Dr Alison Twells BA, MA, PGCE, PhD
Professor of Social and Cultural History
Summary
I research and teach British history in the C19th and C20th, with a focus on:
· religious cultures, gender, class and imperialism/transnationalism;
· the intersection of local and global history;
· gender history and the history of sexuality;
· community history and heritage;
· creative history and the applications of history/the humanities in the wider world.
I am Professor of Social and Cultural history, a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and a HEA National Teaching Fellow (2015).
About
After completing my BA (Hons) in History with African and Asian Studies at the University of Sussex (1985-1988), I qualified as a secondary teacher of history and R.E. Between 1989-1992, I worked at the Development Education Centre (South Yorkshire), where I developed The Empire in South Yorkshire, a history resource for the secondary curriculum (Key Stages 2 and 3). This resource explores the global and imperial dimensions of local history.
During the course of this project, a collection of historical documents in Sheffield Archives and Local Studies Library captured my imagination and led to a part-time MA in History at 香蕉视频 (1990-1993) and then a PhD at the University of York (1993-1997). My research focused on encounters between early nineteenth-century British reformers and missionaries and the people on the receiving end of their ‘civilising mission’, both the working class at home and people overseas in the South Pacific, West Africa and the Caribbean; and how developing notions of ‘civilisation’ became a central tenet of middle-class culture. I joined 香蕉视频 as a full-time member of staff in 1998, having previously held lecturing posts at the University of Humberside and the University of Nottingham.
I believe that academics should be engaged with the places in which our universities are rooted. I have presented on aspects of my research at Heritage Open Days, Off the Shelf Festival of Words, International Women's Day events etc. and have a particular commitment to uncovering some of Sheffield's more hidden histories. For example, I have co-written a school history resource inspired by anti-slavery activist Olaudah Equiano's visit to the town in 1790, developed the Edward Carpenter History Walk and collaborated with community groups campaigning for the commemoration of Carpenter and abolitionist Mary-Anne Rawson. I also run modules in which students produce public history. From a pedagogical perspective, I am interested in the role of public and community histories in inspiring student engagement and understanding of the value of historical knowledge and historical thinking in relation to present-day concerns. I was awarded a prestigious HEA National Teaching Fellowship in 2015 for my work in the development of community-facing history teaching in HE.
C19th religious cultures, social reform and imperialism/transnationalism; the British missionary and anti-slavery movements; the intersection of local and global history; C19th and C20th gender history and the history of sexuality; Edward Carpenter's circle; community history and heritage; history teaching and learning; creative history and the applications of history and the humanities in the wider world.
Teaching
Department of Humanities
College of Social Sciences and Arts
Subject area
History
Courses taught
Modules taught
Common People? Local Voices, Global Histories (Level 4)
Sex, Gender and Sexuality in History (Level 4)
Applied History (Level 5)
Northern Soul: Representations of the North of England, 1800-2000 (Level 6)
Australia: from Penal Settlement to Nation, 1788-2000 (Level 6)
History 香蕉视频 Project (Level 6)
Sex, War and Liberation (Level 6)
香蕉视频
- Humanities 香蕉视频 Centre
- Culture and Creativity 香蕉视频 Institute
My current research focuses on the following areas: sex and gender in WW2 letters and pocket diaries; Edward Carpenter's Sheffield; local and global histories; and ‘creative history’ and the applications of history and the humanities in the wider world.
Sex and gender in WW2 letters and pocket diaries: This project stems from the serendipitous gift of a suitcase of seventy-one pocket diaries from my great aunt, Norah Hodgkinson (1925-2009), who began writing a daily diary as a twelve-year-old scholarship girl in 1938. Norah's diaries raise questions about ways of reading the brief and disjoined entries in a pocket diary, and whether such diaries, supplemented by family history, give us access to the inner lives of people usually absent from the historical record -- in this case, a young working-class woman. Norah’s diaries also reveal an intriguing story of sex, romance and deception during WW2.
’Creative history’: I knew from the outset on inheriting my aunt’s diaries that I wanted to write for a wider audience and I completed the MA Creative Writing at 香蕉视频 to this end. I have a special interest in the field of ‘creative histories’, i.e. histories that are made in imaginative ways and presented in formats other than the academic monograph.
Edward Carpenter's Sheffield: I have written about the process of developing the Edward Carpenter walk and issues concerning the categorisation of C19th sexualities in relation to LGBTQ public history. I am particularly interested in the ‘global’ Carpenter: his travels in India and Sri Lanka and the connections between his life of activism in late C19th/early C20th Sheffield and his friendships with writers such as Walt Whitman and Olive Schreiner.
Local and global histories: I am interested in the ways in which ‘global’ issues are present in, and reshape our understandings of, the most ‘local’ of histories – for example, how Mary-Anne Rawson’s extensive papers documenting her anti-slavery activities are illuminated by Frederick Douglass’s writings/visit to Sheffield in 1846.
The applications of history and the humanities in the wider world: I am currently working with Gertie Whitfield, creative historian and former PSHE Advisor, in the development of a suite of resources which use historical sources to teach the Relationships and Sex Education curriculum in schools (see https://learningcreativelythroughhistory.org/nellsstory.html). I am also engaged in a collaborative project to further develop and make more widely available research on the theme of The Empire in South Yorkshire/decolonising local and regional history.
Publications
Journal articles
Twells, A., Pooley, W., Houlbrook, M., & Rogers, H. (2023). . History Workshop Journal.
Twells, A. (2021). . Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History, 22 (3).
Twells, A. (2019). . The historical journal.
Twells, A., Furness, P., Bhanbhro, S., & Gregory, M. (2018). . People, place and policy online, 12 (1), 8-28.
Twells, A. (2018). . International Journal of Local and Regional History, 13 (1), 47-67.
Twells, A. (2015). . Women's History Review, 25 (1), 143-160.
Twells, A. (2013). . Journal of Women鈥檚 History, 25 (1), 158-181.
Twells, A. (2012). . Journal of Victorian Culture, 17 (3), 309-328.
Twells, A. (2006). Missionary Domesticity, Global Reform and 鈥榃oman's Sphere鈥 in Early Nineteenth鈥怌entury England. Gender & History, 18 (2), 266-284.
Twells, A. (2001). Empire and others: British encounters with indigenous peoples, 1600-1850. ECONOMIC HISTORY REVIEW, 54 (3), 552-553.
Twells, A. (1998). 鈥淗appy english children鈥. Women's Studies International Forum, 21 (3), 235-245.
Twells, A. (1996). 鈥楢 state of infancy鈥: West Africa and British missionaries in the 1820s. Wasafiri, 11 (23), 19-24.
Twells, A. (1995). 鈥淪o distant and wild a scene鈥: language, domesticity and difference in Hannah Kilham's writing from West Africa, 1822-1832. Women's History Review, 4 (3), 301-318.
Book chapters
Twells, A. (2016). . In Midgley, C., Twells, A., & Carlier, J. (Eds.) Women in transnational history : connecting the local and the global. (pp. 180-200). Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge:
Twells, A. (2011). . In Clapp, E.J., & Jeffrey, J.R. (Eds.) Women, dissent and anti-slavery in Britain and America, 1790-1865. (pp. 66-87). Oxford: Oxford University Press
Twells, A. (2007). . In Broughton, T.L., & Rogers, H. (Eds.) Gender and fatherhood in the nineteenth century. (pp. 153-164). Basingstoke: Pagrave Macmillan
Books
Midgley, C., Twells, A., & Carlier, J. (2016). . Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.
Twells, A. (2009). . Palgrave Macmillan.
Twells, A. (2007). . London: I B Taurus.
Reports
Batty, E., Eadson, W., Pattison, B., Stevens, M., Twells, A., & Verdon, N. (2018). . 香蕉视频, Centre for Regional Economic and Social 香蕉视频.
Eadson, W., Pattison, B., Stevens, M., Twells, A., & Verdon, N. (2017). . 香蕉视频, Centre for Regional Economic and Social 香蕉视频.
Theses / Dissertations
Richardson, R. (2018). . (Doctoral thesis). Supervised by Twells, A.
Gould, C.R. (2017). . (Doctoral thesis). Supervised by Twells, A., & Midgley, C.
Other activities
Histories of People and Place, editorial board
Postgraduate supervision
Current doctoral researchers:
Molly Aitken, 'Archive fury: a feminist dialogue with Roman sources.'
Irna Qureshi, 'Memories and journeys of Chhachhi ex-Merchant Navy seamen from the Chhachh to Bradford.'
Paul Whitfield, 'Re-making the past - the role of the play in creative history methodologies.'
Past supervision:
Rachael Richardson, 'Business enterprise, consumer culture and civic engagement, 1890s-1930s: Sheffield entrepreneur, John Graves' (2019).
Gordon Haigh, 'Dissenting Missionaries and the Campaign against British Colonial Slavery, 1823-38' (2019).
Anne Mallery, Crossing the Line: Women and the Railway Mission, 1881-1918 (2018).