Reviewing the relationship between the Counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s and the LGBT movement, this talk concentrates on the origins of LGBT periodicals as part of the alternative press of the period. It will cover such topics as the underground culture of gay men when male homosexuality was illegal, the repercussions of the decriminalisation of male homosexuality in 1967 and the campaign of legal discrimination to which both the early LGBT press and the alternative press were subjected in […]
Radical Alternatives to Prison (RAP) was set up in 1970 in London by a group of ex-prisoners and people connected with the prison service. We are very pleased to have Ros Kane speaking, one of the co-founders of RAP, along with the late Sandra Roskowski. Ros practiced as a psychiatric social worker at Wormwood Scrubs Prison Hospital before helping found the organisation. Ros's talk will cover why RAP was set up, how it operated and what it proposed as alternatives (schemes from both sides of the […]
Not A BRHG Event
From Curzon Cinema website.... We’re thrilled to be joined by Pauline Black, in-person, for a Q&A after the film screening with Dr. Peter Webb. Pauline Black, lead singer of 2-Tone hit band The Selecter, tells her extraordinary life story in the same frank manner that helped shape her as an iconic, era-defining female musician. Pauline had a difficult upbringing and joining the 2-Tone music movement in 1979 was the perfect catalyst; enabling her to explore and express all sides of herself. […]
At the beginning of this century, residents of Hartcliffe and Withywood in Bristol were shocked to hear that the city council planned to close two of their local primary schools. Children, parents and teachers, including Mike Richardson, the author of this pamphlet, mobilised to oppose these closures. The ensuing campaign organised public meetings, wrote petitions and held demonstrations in the city centre, as well as adopting some less orthodox direct action in their bitter determination to […]
The long awaited launch of Paul Smith's book Hartcliffe Betrayed: The fading of a poast-war dream, or how a garden city became a housing estate, 1943-1963. A salutary lesson for current planners can be drawn from this detailed examination of the failure of an ambitious project in the immediate post-war environment to live up to its expectations. Houses were desperately needed: What principles should underpin a new ‘settlement’? Where should the houses go? Who were they for? And what provision […]
Bristol History Podcast is dedicated to exploring various aspects of Bristol’s history. Produced in partnership with the Bristol Cable since April 2018. Episodes include Tom Brothwell’s interviews and conversations with Bristol Radical History Group members and many others.
With the likely victory of the Labour Party in the upcoming election it seems apt to remind ourselves of what previous Labour governments actually did. Memories of 'New Labour' under Blair and Brown (1997-2010) have been popularly tarnished by the lies surrounding the disastrous invasion of Iraq and the subsequent banking collapse of 2008-09. However, other policy decisions by 'New Labour' such as the increasing privatisation of the state sector particularly in health care and education, the […]
Our defence is not for a piece of land, but for the protection of life’s ability to unfold itself (Nûda, member of the YPJ, the women’s defence units, 237). This is a meticulously researched and critically argued book from an author writing not only about but from within the Kurdish women’s movement. In the West, Dilar Dirik is one of the most prominent and articulate voices on the role of women in the Kurdish struggle for participatory democracy, ecological sustainability, and women’s […]
How a garden city became a housing estate, 1943-1963. A salutary lesson for current planners can be drawn from this detailed examination of the failure of an ambitious project in the immediate post-war environment to live up to its expectations. Houses were desperately needed: What principles should underpin a new ‘settlement’? Where should the houses go? Who were they for? And what provision should be made for the likely political and financial changes over the timescale of the project? […]
