I was delighted to be asked to contribute to a round table discussion (which, under pandemic conditions took place asynchronously online!), with colleagues from the OU for the latest issue of Open Arts Journal. The resulting paper was published at the end of 2020. Abstract below: This roundtable explores how issues of the local and…
Tag: Leicester
Shut Up & Write! New for Leicester
Inspired by posts on #WIASN (if you’re a woman in academia, you *must* join #WIASN – look them up on Facebook) and fully aware that I struggle to write without any external motivation, I’ve decided to set up a regular Shut Up & Write! session in Leicester (if you don’t know what Shut Up &…
Back to Goddard: a pop-up exhibition at 31 Granby Street
The architect Joseph Goddard (1840-1900), designed many of Leicester’s Victorian landmarks, including the Clock Tower (incidentally celebrating it’s 150th anniversary this year), but arguably his masterpiece was the Gothic-revival Midland Bank (latterly HSBC and originally built on behalf of the Leicestershire Bank) on Granby Street; a Grade II* listed building constructed between 1872-74. The building…
Save Garden Street Island!
A quick post in the eye of the storm between lectures and seminars (more about that later), to urge my readers (assuming I have any readers!) to consider signing this petition calling for the preservation of Garden Street Island, which is currently under threat of demolition for the second time in three years. Garden Street…
The earliest reference to a person of Chinese origin in Leicester?
The Chinese Giant Rummaging in the British Newspaper Archive has churned up a few more gems. Ostensibly seeking more information about Mr On Lee and his ‘Chinese oath’, I stumbled upon a reference to ‘The Chinese Giant’ (aka ‘Chang woo goo’). ‘Chang woo goo’ or Zhan Shicai to give him his accepted name today was,…
Advertising and Public Memory Social, Cultural and Historical Perspectives on Ghost Signs
In September 2016, ‘the first scholarly collection to collection to examine the social and cultural aspects of the worldwide interest in the faded remains of advertising signage’ (aka ‘ghost signs’, will be published by Routledge. Edited by Stefan Schutt, Sam Roberts and Leanne White, the volume includes a chapter written by Colin Hyde of the…
New year (-ish), new career
Exciting news… I have recently been taken on as a consultant by Tricolor Heritage Development and Design. On Monday, we were interviewed for the first project I’ve been involved with and I’m pleased to say that we won the bid to carry out visitor consultation at Abbey Pumping Station – my favourite museum in Leicester! Seriously, if…
The Chinese in Leicester
Towards the end of my work on the dreaded book (I’m steeling myself for the reviewer’s comments due next week), I came across an intriguing photograph in Benson and Gomez’s The Chinese in Britain, 1800-present. It showed a group of Chinese children or, perhaps children of mixed Chinese-European heritage wearing Chinese-style suits and slippers, standing in…