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With their hallucinatory juxtapositions of medieval English iconography, imperial‐era public statuary, and indicators of contemporary urban unrest, Gilbert and George's monumental 1980 Pictures marked what many initial critics perceived as an unsettlingly political turn in the duo's work – even, some alleged, a gesture of identification with Britain's neo‐fascist right. In fact, this essay argues, much of Gilbert and George's preceding work, including their collages of Edwardian‐era picture postcards, and their canonical performances of The Singing Sculpture, was similarly oriented toward questions of national identity and belonging in a manner more philosophical than propagandistic. At a moment marked by an ascendant if internally contested effort by the political right to reconceptualize 'Britishness' for a postcolonial age, the artists used their self‐appointed roles as 'living sculptures' to emphasize the discontinuities, contradictions, and instabilities inherent to the construct of British identity, stoking an emerging set of anxieties regarding the street‐level legibility of political partisanship in a highly polarized London. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Against a backdrop of pressing economic and strategic concerns shaping British policies after the Second World War, Field Marshal Lord Montgomery, Chief of the Imperial General Staff, embarked on an official tour of Africa in November-December 1947. He visited South Africa, Southern Rhodesia, Kenya, Ethiopia, Sudan, and Egypt, as well as other African territories. Montgomery's controversial report and the reactions to it cast light on British attitudes towards and perceptions of her African empire in the immediate postwar period, as shaped by Labour government defence and developmental policies. At the same time, it invites reconsideration of Montgomery's place in imperial and military historiography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the 1920s, scientists at the University of Cambridge's Sir William Dunn Institute of Biochemistry made major contributions to the emerging discipline of biochemistry while also devoting considerable time and energy to the production of a humor journal entitled Brighter Biochemistry. Although humor is frequently regarded as peripheral to the work of science, the journal provides an opportunity to understand how it contributes to the social infrastructure of scientific communities as modern workplaces. Taking methodological cues from cultural history, ethnography, and humor studies, this essay conducts a close and contextual reading of Brighter Biochemistry. This reading demonstrates how humor served as a central means through which members of the Dunn confronted workplace issues, including creating cooperative work teams, responding to gender discrimination, addressing funding anxiety, and defining professional identity. These conclusions provide a new perspective on the well-documented history of the Dunn and also offer a model for how historians of science can approach humor when its traces are encountered in other settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This analysis explores British perceptions and roles regarding the negotiation of the West German-Soviet Moscow treaty of 1970. Whilst supportive of West German Ostpolitik, Britain has received a very marginal role in the historiography of the treaty. By exploring the consultation process in the so-called Bonn Group of the United States, Britain, France, and West Germany, this exegesis explains that Britain played a leading role in building consensus and forming schemes to resolve the issue of the treatment of Quadripartite Rights and Responsibilities concerning Berlin in the Moscow treaty package. As background, this essay also explains the policies of the Harold Wilson's Labour government and Edward Heath's Conservative government regarding European détente in Europe, including West German Ostpolitik. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The end of the First World War found Britain in dire economic straits, burdened with the costs of converting a wartime economy and straining under an enormous load of debt. As is often the case in such situations, politicians and the public looked to the budgets of the armed services for a large portion of the savings that would presumably enable economic recovery and restore fiscal rectitude. The Royal Navy was a major target of the cost-cutters in post-1918 Britain. Their demands for steep reductions in its budget, however, ran counter to the navy's pursuit of parity with its new major rival, the USA, and its mission of two-ocean imperial defence. This article examines the budget battle that ensued through a close study of the 1919-1922 debates over Royal Navy appropriations bills in the British Parliament and in the British public at large. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents historical information on the British Admiralty's preparations to fight a general fleet engagement that was beyond the power of the post-First World War British naval staff. Discussion on the long-range torpedo threat; Information on the British Naval Gunnery Revolution of 1912-1914; Data on the communications requirements of the technical-tactical synthesis.

With the recent transnational turn in sexology studies, scholars have been highly effective in demonstrating the dialogical nature of exchanges between sexologists and other professionals. Even so, the problem of what counts as ‘sexological’ still haunts the field. One way to circumvent this impasse on the vexing question of disciplinarity is to, first, think about knowledge production in relation to knowledge exchange and second, bring gender into the frame. Drawing on the critique of popularisation developed by historians and sociologists of science, this article turns to the British Society for the Study of Sex Psychology as a case study to argue that popularisation is a blunt instrument, providing limited understanding of the gendered nature of knowledge acquisition and circulation. A different model – termed ‘ventilation’ – allows the historian to step outside the logic of popularisation to explain how dissemination itself bestowed agency to ordinary women and men, who became co-producers of modern sexual knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Only David Lloyd George of the Big Four survived to play a major role in early post-war diplomacy, remaining as British premier until October 1922. This analysis assesses the development of his ideas and policies with particular reference to his war aims speech of 5 January 1918, his Peace Conference Fontainebleau Memorandum of 25 March 1919, and the paper handed to the French premier, Aristide Briand, at Cannes on 4 January 1922. John Maynard Keynes accused Lloyd George of being "rooted in nothing," but Edward House's grudging acknowledgement that "With all his faults, he is by birth, instinct and upbringing, a liberal" seems a fairer assessment. He attempted to put his ideas, based on self-determination, trade, disarmament, and a broad sense of what was just, into practice in his ambitious attempt to re-engage Germany and the Soviet Union into the mainstream of international politics at the 1922 Genoa Conference. By then his credibility with his French counterparts and Tories at home was much depleted. Furthermore, he neglected laying the tedious but necessary foundations on which to build his vision and the constraints of international and domestic politics thwarted his proposed panacea to post-war problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses anti-imperial coups d'etats in the Persian Gulf region and other Arab countries against British colonialism during the post World War II period through the mid 1960s, including efforts to attain popular sovereignty. An overview of ruler Sheikh Saqr al-Qassimi of Sharjah, United Arab Emirates' opposition to British imperialism is provided.

This analysis charts the changes in British aid policy under the Margaret Thatcher government (1979-1990). In particular, it examines the impact of so-called neo-liberal ideology in overseas development strategy in an era where "structural adjustment"—aid in return for market-based reforms—became World Bank and International Monetary Fund orthodoxy. There is some evidence to show British increases in multilateral aid during the 1980s supported a neo-liberal aid policy. Bilateral aid policy, however, demonstrated a subordination of aid to foreign policy and a pro-business—not ideologically pro-market or neo-liberal—alignment. One of the results of these structural changes was the Pergau Dam scandal at the end of the Thatcher years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I analyse the historical constructions of menstruation in mid‐twentieth century Britain. I examine the complex intertwining relations between the female human body and the female nonhuman body. My argument is twofold: firstly, I argue that endocrinological experiments on nonhuman animals' reproductive cycles were mobilised towards affirming a binary division of female/male, animal/human. This facilitated the perpetuation of patriarchal ideologies in British biomedical research. Secondly, I argue that as a result of these dualistic conceptualisations, the female nonhuman body intersected with the female human body in scientific discourses. These bodily transmutations in scientific research contributed towards a form of social control over women, strategically rendering them as 'Other' with nonhuman animals. I illustrate this using Carol J Adams' (2015) concept of the absent referent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historical pageants were important sites of popular engagement with the past in twentieth-century Britain. They took place in many places and sometimes on a large scale, in settings ranging from small villages to industrial cities. They were staged by schools, churches, professional organisations, women's groups and political parties, among others. This article draws on contemporary studies of heritage and performance to explore the blend of history, myth and fiction that characterised pageants, and the ways in which they both shaped and reflected the self-image of local communities. Pageants were important channels of popular education as well as entertainment and, although they are sometimes seen as backward-looking and conservative spectacles, this article argues that pageants could be an effective means of enlisting the past in the service of the present and future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article augments the literature on the British experience of planning by examining attempts to plan the hospital system between 1962 and 1977. The Hospital Plan for England and Wales of 1962 proposed the construction of a suite of new 'District General Hospitals'. Underpinning this proposal was a belief in the value of standardized designs and construction methods, both of which were subsequently investigated in detail by the Ministry of Health and the Department of Health and Social Security (DHSS). The history of this project reveals the challenges of putting centralized planning into practice. Yet while the standardization programme was scaled back in 1975, the article suggests that the drive to 'plan' modern Britain perhaps lasted longer than might initially be thought, into the 1980s, with implications for the way that the broader history of this period is framed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through the example of the British television series,The Bletchley Circle (ITV, 2012–14), my article explores emotions as cultural processes that are socially generated and publically shared. Set primarily in 1952, the series follows the experiences of four women who, during the war years, held positions in the top-secret, Nazi code-breaking work at Bletchley Park. They reunite to pursue a serial killer stalking and murdering young women in London, using their cryptographic skills to track down the killer. Rather than focusing primarily on the economic, social and political realities of women’s lives during and following the war years,The Bletchley Circle Uses the narrative device of a dual generic structure, interweaving historical drama with detective story, to emphasise how the women feel in the aftermath of those exhilarating years at Bletchley Park. I argue that The Bletchley Circle Exemplifies mediated storytelling’s capacity to explore the felt experiences of what it means to live through an era of historical significance [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theories of balancing are under assault. On theoretical and historical grounds, realists and non-realists challenge the claim that states balance against shifts in aggregate material capabilities. In addressing these claims, this article presents a more granular and finely tuned theory of balancing. It contends that states do, in fact, balance effectively. While foreign policy leaders regularly ignore aggregate power developments, they do disaggregate power to identify threatening states and target their balancing against specific threatening elements. Targeted-balancing theory explains why some historical cases coded as under-balancing are really instances of appropriate balancing; why a more powerful state's military buildup, or alliance formation against a weaker state, can constitute balancing; and why some instances of non- or missing-balancing against a more powerful state do not undermine balance-of-power theory. I provide support for my claims through an analysis of Britain's balancing against Germany and Italy between 1936 and 1939. Rather than under-balancing, or failing to balance altogether, London target-balanced against the specific threatening elements of German and Italian power. Given that power is rarely fungible across elements, London ranked other components of their power as secondary, and even last, in terms of Britain's rearmament priorities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BBC Radio feature programmes written by established literary figures in the mid-twentieth century enjoyed richly creative afterlives across many decades and in a variety of media--for example, in print, as commercial recordings, in theatre performance and on television--as well as in a succession of new productions on radio. This activity kept works alive in the public imagination beyond the ephemeral moment of first broadcast and, it is argued, contributed to the sense (for audiences past and scholars present) of an informal canon of literary radio features. This essay explores the intermedial afterlives of three such literary features--Sackville-West's The Rescue (1943), Mac- Neice's The Dark Tower (1946) and Thomas' Under Milk Wood (1954)--in order to demonstrate the significance of the form as a site for exploration of social issues, politics and cultural life. The essay concludes with a call for more wide-ranging attention to the protean feature form, including work that may not have persisted in the schedules, or had rich, intermedial afterlives, but that may still offer significant insights into the history of social, political and cultural life in mid-twentiethcentury Britain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the relationships, both real and imagined, that developed between German prisoners of war and women on the British home front during the First World War. Through an analysis of press coverage and archival materials, it adds a new dimension to the history of women’s wartime experiences. Contact with German prisoners challenged the authorities’ capacity to both control and protect British women on the home front. News of women’s interest in German prisoners jeopardised the morale of British soldiers and the idealised image of British women as potential wives and mothers while threatening the balance between the battle and home fronts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article, based on the Robert Menzies Lecture delivered by the author in London on 31 October 2017, provides a survey of Britain and Australia’s bilateral relationship from the 1930s to the present. In the earlier period particular attention is given to the role of Sir Robert Menzies. The relationship is examined in the light of Britain’s accession to the EEC/EU with reference to bilateral trade, security and global politics, and migration, with emphasis on strong people-to-people links. The author expresses hopes for renewed co-operation over free trade, a rules-based world outlook and links between universities in a post-Brexit world. He argues that although the bilateral relationship went through some troubled times in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, it is now getting back to the natural strength that it deserves. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Research on folk culture in twentieth-century Britain has focused on elite and transgressive political episodes, but these were not its mainstream manifestations. This article re-evaluates the place of folk culture in twentieth-century Britain in the context of museums. It argues that in the modern heritage landscape folk culture was in an active dialogue with the modern democracy. This story begins with the vexed, and ultimately failed, campaign for a national English folk museum and is traced through the concurrent successes of local, regional, and Celtic 'first wave' folk museums across Britain from the 1920s to the 1960s. The educational activities of these museums are explored as emblematic of a 'conservative modernity', which gave opportunities to women but also restricted their capacity to do intellectual work. By the 1970s, a 'second wave' folk museology is identified, revealing how forms of folk culture successfully accommodated the rapid social change of the later twentieth century, particularly in deindustrializing regions. From this new, museums' perspective, folk culture appears far less marginal to twentieth-century British society. In museums folk culture interacted with mainstream concerns about education, regionalism, and commercialization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article uses the work of Bernard Stiegler to understand how widespread digitisation has influenced the transmission of ephemeral and marginalised feminist histories and archives, using as a case study my experience of creating a low-budget feminist digital archive in the first decade of the twenty-first century, the Women's Liberation Music Archive (WLMA). I explore how the WLMA benefitted from unique transmission conditions enabled by digitisation, namely widened access to recorded matter that had become inoperable within feminist communities, technically, socially and culturally. I then go on to examine two areas that pose both threats and possibilities for the sustainability of digital archives in the long term. The first issue relates to the position of low-financed digital archives within the volatile dynamics of change that propel the innovation-driven market economy. The second relates to metadata and how digital technologies present an opportunity to re-think the terms of categorisation used to describe information within networks of association and reference. Finally, I argue that acquiring the technical skills to take care of digital information will perform a key role ensuring digital archives can survive in the long term. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 7 December 1916, in a dramatic coup, Lloyd George supplanted Asquith and became prime minister. This marked the death of a great party and has generated huge controversy. For long, Lloyd George was condemned as the culprit but latterly his reputation has risen sharply. Asquith and Lloyd George came from very different wings of the party, imperialist and Little Englander. Asquith seemed the supreme insider, Lloyd George a supreme Welsh outsider. However in peacetime government, they formed a tremendous partnership. Their close association continued to the formation of the first coalition in May 1915. Then serious division came over military conscription, with Lloyd George moving towards his old foes, the Unionists. As minister for munitions, then secretary for war, he became publicly very critical of the conduct of the war. A great conflict arose over his demand for a new war committee. This was directed against the generals: he did not wish to become prime minister. It looked as if a compromise was possible. On 3 December 1916 Asquith agreed to such a committee but, fatally, reversed his view the next day, Crucial was his misjudgment of the Unionist leaders, especially Balfour. On 6 December the king asked Lloyd George to form a government. Asquith seriously exaggerated his own strength while Lloyd George now had growing Unionist support, the backing of Labour and of a majority of Liberal MPs mobilised by Addison. So Asquith fell and a governmental revolution followed - a new small war cabinet, a cabinet secretariat under Hankey, a secretariat of private advisors in the 'Garden Suburb' and an inexorable move towards prime ministerial (or quasi-presidential) government. In May 1918, the 'Maurice debate' saw the Liberals divided into pro- and anti-government factions; they were crushed at the subsequent general election. The party was thereafter haunted by December 1916 and responsibility was bitterly contested. Yet it should be remembered that before 7 December 1916, the two Liberal leaders formed a dynamic and commanding partnership, which changed British politics profoundly and irreversibly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From 1946–1963, MI5 operated a South-East Asian regional headquarters in Singapore: Security Intelligence Far East (SIFE). This article responds to growing interest in theatre-level intelligence organisation and the importance of intelligence to Britain’s Cold War and decolonisation by examining the performance of SIFE. On the organisational level, SIFE was strongest when it remained wedded to its charter functions and closely adhered to the priorities of its principal consumer: the Commissioner-General for South-East Asia. Its assessments were influential in shaping decision-makers’ understandings of key regional developments, although this did not always translate into public policy. Lastly, SIFE enjoyed success in developing lasting liaison relationships to cement British influence, but failed to utilise these to improve its intake of raw intelligence. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article analyzes how children in 1930s' Britain narrated their everyday behavior, feelings and fantasies when asked to do so by their teachers. It is based upon a study of over one thousand essays that were written by children in 1937 and 1938, which were collected by the British social investigative organization, Mass Observation, as part of its Worktown Project. The argument is situated within the history of emotions and we interrogate the utility of recent conceptual frameworks for the better understanding of children's subjectivities. The essays show that children were able to juggle contradictory demands and expectations, learn emotional codes and match emotional style to spatial context when moving between school, home and leisure arenas. To some extent, then, children adapted and shaped their behavior to comply with specific emotional communities. However, we argue that this model offers only a partial account of children's emotional practices. In the second part of the article we suggest a move away from thinking about emotional communities or emotional styles as predominantly value-based and spatially defined (by the school, home, street--spaces which children inhabited and might have influenced but which were conceived and built by adults) and argue instead for increased attention to be paid to the material context and, particularly, the relationships that operated within and across these spaces. Ultimately, we argue, children's emotional experiences were less about "learning to feel" than feeling through practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines John Newsom’s contributions to non-fiction BBC radio and television coverage of education, poverty, and social disadvantage from 1934 to 1971. The correspondence and scripts concerning his BBC broadcasts for a domestic UK-based audience and an overseas audience are used as source material. Newsom is well known among educational historians as Chief Education Officer for Hertfordshire (1940−1957) and the chair of the Central Advisory Council for Education, which compiled the Newsom Report in 1963. He is associated with the aesthetic and cultural experience of pupils in the physical environment of their schools, rather than with the use of words and sound broadcast to encourage reflection amongst adult listeners on the experience of an educated nation. Newsom’s role in shaping the discussion of education on the airwaves and on screen has been excluded as a significant sphere for researchers. Broadcasting was the space in which Newsom and many other education officers and head teachers spoke most directly to the public and beyond their local realms of responsibility. This article argues that in some of his forays into broadcasting, Newsom was introduced as a stabilising influence on programmes with a subject matter, which it was feared, may have the potential to become too radical. From World War II onwards he acted as an advisor, an editor, and author of scripts and sometimes a chair or a participant in broadcast discussion on the subjects of education, democracy, and the unfolding of the 1944 Education Act. The article explores how despite many colleagues at the BBC being unimpressed with Newsom as a broadcaster, he maintained a sustained involvement in programmes for more than 30 years. The article identifies sensitive issues where Newsom’s choices were occasionally curtailed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]