A Students' Podcast from a Research Seminar:
The Road to Brexit
In a podcast, Prof. Ina Habermann and some students of her research seminar “The Road to Brexit” present their findings about the reasons why so many Britons voted to leave the EU.
When on June 23, 2016 the majority of Britons voted ‘Leave’, many people in the UK and all over the world were surprised. Few had foreseen this outcome. People asked: What should be done now? What would the future bring? And above all: How could it come to this? This was the central issue Prof. Habermann decided to explore in a research seminar at the University of Basel’s English department in the autumn term 2017. Building on an SNF research project about British Discourses of Europe, together with her students she traced the ‘road to Brexit’. As they looked at the various cultural contexts, it became ever clearer that the decision did not come out of the blue, and that Euroscepticism had been growing for some time in the fertile soil of historical entanglements between Britain and Continental Europe. In eleven contributions, the students address various topics such as the influence of the British press, imperial nostalgia and the myth of the ‘island fortress’, which have an impact on the riddled relationship between Britain and Continental Europe.
| Editor & presenter: | Prof. Ina Habermann |
| Participants: | Sam Ammann, Lukas Aresta, Dario Barone, Stefan Bongers, Denise Borchardt, Melanie Frey, Flavia Giudice, Duco Hordijk, Daniela Keller, Lesley Löw, Magalie Nanchen, Nataša Pavković, Isabelle Wirth-Möckel, Michelle Witen, Laura Zahn |
| Producer: | Ania Mauruschat |
| Sound Engineer: | Sebastian Schell, New Media Center, University of Basel |
| Post-production: | Lenja Gathmann & Theda Schifferdecker |
| Music: | "(There'll Be Bluebirds Over) The White Cliffs of Dover" (W. Kent/N. Burton), sung by Vera Lynn (1942) |
Listen to the podcast here:
Contents
| No | Author(s) | Title | Rec. time | Speaker(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | Duco Hordijk | Rethinking Britain and the European Union: The Importance of the Press | 2’11 – 6’33 | Duco Hordijk, Ania Mauruschat |
| 2. | Dario Barone & Melanie Frey | Imperial Nostalgia – The Message of the TV-Series Victoria and Taboo | 7’30 – 12’16 | Melanie Frey, Sam Ammann |
| 3. | Isabelle Wirth-Möckel | Us vs. Them – The Legacy of Winston Churchill | 12’42 – 19’26 | Isabelle Wirth-Möckel |
| 4. | Magalie Nanchen | 20’39 – 25’50 | Magalie Nanchen, Sam Ammann | |
| 5. | Flavia Giudice | The Uses of Invasion Scare Literature for the ‘Leave Campaign’ | 26’14 – 31’10 | Flavia Giudice, Sam Ammann |
| 6. | Lukas Aresta | 35’19 – 40’23 | Lukas Aresta, Sam Ammann | |
| 7. | Laura Zahn | Brexit in a Literary Way: The Post-Brexit Novel Autumn by Ali Smith | 41’17 – 46’03 | Lesley Löw, Daniela Keller, Ania Mauruschat, Michelle Witen |
| 8. | Lesley Löw | My Country: A dramatic Work in Progress by Carol Ann Duffy & Rufus Norris | 46’33 – 51’51 | Lesley Löw, Daniela Keller, Michelle Witen |
| 9. | Nataša Pavković | 52’51 – 58’38 | Nataša Pavković, Sam Ammann, Lesley Löw | |
| 10. | Denise Borchardt | 59’07 – 63’40 | Denise Borchardt, Sam Ammann | |
| 11. | Stefan Bongers | Great Britain and the EU from a European Perspective – Robert Menasse’s Novel Die Hauptstadt Translator of literary quotes: Jamie Bulloch | 64’10 – 68’16 | Stefan Bongers, Sam Ammann |
