Johnnie Anderson

A supportive, encouraging and inspirational team doing hugely important work. Grateful to have this wonderful institution on my doorstep to learn from! www.thenational.scot/news/2552704...

Slightly amended so I can fit this here: I am writing to you as an immigrant who chose to make the UK my home. As someone who is now also a British citizen. And as a German-born historian who understands where the complete normalisation of the far right can end. I write to say: For shame! I first came to the UK in the 1990s for a visit with my grandmother. Objectively, much was backwards here. No mixer taps in the bathroom; awful ‘bread’; and strings had to be pulled to switch on lights. But however I felt about this, my own string had been pulled: I loved this Cool Britannia. It was quite possibly then that I decided that the UK was to be my home. When I arrived to settle here permanently, I made a choice: to contribute my skills, my knowledge—all I have to offer—to this country rather than another one. I am deeply disgusted by your comment today that immigration has done ‘incalculable damage’ to the country. This is the language of the far right. It is insulting, hateful & will fuel xenophobia. And it is just wrong. Migration is a normal part of the human existence. None of us would be where we are without it. Open your fridge and you will see migration. Immigrants help make the UK tick every single day, whether we clean toilets in our hospitals or provide care for the elderly; whether we empty our bins or carry out cancer research. We are mothers, sons-in-law, aunts and uncles, friends, neighbours and colleagues. I ask you not tell me that you do not mean me. I know that you do not—at least not primarily—mean a white woman from Europe who has a PhD. But who do you mean? And, much more importantly, who do you think those racists who were engaged in riots on our streets last summer think you mean? Anti-immigration narratives have defined UK policymaking for the best part of two decades. And fundamentally so. They were the key driver in delivering Brexit, for example, and, as such, have directly limited the rights and opportunities of British citizens.

This obsessive focus on immigration as the ‘problem’—that is the real problem. And it is consistently delivering poor outcomes for the UK. Instead of tackling this, you are choosing to consolidate it, sowing divisions along the way. You may point me to polling and tell me that this is what voters want. Do they? I am not surprised at all that over 50% of voters might say they want to see immigration reduced if that is the question they are being asked. What we need to know is what they would answer to the question: “Would you like to see immigration reduced? What this would mean for you and your local community is XYZ.” That is not how surveys can ask questions, but governments absolutely can choose to make policy using such a more informed position. Prime Minister, you continue to talk a lot about making the tough choices. But let’s be clear: setting immigrants up as the ‘other’, as a scapegoat—describing us as a threat ‘pulling the country apart’, a ‘squalid chapter’, a risk that might make the UK an ‘island of strangers’—these are not tough choices at all. These are the easy choices. They are the choices that populists make who have no solutions to the real problems a country faces. What I would like to know, Prime Minister, is what you will do when your policies lead to the implosion of the UK’s Higher Education sector. What you will tell communities when they can no longer provide any care for the elderly. The policies you announced today will not solve anything at all. They will have exclusively negative impacts. For those immediately affected; for our communities; and for our economy. Being pro-immigration—it is progressive, yes, but the much more crucial point is that it is also the most pro-UK policy approach that any politician in the country can pursue. And you are choosing to do the opposite. This, Prime Minister, is the real damage—and it will be very calculable indeed. Tanja Bueltmann

My letter to the Prime Minister. #immigration

Is Rural Living Better for Mental Health? Does being a rural mouse give you a better chance of having good mental health than being a city mouse?

One of the things I got up to on the @sshmedicine.bsky.social writing retreat at Ross Priory @unistrathclyde.bsky.social @strathhumanities.bsky.social
www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/a-sh...

Loved hearing about this project at the last OHA conference and hope to be near enough to Ipswich to visit this exhibit soon!

New article by me on the Women's Right to Choose Group and abortion rights activism in 80s Dublin. I loved working on this. Thanks to my interviewees,reviewers & special issue editors Gayle Davis & Linda Bryder. Please DM if you'd like a copy. #histmed #reprorights muse.jhu.edu/pub/424/arti... [1/2]

Poster for Oral History project

Are you a South Asian medical practitioner in Scotland? Monique Lerpiniere is a PhD student at the University of Strathclyde, working with the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow.

Please contact Monique on monique.lerpiniere.2022@uni.strath.ac.uk and please share 🙏 😊

For #InternationalWomensDay we celebrate Agnes Owens whose darkly comic stories of everyday working-class life brought a satirical edge to the wealth of post-industrial urban Scottish fiction produced at the end of the 20th cent, can’t wait to open @aowensarchive.bsky.social later this year!

A poster for the 2025 Strathclyde PGR Wellbeing Society Ball. Hosted at St Luke's in Glasgow on April 29th. Ticket includes a 3 course meal, table drinks and ceilidh dance.

Come join the fun! Tickets on sale now for the 2025 PGR Ball. See you there!! 💃🎊🕺

Just over a week left to get your abstracts in!

BBC Radio 4 - Archive on 4, Trouble Staying Still: ADHD's Identity Crisis Sally Marlow reveals the changing faces of ADHD and why it remains so contentious.

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...
Live at 8pm today on BBC Radio 4.

Hyperactive | Reaktion Books Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, is one of the most common developmental disorders, with an average of 9 per cent of US children between the ages of five and seventeen diagnosed each...

For more on the history of ADHD, check out my book Hyperactive: the controversial history of ADHD reaktionbooks.co.uk/work/hyperac....

BBC Radio 4 - Archive on 4, 22/02/2025 Sally Marlow reveals the changing faces of ADHD and why it remains so contentious.

Looking forward to this BBC Archive on 4 broadcast on the history of ADHD, not least because I was interviewed for it. It comes out on the 22nd of February and the programme is called Trouble Staying Still.
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...

A photo of Laura Macdonald smiling on a street. Her name is written in green text underneath

📢 New Featured Researcher for Feb '25

Laura MacDonald (@laurzzs.bsky.social) is a PhD Researcher at @strathhasspgrs.bsky.social studying the writings of Agnes Owens in collaboration with @agrayarchive.bsky.social & @aowensarchive.bsky.social
✍️

Read more 🔗 sgsahresearch.com/featured-res...

How to solve our mental health crisis Investing in people’s future mental health, based on the key socioeconomic factors underlying it, is the only way to address this rising problem.

theconversation.com/how-to-solve...

Job klaxons! We are recruiting three postdoc Fellows to work on the global histories of #HIV and #AIDS #activism in #India; #South #Africa; #Turkey and the Middle East. Thanks to generous funding from the UKRI. You may find the links in the comments below.

Super excited to be off on 'tour' next week for these two events organised by my lovely colleagues @ymcfadden.bsky.social, @phatcontroller.bsky.social & @silviahedley.bsky.social If you find yourself in Glasgow or Brighton, do come along! @ihr.bsky.social @ids.ac.uk @uolondon.bsky.social

PLEASE SHARE👉🏽We are delighted to partner with Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum for GRAY DAY 2025 on 2 x FREE TALKS

- 25.02.25, 1-2pm Talk with our @sgsah.bsky.social CDA student Lauren Forde

- 28.02.25 12pm Join Glasgow Life Museums’ Conservator Hazel Neil and Producer|Curator Katie Bruce

First post on bsky and first @cshhh.bsky.social seminar @unistrathclyde.bsky.social. Next Tuesday we will be joined by Nikolaos Papadogiannis who will present on 'Translating interviews with Greek transgender HIV/AIDS activists', 4-5.30pm in the Teaching and Learning Building 565. All welcome!

History in Action: the podcast for historians making a difference. Have a listen and let me know who I should interview next!

soundcloud.com/historyinact...

Fishing (in) the past to inform the future: Lessons from the histories of fisheries management in Lake Malawi and Mbenji Island Without historical interrogation of past and present fisheries management, governors and their sponsors often fall into the trap of replicating and re…

The main publication from our “Lessons from Lake Malawi” project has just been published OA by Marine Policy.

“Without historical awareness, reproduction of one-size-fits-all approaches to fisheries management remains all too common”

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

🐠 #envhist #envhum 🐟

School Meals Stories Whether loved or loathed, school meals have been a fixture of British childhood for generations. Heather Ellis and Isabelle Carter discuss what the history of school meals can tell us about broader social and cultural change.

How do individual narratives of school meals reflect broader societal change?

@heatherlwellis.bsky.social and Isabelle Carter collect interegenerational oral histories of school dinners @esrcschoolmeals.bsky.social, from Glasgow's play pieces to mum's fish paste sandwiches.

www.historyworkshop....

Really enjoyed hearing about this project at the OHA conference (and attempting my own awful drawing of a sponge pudding and custard!). A great article to follow up with too. Such an interesting project.

Radical Glasgow Tours voucher This voucher entitles the bearer to come on one radical history tour in 2025 - choose from the following dates, times and tours: Saturday Feb 8th...

New Radical Glasgow Tours festive fundraiser - grab a voucher for a tour in Feb, all ££ split between the vital work of Addameer supporting Palestinian political prisoners & Glasgow City Mission which helps people affected by homelessness and poverty radicalglasgowtours.bigcartel.com/product/radi...

Not a problem Laura. People were kind enough to say it did so I'll take that ! :) Was a great chance to talk over the project in more detail so very grateful for the chance to get some thoughts out into the real world.

Colourful screenshot of an instagram grid with pictures including Nye Bevan on stage at Queens Park bandstand, the STUC Black Workers committee banner and a clipping of a newspaper report on a man charged with breach of the peace for kissing his male partner in George Square in 1985

Colourful screenshot of an instagram grid with pictures including a cardboard sign saying "history is ours and is made by the people", Lucy Parsons, CLR James and a stained glass window of John Maclean

Colourful screenshot of an instagram grid with pictures including the cover of Archie Hind's novel The Dear Green Place, Eurydice Glasgow women's socialist choir, boxer Len Johnson and La Pasionaria

Sorry to be doing "do you like radical history?" type posts, but I assume you do like radical history if you're following me here. If so you might also want to keep up with Radical Glasgow Tours on insta where I share tons of archive material, links and resources on histories from Glasgow & beyond

A history of hydrotherapy and mental health Picture the scene: an asylum for women in Claresholm, AB, Canada, in the summer of 1933. Southern Alberta was in the grip of the Great Depression, but this town was also in the midst of the Dust Bowl, so-called because the parched topsoil was easily whipped by the wind into filthy clouds that blocked out the sky. Yet at the asylum, water was still being prioritised for a specific therapeutic purpose. Three women were placed in a tub and wrapped up head to toe in saturated blankets. They stayed in these watery cocoons for 3 hours.

www.thelancet.com/journals/lan...
Hydrotherapy and mental health - a long connection

Such a great project. @strathhasspgrs.bsky.social @unistrathclyde.bsky.social