Ayahs and Amahs were empire's care-workers, raising the children of colonial families. Julia Laite on a new online exhibition that foregrounds their stories.
This Virtual Special Issue curates History Workshop’s contribution to refugee studies - with a new introduction and 20 articles, free access for six months.
How might we understand the origins and the impact of current controversies raging in Britain over changing interpretations of British colonial history? Corinne Fowler has close personal experience of those controversies.
For many decades, archival documents taken from the Global South by British colonial officers have been quietly available to researchers at the National Archives. Tim Livsey explores the history and questionable ethics of this "open…
How does in-access to archives provide opportunities to ask alternative questions about the past? Elisabeth Leake reflects on how personal and professional circumstances ultimately shape the histories we produce.
What is gained when 20th century Queer history is brought into the classroom? Claire Holliss discusses her experience of visiting the archive to find sources for her A-Level students.
In the late eighteenth century Wedgwood’s medallion rallied people to the radical cause of abolition. Can it still inspire radical change today? Georgia Haseldine discusses the medallion’s historic radical power and re-making the…
How can we creatively utilize historical research to bring the past to life? Josh Allen discusses the importance of using archival sources, oral histories and material culture in a creative fashion to bring myth, metaphor and anecdote back…
To what extent has colonial money helped build Britain's heritage sector? Isabel Gilbert on the importance of publicly and transparently acknowledging the problematic roots of British country houses and their collections.
This World AIDS Day, Clifford McManus discusses the UK AIDS Memorial Quilt as a radical object of protest and activism, and a symbol of love and remembrance.
Oral history creates a rich world of storytelling around any type of collection. Its methods can also shape a museum’s relationships and core identity.
What can a gallery comments book tell us about the role radical photography can play in social change? Ruby Rees-Sheridan discusses the Half Moon Photography Workshop Comments Book as a radical object.
In our series on 'Radical History after Brexit', Matt Stallard of the Legacies of British Slavery project reflects on the ongoing politicisation of heritage.
What powers of legitimacy do physical representations of the past hold? Duncan McLean explores the journey and repatriation of a radical object, the Obelisk of Axum, from Abyssinia to Italy to Ethiopia - its return seemingly affirming…
This virtual special issue of History Workshop Journal tells the histories of states in their interlocking national, international, local, and archival dimensions, and as political and legal contestations of sovereign power.
Shahmima Akhtar explores a postcard from the Irish village of 'Ballymaclinton', a display at the 1908 Franco-British Exhibition in London created to promote an Irish soap brand and a politically white Irish unionism.
How should historians respond to acts of violence in the official archive? Catherine Phipps considers the life of Samia, an Algerian-French teenager, arguing that the epistemic attacks she faced highlight the urgency of historical work…
A speculative methodology can also be a deeply political response to the conventions of archival research, argues Sonja Boon in our Writing Radically series.
"You don’t know what you had until you lost it": at a time when few of us can travel far, Catherine Fletcher asks what role travel plays in the historical process.
The archive has been portrayed by historians for many years as a ‘magical’ place of neutral enquiry. In fact, it has historically been used in the perpetuation of many abuses by the state and continues to play a role in privileging some…
Madge Dresser argues that statues of slave traders, such as Edward Colston, often served complex local and civic objectives, which were inextricable from historical processes which silenced the voices of enslaved Africans.
The last fortnight has seen many statues associated with racism and colonialism torn down. When were they originally put up, and what can that tell about the history of whiteness and empire? Peter Hill explores.
How can historical fiction, and the heritage sites that it features, help us think differently about the past? Lucy Arnold steps into Worcester Cathedral to take a local look at Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall.
What can official sources tell us about mass movements for liberation in colonial India? Pragya Dhital introduces a special feature on "Insurgency in the Archives", in issue 89 of History Workshop Journal.
