PB edition of the critically acclaimed ‘The Truth About Empire’ edited by @alanlester.bsky.social w/foreword by @sathnam.bsky.social out now! ‘Book of the Year’ @historyextra.bsky.social Extracted in @theguardian.com Sample 👉 tinyurl.com/38u2ndw3 & use code TRUTH20 for a 20% off in buy link.

Professor Whittle is one of four colleagues in the Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences Faculty at the University of Exeter elected to Fellowship of the British Academy this year. 🗃️ ALL FOUR of these outstanding scholars were placed at risk of redundancy last month. Here's their statement:

"Travel with Hong Kong Characteristics: Tourism and Hong Kong History" Tourism reflects and influences culture, identity, and politics. What’s so “Hong Kong” about the history of Hong Kong tourism? Hong Kong History Day 2026 Secure your spot: tinyurl.com/hkhchistday2...

What a ride! Big congrats to everyone who graduated from the inaugural Hong Kong History Summer School. Those three weeks flew by—so many awesome lectures, visits, and workshops. Loved the discussions and the energy in the room. Great fun!

New content: burying Sun Yat-sen, returning Weihaiwei, Yangzi Gorges and portraits of rural fold: China 1928-31 caught in an album of photographs compiled by British naval officer Leslie Ayre: hpcbristol.net/collections/... Here's one of them, a man in Changsha with a big smile and a big hat

Content update! We have added 247 photographs of Hong Kong from the National Archives, 1869-1900 by Lai Fong, John Thomson & William Pryor. Nice to have 65 by von Stillfried commissioned by governor Hennessy in 1881-82 including this waterfront view. All in www.hpcbristol.net search NA14 NA17 NA25

Last week I posted Song Qingling on a fun dove-shaped jet, so today I thought I’d stay on the theme of rocket-power in Mao-era Chinese propaganda. The most famous example of which is ‘rocket Mao’ from this Great Leap Forward poster from 1958. (1/7) #China #Skystorians #propaganda #Communism

I happened across this cover for the January 1957 edition of China Reconstructs, an ‘external propaganda’ publication for overseas readers. Featuring a flyover from Song Qingling (宋庆龄) in a dove-shaped jet(!), it captures many of the key features of 'external propaganda' (1/8) 🧵 #skystorians #china

Here are some more photos taken by the Jesuits in Taiwan, ca. 1960s. #photography #Taiwan

Writer's block? Always remember Virginia Woolf to Vita Sackville-West, 29 December 1931: ‘Not a word have I written, and I’ve 4 books surging in my head, and shall be 50 next month, and how am I ever to write them? And does it matter if I don’t? Why not give up writing & lavish my days in joy?’

Thrilled to see this fine article on the Girl Guide movement in late colonial HK by Tracy Leung, @hongkonghistory.bsky.social PhD researcher, published by the Journal of Imperial & Commonwealth History! www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

From ‘To Serve Hong Kong’ to ‘To be True to My Country’: The Girl Guide Movement in Late Colonial Hong Kong, 1950s–1997

Using unexamined Girl Guide publications, government papers and oral history testimonies, this article examines how the role of the Girl Guide movement changed throughout late colonial Hong Kong. I...

tandfonline.com

desperately searching for this painting that i've been shown in various art history lectures over the years - it's probably 18th/19th century and depicts art from different ancient cultures all lined up in the order of value that european collectors supposed it to have. does anyone know the title?

One month to go before registrations close. Excited to announce the latest addition to the programme: Prof Madeline Y. Hsu (University of Maryland, College Park) and Prof Su Lin Lewis (Bristol) will join the teaching team for the Hong Kong History Summer School! www.bristol.ac.uk/centre-for-s...

Call for Applications: University of Bristol Hong Kong History summer school, for either undergraduate or grad students—an opportunity to conduct primary-source research in Hong Kong from June 14 to July 4. Apply by May 1.

Happy publication day to @uobrishistory.bsky.social’s Professor Sumita Mukherjee!

Fantastic blog by my former colleague @alanlester.bsky.social forensically refuting the disgraceful attacks on the University of Sussex by the disgracefully ignorant Nigel Biggar. If you’re interested in protecting academic freedom please do read and share

Smearing Sussex (and Me): Responding to Nigel Biggar’s Latest Attack in The Spectator

The University of Sussex, Feb 2026, taken by the author. Alan Lester The Spectator has published an article by Nigel Biggar smearing the University of Sussex as repressing students who ‘don&#…

alanlester.co.uk

We're hosting the CHA this year at UPEI in June. It's going to be a blast. It overlaps with the ACSC and the CCHA. Our wee campus is about the become the historical profession's version of a clown car. I canvased hard locally to have this postcard from a family trip c.2001 on the programme cover.

Canadian Historical Association | Société historique du Canada@cndhistassoc.bsky.social · 6mo ago

The CHA's annual meeting program is now online! We are so excited, and hope to see you in Charlottetown in June. Stay tuned - registration opens next week. #cdnhist

Three-year Lectureship in the History of Modern China - please share widely! jobs.york.ac.uk/vacancy/lect... #China #Skystorians #History

Good news for the weekend! Four posts in History at York: Lecturer (Modern Middle East after 1800) Lecturer (Medieval History c.1100-1450) Lecturer (Modern China) Associate Lecturer (Modern British History and Public History) Find out all about them here: features.york.ac.uk/history-jobs/

York History Department - Academic Jobs

Uncover the past to define the future. We are seeking research-led historians to join our world-class, collaborative community. Discover career-defining opportunities within one of the UK’s most disti...

features.york.ac.uk

We can now revisit all four panel discussions of Hong Kong Day 2025 (6 September 2025) Here is the first panel: Patrick Hase x John Carroll Colonial Hong Kong and New Territories youtu.be/3vtk9SnXig8

Patrick Hase x John Carroll: History and Hong Kong’s New Territories | 夏思義與高馬可對談——殖民地歷史與香港新界

YouTube video by Hong Kong History Centre

youtu.be

The 20th-century globe, as 'colonised by immigrants'.

It’s the 5th of February. Time for a song. youtu.be/WJBrAIVrK-4?...

The 5th of February

YouTube video by John Finnemore

youtu.be

'We understand Hong Kong as a subject providing a wide range of opportunities, as a city and a territory with a distinctive past that has never been more alive.' Excellent write up on the @hongkonghistory.bsky.social in the latest @iias.bsky.social newsletter For more pp.38-40 👉 brnw.ch/21wZEyV

Our latest quarterly round up: a busy three months in the life of the Hong Kong History Centre here at the University of Bristol @hongkonghistory.bsky.social @uobrishistory.bsky.social @bristoluni.bsky.social

Hong Kong History Centre@hongkonghistory.bsky.social · 6mo ago

Welcome to our autumn quarterly roundup! We remain happily and productively busy, advancing new research from around the world through our talks and video series. Full text: www.hkhistory.net/2026/02/02/n...

with a song about extraterritoriality, and the wonderful 'Someone in a Tree' about witnessing history in the making; www.youtube.com/watch?v=JpoK...

Someone in a Tree - Stereo - Pacific Overtures - Original Broadway Cast

YouTube video by Broadway Classics

youtube.com

Ian Rapley@irapley.bsky.social · 6mo ago

There's a Sondheim musical about the opening of Japan? And it features Manjiro, one of the significant castaways, as a key character? And and it's on YouTube? If anyone wants me, I'll be "conducting research" for the next, ~2 hours 20 minutes. youtu.be/g-R2w9dIK2A?...

Speaking of thrillers, I heartily recommend this trilogy by @eadbrookes.bsky.social

Continue introducing our network of ECS, we have Dexter Tse sharing with us his reflections on his academic journey and current doctoral project on “Piracy and British Shipping in Hong Kong, 1900-1945”. Read: tinyurl.com/5n78d9ea

Great to see about 60 people showing up in History Salon last Saturday. A stimulating presentation on the Anglo-Chinese negotiation and experience in archival research by Gary Cheung, a veteran journalist and independent researcher, followed by bites of home-made egg rolls😋. What a wonderful day!

And here’s my response to an attempt to infiltrate this historical propaganda into a serious scholarly journal (albeit a Russian Empire - focused one): alanlester.co.uk/blog/accusat...

Accusation in the Mirror? Distinguishing Scholarship From Propaganda

Alan Lester The Truth About Empire, a collection of essays for a public readership by fourteen leading historians of British colonialism that I edited and introduced, was the subject of Alexander M…

alanlester.co.uk

‘Since January 2025, I have collaborated with Imagined Malaysia, a Malaysia-based NGO, and started a public history campaign titled ‘Malaysia Unbound: Transregional Histories through Documents’…