The Centre for Modern and Contemporary History
World-class research that engages the public
Established in 2022, the Centre for Modern and Contemporary History (CMCH) supports the research of LJMU's historians, strengthens our partnerships with museums and historical societies and creates opportunities for new collaborations at local, national and international levels.
The CMCH hosts a range of activities including seminars, workshops, book launches and other public speaking events. For updates on these events, please follow us on Twitter - @LJMUHistory.
For enquiries related to the CMCH, please contact one of its Directors:
Dr Chris Vaughan - c.m.vaughan@ljmu.ac.uk
Prof James Crossland - j.n.crossland@ljmu.ac.uk
Faq Items
News - 2023-2024
June 2023
Nick White completed his Visiting Professorship at Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris in Tanjong Malim, Malaysia.
July 2023
Lucie Matthews-Jones was awarded £64,000 on internal funding to setup a Disability Researchers Network at LJMU.
August 2023
James Crossland completed his Everett Helm Visiting Fellowship at Indiana University in Bloomington as part of research for his next book, Rogue Agent: The Troubled Life and Dangerous Times of Robert Bruce Lockhart.
September 2023
Andrea Livesey was awarded a British Academy SHAPE Involve and Engage grant for the project: "From Slavery to Roe v. Wade: Using Theatre to Explore Black Diasporic Understandings of Reproductive Health and Justice", in partnership with Liverpool's International Slavery Museum. Details available here.
October 2023
Gillian O'Brien was awarded an Arts and Humanities Research Council Project Grant worth £500,000 for the 3 year project: "Sharing Lands: Reconciliation, Recognition and Reciprocity between the Chochtaw and the Irish", in partnership with Goldsmiths University and the University of Georgia.
December 2023
Nick Ridley's book, Carlo di Rudio and the Age of Revolution was published by Routledge. Details available here.
CMCH Members
Centre Directors
Prof James Crossland (History of terrorism, intelligence, laws of armed conflict)
Dr Chris Vaughan (East African history, decolonisation)
Members
Dr Kate Ballantyne (American Civil Rights movement, youth activism)
Dr Tom Beaumont (French history, labour history)
Dr Mike Benbough-Jackson (Welsh history, regional identities)
Dr David Clampin (Britain in WWII, propaganda and advertising)
Dr Malcom Craig (Cold War history, culture in the nuclear age)
Dr Emily Cumming (Victorian literature and culture)
Dr Dan Feather (South African history)
Prof Susan Grant (Soviet history, nursing and aged care)
Mr. Lukasz Grzymski (PhD Candidate, history of British intelligence)
Dr Katherine Harbord (Middle East history, anti-Semitism)
Dr Andre Kiel (German history, state responses to emergencies)
Dr Andrea Livesey (History of slavery)
Dr Jan Ludvigsen (Sport and security)
Dr Lucie Matthew-Jones (Histories of the home, gender, Victorian culture)
Prof Gillian O'Brien (Irish history, dark tourism)
Dr Nick Ridley (Terrorism and 19th century revolutionary movements)
Dr Isabel Robinson (Postdoc researcher, history of slavery)
Dr Olivia Saunders (South American history)
Prof Nick White (History of decolonisation in South-East Asia, business history)
Externally-Funded Projects and Impact Case Studies
"Anxiety, Prejudice, Paranoia: Shaping British Intelligence Culture, 1880s-1920s"
Leverhulme Trust Project Grant (£113,000 / 2022-2025)
This project examines how colonial anxieties, prejudices and trauma shaped the culture of Britain’s intelligence community during its formative period from the 1880s to the 1920s. This will be done using a novel interdisciplinary method, which will involve combining the study of emotions and human experience (affective science) and collective biography (prosopography) to explore the emotional states and activities of 19 individuals who, after experiences in the colonies, returned to Britain to work for the Community. By uncovering the connections between colonial experiences and the development of the Community’s institutional culture, this project will contribute new knowledge to the field of imperial history, and pioneer a more human-centric approach to intelligence studies, in which the emotional states of intelligence officers will be given greater consideration when analysing how they assess and respond to threats. Through a range of outputs aimed at both academics and the public, this research will open avenues for a wide discussion of the troubling colonial origins of today’s intelligence Community.
Researchers: James Crossland and Lukasz Grzymski
"Engaging with a Pariah State: British Cultural Diplomacy in Rhodesia, 1965 to 1980"
British Academy/Leverhulme Small Grant (£7,715 / 2023-2025)
Debates about the value of cultural boycotts re-emerge on a cyclical basis, often coming hand-in-hand with the implementation of economic sanctions. The key question is always whether it is better to isolate a pariah state, or maintain cultural contact with the general population in the hope of softening attitudes, promoting change, and gaining influence. One example, which has received little scholarly attention, is the efforts by Britain to utilise cultural diplomacy in its dealing with the ‘rebel colony’ of Rhodesia. While Britain and Rhodesia had a unique relationship, and this contact took place at a very different time, this case study can be used as a microcosm for the contemporary challenges states face when attempting to sustain linkages through cultural contact with the aim of maintaining long-term influence.
Researchers: Dan Feather
"Sharing Lands: Reconciliation, Recognition and Reciprocity between the Choctaw and the Irish"
AHRC (£500,000 / 2024-2027)
This collaborative project explores the history and public memory of gifting from the Choctaw Native Americans to Ireland in 1847, and will use participatory methods to produce a range of public facing outputs with a range of beneficiaries among the Choctaw and migrant groups in the US, Ireland and Britain.
Researchers: Gillian O'Brien, Padraig Kirwan (Goldsmiths, University of London)
Research Clusters
Risk, Emergencies and Security
Crises, emergencies, and the notion of a global “risk society” have become a mainstay of the public discourse. In the first two decades of the 21st century alone, societies faced the challenges of international terrorism, global financial crises, the Covid-19 pandemic, climate change, and various armed conflicts. We believe these pressing contemporary issues are rooted in long-term historical developments and thus warrant historically-informed analysis and discussion. Understanding these phenomena requires multi- and cross-disciplinary approaches, and we are therefore keen to include colleagues with a background in sociology, political science, media studies, linguistics and literature, and law (but not limited to them) in the work of the cluster alongside colleagues from history. This cluster aims to provide a forum for researchers in to engage with these issues and to facilitate multi, inter- and cross-disciplinary discussion and collaboration.
Cluster leader: Dr Andre Keil - A.Keil@ljmu.ac.uk
The Postcolonial World: Ends and Legacies of Empire
The end of European global empires in the decades following World War II seemed to herald a fundamental and unprecedented historical shift from a world of empires to a world of nation-states. The process of decolonisation in Asia and Africa, its contingencies and contested outcomes, has come under sustained historical scrutiny in recent years, and the study of newly independent states in the post-colonial world is a key area of interest within the wider context of global history. Yet the questions of whether imperialism really ended with the decolonisation of European empires - particularly given the character of American and Soviet power in the post-war era, and the continued efforts by Britain and France to maintain their imperial spheres of influence - and the nature and extent of the legacy of European imperialism in today’s world, remain key academic and public concerns. This cluster brings together historians of diverse regions and scholars from associated disciplines who work on the ends and legacies of empires in the recent past and contemporary world, with the aim of facilitating sustained conversations and potential collaborations among members of the CMCH. It currently houses Dr Chris Vaughan's AHRC-funded Regionalism in East Africa project.
Cluster leader: Dr Dan Feather - D.J.Feather@ljmu.ac.uk
Gender, Race and Sexuality
This cluster brings together the complex research and ideologies that constitute the histories of gender, race and sexuality. By taking an intersectional approach to these histories, the Gender, Race and Sexuality cluster will provide a space for discussion, sharing of ideas, and constructive feedback for researchers working across disciplines.
Cluster leader: Dr Andrea Livesey - A.Livesey@ljmu.ac.uk
Home and Domestic Cultures
This research cluster will provide an interdisciplinary and collaborative space to investigate home and domestic cultures from a historical and contemporary perspective. The nineteenth century famously saw the proclamation of ‘home, sweet home’, while the recent pandemic has centred home and domestic culture as never before. Home and homemaking continue to be central to our daily lives. Yet, home is not just as a physical space of dwelling, but a feeling and emotion that can extend into other home-like spaces such as gardens, parks, workspaces, community spaces, the nation, and institutions. Broadening understandings of home and domestic cultures, this interdisciplinary research cluster aims to explore more fully how people have made themselves at home both in the past and the present. By decentring a romanticised reading of domestic space, we recognise that not everyone finds their homes to be a place of security and tranquillity. We therefore aim to address how homes are made and unmade, embraced and rejected, located and displaced. This research cluster will run a regular reading group, meetings, and workshops. We are keen to provide a space for researchers across the HSS and APSS who have an interest in home and domestic cultures and to extend this network to the broader community with a view to building partnerships across the heritage, charity, and public sectors. A key component of our research group will be to support knowledge exchange work and to develop funding opportunities.
Cluster Leaders: Dr Lucinda Matthews-Jones - L.M.MatthewsJones@ljmu.ac.uk and Dr Emily Cumming - E.M.Cuming@ljmu.ac.uk
Recent Publications
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James Crossland - The Rise of Devils: Fear and the Origins of Modern Terrorism (Manchester University Press, 2023) In the dying light of the nineteenth century, the world came to know and fear terrorism. Much like today, this was a time of progress and dread, in which breakthroughs in communications and weapons were made, political reforms were implemented and immigration waves bolstered the populations of ever-expanding cities. This era also simmered with political rage and social inequalities, which drove nationalists, nihilists, anarchists and republicans to dynamite cities and discharge pistols into the bodies of presidents, police chiefs and emperors. This wave of terrorism was seized upon by an outrage-hungry press that peddled hysteria, conspiracy theories and, sometimes, fake news in response, convincing many a reader that they were living through the end of days. Against the backdrop of this world of fear and disorder, The rise of devils chronicles the journeys of the men and women who evoked this panic and created modern terrorism - revolutionary philosophers, cult leaders, criminals and charlatans, as well as the paranoid police chiefs and unscrupulous spies who tried to thwart them. In doing so, this book explains how radicals once thought just in their causes became, as Pope Pius IX denounced them, little more than 'devils risen up from Hell'.
Susan Grant - Soviet Nightingales: Care Under Communism (Cornell University Press, 2022) With the advent of the USSR, nurses were instrumental in helping to build the New Soviet Person and in constructing a socialist society. Disease and illness were rampant in the early 1920s after years of war, revolution, and famine. The demand for nurses was great, but how might these workers best serve the country's needs? By examining living and working conditions, nurse-patient relations, education, and attempts at international nursing cooperation, Grant recounts the history of the Bolshevik effort to define the "Soviet" nurse and organize a new system of socialist care for the masses. Although the Bolsheviks aimed to transform healthcare along socialist lines, they ultimately failed as the struggle to train skilled medical workers became entangled in politics. Soviet Nightingales draws on rich archival research from Russia, the United States, and Britain to describe how ideology reinvented the role of the nurse and shaped the profession.
Nick Ridley - Carlo Di Rudio and the Age of Revolution (Routledge, 2023) From a Europe convulsed by revolutions to an assassination plot and international secret diplomacy, to conflict between major European powers which changed the strategic power balance, to the American Civil War, and finally, to Custer’s Last Stand, this tumultuous vista is told through the life and times of a comparatively little-known but indomitable revolutionary. This book provides an account of the life of a little-known nineteenth-century revolutionary, Charles di Rudio, narrating the revolutions and insurgencies of nineteenth-century Europe from 1840 to 1870 and of the United States to 1880 in which di Rudio was involved, offering through his biography a unique perspective on the revolts and insurgencies that took place during this period and placing both his life and these revolts in the wider context of European history.
Kate Ballantyne - Radical Volunteers: Dissent, Desegregation and Student Power in Tennessee (University of Georgia Press, 2024) Radical Volunteers tells the largely unknown story of southern student activism in Tennessee between the Brown decision in 1954 and the national backlash against the Kent State University shootings in May 1970. As one of the first statewide studies of student activism—and one of the few examinations of southern student activism—it broadens scholarly understanding of New Left and Black student radicalism from its traditionally defined hotbeds in the Northeast and the West Coast.
Dan Feather - British Cultural Diplomacy in South Africa, 1960-1994 (Palgrave, 2024) This book analyses the British government’s use of cultural diplomacy in South Africa from 1960 to 1994. Previously, scholarship on UK-South African relations has focussed mainly on political, economic, or military links; this book makes an important and original intervention by emphasising how the British government sought to use cultural ties as part of its diplomacy in South Africa. The book also highlights the controversy these links generated owing to broader international efforts to ostracise South Africa owing to the racist apartheid system in the country at the time. By examining British policy towards educational exchanges, performing arts tours, radio and television broadcasts, and sporting contact, this book provides a dynamic case study from which to analyse Britain’s use of cultural diplomacy during a period of relative decline, while also adding a new layer to the well-established literature on the UK-South African special relationship. |