Speaker: Brian Cathcart

The modern world of news, we are frequently told, is in crisis, and that crisis was brought on by technological change. Twitter and the smartphone are said to threaten the future of journalism itself. As the bicentenary of the Battle of Waterloo draws close, Brian Cathcart examines the role of news at a time before electrical communication existed, in fact before steamships and steam railways. How did humans behave when communication depended upon horsepower and sail-power, and nothing swifter? What do we recognise in the story of how the news of Wellington’s victory reached London in 1815, and what seems different? Is there, for example, a human news instinct – in the teller, in the receiver or in both?

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Contact: Brian Cathcart
Email: B.Cathcart@kingston.ac.uk