{"podcast":{"title":"Understand","slug":"understand-5784160","podcast_index_feed_id":5784160,"rss_url":"https://podcasts.files.bbci.co.uk/m001dwr7.rss","website_url":"http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001dwr7","image_url":"http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/images/ic/3000x3000/p0ntv0rd.jpg","author":"BBC","episode_count":103,"summary":"New in Understand: Ten Fights That Made The Green Movement The modern green movement has been shaped not only by protest, but by conflict within the ranks. Shared ideas are forged through friction - battles over tactics, solutions, or who gets a voice. Justin Rowlatt goes to the heart of these battles - to learn about these dramatic moments from the people who were there. Friends, or sometimes enemies, hashing out big ideas that help define what it means to be green. Understand from BBC Radio 4 - unravelling the complexities of the biggest stories and subjects that really matter right now.","last_synced_at":"2026-07-20T12:20:32.451435+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/understand-5784160"},"episode":{"title":"How Reading Made Us: 2. How Reading Made Our Feelings","slug":"how-reading-made-us-2-how-reading-made-our-feelings","published_at":"2026-03-23T09:00:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/understand-5784160/how-reading-made-us-2-how-reading-made-our-feelings","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/understand-5784160","url":"http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002sn8m","audio_url":"http://open.live.bbc.co.uk/mediaselector/6/redir/version/2.0/mediaset/audio-nondrm-download-rss/proto/http/vpid/p0n7c4hy.mp3","summary":"Reading seems an unremarkable skill. When we say something is as “easy as ABC”, we mean it is very easy indeed. In fact, learning to read has dramatic and irreversible consequences for people and for societies. Learning to read permanently alters your brain. It changes the emotions you experience and the way you relate to others. When a society learns to read the consequences are dramatic: wars break out, revolutions erupt and new political systems spring into being. Reading made us who we are. With time spent reading - and even reading ability - starting to nosedive, Times writer James Marriott explores how reading changed humanity, and what might happen if we stop. In this programme, James asks whether the spread of novel reading in the 18th century caused a moral revolution, whether a book played a role in the abolition of slavery, and whether the rise of reading, a solitary and slightly lonely activity, was one of the factors setting us on the path to our atomized and isolated modern society. Contributions from: - Jung Chang, author - Steven Pinker, professor of psychology at Harvard University - Sarah Maxwell, founder of Saucy Books - Robert Darnton, historian - Naomi Alderman, writer and presenter - Joseph Henrich, professor of anthropology at Harvard University - Maryanne Wolf, professor and Director of the Center for Dyslexia, Diverse Learners, and Social Justice at UCLA Producer - Beth Sagar-Fenton Editor - Chris Ledgard","meta_description":"Reading seems an unremarkable skill. When we say something is as “easy as ABC”, we mean it is very easy indeed. In fact, learning to read has dramatic and…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":2544,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/understand-5784160/episodes/how-reading-made-us-2-how-reading-made-our-feelings/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/understand-5784160/how-reading-made-us-2-how-reading-made-our-feelings.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}