Cambridge American History Seminar: ‘Throwing Away the Gods’

Free Entry, Conference Centre Chaucer Room, 12.30-2.00pm on stated dates The Eccles Centre Summer Scholars series runs through July and August.  The series highlights the work of the Eccles Visiting Fellows and Postgraduate Researchers have done during their residency in the British Library, bringing the latest research related to the North Americas collections to a public audience. Gaiutra Bahadur, author of Coolie Woman, the Orwell Prize-shortlisted narrative history of indentured women, speaks about her strategies for overcoming elisions and biases in the archives that document the migration of bonded labourers from the Indian subcontinent to the West Indies.

Join Ramones Manager Danny Fields looking at the moment the US collided with the UK and Punk was born. Forty years ago, on 4th July 1976, the Ramones played their debut UK concert at London’s Roundhouse, followed the next day by another at Dingwalls. The shows that long hot summer have achieved legendary status. For many – including members of the Pistols, the Stranglers, the Clash and the Damned watching on – the band’s thrilling, fast, rebellious, New York sound blew open the possibilities of music and gave sudden acceleration to the styles that would become Punk. The Ramones manager on those nights was Danny Fields, a man with a pivotal role behind some of the great American music of the 20th century. He makes an exclusive appearance, in conversation with Barney Hoskyns, to tell the story of the moment the US collided with the UK, and is joined by […]

Hear the story of the Sex Pistols tour of America. The Sex Pistols notorious 1978 tour of the southern US was one of the more surreal moments in music history. Banned from the radio and venues at home, the rapidly disintegrating band played places like Memphis, Baton Rouge, San Antonio and Dallas, in a move calculated by manager Malcolm McLaren to generate maximum culture clash. Bob Gruen was one of the acclaimed photographers on the tour and he is joined by Southern historian and US music expert Brian Ward.

Free Entry, Conference Centre Chaucer Room, 12.30-2.00pm on stated dates The Eccles Centre Summer Scholars series runs through July and August.  The series highlights the work of the Eccles Visiting Fellows and Postgraduate Researchers have done during their residency in the British Library, bringing the latest research related to the North Americas collections to a public audience.   Representation and Participation in Progressive Era World's Fairs Emily Trafford explores the activities of Chinese and Chinese-American people at world’s fairs, examining the ways in which world’s fairs became key sites of battle over the representation of the Chinese in America.   “The Low Growl of the Lion:" Black Activists in Britain 1830-1895  Hannah-Rose Murray discusses the impact of Frederick Douglass and other black activists on British society and her creation of the world's first digitised map of their speaking locations in Britain.

Saturday 16 July, 10:00am - 5:00pm Cecil Sharp House, London Pastoralism and modernity in the southern mountains: a centenary symposium on Cecil Sharp's 1916 Appalachian journey. 2016 marks the centenary of song collector and folklorist Cecil Sharp's Appalachian fieldtrip, an event that shaped both North American and European conceptions of the history and culture of the southern mountains of America. To celebrate, Cecil Sharp House is hosting a weekend of Appalachian music and a conference exploring the culture of the region. Friday 15th July, 7:30pm Sharp's Appalachian Harvest - Brian Peters Brian Peters opens the weekender with his show ‘Sharp's Appalachian Harvest’. It tells the epic story of the trips made by Cecil Sharp and Maud Karpeles into the heart of the Appalachian Mountains, portrayed in music, narrative and image by leading ballad singer, musician and researcher Brian Peters. Brian Peters sings some of the best of the ballads, reads fascinating excerpts […]

Free Entry, Conference Centre Chaucer Room, 12.30-2.00pm on stated dates The Eccles Centre Summer Scholars series runs through July and August.  The series highlights the work of the Eccles Visiting Fellows and Postgraduate Researchers have done during their residency in the British Library, bringing the latest research related to the North Americas collections to a public audience. Chris Birkett looks at the 1998 Lewinsky scandal that plunged America into cultural turmoil, and explores how the Home Run Race of the same year deployed baseball mythology to reaffirm beliefs in idealised American values of morality, masculinity and confession during a time of political and moral crisis.

Free Entry, Conference Centre Chaucer Room, 12.30-2.00pm on stated dates The Eccles Centre Summer Scholars series runs through July and August.  The series highlights the work of the Eccles Visiting Fellows and Postgraduate Researchers have done during their residency in the British Library, bringing the latest research related to the North Americas collections to a public audience. Kevan Manwaring explores the iconic ‘log-cabin’, synonymous with the pioneering spirit of North America. Tracing influences back to Scots-Irish and Scandinavian settlers, this illustrated talk will show log-cabins in a new light.