Join us as we focus on the impact of COVID-19 in the context of Armistice Day.
While the confinement which has taken place in 2020 may have no historical precedent in terms of its globality, containment as a result of war occurred regularly during the twentieth century. Using the example of the First and Second World Wars and the Yugoslav conflict of the 1990s, two historians, together with De Montfort University (DMU) PhD students, will tackle these issues. A panel discussion will follow.
Panikos Panayi, Professor of European History, will focus upon the internment camp in Knockaloe during the First World War to demonstrate how, on the one hand, barbed wire disease developed amongst males who could face confinement for years, while, on the other a prison camp society also evolved as prisoners tried to cope with their situation by developing cultural activities.
Jessica Cretney, a second year AHRC M4C funded PhD student, will examine ‘Confinement by Design: Space and Nazi Concentration Camps’. Drawing on her doctoral research, she will consider the factors that shaped the built forms of these sites of confinement and persecution.
Kenneth Morrison, Professor of Modern Southeast European History, will tackle 'Citizen Resilience in Besieged Sarajevo', which will focus on how citizens adapted to life in the besieged city - with no electricity, gas, domestic water supply and under sniper and shell fire. He will look at the lessons that can be drawn from the case of Sarajevo and will be joined by video-link by Elma Hodžić, a curator at the History Museum of Bosnia & Herzegovina, who will discuss how citizens used their creativity to function during the siege.
This event is part of an ongoing series of lectures with leading DMU scholars to mark International Awareness Days.