Woman's Hour - Rachel Wood & Dr Penny Coombes Monicah Kamandau, Brianna Fruean & Farhana Yamin , Dani Larkin, Dr Asma Khalil

Episode Date: November 5, 2021

Following last week’s astounding discovery of a set of Roman sculptures on the HS2 rail link route in Stoke Mandeville, we hear from the lead archaeologist for HS2 contractor Fusion Rachel Wood and also from Dr Penny Coombes, a Teaching Associate in Roman Archaeology at the University of Sheffield. Studies consistently show that women are more vulnerable than men to the impacts of climate change. This is due to women being more likely to live in poverty, more likely to be dependent on the land and natural resources in their day to day lives, and less likely to hold positions of power that could bring about change. Given the stakes, we ask if these women from developing countries are being heard at the climate conference COP26? Anita Rani talks to Monicah Kamandau from Kenya, Brianna Fruean from Samoa and Farhana Yamin, an expert in environmental law and giving a voice to vulnerable nations in international climate negotiations.When you look back over your relationships do you see patterns? Today the story of a woman we are calling Katy who feels that her earliest experiences shaped what she looked for and needed from her partners.And Dani Larkin, a folk musician from the Armagh-Monaghan border joins Anita live in the studio, along with her banjo, to perform her new single – Bloodthirsty!Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Lisa Jenkinson Studio Engineer: Bob Nettles..

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme, peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning and how are you? I say that because I've had this dreaded cold that's going round and it is a lingerer and I'm sharing this with you as a mark of unity with anyone else suffering out there. So for the next hour at least, I hope to take your minds off the excess phlegm with a packed show. Sorry about it being so graphic. Today we will be in the presence of greatness. Moira Stewart will be joining me to discuss the extraordinary contributions of the women in her family to World War II.

Where unearthing sculptures from 1500 years ago there's been a rare and very exciting discovery of roman busts in stoke mandeville i'll be finding out just how astounding this unearthing is and what it tells us about the romans apart from that they were hanging out in buckinghamshire and joy of joys we have some live music in store for you alt folk singer songwriter danny larkin will be here to talk about her beautiful debut album notes for a maiden warrior feel free to send me your thoughts on anything you hear in the show your stories and opinions are welcome you can text me on 84844 text will be charged at your standard message rate or you can also contact us via social media it's at bbc or you can email us through our website but first

the first woman ever has been chosen to write a james bond novel award-winning author kim sherwood is to write three new books set in the iconic world of James Bond, published by HarperCollins and Ian Fleming Publications. The books are now set in a world without Bond and a new generation of secret agents tasked with fighting a global threat. Kim has described Bond as one of the enduring loves of her life and I caught up with her just before we came on air. Congratulations, Kim.

Thank you so much. Thank you for having me on. It's absolutely my pleasure to welcome you on to Woman's Hour as the first woman who's going to write for this franchise. And this is really a dream come true for you, isn't it? Oh, absolutely. This is a lifelong dream come true for me. I mean, I used to joke to anybody who would listen to me,

one day I'm going to write James Bond, but I didn't expect that that would come true for me. I mean, I used to joke to anybody who would listen to me, one day I'm going to write James Bond, but I didn't expect that that would come true. So this is amazing. And I know that for a fact, because we know someone who knows you, who went to nursery with you, who works in the Woman's Hour office, and they said that they remember you saying that when you were tiny. Absolutely. I mean, I was, you know, I was writing little spy stories in Invisible Ink as a kid. And I just fell in love with Bond first through the films and then reading Ian Fleming's novels. And it's been a lifelong love for me.

So who's your Bond? Oh, gosh, it's such a hard question. So my Bond is Pierce Brosnan, because that's the Bond I grew up with. Of course, Sean Connery is iconic. Daniel Craig has done an incredible job reinvigorating this hero as a human being. But for me, Pierce Brosnan's just that smile, just those eyes. It's a controversial choice, but you know what? Everyone has their own.

I mean, mine's Roger Moore, but that's because the man with the golden gun. But anyway, enough of talking about Bond, because we are moving on now, aren't we? Because this is the whole point. You have been brought in to write a trilogy about 00 agents, but Bond is not in the picture anymore. So James Bond is missing. He might be captured. He might be killed. We don't know. And the trilogy will follow a new cast of 00 agents. I mean, this is a very clever thing for them to have thought to do because who doesn't love a spy story but it's the time is right for to modernize this franchise correct? I think so I think James Bond has remained

an evergreen symbol for Britain because he can change with us and what I have the opportunity to do now is to expand that universe for the first time and to create an ensemble cast of heroes who we can all identify with oh so what can you tell us come on give me some can you give us any clues as to what you're going to do what kind of characters have you got in your head you don't have to give too much away because we want the surprise absolutely I mean if I if I tell, I might have to kill you. Like a spy. What I can say is that, of course, the 00 sector, we've always followed 007 before, but there are many other spies who you occasionally hear of in the background of Fleming's novels.

And that gives me this incredible range to be able to have a whole group of heroes on missions around the world, all of whom are from different backgrounds. And that's been really exciting for me as a writer. Very exciting, I'm sure, for lots of aspiring young actors who've always wanted to be part of the Bond franchise, the idea that, oh, there might be a variety of characters now. What about some of the key characters that we have grown to love, like Miss Moneypenny, M, Q? Will they be sticking around? So I can say that Moneypenny will be there.

I can say that there is an M. Of course, M has evolved through the series. I can't comment on any other characters, but I can say that some old favourites are a good term. Now, Kim, you won an award for your debut book, Testament. And so we know that you are a brilliant writer. But in terms of who has been chosen to write for the Bond novels in the past, we've got Kingsley Amis, Sebastian Fox, Anthony Horowitz.

And here you are, I mean, a relative, unknown, you know, they've brought you in, and the first woman. Do you feel the pressure? Well, it's an honour, isn't it, to be in that list of luminaries. I should say as well that the, of course, the writers for Bond film and novels. There's been this incredible continuation line, and I'm actually joining an amazing line of women. So Samantha Weinberg wrote the Moneypenny Diaries.

The Doctor No, the first Bond film, Out from Russia with Love, co-written by a woman, Johanna Harwood. And of course, Stevie Waterbridge joined on No Time to Die. So I feel like I'm joining this incredible network of women as well as men. And to write in a line that includes Sebastian Fawkes, that includes Anthony Horowitz, whose Alex Ryder series I loved growing up, that's just an incredible thrill for me. I think your dog is very happy about it as well. We can hear someone getting very excited in the background. So when will we get to read the first one?

When can we, because we're all getting very excited at Women's RHQ. That's lovely to hear. The first novel will be released September 2022. And I've got to ask, Bond girls, what will become of the Bond girl? What I can say is that for me, it's always been really interesting, the difference between the women of Bond in the novels and some of the films, particularly the older films. I think sometimes the complexity and the rounded characters of the women in the books has been overlooked you know of course the books are products of their time but they're products of their time in all ways so they also represented the changes in feminism at that time and I'm trying to pick up on that I

want to bring a feminist perspective to the canon as a young woman writer and I want to honor what's come before but also create something new and create a space for all of us to be heroes in this universe. And as you said, you know, Bond is such an iconic British character, but Britain has changed so much. And I love that you said that you're going to be bringing a feminist perspective, but, you know, we're living post Me Too, Black Lives Matter, the world is very different

to when Fleming was writing. Absolutely. perspective but you know we're living post me too black lives matter the world is very different to when Fleming was writing absolutely and I think that um you know the the films and the Fleming estate uh who run the novels have have responded to that it's a malleable symbol I think that's why it's lasted as you say we're in we're in a very different world now to to Fleming's novels and in some ways the world Fleming was writing about didn't exist. You know, he was writing about this luxurious, materialistic world where Britain had major significance on the international stage. And he was writing that post-war. He was writing that during changes in Britain's imperialism. So I think Bond has always been a fantasy, but it's a fantasy that can reflect us and shape us.

And I'm so excited to get to be part of that for a contemporary world. We are very excited as well. We love that you landed the job of your dreams, Kim. That's so brilliant. It's such a nice thing to hear. I've got to ask what's your favorite bond film favorite bond film from rust with love very nice very good well come back and

talk to us again you're more than welcome anytime and congratulations once again thank you so much thanks for having me kim sherwood imagine that land the job of her dreams. She imagined writing those books when she was a toddler. And here she is, landed the gig. Great story. Now, COP26 is still underway. And today on the show, we want to focus on how climate change disproportionately impacts women, particularly in what's described as the global south, which means developing countries. This is due to women being more likely to live in poverty, more likely to be dependent on the land and natural resources

in their day-to-day lives, and less likely to hold positions of power that could bring about change. Well, I'm about to talk to three powerful women who've made it their job to try and bring about change. Two young activists, Monica Kamando from Kenya and Briana Fruen from Samoa, and Farhana Yamin, a renowned international environmental lawyer

who's given a voice to vulnerable nations in international climate negotiations and who was also number two on the Women's Hour Power List 2020. Very good morning to you all. Brianna, I want to come to you first. You're actually on your way to the Climate Strike March today in Glasgow.

How has COP26 been for you so far? Good morning. Yes, I am currently at the park of the strike. So you might hear some strikers go past with the chants. COP26 so far has been good for me. I heard from a Pacific elder yesterday and he said that he was quietly optimistic. He's been to every COP and he said that he's really enjoyed the voices of the young people coming through in Glasgow. And so this has given him quite optimism. And so I'm trying to hold on to that energy and also gather more energy to put into my basket today from the strikes.

Oh, I love that. And also you brought your own very fierce energy by making a very powerful speech. I want to play a clip of your speech for our listeners, and then we'll talk about it off the back of this. I don't need to remind you the reality of vulnerable communities. If you're here today, you know what climate change is doing to us. You don't need my pain or my tears to know that we're in a crisis. The real question is whether you have the political will to do the right thing, to wield the right words, and to follow it up with long overdue action.

If you're looking for inspiration on this, look no further than the climate leadership of young Pacific people. We are not just victims to this crisis, we have been resilient beacons of hope. Pacific youth have rallied behind the cry, we are not drowning. We are fighting. This is our warrior cry to the world. We are not drowning. We are fighting. Powerful words, Brianna. We are not drowning. We are fighting. But do you feel that your voice as a young woman from Samoa and the Pacific Climate Warriors has been heard? I feel like our voice by year gets more and more heard. So I started doing climate work in 2009. And I've always been saying this phrase, we are not drowning, we're fighting

collectively with young Pacific activists. And only this year has it really been heard as wide as it has been. And so it's been hard to try and fight for space especially as pacific islanders in the climate space but every year i feel like we're making more and more progress you started you said you became a climate change warrior when in 2009 were you 11 at that time what what happened what what drew your attention to it I was 11 years old when I learned about climate change and so it was a part of our science class in primary school and um I remember the teacher telling me that climate change could mean an island like Tokelau which is my grandma's island um would be gone in 50 years and that that's what inspired me

to get into this movement um and I didn't want to wait. And I was really lucky to have parents who supported me and said, if you want to save the world, let's do it. And my family and my community, my village really rallied behind me. And that's how I'm here today. I'm really a product of a village who raised me and supported me. I'm going to bring in another very powerful voice, Monica. Monica, you've come over from Kenya, you're working for ActionAid and you've led a global climate campaign from nine global South countries. How heard do you feel as a woman from that part of the world

in these climate discussions? Good morning. Good morning. Yeah, I am travelling with ActionAid Kenya. ActionAid. I come from Kenya and this year I have been working with nine countries, working with activists who are working around climate change and calling for climate justice. But as an activist, I did not necessarily have one defining moment like Brianna said, which got me into activism. For me, it has been a journey. I am born in a community that is very

patriarchal. So for me, even when I became an activist, I didn't necessarily go into climate change. I started with experiences like girls not going to school. I live by the base of Mount Kenya in a town called Anuki. And the highest number of people there are pastoralists. And we have this community that is called the Maasai, who are my neighbors. And I could see girls as young as 12 getting married off. So this is what got me into activism. And over time, my activism lens changes from SGBV to climate change

in the recent years because of the reality that is hitting my country with long periods of drought. Yeah. Tell me more about the realities of climate change that are affecting Kenya. Yeah. This year, we have had quite a change. So last year, we had quite a long drought. And then the rains came early this year.

So what has happened is we went the other direction. So we have so much rainfall that there is flooding, which means it doesn't help the farmers because then the crops get carried away and anything that is left in the farm either rots or just is washed away so there is that issue of flooding going on across the country but specifically in my county like here what has happened is that with long periods of drought, as I said, people there keep livestock. There has been an issue that came up between farmers and livestock keepers because livestock keepers want the best for their cows and they want to get pasture. And farmers want to make sure their farms are protected.

So in an area called Olmora, there has been crashes going on where livestock keepers have been raiding farms and kicking people out of their farms to just make sure they occupy that area. And I know this might come up, I do not want to disregard the historical land injustices that go on in Kenya and that specifically like Kipia has. But when I look at climate change, I also think these people have coexisted for quite a while. And the reality that now they're fighting is the fact that we are at a point where it's struggle for survival, where cattle keepers feel like I might not have any other option than to kick out my neighbor so that my cattle can graze in their land or in their farm. So that is the current situation. I'm going to bring Fahana in. Now Fahana, you're in Glasgow too, working with the

Climate Vulnerable Forum. Tell us a bit about the forum and also respond to what you've heard from Brianna and Monica, these two very powerful young voices that are speaking at the conference, but are they being heard? They are. So, you know, please keep on with your brilliant work. And, you know, it gives me great hope that they are speaking up,

that there is a new generation. Frankly, I'm tired. I've been in this for 30 years. So I feel sometimes I did come to Glasgow with a broken heart, but hearing the voices of our young, and they are being heard. But obviously what's sad is that we have to sort of shout and we have to come with such devastating news, as Monica has just said, that, you know, this is a matter of

survival now. People are, literally, you cannot survive for more than a day without water. Cattle cannot survive, on which the livelihoods of so many people depend. Women are finding it very, very difficult in those drought-stressed countries. Typhoons are hitting, cyclones are hitting, destroying homes. and i'm here to help them i lurk around in the background you know telling them a little bit of advice and assistance on how the arcane legal regime works and what might be helpful and giving them a little bit of institutional memory to help their work you said you arrived with a broken heart what do you mean by that well this uh we're facing the devastation that we are

because of so many broken promises, you know, and broken promises that we enshrined in three different treaties, including the Paris Agreement. We're here because countries, the richest countries, the G20, have not delivered the ambition. They did not deliver the 100 billion

that was promised in 2009, Brianna, when you were first becoming aware of climate change. And they're still not delivering. So we're having to fight. You know, I can't believe in some way that we're having to fight for the 100 billion gold that we fought for. My president that I was advising then, the president of the Maldives, this is what we were fighting for. And we were fighting for 1.5 in 2009. That's when it was first put into the negotiations and we demanded 1.5 be included. So I'm heartened that we're making progress,

but just exhausted and frustrated that we're still at this point. But it's a good day because for the first time with the announcement of the many initiatives, with the announcements that have come forward, global emissions, if all the promises are kept, could come under two degrees, like 1.9, 1.9. So that's nowhere near 1.5, nowhere near 1.5,

but at least we're making progress. And I want to encourage Brianna, Monica, and all the thousands of strikers here and around the world to carry on. You need to hold these powerful companies, these powerful countries, the politicians that have ignored science for some time to come because they're too slow and they're not acting fast enough. So let's hear again from Brianna and Monica. I want to hear about your own daily sort of lived experience really Brianna if I'm going to come to you first because we're talking about how climate change

disproportionately affects women um so tell me Brianna a little bit about your own life and the lives of your family and how climate change impacts you yeah so I actually grew up in Samoa in a low-lying coastal area that would always get hit by floods. And when there was a cyclone, it would always flood. And so my lived experience is very much, I know what the smell of mud smells like. I don't know if you've ever been in a natural disaster when there's a flood and then mud sticks to the wall and it will only smell if it's been there for a long time. And like I can, when I like think about it, I can smell that smell because I've smelled it so many times after cleaning up cyclones and scooping that mud out of homes. And that's my lived

experience. I've seen young girls walk through floods smiling and laughing because they were so used to it. They don't know any other life besides every January and December, packing up their homes and moving to their auntie or uncle's village so that they're not there for the flood. But I've also seen the resilience of our people after these natural disasters coming back and rebuilding. And there's a phrase in Samoan culture that goes, if a fool, which means the crown of thorns heals itself. And that's true to our community, is that after the disaster, we don't sit around and wait for a foreign aid to come and help us. We get up, we rebuild, we're scooping mud out of our houses.

And that's our everyday experience. And I think a lot of the times it's our women that really lead this charge. Domestic violence rates go up almost by 20% in the villages that are most impacted because all the pressure of the village is on the women. So already that societal issue is further catalyzed by the climate issue. So that's why it's so important to have these voices. Absolutely. And Monica, your mother is a farmer. My mother loves farming. She is a farmer at heart. Although with the current

situations, she's not farming much. When I was growing up, we lived in a village. So like mud walled, iron sheet roofed houses next to each other. And behind our house, there was a patch of land that my mother grew her vegetables. Until I was 15, we never had to buy onions. We never had to buy kale, spinach, all those things that you need for your kitchen. And this was like a tiny piece of land right behind her house. And over time, I learned to enjoy like going, when we were making dinner, my mom would go like, could you get the onions from the farm? So you just run behind the house and get the onions and come make dinner. Right now, my mom has her own land.

And I go home and feel so devastated that I have to go to the market to get onions. I have to go to the market to get spinach. I have to go to the market to get things that my mom used to show me how to grow and used to get me pick from the garden when I was growing up and as much as she loves farming the reality is in the town I live when the dry season hits it really hits we depend on a river that passes near our home for daily water use and when it dries it means we'll have to walk a bit further to get to a bigger river where we can get get water and as a young girl I would walk with a group of other girls and carry 20 liters cans to go get water and bring it back home and these are issues that I see

of course the women trying to adapt and make sure that they get a bit of a tank. If you have a bit of money, you save up, get a water tank so that you do not have to walk so far. But it means that every other year, these women go through the same things. And as Brianna said, then this also opens up issues of harassment, of GPV, because if girls have to walk longer to find water that time yeah it creates a lot of vulnerability to them um for hannah the un says 80 of people displaced by climate change are women how important is it to have women around the table and particularly

these young women in these negotiations it's absolutely critical because as you're hearing, these sorts of issues are not known and you wouldn't anticipate or know about them unless these lived realities, these actual experiences are voiced. And I'm afraid most of the negotiators, especially the senior negotiators, are still men and they're very, very unaware in many cases of the realities that most of the world's farming is done by women so outside of the west most farmers are women in in the world and they're

very directly impacted they're small-scale farmers feeding their their homes their villages uh extended families and so they're seeing firsthand the experience of climate on what they do every day. And here in the negotiations, you know, we're arguing as vulnerable countries, as vulnerable communities for the recognition of what's called loss and damage. It was recognized and it's included in, as I said, in the Paris Agreement. But there's a tremendous resistance now to actually accepting that harm is happening. So why are people bearing these awful consequences? So how will it, and very quickly, why will it be any different now? You've been working in this, in climate change for 30 years.

You turned up with a broken heart. Is your heart mending? Are we going to see a change? Are these voices being heard? Absolutely. It's only the end of week one and we've got a whole eight days to influence and shape and hopefully the hearts of all of those watching the hearts of all of those listening will be open to the realities that you know these young women remarkably are bringing so that energy is helping me heal and I know that there's

compassion and solidarity and kindness in the world too and we can draw on that and ordinary listeners you know will know that thank you so much for speaking to me this morning monica commando and brianna fruen and for hannah yamin monica and brianna more power to you and keep us posted at women's hour with how it's going 84844 is the number to text tell Tell me what you thought about hearing those stories of the day-to-day reality of living in a country where climate change is impacting your life in such a stark way.

Now, it's been a very exciting week in the world of archaeology. The HS2 rail link route has unearthed two astounding sets of Roman sculptures. They appear to be a man and a woman plus the head of a girl child and were found at an abandoned medieval church in Buckinghamshire. The discoveries at the old St Mary's Church in Stoke Mandeville have been sent for specialist analysis.

And we are joined now by Dr Rachel Wood, the lead archaeologist for HS2 contractor Fusion JV, and Penny Coombe, a teaching associate in Roman archaeology at the University of Sheffield. And she's published extensively on Roman British sculpture. And they're here to tell us all about it. Rachel, I'm going to come to you first. What did you find? And how excited are you on a scale of one to ten?

I think it goes beyond ten. So we are working at the site of Old St Mary's Church, Stoke Mandeville. It's a couple of kilometres south of the modern village and we were there excavating a medieval church and churchyard which of itself is an amazing opportunity because that doesn't really ever happen. Obviously, churches are still in use, most of them. And one of our questions is why is the church in the middle of the field and separated from the village? It turns out that the old village was where the new village is. So the village is where it always has been, so why is our church in the middle of a field? Well it seems to be because that piece of land has had significance

long before the Normans built it in 1080. We were greatly surprised to find the footings of what we think currently is a Roman mausoleum structure, so a place of burial, and it's encompassed by a circular ditch and all of this is beneath the footings of the Norman church and from the kind of demolition rubble we excavated from the circular enclosure ditch we found these amazing sculptures. They're so well preserved and whilst the heads are no longer attached to the shoulders, they've been broken at some point. Yeah. They're really, really well preserved. And they're just such amazing looking at these faces. I'm going to bring Penny in here. I mean, Penny, you must be absolutely thrilled. This is your jam. This is this is it. You are the expert in this British Roman sculpture.

How common is it to find Roman sculpture in Britain? Good morning. Yes, it's really exciting. And these are really unusual finds. So what we have here, as you've said, are three heads and two busts. So the head's fitting onto the shoulders. So not a full sculpture, not a full figure. And they seem to be from these funerary or commemorative burial contexts. And something in this form is really unusual and really exciting.

But in Britain, we do have Roman sculpture, a fair amount, not on the scale that you'd find in Italy or Greece, for instance, but we do have carved stone and images, a few in bronze. In Britain, they tend to be from the Roman period in 2D, so carved in relief of deities, for instance, on altars or tombstones. So to find something like this in a kind of 3D in the round in such a great state of preservation is really, really exciting. And how common is it um to find sculptures or portraits of women rachel well as penny was just saying normally they're kind of of gods or deities um you you might also get them of emperors for example um but to to find ones of women was quite

um yeah it's a bit of a surprise you don't normally get depictions of people that are that old anyway and certainly um when we think they they might actually be of real romans rather than an emperor or a god or a deity so we're really hoping that specialists will be able to tell us more about that what do do we know about them? Who are they? What did they do? What do we know? Well we're certainly hoping the specialists will be able to answer quite a few of these questions for us. They could still be of an emperor and an empress for example but they just look when you look at them they just look very normal, wealthy but normal looking and we do know that a few hundred meters away up on the hill um overlooking our church site was a roman settlement and so it could be that the mausoleum belongs to that

settlement and we could be looking at the faces of the romans who lived um in that piece of land wow i mean so basically it's like a family portrait and penny i hear that the hairdos especially on the female sculptures are a bit of a clue to finding out a bit more about them. Yeah, that's right. So the hairdos that we see on the women's head and the girl's head seem to be a kind of in a plait that's been coiled on top of their head. And you can often look at the hairdos of Roman sculptures to understand kind of the fashions of the day so you might think about the empress the the emperor's wife as really setting the fashion and then images that are similar to that might be picked up around the empire and people kind of get really you know follow that kind of fashion so the one that we see here and I haven't looked at it

closely so I should caveat some of this but it seems to be of a kind of early second century maybe mid-second century kind of type but um yeah we can look for parallels in in other sculptures to kind of see where these influences were coming from and and what dates we could even suggest potentially for this and I know I know they've gone off to kind of be looked at in depth but how can we be sure they are from the Roman era um they they they just look Roman sculpture has a particular style to it um and whilst um there was a habit of creating kind of Roman style busts again in the kind of Jane Austen period. We know that stratigraphically, these are buried beneath a Norman foundation layer and that layer had not been interrupted. So those sculptures must have been put in the ground

before 1080. And they certainly do not look in the Saxon style. So that would put them in Roman style. Well, it's very exciting stuff. Thank you both for joining me to tell me all about it. That's Dr. Rachel Wood and Dr. Penny Coombe. Now, Dani Larkin is a singer, songwriter and alt-folk musician from the Amhar-Monaghan border. Her debut album, Notes for a Maiden Warrior, received widespread critical acclaim and was nominated for Best Album at this year's Northern Ireland Music Prize.

She recently opened the show for Snow Patrol, no less, to a sold-out London Palladium and is hotly tipped as one to watch. She's currently on tour, has a new single out, Bloodthirsty, and she joins me now live in the studio. Welcome, Dani. Oh, what an absolute treat, Anita. Thank you so much for having me. The treat is my treat.

This is great. And you've brought your banjo as well. I can't wait. You are going to be singing live for us. You're in the middle of a tour here in England. You played Newcastle. And I read on your Instagram, you fell in love. I completely fell in love. As soon as we entered into Newcastle, I was like, where has this place been all my life? You know, it feels like a new spiritual home. And yeah, I was treated with open arms and big hearts. And I can't ask for more than

that. Absolutely. Now you're a musician and a storyteller. Is that something you grew up with? Yeah, absolutely. I might sound a bit shy or naive when I say this, but every Sunday evening, how I would relate to my family or how we would relate to each other is in telling stories and sharing songs. And I hadn't realised that everybody, you know, not everybody had that

experience until I left home. But that experience completely sent the foundation for my own sense of songwriting and storytelling and how I moved through the world. Oh, I love that. In what way? Tell me, take us into your home on a Sunday night. What would be going on? Well, I guess, depending on what age you were would absolutely depend on how late you stayed up. But whatever play you'd written that week, whatever Irish dancing you'd learned that week you know everything everything was accepted and celebrated um and I guess as well it was also just a chance to kind of catch up with people um as lives become busier something that's really important to me is take that time to relate to the people that you love. And that's where I really got that from as well.

And well, love brings us onto the themes that you cover in your songwriting. I did describe you as a storyteller. So tell us a bit about what stories you've weaved through the album. Yeah. So the album is very much an album of two halves. The first half is rooted in this idea of Celtic mythology and folklore. And the second half is around the concept of love and how love can create change and transformation. And then the album ends in mystery.

So for me, it's a very personal journey from start to finish, but also kind of taps into a lot of the themes that we're experiencing in terms of the old and new now and harken back to the old to understand where we are and how we can create change moving forward. I think we should hear some music. I'm going to play a clip. But before we get to something live, let's hear something from the album.

I think this is Love Part Three. Wrap your arms around me Sweet Wrap your arms around me Sweet Beautiful. Absolutely stunning. The debut album, Notes for a Maiden Warrior, why that title? What's it mean? Yeah, so the notes are the songs themselves.

The maiden refers to the first aspect of womanhood or femininity in Celtic mythology and also a Jungian archetype. So it's maiden, mother, crone. And then warrior refers to, I'm from the province of Ulster, which is known as the warrior province on the island of Ireland. So it's very much rooted in that sense of place and that warrior sense, perhaps not in a traditionally masculine or violent way as we currently understand it, but more in terms of the wildness and strength and resilience within femininity. So yeah, I really, I'm very chuffed with the title, I have to say.

I'm very chuffed with the title. It sounds great should be it's it's it's powerful and I love that sense of kind of the warrior spirits of women and you actually tapped into your own ancestry to get your name. Yeah I did so Larkin the surname Larkin is the maternal grant my maternal great-grandmother's name that disappeared from the family over 100 years ago and I was on a residency just before the pandemic began in the countryside. And I phoned my mum and I was like, there's something I'm missing. I don't know what it is. Can you give me the names of my grandparents and the maiden names as well? And Larkin came up and I said, OK, there's something there.

I don't know what it is. And then I phoned my granddad and I asked him if I could use it for music, essentially. And he joked and he said, I don't know. I'm not sure about that. And I was like, oh, dear, have I offended him? And then he said, absolutely. I think your grandmother would have been delighted. And it's really it's not only given me a sense of place and home, but a sense of newness that I really am very much enjoying as well.

It's so interesting, actually, Dani. I'm going to be speaking to Moira Stewart in a moment about her own ancestry and what she's learned about the women in her family and what they did during World War II. But, you know, unless we ask these questions, we will never discover anything. And it opens up all these new conversations and it really does connect us with something that we didn't even know about ourselves, doesn't it? Yeah. And I find that so beautiful. I mean, my background is in history as well. So I'm forever asking questions and it's the greatest resource I honestly believe that we have at our disposal is ask people questions. It's so important because like you say, once they've gone, they've gone.

You know, we all feel it. As soon as we lose a grand a grandparent the first thing I felt was why didn't I ask them more questions whilst they were here. You've got a track called Three Wise Women you end your shows with it tell me about that. Oh I love Three Wise Women. It came out of a place of need for me I think I needed Three Wise women at the time. You know, the first woman or the first verse is someone that gives me my name or gives the protagonist their name. The second is about music and joy and dancing in the forest. And the third is about howling with wildness and nature. And there's a part of the song that says dive in for ancestors. And that's rooted in an experience that I had when I was very fortunate to be on a residency program in Indonesia in the

Balinese mountains. And I got to swim with these beautiful women at New Year's and we all dove for ancestors. And I just was a complete sense of renewal. And I carry it with me every day. And every opportunity I get to sing that song and leave it with people it just it fills my heart. Tell me what they meant by that when they were diving for ancestors. Yeah it was the first time I'd ever heard anyone say that you know and I was like oh my goodness is it okay to dive for ancestors is this am I connected enough to myself and where I've come from and understanding of the situation to do that and mostly actually I do have a deep fear of water so there was a lot going on at the time

but for me it was very much a sense of solidarity and an acknowledgement of where we've come from what has come before and not to take that for granted. And was it you know being in a foreign country thinking about your ancestors did that have an impact because for me when you said dive for ancestors i felt an instinct connection to it because for me being of indian heritage i often think about my ancestors in a faraway land no so being diving for ancestors in bali did it make you think about you know back home and island yeah it really did and thank you for sharing because you know it's in these conversations that we can connect with each other

and for my my sense of home I think my mother my mother doesn't even know that I did that so maybe she does now that she's listening but um I was in very good company where um that sense of ancestry was through every conversation that we have so it wasn't something that was out of the blue when we were in the water. It was part of an ongoing conversation over the month that I was there, which I'm very, very grateful for. So big, beautiful themes of femininity and the connection to the land and ancestors and women as warriors. I love all of this.

And you play. You play and you grew up playing guitar. But what you have in front of you is this wonderful banjo. So tell me about where the banjo turned up. Yeah, I actually got this banjo for free at a street party about three years ago. It was sitting in a box two streets over from my house and it said free to a good home. So I went and picked it up and I was like, am I just allowed to walk away with this? And as it turns out, yes, is the answer. It certainly has its own sound and its own stories to tell. And shall we hear it?

Yeah, I'll give it a go. Danny, it's been an absolute pleasure speaking to you. So Danny is now going to play live for us. This is from the album. The track is called Bloodlusty. And through the forest she runs at night And the speed of light with her spear She leaps over hills and cries

And the sound of a hunting spear Blow thirsty Danny Larkin, thank you so much. That was such a treat. The album is out, Notes for a Maiden Warrior. And good luck in Brighton tonight and London tomorrow. Now, Remembrance Day takes place next week. And many of us are, of course, fascinated by wartime stories, Brighton tonight and London tomorrow. Now, Remembrance Day takes place next week and many

of us are, of course, fascinated by wartime stories, especially those within our own families. But according to the family history research website Ancestry, more than half of us have no idea what roles our ancestors actually played during the war. Well, the broadcaster Moira Stewart is with us now. She's embarked on her own family history journey where she's discovered her mother's and two of her aunt's extraordinary contributions to World War II. Moira, welcome to Woman's Hour. Thank you so much. First of all, how wonderful was Danny?

Wasn't that fabulous? What a singer, what a song. Amazing. And, you know, we were talking about asking questions about our family. So you have delved deep through ancestry. What have you discovered about your own family's wartime history? Well, there have obviously been many, many conversations over the years. But what Ancestry introduced me to in years back, 2004, Who Do You Think You Are?, was that my aunt, eldest aunt, was not only serving in the WAFs,

but was actually on film, on a BBC film, would you believe? They are nice. And I couldn't believe that the woman I met much, much later in her life was such a wonderful young woman, looked gorgeous in her uniform, and was on the brink of her life, of her adult life. My mother was the youngest of four sisters who came to England from Bermuda via New York in 1935, and it was to finish their education. But by the time my mother was 17, she was a probationary nurse at the Queen Elizabeth, sorry, Queen Mary Hospital in

Karshawton, Surrey. And funnily enough, that was one of the most heavily bombed hospitals in the entire United Kingdom. But anyway, to actually see her name in the 1939 register, it just put more flesh on the bones of what I already knew. Did they ever talk to you about that experience? Did they ever speak about World War II? Unfortunately, my aunt I only met very fleetingly. My mother, yes. And she told me about looking after these patients who were in such distress. They range from mental health through to all kinds of physical ailments. But what she would do when the bombs were coming over was to move as many as she possibly could to underneath their beds and she'd cover the rest with her own, very, to her it was not anything exceptional. But as I've understood

over the years, I think that I have the privilege and the honor to have come not only from my mother, who's always been an inspiration, but from a generation who were very quietly courageous and did not necessarily share all of the pain, all of the absolute terror. Very stoic generation, the World War II generation. Absolutely, yes. Do you know, Moira, I remember watching your, still to this day, watching your Who Do You Think You Are?

And I will never forget hearing about your extraordinary grandmother I know we're talking about your mother on World War II but your grandmother was remarkable absolutely yes the first female woman of colour studying medicine at Edinburgh University quite extraordinary and also she I met but I never met her husband. He died before I myself visited Bermuda and actually lived in Bermuda for three years. And he, I'd always thought, was such an austere figure. He was, in fact, a parliamentarian, an activist and a general practitioner. And he just sounded so doer, so kind of difficult to warm to. But, you know, I found through Ancestry, funnily enough, that this man was, hey, as we all are, absolutely multidimensional.

And he was far more, I was so, I had intense feelings of love and admiration for my grandmother and obviously my mother and her sisters. But for him, I felt that he was far more real and accessible to me than I had expected. And he was a doctor and they lived in Scotland. Is that right? Yes, absolutely. You've got a very good memory. Can you see? And God, that's a cold place. Woo, baby. Do you know, I have got a good memory, yes.

But actually, your story stood out for me because it's very rare that we hear these stories of black British history. Exactly. It's hidden history and it shouldn't be. We need to hear these stories because this is what makes up the nation, right? And this is what is so important and particularly at this time of remembrance to actually everybody.

This was a world war, the First and the Second World War. And, you know, there are from India, from all over the world, from the Caribbean, from Africa, people all over the world, from the Caribbean, from Africa. People were doing extraordinary things, both on the front line, both in the air. But civilians were doing an amazing job of giving help, succor, and sharing. My mother would tell me about rationing and how one person would have an egg and somebody else would have scrapings of something else and they would sort of all pool together

and actually have what passed for a meal. And it was just delicious and gorgeous and that was the way it was. And I don't want people to feel that my family members were just stoical and wonderful and sacrificing. I mean, both the aunt I met so many years later, who was in the WAFs, and my gorgeous mother, who I lost, unfortunately, three years ago. These were women of extraordinary warmth and fun and just so warm and so gorgeous. I mean, they could adorn the cover of Vogue any day. Well, Moira, we can see that.

The genetics are very strong in the family. I'm the runt of the family. Hardly, hardly. Goddess in my eyes. Actually, you mentioned soldiers from the Commonwealth. Next week on Woman's Hour, I'm going to be talking about another website that's been set up. Because actually the problem is if you do have history in those parts of the world, often you can't trace your ancestry. Well, there is a website I'll be talking about next week where people from the Punjab region will be able to try and find their family members

if they did fight in World War I and World War II. So that will be coming up next week. Tell us a bit more about Ancestry then. More than half of us are unaware of the roles played by our ancestors. So what can people do? Two billion wartime records on the website Ancestry, is that right? All you have to do is to just log on to ancestry.co.uk between the 6th and the 12th of November. It will be absolutely free

and you can locate extraordinarily important things like precious photographs you've never seen, personal letters, war diaries and military service records, which is where I found out about my aunt. I mean, it's just my eldest aunt, Barbara. But, you know, it is so accessible. And when you see that whether your family member was on the front line or was a civilian, you will understand the tribe you come from and how fabulous these people were. And as I keep on saying, apple don't fall far from the tree, and you will find that you are somebody special.

Yes, so true. In fact, just thinking about talking to Dani there, when she found out her grandmother's original surname was Larkin, she took on the name and how she never knew that. And now here she is using her grandma this ancestral and family name as her as her stage name why is it important to pay more attention to our family history what did it do for you Moira when you discovered a bit more about your grandfather and and your own and the women in your family I think it's so important because it literally helps one to connect.

And you have a much, not only a closer connection to your own family's legacy, but you also begin to understand your own genetic makeup, funnily enough, and why you react in the way you do to whatever happens to you in your life. It is extraordinary that we that when I say tribe, I'm not talking about being confined. I'm talking about literally the genes that pass through you and have given you your strength and your desires and your needs. It's amazing that it's true.

But I think by and large, why it is so important is that to find out about your family members is because apart from anything else... Moira, I'm just so carried away with speaking to you, but it's the end of the programme. Moira Stewart, thank you so much for joining us. Go to Ancestry.com, find out about your ancestors. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time.

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