David Saunders (Queen Mary) offers a vivid and unsettling insight into scientific and medical perceptions of homelessness during the Second World War.
Historians’ Watch
Boris Johnson, Rogue Masculinity, and Our Picaresque Political Moment
After the Conservative Party leadership election, and on the eve of the Brecon and Radnorshire by-election, David Hitchcock argues that the Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s persona is animated by a picaresque politics that is closely allied to tropes of early-modern roguishness.
Martyrdom, Misrepresentation and the ‘Tolpuddle Martyrs’
Why has commemoration tended to deprive the Tolpuddle martyrs of their political acumen and capable militancy? To coincide with the annual Tolpuddle Martyr’s Festival, Tom Scriven explores omissions from the ‘martyrdom narrative’ of the six Dorchester labourers who are at the centre of these events.
The Racist History of Jamaica’s Obeah Laws
As debate about Obeah – spiritual and healing practices – erupts in Jamaica, Diana Paton argues that laws against obeah have historically worked to uphold colonial power and to harass poor people.
Stop and search and the politics of policing
These are strange times in the politics of the police. In a companion piece to his History Workshop Journal article, Jonah Miller explores the historical background to debates over stop and search.
What’s the Matter with Capital?
Trevor Jackson examines the history of financial crises in the United States, coincidentally in the years 1819 and 1919, and asks what the future of capitalism holds in 2019.
Counter-Narratives of Empire and the ‘Oceania’ Exhibition
‘Stolen’, ‘plundered’ and ‘more than art’. Meg Foster looks at the living spiritual and cultural meanings of ‘objects’ featured in the Oceania exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts.
First as Tragedy…?
With the defections of eleven MPs (at time of writing!) this week to form the new Independent Group, Emily Robinson reflects on the uses of history and identity in Labour politics.
The Stansted 15 and the Criminalisation of Migrant Solidarity
The Stansted 15, peaceful protesters who grounded a deportation charter flight have been convicted of terror-related charges. This disproportionate response by the British state must be situated within a wave of criminalisation and delegitimisation of migrant solidarity across Europe at a time of great political and economic unease.
Making Radical History in 2018
From #MeToo to migrant solidarity, HWO editors select ten moments in which radical history was made in 2018
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