Inspiration Forum 2024 – war, immunity, forests, new technologies and leisure, and new formats

The fourteenth edition of the festival focused on the question of how to lead a better life in uncertain times. With more than seventy guests, we focused on four thematic blocks dedicated to the relationship between new technologies and leisure, the issue of forests, new concepts of immunity with overlaps into society and politics, and the current phenomenon of war. Workshops and a series of Inspiration Sessions completed the discussion programme. Each evening of the Forum concluded with a live taping of one of the popular podcasts.

Saturday, 26 October was dedicated to the topic of new technologies and leisure. During a workshop with innovation designer Leona Masare and political scientist Kateřina Smejkalová, we collectively explored the Future of Free Time. In the Smart things that save time? debate, columnist Jakub Jetmar asked sociologist Nina Fárová, sociologist Thorsten Peetz and lawyer Jan Vobořil whether smart homes bring gender justice and what problems new technologies solve or create. Under the title Less Work, More Life, economists Ondřej Kolínský and Matthias Sinnemann, sociologist Markéta Švarcová and environmentalist Barbora Bakošová debated the distribution of time between work and leisure. From their London household with three children, philosopher and economist Nick Srnicek and theorist Helen Hester took turns in front of the screen. The topic of their lecture and conversation with theorist and philosopher Václav Janoščík was Home and Our Fight for Free Time in relation to new technologies and more.

27 Oct / The Call of the Forest: Connecting with roots

Sunday, 27 October was dedicated to the forest. Juraj Lukáč, a prominent figure in Slovak forest conservation, opened the programme with a lecture on Forest Protection as a Path For Everyone, where he introduced the project of buying Slovak forests and creating no-go zones. In the debate on the future of Czech forests All for the Forest and the Forest for All, conservationist Jaromír Bláha, indigenous practices lecturer Monika Michaelová, forest councillor Jan Sovák, naturalist Jakub Hruška and environmentalist Anna Kárníková opened up the issues of logging, protection zones and our relationship with nature as the basis for its protection. The Haptic Forest Spa workshop, led by yoga teacher Alice Červinková, visual artist Darjan Hardi and illustrator and designer Klára Zahrádková, offered a space for playfulness, sensitivity and communication with nature right in the forest. In the programme Forest as a Source of Life and Politics with anthropologist Lukáš Senft and filmmaker Hana Nováková, Mi’kmaq indigenous woman Cheryl Maloney told the stories of indigenous peoples' victorious political and activist struggles for the right to natural resources. Photographer Tomáš Hrůza presented his creative journey to the forest and its protection through rich photographic materials from Šumava to Amazonia in an evocative lecture titled Call Into the Forest and Hear It Call Back.

1 Nov / New Immunity: More than just a defence mechanism

On the first Friday in November, we asked whether we might find a new imagination for our place in a changing world along with new discoveries in the field of immunity. Microbiologist Monika Cahová's lecture, Secrets of the Microbiome, presented our current knowledge of this marketing-friendly but still mysterious concept. The debate Untreated, Uncured with the participation of the Human Rights Commissioner Klara Šimáčková Laurenčíková, artist Adam Hrubý, photographer Hana Pololáníková, tropical medicine doctor Silvia Dobrodenková and activist Rebeka Veselá, moderated by publicist Magdalena Dušková, opened the serious and still taboo topic of long Covid. In a conversation with philosopher Lukáš Likavčan entitled Planetary Immunity, philosopher Timothy Morton presented the Christian values of mercy and forgiveness as necessary impulses for the pro-ecological movement in the fight against the climate crisis. And, in an interview with columnist Pavla Hubálková, philosopher Martin Zach presented a New Concept of Immunity, which not only protects us but also repairs damaged tissues

2 Nov / The War of Today: New kinds of technologies, old kinds of dying

Saturday, 2 November was devoted to the issues of contemporary warfare and its transformations. In her lecture Art as a Tool of Resistance and Solidarity, Belarusian artist and activist Rufina Bazlova presented traditional embroidery as a tool of political resistance and support for political prisoners of the Lukashenko regime. She then led an embroidery workshop Thread as a Weapon. The War Without Rules debate explored the future of warfare in a changing world. Political scientist Pavel Barša, anaesthesiologist Eva Kušíková, Colonel in the Czech Army Jan Mazal and political scientist David Scharf opened up questions about the reality and possibilities of aid in war zones, the changing world order and ways to resolve conflicts. In the panel The Future of War and Peace, moderator Jakub Múčka discussed the role of women in peace processes with Norwegian researcher Siri Aas Rustad and peace ambassador and lawyer Kirthi Jayakumar. Journalist Ruwaida Kamal Amer and medical doctor Fatma Mohamed shared their emotional messages directly from the war zones in Gaza and Sudan in the Women Behind the Frontline interview with documentary filmmaker Ivo Bystřičan. Historian Bohumil Melichar also presented the evolution of war reporting on Czech and Czechoslovak television in War in the Archives, illustrating not only the brutality of recent decades, which have been marked by dozens of global conflicts, but also the transformation of our perception of the media’s images of war.

Inspirational Meetings

The Inspirational Meetings offered a space for collective reflection that was open to everyone attending the festival – people with different experiences and backgrounds. On three occasions, under the guidance of lecturers from the NaZemi organisation – Petra Frühbauerová, Sabina Vojtěchovská, Lukáš Pokorný, Sonia Chalányová, Karel Doleček and Alžběta Popelka – we jointly proposed topics we wanted to discuss in informal groups and elaborated on them in a joint discussion. We thought about how to be productive outside of work and looked for ways to be lazy today. We also talked about healthy culture and looked for immunity to war.

Podcasts LIVE at Ji.hlava

Each of the festival nights was dedicated to a live podcast recording. In Redneck, columnist Matěj Schneider and Americanist Jan Beneš, along with the whole world, were anxiously awaiting the outcome of this year's presidential election in the United States. In the Jihlava episode of Studio N, Filip Titlbach talked with Maria Hajek Salomonová about the impact of new technologies on our mental health. Vojtěch Boháč, editor-in-chief of the Voxpot reporting website, talked to sociologist Tereza Stöckelová about how the forest and politics intersect, or what the non-human actors of the forest teach us about ourselves for the Bulletproof podcast. This time, the editors of Seznam zprávy, Václav Dolejší and Lucie Stuchlíková, invited one half of the economic podcast Škrty, economist Jan Bittner, to the political podcast Vlevo dole. Their topic was the future of the Czech left. Chyba systému of the Czech Radio Plus system focused on the legacy of the 1990s for contemporary Czech society. Together with moderator Jan Pokorný and regular guests Apolena Rychlíková and David Klimeš, historian and political scientist Adéla Gjuričová talked about the topic. The 5:59 news podcast focused on the phenomenon of true crime. Barbora Sochorová talked with reporter Kristina Ciroková and television producer Michal Reitler about the ethical dilemmas associated with the media's treatment of true crime. For the first time, Radio Wave's Čelisti also visited Jihlava. Aleš Stuchlý, Vít Schmarc and Tomáš Stejskal commented on a cross-section of the current Jihlava film line-up. In a live episode of Hlas Heroine, Ilona Kleníková interviewed doctor and physiologist Julia Dobrovolná about stress and the search for new resilience. The podcast block ended on Saturday with Na východ!, which was devoted to the life of ordinary Russians under sanctions and the prospects for Russian society. There, Josef Pazderka and Ondřej Soukup invited editor-in-chief of Voxpot Vojtěch Boháč to discuss the topic.

Inspiration Forum

The Future of War and Peace

Women Behind the Front Lines

Planetary Immunity

Home and the Fight for Free Time

David Schard

Fatma Mohamed

Petra Hanáková

Jakub Múčka

Magdalena Dušková

Eva Kušíková

Jan Mazal

Jan Beneš