On Friday 8th November 2024 a workshop was held at the Institute of Historical Research (IHR), London in honour of Professor Pat Thane. This workshop was generously funded by the Royal Historical Society and the Social History Society and with the support of the IHR. Pat is a pathbreaking figure in the historical profession, spearheading … Continued
Jennifer McFarland and Olivia Formby, University of Cambridge jmm269@cam.ac.uk occf2@cam.ac.uk Held at St John’s College, University of Cambridge on 24 June 2024, Age and Health 1500-1800 brought together nine postgraduate and early career speakers working on various aspects of health and the life cycle, with a further thirty attendees in person and online. In … Continued
Dr Roseanna Ramsden, University of Leeds R.Ramsden@leeds.ac.uk @RosieRamsden92 In July of this year, Barnabas Balint and Charlotte Gibbs, of the University of Oxford and the University of Southern California respectively, together hosted an academic workshop on the topic of animals and the Holocaust. Held at Magdalen College, Oxford, with the generous support of the … Continued
Leslie James, Queen Mary University of London leslie.james@qmul.ac.uk By Leslie James, Arista Ajidele, Matheus Da Silva-Armson, Naimah Islam and Shi Jinh Yang In May 2024 the QMUL School of History, with assistance from the Social History Society BME Grant Scheme, ran our first intake of a new programme, ‘Widening Histories’. This programme includes a … Continued
Dr Michael Lambert, Lancaster University m.lambert3@lancaster.ac.uk @GrandCamouflage The current erosion of welfare state institutions – the National Health Service (NHS), social services, and schools – caused by years of underfunding and political intervention exposed by the pandemic, mean that many hark back to a time when things were different. A time when there was a … Continued
Dr Lorinda Cramer, Australian Catholic University lorinda.cramer@acu.edu.au Some consider them a symbol of modern masculinity: a marker of business, power and authority. Others call them a uniform. More still see them as stuffy and overly formal. I’m referring, of course, to men’s suits. Suit-wearing has a complex and fascinating history across the twentieth century, so … Continued
Mary Fraser, writingpolicehistory.blogspot.co.uk @drmaryfraser My new open access article for Cultural and Social History develops the surprising and, to date, untold story of the release of policemen across Britain to help farmers plough the fields. Britain faced starvation in March 1917 due to the German blockade which sank increasing numbers of ships bringing essential foodstuffs. … Continued
Jon Verriet, Radboud University Nijmegen j.verriet[at]let.ru.nl ‘A fiercely antifat culture’, is how the LA Times described U.S. society in 1976. In the corresponding article, the founder of the activist Fat Underground, Vivian Mayer – then known by her radical name Alderbaran – was interviewed about prejudice against people with high relative body weight. At the … Continued
Jasmine Kilburn-Toppin, Cardiff University Kilburn-ToppinJ@cardiff.ac.uk There are few heritage sites as iconic as the Tower of London. For most twenty-first century Londoners and tourists, the Tower is associated with famous prisoners, grisly executions, and the Crown Jewels. To the early modern mind, the Tower had a more varied range of associations. As well as being … Continued
Professor David M. Pomfret, University of Hong Kong pomfretd@hku.hk In the 2001 Hong Kong movie ‘My Life as McDull,’ an animated pig named Mrs Mak dupes her son into thinking he is on a much-anticipated trip to the Maldives. Mrs Mak cannot actually afford such a trip so instead she buys tickets for the leading … Continued
