Historicalstudiesblog

From intute.ac.uk

Spotted on intute.ac.uk

The online database of the Far East Prisoners of War is maintained by the Children & Families of the Far East Prisoners of War (COFEPOW). It provides free access to a searchable database of over 55,000 records of British POWs from World War Two. Holdings are taken from records of the National Archives at Kew,

From Intute.ac.uk

TimeSearch is a history search engine, designed to allow both for chance discoveries and highly focused searches for historical events.

TimeSearch allows the user to design a keyword search according to criteria such as area or theme. The search can be further refined by using the Timeline Sites facility which provides a checklist of websites which can be included or excluded from the search. For example, a user can choose whether or not to include Google, the BBC, YouTube, Flickr, and a number of educational websites, museums, libraries, and archives in the search. Search results are displayed in the form of relevant links to external websites, and related articles in the HistoryWorld website, alongside a timeline of events associated with the search term.

The European History Primary Sources (EHPS) is an index of scholarly websites that offer online access to primary sources on the history of Europe.

Each website that is listed in this portal has a short description and is categorised according to country, language, period, subject and type of source. The portal can be searched in a variety of ways. Most of the listed websites can be accessed for free, though sometimes a registration is required.

This portal is a work in progress and new content is regularly added.

The European History Primary Sources is a joint initiative of the Library and the Department of History and Civilisation of the European University Institute and is also part of the World Wide Web Virtual Library - History.

Spotted on Intute.ac.uk

The Virtual Encyclopaedia of Portuguese Expansion is a project of the Centre for Overseas History, an interuniversity research unit of the Faculty of Social and Human Sciences of the New University of Lisbon and the University of the Azores. It provides free online access to a multimedia encyclopedia offering information on the expansion of the Portuguese Empire from the 15th-18th Centuries. It will include texts, chronologies, maps, prints and teacher's materials. Content is still being added to the site on a rolling basis. All materials are in English or Portguese.  There is extensive coverage of travellers' exploration, colonisation by Portugal, the role of the church and the use of the Empire for trade and cultural transmission.

Thanks to colleague, Celia Walter, for passing this on.

This website is the outcome of a project, part funded by the AHRC, to document the traces of colonial (and specifically British) settlement of South Africa’s Eastern Cape. Through photographs of the built environment of small towns in the area, documentary photographer Peter Metelerkamp examines both the continuing “visible influence of colonial presence” and traces its passing and contemporary social change (less than 10f the regions rural population is of white settler descent). The website “is not intended to offer an apologia for the settler project, nor to celebrate its demise; rather it is an invitation to reflect on its character”, and it contains some 81 elegaic images of ‘settler country’. From Intute.ac.uk

The Great War Archive contains over 6,500 items contributed by the UK general public between March and June 2008. Every item originates from, or relates to, someone's experience of the First World War.  Contributions were received via a special website and also through a series of open days at libraries and museums throughout the UK.

Although the project came to an end, there is still the opportunity to add images to Flickr at The Great War Archive Flickr Group.

The Great War Archive is part of the First World War Poetry Digital Archive,  an online repository of over 4000 items of text, images, audio, and video for teaching, learning, and research.  The First World War Poetry Digital Archive includes collections of primary material from major poets of the period,  as well as a range of multimedia artefacts from the Imperial War Museum and Great War Archive itself.   

British History Online is the digital library containing some of the core printed primary and secondary sources for the medieval and modern history of the British Isles. Created by the Institute of Historical Research and the History of Parliament Trust, the library aims to support academic and personal users around the world in their learning, teaching and research.

From the HSRC Press blog

Professor Premesh Lalu, author of the book "The Deaths of Hintsa :  Postapartheid South Africa and the Shape of Recurring Pasts" (320.968 LALU)  along with those of historians Leslie Witz and Ciraj Rassool discusses the question of whether South African history is developing an authentic new discourse or stuck in the colonial archive.  

Through mining a rich field of research, from colonial archival material to contemporary museum exhibitions, Lalu states that overcoming apartheid has required coming to terms not only with the effects of history, but with the discourse of history itself.

Here's the link to the HSRC podcast page and to the podcast itself (duration 9 mins 10 sec). 

The International Slavery Museum explores both the historical and contemporary aspects of slavery, addressing the many legacies of the slave trade and telling stories of bravery and rebellion amongst the enslaved people. These are stories which have been largely untold. (From the Website)

And the website for the 2007 commemoration in Hull, England, of the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade in England. William Wilberforce, from Hull, introduced the "parliamentary bill to end the slave trade which was passed in the House of Commons in 1807 and throughout the British Empire in 1833." Includes brief background about Wilberforce, the slave trade between 1776 and 1807, and current human trafficking and human rights concerns.

From the Journal's website:

The eJIH was launched in 2000 with the aim of encouraging research in international history. The eJIH embraces all aspects of the history of relations between states and societies. The journal aims to promote an understanding of the breadth, depth and policy relevance of international history by examining how the politics, societies, economies and traditions of countries have shaped and influenced international relations since circa 1500.

At January 2009 there are 9 issues online, and the journal appears to have run between 2000 and 2005. Each issue contains a single but substantial 10,000-word academic paper, with the focus on British history in international context.

Archives Wiki is sponsored by the American Historical Association. It is intended to be a clearinghouse of information about archival resources throughout the world.

"While it is primarily designed to be useful to historians and others doing historical research, we hope that researchers in many disciplines will find it useful."