Key details
Dr Victoria Carolan
Senior Lecturer
Victoria Carolan is a cultural historian specialising in maritime history and film. She completed her doctoral thesis, British Maritime History, National Identity and Film 1900-1960 at Queen Mary, University of London in 2012. She previously held a two-year research fellowship at the Jan van Eyck Academie, Maastricht funded by the Dutch Government, looking at maritime identities through history, philosophy and photography. With a first degree in Literature and Film she completed her MA in Maritime History at the Greenwich Maritime Institute in 2002. At Greenwich Victoria is responsible for the Greenwich Memory Network and a joint organiser of the Great War Greenwich project.
Victoria welcomes research proposals on any aspect of British film (1895- present) especially in relation to the following: representation of history or conflict and documentary in British industries; Second World War home front; maritime and naval topics with a cultural approach.
See more about the University History Research Group here.
Responsibilities within the university
Senior Lecturer, History
Awards
Grants awarded
2008 Grant from the Royal Navy for the IMEHA Conference
2003-4 Stipendiary Research Fellowship in maritime identities awarded by the Dutch Government, Department of Theory, Jan van Eyck Academie, Maastricht, The Netherlands.
Recognition
-Society of Nautical Research Heritage Committee , Secretary 2013-2015, Committee member 2015-
-Administrator for the Greenwich Memory Network
Consultancies
-2013 First World War Researcher, Hackney Council Libraries, Heritage and Culture Department. Consultant to scope sources, create a database and write a report on potential directions for the Council's forthcoming events for the centenary of the First World War.
Research / Scholarly interests
* Representations of the maritime sphere in popular culture, especially film.
* Naval Propaganda and censorship.
* National identity especially in relation to the navy, shipbuilding communities and island studies
* The cultural history of First and Second World Wars
* The National Savings Committee.
Recent publications
-2013 'Regional Voices, National Causes 1930-1945: Shipyard Workers on Screen' in Duncan Redford (ed), Maritime History and Identity: The Sea and Culture in the Modern World (London: I.B.Tauris).-2011 'The Shipping Forecast and British National Identity,' The Journal of Maritime Research, 13:2
-2011 (with Anna Towlson) 'A History in Pictures: LSE Archives on Flickr' ALISS Quarterly 6.-2010 'A History in Pictures: LSE reveals its history through Flickr,' ARC Magazine, Archives and. Records Association, No 252.
-2007 World War One at Sea (London: Pocket Essentials)
-2005 Nelson (London: Pocket Essentials).-2003 'Drawn by the Sea Part 1' in Bettina von Dziembowski and Christine Lemke (eds) Many Happy Returns (Frankfurt, Germany: Revolver)
-October 2003 'Drawn by the Sea Part 2' in Hijr (Art Journal), Harlingen, Friesland.
-December 2003 'Absorbed' The HTV 51 ('Bimonthly non glossy for art') Foundation HTV de Ijsberg, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Presentations
April 2015 'The History of Shipyards on the Clyde and Tyne 1930-1960' Invited speaker at Lloyds Register Global Technology Centre, Southampton.
August 2014 'The Art of Longitude: The Famous Quest from Print to Film' Invited speaker at The National Maritime Museum.
April 2014 'Dumb, Drunk and Dancing Sailors: The Role of Naval Comedy Films during the 'Cult of the Navy' and the First World War'The Great War and the Moving Image Conference, University of Kent.
November 2013 'Propaganda and Projection: The Ship Launch on Film 1895-1945' Invited speaker at the University of Helsinki, Finland.
July 2013 'Navy, Nation and Nitrate: British Naval Film 1895-1928' Navy and Nation Conference, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich.
July 2013 'Shipyard Communities on Film 1930-1960' Port Towns and Urban Cultures Conference, University of Portsmouth
March 2013 'British Maritime Film 1945-1960' Invited to give the Pack Memorial Lecture, Society of Nautical Research, Portsmouth.
January 2013 'Navy, Nation and Nitrate: British Naval Film 1895-1928' Invited speaker at Institute of Historical Research (Film Seminar), London.
July 2012 'A Girl in Every Port: Maritime Comedies 1900-1960' IMEHA International Congress of Maritime History, University of Gent, Belgium.
March 2012 'The Royal Navy on Film 1895-1930' The Society of Nautical Research, Portsmouth.
July 2011 'The Newsreel Counterpart of the Henderson White Paper? Maurice Elvey's For Freedom' The Second World War: Popular Culture and Cultural Memory Conference, University of Brighton.
June 2011 'Maritime Film as Commemoration' Invited speaker, How is British History Commemorated in Text, Film and Artefact? Study Day, Manchester Metropolitan University.
April 2011 'Maritime Film and the Cult of the Navy' Lights, Camera, Naval Action! Oxford Naval Symposium, University of Oxford.
April 2011 'The BBC series Warship' Lights, Camera, Naval Action! Oxford Naval Symposium, Imperial War Museum.
November 2010 'Representations of Shipyard Workers' Labour History Conference: Class, Culture and Communities in Action, University of Huddersfield.
September 2010 'Regional Voices, National Causes, Shipyard Workers on Screen 1930-45' 44th Exeter Maritime History Conference, University of Exeter.
January 2009 'Salt in the Blood / Salt in the Wound: British Maritime History and National Identity' Research seminar, University of Exeter.
June 2008 'Early Film Representations of Sir Francis Drake' IMEHA International Congress of Maritime History, University of Greenwich.
November 2005 'A Cultural History of the Shipping Forecast' The British Commission for Maritime History Seminar Series, King's College University of London.
April 2005 'Water by Water', PSWAR Gallery Amsterdam.
January 2004 'Intimate Histories of the Colour Orange' Jan Van Eyck Academie, Maastricht.
September 2001 'Silencing the Silent Service: Censorship and dissemination of naval information during World War Two' New Researchers in Maritime History Conference, University of Glasgow.
Media Outputs
Radio interviews for BBC radio and LBC for bicentenary of Trafalgar 2005
Conference Organisation
Joint organiser of the Great War Greenwich project.