According to Wikipedia “Iain McGilchrist's 2009 work, The Master and His Emissary has sold over 200,000 copies worldwide. It sought to consolidate research in brain lateralisation and to insist on the individual and cultural importance of the bi-hemisphere structure of the brain”. McGilchrist suggests that “we have become entranced by the version of the world brought into being by the left hemisphere and forgotten the insights produced by the right”.His publishers persuaded him to write a very short book, Ways of Attending, which took the main arguments of his larger, more complex and more technical work, and rewrote them as an extended essay for interested lay-people.In this episode Owen Kelly looks at some of these arguments, quoting from Ways of Attending and McGilchrist’s other published extended essay, The Divided Brain.

This month we have the second Friday Number Five of 2025. At the end of January we started another irregular series of Radio Miaaw: podcasts of music issued under Creative Commons licences; a theme we last explored four years ago.This month we have a special and unexpected surprise. Moby and Little Walnut Productions have re-launched mobygratis with, their words “phenomenally expanded functionality and resources, making it the most robust iteration yet”.They go on to say that “With the addition of 300 previously unreleased tracks, mobygratis provides creators with a revolutionary platform for accessing restriction-free music. This collection is part of an anarchist experiment in creative freedom, allowing unprecedented access to high-quality compositions.Previously available only as stereo masters, mobygratis now offers hundreds of multitrack audio files. These high-resolution tracks invite collaboration by enabling creators to remix, customize, and fully adapt the music to their unique projects, fostering a spirit of shared creativity and innovation. Formats include stereo MP3, stereo WAV, and multitrack WAV - all completely free”.In this episode we dig deeper into #mobygratis, take a look at the contract you receive when you register and download one or more tracks, and listen to a not-quite-random selection from the tracks available. You can find full episode notes with links to all the music at miaaw.net.

We interviewed John Phillips about The Museum of Unrest on December 6, 2024, at the time it launched its second collection, Good Design. You can listen to that discussion again if you click here.Next month, in the middle of June 2025, the Museum of Unrest will launch its third collection, called Community Arts. This collection has been co-curated by John and Belinda Kidd, who has had a long and varied career in community arts, arts research, and evaluation. Currently her work focuses where it began: in Hackney, at Hoxton Hall and Four Corners centre for film and photography.In this episode Owen Kelly talks to John Phillips and Belinda Kidd about the way they have assembled the collection, the range of content in the collection, and where they hope their efforts might all lead, both online and offline.

In Episode 52, Arlene Goldbard and François Matarasso interview Lori Pourier, a citizen of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, who served as the President of the First Peoples Fund (FPF) between 1993-2024. Currently, Lori acts as the Founder and Senior Fellow of First Peoples Fund, which “supports the cultural, artistic and ancestral practices of American Indian, Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian artists, families and communities, helping them to thrive, heal and carry forward Indigenous creative expression, teachings and lifeways.” By supporting artists and culture bearers, First Peoples Fund helps Native communities heal and thrive. Collectively, they approach their work with rootedness, intuition, listening, humility and deep relationships.In this episode we talk about FPF’s work, its history and context, and the challenges posed by the MAGA regime.

This, the final episode of Ways of Listening, was recorded live by Hannah Kemp-Welch at the symposium ‘Listening Together: Practices for Community-Centred Listening’ at London College of Communication in February 2025. Drawing on their experiences and emerging practices, electroacoustic composer Julia Schauerman, queer artist and educator Samantha Dick, and Senior Lecturer at University of Arts London Lainy Malkani reflect on the creative and ethical issues of working with the recorded voices of others. Together, they consider what a reflective and responsible creative practice looks like. The discussion touches upon - consent and permission, artistic interpretation of recorded voices, representation and agency of the voice subjects, and practical challenges.

With this podcast we begin a new set of summer reading suggestions for 2025. In the first episode of the summer (if indeed it is summer where you are) Owen Kelly and David Morley discuss Strange Rebels: 1979 and the Birth of the 21st Century written by Christian Caryl and published in 2014.Neither of them agree with Caryl’s political position but instead argue about the usefulness of the approach he takes to history. Rather than following an issue he traces five plot-threads across the year 1979 and argues that they intertwine in significant ways that narrative-based conventional history overlooks.This, we might feel, is perhaps more prescient than it appeared when the book was first published. Donald Trump’s first 100 days in office have been chaotic but might better be seen as the culmination of a series of separate but related plot threads that originated in Bejing, Jerusalem, Moscow, New Delhi, Riyadh and Tehran, rather than in Washington. Understanding Caryl’s hypothesis might make making sense of the state of the world today somewhat easier.David Morley is emeritus professor at the Department of Media, Communications and Cultural Studies at Goldsmiths in the University of London.

Sovay Berriman describes her work as “rooted in their experience of being Cornish, their culture’s shifting identity, and the mutability yet power of a sense of place”. She “uses her practice as a structure and prompt for action and discussion, and is committed to questioning balances of power”.In 2015 Sovay trained as a plumbing and heating engineer and works in the construction industry alongside their art activity with a commitment to helping customers transition to low carbon heating. Their experiences in this line of work have developed the critical socio-economic and political aspects of their practice, particularly in relation to environment, care and the labour of making.In this conversation she talks to Owen Kelly about her relationship to kernowek, the indigenous Cornish language, its conservation and nurturing, her recent provocation on Rewilding Arts Management, and the ways in which art, activism, and plumbing can work together.

On episode 51 of “A Culture of Possibility,” Arlene Goldbard and François Matarasso talk with David Cutler, Director of The Baring Foundation, based in London. One of Baring’s strategic grant areas is Arts & Mental Health, granting about £1 million per year over at least five years to organizations specializing in arts and creativity with people with mental health problems; supporting participatory artists from Global Majority communities in this work; and supporting more men to engage in creative mental health. They’ve published considerable material documenting this work. We’ll talk with David about how and why the Foundation chose this focus, the impact they’re having, and how their work fits into the larger arts funding landscape.