On the trail of ‘the popular’ in 'the political': Searching for (and finding) That’s Life! in Churchill Archives Centre

Tue 25 February 2020

Churchill College

Eve Colpus, historian of modern Britain and former Churchill Archives Centre By-Fellow, will give this lecture as part of the Churchill History Lecture Series.

Eve’s talk results from work she is doing on a number of interrelated projects about the popular politics of democratic participation in late-twentieth century Britain. On one level, her talk is about the history of the consumer affairs television programme, That’s Life! (broadcast on BBC 1, 1973-1994), and its connections to the worlds of broadcasting and journalism, the consumer movement, and wider legislative reform. Eve’s talk also asks how the history of this television programme might help us to rethink the significance of ‘the popular’, tracing it beyond popular culture to the realm also of political decision-making and practice. In her talk, Eve will draw on research she did in the collections of a number of personal papers held in the Churchill Archives Centre during her term as Archives By-Fellow.

Eve Colpus' research interests span the history of charitable engagement, social activism, women’s history, and histories of popular media and communications. Her first book, 'Female Philanthropy in the Interwar World: Between Self and Other' was published by Bloomsbury Academic Press in 2018, and received a ‘Highly Recommended’ mention in the Women’s History Network Book Prize (2019). Eve studied at the University of Oxford, before moving to the University of Southampton, where she is now Associate Professor in British and European History post-1850. Eve was an Archives By-Fellow at Churchill College Archives Centre in 2019.

Cost: Free