May

Monday, May 6
THE HEART OF THE BEAT
What is it about rhythm, pattern, and synchronization that fascinate us? How do pacemaker cells in a heart synchronize? How can thousands of people unconsciously walk in step? There so many recurring patterns in nature like ripples in sand and the stripes of a zebra. In speaking with musicians, mathematicians, and psychologists, filmmaker Tess Girard explores the idea of rhythm and what it means to us.

Monday, May 13
MADELEINE BLAIR: NOBODY'S VICTIM
A rare and detailed account of a prostitute and brothel owner in the Canadian west during the late 1800s reveals the integral role prostitutes played in shaping the Canadian frontier. It was a period of huge transition where prostitution and so-called 'vice' became the focus of social uplift campaigns which gave birth to laws that are still in place today - laws currently dangling before the Supreme Court.

Monday, May 20
TINCTOR'S FOUL MANUAL
Our ideas about witches and witch hunts may come from an extraordinary manuscript found in the University of Alberta Library. It's one of only four known copies. Written in the 1400s and now being re-translated from medieval French, it created the framework for witch hunts. Dave Redelcarefully opens its cover.

Monday, May 27
BEAUTY AND THE FREAK
When someone loses a breast to cancer, or a leg to gangrene, what do they make of their new body? And then there are the elective procedures such as cosmetic surgery which alters a face. How does it change one's identity? And - there are those who are part of a fringe culture who insert magnets into their fingers. Some body modifications are valorized while others are often vilified. IDEAS contributor Sheetal Lodhia explores how changes to the body change the sense of self.

June


Monday, June 3
THE MANDELA TAPES
In this special edition, you'll hear the voice of Nelson Mandela as you've never heard him before. The program draws on 50 hours of recorded conversations with Nelson Mandela. IDEAS is the first program anywhere in the world to be given full access to these remarkable recordings. Former South African and freelance filmmaker Robin Benger was granted this access and presents this intimate and candid portrayal of the founding father of the new South Africa.

Monday, June 10
THE MUNK DEBATES - TAXING THE RICH
Be it resolved: Should the rich be taxed more? That's the resolution at this spring's Munk Debate. Featured are Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives and presidential candidate; Arthur Laffer, economic advisor to President Regan; Paul Krugman, New York Times columnist, Nobel Prize winner, and global authority on economic inequality; and George Papandreou, the current President of the Socialist International and the past Prime Minister of Greece.

Monday, June 17
IN THEIR SHOES
Canadian novelist Katherine Govier works with immigrant women from around the world. She helps them to tell the stories of how they came to Canada, through a description of the shoes they were wearing when they arrived. In this sequel to an earlier IDEAS program, Paul Kennedy hears more entrancing stories from immigrants In Their Shoes.

Monday, June 24
THE MAKAR AND THE LAUREATES
What happens when a sonnet from a Canadian Poet Laureate meets the Makar of Scotland, the Laureate of that land, in a Laureate Symposium? We eavesdrop as the poets ponder the role of poetry in a world of twitter. IDEAS producer Dave Redel finds the verse to be anything but blank