'Tailored Trades' conference at the Bishopsgate Institute

The conference of the AHRC- funded network ‘Tailored Trades: clothes, labour and professional identity 1880-1939’ took place on 12 and 13 September. This research network, coordinated by Nicole Robertson (Northumbria University) and Vike Plock (University of Exeter), is a series of linked workshops and public events investigating the significance of clothes and costumes in the development of professional communities. The network conference, ‘Clothes, Working Lives and Social Change’, explored the relationship between work, clothes and identities during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This two-day, interdisciplinary event brought together scholars from across the Humanities, Creative Arts and Museum sector to examine the intersecting histories of clothes and labour. It was hosted by the Bishopsgate Institute (London), project partners in the ‘Tailored Trades’ network. Keynote lectures were given by Professor Lou Taylor (University of Brighton) and Professor Eugenia Paulicelli (Queen’s College and The Graduate Center City University of New York). Further information about the conference and the network (including Podcasts of the workshop papers) can be accessed on the Tailored Trades project website. 

Workshop on 'Women, Clothes and the New Workforce'

The fourth workshop in the 'Tailored Trades: Clothes, Labour and Professional Communities, 1880-1939'  project took place on 14 July 2014.  This AHRC-funded research network is co-ordinated by Nicole Robertson (Northumbria University) and Vike Plock (Exeter University).  The  July workshop dealt with the subject of  ‘Women, Clothes and the New Workforce’ and was held in Exeter.  This one-day event examined the role of clothing in discourses on women’s professional opportunities. Papers were given by Lucy Noakes (University of Brighton), Becky Munford (Cardiff University), Fiona Hackney (Falmouth University) and Rhonda Garelick (University of Nebraska-Lincoln).  Topics explored during this workshop included: feminine and military identities in First World War Britain; Virginia Woolf, trousers and the work of the woman writer; dress and workplace identities in British women’s magazines; and Coco Chanel, myth and fashion. The final event of the research network is the 'Clothes, Working Lives and Social Change' conference that takes place 12-13 September at the Bishopsgate Institute (London).  Further details can be found on the 'Tailored Trades' website.

Activism and Integrity

Over the past year members of the Histories of Activism group have worked alongside members of the Integrity Project at the Universities of York and Durham to host a series of events which explore the relationship between activism, reform and integrity. Two events have so far been held:

Activism and Integrity. Workshop at Northumbria University, 16 December 2013

This workshop, which was run in conjunction with the Integrity Project (but which was fully funded by the Histories of Activism group), explored the ways in which concepts of integrity have shaped debates among activists from across the political spectrum; how it has governed action as well as intention; and how forms of organization and collective action are negotiated to preserve the integrity of the actors. Two guest speakers – James Gregory of the University of Plymouth and Mark Pitchford of KCL – and two internal speakers – Charlotte Alston and Joe Street – delivered papers at the event. Podcasts of some of the papers can be found on the Project website.

Integrity Lost/Integrity Regained: Social Conditions and Institutional Pressures. Two-Day Conference held at the Literary and Philosophical Society, Newcastle, 11-12 April 2014

For this conference, Joe Hardwick organised a panel, entitled ‘Integrity and the Reform of Public Life in the Nineteenth-Century Transatlantic World’, which considered the ways in which discourses of integrity informed debates about the reform of institutions and public life during the transatlantic ‘age of reform’ of the early nineteenth century. The speakers were Heath Bowen (St. Thomas Aquinas College, New York), James Gregory (Plymouth) and Aashish Velkar (Manchester). Details on the event – which featured three research papers and an introduction – can be found here.

Joe Hardwick and James Gregory are currently developing this panel into an edited collection, entitled Cultures of Integrity, c. 1775-1851. The call for papers for the edited collection will be disseminated shortly.

Research group publishes themed journal issue on humanitarianism

In 2012, the 'Histories of Activism' group hosted a workshop on 'Transnational Solidarities', supported by the Department of Humanities and the Society for the Study of Labour History. We can now announce the publication of the first output that originated in this event – namely a themed issue of the Journal of Modern European History (vol. 12, no. 2), edited by Daniel Laqua and Charlotte Alston. Taken together, the articles shed light on ‘Ideas, Practices and Histories of Humanitarianism’. The issue contains the following contributions:

• Daniel Laqua, 'Inside the Humanitarian Cloud: Causes and Motivations to Help Friends and Strangers)'
• Norbert Götz, 'Rationales of Humanitarianism: The Case of British Relief to Germany, 1805-1815' 
• Charlotte Alston, '"A Great Host of Sympathisers": The Doukhobor Emigration and its International Supporters, 1895-1905'
• Stefan Dyroff, 'Minority Rights and Humanitarianism: The International Campaign for the Ukrainians in Poland, 1930-1931' 
• Isabella Löhr, 'Solidarity and the Academic Community: The Support Networks for Refugee Scholars in the 1930s'
• Angéline Escafré-Dublet, 'Aid, Activism and the State in Post-War France: AMANA, a Charity Organisation for Colonial Migrants, 1945-1962'
• Jochen Kemner, 'Fourth World Activism in the First World: The Rise and Consolidation of Euroepan Solidarity with Indigenous Peoples' 

You can access the articles via the following URL (please note that the first and final article on the site are separate pieces and do not form part of the themed issue).

LSRG Workshop on Labour Movements and Religion in the 19th and 20th Centuries

On 22 May 2014, the Labour and Society Research Group - a joint research project of Newcastle and Northumbria University - will host a workshop on 'Labour Movements and Religion in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries'. The event features speakers from both universities: Joan Allen, Claudia Baldoli, Martin Farr, Matt Perry and Felix Schulz from Newcastle; Charlotte Alston and Daniel Laqua from Northumbria.

The keynote speaker is Prof. Patrick Pasture, head of the Centre for European Studies at KU Leuven. His lecture is entitled 'Standing Up: Christian Social-Political Activism in the Twentieth Century'.