Proceedings of the 1st European conference on disability, virtual reality and associated technologies (ECDVRAT 1996)

The proceedings of the conference

Prowess, the Nine Worthies and the Hundred Years War: the Prologues to the Chroniques of Jean Froissart and Enguerrand de Monstrelet

An analysis of the evolution of the image of chivalry in the successive redactions of the Prologue to Froissart's Chroniques, focussing on the figures of the Nine Worthies as models of behaviour for young noblemen. This is then compared and contrasted with the prologue written by his continuator, Enguerrand de Monstrelet, whose work betrays a shift in sensibilities that expresses itself, inter alia, by a near-total absence of the Worthies in his Chronique. Close textual analysis suggests that the two choniclers shared a comparable sense of disillusion, though expressed in different ways.

Carbon and nitrogen stable isotope ratio analysis of freshwater, brackish and marine fish from Belgian archaeological sites (1st and 2nd millennium AD)

Carbon and nitrogen stable isotope ratios were measured in 157 fish bone collagen samples from 15 different archaeological sites in Belgium which ranged in ages from the 3rd to the 18th c. AD. Due to diagenetic contamination of the burial environment, only 63 specimens produced results with suitable C:N ratios (2.9–3.6). The selected bones encompass a wide spectrum of freshwater, brackish, and marine taxa (N = 18), and this is reflected in the δ13C results (−28.2‰ to −12.9%). The freshwater fish have δ13C values that range from −28.2‰ to −20.2‰, while the marine fish cluster between −15.4‰ and −13.0‰. Eel, a catadromous species (mostly living in freshwater but migrating into the sea to spawn), plots between −24.1‰ and −17.7‰, and the anadromous fish (living in marine environments but migrating into freshwater to spawn) show a mix of freshwater and marine isotopic signatures. The δ15N results also have a large range (7.2‰ to 16.7‰) indicating that these fish were feeding at many different trophic levels in these diverse aquatic environments. The aim of this research is the isotopic characterization of archaeological fish species (ecology, trophic level, migration patterns) and to determine intra-species variation within and between fish populations differing in time and location. Due to the previous lack of archaeological fish isotope data from Northern Europe and Belgium in particular, these results serve as an important ecological backdrop for the future isotopic reconstruction of the diet of human populations dating from the historical period (1st and 2nd millennium AD), where there is zooarchaeological and historical evidence for an increased consumption of marine fish.

'Between slavery and freedom': the expulsion and enslavement of free women of colour in the US South before the Civil War

For free black women in the pre-Civil War American South, the status offered by ‘freedom’ was uncertain and malleable. The conceptualization of bondage and freedom as two diametrically opposed conditions therefore fails to make sense of the complexities of life for these women. Instead, notions of enslavement and freedom are better framed as a spectrum. This article develops this idea by exploring two of the ways in which some black women negotiated their status before the law—namely though petitioning for residency or for enslavement. While these petitions are atypical numerically, and often offer tantalizingly scant evidence, when used in conjunction with evidence from the US census, it becomes clear that these women were highly pragmatic. Prioritizing their spousal and broader familial affective relationships above their legal status, they rejected the often theoretical distinction between slavery and liberation. As such, the petitions can be used to reach broader conclusions about the attitudes of women who have left little written testimony.

Western Containment Policies in the Cold War; The Yugoslav Case, 1948-1953

Containment, as conceived by the US government official George Kennan, was an aggressive attempt to cause the Soviet Cold War empire to disintegrate. This can is demonstrated by the case study of how the USA, Britain, and France tried to instrumentalise renegade Tito's Yugoslavia as a wedge to break up the cohesion of the Communist regimes within the Soviet sphere. They supported Tito against subversion and planned Soviet-orchestrated military attack from its neighbouring states; Western plans for the support of Yugoslavia included plans for a selective use of nuclear weapons.

Securing Peace in Europe, 1945-62: Thoughts for the Post-Cold War Era

Articles include: Beatrice Heuser: ‘Stalin as Hitler's Successor: Western Interpretations of the Soviet threat', pp. 17-40

War, Peace and World Orders from Antiquity until the 20th century

Chapters contributed by experts on each period examine how world views have determined the view of war and peace, and the conduct of war, throughout European history.

Carl von Clausewitz: On War

OUP Abridged edition, based on the Howard & Paret translation. Includes my Introduction.

‘Victory in a Nuclear War? A Comparison of NATO and WTO War Aims and Strategies’

Given the danger of the unbearable catastrophe of nuclear war, NATO in the mid-1950s abandoned any war aim of achieving victory in an all-out war with the Soviet Union or the Warsaw Treaty Organisation. Instead, it adopted the war aim of a cease-fire or war termination. By contrast, the WTO clung on to the war aim of victory - expressed even in terms of the survival of slightly more Soviet citizens than NATO citizens, after unprecedented losses of life in nuclear exchanges - until the mid-1980s when under Gorbachev the concept of victory in nuclear war was abandoned.

'A hideously difficult country': British propaganda to France in the early Cold War

This article examines British propaganda efforts in the early Cold War in the light of a developing relationship in which the senders' own strategies were to be modified and challenged.The article argues that initiatives to broadcast propaganda from Britain into France via the BBC operated within a broader and developing information policy context. Broadcasting from outside the country through the BBC was supplemented with attempts by British personnel stationed in France to embed positive messages directly within the contemporary French media. By 1950 however, the Britsih propaganda initiative seemed inappropriate and outmoded, taken over by the French themselves and by a British desire to prioritise countries outside Western Europe.

‘Keystone in the Division of Europe: Germany in the Cold War’

Review essay on literature on the role of Germany in the Cold War

A matter of choice: strategy and discretion in the shadow of World War Two

American policy-makers are predisposed towards the idea of a necessary war of survival, fought with little room for choice. This reflects a dominant memory of World War II that teaches Americans that they live in a dangerously small world that imposes conflict. Critics argue that the ‘choice versus necessity’ schema is ahistorical and mischievous. This article offers supporting fire to those critiques. America’s war against the Axis (1941–45) is a crucial case through which to test the ‘small world’ view. Arguments for war in 1941 pose overblown scenarios of the rise of a Eurasian super-threat. In 1941 conflict was discretionary and not strictly necessary in the interests of national security. The argument for intervention is a closer call that often assumed. This has implications for America’s choices today.

Listening behind the Curtain: BBC broadcasting to East Germany and its Cold War echo

This article considers the BBC External Service's East German wing, which broadcast from 1949 on, focusing on the continuities in broadcast techniques between wartime anti-Nazi programming and slots such as 'Two Comrades' and 'The Bewildered Newspaper Reader', both of which replicated pre-1945 formats. The role of the Foreign Office, both as cold warrior in the 1940s and force for detente in the 1970s is included. The article also investigates the response from German listeners to the BBC's external service broadcasting in the 1950s and 1960s. The BBC paid special attention to its German listeners, and has preserved a large number of original letters at the Written Archive at Caversham, as well as conducting regular listener surveys. These considered whether Britain's democratic agenda was getting across in the late 1940s and 50s, but the author also considers to what extent German listeners were pressing for a harder stance in the Cold War or were urging caution on the great powers deciding their fate.