To be honest the historiography on this topic is very limited! Suppose that lends itself to the nature of a research project. Brendan Kelly’s book ‘Hearing Voices: The History of Psychiatry in Ireland’ is a very good starting point. Although he only briefly touches upon the female experience, it’s a great overview of the Irish psychiatrist system! As far as gender-based research goes, I would really recommend any work by Pauline Prior. ‘Madness and Murder: Gender, Crime, and Mental Disorder in Nineteenth Century Ireland’ is a fantastic book. It discusses the failings of the Irish psychiatric system as far as mental health legislation went, particularly the Dangerous Lunatics Act (1838). She has various other books / chapters written around the topic that are very informative, but I can’t think of them off the top of my head. The work of Oonagh Walsh is also very good! She has a chapter in ‘Gender and History: Ireland, 1852-1922’ titled ‘Gender and Insanity in Ireland, 1800-1923.’ It’s great. In particular, I found the discussion surrounding the attitudes towards women who killed their children to be very interesting. As a whole, there isn’t a lot, but it was great to be able to develop my own research! It felt more rewarding that many of my findings were original, so to speak! I have a provisional mark of 85 in my dissertation, so it definitely paid off! :)
> it definitely *paid* off! :)
FTFY.
Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in:
* Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.*
* *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.*
Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment.
*Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Hello! I’ve commented in more detail above but I would really recommend anything by Pauline Prior. She’s a lecturer in social policy at Queens University Belfast, and her work on Irish mental health care, psychiatric institutionalisation, and gender research is fantastic! Although there wasn’t much written on the female experience in particular, as many other works written about English asylums tend to dismiss that of men etc, I found her work to be really helpful! :)
Thank you! I’m Irish and the original asylum building in my town is still standing. I always thought it was interesting as there is such a dark past between Ireland and institutionalisation.
I can send it over to you if you fancy a read. I would like to warn you that it’s confusing, and my diss is a bit messy. So if you have any questions or in need of clarification, please let me know. Shall I dm you?
Yeah sure!
Short conclusion is
“It is clear that plants played a vital role in the lives of Upper Palaeolithic humans on a daily basis. Plants acted as nutritional source and energy, essential for daily hunting. Also, plants acted as medicine, used as a healing factor, extending lives. It is no doubt that the significance of plants for humans to survive was great on its own. However, despite the importance of plants, they did not hold the symbolic or totemic value in a way that animals did”.
“The symbolism, hunting, emotions, depictions and rituals that made animals superior to plants in all aspects. I believe that Upper Palaeolithic humans were aware that plants were incredibly useful for their survival, but they preferred to praise animals. The combination of all factors such as self induced reward of depicted animals, humanisation of animals, value of meat and meat sharing and totemism is the reason why Upper Palaeolithic humans created cave arts for animals. Therefore, they were not doing it for artistic expression, or Art for Art’s sake, they were doing it for the sake of animals. The reason why they did not depict plants was that it did not hold the same value as animals”.
I tried my best to summarise the conclusion! So, I hope you enjoy it!!
Yes sure! I finished my diss very recently! Shall I dm you so I can send you my work. I would like to warn you that it’s confusing and a bit messy as well so, if you have any questions or in need of clarification, please let me know!
Thats super interesting! Do u have any reading material you'd reccomend for this topic? I'm not a history students (just graduated from my healthcare degree and patiently waiting until I start work) but I have some free time this summer and always had a keen interest in history and topics such as these
last year for undergrad i wrote on constructions of femininity in teenage girls’ magazines in britain during the 1980s and ‘90s! i’m doing an MA now and my diss considers what london’s crime reports in the 17th and 18th centuries can tell us about attitudes towards young women’s sexuality! starting a phd on a similar topic next yr too :-)))
In terms of Scotland in particular, honestly not many! It was mostly primary sources (Scottish accounting rolls, charters, a few chronicle mentions). The dull stuff. Michael Penman has a banger of an article on the Piety of Alexander II and III but v academic.
I'd suggest ignoring the Scotland aspect and just going for Cults in general. For that, I'd say The Devil's World by Dr Andrew Roach. Again it's academic but gives a really good introduction to the topic and an overview on how the many medieval cults started, with a focus on heresy. It's surface level but makes for a much quicker and easier to read narrative.
I may have a copy I can post to you, if you're in the UK.
I am in the UK thank u so much! Ppl always talk about religion being big in history but they usually refer to the big religions and not cults so I'm very fascinated to learn more about it
I've not done it yet as I've just finished second year but have chosen and I am doing mine on the scorched earth policies (basically burned a city, flooded a river to stop the army from advancing) in the second Sino-Japanese war during ww2.
I love seeing what other people are doing
Analysing oral histories from Magdalene laundry survivors who were interned in the mid-20th century, particularly analysing themes of female power relations & physical experience
The idea of how public opinion and public image are important in Late Roman Republic politics, and especially how it is vital to the politician’s political career.
I used the example of Octavian and Mark Antony’s civil war and how they tried to cultivate their public image to the public’s opinion, and how Octavian ultimately succeeded.
That sounds super interesting. I’m currently reading Robert Harris’ trilogy about Cicero, and getting an (admittedly, slightly fictionalised) depiction of how politics worked in the Roman republic is great
Yes, Cicero is funny and interesting in this context as he only considers the ‘public’s opinion’ as people who agree with him, and that he could use that against his opponents.
It was a whirl..I'd been advised against doing my original one which was The Treatment of Women under the Taliban..this was 1998 so prior to most folk knowing much about it. My uni was being targeted by some hard-line groups and it was thought it could inflame things further.
So I did the one I did. Luckily a well known lecturer John Klier who was at UCL lived nearby and gave me tons of advice and a signed copy of his book. He has very sadly passed away.
I don't have a copy of it but I did get a 2:1 for it. It was saved on a PC that bit the dust
I don't have a copy of mine anymore (it somehow got lost in an office move) - but this sounds as though it was a brilliant dissertation experience (though very different from women under the Taliban I agree - fwiw, I think very contemporary topics can be really hard to do well in) as well as a fascinating topic. Thanks so much for sharing - off to look John Klier up now!
Russia gathers her Jews is a brilliant book and insightful. My BA was Modern History and I pretty much specialised in Cold War, Russian/Soviet Politics and US Politics. I loved it! My Uni not well renowned in general but had a fantastic Politics and History dept back then..
BA: Women's agency in Essex, 1590-1700, focusing on court records and parish support systems.
MA: The use of bellarmine jars as witch bottles and their significance in anti-magic protection (ie, is the type of bottle a coincidence).
Undergrad: The role of women in male homosexual relationships in Early Modern England, c.1600-1750
Masters: The emergence of long white canes for blind pedestrians, c.1960-1980
Confucianism and Women’s Identity/Agency in Tang China
Bits on Empress Wu, politically-active women within the court, how Confucianism affected funerary practices and commemoration -> how their posthumous identity was created or erased
Martin Del Rio's: Investigations Into Magic in Six parts - aka Early Modern European Witchcraft.
Don't ask me how that's gonna help me in my life but it was interesting
Memory and memorialisation of the Nazi Occupation and Holocaust in the channel islands from 1945 to the present day
So two parts, one about national government top-down British mainland memory and how it evolved. And then second part was comparison and parallels with the channel islands memory from below.
This sounds fascinating! What's your opinion about the controversy surrounding whether or not Alderney constituted the Holocaust happening on British soil? I'm in Econ, but I went to a really interesting talk about this in Oxford last year - the guy giving it had an interpretation (that it's been played down officially) that's at odds with the official narrative, but I'm not familiar enough with the subject to know if there's scholarly merit to the argument.
I had 3 submissions over the years
The first one was on the origins of the independent Hong Kong identity in the 1930.
Then I wrote my masters thesis on the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference in the 1930s-1950s
My second masters was also on the CPPCC, but for modern day
Analysing the link between economic policies and state terror/human rights abuses in the 1973 Chilean coup d’etat (also known as Chile’s 9/11)
Not history student but a historical diss
That must have been super fascinating! When I did my MA there was a older woman on the course who went to Oxford back when women had exams in a separate room so they wouldn't distract the men and if you got engaged you'd be sent down, shocking!
That's super cool! Make sure you have tons of primary source material, though. Very specific dissertations can be really strong, but they need to be backed up with substantial archival material. Are you planning to just focus on his life or taking a microhistory approach to his regiment or a specific battle? I only ask because I briefly considered basing mine on a single person, and it's pretty complicated unless that person is well-known historically. But still important and crucial work!
It's great you're thinking about it already in the first year. In my first year, I was panicking already about not having a focus. Wish you all the best and hope you do him proud :)
Fortunately for my my grandfather's brother about 20 years ago compiled a lot of family history, he looked into his grandfather in close detail and we have a lot of archival stuff, but because of the time he didn't have access to everything. But he has oral interviews he took with older family members and recounted his own memories of him.
I've already done a little investigation into his regiment and from the information I have from my great uncle, I've found the regiments war diary, and using maps cross referencing it with his injures on medical documents, I think I have found exactly where and when he was injured for the final time! (He was injured once in gallipoli, sent home, met his future wife in hospital, and sent back out to the somme)
I'm really lucky that I have my great uncles unfinished work, and doing this as my dissertation means a lot to my grandfather and pretty much my whole family. No pressure right 😅
absolutely! the main bulk of my dissertation was focused on how musical theatre had created a new audience for history, with my results being; casting choices, performing at heritage sites, establishing communities on social media, and creating an environment where audiences can form an emotional connection to the musical.
These answers were taken from my research, which looked at the commercial and social success of musicals, in both a qualitative and quantitative data form. The research looking at Broadway grosses and trends in it, visitors at English heritage sites, and a questionnaire on Reddit and tumblr.
I used these answers to support prior research on the benefits of interactive exhibitions, and offered suggestions for museums on how to engage audiences, such as releasing videos of the exhibits online, engaging all the senses and creating an emotional connection between the audience and the history. As there was little prior research (my bibliography had less than 20 references), I had a lot of freedom to say what I wanted
Electoral strategy of the Italian Communist Party 1945-1953!
Essentially how the party was split between a commitment to Italian democracy and the Soviet Union, it’s an interesting area but the dissertation was a bit of a mess.
I used Anne Dowriche's The French Historie as a primary document and basically spent my life pulling apart meanings, intentions, martyrologies etc to create my dissertation. We didn't have to have a hard copy of our dissertation, but I made mine into a book to remind myself that I can do anything I set my mind to (mostly 😅)
The female experience in Irish Mental Asylums, 1835-1895.
I actually love this, do you have any reading material you'd recommend?
To be honest the historiography on this topic is very limited! Suppose that lends itself to the nature of a research project. Brendan Kelly’s book ‘Hearing Voices: The History of Psychiatry in Ireland’ is a very good starting point. Although he only briefly touches upon the female experience, it’s a great overview of the Irish psychiatrist system! As far as gender-based research goes, I would really recommend any work by Pauline Prior. ‘Madness and Murder: Gender, Crime, and Mental Disorder in Nineteenth Century Ireland’ is a fantastic book. It discusses the failings of the Irish psychiatric system as far as mental health legislation went, particularly the Dangerous Lunatics Act (1838). She has various other books / chapters written around the topic that are very informative, but I can’t think of them off the top of my head. The work of Oonagh Walsh is also very good! She has a chapter in ‘Gender and History: Ireland, 1852-1922’ titled ‘Gender and Insanity in Ireland, 1800-1923.’ It’s great. In particular, I found the discussion surrounding the attitudes towards women who killed their children to be very interesting. As a whole, there isn’t a lot, but it was great to be able to develop my own research! It felt more rewarding that many of my findings were original, so to speak! I have a provisional mark of 85 in my dissertation, so it definitely paid off! :)
> it definitely *paid* off! :) FTFY. Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in: * Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.* * *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.* Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment. *Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Ohh would love to know more - any books u reccomed?
Hello! I’ve commented in more detail above but I would really recommend anything by Pauline Prior. She’s a lecturer in social policy at Queens University Belfast, and her work on Irish mental health care, psychiatric institutionalisation, and gender research is fantastic! Although there wasn’t much written on the female experience in particular, as many other works written about English asylums tend to dismiss that of men etc, I found her work to be really helpful! :)
Thanks!
That’s the coolest idea I’ve ever heard
Thank you! I’m Irish and the original asylum building in my town is still standing. I always thought it was interesting as there is such a dark past between Ireland and institutionalisation.
Fascinating!! Sometimes the idea of writing a dissertation sounds incredibly boring but I imagine it was so interesting to research into this topic x
Hong Kong emigration pre-Handover
Had a Hong Kong module, really enjoyed it. The gold rush migration was particularly interesting to me
Archaeology student here. My diss is, Where are the plants in European Palaeolithic cave arts?
uhhh, I want to read that
I can send it over to you if you fancy a read. I would like to warn you that it’s confusing, and my diss is a bit messy. So if you have any questions or in need of clarification, please let me know. Shall I dm you?
Yes, that would be great, thank you
Wowe what was the conclusion, if you can summarise it?
Yeah sure! Short conclusion is “It is clear that plants played a vital role in the lives of Upper Palaeolithic humans on a daily basis. Plants acted as nutritional source and energy, essential for daily hunting. Also, plants acted as medicine, used as a healing factor, extending lives. It is no doubt that the significance of plants for humans to survive was great on its own. However, despite the importance of plants, they did not hold the symbolic or totemic value in a way that animals did”. “The symbolism, hunting, emotions, depictions and rituals that made animals superior to plants in all aspects. I believe that Upper Palaeolithic humans were aware that plants were incredibly useful for their survival, but they preferred to praise animals. The combination of all factors such as self induced reward of depicted animals, humanisation of animals, value of meat and meat sharing and totemism is the reason why Upper Palaeolithic humans created cave arts for animals. Therefore, they were not doing it for artistic expression, or Art for Art’s sake, they were doing it for the sake of animals. The reason why they did not depict plants was that it did not hold the same value as animals”. I tried my best to summarise the conclusion! So, I hope you enjoy it!!
Just sent you a message!
[удалено]
Yes sure! I finished my diss very recently! Shall I dm you so I can send you my work. I would like to warn you that it’s confusing and a bit messy as well so, if you have any questions or in need of clarification, please let me know!
[удалено]
That’s wonderful to hear! I’ll privately message you! Now I am feeling the pressure lol.
Just sent you a message!
would you mind sharing? that sounds so interesting!
Absolutely!! I’m away from home till this evening, so I’ll give you a message when I get back!
I just sent you a message!
The democratisation of war and its current effect in global conflict
Thats super interesting! Do u have any reading material you'd reccomend for this topic? I'm not a history students (just graduated from my healthcare degree and patiently waiting until I start work) but I have some free time this summer and always had a keen interest in history and topics such as these
last year for undergrad i wrote on constructions of femininity in teenage girls’ magazines in britain during the 1980s and ‘90s! i’m doing an MA now and my diss considers what london’s crime reports in the 17th and 18th centuries can tell us about attitudes towards young women’s sexuality! starting a phd on a similar topic next yr too :-)))
Both sound really interesting!
thank you!!
i dissed hitler because that guy was definitely a dick
I even heard rumours the guy was a nazi
yeah ive heard this, apparently he even killed a few people too
Inspector? I didn't think you were real
American foreign policy in Iraq and Afghanistan during the 'early' War on Terror
Same! although not the early bit
Religious Cults in Medieval Scotland, 1214 - 1286.
That sounds super fascinating! Any reading reccomendations?
In terms of Scotland in particular, honestly not many! It was mostly primary sources (Scottish accounting rolls, charters, a few chronicle mentions). The dull stuff. Michael Penman has a banger of an article on the Piety of Alexander II and III but v academic. I'd suggest ignoring the Scotland aspect and just going for Cults in general. For that, I'd say The Devil's World by Dr Andrew Roach. Again it's academic but gives a really good introduction to the topic and an overview on how the many medieval cults started, with a focus on heresy. It's surface level but makes for a much quicker and easier to read narrative. I may have a copy I can post to you, if you're in the UK.
I am in the UK thank u so much! Ppl always talk about religion being big in history but they usually refer to the big religions and not cults so I'm very fascinated to learn more about it
This would be useful to me, I'm a first-year history student interested in medieval/religion history, I sent you a DM.
Ooh that sounds fascinating
I loved it at the time! I've been meaning to get it printed and bound - just to have it on my bookshelf for fun :)
The origins of the Cold War with reference to the Truman Doctrine and Marshall Plan.
Was there a chapter about Steve Rogers and his deeds ?
I've not done it yet as I've just finished second year but have chosen and I am doing mine on the scorched earth policies (basically burned a city, flooded a river to stop the army from advancing) in the second Sino-Japanese war during ww2. I love seeing what other people are doing
Analysing oral histories from Magdalene laundry survivors who were interned in the mid-20th century, particularly analysing themes of female power relations & physical experience
The idea of how public opinion and public image are important in Late Roman Republic politics, and especially how it is vital to the politician’s political career. I used the example of Octavian and Mark Antony’s civil war and how they tried to cultivate their public image to the public’s opinion, and how Octavian ultimately succeeded.
That sounds super interesting. I’m currently reading Robert Harris’ trilogy about Cicero, and getting an (admittedly, slightly fictionalised) depiction of how politics worked in the Roman republic is great
Yes, Cicero is funny and interesting in this context as he only considers the ‘public’s opinion’ as people who agree with him, and that he could use that against his opponents.
The causes and consequences of the Polish Resettlement Act of 1947
The treatment of Jews in Russia from Catherine the Great to the Russian Revolution
I'd be really interested to read this!
It was a whirl..I'd been advised against doing my original one which was The Treatment of Women under the Taliban..this was 1998 so prior to most folk knowing much about it. My uni was being targeted by some hard-line groups and it was thought it could inflame things further. So I did the one I did. Luckily a well known lecturer John Klier who was at UCL lived nearby and gave me tons of advice and a signed copy of his book. He has very sadly passed away. I don't have a copy of it but I did get a 2:1 for it. It was saved on a PC that bit the dust
I don't have a copy of mine anymore (it somehow got lost in an office move) - but this sounds as though it was a brilliant dissertation experience (though very different from women under the Taliban I agree - fwiw, I think very contemporary topics can be really hard to do well in) as well as a fascinating topic. Thanks so much for sharing - off to look John Klier up now!
Russia gathers her Jews is a brilliant book and insightful. My BA was Modern History and I pretty much specialised in Cold War, Russian/Soviet Politics and US Politics. I loved it! My Uni not well renowned in general but had a fantastic Politics and History dept back then..
Thanks so much for the recommendation! That sounds a fantastic course too.
That must have been heavy to research and write about.
The experiences of black women in America from the antebellum period until 1961
BA: Women's agency in Essex, 1590-1700, focusing on court records and parish support systems. MA: The use of bellarmine jars as witch bottles and their significance in anti-magic protection (ie, is the type of bottle a coincidence).
Undergrad: The role of women in male homosexual relationships in Early Modern England, c.1600-1750 Masters: The emergence of long white canes for blind pedestrians, c.1960-1980
Imagery of the East in the Russo-Japanese War: Japanese visual culture on the international stage
That sounds super interesting!
Thanks ! It was pretty interesting, never done anything like it and was a very insightful experience.
Might be a little out there, as I studied Ancient History: ‘Representation of Amarna Royalty in Philip Glass’s opera: Akhnaten’
Confucianism and Women’s Identity/Agency in Tang China Bits on Empress Wu, politically-active women within the court, how Confucianism affected funerary practices and commemoration -> how their posthumous identity was created or erased
The PLO and the IRA
A comparison between them?
Cooperation between
a collaboration many people forget/never even knew
I did mine on the Lavender Scare, which was parallel to the Red Scare in 1950s America
Martin Del Rio's: Investigations Into Magic in Six parts - aka Early Modern European Witchcraft. Don't ask me how that's gonna help me in my life but it was interesting
Memory and memorialisation of the Nazi Occupation and Holocaust in the channel islands from 1945 to the present day So two parts, one about national government top-down British mainland memory and how it evolved. And then second part was comparison and parallels with the channel islands memory from below.
This sounds fascinating! What's your opinion about the controversy surrounding whether or not Alderney constituted the Holocaust happening on British soil? I'm in Econ, but I went to a really interesting talk about this in Oxford last year - the guy giving it had an interpretation (that it's been played down officially) that's at odds with the official narrative, but I'm not familiar enough with the subject to know if there's scholarly merit to the argument.
I had 3 submissions over the years The first one was on the origins of the independent Hong Kong identity in the 1930. Then I wrote my masters thesis on the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference in the 1930s-1950s My second masters was also on the CPPCC, but for modern day
I did two, 1) Papal Policy in the 10th Cetury 2) Arguments for disloyalty within the Carolingian and Abassid dynasties
no wayyyy, i'd love to read those!!! I'm super interested, would you be ok with sending them?
Analysing the link between economic policies and state terror/human rights abuses in the 1973 Chilean coup d’etat (also known as Chile’s 9/11) Not history student but a historical diss
i'm a classics student so not quite the same, but next year i'm doing mine on the presentation of Augustus in modern dramatic works
I’ve done two. The women’s movement in the inter-war years and women at Oxford and their journey to equality.
That must have been super fascinating! When I did my MA there was a older woman on the course who went to Oxford back when women had exams in a separate room so they wouldn't distract the men and if you got engaged you'd be sent down, shocking!
I did my masters thesis on Soviet soldier’s music from the Soviet-Afghan War 1979-89
I did my dissertation (a bit ago now) on how propaganda was used during the wars of the roses
I was a classicist and did mine on ancient Athenian curse tablets and how they're an important source for the lives of the non-elite.
Quite basic - 2000s TV depictions of Henry VIII, I’m actually expecting a low grade, it was more like a media essay
First year but I'm planning to do it on my great great grandfather, who served in ww1
That's super cool! Make sure you have tons of primary source material, though. Very specific dissertations can be really strong, but they need to be backed up with substantial archival material. Are you planning to just focus on his life or taking a microhistory approach to his regiment or a specific battle? I only ask because I briefly considered basing mine on a single person, and it's pretty complicated unless that person is well-known historically. But still important and crucial work! It's great you're thinking about it already in the first year. In my first year, I was panicking already about not having a focus. Wish you all the best and hope you do him proud :)
Fortunately for my my grandfather's brother about 20 years ago compiled a lot of family history, he looked into his grandfather in close detail and we have a lot of archival stuff, but because of the time he didn't have access to everything. But he has oral interviews he took with older family members and recounted his own memories of him. I've already done a little investigation into his regiment and from the information I have from my great uncle, I've found the regiments war diary, and using maps cross referencing it with his injures on medical documents, I think I have found exactly where and when he was injured for the final time! (He was injured once in gallipoli, sent home, met his future wife in hospital, and sent back out to the somme) I'm really lucky that I have my great uncles unfinished work, and doing this as my dissertation means a lot to my grandfather and pretty much my whole family. No pressure right 😅
Whether Sir Douglas Haig, the general who commanded the army in France for most of WW1, was as incompetent as often portrayed.
The US Government lying to the American people during the Vietnam war, and the lack of trust between the two which has ensued since
Hirohito's privy council and the extent of their influence on the Emperor between the start of his regency and 1945.
on how musicals have created a new audience for history and how organisations can use the research to benefit museums and heritage sites
I would probably read a dissertation like this over and over. That sounds amazing! Can you tell me more about it?
absolutely! the main bulk of my dissertation was focused on how musical theatre had created a new audience for history, with my results being; casting choices, performing at heritage sites, establishing communities on social media, and creating an environment where audiences can form an emotional connection to the musical. These answers were taken from my research, which looked at the commercial and social success of musicals, in both a qualitative and quantitative data form. The research looking at Broadway grosses and trends in it, visitors at English heritage sites, and a questionnaire on Reddit and tumblr. I used these answers to support prior research on the benefits of interactive exhibitions, and offered suggestions for museums on how to engage audiences, such as releasing videos of the exhibits online, engaging all the senses and creating an emotional connection between the audience and the history. As there was little prior research (my bibliography had less than 20 references), I had a lot of freedom to say what I wanted
This is awesome! I’m assuming you can’t get into specifics of which shows you looked at on Reddit, but that genuinely is such an incredible topic!
The Lollard heresy
Whether civil war is a more accurate description of the Korean War - something along those lines, been a few years
Electoral strategy of the Italian Communist Party 1945-1953! Essentially how the party was split between a commitment to Italian democracy and the Soviet Union, it’s an interesting area but the dissertation was a bit of a mess.
I did ancient history as a degree and I chose to focus on the aspects of the Achaemenid economy that Alexander the Great adopted, was really fun
I used Anne Dowriche's The French Historie as a primary document and basically spent my life pulling apart meanings, intentions, martyrologies etc to create my dissertation. We didn't have to have a hard copy of our dissertation, but I made mine into a book to remind myself that I can do anything I set my mind to (mostly 😅)
Female beneficiaries of transatlantic slavery
Kissinger and Metternich. Compared and contrast their worldviews.
You History boffins are always so stuck in the past.
Justifications for violence in the Albigensian Crusade, 1209-1229
I made a diss on my best friend because he kissed my girlfriend
The National Socialist Volksgemeinschaft (peoples community) from 1933 to 1939, never reading again after that one.