Thinking Allowed Folgen

Residential care revisited - Laurie Taylor considers Peter Townsend's landmark research, 'The Last Refuge', fifty years after its publication. Retracing Townsend's footsteps, a hundred, older volunteer researchers sought to find out what had happened to the 173 care homes in his classic study. Julia Johnson, one of the authors of the new study, charts the changes and continuities in care for older people in England and Wales. She's joined by Robin Darton, an expert in social care, Also, the archaeologist Rachael Kiddey, examines artefacts from two homelessness sites in Bristol and York. What can these items, as well as oral histories collected from the homeless, tell us about what it means to have no shelter in the 21st century?Producer: Jayne Egerton.

What was behind the British riots? From Blackberry and gossip to hard facts and first hand accounts. Laurie Taylor talks to Daniel Briggs about his research into last year's summer of discontent and damage. A definitive account of the nature and causes of the riots of 2011. Also, is it all over for the weekend? The sociologists, Jill Ebrey and Guy Standing, ask whether or not the weekend as a time for rest, family life and pleasure, is threatened with extinction by contemporary patterns of work.Producer: Jayne Egerton.

Ever in need of a new way to travel? 'Couchsurfing', in the form of online social networking, allows users to travel with and stay at the homes of fellow users. It's just one example of how the internet aids face to face intimacy - sometimes amongst strangers. Paula Bialski talks to Laurie Taylor about her book 'Becoming Intimately Mobile' . Based on five years of ethnographic research amongst coach surfers and online hitchhiking website users, it documents new forms of human hospitality and connection. Also, trauma advocates in Croatia. Vanessa Pupavac and Ben Shephard reflect on the growth of compensation schemes for victims of civil war.Producer:Jayne Egerton.