Women’s Victorian college life at BGU on show at Being Human Festival

This year Bishop Grosseteste University (BGU) in Lincoln takes part in the national festival for the Humanities, Being Human 2017, to reveal the lost and found voice of the first students who trained to become teachers in the Victorian era.

BGU’s event, titled ‘Becoming teachers: women’s college life from 1862 to 1918’, will explore the lives of women who trained as teachers from the 1860s onwards. Staff and students worked together in unfolding their stories through the remarkable original material diligently preserved in the BGU archive located on campus in the Cornerstone Building. This is the first time this rich material will be displayed and presented to the community.

The event takes place on Saturday 18 November 2017 and invites attendees to engage with the lives of women, who trained as teachers at BGU from the 1860s to the vote, through imaginative activities. The programme includes an interactive display, talks, workshops, and presentations. You will be involved in rediscovering the lost voices of pioneering women and in unfolding BGU’s Victorian origins. At the centre of the event there is an exhibition entitled, BGU’s Victorian Origins: a women’s teacher training college for the Diocese of Lincoln, which displays original material from the archives including photographs, needlework, bulletins, records, and books. The event will being at 11:00 am. For more information on the event please click here.

Additionally, on Thursday 23 November, Lincoln’s young writers in the making will help give the women who trained as teachers from the 1860s onwards a voice. Young writers from local schools who take part in Slam Jam and First Story will work with staff, students, and creative writers to recreate voices from the archives imaginatively through creative writing workshops. (If your school would like to take part in this event, please contact Dr Claudia Capancioni, claudia.capancioni@bishopg.ac.uk, by the 3 November.)