Fully funded PhD Studentship – “Anxiety, Prejudice, Paranoia: Shaping British Intelligence Culture, 1880s-1920s”

Overview

Applicants are invited to apply for a three-year fully funded PhD studentship at Liverpool John Moores University, working as part of the Leverhulme Trust funded project, “Anxiety, Prejudice, Paranoia: Shaping British Intelligence Culture, 1880s-1920s”, to commence in June 2023.

About the project

This project examines how colonial anxieties, prejudices and trauma shaped the culture of Britain’s intelligence community during its formative period (1880s-1920s). This will be done via a methodology that combines the study of emotions and human experience (affective science) and collective biography (prosopography) to explore the emotional states and activities of a sample of individuals who, after experiences in the colonies, returned to Britain to work for the intelligence community. The project will also involve tracing how the development of a ‘paranoid style’ within the intelligence community affected threat assessment and operational norms.

This project has three key aims:

1. To understand the emotional impact of colonial experiences on intelligence community members.
2. To uncover the extent to which colonial experiences and their emotional impacts created a ‘paranoid style’ within the intelligence community’s culture.
3. To assess whether this culture was detrimental to operational effectiveness in countering terrorism in Britain.

The project’s Principal Investigator (PI) is Dr James Crossland, who will act as the PhD candidate’s Direct of Study (DoS) for the duration of the studentship.

About the Role

The PhD candidate will develop a research question closely aligned to the project’s second key aim of tracing the evolution of ‘paranoid style’ within the British intelligence community. Using Richard Hofstader’s concept of ‘paranoid style’ as a theoretical basis, the PhD candidate will take an interdisciplinary approach to their research, combining colonial history with affective science and prosopography, to determine the extent to which a paranoid culture existed within Britain’s nascent intelligence community. As part of their enrolment, the PhD Candidate will become a member of Liverpool John Moores University’s Centre for Modern and Contemporary History (CMCH) and will be required to engage in research dissemination events hosted by the CMCH.

Support

The Leverhulme Trust funding for this studentship covers:

• 36 months of PhD tuition fees (£4,596 per annum)
• 36 months of PhD stipend (£17,668 per annum, rising in-line with UKRI rates)

Essential Criteria

• A Bachelors (Honours) degree at 2:1 level or above (or its international equivalent) in colonial history or intelligence studies and a UK Master's degree in cognate disciplines, with an average of 65% or higher, with a minimum of 65% in their dissertation.
• English language fluency. Applicants for whom English is not a first language will need to evidence a recent (within two years) IELTS score of 7.0 with 7.0 in the writing component.
• A willingness to reside within a commutable distance to LJMU’s campus.

Preferred Criteria

• Experience in prosopographical research and/or affective science.

Application Requirements

The following must be provided:

• A cover letter that demonstrates your understanding of the project, the PhD candidate’s role and your suitability to fulfil that role.
• Evidence of academic grades and English competency to the standard outlined in the Essential Criteria.
• An up-to-date CV, outlining non-academic and academic work experience.

The documents comprising this application must be emailed to j.n.crossland@ljmu.ac.uk before 5pm on Monday 1^st May. Shortlisted candidates will be interviewed the week commencing 15^th May.

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