Susannah Wright
Editor’s note: Susannah Wright is a colleague of Juliet Henderson’s in Humanities and Social Sciences at Brookes University.
Were you a pacifist or involved in peace campaigns as a child, before 1970? Or did you talk to children about pacifism? Were children involved in peace campaigns with you? If so, I’d love to interview you for a University research project about children and the peace movement from 1919 to 1969.
The interview would take no more than one hour of your time and could take place at a time of your convenience. At the moment, all interviews will take place via telephone or video-meeting. For more information about the wider project and what the interviews would involve, please see
https://sites.google.com/brookes.ac.uk/peacefulyouth1919-69/home.
Or you can email me: susannahwright@brookes.ac.uk.
Throughout the 20th century, thinking about, learning about, and campaigning for peace has been an important element of the lives of many English children. It remains so today. For the period 1919-1969, from the end of the First World War to the end of the first ‘wave’ of CND mass membership, many thousands of children in England were involved in some way. For some this was a matter of personal conscience. Others learned about the topic at home, in school, through religious groups (including, of course, the Quakers), and political groups. Some were committed and involved campaigners who engaged with or even initiated events and direct action.
For me, though, the perspectives of these children and of the adults who advised and involved them are not highlighted enough in existing texts on the peace movement; these are more about the national campaigns and movement leaders.
In my project on children in the peace movement in England (1919-1969), I want to know as much as possible about these children’s experiences and views. I am looking at written sources – from the peace movement, in school magazines, and in individual memoirs.
Some peace movement activists have reported their childhood experiences also in the oral history interviews retained by the British Library and Imperial War Museum. But I believe that there are many more whose stories have yet to be recorded. I’ve already interviewed a few and feel immensely privileged to learn about their experiences.
If this resonates with your childhood in the pre-1970 period, or you know someone this applies to, please do contact me to arrange an interview, or pass the details on. Given present conditions all interviews would be online or telephone at the moment. Or if you just want to find out more about the project please contact me too!
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Forty-Three Newsletter • Number 513 • January 2022
Oxford Friends Meeting
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