Events archive

2021

Dante’s Journey Through Popular Culture

Emma Marigliano

T. S. Eliot said “Dante and Shakespeare divide the world between them...

CANCELLED: Liverpool Heritage Walk with Mike Higginbottom

Mike Higginbottom

The heritage walk gives an insight into the historic development of the city and port of Liverpool.

From Sickle Cell to Seacole - In Conversation with Professor Dame Elizabeth Anionwu

Professor Dame Elizabeth Anionwu

The discussion will cover the lives, struggles and achievements of both women. They grew up over a century apart, but as mixed-race girls they both had to overcome the obstacles and frustrations of white, male-dominated society...

The Tiny Spacecraft Revolution

Professor Craig Underwood

The University of Surrey and its spin-out company, Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. are world leaders in the design, construction and operation of “micro-satellites”...

AGM 2021

The Annual General Meeting of The Manchester Literary & Philosophical Society will be held online, via the BlueJeans platform, on Tuesday 21st September 2021 at 6.30 p.m.

NB Registration is a two-stage process. Once your details have been approved by a moderator you will receive an email with details on how to 'join the event' on the night.

*Registration closes at 5.00 pm on Friday 17th September so if you would like to attend please register in good time.*

Life in a City of Business, Noise and Strangers: Work, Family and Faith in Industrial Revolution Manchester

Professor Hannah Barker

A visit to Manchester two hundred years ago would have been an assault on the senses...

A tour into the very heart of old industrial Manchester

Ed Glinert

Ed Glinert of New Manchester Walks, the city’s group of professional guides, will be leading this tour into the very heart of old industrial Manchester.

Delia Derbyshire and The BBC Radiophonic Workshop

Caroline Churchill

Caroline Churchill (who works under her professional name of ‘Caro C’) will talk about The BBC Radiophonic Workshop (1958 to the late 1990s), a somewhat obscure department of the BBC that provided sound and music for TV and radio...

Hans Holbein and the Ambassador’s Secret

Brian Healey

The double portrait identified only in the last century as two ambassadors to the court of Henry Vlll at the time of his “Great Matter” – his divorce from Katherine of Aragon - and which hangs in the National Gallery, is a painting that has been subject to much interpretation and research...

From cat skin to submarines - new materials that are a bit of a stretch

Professor Helen Gleeson

Liquid crystals are self-organising fluids that are perhaps best known for their use in displays (LCDs). Much of the research in the area over the past 30 years has been focused on achieving faster switching and more complex images in flat panel TVs. However, such technology is now mature...

Manchester and the Civil War

Tim Cockitt

In the 17th Century Manchester was a peaceful, quiet and unexceptional market town. However, at this time, there was growing unease with the monarch, Charles I...

Visual Literacy and Dermatology: From Natural History to Art History

Professor Chris Griffiths OBE MD FMedSci

Visual literacy - the ability to construct meaning from visual images - is a cornerstone of art history and of medical practice. This is particularly prominent in the case of the specialty of dermatology where diagnosis is often dependent on the “power of the glance”...

“Sensation, Sensation, Sensation”: Collecting the New Age - the extraordinary case of the 5th Marquis of Anglesey

Professor Vivien Gardner

Professor Gardner’s presentation will offer a unique snapshot of Britain’s fascination with the ‘new’ that characterised the lifestyle of many of the cultural elite at the turn of the last century...

Science, Politics and Adventure in Antarctica

Jonathan Walton

Humans have messed up six of the world’s seven continents. At the height of the Cold war, in 1961, 12 powerful nations signed a major treaty: the Antarctic Treaty...

How will extreme weather events alter due to climate change?

Professor David M. Schultz

Headlines from newspapers and websites scream out the soundbite that anthropogenic climate change is causing more extreme weather...

Back to the Future Part 1 or Part 2? Research and Higher Learning in the Mid-Twenty-First Century

Professor Karl Dayson

The notion of Industry 4.0 is permeating all aspects of the global economy, creating a narrative rooted in more intensive automation of work and globalisation...

George Orwell: A Political Life

Dr Alan Sennett

Why does George Orwell matter today? Those who know something of his writings can probably name at least two of his books - Animal Farm and Ninety Eighty-Four - and appreciate their importance has to do with his analysis of authoritarian regimes...

Sex, Lies and Brain Scans

Professor Barbara Sahakian

The recent explosion of neuroscience techniques has proved to be game-changing...

Supernovae and the search for Dark Energy

Professor Isobel Hook

Just over 20 years ago, two teams of astronomers discovered that the expansion of the Universe is accelerating...

Interesting Times, Interesting People

Mike Higginbottom

From Cemeteries and sewers, to theatres; St Pancras Station in London, to the “windy city”. Mike Higginbottom’s lecture programme offers a diverse, informative and entertaining look at social and architectural history...

Past events

2021