A wrap studio session of the RTÉ Davis Now Lectures: Making Home series is hosted here by architectural historian and the series consultant editor Dr Ellen Rowley - listen above.
Along with Rowley in this podcast, the four others who contributed new lectures to the series join her to consider the subject covered by each of them in their talks, a conversation that is prompted along by atmospheric recordings related to the themes of the various lectures. These clips encourage different notes of poignancy and wit as well as a sense of urgency being at heart of what they share with us.
Prompted by the clips and one another, the animated contributors remember childhood memories of freezing cold homes in 'one-station land' with not a TV remote control in sight. They are equally moved by contributors in the clips who talk about the emotional toil of living in direct provision centres, of a traveller woman who in her own lifetime has moved from tent to caravan to settled house as well as by people who are renting
or trying to rent; the experiences of being accidental landlords or the victims of landlords who have without notice cut-short their unreliable agreements with their tenants.
(l-r) Michelle Norris, Linda Doyle, Roise Goan and Hugh Campbell
Rowley’s lecture Clearing Hovels and Building Homes: an Architectural History of Irish Housing, as well as the further four related lectures can be heard as podcasts on RTÉ Culture, from the series website or wherever you get your podcasts.
The other lectures in the series are: Bricks, Mortar and Data: Technology and the Home of the Future by Professor Linda Doyle who is Vice President Dean of Research and Professor of Engineering and the Arts, Trinity College, Dublin and recording at Workhouse Union, Callan, Co Kilkenny; Too Close to Home: Irish Theatre and Home by Róise Goan, Artistic Director of Artsadmin, London, writer, producer and director, and recorded at Glebe House and Gallery, Churchill, Letterkenny, Co. Donegal; Unmaking Home: Making Homes for Shelter or for Investment? by Professor Michelle Norris, Head of the School of Social Policy, Social Work, and Social Justice, University College Dublin and recorded at Moyross Community and Enterprise Centre in Limerick City. Finally Houses in Motion: Architecture and Patterns of Dwelling by Professor Hugh Campbell, of University College Dublin’s School of Architecture, Planning and Environmental Policy, University College, Dublin and recorded at Nano Nagle Place in Cork City.
The RTÉ Davis Now Lectures are produced by Clíodhna Ní Anluain.
