‘Comment is free, but facts are sacred’
The Guardian in Local, National, and Global History
The John Rylands Library, The University of Manchester
Thursday 6 April 2017
Keynote speaker: Alan Rusbridger, Principal of Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, and former Editor-in-Chief of the Guardian.
The University of Manchester Library and the John Rylands Research Institute invite submissions for a one-day interdisciplinary conference on the history of the Guardian newspaper.
Founded in 1821, the Manchester Guardian began life as a provincial journal, but under Scott’s inspired editorship it was transformed into a national newspaper with a reputation for journalistic integrity and honesty. The Guardian is still remembered in the North West of England as a great Manchester institution, but today its scope and reputation are truly international – its groundbreaking journalism brought to the widest audience through its pioneering use of digital media.
This event celebrates the cataloguing of C.P. Scott’s Editorial Correspondence in the Guardian Archive, a project made possible by the National Cataloguing Grants Programme for Archives.
The conference welcomes papers focusing on any aspect of the Guardian’s history, from 1821 to the present. However, reflecting the newspaper’s Manchester origins, the organisers are particularly interested in submissions which take account of the relationship between local and global, provincial and metropolitan, in the newspaper’s history, as well as submissions which focus on Scott or issues with which he is associated. They are also interested in research which has made use of the archive – either the earlier material held by The University of Manchester Library, or the more recent papers at the Guardian News and Media Archive in London.
They invite submissions for papers of 20 minutes (with an expectation of an additional 10 minutes for questions). Potential topics might include, but are by no means restricted to:
Please submit abstracts of up to 250 words to fran.baker@manchester.ac.uk. The deadline for submissions is Monday 31 October 2016.