Students attended the Weston Library Special Collections in Oxford to explore the archives, and took part in workshops with staff to learn of the benefits of research and further study.
Earlier this year, Queen Mary University of London's School of History, and the Social History Society BME Grant Scheme, ran the first intake of a new Summer School programme, named ‘Widening Histories’.
The programme began with a week-long Summer School at the end of their undergraduate second-year, followed by workshops, to complete as a cohort in their final year. To offset costs of missing paid Summer employment, students received a bursary for each day of the Summer School.
Ten second-year undergraduate students were selected after completing a competitive application process, and spent four days with historians from the School of History, as well as visiting speakers and attending a research trip to the Weston Library Special Collections in Oxford.
One of the goals of the Widening Histories programme is to provide students with practical guidance on how to pursue postgraduate study, including honest discussion about existing barriers and biases in universities and the profession, as well as opportunities to pursue research.
During the first day, students attended sessions titled “Making your Research Your Own” and “What is the University, the academy, what can pathways look like?”, which aimed to challenge their perspectives and impressions of academic research. At the end of these sessions students were asked to share one word that summed up their impressions about academic research. They shared words such as: introspection, discovery, choices, authenticity, ethics, values, options, self-belief, curiosity, origin, integrity.
The second goal of the programme is to nurture students curiosity and passion for history, through practical examples and active experiences of conducting research. During the visit to the Weston Library, each student viewed a primary source related to their area of interest. The following day they worked with our Senior Writing Tutor to draft poster presentations about the source they encountered. On the final day students presented their work to the cohort and staff from the School.
The posters were exhibited at a final reception with two guests each student invited. The final event was an important combination of bringing together students curiosity and passion and addressing the practical aspects of pursuing further education. Students showcased their work to their support network, and through the posters and conversations with staff, parents and carers can better envision and subsequently help support the students’ goals.
We asked several students gave their responses to the following question: How did your ideas about what research looks like change throughout the week?
Arista
"Before the Widening Histories Summer School, I thought that research, at least in my area of research (intellectual history) was easily accessible but limited in nature – from my knowledge, primary and secondary literature could easily be found either online or in the university library – however, this also meant that I assumed that sources of intellectual history were limited to what I could find in books. By the end of the week, I realised that this was not the case, as I realised that intellectual history can be found in a range of sources – notably, through the personal letters of the author(s) / themes concerned, which additionally provided personal insights into the intellectual thought of the time period / author(s)."
Matheus
"Our visit to the Oxford archives was an eye opening experience for me. Fundamentally it was an exercise in fulfilling my academic curiosity by handling, interpreting and working with primary material. Beyond that, the visit offered practical insights into the realities of archival research. Coming out of the archive I felt armed with a new historical vocabulary that makes me feel empowered to take on my final year of study."
Naimah
"At first, I thought that research meant looking at old books and spending hours with them, analysing them front to back and looking at online resources in the same manner. I used to think in order to actually do research you had to be in a much higher level of education like doing a PhD. I hadn’t expected to do research of this level as an undergrad. During the week I was exposed to many types of research like the collecting of oral histories and the use of archives which I had expected to be boring. After hearing about the experiences of researchers in archives I was intrigued, and I realised there’s more to archives than I had thought. After taking a look at some manuscripts myself in the archives and exploring a topic I hadn’t thought of before I appreciated how exciting archives can be when you learn something new or out of the ordinary."
Shi Jing
"Throughout the past two years of my history undergraduate degree, I’ve always thought that research was about using online archives, databases and secondary source books from local libraries to reach a response to the proposed essay question. Studying through COVID made me think it was sufficient to rely on the internet and only use local books. During the visit to the Bodleian Library, I realised that not all sources are digital for access, and different archives have different collections of history, periods and countries. Hearing various archivists responsible for and knowledgeable in various parts of the history in the library, from African history, British history, the Middle East, and the Ming and Qing dynasties, made the research process more human."
"They were like a human Google to ask research questions to, that can direct you to sources unavailable online. It makes the research process very interactive and less lonely."