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Exposing the ‘Naked Man’: A 16th-century motif of cultural nudity
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Plunging into industrial archives
by Marta Musso When I think of classicists spending hours trying to analyse what is left of a civilisation from a few words on a stone that survived centuries of rain, I pat myself on the back for deciding to specialise in contemporary history. It actually feels like cheating: not only are sources everywhere and…
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History and United States prison policy: An interview with Dr Heather Ann Thompson (Part II)
by Jess Hope Last week we published the first of a two-part interview with Dr Heather Ann Thompson, whose research on the history of mass incarceration has frequently contributed to debates about prison policy in the United States. Addressing post-war urban crisis, the decline of the labour movement and the rightward shift in political power…
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On the ‘right to be bigots’: the dehistoricisation of racism
By Jess Hope What happens when policy ignores history? This week, Australia’s conservative government announced proposed changes to the Racial Discrimination Act (1975) and its amendment the Racial Hatred Act (1995), which was established in response to an increase in verbal and physical racial violence in Australia. The changes would see the repeal of Section 18C, which presently…
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Cultural Memory and the Finnish Civil War
by Tiia Sahrakorpi “Why are Finnish people constantly discussing World War II?” The Second World War is brought up by many elderly Finns in interviews concerning Russia’s actions today in relation to Finland. World War II still forms an important part of Finnish cultural memory and self-identification. However, the Finnish Civil War of 1918 does not have…
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