Absolute Units

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How does humanity fit into nature? How long have we viewed ourselves as being apart from it? And what are the problems that creates?
This time, we chat with Tom Oliver and Marzia Briel from the University of Reading to learn about their Nature-centric Catalyst project. We discuss the rights of nature, the advocacy landscape today, and how we can better centre the natural world in our thoughts and deeds.
Also, we end with a 5-minute meditation, beautifully performed by Marzia.
Relevant links:
Nature-centric Catalyst
Tom Oliver
Marzia Briel
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Absolute Units is the official podcast of The Museum of English Rural Life. This series is made possible through the generous support of Arts Council England and Museums Partnership Reading, a partnership of The MERL with Reading Museum. Theme tune by Tai Dawson. This podcast contains audio from Epidemic Sound.
Co-hosts: Ollie Douglas and Joe Vaughan
Producer: Joe Vaughan
Shop MERL merch: https://merl-shop.co.uk/shop/absolute-unit.html
Support the pod: https://merl.reading.ac.uk/visit-us/donate/

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Okay. Take 2.
Last month we drew to a close two major installations at The MERL: our gallery trail Radical Rural, and our exhibition Voices of the Countryside.
In this episode, Joe and Ollie reflect on these two projects. We explore what we learned from them, what they meant to us, and how we want to build on this work for the future.
We also talk about the World Cup, explain what the heck went wrong last time, and go on a few other tangents that we don't regret at all. Enjoy.
Relevant links:
Radical Rural: https://merl.reading.ac.uk/whats-on/radical-rural-gallery-trail/
Man in the Woods' Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/man.in.the.woods/?hl=en
Wild Card's Rewilding the Ghost Woods: https://wildcard.land/campaigns/rewild-the-ghost-woods
CPRE: https://www.cpre.org.uk/
---
Absolute Units is the official podcast of The Museum of English Rural Life. This series is made possible through the generous support of Arts Council England and Museums Partnership Reading, a partnership of The MERL with Reading Museum. Theme tune by Tai Dawson. This podcast contains audio from Epidemic Sound.
Co-hosts: Ollie Douglas and Joe Vaughan
Producer: Joe Vaughan
Shop MERL merch: https://merl-shop.co.uk/shop/absolute-unit.html
Support the pod: https://merl.reading.ac.uk/visit-us/donate/

Send us Fan Mail
Greetings, friends and listeners. We had a problem with this week's episode where the SD card that we're using for recording has broken, leaving us with a very patchy episode not really fit for human consumption. We will be putting our best minds to the matter of resolving this and will be back with the podcast we intended to put out next week. Thank you for sticking with The Museum of English Rural Life.
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Absolute Units is the official podcast of The Museum of English Rural Life. This series is made possible through the generous support of Arts Council England and Museums Partnership Reading, a partnership of The MERL with Reading Museum. Theme tune by Tai Dawson. This podcast contains audio from Epidemic Sound.
Co-hosts: Ollie Douglas and Joe Vaughan
Producer: Joe Vaughan
Shop MERL merch: https://merl-shop.co.uk/shop/absolute-unit.html
Support the pod: https://merl.reading.ac.uk/visit-us/donate/

Send us Fan Mail
How do museums engage with accessibility, both as spaces that welcome visitors and as collections of human stories?
On this episode, we're joined by the brilliant disability activist and performance artist Anahita Harding. 
We discuss Anahita's work in agricultural museums (both the Food Museum and The MERL), the histories of disability in our collection, and how we can improve access and representation for disabled people in the future.
Relevant links:
Anahita's website: https://anahitaharding.com/
Len's Leg: https://www.fwi.co.uk/news/newshow-a-false-leg-inspried-a-farm-safety-campaign
Curating Visibility: https://curatingforchange.org/
---
Absolute Units is the official podcast of The Museum of English Rural Life. This series is made possible through the generous support of Arts Council England and Museums Partnership Reading, a partnership of The MERL with Reading Museum. Theme tune by Tai Dawson. This podcast contains audio from Epidemic Sound.
Co-hosts: Ollie Douglas and Joe Vaughan
Producer: Joe Vaughan
Shop MERL merch: https://merl-shop.co.uk/shop/absolute-unit.html
Support the pod: https://merl.reading.ac.uk/visit-us/donate/

Send us Fan Mail
Turns out delays come like London buses. First Joe got the flu. Then we accidentally re-shared the first episode with Guy rather than the new one. If you listened before we caught it, we hope you enjoyed that episode even more the second time.
Anyways, we're back! We return in full strength, with the right episode to boot, to pick up once more with the brilliant environmentalist, author, and campaigner Guy Shrubsole.
Where last time we charted a potted history of land ownership and access in England, from the Normans to the present day, this time we're honing in on one specific case study: hunting and more specifically grouse shooting. What does hunting teach us about how land gets used and shared? How has hunting changed? And what are the disastrous ecological impacts of unleashing 50 million pheasants each year into the English countryside?
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Absolute Units is the official podcast of The Museum of English Rural Life. This series is made possible through the generous support of Arts Council England and Museums Partnership Reading, a partnership of The MERL with Reading Museum. Theme tune by Tai Dawson. This podcast contains audio from Epidemic Sound.
Co-hosts: Ollie Douglas and Joe Vaughan
Producer: Joe Vaughan
Shop MERL merch: https://merl-shop.co.uk/shop/absolute-unit.html
Support the pod: https://merl.reading.ac.uk/visit-us/donate/