Previously... Scotland's History Festival

This year's Previously... Scotland's History Festival is taking place between November 17th-26th in Edinburgh. Some of the events that are drawing my attention, if I can get over to Edinburgh (!) :

A Very Short Introduction To The Napoleonic Wars

Scotland : A Century of Nationalism

Reformation Dramas

Coffee, Tea and a PhD : Mark Huggins : A Thousand Years Of Easter

Kings, Demons and Witches

Unionists and Jacobites

Growing Up In Scotland : A Century of Childhood

The Antonine Wall : What World Heritage Sites can do for you


and just for good measure, because it sounds brilliant:

Ghosts, Skeletons and Koopa Troopas: A Brief History of Baddies in Computer Games


There are dozens more events - the full list is available at www.historyfest.co.uk/events.

Chris

My next 5 week long Scotland 1750-1850: Beyond the OPRs course commences Nov 6th 2017 - details at https://www.pharostutors.com/details.php?coursenumber=302. For my genealogy guide books, visit http://britishgenes.blogspot.co.uk/p/my-books.html, whilst details of my research service are at www.ScotlandsGreatestStory.co.uk. Further content is also published daily on The GENES Blog Facebook page at www.facebook.com/BritishGENES.

Australian historian seeks participants for family history study

I've received a request from Dr Tanya Evans, MRes Director, Senior Lecturer and President of the History Council of New South Wales, with regard to a study that she is currently working on comparing family historians and the meanings of family history in Australia, England and Canada. Her request was to ask if I could participate - I mentioned I was none of the above, but an Irishman living in Scotland, and the response was, yes, I want that too!

Tanya's research will involve collecting survey data and a handful of oral history interviews. Her last book on family history in Australia, called Fractured Families: Life on the Margins in Colonial NSW, won the NSW Premiers' History Award in community and regional history. She has also written 2 books on the history of illegitimacy in England.

If you are happy to participate, please contact Tanya at Tanya.evans@mq.edu.au and she will email a consent form and the survey. I completed the survey late last night, it will take a wee while to work through, so I'd allow at least an hour. There were some very interesting questions, I certainly found it a worthwhile exercise.

Chris

For details on my genealogy guide books, including A Beginner's Guide to British and Irish Genealogy, A Decade of Irish Centenaries: Researching Ireland 1912-1923, Discover Scottish Church Records (2nd edition), Discover Irish Land Records and Down and Out in Scotland: Researching Ancestral Crisis, please visit http://britishgenes.blogspot.co.uk/p/my-books.html.

Ulster Protestants, the Famine, and how we were taught history

The Belfast Newsletter has an interesting article at www.newsletter.co.uk/news/many-ulster-protestants-also-died-in-the-irish-potato-famine-of-the-1840s-1-6888602 concerning the plight of many Ulster based Protestants during the Irish potato famine of the late 1840s. The subject was the basis of a talk given at the Shankill Library earlier today in Belfast, in which the myth that Ulster was somehow not affected by the catastrophe was forensically deconstructed and repudiated.

The article is one that struck a chord with me, particularly in its description by a member of a local social history group in the Protestant based Shankill area of how Irish history was taught at Northern Irish schools - “We were never taught it in school – we never heard about it in any history. Occasions like this help reconcile people to realise that we all suffered”. When I attended Carrickfergus Grammar School (Co. Antrim) in the 1980s, my only recollection of Irish history being taught there was about Sir Roger Casement and gun running in Larne, and the Easter Rising, in the midst of the First World War. None of it was presented with any historical context other than that of the British Empire and the distractions it caused from the war, something I have taken many years to redress by reading up on Irish history for myself.

Since living in Scotland I have often heard similar cries from folk here about how they weren't taught their own history as children, and I have no doubt many in England, Wales and the Republic of Ireland may have also felt the same in the past. Today, that has certainly changed, certainly here in Scotland at least - as a parent of two children at school just now I am aware of the Scottish history curriculum that they are now taught, but for those who feel that they never did quite get such an opportunity as kids, this is certainly one of the benefits of studying family history. Our ancestral research path can help us to determine a personalised curriculum into our past on a highly enjoyable and much more relevant grass-roots based basis than any grand over-arching historic narrative that may have failed us as children.

So move aside Starkey, and take a break Schama - here's to the continued democratisation of our history!

Chris

For details on my genealogy guide books, including my recently released Discover Irish Land Records and Down and Out in Scotland: Researching Ancestral Crisis, please visit http://britishgenes.blogspot.co.uk/p/my-books.html.

Previously... Scotland's History Festival announces programme

Previously...Scotland's History Festival has announced its programme of events and talks for this year's offering from Wednesday 12th to Sunday 30th November 2014. The programme is available at http://www.historyfest.co.uk/2014-events/november-12/

Chris

Now available for UK research is the new second edition of the best selling Tracing Your Family History on the Internet: A Guide for Family Historians, whilst my new book British and Irish Newspapers is also now out. And please consider purchasing the great new version of Caledonia by The Libations at 79p via www.caledonia2014.com - all profits go to help fund Scottish foodbanks

Melvyn Bragg's In Our Time series archive

I have a real love/hate relationship with the BBC. For one thing, I worked for them for 9 years many moons ago, and walked away from them swearing never to do so again in a production capacity; for another, I attended my first political protest a couple of weeks back outside Pacific Quay against BBC news bias here in Scotland. On the other hand though, when the BBC makes a product that works, it is unparalleled in its brilliance around the world. No-one makes drama quite like the BBC (I am the world's biggest Whovian!), and no-one makes documentaries quite like the BBC, particularly observational documentary series (though these are an endangered species now in the 'celebrity' age).

But the one area where I think the BBC excels in more than anything, and an area in which I never worked but dearly wish I had done (!), is the area of radio documentaries. And one of the most brilliant series ever made, in this wee mortal's opinion, is Melvyn Bragg's In Our Time, which has been broadcast on Radio 4 since 2004.

If you aren't aware, the BBC website has an archive available online containing all 649 episodes of the series that have been broadcast since 2004. These are categorised into 5 areas - Culture, History, Philosophy, Religion, and Science. 187 of these programmes are on history topics, predominantly on English or British based themes, though you will find the occasional programme on topics away from England such as one on Yeats and Irish Politics, or on the medieval scholar Gerald of Wales. The archive is available at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/features/in-our-time/archive/20th_century/12.

In most instances you will hear Bragg steering a group of academics through the topic under discussion, which for the most part tends to work, though if you listen to some of the really complex science or philosophy subjects you may experience the same sensation I once did when standing under a huge waterfall at Yosemite - a feeling of being really small! In such cases the fun of the programmes is trying to listen to Bragg seize control of the virtually unintelligible in such instances, to make it manageable for the listener. But the history programmes are usually top notch.

Some examples of history topics include:

Work in the 20th Century
1848: Year of Revolution
Boudica
Alfred and the Battle of Edington
Consequences of the Industrial Revolution
Hadrian's Wall
History of History
London
Athelstan
Chivalry

...and many, many more.

NB: I am unsure whether the programmes can be listened to beyond the UK. For those in the UK, however, they are well worth a dip in to explore.

UPDATE: Thanks to Merv (see below) for confirmation that these can also be accessed overseas. Enjoy!

Chris

Now available for UK research is the new second edition of the best selling Tracing Your Family History on the Internet: A Guide for Family Historians, whilst my new book British and Irish Newspapers is also now out. And FindmyPast - please reinstate the original Scottish census citations on your new site.

Bletchley Park history and archive course

Bletchley Park has announced that it will be holding a history and archive course on site on December 9th from 10am to 3pm, priced £20.

The course will cover:

• The pre-war history of Bletchley Park
• Some codebreaking
• A summary of the Wartime work carried out and some of the characters involved
• A rare opportunity to access some of the items in the archive of GCHQ material

For further details visit www.bletchleypark.org.uk/calendar/d.rhtm/714371-Bletchley-Park-History-and-Archive-Course.html

Chris

My latest book, Discover Scottish Civil Registration Records, is now available from http://www.gould.com.au (print) and http://www.gen-ebooks.com/unlock-the-past.html (ebook), whilst Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet is available at http://www.pen-and-sword.co.uk/Tracing-Your-Irish-History-on-the-Internet/p/3889/. My next Pharos Scottish course, Scotland 1750-1850: Beyond the OPRs, starts Nov 13th - see http://pharostutors.com.

Previously... Scotland's History Festival

The third year of Previously... Scotland's History Festival gets under way across Edinburgh (with a few events also in Glasgow, Falkirk, Roslin, Penicuik, Muir of Ord, Crichton and Dunfermline) from November 13th-30th.

From the event's website:

Year 3 and this is our most ambitious Previously...ever. Look out for talks, performance poetry, live music and theatre productions. Storytelling, great authors, exhibitions, food and drink. Get active with 3 weeks of guided walks, bus and cycle tours. Graveyards, dungeons, homes, castles, streets and alleyways to explore.

The event will also have a permanent hub for the first time, created in the historic Adam House building on Chambers Street in Edinburgh. Former politicians Tam Dalyell and Gordon Wilson, broadcaster James Naughtie, Lesley Riddoch and Billy Kay, authors Andrew Greig, Alan Bissett and historians Tom Devine and Alistair Moffat are all due to appear.

For full details on the programme visit www.historyfest.co.uk

Chris

My latest book, Discover Scottish Civil Registration Records, is now available from http://www.gould.com.au (print) and http://www.gen-ebooks.com/unlock-the-past.html (ebook), whilst Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet is available at http://www.pen-and-sword.co.uk/Tracing-Your-Irish-History-on-the-Internet/p/3889/. My next Pharos Scottish course, Scotland 1750-1850: Beyond the OPRs, starts Nov 13th - see http://pharostutors.com.

Free 7 days access to history journals

The Taylor and Francis Online site is offering free access for the next seven days to all academic history based content published in journals since 2010. You need to register with the site and to verify the email before you can gain access.

Journals include American Nineteenth Century History, Business History, Cold War History, Contemporary British History, First World War Studies, The History of the Family, The International History Review, Journal of Medieval History, Journal of Modern Jewish Studies, Journal of Victorian Culture, Slavery & Abolition: A Journal of Slave and Post-Slave Studies, Women’s History Review and many, many more.

To register, visit www.tandfonline.com/action/registration

(With thanks to Karen Nichols @scotiaheritage)

Chris

Check out my Scotland's Greatest Story research service www.ScotlandsGreatestStory.co.uk
New book: It's Perthshire 1866 - there's been a murder... www.thehistorypress.co.uk/products/The-Mount-Stewart-Murder.aspx (from June 12th 2012)