Summer Scholars

When Mondays and Fridays from 4 July – 26 August, 12.30-14.00
Where Check individual listing for room location
Price Free, no booking required

The Eccles Centre sponsors numerous Visiting Fellowships and Postgraduate Research Awards each year. The Summer Scholars programme highlights the work that they have done during their residency in the British Library, bringing the latest research related to the North Americas collections to a public audience.

FRIDAY 26 AUGUST The Centre for Conservation Foyle Room
The Great American Desert
Eccles Centre Writer in Residence William Atkins is working on a cultural history and travel book about the world’s deserts, with a particular focus on the US southwest. He discusses his use of the America’s collections in researching the evolution of the US’s perception of its desert regions, from John C. Frémont’s account of his exploration of the Great Basin in 1843, to the development of an American ‘desert aesthetic’ in the seminal writings of John C. Van Dyke, Mary Austin and Edward Abbey in the twentieth century.