History@Portsmouth
University of Portsmouth's History Blog
Research in Focus
Many people instinctively blame King Charles I for the British Civil Wars. So recent UoP history graduate Connor Scott-Butcher’s decision to use his dissertation to challenge the idea, perpetuated by the regicides, that Charles was a “man of blood”, and the weight of historical argument ranged against him, always seemed to me a risky and […]
Third-year student Ashleigh Hufton writes about the experience of presenting her undergraduate research at the British Conference of Undergraduate Research. Because of the pandemic, Ashleigh had to get to grips with presenting on Zoom a process she found nerve-racking but a very worthwhile learning experience. Ashleigh’s dissertation research, ‘Social Differentiation and the Polite Society: Food […]
By James Farrar, final-year history student at the University of Portsmouth. James’s supervisor Dr Fiona McCall writes: James was an exemplary dissertation student, always ahead of schedule in planning and carrying out his dissertation work, making him ideally placed to advise others on how to go about it. James’s dissertation, ‘“This creature not deserving […]
Last year Emily Burgess produced an outstanding dissertation on the all-female working-class gang from South London known as the Forty elephants. Here she writes about how she came up with the idea and carried out the research, with Rob James as supervisor. Emily concludes with some useful advice for all our students currently writing proposals […]
On 10th March 2021 the paper in our UoP History Research seminar series was by UoP history lecturer Dr Fiona McCall, who gave a paper on female deviance during the English interregnum, including fighting in church, sexual harassment, drinking, swearing and cursing, adultery and witchcraft. This paper has been recorded for those unable […]
As a naval town, Portsmouth’s history has tended to have a masculine focus. But many Portsmouth women have actively campaigned for women’s rights and set up practical initiatives in the Portsmouth area to improve the lives of women. A Heritage Lottery Fund grant enabled the setting up of a project to interview these women and […]