Remembering the Reformation
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Cambridge
Department Name: History
Abstract
The Protestant Reformation was a pivotal event in the history and heritage of England, Europe and the world, which has decisively shaped politics, culture, and society in the centuries since. The violence and turmoil by which it was accompanied engendered intense conflicts that continue to divide communities and which have left a lasting imprint upon the landscape, physical environment, and literature of the British Isles. Memory of the events and individuals at the centre of this series of developments has been embodied and crystallised in a vast array of material objects, images, rituals, traditions and texts. Yet surprisingly little critical attention has been paid to the process by which enduring assumptions about the significance of the Reformation as a legendary and landmark event came into being. The participants in this interdisciplinary research project seek to redress this area of scholarly neglect and to re-examine central questions about the impact and effects of this religious revolution through the prism of memory. They will identify and evaluate the sources in which memories of the religious changes of the 1530s, 40s and 50s in England were recorded and preserved, explore their role in the formation of religious, national, social and individual identities, and investigate how far they contributed to the ongoing and repeated religious confrontations and upheavals that marked the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. They will assess the process by which successive generations remembered the English Reformation and the complex mixture of remembering and forgetting through which it entered into the historical and literary imagination. A key dimension of the project will be to situate discoveries about England within the context of the development of commemorative cultures in the British Isles and Europe more generally. It will contribute to enhancing our understanding of the Reformation as an international movement which bound together believers separated by languages and borders, but which also engendered distinctive cultures in the different regions in which it took root. Bringing together historians and literary scholars, it will deploy approaches and methods from various disciplines to forge new insights about both the formation and fragmentation of cultural memory and the English Reformation.
The 500th anniversary of the event that is widely regarded as having precipitated the Reformation - Martin Luther's protest against the Church of Rome in 1517 - provides an excellent opportunity to investigate its role in shaping modern historical consciousness and to interrogate its lasting legacies. In its focus upon the agency and influence exercised by the public and private, official and unofficial memory of past events, the project raises questions of enduring concern and contemporary relevance.
The 500th anniversary of the event that is widely regarded as having precipitated the Reformation - Martin Luther's protest against the Church of Rome in 1517 - provides an excellent opportunity to investigate its role in shaping modern historical consciousness and to interrogate its lasting legacies. In its focus upon the agency and influence exercised by the public and private, official and unofficial memory of past events, the project raises questions of enduring concern and contemporary relevance.
Planned Impact
This research will seek to make impact on audiences beyond the academic community through a carefully managed programme of dissemination. This is designed to engage and expand the imaginations of individuals and groups and enrich their awareness of a movement that had a major impact on the history of Britain, Europe and the world. The prominence of religious conflicts in current affairs will enable us to underline the relevance of our research to understanding recent and contemporary developments. In particular, we seek to benefit the following constituencies:
(1) Primary and secondary school students and teachers
Through specially designed workshops we will introduce children and young people to objects, images, texts and documents in which Reformation memory is embedded and compel them to reflect critically upon the origins of their inherited assumptions in the light of their own religious backgrounds and in the context of an increasingly secular society. The material used in the workshops will be uploaded to the website for educational use nationally and internationally. Thereby we hope to influence the delivery of curriculum in schools, especially at key stage 2 and 3, and to inform primary and secondary school teachers and students about exciting new developments in scholarship.
(2) Curators, librarians and archivists
The creation of a digital exhibition involving material from Cambridge University Library (CUL), York Minster and Lambeth Palace will help to foster closer cooperation between these institutions, establish the foundations for future collaboration, and create and strengthen links between librarians and archivists and professional academics, departments and faculties. Publicised through the CUL's existing channels of communication, it will enhance awareness of the content of the collections of the participating repositories, and enable other institutions to compare and link them with their own holdings. It will expand electronic access to heritage items to wide constituencies beyond their regular academic users and make them available for use in other projects within Britain and (via the internet) in other parts of the world. It will help these institutions to fulfil their central mission to enable and augment research, teaching and learning through the expertise of their staff, collections, facilities and services. By generating interest in their collections, it may also promote an increase in visitor numbers.
(3) The wider public in the UK and abroad
The website, digital exhibition, public lectures by leading scholars, and presentations at the York and Cambridge Festivals of Ideas (which will also be podcast and uploaded to the project website) will engage members of the general public in the research process and findings of the project. These outreach activities and initiatives will broaden and deepen public understanding of which aspects of the Reformation became entrenched in popular memory and expose people to the material texts and artefacts by and through which enduring myths and narratives about it were created. They will encourage them to consider the roots of their own inherited ideas about the Reformation, and to interrogate prevailing presuppositions about religious developments that have made a lasting impact and left permanent marks on the culture, heritage, environment and society of England, Britain and Europe. Both the digital exhibition and website will have facilities for collecting feedback and commentary. These will provide a platform through which individuals and organisations can contact the project team members and contribute information about local traditions, texts, images, objects and documents that commemorate the Reformation, thus participating in building up a base of relevant source material and raising consciousness.
(1) Primary and secondary school students and teachers
Through specially designed workshops we will introduce children and young people to objects, images, texts and documents in which Reformation memory is embedded and compel them to reflect critically upon the origins of their inherited assumptions in the light of their own religious backgrounds and in the context of an increasingly secular society. The material used in the workshops will be uploaded to the website for educational use nationally and internationally. Thereby we hope to influence the delivery of curriculum in schools, especially at key stage 2 and 3, and to inform primary and secondary school teachers and students about exciting new developments in scholarship.
(2) Curators, librarians and archivists
The creation of a digital exhibition involving material from Cambridge University Library (CUL), York Minster and Lambeth Palace will help to foster closer cooperation between these institutions, establish the foundations for future collaboration, and create and strengthen links between librarians and archivists and professional academics, departments and faculties. Publicised through the CUL's existing channels of communication, it will enhance awareness of the content of the collections of the participating repositories, and enable other institutions to compare and link them with their own holdings. It will expand electronic access to heritage items to wide constituencies beyond their regular academic users and make them available for use in other projects within Britain and (via the internet) in other parts of the world. It will help these institutions to fulfil their central mission to enable and augment research, teaching and learning through the expertise of their staff, collections, facilities and services. By generating interest in their collections, it may also promote an increase in visitor numbers.
(3) The wider public in the UK and abroad
The website, digital exhibition, public lectures by leading scholars, and presentations at the York and Cambridge Festivals of Ideas (which will also be podcast and uploaded to the project website) will engage members of the general public in the research process and findings of the project. These outreach activities and initiatives will broaden and deepen public understanding of which aspects of the Reformation became entrenched in popular memory and expose people to the material texts and artefacts by and through which enduring myths and narratives about it were created. They will encourage them to consider the roots of their own inherited ideas about the Reformation, and to interrogate prevailing presuppositions about religious developments that have made a lasting impact and left permanent marks on the culture, heritage, environment and society of England, Britain and Europe. Both the digital exhibition and website will have facilities for collecting feedback and commentary. These will provide a platform through which individuals and organisations can contact the project team members and contribute information about local traditions, texts, images, objects and documents that commemorate the Reformation, thus participating in building up a base of relevant source material and raising consciousness.
Publications
Brian Cummings
(2016)
The Reformation in Shakespeare
Brian Cummings
(2016)
'Remembering the Reformation'
Brian Cummings
(2017)
One Year of Remembering the Reformation: the Stainton Missal 1516-2016
Bronwyn Wallace
(2016)
(Un)binding the Cantiones Sacrae: the York Minster part-books
Cummings B
(2017)
Remembering the Reformation
Cummings B
(2020)
Memory and the English Reformation
Cummings B
(2020)
A Companion to World Literature
Cummings B
(2018)
Literature, Belief and Knowledge in Early Modern England: Knowing Faith
| Description | Remembering the Reformation has resulted in a number of Key Findings. These can be summarized as follows: 1. Collective and social memory played a key part in the formation of the idea of the Reformation at a national and international level. That is, the Reformation is not simply an event or series of events that came to be remembered, but a process in which changes to memory influenced the way in which an idea of the Reformation was constructed. The first volume of essays from the project (Memory and the English Reformation (CUP, 2020) ) is dedicated to this finding. 2. The formation of memory in the period under study (1500-1700) has played a key part in modern constructions of consciousness. Like the French Revolution or the twentieth-century World Wars, the Reformation constructs an idea of past and present around which historical memory is formulated. The second volume of essays from the project (Remembering the Reformation (Routledge, 2020) ) is dedicated to this finding. 3. The history of memory as a sub-discipline cannot be separated from a theory of memory. The project has thoroughly compared ideas of memory according to classical, early modern and modern models, as evidenced in the Introductions to both volumes of essays. 4. Historical memory is encountered in texts but also in visual culture and in objects from the past. The project developed a new methodology of presentation for this finding in the digital exhibition (https://exhibitions.lib.cam.ac.uk/reformation/). These findings are in accord with the original objectives for the Project, as set out in the Research Questions in the Case for Support: 1. When and why did the religious developments of the early and mid-sixteenth century cease to be regarded as an incomplete process and begin to be remembered as a legendary and landmark event? What aspects of religious change left a lasting impression on the historical and literary imagination and why? 2. How far did memory of the Reformation function as a source of ideological and cultural cohesion? To what extent did it serve to catalyse and fuel conflict and division? 3. What were the media and mechanisms through which memory of the Reformation was constructed and transmitted? 4. How, why and with what consequences did memory of the Reformation mutate with the passage of time and the generations? In what ways have modern historiography and the literary canon been coloured and shaped by the processes of memory-making initiated in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries? |
| Exploitation Route | This research has laid the foundations for further studies of the memory of transformative historical events. It provides a template and model for future projects centred on significant anniversaries. Its major outputs (two substantial volumes of essays, both now in press) will shape the historiography of the English and European Reformations. The digital exhibition, 'Remembering the Reformation' attracts a significant proportion of traffic to the Cambridge University Library's digital exhibition site, and is now widely used in teaching. |
| Sectors | Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections |
| Description | 1. Details of the impact (indicative maximum 750 words) The research has influenced how the individuals and institutions that mediate and communicate memory of English religious history view the Reformation as a moment of profound religious and cultural rupture. By engaging especially with non-academic custodians and gatekeepers of collective memory, the project has raised public consciousness about how the Reformation has retrospectively been constructed as 'an historical event'. It has contributed towards fostering critical awareness of the confessional myths and triumphalist narratives that still surround it. It has underlined the plurality, complexity and contingency of the Reformation; the trauma and violence that accompanied it; and the continuities that mitigated the dramatic changes it wrought. It has enhanced awareness of the ongoing process of remembering and actively reinventing the Reformation past to buttress the present and to set future agendas, and drawn attention to the strategies of amnesia and oblivion that were integral to the movement. Shaping Public Understanding within Heritage Contexts and Faith Communities The activities and outputs of the Remembering the Reformation have attracted considerable public attention. Launched in front of a large public audience in September 2017, the digital exhibition, involving more than 130 items from Cambridge University Library, (CUL) York Minster Library (YML), and Lambeth Palace Library (LPL), has attracted (to date) some 46,000 users from around the world, including France, Germany, Switzerland, Canada, Australia, and the US (who represent 35% of the total exceeding the figure of 32% from the UK). Use peaked at 1300 page views on 31 October 2017, the day on which Martin Luther reputedly nailed his 95 theses to the door of Wittenberg's castle church, an iconic event whose status as the birth date of the Reformation the exhibition questioned and nuanced. An accompanying physical exhibition at LPL in August-November 2017, visited by over 2000 people, was described as 'fascinating' and 'instructive' in written feedback. Attendees at a public lecture at LPL in November 2018 not only came away better informed about the 'multiplicity of perspectives and contexts' that shaped the Reformation; they were also inspired to 'think about forgetting as a function of memory'. At the present time, the digital exhibition attracts approximately 18% of all traffic to the Cambridge University Library's digital exhibition webpages. The research has led to invitations to talk to non-academic audiences, including Historical Association groups in Norwich and Canterbury, well attended public lectures delivered by Walsham in California (May 2018) and Melbourne (March 2019), and requests for advice from television producers. She was involved in several high profile events during the anniversary year, including a symposium at St Margaret's Westminster on 31 October 2017, co-organised by the Church of England and the Council of Lutheran Churches, at which she spoke on 'Forgetting Luther', which was reported in the national and US press. She also participated in panel discussions at The National Archives and the German Embassy. A podcast of the former has been frequently downloaded and the ambassador described the latter as a 'deeply thought-provoking insight into the perception of the Reformation anniversary in Germany and the UK. It set the scene perfectly for a look back at a decade of celebrations of the Luther phenomenon and forward to the further impact of Luther and his legacy today'. More generally, the project has shaped how faith communities understand and memorialise the divisive legacy of the Reformation. An ambitious day of family activities, organised in conjunction with Great St Mary's (GSM), Cambridge, in late October 2017, saw some 3300 visitors of all ages pass through the church. Visitors were able to print their own memorial broadside using the CUL's historic wooden printing press. The day concluded with a dramatic historical re-enactment produced by HistoryNeedsYou (HNY) with input from Walsham and Law, whose research shaped a script that was designed to disrupt celebratory Protestant assumptions and engage with new audiences. This collaboration was described as 'invigorating' by HNY. One attendee commended the multidisciplinary approach, which 'really brings this seminal period and its fundamental issues of conscience to life'. A visitor from the Netherlands wrote that 'my personal Reformation jubilee has become unforgettable'. His experience of the day also inspired him to use it as a model for elements of the official commemorations of the Synod of Dordrecht (1618-19), which he helped to coordinate. Educational Impact and Syllabus Enhancement The research underpinning this case study has also had a more direct educational impact at primary, secondary and tertiary level, stretching students and teachers beyond the National Curriculum and conventional syllabi. In addition to lectures delivered in secondary schools (e.g. in Guilford and Bedford), specially crafted sessions on Reformation visual propaganda and iconoclasm were devised for Key Stage 3 students as part of the Cambridge History for Schools programme in February 2017 and February 2019. Participants commended them for 'showing a different perspective of the event than when we study it in school' and helping them to recognise how satirical representation in the sixteenth century has 'links to modern times'. By re-enacting the defacement of sacred pictures and finding to their surprise that this was 'actually fun', they gained insight into the mixed motivations of iconoclasts: 'it is really cool and sad to see what happened in the past'. GSM's outreach officer borrowed and adapted the first of these sessions for use in local Cambridge schools. A workshop for school teachers and trainee teachers is in the process of being organised in conjunction with Cambridge University Library and will build on these initiatives, in an effort to reveal fresh dimensions of familiar topics, creatively enhance their approach to teaching A level syllabi, and highlight the value of the digital exhibition for use in the classroom. Widely used by university lecturers for courses on the Reformation, the exhibition has established itself as an excellent teaching aid. A colleague from Sussex describes it as a 'brilliant' digital resource and reports that the seventeenth-century Luther and Calvin tobacco box led to stimulating seminar discussions about the ubiquity of the reformers' images in consumer culture and about 'the smell of the Reformation'. Described as 'haunting', defaced and mutilated liturgical books have inspired explorations of how Protestantism engaged in a deliberate project of selective forgetting. Engaging Custodians of Memory: Librarians, Archivists, and Museum Curators This research has also afforded librarians, archivists, and curators important new insights into the collections they care for and shaped curatorial decision-making and practice. Through its collaborations with CUL, LPL and YML on the digital exhibition, 'Remembering the Reformation' has helped to contextualise the early printed books and manuscripts they hold and illuminated the afterlives of medieval texts and objects that survived the Protestant onslaught against remnants of 'superstition' and 'idolatry'. It has also underlined the extent to which such libraries and archives are artefacts of Reformation memory itself. Sara Griffin indicates that the 'overwhelmingly positive experience' of working with the project team has been vital in fulfilling YML's strategic aim to explore the values that shaped its collections, connect them to current issues, and interpret them for its users. Emily Dourish (CUL) writes that it has 'paved the way for a more cross-institutional way of working, and provided tangible outputs around our collections for the international scholarly community'. Cathedral librarians who attended our workshop on 'Memory and the Library' in June 2016 were inspired with 'several ideas about how our collections might be used to engage the public'. Contacts with curatorial colleagues in the Fitzwilliam, Victoria and Albert Museum and Hamilton Kerr Institute have likewise enabled them to 'reconsider selected objects in a deeper historical context, drawing out their significance in relation to changing attitudes to faith', and underlining the importance of 'reconstructing the original setting for which such objects were created' (Tessa Murdoch, V&A). Murdoch has subsequently consulted closely with Walsham regarding two forthcoming physical exhibitions on English Catholic material culture and 'Making Time'. Walsham was also a member of the advisory board of the Auckland Castle Trust Faith galleries project, and two of its curators attended an academic workshop in October 2016, which 'transformed' how they planned to approach the galleries covering the Reformation era. By challenging inherited assumptions that still colour perception of this iconic event and drawing attention to how it has been retrospectively constructed, 'Remembering the Reformation' has thus shaped how librarians, archivists, heritage professionals, faith communities, students, teachers, and members of the general public understand, communicate and commemorate it. |
| First Year Of Impact | 2016 |
| Sector | Education,Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections |
| Impact Types | Cultural,Societal |
| Description | Digital exhibition in collaboration with Cambridge University Library, Lambeth Palace Library, and York Minster Library |
| Organisation | Lambeth Palace Library |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
| PI Contribution | The research team selected and researched all 135 items in this exhibition. 2/3 of these were from the collections of Cambridge University Library; 1/6 from Lambeth; and 1/6 from York Minster Library. We wrote captions, ordered photographs, sought and obtained permission to include additional items from other repositories, and uploaded material to the virtual exhibition site. We worked closely with librarians and curators in a mutually beneficial partnership to mount and launch this major exhibition, to coincide with the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. |
| Collaborator Contribution | Our partners provide both intellectual and practical assistance. Librarians and curators suggested appropriate material, answered questions, provided scholarly expert advice, and guidance on the technical side. Each repository waived reproduction fees and facilitated our work by providing us with exclusively and special access to their collections. In the case of Lambeth Palace, the digital exhibition led to a physical exhibition marking the 500th anniversary which was part of the Lambeth Heritage Festival 2017. Using the captions for the items from Lambeth provided by the project team, this was created by the Lambeth Library staff. |
| Impact | This collaboration has produced a major digital exhibition, which is now a permanent feature of the Cambridge University Library digital exhibition collection (see https://exhibitions.lib.cam.ac.uk/reformation/). This collaboration has forged links between librarians, curators and other technical staff in the AHRC project and the three libraries. |
| Start Year | 2016 |
| Description | Digital exhibition in collaboration with Cambridge University Library, Lambeth Palace Library, and York Minster Library |
| Organisation | University of Cambridge |
| Department | Cambridge University Library |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Academic/University |
| PI Contribution | The research team selected and researched all 135 items in this exhibition. 2/3 of these were from the collections of Cambridge University Library; 1/6 from Lambeth; and 1/6 from York Minster Library. We wrote captions, ordered photographs, sought and obtained permission to include additional items from other repositories, and uploaded material to the virtual exhibition site. We worked closely with librarians and curators in a mutually beneficial partnership to mount and launch this major exhibition, to coincide with the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. |
| Collaborator Contribution | Our partners provide both intellectual and practical assistance. Librarians and curators suggested appropriate material, answered questions, provided scholarly expert advice, and guidance on the technical side. Each repository waived reproduction fees and facilitated our work by providing us with exclusively and special access to their collections. In the case of Lambeth Palace, the digital exhibition led to a physical exhibition marking the 500th anniversary which was part of the Lambeth Heritage Festival 2017. Using the captions for the items from Lambeth provided by the project team, this was created by the Lambeth Library staff. |
| Impact | This collaboration has produced a major digital exhibition, which is now a permanent feature of the Cambridge University Library digital exhibition collection (see https://exhibitions.lib.cam.ac.uk/reformation/). This collaboration has forged links between librarians, curators and other technical staff in the AHRC project and the three libraries. |
| Start Year | 2016 |
| Description | Digital exhibition in collaboration with Cambridge University Library, Lambeth Palace Library, and York Minster Library |
| Organisation | York Minster |
| Department | Library and Special Collections |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
| PI Contribution | The research team selected and researched all 135 items in this exhibition. 2/3 of these were from the collections of Cambridge University Library; 1/6 from Lambeth; and 1/6 from York Minster Library. We wrote captions, ordered photographs, sought and obtained permission to include additional items from other repositories, and uploaded material to the virtual exhibition site. We worked closely with librarians and curators in a mutually beneficial partnership to mount and launch this major exhibition, to coincide with the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. |
| Collaborator Contribution | Our partners provide both intellectual and practical assistance. Librarians and curators suggested appropriate material, answered questions, provided scholarly expert advice, and guidance on the technical side. Each repository waived reproduction fees and facilitated our work by providing us with exclusively and special access to their collections. In the case of Lambeth Palace, the digital exhibition led to a physical exhibition marking the 500th anniversary which was part of the Lambeth Heritage Festival 2017. Using the captions for the items from Lambeth provided by the project team, this was created by the Lambeth Library staff. |
| Impact | This collaboration has produced a major digital exhibition, which is now a permanent feature of the Cambridge University Library digital exhibition collection (see https://exhibitions.lib.cam.ac.uk/reformation/). This collaboration has forged links between librarians, curators and other technical staff in the AHRC project and the three libraries. |
| Start Year | 2016 |
| Description | Reformation 500: Cambridge remembers the Reformation, Great St Mary's church, Cambridge |
| Organisation | Great St Mary's Church |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
| PI Contribution | The research team worked closely with colleagues at Great St Mary's (the official University Church) in Cambridge to organise a free family activity day on 28 October 2017, which culminated in a spectacular play re-enacting key Reformation events, including the posting of the 95 theses and the the burning of the exhumed bones of the reformers Martin Bucer and Peter Phagius in 1557. Alex Walsham, PI and Ceri Law, PDRA, acted as historical advisors to the playwright, providing historical documentation and checking accuracy. We met own many occasions with clergy and churchwardens of Great St Marys and with History Needs You to ensure that the day was a success. On the day, together with Bronwyn Wallace, PDRA, we participated in and assisted in a range of craft activities, and in gathering feedback on the event. We directly funded the input of HistoryNeedsYou from the Project's Impact budget. The published research of Alex Walsham on the incident of the Cambridge 'book fish' in 1627 provided a focus for one of the storytelling sessions of the day, led by Anna Lovewell. We were also able to secure the loan of a reproduction printing press owned by the Rare Books department of Cambridge University Library, which was operated during the day by a retired member of the library's staff. |
| Collaborator Contribution | The event was held in Great St Mary's Church. Its churchwarden Margaret Johnston, its events coordinator, Richard Summers, and its heritage officer, Anna Lovewell, made the practical arrangements, dealt with publicity, risk assessment and health and safety, notified the city council, organised technical equipment, and coordinated the craft and other activities on the days. HistoryNeedsYou (a theatrical re-enactment company) wrote and produced the play, and secured the services of musicians, and other actors. |
| Impact | This was a highly successful event. Over 3000 people passed through the doors of Great St Mary's on the day and more than 100 attended the theatrical performance in the evening. Written and oral feedback was extremely encouraging and positive. The day was much enjoyed by visitors, both Cambridge residents and visiting tourists. We are continuing to work with Great St Mary's and to contribute to its programme of schools outreach. |
| Start Year | 2017 |
| Description | Reformation 500: Cambridge remembers the Reformation, Great St Mary's church, Cambridge |
| Organisation | HistoryNeedsYou |
| Sector | Public |
| PI Contribution | The research team worked closely with colleagues at Great St Mary's (the official University Church) in Cambridge to organise a free family activity day on 28 October 2017, which culminated in a spectacular play re-enacting key Reformation events, including the posting of the 95 theses and the the burning of the exhumed bones of the reformers Martin Bucer and Peter Phagius in 1557. Alex Walsham, PI and Ceri Law, PDRA, acted as historical advisors to the playwright, providing historical documentation and checking accuracy. We met own many occasions with clergy and churchwardens of Great St Marys and with History Needs You to ensure that the day was a success. On the day, together with Bronwyn Wallace, PDRA, we participated in and assisted in a range of craft activities, and in gathering feedback on the event. We directly funded the input of HistoryNeedsYou from the Project's Impact budget. The published research of Alex Walsham on the incident of the Cambridge 'book fish' in 1627 provided a focus for one of the storytelling sessions of the day, led by Anna Lovewell. We were also able to secure the loan of a reproduction printing press owned by the Rare Books department of Cambridge University Library, which was operated during the day by a retired member of the library's staff. |
| Collaborator Contribution | The event was held in Great St Mary's Church. Its churchwarden Margaret Johnston, its events coordinator, Richard Summers, and its heritage officer, Anna Lovewell, made the practical arrangements, dealt with publicity, risk assessment and health and safety, notified the city council, organised technical equipment, and coordinated the craft and other activities on the days. HistoryNeedsYou (a theatrical re-enactment company) wrote and produced the play, and secured the services of musicians, and other actors. |
| Impact | This was a highly successful event. Over 3000 people passed through the doors of Great St Mary's on the day and more than 100 attended the theatrical performance in the evening. Written and oral feedback was extremely encouraging and positive. The day was much enjoyed by visitors, both Cambridge residents and visiting tourists. We are continuing to work with Great St Mary's and to contribute to its programme of schools outreach. |
| Start Year | 2017 |
| Description | Reformation 500: Cambridge remembers the Reformation, Great St Mary's church, Cambridge |
| Organisation | University of Cambridge |
| Department | Cambridge University Library |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Academic/University |
| PI Contribution | The research team worked closely with colleagues at Great St Mary's (the official University Church) in Cambridge to organise a free family activity day on 28 October 2017, which culminated in a spectacular play re-enacting key Reformation events, including the posting of the 95 theses and the the burning of the exhumed bones of the reformers Martin Bucer and Peter Phagius in 1557. Alex Walsham, PI and Ceri Law, PDRA, acted as historical advisors to the playwright, providing historical documentation and checking accuracy. We met own many occasions with clergy and churchwardens of Great St Marys and with History Needs You to ensure that the day was a success. On the day, together with Bronwyn Wallace, PDRA, we participated in and assisted in a range of craft activities, and in gathering feedback on the event. We directly funded the input of HistoryNeedsYou from the Project's Impact budget. The published research of Alex Walsham on the incident of the Cambridge 'book fish' in 1627 provided a focus for one of the storytelling sessions of the day, led by Anna Lovewell. We were also able to secure the loan of a reproduction printing press owned by the Rare Books department of Cambridge University Library, which was operated during the day by a retired member of the library's staff. |
| Collaborator Contribution | The event was held in Great St Mary's Church. Its churchwarden Margaret Johnston, its events coordinator, Richard Summers, and its heritage officer, Anna Lovewell, made the practical arrangements, dealt with publicity, risk assessment and health and safety, notified the city council, organised technical equipment, and coordinated the craft and other activities on the days. HistoryNeedsYou (a theatrical re-enactment company) wrote and produced the play, and secured the services of musicians, and other actors. |
| Impact | This was a highly successful event. Over 3000 people passed through the doors of Great St Mary's on the day and more than 100 attended the theatrical performance in the evening. Written and oral feedback was extremely encouraging and positive. The day was much enjoyed by visitors, both Cambridge residents and visiting tourists. We are continuing to work with Great St Mary's and to contribute to its programme of schools outreach. |
| Start Year | 2017 |
| Description | 'Matters Overlooked: Straightening out the Story of the Reformation' - public lecture by Professor Diarmaid MacCulloch |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This public lecture by Diarmaid MacCulloch, held in the Great Hall at Lambeth Palace, attracted a large and enthusiastic audience, who listened avidly to the lecture and asked invigorating questions about the Reformation afterwards. A drinks reception followed in the Archbishop's Drawing Room, where conversation was lively. Those who attended, including many Friends of Lambeth Palace Library, greatly appreciated the event. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://rememberingthereformation.org.uk/events/diarmaid-macculloch-matters-overlooked-straightening... |
| Description | 'Remembering the English Reformations' |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The full team of researchers attended the REFO 500 conference in Wittenberg, Germany, and presented the work of the project in a panel, which was notably well attended. We used the occasion to share the fruits of our ongoing work in preparing the digital exhibition, and had the opportunity to engage with academics and postgraduates working on cognate topics and projects from a range of European countries, including a project on the Nordic Reformation. We also advertised the Project's conference in Cambridge in 2017, and our attendance at the conference led to a number of paper proposals for our own conference and contacts and associations that we have already built upon and will build upon in the future. Alex Walsham's short talk about a Protestant tobacco box was subsequently published on the project's website as a blog: 'The Smell of the Reformation'. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://www.reforc.com/seventh-annual-reforc-conference-2017-wittenberg/ |
| Description | Advisory Board, National Faith Museum, Auckland Palace Trust, Auckland Palace, Co. Durham |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The PI and Co-I of the 'Remembering the Reformation' project are both members of the advisory board of the HLF funded National Faith Museum initiative, which is establishing a series of galleries relating to the history of Christianity in the British Isles. This major new museum will be located at Bishop Auckland Palace, co. Durham. We are members of an advisory board together with museum professionals and other specialist academics, which provides advice on content, scholarship, and exhibition items. This group met twice in 2016 and there are ongoing meetings in 2017 and 2018. We have also sent written comments and provided verbal advice about the galleries relating to the Reformation. The senior curator, Anna Harnden, and her assistant, Claire Marsland, both attended our Remembering the Reformation Project workshop in October 2016. She has had ongoing conversations with the PI about the Faith Gallery as it has evolved. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | http://www.aucklandcastle.org/faith-galleries/ |
| Description | Alexandra Walsham, TV interview by Dr Alice Roberts for Channel 4 programme, 'Norwich: Britain's Most Tudor Town' |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This programme was part of a Channel 4 series that has been broadcast twice and sold to other countries, including Australia. It drew attention to the role of John Foxe's Actes and Monuments as a key vehicle for memory of the Reformation. The episode has been widely watched, indirectly highlighting the research of the AHRC project. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8315900/ |
| Description | BBC Radio Ulster interview: Brian Cummings, The Book of Common Prayer, 16 September 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This radio interview on BBC Radio Ulster, was stimulated by the publication of Brian Cumming's Very Short Introduction to the Book of Common Prayer, and broadcast to audiences across Northern Ireland. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Bedford Modern School, talk by Alexandra Walsham to sixth form on 'The Mid Tudor Reformations' |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Local |
| Primary Audience | Schools |
| Results and Impact | This interactive session for A level students and their teachers at Bedford Modern School discussed the mid Tudor Reformations and involved material from the digital exhibition. It prompted significant interest and good questions from the students, who found it helpful to be stretched beyond the syllabus and to gain a sense of the whole period and the connections between different events and developments. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Brian Cummings, 'Erasmus and Tragedy', part of panel on Renaissance tragedy, Renaissance Society of America, Toronto, 2019 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | This paper and the panel it was part of were delivered at the major international conference organised each year by the Renaissance Society of America. It drew attention to the work of the project and the team members and was attended by about 30 scholars and postgraduate students. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Brian Cummings, 'Talking Books', Irish Radio Newstalk, Christmas Edition, 25 December 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This radio interview was simulated by the publication of Brian Cummings' Very Short Introduction to the Book of Common Prayer. It followed his earlier interview on BBC Radio Ulster about the BCP. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://www.newstalk.com/talking-books/the-book-of-common-prayer-a-very-short-introduction-with-bria... |
| Description | Ceri Law, ' 'We thought we could not be saved without such thyngs': popery in the eyes of the sixteenth-century convert', paper at workshop on 'Anti-Catholicism in British history, c.1520-1900', University of Newcastle |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This conference paper at a workshop funded by an AHRC network provided an opportunity to share research undertaken as part of the 'Remembering the Reformation' project. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Converting the Cross: Monuments, Memory and Time in Post-Reformation England, keynote lecture delivered at postgraduate masterclass at Aarhus University, Denmark. |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham was invited to participate in a master class for postgraduates and early career scholars at Aarhus University, Denmark, by the organisers because of her work on the AHRC project and associated publications. She provided commentary on the papers they delivered, participated in a field trip to a Reformation church, and delivered a keynote lecture which was also attended by colleagues from various departments at Aarhus and Copenhagen. The visit facilitated new connections and served to draw attention to the work of the project. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | http://lumen.au.dk/aktuelt/arrangementer/vis/artikel/masterclass-with-alexandra-walsham/ |
| Description | Converting the Cross: Monuments, Memory, and Time in Post-Reformation England |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham, PI, participated in a symposium at the University of Tampere on 'lived religion'. She spoke about her work on the recycling of pre-Reformation religious monuments, and particularly the conversion of decapitated churchyard crosses into sundials, in England, engaging with scholars and students of the Scandinavia Reformation from Finland, Denmark and elsewhere. The symposium also anthropologists, archaeologists and historians. Her participation in this event has led to her invitation to act as a member of an international advisory board to a Centre of Excellence on the History of Experience funded by the Finnish Research Council, which will involve further trips to Finland. Her host, Dr Raisa Maria Toivo, will visit Cambridge for the Michaelmas Term 2018 as a visiting scholar. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | http://www15.uta.fi/trivium/events.html |
| Description | Converting the Cross: Monuments, Memory, and Time in Post-Reformation England, Cambridge-Tubingen Early Modern Colloquium, September 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham gave a short paper on her work on the conversion of freestanding medieval churchyard crosses for alternative purposes after the Reformation as part of the annual Cambridge-Tubingen early modern workshop on 'Religious Knowledge in the Early Modern World'. This annual event brings together scholars, students and postdocs from England and Germany to share their work and engage in debate and conversation. The workshop also provided an opportunity to draw attention to the digital exhibition. Audience members were keen to hear more about this strand of the Project's work. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | http://www.uni-tuebingen.de/en/faculties/faculty-of-humanities/departments/geschichtswissenschaft/se... |
| Description | Digital exhibition |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This major digital exhibition is the product of collaboration with Cambridge University Library, Lambeth Palace Library, and York Minster Library. It features more than 130 items from these collections, and several items from other repositories. It has been publicised and advertised widely via flyers, social media, and at conferences in several countries, and launch events in Cambridge and Lambeth. It has also led to a physical exhibition of the Lambeth items, which was part of the Lambeth Heritage Festival 2017, and attracted more than 1500 visitors. The CUL maintains ongoing website hit figures which are in the tens of thousands. Its impact is attested by colleagues indicating that they are using it in teaching and by social media, including tweets. It has been heralded as a major and lasting resource and has been featured on the Cambridge University webpages (http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/features/the-reformation-is-remembered) and the AHRC's webpages (see http://www.ahrc.ac.uk/research/readwatchlisten/features/remembering-the-reformation-using-digital-curation-to-widen-the-debate/). This exhibition has done more to raise the profile of the project than any other output thus far. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://exhibitions.lib.cam.ac.uk/reformation/ |
| Description | Dr Williams' Library Annual Lecture, delivered by Alex Walsham, 'Archives of Dissent: Family, Memory and the English Nonconformist Tradition' |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The annual lecture of Dr Williams' Library attracts a diverse and general audience, including the Friends of the Library. The lecture provoked a range of questions and drew attention to the research of the project and the collections of Dr Williams' Library. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | https://dwl.ac.uk/event.php?&event=52 |
| Description | Eamon Duffy, public lecture: Rome Ruined, Rome Recalled: Reformation, Memory and the Antiquity of Godliness |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Public lecture entitled 'Rome Ruined, Rome Recalled: Reformation, Memory and the 'Antiquity of Godliness' by Professor Eamon Duffy, attended by a mixed audience of members of the public, professional academics, undergraduate students and postgraduate students. The lecture prompted a lively intellectual debate both in the time set aside for formal questions and at the drinks reception afterwards; the reception offered an important networking opportunity for all attendees. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | http://rememberingthereformation.org.uk/events/rome-ruined-rome-recalled-reformation-memory-and-anti... |
| Description | England's Reformation: Three Books that Changed a Nation |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Brian Cummings was interviewed on one of the BBC's major programmes commemorating the Reformation in 1517. This BBC 4 programme , hosted by Janina Ramirez, explored the Bible, Book of Common Prayer and Foxe's Book of Martyrs. Brian Cummings was interviewed about the BCP. This programme reached a significant audience when it was broadcast and was subsequently available on BBC iplayer. The programme challenged audiences to rethink their assumptions about the English Reformation and the role of the printed book in its dissemination. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0992jdt |
| Description | Generations lecture for Frankfurt lecture series |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Lecture for online lecture series run by the Frankfurt Excellenz cluster on Polycentric Christianities, in the series Frankfurt Lectures on Keys to Understanding Early Modern Christianities |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
| Description | Guest lecture on the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, Bradford Literature Festival |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Brian Cummings, Co-I, was guest speaker on the 500th anniversary of the Reformation at the Bradford Literature Festival. His talk engaged a general audience and served to provoke questions and to draw attention to the work of the project. This festival, which has been running since 2014, attracts a growing audience from the Yorkshire region and further afield, in 2016 involving 200 events and over 30,000 people, with a commitment to engaging young people. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://www.bradfordlitfest.co.uk/speakers_and_authors/brian-cummings/ |
| Description | Hating Popery at Home: Memory and Material Culture in Post-Reformation England, keynote lecture delivered at conference on Anti-Catholicism in Britain, University of Rouen, France |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This key note lecture was delivered at the University of Rouen, and allowed Alex Walsham to share the fruits of her research arising from the project, advertise the digital exhibition, and make new connections. It is likely to lead to a further invitation to speak in Paris. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | http://eriac.univ-rouen.fr/anti-catholicism-in-the-british-isles-in-the-16th-21st-centuries-2/ |
| Description | Hating Popery at Home: Memory and Material Culture in Reformation England, paper delivered at the Sister Reformations conference at the Humbolt University, Berlin |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This paper was delivered at an academic conference in Berlin, and allowed Alex Walsham to share the fruits of the project's research and to advertise the exhibition. It also facilitated contact with international scholars from Germany and other European countries. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Image-Breaking: Religious Violence against Objects in Reformation Europe |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Schools |
| Results and Impact | This was a workshop for school children at Key Stage 3, offered as part of the Cambridge History for Schools programme. There were 18 children who attended, and as well as Walsham (PI) and Law (PDRA) there were 5 postgraduate student helpers. The session introduced students to religious violence against objects in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, asked them to think about parallels in the present day, and gave them an opportunity to put their newly acquired knowledge into practice in interactive activities. Feedback collected on the day was highly positive. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | https://www.hist.cam.ac.uk/events/history-for-schools-2018-2019 |
| Description | Kathleen Fitzpatrick Lecture delivered by Alex Walsham, 'Remembering the Reformation', University of Melbourne |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This named lecture at the University of Melbourne attracted a broad general audience, as well as staff and students in the Department of History at the University of Melbourne. it was also attended by members of the University's Christian union. It stimulated questions that drew connections between past and present and explored the legacies of the Reformation today. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/12195-remembering-the-reformation |
| Description | Keynote lecture by Alex Walsham, 'Heirloom Books and Archives of Memory in Early Modern England', Durham Early Modern Conference |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham delivered a keynote lecture at this annual international conference. Her work on heirloom books (bibles and prayer books) attracted considerable interest and has led to further invitations to speak in the UK and abroad. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | https://www.dur.ac.uk/imems/events/conferences/?eventno=38761 |
| Description | Keynote lecture, Alex Walsham, 'Hating Popery at Home: The Material Culture of Anti-Catholicism in Early Modern Britain', Media of Hate conference, Cambridge, September 2019 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham delivered a keynote lecture at this interdisciplinary conference, which drew scholars from around the world. The lecture sparked questions and discussion and has led to an invitation to contribute to a publication. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | http://www.crassh.cam.ac.uk/events/28573 |
| Description | Late Medieval History Seminar, University of Oxford: Alexandra Walsham, Converting the Cross: Monuments, Memory and Time in Post-Reformation England |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | A seminar paper to an Oxford seminar, which drew in staff, students and a wider audience, and provoked questions about memory and material culture, as well as drew attention to the findings of the project. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Lecture by Alex Walsham on 'Archives of Prayer: Medieval Books and Catholic Memory in Elizabethan England', at conference on 'The Book Culture of the Elizabethan Catholic Underground', Huntington Library, San Marino, California, November 2019 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This lecture was delivered as part of a major conference on Elizabethan book culture. Alex Walsham's paper drew on the extensive research carried out as part of the AHRC project, and attracted considerable interest and provoked a number of questions. It will lead to a publication. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | https://www.huntington.org/book-culture |
| Description | Looking Back at Luther 500, panel discussion at the German Embassy in London, 21 November 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | By invitation of the German ambassador, Dr Peter Ammon, Alex Walsham participated in a panel discussion at the German Embassy in London alongside several leading Reformation historians from the UK and Germany. The discussion reflected on the impact of the anniversary year and the legacy of the Reformation after 500 years against the backdrop of recent cultural and political developments. Attended by members of the general public, embassy staff, academics, and the press, it provided an opportunity to highlight the work of the project and to engage in lively conversation about the topical resonances of the Reformation. Involvement in this event has led to an invitation to participate in another public panel discussion at the National Archives in April 2018. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | Luther and Literature, keynote lecture at Anglistentag (German Society for English Studies), Regensburg, Germany |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Brian Cummings, Co-I, delivered the keynote lecture on 'Luther and Literature' at the Anglistentag (German Society for English Studies), in Regensburg, Germany. This major and well attended international event in the Reformation anniversary year drew attention to his ongoing work on Luther and to the work of the AHRC project, engaging a German audience and provoking questions and discussion. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://anglistentag2017.wordpress.com/keynotes/ |
| Description | Matthew Parker: Archbishop, Scholar and Collector, Conference at CRASSH and Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, 15-17 March 2016 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Study participants or study members |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham and Brian Cummings both presented invited papers at this major conference on Matthew Parker. Alex Walsham was a keynote speaker and delivered a paper entitled 'Matthew Parker, Sacred Geography and the British Past' and Brian Cummings delivered a shorter paper on 'Parker, Bucer, and the Book of Common Prayer'. This conference attracted an international audience and was fully booked. Both papers highlighted the project and its work and led to stimulating questions. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | http://www.crassh.cam.ac.uk/events/26222 |
| Description | Memory and Material Culture in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | This workshop on material culture and memory was organised in conjunction with Dr Vicky Avery, Curator of Applied Arts at the Fitzwilliam Museum. It brought together established and postgraduate historians, literary scholars, art historians and museum curators to discuss memory and materiality, and involved two specially planned handling sessions, when participants were allowed to touch and handle items from the Fitzwilliam's collection. These experiences significantly reshaped the understanding of the participants and gave the Fitzwilliam's staff new insight into items in their collections. The morning sessions, held at Trinity College, involved short papers and discussion centred on particular objects. This was a very valuable collaboration with the Fitzwilliam, building on the strong tradition of cooperation between the History Faculty and the Museum. The day concluded with an excellent and highly illustrated lecture by Professor Andrew Morrall of the Bard Center, New York, held at Trinity College, which was open to the general public, and which provoked much discussion and many questions. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://rememberingthereformation.org.uk/research/memory-and-material-culture-late-medieval-and-earl... |
| Description | Memory and the Library: Remembering the Reformation |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Study participants or study members |
| Results and Impact | This workshop was co-organised with the Cathedral Libraries and Archives Network and funded by an additional grant from the University of York's Impact Fund. It brought together cathedral and other professional librarians (including from our partners, Cambridge University Library and Lambeth Palace Library) and speakers from the United States and the United Kingdom (Mark Rankin, James Madison University) and Sebastiaan Verweij, University of Bristol) to discuss the library as a locus of memory of the Reformation. Members of the 'Remembering the Reformation' team each made a short presentation. The audience was varied and included postgraduate students and members of the general public. Subsequent to this event we have maintained connections with specific colleagues at Norwich Cathedral and Cathedral Library, as well as continued conversations and collaborations with York Minster Library, Lambeth Palace Library and Cambridge University Library. Those involved asked to be kept informed of future events. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | http://rememberingthereformation.org.uk/research/memory-and-library-remembering-reformation-event-re... |
| Description | Memory, Reading and Reformation: Roundable discussion |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | This roundtable discussion at the annual Renaissance Society of America conference in New Orleans brought three members of the project team together with other scholars to discuss the intersections between reading and memory. It provoked a lively discussion among attendees and drew the AHRC project to the attention of scholars working in a range of associated disciplines. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://www.rsa.org/general/custom.asp?page=2018NOLA |
| Description | Paper by Alex Walsham, 'Hating Popery at Home: The Material Culture of Anti-Catholicism in Early Modern Britain', delivered at workshop on 'Anti-Catholicism in the British Isles', University of Newcastle, |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This paper, which was delivered as part of an AHRC funded network, attracted a number of questions and provoked discussion. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | https://catholicarchivesociety.org/2018/10/28/cfp-representing-popery-in-britain-ireland-1520-1900/ |
| Description | Philip Melanchthon |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Brian Cummings contributed to a Reformation anniversary edition of BBC radio 3's 'The Essay' on Philip Melanchthon. This popular programme attracts a substantial general audience Part of a series of broadcasts about leading figures in the Reformation ('Luther's Reformation Gang'), it served to stimulate interest in the events of 1517 and to enhance and deepen the knowledge of non-specialist audiences. The podcast is still available to download and listen to. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08nxx0s/episodes/player |
| Description | Philip Melanchton, recording for BBC radio 3 programme, 'Luther and his Gang' |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Brian Cummings recorded a piece on Philip Melanchthon for this BBC Radio 3 programme on 'Luther and his Gang' which will shortly be broadcast. Evidence of impact will be reported at that point. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | Project website |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The project website was launched in May 2016 and provides the main interface between the project and wider audiences. It includes a regular blog, news of events, and a resources pages. It is already clear that it has raised the profile of the project and has led to contacts and consultancy requests from the media (BBC), The National Archives, and other organisations, as well as from academics and scholars. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016,2017 |
| URL | http://rememberingthereformation.org.uk/ |
| Description | Public lecture by Professor Andrew Morrall, 'From "Pope as Devil" to "the Library of Vulcan": Religion, Objects, and Early Modern Cultures of Memory' |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This public lecture by Andrew Morrall was widely publicised and attracted a general audience. It sparked considerable interest and intelligent questions. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | https://rememberingthereformation.org.uk/events/professor-andrew-morrall-public-lecture-pope-devil-l... |
| Description | Reading Luther |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | This paper was delivered to the 'Theologies of Reading' colloquium, organised by the Faculty of Divinity at Cambridge and held at CRASSH. It enabled Brian Cummings to engage with theologians and scholars in other disciplines to share his new work on Luther, reading and memory. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | http://www.crassh.cam.ac.uk/programmes/theologies-of-reading |
| Description | Recycling the Sacred: Material Culture and Cultural Memory after the English Reformation |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham, PI, gave the keynote lecture at a symposium in honour of Professor Jane Dawson, at the University of Edinburgh, in June 2017. The event was open to the public and alumni of the School of Divinity as well as to an academic audience and provoked discussions and questions from scholars and other attendees about the relationship between material culture and memory. It also served as an opportunity to flag the Cambridge conference in September 2017 and to advertise the digital exhibition prior to its launch. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://www.ed.ac.uk/alumni/services/news/noticeboard/divinity-colloquium-jane-dawson |
| Description | Recycling the Sacred: Material Culture and Cultural Memory after the English Reformation, 'Reformation and Remembrance' Symposium, Ohio State University, October 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham, PI, gave the keynote lecture at a symposium held at Ohio State University in October 2017 on 'Reformation and Remembrance', marking the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. Attended by around 80 people including members of the general public and undergraduates as well as academic staff from several countries, the paper provoked discussion and debate. Undergraduate students who had not studied the Reformation before appear to have found it of particular interest. The symposium also provided an opportunity to advertise the project's digital exhibition to a US audience. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://cmrs.osu.edu/reformation-and-remembrance |
| Description | Recycling the Sacred: Material Culture and Cultural Memory after the English Reformation, German Historical Institute, London, seminar |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham, PI, gave an invited seminar paper at the German Historical Institute, London, in October 2017, relating to her work on material culture and memory. This well attended event, which attracted scholars from across London as well as members of the general public, provoked a range of interesting questions both immediately following the lecture and in a drinks reception following it, and also provided an opportunity to highlight the digital exhibition. Prof. Walsham's involvement in this event has led to further planned collaborations with the German Historical Institute, including involvement in the Anglo-German Reformation summer school. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://www.ghil.ac.uk/events_and_conferences/seminars_and_lectures/2017/seminars.html |
| Description | Recycling the Sacred: Material Culture and Cultural Memory after the English Reformation, Simon Fraser University |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Undergraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham presented her work on the recycling of medieval liturgical objects to a class of senior undergraduates at Simon Fraser University in March 2017. The event was also attended by a local antiquarian book collector. This provoked considerable interest and many questions from those involved, as attested by the course leader, and by the number of these students who subsequently attended another public lecture given by Prof. Walsham. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | Reflections on the Reformation, panel discussion involving Alexandra Walsham, at the National Archives, Kew |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham was an invited participant in a panel discussion at the National Archives, which discussed the memory of the Reformation, and provoked discussion and questions from a lively audience. This was part of an ongoing collaboration with TNA, which will bear fruit later this year in a session for school teachers which we are co-organising with colleagues there.The discussion is now available as a podcast. Marianne Wilson, the organiser, wrote 'thank you particularly for your insightful contribution to the discussion; I really appreciated the trouble that you took to link your reflection to the role of The National Archives in Reformation studies - that was very apt and welcome ... everyone that I spoke to enthused about how much they enjoyed the event, so it was a great success. I do hope that we will have the opportunity to work together again in the future and wish you all the best with your projects'., |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://media.nationalarchives.gov.uk/index.php/reflections-on-the-reformation/ |
| Description | Reformation Recycling: Material Culture and Memory in Early Modern England |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Local |
| Primary Audience | Undergraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham, PI, gave a short talk to around 30 undergraduates and graduates at Balliol College, Oxford, about her work on material culture and memory in March 2018. Much of the audience had not studied Reformation history, but the range of questions provoked by the talk indicated that it had stimulated interest and thinking. A number of these students subsequently emailed their tutor saying that they wished that they had taken the opportunity to study more Reformation history during their degree. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Reformation Studies Colloquium, Newcastle University, 14-16 November 2016 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The project team organised two panels of three papers for the biennial Reformation Studies Colloquium, held in Newcastle. As well as the project team members, these panels involved postgraduate and postdoctoral scholars from Cambridge. The sessions were well attended and drew attention to the project as well as to its forthcoming activities. The audience was international and interdisciplinary. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | https://reformation2016.wordpress.com/ |
| Description | Remembering Reformation and Forgetting Luther |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham, PI, was one of five invited participants in a high profile event on the anniversary of the posting of the 95 theses, 31 October, 2017. 'Liberated by God's Grace 1517-2017: 500 Years of Reformation' was held at St Margaret's Church, adjacent to Westminster Abbey, and immediately followed a major ecumenical service in the Abbey to mark the anniversary. Organised by the Council of Lutheran Churches, and involving theologians and historians, this event was attended by more than 400 people, and included many clergy in post. Prof. Walsham's talk focused on the comparative insignificance of Luther in English Reformation memory. Subsequent to the event, many attendees contacted the organisers to ask for copies of the papers, which were circulated in PDF form. This was a major opportunity to highlight the work of the AHRC project at a symposium that engaged, challenged and stimulated people of faith. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | http://www.westminster-abbey.org/events/events/liberated-by-gods-grace-1517-2017-500-years-of-reform... |
| Description | Remembering and Forgetting Recantation in the English Reformation |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Ceri Law, PDRA at Cambridge, gave a very well attended invited paper at the University of Oxford's Early Modern Britain seminar on 18 January 2018. This drew attention to the research she has been undertaking on her strand of the project, 'Lives and Afterlives', particularly on the phenomenon of recantation, and provoked many helpful questions. It engaged postgraduates, academic staff and other members of the public. It also drew attention to the work of the AHRC Project more generally. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://earlymodern.web.ox.ac.uk/events-for-current-term#collapse407131 |
| Description | Remembering and Forgetting the English Reformation, Norwich Historical Association, University of East Anglia, 22 February 2016 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Ceri Law gave a talk based on her work on the project to the Norwich Historical Association, based at the University of East Anglia. Her presentation stimulated discussion and questions from the general public, as well as academics in attendance. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://www.history.org.uk/events/resource/1209/norfolk-and-norwich-branch-programme-2016-17 |
| Description | Remembering the Dead in Hamlet |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | This paper to the Medieval and Early Modern Seminar at Leeds was attended by postgraduates and staff in a range of disciplines and enabled Brian Cummings to share the fruits of his research arising from the AHRC project. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://ahc.leeds.ac.uk/english/events/event/102/medieval-and-early-modern-research-seminar |
| Description | Remembering the English Reformation Workshop, University of York, 21-22 October, 2016 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Study participants or study members |
| Results and Impact | This two-day workshop at the University of York brought together 24 scholars (including the members of the Project team) from the United States and the UK who will contribute to the first of the two edited volumes that will emerge from this project. Participants pre-circulated short papers, which provided the basis for lively discussion over two days. In addition to the speakers, those involved included postgraduate students from York and London, an outreach officer from Norwich Cathedral and the Senior Curator and her assistant of the National Faith Galleries project at Bishop Auckland Castle. The total attendance was about 40 people. Participants found this a very stimulating event and one said it was the best academic event they had attended in some time. Anna Harnden from the National Faith Galleries project said that it had fundamentally changed her thinking about how to present the Reformation. A proposal for the edited volume is now in preparation and we are in discussion with Cambridge University Press. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | http://rememberingthereformation.org.uk/events-archive |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation Postgraduate Colloquium |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | This postgraduate symposium, held at Lambeth Palace Library, and supported by the Church of England Record Society and the Ecclesiastical History, attracted papers from over 50 postgraduate students. Members of the project advisory board and representatives from the CoERS and EHS served as chairs for the sessions, which showcased the work of younger scholars. This was a successful initiative, which built on our existing collaboration with Lambeth Palace Library, and which provided valuable and much appreciated opportunities for postgraduates from universities across the UK and abroad to interact and network with others. The day concluded with a roundtable discussion and a lecture delivered by Diarmaid MacCulloch, 'Matters Overlooked: Straightening out the Story of the Reformation' which was attended by over 100 members of the general public. LPL re-established the physical display of items from the digital exhibition for this occasion and the final drinks session was held, by kind permission of Lady Welby, in the Archbishop's Drawing Room. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://rememberingthereformation.org.uk/events/postgraduate-symposium |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation in Hamlet |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Brian Cummings, Co-I, delivered a major plenary lecture at the Asian Shakespeare Association Conference held in South Korea in October 2017. A major international event attracting scholars from across Asia, this occasion enabled Brian to disseminate his work on the project, on Reformation memory, and to highlight the digital exhibition for a new audience. Provoking much interest and many questions, it has spread awareness of the digital exhibition to an international audience. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | http://asianshakespeare.org/2017/07/11/shakespeare-association-of-korea-conference-27-28-october-201... |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation, Guest Event for friends of the Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington DC |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Brian Cummings launched the 'Remembering the Reformation' digital exhibition to an American audience at a guest event organised by the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington DC. In a highly illustrated talk, he highlighted the work of the project and its key output for 2017, the digital exhibition. The talk provoked many questions and led many members of the audience to access and explore the exhibition themselves. It also drew attention to the project's collaboration with Cambridge University Library, Lambeth Palace Library and York Minster. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation, Historical Association, Canterbury |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This talk to the Historical Association in Canterbury was based on the findings of the project, served to highlight the ongoing process by which the memory of the Reformation is made, and advertised the exhibition to a wider audience. It provoked interesting and challenging questions from the audience. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation, The Crotty Lecture, delivered by Alexandra Walsham at the Huntington Library, San Marino, California |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This public lecture was delivered to a wide audience consisting of the general public at the Huntington Library, California, as part of its annual series. It attracted over 300 attendees and stimulated a range of questions and a good deal of interest. It afforded an opportunity for sharing the fruits of the project's work and spreading news of the digital exhibition. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | http://huntingtonblogs.org/2018/08/recent-lectures-april-17-august-16-2018/ |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation, delivery of Saxton lecture at Royal Grammar School, Guilford by Alexandra Walsham |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Local |
| Primary Audience | Schools |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham delivered this inaugural lecture in honour of a retiring History teacher at the school by special invitation. The audience, consisting of students, teachers, and parents, and some members of the wider public, were introduced to the broad themes of the project and asked stimulating and interesting questions sparked by the lecture. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation, international conference, Cambridge 7-9 September 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This major conference held at Murray Edwards College, Cambridge, 7-9 September, attracted more than 120 delegates from countries across Europe, North America, and the world. There were 12 plenary speakers and over 60 shorter papers delivered in parallel sessions. The conference provided an opportunity for lively discussion, networking, and was associated with a public lecture and launch of the digital exhibition at Great St Mary's. It was widely reported on twitter and other social media. The conference has led to plan for a volume of essays, incorporating revised versions of 12-14 papers from the conference. We have engaged in conversations with the publisher Routledge. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://rememberingthereformation.org.uk/events/remembering-reformation-conference-7th-9th-september... |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation, roundtable panel at the Sixteenth Century Studies Colloquium, Bruges, Belgium, 18 August 2016 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Study participants or study members |
| Results and Impact | The project team attended the annual Sixteenth Century Studies Conference in Bruges, Belgium and participated in a roundtable session devoted to the Project, chaired by Simon Ditchfield, one of the members of the Project's Advisory Board. Each member gave a short talk based on their research to date, which sparked questions and discussion. This was one of the best attended sessions of the whole conference and the audience numbered over 100. The session was also reported on social media, including Twitter. It has helped to draw positive attention to the project, including our major conference in September 2017, and stimulated interest in it internationally. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | http://www.sixteenthcentury.org/media/pdfs/SCSC2016.pdf |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation: Books, Manuscripts and the Memory of a Movement |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The Protestant Reformation had profound consequences for English intellectual and cultural life in the sixteenth century. It led to the dispersal of monastic libraries and the defacement, disposal, and destruction of many medieval books and manuscripts. Other texts were preserved and absorbed into the collections of individuals and institutions in ways that transformed them from sources of spiritual truth into material artefacts of the rejected Catholic past. Libraries thus offer compelling insights into the transformation of cultural memory in the wake of a European-wide religious movement in which Cambridge played a key part, and the migrations of significance and meaning that ensued. This fully booked masterclass placed these contradictory and paradoxical processes of remembering and forgetting under the spotlight. In addition to hearing short talks by the organisers, participants had the opportunity to inspect some of the rich holdings of Trinity College and the University Library and to engage in conversation with librarians, historians and literary scholars on these intriguing topics. The session generated many interesting questions and the feedback was encouraging; participants asked for further events of this kind. All four members of the AHRC project team were involved together with colleagues from the Wren Library and the Rare Books department of Cambridge University Library. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | http://www.festivalofideas.cam.ac.uk/events/fully-booked-remembering-reformation-books-manuscripts-a... |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation: Lives and Temporalities |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | The two postdoctoral research fellows, Ceri Law and Bronwyn Wallace, gave a joint presentation entitled 'Remembering the Reformation: Lives and Temporalities', at the Institute for Medieval and Early Modern Studies, University of Bangor, on 28 March 2017. This was part of a regular interdisciplinary seminar series, in 2017 on the theme of memory, which attracts academic staff, postgraduate students and members of the general public. Attended by around 25 people, including some by video link to other universities in Wales, this provided an opportunity to highlight the work of the project and provoked discussion and questions. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation: Pictures and Personalities, 25 February 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Schools |
| Results and Impact | Why are some people remembered as heroes, and others as villains? Why can the same person -and the same events - be seen in such different lights by different people? In this workshop we'll be exploring these themes in the light of one particularly controversial period of time: the era of the Protestant and Catholic Reformations. This challenge against church authority launched by Martin Luther in 1517 caused not just religious but also social and political change across sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Europe; it created arguments and controversies that echoed right into our modern world. People, reputations and portrayal were right at the heart of many of these battles. Offered as part of the Cambridge History for Schools Programme, this workshop for Key Stage 3 (11-14 year old) students explored why some people are remembered and others forgotten. we explored how images and objects can help us understand this before encouraging participants to make their own portraits of early modern heroes - and villains. The session was fully booked and the feedback following the session indicated that students had found it engaging, informative and imaginative. Many had never studied the Reformation before. A Cambridge city tour guide who was the mother of one of the children involved asked if she could contact us further to discuss how she might develop a tour of Cambridge for children focused on the Reformation. Postgraduate students from the University of Cambridge were also involved as teaching assistants and they benefited from the experience. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | http://www.hist.cam.ac.uk/schools/programme/view |
| Description | Remembering the Reformation: launch of digital exhibition at Lambeth Palace Library |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Held on 28 September 2017, this event, co-organised with Lambeth Palace Library, was a public launch of the digital exhibition, 'Remembering the Reformation'. It was held in the Great Hall at Lambeth Palace and attended by an audience of around 100 people, many of whom were Friends of Lambeth Palace Library. It also attracted postgraduate students, academics, and research associates from other projects, including Marianne Wilson of the National Archives. Each member of the team briefly described their section of the exhibition, highlighting one particular item it featured from Lambeth's collection. The event also gave people an opportunity to view the associated physical exhibition of Lambeth items in the virtual exhibition, and to ask questions of the Project team over a drinks reception. The event showcased the work of the project, cemented the collaboration between the project team and Lambeth Palace Library (especially its librarian and sub librarian Giles Mandelbrote and Hugh Cahill). |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://lambethpalacelibrary.wordpress.com/2017/09/15/reformation-special-library-and-record-centre-... |
| Description | Seminar paper |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Invited online lecture to the Radboud Medieval and Early Modern Society, Radbout University, Nijmegen |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
| Description | Seminar paper at the University of Sussex, 'Heirloom Books and Archives of Memory in Early Modern England' |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Seminar paper for University of Sussex. Held on Zoom and attracted an audience from around the country and Continental Europe. Prompted subsequent exchanges about similar material texts in the John Rylands Library and items in personal ownership. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | Seminar paper by Alex Walsham, 'Converting the Cross: Monuments, Memory and Time in Post-Reformation England', Late Medieval History Seminar, University of Oxford |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | This seminar paper attracted a diverse interdisciplinary audience and provoked stimulating questions from participants working on a range of periods. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Seminar paper, 'Heirloom Books and Archives of Memory in Early Modern England', and graduate training session on 'Archives, Memory and Material Culture', Stockholm University |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | These interactions took place via zoom, because a physical visit was not possible in the pandemic. The paper and training session engaged with early modern postgraduate students in Sweden and built on an existing connection with colleagues in Stockholm, which will be further cemented by an initiative associated with the Cambridge-Stockholm collaboration. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | Shakespeare and the Reformation |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Brian Cummings, Co-I, gave a keynote lecture at the Deutsche Shakespeare Gesellschaft, Weimar, Germany, on 'Shakespeare and the Reformation'. This major conference, held in the Reformation anniversary year, drew attention to the work of this interdisciplinary project, and stimulated discussion and questions from a German and international audience. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | http://shakespeare-gesellschaft.de/en/conferences/past.html |
| Description | Stilled Lives, Still Lives: Reformation Memorial Focus, public lecture at Great St Marys, Cambridge |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The second public lecture of the Project was delivered by James Simpson of Harvard University at Great St Mary's Church, Cambridge. This public event, organised in conjunction with Great St Mary's, and coinciding with the Cambridge Festival of Ideas, attracted over 120 people, and was a stimulating exploration of the visual legacies of Reformation iconoclasm, which provoked discussion both immediately following the lecture and at a reeception afterwards. The lecture was preceded by the formal launch of the project's digital exhibition, in the presence of members of the staff of the University Library. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://rememberingthereformation.org.uk/events/public-lecture-professor-james-simpson-stilled-lives... |
| Description | Talk at Tudor and Stuarts History Weekend on 'The Tudor Counter Reformation', April 2019 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This talk on the Tudor Counter Reformation was part of an annual history festival at Canterbury Christchurch University, where Alex Walsham spoke alongside other well-known historians, including David Starkey and Helen Castor. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | https://www.canterbury.ac.uk/arts-and-humanities/research-kent-history-and-archaeology/tudors-and-st... |
| Description | The Archbishop of York and the Reformation of the Minster Library |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This presentation to the Association internationale de Bibliophilie provided an opportunity for Brian Cummings to share his research on libraries, books, and religion to an international audience of book lovers. It raised consciousness of the AHRC project's findings and fostered interest and discussion. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | The Cult of the Book, Public Lecture, Friends of York Libraries, Spring Lane Lecture Theatre, York, 24 November 2016 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Brian Cummings delivered the inaugural public lecture of the Friends of York Libraries in York on his work related to the project. The talk drew attention to the project and his research and stimulated discussion and questions. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | https://www.york.ac.uk/news-and-events/events/public-lectures/autumn-16/cult-of-the-book/ |
| Description | The Ford Lectures in British History, University of Oxford |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham, PI, gave the Ford Lectures in British History at the University of Oxford on 'The Reformation of the Generations: Age, Ancestry and Memory in England, 1500-1700'. This prestigious annual lecture series attracts a large audience (c. 150-200) and is open to the public. All of the lectures reflected the fruits of her work on the AHRC project, and lectures 5 and 6 ('History and Time' and 'Memory and Archive') were particularly pertinent to the theme. The highly illustrated lectures also featured a number of items from the digital exhibition, which was advertised via flyers distributed in lecture 5. The lectures have been available as podcasts this term, and emails and social media attest to their impact beyond the UK in a range of countries. The lectures were discussed in a session of Oxford's Early Modern British History Seminar, which was attended by around 60 people. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://www.history.ox.ac.uk/james-ford-lectures-british-history |
| Description | The Reformation and the Book, talk at the British Library Open Day, Boston Spa, 1 February 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Brian Cummings gave a short talk on this topic related to the project at the British Library Open Day at Boston Spa. The talk sparked questions and discussion from members of the general public. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | The Reformation: A World Divided, BBC World Service programme, 28 October 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Brian Cummings was part of a panel interviewed by Bridget Kendall regarding the Reformation in connection with the BBC's programme of events related to the 1517 anniversary. This programme, part of 'The Forum', was broadcast on 28 October on the BBC World Service, reaching a large audience around the world. It is still available via podcast. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3csv0s0 |
| Description | The Temporality of Anniversaries |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Bronwyn Wallace, PDRA at York, gave an invited talk on 'The Temporality of Anniversaries' as part of a panel discussion of 'Anniversaries and the Early Modern Period' in April 2017. This panel also involved Geoffrey Cubitt, a member of the project's advisory board. The presentation engaged an interdisciplinary audience, drew attention to the work of the project, and provoked a stimulating discussion about the significance of anniversaries, including the 500th anniversary of the Reformation in 1517, and the distortions and problems they pose for historical understanding. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://www.york.ac.uk/crems/events/events/2016-17/cofcanniversaries/ |
| Description | Thomas Maxfield and his Afterlives: Relics, Memory, and the English Counter Reformation, Relics Cluster, Keble College, Oxford, 23 November 2016 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham gave a lecture on her research on relics as conduits of memory as part of the regular session of seminars organised by the Relics Cluster at the University of Oxford. This group of scholars involves scientists as well as humanities scholars. The lecture provided an opportunity for interdisciplinary discussion. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | http://www.keble-asc.com/cluster/relics-cluster/relics-cluster |
| Description | Visit to National Archives to discuss collaboration, 6 December 2016 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The team visited the National Archives on the invitation of Dr Marianne Wilson, who is employed as a research associate to develop the TNA's reputation as a centre for research on the Reformation. We met with archivists working on the medieval and early modern records in TNA, who we keen to hear about our project, and who had made available some key materials for inspection and discussion. We also engaged in discussions about a future collaborative venture, possibly in the form of a workshop for postgraduates. We look forward to further engagement with the TNA. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| Description | What is an Image in Medieval and Early Modern England, SAMEMES conference, University of Zurich, Switzerland, 9-11 September 2016 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Alex Walsham and Brian Cummings were both keynote speakers at this conference in Switzerland and spoke about their work related to the project. Alex Walsham's paper was entitled 'The Art of Iconoclasm and the Afterlife of the English Reformation'; Brian Cummings's was entitled 'The Cult of Images and the Cult of Books'. The papers drew attention to the project and its activities and generated stimulating discussion and questions. Papers from the conference will be published in Swiss Papers in English Language and Literature. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | http://www.samemes-5.uzh.ch/en/Programme.html |
| Description | Workshop on 'Nostalgia in the Early Modern World', co-organised with Harriet Lyon, January 2020, Christ's College, Cambridge |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Study participants or study members |
| Results and Impact | This small workshop grew out of the work of the PI, Alex Walsham, on the AHRC project, and was co-organised with one of her former research students. It proved an extremely stimulating occasion, provoking engaged discussion with colleagues from several disciplines working in this area, and it will lead to a publication and possible further collaborations. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | York Minster Library workshop, 28-29 January 2016 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | In collaboration with York Minster Library we ran a public workshop focussing on several objects from the Library's collection with connections to the Reformation. Attendees were encouraged to examine and handle the objects (Including books, manuscripts, and church silver), and afterwards engage in discussion about their reactions. Feedback from attendees was extremely positive - many said that the experience had affected the way they thought of both the reformation and contemporary religious and social contexts. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |