1605, 2023

Part 2/ Locating Voices of Black, Indigenous and People of Colour in 19th Century Missionary Periodicals

By Special Collections|16th May 2023|Behind the scenes, Collections & Research|0 comments

Today’s blog comes from Dr Joanne Davis, Research Associate with the Centre of World Christianity at SOAS. Following on from her last blog, Jo reflects on the completion of a successful collaborative research project, BIPOC Voices in the Victorian Periodical Press, which has recently launched on onemorevoice.org. This work introduces and documents a series of unknown or little-studied pieces from Victorian missionary periodicals by BIPOC creators. Here she presents a quick overview of the

2102, 2023

Collection Care & Digitisation at SOAS Library

By Special Collections|21st February 2023|Behind the scenes|0 comments

As SOAS Library formally opens its new Collection Care & Digitisation facilities, we look behind-the-scenes at the work that will now be supported thanks to generous funding from donors including the Foyle Foundation, the Garfield Weston Foundation and the Wolfson Foundation. Collection Care & Digitisation (CCD), part of our Library Services Directorate, is home to our small digitisation team and a recently appointed Conservator (a first for SOAS) who is

0411, 2022

Plants in the archives: exploring botanical sources at SOAS Special Collections

By Special Collections|4th November 2022|Collections & Research|0 comments

This week we look at a selection of sources in SOAS Special Collections, which depict and discuss the botanical world, ranging from photographs and paintings of plants and flowers, handwritten lists of plants by specimen collectors, printed natural histories and local botanical studies, to depictions of plants and flowers in the miniatures and illustrations of the manuscript collections. Personal papers & archives Amongst the archives at SOAS are the papers

2910, 2021

Locating Voices of Black, Indigenous and People of Colour in 19th Century Missionary Periodicals

By Special Collections, SOAS Library|29th October 2021|Collections & Research|0 comments

Today’s blog comes from Dr Joanne Davis, Research Associate with the Centre of World Christianity at SOAS. Following on from her last piece, Jo reflects on a period of research in SOAS Special Collections for a new project, ‘Recovering BIPOC Voices from the Victorian Periodical Press’, which establishes a publishing partnership between SOAS Special Collections, an open access digital humanities initiative One More Voice (onemorevoice.org) which is focused on recovering non-European contributions from Victorian-era British colonial archives, and

1910, 2018

Annual Open Day

By Special Collections, SOAS Library|19th October 2018|Behind the scenes, Collections & Research, Teaching & Learning|0 comments

We’ve had quite a busy time of it lately here at SOAS Archives, introducing new students to our search room and some of the treasures of our collections. Our annual Open Day proved a huge success attracting over 100 members of staff and students to come and look at a large display of material and take part in behind the scenes tours of the archive stores. The Archives and Special

3007, 2018

David Storm Rice’s photographs of Harran

By Special Collections, SOAS Library|30th July 2018|Collections & Research|0 comments

This week’s blog looks at David Storm Rice’s photographs of archaeological excavations at Harran, Turkey, in the 1950s. This recently catalogued collection joins Rice’s papers catalogued last year, and together the two collections provide insight into the scope of his work on the site at Harran. Professor David Storm Rice (1913-1962), an academic at SOAS, made four expeditions to Harran between 1951 and 1959. His records of the expeditions are

0706, 2018

A Customs Officer’s view of China: the photographs of R.F.C. Hedgeland

By Special Collections, SOAS Library|7th June 2018|Collections & Research|0 comments

This week’s blog looks at the photographs of Reginald Hedgeland, an officer with the Chinese Maritime Customs Service. Throughout over thirty years of service across China, Hedgeland photographed the work of the Customs Service and his domestic and social life, giving an insight into the life of a Customs officer. Reginald Follett Codrington Hedgeland was born in Exeter, Devon on 18 December 1874. He joined the Chinese Maritime Customs Service

2304, 2018

John Charles Oswald’s photographs of China

By Special Collections, SOAS Library|23rd April 2018|Collections & Research|0 comments

Continuing our series on historical photographs of China, this week’s blog looks at John Oswald’s photographs of Foochow [Fuzhou]. His photographs document the home, work and social life of a British tea merchant living in a treaty port. John Charles Oswald (1857-1930) arrived in Foochow in the late 1880s, having worked for a tea importer in London for thirteen years. Initially working for Odell & Co. as a clerk, he

1402, 2018

Valentine’s Day in the Archive

By Special Collections, SOAS Library|14th February 2018|Collections & Research|0 comments

Our collections at SOAS Archives reflect the British interaction with Africa and Asia over the last 250 years and include the papers of missionary societies, NGOs and campaign groups, and business organisations. Not where you would expect to find tales of love, perhaps, but every Archive has its romances and Valentine’s Day seems to be a good day to share a few! Voices of those in our Archive who travelled and explored Asia and

0602, 2018

Hausa Popular Fiction at SOAS

By Special Collections, SOAS Library|6th February 2018|Collections & Research|0 comments

This week’s blog comes from Dawn Wright, SOAS subject Librarian for Africa, and looks at the Furniss Collection (E Coll 7), a collection of Hausa Popular Fiction made by Professor Graham Furniss (former Pro-Director for Research and Enterprise at SOAS, University of London) and acquired by SOAS Library in 2008. The collection was amongst a larger selection of Hausa materials from the Library’s collections on display for a recent visit