Show Notes
Send us Fan Mail EPISODE 1 NOW LIVE It's just like all the other podcasts you love, but instead of trying to sell you mattresses and underwear we're explaining everything you always wanted to know about the history of rural England but never knew to ask. Why the name? Well, we're known for the Internet's most famous sheep, an 'absolute unit' who first went viral in 2018. But ask any of our staff and they'll tell you everything at The MERL is worth that level of fuss. So join us for a ve...
More from Absolute Units
Send us Fan Mail In 2013, we acquired a collection of over 1,800 rural films that had been carefully assembled, preserved, and frequently shared by a Nottinghamshire farmer called Richard Watts. Now, with funding from the BFI, we've been able to work on this incredible archive, cataloguing the films, digitising them, and sharing them in screenings of our own. In this episode, Joe (just Joe this time!) is joined by the team working on our BFI-funded project, Watts in the Country: Hannah ...
Send us Fan Mail Sorry we missed a week! We're catching up after both being out on leave. In this episode, Joe and Ollie chat about what they've been up to lately with many surprising links to rural history: from Ollie's son sending him surreal livestock portraiture on WhatsApp, to Joe's visit to Versailles. We also discuss what's coming up soon - including an episode about the Bayeux Tapestry. Relevant links: CF Payne's art: https://www.cfpayne.com/Joe's interview with NPR about cottagecore:...
Send us Fan Mail What will farming look like in 100 years time? That's the question asked by a group of University of Reading PhD students, managed by Rosy Scholes and Ellen Knight, as part of the University of Reading's centenary celebrations. In this pod, Joe and Ollie catch up with Rosy and Ellen about their research and their project, which culminated in the burial of a time capsule in our garden, filled with research, creative responses, and visions of what the future of farming might be...
Send us Fan Mail How do you lead a rural history museum in 2026? What does that look like in practice? And how does our contemporary work vary to the vision of our founders back in 1951? In this second of two conversations with Kate Arnold-Forster, Director of The Museum of English Rural Life and the University of Reading's Museums and Collections, Ollie and Joe chat with Kate about our museum's ongoing evolution, the power of eBay for contemporary collecting, and what the future holds for un...
Send us Fan Mail So far we've spoken a lot about The Museum of English Rural Life's earliest years. Yet so much of what we are today results from a radical rethinking of what The MERL can be, which has happened under the brilliant stewardship of Kate Arnold-Forster, Director of The Museum of English Rural Life and the University of Reading's Museums and Collections. In this episode, we speak with Kate about her journey into museums, the significance of university museums, and her pivotal role...