The Ashby Lecture – archive

Clare Hall hosts the Ashby Lecture each year within the Obert C. Tanner Lecture series.

This page houses the College’s Ashby Lecture archive.

2024
The Ethical Museum: Reflections on Cultural Mission and Civic Responsibility

Full archive

2020s

2023: In conversation with Orhan Pamuk, Nobel Prize-winning novelist

2022: Why the Left is not Woke – Professor Susan Neiman, Philosopher and writer

Watch the recording on Youtube.

2010s

2018: Oiling the Wheels of Nations? Religion and Politics, Then and Now – Professor George Van Kooten, Lady Margaret’s Professor of Divinity, Fellow of Clare Hall.
Read the full Lecture transcript.

2017: How much is the free market compatible with a ‘decent’ society? – Dr Ha-Joon Chang, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge. 

2016: Imagining universities: new worlds, old ideas? – Professor Stefan Collini, Professor Emeritus of Intellectual History and English Literature, University of Cambridge; Emeritus Fellow of Clare Hall. 
Read the full Lecture transcript.

2015: Liberty, Equality. What Happened to Fraternity [Human Solidarity]? – Albie Sachs, South African lawyer, activist, writer, and former judge.

2014: The Impact of the First World War on Strategy – Sir Hew Strachen, Chichele Professor of the History of War at All Souls College, Oxford.

2013: Energy, water, food and the nine billion – Lord Oxburgh, Former Chairman of Shell UK and former Rector of Imperial College.

2012: In the Eye of the Storm: Journalists under Fire – John Fisher Burns, London Bureau Chief for the New York Times and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist.

2011: Lessons from America: The Impact of Universities on their Region and the World – Professor Andrew Hamilton, Vice-Chancellor, University of Oxford.

2010: How and Why Did Hitler’s Germany Fight On to the Bitter End? – Professor Sir Ian Kershaw, Emeritus Professor of Modern History, University of Sheffield.

2000s

2009: Perverting Trust – Baroness O’Neill of Bengarve, President of the British Academy; Chair of the Nuffield Foundation; Professor of Philosophy.

2008: The Business of Climate Change – Sir David King, Director of the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment, University of Oxford.

2007: Happiness and Values – Richard Layard, Emeritus Professor of Economics, London School of Economics,

2006: The Case for an Emergency Constitution – Bruce Ackerman, Sterling Professor of Law, Yale University.

2005  From Alola to Helena: A Tribute to the Women and Children of East Timor, 1999-2005 – Kirsty Sword-Gusmao, First Lady to the President of the independent nation of East Timor.

2004: Trans-civilisational Perspective on Global Issues – Professor Yasuaki Onuma, University of Tokyo.

2003: Muslims and Modernity – Guy Sorman, contributing editor, publisher and CEO of France-Ámerique.

2002: Dancing Beneath the Red Banners: Chairman Mao’s Red Guard Movement During the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) – Dr Aiping Mu, one of the earliest Red Guards and author of Vermilion Gate.

2001: Storytelling – Isabel Allende, Chilean novelist.

2000: In Search of a Common Language – What does Chinese Traditional Medicine Have in Common with Modern Physics? – Dr Kenneth Hsu, Chinese scientist, geologist, paleoclimatologist, oceanographer.

1990s

1999: Universities and the Magic Fountain: African Literature into the 21st Century – Ngugi Wa Thiong’o, Kenyan writer and academic.

1997: From Penitentiary to Palace of Art: Uncovering the History of the Tate Gallery – Professor Frances Spalding, art historian, critic and biographer.

1996: The State of Our Prisons – Sir Stephen Tumim, English judge; Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons.

1995: Some Reflections on Multinationalism: the Example of Former Empires in East Asia – Professor Herbert Franke, Austrian scientist and writer.

1994: Understanding and Justification of Other Cultures – Professor Eero Loone, Estonian philosopher.

1993: The Education of a ‘British’ Protected Child – Chinua Achebe, Nigerian novelist, poet, and critic.

1992: When was Modernism in Indian Art? – Geeta Kapur, critic and curator.

1991: After Marx – the Prospects for Post-Communism – Svetozar Stojanović, Serbian philosopher and political theorist.

1990: Into Inequality Born – a Tale of the Health of Women in South Asia – Professor Vulimiri Ramalingaswami, Indian medical scientist, pathologist and medical writer.

1980s

1989: The Fusion of the Great and Little Traditions of Indian in Salman Rushdie’s Work – Anita Desai, Indian novelist; Emerita John E. Burchard Professor of Humanities at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

1988: Models of the Mind – Professor Christopher Longuet-Higgins, British scholar and teacher, Professor of Theoretical Chemistry at the University of Cambridge.

1987: The Nature of (Literary) Naturalism – Professor David Baguley, Emeritus Professor of French at Durham University.

1986: Narrative Verse – Alec Hope, Australian poet and essayist.

1985: Genes and Disease – Opportunities and Reservation – Dr Paul Berg, American biochemist; Professor Emeritus at Stanford University

For any queries about this archive, please contact our College Archivist.

Return to the main webpage on Clare Hall’s lectures.