Tristram Hunt



Profile:
Full name: Tristram Hunt

Area of interest: Society, politics, heritage, social history (expert on Urban History)

Journals/Organisation: The Observer | The Guardian | Financial Times

Email: [mailto:tristramhunt@btopenworld.com tristramhunt@btopenworld.com] | [mailto:tristramhunt@parliament.uk tristramhunt@parliament.uk]

Personal website: http://www.tristramhunt.com

Website: http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/tristramhunt

Blog:

Representation: Capel & Land

Networks: https://twitter.com/#!/TristramHuntMP



Biography:
About: http://www.tristramhunt.com/web/about-tristram

Education: Trinity College, University of Cambridge: History; University of Chicago: Postgraduate fellowship; University of Cambridge: PhD on Victorian civic pride

Career:

Academic positions:
 * King’s College Cambridge: Associate Fellow of the Centre for History and Economics
 * Institute for Public Policy Research: Research Fellow
 * Queen Mary, University of London: is currently a lecturer in Modern History - Making The Modern City, 1789-1914 (see: staff profiles) contact: [mailto:t.hunt@qmul.ac.uk t.hunt@qmul.ac.uk]

Politics:

Intern with think-tank Demos; worked for the Labour Party for the 1997 and 2001 general elections. Co-wrote the encomium to New Labour's first three months in government Blair's 100 Days. Former researcher to Tony Blair and special adviser to Lord Sainsbury; in the 2010 General Election, he was elected as the Member of Parliament for Stoke-on-Trent Central

Current position/role: broadcaster and columnist


 * also writes/written for: The Times, New Statesman and specialist journals

Other roles/Main role: University lecturer

Other activities:
 * Sits on the board of the Royal Institution Science Media Centre
 * Trustee of the Heritage Lottery Fund
 * Fellow of the Royal Historical Society

Disclosures:

Viewpoints/Insight:

Broadcast media: Wrote and presented a number of radio and TV series, including Civil War (BBC2), Isaac Newton: Great Briton (BBC2), The British Middle Class (Channel 4) and Past Presence (Radio 4)
 * IMDb

Video:

Controversy/Criticism:
 * The Daily Telegraph: Tristram Hunt v nuns: snobbery and vanity are destroying Labour - Tim Stanley: Hunt's sneering words about Catholic education suggest a Labour Party far removed from its grassroots. Snobbery has become a nasty habit for the metropolitan Left - 6th February 2015
 * The Guardian: This milquetoast consensus is unnerved by radical faith: By ignoring the influence of religion on progressive politics, the new atheist orthodoxy reveals itself as stupid and solipsistic - 12th September 2007 (criticises Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett for their 'new atheist orthodoxy')
 * George Walden: Immigration is fine for the rich (Criticises Tristram Hunt's views on his book Time to Emigrate? following a discussion between the two on Radio 4's Today programme) 5th November 2006

Awards/Honours:

Scoops:

Other: Son of Julian Hunt, scientist and professor of climate modelling



Books & Debate:

 * The English Civil War – At First Hand OCLC 59463994, 2005 (see video: Meet the author The English Civil War At First Hand)
 * Building Jerusalem: the rise and fall of the Victorian city OCLC 61254032, 2005
 * Making our mark: 80 years of campaigning for the countryside OCLC70051856, 2006
 * Art treasures in manchester: 150 years on OCLC181068498, with Victoria Whi, 2007

Latest work: A biography of Friedrich Engels, The Frock-coated Communist OCLC298597985, 2009. Reviewed by John Gray in The Independent here

Speaking/Appearances: Friedrich Engels Memorial Lectures: From Cottonopolis to Original Modern: lessons from 19th Century Manchester for the 21st

Debate: 

Journals:

 * No regular column



Articles: 2016

 * End London’s role as a clearing-house for dirty money - A modern-day Sherlock Holmes must unravel the flows of cash that skew the London property market at the expense of school and hospital-building in Kinshasa - 20th November
 * We’re still fighting the English Civil War - The rupture between the parties is a battle between light and dark that dates back to the Roundheads and Cavaliers - 24th September
 * This boundary gerrymandering is grotesque. What’s next, abolish Labour seats? - Labour MPs will be pitted against each other as constituencies such as mine are carved up. Our leadership must fight for democracy - 13th September
 * Labour is on its final warning and has to start speaking for the people - The party must change but not split: it must have a new sense of purpose and a new leader - 24th July
 * Labour members need to do something about Jeremy Corbyn - To protect Labour values in the Tory renegotiation, we need someone with insight and nous. That’s not Jeremy Corbyn - 26th June
 * There’ll always be an England … and Labour must learn to love it - The party has alienated its traditional white working class voters. A new book of essays from all wings of the party shows that it needs a dose of radical patriotism - 15th May
 * Labour must embrace Englishness – and be proud of it - Squeamishness about English patriotism speaks to a widening culture gap between Labour and the people it seeks to represent - 5th February



Articles: 2015

 * Labour is now the party of rural England - On fracking and Green Belt building, the Tories are betraying our nation’s natural heritage - 24th December
 * Jeremy Corbyn's allies want war - between Labour's members and its MPs - There is no denying Jeremy Corbyn’s support from Labour Party members, but some of his hard-Left advisers are seeking to manipulate that legacy to delegitimise MPs - 3rd December
 * We shouldn’t pay blood money for slavery - Instead of historical apologies we ought to use our aid budget to boost cultural and educational links to the Caribbean - 3rd October
 * Labour can rise again, but it must resist Jeremy Corbyn’s siren calls - Reheated Bennism is not the answer – the party has to show that it is on the side of aspirational voters - 25th July
 * Labour must understand the scale of its defeat. But we can and will rebuild - This election has been a tragedy for Britain: the party has to learn from the SNP that politics isn’t a public policy seminar but an emotional and cultural force - 12th May
 * From creationism and bullying to reading abilities that go backwards, free schools are a complete and utter failure - But when will David Cameron finally admit defeat and stop trying to expand them? - 28th March
 * ‘British values’ are about more than flag-waving - Michael Gove’s legacy is reactionary, monarchist and London-focused. Pupils deserve better - 24th March



Articles: 2014

 * Why Labour would give teachers a break - We need to stop the relentless initiative-itis and increasing workload piled on teachers that has led to too many leaving the profession - 21st October
 * All David Cameron has left now is abuse - The prime minister's attack on me was cheap and unworthy of his office - 5th October
 * The Wedgwood Museum is an ode to Britain’s industrial past – we must save it - The collection is an inspiration for young ceramicists as well as a compelling account of industrial, social and design history - 2nd September
 * Only Labour can finish Rab Butler’s education reforms - The 1944 act failed to provide comprehensive education. Seventy years on, this is the historic wrong that Labour is determined to right - 18th August
 * Britishness cannot be dictated but it can be taught - The Tory philosopher Roger Scruton described how he was imbued with a sense of national belonging... - 6th July
 * Don't be distracted by the Tory turf war – Michael Gove has questions to answer - The education secretary was warned about the hijacking of Birmingham schools four years ago. Why didn't he do anything? - 6th June
 * The first lesson: pupils must be educated, not segregated - Birmingham has a heroic history of broad-minded, civic education. It was in Matthew Boulton’s Soho... - 1st June
 * Birmingham's schools must prepare pupils for a multicultural Britain - Good schools succeed when they reflect, and are part of, their communities – but they have to avoid becoming cultural silos - 20th April
 * School inspections must be free of political meddling - Michael Gove's intimidation of Ofsted shows that the system has to be clearly independent. Too many heads have lost faith in the quality of inspectors - 13th March
 * Michael Gove, using history for politicking is tawdry - The British left supported the 1914-18 conflict – which was far more complex in its origins than the education secretary's simplistic assertions admit - 5th January



Articles: 2013

 * The London Challenge is a lesson in how to turn around poor pupils' lives - A Labour policy that has improved results in many London schools should be rolled out to failing shires. Instead it has been abandoned - 9th December
 * Let slip the Shanghai dragon into our schools - Adopting the city’s teaching model will raise standards and help Britain win the global race - 1st December
 * Ed Miliband's one-nation message still resonates - The Labour leader's concept of a society beyond the confines of the market challenges traditional social democratic ideas - 19th September
 * Why does Michael Gove not want me in schools? - I give an occasional class in history. This doesn't make me a teacher – it gives me more respect for well-trained professionals - 20th June
 * Don't patronise urban communities – give them the William Morris Gallery - The museum of the year was under threat till a council realised that the local people were perfectly able to appreciate fine art - 6th June
 * History is where the battles of public life are now being fought - From curriculum rows to Niall Ferguson's remarks on Keynes, our past is the fuel for debate about the future - 12th May
 * Britain now has one selfish class - There is no sense of mission to this modern middle class - 8th April
 * The Crown suffers if we can’t see the Queen - Skilful PR work will be needed when Elizabeth II moves from active ruler to figurehead - 13th March
 * It’s right for schools to put British history first - Michael Gove’s new curriculum has serious flaws. But at least he cares about the subject - 6th March
 * Israel, Palestine and the mapping of power - In portraying politics rather than geography, Ramallah and Jerusalem are displaying instincts as ancient as Ptolemy - 4th February
 * Talk of ‘shirkers’ echoes Victorian past - UK coalition is distorting the welfare state - 11th January



Articles: 2012

 * The threat to local government's heroic, civilising role - Brutal cuts and the demands of core provision put services such as museums, parks and community halls at huge risk - 26th October
 * Universities can't do everything. Reinvent the polytechnic - True equality between vocational and academic education calls for a plan for some form of polytechnic-style capacity - 19th August
 * Olympic pageant riled right by showing the reality of new Britain - Opening ceremony was iconoclastic and era-defining – and its conservative critics' reactions speak volumes about them - 28th July
 * London’s Olympic century paints a portrait of Britain - The UK is now more akin to Asquith’s than to Attlee’s era - 21st July
 * The Cutty Sark not the Titanic is the true tale of Britain today - The love that is given to ships is profoundly different from the love men feel for every other work of their hands,” wrote Joseph Conrad - 23rd April
 * India as 'cricket and curries'? That's not the way to win a fighter jet bid - The right is outraged by India awarding a fighter jet contract to the French, but it is this arrogance that damages our relationship - 3rd February
 * Britain has socialism in its psyche, too - David Cameron's popular capitalism speech is a political move. History tells us another story - 21st January



Articles: 2011

 * we have no history, we have no future'' - This elimination of our national story in many of our schools is nothing short of a tragedy - 28th August
 * the Brics are building on their history'' - Tristram Hunt on how the Bric countries are rebranding their global images - 10th June
 * and leverage in an age of global royalty'' - Tristram Hunt finds modern monarchy liberal and internationalist - 28th April
 * politics of protest matter'' - That many on the right have been so quick to denounce the cuts protest says much about their contempt for public opinion - 29th March
 * need to start charging for museums and galleries again'' - Reintroducing entrance fees for the great collections should be a plank of government arts planning - 6th March
 * coalition holds Britain's cultural fabric in contempt'' - The port of Dover is now on the market. How does 'big society' talk fit with flogging off our heritage? - 2nd February
 * hammer blow for the peerless Potteries'' - The Wedgwood Museum must be saved as a memorial to Britain’s glorious industrial past - 24th January (writing in The Daily Telegraph)



Articles: 2010

 * used to be the study of great men. Now it's of Everyman'' - The past has never been more popular as TV entertainment, but we should still value more serious studies - 21st November
 * Heathite lurks behind the big society'' - The voting system bill demands the sacrifice of tradition on the altar of utility - 6th September
 * Clegg: Florida, here we come'' - Clegg's rush to reform constituency boundaries will disenfranchise many poor and minority voters - 20th July
 * the towpath that leads to the Big Society'' - We should mutualise the waterways along a National Trust model - 7th July
 * licence of academies'' - Plans to free up schools rest on questionable data and may have results that appal history buff Gove - 11th June (with Anastasia de Waal)
 * Tea Party: lofty ideals, grubby facts'' - Boston's was brewed up by wealthy merchants. Now corporate interests wind up the people with spurious talk of freedom - 16th March
 * has a duty to rescue its faded ports'' - Once booming cities are in real danger of business collapse - 8th March
 * doesn’t exist. Thank the Green Belt'' - Britain has been spared from US-style, countryside-gobbling, urban creep: but would a Tory government put that at risk? - 28th January (writing in The Times)
 * from reality'' - The left's hostility to family and marriage has had some profoundly unprogressive results - 9th January



Articles: 2009

 * Cameroonian Carol for our times'' - Behind the Victorian sentimentality of Dickens’ Christmas classic lies a pertinent political point - 24th December (writing in The Times)
 * MPs outraged 1830s Britain, but at least had the sense to reform'' - A parliamentary history of a strangely familiar era should tell Westminster how to respond to the public's contempt today - 9th December
 * us Mr Sergeant's saccharine Britain'' - Enough of this nostalgic navel-gazing – we need to reimagine our place in the world - 15th November
 * cannot lay claim to progressive politics'' - Warm words are not enough - 13th November
 * treasure stirs the West Midlands' Anglo-Saxon soul'' - The Staffordshire hoard has brought history to life in modern-day Mercia – and it is here that the collection has to return - 10th November
 * dinosaurs are still teaching us'' - The recent archeological finds of a pliosaur skull in Dorset and bullets at Bosworth are a refreshing change from academics speculating on the past - 1st November
 * Supreme Court is a perfectly English idea'' - Don’t let them tell you this is another American import. It is modelled on the free democracy of Britain in the 18th century - 1st October (writing in The Times)
 * very foreign policy'' - In cancelling the European missile shield, Obama is overturning a century of foreign policy based on a one-hour lecture by a Victorian geographer - 25th September
 * Cameron's California dreaming'' - The Tories' love affair with the Golden State bodes ill for Britain – the homeland of Google and green politics is in fiscal freefall - 19th September
 * Britain's dockland mirror, China is sailing into view'' - Emblems first of empire, then post-industrial drift and rampant capitalism, London's docks are now in hock to a new power - 7th September
 * shops and strip clubs stand as monuments to New Labour morality'' - The consequences of 12 years of relativism and market choice can be seen on almost every street corner in Britain - 7th August
 * suburbs are derided by snobs, yet they offer hope for our future'' - We now need to take a lead from Croydon and Kingston-upon-Thames - 19th July
 * Lib Dem power failure'' - The party controls swaths of urban Britain but lacks the leadership and vision our great cities require - 16th July
 * Karl Rove school of politics'' - The Tories have started a new game, turning their opponent's strengths into weaknesses. Labour should consider playing - 4th July
 * penguins'' - Should a modernist zoo pen survive while a fine example of the aesthetics of social justice is sold? - 22nd May
 * of the words'' - Engels's polemic against the injustices of rising capitalism that he witnessed in 19th-century Manchester continues to resonate powerfully around the world 150 years after it was written - 9th May
 * Marxist misanthrope'' - The May Day marchers will number only a few hundred. It's all the fault of Engels – he simply couldn't get on with anyone - 1st May
 * Downs is a true place in the country'' - Labour has transformed the south coast at last by declaring the Downs a national park - 2nd April
 * the banks is nothing new. The English have been at it for centuries'' - From the Peasants' Revolt onwards, Britain has enjoyed a tradition of anarchic protest at poverty, inequality and the abuse of power. So this week's protests are healthy - but they won't change the world - 29th March
 * about the war are history'' - Forget the chatter about Twitter, new plans for the primary school curriculum might just help to inspire passion about the past - 26th March
 * philistines would appal these pootling pioneers'' - The very vehicle that green groups decry today was behind the wave of interest that resulted in their foundation - 16th February
 * perfect gift to soothe Obama's British suspicions'' - To repair the president-elect's UK impressions, Gordon Brown should begin by presenting him with Hope in a frame - 14th January
 * New Deal is a far greater gamble than you might think'' - Roosevelt's call to arms against recession is resonating today, but his followers would do well to consider all its implications - 4th January



Articles: 2008

 * good sense be no barrier to concreting the countryside'' - The construction lobby's argument for a greenbelt landgrab has been blown apart by the credit crunch. Yet still they win the day - 17th December 2008
 * is ready to take advantage of this seismic shift'' - It is encouraging how well-positioned Britain is to take advantage of the post-American settlement. For ours is a global, often imperial history which has enjoyed - in the late 18th century and, again, the period 1870-1914 - times of remarkable trade flows and cultural engagement across the world - 23rd November 2008
 * let politicians destroy the unique value of the BBC'' - The Corporation needs to rediscover its confidence if it is to recover from the fallout of its latest act of self-immolation - 2nd November 2008
 * have always been drawn to the rich and suspect'' - The shadow chancellor's Corfu antics represent a new low in British public life. But we should stop affecting naivety - 26th October 2008
 * of ideas, Tories have the Jamie Oliver of politics'' - If the financial crisis gave David Cameron a chance to prove his ideological substance, he's failed the test miserably - 18th October 2008
 * capitalism'' - As Marx and Engels found in Victorian Britain, predicting revolutions can be a frustrating business - 20th September 2008
 * The fate of 39 Labour MPs is at stake in Glasgow East - Looming over tomorrow's byelection is the shadow of 1707. Gordon Brown knows the union is crucial to the health of his party - 23rd July 2008
 * Stockholm syndrome - Wonder how Sweden created its social democrat paradise? They imported the ideas from Britain - 5th July 2008
 * Just get over it, Ken - London's Labour party needs to rid itself of the Livingstone past. But the ex-mayor won't go away - 23rd June 2008
 * Children should first learn that history begins at home - Within our education system, there lurks a crippling ignorance of British history and our cultural heritage - 25th May 2008
 * Octavia Hill revisited - A 19th-century social reformer devised many of the policies ministers are grappling with today - 6th May 2008
 * A waste of space? - Parliament Square has turned into another bleak, polluted London roundabout - 29th April 2008
 * BL hell - Opening up the British Library to every undergraduate in town is making it impossible for genuine researchers to get a seat - 21st april 2008
 * The business of giving - A new class of corporate philanthropists would have us believe charity is post-political. Far from it - 17th April 2008
 * Freshly tilled heritage - Rejoice! Great Dixter is set to be saved - and we get our finest planted gardening in perpetuity - 24th March 2008
 * The un-eco eco-towns - The government has entered into a pact with developers - and our countryside is suffering - 23rd February 2008
 * Patriotism before profit - The nobility of Britain are impoverishing us all by hawking archives to the highest bidder - 13th February 2008
 * Knock-knocking on Evans' door? - The Prime Minister has a humdinger of an appointment to make: a professor of history at Cambridge - 15th January 2008 (The Times)
 * A museum of back-slapping will belittle our island story - The absurd plan for a Soviet-style celebration of Britain's historic glories and empire is no way to forge a sense of heritage - 15th January 2008



News & updates:

 * Labour reshuffle: Tristram Hunt gets education brief in 'cull of the Blairites'. The Guardian, 7th October 2013



References:


Links:

 * Guardian/Observer articles (archive)
 * New Statesman articles (archive)
 * Wikipedia bio
 * Journal of Social History: Reality, identity and empathy: The changing face of social history television