The history of History @ adelaide.edu.au

Next year will see the 110th anniversary of the appointment of George Cockburn Henderson to the Chair of History (and, originally, English) in the University of Adelaide, and the 10th anniversary of the administrative transformation of the Department of History which Henderson created into the present School of History and Politics.  Both anniversaries provide a convenient occasion and pretext to fill the pressing need for a history of History at Adelaide.

To that end we are delighted to announce a symposium on the above theme, to be held in the Stretton Room, Napier Building, North Terrace on Friday 2 and Saturday 3 December 2011. The papers delivered on this occasion will form the basis for the chapters of a multi-author volume, which we will offer – with some confidence – to the University of Adelaide Press for publication in 2012.

Our present plan is to combine chronological and thematic approaches. Besides studies which focus broadly on Adelaide history and historians over particular periods of time, thus providing a central core or backbone for the eventual book, we therefore invite contributions on the widest conceivable range of topics. These might include the following: what was taught (curriculum and syllabus content and structure, the teaching of particular periods and geographical areas, national or thematic histories – e.g. economic, military); who taught and how (tutors and tutorials, lectures and essays, field trips and workshops); staff and students (undergraduate, Honours and postgrad), their experiences, and their interactions; administration, governance, and foreign relations (History and the rest of the university); the History and Politics Club, its publications and camps; research and publications; coursework postgraduate degrees; politics and public life, etc., etc. Panels or groups of papers, as well as individual papers, are very welcome. We envisage including numerous illustrations, a series of autobiographical memoirs, and some statistical analysis of staff and student numbers from the earliest days to the present. More difficult, but equally rewarding, would be an exploration of the life trajectories of former Adelaide history students.

Offers of papers, including a brief (100-150 word) abstract and an equally brief biographical note on the author(s), should reach history@adelaide.edu.au or Ms Julie McMahon, School of History and Politics, University of Adelaide 5005, no later than 28 July 2011.

Further enquiries may be addressed to either of the undersigned.

Norman Etherington (nether@cyllene.uwa.edu)
Wilfrid Prest (wilfrid.prest@adelaide.edu.au)