History Lab is the national network for postgraduate students in history and related disciplines. Based at the Institute of Historical Research, it is an intellectual and social forum designed to meet the needs of the postgraduate history community. Meetings are an opportunity for the next generation of historians to discuss ideas and to drive the study of history forward.

History Lab is dedicated to inclusion, diversity, and opportunity. We welcome postgraduate students working on any period, geographical location, methodology, and area of historical study to present, so our programme offers a wide variety of specialisms and interests.

Our workshops – including the ‘Elevator Pitch’ session in Term 1 which helps participants to explain their research in three minutes – provide the chance to hone their research skills and to share research problems and solutions with fellow students.

These seminars and workshops run fortnightly on Thursdays throughout the academic year and will be hosted on Zoom. It can feel difficult to connect with other researchers in the current circumstances, with face-to-face networking limited. Alongside our scheduled events, we also hope to use social media and online social events to create opportunities to connect socially with other researchers and share tips and advice. History Lab invites you to be part of a friendly, engaging, and supportive community run by history postgraduates for history postgraduates.

We also run a blog, hosted here on WordPress, featuring submissions on personal research as well as reflections on current affairs and the issues affecting postgraduate students. We hope that it will also provide an alternative forum for students to explore their ideas whereby they might not have access to similar department forums, organisations or institutions. Postgraduate students come from a variety of different backgrounds with a range of opportunities available, or not available to them, as the case may be. If you are from a non-traditional academic background, part-time, not affiliated with a funding body, first generation, BAME or simply unsure where to start and looking to take a first step, we hope that you will consider submitting to our blog to share your research. For submissions, please email ihrhistorylab@gmail.com with ‘BLOG’ in the subject line, alongside a short profile. Any questions? Drop us an email, or ask us on Twitter!

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