Research

Modern Britain, civil defence, and nuclear culture

Research focus

My research examines how British governments and citizens understood the threat of nuclear war. I am particularly interested in the relationships among civil defence policy, political debate, popular culture, and the responsibilities assigned to individuals and the state.

Doctoral research

If All Else Fails… SURVIVAL: Protect and Survive and the End of the World in Thatcherite Britain

My dissertation situates British civil defence within the political and cultural history of the Cold War. It examines how economic pressures, nuclear deterrence, and changing political priorities shaped official survival planning, and how citizens and cultural producers responded to those plans.

The project brings together government records and civil defence media to explore the relationship between official assurances and public debate. Protect and Survive provides a focus for understanding competing ideas about survival, citizenship, and government responsibility.

Broader interests

Cold War popular culture in Britain, the United States, and Canada; media and political communication; British conservatism and the left; historical representations of home, security, and everyday life.

Primary-source media

The Protect and Survive films below illustrate the official communication of nuclear survival advice that forms a central concern of my research.