British History 01

In this first episode I talk about the geography of the British Isles, about the languages spoken on the British Isles, as well as about the flags and saints of the United Kingdom.

Unfortunately, I've somehow managed to record the beginning and the main part of this episode in two different qualities, so there's a noticable break after the intro -- sorry about that! I will probably have to record this whole podcast in a lower quality anyway, to ensure that I won't exceed my 100 MB per month. :)

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Recommended Reading for the British History Series:

• Mike Corbishley et al. The Young Oxford History of Britain and Ireland. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1996. (The latest edition is published under the title of The History of Britain and Ireland. -- Most of my students find this the easiest book to work with.)


• Barry Cunliffe et al., eds. The Penguin Illustrated History of Britain and Ireland: From Earliest Times to the Present Day. London: Penguin, 2004. (This was first published under the title of The Penguin Atlast of British and Irish History. It contains great overviews, but many of the relevant historical events we discuss in CS1 are not included.)


• Michael Maurer. Kleine Geschichte Englands. Rev. ed. Stuttgart: Reclam, 2002. (Well, obviously, the big disadvantage of this book is that it's written in German.)

Most of the information about British geography used in the first episode is from:

• John Oakland. British Civilization: An Introduction. 3rd ed. London: Routledge, 1995.

DVDs you might find interesting:

• How We Built Britain (present. David Dimbleby, BBC)


• A Picture of Britain (present. David Dimbleby, BBC)


• The British Isles -- A Natural History (present. Alan Titchmarsh, BBC)


• Coast (Open University)

From Ben Nevis to the Isles of Scilly (excerpt from The British Isles -- A Natural History