What function does comedy serve? What do people in power learn by watching tragedies? In this collection of five animations comedienne Josie Long guides us into the fascinating world of Literary Theory. Along the way we’ll discover two very different types of poet (and lover): The Petrarchan and The Libertine, we’re given insight into the complexity behind the term author and learn the difference between a book and the idea of a book.

This collection was created in conjunction with The Open University course A334 English Literature from Shakespeare to Austen

What are the key issues for sustainable resource management? How do companies operate while maintaining corporate social responsibility? From understanding the need for sustainability, and environmental auditing to learning how organisations integrate health and safety policy. This collection/album explores many of the issues that face modern businesses and gives some insight into how these companies function while adhering to various environmental management systems.

This material is taken from Open University course T867: Managing for sustainability

How does society create and control our social world? How do passports and passbooks function as agents of government control? And what are the purposes of citizenship tests and ceremonies? This album provides insight into how large communities are organised to regulate their social behaviour. People who lived under Apartheid in South Africa describe how their passbook governed their social world, from alcohol consumption to medical health. Philosophers, politicians and academics offer differing perspectives on requirements for citizenship and the importance of citizenship ceremonies in the UK and Australia. In the two audio tracks, course team members Liz McFall and Sophie Watson put the ideas covered in the album into their academic context. This material is taken from The Open University course DD308 Making social worlds.