The University of Sussex is a leading international centre for life history research, oral history, and life writing research and teaching, and The School of Media, Arts and Humanities is home to the Centre of Life History and Life Writing Research. The Centre explores life stories - from oral history or personal narrative to autobiography or biography - as a primary source for the study of history and culture. An interdisciplinary field, contributions include history, sociology, anthropology, literary philosophy, media & cultural studies and psychology, and researchers present their work in many forms, from academic publications to radio, TV and film, from auto/biographical drama and reminiscence work to digital and video presentations and exhibitions.

2022/23 has been a very productive year for the Centre, with ground-breaking research projects with diverse funding streams, exciting, informative and free events open to the public, and partnerships with community projects, businesses and organisations. 

Event and project highlights from the past year include:

Standards for Digital Interventions in Holocaust Memory and Education - with Viki Walden and Kate Marrison (5 and 9 September 2022)

Participatory workshops, organised as part of Viki’s Digital Holocaust Memory project and supported and attended by CLHLWR. Around 30 participants from different sectors including Yale Fortunoff Archive, National Holocaust Centre, British Library, Freie Universitat Berlin, Centre for Life Narrative Kingston University.

Narrating Feminist Lives in the Backlash - Keynote by Margaretta Jolly (September 2022)

Centre Director Margaretta Jolly at the Remembering Contentious Lives, Activist Memory Network conference at the University of Utrecht, Netherlands. 

Blots, dots and spots in colour history: From Mary Gartside to Rana Begum - Talk and presentation by Alexandra Loske (March 2023)

A talk and presentation by Alexandra about the use of blots by women artists and colour theorists at the 5th Slade School of Art symposium Colour & Poetry (2023).

Connected Histories of the BBC - with Margaretta Jolly, David Hendy, Alban Webb, Denice Penrose, John Hughes (October 2022)

Joint event with prestigious partner institution, the BBC, at Broadcasting House, London, to publicise the Connected Histories of the BBC project: launch of digital catalogue of seven oral history collections, focus on nine themed BBC resources of curated clips, and a bespoke launch film as well as a book event for 'The BBC: A People’s History', by Emeritus David Hendy.

Life writing texts and contexts and the case of a publisher memoir - presentation by Margaretta Jolly (October 2022)

For the University of Oxford's Modern and Contemporary Literature Research Seminar. Other speakers included Prof Hermione Lee, Prof Patrick Hayes, Prof Max Saunders, King’s College London Centre for Life Writing and Oxford’s Centre for Life Writing.

Colour, Convalescence, Cosmos: The Late Watercolours of Dr Grace Pailthorpe - Talk by Hope Wolf (January 2023)

Online event for the College of Psychic Studies with around 25 participants. Hope presented on her long-standing research project. 

Lives in Colour: Pioneering Women in Colour History - Talks by Alexandra Loske (February and March 2023)

An in-person event organised by the Eastbourne Arts Circle at Towner Gallery and an online event celebrating International Colour Day 2023, organised by the Interdisciplinary Colour Association (ICA) Belgium.

Trade Union Travellings: Your Next Life Writing Challenge - Organised with Brighton Centre for Memory, Narrative, Histories (March 2023)

To build on the work of current Visiting Associate Rosalind Eyben, and connect with LPS and the Centre for Memory, Narrative and History at the University of Brighton.

Centre for Life History and Life Writing Research Open House (March 2023)

An initiative to explore ‘work in progress’, including memoirs, biographies, oral history or documentary methods, challenges of inheriting family archives, and autoethnographic art history.

Let’s start with Fi Glover: Oral history and the Connected Histories of the BBC - Presentation by Margaretta Jolly (March 2023)

This online seminar for the University of Oxford's Centre for Life Writing postgraduate seminar series provided an excellent opportunity to promote the Connected Histories of the BBC project.

It’s Not Just About Pictures: The Oral History of Art History at Sussex (June 2023)

To celebrate and launch the project's oral history archive in Special Collections at The Keep, with Flora Dennis (project director), Alexandra Loske (interviewer to the project), Hope Wolf (interpreter/commentator) and Margaretta Jolly (advisory board member). The Oral History of Art History at Sussex project started in 2016 and the archive will help to promote Sussex’s heritage and intellectual history.

Let’s start with Joan Bakewell: Women’s Television History in the Connected Histories of the BBC project - Talk by Margaretta Jolly (June 2023)

Presentation by Margaretta at Doing Women’s Film and TV conference at the University of Sussex, directed by Professor Lizzie Thynne.

Boyz 2 Men Sponsored headline event for the Brighton Book Festival 2023 (June 2023)

The Brighton Book Festival grew out of a knowledge exchange event organised and led by Margaretta Jolly as part of her Business of Women’s Words research project. Taking place at the Sallis Benney Theatre, University of Brighton, Boyz 2 Men offered community engagement with local Black/feminist creative and literary communities, such as Brighton's Afori Books and the Feminist Bookshop. The event featured literary life narratives from a brilliant panel of Black authors, Yomi Sode, Okechukwu Nzelu, Stephen Buoro, Nikesh Shukla, Brandon Taylor, and Obiomo Ugoala.

Angelica Kauffmann: Trailblazing Artist in Georgian Britain - lecture by Alexandra Loske (July 2023)

Adam Matthews engaged Margaretta Jolly in 2021 as a consultant to Women’s Life Writing, a digital resource needing advice on archival resources and content. The consultancy involved online meetings in 2022 and an in-person meeting at the British Library in 2023.

In the pipeline for 2023/24:

Looking ahead, the Centre already has exciting plans and ideas for the new academic year. Here are a few to look forward to:

• 10 October - Class histories, university histories, oral histories: part of the new Education Enhancement series, featuring the Mapping Mithras oral history project.
• 16 October - Centre for Life History and Life Writing Research Open House
• 13 November - Algorithmic Autobiographies (and fictions): led by Dr Tanya Kant and Sandra Nelson with the Sussex Humanities Lab.
• 29 November - The Great Diary Project: A CLHLWR-English Colloquium event
• 6 December - Making Something from Nothing: with Susie Scott from Narratives of Nothing and Augusto Corrieri on lives unlived.

What a year! We look forward to seeing what 2023/24 brings for the Centre for Life History and Life Writing Research.

Back to news list