LLAS Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies

George Washington Wilson collection
The George Washington Wilson collection comprises 40,000 negatives spanning the period 1859-1908, which offer a topographical record of the UK (but also include material relating to colonial Australia and South Africa, and the western Mediterranean coast). It is also a rich record of urban and rural growth, industrialisation, transportation and many elements of social history. Further collections held by the University complement the GWW archive with many more photographs of Scotland, and particularly north-east Scotland - its landscape, buildings and archaeology.

Mapping the World: collaborative support for research on overseas mapping
The aim of this project is to open up a major under-used resource for research in a wide range of disciplines in the Humanities and Social Sciences by targeted series-level cataloguing of post-1850 overseas mapping. This will facilitate remote access to key materials by converting map library catalogue records, which at present are held on cards and accessible only to researchers visiting the libraries in person. The areas of coverage include Africa, North and South America, Europe, Australia and New Zealand as well as much of Asia and the Middle East. The individual countries covered range from the tiniest Pacific islands to the vast areas of British Antarctica, from Mediterranean islands such as Cyprus and Malta to countries the size of Nigeria and Canada. Initially, different areas of the world were allocated to each partner but now each institution can also derive CURL records for areas already covered. For example, six libraries have completed work on Australia, Iran, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and South Africa.

UK students look Down Under
An article on the BBC news website, 3rd June 2004, reports the rapidly expanding interest in Australian studies.

Call for papers: Teaching across cultures: interdisciplinary thinking and student diversity in an international context

Unfortunately this event has been cancelled. The Subject Centre and the School of Art, Media & Design, University of Gloucester are looking for contributions to our forthcoming event on 1st November 2003. This conference is aimed at those who teach cultural material as part of Anglophone Area studies programmes in the Higher Education sector (particularly American, Australian and Canadian Studies) as well as those involved in teaching elements of Anglophone cultures in Education, Film, History, Media/Media Communications, Human Geography, Postcolonial Studies and Sociology courses. The focus of the conference is on classroom practice.

New Zealand Studies Teaching in the UK
The content of New Zealand Studies teaching in the UK is outlined in sections covering Literature, Film, Geography, Social Sciences, History, Tourism and Sport. Links to resources available in print and on the Internet are provided.

Australian Studies teaching in the UK
A survey of Australian Studies teaching in UK universities, from interdisciplinary and single discipline perspectives, including history, literature, and the culture of indigenous Australians.