Forthcoming Conferences and Workshops:
Previous Conferences and Workshops:
2010
Workshop "Towards a New History of the League of Nations"
August 2010, Jesus College, Oxford
Scholars Currently Working on the History of the League of Nations around the world
(funded by the Carnegie Corporation, New York).
Gilbert Murray - Vice President
League of Nations Society from 1916
This workshop brought together scholars who have published or are known to be working this field. The workshop was organised by Patricia Clavin (Oxford) in collaboration with Susan Pedersen (Columbia). Plans are also being developed to host a further meeting at the United Nations Geneva in 2011. There was graduate participation in the event and a substantial list of junior and senior scholars attended.
"Writing Europe into the World, 1880-2010"
Oxford-Oslo Graduate Conference on Contemporary History
May 2010 - Faculty of History
Conference Report
This final conference of a six-year long research programme sponsored by the Forum for Contemporary History at the University of Oslo, and the Modern European History Centre (MEHRC) of Oxford University brought together graduate students and those who had recently completed their doctoral studies to explore recent challenges to the position of European history in the world and to the challenge to history’s privileged claim to understand the past. The conference provided the opportunity for participants to address themes and issues which they haven't always had time to reflect, including the tendency of global history writing to highlight fragmentation, the insights afforded by micro-historical study, set against the impulse of European history to identify common themes, and compare.
The conference was organised by Dr Patricia Clavin (Oxford) and Dr Helge Pharo (Oslo)
2009
"The Changing Landscape of East-Central Europe since1700 in Transnational Context" |
Thursday 24th-Saturday 26th September 2009 |
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The British-Czech-Slovak Historians' Forum http://users.ox.ac.uk/~bcsforum/purpose.html was founded in 2000 to further professional contacts between the three countries and to promote study of the history of (east-)central Europe in a broad context. A first conference was held at Dundee in 2002, with generous support from the British Academy. Papers from that conference were published by the Academy as Czechoslovakia in a Nationalist and Fascist Europe, 1918-48, ed. M. Cornwall and R.J.W. Evans (Proc.Br.Acad.140, Oxford, 2007). Subsequently further conferences were held in the Czech Republic in 2004, on 'Nationality, Ethnicity and Confession in the Era of Reformations, 1380-1700', and in Slovakia in 2006, on "Inventing Each Other, 1526-1800'; the proceedings of both of these events are due to be published.
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This fourth conference, which took place in Oxford in September 2009 'The Changing Landscape of East-Central Europe in Transnational Context, c.1700-1989'. looked at current work on a range of issues relating to environment, (de)industrialization, conservation, etc., with a focus on the Czech and Slovak lands, but with comparative material from elsewhere in central Europe and beyond, including a British dimension. Environmental history is a fast-growing area of research, spurred of course by present concerns, but drawing on rich traditions in the study of rural and urban settlement, land management, (heavy) industries, transportation and communications, historical geography, town planning, attitudes to the natural world, etc.
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New College, Oxford 28 March 2009
This conference sponsored by the MEHRC jointly with the University of Oslo, and held at New College, brought together international scholars interested in themes in merchant shipping. The papers explored issues of organizational and economic change during periods in which the nature of shipping changed from a collection of localized activities to a technologically advanced, capital intensive and internationally concentrated industry. Papers particularly examined the nature of the role of specialized small countries (particularly Greece and Norway) in this industry. In addition, attention focused on the implication of technical change for industrial organization and freight rates. Important new information on the time pattern of freight rates during the years of transition to metal ships and steam propulsion were presented. Papers were given by Gelina Harlaftis (Ionian University, Greece), Katerina Galani (Oxford), Lewis Fisher (Memorial University of Newfoundland), Eivind Merok and Espen Ekberg (University of Oslo), Jan Tore Klovland (Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration), Knick Harley (Oxford), Camilla Brautaset (University of Bergen) and Stig Tenold (Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration).
The conference was organized by Professor Even Lange (Oslo) and Professor Knick Harley (Oxford). |
2008
The Intellectual Consequences of Religious Heterodoxy
1650-1750
St Hugh’s College, Oxford
14th - 15th March 2008
Pietro Giannone (1676-1748) Civil and Sacred Historian |
Held at St Hugh’s College on 14 and 15 March 2008, this multi-disciplinary, international conference explored the intellectual consequences of the inability of both Protestant and Roman Catholic churches to prevent discussion of ‘heterodox’ doctrines in the 100 years between the Thirty Years’ War and the Enlightenment. Twelve speakers considered the impact of Arminian and Socinian, Jansenist and Jesuit theologies on contemporaries’ understanding of human society and its history. Among the thinkers discussed were Hugo Grotius, Thomas Hobbes, members and critics of the early Royal Society, John Locke, Pierre Bayle, Thomas Burnet, Conyers Middleton, and David Hume. Themes which ran through the papers were the relation between divine and human justice, the status of ‘truth’ in theology and philosophy, the social and intellectual significance of idolatry, the extent to which historical treatments of Christian doctrine fostered heterodoxy, and the relation between heterodoxy and toleration in Protestant contexts, as contrasted with the room for intellectual manoeuvre (not toleration) available within the Roman Catholic Church. Speakers included Rosa Antognazza, Hans Blom, Justin Champion, Girolamo Imbruglia, Jonathan Israel, Scott Mandelbrote, Sarah Mortimer, Enrico Nuzzo, Will Poole, Sami Savonius, Richard Sergeantson, and Brian Young; among the discussants were Giuseppe Ricuperati, Camilla Hermanin, Sharon Achinstein, Peter Harrison, and Noel Malcolm. An attendance of 50 included scholars and graduate students from across the United Kingdom
The conference was organised by John Robertson (Oxford) and Sarah Mortimer (Cambridge). We were grateful for funding from the British Academy, the Royal Historical Society, the University’s John Fell Fund, and the History Faculty. A volume of revised papers will be edited by Sarah Mortimer and John Robertson for publication by Brill in 2010.
2007
A SYMPOSIUM OF THE SPANISH WAR
Mawby Pavilion, Rewley House
June 2007
MEHRC in collaboration with the Centro de Estudios Constitucionales y Politicos,Complutense University, Madrid
To mark the seventieth anniversary of the Spanish Civil War, a Symposium was held at Rewley House, Oxford, on 29 June- 30 June 2007. The specific aim of the event was to assess the current state of scholarly research into the Civil War, and to discuss new directions that it is taking and might take in the future. An invited group of expert historians from Britain, Spain and the United States took part, and funding was provided by the Oxford History Faculty and the Centro de Estudios Constitucionales y Políticos, Complutense University, Madrid. Following a keynote address by Professor José Alvarez Junco (Complutense University), there were five panel sessions at which the following subjects were discussed: atrocities and violence; politics; military and international issues; culture; and war & memory. The other speakers were Dr Frances Lannon, Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford; Dr Mary Vincent, University of Sheffield; Professor Glyn Stone, University of the West of England; Professor George Esenwein, University of Florida, USA; Professor Robert Stradling, Emeritus, University of Wales, Cardiff; Dr Michael Richards, University of the West of England; Dr Enrique Moradiellos, University of Extremadura, Caceres, Spain; Dr Hugo Garcia, Complutense University.
The symposium was organised by Dr Tom Buchanan, MEHRC, Oxford; Dr Tim Rees, University of Exeter, and Dr Nigel Townson, Complutense University.
2006
The Holy Roman Empire/Das Heilige Romische Reich, 1495-1806
This conference on took place at New College, Oxford, from 30 August to 2 September 2006, in co-operation with the German Historical Institute and the Austrian Cultural Forum. In some measure it constituted a commemoration of the Empire’s dissolution exactly two hundred years earlier; but our main purpose was to assess the current state of scholarship on important aspects of the later history, through the early modern period, of one of Europe’s most enduring political structures, and to set this into a full international context. Such a stock-taking had not previously been attempted in Britain, and a further aim was to contribute to a better understanding in this country of that era in central-European history. Both plenary and parallel sessions were held. We hope the conference will yield a publishable volume of essays.
The themes of the conference were: The Reich as a state or federation; Society and institutions; Society and culture; Political culture; Core and periphery; the Reich and Europe. Some 35 speakers participated. About half were from Germany and Austria; the rest from the USA, Britain and other European countries. Both plenary and parallel sessions were held, and we also included a session for postgraduates to report on their research. The languages of the papers and discussion were in English and German.
We are very grateful to the bodies which provided financial support for the conference. These included the Arts and Humanities Research Council, Austrian Cultural Forum in London, the British Academy, the German Historical Institutes in London and Paris, the Europaeum, the Royal Historical Society, and the Oxford History Faculty. A volume of papers is scheduled for publication by Brill in 2010.
The members of the organizing committee were Robert Evans (History Faculty, Oxford),Robert Oresko (London), David Parrott (New College, Oxford), Lyndal Roper (Balliol College, Oxford), Michael Schaich (German Historical Institute, London), Hagen Schulze (German Historical Institute, London), Peter Wilson (University of Sunderland), Dr Johannes Wimmer (Austrian Cultural Forum, London).
