Smoking

Laurie Taylor talks to Ivan Markovic, Lecturer in Human Geography at Durham University, about the unique social atmosphere surrounding tobacco use in modern Britain, from its encouragement as part of the Home Front ‘mood management’ during the Second World War to the impact of smoking on 1980s workplace regulations and the UK ban on its use in public places in 2007. Does smoking still play a significant part in the British cultural imagination? Also, Tricia Starks, Professor of History at the University of Arkansas, discusses cigarettes and the Soviet smoking habit. How did the USSR become the first mass smoking society whilst simultaneously opposing this quintessential capitalist product? Producer: Jayne Egerton

You can listen to Smoking online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Smoking is an episode from Thinking Allowed by BBC.

This episode is 28:20 long.

This episode was published on Mar 18, 2025.

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