The Directorship of the Institute of Historical Research

 

The Directorship of the Institute of Historical Research

I was reading David Cannadine’s book, Making History Now and Then: Discoveries, Controversies and Explorations, two days ago when I came across his reflections on his time working at the Institute of Historical Research in the University of London from 1998 to 2008. For the first part of this period, he was the Institute’s Director, a role he considered to be “one of the four senior posts in the English historical profession, along with the Regius Professorships of Modern History at the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and the Presidency of the Royal Historical Society … But unlike the two Oxbridge professorships, the Directorship of the IHR carries with it specific and extensive administrative responsibilities; and unlike the Presidency of the Royal Historical Society, it is a full time academic job here in the University of London.”[i]

I have to admit that this comparison had never occurred to me. There can be no doubt that the IHR is an important academic institution located as it is in Bloomsbury not far from the British Library and some of the colleges of the University of London. It certainly acts as host to a wide range of historical seminars covering the British Isles, continental Europe, North America and further afield. Historians visiting London from the rest of the U.K. and other countries find it a positive hub of contacts with other historians and the repository of a more than useful library. David Cannadine can certainly be congratulated on his strenuous efforts to renovate its premises and to augment its finances. 

                                                                                                                                            12th June, 2021


[i] David Cannadine, Making History Now and Then: Discoveries, Controversies and Explorations (Palgrave Macmillan. London , 2008), Pp.283-284. I had been looking at his appreciations of the life and work of Lawrence Stone, particularly at Princeton, for another piece of writing.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Finding out about what is going on in early modern history beyond this country

One of the puzzles I face most days concerns what is going on in early modern history in English-speaking countries beyond these shores. I have a reasonable understanding of the seminar papers being offered here and of the conferences being or about to be held. Most of the websites of relevance are known to me and I am, broadly speaking, aware of the names of historians working in the areas I am interested in. Google alerts and social media help to fill in the gaps. Where I am much less well informed arises from the activities of early modern historians in north America, in Australia and New Zealand. Despite having some regular contacts on the other side of the Atlantic, I have to work hard to search the myriad history departments and learned societies of the U.S.A. and Canada. Oddly enough, this does not appear to be so large an issue with countries in Europe where I conduct regular searches for publications and theses, conferences and seminars of potential interest. It would be good ...
Read more

Simon Healy has died

Image
  I am extremely sorry to report that Simon Healy, who worked for the History of Parliament Trust's 1604-1629 section for many years,  has died. I remember him as a very cheerful and engaging conversationalist. My condolences go to his widow and their two children.
Read more

Centre and Locality: review reflections

  Quite by chance, I was browsing on Twitter last Friday (9 th April) when I spotted on Edward Vallance’s site a reference to a video conference organised by William Clayton of the University of East Anglia at the end of last month. Further searches led me to William Clayton’s review of the book edited by Chris Kyle and Jason Peacey, Connecting Centre and Locality: Communication in early modern England, which appeared under the auspices of the Manchester University Press in 2020 and which Clayton had reviewed for The Seventeenth Century in its most recent issue. [1] This is a subject which interests me and I did give some thought to responding to William Clayton’s largely laudatory comments. However, I was also conscious that I had not read this collection of essays and was thus less well equipped than I should be for assessing either the book or William Clayton’s review. There was, however, one historiographical issue upon which I did feel qualified to comment. Right at the st...
Read more