Transformation and Innovation in the British Military
A Symposium for Postgraduate and Early Career Historians
13 April 2011
I am pleased to announce our forthcoming symposium…More information as it become available will be posted here.
This symposium, organised by the Centres for First and Second World War Studies at the University of Birmingham, intends to give postgraduate and early career historians the opportunity to examine the process of transformation and innovation in the British military as recent literature on the subject has highlighted a need to evaluate the process from 1642 to the present day. The symposium will be held in the Arts Building at the Edgbaston campus of the University of Birmingham.
The symposium will also give delegates the opportunity to present aspects of their research to a wider audience and engage with the academic community in military history. The conference programme is attached, and includes eighteen papers on aspects of transformation and innovation in the British military from the early modern period to the modern and from a range of perspectives. Professor John Buckley, Chair of Military History at the University of Wolverhampton Military History, will deliver the keynote lecture. Professor Gary Sheffield, Chair of War Studies at the University of Birmingham, will deliver the symposium’s closing address.
The conference fee, which includes tea & coffee and lunch on the day, is yet to be confirmed.
For informal enquiries please email us at birminghamwarstudies@gmail.com or post a comment below.
Provisional Conference Programme:
8:45 – Registration
9:15 – Introduction and Welcome – Ross Mahoney, Stuart Mitchell and Michael LoCicero
9:30 – Panel 1: Transformation and Innovation in the Early Modern Era, 1642-1815
Chair: TBC
Sara Regnier-Mckeller (University of Essex) – Honour and Manhood in the Armies of the British Civil Wars
Britt Zerbe (University of Exeter) – Amphibious Brotherhood: 1664 or 1755? What Foundation and Establishment mean to Marine Identity
11:00 – Tea
11:15 – Panel 2A: Transformation and Innovation in the 19th Century
Chair: Aimée Fox (University of Birmingham)
Peter Randall (University of Reading) – The Influence of the Napoleonic Wars upon the British Military, 1815-1854
Andrew Duncan (University of Birmingham) – British Army Medicine, 1854-1914 (Title TBC)
Edward Gosling (University of Plymouth) – The Cardwell-Childers Reforms, 1868-1881
11:15 – Panel 2B: Transformation and Innovation at the Fin de Siècle
Chair: Michael LoCicero (University of Birmingham)
Dr Spencer Jones (University of Wolverhampton) – Countdown to the ‘Mad Minute’: The Reform of British Musketry, 1899-1914
Dr Peter Grant (Cass Business School, City University) – Learning to Manage the Army: The Army Administration Course at the London School of Economics
Martin Gibson (University of Glasgow) – The Royal Navy’s Conversion from Coal to Oil, 1900-1914
12:45 – Lunch
13:30 – Keynote Address by Professor John Buckley, Chair of Military History, University of Wolverhampton
14:30 – Panel 3A: Transformation and Innovation in the First World War
Chair: Stuart Mitchell (University of Birmingham)
Paul Harris (King’s College London) – Soldier Banker: Lieutenant-General Sir Herbert Lawrence as the BEF’s Chief of Staff in 1918
Simon Justice (University of Birmingham) – Vanishing Battalions: The Reorganisation of British Infantry prior to, and as a result of, the German Spring Offensives of 1918
Dr Jonathan Boff (King’s College London) – Innovation and Victory: The British Army during the Hundred Days Campaign, 1918
14:30 – Panel 3B: Transformation and Innovation in the Second World War
Chair: James Pugh (University of Birmingham)
Neal Dando (University of Plymouth) – From ‘Jock Column’ to Armoured Column: Transformation and Change in British and Commonwealth Unit Tactics in the Western Desert, January 1941 to November 1942
Sarah McCook (University of Durham) – Wartime Communications: British Dispatch Riders and the need for reliable communications during the Second World War
Dr Matthew Ford (University of Hull) – Learning the Lessons of Battle: Organisational Learning, Small Unit Tactics and the Problems with the Force Transformation Literature
16.00 – Coffee
16:15 – Panel 4: Transformation and Innovation in the Third Dimension
Chair: Ross Mahoney (University of Birmingham)
James Pugh (University of Birmingham) – Oil and Water: Military and Naval approaches to Air Power Doctrine and Technological Innovation, 1911-1914
John Alexander (University of Birmingham) – Transformation and Innovation in British Air Defence, 1922-1936
Richard Hammond (University of Exeter) – British Aero-Naval Co-Operation in the Mediterranean and the Formation of RAF No. 201 (Naval Co-Operation) Group
17:45 Closing Address by Professor Gary Sheffield, Chair of War Studies, University of Birmingham
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