As well as meeting with a wide range of family historians and conducting interviews and focus groups and other research activities in Australia, there has also been (just enough) time for a series of seminars and workshops as Double Helix History continue their world tour!

First up was a “What is Public History” masterclass for history teachers and PG students at the University of Technology, Sydney in collaboration with the Australian Centre for Public History and the Centre for Applied History. The presentation posed a series of challenging questions around our conceptions of the past, truth, and the influence of biases, science, politics, and much more – with topics ranging from Trump and Brexit to Richard III and from Mr Darcy to Cheddar Man.

The slides for the masterclass are here, for those interested (may contain images that we do not hold the copyright for): Download slides.

at UTS

This was followed by what one audience member described as their “Ultimate Family History Panel” alongside the phenomenal Indira Chowdhury and Tanya Evans, hosted by the Sociology Department of the University of Melbourne, supported by the Melbourne-Manchester Collaboration Fund. Following papers on Double-Helix History and Family History and Social History, which surveyed new developments, directions, and challenges for our areas of study we had a fruitful and interesting discussion with family historians, students, and faculty members.

Jerome de Groot, Tanya Evans, Indira Chowdhury at the University of Melbourne, above

Bright and early Tuesday morning we were up and meeting with colleagues Tanya Evans and Ashley Barnwell to discuss the range of papers from our recent events, our differing research practices and progression, and the future of the field, taking the opportunity to hammer out plans for future collaborations, networking, and publications.

Jerome then led an interdisciplinary masterclass at the University of Melbourne, before heading to LaTrobe University for another masterclass and a research lecture.

Masterclasses at Melbourne, at LaTrobe, above

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