18 August 2017
On Monday 14th August, Paul Oliver – the world’s most prolific writer and most respected blues scholar – passed away in Oxfordshire at the age of 90. Scores of blues historians, researchers, enthusiasts and musicians are paying tribute…
14 July 2017
The History blog has not been as active as usual in recent months, and while this was not ideal, there is a good excuse. Over the last seven months, staff and students in History at the University of…
6 April 2017
One hundred years ago today, on April 6th 1917, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to approve Woodrow Wilson’s call for a declaration of war against Germany to “make the world safe for democracy”. Although the United States…
20 March 2017
The web is bursting with tributes and obituaries to Chuck Berry, the songwriter and guitarist who died on Friday at the age of 90. And this is understandably so. Berry’s famous repertoire which includes songs like ‘Johnny B…
17 November 2016
This review was written by 2nd year undergraduate student Jenna M. Pateman. As November begins, I felt it was right to look back at this year’s Black History Month in Cheltenham, a yearly event put together by a number…
7 September 2016
On the face of it this year’s Cheltenham Literature Festival does not offer a great deal of interest to the student of history. Yes, there are sessions on Rethinking the Somme, the Great War, Cheltenham in the Great…
29 June 2016
I was recently asked to speak about the EU referendum on BBC Radio Gloucestershire’s breakfast show, and consider how historians will talk about ‘Brexit’ 30 or 40 years from now. Clearly, no-one has a crystal ball, let alone…
13 June 2016
Having just been to see Race, the (rather boring, I have to say) bio-pic about the great African American athlete, Jesse Owens, I found myself thinking about people like Owens, and Joe Louis, and contrasting them with Muhammad…
28 April 2016
When I was thinking of a subject for a possible blog post on my Fulbright experience, I had no shortage of options. I could have easily talked about teaching American history to American students at Elon University, which…
16 February 2016
Last Saturday, while on my four month stay in the USA, I took the opportunity to visit the nearby International Civil Rights Museum in Greensboro, North Carolina. This museum is in the Woolworth building, which holds a special…