Can we predict the future? How is identity shaped by the past? And how can history help with making sense of our present? In today’s episode, Antonia and guest Adriaan Duiveman go – quite literally – back to the future and talk about how a historian ends up studying a time that hasn’t even happened yet. And why being a “futurologist” is anything but straight-forward. Adriaan Duiveman is a postdoc at the Faculty of Arts, where he researches crises – and the stories citizens, authorities and opinion makers tell in and about them. Would you like to learn more about the future, the past and the present (or at least one way of looking at it)? Then Adriaan recommends the novel “Time Shelter” by Georgi Gospodinov.

Edit: Jara Majerus

Cover: Antonia Leise

Can we overcome capitalism? What alternatives to communism exist? And what keeps us from imagining new economies?

In the first episode of In a Nutshell’s third season, we delve into the challenges of capitalism. Together with this week’s guest, Querine Kommandeur, we discuss whether it is possible to exit capitalism and learn why it matters how we talk about economics.

Querine is a PhD candidate at Radboud University. In her research, she focuses on alternative economic discourses. With her work, she aims to better understand how these discourses emerge and develop, and how they can lead totransformations.

Do you want to delve deeper into alternative economics? Make sure to follow Querine’s recommendations and listen to the podcasts “Economics for Rebels” by Dr. Köves Alexandra, “Leven na de groei” by Just Enough, or “Ecosofie” by MarnixKluiters.

And if you want to stick your nose into some books, check out “Doughnut Ecomics” by Kate Raworth, “Mission Economy” by Mariana Mazzucato, and “Less Is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World” by Jason Hickel.

Edit: Jara Majerus

Cover: Antonia Leise

How advanced are robots? Why do we communicate differently with them than with humans? And why are cats, in the end, perhaps the better companions than robots?

In today’s episode, Antonia talks with Lynn de Rijk about how we communicate with beings that aren’t human, or, differently put: how we communicate with cats and robots. And why that is sometimes anything but straight-forward. Lynn talks about her research at the cat café in Nijmegen and Amazon robots that have already ceased to exist before they even hit the consumer market.

Lynn de Rijk is a PhD candidate at the Faculty of Arts and part of the Centre for Language Studies. They investigate how humans attribute meaning to non-verbal conduct – especially between humans and non-humans.

Would you like to learn more about communication between humans, cats, robots and others? Then follow Lynn’s suggestion and have a look at the books Ways of Being by James Bridle and Animal Languages by Eva Meijer.

Edit: Jara Majerus

Cover: Antonia Leise