This week our @erc.europa.eu project team met in Stockholm. One of the highlights was travelling to Gripsholm Castle to see Gustav III’s court theatre - an amazing survival from the 18th century. Scene cloths still hang above the stage that haven’t been lowered since the 1770s. Tantalising right?

This week we had our project meeting in Stockholm. We were considering how contemporary cultural institutions connect to their local communities. We then thought about how this may apply to our historical examples. Over the next week we’ll share some of the things we got up to. Teaser below:

The first book from our @erc.europa.eu project on ‘Performing Citizenship’, looking at amateur theatre in the German context, is now available for pre-order. Congratulations to Meike for getting this out in the world! Thank you @bloomsburybooksuk.bsky.social for making this happen.

Fully funded PhD studentship (for UK or international candidates): AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Partnership (CDP) studentship Imperial Intimacies: Portraiture and the East India Company, c.1757–1857, with Tate and the Courtauld courtauld.ac.uk/jobs/

If you have 10 mins and want to watch real Edwardian women talk about their experiences of being teenagers at the turn of the century, then this is for you. youtu.be/pv6V1yHvJyo?...

📣 Deadline is coming soon! Monday 17 March 2025 at 10:00 a.m. (Brussels time) 📢

Eight of our working groups and the TaPRA Gallery have extended their Call For Papers deadline to Tuesday 18 March. All details are available on the Warwick website here: warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/sca...

More details to come tomorrow but several of the TaPRA working groups have extended their CFPs until Tuesday 18 March. Please the webpage linked for first sight on which are still accepting submissions. warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/sca...

Great article by @davidjcoates.bsky.social about theatre history, queer artists and embodied knowledge in @theconversation.com, and an excellent demonstration of the social role that theatre history plays. theconversation.com/queer-theatr...

Keep those abstracts coming in for this year’s @tapra.bsky.social conference folks! It’s been great to see so many popping into the inbox from the online form over the last week. The deadline for papers is today.

Updated deadline: QMCECS/BSECS Early Career Visiting Fellowship to facilitate research in London libraries & archives. £500 travel/living expenses + accommodation in Mile End. Applications + 2 page CV to [email protected] by 31 March 2025 #18thC #skystorians #ecr 🗃️ www.qmul.ac.uk/sed/english/...

Former 🇺🇸 ambassador to Russia 👇🏽

Me: I can’t believe UK voters chose to torch their economy with Brexit. That can never be topped. American voters:

MEUSER: You've got Trudeau saying how the president is making a dumb move. That's bad diplomacy. SANCHEZ: I'm not sure how it's good diplomacy to say that a neighboring country should be the 51st state and that you're gonna impose economic hardship to achieve that goal.

Trudeau: I want to speak first directly to the American people… your government has chosen to do this to you. Your government has chosen to put American jobs at risk. They have chosen to raise costs for American consumers on everyday essential items…

Theatre and Performance Studies are delighted to have named one of our studios after our dear colleague Professor Jim Davis who passed away in 2023. His legacy in the department is significant. We’ll raise a toast to officially open it at the end of our 50th anniversary celebrations on 28 June 25.

Theatre feature: Beyond Oscar Wilde: Queering the Theatrical Past - David Coates, an Assistant Professor in Theatre Studies at the University of Warwick, has been retrieving histories of LGBTQ+ men to coincide with Queer History Month. www.britishtheatreguide.info/features/bey...

Pass it on. #StandWithUkraine

NEW: A searing editorial in the The Kyiv Independent. “It’s time to say it plainly. America’s leadership has switched sides in the war. The American people have not, and they should speak up. “A president just disrespected America in the Oval Office. It wasn’t Zelensky.” @kyivindependent.com

This scrum of pot-bellied, sunken-chested betas trying to bully an all-black clad badass Eastern European wasteland survivor while dressed like Men’s Wearhouse mannequins is peak cinema.

This will be great! @tapra.bsky.social #skystorians #c18th

The TaPRA Theatre and Performance Histories group have our next free online lecture on 5 March, 5-6.15pm GMT. Prof. Fiona Ritchie will present “Four Nights in Oxford in 1815: What the End of Dorothy Jordan’s Career Can Tell Us About Women and Regional Theatre”. Sign up: [email protected]

A reminder that the calls for papers for the 13 working groups of the Theatre and Performance Research Association (TaPRA @tapra.bsky.social) are live. We’ll be hosting the event here at Warwick from 27-29 August 2025. The deadline for abstracts is 10 March. Details: warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/sca...

We’ve had a remarkable two days at Craig-y-Nos castle assessing the condition of the theatre and its assets. We hope to be able to share our findings through the Society for Theatre Research, who generously funded the work. We’ll use the findings to advocate for funding to conserve the theatre.

This is a second lavender scare. They're going to purge all LGBTQ employees from the federal government.

The call for applications for Being Human Festival 2025 is open! Funding available for public engagement with research activities to take place in November. Deadline 4 July 2025. www.beinghumanfestival.org/get-involved #18thC #skystorians 🗃️

Alongside Grit Eckert, I’ve been coordinating a group of experts to visit Craig-y-nos castle this week to consolidate what we know about the theatre, to assess its condition and to plan for its future. Thanks to the Society for Theatre Research for funds and @amateurtheatre.bsky.social for my time.

We've created a new Starter Pack of #History institutes and research centres in the UK & Ireland bit.ly/3F3Eo2M Please do share. There will be gaps and recommendations are welcome. We hope this pack helps you keep in touch with work by and for historians in the UK & Ireland #Skystorians.

Huge investigation on class and the creative industries in @theguardian.com with some superb work from @lanre-bakare.bsky.social & team www.theguardian.com/culture/2025... & www.theguardian.com/culture/2025... & www.theguardian.com/culture/2025...

CALL FOR PAPERS: The Oxford Faculties of English & History are delighted to host the 25th anniversary conference of the British Association for #Victorian Studies on 23–25 July. Papers on any aspect of long-nineteenth-century studies are welcome (submit by 17 March). #BAVS #Victorianstudies #19thC

Friends ive got something to tell you … and booking opens today ! www.theguardian.com/stage/2025/f...

"Encouraging future generations to be both critical thinkers & creative beings feels more important than ever... Feeding the talent pipeline for the creative industries is vital, but so is creating well-rounded humans, able to express themselves, communicate, empathise & collaborate with others."

Joining our annual conference for the first time? We've created a page explaining how things work. Do get in touch with us if you have any questions or worries! tapra.org/how-tapras-c... #theatre #performance #theatrebluesky

From 21 February @royalhistsoc.bsky.social will be closing and archiving its X account. From this date all updates from the Society - and its promotion of work by fellow organisations for #history and the humanities - will be via BlueSky. Please encourage colleagues to join us here #skystorians

Hello, Bluesky! TaPRA checking in. We are so happy to announce that the Call For Papers for this year's annual conference is live on Theatre at Warwick's website. Choose from one of 13 working group themes to submit a paper. Deadline: 10 March 2025 via webform warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/sca...

No growth and less trade: Five yeas later, Brexit is a ‘flop’ for London Promises remain unfulfilled, and for the time being, we see only the negative effects of choice that reduces productivity by 4 percent and exports by 15 percent www.eunews.it/en/2025/02/0...

📣 Funded PhD at York with the National Trust: ‘At Home with Angelica Kauffman: The Material and Print Culture of an Eighteenth-Century Artist’. Co-supervised by Chloe Wigston Smith @chloewigstonsmith.bsky.social & Rachel Conroy @curatorrachel.bsky.social #18thC wrocah.ac.uk/cda-projects...

So - yesterday we launched the Theatre and Performance Research Association #TaPRA2025 conference and the calls for papers. The deadline for abstracts is 10 March. The conference runs from 27-29 August 2025. We’re looking forward to welcoming you to Warwick very soon! warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/sca...

Traitors withdrawal symptoms? I have the ‘coolest’ friends (term used loosely), who create a whole evening of missions, secret missions, Linda moments, cattiness and cries of ‘I’m 100% faithful’. And yes, below you will have it confirmed that there was a recreation of the stained glass challenge.

Today’s research highlight - finding Ronald Macdonald - an amateur theatre enthusiast in the 1890s.

Pleased to announce the expansion of our Early Career Researcher Network across the North East and Northern Ireland. We hope for UK wide coverage by the end of the year. If you are an early career researcher, you can join at no cost www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/news/early-c...

Print copies! It has arrived! ❤️📚📚📚

Anyone fancy coming to join us here at Warwick for two years on a British Academy International Fellowship?

The start to the academic year has been busy, mainly because I had the pleasure of having a week in Oxford to do some archival research and to attend the #BSECS2025 @bsecs.bsky.social annual conference. It was a chance to share my research in a new forum.

Presented at #BSECS2025 today - my first paper as Dr Dallas! Talking about Robert Southey's Wat Tyler (written in 1794, scandalously published in 1817), closet drama and radicalism. A fun bit of new work post-thesis!

Making the most of my time in Oxford for #bsecs2025 @bsecs.bsky.social by doing some archival research. Here’s an image I’ll mention in my paper tomorrow on eighteenth and early nineteenth century amateur theatricals.

Anyone else got any theories or ideas?

Going to physical archives helps us realize -the illusion that 'everything' is online -how much of historical record has already been lost -the inadequacy of the written -the selectivity of digitization projects Great @contingent-mag.bsky.social piece, and thanks for shout-out to archivists' labor!