
Dr Annemarie McAllister
Senior Research Fellow in History
School of Psychology and Humanities
Annemarie works on the history of UK Temperance, with its strong Preston connections. As well as her many academic publications, she curates exhibitions, speaks to a wide range of groups, performs re-creations of temperance events, and works with communities to whom temperance is particularly relevant. Her interdisciplinary work focuses on the cultural history of temperance movements, their material (particularly visual) cultures and the social impact they had on their members.
Annemarie’s role is research-only, after a long career in teaching, but she is available to advise students with an interest in temperance history. She publishes in a wide range of fields, primarily history, both in print and online media, and has written a popular survey, 'Demon Drink? Temperance and the Working Class,' for Kindle (2014). Another aspect of her work is giving invited talks to a wide range of audiences, from local history societies to addiction specialists. She also works with and on radio and TV productions, such as ‘A House Through Time’ series 3 (2020). See her work at Demon Drink.
Annemarie has taught a varied range of courses at school, college and university level, and her own writing, speaking and presentation work is characteristically interdisciplinary. Her academic study of the history, culture, and impact of the UK temperance movement has resulted in academic papers, chapters, and a monograph (in process), but she also enjoys the varied range of public activities which she is invited to undertake. Her work has been recognised in many ways: she was awarded £50,000 by the Heritage Lottery Fund for her project ‘Temperance and the Working Class’ (2012-3), involving several exhibitions, including an eight-month show at the People’s History Museum and the ground-breaking virtual exhibition at www.demondrink.co.uk, which continues to attract international and interdisciplinary notice. She has spoken and performed at a range of conferences ranging from the Alcohol and Drugs History Society to The Victorian Popular Fiction Association, and has organised several conferences in the UK and US, the most recent being ‘Radical Temperance: social change and drink, from Teetotalism to Dry January’ (UCLan, 2018), supported by grants from Alcohol Concern UK and the Alcohol and Drugs History Society. Annemarie has also been invited to write articles on temperance history for popular magazines such as 'Who Do You Think You Are?' as well as acting as advisor on the topic for many programme-makers. She has appeared on radio programmes including 'You and Yours' and 'Woman’s Hour,' and her TV work ranges from 'The One Show' to 'Antiques Road Trip,' and 'A House through Time' (2020). As well as writing on many aspects of the temperance movement in the past, she studies and has links with current recovery and sobriety groups, liaising with national and local societies. This dual focus led to her invitation to create a special edition of the Alcohol and Drugs History Society journal, ‘Temperance Past and Present’ (2019). Her introduction to this volume surveys temperance historiography and the modern sobriety and recovery ‘tribes.’ She is a member of The Lancashire Research Centre for Digital Life, collaborating with Dr Tamsyn Mahoney-Steel in a number of digital projects linked to UCLan’s Livesey Collection. Annemarie’s expertise in temperance periodicals was instrumental in her gaining a 2019-20 Curran Research Fellowship and grant, from the Research Society for Victorian Periodicals, to prepare her monograph on Activist Writers.
- Postgraduate Cert in Electronic Learning, University of Central Lancashire, 2008
- Postgraduate Cert in Research Student Supervision, University of Central Lancashire, 2006
- PhD in Cultural Studies, University of Salford, 2004
- PG Advanced Diploma in Education Management, OU, 1991
- M.Phil in English Literature, University of Lancaster, 1986
- PGCE in English and Drama, University of Liverpool, 1975
- BA Hons (English and Related Literature), Class 2:1, University of York, 1974
- Curran Fellowship, 2019-2020, Research Society for Victorian Periodicals
- Temperance history and current sobriety movements
- Nineteenth and twentieth century periodicals
- Propaganda and representation
- PhD examiner at Universities of Greenwich, Edge Hill, and the Open University
- Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
- Co-convenor of the Abstinence, Moderation, and Sobriety sub-cluster of the Drinking Studies Network
- Member of:
- Alcohol and Drugs History Society
- British Association for Victorian Studies
- Drinking Studies Network
- Research Society for Victorian Periodicals
- Royal Historical Society
- The Magic Lantern Society
- Victorian Popular Fiction Association
The temperance movement was such a huge and significant movement that a comprehensive survey of it must necessarily be general. Annemarie's popular 'Demon Drink? Temperance and the Working Class' was written for the people who enjoyed her exhibitions, rather than an academic audience, although it is based on her research. More representative are the many specialist studies she has made of previously-undiscovered aspects of the temperance movement, such as the importance and use of children's songs in 'Temperance Battle Songs: the musical war against alcohol.' Popular Music, 35 (2). pp. 191-206. ISSN 0261-1430 (2018). One of her chapters is now a standard source for research in the particular field: 'Temperance Periodicals.' in The Routledge Handbook to Nineteenth-Century British Periodicals and Newspapers. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-4094-6888-2 (2016). Much of her work focuses on children's agency and the way in which the Band of Hope addressed them using a discourse of empowerment, such as 'Giant Alcohol: A Worthy Opponent for the Children of the Band of Hope.' Drugs: Education, Prevention and Policy, 22 (2). pp. 103-110. ISSN 0968-7637 (2014), but she has also, for example, examined issues of public space and display in 'The Alternative World of the Proud Non-Drinker: nineteenth-century public displays of Temperance.' Social History of Alcohol and Drugs, 28 (2). ISSN 1930-8418 (2014).
Use the links below to view their profiles:
- Researchgate
- View their unique and persistent identifier on the ORCiD registry
- Full list of publications and articles on CLoK
- Academia
- History
- Monograph, Activist Writers (Routledge, 2021/22)
- Digital Humanities collaborative project on Livesey Collection, working with colleagues in LIS and Dr Tamsyn Mahoney-Steele towards collaboration with Stanford University's collection (Ongoing)
- Southport Temperance Society, acting as adviser and academic support in English Heritage bid for museum, 2021
- Monograph on the Band of Hope (2022/2023)
- Heritage Lottery Fund £50,000 (2012)
- Alcohol Research UK (now Alcohol Concern UK) £1,500 (2018)
- Alcohol and Drugs History Society £400 (2018)
- The Research Society for Victorian Periodicals $3,300 (2019)
- Invited lectures at Leeds Metropolitan University, Liverpool Hope University, Liverpool John Moores University, Edge Hill University, Birkbeck College, University of London, John Cabot University, Rome
- Keynote lecture, ‘Drink and Temperance in nineteenth-century Ireland’ (2016), Open University
- History of Education Society, Winchester, 2017
- Alcohol and Drugs History Society, Utrecht, 2017
- Research Society for Victorian Periodicals (RSVP), Freiburg, 2017
- A Million Pictures (magic lantern studies) Utrecht, 2018
- International Nineteenth Century Studies, Rome, 2018
- Radical Temperance, UCLan, 2018
- RSVP, Vancouver, 2018
- Print Networks, 2019
- RSVP, Brighton, 2019
- Drinking Studies, Leicester, 2019
Telephone:n/a
Email: Email:Dr Annemarie McAllister
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