In-depth reporting and analysis from a global perspective. 
Chapters
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Melinda Gates
Melinda Gates has big plans to revolutionise women’s access to contraception. She is hosting a ground-breaking family planning summit with the British government.
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Equality – the next generation
As the next generation of boys grow to become men, what are they learning about the balance of power between the sexes?
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Ruth MacKenzie - Cultural Olympiad
Jane speaks to the woman at the helm of the London 2012 Festival, director Ruth MacKenzie, to find out more about its achievements and aims.
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My Friend the Fabulous Freak
Why are there so few eccentric female characters in popular culture? The film critic Catherine Bray and the novelist Joanna Kavenna join Jane.
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My Friend the Fabulous Freak
What do the books Withnail and I, Le Grand Meaulnes, Brideshead Revisited, The Great Gatsby and On the Road have in common? They all have a hero who’s charismatic, eccentric, sometimes badly behaved, being observed by their (usually not nearly so interesting) narrator friend. And they are, of course, all men. It’s a notion that the novelist Joanna Kavenna has turned upside down in her latest novel, Come to the Edge. The book is a social satire with a narrator who runs away from a broken marriage to what she thinks will be a rural retreat on a Lake District farm looking after a widow. Cassandra White is a widow, certainly. But she’s a widow with social justice on her mind as she starts moving impoverished locals into the holiday homes of the rich, and stories start to spread about her. The film critic Catherine Bray and the novelist Joanna Kavenna join Jane.
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Equality – the next generation
As the next generation of boys grow to become men, what are they learning about the balance of power between the sexes? Do they accept that men and women are equal and how do their parents’ attitudes to work, family and the division of domestic chores affect how they themselves might choose to live their lives in the future? Reporter Geoff Bird speaks to a group of young men from the Wirral and Jane will be joined by Joe Hayman, author of a new book on British social attitudes and mentor to an 18 year old boy through the charity Friendship Works; and by novelist and journalist Emma Burstall, who’s trying to bring her sons up as feminists.
Friendship Works Children’s Mentoring Charity
Emma Burstall’s new novel, The Darling Girls, is out now on Kindle.
British Voices by Joe Hayman is available now as an ebook and will be released as a paperback in August. -
Ruth MacKenzie - Cultural Olympiad
Alongside the sport of the London Olympics, there’s a parallel event – the cultural Olympiad. It’s been up and running since the end of the Beijing games in 2008, and has involved names like Tracey Emin, Damon Albarn and Jude Law. Now as it reaches its culmination with the London 2012 Festival, Jane speaks to the woman at its helm, director Ruth MacKenzie, to find out more about its achievements and aims.
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Melinda Gates
Melinda Gates - global philanthropist and co-founder of the Gates Foundation, the world’s largest philanthropic organisation – has big plans to revolutionise women’s access to contraception worldwide. Today she is hosting a ground-breaking family planning summit with the British government in London, attended by world leaders, in a push to give contraceptive access to an additional 120 million women and girls in the world's poorest countries. According to new figures published in the Lancet this week, across the developing world some 222 million women who want to avoid pregnancy are not using a modern method of contraception, yet she says with access to family planning their lives could be changed, bringing increased choice, and significant health, economic, and development benefits. However Melinda Gates is also a practising Catholic and her stance has caused much controversy amongst Catholics. On the morning of the summit, she joins Jane Garvey to explain why she wants to make family planning a global priority, how this squares with her faith, and why her philanthropy and development work means so much to her personally.
Broadcasts
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BBC Radio 4Wed 11 Jul 2012 10:00 BBC Radio 4
Free downloads
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Cook The Perfect...
Discover cooking techniques and tips to help you perfect your cooking know-how. Jenni Murray and...
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Woman's Hour Power List
Which women have the biggest impact on Britain’s economy, society, politics and culture today?...
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Woman's Hour: News, Politics, Culture
Woman's Hour brings you the big celebrity names and leading women in the news, with subjects ranging...
