Just before the end of 2020, my article ‘Gender, Authority and the Image of Queenship in English and Scottish Ballads, 1553–1603‘ came out in History. It was based mainly on a paper that I gave a couple of years ago to the EFDSS Broadside Day in Glasgow. Many of you will know that Mary I…

I’m really pleased to say that two weeks ago, I was appointed as the new administrator for the Social History Society. Most of the time, it’s only going to be one day a week, but for the first time in many, many years, I’ve got a small but steady and reliable year-round income (at least…

I’ve spent pretty much all week copying and pasting. I’ve been collating the words to hundreds of broadside ballads into a single document, so that I can find them when I need them. It’s the first step towards beginning my new research projects – whichever one I go for first, I needed to expand my…

And so I begin what might well be my final year of working in the academy. The main focus of my teaching this time will be two seminar groups on Hist100, the first year core course, which are taking place face to face (well, at least to begin with…. we’ll see how long it lasts…!).…

It’s been a strange summer. There have been no holidays with historical aspects to blog about, and only a couple of conferences that I attended to write about. I’ve hardly left the house since March… I’ve done a lot of home schooling, and this has carried on in September despite my children returning to school…