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Re-enacting the Second World War: History, Memory and the UK Homefront

Knowles, Benjamin

[Thesis]. Manchester, UK: The University of Manchester; 2017.

Access to files

Abstract

Historians currently engage with film either as a form of evidence or as a medium for representation. This doctoral thesis aims to move beyond this binary by examining how historians can use film-making as a research method for generating new insights into certain areas of historical research, such as public history and cultural memory. Focusing on the Second World War re-enactment group UK Homefront as a case study, my investigation uses film-making to analyse how members of the group ‘make’ history, use re-enacting as a pedagogical tool, and contribute to the cultural memory of the war through their representations of aspects of the homefront experience. This thesis also considers how historians who use film-making as a research tool can disseminate their insights through the mediums of film and prose.Over three chapters and a fifty-minute research film, I explore how historians can use film-making as a research method and I reflect on the results that this approach can produce. The thesis begins by building on scholarship in visual anthropology and oral history to discuss how historians can employ film-making as a research tool. Then it moves onto demonstrate how historians can use film-making to research re-enacting as a form of public history, charting how and why members of UK Homefront re-enact. Finally, I engage with the group’s re-enacting as a form of cultural memory and use film-making to uncover the fluid, dynamic, and contested nature of cultural memory as it is manifested at re-enactment events. Through an examination of both film-making as a method and the insights that it can generate, my thesis demonstrates how film-making offers historians a method for research which can provide new insights into the sensory and the embodied aspects of public history and cultural memory.

Additional content not available electronically

There is an accompanying research film called 'Re-enacting the Second World War: History, Memory and the UK Homefront' which is available to view digitally or on the website www.filmingthepast.com

Bibliographic metadata

Type of resource:
Content type:
Form of thesis:
Type of submission:
Degree type:
Doctor of Philosophy
Degree programme:
PhD History
Publication date:
Location:
Manchester, UK
Total pages:
164
Abstract:
Historians currently engage with film either as a form of evidence or as a medium for representation. This doctoral thesis aims to move beyond this binary by examining how historians can use film-making as a research method for generating new insights into certain areas of historical research, such as public history and cultural memory. Focusing on the Second World War re-enactment group UK Homefront as a case study, my investigation uses film-making to analyse how members of the group ‘make’ history, use re-enacting as a pedagogical tool, and contribute to the cultural memory of the war through their representations of aspects of the homefront experience. This thesis also considers how historians who use film-making as a research tool can disseminate their insights through the mediums of film and prose.Over three chapters and a fifty-minute research film, I explore how historians can use film-making as a research method and I reflect on the results that this approach can produce. The thesis begins by building on scholarship in visual anthropology and oral history to discuss how historians can employ film-making as a research tool. Then it moves onto demonstrate how historians can use film-making to research re-enacting as a form of public history, charting how and why members of UK Homefront re-enact. Finally, I engage with the group’s re-enacting as a form of cultural memory and use film-making to uncover the fluid, dynamic, and contested nature of cultural memory as it is manifested at re-enactment events. Through an examination of both film-making as a method and the insights that it can generate, my thesis demonstrates how film-making offers historians a method for research which can provide new insights into the sensory and the embodied aspects of public history and cultural memory.
Additional digital content not deposited electronically:
There is an accompanying research film called 'Re-enacting the Second World War: History, Memory and the UK Homefront' which is available to view digitally or on the website www.filmingthepast.com
Thesis main supervisor(s):
Thesis co-supervisor(s):
Language:
en

Institutional metadata

University researcher(s):

Record metadata

Manchester eScholar ID:
uk-ac-man-scw:307573
Created by:
Knowles, Benjamin
Created:
20th February, 2017, 18:14:21
Last modified by:
Knowles, Benjamin
Last modified:
6th April, 2017, 08:05:03

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