>http://loveofhistory.com</link>
	<description>A historical perspective of current events</description>
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		<title>Bettany Hughes&#8217; support of Classics</title>
		<link>http://loveofhistory.com/bettany-hughes-support-of-classics/</link>
		<comments>http://loveofhistory.com/bettany-hughes-support-of-classics/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 18 Nov 2010 22:32:42 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[constantinakatsari]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Languages]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[BBC]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Bettany Hughes]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[classics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[radio 4]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[Below is a transcript of Bettany Hughes&#8217; appearance on Woman&#8217;s Hour. Womans Hour, BBC Radio 4 November 16, 2010 &#8220;Jenni Murray: Now, even in the sixties, when I was at a state school and Latin was for everybody (Greek only for the very bright) there were plenty of mumblings about pupils wasting their time on dead languages when they could be learning French, German, Spanish and perhaps even Russian or Chinese. Well, its not on the National Curriculum and only 17% of state schools teach classics, but there is a new campaign called Classics For All. One of its leaders is Bettany Hughes, whose latest publication is The Hemlock Cup: Socrates, Athens and the Search for the Good Life. Bettany, how would you sell Socrates to a class of 21st-century pupils? Bettany Hughes: Well, Id tell them that they are living the way they do because Socrates thought the way he did. The very fact that he says the unexamined life is not worth living is the reason that they are sitting in school in the first place, because they are there to learn about life. So he is intently relevant. JM: Why are you so passionate about it, that you chose to write your next major tome about it? BH: Well, I think he introduces so many things to usthe idea that we need to ask questions about life: What is good? What is bravery? What is the point of death? And these are questions that we all ask about ourselves still today and hes incredibly relevant to our world, because he lived in this kind of can-do society, 5th century Athens, where everything was going very well, there was a lot of materialism, they were expanding their empire. But suddenly, everything collapses, democracy doesnt seem to have the answer to everything, its not a panacea, and Socrates is almost a prophet for our age, because he says: what is the point of all of this, what is the point of glittering statues, city walls and beautiful warships if those who live in these cities are not happy? So I think he asks an important question of our time JM: Which indeed is being asked at this moment, by the Prime Minister. Alright, now convince this same class that Latin and Greek are worth the effort. BH: Well whats interestingI think my battle would be half-won, if I were to go into that classroom, erm because we know, Im the President of a thing called JACT (Joint Association of Classical Teachers) and with Friends of Classics we did an independent survey and between 70 and 76% of the pupils we spoke to in 1000 schools all told us that they desperately wanted to learn classical subjects, they wanted to learn Latin, Greek and Classical Civilisation. But the terrible situation that were in now is that between 60 and 70 classics teachers retire every year, only 27 are being trained, so they are not being met, their desires are not being met. JM: But did they say, because you know I suspect those of them who had parents who went through it, the parents who say Oh my goodness, do you really want to go through, you know, The farmer threw a spear at the barbarian? for instance, she says, with memory. [chuckles] BH: Indeed. Amo, amas, amat, and all that. Well I think actually that is one of the reasons they do want to learn, because they think that this is this special code-breaking that they as the next generation can do. Er, they love classical subjects. They go in their thousands, their tens of thousands, their millions to films about the classical world. This film about Sparta called The Three Hundred [sic] took 72 million dollars in its first weekend, and most of those were 14 and 15 year-old kids who were desperate to find out about the ancient world. So it sparks their imagination, and actually what is very interesting is that theyre voting with their feet and theyre saying Please, can you teach us more? We want to learn. JM: But when, politically, you find, alright a former-former-former Education Secretary, Charles Clark, saying Oh, education for its own sake is a bit dodgy, how do you counter that political view? BH: [sighs] I mean, thats just daft, isnt it. Because what do we want out of our next generation? We want them to be enlightened and inspired and stimulated, surely, we want theirs to be a generation that has open minds, rather than closed minds. But there are also incredibly practical results that come out of learning Latin and Greek. Er, most of the European languages, all of the Romance languages, are based on Latin. Between 40 and 60% of the words that you and I are speaking now are Greco-Roman in origin, so actually it makes you a great linguist, to learn these subjects, and of course it also teaches you about why we live the way we do. The fact that we have this word democracy, that we have politics &#8211; it is a greek word, politics &#8211; helps you to understand the modern world if you, if you know more vividly, and with more nuance, where those words and ideas came from. JM: But how impressed do you think an employer would be, with a kid with straight-As in Latin, Greek and Ancient History, as opposed to the one whos done Business, Finance, and I.T.? BH: The fantastic thing, we have some great statistics, luckily, to back up our campaign. If you talk to Cambridge University, theyll tell you that of all their Arts graduates, excluding law students, if you call law students Arts graduates, classicists are the most highly employable. And actually, if you go to businesses, across the board, particularly international businesses, they love a classical degree, because it shows you can deal with quite complex data, it shows that you have an interest in the wider world, and it also shows that you have a fundamental interest in humanity, and increasingly, businesses of all kinds are realising that thats an absolutely essential skill to have. JM: How did you get your classical education? BH: Well, I was very lucky. I got a scholarship to a school where there were still classics teachers. There were only three of us who learnt I mean at this time it was very unfashionable, it was on its way out but they were brilliant teachers: Veronica Anstee and Mary Sergeant and they inspired us to love this subject. And I think I carried on with it partly in a slightly bloody-minded way because I thought: this is SO important and it teaches us so much we cannot allow it to die. JM: And how do you retain that passion for it? BH: Because the whole world is in antiquity. If you look to the distant past, you see yourself and you understand why we live as we do. And apart from that, there are just fantastic stories in antiquity. I love the fact that the poet Sappho first described love as bitter-sweet 26 centuries ago. Although, in fact, she called it sweet-bitter, which is much more accurate! JM: But why do people say, Ooeurgh, its such an elitist pursuit, oh, she had the benefit of a classical education, lah-di-lah-di-lah BH: Again, isnt that terrible? It was lost from schools partly because people said: this is an elitist subject. How do you make a subject elitist? By only teaching it in the most elite schools. So, we know that state schools across the country are genuinely desperate I get about 100 emails a week from children saying I want to learn more so we set up this campaign purely so that we can meet that need. JM: But what about the teachers? I think youre losing about 60 or 70 classics teachers retiring each year. How are you filling up those gaps? BH: We are, we are losing that number of classics teachers. The good news, though, is that the numbers of students in universities at the moment are 12,000 studying classical subjects, thats the highest level its been at for ten years. So actually, in three or four years time, were going to have a lot of very classically-educated young people who are going to be available to teach, and what our campaign is going to do is to give grants to schools who want to invite those new teachers into their schools to do the work. JM: Well, Bettany Hughes, thank you very much indeed for being with us. [plugs BMs book]&#8221;]]></description>
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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Digging for Britain</title>
		<link>http://loveofhistory.com/digging-for-britain/</link>
		<comments>http://loveofhistory.com/digging-for-britain/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 15 Oct 2010 20:06:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[constantinakatsari]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Archaeology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[archaeologist]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[BBC]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Digging for Britain]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://constantinakatsari.wordpress.com/?p=782</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I have received the following email from Gemma Hagen in the BBC that may be of interest to some of you. Please, ignore the exaggerated tone of triumph. It may be a great opportunity for a young archaeologist to advertise his/ her project. &#8220;Great news! We will be making series two of Digging for Britain. We hope to start filming in early 2011. I’m delighted to say that the whole of Digging for Britain has been a success and rated really well with our audience. The final viewing figures for the Roman programme came in at 2.75 million which is absolutely enormous for BBC2 these days. To put it into context, the viewing figures for the 9pm slot on Thursday evenings have dropped back to 1.6 million after the series finished, which these days is normal for this time on BBC2. Received equally well by the critics, the preview in the Times said that “if archaeology had a World Cup, this would be the finals” and Time Out Magazine called it “exemplary stuff”. Digging for Britain has also helped to give archaeology a really high profile in the press in the last couple of months – with some of our exclusive stories hitting headlines around the world! Such as the following two stories….. Hambleden Infanticide http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10384460 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/7853419/Romans-killed-babies-at-brothel.html Frome Hoard http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1292990/Chef-Dave-Crisp-discovers-largest-hoard-Roman-coins-Somerset-field.html And for series two we are already looking for great archaeology stories, and so if you have something coming up, or in the pipeline – whether this be field work, marine archaeology, lab work, skeletal work, conservation, post-ex analysis, community archaeology projects – or anything in between– we would love to hear about it as we will be researching and developing the stories between now and production in 2011. Please do not hesitate to call me if you have a story in mind – my mobile is always on 07818 532230 – or drop me an email. Gemma Hagen]]></description>
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