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Writer's pictureMark Thomson

177 Nations of Tasmania episode highlights : Being non-sectarian in Northern Ireland and a Moroccan expert on housing issues

Recent episodes have become a little sparse in the second half of 2024, but I'm definitely hoping for and indeed expecting a fair bit more activity during the summer months.


However, what we've lacked in quantity, we've hopefully made up for in quality with two really interesting episodes featuring Morocco and Northern Ireland.



BEN ( Morocco)




Ben comes from a family of 11, but he was the only one to go to university, where he not only go a degree in Sociology, but continued on to do a Ph.D at the University of Tasmania. His specialisation is a field that continues to be a hot topic in Tasmania - housing, particularly social housing. In this episode, we discussed a bit about some of the parallels between the housing issues in Morocco and Tasmania, as well as the central role of food and family in Moroccan culture.



NIALL ( Northern Ireland)


Niall grew up in Belfast when there was still ongoing conflict between Catholics and Protestants and the sectarian divide still permeated many areas of society. NIall's family were a bit of an outlier in that they didn't sit on either of this divide, giving Niall an interesting perspective.

We talk about his whole journey out of Belfast via the arty atmosphere of Brighton, the brewpub scene of Melbourne, mental burnout, a tortuous visa application process and working at the Museum of Old and New Art.

Niall was really good at painting a picture of all these places that he lived.



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