Latest History Blog Articles

Discussing New Perspectives on Moral Change

In our interview with Cecilie Eriksen and Nora Hämäläinen, the editors of New Perspectives on Moral Change, volume 13 in the WYSE Series in Social Anthropology, they explain the thinking behind their work, how they found their contributors, and the range of issues that they tackled. Dr Eriksen, Dr Hämäläinen, thank you for joining us. […]

In commemoration of German reunification

German Unity Day is celebrated on October 3rd. Tag der Deutschen Einheit celebrates the 1990 reunification of the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic with ceremonial acts and the citizens’ festival Bürgerfest. Browse our relevant titles and journals on the ramifications of a divided Germany below. Easily access critical research material with […]

International Translation Day

According to the United Nations, International Translation Day is “an opportunity to pay tribute to the work of language professionals, which plays an important role in bringing nations together, facilitating dialogue, understanding and cooperation.” This International Translation Day, we’d like to celebrate the language professionals who translated the following works into English, bridging academic communities […]

Excerpt: EXTINCT MONSTERS TO DEEP TIME

Following up on Smithsonian Day last week, an event hosted by ‘Smithsonian’ magazine where participating museums and various cultural centers across the US provide free entry, Berghahn is excited to feature an excerpt from Extinct Monsters to Deep Time: Conflict, Compromise, and the Making of Smithsonian’s Fossil Halls by Diana E. Marsh. Describing participant observation […]

An interview with David Zeitlyn, author of An Anthropological Toolkit

Can you give some background to yourself, and how you became an anthropologist in the first place? Well, I was born in 1958 in Cambridge and brought up there. I went to the Perse School (which incidentally is the origin of the name Free School Lane, where the Cambridge Anthropology Department is based). As an […]

Disasters, Risks, Responses, and Recovery

“As disasters are increasing in number and intensity, so too will be the need for reconstruction…” So reads a line from the blurb of Making Things Happen, Jane Murphy Thomas’ account of post-earthquake reconstruction in Pakistan. And, sadly, how prescient it was, for her book was published just weeks before the same nation experienced a […]

Making Connections: Reflections on Writing Towards a Collaborative Memory

Sara Jones, University of Birmingham The idea for Towards a Collaborative Memory came when I was researching my last book on memories of the East German Stasi. I was reading press releases from the Stasi Prison Memorial at Berlin Hohenschönhausen and came across one in which the then Director of the Memorial used a visit […]

National Read a Book Day 2022

September 6th marks National Read a Book Day in the United States. To celebrate, we want to share what the Berghahn staff is currently reading and a scholarly reading from Berghahn Books we recommend for you. Marion Berghahn, Publisher and Editor-in-Chief Currently Reading: A Book of Secrets: Illegitimate Daughters, Absent Fathers by Michael Holroyd “Master […]

The beginning of a Germany divided

August 13th marks the anniversary of the construction of the Berlin Wall. The concrete barrier physically and ideologically divided Berlin from 1961 to 1989. Along with separating West Berlin from East German territory, it came to symbolize the “Iron Curtain” that separated Western Europe and the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War. Browse relevant Berghahn titles on the history of […]

The Making of Making Things Happen

An interview with Jane Murphy Thomas JANE MURPHY THOMAS is an independent consultant, practitioner, project manager and social anthropologist in projects for UN agencies, NGOs, governments, donor agencies, and consulting firms, specializing in anthropological approaches and community participation in conflict and disaster-prone locations. Her book, Making Things Happen: Community Participation and Disaster Reconstruction in Pakistan […]

Berghahn History

New & Recent titles

December 2022

Selling the Economic Miracle

Economic Reconstruction and Politics in West Germany, 1949-1957

Spicka, M. E.

November 2022

In Search of European Liberalisms

Concepts, Languages, Ideologies

Freeden, M., Fernández-Sebastián, J. & Leonhard, J. (eds)

December 2022

Voices on War and Genocide

Three Accounts of the World Wars in a Galician Town

Bartov, O. (ed)

December 2022

Comrades in Arms

Military Masculinities in East German Culture

Smith, T.

December 2022

When Will We Talk About Hitler?

German Students and the Nazi Past

Oeser, A.

October 2022

Submerged on the Surface

The Not-So-Hidden Jews of Nazi Berlin, 1941–1945

Lutjens Jr., R. N.

September 2022

Making Bodies Kosher

The Politics of Reproduction among Haredi Jews in England

Kasstan, B.

November 2022

Luso-Tropicalism and Its Discontents

The Making and Unmaking of Racial Exceptionalism

Anderson, W., Roque, R., & Ventura Santos, R. (eds)

August 2022

Gendering Post-1945 German History

Entanglements

Hagemann, K., & Harsch, D., & Brühöfner, F. (eds)

November 2022

Crime and Criminal Justice in Modern Germany

Wetzell, R. F. (ed)

November 2022

Optimizing the German Workforce

Labor Administration from Bismarck to the Economic Miracle

Meskill, D.

November 2022

After the 'Socialist Spring'

Collectivisation and Economic Transformation in the GDR

Last, G.

August 2022

200 Years of Peace

New Perspectives on Modern Swedish Foreign Policy

Biltekin, N., Müller, L., & Petersson, M. (eds)

August 2022

Towards a Collaborative Memory

German Memory Work in a Transnational Context

Jones, S.

August 2022

Dynamics of Emigration

Émigré Scholars and the Production of Historical Knowledge in the 20th Century

Berger, S. & Müller, P. (eds)

September 2022

Borders in East and West

Transnational and Comparative Perspectives

Berger, S. & Hashimoto, N. (eds)

September 2022

Pacific Automobilism

Adventure, Status and the Carnival of Mobility, 1970–2015

Mom, G.

September 2022

Edible People

The Historical Consumption of Slaves and Foreigners and the Cannibalistic Trade in Human Flesh

Siefkes, C.

September 2022

Managing Sacralities

Competing and Converging Claims of Religious Heritage

Hemel, E. van den, Salemink, O., & Stengs, I. (eds)

September 2022

The Chernobyl Effect

Antinuclear Protests and the Molding of Polish Democracy, 1986–1990