Danny Bate discusses with Ivan six things which should be better known.

Danny Bate is a linguist, writer, broadcaster and podcaster who is fascinated by the study of historical languages and etymology. He took his BA and MPhil degrees from the University of York and the University of Cambridge respectively, and his PhD in linguistics from the University of Edinburgh. He can be found at dannybate.com. His new book is Why Q Needs U, which is available at https://dannybate.com/book/.

1. The alphabet is a product of migration, born out of a meeting of different peoples and their languages
2. Our letters started out as depictions of things (body parts, animals, everyday objects)
3. English's letters are connected via a big family tree to many other scripts, including many that seem 'alien' to its readers (e.g. Arabic, Hebrew)
4. There isn't universal one way to create writing, you pick which aspects of language (words, syllables, consonants) as a primary base
5. English and related alphabets aren't phonetically accurate (and that's okay)
6. Even when spelling diverges from a strict letter-to-sound ratio, new principles and processes can emerge

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Deepa Anappara discusses with Ivan six things which should be better known.

Deepa Anappara’s debut novel, Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line, was named as one of the best books of the year by the New York Times, Washington Post, Time, Guardian and NPR. It won the Edgar Award for Best Novel, was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction, and shortlisted for the JCB Prize for Indian literature. It has been translated into over twenty languages. Anappara is the co-editor of Letters to a Writer of Color, a collection of personal essays on fiction, race, and culture. The Last of Earth is her second novel and is available at https://www.waterstones.com/book/the-last-of-earth/deepa-anappara/9780861548620

1. 19th century British mapping of Tibet by Indian surveyors https://royalsociety.org/blog/2023/09/mapping-india/
2. Cartography as a tool for furthering imperialism https://www.theelephant.info/analysis/2026/01/21/cartographic-colonialism-and-the-true-size-of-africa/
3. How we can find the colonised's experience in the coloniser's records and archives? https://shura.shu.ac.uk/30780/3/Cere-UncoveringColonialLegacy%28AM%29.pdf
4. The problems with 'Show, Don't Tell' and other similar creative writing diktats https://www.emwelsh.com/blog/show-dont-tell-rule
5. Indian is not a language! https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/11/25/should-a-country-speak-a-single-language
6. Tipu's Tiger at V&A https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/tipus-tiger

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Nigel Biggar discusses with Ivan six things which should be better known.

Nigel Biggar is Emeritus Regius Professor in the University of Oxford and Fellow of Christ Church. He founded in Oxford the MacDonald Institute for the study of Ethics and Empire. He is now a Fellow of St Cross College Oxford, and an author, lecturer and broadcaster throughout the English-speaking world. After many acclaimed academic books, he wrote and published the bestselling Colonialism. His new book is The New Dark Age: Why Liberals Must Win The Culture Wars, which is available at https://www.politybooks.com/bookdetail?book_slug=the-new-dark-age-why-liberals-must-win-the-culture-wars--9781509568321.

1. Terence Malick's 1998 film, The Thin Red Line https://www.theguardian.com/film/1999/feb/26/film-of-the-week-the-thin-red-line
2. Helmuth James von Moltke (1907-45), anti-Nazi martyr https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/19666775-last-letters-the-prison-correspondence-between-helmuth-and-freya-von-mo
3. Sir John Malcolm (1769-1833): exemplar of empire https://www.westminster-abbey.org/abbey-commemorations/commemorations/sir-john-malcolm
4. 'Mass graves' discovery in grounds of an Indian Residential School at Kamloops, BC, Canada, May 2021: to this day, no body has been disinterred. https://www.fraserinstitute.org/commentary/no-evidence-of-mass-graves-or-genocide-in-residential-schools
5. The World Values Survey 2023: showing Britain to be one of the least racist countries on earth. https://www.kcl.ac.uk/policy-institute/research-analysis/uk-world-values-survey
6. Kathleen Stock, martyr in the cause of free and honest thinking on campus https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/mar/26/university-of-sussex-fined-freedom-of-speech-investigation-kathleen-stock

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