New Generation Thinkers 2011-2016
New Generation Thinkers was launched in November 2010 at Radio 3's Free Thinking Festival of Ideas. The New Generation Thinkers scheme invites applications from academics at an early stage of their career who are passionate about communicating modern scholarship to a wider audience.
Led by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) with BBC Radio 3, we invite up to sixty early career researchers to BBC-run workshops to develop their programme ideas alongside experienced BBC producers. From these sixty, the ten resident New Generation Thinkers are selected, who go on to develop their ideas for BBC Radio 3 in a year-long partnership.
View some of the highlights below, from the scheme's earliest years.
2016
Read the New Generation Thinkers 2016 biographies.
Read New Generation Thinkers feature on the BBC website.
Watch New Generation Thinker Dr Gulzaar Barn discuss her research and being a New Generation Thinker.
2015
Read New Generation Thinkers feature on the BBC Arts website.
Watch the video from 2015
- Listen to all 10 free thinking essays from the 2015 Festival, starting with the first one by Catherine Fletcher from Swansea University
- Read our Claire Walker-Gore (NGT 2015 finalist) interview with NGT 2017 finalist Eleanor Lybeck.
2014
- Read our press release: BBC Radio and TV Broadcasters of the Future Announced at Hay Festival to find out who the 10 finalists were
- Read our joint interview with Seán Williams (New Generation Thinker 2016) and Alun Withey (New Generation Thinker 2014).
- Listen to four of the free thinking essays from the 2014 Festival, starting with the first one by Alasdair Cochrane from The University of Sheffield.
2013
Read our press release: New Research, New Broadcasters - Radio 3 Announces New Generation Thinkers to find out who the 10 finalists were.
Read New Generation Thinkers feature on the BBC Arts & Culture website.
2012
- Read our interview with Charlotte Blease (NGT 2012) and Joanne Paul (NGT 2017)
- Read New Generation Thinkers feature on the BBC Arts & Culture website
- Where are they now? Professor Nandini Das (2012 NGT Finalist) presents Tales of Tudor travel: The Explorer's Handbook on BBC4 iPlayer.
2011
- Read our interview with Alexandra Harris, one of the first researchers to be successful under our scheme
- Listen to five of the essays on the BBC Arts & Culture website
- Read the first BBC press release about the NGT scheme, dated 28 June 2011.