Unique collection items & expert commentary related to History, English, Religious Studies & Citizenship.
Looking for one of our older resources? Try the UK Web Archive.
English
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Discovering Literature: Medieval
Explore unique collection items & a variety of articles relating to some of the earliest works of & figures in of English literary history.
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Discovering Literature: Shakespeare & Renaissance writers
Learn more about the world of Shakespeare & Renaissance writers. Explore a range of critical views on key plays & poems.
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Discovering Literature: Restoration & 18th century
Explore the lives & works of key writers from a period that ushered in political unrest, social change & new literary forms.
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Discovering Literature: Romantics & Victorians
Discover some of our greatest literary treasures from the Romantic & Victorian periods, & learn about the historical, social & political contexts in which they were written & set.
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Discovering Literature: 20th century
Explore the ways in which key 20th-century authors & playwrights experimented with new forms & themes to capture the fast-changing world around them.
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Sounds Familiar?
Do you call a ‘bread roll’ a cob, batch, barm cake or scuffler? How do you pronounce the words cup & plant? Discover the diversity of spoken English in the second half of the 20th century.
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Poetry & Performance
Listen to well-known figures perform readings of poetry by some of Britain & America’s most distinguished poets. Access audio recordings & explore the connections between the poets’ lives & their work.
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English Language & Literature Timeline
From the 11th century to the present day, follow the evolution of the English language & our literature decade by decade to uncover the richness & diversity of our poetry & prose.
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Texts in Context
Texts in Contexts unites a rich, yet disparate collection of over 400 texts: from the first English dictionary, to cook books, shopping lists & song lyrics, explore how language is changed by context & through time.
History
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Asians in Britain
Uncover the rich & diverse history of Asians in Britain, from 1858 to 1950, through this collection of contemporary accounts, posters, pamphlets, diaries, newspapers & reports.
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Campaign for Abolition
Learn about the origins & history of the transatlantic slave trade & the subsequent campaign for its abolition. What can we learn from the abolitionists about equality & justice?
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Dreamers & Dissenters
How do people respond to the world they live in when they disagree or dream of change? This site introduces some of the visionaries, dissenters & rule breakers of past centuries.
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Georgian Britain
The Georgian period was a time a great change, as cities grew, trade expanded & popular culture blossomed.
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Magna Carta
Explore the origins & 800-year legacy of Magna Carta, & discover its relevance to justice, liberty & the law today.
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Playtimes
A collection of articles, film & audio recordings documenting 100 years of children’s songs, rhymes & games.
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The Middle Ages
Find out about social history in the Middle Ages by exploring illuminated manuscripts and articles revealing the everyday lives of people across the social spectrum.
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Timelines: Sources from History
From medieval times to the present day, explore collection items chronologically in this beautiful interactive timeline. Discover a wide range of historical sources that reflect everyday life & major political events.
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Victorian Britain
Discover historical sources and articles written by experts that reveal the everyday reality of living in Victorian Britain.
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Voices of the Holocaust
Listen to clips taken from the oral testimonies of Jewish men & women who survived the horrors of the Holocaust.
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Votes for Women
Explore short articles & examine scrapbooks, political pamphlets, photographs & posters to discover how suffragists & suffragettes campaigned for democratic rights.
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West India Regiments
Explore changes in racial thought & how British-armed people of African descent served within the wider British army in the 18th & 19th centuries.
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Windrush Stories
Explorations of race, migration & culture. Windrush Stories invites us to consider the ongoing relationship between Britain & the Caribbean.
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World War One
Discover how World War One affected people on different sides of the conflict via this collection of over 500 historical sources contributed by libraries from across Europe.
Citizenship
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My Digital Rights
Magna Carta: My Digital Rights provides free classroom resources to support students and teachers as they consider their rights, safety & responsibilities online.
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Sisterhood & After
Listen to the women at the forefront of Britain’s Women’s Liberation Movement in the 1970s & 80s. Learn about what motivated the movement & how women and society reacted to the fight for equality.
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Spare Rib
Explore digitised images from this ground-breaking 20th-century magazine – from sexuality & health to childcare, the arts & legal rights, Spare Rib offers a wealth of themes to investigate.
Religious Studies
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Sacred Texts
What is sacred? How do we extract meaning from sacred texts? Where do religious stories come from? Explore these rich interactives to uncover the stories & meanings in some of the world's most complex texts.
