Learning and Living

Thumbing through dusty old street directories from the early nineteenth century may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but it sure pairs nicely with my cup of morning brew here in Brighton!  You see, I’ve been reading about Brighton for months – about its fascinating history as an aristocratic bathing resort turned popular vacation destination for all – but I hadn’t conceptualized the people who live and lived here as dynamic actors in society.  Until now.  Now I can tell you that a Mr. Paul Antonio, professor of dancing, lived at number 5, King’s Road along the seafront in 1848 – and that one of Mr. Antonio’s neighbors, one Michelet Captain Claudius, was also a professor – of fencing and gymnastics!  I can even tell you that I met a local man who lived through WWII here in Sussex -- but more on that later!

This is why I love history.  It’s an incredibly rich and layered discipline with all sorts of angles – the architectural component, the public health component, the social component, the intellectual component, just to name a few – but it always comes back to human beings.  US!  History is about people.  My honors project – the one I am researching here – is about people.  It’s about how a diverse influx of visitors and locals shaped and were shaped by the seaside urban scape. 

Long winded introduction aside, this week has been all about getting started on my research and getting acclimated to academic life at Sussex.  I registered as a researcher at the Brighton archive (rather ominously called “The Keep”) on Tuesday, and I’ve started to try to sort through some of the primary documents that I might be able to use for my project.  However, the archive also has an excellent collection of out-of-print secondary works on Brighton that I’m trying to read through, just to get a sense of which themes local historians have already explored. 

  The Keep, where I have been conducting research, and a tunnel near the Keep that reminded me of Harry's encounter with the dementors in The Prisoner of Azkaban!

As far as classes, I’ve really enjoyed them so far!  Most of my classes are very small – just 10-15 students and a professor, always arranged in Socratic circle style to facilitate discussion.  I don’t have class as frequently as I would back at the University of Arkansas.  Most classes (called modules here) meet just once a week, but for longer chunks of intensive discussion and critical reading time.  I’ve been the only American in three out of my four classes – which has been amazing!  I love approaching each class, and indeed the entire education system here, as an outsider.  In one of my courses, called Transatlantic Rhetoric, we discussed a collection of speeches by American politicians, and the professor kept asking me to explain elements of the American political system to the class! 

The small class dynamic certainly makes it easy to discuss the readings.  My professors have also been very kind and excellent at guiding the discussions.  I would have to say that my two favorite classes so far are “Transatlantic Rhetoric” and “Victorian Things.”  In Victorian Things, we talked about how people – in this case the Victorians – were molded by the material objects that they surrounded themselves with.  At the beginning of the class, we each had to choose an object, be it mundane or sentimental, that would help describe us to the rest of the group.  I chose my USB flash drive – an object that perhaps marks me as a dinosaur, non cloud-using relic of the pre-2010s.  However, it is also an object that doesn’t physically represent any of the (rather intangible, at least from the outside, I suppose) files that it contains.  I think I’m going to like this class a lot!

This weekend I explored Brighton and Hove a bit more.  On Saturday, I walked around Hove in the morning before visiting the Royal Pavilion downtown in the afternoon.  The Oriental-style pavilion, fueled by the British imperialism sentiment of the early nineteenth century, was a kind of vacation palace for King George IV (a king famous for his rambunctiousness and sexual promiscuity).  My friends and I also explored the Brighton Museum and Art Gallery, which included an exposition on the work of the twentieth century artist Gluck.

     

 Pausing just outside the Pavilion with my friends Nico and Erlend

One of the main streets in Hove near where I live

 

On Sunday, I attended a morning church service at St. John's Church, Hove - an Anglican church that was erected in the mid nineteenth century to serve the city's westernmost population centers - with my friend Corey.  The service was really cool, and the people we met were incredible!  A few of the parishioners invited us to get coffee and talk with them after the service. 

One man, Derrick, told me about his experiences living through WWII (he was seven years old when war was declared).  He said that a bomb was dropped on his home in Brighton when he was a child -- and his father was inside the home at the time.  His father escaped alive and Derrick's family moved to the countryside.  The bombing continued, however, as German bombers dropped their leftover bombs (from their raids on London) on England's south coast during the early years of the war.  Derrick also told me that his brother was heavily involved with the building of the University of Sussex - how cool is that!!

Standing just across the street from St. John's in Hove -- about two blocks from where I live

The vicar of the church, a man with University degrees from Oxford, Cambridge, AND King's College in London, named Douglas, also spoke with us.  He said that when Oxford and Cambridge have rowing competitions, he always wins!  I enjoyed briefly conversing with these men about the local history of Brighton and Hove and of Sussex.  My experience meeting a few of the congregants at St. John's was one of my absolute favorites so far.  The people here are very welcoming and really seem to open up during conversation.  I've found that it's easier to talk to strangers here than it is at home, because I can always start by saying that I'm not from here and I want to learn something new! 

My sense of wonder at this whole experience is still in full bloom, yet I no longer feel like a tourist.  I'm starting to get used to the rhythm of life here, and I'm loving every minute of it!

Cheers for now,

BD