This week, I am going to highlight two Centre events that showcase the Centre’s commitment to student experience beyond the seminar room, working with others inside and outside academia, and the value of research, knowledge exchange and impact of the humanities, specifically history, to audiences locally, regionally and nationally. Moreover, these events have been led and organised by the three key members of the Centre – see below.
Category: Victorian
From local to global and back again – exploring historical Kent
Stop press, calling all schools – do you want to design a Thomas Becket giant? Now is a great opportunity, but you need to be quick because the deadline is 1 July!! Here is the link to the competition pack with the necessary details: https://www.canterburybid.co.uk/canterbury-medieval-pageant/ For the KS1&2 version, please contact: Rachel Pilard: rachel.pilard@canterburybid.co.uk who has the details.
Wat Tyler, Lossenham project and Cuxton – a fascinating mix
This week I want to start with an event that took place at Smithfield just over 640 years ago because it was great that BBC Radio Kent had noticed that yesterday (15 June) marked the violent death of Wat Tyler, one of the iconic leaders of the Great Rising, or what the Victorians called the Peasants’ Revolt.
Green Heritage, Medieval Animals and Lych Gates – sustainability in action
Firstly Max Barrett’s ‘A – Z of Kent’ for BBC Radio Kent reaches ‘Tudor Canterbury’ night, Friday 11 June at 8.30pm within the show Access All Areas. Here is the link to listen live: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p09jgfn2 . Max is a 3rd year Film Studies student at CCCU and it was great working with him on this. Also, on the grounds that the next two weeks are going to be very busy with the Kent History Postgraduates and the Lossenham Project next week, and then the Kent MEMS Fest with Jane Richardson and Victoria Stevens on Friday 18 June and the CCCU History ‘Garden Party’ presentations on Wednesday 23 June, this week I really am keeping it very short.
Kent History Postgraduates and Kent Maps – exploring space and time
I thought I would start this week by saying that I really like the display in the CCCU Bookshop front window for Marc Morris’ new book due out on 20 May For as well as Marc’s very striking cover for his The Anglo-Saxons. A History of the Beginnings of England, Craig also has a couple of artefacts as part of the display that shout out ‘Anglo-Saxon’.
In the news – Becket, Nonington and Kent History Postgraduates
I thought I would start with a couple of news items, especially Thomas Becket: Life, Death and Legacy, a three-day online conference organised by the HLF-funded Canterbury Journey team at Canterbury Cathedral, with staff at the University of Kent and Canterbury Christ Church University from Wednesday 28 to Friday 30 April. The conference programme is now available on the website: https://becket2020.com/ and any questions, please email: canterburybecket2020@gmail.com Standard Tickets are £25 per day and for students the day rate is £10.
Representations of the Arctic and Dover – terrific talks
This has been yet again a busy week at the Centre, Dr Diane Heath is putting together her revised application to the HLF for her ‘Medieval Animals’ project, Dr Claire Bartram gave an online lecture to the Canterbury Historical and Archaeological Society yesterday evening, see report below, and I am giving one of the talks at the free CHAS Centenary online conference this coming Canterbury, see below for details including the joining url. Moreover, yesterday was the penultimate Lunch Time Lecture, also see below, as well as a meeting of the Kent History Postgraduates group – report next week.
Becket, Canterbury, Gothic images and the Arctic – great news
Before I get to the Lunch Time Lectures – today and next week, I thought I would bring you some exciting news about the Becket 2020 online conference, the Manorial Register for Kent, and the CHAS online conference coming up shortly, as well as just briefly mentioning that there is now a small group working on medieval and early modern wills for Newenden and surrounding parishes as part of the Lossenham project. We had our first online meeting this week and everyone is enthusiastic with work having already started and we are now going up a gear – more on this in future weeks and thanks to everyone involved.
Ian Coulson Awards, Maritime Kent and Canterbury
This week’s blog contains several items of good news, somewhat in contrast to the national situation. Firstly, it gives me great pleasure to record that Tracey Dessoy and Jane Richardson have been awarded grants from the Ian Coulson Postgraduate Award fund.
Virtual ‘Becket’ Pavement – celebrating medieval animals
As this is the last blog before its 2-week ‘vacacion’, I thought I would remind readers about the great opportunity for a part-funded MA by Research on a project based around the St Albans Library inventory. Due to the generosity of a local benefactor, this is a chance for someone interested in Book History and Material Culture to investigate a substantial gentry family library collected in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, which covers a very wide range of fascinating subjects. Annotations cover the period up to the auction of the library books in 1938 and the inventory also includes silver and plate, jewels, statues, objects of worth and paintings. This project will draw on comparable ‘great house’ libraries to explore, for example, ideas about collecting and reading habits, as well as the presence of book-sharing networks among this group in Hanoverian and Victorian society. The successful applicant will be offered a bursary of £1000, with the possibility of applying for a further £1000 from the Ian Coulson Award fund. If this sounds exciting and you would like to find out more about the opportunity, please do contact Dr Claire Bartram who will be one of the supervisors: claire.bartram@canterbury.ac.uk
