New academic year, revived Modern Cultural History seminar! A highlight of Cambridge for me, and I hope you'll join me, Peter Mandler, Holly Smith and Tania Shew next week for Simon Gunn, Oct 7 5pm. ‘The 'British Invasion' Revisited: Exporting Pop in the 1960s’ www.hist.cam.ac.uk/event-series...

Petition to start having a 'hindrances' section in books and PhD theses - an anti-acknowledgements where we detail all the things that have hindered progress Eg, the year-long building renovation opposite my flat that has introduced me to sixty different types of drilling noise from 8am each day

Is that meant to be a punishment...?

✈️🇬🇧 Our latest New Voices blog is out! @tomkelsey.bsky.social compares and reflects on the ambitions, political economies and outcomes of two high-profile national projects in recent British history: Concorde and Brexit. www.cambridge.org/core/blog/20...

Was Concorde Really the Flying Brexit? « History# « Cambridge Core Blog

The Anglo-French supersonic airliner, Concorde, is well known as a symbol of European collaboration. With its dubious economics, it is no surprise that Britain partly stayed in the project to ease its...

cambridge.org

Great piece for those interested in nuancing the cultural Cold War away from a straight battle between modernism and socialist realism!

Contemporary European History@conteurohistory.bsky.social · 3mo ago

📣 New article online! 'Commerce and Conservatism: The Politics and Practice of Soviet Art Export', by Vera Otdelnova Read #OpenAccess here: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Young people from across the Empire travelled to study in London in the postwar era. The British Council offered accommodation – and then abruptly told them to leave. 🔒 Chris Campbell’s article from the June issue is in the archive buff.ly/LRK51Mh

The Hans Crescent Strike: The Students at the Hotel

Eager to create goodwill towards Britain in its former colonies, the postwar government encouraged students from across the Empire to study in London. Housing them was a problem, as events in the summ...

buff.ly

Delighted to have an article in this month's @historytoday.com The article explores the 1951 Hans Crescent Strike, the post-war history of colonial students in the UK, and the British Council's attempt to use them for imperial soft power. www.historytoday.com/archive/feat...

The Hans Crescent Strike: The Students at the Hotel

Eager to create goodwill towards Britain in its former colonies, the postwar government encouraged students from across the Empire to study in London. Housing them was a problem, as events in the summ...

historytoday.com

This is just so unsurprising - the British government has historically never understood soft power. The British Council averaged about three government enquiries into its work per decade in the twentieth century - and it still doesn't really know what it's for, or how to fund it properly.

Margot Finn@eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 5mo ago

How surprising that a government that's dismissive of the arts, humanities and social sciences in (and beyond) its universities and and is allowing the British Council to spiral in decline is floundering on the soft power front. Who could have guessed? giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

Pleased to see my blog post published by Cambridge's Legacies of Enslavement Network - it reflects on researching imperial legacies at country houses and how histories of antislavery present both a challenge and opportunity for the heritage sector: www.legaciesofenslavement.cam.ac.uk/news/antisla...

Have just had my first encounter with an AI-generated piece of undergrad work... all the classic hallmarks: fake sources, em-dashes, weird phrases that say nothing. They keep telling us AI can do history, but it really, really can't. It can't even write an undergrad essay plan.

I have a piece in today’s Guardian on the recent history of retirement: a collective social experience whose moment has almost passed? www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Britain pioneered the comfortable retirement – but that golden age is coming to an end | Helen McCarthy

The once inexorable rise in retiree living standards since the second world war has broken down. Can we keep the dream alive for future generations, asks historian Helen McCarthy

theguardian.com

"But primary sources are not just repositories of data to be mined and tabulated; they are fragments of past attitudes and sensibilities that need careful and sensitive reading. AI... makes a poor companion for those seeking to understand our human past."

Chris Campbell@chriscampbell1.bsky.social · 8mo ago

Delighted to contribute to this fantastic series on AI, British Studies and the wider humanities with @thenacbs.bsky.social! www.nacbs.org/post/back-to...

And that’s a wrap on our blog series on artificial intelligence! Thanks to @amywb.bsky.social @chriscampbell1.bsky.social @phdhurtbrain.bsky.social @megsmith.bsky.social @ktl10.bsky.social and Anushmita Mohanty for their wonderful contributions! Visit nacbs.org/broadsides to read the full series!

To close out our series on AI, @chriscampbell1.bsky.social reflects on the response to his recent article in Transactions of @royalhistsoc.org, “The Historian in the Age of AI.” Read the full piece: www.nacbs.org/post/back-to...

Back to Basics? Historical Methods and the Rise of AI

"For if AI threatens to strip historical research and writing back to its most basic form, perhaps that’s a challenge we should meet head on."

nacbs.org

Delighted to contribute to this fantastic series on AI, British Studies and the wider humanities with @thenacbs.bsky.social! www.nacbs.org/post/back-to...

Back to Basics? Historical Methods and the Rise of AI

"For if AI threatens to strip historical research and writing back to its most basic form, perhaps that’s a challenge we should meet head on."

nacbs.org

📣Out now on #firstview! Molly Groarke (@mollygroarke.bsky.social) (@camhistory.bsky.social) on 'Imperial Family Biographies and New Approaches to the Family in Histories of the British Empire, c.1650–c.1950' #Empire #Family #Personal #Review 📜🗃️ 👉Read open access: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

This is a fantastic piece about UCL from Georgina Brewis, which made me reflect on my own four years as a student there. Lots of parallels with exploring London and engaging with topical issues - less so with the bawdy entertainment in taverns... www.historytoday.com/archive/feat...

The Godless Students of London University

historytoday.com

Very happy to announce my article is now out with the @historicaljnl.bsky.social! It reviews the current literature on family networks in the British Empire and biographical approaches to writing imperial history www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

“Studying history, we know that nothing is inevitable.” In the first piece in a series on artificial intelligence, @amywb.bsky.social argues that now is the time to make the case for studying the humanities. Read the full piece at Broadsides: www.nacbs.org/post/the-ai-...

The AI Takeover Is Not Inevitable: Now Is the Time to Resist

"Studying history, we know that nothing is inevitable."

nacbs.org

🇺🇸 The U.S. is actively dismantling its own soft power

Carl Quintanilla@carlquintanilla.bsky.social · 9mo ago

“.. a poll of Germans found nearly two-thirds said they wanted to avoid US brands. .. an astounding 83 per cent of Swedes said they were no longer buying US brands.” @financialtimes.com www.ft.com/content/3276...

Media outlets are still giving airtime to that Microsoft report on AI and the workplace, even though its methods and conclusions are so crude... and they're also not balancing it with any of the report's critiques. This was published yesterday: fortune.com/article/what...

Microsoft researchers have revealed the 40 jobs most exposed to AI—and even teachers make the list | Fortune

Sorry, Gen Z: AI is coming for safe and secure teaching jobs, as well as grad roles.

fortune.com

This week we also published its latest article in the Society's journal 'Transactions'. 'The Historian in the Age of AI' by @chriscampbell1.bsky.social explores what it means to be a historian, and why historical skills and craft need to defended and understood bit.ly/4atErTB #Skystorians 1/2

What does Gen AI mean for the work of the historian and the value of historical experience, skills and craft? 'The Historian in the Age of AI' by @chriscampbell1.bsky.social. New Comment article now available in 'Transactions of the Royal Historical Society' bit.ly/4atErTB #Skystorians 1/2

If anyone remembers that list which said historians were second in line to be replaced by AI, I've had some thoughts about it... and how it relates to some aspects of public history and the current climate facing historians. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Well that’s embarrassing

Archival find: Here's Churchill exploiting his diplomatic connections to maintain his usual supply of whisky, despite French import quotas.

🚨 Job Alert! We're recruiting a part-time freelance managing editor to join the CEH editorial team. Applications are due by 30 November 2025. Full details and application process here: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Dream PhD opportunity! We are recruiting another doctoral researcher in our @erc.europa.eu synergy project BLOCKADE - this one is on interwar blockades and sanctions. 4 years, fully funded at @uvahumanities.bsky.social and supervised by the amazing and super kind @samuelkruizinga.bsky.social

Samuël Kruizinga@samuelkruizinga.bsky.social · last yr.

See the full vacancy text here: werkenbij.uva.nl/en/vacancies...

🧵 In CEH's first digest (tinyurl.com/38p3yxky), our six editors each highlighted a recent article they have particularly enjoyed working on. This thread showcases these articles and explores why our editors made their selections. ⬇️ [1/7]