The Department of History & Politics, University of Chichester, present lecture by Dr Jennifer Iles, University of Roehampton
Cloisters Chamber, Bishop Otter Campus, University of Chichester
The First World War of 1914-18 has now passed beyond living memory and yet nearly a hundred years after the guns fells silent, its heritage still lives on and has become woven into the fabric of British society. Remembrance Sunday is still an important day in the national calendar, the causes and conduct of the war continue to be the subject of contentious debate and every year, thousands of tourists still travel across the Channel to visit the battlefields of the former Western Front, the decisive theatre of operations for the Allied troops. Although the pleasant and unremarkable topography of the region now reveals little of the momentous nature of the battles fought across its expanses, British visitors continue to be drawn to the war landscape to empathise with its symbolic, commemorative spaces. This talk will explore some of my research into the ways in which tourists engage with the battlefield landscape and how their encounters are directed by the role of the tour guide. It will also consider how their touristic experiences are shaped by complex notions of national identity and then move on to discuss the ongoing dialectic between the need to remember and the need to forget wartime experience. Lastly, I will be discussing some of the tensions that exist between tourists and locals who may be at odds regarding the landscape’s historical associations.
Free entry - all welcome. Please email L.Beard@chi.ac.uk with any questions.
