Richard Marsden’s piece in The Conversation on Game of Thrones and visions of the Middle Ages

Dr. Richard Marsden, Lecturer and Staff Tutor in History, has published a piece in The Conversation on Game of Thrones: imagined world combines romantic and grotesque visions of Middle Ages.

The article explores how the hit fantasy-drama series draws on romantic and grotesque perceptions of the medieval period, arguing that while the series illuminates little about the past, it reveals much about how we imagine that past.

Luc-André Brunet’s article in The Globe and Mail

Dr Luc-André Brunet, Lecturer in History, has published an article in The Globe and Mail, Canada’s leading newspaper of record. Current Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has been facing opposition by environmental groups around his decision to extend an oil pipeline from Alberta to the Pacific Ocean. Dr Brunet draws on his research on peace activism in Canada in the 1980s – which was directed against then Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, the father of Canada’s current leader – to discuss similarities between the two issues and what lessons can be drawn for today’s policymakers. You can read the article here: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-like-father-like-son-prime-minister-trudeau-faces-greenpeace/

Luc-Andre Brunet interviewed by LSE Ideas about his new book Forging Europe

LSE Ideas interviewed Luc-Andre Brunet, Lecturer in Twentieth Century European History, on his new book, Forging Europe: Industrial Organisation in France, 1940–1952. Forging Europe is a detailed and original look at the radical reorganisation of French heavy industry in the turbulent period between the establishment of the Vichy regime in 1940 and the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), the forerunner to the European Union, in 1952. By studying institutions ranging from Vichy’s Organisation Committees to Jean Monnet’s Commissariat Général du Plan (CGP), Luc-André Brunet challenges existing narratives and reveals significant continuities from Vichy to post-war initiatives such as the Monnet Plan and the ECSC. Based on extensive multi-archival research, this book sheds important new light on economic collaboration and resistance in Vichy, the post-war revival of the French economy, and the origins of European integration.

Neil Younger on Drama, politics, and news in the Earl of Sussex’s entertainment of Elizabeth I

Neil Younger has recently published an article on a previously unknown entertainment of Elizabeth I at New Hall in Essex, and the political and cultural contexts surrounding this event.

Drama, politics, and news in the Earl of Sussex’s entertainment of Elizabeth I at New Hall, 1579‘ appears in The Historical Journal, Volume 58, Issue 02, June 2015.

Listen to Neil talking about this research on BBC Radio 4’s ‘Making History’.

 

Karl Hack on Channel News Asia

Dr Karl Hack was interviewed live for Channel News Asia on 16 September 2013, on the death of Asia’s longest serving head of a communist party, Chin Peng. Chin Peng died that day aged 88, having led the Malayan Communist Party since 1947, and Dr Hack had met him in 1999 and co-edited a book of dialogies between him and historians.

 

TV Series: Empire on BBC One starts 27 February

Empire is a major five-part series telling the story of the British Empire in a new way, tracing not only the rise and fall of the Empire but also the complex effects of the Empire on the modern world – political, technological and social – and on Britain.

Members of the Empire: 1492-1975 (A326) module team assisted in the preparation of the series and some of the content and activities associated with it. Karl Hack, A326 chair, wrote the text for the free wallchart to accompany the series. RSVP Empire, an interactive Empire themed activity, was written by A326 Associate Lecturer, John Kirkaldy.

To find out more, order a free Empire poster or play Empire interactive, go to: www.open.ac.uk/openlearn/empire.