Les Back accompanies Professor David Silverman to the Lady Sara Cohen home where her leads a singing session each week with residents with dementia. David Silverman was one of the founding members of the Goldsmiths Sociology Department and he is an internationally acclaimed writer on qualitative research and methodology. He talked about the value of the ethnographic eye and also the power of singing.

Les Back visits Nantes to speak at the universitys International Week. He visits Krzysztof Wodiczko and Julian Bonders Abolition of Slavery Memorial and discovers how deeply Nantes was implicated in the Atlantic Slave Trade.

Committed Sociology: the Annual A Level Sociology conference at Christ The King, 6th March, 2014es Back talks about commitment and sociologys purpose with Professor Bev Skeggs and Dr Lez Henry. The theme of committed sociology was the focus of this years sixth form conference at Christ The King College, Lewisham. The podcast also includes interviews with Marie Carver-Hughes the teacher behind the conference and sociology student Ellta Woldermariam with music played by Jacob Fritze.

Les Back talks to Nirmal Puwar about their book Live Methods on location in Berlin, where they gave a lecture at the Humboldt University. They also reflect on running a workshop where 25 students put their ideas to work in a group ethnography experiment on the hotel lobby as a public space. Manuela Bojadzijev, who hosted the event, reflects on what her students got out of this experiment and what it revealed about Berlins tourist economy.

Les Back reviews Dick Hobbs book Lush Life: Constructing Organised Crime in the UK Oxford University Press, 2013. He also reflects on the importance of letters for prisoners inside the criminal justice system, which offer a way to escape imaginitively the discipline of life behind prison walls.

In this podcast Les Back talks about New Years resolutions and two of his. In particularly he talks about the need to get away from the scholars desk and get out more and the joys and perils of cycling in London.

Les Back offers a class analysis of Christmas and he reflects on contributing to a new collection by Hannah Jones and Emma Jackson on urban culture called Stories of Cosmopolitan Belonging. The book will be published in 2014 and Emma and Hannah were both PhD students at Goldsmiths.

In this weeks podcast Les Back talks about the frustrations of writing as well as the pleasures of reading. In particular he reviews recent books on the politics of music including Dave Hesmondhalghs Why Music Matters and John Streets Music and Politics. Les also talks about Dave Beers new book Punk Sociology and the niceties of writing endorsements for books.

Les Back speaks to teacher and Kent based cultural activist Richard Robinson about his work on music and anti-racist education. They discuss the album he produced with Romany RD and Asian Dub Foundation Education in 2001 called Asylum. They also talk about the impact the CD had on the making Terry Hall Mustaqs collaboration The Hour of Two Lights.

Les Back talks to Charlynne Bryan about her involvement in the EUMARGINS research project and her thought on research ethics and authorship.

Les give an up date on his attempts to become a routine writer and describes the process of writing a new piece on the way UK Border Agency are using mobile mobile phones to seek track migrants who are overstayers. He discusses how Twitter and the iPhone is used to uncover what UKBA is doing.

This time Les is off to Norwich to be part of the Humanities in Human Rights weekend workshop. He talks to Lyndsey Stonebridge about Hannah Arendts thought and what she would have thought about the feature film that was made about her life.

Leaving Copenhagen, Les talks about the way wildlife endures in the heart of the city and the joggers and runners who pound the streets exercising.

Les meets Benny Lihme, publisher of Social Kritik, at the journals 25th anniversary celebrations in Copenhagen. Benny talks about the history of the journal, rejecting an article by Pierre Bourdieu and publishing unkempt writers who have something to say.

In this postcard Les focuses on the routines of writing through a discussion of Paul J Silvias How to Write A lot - A Practical Guide to Productive Academic Writing. He also talks about the writers he admires - many of whom like Primo Levi had day jobs - managed their time.

Les Back reflects on visiting a Goldsmiths student in prison. This podcast explore the transformative power of higher education in relation to Goldsmiths Open Book Project. Just a few days after the Wormwood Scrubs he attended Goldsmiths Graduation ceremony

Les interviews his old friend and collaborator Michael Bull at his home near Lewes. Together they discuss the process of writing and publishing together 10 years on from the publication of their first edition.

In Leeds to attend a workshop on Urban History in Leeds, Les reflects on the meaning of a sabatical, and takes the time to consider how it feels to take Deptford to Yorkshire.

Professor Les Back is finishing his time as Dean of the Goldsmiths Graduate School, and is about to embark on a year-long period of study-leave. During his time away from the campus, Les will be sending these postcards back, giving us insight into these periods in an academics life, when research and study fill the spaces left by admin and teaching. Or perhaps, the spaces left by colleagues and students.