History in Conversation

Lisa Pine speaks to Paul Preston about his life in history and the history of his life.

Professor Sir Paul Preston's main fields of interests are Anglo-Spanish relations; contemporary Spanish politics; defence policy; European fascism; European left; Gibraltar; Spain; Spanish army; Spanish history, the Spanish Civil War, the Franco Regime, the transition to democracy in Spain. At LSE, he teaches courses within these topics and can act as a second supervisor or examiner to students for their dissertations and theses at all levels, from undergraduate to PhD.

Paul Preston studied for his undergraduate degree at Oriel College, Oxford before moving to the University of Reading where he gained his MA in European Studies. He moved back to Oriel College to work on his PhD. He returned to Reading to take up a post of Lecturer before moving on to Queen Mary College, London. He joined the LSE as a Professor in International History in 1991.

The host of A Historian's Life, Lisa Pine, is an Associate Fellow of the Institute of Historical Research, University of London and Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Her main research interests are the history of Nazi Germany and the Holocaust. She was educated at the London School of Economics and was awarded her PhD from the University of London in 1996. She is the author of 'Nazi Family Policy, 1933-1945' (1997), 'Hitler’s “National Community”: Society and Culture in Nazi Germany' (2007, 2017), 'Education in Nazi Germany' (2010), 'Debating Genocide' (2018) and (with Kees Boterbloem) 'Soviet and Nazi Posters: Propaganda and Policies' (2025). She is the editor of 'Life and Times in Nazi Germany' (2016), 'The Family in Modern Germany' (2020) and 'Dictatorship and Daily Life in Twentieth-Century Europe' (2022). She has also published numerous journal articles and chapters in books on her areas of expertise. She is currently editing a new book, 'Food and Food Policies in European Dictatorships,' for publication by Bloomsbury Academic. She is co-editor (with Peter C. Caldwell) of the book series 'German History in Focus' (Bloomsbury Academic).

Lisa Pine speaks to Luc Noakes about her life in history and the history of her life.

Lucy is Rab Butler Professor of Modern History at the University of Essex, President of the Royal Historical Society, and a social and cultural historian of early to mid 20th-century Britain. Before joining the University of Essex in 2017, Lucy held academic posts at the universities of Southampton Solent, Portsmouth and Brighton.

As a specialist in the history of modern Britain, Lucy researches the experience and memory of those who have lived through conflict, with a particular focus on the First and Second World Wars. Her recent publications include the monographs Dying for the Nation. Death, Grief and Bereavement in Second World War Britain (2020) and War and the British: Gender, Memory and National Identity 1939-1991 (revised edition 2023), and the co-edited collection Total War: An Emotional History (2020).

The host of A Historian's Life, Lisa Pine, is an Associate Fellow of the Institute of Historical Research, University of London and Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Her main research interests are the history of Nazi Germany and the Holocaust. She was educated at the London School of Economics and was awarded her PhD from the University of London in 1996. She is the author of 'Nazi Family Policy, 1933-1945' (1997), 'Hitler’s “National Community”: Society and Culture in Nazi Germany' (2007, 2017), 'Education in Nazi Germany' (2010), 'Debating Genocide' (2018) and (with Kees Boterbloem) 'Soviet and Nazi Posters: Propaganda and Policies' (2025). She is the editor of 'Life and Times in Nazi Germany' (2016), 'The Family in Modern Germany' (2020) and 'Dictatorship and Daily Life in Twentieth-Century Europe' (2022). She has also published numerous journal articles and chapters in books on her areas of expertise. She is currently editing a new book, 'Food and Food Policies in European Dictatorships,' for publication by Bloomsbury Academic. She is co-editor (with Peter C. Caldwell) of the book series 'German History in Focus' (Bloomsbury Academic).

Lisa Pine speaks to David Carpenter about his life in history and the history of his life.

David Carpenter is a leading authority on the history of Britain in the central middle ages. Prior to joining the Department in 1988, David held lectureships at Christ Church, Oxford, St Hilda’s College Oxford, the University of Aberdeen, and Queen Mary College, University of London.

He was educated at Westminster School and Christ Church, Oxford. His Oxford doctorate was supervised by J.O. Prestwich. David is on the committee of the Pipe Roll Society. He was Principal Investigator of the AHRC funded ‘Henry III Fine Rolls Project’ (2005-2011) and a Co-investigator on the ‘Paradox of Medieval Scotland Project’. He is currently a Co-investigator on two further AHRC funded projects, ‘The Breaking of Britain Project’ about Scottish political culture before the Wars of Independence and the ‘Magna Carta Project’.

The host of A Historian's Life, Lisa Pine, is an Associate Fellow of the Institute of Historical Research, University of London and Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Her main research interests are the history of Nazi Germany and the Holocaust. She was educated at the London School of Economics and was awarded her PhD from the University of London in 1996. She is the author of 'Nazi Family Policy, 1933-1945' (1997), 'Hitler’s “National Community”: Society and Culture in Nazi Germany' (2007, 2017), 'Education in Nazi Germany' (2010), 'Debating Genocide' (2018) and (with Kees Boterbloem) 'Soviet and Nazi Posters: Propaganda and Policies' (2025). She is the editor of 'Life and Times in Nazi Germany' (2016), 'The Family in Modern Germany' (2020) and 'Dictatorship and Daily Life in Twentieth-Century Europe' (2022). She has also published numerous journal articles and chapters in books on her areas of expertise. She is currently editing a new book, 'Food and Food Policies in European Dictatorships,' for publication by Bloomsbury Academic. She is co-editor (with Peter C. Caldwell) of the book series 'German History in Focus' (Bloomsbury Academic).

Lisa Pine speaks to Peter Mandler about his life in history and the history of his life.

Peter Mandler was born in the USA in 1958, educated at Oxford and Harvard Universities, and until 2025 was Professor of Modern Cultural History at the University of Cambridge and Bailey College Lecturer in History at Gonville and Caius College. He writes on the cultural, social and intellectual history of Britain since c. 1800 and on the history of the humanities and the social sciences in the English-speaking world. From 2012 to 2016 he served as President of the Royal Historical Society and from 2020 to 2023 as President of the Historical Association. He is a Fellow of the British Academy and of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His latest book The Crisis of the Meritocracy: Britain's Transition to Mass Education since the Second World War was published in autumn 2020 by Oxford University Press. He is currently writing on the history of secondary education in the UK since 1945, on the language of social science in everyday life across the 20th century, and on the rise of the undergraduate degree in history.

The host of A Historian's Life, Lisa Pine, is an Associate Fellow of the Institute of Historical Research, University of London and Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Her main research interests are the history of Nazi Germany and the Holocaust. She was educated at the London School of Economics and was awarded her PhD from the University of London in 1996. She is the author of 'Nazi Family Policy, 1933-1945' (1997), 'Hitler’s “National Community”: Society and Culture in Nazi Germany' (2007, 2017), 'Education in Nazi Germany' (2010), 'Debating Genocide' (2018) and (with Kees Boterbloem) 'Soviet and Nazi Posters: Propaganda and Policies' (2025). She is the editor of 'Life and Times in Nazi Germany' (2016), 'The Family in Modern Germany' (2020) and 'Dictatorship and Daily Life in Twentieth-Century Europe' (2022). She has also published numerous journal articles and chapters in books on her areas of expertise. She is currently editing a new book, 'Food and Food Policies in European Dictatorships,' for publication by Bloomsbury Academic. She is co-editor (with Peter C. Caldwell) of the book series 'German History in Focus' (Bloomsbury Academic).

Reshaping the past: the lingering colonial present

Tom Bentley (University of Sussex)

Converting Emotions: Possession and Power in Female Missionaries’ Writing about Native Converts

Angharad Eyre (Queen Mary, University of London)

What might a global history of the 20th century look like?

Dr Lockyer lectures on the history of Japan at SOAS and has written many important and provocative pieces on modern Japanese representations of art, technology and nature.

Angus Lockyer

28 February 2011

Diseases long ago and far away: Does doctor's knowledge answer historians' questions?

Audio Quality: please note the audio quality of this particular podcast is not optimal Professor Hamlin, who teaches the history of science and of the environment at Notre Dame, is the author of exemplary studies of public health, including A Science of Impurity and Public Health and Social Justice in the Age of Chadwick. His latest book was Cholera: the Biography. Chris Hamlin takes a rather contentious position in this session of the Global History seminar which produced a good and interesting debate amongst those present. Hamlin asks the question ‘why should we care?’ in regards to historians attempts to diagnose old diseases and illnesses through knowledge of modern medicine. The problem with such diagnoses is that historians are rarely in a position to be able to say for certain and at any rate are imposing modern understandings of medicine onto medieval and early modern knowledge. Does it matter what disease actually caused the Black Death and how useful, really, is statistics that suggest high percentages of deaths connected specifically to that one disease? Hamlin argues that the understanding of the time is more important and that other illnesses and infections caused by (amongst other factors) malnutrition are often ignored in such simplistic categorisations. Hamlin’s paper is about the practice of historians and asks the question whether changes should be made to the way we approach such subjects. Debate throughout the presentation suggests that not everyone agrees with Hamlin’s position, but nevertheless does force them to find reasons why they think that way.

Chris Hamlin

Technology – a Global History

Professor Edgerton has written some of the most impactful books of recent years on the history of technology, including Warfare State; Science, Technology and British Industrial Decline and the iconoclastic The Shock of the Old.

David Edgerton (Imperial College London)

3 March 2010

Synchronicity in Global Development - from Divergence to Convergence?

Lucy Badalian and Victor Krivorotov

21 February 2011