Events

8 February 2021, Monday, 6pm, Zoom

Book Talk: Operation Moonglow: A Political History of Project Apollo

Speaker: Dr Teasel Muir-Harmony (Smithsonian)
Chair: Dr Thomas Ellis (LSE International History)

Dr Teasel Muir-Harmony discussed the political forces that brought Americans to the Moon in 1969 and the space programme’s role in American diplomacy.

Sponsored by the department's The Americas in World History  and the Contemporary International History and the Global Cold War research clusters.

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4 February 2021, Thursday, 5pm to 6.30pm, Zoom

Book Discussion: Nature’s Evil. A Cultural History of Natural Resources

Speakers: Professor Alexander Etkind (EUI), Professor Maxine Berg (Warwick), Dr Katja Castryck-Naumann (Leipziger Universitatsverlang) and Professor Giorgio Riello (EUI/Warwick)
Chair: Dr Dina Gusejnova (LSE International History)

A discussion of Alexander Etkind’s book Nature’s Evil. A Cultural History of Natural Resources (Polity, 2021) followed by a roundtable conversation.

Sponsored by the department's Conflict and Identity in Europe since the 18th Century research cluster.

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26 January 2021, Tuesday, 6pm to 7pm, Zoom

Book Discussion: Ruin and Renewal: Civilising Europe after World War II

Speakers: Professor Paul Betts (Oxford), Professor Sir Richard J. Evans (Cambridge) and Professor Mary Vincent (Sheffield)
Chair: Dr David Motadel (LSE International History)

The panel discussed Professor Paul Bett’s new book, Ruin and Renewal. Civilising Europe after the Second World War (Profile Books, 2020). Drawing on original sources as well as individual stories and voices, the book provides an account of how Europe rebuilt itself - and what we, in the twenty-first century, could lose again.

Sponsored by the department's Conflict and Identity in Europe since the 18th Century research cluster.

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11 January 2021, Monday, 2pm to 3pm, Zoom

Book Launch: The (Un)Governable City: Productive Failure in the Making of Colonial Delhi, 1858-1911

Speakers: Dr Raghav Kishore (LSE International History), Dr Prashant Kidambi (University of Leicester) and Dr Sheetal Chhabria (Connecticut College)
Chair: Dr Taylor Sherman (LSE International History)

Dr Raghav Kishore discussed his new book The (Un)governable city: Productive Failure in the making of Colonial Delhi, 1858-1911 (Orient BlackSwan, 2020), which explores the radical transformation of urban governance in Delhi between 1858 and 1911 as bureaucracy expanded and new modes of governance reshaped the city—spatially, politically and culturally. 

Sponsored by the department's Modern World History research cluster.

30 November 2020, Monday, 4pm to 5pm, Zoom

Book Talk: Whistleblowing Nation: The History of US National Security Disclosures

Speakers: Dr Kaeten Mistry (University of East Anglia, pictured) and Dr Hannah Gurman (New York University)
Commentator: Professor Andrew Preston (University of Cambridge)
Chair: Dr Roham Alvandi (LSE International History)

Kaeten Mistry and Hannah Gurman discussed their new edited collection Whistleblowing Nation: The History of National Security Disclosures and the Cult of State Secrecy and the complex culture, history, and politics of divulging state secrets.

Sponsored by the department's The Americas in World History and Contemporary International History and the Global Cold War research clusters.

Co-hosted by the Cold War Studies Project at LSE IDEAS.

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26 November 2020, Thursday, 6.30pm, Zoom

Gerda Henkel Visiting Professorship Inagural Lecture: An Empire of Shaming: Reading Nazi Germany through the Violence of Laughter

Speaker: 2020/21 Gerda Henkel Visiting Professor Martina Kessel (LSE International History)

Survivors of the Shoah have often described how the SS liked to define torturing practices during the genocide as ‘jokes’. The paper discussed the systematic presence of derisive laughter in Nazi Germany and analyzed its meanings as a way both to act out understandings of Germanness and to ‘justify’ violence.

The Visiting Professorship is a joint project of the GHIL and the Department of International History at LSE and is funded by the Gerda Henkel Foundation.

Co-hosted by the German Historical Institute London.

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19 November 2020, Thursday, 4pm to 5.30pm, Zoom

History, Culture and Diplomacy Series: "Mind the Gap": New Directions in History, Culture and Diplomacy in a Time of COVID

Panellists: Dr Margaret Peacock (University of Alabama, pictured), Dr Audra J. Wolfe, Dr Patryk Babiracki (University of Texas-Arlington), Professor Blanche Wiesen Cook (City University of New York)
Moderator: Dr Victoria Phillips (LSE International History)
Chair: Professor Piers Ludlow (LSE International History)

First event in the History, Culture and Diplomacy series.

Sponsored by the department's Contemporary International History and the Global Cold War research cluster.

Co-hosted by the Cold War Studies Project at LSE IDEAS.

Listen to the podcast.

17 November 2020, Tuesday, 6pm to 7pm, Zoom

Book Talk: The Beginning of the End of the Cold War

Speaker: Dr Simon Miles (Duke University)
Chair: Professor Michael Cox (LSE IDEAS)

Dr Simon Miles discussed how the United States and the Soviet Union decided to move from covert engagement to overt conversation and how this laid the groundwork for the end of the Cold War.

Sponsored by the department's The Americas in World History and Contemporary International History and the Global Cold War research clusters.

Co-hosted by the Cold War Studies Project at LSE IDEAS.

Listen to the podcast and watch the video.

27 October 2020, Tuesday, 6.30pm to 7.30pm, Zoom

Book Talk: Project Europe: Success or Failure?

Speaker: Professor Kiran Patel (Ludwig Maximilian University)
Panellists: Dr Eirini Karamouzi (Sheffield University), Professor Mary Nolan (NYU)
Chair: Professor Piers Ludlow (LSE International History)

Professor Kiran Patel, the author of Project Europe: A History (CUP, 2020) and esteemed panellists will discuss the myths and realities of European integration.

Open to all with pre-registration.

Sponsored by the department's Contemporary International History and the Global Cold War and the Conflict and Identity in Europe since the 18th Century research clusters.

Listen to the podcast.

20 October 2020, Tuesday, 4pm to 5pm, Zoom

Book Talk: How the United States Decided to Dominate the World

Speaker: Dr Stephen Wertheim (Columbia)
Chair: Professor Steven Casey (LSE International History)

Dr Stephen Wertheim discussed how and why the United States decided to shun most of its history and dominate the post-World War II world.

Sponsored by the department's The Americas in World History and Contemporary International History and the Global Cold War research cluster. Co-sponsored by the Cold War Studies Project at LSE IDEAS.

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15 October 2020, Thursday, 6.30pm to 8pm, Zoom

Book Talk: How the Global Cold War Remade American Politics

Speaker: Dr Michael Brenes (Yale)
Chair: Dr Thomas Ellis (LSE International History)

Dr Michael Brenes gave a book talk on his first manuscript For Might and Right: Cold War Defense Spending and the Remaking of American Democracy, recently released by the University of Massachusetts Press.

Sponsored by the department's Contemporary International History and the Global Cold War research cluster.

Listen to the podcast.