Wednesday 16:00-16:30 Laurie Taylor discusses the latest social science research.
18 February 2009 repeat 22 February
KISSING COUSINS Like the queen, and many of his own class in the nineteenth century Charles Darwin was married to his first cousin. However he became increasingly anxious about the consequence of such close intermarriage; he attempted to have Parliament amend the census include a question on cousin marriage, and even asked his son George to scientifically investigate close-kin unions on a national scale. By the new century, though, it was a statistical rarity and by the 1920s only one marriage in 6,000 was with a cousin.
Laurie Taylor is joined by Professor Adam Kuper, author of ‘Changing the subject – about cousin marriage, among other things’ to discuss Charles Darwin, Victorian marriage and the sudden demise of kissing cousins.
BIG CATS IN RURAL WALES Samantha Hurn, Lecturer in Social Anthropology at the University of Wales, Lampeter talks about her research on feral big cats in Ceredigion, West Wales between 2001 and 2008.
Additional information:
Professor Adam Kuper Professor of Anthropology at Brunel University, a fellow of the British Academy, and a member of the Academia Europea
Changing the subject – about cousin marriage, among other things Published in the Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute Issue 14:4 – December 2008 ISSN 1359-0987
Dr. Samantha Hurn Lecturer in Social Anthropology at the University of Wales, Lampeter
Research: Here be dragons? No, big cats! Predator symbolism in rural West Wales Published in: Anthropology Today February 2009 – vol 25 – issue 1
The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites
