Anniversary Cultures: New Histories of Students and Higher Education

Organised by UCL's International Centre for Historical Research in Education (ICHRE) and the Institute for Historical Research (IHR)
About this Event

This conference marks 200 years since the foundation of London’s first university in 1826. Students have formed a significant part of London’s population since then and new research centres their experiences in the capital. The ‘Generation UCL: 200 Years of Student Life in London’ project examined life at the original London University (known as University College London since 1836) alongside many other institutions that eventually joined with UCL, capturing a diverse range of higher education experiences. The resultant book was published in February 2026.

Through this free one-day event, we seek to open the discussion beyond London students, examining new ways of writing histories of universities and inviting exploration of students’ everyday lives, fees and funding, collegiate cultures, social and political engagement, religion, physical and mental health, recreation, sports and leisure as well as changing student attitudes to class, race, gender, sex and sexuality. Following Huxford and Wallace’s (2016) discussion of ‘anniversary cultures’ in universities we also invite reflection on how and why different types of institutions mark anniversaries, and the role historical research can play in this process.

We are delighted to welcome Professor Rosinka Chaudhuri to give the 2026 Richard Aldrich lecture.

Provisional Programme

9.30 Registration (The morning part of the programme takes place in Chancellor's Hall, Senate House)

Please note we are not serving refreshments during this opening so feel free to get a coffee from a local cafe before you arrive.

Opportunity to view an archives showcase from Senate House Library and Archives arranged by University of London archivist Beth Astridge.

10.00 Welcome and introductions – Claire Langhamer (IHR) and Gary McCulloch (UCL)

Short talk introducing Student London – Sam Blaxland and Georgina Brewis (UCL)

10.45 Lightning talks 1

Chair: Mark Freeman (UCL)

Charlotte Taylor (LSBU), Reactivating the Student Archive: Student Experience, Activism and Identity at London South Bank

Meredith McLaughlin (UCL), Women Pioneers at Wyoming

Azure Bao (UCL) IOE’s 75th Anniversary and the Bloomsbury 'Jigsaw'

Lucia Qureshi (UCL), Gendered Opportunities for Transness in Histories of Higher Education

Nick Mead(Oxford Brookes), Reflections on student-teachers’ experience of dialectical synergies within the affiliated training colleges of the institutes of education in the universities of London, Manchester and Newcastle 1958 -1975

11.15 Break - Tea, coffee, water, juice and pastries will be provided

11.40 Lightning talks 2

Chair: Daniel Laqua (Northumbria University)

Mark Freeman (UCL), Anniversaries and Adult Education: The Vital Message

Minghao Zhang (UCL), Chinese and Japanese Students in UK higher education, 1895-1941

Isabel Mangum (University of Oxford), Women’s Universities, Mobility, and the Making of 20th Century American Imperial Knowledge

Adrian Fernandes (University of Oxford), Disrupting Epistemic Dominion: A Blueprint for Antiracist PGCE English Programmes

Anthony Armstrong (Birmingham City University), The History of Doctoral Supervision

12.15 Roundtable: Anniversary Cultures

Chair: Claire Langhamer (IHR)

Speakers: Lucy Briggs (UCL), Angharad Eyre (University of London) and William Whyte (University of Oxford)

13.15 Lunch - Buffet lunch, water, tea and coffee

14.00 Paper session A

A1: Institutions and Anniversaries (Chancellor's Hall)

Chair: Jack Deasley (UCL)

· Jodi Burkett and Anna Delaney (University of Portsmouth), Students in 1926 Portsmouth: Negotiating competing interests in a civic anniversary exhibition

· Tom Woodin and Nazlin Bhimani (UCL), Anniversary cultures and the history of teacher education

· Keith Vernon (University of Lancashire), A Model Space for FE Students. The Harris College Preston, c.1950 – 65

· Josh Patel (Edge Foundation), The New Universities sixty years on, and the purposes of histories of learning

A2: Reflecting on Historiography and Methodology (Wolfson Room, IHR)

Chair: Jennifer Bond (UCL)

· Mirelsie Velazquez (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign), Writing our Own Place in History: La Carta Informativa and Latina/o Students at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

· Milo Edwards (University of Oxford), Critical use of Archival Materials in Understanding LGBTQ+ Student Experience Narratives

· Anna Edwards (University of Sheffield) Cramming and Crisis: Student Mental Health and the British Professional Press 1880-2000

· Sarah Limb (King’s College London), Colonial and Commonwealth Students at King’s College London between 1918 and 1970

3.30 Break - Tea, coffee, water, juice and biscuits will be provided

4.00 Papers session B

B1: Student Experiences (Chancellor's Hall)

Chair: Milo Edwards (University of Oxford)

· Grady Owens (University of Oxford), Collegiate Martiality: Student-Soldiers, Warlike Sport, and the Making of Martial Minds on American College Campuses during World War One

· Jenny Macleod (University of Hull), Student voices from the crucible of war: University College Hull in the Second World War

· Joseph Price (University of Warwick), AIDS and the Student Body: Reactions and Responses from the National Union of Students

· Mengyuan Yue (University of Glasgow), Fellowship and Identity: Evangelical Student Organisations and International Students in Postwar British Universities

B2: The student media and mixed methods (Wolfson Room, IHR)

Chair: Tom Woodin (UCL)

· Carly Randall (Brunel University of London), “You can’t say that now!” Balancing Sensitivity and Authenticity when Handling the Archives of a Students Union.

· Leona Fensome (University of Bedfordshire), Transformative Transience: Passing through, British Student Radio Management Alumni

· Tommy Barone (University of Oxford), The New In Loco Parentis: The Student Press and Harvard After Vietnam

5.30 Richard Aldrich Lecture 2026 (Chancellor's Hall)

Rosinka Chaudhuri (Director and Professor of Cultural Studies, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta), ‘Pioneering Global Trends in Education, 1817-1835’

Chair: Georgina Brewis (UCL)

6.30 Drinks reception sponsored by UCL200

Copies of Student London will be on sale for the special price of £20

7.30 Close

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