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Wednesday 26 April, 5pm

University of Birmingham Arts Building, Lecture Room 3

Followed by Drinks Reception.

Alexandra Walsham will deliver this term's lecture "Writing the Generations: Time, Place and Family Memory in Early Modern England"

"The generation, understood as both a social cohort and a biological unit, is a neglected site of life-writing and record-keeping. This lecture seeks to explore the significance of families of blood and faith in the preservation of the past and in the creation of legacies for posterity. By focusing on individuals and collectivities who derived their identities from a shared location in time, it offers a fresh perspective on the arts of place in early modern England."

Our annual lecture, a collaboration between Arts of Place and OCLW, aims to bring together thinking about place with some of the most exciting current work in the fields of biography and life-writing. Lives happen in places; places shape lives and have lives of their own. 

We're delighted in 2023 to welcome one of the leading historians of our times: Alexandra Walsham, CBE, FBA, Professor of Modern History at the University of Cambridge. Her book The Reformation of the Landscape, well-thumbed on many Arts of Place bookshelves, shaped understandings of how the landscape was perceived in early modern Britain when layers of Pagan and Catholic belief and culture were written over by waves of Protestant reform. Alexandra's new book, Generations, is out this spring, and brings a wealth of evidence from local and family archives to questions of generational identity, belief, sense of time and sense of place.

Register here via Eventbrite here

You might like to leave time to explore the superb art collections at the Barber Institute of Fine Arts, rightly known as one of the finest small galleries in Europe. The Barber is open until 5pm, and is just a few minutes' walk from the Arts Building, where the lecture will be held.