Your branch from home

The HA Virtual Branch is a great way to keep your history up-to-date, whether you are working or relaxing, all from the comfort of your home. The Virtual Branch is free and open to everybody, and recordings of the talks are made available online after the event for HA members.

Did you know? As well as accessing session recordings, members can attend talks held by HA local branches for free, plus exclusive members' webinars and short courses, and a variety of other benefits. Find out more. 

Upcoming talks

*LIVE - Tuesday 17 September, 7.30pm
The Vagabond v. the Mendicity Society: Fear and Loathing on the Streets of London
Dr Oskar Jensen
Book here

In this talk Dr Jensen will discuss how Red Lion Square had long been one of London's most genteel addresses, home to nobles, scholars, and professionals. But on 25 March 1818, one house on the south side opened its doors to quite another class of person, as the Mendicity Society began its business. Read more

*LIVE - 1 October 2024, 7.30pm 
Challenging claims that egalitarian, peaceful societies disappeared with the founding of agriculture or with the founding of state-level social organisation
Dr Alvin Finkel
Book here 

Yuval Harari has offered the view that early humans, out of necessity, lived in egalitarian, peaceful societies that represented true civilisation, standing on its head the notion that early societies were primitive and unsophisticated. His claim, however, that an ‘agricultural revolution’ wiped clean the democratic, egalitarian ideals of hundreds of thousands of human experience has been challenged by David Graeber and David Wengrow, who point out that early agricultural societies maintained the value of foraging societies. They suggest that the creation of state-level societies was the real villain in destroying the truly human values of early societies. Read more

*LIVE - 6 November 2024, 7.30pm
A recycled Renaissance? The cultural world of Elizabethan England
Professor Emma Smith
Book here 

In this talk, Professor Smith will provide a preview of her current research, which explores the lives, reads and cultural undercurrents of Elizabethan England. What was influencing their cultural tastes and how much of it was new, or had it all been seen before? Read more

*LIVE - 11 December 2024, 7.30pm
Crusader criminals
Dr Steve Tibble
Book here 

The religious wars of the Crusades are renowned for their military engagements. But the period was witness to brutality beyond the battlefield. More so than any other medieval war zone, the Holy Land was rife with unprecedented levels of criminality and violence. Read more

*LIVE - 14 January 2025, 7.30pm
The Fall: last days of the English Republic
Dr Henry Reece
Book here  

Oliver Cromwell’s death in 1658 sparked a period of unrivalled turmoil and confusion in English history. In less than two years, there were close to ten changes of government; rival armies of Englishmen faced each other across the Scottish border; and the Long Parliament was finally dissolved after two decades. Why was this period so turbulent, and why did the republic, backed by a formidable standing army, come crashing down in such spectacular fashion? In this talk, Dr Reece will address some of these questions. Read more

Past lecture recordings

If you've missed any of our previous Virtual Branch talks, HA members can access recordings below. Not already a member? Join today

Speaker		Title & link		Date recorded
Sharon Bennett Connolly		Women of the Anarchy		July 2024
Professor Henrietta Harrison		The Chinese Communist Revolution of 1949		June 2024
Harry Freedman		Shylock's Venice: The remarkable history of Venice’s Jews and the Ghetto		May 2024
Professor Judith Green		From Pirates to Princes: the Normans in Eleventh-Century Europe		April 2024
Dr Joanne Paul		The House of Dudley		March 2024
Dr Mark Williams		The East India Company and Empire: Foundations and Memory		February 2024
Professor David Carpenter		King Henry III and Simon de Montfort: Reform, Rebellion and Civil War in England 1258-1265		January 2024
Dr Steve Tibble		The British Templars: From Crusaders to Conspiracies		December 2023
Christina J. Faraday		Tudor Liveliness? Discovering Vivid Art in Post-Reformation England		November 2023
Jasmine Calver		The Connected and Competing Activisms of the Women's World Committee against War and Fascism		October 2023
Levi Roach		Empires of the Normans		September 2023
Paul Clammer		Henry Christophe, the Haitian Revolution and the Caribbean's Forgotten Kingdom		July 2023
Professor Erik Linstrum		Age of emergency: living with violence at the end of the British Empire		June 2023
Dr Nicholas Morton		The survival strategies of the Near Eastern powers facing Mongol invasion		May 2023
Dr Fitzroy Morrissey		A short history of Islamic thought		April 2023
Dr Gabrielle Storey		Berengaria of Navarre: History and Myth		March 2023
Professor Jan Rüger		Heligoland: What a small island in the North Sea tells us about the Anglo-German past		Feb 2023
Professor John Blair		Building Anglo-Saxon England		Jan 2023
Dr Nicholas J Evans		Death in diaspora		Dec 2022
Professor Malcolm Gaskill		The Ruin of all Witches: Life and Death in the New World		Nov 2022
Dr Peter Hounsell		Bricks and the making of the city: London in the nineteenth century		Oct 2022
Professor Richard Toye		Churchill's Great Game: Rethinking the origins of the Cold War		Sept 2022
Dr Nicola Clark		Seen but not heard? The ladies-in-waiting who served the six wives of Henry VIII		Aug 2022
Judith Herrin		Ravenna: Capital of Empire, Crucible of Europe		June 2022
Dean Irwin		A Jewish divorce case in medieval England		May 2022
Bob Morris		Why has monarchy survived in Europe?		Apr 2022
Marcus Collins		“The Talk Should Not Be Broadcast”: Homosexuality and the BBC before 1967		Mar 2022
Paula Kitching		Why does the massacre of the Armenians in the First World War still get overlooked?		Feb 2022
Anna Cusack		What a strange place to be buried: Unique burial locations in London, c. 1600-1800		Jan 2022
Karin Friedrich		The Partitions of Poland, their Repercussions for German-Polish Relations and their Legacy		Dec 2021
Robert Sackville-West		The Searchers: The Quest for the Lost of the First World War		Nov 2021
Robert Pike		Silent Village: Life and Death in Occupied France		Oct 2021
Toby Green		West Africa from the Rise of the Slave Trade to the Age of Revolution		July 2021
Marc Morris		Meet the author: Marc Morris on the Anglo-Saxons		June 2021
Martyn Whittock		Mayflower Lives: building a New Jerusalem in the New World		May 2021
Clare Kennan		Building St James's Spire: Louth's Guilds and Popular Piety in the Later Middle Ages		April 2021
Stephen Bourne		Writing Black British histories		March 2021
Jonathan Phillips		The life and legend of Sultan Saladin		Feb 2021
Rana Mitter		China's good war: how World War II is shaping a new nationalism		Feb 2021
Katja Hoyer		Weltkrieg: the German home front during World War I		Jan 2021
Anne Curry		Anne Curry: Henry V – Henry the conqueror		Jan 2021
Peter Mandler		The Origins of Mass Society: Speech, Sex and Drink in Urbanising Britain, 1780-1870		Oct 2020
Jo Fox		Reimagining the Blitz Spirit: the mobilisation of World War II propaganda in our own times		Aug 2020
Michael Wood		The Making of Early England 500-1066		July 2020

 

Local HA Branches

The HA has over 45 local branches around the country. Some of these have been able to return to their venues for their monthly talks. Others have decided to make their branch programmes online via Zoom – this provides a wonderful opportunity for you to see some of the great lectures that occur across the country as part of the HA. Check our branch calendar for full listings.

If you're a teacher don't forget that we also run our regular calendar of CPD events - view the secondary webinar calendar here and the primary calendar here.

Other events coming up

View out full Historian events calendar