I’m very grateful to the Royal Historical Society for their support and recognition of this exciting new module. ‘Archives Against the Grain’ is designed to help History students think critically and expansively about archives and archival forms. It’s an honour, too, to receive an award in Jinty’s name – I was lucky enough to meet and work with her on a public history project in 2016, before my time at King’s. I was inspired, then, by her energy, commitment, and enthusiasm.
Dr Sundeep Lidher
05 March 2025
Dr Sundeep Lidher receives RHS Jinty Nelson Teaching Fellowship 2024-2025
Dr Sundeep Lidher, Lecturer in Black and Asian British History (post-1800), is recipient of a Royal Historical Society (RHS) Jinty Nelson Teaching Fellowship for 2024-2025 academic year, awarded in support of a new undergraduate History module ‘Archives Against the Grain’.
Launched in 2023, the RHS’s Jinty Nelson Teaching Fellowships support historians in Higher Education who wish to introduce innovative and creative approaches to their teaching—and for which funding is required to make this possible. The Fellowships are named after Dame Jinty Nelson FBA (1942-2024), who was the first female President of the RHS between 2001 and 2005. Jinty was also a member of the Department of History at King’s, having joined it in 1970, and became a professor in 1993. She published extensively on early medieval history, especially on the Frankish kingdoms, focusing among other things on political ritual and political thought, family and gender.
The Fellowship has been awarded to Dr Sundeep Lidher to support her work on the development and delivery of a new 10-week undergraduate History module, ‘Archives Against the Grain’. The module, launched in September 2024, offers final-year History students an opportunity to learn more about what archives are, how and why archives are created, the changing histories of archival practice, and scholarly debates about archives and their selection, application, and interpretation. Students are encouraged to think critically about the relationship between archives and the construction of historical narratives, reflecting on the limitations of the archive, whose voices and experiences are included and excluded, and how archival silences might be recovered.
The Fellowship has supported various aspects of the new module's development, including the establishment of partnerships with local archivists and record specialists in its co-delivery. Via guest-lectures and class trips, the first cohort of students enrolled on the module have been lucky enough to learn from the expertise of staff at the National Archives, Autograph Gallery and Archive, The British Library Sound Archive, The Institute of Race Relations, Tower Hamlets Library and Archive, and The London Archives, King’s College London Archives, and LSE Archives and Special Collections.
In this story
Lecturer in Black and Asian British History (post-1800)