On Tuesday 14th October 2025, the Sheldonian Theatre played host to the University Of Oxford’s annual Romanes Lecture. This prestigious talk is designed to shed light on key issues in science, literature, and the arts. Each year, the speech is delivered by a distinguished public speaker at the Vice Chancellor’s invitation. This year’s was delivered by Mishal Hussain, best known to audiences as the former host of the Today programme, BBC Radio 4’s morning news show. Hussain is about to begin a new chapter of her career with The Mishal Hussain Show on Bloomberg Weekend, where she will carry out long form interviews with people who have had distinguished careers, beginning with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.
As the theme for her lecture, she chose ‘Empire, Identity and the Search for Reason’, trying to search for points of light in an increasingly troubled world. She demonstrated this by showing how British history and that of her family’s Indian heritage are intertwined, and how so much of what we know to be positive about British society today stems from many different cultures as part of a common heritage. To illustrate her point, she discussed the contributions of her own Islamic faith, challenging the conception of the ‘East’ and its culture as being opposed to that of the ‘West’.
After being introduced as a ‘national treasure’ by Professor Irene Tracey, the university’s Vice Chancellor, Hussain began her speech by remarking on the very first Romanes lecture given by William Gladstone in 1892. This was a useful point of departure as it coincided with the election of the first ever Asian MP to the British House of Commons– Dadabhai Naoroji was a history maker, even if just by 5 votes after a recount. This was the beginning of a fascinating trip through a history of empire where Britain and India were inextricably linked. Such was Naoroji’s appeal that he is cited as an inspiration to both India’s founder Mahatma Gandhi, and that of Pakistan, Mohammed Ali Jinnah.
For Hussain, this was a personal story too, as the impact of Naoroji’s words were directly felt by her ancestors. Her grandma was born at a university founded with the help of Naoroji’s influence. In an incredibly thought-provoking moment, Hussain questioned whether her journey as a ‘Brit’ began when her father moved to this country to be a doctor, or much earlier, when the title of ‘British Subject’ was applied to her colonised ancestors. This is something that will resonate with many whose ancestors arrived in this country as a direct result of the empire.
The speech wasn’t just a history lesson though; she spoke of the power of terminology, of how despite ‘Protestant’ and ‘Catholic’ no longer being terms used to divide the Northern Irish community, similar language is still used to talk about Muslims in our media. Hussain pointed out the double-standard whereby the term ‘holy war’ is often spoken of to describe conflicts perpetrated by Islamic states or entities, when no such description has been applied to Russia’s war in Ukraine, despite being supported by their Orthodox Church. Another such example she gave was that of Shamima Begum, who infamously left the UK as a teenager to join the prescribed terror group Islamic State. While clearly condemning this action as illegal, Hussain pondered why less attention was given to the fact that she was a minor and was vulnerable to grooming and propaganda. Furthermore, she questioned the morality of journalists tracking her down just days postpartum to try to secure the first interview with her. Hussain seemed to imply that Shamima Begum’s Muslim faith may have contributed to her negative press coverage, though conceded that as a fellow Muslim, this story may have hit her harder.
She then remarked on how 80 years after the end of the Second World War, the world was going through a very difficult time, leading her to search for points of light in the world. Because of her heritage, she has done this by looking at five ways that Muslims have positively contributed to today’s society, to demonstrate that all societies have built off of the back of each other’s progress, a positive message in an age of division. These five examples were: the long tradition of inquiry and education for men and women (which she lamented the Taliban’s ignorance of); their role in Renaissance contributions – including the reason we have algebra; their contribution to architecture; their works of poetry; and their role fighting and dying alongside so many others for the allied cause across the two World Wars. This showed that we all, no matter which culture we belong to, share a ‘common inheritance of knowledge’. The more we learn, she said, the more we would be able to see this.
The lecture concluded by a return to the discussion of how Naoroji and Gladstone both went onto become ‘grand old men’ of their countries. In keeping with Oxford’s motto, dominus illuminatio mea, that translates to ‘the Lord is my light’, Gladstone in 1892 and Hussain in the present day are united in their desire for the quest for the light of knowledge to continue at Oxford for many years to come.
The speech was incredibly thought-provoking and opened the eyes of members of the capacity audience to facts about our history that many wouldn’t have known before. To learn of the name Naoroji and the link he represents between the three nations and histories of Britain, India and Pakistan was fascinating. This was a speech that showed so vividly how every family’s story is connected in a larger history, joined together by the ‘common threads’ of which Hussain spoke, leaving us as the audience to ponder our own identities and how our families were affected by empires of the past.
Hussain provided some comfort that despite all of the inflammatory stories in today’s political climate, there is still space to recognise the positive work that communities across the UK have carried out to contribute to this country. Indeed, it personally left me wondering how many other stories there are to tell of our various cultural groups and how they’ve shaped our national story. That though is a question for another day.