Use BBC.com or the new BBC App to listen to BBC podcasts, Radio 4 and the World Service outside the UK.

Find out how to listen to other BBC stations

Episode details

Radio 4,12 Aug 2026,57 mins

Eclipse, China's fake brides, Female climbers, Dr Amanda Cole & Tourette syndrome

Woman's Hour

Available for over a year

One of the most spectacular solar eclipses the UK has seen for decades is taking place this evening. The extraordinary celestial event will see the Moon move across the face of the Sun, creating a partial solar eclipse across the UK. Dr Becky Smethurst, an astrophysicist at the University of Oxford, and Zara Gray, an amateur eclipse chaser discuss the phenomenon. There are now 30 million more men than women in China due to China's one-child policy and that has led to many single men desperate to find a wife. But desperation can also make people vulnerable to exploitation. The authorities in China are warning of a rise in marriage fraud as scammers target those single men. Nuala is joined by the BBC China Correspondent Laura Bicker and Times columnist and author of the Chinese Whispers Substack Cindy Yu Britain's star athlete Keely Hodgkinson is competing in the women's 800m at the European Athletics Championships in Birmingham. She is in the semi-finals tomorrow, with the final taking place on Friday. Team GB are hoping for gold. It has been called the race of the year, but the record has remained unbroken for 43 years despite huge advances in training, nutrition and technology. BBC sports journalist Emma Middleton explains more. Women climbers have defied altitude, expectations and convention. Journalist and author Rosemary J. Brown joins Nuala to discuss her new book, Moving Mountains, which uncovers the extraordinary stories of pioneering female mountaineers and the peaks named in their honour. When Dr Amanda Cole found out she had Tourette syndrome in her twenties, she thought it would destroy her life. Now a professor of sociolinguistics at the University of Cambridge, she is the subject of a new BBC documentary about her experiences with the neurological condition. Having previously kept her Tourette syndrome hidden, Dr Cole joins Nuala to discuss sharing her diagnosis with students at Cambridge and how being diagnosed has influenced both her personal and professional life. Presenter: Nuala McGovern Producer: Dianne McGregor

Programme Website
More episodes