Economic and Social History workshop
Term Card for Lent 2024:
29 January: Lovansh Katiyar (Cambridge): Deconstructing Development Realities in India
12 February: Sandra Ujpetery (Cambridge): Who were the hand-spinners and handloom weavers when industrialisation struck? Findings from Silesia and the Swiss canton of Glarus, first half of the 19th century
26 February: Michele Bolla (Cambridge): Income Inequality around the Year Zero: Quantitative Insights from Chinese Literary Sources
11 March: Jan Altaner (Cambridge): Sex and the City Center: Prostitution, Urban Planning and Sociological Research in 1960s Lebanon
Our next paper will be presented by Jan Altaner (Cambridge), and is entitled 'Sex and the City Center: Prostitution, Urban Planning and Sociological Research in 1960s Lebanon'
Abstract for the paper: This paper offers a first, preliminary foray into the social history of brothel-based pros-titution in 1960s Lebanon. While colonial archives have facilitated historical research into prostitution during French Mandate Lebanon, sex work during the period following independence in 1943 remains unstudied, not least due to a dearth of sources. Following recent calls to appreciate historical surveys as social history archives, a 1964 sociological survey of sex workers in Beirut’s brothel-district lies at the core of this paper. The paper argues that the sociologists undertaking the survey had teamed up with urban planners to facilitate the erasure of the port city’s brothel district in a large-scale urban renewal scheme by distorting the interpretations of their data. The re-reading of the survey however unearths the sex workers’ contrasting perspectives, agency, and the meanings they attached to the brothel district, underscoring their opposition to the project’s objectives and the sociologists misusing their power to deceive and coerce them into participation.
The economic and social history workshop fosters discussion on a range of social or economic topics from any time period or geographic region. Our normal format involves c.20 minute papers followed by half an hour of questions and discussion. We feature papers that consider any aspect of social or economic policy, historical demography, political economy, labour movements, financial institutions, or histories of poverty and welfare. All papers are by postgraduate students, and preference will be given to those from the University of Cambridge, but scholars from elsewhere around the world are more than welcome. The workshop provides a friendly, collaborative environment, and are usually also attended by a senior member of the Faculty to respond to the paper and offer constructive feedback. Attendance by students on the Economic and Social History MPhil is expected, and we encourage MPhil students to present works-in-progress in Easter Term. The current co-convenors are Jerome Gasson (jttg2@cam.ac.uk), Yasser Alvi (ya326@cam.ac.uk), and Emily Chung (evc28@cam.ac.uk) - do get in touch with us if you'd like to share your work next term, or if you would like to help convene the workshop.
We meet 13:00-14:00 on Mondays during term in room 11 (more convenient than room 9), with refreshments provided :)). Full details are to be provided on the term card and via our mailing list, which you can join here.
Some previous term cards from the archive:
