History@Portsmouth

University of Portsmouth's History Blog

Tag Archives | twentieth century

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The experience of Italian Jews under the racial laws of 1938

By on June 27, 2024 in Learning in Focus, Research in Focus

Italy’s involvement in the persecution of Jews is often overshadowed by the horrors of Nazi Germany. Chanel Parker earned a first in her dissertation titled “Inscribed Otherness: The Role of Historical Integration on Italian Jews’ Experiences and Responses to the Leggi Razziali,” where she unveiled Italy’s historically understated role in anti-Semitic prosecution, and investigated how the country has perpetuated the idea of its benevolence towards Jews. Below, Chanel details the intricacies of her research, and discusses her experiences and advice for writing the dissertation. Primo Levi’s haunting memoirs are among the few famous reminders of Italy’s involvement in Jewish persecution. In the overbearing shadow cast by Nazi Germany, Italy has […]

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A photograph in a riot: How much can we believe?

By on February 27, 2024 in Learning in Focus

Photographs provide compelling insight into the past, but can we trust them to give an accurate depiction?[1]. Second-year UoP history student Becky Platt shows how a photograph seemingly showing an argument between a woman and a protestor during the poll tax riot in London in 1990, is shown to have a very differing story from the account of the woman in the picture. It is a great example to discuss how far we can believe a photograph to depict an event accurately. Becky originally wrote this piece for the 1st year history module Traces of the Past: Exploring Lives Through Sources. The photo portrays a man and woman arguing with […]

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Debates about the Jews’ place in a decolonised world

By on December 1, 2023 in Research in Focus

On Wednesday 8 November Dr Laura Almagor (University of Utrecht) presented a paper in our History Research seminar series entitled Reinvention at Bandung: Jewish Displaced Persons and the new global order, 1943-1962. During the summer and autumn of 1945 millions of uprooted persons made their way back to homes across Europe.  The remaining refugees crowded together in displaced persons camps in Germany, Austria and Italy.  Six years later, 175,000 individuals, mostly Jews, still languished in the camps.  In 1955, the Bandung conference convened to discuss the lingering problem of these displaced persons. Laura’s research looks at what the conference debates reveal about how displaced persons and Jewish leaders understood the […]

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Blackout accidents on Britain’s railways during World War Two

By on August 4, 2023 in Research in Focus, Uncategorized

University of Portsmouth History student Evan Cossburne produced a blog for the Railway Work, Life & Death project as part of his work on the second year core module ‘Working with the Past’, coordinated by Mike Esbester. Mike co-leads the RWLD project along with Karen Baker (Librarian, National Railway Museum) and Helen Ford (Manager, Modern Records Centre) with the assistance of Craig Shaw (Volunteer Administrator, NRM). In this blog, Evan looks at the impact of the Second World War on railway personnel’s working conditions, focusing particularly on the accidents caused by a ‘lack of light’. To read the blog, click this link.

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London’s female gangsters: press responses and gendered implications 1890-1940

By on May 22, 2023 in Alumni, Events, News, Research in Focus, Uncategorized

On 17 May 2023 University of Portsmouth PhD researcher, Emily Burgess, presented her paper on the press’s treatment of female gangsters from the late-nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries. If you missed the paper, the recording is available to watch here. You will need the following password T19#MUVU to access the recording. An abstract for Emily’s paper can be found below. Emily is a graduate of the University, having studied for a BA (Hons) History degree between 2017 and 2020 (awarded First Class honours) and an MRes in History between 2020 and 2021 (Distinction). She was awarded the ‘Robbie Gray Memorial Prize’ for the Best Undergraduate History Dissertation in 2020, and started […]

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Charting the major milestones of the Space Race: Wally Fawkes and the satirical cartoon

By on March 23, 2023 in Alumni, News, Research in Focus, Uncategorized

On 1 March 2023 the renowned jazz musician and cartoonist Wally Fawkes passed away aged 98. In his long career, Fawkes illustrated satirical cartoons for The Daily Mail under the pseudonym ‘Trog’. His most famous creation was the comic-strip ‘Flook’, but his illustrative work increasingly focused on British politics. In this blog, alumnus student Daniel Millard discusses Fawkes’ role in familiarising the British public with the country’s role in the ‘Space Race’ during the Cold War years. Daniel interviewed Fawkes as part of his research for his undergraduate dissertation, ‘Exploring together: how curators, correspondents and cartoonists presented the Space Race to the British public, 1957-1975‘. Daniel graduated with a first-class BA […]

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