BBC World News
The State of America
Ahead of the 2016 US presidential election, BBC World News and BBC.com/news explore the state of Obama’s America. What sort of country and economy will the next President, whoever it is, inherit? This season of programming health checks the US economy – still considered to be the largest and most innovative in the world, and discovers how Americans feel about their future and their country’s role in the world.
The Travel Show
July 9th 05:30, 15:30, 20:30
July 10th 08:30
July 13th 10:00
America’s relationship with Mexico and the role of immigration have been divisive debate points during the US primaries. In this Travel Show US special, Rajan Datar travels along America’s southern border by train to investigate the country’s long and sometimes complex history with its southern neighbour, and looks at the other influences that have helped shaped the region. Starting at the originally French port city of New Orleans, Rajan traces the story of American expansion westwards stopping off at the Alamo, where Texan frontiersmen entered American mythology by facing overwhelming Mexican forces. Rajan then heads to Big Bend National Park where he kayaks along the line that divides the two countries.
July 16th 05:30, 15:30, 20:30
July 17th 08:30
July 20th 10:00
In part two of this transcontinental trip, Rajan Datar travels to the West Texas borderlands and visits a tiny town that has become an unlikely oasis for art. Rajan also visits Tucson in Arizona - the only place in the world where tourists can get close to an intercontinental nuclear missile – and goes behind the scenes of a nuclear bunker to explore how the Cold War shaped this part of America. Native American heritage is also a vibrant part of the state’s history, and Rajan treks through a site of ancient rock paintings and meets the laser artist who is campaigning to preserve them. On the way to his final stop, Los Angeles, Rajan visits Palm Springs, the desert city which Hollywood celebrities once escaped to from their studios and now a mixed population of retirees, LGBT activists and Islamic converts all live their version of the American dream.
Click: Future Tech
July 9th 08:30, 21:30
July 10th 05:30, 15:30
July 14th 10:00
Click looks to the future in this US special and goes behind the scenes at the world’s first virtual reality amusement park. The team also test out the research robots that are pushing boundaries at Stanford University, and special guest reporter Ana Matronic investigates the Boston-based bots which mimic nature’s creatures. Plus, with the rise of drones, Click reveals how the US is leading the way in custom UAV traffic management projects at LAX and NASA.
Click: Silicon Valley
July 16th 08:30, 21:30
July 17th 05:30, 15:30
July 21st 10:00
In the second episode of Click’s US special the team head to tech nirvana, Silicon Valley, where they meet with some of the biggest players in tech and the young start-ups that are hoping to make a big difference - but will they succeed or just be a flash in the pan? And how tough is it to distinguish your company from the next? From innovative research projects at Google, to cutting edge sounds at George Lucas’s Skywalker Ranch and Uber’s rapid expansion, the tech giants share their secrets on how to stay ahead. Plus, with the US elections heating up, Click visits the start-ups that are using data to spot trends and help share views.
Talking Books at Hay festival 2016: Lionel Shriver
July 16th 14:30
July 17th 02:30, 09:30, 21:30
July 19th 10:00
In a special Talking Books from Hay Festival, George Alagiah talks to Lionel Shriver. Shriver is best known for her hard-hitting 2003 novel ‘We Need To Talk About Kevin’ which centres around a fictional school massacre and is told in a series of first-person letters; the book was a runaway success and lead to a film adaptation in 2011. Her new book ‘The Mandibles: A Family 2029-2047’ focuses on three generations of a wealthy family as a fiscal crisis hits a near-future America.
Artsnight: David Baddiel on The Great Man Theory
July 23rd 04:30, 19:30
July 24th 12:30
July 28th 11:30
In the 19th century, Thomas Carlyle came up with The Great Man Theory - a view that history is formed by the impact of certain charismatic and powerful men. For this episode of Artsnight, David Baddiel travels to New York to see if there are any great men left and whether the idea, embodied by figures like Picasso, Saul Bellow or Norman Mailer, is untenable now. David talks to writers Martin Amis, Nick Laird, Katie Roiphe and Meg Wolitzer to ask whether anyone can be called great in a culture where so many voices and opinions exist that anyone that claims greatness is easily shot down. David argues that even those who might be considered great can't be that absurdly masculine anymore so can only achieve greatness with an ironic nod and a wink. So, David asks, what has been gained and lost by the death of The Great Man idea?
“Who Women Want”
July 9th 14:30
July 10th 02:30, 09:30, 21:30
Gender is set to be a defining issue in this year’s US presidential race. Donald Trump recently claimed that “The only thing [Hillary Clinton has] got going is the women’s card, and the beautiful thing is, women don’t like her.” However, polls suggest that Hillary Clinton enjoys a clear lead among female voters of all backgrounds, while she struggles with the blue collar male vote. Award winning BBC World News America Presenter Katty Kay examines who women want in this year’s presidential race: Trump or Clinton, and why it will be so crucial to the final result.
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Sport Today Extra: Aries Merritt
July 2nd 14:30
July 3rd 02:30, 09:30, 21:30
July 5th 10:00
Aries Merritt won Olympic gold at London 2012 in the men’s 110m hurdles and broke the world record for his event a month later. His road to Rio seemed set but in 2015, after winning a bronze medal at the World Championships in Beijing, the American was on the operating table having a kidney transplant – the kidney was donated by his sister. Now Aries is hoping that the road to recovery leads to Rio. BBC World News spends time with him at his Arizona home and during training as the reigning Olympic champion looks to clear his final hurdle and win at the Olympic Games.
Heroes
TX tbc
In the run-up to the Olympics, BBC World News explores the amazing stories of five real-life heroes. This programme tells the stories of five exceptional individuals who overcame great obstacles in their lives through sport and now use it to help people living in some of the poorest and most violent places in Brazil. Heroes includes stories from a skateboarder, a runner, a sailor, a golfer and a badminton coach. Their work is helping to tackle Brazil's most pervasive problem: the country is still one of the most unequal in the world.
Favela Athletes
TX tbc
All over the world athletes are stepping up their training in a bid to represent their country in one of the most revered sporting competitions on the planet: The Olympic Games. As all eyes turn to Rio, this programme follows three young Olympic and Paralympic hopefuls on their journey from their homes in the Rio favelas to the moment of ‘selection’. For 17 year old diver Giovanna, 13 year old gymnast Ana Carolina and 26 year old Paralympian high jumper Jorge, the moment of truth has almost come. Will their dreams of sporting glory come true?
Hidden Rio
TX tbc
Hidden Rio examines some of the unique tales of cariocas, the unique term given to the people of Rio de Janeiro. These extraordinary stories reveal another side of Rio and touch on the city’s unique ancestral roots, samba, geology, art, social protests and inequality. The stories include those of a former slave refuge in Rio’s richest area where descendants still live, and a town in the mountains that was founded by Finnish migrants where Father Christmas is out all year round, temperatures fall below zero – and it snows!
Team Refugee
TX tbc
For the first time, refugees around the world are in training hoping to compete in the team of Refugee Olympic Athletes (ROA), newly formed by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). From fleeing the horrors of war and seeking refuge, to being on a world stage competing as an Olympic champion; BBC World News and BBC.com are charting the dramatic changes in circumstances of a group of incredible athletes.
Team Refugee follows Syrian teenager Yusra Mardini who fled the country’s civil war and is now in Germany hoping to swim for the ROA. It also examines the stories of Popole Misenga and Yolande Mabika who escaped from the DRC and made a bid for asylum in Brazil during the 2013 World Judo Championships in Rio. They are now living in the Rio slums but train every day with the help of the Brazilian National Olympic Committee (NOC). And in Kenya, a group of athletic competitors from the Kakuma and Dadaab refugee camps are hoping to qualify for the IOC’s Olympic Refugee Team and compete in Rio this August.
Horizons
Healthy Harvest
July 2nd 03:30, 10:30
July 3rd 16:30, 22:30
July 5th 11:30
Adam Shaw reports from Africa on how science is improving harvests for farmers plagued with pests and drought. And explores how new techniques and technology are enabling rural food production.
Planet Oil
Episode 1
July 2nd 11:10, 23:10
July 3rd 04:10, 17:10
The moment we first drilled for oil we opened a Pandora's box that changed the world forever. Oil has transformed the way we live our lives, spawned foreign wars and turned a simple natural resource into the most powerful political weapon the world has ever known. But when exactly did geology turn into such a high-stakes game? In this series, Professor Iain Stewart visits the places that gave birth to the earth's oil riches, discovers the people who fought over its control and supply, and explores how our insatiable thirst for oil is changing the very planet on which we depend. It's a journey that will help us answer a fundamental question - how did we become so addicted to oil in little more than one human lifetime?
Episode 2
July 9th 11:10, 23:10
July 10th 04:10, 17:10
By the early 1950s oil, plastics and fertilisers had transformed the planet. But as Professor Iain Stewart reveals, when the oil producing countries demanded a greater share in profits from the Western energy companies, the oil and gas fields of the Middle East became a focus for coup d'états and military conflict.
In this episode, Professor Stewart travels to the North Sea and recalls the race against time to find alternative supplies in the shallow, but turbulent waters both here and in America's Gulf Coast.
The offshore discoveries in the 1970s proved to be a game changer. They marked an engineering revolution; the moment when 'difficult' oil and gas (previously unviable sources) could be commercially produced from the ocean depths. It was the moment when Western Europe and the US finally unshackled themselves from their 20th century energy security nightmare.
Episode 3
July 16th 11:10, 23:10
July 17th 04:10, 17:10
As we entered the 21st century the world was guzzling oil, coal and gas like never before. Despite fears of 'peak oil', Professor Iain Stewart discovers that while huge technological advances are helping extend the life of existing oilfields, new unconventional oil and gas supplies, like shale gas and tar sands, are extending the hydrocarbon age well into the 21st century.
Given that there are plenty of fossil fuels still in the ground, the spectre of climate change has forced many to ask if we can really afford to burn what's left. In this concluding episode, Iain Stewart argues that we face a stark choice: do we continue to feed our addiction - suck Planet Oil dry - and risk catastrophic climate change, or do we go hell for leather for alternative energy sources and make the transition from our fossil fuel past to a low carbon future? In which case, how do we make that shift?
9 Months in the Bronx
TX tbc
The BBC’s Anna Bressanin follows the story of Felicia, a pregnant 22 year old from the Bronx borough of New York City. Felicia knows that as soon as she gives birth Children Services may come to the hospital and take her baby away, and she’s determined to stop that happening.
