Since 1948 the BBC has broadcast The Reith Lectures, a tribute to the first Director-General of the BBC, Sir John Reith. The first lectures were presented by philosopher Bertrand Russell. John Reith maintained that broadcasting should be a public service which ”enriches the intellectual and cultural life of the nation”, and it is in the same spirit that SAfm is launching the SAfm Summer Lectures 2002.

SAfm is taking the philosophy behind the Reith Lectures one step further and will use the SAfm series as a vehicle to celebrate the richness of South African intellectual thought. It will also acknowledge some of the cutting edge research being done in South African Universities.

The inaugural lecture is to be presented by Professor Trefor Jenkins, Professor Emeritus and Honorary Professorial Research fellow at the Department of Human Genetics at the University of the Witwatersrand. The topic he has chosen for the lecture series is Genesis, Genes & Neugenics.

The series is being launched by a “live” lecture, open to the public and invited guests on February 4. It will be followed by a four-part weekly broadcast on SAfm, beginning on February 6, continuing throughout the month. CD copies of the lectures will be sold from April.