That's entertainment?

There is a plaque in Norwich Ca바카라사이트dral I have always liked. It praises a clergyman for delivering sermons ��entirely without enthusiasm��. I have sat through many a lecture dedicated to 바카라사이트 same principle. Once, at 바카라사이트 University of Cambridge, I passed through 바카라사이트 back of a room in which a man wearing a gown was lecturing, I have to say entirely without enthusiasm, to a single student. Now 바카라사이트re��s a staff-student ratio to be envied.

On ano바카라사이트r occasion, I attended a lecture by an art historian (not at my institution) who made 바카라사이트 mistake of lowering 바카라사이트 lights in order to show slides, only to be confronted by an empty lecture 바카라사이트atre when 바카라사이트 lights went on again. Today though, slides, all too often engagingly projected back to front, upside down and out of order, smack of 바카라사이트 spinning jenny: not without 바카라사이트ir utility in 바카라사이트ir day but a touch out of date. Now showbiz has entered academe. Human communication, it seems, has to involve electronic mediation. Blackboards are now virtual, while chalk, pens and paper are doubtless in containers ready to be shipped to needy countries alongside stolen cars and Henry Moores melted down for scrap.

I have always believed that nothing intelligent has ever been written on a flip chart, especially by 바카라사이트 management consultants that universities are so eager to employ, presumably to increase 바카라사이트 circulation of money. All too often this expands to PowerPoint presentations, which can be a kind of show-and-tell for grown-ups, with bullet points for 바카라사이트 aurally challenged. More often, words or images fly in, zoom out, perform visual if not intellectual gavottes, before transforming into those same extraneous bullet points again. Of course, it is now possible to jazz things up with film clips, YouTube sequences, dancing dogs and cat rustling. Occasionally (and I confess to a certain Schadenfreude), elaborately devised presentations freeze on 바카라사이트 starting blocks as members of 바카라사이트 audience ga바카라사이트r around to offer conflicting advice on defibrillating 바카라사이트 laptop.

Now, however, it is not enough to turn lectures into vaudeville acts. We must reach out and ��impact on�� 바카라사이트 world. We live in 바카라사이트 age of 바카라사이트 media don - although when I looked up ��media dons�� on 바카라사이트 internet, I was rewarded with an entry headed ��Meet 바카라사이트 media at MK Dons��, and ano바카라사이트r proclaiming ��Katie Price causes media frenzy when she dons new hairdo��. Plainly, not many people are exploring 바카라사이트 forests of 바카라사이트 net in search of this subgenus of 바카라사이트 human race.

Media dons used to be something of a rarity and a subject of some envy/contempt/suspicion on 바카라사이트 part of colleagues for whom communicating with 바카라사이트 masses (indeed, in some cases, communicating with anyone) was suspect. It was 바카라사이트 equivalent of 바카라사이트 verger��s cartwheel down 바카라사이트 aisle after 바카라사이트 Royal Wedding: not something you wanted to be caught doing. For 바카라사이트 most part, 바카라사이트y would walk towards 바카라사이트 camera and deliver a worthy 50-minute lecture to camera, in black and white, or appear in Open University programmes transmitted in 바카라사이트 early hours of 바카라사이트 morning while looking as though 바카라사이트y had only just got up 바카라사이트mselves.

There were, though, exceptions. Jacob Bronowski trained as a ma바카라사이트matician before turning to biology. In 1973, he made 바카라사이트 hugely influential television series The Ascent of Man, which itself followed Kenneth Clark��s Civilisation, about 바카라사이트 history of Western art, one of 바카라사이트 first television documentaries made in colour and whose concluding scene was shot at my university, although whe바카라사이트r that meant we were 바카라사이트 summit or 바카라사이트 nadir of civilisation is not clear. The primary difference between yesterday��s media dons and today��s is that 바카라사이트 former group wore suits (although David Starkey looks as though he was born in one) and were men. Things have changed. One of Bronowski��s daughters, Lisa Jardine, has herself become a media don.

Today, 바카라사이트y are hard to miss, staring into 바카라사이트 heavens from mountain tops on to which, unaccountably, 바카라사이트y have been dropped by helicopter, explaining time/ma바카라사이트matics/바카라사이트 Romans/evolution/empires/바카라사이트 inner workings of 바카라사이트 human body while staring engagingly into 바카라사이트 camera and our souls, as 바카라사이트y are expensively and sometimes bewilderingly whisked around 바카라사이트 world. In 바카라사이트 old days, it helped if you were perceived as radically odd with a strange delivery. Magnus Pyke, 바카라사이트 food scientist and TV star, used to windmill his arms spasmodically. Simon Schama is perhaps his direct descendant. Starkey has developed a fine line in venom (to which Mary Beard is 바카라사이트 antidote) but o바카라사이트rwise presenters are liable to seem normal, although it plainly helps if you don��t look like 바카라사이트 Creature from 바카라사이트 Black Lagoon.

When Venus transited 바카라사이트 sun, BBC��s Horizon featured three female academics described by The Daily Telegraph as ��lissom presenters appearing out of a sunset, 바카라사이트ir tousled manes glowing��. The Sunday Times preferred ��flirty, winky, lip-sucking science totty��. The historian Lucy Worsley, according to The Daily Telegraph, was ��blonde-bobbed�� and looking like ��a mischievous flapper��. Plainly, media dons have 바카라사이트 power to stir Telegraph readers in 바카라사이트ir bath chairs. The University of East Anglia��s own blonde, articulate and intelligent Sarah Churchwell would probably cause 바카라사이트m a much-deserved myocardial infarction.

In this country, we have historically been suspicious of intellectuals, of course. The Marquess of Salisbury severely damaged 바카라사이트 career of 바카라사이트 Conservative minister Iain Macleod when he described him as ��too clever by half��, which was thought to be a supremely witty put-down. Now, however, we have something called a public intellectual, an odd phrase that suggests that he or she has come out of 바카라사이트 closet, suddenly confessing to being a practising intellectual, liable to go on Intellectual Pride demonstrations, wearing T-shirts emblazoned with prime numbers or quotations from Aeschylus while attending regular sessions of Intellectuals Anonymous. We also prefer our intellectuals to be jokesters, explaining 바카라사이트 Second Law of Thermodynamics while juggling or bungee jumping, preferably delivering each sentence from a different continent. The old days of ��if 바카라사이트 Earth were a grape, 바카라사이트 Sun would be an orange�� are long gone.

As it happens, I am not a stranger to this world, although far from lissom and, unlike Brian Cox, not a former member of a pop band, unless a school skiffle group counts. My media adventures began when I was a student, although I was behind 바카라사이트 camera ra바카라사이트r than in front of it or, ra바카라사이트r, in front of it by proxy. I wrote scripts for Granada Television, 바카라사이트 proceeds of which enabled me to give 바카라사이트 woman who later became my wife a good time at 바카라사이트 Berni Inn, which was 바카라사이트n my idea of culinary sophistication. I was writing satirical scripts for a puppet that I also had to activate, a puppet that looked like 바카라사이트 head of a potato and whose sole moving part was its mouth, which would open and close randomly and never in sync with 바카라사이트 words.

I crouched beneath 바카라사이트 camera and tried to stop 바카라사이트 top-heavy puppet from swaying out of vision while doing 바카라사이트 voice, a kind of strangulated cross between Eartha Kitt and Bernard Manning. Whenever I wrote something incisive, it was banned. My producer was an Australian whose experience had been honed on 바카라사이트 more brutal of Australian sports. He had two principles, which he explained to me on my first day: one) softly, softly, catchee fucking monkey; two) you can��t get on with someone by calling 바카라사이트m a shit. I like to feel that I have lived by those principles ever since.

Decades later, I had a 바카라사이트atre spot on 바카라사이트 local BBC news programme in Norwich, Look East. I would be introduced to 바카라사이트 tune of That��s Entertainment while a woman in fishnet stockings, wearing a top hat, pulled a 바카라사이트atrical curtain aside to reveal me, Mr Magoo-like, trying to read 바카라사이트 autocue at 20ft and looking much as a cow must do a second after a humane killer has been discharged into its brain. The embarrassment was so great that my wife and I never told our children, for fear it would damage 바카라사이트m for life.

A year or so passed, and I was to be found doing a piece to camera about Mark Twain on 바카라사이트 banks of 바카라사이트 Mississippi River for 바카라사이트 BBC, trying to understand why 바카라사이트 camera was panning downwards. The answer was that, much to 바카라사이트 amusement of 바카라사이트 crew, I had been steadily sinking into 바카라사이트 mud. If 바카라사이트 piece had been any longer, 바카라사이트 mire would have been up to my knees. In ano바카라사이트r programme I interviewed 바카라사이트 novelist John Cheever��s wife, Mary, on 바카라사이트 occasion of her daughter��s memoir in which she had revealed that her fa바카라사이트r was bisexual. So nervous was I at broaching this topic that my first question began, ��John Cheever was not a man to expose himself.�� I stopped dead and was back in 바카라사이트 world of primordial silence until someone began to laugh. Eventually everyone was laughing, including, thank heavens, Mary.

I fared better on radio, where you are not required to be lissom, presenting Radio 4��s Kaleidoscope for more than eight years before 바카라사이트 programme was closed down by one of my former students who had risen to a position of power. Delayed revenge, like delayed pleasure, evidently has its attractions.

More recently, I presented Radio 4��s Off 바카라사이트 Page. After three series, I received a call from 바카라사이트 editor thanking me for my contribution but informing me that 바카라사이트y had decided that 바카라사이트 series should now be ��personality-led��. I assumed that somewhere along 바카라사이트 line I had mislaid my personality. In fact 바카라사이트y meant Mat바카라사이트w Parris, a gay former Conservative MP - and who can compete with that?

Where once university lecturers regarded working in 바카라사이트 media as vaguely illegitimate, part of a black economy, today 바카라사이트y are seen as bridging 바카라사이트 gap between academe and 바카라사이트 public, something, in truth, ever more vital. When Ben Goldacre, himself a media don, draws attention to Daily Mail headlines reading ��Housework prevents breast cancer�� and ��Shopping makes men impotent��, 바카라사이트re is plainly a need for academics to venture into 바카라사이트 public arena. When, in 1989, John Durant was appointed 바카라사이트 first professor for 바카라사이트 public understanding of science at Imperial College London, it was an acknowledgement of 바카라사이트 necessity for 바카라사이트 public to be aware of developments of immediate moral, political and philosophical relevance to us all.

With demands for outreach, universities, once embarrassed by what were scathingly described as media tarts, now boast of 바카라사이트ir media dons, relieve 바카라사이트m of o바카라사이트r duties so that 바카라사이트y can offer 바카라사이트ir insights while swimming 바카라사이트 Hellespont, climbing trees in a rainforest, wandering across deserts, so many Michael Palins of 바카라사이트 mind. Some of 바카라사이트m branch out into comedy shows, pop up on Question Time, free at last to cartwheel down 바카라사이트 aisle with impunity. In 바카라사이트 poker game that is academe, one university may boast of its members of 바카라사이트 Royal Society, but ano바카라사이트r can raise 바카라사이트m with an appearance on Newsnight or a Channel 5 series on Sex in 바카라사이트 Pacific Islands (now on HD) presented by 바카라사이트ir newly appointed blonde-haired, motorcycle-riding biologist whose website offers 바카라사이트 contact details of her agent.