I started to listen to BBC Radio 4 when I was studying in France. French was all that I heard, all day long. I was in a serious danger of forgetting the little English I know. (Other dangers were overexposure to pains aux chocolats and snobbery. ;) )

Revenons à nos moutons! One of the programs that I really started to love was the brilliantly written Clare in the Community. I managed to get my hands on all the seven series by means legal and otherwise. :) God bless the internet! And since, I have been listening to these thirty minutes episodes over and over again!

Wikipedia would have me believe that Clare in the Community is originally a strip cartoon in The Guardian by Harry Vennin and is later successfully adapted for BBC Radio 4.

Clare is a social worker with all the politically correct jargons but none of the practical solutions. She is white, middle class and heteroxexual and does not like to be reminded of it. She lives with her parter, Brian, and is too much of a control freak to take driving lessons from him.

The episodes explore the PC minefield that is the Sparrowhawk Family Centre where Clare works alongside her colleagues Irene (a black lesbian who has split up with her husband), Helene (a middle aged jewish woman with a ‘delinquent’ son), Ray (a gay man with an appalling personal hygiene) and Megan (a Irish Scottish with a very naughty toddler).

In a nutshell : forty two episodes of intelligent, ‘politically correct’ humour! :)