Latest Posts
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Magic, Medicine, Miracles: How Reading Abbey Helped to Invent Halloween
by Professor Anne Lawrence-Mathers On Saturday 27 October, I had the privilege of giving a public lecture for the Friends of Reading Abbey, in the presence of the Mayor of Reading, Councillor Debs Edwards. The event took place in St… Continue reading
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History and Theatre: Working with Reading Between the Lines
by Professor Lindy Grant Monday 8th October was the opening night of Henry II, the last in a cycle of three new plays about Reading Abbey and the dynasty who founded it, each focusing on a key historical figure: King… Continue reading
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The Stenton Lecture and Symposium 2018
Thursday 22nd November marks the date of this year’s Stenton Lecture which is preceded by the Stenton Symposium. Both events take place on the Whiteknights Campus, University of Reading. The 2018 Stenton Lecture was live-streamed at our departmental Facebook page, and… Continue reading
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Fieldwork Notes: ‘Just smile and be friendly Beth, you’ll do fine…’
by Beth Rebisz, Ph.D. student For the two months running up to my departure in July for Nairobi, Kenya, I did what I do best: worry. I worried (for no reason) that my visa wouldn’t be accepted. I worried that… Continue reading
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‘As you love your father so love her’: Remembering the marriage of Francis Sitwell and Harriet Augusta Manners, 26 September 2018
by Hilary Matthews, PhD student My thesis explores the idea of an ‘agricultural friendship’ among a group of men, from different backgrounds, who were interested in progressive farming at the turn of the nineteenth century. I am especially interested in… Continue reading
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A Life on the Ocean Wave: This Week in Maritime History
by Dr Richard Blakemore Early modern maritime history has been in the news a lot this week. On Monday, the BBC ran a story about the London, a seventeenth-century wreck in the Thames. On Tuesday, the Guardian revealed a new… Continue reading
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Writing the Noise: The Second International Conference of the Subcultures Network, 6-7 September 2018
by Prof. Lucy Robinson and Prof. Matthew Worley Last week saw the University of Reading’s History department host the Second International Conference of the Interdisciplinary Network for the Study of Subcultures, Popular Music and Social Change. Titled ‘Writing the Noise’,… Continue reading
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‘Our Friend Rommel’: How Hollywood invented the ‘Good German’
by Professor Patrick Major Twenty years ago the Polish-American installation artist Piotr Uklański mounted an exhibition simply called ‘The Nazis’ (you can see many of the photographs from the exhibition here). It showed 164 images of Wehrmacht officers in uniform,… Continue reading
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Crawling on Deaf Ears: Seven Ways to Oust an Insect from Your Ear
by Dr Hannah Newton Each day in the UK, 6 or 7 people – mainly children – undergo a medical procedure to remove a foreign object from the ear canal, with an annual cost to the NHS of around £2.8… Continue reading
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