IDEAS is a deep-dive into contemporary thought and intellectual history. No topic is off-limits. In the age of clickbait and superficial headlines, it's for people who like to think.
225 episodes transcribedFeeling the weight of a world? A lecture on hope might be a much needed balm. Scholar Shannon Murray shares lesson in hope, patience, empathy and 'fre...
Living in modern society is hard and so people often turn to the "mystical marketplace" where Westerners consume Eastern traditions to find some kind...
The burning of fossil fuels causes the past, present and future to collide in destructive ways. In her fourth Massey Lecture, Astra Taylor tells us th...
Our series, looking at pivotal years in recent history, continues as we focus on the year 1963. Martin Luther King, Jr. leads a march on Washington, t...
English may have a reputation for being a "linguistic imperialist," pushing local languages into obscurity but linguist Mario Saraceni argues English...
Négritude was a Francophone movement to rethink what it meant to be Black and African. Scholar Merve Fejzula explores the dynamic debates happening in...
A cotton sack from the time of slavery bears the first names of a mother and her daughter, who was sold at the age of nine. Harvard historian Tiya Mil...
It’s a paradox — we live in the most prosperous era in human history, but it’s also an era of profound insecurity. Massey Lecturer Astra Taylor sugges...
On the eve of the Second World War, Hitler annexes Austria and escalates antisemitic persecution, Japan wages war on China, and the parallel collapse...
Tested is a new podcast series from CBC and NPR that asks the question, who gets to compete? Since the beginning of women’s sports, there has be...
How should we fill our time, and what is most important to remember? Giller Prize-winning novelist and poet Ian Williams looks at the meaning of life,...
For nearly five years, Turkey imprisoned one of its most significant writers. Fifty-one Nobel laureates called for his release. Now free, the resilien...
Celebrated Turkish writer Ahmet Altan spent almost five years in jail. He wrote his memoir which was smuggled out on bits of paper. This episode aired...
In Astra Taylor's second Massey Lecture, she argues our social order runs on insecurity. But we’re also guaranteed the right to “security of the perso...
After the First World War, the Western powers create new borders and carve out spheres of influence, leaders from the Global South fight for self-dete...
Arthur Schafer taught ethics to medical students in 1972. His 50-year career put the philosopher at the heart of major ethical debates like MAID. Scha...
Christina Sharpe's award-winning book, Ordinary Notes, explores the complexity of Black life — blending memoir, history, cultural and political critiq...
The Sermon on the Mount is one of the greatest gifts of scripture to humanity; just ask Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., and Leo Tolstoy. But w...
Insecurity has become a "defining feature of our time," says CBC Massey lecturer Astra Taylor. The Winnipeg-born writer and filmmaker explores how ris...
For award-winning poet and bestselling author Ross Gay, joy and delight aren’t frivolous or a privilege. He argues they’re absolutely essential to a m...
