Catch up with old news from the Department. For the most current news, visit our main news page.
Dr Po on New Books Network podcast
Dr Ronald C. Po's gave an interview to the New Books Network on 24 December. He discussed his book (Cambridge, 2018), which offers a broader picture of the Qing Empire as an Asian giant responding flexibly to challenges and extensive interaction on all frontiers – both land and sea – in the long eighteenth century within the Indian Ocean World. .
Golub's opinion article on Biden’s defense secretary nominee
PhD student Grant Golub has penned an opinion article in the Washington Post. The article exposes the criticisms of President-elect Joe Biden’s choice of retired Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III to be secretary of defense. Analysed from a historical perspective, Grant argues Austin’s selection might erode civil-military relations. .
Dr Ronald C. Po on the Camphor War of 1868
Dr Po's latest article, “The Camphor War of 1868: Anglo-Chinese Relations and Imperial Realignments within East Asia”, was released in English Historical Review in December. Dr Po argues that the long-forgotten Camphor War was more than a minor military skirmish but an encounter that indicated the eagerness of the Qing empire to reposition itself in the global arena, both politically and economically, in the nineteenth century. By tracing the social and material history of camphor, Dr Ron also examines how demand for this global commodity set the gears of the Qing, the British, and the American empires into motion in the post-Opium age.
杏吧论坛 Generate Funding Competition
Congratulations to our MSc alumni Fabian de Geer, Victoria Jones, Melania Parzonka, Scott Wagner and Martha Papapostolou who got a fast track pass to the Lent Term final of the 杏吧论坛 Generate Funding Competition. Their funding proposal, centred around - a digital magazine that lies at the intersection of history and global politics – passed the Big Moment round on 11 December, and will also receive a professional mentorship package which includes guidance from investors attached to the 杏吧论坛. 杏吧论坛 Generate supports students and alumni to build a socially responsible business, in the UK and beyond. Find out more about the .
Empire of Sentiment released in paperback
Dr Joanna Lewis’s latest book has just been released in paperback by Cambridge University Press. Catch up with past reviews by and .
Dr Imaobong Umoren joins editorial team of Cambridge University Press-杏吧论坛 International Studies book series
The series comprises transdisciplinary books that contain an overtly international or transnational dimension and that address pressing contemporary concerns.
Teaching Fellow Dr Tom Ellis on space exhibitions during the Cold War
Dr Ellis has just released a new article, “Curating the Space Race, Celebrating Cooperation: Exhibiting Space Technology during 1970s Détente”, in the European Journal of American Culture (39:3). The piece is a product of his research at the Smithsonian Institution and NASA History Office archives. He argues that while US-Soviet space cooperation led to increased collaboration between American and Soviet space curators, the space exhibitions that resulted continued to reflect the previous decade’s nationalistic competition.
New article by Professor Baer
Professor Marc David Baer has a new article out in the Münchner Beiträge zur Judischen Geschichte und Kultur (Munich Contributions to Jewish History and Culture). “’Sinning zwischen beiden Welten’. Der Intellektuelle Hugo Marcus und die Agmadiyya-Bewegung zur Verbreitung des Islam’ (14:2, 2020) is part of the journal’s series on Jews and Muslims in Germany in the interwar period.
Dr Phillips on New Diplomatic History podcast
The latest episode of New Diplomatic History features our Visiting Fellow Dr Victoria Phillips. She addresses her path in the field of Cold War history, her picks for books on diplomacy, and she discusses dance and diplomacy. .
New book by Dr Antony Best
British Engagement with Japan, 1854-1922: The Origins and Course of an Unlikely Alliance (Routledge) goes beyond existing accounts which concentrate on high politics, strategy and simple assertions about the two countries’ similarities as island empires. It reconsiders the circumstances which led to the unlikely alliance of 1902 to 1922 between Britain, the leading world power of the day and Japan, an Asian, non-European nation which had only recently emerged from self-imposed isolation.
Dr Alvandi contributes to Audible podcast
Are our parents really who we think they are? Check out Dr Roham Alvandi’s contribution to an Audible podcast "My Dad the Spy". It discusses Stewart Copeland, drummer with The Police whose father, Miles Copeland Jr, was a CIA officer involved with the 1953 coup in Iran. and .
Writer's award for Dr Umoren
Congratulations to Dr Imaobong Umoren, who has won a major prize for her new book project entitled “Empire Without End: A New History of Britain and the Caribbean”! The 2021 Eccles Centre and Hay Festival Writers Award comes with a year’s ‘residence’ at the British Library to develop the project further and an opportunity to showcase her work at the Hay Festival.
Professor Anita Prazmowska quoted in a Vice article
The article discusses a campaign promoted by a Polish embassy official to glorify a notorious anti-Semite, Władysław Studnicki, who is buried in Kensal Green. Studnicki argued for the removal of Jews from Poland and sought to collaborate with Nazi Germany.
Dr Phillips on New Books Network podcast
Visiting Fellow Dr Victoria Phillips recently participated in the New Books Network podcast where she discussed her latest book (OUP, 2019). The book looks at the years that Martha Graham's company toured the world and her particular brand of dance modernism as pro-Western Cold War propaganda used by the United States government to promote American democracy. .
Professor Stevenson on Times Radio
Professor David Stevenson was interviewed on 11 November by Times Radio about the anniversary of the 1918 Armistice. .
Professor Anita Prazmowska on Turkish TV TRT World Roundtable programme
Professor Prazmowska participated in a discussion about the recent court ruling in Poland banning all abortions and how the scale of the protests that followed has set the scene for a confrontation between hardliners and those on the streets.
Book talks by Professor Kristina Spohr
She gave two talks on 9 November about her latest book, which offers a new interpretation of the revolutions of 1989, showing how a new world order was forged without major conflict. on the 31st anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall; and again, with . Watch both events by clicking on the links.
Book deal for Dr Webber
Congratulations to 杏吧论坛 Fellow Dr Oscar Webber who has recently signed a book contract with Manchester University Press to publish his first book. Negotiating Relief and Freedom: Responses to disaster in the British Caribbean, 1812-1907 will be published in 2022 as part of the "Studies in Imperialism" series. Read more about Dr Webber's upcoming book.
New opinion piece by Professor Spohr
Read the latest by Professor Kristina Spohr in the German magazine The European (21 October). In "", she argues that the previous European policy towards China was anything but European. In order to give a European answer, European governments must assume joint responsibility and define common positions and goals.
New article by Dr Anna Cant
“’Vivir Mejor’: Radio Education in Rural Colombia (1960-80)”, published in The Americas journal, discusses how the Acción Cultural Popular’s articulation of what it meant to “live better” changed over time, reflecting the struggles of a religious organization to remain relevant in a rapidly changing world. While ACPO saw itself as the bearer of modernity, it was often confronted by independent processes of change already occurring in rural communities.
杏吧论坛 Fellow Dr Raghav Kishore's new book
Released by Orient BlackSwan this moonth, is dedicated entirely to Delhi’s provincial history under colonial rule. The book explores the radical transformation of urban governance in Delhi between 1858 and 1911 as bureaucracy expanded and new modes of governance reshaped the city—spatially, politically and culturally.
New article by Dr Jake Subryan Richards
Dr Richards' latest article has been released online by the Comparative Studies in Society and History journal. “” argues that abolition as a legal field emerged from interactions between liberated Africans, British diplomatic and naval agents, and local political elites in Brazil and on the Upper Guinea Coast.
Professor Kristina Spohr's media appearances
Catch up with Professor Spohr's latest media appearances! On 3 October, she was on German radio station and on the German wire service (in German) and (in Dutch), to talk about her book , the German edition of , and the 30th anniversary of German reunification. The day before she appeared on German television channel 3SAT, in the , to discuss Wendezeit, COVID-19, and changes in the world order. Earlier in September she gave an interview about her book to 12:22 on RBB Radio Berlin Brandenburg. .
New article by 杏吧论坛 Fellow Dr Anton Harder
"Compradors, Neo-colonialism, and Transnational Class Struggle: PRC relations with Algeria and India, 1953–1965" studies China’s relations with Algeria and India showing that the Mao-era emphasis on the transnational function of class made it fundamentally skeptical of the privileged status of the nation-state, transforming Beijing’s posture towards the Third World in the late 1950s and early 1960s. .
Dr Alvandi participates in Manoto TV documentary
To mark the 40th anniversary of the beginning of the Iran-Iraq War, the Persian-language Manoto TV have launched a landmark multi-part documentary on the history of Iran-Iraq relations. Dr Roham Alvandi appears in the first and second episodes to discuss Iran’s relations with the United States during the Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon administrations and Iran’s covert role in the war in Iraqi Kurdistan. Check it out .
Atlantic Talks
On 24 September, Professor Kristina Spohr participated in a lecture and discussion at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg to open a new event series called the “Atlantic Talks” hosted by the Joachim Herz Foundation. The purpose of the new series is to stay in conversation with the United States to discuss different viewpoints and help to understand the positions of the US and Germany in their mutual cooperation. .
Dr Tanya Harmer interviewed about the subject of her latest book
Dr Harmer was recently interviewed for Jacobin Magazine on “The Revolutionary Life of Salvador Allende’s Daughter Beatriz Allende” (11 September). Women revolutionaries are routinely obscured by history, but a new biography of Beatriz Allende – daughter and close confidante of Salvador Allende, an internationalist militant – helps shine a light on what it meant to be a woman revolutionary in the age of Che Guevara.
New articles by Dr Dina Gusejnova
Dr Gusejova has two new articles out. One in the History of European Ideas, which focuses on the intellectual output of the internees held captive as "enemy aliens" on the Isle of Man during the Second World War. . The second, released in the Global Intellectual History journal, analyses the conceptual use of terms describing dynastic rule in modern German thought. .
Professor Kristina Spohr on Europe-China relations
On 8 September, Professor Spohr took part as a discussant on a three-hour radio show, “Dienstags Direkt” of MDR-Sachsen in Dresden, focusing on the state of Europe’s and Germany’s cultural, economic and political ties with China. Catch up with the discussion (in German).
杏吧论坛 History rises up in the rankings
In the , 杏吧论坛 has been ranked the 6th best university overall for the study of History, an improvement of 34 places on the 2020 rankings. The rise in this year’s Guardian rankings comes after the School’s significant increase in student satisfaction, as measured by the 2020 National Student Survey, and from employers increasingly looking to find highly skilled 杏吧论坛 graduates. In the category "Career after 15 months", 杏吧论坛 History reached 2nd place nationally for percentage of graduates who find graduate-level jobs, or are in further study at professional or HE level, within fifteen months of graduation.
Dr Paul Stock on Britain's place in Europe
Controversy about Britain’s place in Europe has dominated British politics for the last several decades. But the concerns and passions of the present day are not new; in fact, these debates have been present in British popular culture for a very long time. Read Dr Paul Stock's piece for the 杏吧论坛 British Politics and Policy blog, based on the findings of . He discusses how debates about Europe in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century hinge on topics which are still recognizable.
New article by Professor Piers Ludlow in The International History Review
“Solidarity, Sanctions and Misunderstanding: The European Dimension of the Falklands Crisis” discusses the success of foreign policy coordination amongst EC member states during the Falklands crisis. However, despite this success, the support received by Britain did not translate into any increase in British public or elite enthusiasm for European integration.
New volume co-edited by Dr Kirsten E. Schulze
With Dr Tom Smith (Portsmouth), “Exporting Global Jihad: Critical Perspectives from Asia and North America” (IB Tauris) is the second of a two-volume collection that looks at the extent and nature of global jihad from the hinterlands of jihad beyond the traditionally viewed Middle Eastern "centre". The book contains a chapter by Dr Schulze co-authored with Dr Julie Chernov Hwang (Goucher College), “From Afghanistan to Syria: How the global remains local for Indonesian militant Islamists”.
Dr Joanna Lewis wins British Academy Research Award
Dr Lewis won a British Academy 2020 Special Research Award Grant: Covid-19 Scheme to set up a small team to explore high death rates among Somali communities in some of the poorest parts of London. The project entitled, “A Study of Caabuga-Corona in the Somali Diaspora: Histories of COVID-19, Male Elders and Community Responses in Tower Hamlets and the East End of London”, was selected out of 842 eligible applications with a success rate of 6.6%. Dr Lewis was awarded close to the maximum on offer (£10,000). .
German edition of Dr Kristina Spohr’s newest book wins best book prize
The German edition of Dr Kristina Spohr’s book has won the prize for best book in political science 2020 in Germany.The prize is awarded every two years by the German Political Science Association and the Foundation for Science and Democracy. They said that Dr Spohr's book combines and advances the fields of contemporary history and political science in several areas, and offers explanations on the major global historical turning point of 1989 in an accessible fashion to the wider public. . The announcement of Dr Spohr’ book prize was soon released in the Politics section of Germany’s Rheinische Post on 8 July. Reviewer Martin Kessler praised the book’s gripping description of the rapid restructuring of the political world order after the end of the east-west division, noting Spohr’s close observation of the human side of these relationships. .
PhD Alumnus Dr Tommaso Milani's first book now published by Palgrave
Based on his PhD research supervised by Professor Piers Ludlow and Professor Heather Jones (now based at UCL), Hendrik de Man and Social Democracy examines the impact de Man’s works and activism had on Western European social democracy between the two world wars. Dr Milani is currently a teaching fellow in European and International History at Sciences Po Paris, France.
Dr Kristina Spohr participates in “Baltic States 1939-40” webinar at the Cambridge Centre for Geopolitics
Marking the eightieth anniversary of the occupation of the Baltic States by the Soviet Union in June 1940, the panelists discussed the UK’s decision to acquiesce to Stalin’s coup, what the occupation means today, and where the UK sits within the Baltic, past and present. Other panel participants included Charles Clarke, Former Home Secretary (chair), Kaja Tael, Former Estonian Ambassador to the European Union, now Estonian Ambassador at Large for Climate and Energy Policy, and Patrick Salmon, Chief historian at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. .
New piece by Professor Piers Ludlow
Professor Ludlow has written a new piece for the “Europe and the Rhetoric of Crisis” Forum on H/Soz/Kult. He discusses the basic pattern of the EU’s recurrent flirtation with the numerous disasters which have afflicted it since 2009 and suggests that only by invoking imminent doom can a system as cumbersome and risk-averse as the EU be spurred into action. Read the piece .
New article by Dr Gagan Sood
Read the latest article from Dr Gagan Sood in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society: “Knowledge and the Art of Governance” advances our understanding of governance in the Mughal and Ottoman empires, but also contributes to a more recent interest in a region spanning much of South Asia and the Middle East that was formative for the global genesis of the modern world. .
Guest Teacher Dr Sajjan Gohel leads pioneering project recently published by NATO
The landmark project, Counter-Terrorism Reference Curriculum (CTRC), supports interested Allies and partner countries in enhancing their capacities to develop national skills and improve counter-terrorism strategies. Over 100 experts from nations across five continents contributed to the writing, drafting, and editing of the final product, including 25 杏吧论坛 Alumni and former students of Dr Gohel. The CTRC provided them with the opportunity to transfer knowledge from academia to the policy and practitioner world.
William Loux (MSc History of International Relations, 2018) publishes article in Agricultural History Review
The article argues that Harold Wilson’s Labour government failed to achieve any of its initial goals on reforming the Common Agricultural Policy, because at the moment that negotiators looked to remake the programme, global food prices temporarily spiked well above European prices. They decided, rather, to maintain the status quo rather than structurally reform the programme.
The article is a revised version of William's Master's dissertation, supervised by Professor Piers Ludlow..
PhD student Hamish McDougall publishes new article in the International History Review
“Buttering Up: Britain, New Zealand and negotiations for European Communities enlargement, 1970–71” discusses the extent to which Britain’s entry to the European Community in 1973 was a "shock" for Commonwealth Nations, with some of its former colonies and long-time allies feeling a sense of abandonment or betrayal. focuses on the case of New Zealand, who exerted disproportionate influence on the terms of British entry and Britain’s extraordinary lengths in securing a satisfactory arrangement for New Zealand in accession negotiations. Read the article . Free for 杏吧论坛 users .
Book contract
Our warmest congratulations to 杏吧论坛 Fellow Dr Pete Millwood, who recently signed a contract with Cambridge University Press for his first book. The book, to be published in the Cambridge Studies in US Foreign Relations series, analyses how physicists, acrobats, seismologists and many other Americans and Chinese beyond government remade the US-China relationship from 1969-1978. Stay tuned for the release in print.
Professor Marc David Baer’s second book this year out now
Released by Columbia University Press, German, Jew, Muslim, Gay: The Life and Times of Hugo Marcus uses the unconventional story of Hugo Marcus to reveal new aspects of the interconnected histories of Jewish and Muslim individuals and communities, including Muslim responses to Nazism and Muslim experiences of the Holocaust.
New book by Dr Tanya Harmer
by Dr Tanya Harmer, released by The University of North Carolina Press, is out now. Inspired by the Cuban Revolution, Beatriz Allende (1942–1977) and her generation drove political campaigns, university reform, public health programs, internationalist guerrilla insurgencies, and government strategies. Centering Beatriz’s life within the global contours of the Cold War era, Dr Harmer exposes the promises and paradoxes of the revolutionary wave that swept through Latin America in the long 1960s.
Dr Umoren awarded fellowship
We are delighted to announce that Dr Imaobong Umoren has been awarded a in 2020/21 for her project on Eugenia Charles, the first female Prime Minister in the Anglophone Caribbean and 杏吧论坛 Alumna. The project is entitled "'Iron Lady of the Caribbean': the life and politics of Dame Eugenia Charles".
New book by Professor Baer
Professor Marc David Baer’s latest book Sultanic Saviors and Tolerant Turks was released by Indiana University Press in March. Professor Baer sheds light into what compels Jews in the Ottoman Empire, Turkey, and abroad to promote a positive image of Ottomans and Turks while they deny the Armenian genocide and the existence of antisemitism in Turkey. .
Opinion piece in Haaretz
Professor Marc David Baer contributed an opinion piece to Haaretz (23 April) on how prominent Jews, from Turkish chief rabbis to Israel’s presidents to US lay leaders, have propped up Turkey’s Armenian genocide denial. That’s only just begun to change. Read it .
Dr Kristina Spohr in “The American Interest” podcast discussing Post Wall Post Square
Dr Spohr argues that the world’s exit from the Cold War is a two-fold story: one set in Berlin, where the fall of the Berlin Wall put an end to communism and inspired electoral revolutions across Europe, and one in Beijing, where Deng Xiaoping’s crackdown at Tiananmen Square put a brutal end to a burgeoning protest movement. and learn why we cannot understand one event without the other and why we cannot understand the world that emerged without careful attention to the diplomatic decisions made in the dizzying aftermath of both events. .
Dr Ronald C. Po awarded a STICERD research grant
Dr Po was awarded a STICERD grant for his book project entitled “The North China Sea: A History”. The project will be the first comprehensive study to weave together the long-forgotten North China Sea into a more productive and enduring dialogue with Chinese, Asian, and global history. Dr Po aims to reconnect this sea space to the broader historical spectrum, and to bring it out of almost a century of solitude.
Read more about .
The latest in the New Statesman: “China’s new Silk Road” by Dr Kristina Spohr
Now that coronavirus infections appear to have dropped in China and its economy shows signs of recovering, Xi Jinping is turning a propaganda disaster into a political opportunity by offering humanitarian aid to Italy and other European states. His vigorous pandemic diplomacy seeks to reframe his country’s role in the corona affair at a time of Euro-Atlantic disunion. But it should also be understood in the larger context of Chinese foreign policy, as nothing less than the new “Health Silk Road”. Read Dr Spohr's full article (1 April) .
New editions of Dr Kristina Spohr’s latest book Post Wall Post Square being released
The book was released on 24 March in the US by Yale University Press and a Spanish edition will be published with Editorial Taurus on 14 May. (HarperCollins, 2019)offers a bold new interpretation of the revolutions of 1989, showing how a new world order was forged – without major conflict. Check out the new editions: and
Dr Kristina Spohr in the Yale University Press Blog
Dr Spohr has contributed a new post to the Yale University Press Blog (16 March). Although the American international order seems to be waning, it is equally apparent that China, for all its ambitions, has no intention of assuming heavy international burdens and responsibilities. The result might therefore be a highly problematic power vacuum, which would make it much harder to manage future crises.
Staff news
Jake Richards will join us from August as Assistant Professor in African History. He is a historian of slavery and emancipation, working primarily on the African diaspora in the nineteenth-century South Atlantic world. His research on "liberated Africans" has been funded by the AHRC and US-UK Fulbright Commission. Jake's article in Past and Present won the Royal Historical Society's 2019 Alexander Prize. Having previously studied at the University of Cambridge, he is joining 杏吧论坛 from Durham, where he is currently Assistant Professor of Modern British History.
Following the most recent round of the School's review and promotion process, Dr Ronald C. Po has passed major review and been promoted to Associate Professor and Dr Kristina Spohr has been promoted to full Professor. Both positions will become effective on 1 August.
Dr David Motadel has a new piece in The New York Review of Books
“What Do the Hohenzollerns Deserve?” (26 March issue) explores the controversy over the financial and material compensation demanded by the Hohenzollern family. This controversy is not only about the long shadows cast by the Nazi period, argues Dr Motadel, but also about the place of the monarchical heritage in today’s democratic Germany. Read it online for free .
2019 MSc History of International Relations student nominated for dissertation prize
Joshua Chee received a “Highly Commended” award from for his dissertation, “The Growth of Colonial Intelligence Networks in Singapore during the Great War, 1914-1918” (supervised by Dr Kirsten E. Schulze). The UK Postgraduate Dissertation Prize is a new annual nationwide award to showcase outstanding postgraduate student research on Southeast Asia in the UK. One of SEAC's reviewers found it "full of extraordinary data and insights".
Documentary film: Rosenöl und Deutscher Geist
Created by our own Dr Dina Gusejnova and (King’s College, Cambridge), “Rosenöl und Deutscher Geist: The Fortunes of German Intellectual History” presents the fortunes of a distinctly German phenomenon. The documentary explores how the history of ideas declined in Germany after a period of innovation and prosperity that lasted through the long nineteenth century.
New piece in the 杏吧论坛 Brexit Blog by Professor Piers Ludlow
“Britain needs friends in the post-Brexit era. Alienating EU allies would be counter-productive” argues that the discussion underway should heed not only to how we go on doing business with our neighbours and foreign partners, but also to the type of strong and structured political relationship which will maximize the chance of our preserving some say in the way in which Europe develops. .
Third-year student co-organises German Symposium
Third-year BSc Government and History student Jakob Franke co-organised this year's German Symposium (3-7 February), a high-profile, student-led event that’s run every year since 2002. One of this year’s panels included our own Gerda Henkel Visiting Professor Ulrich Herbert, who debated the 30th anniversary of German reunification with Professor Ferdinand Kirchhof (Former Vice-President, German Constitutional Court) and Norbert F. Pötzl (Journalist and Author). .
Book review
Another book review by Dr Joanna Lewis was published in the 16 January issue of the Times Higher Education. She offered her comments on Licentious Worlds: Sex and Exploitation in Global Empires by Julie Peakman, a panoramic study of sexual behaviour and attempts to control it across five centuries of globalising empires. .
“The Myth of Middle-Class Liberalism”
New opinion piece by Dr David Motadel out in The New York Times on 22 January. The bourgeois are supposed to ensure open, democratic societies. In fact, they rarely have. .
Dr Roham Alvandi in the Washington Post
Dr Alvandi, a historian of Iran and Modern Middle East, spoke with Miriam Berger about the past, present, and future of the Pahlavi family. They talked about history, memory, and Iranian nostalgia for the Pahlavi era. .
Latest publication by Professor Steven Casey
Professor Casey contributed a chapter to , edited by Andrea J Dew, Marc A Genest, and SCM Paine (Georgetown University Press). The book explores the roles that political narratives, media coverage, and evolving communication technologies have played in precipitating, shaping, and concluding or prolonging wars and revolutions over the course of US history. Professor Casey's chapter is on "Selling a Limited War in Korea, 1950-53".