Prominent modern historian to discuss globalisation at Northumbria

One of the UK’s most respected historians, Professor Robert Gildea, will visit Northumbria University, Newcastle this week to deliver the latest in a series of free public lectures.

Professor Gildea’s talk, entitled The Challenge of Global History, will explore how the forces of globalisation have led to historians beginning to write a global history that moves beyond national or regional histories.

He will suggest that global changes such as the transnational movement of people, commodities, technologies, ideas and beliefs, that seem to recognise no frontiers, have altered the questions we ask ourselves about how we have arrived at where we are today.

Professor Gildea, who is Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford, will explore a number of questions including: what is global history? Is it one story or is it many? Is it macro history or can it also be a micro-history of small communities or even individuals? And should it be studied from a non-European perspective?                   

A specialist in French and European history, Professor Gildea has written a number of books on the subject, including his first publication, Barricades and Borders: Europe, 1800-1914, published in 1987, and his most recent, Fighters in the Shadows: A New History of the French Resistance, published in 2015.

He is currently working on a book exploring the legacies of French and British colonialism since the Second World War entitled, Empires of the Mind.

Northumbria University’s Public Lecture Series celebrates the achievements of leading Northumbria Professors alongside high-profile external speakers such as Professor Gildea. The speakers involved come from all walks of life and cover a wide variety of topics – from business and economics to health and the arts.

Professor Gildea’s lecture takes place at Northumbria Law School, on Wednesday 11 January from 6.30pm to 7.30pm. Refreshments are available from 6pm and admission is free.

For more information about this and other lectures in the series, or to book a place, please visit www.northumbria.ac.uk/publiclectures