Dr Tom Allbeson

Publication

• Date
• Type

Research

Research interests

• Media history
• Photographic history
• Cultural memory
• Urban history & visual culture

Research Funding

(2018-2019), 'Photography and the Languages of Reconstruction, c.1944-49'

• Institute for Modern Languages Research Grant to establish research network and deliver research workshop
• Co-Investigators: Professor Claire Gorrara (Cardiff University) & Dr Tom Allbeson
• Special issue forthcoming in the Journal of War and Culture Studies 

(2016-2018), 'Picturing Peace: Photography, Conflict Transformation & Peacebuilding'

• Social Trends Institute Experts' Meeting Grant to deliver research workshop and publish an edited volume
• Co-Investigators: Professor Jolyon Mitchell (University of Edinburgh) & Dr Tom Allbeson
• Proposal for edited volume currently under review

(2014-2015), 'Fostering Photographic Research'

• Challenge Investment Fund Grant to develop a series of workshops to foster interdisciplinary postgraduate research in partnership with Edinburgh archives, museums and galleries
• Principal Investigator: Dr Tom Allbeson University of Edinburgh

(2014) The Business of War Photography: Producing and Consuming Images of Conflict

• Co-Investigators: Dr Pippa Oldfield & Dr Tom Allbeson
• Collaboration with Impressions Gallery, Bradford and the Centre for Visual Arts & Culture, Durham University
• Royal Historical Society Grant to support a conference addressing business histories of conflict photography
• Published in a special issue of the Journal of War and Culture Studies (9:2)

Teaching

Current teaching

• A Century of War Photojournalism: Conflict Imagery in the UK
• Employability: Knowledge, Skills & Experience
• Media Scholarship

Previously Taught

• Conflict & Memory: Europe in the Twentieth Century
• War & Photography in Britain, 1914-1989
• Europe of Extremes, 1789-1989
• Postwar Reconstruction: Europe, 1944-57
• Urban History: Twentieth-century Cities
• The Cultural History of Photography
• History and Guilt: The Historiography of the Holocaust

In addition to positions as a lecturer at the universities of Cardiff and Swansea, I previously held a number of teaching positions at Durham University (Tutor, Department of History, 2010/11 and 2013/14), University of Edinburgh (Tutor, Edinburgh College of Art, 2013-2015) and Edinburgh Napier University (Lecturer, 2014/15).

In 2018, I completed my PG Certificate in Higher Education Learning and Teaching, and became a fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

Biography

Career Overview

2024-present: Reader in Media & Photographic History, Cardiff University

2021-2024: Senior Lecturer in Media History, Cardiff University

2017-2021: Lecturer in Cultural History, Cardiff University

2015-2017: Lecturer in Modern History, Swansea University

2014-2015: Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Department of History, University of Nottingham

2014-2015: Research Associate (part-time), University of Edinburgh

2013: Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, University of Edinburgh

2003-2013: Senior Officer Grants / Officer Grants, Heritage Lottery Fund, Edinburgh

Education

2012: PhD (Cultural History), Durham University

2008: MA (Photography Studies), Durham University

2001: MA Hons. (Philosophy & English Literature), University of Edinburgh

Supervisions

I am currently supervising collaborative doctoral research projects in partnership with the Imperial War Museums, Historic England and Amnesty International. 

I welcome PhD proposals in the following areas:

• Conflict and photojournalism
• Humanitarian photography
• Photography, memory and post-conflict societies
• Histories of the photo-magazine
• Histories of photography and urban space
• Histories of photography, democracy and activism

NB As of April 2025, there are two live opportunities for funded PhD projects:

Social Inequality and British Documentary Style: Bert Hardy’s photographs for Picture Post magazine, 1940-57

The Valleys Archive at Ffotogallery: Community, Photography & Democracy in South Wales, 1978-2028

Current supervision

Anna Gormley

Sadie Levy Gale

Andrew Cleminson

Nelly Ating

Past projects

Rio Creech-Nowagiel, Picturing Malaya: Colonial counterinsurgency, camera imagery and imperial imaginaries in ‘emergency’ Britain (1948-58). PhD Thesis, Cardiff University. (2024)

Engagement

Since September 2021, I have been involved with a number of projects that seek to engage new audiences in aspects of research into photographic history. This includes engagement work related to the famous photo-magazine Picture Post and one of its most well-known photographers, Bert Hardy. 

I have worked with the Tiger Bay Cultural & Heritage Exchange to deliver workshops and photo-elicitation events regarding their collections housed in the Glamorgan Archives, as well as photographs of Butetown taken by Hardy in the 1950s.

I am collaborating on an exhibition about Picture Post (1938-57) with Amgueddfa Cymru National Museum Cardiff. Along with Bronwen Colquhoun (Senior Curator, Photography), I have been working with young people to explore directions and interpretation for the exhibition, including looking at renowned photo-essays produced across Wales.

I co-curated an exhibition on Bert Hardy for the Photographers Gallery in London (Bert Hardy: Photojournalism in War and Peace). This was delivered in partnership with the V&A and Cardiff university Special Collections and Archives, which is responsible for the Bert Hardy Archive.