Gresham College has provided free public lectures since 1597. There are over 1,800 past lectures available on our website (www.gresham.ac.uk)
Gresham College was founded in 1597 and has been providing free lectures within the City of London for over 400 years.
18/03/2025
Today at 6pm: The Turbulent Brain: Rhythms and Waves
Watch via: https://gres.hm/turbulent-brain
Despite its calm exterior, the brain is a hub of complex wave dynamics. Beyond electrical activity, the brain also experiences slow chemical waves that can trigger migraines and mechanical waves resulting from trauma. Professor Alain Goriely* explores the impact of this on brain function.
* also of Oxford Mathematics
Is AI infallible?
Prof Victoria Baines explores data through the ages, including the drawbacks of relying on large language models, which inevitably rely on human sources...
Catch up: https://gres.hm/data-love-story
The Worshipful Company of Information Technologists
Intellectual Forum, Jesus College
Bournemouth University
14/03/2025
In-person tickets open: The 2025 Annual Lord Mayor's Event
Lecture by Alderman Alastair King, the 696th Lord Mayor of the City of London
Book via: https://gres.hm/lord-mayor-25
13/03/2025
š¢ Did you know that if you track a fixed point on the rim of a rolling wheel, you get a cycloid curveāthe same shape found on ice sheets near the poles & even Jupiterās moon Europa? ššŖ
Gresham Emerita Professor Sarah Hart, recently joined Professor Brian Cox & Robin Ince on The Infinite Monkey Cage to talk about the hidden beauty of mathematics, from symmetry to the Golden Ratio (aka natureās favourite number).
And the most underrated shape? The Rhombicosidodecahedronātry saying that three times fast! š
š§ Listen: https://gres.hm/sh
BBC Radio 4 - The Infinite Monkey Cage, Series 32, Nature's Shapes - Dave Gorman, Sarah Hart and Thomas Woolley Brian Cox and Robin Ince reveal the hidden codes behind the shapes we see in nature
13/03/2025
āļøNew blog* by Gresham Prof of Rhetoric, Melissa Lane on the lessons we might draw about civil disobedience - and the role of laws - from Antigone... and their relevance today:
https://blog.apaonline.org/2025/03/12/executive-orders-offices-and-laws-democratic-conundrums-in-ancient-greece-and-modern-america/
* for the American Philosophical Association
Executive Orders, Offices, and Laws: Democratic Conundrums in Ancient Greece and Modern America | Blog of the APA An executive order is issued by the new ruler of a country. A woman defies the order in the name of higher laws. How should we as democrats think about their actions? I wrote that opening paragraph with reference to Antigone, as presented in Sophoclesās play of that name. Sophocles wrote that play...
12/03/2025
Today at 6pm: Banned Books and Freedom of Expression
Watch via: https://gres.hm/banned-books
Professor Rachel Potter* focuses on the recent history of banned literature and considers the changing nature of literary censorship, arguments in defence of free expression, why literary writers have so frequently pushed the boundaries of the acceptable, and the impact of technology on censorship and free speech.
*of University of East Anglia (UEA)
Who is the Horned God, and where did he come from?
In nineteenth-century Britain, there was a new favourite pagan god: a horned divinity associated with the countryside and wild nature, often personified as the Greek Pan.
Professor of Divinity Ronald Hutton explores the impact of Pan on British culture, when he appeared and the full subversive potential of him as a force for personal liberation became realised.
Watch full lecture: https://gres.hm/horned-god
University of Bristol History Society
Bristol University Historians
The Pagan Federation
10/03/2025
In-person tickets open: What Rights and Duties are Missing from the U.S. Constitution?
Book free via: https://gres.hm/missing-us-constitution
Regarding the US Constitution, there is a major split between the Originalists (typically conservatives) and those who believe in an organic document that grows with the times. There have been enormous changes since 1789 ā the internet is just one example ā and the document must change one way or the other.
Prof Clive Stafford Smith explores some of the unenumerated rights that might be added. These are not without their own subjective cultural elements. For example, Europeans are much more focused on āprivacyā than Americans, and it is debatable whether free speech is truly consistent with privacy.
University of Bristol Law School
Goldsmiths, University of London
09/03/2025
In-person tickets open: A World Remade by Decolonization?
Book via: https://gres.hm/world-decolonization
Professor Martin Thomas* shares perspectives from global history, comparative politics, and international relations to revaluate whether the twentieth-century collapse of European colonialism was as definitive as often portrayed. It suggests that, while in some ways, ending European Empires remade our contemporary world, in others processes of decolonization are far from complete.
We would like to thank the Independent Social Research Foundation for sponsoring and developing this series.
*of University of Exeter
08/03/2025
Tickets open: How Surveillance Works
Book via: https://gres.hm/how-surveillance
Our alert systems for identifying safety and security threats have evolved over time. As the threat from wild animals diminished, the perceived threat from other humans increased. To defend ourselves, we began to gather intelligence on our enemies, in the hope that being forewarned would give us an advantage.
Professor Victoria Baines explores our use of technologies that have allowed us to keep a closer watch, and the ingenious methods that have been used to counter them.
The Worshipful Company of Information Technologists
Intellectual Forum, Jesus College
Bournemouth University
Happy International Women's Day!
Today, we're celebrating our brilliant female Professors and speakers, whose lectures provide us unique and fascinating insights across a broad range of subjects...
In the future, will we breed plants to grow antibodies for us?
Professor Robin May explores this in his brilliant lecture on the immune systems of plants. He reveals how plant immune systems have their own enviable features, and that new scientific breakthroughs may soon allow us to take advantage of this, modifying plants to boost our own immunity.
Watch via: https://gres.hm/green-immunity
University of Birmingham
Food Standards Agency
06/03/2025
Today at 6pm: Divine Law, Human Prophet: Moses in Hebrew and Greek
Watch via: https://gres.hm/human-prophet
Professor Melissa Lane explores how ancient Jewish authors compared Moses with ancient Greek lawgivers on topics including education, ethical habituation, writing, prophecy and political rule.
Princeton University
University Center for Human Values, Princeton University
Princeton Politics Department
04/03/2025
Today at 6pm: Carbon Offsetting: Does It Really Work?
Watch free via: https://gres.hm/carbon-offsetting
In a net zero world, can you compensate for your own emissions by paying someone else to reduce theirs? Professor Myles Allen explores potential offsetting strategies we could take and asks, even if we need one that is effective, would setting up an ineffective strategy be the best place to start?
Oxford School of Geography and the Environment
University of Oxford Physics
03/03/2025
Tickets open: The LGBT+ Showstopper: āI Am What I Amā
Book free: https://gres.hm/lgbt-showstopper
Written by Jerry Herman, renowned for Hello, Dolly!, 'I Am What I Am' debuted in the 1983 Broadway musical La Cage aux Folles. In this lecture, Professor Dominic Broomfield-McHugh* explores its subsequent cultural impact, including as a significant gay anthem during the AIDS crisis.
* also of The University of Sheffield
02/03/2025
In-person tickets open: Modern Druids
Book free via: https://gres.hm/modern-druids
The ancient Druids have long represented some of the most striking and controversial figures in ancient and medieval literature.
Professor Ronald Hutton looks at the many different ways they have inspired the modern imagination, both as heroic ancestors and demonic villains against whom civilisation can be defined.
University of Bristol History Society
Bristol University Historians
The Pagan Federation
Happy St David's Day!
Enjoy this lecture by Professor Ronald Hutton, 'Finding Lost Gods In Wales' where he introduces vivid characters from Welsh mythology like the proud and wilful Arianrhod, the beautiful and treacherous flower-maiden Blodeuwedd, the decent and vulnerable Lleu Llaw Gyffes, and the supreme bard Taliesin.
Watch via: https://gres.hm/welsh-gods
Why Does Britain Have a Water and Sewage Crisis?
Watch via: https://gres.hm/water-crisis
The discharge of raw sewage into rivers, as well as major water companiesā financial problems, have become serious political and social concerns.
Professor Martin Daunton* explores the history of Britain's water infrastructure, noting how cities have faced similar challenges in the past. Notorious among them was the āGreat Stinkā in London in 1858 that led to the construction of Bazalgetteās sewer.
*also of Faculty Of History, University Of Cambridge
The College was established out of the Will of Sir Thomas Gresham, one of the most influential and important men across the Tudor and Elizabethan periods. Sir Thomas made himself indispensible as the financial agent for four successive monarchs from Henry VIII to Elizabeth I. As well as founding the Royal Exchange, Sir Thomas left proceeds in his Will for the foundation of the College in his name.
Gresham College was established in 1597 in Sir Thomas' former mansion on Bishopsgate. It was there that the seven original Gresham Professors lived and lectured, including the likes of Sir Christopher Wren and Robert Hooke. After over 150 years at Bishopsgate ā a period that saw the establishment of the Royal Society within the College ā we moved to new premises on the corner of Gresham Street and Basinghall Street. In 1991 the College moved to Barnard's Inn Hall, a 14 th Century hall located close to Chancery Lane.
Today the College continues our four-century-old tradition of providing free public lectures within London. We uphold our founding principle in maintaining the highest possible academic standards for all of our appointed Gresham Professors, Visiting Professors and visiting speakers. All of the College's 130 and more lectures and events each year are free and open to all. Booking is not generally required, but for a few lectures which do require it are all clearly marked.
The College has been recording its lectures since the 1980s and there are now over 1,900 lectures freely available online in text, audio or video formats. The provision of this free online archive of lectures aligns with our founding principles of accessible free education for all.
